Co-op & Story mode confusion

[LazerCatPewPew.6708]

Hey All,

 

I been playing GW2 with my wife off and on for a long time. I think it is a great game, but recently something really perplexes me. My wife and I have always been just roaming around randomly, dipping into PVP and never really focused on the story or the world. We decided the other day we wanted to do that. We wanted to delve into the story and go through the game together.

 

We ran into a roadblock immediately! When we started "My Story" it started taking us on different paths. One of us could help the other for some karma, but we couldn't develop the story and progress forward together. It is almost as if "My Story" is this single player mode in an MMORPG? From what I understand the story you follow here is determined when you create your character...

 

My question to you guys is, is there something I am missing? Is there some way we can progress through GW2 together and experience the story together? (Currently, we are doing a little bit of my story, then we go do a little bit of my wives and so on. It is a bit frustrating to have to go back and fourth.) Is "My Story" the wrong thing to follow? What should we do to learn about the world and story of GW2 together?

 

This really caught me off-guard as something very strange. I am glad we didn't immediately care about that when we started GW2 long ago because we may have never experienced so many of the awesome things GW2 has to offer. I could definitely see that as a hindrance to new players who buy the game with their friends albeit it is probably too late now. Mostly because it seems like the most obvious path to follow, but then again maybe isn't?

[Taygus.4571]

The personal story starts off based on your character selection.

 

Race plays a big part but so does class/group.

So you and your wife picked different choices. So the start of your personal stories are different.

 

Afaik it's only the case up to like story level 30.

 

You could also skip the personal story and start on like living world 2 if you wanted.

[Ayakaru.6583]

There are a few branches

Race 1 , race 2 , order , choices during campaign, and then from heart of thorns on everything is pretty much streamlined.

 

So yes if you want to play and progress together, you need to be the same race, same background, and choose the same order. After completing the campaign of Orr there are few to no differences in instances anymore, maybe only a few methods within the instance

[Zeefa.3915]

There are certain choices that determines early story. Race. And then each race has a couple too. For human it is streetrat/noble/commoner and biggest regret parents/sister/circus. Thats the level 10 and level 20 parts of the story. Level 30 is race specific, but within each race it merges.

At level 40 all the races merge. However be aware that there is another split if you choose different orders. Whispers/Priory/Vigil.

At level 50 there is a few differences based on race. Can still merge depending on the race combosition.

The 3 orders does not merge untill level 70.

After level 70 and onward to the most recent LS it is merged. If you at the split choices (that are not that many of them) make the same ones... which should happen if you play together and accept progress at the end of each instance if your partner is the instance owner.

 

But yeah if you play the same race it will merge pretty quickly :)

If different races, it merge a little later, but not by much.

 

Hope this helps.

[LazerCatPewPew.6708]

Thanks for the replies! Luckily, we are the same race (Sylvari). Looks like we will just have to deal with this until we are level 30-40 quest-wise.

 

I don't know if this makes a difference, but our characters are both level 80 and have both made no progress in terms of story. Does that change anything?

[Tycko Larsson.7829]

No it will not change anything other then making the fights in your personal stories easier.

[Taygus.4571]

> @"Zeefa.3915" said:

> At level 40 all the races merge. However be aware that there is another split if you choose different orders. Whispers/Priory/Vigil.

> At level 50 there is a few differences based on race. Can still merge depending on the race combosition.

> The 3 orders does not merge untill level 70.

> After level 70 and onward to the most recent LS it is merged. If you at the split choices (that are not that many of them) make the same ones... which should happen if you play together and accept progress at the end of each instance if your partner is the instance owner.

 

Afaik, you can or could..accidentally switch orders by technically being on same story step and chosing to accept it. As it gives you option to continue story.

 

So it's really only before those steps that they can't continue together.

 

[Tanner Blackfeather.6509]

> @"Taygus.4571" said:

> > @"Zeefa.3915" said:

> > At level 40 all the races merge. However be aware that there is another split if you choose different orders. Whispers/Priory/Vigil.

> > At level 50 there is a few differences based on race. Can still merge depending on the race combosition.

> > The 3 orders does not merge untill level 70.

> > After level 70 and onward to the most recent LS it is merged. If you at the split choices (that are not that many of them) make the same ones... which should happen if you play together and accept progress at the end of each instance if your partner is the instance owner.

>

> Afaik, you can or could..accidentally switch orders by technically being on same story step and chosing to accept it. As it gives you option to continue story.

>

> So it's really only before those steps that they can't continue together.

>

 

I've done this! What happens is you become functionally a member of *both* orders! It seems completely random which mentor tags along for which story instance!

[Taygus.4571]

> @"Tanner Blackfeather.6509" said:

> > @"Taygus.4571" said:

> > > @"Zeefa.3915" said:

> > > At level 40 all the races merge. However be aware that there is another split if you choose different orders. Whispers/Priory/Vigil.

> > > At level 50 there is a few differences based on race. Can still merge depending on the race combosition.

> > > The 3 orders does not merge untill level 70.

> > > After level 70 and onward to the most recent LS it is merged. If you at the split choices (that are not that many of them) make the same ones... which should happen if you play together and accept progress at the end of each instance if your partner is the instance owner.

> >

> > Afaik, you can or could..accidentally switch orders by technically being on same story step and chosing to accept it. As it gives you option to continue story.

> >

> > So it's really only before those steps that they can't continue together.

> >

>

> I've done this! What happens is you become functionally a member of *both* orders! It seems completely random which mentor tags along for which story instance!

 

That actuallu seems quite funny xD.

[Danikat.8537]

Here's a quick summary of what determines your story:

* **Level 10** - Race + one of the choices you made during character creation.

* **Level 20** - Race + another character creation choice.

* **Level 30** - Race + the Order/s you choose to support. (Importantly the final choice is final, the NPCs do make this clear.)

* **Level 40** - The Order you chose to join.

* **Level 50** - The race you choose to support. (This is partially determined by your race - for example asura can't choose to help skritt.)

* **Level 60** - The Order you chose to join.

* **Level 70** - Whatever you pick when the Pale Tree asks for your greatest fear during the level 60 story.

* **Level 80** - Entirely based on choices you make at the end of each story step on what to do next.

 

There are also one-off choices within chapters. For example during the level 30 story when you're meeting the 3 Orders you can choose which one to follow for each step, and if you pick different ones you'll get different instances for the next step, but can re-join after that.

 

So if you want to do your entire story together you need to plan it right from character creation, but as long as you make the same choices whenever possible you'll be able to do most of it together.

 

And the Living Story and expansion stories are all shared. There's some dialogue and things which will be different but you can do all the instances together even with someone who is playing a different race and order.

[Donari.5237]

I suggest embracing the fact that you aren't doing the same story. There are a lot of different paths to see, so having two people doing different paths and just hopping back and forth to help each other lets each see more of the options. Also in the 10-80 PS the instance owner gets their character's face in the cutscenes (and voice too iirc) so you also get double the voice acting and/or character immersion.

[Mewcifer.5198]

You can still join each other for the stories. Think of it this way, you get to experience twice as much of the original story in lore of the game than if you played alone :D

[Rfreak.6591]

I do think they could revise the old Story system so it's more appealing to groups even if it's just 2 players, on a note:

-You can't experience Living Story season 1 as of now but there are some youtube videos that do a good job at recapping those times, especially since they introduced so many characters through something you can't redo.

-Maybe you could have someone host other living story seasons since you might not have'em unlocked, like, I do have everything unlocked but I've been kinda busy lately so I might not be reliable that way, you can still try though.