Specializations
Were they fun?
- The new mesmer elite specialization is amazing. I can easily see a lot of use of it in pve content and sPvP 5v5 fights. The spec have a lot of wells to make life for enemies harder, and in the meantime to support allies as well. The shield skills are great, as well as the new shatter skill ‘Continumm Split’, which can be very useful for escaping near dead situation or confusing enemies even more. From what i experience the spec is balanced very well, without being too OP.
Revenant: I tried playing Hammer Revenant with Legendary Demon and Shiiro legends. The balance in PvE content is fine, but i have a feeling the class could use a little nerf in PvP. The first skill in hammer stance with Shiiro legend can do redicilous amount of dmg to players in a very short time, all the while making you block projectiles and leaping on enemy forward on enemy locations and going backward to previous ones with the skill 3. Havent tried playing against Revenant, myself. This is all from a perspective as the one playing the class. Still like the staff stance very much. Amazing supportive gameplay.
Did they Change how you play your profession in a meaningful way?
- Speaking for the elite spec on the Mesmer: Indeed. Also it made it way more enjoyable.
How were the improvements to the previous Specializations? (Dragon Hunter, Tempest, Chronomancer, Reaper)
Feedback on new specializations, as well as any changes to the old
– Still haven’t gotten to try more of the new specs. I just got carried away with playing the Chronomancer
Creatures
How is the difficulty of the new hostile mobs, and are they fun and exciting?
- The difficulty seems fine. The little nerf did wonders for more casual players like myself. I had bad experience during night fights in the last beta. Balancing is a difficult thing, as one must try to appease huge amount of players with different take on gameplay, but i think Anet is going in the right direction. There are more difficult fights and more relaxed and casual ones, so I think in this theres something for everyone to play and enjoy.
World
Beautifully crafted and enjoyable. The team really outdid themselves this time. I felt lost many times (which in a sense have a point. We’re in a massive jungle afterall), before i unlocked the masteries, but once i did the map opened in such amazing way to me, that I was litteraly speechless. Hands down the best map ever made in any MMO I’ve played. I cant wait for October 23th to explore the whole region.
With the Opening of two new outposts, we are adding in a bunch of new events. Are they fun?
Yes, a lot. Especially a chain event, with a certain familiar noble The end of the chain event was great, and felt you really accomplished something.
Do the new events bring you more into the world?
- Yes.
Are the new events challenging, meaningful, and interesting?
- Yes. We were defending outposts in the night with a group of five guildies, and some of the events felt really challenging, to the point where certain champions were wiping us with suprising attack all at once. Very fun!
Mastery System
How is the progression?
- The progression is fine. What most people seem to not understand is, that by simply killing mobs around the world will not progress you very fast on the mastery system. The trick here is doing events. By doing few events last night i was able to train 2 masteries and unlock them.
How is it using the mastery abilities in the current area?
Very fun. Gliding and jumping mushrooms opens the area in an amazing way, letting you explore more and more of the jungle. I think most of the people i saw i map chat saying how they are lost around the map, havent simply unlocked their masteries yet, or havent figured out how to use them to their full potential. Im still learning it myself, but im slowly progressing and its more and more fun the longer you do it. The conclude this – You need masteries to fully enjoy the new maps. No way around that, otherwise they can seem very confusing and hard to navigate.
Is the mastery system providing a meaningful area of progression?
- Yes.
Do you care about experience and mastery points?
- Yes I do. You cant fully enjoy the new world maps without them.
Does it provide a good framework to add more masteries in the future?
- Yes, the masteries system is great, and very simple structured. I can clearly see how the system can work to add even more masteries you can use in all of Tyria, not just in the jungles.
Do you want to learn as many masteries over time to overcome challenges later in the future?
- Yes.
Bugs
Report and notify any and all bugs using in game system as well as boards. Take screenshots and describe as best as you can
Here comes the part with the not so enjoyable experience i had in my time exploring the new map.
Textures: Sometimes textures stop to read right, more noticiable on trees and stones. They appear very blurry like and low quality wise, even tho im playing with everything maxed out on 1080p resolution. I even noticed my Sylvari loosing all texture and glow effects even during night, and appearing greenish with low quality textures on the model. (So far noticed this only while playing Sylvari. All other races appear to lack this issue). I will get back and post a screenshot of those as soon as I can.
The world: Many times i noticed drops in the sound, and animations not appearing right, like the Chronomancer wells animations. This can be very confusing, especially in big zergs, when you and your alliase want to stand on or near those well to receive the boons from them. The skill ‘Prestige’, skill 1 on torch, still very often fail to trigger stealth as it should. This can be very annoying in sPvP fights where this skill can be the difference between continuing the fight or getting overwhelmed fast.
Mobs: Encountered few giant beetles who just displayed ‘Immune’ above them, and nothing I did to them appeared to affect them in some way. In the end i just gave up, after 2 mins of unsuccesful attemps, and used an jumping mushroom to fast get away from them. Sorry no screenshots, but I think my explanation was quite clear. This bug only happended with the giant beetles and with them alone.
I havent personally noticed any bugs with the gliding system and the jumping mushrooms. Everything seems to be working fine there, base on my experience.
The summarize: I had a blast and a great fun so far in the BW2 and Im very much exited for the launch at October 23th. I think Anet team have been quite hard at work, and they bought us a great beta experience this weekend. They were fun things, and they were some annyoing bugs and moments, but that how it is with beta testing. All and all i think Anet are on the right direction with this expansion.
Cheers!