Official Feedback Thread: LWS4 Episode 4: A Star to Guide Us

[Aerinndis.2730]

I really liked the Convergence of Sorrow I: Elegy achievement. I did not mind the running back and forth. It told a bittersweet story along the way and I found myself very much engaged. Very nice story writing there.

[HnRkLnXqZ.1870]

It was a very weird roller coaster ride, even for LS standards: too many plot twists, too many crazy plans and too many heroic moments. I know the commander is supposed to be the hero of Tyria but at certain points it was quite ridiculous.

 

Impressive job with the Deadeye! Creating a good guy in a story is sort of cheap and easy to be achieved. But creating a bad guy which is disliked and even hated by the audience is quite difficult to make. Given the fact that we had one story instance only and reading through all the comments about her here, in the other threads and ingame - really good job. Every person complaining about her is a compliment for the developers.

 

I've seen the new barrier and tested it on a few maps, quite impressive. With a little luck it is impenetrable this time. It is technically not part of the LS, but I do not feel to spam the forum with another thank-you thread. Thanks for the barrier.

 

I am a little confused about Snaff. As far as I recap, there were theories about him being either a necromancer or a mesmer. But that weapon he was wielding does not suit to any of these.

 

Going to enjoy exploring the map in detail now and doing all the funny quests in the new instance. A really big thanks for carrying over all the stuff I collected in LS 3. I can finally get rid of my exalted portal stone. It was really nice to see all the items I've collected back then.

[hugo.4705]

I really liked all these rifts, and these new creatures riftstalkers a mix between karkas and chaks... Amazing loved them! Also awesome jobs about the anomalies around the maps and their events! They can summon ruins and trees!! I hope in the future episodes we will see portals, rifts and weird areas too! And maybe more of mists, teleportation between rifts? Ability to fly with glider or mounts through portal? That's it I'm waiting to see more of that, great work on these points again.

[notebene.3190]

Nice, Library!

 

Keep finding all sorts of things. This is the most fun I've had since PoF came out. Thanks again!

[raykor.6723]

Can we PLEASE get a way to replay the Shattered Nation instance for achievements without going through the entire summit dialog over and over and over?

[eduardo.1436]

To be honest how much more can I praise? Exceptional story, cried....a lot, map has interesting areas and mechanics, good metas, and completely biased but thank you for including my fav character in the game, hope to see the Tron golem again :) That aside all in all I really like the episode, now off to complete collections. Thank you.

[Pyreo.8517]

I think I only have good things to say about this ep. It wasn't a huge smash hit like Long Live The Lich but it was just generally Good on all fronts.

 

* Such strong themes, making a kind of nexus of all the character deaths and punching us with that. Thanks! Hits especially hard after the light humour we got with Joko.

* I felt the Eir part was a little rehash-y of an earlier conversation with Braham over why she didn't raise him, but it's okay, that was a while back. It's such a good way to round up his rebellion arc and give him closure, and the cinematic where Eir steps out of the Mists? Oh god my heart.

* A gradually upgradable safehouse type place with all kinda of intricate NPC interactions? Boi you guys are just catering to me directly arentcha.

* I didn't really have any thoughts about Snaff before this episode, however I NOW LOVE HIM

* Liked the sniper mission! I really appreciate all the times (like stealth missions) that effort goes into changing things up. I also like meeting someone whose life was impacted by our actions in a bad way, I like anything that doesn't paint the Commander as an infallible hero.

* Blish. I'm not sure if it felt a BIT overwrought to name an episode after the guy - sad as it may be - however I commend the efforts you've obviously gone through to avoid creating throwaway characters just for the death impact. Belinda and Blish occupy complete opposide sides of the scale. I feel like I should have seen it coming (and I didn't!) with the amount of foreshadowing, having Blish become a follower to you for a while, having a blaring 'THEY'RE PROTECTIVE OF EACH OTHER' sign over him and Gorrik... do you know how many times I'd listened to 'Blish's Sorrow' 'cause it's a total jam, only for that to kick me in the butt here?

* Final instance oh my god the realising of reality falling apart. The sheer drama. Trying to outrun a nightmare cloud as it envelopes everything. The audacity

* It was ALMOST a tired cliche to have Gorrik interrupt you and not let you inform him and Taimi-- but to realise he already knows and just didn't want you to say it. That was so real.

* Didn't even play GW1 but I love Koss and am so glad he's back. Put him in the guild! I want him to sign my Koss on Koss!

* I also found that desert fox like 20 minutes into the map and needed to dedicate my LIFE to finding out how to feed it

 

And here's my short bunch of other things that aren't praise

* I don't want Braham to end up like Caithe, constantly being kicked and having to apologise. It was fine this once, but Caithe kinda ended up in a weird 'we will NEVER trust you again' despite what she did not really being that bad. I know Braham did impulsive things and needed his mother's words to rein him in, but I really liked his position as the group's contrary opinion. It's fine for him to disagree with us. The Commander can handle that. We don't need to be grovelled to for forgiveness. Constantly.

* Aside from that the amount of genuine character moments was LOVELY PLEASE DO MORE OF THAT. Taimi's admission (I didn't even realise we can't appear in the cutscene until days after, how weird is that), Braham getting past his issues, this is exactly what I want, and I hope we get more for some other characters too! Particularly say, Rox and Canach. I have nothing against the importance of Taimi and Braham, I'd just like to mix in my other faves for the same treatment.

* I'm disappointed there wasn't anything in the upper inside of Kodonur Temple? I got in there thinking it was a secret, whoops.

 

Ty devs for all your work as always \o/

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

My biggest problem with the new map is that if you end up falling off the mount, you have to fight the entire map to get back on it. The enemy density in places is really thick, but they also have incredibly long range attacks and aggro range. This means that, when you go to kill a far-off enemy to break combat, you'll aggro everyone next to that enemy, then you'll aggro everyone next to those enemies, and so on. It can get really tedious.

 

Otherwise, everything is fine. The story was good, the environments were good, music was good, the new shatterer fight is fun, although I don't know what any of the pre-events are. I haven't done any of the collections yet.

[Pifil.5193]

For me this has been the best episode yet.

 

I avoided spoilers so I had a fantastic experience running through the story, stumbling into the jungle was a huge surprise (I love having uses for the HoT masteries again, great idea!) and traveling into "Orr" was great but the mushroom cave was the highlight for me. It was so much fun and the hallucinations were perfect. Didn't care much for our character letting a murderous Deadeye off scot-free, she should have been captured and imprisoned, IMO, she should have to prove herself to us, not the other way around. Glad to see Braham come back into the fold.

 

Sun's Refuge is a lovely little instance with some great quest-like collections and I'd love to see more like that. I'd prefer to see that kind of content added through the story journal or some kind of dedicated quest log rather than the collections as the collections themselves act as spoilers. I'd also prefer more dialogue leading you around the quests. It doesn't have to be voiced but I think it would be much better to be told through in-game dialogue where, for example, an awakened memorial was instead of reading it off a tool tip. It was sad to see Blish go so soon, I enjoyed running around with him in the open world.

 

The new shatterer is a lot of fun.

 

For me the only real downside is the decision to use the Sigil of Nullification for the skin collection (and so many of them), that doesn't seem to have been well thought out (also there's the fact that the upgradeable armour was just fancier skins, not actual upgraded armour).

[notebene.3190]

Not sure why 4.3 is still a sticky and 4.4 is free to roam in the wild, but I digress.

 

I really like that Desert Fox pet and the one in the Refuge. It would be nice to have all those interactions out in the open world, and consider doing it for more future pets.

[Menadena.7482]

@"Gaile Gray.6029" I Just did the first instance (a bunch of RL stuff delayed me). LOVING that there is more of an emphasis on the story and it is not just 'can you tackle this big bad'. [see people, vets/lower can be fun.] Hopefully the rest of the story is the same. Yes, you can do it with a group to make it easier but there are always people in the group who want to race through and you can not take the time you would like to spend. I did die once but that was partly due to doing something stupid.

 

edit: Also great we finally get a map connected to another map!

[megilandil.7506]

only a little issue with map exploration, puting a POI closed by a time gated non metaevent is annoying in regard of exploration efficiency. make the POI obtainable by aproaching gate or make the event mapwide anounced, completing the map and having to wait a long time to the event spawn is truly annoying

[Tyson.5160]

> @"megilandil.7506" said:

> only a little issue with map exploration, puting a POI closed by a time gated non metaevent is annoying in regard of exploration efficiency. make the POI obtainable by aproaching gate or make the event mapwide anounced, completing the map and having to wait a long time to the event spawn is truly annoying

 

Ah yeah, that Poi. Easier just to complete the first instance.

[Menadena.7482]

@"Gaile Gray.6029" Parts of the story in the open world? Were the devs copying all my suggestions? :)

[Blanche Neige.7241]

Can you rework the Fucking freaking raptor jumping puzzle at the end?

 

I HATE those fuking JP and putting one INTO an instance is the most stupid idea you ever had so far. Been at it for one hour now, and I always dies one way or another. If this is your idea of fun, it's not mine.

 

Too bad this JP junk ruins and otherwise very well done LS episode.

[Cyrin.1035]

By far one the best episodes of Season 4 and a return to what I love about GW 2.

 

This is what I would call a PROPER living world episode. You can feel the weight of how much more the developers have in store. It was packed full of quality content, instead of stretched thin and hollow. This is an episode that will last. As soon as I finished it, I wanted to play it over again. They achieved the right balance with this episode. It was the right length with many significant things taking place. The most important thing for me was that the story would return to focus and we'd move past the filler. Not only did they return to the main story but they also properly closed the filler story with Joko in a way that gave it importance without total exclusion.

 

They have moved several plot lines along with multiple characters, all of them in a satisfying way. They introduced new ways of doing previous mechanics and in a way that is fun and moved the story along. All of the instances and sequences were different and exciting. They have once again created an experience and something new in GW 2 that makes us wonder and imagine what they could do next. That end sequence brought me back to the feeling I had when GW 2 was at its peak best. The idea of an Elder Dragon in the Mists is a brilliant idea and opens up so many more possibilities for what could happen in the story. There were surprises and revelations throughout. I loved the idea of Maguuma showing up in the desert.

 

I can't stand that Braham is still around and the devs are on a crusade to make him likable and to justify his character, but this episode has done a decent job in at least making him somewhat tolerable. I still want him in the Mists with his mother.

 

The devs and everyone involved have really shined on this episode. This is what I have been waiting for. A WIN for GW 2 after several recent, major fails. This is the new bar. Don't go back. Keep going up.

 

9/10

[Warlord.9082]

I would like Travel to Sun's Refuge portal scroll to end up inside the actual refuge rather than still a minutes travel away after using it.

[Randulf.7614]

> @"Warlord.9082" said:

> I would like Travel to Sun's Refuge portal scroll to end up inside the actual refuge rather than still a minutes travel away after using it.

 

As a temp workaround, if you use it again inside you will be ported to the middle. I think they said they are sorting it long term tho

[Jinn Kazuma.2163]

The map is pretty good, but the story is just... why.

It's like the writers discovered the Ex Machina cliche when they started working on this episode, and just HAD to use it in every scene. Almost every chapter had an Ex Machina moment. I felt like Cinamasins should have been narrating the episode.

[Tarlonniel.6534]

Amazing: The GW1 callbacks. Snaff. Aurene. Peace negotiations. Weird time-space anomalies. The main plot finally showing back up.

 

Not amazing: The jumping puzzle (&^%$%#^&). Most of the commander's companions, still. Can I take Aurene, Canach and Faren and start my own group? Team "These ones I like, please don't kill them"? (RIP Trahearne :'( )

[Opopanax.1803]

Liked the deadeye and also clearing the spiders.

 

The raptor jumping was different and was fine to do even if I died a bunch.

 

I like where the story is going. No real clue what is going to happen next.

 

Guesses:

 

Gorrik "saved" his brother and will make another copy of him.

 

Taimi is going to absorb energy and become a godess when she kills kralk. Haha.

 

 

[Urud.4925]

> @"Gaile Gray.6029" said:

> Hi,

>

> Please share your high-level feedback about Episode 4 of Living World Season 4: A Star to Guide Us. If you can provide a synopsis here, that would be appreciated, maybe around 50 words or so?

>

> Bug reports can go into a [bug Report Thread ](https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/55324/bug-reports-lws4-episode-4-a-star-to-guide-us "Bug Report Thread ") specifically intended for the reports of any issues or bugs. It is posted in the Bugs Subforum and linked in the previous sentence.

 

There was already a thread about it [here](https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/55574/how-do-you-rate-a-star-to-guide-us-in-scale-1-10-spoilers/p1 "here"), in case you want to include it. I feel a bit cheap/spammer to copy/paste my previous comment. Also there were good articulated feedback.

[Tyger.1637]

It was mostly interesting till the Deadeye fight (pre-adjustments) and the ending slammed me due to the instancing bug that put a halt to me proceeding further at the time.

 

Little disappointed with Sun's Refuge; it's short-term fluff content which while good just feels a bit lacklustre that it won't be a Sunspear 'Guild Hall' long-term (I know, it can be revisited in future story instances just like Rata Novus was). Alliviated by no material costs

 

Abandonded pursuit of the Requiem skins due to the now exorbitant costs for the sigil. A collection for everyone (and a selling point for the episode) should not be gated by RNG.

[xenon.3264]

would ve been perfect living story if if were not for the sigil of nullification stuff. nice map, nice living story fight, nice heart quest . but the nullification stuff stopped me for caring about the map itself after boots and leggins.

 

ah least let us skip parts. i do not care about gloves , shoulders or LOL head i'd just need chest but i refuse to pay tp flippers for this.

 

it's a feedback thread but which feedback are you providing on this issue ? none. this is so sad

[Gin.5427]

From what I can remember:

* Aurene is too tired for all of this, but by God she's going to do it. Please anet let us give our large daughter a hug. I'm begging you.

* Braham's development is soooo welcome. I'm so glad he's done pulling an Anakin Skywalker over his absent mother and her unfortunate death. It's felt natural over the episodes.

* I miss Canach, Marj, and Kas :c

* I adore Blish

* Not so much Gorrik, but he's still a great character

* Maps aren't terribly memorable for me. But I'm a casual player who plays for the interactive story. Unless there's storytelling in the details of an area, I probably don't care.

 

On to what I didn't like. At all.

* When will the writing teams for GW2 learn that character death isn't intrinsically valuable? From Zhaitan to the current season. Tegwen dies for no reason. Trahearne's death was shoe horned in (right after he became a fun character wtf?). A number of characters I don't even remember. Your mentor. And now? Blish? Give me a BREAK like that guy wouldn't have brought an extra set of batteries. You cannot hand me an intelligent character who thus far has been shown to be hyper competent, then tell me he kills himself because he neglected to bring batteries/an extra power supply. AND THEN! Turn around and tell us TAIMI our OTHER DAUGHTER is dying. Who's next? Commander has already died. Is Braham going to die? Canach? Everyone?

**At this point I'm just rolling my eyes and getting angry that the few characters I have connected with are dying pointlessly. **

* Even if we go back, grab a powered down Blish, and bring him back, it does not change the fact that his sacrifice was treated as a death. It was written as a death. If you kill off all the likeable characters, no one is going to care about your story. Characters can lift a garbage story. And thus far GW2 doesn't have a terribly strong narrative without the characters that have made it interesting.

* Moving away from the writing. The deadeye-priestess had an absurd difficulty curve. There were parts where I absolutely could not progress. I feel that the level designers shouldn't have to be reminded that this is a rather casual MMO. If you're going to add elements like this, you need to make sure they fit in with the rest of the motor difficulties.

* **That said, please take my criticisms with a grain of salt. I wouldn't be so peeved about Blish if it wasn't such a common thing in the GW2 narrative.**

 

Suggestions that may or may not be applicable, but things that would make me ridiculously happy to see.

* Taimi gets a sick robot body

* Someone dives down Kralkatorrik's throat and pulls out Blish

* Rytlock gets called out on his shit

* Honestly why did Caithe get so much shit in HoT but Rytlock gets off scott free?

* We get to call GLINT out on making babies just to burden them with killing the elder dragons and replacing them (bad mom of the eternity award)

* Rox comes back after being adopted by the Olmahkhan