36 replies to this topic

[Sans]

Do you guys think we've lost a big source of lore since there aren't as many NPC's that give us information?

In GW1, a lot of lore came from talking to NPC's that gave us quest, they would give us some background information, and most of the time we could ask for more with the different options they would have before we accepted a quest.

Now, we just run into a certain area and all it gives us is our objective.
Nearby NPC's dont give us more information, and rarely is it lore.

What do you guys think...

[Mockingjay74]

I think that GW2's lore is unique in the sense that it's something you might have to dig around for. While you won't get lore in the same way as you used to (in the form of quest text like you said), it's still there in the form of DE/heart text or the actual content that you're walking past, over, under or through.

I'm not sure why you would say that NPC's near dynamic events and hearts don't give any sort of lore. Obviously not every NPC will show you a new discovery, but they're definitely woven through the map if you look carefully enough. GW2 still has as much lore as GW1, as well as the potential for more. It's just obtained in slightly different ways.

[Sans]

As an example in GW2, in Kessex Hill and Hinterlands... A lot of the DE's are just general "Humans vs Centaurs".
Once you finish one, you move on to the next camp, and that's really it.

In GW1, Domain of Anguish, there are a lot of quest that give you lore about the area, such as the past god (I think) Arachnia, or about the Margonite and how they tie in with Abbadon, etc.

[Tregarde]

Personally, I love Dynamic Events. They make the world seem so much more alive than traditional quests.

As for lore, it's out there. You just sometimes need to dig for it. See an NPC with a name more unique than "generic guard" or whatever, talk to it. Sometimes they have something interesting to say.

But, honestly, I wish they had some real books in the game also.

[Gremlin]

I think we still have the lore and the dynamic events are just extra, I like them because often you have several ways of completing the task.

The Lore in gw2 comes from the personal storyline a mixture of world events and things more closely associated with your family, as you progress the personal story becomes more concerned with wider issues in the game world.

Also the dynamic events become more serious than a farm being attacked by bandits and they too take you across the maps seeking to halt the dragons minions.
All works pretty well except for some minor quibbles about respawn rates.

[Steadfast Gao Shun]

I think lore in GW2 is fine, though more of it would be welcome. Even those centaur chains give a lot of information about how their society functions, and there are holes everywhere that lore-bugs would die for every you look. Anet's approach, however, is probably aimed at the vast majority of the player base. In other words, if presented with something a bit more complicated than monosyllabic words and simple concepts (kill ten bear, get me claw, etc), are likely to just click through to the green checkmark to start killing stuff.

If anything, I miss the cutscenes of GW1.

Also, I feel like a lot of the lore is carefully tucked away in a non-intrusive manner, so by that nature it's a bit harder to find.

[Trei]

Sans, on 03 December 2012 - 11:56 PM, said:

Do you guys think we've lost a big source of lore since there aren't as many NPC's that give us information?

In GW1, a lot of lore came from talking to NPC's that gave us quest, they would give us some background information, and most of the time we could ask for more with the different options they would have before we accepted a quest.

Now, we just run into a certain area and all it gives us is our objective.
Nearby NPC's dont give us more information, and rarely is it lore.

What do you guys think...

I think you need to talk to more NPCs, and not just nearby ones.

Tregarde, on 04 December 2012 - 12:45 AM, said:

But, honestly, I wish they had some real books in the game also.

I found some scrolls in Orr, if that counts...

[Razuuli]

If you talk to all the named NPCs, and examine various places/things, the story is there. It's just not handed to you via text-dump (outside the instanced story stuff). There's actually quite a bit of story around the zones if you take the time to listen and look.

Edited by Razuuli, 04 December 2012 - 03:29 AM.

[Konig Des Todes]

Sans, on 04 December 2012 - 12:44 AM, said:

As an example in GW2, in Kessex Hill and Hinterlands... A lot of the DE's are just general "Humans vs Centaurs".
Once you finish one, you move on to the next camp, and that's really it.

In GW1, Domain of Anguish, there are a lot of quest that give you lore about the area, such as the past god (I think) Arachnia, or about the Margonite and how they tie in with Abbadon, etc.

In Kessex and Hinterlands, you get a lot on the alliance between bandit and centaurs (how they cooperate, that they're cooperating, etc.), why centaurs hate humans so much, as well as the centaur social structure.

There's a lot more on those two zones than just "human vs centaur" - and this is just about centaur lore in of itself, let alone all the other bits and pieces.

Arachnia was never mentioned in game in any way shape or form - there was a quest talking about Abaddon's predecessor, but it was never named. Information on Arachnia was pieced together via tidbits on various location descriptions dug out of the gw.dat. In other words, what we know of Arachnia, though its canonocity is in quest, was gathered a similar way as how we gather GW2 lore (except GW2 lore doesn't require .dat diving).

There's a lot of lore out there, the issue is that it's not so obvious anymore. Which is both a good and bad thing. We're no longer spoon-fed, so it doesn't feel like doing quests is reading an interactive wiki article, but its harder to find.

Talk to all NPCs and objects you fine, follow quest chains from beginning to end and redo them to follow NPCs that go off in different directions to see what they do, and sometimes just sit where there's a bunch of NPCs (even hostile ones!) where you may get a idle dialogue script that gives you something (for instance, the guards outside The Beastpool in Gendarran Fields will talk about the War Beasts when you approach).

Tregarde, on 04 December 2012 - 12:45 AM, said:

As for lore, it's out there. You just sometimes need to dig for it. See an NPC with a name more unique than "generic guard" or whatever, talk to it. Sometimes they have something interesting to say.

Talk to generic NPCs at least once as well. Some of them - like one of the Seraph Guards in Fort Salma in Kessex Hills - may have unique dialogue (the one I mentioned tells us about Ulgoth, leader of the Modniir, and why/how he reignited the war with humans).

[Sword Hammer Axe]

I think it's very refreshing, very dynamic, very fun, but not a complete substitute. They seem to have known that, having made these heart quests and such, but those things I personally believe to have failed completely. I personally think having events like we have now and traditional quests instead of the heart quests would've been more fun.

[Theworldasd]

The heart NPCs do actually have "quest text" if you talk to them before completing the heart. They will explain why you'll need to do such and such.

[Miragee]

Dynamic events are fine, they are adding a lot to the world. What bothers me are the reknown hearts. They are generic and boring mmo standard foot. Most of the times the NPC's don't give interesting lore informations. Just "baaw, blabla is attacking and you have to milk the cows because my chickens run away bla". There some interesting ones though (mostly Durmand Priory). I hope they will add traditional quests instead of hearts because they give a lot more opportunities to be interesting in both lore and quest itself. Hearts are missing to send you long ways, searching for something interesting or speak to someone interesting. I loved those lore quests in gw1 and they are so much more fun (just because of the backstory and the kind of tasks they offered) than most of the hearts.

For the lore itself: There is a lot in the game.

[Quivvie]

Sans, on 03 December 2012 - 11:56 PM, said:

Do you guys think we've lost a big source of lore since there aren't as many NPC's that give us information?

In GW1, a lot of lore came from talking to NPC's that gave us quest, they would give us some background information, and most of the time we could ask for more with the different options they would have before we accepted a quest.

Now, we just run into a certain area and all it gives us is our objective.
Nearby NPC's dont give us more information, and rarely is it lore.

What do you guys think...

There are plenty of books scattered around the lands that talk about 'lore'.  If you want lore from NPCs, you've chosen the wrong game.

[Valkaire]

There's also a renown heart in frostgorge sound which involved reading Kodan journals about their flight from the north.

[Miragee]

Valkaire, on 06 December 2012 - 07:55 PM, said:

There's also a renown heart in frostgorge sound which involved reading Kodan journals about their flight from the north.

Haha, yes, that was one of the few hearts I really enjoyed (and the only one in frostgorge sound afair).^^

[Thaddeuz]

I like it better that way. If you don't feel like speaking to the damn guys who's asking you to clear is garden, well i don't have to listen to his boring explanation. I just do the quest and get out with the reward. In the mean time, we i get to a interresting quest about demon spawning around the spawn, well i'm gonna talk to the npc because i want to figure it out. If i read about the lore in gw2 its because i want to, not because for a reason that i cannot understant i just can't skip the guys explanation on why he need a perfect stranger to shoot some insect nest with turret to get some grub and toss them into the fire to make food.

There is hundred of quest in a MMO, sure some of them gonna stinks, that's why i want to be able to go strait to it and not talk to the wizard a thousand mile away so he can ask me to get herb in the next country before returning to him so he can give me the stupid potion that change me into a rat or something.

All MMO should follow either SWTOR exemple and give me amazing story telling with full voice dialogue or the GW2 way of leaving me the possibility to read what lore i want. But that's just my opinion ; )

[Razuuli]

If anything the main weakness is there aren't enough variety of them per zone atm.

Edited by Razuuli, 24 December 2012 - 05:50 AM.

[Zan7]

Not enough of them, which means that they tend to repeat themselves too much.
How many times do you have to kill the same boss or protect the same outpost over and over again in the same hour?

[XgreatArtist]

more DE variety. BUT DEs are the way to go, along with several 'unique' quests(no fetch, kill, rob quests etc).

Imagine if skyrim had DEs instead of all those crap quality quests. Dream come true. But back to gw2.

1. No Broken DE.
2. DE should have enough people. Those temples in Orr are still contested. therefore the DEs should have a way of attracting people to do it. Better rewards are what i mean.
3. Traditional quests and DE work together. But it should be balanced out with fewer heart tasks. They are really repetitive...

[typographie]

Sometimes, a farmer is just some random farmer who has innumerable things he needs done and we know his lore without even having to read it. I like this event system because it feels natural that the game has a lot of random, faceless citizens who are just trying to live ordinary lives. Not everyone is involved in fighting off the forces of pure evil in a believable world, and not everyone has a story worth hearing.

The interesting lore attached to the overarching threats and forces present in an area is explained by Scouts. And of course, the farmers do share their lore if you ask them.

[4arsie4]

I don't think having the quests in DE format reduced the amount of lore. The good and bad thing of DE compared to traditional MMO repeatable quests are that you cannot reliably do them whenever you want to. And that, to me, adds a bit, albeit a tiny bit, more realism. I can live without arrows on people's heads.

I agree that there should be more and more varied DE, but the problem with DE is that they are the hardest type of quests to QA and bug fix, because they have a possibility of interacting with other parts of the game world, like other DE, and other mobs, timers, event triggers, etc.

Look at the Karkas invasion quests. Almost all of them bugged out. Some because of spammable timers (dude in wizard's fief and dude in caledon), some likely because they interacted with the nearby DE (quaggan and largos).

[Eon Lilu]

I hope they improve on the lore and story plus dynamic event in an expansion and don't get lazy with cookie cutter copy and paste.

This does not feel like an RPG MMO to me, its not even a decent single player story, I didnt feel any sort of connection to tyria or the story or my characters story since the first few parts of my storyline, those were great then it just gets boring and loads of dissapointment and lazy programming.

They need to really flesh out the lore, story of the game and take dynamic events to a new level.

Edited by Eon Lilu, 08 January 2013 - 02:54 AM.

[Reason on Cooldown]

Love the DEs, but funny you should mention that, as I've been thinking lately that GW2 needs a bit more story, more memorable characters.  Sure you have Destiny's Edge, and some of the characters around them, and Trahearne.  But outside storyline quests and story dungeons, there don't seem to be many notable characters in the world.  Outside maybe the dragons.

I think it would be cool if they took some of these monthly events, and instead of doing something special and independent from the rest of the game (although I loved Mad King and Wintersday), they actually create events tied to what is actually going on in the world.  Maybe Kralkatorrik's minions and lieutenants are making a bigger push into the world.  Maybe have sporadic events like the end of beta event where players got turned into Branded.  Events that grow the existing lore, instead of standalone content that once it sends it is forgotten.

It would also be an opportunity to introduce more bigger name characters to the world.  Memorable people outside Destiny's Edge.  Although working more Destiny's Edge into the open world isn't a BAD idea either.

Yes I should be taking more time to talk to characters like many have suggested here.  Shame on me for not doing so.  Lot's of little gems out there, like the little Quaggan that was happily singing after a DE.  So cool.  Just some ideas to grow and personalize the world.

On a side though, doing something like a Branded incursion, might be a way to temporarily bump the drop rate of some highly farmed mats that are impossible to find because very few types of creatures are in the top level areas.

Have a day!

[I'm Squirrel]

GW1 traditional quests, along with it's "personal storyline."

DE's are too repetitive and too grindy. Their storylines are weak and their conclusions don't provide you with a sense of justice. They also don't provide a sense of exploration either, which is really what makes a "quest," a quest. ex. "The Quest for the Holy Grail!"

[matsif]

from a lore standpoint, I preferred GW1's version of quests and missions rather than DEs, hearts (basically side quests), and the personal story.

from a gameplay standpoint, I like them about the same.  The only thing I don't like about DEs is the fact that you can literally level entirely to 80 in 1 zone just by spamming 1 event chain for however much time because they aren't randomly triggered, they are on timers.  So every 3 hours frostgorge spikes cause of jormag, or every 30 minutes or so wayfarer spikes for the shaman, and then everyone either leaves or sits around waiting for the events to start again.

[B3aT]

Is a better system, a normal evolution in this genre.

The lore is still there, the NPC dialogs are still there, there are some NPC's with dialogs that don't even give you quests ...but now you can do the events w/o reading and skipping all that wall of text that only few read ..just hitting next next, that was a **it system.

Who wants to feel the love of the game will wonder around and talk to all NPC's, listens to random dialogs and read the quests descriptions.

DE are not grind and not repetitive, along with the hearts you have over 800 quests which can fill a long chuck of time ... who does the same DE over again is their fault ...they choose to be grinders.

[Thaddeuz]

I, on 08 January 2013 - 03:34 AM, said:

GW1 traditional quests, along with it's "personal storyline."

DE's are too repetitive and too grindy. Their storylines are weak and their conclusions don't provide you with a sense of justice. They also don't provide a sense of exploration either, which is really what makes a "quest," a quest. ex. "The Quest for the Holy Grail!"

Well, this is one of the main problem with MMO. They usually give you a bunch crappy quest only there so you can level up. Sometimes you get some nice quest, but that's the exeption. With Personnal Storyline, the quests usually don't feel stupid since you follow a epic story. But that's not a GW2 problem, thats a MMO problem. A least GW2 skip the talk to the npc, run 10min to the quest, do it, run back 10min to the Npc, talk to the npc. Now its just about doing the quest, and there is several way to do the quest which make it a better system that a lot of other MMO.

The only MMO that enjoyed almost every single quest was SWTOR. There was always some nice settings, lore and reason when you do a quest. The problem is that its awesome the first time. Repeat it, and its already less fun, like a good movie feel not as great if you watch it again a week latter.

[Norn Osprey]

Sans, on 03 December 2012 - 11:56 PM, said:

Do you guys think we've lost a big source of lore since there aren't as many NPC's that give us information?

In GW1, a lot of lore came from talking to NPC's that gave us quest, they would give us some background information, and most of the time we could ask for more with the different options they would have before we accepted a quest.

Now, we just run into a certain area and all it gives us is our objective.
Nearby NPC's dont give us more information, and rarely is it lore.

What do you guys think...

There is -tons- of lore out in the game, it's just not given to the player on a silver plater. Its not pushed into your face while saying, "Here I am, I'm the game lore."

Personally, I would dearly love all MMOs to switch from a quest system to a DE system. When a quest is broken, especially if its a main quest, all forward progress is halted for the player(s) because all subsequent quests are not opened up. The player can't skip over a broken quest to the next or the next area, because questing systems are typically chains. If one link breaks, the entire rest of the game becomes unavailable and only unimportant single quests are still there. A truly horrible system that the original creator of, a former Blizz employee, has now admitted was bad and he has praised DE's.

[Mockingjay74]

Not to mention that traditional quest chains like to get super confusing. Like you said: if you make one wrong step or click one wrong thing you might not be able to continue the quest chain or pick it up ever again. That's a ton of lore people might miss out on. Questing was one of those things that was really great on paper, and even as a short-term thing... although now I think they're really overshadowed by DE's and hearts. I still think that hearts and DE's should be a bit more common and thickly spread, though.

[Iryl]

Well tbh I didn't even read half of the quest text given in other MMO's. I feel like I'm more a part of the lore by jumping in events and discovering areas.