Guild Wars 2

If takes way more time and effort to get the Gift of Exploration than to get the Gift of Magumma. It’s very uneven to have them both end up being roughly equivalent in terms of function. It would make a lot more sense to break things down a bit more, and give us gifts for each of the regions of Tyria equally, ie Gift of Kryta (Divinities Reach, Queensdale, Kessex Hills, Gendaran Fields, Harathi Hinterlands), Gift of Tarnished Coast (Bloodtide Coast, Sparkfly Fen, Mount Maelstrom, Timberline Falls), etc. Then all the gifts would be for areas that are approximately equivalent in size. This would require some playing with the recipes (probably you would need a few gifts per), but evening it out so all legendaries have the same amount of effort involved would be nice from a balance perspective.

The effort and costs for the HoT legendaries are shifted when compared to the core ones. While the Gift of Maguuma may be easier, take a look at the ingredient beside it, the Gift of Insights.

Personally, I think it’s easier to acquire the Gift of Exploration than to acquire the Gift of Maguuma and other Maguuma Gifts. I have most of the Gifts (or the required items to craft the Gifts) for a Core Legendary, and I’ve not tried to acquire a single item. Just things I’ve picked up in play. I have nowhere near any Maguuma Gifts, with the exception of, maybe, Aurillium, if that’s even an item/material needed.

Of course, just one player’s opinion.

As Greener suggests, it doesn’t matter that Exploration is or is not equivalent to Maguuma — what matters is if the total effort (for the final stage of the process) is comparable. So you have to look at all the components, not just those two.

The Gift of Maguuma is weighed a little less in the crafting of a HoT legendary. The Gift of Insights is more comparable to the Gift of Exploration. It requires you to max out the four mastery lines.

In any case, for the amount of work involved in world map completion to get the Gift of Exploration, you DO get two of them, so it’s sort of moot.

Central Tyrian Exploration takes longer, but is far easier because you never have to rely on other players to get any of it done. What you’re suggesting is to add another tier of crafting to legendary weapons for the same result, which would be more unnecessary micromanagement.

Astra Lux.2846:

The Gift of Maguuma is weighed a little less in the crafting of a HoT legendary. The Gift of Insights is more comparable to the Gift of Exploration. It requires you to max out the four mastery lines.

In any case, for the amount of work involved in world map completion to get the Gift of Exploration, you DO get two of them, so it’s sort of moot.

So you can divide the number of core maps in half for a better comparison.

Gift of Insights is also closer to the Obsidian Shards it replaces than the Gift of Exploration since the masteries doesn’t matter after the first weapon. The elephant in the room the OP is ignoring is the Crystalline Ingots …

When HoT first came out the currency along with the sparks/oil/dust was also pretty grindy to get, especially the sparks.

You don’t have to max out all masteries to make the core legendary weapons. There are also other account-bound items required for the HoT legendary weapons. So the 20-24 hours spent getting the gifts is neglible.