A radical proposal for future content.

[InkstainedGwyn]

Oh man I can't wait to go through five expansions, branching off my choices, only to have the finale differ in hue and saturation between paths [looks at Mass Effect].

Thank you for making the ME reference I almost made. I'm glad I'm not the only one whose brain went there immediately.

[Melichoir]

Problem with choice in an MMO is that it will always come back to the same ending, because everyone has to reach that ending. You cant have a timeline where the scions die cause youre like "Screw you guys! Imma join Zenos!" cause then the end game content will vary drastically.

So if you give decision, eventually we'll have to go back to a similar timeline. Then the complaint is "My choices are meaningless! This is dumb!"

Honestly, Id rather they go harder and hammier on the story. Sometimes I feel its a little to generic and safe. I want betrayel and intrigue and meaningful and meaningless deaths! I want Garlemald to show up at the end of SB here and obliterate Doma for its insurrection, where we fight hard to stop it from happening but still fail and many die because we made mistakes. I want us to be branded as traitors and have that stick until we can prove our innocense. I want to see allies make heroic sacrifices only to be revealed it was a pointless gesture and amounted to nothing. I want to see things not work out like we want, and to sometimes luck out and get something done.

That sounds like debbie downer status, I know. But I think my biggest criticism of the story broadly is everything seems a bit inconsequential and rushed. You cant have highs if you dont get lows. And I think the game avoids downer moments a lot in favor of more 'muted' and inconsequential moments. Its one of hte reasons why I liked parts of the story with Zenos

where you fight him multiple times but pretty much lose. It shows fallibility, and makes beating him mean more.

Edit:
So one consideration I just had is you could 'technically' incorporate player choice in the game by creating subquests lines (like how hildebrand operates) that have 0 effect on the MSQ, but the sub stories could have their own paths and choices, where these sub plots are more solo content than MMO.

[Iscah]

Different games do different things. If you enjoy branching narratives, play a game that has branching narratives.

This is not that game, and when it's a single long-running story that people picked up three games ago because of what it was like at the start, it makes no sense to change the format of it now.

Also, essentially "Western" and "JRPGs" take roleplaying differently. In one, you're creating your own character, in the other, you're literally role-playing as another fixed character.

[BillyKaplan]

I want us to be branded as traitors and have that stick until we can prove our innocense.

Remember when the ending of ARR was handwaved away with the exception of Rahbaun's arm, but that's ok because he's still more or less the strongest guy after us?

I want to see allies make heroic sacrifices only to be revealed it was a pointless gesture and amounted to nothing.

Papalymo.

I want to see things not work out like we want

Rhalgr's Reach.

incorporate player choice in the game by creating subquests lines

Won't happen because they want you to be able to access all content on a single character. So far the only time they broke that was with the starting cities, but we saw how long that lasted and how often they repeated the feat.

[Super_Bee_Brian]

Problem with choice in an MMO is that it will always come back to the same ending, because everyone has to reach that ending. You cant have a timeline where the scions die cause youre like "Screw you guys! Imma join Zenos!" cause then the end game content will vary drastically.

So if you give decision, eventually we'll have to go back to a similar timeline. Then the complaint is "My choices are meaningless! This is dumb!"

Honestly, Id rather they go harder and hammier on the story. Sometimes I feel its a little to generic and safe. I want betrayel and intrigue and meaningful and meaningless deaths! I want Garlemald to show up at the end of SB here and obliterate Doma for its insurrection, where we fight hard to stop it from happening but still fail and many die because we made mistakes. I want us to be branded as traitors and have that stick until we can prove our innocense. I want to see allies make heroic sacrifices only to be revealed it was a pointless gesture and amounted to nothing. I want to see things not work out like we want, and to sometimes luck out and get something done.

That sounds like debbie downer status, I know. But I think my biggest criticism of the story broadly is everything seems a bit inconsequential and rushed. You cant have highs if you dont get lows. And I think the game avoids downer moments a lot in favor of more 'muted' and inconsequential moments. Its one of hte reasons why I liked parts of the story with Zenos

where you fight him multiple times but pretty much lose. It shows fallibility, and makes beating him mean more.

Edit:
So one consideration I just had is you could 'technically' incorporate player choice in the game by creating subquests lines (like how hildebrand operates) that have 0 effect on the MSQ, but the sub stories could have their own paths and choices, where these sub plots are more solo content than MMO.

Dude, you mentioned that you wanted things to fail sometimes.

It did. Heavensward... Protagonist got accused of poisoning the sultana. Remember?

[Melichoir]

Remember when the ending of ARR was handwaved away with the exception of Rahbaun's arm, but that's ok because he's still more or less the strongest guy after us?
Papalymo.
Rhalgr's Reach.
Won't happen because they want you to be able to access all content on a single character. So far the only time they broke that was with the starting cities, but we saw how long that lasted and how often they repeated the feat.

Derp, ok lets break this down real quick:

1) What happened at the end of ARR was cool. Then it was wrapped up pretty quickly in HW. There was no lasting impact really, other than Raubahns arm. And as for that, he's still the toughest guy. "Woops, got my arm lopped off. Its just a flesh wound!" Ill grant Raubahn had better development in SB, but it took a long while ot get there and for basic intensive purposes, nothing changed.

We were literally accused of assassinating a royal (or attempting to), and all that was waved away in pretty quick order. There was no real time in the story where I felt "Hmm, this could be a huge issue for me."

It was "Nah, cleared that up. Everythings back to normal after questing for 20 minutes." It carried no weight, which took a lot of build up and threw it out in favor of rushing us into HW.

2)Paps Gesture is probably the only case of it, at best (and thatd debateable as Im out to point out), and was more used as a "We need to fix this" bandaid rather than a big action that meant nothing. Pap knew more or less what he was doing wasnt going to be a solution, but he had to do it right then and there because it was the best bet given the circumstances. In one light, this meant it wasnt a wasted action, but the right choice, albeit a difficult one. Its not a tragic decision, in the sense that what Pap did was pragmatic and knowingly a short term solution, rather than if he went on a death defying mission, died in that mission, only to reveal the mission wasnt all that important and was a moot point. Like that the intel on the mission was bad or you made a bad choice deciding this was the right course of action and your mistake got a team mate killed.

3)Rhalgers Reach is still there. Zenos literally strolled in, screwed crap up for the MSQ, left, and that was it. And trust me, I like those parts of the MSQ. But The Garleans didnt wipe out Rhalgers. They didnt occupy it. They just came in, broke stuff, and left. Again, part of it is cool, but no lasting consequences and easily resolved.

4)As for solo content, what I suggested was that, a suggestion on how it could be performed. Whether they do it is another story. Likely not, as you have suggested. But it could provide some more lore and engagement that even the devs feel is necessary.

[hynaku]

Option that let me choose size my au ra's horns are that be nice. Also be nice if they gave you option to change color of your scales.

[Shurrikhan]

I'd rather have one longer, more detailed, more cohesive, and individually more entertaining, even if mostly singular path than several paths of lesser quality in those regards.

I'd be happy just having better emote integration during the in-game cutscenes, more dialogue choices, and less static character animations by our selves and the NPCs. Reacting in our own way is enough. I don't need to jump storylines.

[Xlantaa]

That's why exist both of them. For more lineal RPG, you have JRPG, for more free RPG you have WRPG. If we make both the same... what's the point then? I prefer how is it. I like both JRPG and WRPG, but I do not like they become the same. Variety is the key.

For example, on Star Wars The Old Republic MMO, you can choose side with the Empire or the Republic at the beginning, but more ahead, you ca re-choose again, even changing position like being a Sith of the Republic, or a Jedi on the Empire. Anyway, you will fight the opposite faction, that's mean if you have other friend players in the other side, you basically cannot play with them in most of the content. In FFXIV what happens if you choose Empire, but your players Choose Eorzean Alliance?

And I must add. SWTOR is a BAD MMO. Very bad. Not only because is programed like shit (it is plagued by bugs) but story is bad, and one on the reasons story is bad is because this multi-choice system. Does not have consistence. It is bad, specially coming form Bioware, who is supposed to be good a this. May work for single player, but is bad for MMO.

Personally I like the JRPG mode for MMO for this reason mostly.

[Super_Bee_Brian]

Option that let me choose size my au ra's horns are that be nice. Also be nice if they gave you option to change color of your scales.

What does this have to do with the topic? lol

This is about story choices. NOT cosmetics.