SO now I've got to the end of the story and experienced all maps, I preferred HOT

[Bloodtau.4672]

I get it, people have come in with nostalgia goggles due to Elona being in GW1, but the maps are just so, empty.I have a feeling that give it a week or so, the maps will be properly dead, like Southsun dead. HOT maps have the metas to bring people back, POF ones have nothing (except bounties but those are barely cutting edge content)it's a shame really because all the maps are just so pretty!

[Just a flesh wound.3589]

imo these are Living Story maps. You go there. You do the story, get the achieves, any minis and do the collections and then you move on to the next Living Story map when it arrives. There's not much reason to return to a Living Story map once you've checked off your To Do list. The Devs have learned from the hate expressed for HoT style meta events and changed to a Living Story map formula.

[Oglaf.1074]

Big mistake not having metas in them. These maps are a huge leap backwards - they feel just as "dead" as Tyria open world. Dead and static.

Very disappointing, honestly.

@Just a flesh wound.3589 said:The Devs have learned from the hate expressed for HoT style meta events and changed to a Living Story map formula.

People don't hate the metas. What they hated was how maps like Tangled Depths were just so confusing and annoying to navigate because of how the minimap isn't up to snuff to clearly tell you which level you are on.

So Anet missed a huge opportunity here: they could've taken what people loved about HoT maps (the metas, the alive-feeling of teh area) and applied it to a less complex map. That would've been win-win.

[itspomf.9523]

@Just a flesh wound.3589 said:imo these are Living Story maps. You go there. You do the story, get the achieves, any minis and do the collections and then you move on to the next Living Story map when it arrives. There's not much reason to return to a Living Story map once you've checked off your To Do list. The Devs have learned from the hate expressed for HoT style meta events and changed to a Living Story map formula.

Oh no.

And honestly, I was hoping to hear that there would be more dynamic events and world bosses or something. I really disliked Living Story 3 being nothing but a pointless grind with no real purpose to exploration or discovery. They felt lifeless in spite of being filled with people doing the overarching meta / uber-boss (if one was present) over and over and over.

[Rennie.6750]

@Oglaf.1074 said:Big mistake not having metas in them. These maps are a huge leap backwards - they feel just as "dead" as Tyria open world. Dead and static.

Very disappointing, honestly.

@Just a flesh wound.3589 said:The Devs have learned from the hate expressed for HoT style meta events and changed to a Living Story map formula.

People don't hate the metas. What they hated was how maps like Tangled Depths were just so confusing and annoying to navigate because of how the minimap isn't up to snuff to clearly tell you which level you are on.

So Anet missed a huge opportunity here: they could've taken what people loved about HoT maps (the metas, the alive-feeling of teh area) and applied it to a less complex map. That would've been win-win.

No no people do hate meta events foring you to do these silly open world raid to level up and have to organise your playtime around finding maps to do so (it can take a lot of time, and it's not always successful) or waiting for a timer to end to progress through your map completion or story.

[Just a flesh wound.3589]

@Oglaf.1074 said:Big mistake not having metas in them. These maps are a huge leap backwards - they feel just as "dead" as Tyria open world. Dead and static.

Very disappointing, honestly.

@Just a flesh wound.3589 said:The Devs have learned from the hate expressed for HoT style meta events and changed to a Living Story map formula.

People don't hate the metas. What they hated was how maps like Tangled Depths were just so confusing and annoying to navigate because of how the minimap isn't up to snuff to clearly tell you which level you are on.

So Anet missed a huge opportunity here: they could've taken what people loved about HoT maps (the metas, the alive-feeling of teh area) and applied it to a less complex map. That would've been win-win.

Actually I read a fair amount of complaints about how you needed a timer to do the HoT events. What they disliked was the HoT timed metas and asked for the Silverwastes type of meta. It seems ANet only noticed the complaints about metas and left them out of this expansion.

[Ahlen.7591]

Every time I read someone hated HoT maps I can't help but think "git gud". They weren't THAT complicated, and being complicated is what made them good.

[borrok.9267]

@Oglaf.1074 said:Big mistake not having metas in them. These maps are a huge leap backwards - they feel just as "dead" as Tyria open world. Dead and static.

Very disappointing, honestly.

@Just a flesh wound.3589 said:The Devs have learned from the hate expressed for HoT style meta events and changed to a Living Story map formula.

People don't hate the metas. What they hated was how maps like Tangled Depths were just so confusing and annoying to navigate because of how the minimap isn't up to snuff to clearly tell you which level you are on.

So Anet missed a huge opportunity here: they could've taken what people loved about HoT maps (the metas, the alive-feeling of teh area) and applied it to a less complex map. That would've been win-win.

I still haven't completed TD, and am missing almost all hero points there.

[Zaltys.7649]

Why should there be any reason to return? New players will still go there to get the masteries, so it won't be totally empty. And it seems that there's bounty dailies, so there's that.

...though all of the bounties that I saw today failed. Gotta wonder how bad that'll be when there's less players around. Definitely not for soloing, can't just expect some passerby to help with those.

[PseudoNewb.5468]

Regardless the boss fights and if you needed to grind them (locking them to a few hour cycle is kinda annoying, but predictable), HOT maps made it easy to find event, event chains (because all the events actually did chain for a significant duration, and backed with a significant amount of narrative direction) and to do events. POF (also Season 3) map events seem to have reverted back to how they where in the base game. Now you have mounts, but still, you seem to just wander around without direction and when you reach an event, maybe, or maybe not, you will have a chance to receive participation and succeed (I have noticed at least a handful of the new events, where I see [Group Events}, shrugged because a lot of champions are considered group events, then looked at the parameters/time limit, then the actual people participating, and said to myself, why do I even try?). Afterwards you kinda have to just look for another even somewhere else. Bounties are probably easier to find, with the bounty boards, but I kinda don't want to constantly run back to city/outputs and haven't used them too much yet. At least they work for finding something to do, but they are all the same type of event...

Also the population seems alarmingly low, but I am not sure if this is because the maps are so big and directionless scattering people across. Maybe the maps don't need huge meta events, but they need some kinda of guidance. HOT had that. The, game itself, what it needs most, is to ensure players can drop in and find things to do and other players to do them with. The base game was just annoying. HOT, actually seems to work for that but there is a lot of bitterness about the difficulty and relying on unreliable map population.

[HyperLooser.2698]

I feel there just too many map instances for PoF maps and the system spreads players too apart.

[Malediktus.9250]

I also preferred HoT maps, these new maps have horrible replay value.

[Tekey.7946]

@Zaltys.7649 said:Why should there be any reason to return? New players will still go there to get the masteries, so it won't be totally empty. And it seems that there's bounty dailies, so there's that.

...though all of the bounties that I saw today failed. Gotta wonder how bad that'll be when there's less players around. Definitely not for soloing, can't just expect some passerby to help with those.

Why there should be a reason to return? I don't know, maybe a game should provide more than:

• Login
• daylies
• log out

The principle of the Living World Season 3 maps won't work forever: farm map currencies, buy your items, throw the map away and continue in the next map. Where's the difference to generic asian grinder MMORPGs now? A game needs substance, giving the players something to do that is fun - not only farming.

[Tao.5096]

The only awful meta map that was in HoT was Tangled Depths.What I really liked about Verdant Brink was Day/Night mode which was making the game in that map more interesting and how the camps were important.VB is full of events and people who even pass by and do them.Auric Basin was a walk in paradise, kind of a breather from VB.TD was, is and will be Awful.

What Anet should do is to rather make PoF maps more similar to VB in a matter of having a "busy map".

[Nate.8146]

I also agree with the OP. I think Anet took a big risk creating larger maps and spreading their population to thin. It was fairly quiet at launch compared to HoT, and more so now after the initial rush died down. At the end of the day, MMOs are no different than any other multiplayer game. Returning players just want some activity to do with others. Doesn't matter if it's a small arena or some MOBA map. Anything to wanting to keep coming back and do something entertaining. I just don't see that social interaction in the Crystal Desert, and it is indeed a shame because it looks beautiful and there's certainly room for something bigger to happen.

[Ganntak.6532]

Pretty sure they could easily add Meta events a few patches down the road if need be .

[Terrahero.9358]

Two weeks into HoT and both events and meta events were failing left, right, and centre due to how few people showed up to participate.

I only went back to HoT maps to do the hero challenges on various characters to have enough skillpoints for when PoF launched. When HoT was still fresh i did it to get the stuff i needed for collections, but whether they put that behind a meta event or regular events i couldn't have given two damns.

At least when you crash during a regular event it doesnt invalidate an hour of your time for zero progress made. I'll never forget spending more than an hour in Dragons Stand and DCing with Mord at ~15%. Unable to get back into the map i was in. If anything that kind of crap turned me away from revisiting maps. HoT had a ton of stability issues, especially early on.

What draws people to maps is profit or progress. So long as they are getting something out of it they'll return to it. Never forget the Frostgorge Champ Train. People ran the same map for hours killing champs, and these maps were full, just because it was a profitable thing to do or gave them a chance at new skins that recently released. No meta event required.Quite a few maps had groups of people running around doing events and champs, events because they typically spawned more champs. Even starter areas like Queensdale. A big reason you don't see that anymore is simply because anet nerfed the ever living bejeezes out the rewards.

Meta events are not required, rewards are. People go where they feel their time is best rewarded.

[Nikal.4921]

I prefer the PoF maps over the HoT maps, to say the least, but I agree that there needs to be a draw for players to keep returning. If a meta is what it takes, then so be it.

[Vladish.3940]

@Rennie.6750 said:

@Oglaf.1074 said:Big mistake not having metas in them. These maps are a huge leap backwards - they feel just as "dead" as Tyria open world. Dead and static.

Very disappointing, honestly.

@"Just a flesh wound.3589" said:The Devs have learned from the hate expressed for HoT style meta events and changed to a Living Story map formula.

People don't hate the metas. What they hated was how maps like Tangled Depths were just so confusing and annoying to navigate because of how the minimap isn't up to snuff to clearly tell you which level you are on.

So Anet missed a huge opportunity here: they could've taken what people loved about HoT maps (the metas, the alive-feeling of teh area) and applied it to a less complex map. That would've been win-win.

No no people do hate meta events foring you to do these silly open world raid to level up and have to organise your playtime around finding maps to do so (it can take a lot of time, and it's not always successful) or waiting for a timer to end to progress through your map completion or story.

I am a person and I loved meta events and I MISS them. Using broad statements like that is dumb in the least. SOME people like them, SOME did not. Some were badly designed like Tangled Depths (by popular opinion which I share), but some were pretty good (I still love Auric Basin). In my OPINION, it was a mistake to completely abandon the meta events was a mistake. Make them little less frequent or not as impactful MIGHT have been a better way to go, but completely letting go of them Imho was a bad decision. Currently maps look amazing, but are boring. Static events are largely ignored, and feel like a hassle to even bother starting them. Bounties aren't fun, having to make a group and then just choo choo train them all (yay world boss trains except with no challenge associated with them and no real satisfaction from doing them, given how negligible the rewards are). Personally, I am much more willing to participate in dynamic events that happen to occur as I was passing by on my way somewhere else and bosses that populate world and allow me to just "jump in" if I see people attempting it. Now everything is boring "go from a to b" akin to Desolace in WoW (for those familiar with vanilla WoW).

[welns.3245]

The last 2 maps desolation and vabi has metas.

[Arzurag.7506]

@welns.3245 said:The last 2 maps desolation and vabi has metas.

Wanted to say the same, there are metas, just not in every map.

[Einlanzer.1627]

Don't forget that they're picking up with LW4 pretty quickly, so I assume there will be more metas involved in PoF -style content in the near future.

[ugrakarma.9416]

The Bounty Hunter trains is kinda addictive, i doubt it will become dead.... Remeber that ppl still do Orr trains. PoF is like Orr on steroids.

[Zaraki.5784]

I completely disagree, I prefer much more PoF than HoT.Maps are much more enjoyable, beautiful and not full of one-shotting mobs and without a big monopolizing meta event. To me navigating these maps was really a pleasure, story was great (except the ending which left me with a big MEH). I think I liked every new mechanic so...100% approved this time anet! You learnt from HoT's errors and that's great!!!

[Nokaru.7831]

There are praiseworthy aspects to the HoT metas, but there is no denying their major flaw: Nothing felt more frustrating than failing any of them. You can say, "git gud" or whatever, but it doesn't change the fact that these maps were often not succeeding and giving tons of people bad experiences. This, coupled with their long recharges and how annoying it was trying to "Join In" on a "good" map, overshadowed most of their good qualities.