Power Up the Exploration Area

While playing the Cantha Event, can see that A.net has put several new features (some that was suggested here at forum) in to make the game better. From many aspects, the PvE is a step up. However, some thing still seems lacking, and is filling me with desire for post more suggestion!

In all cases, I will write this post about the Exploration Area. The exploration area is a large, and very beautifully crafted place. Also it seems it is now filled with more randomizing enemies (in their grouping, location, and behavior) as per suggestion before. However, after all quest is done, all the out post reach, people will very very not likely to revisit them again, putting it to waste. Also just after the 3rd or 4th run (when doing some quest) of going through the map again, everything just seem to become very dull as well. I was giving it some thoughts on how to better improve such things, and here is some ideas.
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Essence Power Up:
More power ups.
Problem:
It is true that GW is a game of balance and fairness, where you can not grind your self to pwn the noob and weak mobs. However, it also kills that sense of progression and “step up” that many stats RPG player get. From this, I would say add a thing call Essence.

What they are:
They are one time use power up (when click on them, will be like chest which will ask you if you want to use it). When use, they will give the player or group certain power up that will last for 20 min or till exit out of that map. There are different kinds that give different bonus. They will be “equipped” on to you, as a ghostly/glowie thing around you body/weapons. Usually be drop by boss mobs or find in a “key place”, and as drop, they will be assigned much like item. (but you can’t pick it up). Some example might be:

• Essence of Power Sword: +X to your attack power.
• Essence of Winded Sandal: +X% to you movement speed.
• Essense of Booming Shield: +X to your defense.

How would they help:
This make you feel as if you are “leveling up”, or where the more mob (or mob bosses) you kill, the better you become, and easier to conquer the map. It makes you feel that you earn something when taking on that massive group of mob or that powerful boss, and fuel you to keep going. Also can be use as other “rewards”. It follows the idea of “temporary loot”.
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Exploration Quest
Problem:
There seem very little goal or need to go back to an explored area. And all the repeatable quest just seem the same.

What they are:
Exploration Quest are small quest that are design more to encourage Exploration. For reward, they give out amount of xp, gold, and power up Essence after completion. They are Random. So that mean the NPC that give out such quest will not always instanize with the map, as will as different locations and different quests. Also once exit out of the map, the quest will automatically abandon it self. They will also not have a guiding Green Dot.
Some possible idea for such quest might be:

• Kill (some boss) in the map.
• Kill (X) amount of (Y) monster
• Go to Location (a description)
• Find and Talk to another NPC

How would the help:
They give player a quick goal to achieve, and would encourage them to explore around the map more. Also since there are no green dots to tell you where to go, it really challenges to player to take more notice of what is in the map, where are some locations, where the bosses and mob type located, and such, where it would help them finish such quest easier and faster.
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Lore of the Land

Problem:
People tend not to “bond” with some of the “key locations” of the exploration map. There is not enough emersion. (by key location I mean certain place in the map that is more crafted out, and seem to have, or can have, more story behind it)

What they are:
Different ways to give “key location” of the map more lores. They can come from a NPC (next to or in town), or a sign post/plaque/tombstone/torn journal page to read. Also some of those key locations might be heavily guarded, and could be a place that offer Essence Power up as well as exploration quest as well, and even puzzle to solve.

For example, there is one very beautiful well that I come to in my travel. From some NPC I talk to before that I learn that this is call the Crying Well, where there is a story where a girl, after lost her love, jump in to the well. (and when you go near it, you can still hear the crying.) After clearing the mob there, you can find a Sorrow Essence there to use. Whats more, if you use the /sad emote, a ghost will come up and talk to you, giving you another Essence and some boost.

How would the help:
Emersion is always important. Also it can server other rewarding purpose, and would leave a more memorable impression in player mind. And it would appear to the more “Mystery Solving” player, who when hinted, will be wanting to go back into the exploration to see/try it out them self.
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More Randomization and Non-linear Content:
There are already few thread about this before, so I won’t go much into it.

Those are some suggestions that I think would help make exploration area more fun and more enjoyable to repeat. (I think it is sad to see that most people just repeat of going to one exploration area just for farming, and never really get fully immerse into the wonderful environment the Dev has created.) Of course it still need to be combine with other aspect of game to make it fully work (loots, rewards, RP collectibles, mini games, etc etc), but in all, I think if we see this in the future expansion, it might attract more players.

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comments are feed back are welcome. QnA if needed, or point to /critque to things you think will not fit. Also would like to hear further suggetions on how to imporve exploration areas.

Since hope to atleast get one reply.. so giving it a quick /bump

(also this is more about making the exploration area more enjoyble area, and not really stress on ways to attract more people to go back to a exploration area. That can be for another thread)

I wouldn't look forward to the essence things. I can already see wammos boasting. "See noob!!11 I have teh essence sowrd!!!!!"

Not many players want to go back just to explore areas. I certainly wouldn't. in fact I don't pve at all anyways.

But writing a bit on each key city would be good. Some nice rpers would like that

I don't see this happen at all, since all of the "essensce" power up (like the statue power up) only stay in one map. They will be gone as soon as you leave.

And yes, there also need to be ways to make people want to go back to Exploration area (the OP suggestion does small part of that, but it also need lots other things to make exploration area more attractive)

/signed

I love the lore and hidden stories that are currently in GW. Nothing wrong with expanding and adding more immersion into the world!

I like it!

As for the power ups if you kneel at the resurrection spot when you’re terroritory has favor you will have 4 options for power ups. They differ from the each god and have different cost like from 100g to 500g (the last maybe wrong).

In case for those that don't know already

ATM the moment I only remember one power up that increasd the speed of the Asssain. Sorry

Maybe someone got some screenshots of them and will post them

Yes, i know this. The idea of Essense is sorta build on that "temporary in-map powerup" idea similar to the statue/avatar. (but also to enhance the "boss" or "key location" encounters, so you feel more rewarding when you over come a hard group mob or come to a beautiful site.)

When you play, after clearing out a high level boss or a massive group of mobs, don't you feel like you didn't achieve much? (+2% moral bonus just isn't that much) Adding more such boost will make you feel you have "done" something, and you are better, more powerful than before.

Its also come from the old skill gem thing, which if boss would drop something special, it make you feel worthwhile in taking them on.

some very good ideas, as decent as any of the other 'make PvE interesting' ideas

I definitely agree that there is alot of really pretty yet largely wasted real-estate in the GW realm. There IS a reason to go out and explore at least some of it, however. Though I haven't done much Elite Skill hunting specifically I have done alot of exploring of the landscape and I notice that the Bosses which carry Elite Skills tend to wander around out in the otherwise unexplored recesses of the map.

So it seems they at least considered this notion when they cooked up the whole "capturing skills from special boss characters" idea but I'm still all for any more ideas they might come up with to reward intrepid explorers like myself as I really do enjoy poking through every nook and crany of a game's world map; especially when it looks as good as GW does.

There's also the whole random treasure chest thing they have going though those tend to just pop up often on the beaten path in areas you'd normal explore around doing quests and such.

yes, I hear ya.

I was exploring/doing quest in the Cantha Event the other day, when I come to a Yetti cave. Inside is full of Yettis and a boss. Its cool and all, but after disbatching them all in the cave, you still don't really gain much... or anything to show. Sure there is a boss, who you can probl get capture elites from (but usually people don't carry a cap sig just with them at all time), as well as a chest (but people also don't usually carry keys with them, unless got from drop or doing chest runs). And it is not like the chest will give you a grantee Yetii Hammer or anything, so all those don't really show for much.

Won't it be nice to get a power up when you clear the cave? ("You got Yetti Strength!") Or to find a bloody note that says something like "Living with Yetti in the Mist is not much fun". Or even just have usless item like a Yetti Drum.. which might suggest Yettis like to play drums. little things like that to make it better.

Yep. I pretty much thing everything should be there in one form or another.

Sorry, but I don't agree with a few of the things you say. the essence things, I believe, would be used by people who don't know how to play through on their own steam and would be used to progress through the story quicker, instead of just maps(sounds kind of the same, but it's not).

I also don't agree with the exploration quests. I think that it should be the players choice whether they explore the maps or not. I personally found it rewarding to be one of the first(as in one of the first couple thousand) to reach the temple with the bone dragons in the first week after GW was released. And, I find it satisfying to know that not everyone has toured Dragon's Gullet. And I'd like to keep it that way, because it gives me an upperhand over the people who just play the quests and nothing else. Those same people usually turn out to be the ones who can't make an original build, do a 5 man oro run, and generally don't do anything extraordinary on their own, and I can at least feel like I'm better than them if I've seen scenery they haven't even if they have better armor and better weapons.

I do agree, however, with your ideas on the lore and the non-linear content. I make abstract builds(because I like being original, I don't post my builds or use anyone elses) and unfortunately if you were to try to explain one of my builds to someone they would fail to see its usefulness. And so, I'm reduced to doing ettin runs solo(because I don't have a build that can solo UW, and I don't care to have one, if I wanted to play an easy game I wouldn't play an RPG in the first place) because there's no other place where drops for gold producing items can be found with semi-easy monsters. Any sooner than ettins, and the gold you can sell each item for is too low to amount quickly, and much further and the hoardes become much harder to defeat with a build I'm testing. So, I'd like to see better drops from everywhere in general. Of course I don't expect a sup vigor to drop in pre searing ascalon, but some places are just devoid of any loot at all. On some maps, I'd collect 50 items and 2 would be magical. The rest would be useless, selling for low amounts of gold and having nothing special on them. And I'd like to see more lore. I'm an RPG person, and I like to know the story behind the hours of monotonous monster killing. Why orr died and such, it's interesting to me.

Yes, they all sound good.

Thx you for your concern and reply.

-Note that I never say anything about Essense in Mission Maps.

-Exploration quest are suppose to be randomize-repeatible quest that give you something more rewarding should one decide to go exploring. Also it encourage (but not force you) to explore by not telling you the quest locatio, instead only hinting you where, thus your previous "experience" from past exploring will help you do such quest better, should you want to do them.

-So many ways to add more lore and life into the game, and this would be just one of them. (and such thing I think should also tie, in one way or another, to some sorta reward. Thus Essense, as a temporary reward, also comes into play) Also... that does lore have to do with your farming build?

But feel free to post what you thought, or how to improve and make things better. It is after all the suggestion forum.

I like all of these ideas...they would add a lot of new content to the game. Its all very well written out and explained also.

/signed