Guild Wars 2

Hi! I saw a lot of people having trouble with this ability, and so to clear up any confusion I’ve created this handy guide on reliably reaching your destination, with no hassle!

Hopefully this guide will prevent any troubles you may have had in getting some of those pesky crystals, and may even teach you how to be a better player!

Thank you. Very good video. I hope everybody checks it out (especially the devs).

If I had any idea how to record my screen, I would do a video showing you what it’s like when a latency pro like myself tries. You think you are good at randomly dying due to glitches? Pffffftttt, you got a lot to learn, son.

For this who didn’t get the sarcasm, this mechanic is unplayable for me and I’m not sure ill be able to participate.

odd/weird/interesting
I have no trouble with Lighning Pull.
However, I can not get the hang of Assisted Jumping.
When possible i use Lightning Pull instead of Assisted Jumping.

So, that video.
Sofar, I never had that the jump is to short or to long, and i also nevr rolled forward when landing. Always landed completely still.
Wierd.

Can I please come over and play at yours, then? This way I may have a chance to actually participate in absolutely anything for the next 4 weeks.

LOL! Thanks I needed a laugh, good video. Sucks that there are always so many bugs in the new content.

I lol’d.

But yeah, in order to do a successful long jump from those mini obelisk to another you gotta wait for the skill to blink. Once it blinks, you are ready to do those jumps, otherwise you will be performing a normal, lower distance jump.

BlueSoda.6297:

LOL! Thanks I needed a laugh, good video. Sucks that there are always so many bugs in the new content.

Actually, this is less of a bug and more of an extremely poor design choice, given their other design choices…

Basicly they’re doing some of the biggest NO-NOs of programming server<→client systems… Such as NOT having diffrent ends performing calculations for the same thing… In this case, your client sends your ground target, relative to where you are… But it isnt actually sending your current location… So the server uses your last sent static coords with adjustments for the relative movements it has recieved since… Now here’s the kicker… Packets DO get lost, and the relative movement ofc, isnt done in realtime… That means the server will ALWAYS have a diffrent location that it uses to calculate where your target is… From where you ACTUALLY are… That means the targetting, will always be off… That’s something you dont normally do in programming…

You have EITHER the server OR the client decide both things… Having the server do it, has some performance issues… Letting the client do it, has security issues… So that makes some programmers not very experienced in client-server systems think it’s a good idea to go with this design… The right design for this “problem” is however, to have the client always do the calculation, but not TRUST the client providing the data. Such as have the client decide what happens, but also have the server VERIFY the input… Such as, the client always decides how it moves and where… But have the server verify if that movement is possible… Say every second, it checks your speed, and your locations a second ago and checks your location now, and sees if it possible that you could have moved that distance given that timeframe, which stops speedhacking… Doing the same for checking terrain is also possible… This eliminates both the main security issues (as well as makes a system available to be easily expanded with additional security checks of this type) as well as the performanceissues, because it’s the server doing all the main calculations, and the major benefit, is that you will never rubberband (classic MMO thing) and the server will never missinterpret your targets or similar…

The problem in this case, is exactly these problems… When you’re jumping short of the target, it’s the same as if you had rubberbanded… As in the server pulls you back because it sends out new coords that you “should” be at, based on the relative movements from your last sent actual coords… Now dont get me wrong… This design choice also has its virtues, Im not bashing that choice… Most MMO games choose it because the method I describe, is more network and server load intensive, meaning they would need more server capacity to handle it, and bigger pipes… And it would also mean it would require faster machines to handle the client, and more bandwidth for the clients….

The thing is, as I said before, they are seemingly too much of beginners in the client-server programming, to understand the weaknesses of their prior choices… When making the choice they’ve made with the network design… One HAS to understand that this WILL limit some other choices, such as “Dont do ground targetting for precision dependant things, such as movement”… THIS is what the devs have forgotten in this case…

In this case, it’s likely a sideeffect of some mass recruitment in the creativity department that doesnt know the limits, combined with programmers and designers not understanding the consequences of the choices. Or that the poor dev that was given the task of implementing this, knew, but didnt dare advice against it for some reason… (that last one I’ve sadly seen waaaay too often ;_;)

Very interesting read. ^

What I would like to know is why all my ground-targeting skills are precise, and all my normal jumping is precise – but in jump pads and aspect skills the game is utterly failing me. It seems they didn’t use the same implementation method on the normal skills, so why the change?

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Very interesting read. ^

What I would like to know is why all my ground-targeting skills are precise, and all my normal jumping is precise – but in jump pads and aspect skills the game is utterly failing me. It seems they didn’t use the same implementation method on the normal skills, so why the change?

I’ve known people to make a jump in this game, land where they were going, teleport down as if they’d fallen, then up again, then down again, and finally stop there. Sometimes it happens more times than that before it accepts a final location: once just messing around in LA near the gate to SC, I leapt off the edge and landed on the boardwalk… then appeared at the top again. Leapt off and landed… then back to the top. Repeated multiple times, finally got down. Alternatively it can be exactly like the first one, where I don’t have to leap off twice, it just goes back and forth for ages.

I think in this case, what makes it so much worse is probably the speed and distances involved. I do notice it with normal skills sometimes, but not usually this severe unless it’s like WvW and the server is on fire because people are fighting in the SMC lord room.

dagrdagaz.4913:

odd/weird/interesting
I have no trouble with Lighning Pull.
However, I can not get the hang of Assisted Jumping.
When possible i use Lightning Pull instead of Assisted Jumping.

So, that video.
Sofar, I never had that the jump is to short or to long, and i also nevr rolled forward when landing. Always landed completely still.
Wierd.

Only thing I noticed with the assisted jump (besides amusing latency that would mean sometimes I ran, pressed jump, fell off the edge, and sprang back up into the air when it realized I’d jumped) is that if you aren’t moving when it starts, you’re pretty much limited to ‘up’ without much ability to steer around, and rarely, for some reason I don’t quite grasp, it doesn’t do anything when you press it… until you take a step, and get shot into the air.

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Very interesting read. ^

What I would like to know is why all my ground-targeting skills are precise, and all my normal jumping is precise – but in jump pads and aspect skills the game is utterly failing me. It seems they didn’t use the same implementation method on the normal skills, so why the change?

All your normal jumping is normal, because the design they’ve chosen is for movement to be relative and what you do to compensate for packetloss in that design, is that you allow for some variation, and at regular intervals, send a true coord from the server, to the client and vice versa.. And then if the variation is small enough, the client data overrides the server, but too large, and the client will update itself according to the server, resulting in a bungieeffect, AKA rubberbanding… For normal movement, that becomes fine unless there is quite significant lag, and VERY annoying if you have any packetloss to speak of…

As for other ground target being precise… I kindof actually doubt that but unless YOU are lagging, the variation for a none movement groundtarget, would be very small. Even for a regular groundtarget movement skill, the imprecision will not be very visible because short distance movement, will not create a diffrence large enough for the server to override the client position… When doing a long jump like with lightning pull however, your position becomes VERY likely to be overwritten… If you’ve had a packet lost that as an example, moves you half a second forward… Well then your jump will be half a second short, or rather the ground target cursor will… Meaning the server will think you targeted somewhere completely diffrent, likely in the middle of the empty space, even though the client doesnt actually allow you to do that…

As for packets being lost… Well that’s not really common unless you’re on wireless connections, EXCEPT when a connection gets overloaded, such as server being loaded beyond capacity… The skill is pretty much accurate without these problems, at 3AM or atleast, accurate enough to not fall short or overshoot as often as it does in primetime…

So, it’s not really that they’re using a diffrent implementation, it’s just that the problems arnt as visible with the short distances of the regular groundtarget movements.

Thanks for the elaborate answer. Makes total sense to me.

Just a shame that I can’t expect anything to be done about this before the end of the event, so I guess I’ll just miss most of it. :’-(

And whenever I get 3rd place in Sanctum Sprint and comment on this…. people say it’s just me =l

The problem is that you’re not walking close enough for the automatic targeting version of the lightning jump skill to kick in. You’re too far away that you have to ground target your jump.

Just walk in closer and watch your icon flip.

Tawa.3180:

The problem is that you’re not walking close enough for the automatic targeting version of the lightning jump skill to kick in. You’re too far away that you have to ground target your jump.

Just walk in closer and watch your icon flip.

OP is using ground targeting.

Tawa.3180:

The problem is that you’re not walking close enough for the automatic targeting version of the lightning jump skill to kick in. You’re too far away that you have to ground target your jump.

Just walk in closer and watch your icon flip.

I’ve died plenty of times using the automatic Obelisk version. Usually it shoots me way too far and I fly past the ledge.

NO way is this awesome thread dying in a sea of whine!
Dabump and +1 for the shrieks.

Also +1 for Fancia ripping of the curtain Anet is hiding behind.

HawkMeister.4758:

NO way is this awesome thread dying in a sea of whine!
Dabump and +1 for the shrieks.

Also +1 for Fancia ripping of the curtain Anet is hiding behind.

It’s not a curtain and they’re not really hiding behind it… It’s just a matter of someone taking a design decision, that was not appropriate given their other decisions… This is something completely normal in large orgs… The sad part is really that for some reason, those that did understand, did not advice against it, or that their advice was ignored… Either way though, it’s not like they’re hiding with this… Not saying something, is not the same as hiding and it’s not normal to divulge too much about their code in programming.

Hilarious Video!

Yeah I sensed a lot of buggyness in that particular skill (especially from trial & error on a very similar platform in the Sprint Race!!) so I just kept running past that part and then used Sun Sprint off the Cliff ABOVE that particular Crystal. …landed right on it the first try and was like “Awwww Yeah so Pro!” … (until I realized it was about 5 feet too short for the FULL distance that a Sun Sprint usually takes you and I should have pressed 2 again )

Fancia.3746:

The sad part is really that for some reason, those that did understand, did not advice against it, or that their advice was ignored… Either way though, it’s not like they’re hiding with this… Not saying something, is not the same as hiding and it’s not normal to divulge too much about their code in programming.

Yeah, I understand.
Actually I´m not even that peeved about the obvious problem with the current content release that the vid shows.

It´s how these things actually harm us players by seemingly making it so easy for the botters to exploit this game, to which ANet´s standard MO is to nerf the Hell out of every halfway decent PvE activity.
I´ve basically given up on crafting because of the bot induced ANet nerfs, usually one of my main funpoints in a MMO.

Just watched it right now, still laughing, thanks!

Great vid, almost exactly what I went through when doing those jumps! At least it prepared me for how to handle the ones higher up near the second way point,

Yeah, I lol’d when I watched the vid, but noticed right away what the problem was. With Lightning Pull, when going to another Lightning Thing (what’s it called? The tall thin pyramid thing?), look at the skill icon on your bar. If you’re watching, you’ll see it “flip” on your bar, and then the red “out of range” bar gets added to the bottom of the skill icon. You may also notice that the pyramid you want to jump to has lit up. This signifies that LP will automatically send you to the next pyramid without the need to ground target. When the red bar is present and you override it with ground targeting, it’s not as accurate (as the hilarious video shows).

Hope that helps!

The auto pull on those ones just over shoots you (well, me and the OP anyway). I found the safest way (for me) to do it is stand away so you get the manual target then aim so that you roll into the pyramid thingy and not overshoot.

But yeah it’s buggy at best. Here’s another example, doing a sprint – I was actually first to the first check point! Reached the bridge – press “3” nothing happens. Fall into water.
Reach bridge again – press “3” no response. At least this time I stopped entirely. Press “3” again and FINALLY the lightning pull activates, now I’m in 12th spot – which is where I usually am. ;p

Not just that part either. For all the lightning bits I usually have to press it a few times before it goes. Not such an issue while exploring but having to -stop- to activate it / ensure it activates is fubar.

“Fubar in a race,” I forgot to add.

ROFL, thanks OP.

For a while I thought “great, here’s gonna be some guy with no latency who thinks we’re doing something wrong” – but nope. Thanks for recording what we’ve been trying to tell anet since the Jp launched

ahahahahah!!
hilarious vid! and also incredibly helpful, thanks!

more guides should be like this, instead of the typical “makes it look easy”

Tawa.3180:

The problem is that you’re not walking close enough for the automatic targeting version of the lightning jump skill to kick in. You’re too far away that you have to ground target your jump.

Just walk in closer and watch your icon flip.

The automatic version overshoots just as easily. I only use it when crossing a gap with something on the other side, like when you’re moving around the market and will just smack into a wall after landing. For the crystals out on small platforms with no wall to hit, I actually had to intentionally avoid the auto target version, and instead manipulate the manual targeted one so that I launched from as far back as possible on the platform and hit the spike in the middle of the next one – else I’d roll right off the far side most times.

Of course, totally at random, it would throw in one where I fell short instead…