‘I am a leaf in the wind’. Guild Wars 2 paying homage to
Serenity certainly brought a smile to my lips. Those words are the end of a
conversation by two Sylvari speaking about the different paths they took after birth;
one is a healer and the other a warrior. The Sylvari, are a plant race in Guild
Wars 2, who are born fully formed with all the racial memories of their kind.
It’s a powerful tool that has been slowly corrupted by a faction of Sylvari who
wish to turn their dreams into Nightmares. Your guide to Guild Wars 2 is a
firstborn, one of the heroes of the defunct guild Destiny’s Edge, Caithe who
out of all the members of the group I’ve met is the most interesting. Long ago
she was the best of friends with the leader of the Nightmare Court, Duchess Faolain.
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| Caithe |
So I’m spending time on my Sylvari Necromancer lately. The
Necromancer has the most health of any class and has a lot of cool DOT’s to
work with. Damage over time is not usually my cup of tea but the class really
reminds me of the Death Knight class from World of Warcraft. I’ve been dual
wielding daggers and kept my staff on standby. GW2DB.com has a nice character
calculator that I’ve been using to plot out the course of my leveling. Suffice
to say that I want to see if my plans were accurate and this is likely to be my
main. I’m not focusing on doing the most damage; rather I want to be the last
man standing.
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| Beastly Health |
The Secret World, but especially The Old Republic has
spoiled me. I was playing Guild Wars 2, and I came to the realization I was
bored. Role Playing Games are all about the payoff. The payoff is different for
everybody, for some people its combat, for some people its seeing that hundred
percent complete rating, but for me it’s always been the story. The strictly game
side of Guild Wars 2 is probably the best and most complete I’ve ever played,
even though parts of it might not be better than other games, but the story is…
well not. When there is story the game is sometimes better than average, but
the story is so spaced out that it’s hard to get any real emotional connection
to it. I remember watching the first episode of the seventh season of Doctor
Who and thinking to myself that they were dropping plot twists left and right
that other lesser shows would have spent entire episodes on. When it was all
done the episode was epic, it was the kind of statement episode that a great
show makes saying ‘Yes, we’re still the best’. I don’t see that with Guild Wars
2, and the game is lesser for its lack. But I acknowledge that I’m in the very
quiet minority. From what I read around the watering hole, most gamers couldn’t
care less about story in MMO’s.
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| The Pale Tree or Home |
In many ways the shine is off Guild Wars 2, by twenty you
start noticing that personal story quests are being spaced further and further
apart. The dynamic events are vaguely grindy, but worst of all you start seeing
weaknesses in your class and the character you’ve invested time and effort on.
As annoying as all that is, twenty is also when you start to see the payoff in
your trait line. My haphazardly outfitted necromancer had 3500 health, I now
laugh at single mobs because they can’t bring my health pool down and a group
of mobs says hello to my wells. I won’t say that everything is sugar and spice,
but pushing through the fog is part of any MMO and Guild Wars 2 still has much
to offer.
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