Guild Wars 2

Hi there,

I’ve come back to GW2 after a few years, and I got one question – I got a 80 lvl necromancer who was geared for fractals, and had half exploration of the world, now I want to raise a ranger. After all changes to the game, I got a question or two:

a) is full map exploration needed to get the most power out of my character, and how important is it? (note: I’m not in mood to play “hardcore” or raid intensively, so I don’t mind going for 80-90% of power instead of 100%) I’d love to raise that ranger, but I wonder if leaving that necro would be a big waste nowadays and I’d need to spend around 100h to get that new character “working” for the new expansions

b) are there any prerequisites to start HoT/PoF stories, do I need to complete whatever basic game offered in terms of Living World? (apart from being 80 of course)

c) can I earn any mastery or elite traits before I hit 80 – I’m thinking of boosting that ranger and still do some exploration anyway, at the same time trying to do HoT storyline (if possible)

Thanks in advance

You don’t need map exploration, all it wards you is a title, a star next to your name, and a gift for crafting legendary weapons.. nothing of power.

You will however, need to explore the expansion zones to gather hero points to skill your elite specialisation. Don’t bother with the HPs in Central Tyria, you need more than 250 of them an that would take too long- the HPs in the HoT maps give 10 a piece although they are much more difficult usually.

If you’re trying to power level before the expos, don’t bother. You can only fully collect what you need to play them by playing the expo itself.

There are no prerequisites to start the stories, but to experience the full story you will need to buy LS2 (before HoT) and LS3 (post-HoT) off of the gemstore. These will also bring in new maps, which are alot of fun to play and where the majority of the level 80 content and rewards is these days, you even get stat-selectable ascended trinkets and backpieces from playing these maps with four-stat sets.

Also, by skipping Living Story you may find that you don’t have enough mastery points (MPs) since there’s alot fewer achivements to do for them.

You can go Core->HoT, or Core->PoF it doesn’t matter, but you need to be lv80. Keep in mind that skipping HoT for PoF will let you miss out on certain masteries like gliding that also apply in Central Tyria and future expansion zones.

If you level a newbie for the expos make sure you start out in tanky exotic gear, something like Solider or Dire, don’t try in glass or rare gear. Basically, you need to be well built because the enemies are more powerful.

Hopefully this helps..

a) No. But full map completion gives ‘gifts of explorations (2)’ – you need these for crafting legendary weapon.
b) You need level 80 character, no story progress is required, your brand new character will be considered a ‘commander’ who made ‘amazing’ things – aka passed full base game story… I don’t want give you some spoilers here
c) Yes, the point is you can unlock elite specialisation by hero points from Tyria or Maguma jungle, after boosting character to 80 you will get enough points for unlocking all traits of base class (everything except elite spec) also it’s very easy to get it unlocked since you get 10 hero poitns for each ‘green hero point’ in maguma.

Feel free to boost your ranger, I wouldn’t recommend using booster if it is your first character ever in gw2 :P

Hi !

Are there any prerequisites for the new specializations in the upcoming expansion PoF ? I mean, if I didn’t invest any hero points in the berserker elite spec for my warrior, could I still use them for the Spellbreaker spec ?

soni.4037:

Hi !

Are there any prerequisites for the new specializations in the upcoming expansion PoF ? I mean, if I didn’t invest any hero points in the berserker elite spec for my warrior, could I still use them for the Spellbreaker spec ?

We don’t know yet. On spec, many players are running alts through HoT HP zergs to slurp up all the extra HP they can. The main question is whether ANet will this time be ok with people unlocking the elites very quickly or will again want players going through the content for a while first. Or it could be a combination, you can apply HoT HP (which are fungible with Pact HP, really) to PoF elites, but must also do some quest lines in PoF to get the right to spend the HP on training.

But think of it this way: worst comes to worst and your banked HP don’t help, you can go ahead and get the berserker elite after all Meanwhile you’re as ready as anyone else is for PoF.

Thank you for your answer !

As you said I think I’ll play it safe for now and I’ll bank them until we can know for sure