Black Raven Dragoons

[Grimblast]

Just got this on my usual feeds of info. Looks like their next story arc starts February 18th and is called "Escape from Lions Arch". I might be interested in this if I find the time of course but just like any living story content, I'm sure they will whisk it away.

[Zancarius]

As if Lion's Arch wasn't already lag city.

[Highgrade]

why do you think we have to escape from it Thal....... Gosh way to ruin the entire story arc man.

[Zancarius]

You're not actually fighting Aetherblade pirates. You're fighting random disconnects and long-standing bugs no one's bothered to fix.

What bothers me is that this is only the penultimate entry in the Scarlet arc. I'll be glad when we're done with her for good. People hate her not because she's an exceptionally good (or convincing) villain, but because she's fantastically stupid and annoying.

Judging by the latest content that's been impossible on all but a handful of servers (and even then it seems no one can consistently do the new content anyway), it seems like it's new content for the sake of new content. And probably to quiet down those idiots who were complaining that the PvE end game wasn't hard enough and threatened to leave for another game.

I wonder if this means we'll be left with NEW! EXCITING! content that'll stick around for 4 weeks that no one can actually do because it's too difficult?

[Elade]

I think Scarlet's whole spiel would have been a lot better if they had just delivered it differently. The story itself obviously took some thought and planning, but the way they implemented it made it kinda stale (and the acting could use some work, but that's not anything new ).

Also it's evident that Anet is moving towards events that involve the entire server. As far as I know, BG and conglomerate, multi-server guilds are the only ones who have been able to complete the new content. Don't get me wrong, the fights are exciting and refreshing in their non-zerg strategy, but it does leave out the smaller servers that lack the numbers and organization inherent to large servers. Anet is really good at generating content that doesn't go stale after one week when it comes to the large scale events; I just wish they'd start using those skills for those of us that enjoy playing the game with small groups of people.

[Zancarius]

I think Scarlet as a villain is more like imagining an autistic child with a stroke of evil genius and a penchant for mechanical deathtoys. Her persistence, uncanny knack for appearing throughout every installment of the living story, and her love of blood thirsty robots elevates her to Dr. Wily status. If this continues, I might suggest that ArenaNet give us all blue outfits and a megabuster.

Hopefully once this is all done with Lion's Arch being turned into a mini-Cataclysm we can get on with more permanent content. Still, I'm worried that they'll let her escape in a little UFO pod thing (I'd tip my hat if they include the eyebrow wiggle), but certainly not more than if the last installment of the living story involves anthropomorphic pandas.

Their fascination with having server-wide content requiring large scale cooperation is understandable and is a worthwhile experiment. The problem is that it's something very difficult to attain in the context of a video game where the only requisite training is that you can breathe and click a mouse. Hence, their latest "non-zerg" encounters require zerg-like numbers, a small dose of luck, and enough mouth-breathers to hopefully keep the enemy occupied long enough to poke it in the abdomen. Or whatever other sensitive bits of anatomy are within easy reach. The low-hanging fruit of dungeon-like encounters as it were.

That said, hundreds of disorganized players requiring substantial organization truly is problematic, and I'm not sure of the best solution. An infinite number of monkeys with an infinite number of typewriters isn't going to produce the collective works of Shakespeare. It's going to produce an infinite number of broken typewriters. The only difference is that you don't get cunt jokes interspersed with other juvenile humor when you're dealing with monkeys. Imagine how awkward that'd make it for the scientists working in infectious disease labs featuring primates. You haven't lived until an ape has called you a "dick fiddling cunt banana."

I know. Maybe ArenaNet should buy us some chimps to play with. At least they won't call my mother bad names. They might actually do Tequatl right the first time.