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The thing(s) to remember about Heart Quests
BadSpock
Member UncommonPosts: 7,979
in Guild Wars 2
Just remember - there are only about 300 Heart Quests in the game.
Just 300.
There are over 1,500 Dynamic Events in GW2.
There are more Points of Interest to explore than Heart Quests - almost 3 times as many.
There are more Waypoint for fast travel to unlock then there are Heart Quests.
The ratio of Heart Quests to Events is purposefully a lot higher in the early zones to help guide new players.
Proof?
The Map tells you how many of what there are in the game... (this is an old picture)
Comments
I am assuming Heart Quests will become less and less as we progress. They have already stated the Orr (the final zone in the game) is going to have zero hearts. It is just hand holding crap anyways, I will be glad when they are gone
They're also necessary for that very reason: Too many people were completely lost without having their hands held until they learned a new way to experience content. Hearts were added for exactly that reason, and as people learn to explore and find content they'll have less and less hearts to guide them.
Oderint, dum metuant.
I have seen heart quests mentioned many times but I guess I still don't really know the point of them, can anyone explain please?
They are just as Volkon stated they are. =P
I am glad for the hearts for some, but I don't understand how thousands of people could have played Skyrim and not had them. Why when you get to GW2 do people become so lost exploring?
Death is nothing to us, since when we are, Death has not come, and when death has come, we are not.
Whoops missed that one while I was posting, thank you.
Basically heart quests are like the quests in wow, eq2...standard quests. You know when you walk up to an NPC and they have an ! over their head. Think of heart quests like that...however where as you would generally talk to an NPS to start ! quests, yuo don't necesarrily have to do that in GW2. You can just walk in the vicinity and a heart quest will update on your screen. They also can lead to further heart quests, and Dynamic events.
You did have big fat arrow pointing you through the main story line always there (unless you turned it off), that's sort of comparable to the hearts.
WoW syndrome. People have been trained in MMOs to congregate on a hub, gather all the quests you can, finish them, go back to the hub, collect rewards, go to the next hub. Although there's overlaps in the populations, most RPG gamers (and anyone with any sandbos experience at all) know how to seek out content instead of being led to it by a ring in their nose.
Oderint, dum metuant.
I did the heart quests the first couple times I quested but they tended to be a little boring after a while so I now I just go around exploring and doing the DE's that pop up. Sometimes I end up doing the heart quests without even realizing it anyways. That's the way questing should be, no talking to an NPC to pick up quests and constantly checking your quest log. The DE's are pretty easy at first but after leveling up to 18 a couple of times I found that the DE's got pretty challenging. I tended to stay in zones that I was just barely a little low to go in (I like the challenge).
Other than that, it is good to complete heart quests from time to time at least though. When you complete a task for the Heart Quest NPC, he will sell items to you. You buy items with your accumulated Karma Points that you get from doing DE's and heart quests. Every NPC has different items.
Ya, I have even played some f2p games that actually move you to the quest location automatically! hehe
Anyway, ty for the heart info BS. It's good to open the knowledge to othes!
Death is nothing to us, since when we are, Death has not come, and when death has come, we are not.
The Vistas are a nice touch - a way to introduce players to the concept of jumping puzzles.
There are SO many more that are not tied to a Vista though.
I gave up and started doing the Hearts. Most of the way through the second Heart(the god awful one that turns into a wolf) I encountered my first Sylvari DE.
I spent most of BWE3 in the Sylvari starting zone and only saw like 7 DEs and each one no more than 3 times.
If thats the "new way to experience content" then the old way is just fine.
Highlighted the key point for you.
For better or for worse, the starter zones have a lot of Heart quests and not as many DE's.
By level 14-15 the ratio improves greatly.
I.... I actually really LIKE the heart quests. At least, the non-combat parts of them. I can kill monsters ANYWHERE. I get a certain secretive glee out of feeding cows and bunnies and baby kittens. I got REALLY excited when it had me answering basic math problems and solving riddles!
....
... the only part I don't understand is that the heart quest fairly clearly explains that's simply an option. With only a couple EXTREMELY rare exceptions (I think 3 hearts out of 9 zones), you can simply kill things instead. You don't HAVE to answer riddles, or pick up eggs. You can kill things.
Often, just by doing a dynamic event you can finish a heart, and it's basically an orgy of killing and destruction.
I'm just happy whenever I can take a break and do me some Animal Crossing/Harvest Moon type stuff. :T
I know right?
Every MMO has mass slaughter of creatures, monsters, and characters.
I like running around watering plants and feeding cows and stuff.
Make the world feel more real - like my character is more of a person than a mindless killing machine.
I disagree.
The first heart quest I did was the same one this poster mentions- the "turn into a wolf" one.
I ran into 3 DEs on the way to it. Mind you, I meandered like a mofo. I was like "'Ooh, lemme go get that PoI, it's just over that ridge", "Hey, is that a vista? lemme see what the deal with those is." "Wow there's a lot of people over there. Lemme see what's going on."
The game almost rewards you for being ADDHD. If you make a beeline from heart to heart, you miss a LOT.
Heart quests are just a tutorial/introduction to dynamic events. They were added to the game for people who didn't know what to do, for people who got stuck in the old ways of questing. Heart quests are not the main part of the questing system, dynamic events are.
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Unfortunately they are like a double edged sword the way they are implemented. There's too many players not able to see the difference between DE's and hearts and getting into their old habit of just following directions. Those that persist will eventually learn but too many gamers have their judgement ready far too soon and are difficult to convince otherwise once they set an image and opinion in their mind.
I'm just waiting for higher levels where are there are a lot fewer Hearts and a lot more DE's and this subset of players are going to come on the forums and QQ about "the mid/high level zones are empty there are no quests I have to grind mobs to level QQ!"
And I shall simply laugh... and maybe facepalm.
In the end it's there in the game people are seeing it, people are experiencing it; so you're right that opinion will be formed from experiencing the game. I thought the reasoning of the heart implementation was odd from the get go, almost counter productive, why would you design something to break habits and go against the status quo, only to in turn implement that status quo anyway? Add to that spending months on end explaining your game as different to in turn make the introductory phase exactly like the rest.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Well, there are things simultaneously side by side with the hearts that are different (And hearts themselves are different in various ways, I actually like them still), but hearts are far more familiar looking and have static locations, so people glom onto them.
I'm not sure totally getting rid of hearts is the right solution either, they're a sort of 'at least there is SOMETHING to do, even if no dynamic events are going on' thing.
In a way they are, but consider this:
Most of the players complaining about the quests being the same as other MMOs, are of the same mindset as the players who were completely lost during internal testing, and didn't know what to do.
Most of the players who understand the difference between a DE and a heart NPC, or the difference between GW2 events and traditional quests were either smart enough to figure things out on their own, or watched enough videos to educate themselves on the game. Thus, they aren't really effected in this way by hearts.
So, the people who the hearts are designed for, instead of being completely lost and complaining the game has zero content, are not divided between:
- those that 'get it' and appreciate the game
- those that still don't get it, and think hearts are all the game has.
So from this perspective, the hearts are clearly a step forward. They've managed to educate a large amount of people into understanding that the game actually has a ton of content.
The tradeoff is that some of these people now think the game is only traditional quests, disguised as hearts. However, these people would've been no less ignorant without the heart NPCs. Only instead of assuming the game is the same old same old, they would be assuming that the game has absolutely zero content.
You're probably right that getting rid of them isn't the answer, instead what I'd have suggested was toning down the level of guidance they offered, or at least the type of guidance.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Here's what I see different from Hearts, and general MMORPG quests.
General Quests: You grab 5-6 from a central location. You then make a plan of attack, because it even shows you on the map where to complete such quests. You go out, do the ONE and only way to do said quest, and then move to the next, doing that ONE and only way to do said quest again. You finish all 5-6, return to central area, and turn in quests for xp/loot/moneys.
Not bad, but always felt to hand-holding for me. You have to do this, and get ALL of them to get credit.
GW2 Hearts: It's shown on map, kind of similar to old quests, it also has a large ring around to show you in this area is where to do said quest. Now, the difference lies in completion. It's not a simple, capture 10 fish, and only 10 fish, no more than 10 fish, because the NPC only wants 10 fish! Instead it's, capture fish, or feed the fish to bear cubs, or de-activate bear traps, or kill bear poachers. Because the point of the quest is to help/feed the bear cubs. And there is more than 1 way to do that. Then when you're done, check your mail, vuala, moneys and XP is already granted.
GW2 still hand-holds on Hearts, but that's what they're for. Normally a Heart will spark a DE in the lowbie zones, to get players used to understanding how DE's evolve, and to follow them. They aren't the steak of the meal, it's the side of green pea's that I hate. Some people like green pea's, but I don't. They have to be done right for me to down them. And even then.... ugh.
That's my understanding of the "questing" system in gw2.
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