I have 100% queensdale and 100% the capital north of it.  I've salvaged everything I've found, harvested every node I've come across (without having to go too far out of my way), and crafted as much as I can.  I've done no WvW, but otherwise I've done everything except pointlessly grind.  I've done every dynamic event at least once, and several twice.

I'm level 16.  Only by doing every single other possible thing save for WvW, have I been able to keep up with the levels of my personal story.  That's a problem. 

Crafting and harvesting should be optional, as should WvW, as should dynamic events.  But you certainly can't skip all three, because without them, the game has a SERIOUS lack of content.  Not only that, but running around to get points of interest and vistas is a horribly inefficient, and in my opinion UNFUN way to level.  It pays off when you get 100%, with special goodies I hadn't gotten from anything else, so now I feel like I have to complete every single zone or miss out.

It's like they could not be bothered to put real content in the game.  The hearts are a massive cutting of corners to normal questing, and at best, they count as a single quest, a glorified kill x, deliver x, collect x.  The dynamic event system, which many fans have proclaimed to be so much more interesting than earlier iterations in previous MMOs such as Rift and WAR, are nothing of the sort, at least not in queensdale.  In fact, since everyone just does their own thing, they may as well have a scorecard at the end, but they don't.  You almost always get gold contribution for showing up, and sometimes you'll get silver despite practically solo'ing the thing. 

Crafting:

I actually like the crafting system, though I would like it more if other parts of their game, such as the trading post, worked.  However, the GW2 provides no guidance.  It doesn't tell you how you will learn new crafting recipes outside of mere discovery, which makes a final product. 

Graphics:

The artwork of the terrain and structures is honestly the best thing GW2 has to offer.  While at the same time the character models, especially faces, look a decade old.  They have a somewhat asian androgynous bent to them as well. 

Personal Story:

I have to list this here because it's something that bothered me in Kotor as well.  I don't want the story to be about me in an MMO.  I want to have long involved quests about the people around me, and how I interact with them.  My past is my own and should be decided by ME at character creation.  Writing my story for me through the game puts a layer of separation between the character and the player and lessens immersion.  It's nice that they give me some choices at the beginning of the game concerning my origin, but I'd rather just skip all that and have normal questing, though not the short dumb quests other MMOs offer these days.

Grouping:

There is none at this point.  Massive failure for an online RPG in my opinion.  The game is a solo fest.  Even when you are bumping elbows with another person, they are nameless and silent and solo'ing.  This is bad for the community.

Overflow:

This is even worse.  A queue would have been better.  The bad apples do not move on from an RP server to a non-RP server due to an overflow server, but the people who actually care about a sense of community very well might.  Anet is weeding out the wrong people.  However, most people won't be going anywhere, because why would they when they can still play?  If they were going to do overflow, they could have at least had separate overflows for each server, or create server clusters of overflow. 

Server rulesets:

Another error.  PvP FFA or at least world PvP servers, where the opposing server can invade regular zones would have been awesome, and having a couple official RP servers would have been nice as well.  But no soup for you.  You get one server type, deal.

Combat:

You can dodge twice before running out of juice.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.  I tend to use it to try to get some distance between myself and an enemy, or pack of enemies.  It's an alright idea, but double tapping a direction key is something I can't do on the fly like that, so I remapped it to spacebar, then I realized, why didn't Anet just change jump to dodge while in combat?  Oh well.  Now I have to jump with the alt key.  It's clumsy, but I need to be able to dodge, as it's one of the few complexities this combat offers.

Otherwise I sort of hate the overall combat setup.  There's no mana bar, stamina bar, no resource bar for attacks at all.  And your first five abilities are dictated to you based on the weapon wielded.  You have some room for customization if you use a one hand and off-hand, but two handers give you no choices, take them or leave them.  You cannot even move the abilities around on the bar.  The first attack is a spammable auto attack with a cast timer that can be interrupted with any of our other abilities, all of which rely on cooldowns in place of real combat skill management.

So with the exception of abilities that do AoE with light damage and nothing else, you simply prioritize your cooldown abilities, and fire all of them off whenever they are up unless the enemy is so low on health it would be a waste.  It's pretty boring.  Especially considering they could have gotten rid of the auto attack nonsense, put in stamina, and had you manage ability usage based on how tiring they were, rather than cooldowns all the way.

You get some customizable abilities in the other 5 slots, but so far they seem lackluster (on the ranger).  I get a trap that slows enemies, unfortunately they have to be on top of me already killing me for it to work since I have to cast it at my feet.  I get a heal, thank god, and a passive that removes conditions.  There's other choices, but they suck.

I actually don't mind the idea of skills being tied to the weapon you are using, but how about just 2 for 1 handed weapons, 3 for 2 handers, and an off hand adds 1.  Let us choose which ones out of the current ones to add to our bar, and add 2 more skill slots from a new category focused on damaging attacks that we get to customize, and I'd call it a fair compromise. 

Traits:  I have 6 trait points.  I can't say much about them.  Their existance however, does not invalidate the above I assure you.

Summary:

I've mostly listed what I didn't like, but overall the game is enjoyable, or at least tolerable while I try to get to higher levels.  But the rate of leveling outside of WvW is pretty slow, and the game overall has a serious lack of options in terms of what you do with your time and how you play your character.   I feel like I'm missing five levels I should have due to how much I went out of my way to complete everything.  Anet owes me some XP. 

Despite the good in the game, the lack of real grouping, and real quests is a major game design flaw.  I can see how some feel like they are trying to break the mold, but to me it's just cutting corners.

Originally posted by Hydros13
Are you sure you are playing GW2? After reading this, it seems you are playing something entirely different from what I'm playing.

lol 

Different strokes for different folks.

Originally posted by Hydros13
Are you sure you are playing GW2? After reading this, it seems you are playing something entirely different from what I'm playing.

These are his opinions.  Why invalidate them simply because you don't agree with them?  I happen to agree with quite of few of the things he said, both positive and negative.  The thing I most agree with is his paragraph about the shortcomings of the game on a social/community level.  

Originally posted by RebelScum99

Originally posted by Hydros13
Are you sure you are playing GW2? After reading this, it seems you are playing something entirely different from what I'm playing.

These are his opinions.  Why invalidate them simply because you don't agree with them?  I happen to agree with quite of few of the things he said, both positive and negative.  The thing I most agree with is his paragraph about the shortcomings of the game on a social/community level.  

Well the thing about social and community is that they are not required but are optional.  Always will be and should be.  Forcing social interaction between players is not healthy, it is not good and it does not create a good community.

A good gaming community builts itself and its not forced upon the player base but hey logic and common sense are hard for people like you and the op. 

FYI, I have not done any soloing in GW2 yet.  I have been in a group since the 25th.  I am level 39, up to date on my story quest (can bring friends with you).   So why are you soloing if you do not want too?  Seems to me you want to solo because if you did not want to solo, you would be a group because nothing is stopping you, not even exp as Exp is the same in or out of a group.

Originally posted by adam_nox

 

Crafting and harvesting should be optional, as should WvW, as should dynamic events.  But you certainly can't skip all three, because without them, the game has a SERIOUS lack of content.  Not only that, but running around to get points of interest and vistas is a horribly inefficient, and in my opinion UNFUN way to level.  It pays off when you get 100%, with special goodies I hadn't gotten from anything else, so now I feel like I have to complete every single zone or miss out.

 

While I respect your opinion and know that this game is not for everyone, you basically said in the above paragraph that if you skip all of the content, there's a serious lack of content.

Just because you don't enjoy the content, doesn't mean it isn't there. There's a ton of content in this game. I am level 15 and have completed exactly what you say you;ve completed, and I have 6% of the world completed. Now, since I thoroughly enjoy all of the content so far, that leaves me with a metric ton of content to look forward to.

So there's not a serious lack of content by any means. There's a serious lack of content that you enjoy, and that's different.

The game is huge with a LOT to do for anyone who enjoys this type of content.

Edit -- I'm assuming (yeah yeah, I know...) that there's continued content in all of the areas of the world. If there are gigantic areas with zero content, then my above statement will be wrong of course. I can only judge based on the ton of content from levels 1 - 15. Hopefully this continues onward.

Originally posted by MercurialG
I honestly don't think I could possibly disagree anymore with your post.  I get what you are saying so it is definately not a troll post.  However it really seems like you are have blinders on or have completely bought into the typical MMO and are trying to make this game the same.  This game is not about pushing through levels, or getting 100% completetions.  This game is about having fun.  If you like to craft, then craft.  If you like to explore then explore.  If you like both then definately do both.  There are 5 different zones that are level 1-15 so you have four other places to look at.  With level scaling they will not be trivial.  You could try the 15-25 zone but after how you explained your combat tatics I would strongly advise against it.  Combat in this game is not about blowing cooldowns, it is about setting up conditions and boons and getting the right combos and finishers.  There is a really really deep layer that makes the combat in this game great.

This, basically.

I do 0 PvP.  I spend more than a normal amount of time gathering and exploring, while doing hearts and DE's as I do so.

I never find myself more than 2-3 hours away from my next PS quest. My advancement seems to come at about an hour and a half per level; longer if I'm wandering around where I've already been or crafting, much shorter if I'm in a new area running through hearts and DE's.  In many cases, the same DE I participate in that gets me to the next level puts me about 20% into that level by the time it's over.

I never feel like I have to "grind" anything, or that I've hit some wall that means I have to go out and just kill random crap in order to level.  I feel like there's nowhere I can't go within my level, or under, that I can't get the XP I need to advance.  And getting XP for "downtime" activities adds to that feeling that there's no such thing as wasted time, from a levelling OR fun standpoint.

So much of the OP, particularly the bit about hearts being something of a lazy way to develop quests seems to miss the point, IMO.  It just seems like an extremely burnt out and cynical way to look at it.  And I thought I was a cynic! 

But like Mercurial said, OP, I appreciate you being fair and commend you on avoiding the baiting rhetoric that tends to get snuck into forum reviews, these days.  I hope you find the game you're looking for!