Guild Wars 2

Hey all, I’ve been away from gw2 for little while now(about 4-5 months) I was wondering if heart of thorns was worth picking up and if the game has improved for the better. I had a lot of fun with gw2 back when I was playing, but I have heard some mixed things about the expansion, so I thought I would go right to the forums. If you have any info share it would be greatly appreciated!

What was the reason for stopping playing, and what didn’t you like about the core game?

IntheCoconut.3497:

What was the reason for stopping playing, and what didn’t you like about the core game?

Mostly school. However, I was growing tired of my class and I found myself just doing fractals over and over.

Should wait for price to go down. My opinion not worth cost now. I regret I pay so much for it. I hate HoT map giant jump puzzle with endless trash mob can not enjoy explore. Revenant is fun to play but not worth cost of expansion for new profession.

Qugi.2653:

Should wait for price to go down. My opinion not worth cost now. I regret I pay so much for it. I hate HoT map giant jump puzzle with endless trash mob can not enjoy explore. Revenant is fun to play but not worth cost of expansion for new profession.

Thanks! I think I will wait this one out as much as I want to play the revenant. Maybe the price might shrink around christmas! (although highly unlikely)

It depends on your mindset honestly. My friends and I are enjoying the game and finding plenty to keep us entertained.

Fractals have changed. They now have 5 daily reward options. You get a chest for completing any 3 levels from the 1-20 bracket, any 3 levels from 21-50, and any 3 levels from 51-100. You also will have a random level selected from level 1-20 and level 20-50 as a daily reward as well, totaling 5 chests. Luckily, you are not locked into doing 3 fractals at once in order to get credit. Completing 1 fractal will send you back to the lab, and you can do them in any order. I like this a lot because I get burnt out easily, so I just randomly do them when I get the time. The new system is much more forgiving for people who can’t commit a full hour. Rewards are pretty lack luster, but ANet has confirmed changes are in the works for how people receive rewards from Fractals.

Dungeons do not give as much gold, which has a lot of people upset. If you enjoyed dungeons, this might upset you. I found dungeons boring, and I am now happy that I don’t feel compelled to do them just to get some quick gold. I can focus on getting gold from other things that I enjoy doing more.

A lot of the new events in HoT requires a group to participate in order to be successful. If you like to lone-wolf content, then you might get frustrated with the game. I play with my husband, and we can complete most of the small events and challenges in the game with just the two of us. There are, however, some big “meta” events, which basically requires the entire map to participate in order to win. I usually find the maps to be populated enough for these events to succeed. In the instances that 1-2 people aren’t enough to complete the smaller events, there are usually enough people that help out just in passing through. If not, you can always ask /map for some help.

Guilds got a lot of new content. I am in a small (5-10 man) guild, so we are still at the early stages and so therefore I can’t really speak much about what you get from this.

New Legendaries, and other things to craft if that’s your thing.
The continued personal story is a lot more interesting than the Zhaitan chain, in my opinion. It is also very short, but that is really my only complaint with it. The events are a lot more varied, and you’ll find yourself doing more engaging things than just “kill this mob of enemies” which is a refreshing change.

Raids are fun, and challenging. They require a really coordinated team with good communication, and is definelty meant as end-game content. And by end-game I mean having mostly ascended gear equipped.

The biggest complaint from people is the amount of time and resources it takes to get a lot of the content. Guild Halls requires a LOT of materials in order to unlock new levels, buffs, and content. Ascended gear and Legendries, as per usual, take a lot of dedication, materials, gold, and time. Some items can only be crafted once per day. Specializations take time to unlock because you likely wont have enough Hero Points to unlick all traits/abilities. And some areas in the new maps will not be open to you right away because they require you to level up masteries.

A lot of people are upset about not being able to unlock all the content on day-one of playing the game. If you are impatient, are think you will get bored easily, then I’d say probably save your money.
If you are okay with not being able to experience all the content on day-one, and are okay with taking your time to experience everything, then I’d say get it.

IntheCoconut.3497:

It depends on your mindset honestly. My friends and I are enjoying the game and finding plenty to keep us entertained.

Fractals have changed. They now have 5 daily reward options. You get a chest for completing any 3 levels from the 1-20 bracket, any 3 levels from 21-50, and any 3 levels from 51-100. You also will have a random level selected from level 1-20 and level 20-50 as a daily reward as well, totaling 5 chests. Luckily, you are not locked into doing 3 fractals at once in order to get credit. Completing 1 fractal will send you back to the lab, and you can do them in any order. I like this a lot because I get burnt out easily, so I just randomly do them when I get the time. The new system is much more forgiving for people who can’t commit a full hour. Rewards are pretty lack luster, but ANet has confirmed changes are in the works for how people receive rewards from Fractals.

Dungeons do not give as much gold, which has a lot of people upset. If you enjoyed dungeons, this might upset you. I found dungeons boring, and I am now happy that I don’t feel compelled to do them just to get some quick gold. I can focus on getting gold from other things that I enjoy doing more.

A lot of the new events in HoT requires a group to participate in order to be successful. If you like to lone-wolf content, then you might get frustrated with the game. I play with my husband, and we can complete most of the small events and challenges in the game with just the two of us. There are, however, some big “meta” events, which basically requires the entire map to participate in order to win. I usually find the maps to be populated enough for these events to succeed. In the instances that 1-2 people aren’t enough to complete the smaller events, there are usually enough people that help out just in passing through. If not, you can always ask /map for some help.

Guilds got a lot of new content. I am in a small (5-10 man) guild, so we are still at the early stages and so therefore I can’t really speak much about what you get from this.

New Legendaries, and other things to craft if that’s your thing.
The continued personal story is a lot more interesting than the Zhaitan chain, in my opinion. It is also very short, but that is really my only complaint with it. The events are a lot more varied, and you’ll find yourself doing more engaging things than just “kill this mob of enemies” which is a refreshing change.

Raids are fun, and challenging. They require a really coordinated team with good communication, and is definelty meant as end-game content. And by end-game I mean having mostly ascended gear equipped.

The biggest complaint from people is the amount of time and resources it takes to get a lot of the content. Guild Halls requires a LOT of materials in order to unlock new levels, buffs, and content. Ascended gear and Legendries, as per usual, take a lot of dedication, materials, gold, and time. Some items can only be crafted once per day. Specializations take time to unlock because you likely wont have enough Hero Points to unlick all traits/abilities. And some areas in the new maps will not be open to you right away because they require you to level up masteries.

A lot of people are upset about not being able to unlock all the content on day-one of playing the game. If you are impatient, are think you will get bored easily, then I’d say probably save your money.
If you are okay with not being able to experience all the content on day-one, and are okay with taking your time to experience everything, then I’d say get it.

Wow. Thank you very much for this in depth response. There is a lot to think about but I do like how the content is not just handed to me all on day one. I wanted to level a revenant anyways so It would take some time to do that, but I like how it takes time to really reach end game. I like a good challenge!

If you are going to play with a group maybe yes the expansion was made to be played with a group, if you are going solo I say no the mobs are to fast to many slows,stuns,etc they literally one shot you It,s very frustrating specially if you play a elementalist which has the lowest and weakest health pool. I got so frustrated I quit the game and regret buying this expansion. I’m not supporting arena net anymore. Good luck.

Deotronomio.1962:

If you are going to play with a group maybe yes the expansion was made to be played with a group, if you are going solo I say no the mobs are to fast to many slows,stuns,etc they literally one shot you It,s very frustrating specially if you play a elementalist which has the lowest and weakest health pool. I got so frustrated I quit the game and regret buying this expansion. I’m not supporting arena net anymore. Good luck.

Well that will definitely be a challenge I will consider. Thank you.

If you liked the core game, HoT is not for you. They go a completely different direction with the xpac. Previous maps were easy to explore where as these are a chore. The masteries requires a lot of time and grind, and there aren’t any new dungeons. Raids are entertaining, but that’s about the only thing in HoT that I personally enjoyed.

Again, it’s just not anything like the core game.

Maximillian Greil.1965:

If you liked the core game, HoT is not for you. They go a completely different direction with the xpac. Previous maps were easy to explore where as these are a chore. The masteries requires a lot of time and grind, and there aren’t any new dungeons. Raids are entertaining, but that’s about the only thing in HoT that I personally enjoyed.

Again, it’s just not anything like the core game.

I completely disagree. I liked the core game and I like HoT. It really depends on what things interest the OP.

HoT does a lot of things that some people asked for and that has made it hard for people to acclimate to the expansion:

• Core game allowed you to do any content, amass gold, and buy what you like; HoT has map-specific currencies and you need those. So it encourages people to stay in maps and help, although some people will see it as “forcing” people to remain.
• Core game set a lot of rewards behind RNG (which affected TP prices); HoT has more rewards that depend on doing specific things.
• Core game has almost no gating (all the personal story gates are level dependent); HoT gates a lot of the story behind the (lower tiers of the) new masteries.
• Core game allows leveling via XP; HoT allows mastery leveling via XP.
• Core game unlocks all skills and traits automatically by L80; HoT elite traits require doing hero challenges (some people think that’s no biggie; some people think it’s a chore).

etc etc — so it really just depends on your point of view.

I just got it. I am having a hard time with it. no instructions on how to learn to use bouncing balls it just says to explore jungle. How can you explore when it requires to bounce and glide. You have to have asscended armor with all the boost otherwise you get killed to fast. havent tried a raid yet. I need to get my kitten armor first so far a casual player I would not recommend it. It reminds me of Drytop and Silverwaste which i did not like

SW was at least only one or generously two layered.

HoT is like Drytop on steroids. But compared to drytop, navigation gets less and less tiresome if you unlock the masteries.If you are looking for an experience of something getting less tiresome, is another question.^^

Mild Climated.6293:

Hey all, I’ve been away from gw2 for little while now(about 4-5 months) I was wondering if heart of thorns was worth picking up and if the game has improved for the better. I had a lot of fun with gw2 back when I was playing, but I have heard some mixed things about the expansion, so I thought I would go right to the forums. If you have any info share it would be greatly appreciated!

no. not worth it.

Actually I enjoyed learning the HoT zones. They’re not brain dead easy, and even if you can play with a single friend, it’s pretty much doable. The thing is, it’s nice to actually employ the skills I’ve learned, instead of pressing one.

I return to core Tyria when I want to relax. But HoT gets my blood pumping. At my age, that’s a huge plus. lol

If you like group play and finding players to play with, you may enjoy HoT.
If you like to play solo, HoT might not be for you.

If you enjoy challenging content and wish there was more of it, you may enjoy HoT.
If you rather take it easy and press 1 for loot, HoT might not be for you.

If you like large map-wide meta events like the Silverwastes, you may enjoy HoT.
If you prefer hearts and one-off events, HoT might not be for you.

If you don’t mind lots of repetition to achieve your goals, you may enjoy HoT.
If you can’t stand required repetition to achieve your goals, HoT might not be for you.

If you like going on scavenger hunts, you may enjoy HoT.
If you find scavenger hunts tedious, HoT might not be for you.

If you thought the mobs in Orr were too sparse and lacking in CC, you may enjoy HoT.
If the thought of never ending hordes of demon-spawn that threaten to climb out of your computer screen and destroy all of your hopes and dreams bothers you, HoT might not be for you.

Save your money and buy Black Desert Online instead.

Spirited Was Eceni.3869:

Save your money and buy Black Desert Online instead.

Said about ESO, Said about Neverwinter. Said about Wildestar and particularly said about Archeage, and look at how that worked out.

I think that Black Desert will definitely have an audience, but I suspect it’ll be a much smaller one than you envision.

Jeah it is worth it. For me HoT is all about 3 things:

1.) Elite specializations. Elites give something new into your characters and new builds are fun to play. Also there are some concerns that if you don’t have the expansion you are left behind.

2.) Group content (raids mainly, but also new map events). Raids are fun with guild team. If you don’t want to get into active raid group then it sucks for you. New map events are kinda cool too, pretty difficult also you need to be coordinated.

3.) Solo story and exploring new maps. This was the first thing I did in HoT. Was super fun to me. Story was good and jungle was fun.

Vayne.8563:

Spirited Was Eceni.3869:

Save your money and buy Black Desert Online instead.

Said about ESO, Said about Neverwinter. Said about Wildestar and particularly said about Archeage, and look at how that worked out.

I think that Black Desert will definitely have an audience, but I suspect it’ll be a much smaller one than you envision.

Those games probably have a bigger audience than GW2 would have had if they’d launched with an abundances of content that’s anything like what the expansion’s content is like.

Manasa Devi.7958:

Vayne.8563:

Spirited Was Eceni.3869:

Save your money and buy Black Desert Online instead.

Said about ESO, Said about Neverwinter. Said about Wildestar and particularly said about Archeage, and look at how that worked out.

I think that Black Desert will definitely have an audience, but I suspect it’ll be a much smaller one than you envision.

Those games probably have a bigger audience than GW2 would have had if they’d launched with an abundances of content that’s anything like what the expansion’s content is like.

Those games have a smaller audience than Guild Wars 2 though, even though people thought they would be the death of this game. Because it’s easier to hype an MMO than it is to create one. We’ve seen that all over the place, including here.

Black Desert should start okay, but I strongly suspect the grind there for BIS gear will put Guild Wars 2 to shame…and people complain here.

Yes, I agree with all of what Boysenberry says. That should have been included in the HoT adverts.
The only thing I like about it is the new elite specializations, which actually for me is worth the 50$ spent.

OP, don’t waste your money. You can read thru-out the forum how bad the expansion was. Don’t have buyers remorse like most of us.

I like HoT. I don’t find it hard or frustrating in my opinion. I run around the new maps solo on my Ele all the time unless my friend joins me. Sure, I die if I can’t out run, dodge, use a bouncing mushroom, and/or jump off a cliff and glide away from the mobs trying to murder my face in. But eh not a big deal breaker for me to be honest. I find it fun but to each their own. Also, it’s not hard to find players doing events so, I’m never really alone. But you’ll never know if it’s worth if you don’t at least try it for yourself and come to your own conclusion. =]

For PvE, yes. Everything else from PvP to WvW (large scale, server vs server combat), No. The actual trend is Anet is converting what made GW1 good to another generic PvE MMO with timegated stuff.

look around, search for a cheaper store.
i had it pre-ordered for €32,- so it saved me €18,-, it’s simply not worth €50,-

Shen Slayer.3058:

OP, don’t waste your money. You can read thru-out the forum how bad the expansion was. Don’t have buyers remorse like most of us.

This proves nothing. People voice negativity much more then positivity. The main reason why is the people that actually enjoy it are playing the game, rather then crying about it in a forum. Besides, just saying the expansion is horrible is not constructive feed back which is basically what you are doing. Because that is just your opinion. An example is, some may dislike the fact that the expansion requires groups to complete most of the content, while some people love it. Neither opinion is wrong. It is just a matter of preference.

With that said, if you like group content, that is challenging, and enjoy raids, jumping puzzles, and endgame type content in general, you may enjoy this expansion.

Personally, I enjoy the story and the elite specializations as well as the Revenant. I consider myself a pretty casual player (I play maybe an hour or 2 a day at most and some days I don’t get a chance to play) so I enjoy a lot of the smaller things like leveling, farming hero points etc. and I do enjoy the challenge of the content. To me the expansion was worth it but that is just me personally. It keeps me from blowing my money on console games every month which is 60 dollars a pop these days, so it was well worth the $50.

HoT is fantastic. Just as mattkoko said above, people almost always voice negative opinions much more often and loudly than positive ones. If you just spend three minutes on this forum, you may get the impression that HoT is a disaster, but spend three minutes in game and you’ll see large player populations who are having a great time.

All the talk of “group or lose” in HoT baffles me. I constantly run around the world solo doing events and exploring maps (on a full zerker ele no less – 11.6k health ftw) and don’t seem to have any problems. Usually you bump into other players during event chains, but even if you don’t, essentially all of them are soloable. It’s the big meta-events that require large map participation, but they only run once every hour or two and tend to be quite fun! You are more than capable of playing the HoT content without actively looking for a group.

The map design is literally the best I have ever seen in an MMO. I actually want to get back out into the maps, rather than standing around in a major city as players in other MMOs tend to do. They’re dynamic, complex (yes, they have a slight learning curve, but after that it’s not a problem – plus the learning curve is half the fun!), rewarding, full of activity, and have beautiful artwork. Mobs actually have some depth to them now as opposed to just spamming auto-attacks on you – suddenly the combat system is able to shine.

The elite specs add a whole new dimension to each profession and are, for the most part, incredibly well designed. I’ve been playing ele for 3 years now and Tempest feels like what I’ve been missing this whole time.

There is a whole host of new achievements and collections you can work on while you play, adding tons more replayability to the new maps and content and the new rewards systems allow you to experience the content how you want to, and still reap at least something for your efforts.

The mastery system adds new long-term goals for players already at level cap, with only one or two actually being super necessary for getting around (you’ll have them within the first 2-3 hours of play, especially if you start right away on the story). Again, more replayability for the new maps, and things to work on beyond just your first day of play.

Not to mention, the raids are absolutely fantastic. I also used to raid in WoW and I’m having just as much fun (if not more – GW2’s combat system is actually amazing) as I did playing WoW back in its glory days. (Plus, not having a gear treadmill is so nice…. Don’t let anyone tell you you need ascended armor for raids – you don’t. This is confirmed.)

It’s hard to parse through a lot of the negativity on the forums, but there are a ton of players who are really enjoying the game right now and who all would definitely tell you it’s totally worth it. You can always come back to the core game for a bit and see what you think of that before deciding to buy HoT, but keep in mind, you’ll be missing out on quite a bit without the xpack.

Hope that helped!

Giant jump puzzle with endless packs of mobs sums it up, i can only do the story for a half an hour at a time before i need to step away from the computer and break things

softblackcarbon.1537:

HoT is fantastic. Just as mattkoko said above, people almost always voice negative opinions much more often and loudly than positive ones. If you just spend three minutes on this forum, you may get the impression that HoT is a disaster, but spend three minutes in game and you’ll see large player populations who are having a great time.

All the talk of “group or lose” in HoT baffles me. I constantly run around the world solo doing events and exploring maps (on a full zerker ele no less – 11.6k health ftw) and don’t seem to have any problems. Usually you bump into other players during event chains, but even if you don’t, essentially all of them are soloable. It’s the big meta-events that require large map participation, but they only run once every hour or two and tend to be quite fun! You are more than capable of playing the HoT content without actively looking for a group.

The map design is literally the best I have ever seen in an MMO. I actually want to get back out into the maps, rather than standing around in a major city as players in other MMOs tend to do. They’re dynamic, complex (yes, they have a slight learning curve, but after that it’s not a problem – plus the learning curve is half the fun!), rewarding, full of activity, and have beautiful artwork. Mobs actually have some depth to them now as opposed to just spamming auto-attacks on you – suddenly the combat system is able to shine.

The elite specs add a whole new dimension to each profession and are, for the most part, incredibly well designed. I’ve been playing ele for 3 years now and Tempest feels like what I’ve been missing this whole time.

There is a whole host of new achievements and collections you can work on while you play, adding tons more replayability to the new maps and content and the new rewards systems allow you to experience the content how you want to, and still reap at least something for your efforts.

The mastery system adds new long-term goals for players already at level cap, with only one or two actually being super necessary for getting around (you’ll have them within the first 2-3 hours of play, especially if you start right away on the story). Again, more replayability for the new maps, and things to work on beyond just your first day of play.

Not to mention, the raids are absolutely fantastic. I also used to raid in WoW and I’m having just as much fun (if not more – GW2’s combat system is actually amazing) as I did playing WoW back in its glory days. (Plus, not having a gear treadmill is so nice…. Don’t let anyone tell you you need ascended armor for raids – you don’t. This is confirmed.)

It’s hard to parse through a lot of the negativity on the forums, but there are a ton of players who are really enjoying the game right now and who all would definitely tell you it’s totally worth it. You can always come back to the core game for a bit and see what you think of that before deciding to buy HoT, but keep in mind, you’ll be missing out on quite a bit without the xpack.

Hope that helped!

This definitely helped a lot thank you! I’m kind of getting excited for this, I’ve been looking for some good end game that will keep me entertained for quite a while!

I would refund this expac now if I could and wait for it to go to 15 bucks, that’s what it is worth atm. You will not get into a raid unless you are in full ascended gear thanks to the gear treadmill they praised against so much, but happened. Most of the time you can’t find enough people to do the events on the new Hot maps and good luck with the champs.