I thing I find strange.....well, a few.....

[Madruck]

Quests are really kind of rare in GW2 from the looks of it. I get a quest (green star) and then I have to go meet up with someone and go talk with them to further the storyline along, so I'm guessing these are personal story quests. Currently I'm level 8 but my next quest is level 11 from what it says and I'm not sure if I should go do it yet since I'm like 3 levels away, should I go do it now or level up a bit? Also, I see the heart quests (Dynamic Events) and I've done like a whole bunch of them in Queensdale, but I don't see just normal run of the mill quest givers anywhere and I can't fill up on like 5 or 6 quests and then run them back when I'm done.

I'm sure this is the part where I'll be told to "forget about questing as I know it because the whole idea of questing has evolved" or to "forget about what I've seen in other MMO's and explore a bit", but you know what.......? That gets boring. I want some stuff to do instead of chasing green stars one at a time and doing heart quests. I'm beginning to think that the "naysayers" are correct about this game not having enough meat on it's bones.....

[Vayne]

First of all heart quests are not dynamic events. THey're different. Dynamic events often occur around heart quests and some you can start yourself.

But the personal story doesn't replace questing in other games, and was never meant to. If anything it replaces missions in Guild Wars 1. Guild Wars 2 quests are dynamic events. But don't assume that they're just one thing and you leave. A lot of dynamic events chain into other events.

And if you find that boring, you're probably not going to enjoy PVe in this game.

[Madruck]

First of all heart quests are not dynamic events. THey're different. Dynamic events often occur around heart quests and some you can start yourself.

But the personal story doesn't replace questing in other games, and was never meant to. If anything it replaces missions in Guild Wars 1. Guild Wars 2 quests are dynamic events. But don't assume that they're just one thing and you leave. A lot of dynamic events chain into other events.

And if you find that boring, you're probably not going to enjoy PVe in this game.

As soon as I finish a heart quest the person I'm helping immediately becomes a vendor and then that's it. Every event I've been a part of has ended after it was done with nothing more to offer, and I've hung around and spoken to NPC's and waited and still nothing. I killed a wasp queen, I've fended off Centaurs, I've gathered apples, and other such things and nothing.

So there is no actual questing in this game aside from hearts and green stars I take it? I'm enjoying it, but it's not been the game I thought it would be and there isn't a whole lot to do so far.

[Vayne]

You must be playing a different game than I am.

Heart quests are identified by a heart, and they are solo quests, no group quests. You fill the heart bar alone. Dynamic events have different icons to identify them. Crossed swords for combat, shields for escorts, baskets for gathering, but they're completed by groups. THere are also group events the word group will appear in the quest tracker, made for more than one person. You can solo very few of these.

I don't know what zone you're in but it sounds like you might be in the sylvari zone. Depends a lot maybe on your server too. Sylvari are popular on my server and there are more people there and tend to be more events than other servers. Humans are universally popular across all servers. On most servers, norn and human starting areas will have the most events, because they have the most people. That said, you can take your character to any starting zone to look for events. You're not stuck in your racial starting zone.

But in the Sylvari area, there's a very early event where you gather firefly essence to light lamps. If you get enough, you finish the event. If you stay around for a few seconds, the sylvari you give them to lights the lamps, which draws in a ton of giant mosquitos which have to be dispatched. One event piggybacks off another.

I used this example specifically because there are two events early in the area I suspect your in. Later in the game, event chains are much longer and sometimes intersect with each other.

The trick is to be on busier servers in busier areas, I think.

[Centaur]

You're right that the green stars are your personal story missions. You have a few of them every 10 levels, and some of them will branch. But doing them won't really help you level much. They are just a little main storyline that runs through the game, nothing more.
As Vayne explained, the hearts are Renown Heart events, not Dynamic Events... they are one-offs and basically solo quests. They give you some points on the map to explore, and they will bring you to different areas of the game, but these are no the dynamic events I spoke of in my earlier post, and yes, these do not have much of a story around them.
The dynamic events will just happen in the world around you while you are there. Occassionally you will see a notice pop up on your right-hand bar that there is an event near, and you will see an orange circle on your map to indicate where. If you go there and participate, then that is the dynamic event. If you participate in one of them, you will either receive a bronze, silver or gold participation reward (depending on how much you did). And several of these dynamic events do have a little story at the start and at the end (though if you run to the orange circle, you will obviously already have missed the story at the start, and it may be a bit tricky to figure out which npc to follow at the end)
Dynamic Events (not Renown Hearts or Personal Story missions) are actually the main content in GW2... they are the real replacement of the traditional quests. And as I wrote earlier, some of them are time triggered, and some are player triggered (either by talking to an npc - often not marked by any heart or circle - or by interacting with a certain object). As Vayne already indicated, the time triggered ones will occur more often if there are more players in a zone... the others you will have to find for yourself (then again, when there are more people playing, chances are larger that someone else will trigger it). It can take some puzzling and exploring to figure out where you need to go and what you need to do to trigger them, but sometimes the results can be huge, as you might just have triggered a large event chain with a really big boss at the end.

[Delvoire]

You are in Queensdale.. so this is what you need to do. Hit up the heart quests as you have. Basically ignore the green icon for the story quests until you are at that lvl or beyond. Unless you are already skilled, the story quests can be a little difficult and you'll end up wiping and breaking your armor a lot. It happened to me a few times early on when I tried to push through with my thief.

Look for the gold circles to pop up with, as Vayne said, Crossed swords, shields, and gathering baskets. These are the dynamic events and help you level up and reward you with gold and such. You can also start dynamic events.

For instance, in the middle of the map on Queensdale there is a small fort surrounded by water. I don't know the name of that area exactly, but it's just about smack dab in the middle. There is usually an NPC in that fort and if you talk to them, they will ask you to help them escort a pack mule further along the road. You agree and BAM! Dynamic event has started. You then follow and kill bandits who try to mug the mule.

Another good thing to do is map completion. Get the Vistas and the Points of Interest and the Waypoints. You not only unlock most of the map, but you get exp, gold, and some goodies as well.

I usually do Map Completion, Hearts, and Dynamic Events to clear the map, then go back and further the story along to go to the next map.

[Fey]

Not gonna lie, I kinda miss real quest chains with proper stories. "Kill 10 rats" can go DIAF, but developed side quests that have their own well written plots are tight. Would make the game feel more alive than it already does.

[Vayne]

Not gonna lie, I kinda miss real quest chains with proper stories. "Kill 10 rats" can go DIAF, but developed side quests that have their own well written plots are tight. Would make the game feel more alive than it already does.

Actually I thought the first halloween quest chain was pretty fun. A bit more involved and you had to solve clues (not that they were massively hard). But it was entertaining, particularly if you didn't use the wiki. My wife and I solved it together and it was a hoot.

[Centaur]

Not gonna lie, I kinda miss real quest chains with proper stories. "Kill 10 rats" can go DIAF, but developed side quests that have their own well written plots are tight. Would make the game feel more alive than it already does.

Actually, I'm still very much enjoying the dynamic events in this game... as many of them do have their own little story. The problem is, most people never get to experience the start of those stories as they just come running in when the gold circle appears on the map... on top of that, many run off again when the event completes, so they never see the end of the story either. I would love to get more (different) dynamic events happening in all the zones, though.

And who knows, if I ever have a whole bunch of time, I might just write a "guide to dynamic event stories" or something like that.

[Fey]

Actually, I'm still very much enjoying the dynamic events in this game... as many of them do have their own little story. The problem is, most people never get to experience the start of those stories as they just come running in when the gold circle appears on the map... on top of that, many run off again when the event completes, so they never see the end of the story either. I would love to get more (different) dynamic events happening in all the zones, though.

And who knows, if I ever have a whole bunch of time, I might just write a "guide to dynamic event stories" or something like that.

Hey don't get me wrong. I love dynamic events too. But the other type is fun also, as long as it's not "Collect 10 bear asses from ass-less bears". I feel like this game has a lot of lore but you don't see any of it. I plan to pick up the books and read up on some of it, but I wish I could experience more of it in game. Like as an actual plot, instead of just an event that's going to spawn again on a timer. Or a statue or a painting or something that just has text to read.