This article will contain major spoilers for the new story, the new map, and other additions in the new update, so be warned.
Story
Following the defeat of the titans at the end of the previous update's story, our heroes heed Ura's ominous warning—"the door we came through sits wide open"—and travel to the outskirts of Bava Nisos, bringing us to the new map: Mistburned Barrens. This is where the new story picks up: powerful magic prevents us from advancing further, so the Commander is tasked with surveying the area to search for clues.
Characters
One of the first major changes with this portion of the story is that our adventuring party has changed compared to the first half of the expansion. While we're still accompanied by Pokey and Waiting Sorrow, Caithe and Malice have left Janthir to return to their own duties; taking their place are Countess Anise and Isgarren.
I actually quite like this change. One of the stated goals of the new content model was to use smaller expansions to bring us to locations and address conflicts and ideas that might otherwise not be able to hold up an entire expansion by themselves; in a similar vein, it seems that Janthir Wilds is taking advantage of its story to switch things up and let us spend time with a wider variety of existing characters, which is a very welcome change of pace compared to SotO, where we were bombarded with, like, 20 new major characters to keep track of.
As for Caithe and Malice's departure form the story, I have no issue with this. Caithe's primary motivation for accompanying us was searching for a cure for the Pale Mother; once it was clear the Bearkin didn't have one, she only stuck around because she felt obligated to help deal with the titans. In Malice's case, she held a personal vendetta against the titans due to the Charr's history with them. While I enjoyed having them present—particularly Malice, since she's a character we haven't really spent much time with before—there isn't really a huge need for them to stick around for the rest of the expansion; their part in the story was wrapped up neatly, and now its time for other characters to take the spotlight.
Speaking of other characters, having Anise and Isgarren join the A-team for the latter half of the expansion is an amazing choice. Both of them are characters that, while very important to the world and story, have never directly joined the Commander's adventures before. Their presence also presents an interesting shift in the dynamics of the group: since LW1, the Commander has almost always been accompanied by allies who were subordinate to them; in contrast, we are at best equals to Anise and Isgarren. Isgarren also presents a particularly interesting dynamic with the Commander, in that he is one of the very few member of Team Good that might actually be stronger than us.
Of course, the mere fact that we haven't gone adventuring with them before doesn't alone justify Anise and Isgarren's place in the story. What does is their shared connection with another recurring character in this release: Mabon. The fact that Mabon died so early into SotO—before we really got to know him—is one of the most frequent critiques I see of that expansion's story; his inclusion here in JW almost seems like a direct response to those critiques, and I think it is executed wonderfully.
Bava Nisos was the last bastion of Mabon's people, the Mursaat—a race that is generally treated as unequivocally evil in GW2's story, and for pretty good reason at that. While investigating the ruins of Mistburned Barrens, we encounter Mabon's lingering spirit, which leads us through the area and shows us both some of his own memories and those of some of the others who died here.
We get to see Mabon's strained relationship with his people—the disgust he feels at their actions, and the guilt he feels for his relation to them. It adds some much-needed nuance and backstory to his character, and it provides plenty of opportunities to pluck at the heartstrings of Anise and Isgarren, who both knew him well in life; this is particularly effect, considering that they are both characters that we don't often get to see being emotionally vulnerable.
What is most compelling about Mabon's place in the story, however, is the mystery of his involvement in current events. We're shown that Mabon returned here to Bava Nisos not long before his death in SotO, and it's heavily implied that he might have played a part in the return of the titans, or whatever else is going on inside the city's walls. This troubles our heroes just as much as the glimpses we see of his memories, adding even more nuance to his character.
There is one final character I would like to comment on before we finish this section: Yagon. She is one of several Mursaat ghosts haunting the ruins, and she acts as the main antagonist of Repentance. Her tenure as a villain is short, but her characterization is strong: she's proud, arrogant, haughty, and, most importantly, is the inventor of Spectral Agony, the twisted magic which served as one of the Mursaat's main weapons, one which is specifically designed to cause their targets to suffer agonizing pain rather than merely kill them.
While Yagon herself is a somewhat interesting character, and one of the few examples we get for what the Mursaat were like, what's truly compelling about her is her connection to Isgarren. We learn from her and a few lore books connected to her that Isgarren was feared by the Mursaat, who called him the "Mask Scourge", largely due to an incident where he snuck into Bava Nisos to assassinate Yagon, killing her brutally in broad daylight and in the presence of her family.
This event, and the words Isgarren himself has to say regarding it after we dispatch Yagon's ghost, add some extremely compelling characterization and backstory to our favorite Seer, not only showing us that he wasn't always as reserved as he is now, but also a clear example of just how cruel and ruthless he can be in the pursuit of what he believes is just. I find Isgarren to be an extremely interesting character, and his grey morality and the ways he butts heads with the Commander's own ideals are some of the main driving forces of that; I hope we get more moments like this going forward.
Plot
What stands out to me about Repentance's plot is that the overarching story doesn't really move at all for this entire episode. We enter Mistburned Barrens at the beginning of this release unable to break through the ward around Bava Nisos, prompting us to investigate; we end the release having failed to find a solution, forced to pull back temporarily and discuss solutions with the rest of the Alliance.
To a degree, this seems to me to be an overcorrection after the issues the writers faced in the latter half of SotO's story. With SotO, they tried to pack so much plot into the post-launch releases that they probably could've turned the events in Nayos into a second expansion; this forced them to rush through events in characters, denying them time to really develop the worldbuilding or characters. In contrast, this time around the writers made sure to leave themselves plenty of room to breathe, resulting in what we see here in Repentance, where the overarching plot barely advances whatsoever.
With that said, I definitely prefer this over the rushed pacing of SotO. While the main story might not progress much in Repentance, we aren't just sitting around doing nothing—the fact that the writers gave themselves so much extra space meant that we got to spend basically an entire episode just focusing on the worldbuilding, lore, and characters. I mean, I wrote 11 whole paragraphs on just how the characters were utilized in this release, and I didn't even go into much depth with any of them.
GW2 has an extremely expansive world filled to the brim with compelling lore and worldbuilding and an ever-expanding cast of interesting characters. It's nice to be able to slow down and just focus on those things rather than running headfirst towards the next big threat, and while I'd ideally prefer a slightly better balance of plot progression and character building, I definitely think this is a huge improvement over SotO, showing that the team has learned the right lessons from its failures.
The developments of Repentance leave me eager to see this story's conclusion in the next (and final) installment. While we don't find a way into Bava Nisos, we do manage to determine that there is almost certainly a fourth titan—a fact that the Story Journal makes particularly explicit, in case you missed the implication like I did at first. We end the final instance deciding to convene with the Alliance to explain the holdup and search for solutions, as we still need a way to break into the city in addition to having another titan to deal with.
A plot thread that has hung heavy over this expansion is the existence of the Scepter of Orr, and the question of whether or not we should use it. The reveal of another titan will surely bring it back into the conversation as we meet with the Alliance, and if we do decide to use it this time, I can't help but imagine things somehow going awry. In particular, it would be terrible if there were a mastermind figure manipulating the titans—Menzies, for a popular example—who managed to get ahold of the Scepter after we used it.
Mistburned Barrens
Along with the continuation of the story, this release gave us the third map of this expansion, Mistburned Barrows, and it is a very unique one. What stands out to many players first is that this map is very small—the smallest explorable zone we've ever received, I'm pretty sure (obviously excluding hub zones and the like).
While I've seen plenty of doomerism around this map's small size, I don't actually mind it myself. For one, we really should've seen this coming—the team's original plan was to give us three new map, with the third split in half between two releases. They later changed their minds and decided to give us two separate maps instead of one split in half, but that choice didn't magically generate more development resources for them to use; that the two final maps of this expansion would be relatively small is an incredibly obvious conclusion in hindsight.
That isn't the only reason I think this works, however. Most maps in GW2 are designed to be expansive zones for players to explore—map exploration mechanics are baked into the game's core, after all. In the case of Mistburned Barrens, however, it is very clear that exploration wasn't a core focus; instead, this map was designed with a unique vision in mind, one that is almost laser-focused on its core gimmick, that being the three "survey" event chains. Because this map's main focus was on those events, it doesn't necessarily need to be any bigger than it is—if it were bigger, that'd either just mean the escort events would be pointlessly lengthened, or that most of the extra space would be more or less empty and unused.
Before we discuss the surveys in more detail, I'd like to comment on the imagery and atmosphere of the map. The zone as a whole is visually pleasant, and the team did a good job of using subtler details like lighting to make different sections of it look distinct from each other despite using a lot of the same architecture. If you look at side-by-side screenshots of some of the different areas of the map, they have completely different vibes, but while you're running around the map, the transition between them is subtle enough that you don't really notice.
Surveys
As noted above, Mistburned Barrens is very small, and in addition to that it has very few dynamic events. Instead, the map's focus is placed almost entirely on three looping event chains which it calls "surveys". While the official blog post insists these aren't meta-events, they really are just mini metas in all but name. They remind me most of the "outpost" event chains from HoT, which were another form of totally-not-meta-event.
The barrens' surveys differ from typical metas and from outposts in two ways: firstly, they loop very frequently, with just a short break between the end of each survey and its first event triggering again; secondly, some parts of each survey chain rotate between different possible events each time the chain runs. All three chains occur independently of each other, meaning there's almost always something happening on the map. The final event of each chain awards players with a large chest that can only be looted if you participated in the survey, and it grants a container with even greater loot if you had high participation (meaning you participated in 3 events of the chain).
The main goal of Mistburned Barrens seems to be to allow players to continually farm the event chains, providing them with events to constantly jump between (similar to Silverwastes, Dragonfall, Drizzlewood, etc). With that in mind, the quality of the map as a whole rests on one fact: are the new events fun?
I personally think the surveys are decent, but nothing to really write home about. They're pretty short, only consisting of three or four events each, and the individual events are fairly simple and generic. The central and southern chains both have a simple escort as one of their events, and the mid-bosses are all generic champion enemies. Two of the possible final bosses at the end of different chains (the fights against Yagon and Manikaz) are also basically just fights against more generic champion enemies with a couple new mechanics happening around them. None of the events are particularly bad, they're mainly just a bit basic and uninspired.
The chain that's the most unique is definitely the north chain, which puts a spin on your classic escort event by having the NPC you're escorting enter an area that players cannot, tasking you with collecting essence to throw down at the NPC instead of helping it kill enemies directly. While this event is unique, it's also a bit long and gets repetitive quick, especially if you're farming the map and end up doing it multiple times in a short period; I think it would be massively improved if they simply buffed the damage of the Jade Armor so it got through the enemies a little faster. One of the possible events of the southern chain, where you use a special rifle to protect scanners from bees, has a similar issue: it has a unique premise, but it takes too long and gets old quick because of it.
Ultimately, while the events are fairly simple, they're still decently fun, and running between different lanes as you finish each one can be a great time. The map's small size and simple layout are a benefit in this regard, making it very quick and easy to catch up to any of the three surveys from either the central waypoint or either of the other lanes.
Everything Else
While the new story and map make up the brunt of what most players will experience in this update, there are a few other notable additions that I'd like to comment on.
Wing 8 Raid CMs
This patch gave us the Challenge Modes for all three wing 8 bosses, and we'll be getting a Legendary Challenge Mode for Ura on the 25th. On patch night, I spent about 2 hours progging Decima CM with some friends, and while we only got her down to ~70%, I can confidently say already that it looks like an amazing fight, and taking it on was incredibly fun. I've yet to see what Greer and Ura's CMs look like, but I'm optimistic that they're of similar quality. I've heard a lot of misgivings about Greer, though, so maybe not.
I'd also like to say, I'm a big fan of the bosses having different names in CM. Reminds me of Nightmare and Shattered Observatory; very fun detail.
Janthiri Bee
This patch added a new pet, the Janthiri Bee! This seems to all but confirm that JW will be following the same pattern as SotO regarding new ranger pets—that being one pet each on launch, in the 2nd major patch, and in the 3rd. Assuming they stick with the same general expansion format going forward, it's safe to assume that the same will go for this ranger pet release pattern.
Greer Convergence
The Mount Balrior Convergence finally gained a second boss in the form of Greer. Which boss appears at the end of the Convergence rotates on a weekly basis.
I haven't done the Greer Convergence; oops. I may update this post later with my thoughts on it after I do, but I'm pretty sure I missed his week, so that might take a little while.
Mursaat Shadowcraft
Finally, this patch brought us a new Mastery line in the form of Mursaat Shadowcraft. It contains three new Masteries: one that allows you to use mursaat mirrors to traverse the map, one that grants you extra map currency for events in Mistburned Barrens, and one that provides increased rewards from the grand chests at the end of surveys.
The latter two Masteries are rather uninteresting, being just additional iterations of the "loot Mastery" concept which has become more and more common over time. Let's instead focus on the mursaat mirrors, since they actually do something interesting. Notably, obtaining this Mastery is mandatory to progress the Repentance story, and the point where it is required appears very early on.
Mursaat mirrors are dotted around Mistburned Barrens, as are a number of impassable red spheres that teleport anyone who touches them to a random point on the map. Interacting with a mirror with the Mastery will transform you into a wisp that moves automatically along a set track, with a single predetermined route for each mirror. Each route takes you within one of the impassable spheres around the map.
Though an interesting concept, the mursaat mirrors are... kind of lame, in execution. For one, the idea of a Mastery that lets us teleport across the map is nothing new—we already have the Jackal's sand portals, the raven portals in IBS, and even the jade teleporters in EoD; the mirrors are the same thing but with a long, drawn-out animation.
The Mastery's originality aside, its implementation is also rather uninspired. Each impassable sphere contains some combination of Mastery insight, obsidian gathering node, or locked chest, and there's no reason to enter them aside from to harvest those resources or grab the Mastery points on your first visit to the map. Due to the slow animations, they aren't useful for getting across the map more quickly, either.
To make the Masteyr more interesting and useful, I think it would've been nice if the travel animation was faster and if the mirrors brought you to a wider variety of locations rather than being used almost solely for resource gathering. It'd also be nice if the mirrors appeared across more than just Mistburned Barrens—I'm sure we'll see them again inside Bava Nisos's walls, but it might've made sense to retroactively add a couple to Janthir Syntri, as well. As they're used now, the mirror Mastery just feels like a key for a handful of specific locks rather than a unique new ability, which is becoming more and more of a common theme with each new set of Masteries we get.
Conclusion
I feel like the latter half of this review had a rather negative tone to it, so I'd like to clarify here in the conclusion that I actually quite like this patch. It is a bit of a small one, with it being quite easy to completely explore the new map and earn all its achievements in just a couple days, but it also brings new repeatable content in the form of the Raid CMs, the Greer Convergence, and the three survey event chains.
While I think the surveys could certainly be improved to be more enjoyable, they're perfectly serviceable as-is. The events are short and simple, which might make them seem a bit lackluster as the primary focus of this patch, but it also means they're easy to pick up at a moment's notice; it'll always be fairly easy to hop onto the map and run a quick survey, as opposed to other farmable maps such as, say, Gyala Delve, which pretty strictly require a large, semi-organized group to get anything done.
I find the direction of the story in this patch very promising, and overall I think Repentance is a good indication that the team has learned a lot of good lessons from SotO's flaws. I'm looking forward to the final patch, and I believe we have every reason to believe the next expansion will be even better—especially after they just announced they're extending its development period by two months. And who knows—we're getting a small patch on the 25th for Ura LCM, and it's entirely possible the team will address some of the issues with the Barrens in that patch.
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