2,185 days or 5.98 years. That’s how long it took me to get to the end of the Guild Wars 2 core personal story. I don’t know if that’s dedication or stubbornness. Towards the end, it felt a lot like stubbornness.
My problem with Guild Wars 2 is that I keep creating new characters but a few months ago I finally settled on a thief and I’ve taken him all the way through. I finished up the last story mission, Victory or Death, Saturday afternoon and now I can reflect on the story as a whole.
The first act was good with my character’s backstory, I liked the Durmahnd Priory part but as soon as they all formed the Pact I was no longer interested. It was less of a story and more of let’s go run these specific errands before we take down the big, bad, dragon. I really didn’t care for it but I was determined to see it through and finally get out of core Tyria.
Some of the later missions were just plain annoying. Like the part where we were flying to Zhaitan’s lair on the airship and had to fight giant’s and dragons. I felt like I was too squishy as a thief to take out a lot of the spawning enemies and even though I had a bunch of allies on the airship, they didn’t want to help unless I was dead. And I was dead a lot during that mission. It also took me a while to understand what the heck I was supposed to so. Which was man the cannons and shoot until things spawned and then clear them out.
The final mission, Victory or Death was done about as well as it could have been. It felt like an epic battle and I liked taking out Zhaitan with airship cannons rather than my character slapping him with a staff over and over. The cut scenes were pretty cool too. Destiny’s Edge showed back up after disappearing for half the game. I swear if I didn’t run a dungeon and figure out that’s where they all went I would have forgotten about them all together. I’ll have to get around to running all of the dungeons to get their story someday.
What I did like were the Orr zones. They were desolate and weird but also strangely beautiful. I will definitely be visiting them later and fully explore them. I wanted to get the personal story out of the way so I was in a bit of a rush going from green star to green star. The Source of Orr is one of my favorite missions of the personal story. There is a part when fighting an Eye of Zhaitan where all of the sounds cuts out and is replaced by a nice piano solo. It gave the battle a calm, serene, and almost sad feel.
For as forgettable as the last act of the story was I’m glad I played it. It was fun leveling through the zones and seeing new places. after starting characters over an over again, I’ve seen the same things a hundred times. Buton this playthrough I actually got to see content I’ve never seen before. I’m looking forward to playing the living world season 2 and then moving into the first expansion with my thief. I think I’ll stick with him for a good long while. I’m kind of attached.
Many Welps 
I’ve still never finished the Personal Story on a single character, despite having three accouints, 17 level 80s and many thousands of hours played. I also lost interest when I got past the part where you choose your faction. I eventually got as far as Orr but I never progressed to killing
Zhaitan.
That’s somewhat misleading because I did actually do the last fight to kill the dragon all the way back in 2012. I joined a group to help Mrs Bhagpuss do it, back when you could only do it in a group. It was underwhelming.
I might get round to it eventually. I’ve been thinking about it recently. I also might do map completion one day, I guess. Never bothered to finish that, either.
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The last mission in the storyline formerly required a group. And while Bhag says that it was underwhelming for him, I can say that doing that mission in group is acceptable. Even with two persons, so my wife and me, the mission is much more manageable. One person keeps the deck clear, the other one handles the cannons. (Although with two people, it still sometimes is necessary to leave the cannon and help clearing the deck. ) Once I was in there with a guildmate who asked for help. In a full group, it really wasn’t that bad.
Unfortunately the community demanded the mission to be soloable. I mean, I get it: it’s a MMO, nobody expects to play with other people there, and being required to do so is an atrocity. So now you can get in there all by yourself. I did the mission solo on some characters, but even on those which were rather durable, I died several times. No matter how tough your character is, you can’t be at several places at once, which the mission basically requires you to be.
Due to the missions design, you can die through it. Rack enough deaths and you are guaranteed to succeed. But fun is a different thing, and really only happens when you have some people and at least minimum coordination.
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Congratulations!
I was under the impression the last step is still a group thing, because that’s where I’m standing with my first character (also first max-level one). Maybe I should read up and finally get it done as well 😉
And I guess I’m with Bhagpuss on that one – whenever I reach Orr I space out and go do something else. I guess I’m just fed up with zombies.
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