Heart of Thorns - brilliant zone design

fivoroth

I've been playing the new expansion and one thing is completely fascinating - the zone design. I have played many MMORPGs/RPGs and a lot of them have featured "jungle" zones but they all pale in comparison to the way the zones are designed in this expansion.

The zones can be very confusing and difficult to navigate as they are so many levels. I kept getting lost all the time and it was actually fun trying to figure out where I wanted to go. While I was looking for something I accidentally ended up at the top of a big ass tree and stumbled onto a group event to kill a legendary dragon. Surprisingly there were tons of people there lol.

In any case these zones promote exploration and you can easily get lost. There are tons of little things scattered across the map. 

Ooh and so many accidental deaths from falling off into a pit haha.

Warlyx

i remember when Eq2 on the 1 expansion introduced wall climbing ...i was , i think it was the 1 mmorpg to have it .... i haven been watching some stream and gliding , climbing make the zone way more interesting.

AshfordThunder

I know right, the HoT zones are soo beautiful and mind blowing. Meta events are fun and difficulty are challenging, one of the best open world experience I had in video games. 

Thupli

I hope you guys are right. I keep hearing its like silverwaste events over and over and over... That zone got old for me after the first month. Can't play that zerg style anymore...

WikileaksEU

Thupli said:

I hope you guys are right. I keep hearing its like silverwaste events over and over and over... That zone got old for me after the first month. Can't play that zerg style anymore...

That is not true. HoT zones are much much better than Silverwastes. I hoped that the core zones of GW2 was like HoT zones,  HoT is the best experienced I've had in an mmorpg. The progression is fun and it's not too slow, it's just really good and fun.

A lot of people complain about the Hero Points and how slow it is to unlock Elite Specialization. In my opinion I think it's great and how it's supposed to be. If I could unlock the elite spec right away that would be a loss of progression and ruin the experience. 

bcbully

WikileaksEU said:

Thupli said:

I hope you guys are right. I keep hearing its like silverwaste events over and over and over... That zone got old for me after the first month. Can't play that zerg style anymore...

That is not true. HoT zones are much much better than Silverwastes. I hoped that the core zones of GW2 was like HoT zones,  HoT is the best experienced I've had in an mmorpg. The progression is fun and it's not too slow, it's just really good and fun.

A lot of people complain about the Hero Points and how slow it is to unlock Elite Specialization. In my opinion I think it's great and how it's supposed to be. If I could unlock the elite spec right away that would be a loss of progression and ruin the experience. 

From what I'm reading (forums after all) people are saying that you will have run the content several times before unlocking the elite specs. They are saying by the time they unlock it they will already have played the new stuff to death. 

Gaia_Hunter

bcbully said:

WikileaksEU said:

Thupli said:

I hope you guys are right. I keep hearing its like silverwaste events over and over and over... That zone got old for me after the first month. Can't play that zerg style anymore...

That is not true. HoT zones are much much better than Silverwastes. I hoped that the core zones of GW2 was like HoT zones,  HoT is the best experienced I've had in an mmorpg. The progression is fun and it's not too slow, it's just really good and fun.

A lot of people complain about the Hero Points and how slow it is to unlock Elite Specialization. In my opinion I think it's great and how it's supposed to be. If I could unlock the elite spec right away that would be a loss of progression and ruin the experience. 

From what I'm reading (forums after all) people are saying that you will have run the content several times before unlocking the elite specs. They are saying by the time they unlock it they will already have played the new stuff to death. 

Maybe for the first profession, since you are unlocking the masteries (that are account wide) that are necessary to reach some of the hero challenges.

Once masteries are in place and people recognize the map it will be somewhat trivial to get the required points.

BTW, unless you haven't done any map completion at all, every level 80 character will be able to unlock the elite spec and the weapon, just not all the traits and utility skills.

And there are always Living World updates in the future.

PS:  It is curious to see how much actual players of GW2 care about the traits - I'm not running the elite spec until I have a grandmaster trait as well - while people that don't like GW2 keep saying that there is nothing to get after level 20.

andre369

bcbully said:

WikileaksEU said:

Thupli said:

I hope you guys are right. I keep hearing its like silverwaste events over and over and over... That zone got old for me after the first month. Can't play that zerg style anymore...

That is not true. HoT zones are much much better than Silverwastes. I hoped that the core zones of GW2 was like HoT zones,  HoT is the best experienced I've had in an mmorpg. The progression is fun and it's not too slow, it's just really good and fun.

A lot of people complain about the Hero Points and how slow it is to unlock Elite Specialization. In my opinion I think it's great and how it's supposed to be. If I could unlock the elite spec right away that would be a loss of progression and ruin the experience. 

From what I'm reading (forums after all) people are saying that you will have run the content several times before unlocking the elite specs. They are saying by the time they unlock it they will already have played the new stuff to death. 

Keep on reading then. It is pretty easy to unlock what you need to get the skillpoints. People probably level up the wrong thing and then complain. 

JonnyBigBoss

I feel the exact opposite.

When I want to get somewhere, I have to fight through tons of mobs. It's a real chore.

simplius

JonnyBigBoss said:

I feel the exact opposite.

When I want to get somewhere, I have to fight through tons of mobs. It's a real chore.

yea, its just like Taris, only with harder mobs

youre basically hacking your way through a green canyon

exciting content, yes?

PS! take a look at silverwastes now

that shows the long term attractiveness of this type of design

Aeander

simplius said:

JonnyBigBoss said:

I feel the exact opposite.

When I want to get somewhere, I have to fight through tons of mobs. It's a real chore.

yea, its just like Taris, only with harder mobs

youre basically hacking your way through a green canyon

exciting content, yes?

PS! take a look at silverwastes now

that shows the long term attractiveness of this type of design

What? The Silverwastes was the most popular zone in the game up until the day of the expansion. You cannot honestly expect any core zone to hold popularity in the period of excitement that comes with new content AND a holiday event that people are farming for gold.

simplius

Aeander said:

simplius said:

JonnyBigBoss said:

I feel the exact opposite.

When I want to get somewhere, I have to fight through tons of mobs. It's a real chore.

yea, its just like Taris, only with harder mobs

youre basically hacking your way through a green canyon

exciting content, yes?

PS! take a look at silverwastes now

that shows the long term attractiveness of this type of design

What? The Silverwastes was the most popular zone in the game up until the day of the expansion. You cannot honestly expect any core zone to hold popularity in the period of excitement that comes with new content AND a holiday event that people are farming for gold.

it was only popular because it was end game..many people didnt have anything else to do

now, that people have an alternative, you can see its TRUE attractiveness

maguma will suffer the same fate, if they ever expand the game more

unused content=waste of money= missing content in the next cycle

thats prolly why, this "expansion" is VERY light on content

note, how surprised they were, when they realized, that so many had skipped the living story

fivoroth

simplius said:

Aeander said:

simplius said:

JonnyBigBoss said:

I feel the exact opposite.

When I want to get somewhere, I have to fight through tons of mobs. It's a real chore.

yea, its just like Taris, only with harder mobs

youre basically hacking your way through a green canyon

exciting content, yes?

PS! take a look at silverwastes now

that shows the long term attractiveness of this type of design

What? The Silverwastes was the most popular zone in the game up until the day of the expansion. You cannot honestly expect any core zone to hold popularity in the period of excitement that comes with new content AND a holiday event that people are farming for gold.

it was only popular because it was end game..many people didnt have anything else to do

now, that people have an alternative, you can see its TRUE attractiveness

maguma will suffer the same fate, if they ever expand the game more

unused content=waste of money= missing content in the next cycle

thats prolly why, this "expansion" is VERY light on content

note, how surprised they were, when they realized, that so many had skipped the living story

Cause that doesn't happen in every single mmorpg. I think it's logical that people will move onto the expansion content. This will happen no matter how good a zone is. 

Shocker people wiuld abandon old content to do new content. At least in gw2 old zones don't become obsolete and meaningless because of level increases. In other mmos they increase level cap and there is no scaling so everything below max level is just levelling content. If anything gw2 model is better.

also have you played the new expansion?

simplius

fivoroth said:

simplius said:

Aeander said:

simplius said:

JonnyBigBoss said:

I feel the exact opposite.

When I want to get somewhere, I have to fight through tons of mobs. It's a real chore.

yea, its just like Taris, only with harder mobs

youre basically hacking your way through a green canyon

exciting content, yes?

PS! take a look at silverwastes now

that shows the long term attractiveness of this type of design

What? The Silverwastes was the most popular zone in the game up until the day of the expansion. You cannot honestly expect any core zone to hold popularity in the period of excitement that comes with new content AND a holiday event that people are farming for gold.

it was only popular because it was end game..many people didnt have anything else to do

now, that people have an alternative, you can see its TRUE attractiveness

maguma will suffer the same fate, if they ever expand the game more

unused content=waste of money= missing content in the next cycle

thats prolly why, this "expansion" is VERY light on content

note, how surprised they were, when they realized, that so many had skipped the living story

Cause that doesn't happen in every single mmorpg. I think it's logical that people will move onto the expansion content. This will happen no matter how good a zone is. 

Shocker people wiuld abandon old content to do new content. At least in gw2 old zones don't become obsolete and meaningless because of level increases. In other mmos they increase level cap and there is no scaling so everything below max level is just levelling content. If anything gw2 model is better.

also have you played the new expansion?

i have TRIED playing it, but its just unbearable

i know it happens, when new content comes out, but some zones are worse, than others

go to some of the old grind zones in WOW , theyre so deserted, that blizzard doesnt even

patch them any more

other places with same level, but better design, like sunisle doesnt have that problem

(at least , not to the same extent)

these new maps look more like rat mazes to me

there are three ways..the right, way, the wrong way, and the way out

i chose the latter

simplius

now they have placed raid entrances in EVENT zones , that SCALES BY PLAYER NUMBERS

brilliant? this is amateur hour

the simplest test would have shown this problem

still, they put it on the live servers

sadly, this is a REAL F2P game now

Impacthound

simplius said:

now they have placed raid entrances in EVENT zones , that SCALES BY PLAYER NUMBERS

brilliant? this is amateur hour

the simplest test would have shown this problem

still, they put it on the live servers

sadly, this is a REAL F2P game now

I hadn't seen a successful Chak Gerent kill in any lane before the raid. either.