Flameseeker Chronicles

Guild Wars 2 has been criticized in the past for not having having much PvE content for guilds and large groups of players. Several months ago, guild missions were added and helped fill that gap, but apparently we have more to look forward to.

ArenaNet's Chris Whiteside was chatting with players in the game and was asked whether or not we'd ever see raiding in Guild Wars 2. His reply was, "Our answer to raiding may very well be in the works! It is something I am very excited about and will be unique to GW2."

What could this mean for Guild Wars 2 and its players? What kind of unique spin could ArenaNet put on raiding? Let's dive into those questions after the break in a video edition of the Flameseeker Chronicles!

I hope you've all been enjoying your time in sunny Southsun Cove. We talked about it last week, so if you're a little lost as to what's going on, I'd suggest reading back a bit.

Wooden Potatoes recently posted an excellent recap of what's changed and happened in Guild Wars 2 from launch to the present day. It's an good reflection, which will hopefully give us a good perspective as we look at where the game might be going.

At almost precisely nine months of launched life, Guild Wars 2 is at something of a defining point. It looks as if the team is going to be moving to a more rapid cadence. That's not a guarantee, but as we're seeing more consistent releases, I'm prepared to get my hopes up a little bit. We're also seeing more sPvP and WvW features coming down the pipe; the last few updates set that in motion, and the preview for today's patch seems to be following up in support of those.

My goodness, that lady's bikini is awfully close to body tone from this far away, isn't it?

If the sun and sandy beaches didn't give it away, I've spent most of the last week or so of Guild Wars 2 time in Southsun Cove. Karka Island! Sunny Orr! Whatever you call it, I hope we can all agree that Southsun Cove is a terrible place filled with awful monsters that nobody in their right mind, in-universe or otherwise, would ever want to visit without the lure of titles and shiny -- literally, one of them glows, and the other glistens -- backpieces.

With Guild Wars 2's first multi-month living story arc drawing to a close, I thought this might be a good time to do a little bit of reflection on how the living story is treating Guild Wars 2 so far. Sure, what we've seen so far isn't necessarily indicative of the way things are always going to be, but it's a good starting point. (In fact, it's our only starting point. Unless, of course, you like rampant and foundless speculation as a starting point. This is, after all, the internet.)

To expand the conversation a bit, I think we're including holiday updates as part of the living story. It's seasonal, but it also fits into the grander scheme of providing changing content to keep the world moving and to keep players engaged. That means that what we've seen to date includes all of Flame and Frost, Wintersday, Halloween, and the Lost Shores event. Also, I guess the Super Adventure Box? I mean, it's returning and it had a lore tie-in and stuff. Maybe? I'm not sold.

Right after finally crafting The Flameseeker Prophecies, I took my in-game efforts down a couple of notches. As a result, I've had a few fairly quiet weeks in Guild Wars 2. It's not for lack of things to do or of goals; I've still got plans for oodles of armor sets, a few of the pseudo-legendary weapons, a double-handful of additional level 80 characters, and some titles. I've just been taking a more laid-back approach to achieving those goals. For the last month or so before getting my shield I was running two to three dungeons a day along with other things like camping meta events and going into Orr for T6 mats, which is by no means hardcore but has made for a very pleasant experience switching into a lower gear. I've been taking time to enjoy the simpler pleasures of Guild Wars 2.

Some days, saving the world from Elder Dragons just feels like such a drag. Every time you put a dragon lieutenant down, you know that another one is, even then, being knit together from crystals or rotting corpses and it won't be all that long before it's time to save the world again.

That sort of knowledge can really take a toll on a girl.

Making full use of the magic of technology, I've started escaping the pressure of dragonfighting by going back into Guild Wars. Because it's the game that most directly relates to the state of affairs in Guild Wars 2, I've been playing the original Prophecies campaign. I've also been streaming the experience for the uninitiated, so if you'd like to catch up and live the adventure vicariously through me, you can check out the first bits on Massively's Twitch channel. If you'd like to quickly familiarize yourself with where Prophecies sits in the grand scheme of things, I recommend acquainting yourself with our brief history of Tyria.

It's been a neat experience so far. I'd like to talk about it with you.

It's good to have memorable characters. It's important, in a game, to have the sort of characters that players can look back on a month or a year or a lifetime later and think, "Yeah, I remember that NPC." In that sense, I guess ArenaNet has succeeded admirably in the case of Rox the Charr Ranger. I'll remember her until my dying day.

... Mostly because she absolutely petrifies me.

Have you seen this lady's eyes? They were clearly made for soul-eating. They're half the size of her face (maybe this is why the baby devourer thinks she's its mommy?), far more cartoony than pretty much anything else in the game, and more saccharine than the fluffy pink quaggan backpacks with bows and hearts. I don't know whether it makes it better or worse that she's got a fairly normal Charr lady voice.

Rox was introduced to us, of course, in the Flame and Frost: The Razing patch that came out at the end of March. Let's see what's been going down in the world of Guild Wars 2 since then.