I'm Lost...

Ok, maybe someone can give me some words of wisdom and encouragement here. I am so lost.

Here's my boring story. I just bought the game Friday. I decide to create an Elementalist/Necromancer. I took a day and a half or so and familiarized myself with pre-searing. I was having a good time and didn't mind doing the tons of pointless quests (carrying a basket of apples...). At level 7 and after doing most of the pre-searing stuff, I decided to go to post-searing.

Now I run around the areas around Old Ascalon doing quests mostly with henchmen including the Northern Wall mission. Eventually I meet up with some people and not knowing what I am doing I decided to just follow them and in doing so I ended up following them through mission after mission all the way to the Lions Arch. At this point I realize I have no idea what is going on or what the story is really about...oops.

Why did we have to go through the mountains? What was the goal in mind? What is the purpose of leading a group to Kryta? Who are these undead things all over Kryta? My mind is full of questions.

During times when these people were offline, I decided to return to the Ascalon area and I did most of the quests there. Then I went to the mountains and did most of the quests there too (all quests with henchmen with the exception of the ashes one). I have built of some neat looking skills and crafted some armor which I dyed all sorts of colors.

Now finally today I end up with the same group again and I am following them all around Kryta. I kept asking where we were going. No response. What are we doing? No response. I just keep following them around until I finally have had enough. I left the group and went back to the Lion's Arch to sulk in peaceful solitude. Occasionally I get a guild invitation which I end up turning down because so far being in a group has not helped me much at all.

As it stands right now I am level 15 who is huddled in a corner at the Divinity Coast Mission place. I had hoped that a level 15 character would have some clue as to what they are doing but I really don't. All of the groups I have been in have for the most part been completely silent (the only communication being lines drawn on the map). I have no idea what the story is. I have no idea where I am supposed to go. I have no idea what I am supposed to do. No one will tell me anything and I am just completely lost...

Go back to the mission outposts and talk to the people on the pedastal and they'll tell you what is going on.

If you are THAT lost as to the story line I can only assume that you either didn't pay attention to the cutscenes(cinematics) during the missions, skipped the cutscenes all together, or bypassed the missions on the way to Lions Arch.

If you truly are interested in understanding the story, I'd suggest going back through the missions and pay close attention to all the cinematics. THey explain the story rather well.

2 simple tips:

1) dont skip the cutscenes in the missions
2) each mission meeting area has a lore npc you can talk to, he will explain the point of the mission and give you some background. Talk to them and actually read what they say if you want to know the backstory- thats what they're there for. I suggest you go through all the places you've been to in order and just read for a bit, you'll get it.

yes, try to follow the storylines although it's a bit tough. From a play perspective the game is incredible, but from a literary perspective the game is mediocre at best and from an acting viewpoint... my god... I can't help but think that the actors doing the voices were just the devs and code-monkeys being paid overtime.

The first time I played through I ended up doing everything in the wrong order (the joy of PUG's). I was rescuing people that I've already assassinated, I was giving items of great power to bad guys, I was delivering information to spies... everything was backwards in the story. My advice, do the mini quests, they fill in a lot of the information, and some of the cooler people will reappear later in the game also.

I still can't figure out what the connection is between the Charr and the ***** (censored for spoilers) main bad guys is. Did they instigate the Charr invasion? It seems like as soon as I crossed the mountains into Kryta there was no more talk of Charr, except from a few (very few) Krytans who also talked of the invasion (though there are no signs of it) and the refugee/settlers who speak of the invasion. Is there a connection?

I skipped a lot of the cutscenes because everyone else always wanted to skip them. I guess I didn't want to hold anyone up. Which is another frusteration for me. Everyone is always rushing through everything as fast as humanly possible. Stopping for two seconds is apparently not an option I suppose. I'll go talk to the pedestal people.

Don't stress, the plot is as deep as a teaspoon, must be a certian game dev company thingto make plots that way, <Ahem> and anyways you can always go back and do it again, and again and again until you are sick of seeing Rurik and char and anything else :P

I guess i'll just try to review it for you up to now. For those who are reading that haven't somehow gotten to Lions Arch yet...

--- SPOILERS ---






Ascalon Series: Okay, at the beggining of pre-searing, you're being trained to fight against the forces of charr. The series of quests are linked with a few funny easter eggs in the future game, but in the storyline arn't really concerned. The Searing is the day when the Charr used major magic to break down the Wall, which was the largest and last line of defense for ascalon. King Adelbern has gotten paranoid and think's he can hold off the charr forever. His son, prince rurik, is more intuned with reality and knows that he must go on the offensive to beat the charr. He intends to gain more support from the white mantle (Krytans, ambassador Zain) and other ascalonians. You then travel with him to the capital city of Rin. Once you get there, you find out that it's been destroyed and ascalon is pretty much hopeless. He's forced to lead followers through the mountains to live in Kryta.

Southern Shiverpeaks Series: This is just the journey you must take to get the men to Kryta. Not really a storyline to continue from here currently. You gain help from friendly dwarves and in return, help them in thier battle against the evil dwarves. Once you get to Lions Arch you see a cutscene concerning the Sceptor of Orr. The artifact can grant the beholder control of the undead and therefor the Undead Lich is after it.

Since you're at lions arch i don't see a reason to explain any further. From now on I just suggest you talk to the npc's around and watch the cutscenes.

I HATE it when people insist on skipping the cutscenes.....I was even in one group where our warrior left because half the team had never been there before and wanted to see the story....well we finished just FINE without that jerk and got a tad more loot8)

I've enjoyed the story so far. Adds drama and all that. But really, what's going on is that you're bashing monsters so you can get better armor so you can bash higher-level monsters. If you're doing that, then, well, there you go.

Don't feel pressured to skip cutscenes if you haven't watched them, you will miss out a lot if you do.

Anyway yeah, I think even if you have watched all the cutscenes it's still a bit confusing cos I still don't really get the connection between the Charr and everything else - it seems as if you forget all about Ascalon, but I think the idea is that everyone left Ascalon when Prince Rurik did - when you get further on you will find there is an Ascalon settlement where the refugees ended up.

Oh, and btw, you can always go back and redo the missions if you want to, can always do them with henchmen so you get to watch the cutscenes without worrying about anyone else

Hah I did even worse.

I hadn't even done the Northern Wall mission. And I said to my self, "Hey Gara Gara Gara!" 'WHAT!?' I replyed, "Let's head west a bit to buy a few skills before we do the northern wall mission! \o/" 'Fine.' I said.

Next thing I know, I'm in riverside and I have no idea what the mixed up plot is!

I had a similar problem. I, however, was following the story fine right up until Nolani Academy. Once I reached there, I got so sick and tired of seeing ol' seared Ascalon that I grabbed some henchmen, looked to the west, and just... ran. This was before I'd explored the map or visited any websites, so I had no idea what towns there were or if there was even anything in the west. I'd never heard of Lion's Arch or anything like that. I very nearly tried to go south from Regent's Valley, but that would have been a pretty frustrating task...

Several hours of back-breaking combat and plenty of running later (without dying once, interestingly enough, despite all those minotaurs...), and after moaning that I hadn't encountered a single town in what seemed like years (I missed a couple, I now know), I ended up at the Gates of Kryta before I even knew they were there. When I was told that Prince Rurik was dead, despite me having talked to him the very same day, I decided it would probably be best to go back to Nolani and follow the missions again. But first I went and found some food, because I hadn't been able to stop since I left Nolani.

Let that be a lesson to everyone else who's just starting out: all it takes is a little courage and determination, and you can get completely lost in some God-forsaken mountains and totally lose track of the plot in a matter of hours. It's easy when you know how to mess up properly!

<sigh> Yeah, that's why I only mission with henches. I get stressed by the constant mindless rushing when playing in pick-up groups. Honestly, I don't know what's fricking hurry. Stopping to let health and energy build up, and waiting while a bowman pull mobs is perfectly acceptable behaviour IMO, but I've never been in a pick-up group that agreed.

Part of the problem, I guess, is the lack of communication and the fact that the fastest, not the slowest, player sets the pace.

FWIW, I'm at lvl 20, doing ascension quests, and I have only a vague idea what the story is even though I've watched all the cut scenes.
A big part of it is probably that dialogue-bubbles in missions aren't visible if you have anti-aliasing enabled, something I found out only recently, and most npc dialogs don't show up in the chat window.

No, that's just the impression. Really, the party moves at the rate of the healers in most cases. Yes, the Wa/Mo can rush off and aggro stuff, but if he dies before you get there no biggie, he'll learn. Find a few good players - I'll admit that I rush missions a lot, but not if someone wants to take time. I'm on my 6th or so RP character (I deleted a few as I decided I wasn't enjoying them...) so honestly, running through Fort Ranik is pretty routine by now, and unless asked I'll tend to go at the quickest rate that is safe. Sometimes it may be faster than the rest of the party I guess, but only because it is still safe.

A big difference comes from level and class as well, especially early in the game - a lvl 9 Warrior/X with a good weapon and armour can tank pretty much anything in the first few missions with no worries (and if you did everything in pre-searing and killed all the Charr north of the wall you will be that high...), while a lvl 6 (or really, even a lvl 9 to some extent) mesmer still has to be careful - later in the game the warrior won't be able to rush ahead mindlessly, but unfortunately it is a hard habit to break them of.

It does come down to a good group - I like the dynamics of playing with a good buddy and henchmen, or a few guildies, or even a whole guild party, if they are into doing the mission - I don't enjoy getting a rush from a lvl 20, or adventuring with folks out to do everything as fast as possible.

Yes this is a big problem for many of us, ending p in groups where other players rush through killing as fast as they can and never talking, exploring, or paying atention to anything. If you can manage to find a group of people without ADHD and a bad attitude it is a little better.

--Nokomis

Not hitting the skip button for cut scenes is like silently farting in a room of people. Just never admit you were the one and you'll be fine.

Best analogy of the day

The only problem I have with one person not hitting skip is that, that has happened when we were in the middle of being attacked, so half of us were dead when the cutscene ended. (this has happened at least twice for me).

lol, that is the bext example so far...

That has to be the best analogy I have ever heard. Thanks for the laugh.

As far as being lost and wanting some type of communication, try getting on a voice chat program like teamspeak or ventrillo. Now granted many of those can be filled with inane chatter and 10 year olds trying to act 16 but if you get with a group of somewhat normal folks, the inane crap is at a minimum plus on most voice chat systems, if the inane chatter gets too annoying, you and your party can start another room just for yourselves. I have to admit I am not one for typing, it takes just long enough for me to get aggro'd and get the bageesus beat outta me when I stop to type.

Yeah, nice analogy. That said, if the cutscene is not an end of mission cutscene and you're party is getting beat on, please skip the cut scene. You can die during some of the longer ones and during a cutscene, you can't fight back. As an example of this;

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=14456

That seems to me like it should be one of those things Anet should be trying to fix one of the next patches. Maybe something simple like making all characters invincible during a cutscene. Or just making enemies static, unless moved by the script of the cutscene itself. Of course, knowing programming, characters would probably remain invincible afterwards...
Thankfully I have yet to do a mission with other people, so whenever I encounter this problem I can instantly skip the cutscene without needing to wait for anyone else to do so. I've only done that once, I think, as I usually only get attacked in a final cutscene, but still.

But people shouldn't be forced to skip the cutscene by a stupid shortsighted problem like this. It should be fixed.

Say hello to my new sig ... if they allowed it.

Spoiler:

When Ascalon was attacked to years ago many prisoners were taken as slaves to the Charr, everything was burned down, etc. Ascalon is still hit by attacks of the Charr every now and then.

You go to the Great Northern Wall, and are asked to go scout out due to the "quiet before the storm". You go and find this enormous army of Charr and run for your life back to alert them. The wall is lost. Oh no. Then you go to the next mission, and you fight a bunch of charr off, and rescue some slaves. Woopee. Next mission, you go use this thing called the Stormbringer you found inthe last mission to bring rain. Appearantly, an army can't kill the charr, but rain can. Then you continue to murder them. Then, you gotta take refuge somewhere. Ascalon is burnt to the ground. Your people can't live there. So you go with Rurik across the Shiverpeaks to Lions Arch. He dies there cought between one of the many conflicts between the Dwarves and the Stone Summet Dwarves. Then, you go to the Gates of Kryta, and help Justiciar Hablion clear the swamps which are filled with undead people from the once great city of Orr. You gain your people entrance to Lions Arch. Your people now live in Kryta, in Ascalon Settlement, north of Lions Arch.