Gwars 2's Questing Experience is Terrible (Spoilers on the early parts of the game)

[Dragoncurry]

I'm about to lay this down as cleanly as I can comparing two MMOS to Guild Wars 2: 1. Guild Wars 1 and 2. World of Warcraft, and trying to explain why I think the questing in Guild Wars 2 is slow, uninteresting and ultimately does not draw you into the story in a good way, suggesting significant flaws in questing design and flow. This is for the human side, I don't know about the rest of the races.

Questing Flow:

Fact: One of Guild Wars 2's questing flows involve you doing heart filling quests/dynamic events in no particular order in order to fill the level gap between the personal story quests.

This, by definition, is a design that disrupts the flow of a story. Exploration is encouraged by random dynamic events, heart events, and skill point upgrades on the map in order to "gain experience". A lack of direction here just throws a random ton of information to me that does not hold any real significance. I will provide the examples below.

Point in case 1: City X is under attack from bandits because it is so far from Divinity's Reach and reinforcements have a hard time getting there.
(Alright, but Divinity Reach's water supply was being poisoned, don't I need to get on that? Oh wait I can't because I'm level 7, and I need to be at least 9 before going there.)
Conclusion: Bandits are a problem

Point is case 2: Kobold like creatures are thieving tools from helpless farmers. Help them.
Conclusion: Kobolds are a problem.

Okay, so what's the bigger picture here?

Furthermore, the game begins by stating I left home to learn more about the world. On top of that, I am a elementalist with powers rivaling the Avatar. Why exactly am I helping a random huntsman hunt wild boars? Why am I cleaning up the graffiti in Bettletun? I walk into Beetletun, and I'm automatically asked to help in the fair? How is this reinforcing that I left home to learn more shit about the world? What I left home to quest about bandits?!

I'm trying to show that there's very little motivation to do all of this shit, and even less because it doesn't pull you into the story or any greater conflict. You spend the first couple critical hours of the game bored and confused because there's no direction outside of the personal quests and the directions pull you whichever way into tedious bandit killing dynamic events that have all to do with the local picture and nothing at all to do with the greater picture of the world. I mean, if they said, look on the horizon is the bigger conflict where we are losing lands to the charr. Prove yourself by killing bandits and you can go fight the charr. But no, all I fucking get is kill bandits, we won't tell you anything else because you can't even continue with the "game" until you pass this level block.

Comparison 1: Guild Wars 1

Immediately after finishing the tutorial area, Guild Wars 1 throws you into a post apocalyptic time skip where you have to defend your homeland from a Charr invasion. The missions and quests are related to the war effort and pull you town to town until you arrive at a mission hub where you undergo a story driven mission relating to the events you've been working towards. The very first mission, I'm pushing to the wall with the Prince, second, I'm escaping from a Charr Invasion ARMY, and third...well you get the idea. This is what I mean by flow.

Comparison 2: World of Warcraft (Post Cataclysm)

No one can deny that collect 5 wolf pelts, then kill Princess for no reason was not very innovative quest flow. But post-Cataclysm World of Warcraft is a completely different animal. The very first questline after making a human is to push back the Orcs that are coming from the searing gorge post Deathwing's shattering. Entire quest zones have been tied together, bringing the greater conflict against deathwing to light in many (not all) of the zones. Furthermore, zones like Duskwood retain their feel and character by having their own personal problems against the rampaging worgen. I mean...how people critique post Cata WoW for having a poor questing design/flow, I will never understand.


In motherfuckin conclusion, these 2 games, one of them being made by Arenanet themselves, have much better questing flow and design than Guild Wars 2. What appeals to you guys in that game's questing, I do not know. It doesn't pull you into the greater story, it's slow, and there's blocks where you are forced to bypass through random bullshit quests on the side!!! This is absolutely ridiculous and I don't know if it's just the human story or all the stories, but the human early game is terrible, and if the rest is like this, there is no real reason anyone can say the questing experience is fantastic, because frankly, it's not.

[Rapti]

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...PINIONS-INSIDE
Theres that thread for a reason.

[Elite Peon]

Not to derail but you could have put this in the negative opinions thread ...just saying . With that said I agree with you ..leveling in this game is a hot mess .

[Edge-]

We've got a big discussion for people who are disappointed with the game, don't need to create new threads.

http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/...PINIONS-INSIDE