Guild Wars 2

Daddicus.6128:

Odin of Ark.4860:

Regular masteries can be lvled anywhere in central tyria. And its not hard to level maguuma masteries at all. Dragons stand is pretty great for XP.

Did you read his post? He CAN’T GET THERE because he’s been gated out. For crying out loud, read before you post something so stupid.

You can get to DS only using gliding. You don’t even need bouncing mushrooms.

maddoctor.2738:

Daddicus.6128:

Odin of Ark.4860:

Regular masteries can be lvled anywhere in central tyria. And its not hard to level maguuma masteries at all. Dragons stand is pretty great for XP.

Did you read his post? He CAN’T GET THERE because he’s been gated out. For crying out loud, read before you post something so stupid.

You can get to DS only using gliding. You don’t even need bouncing mushrooms.

And how do you get to the islands and the chest without updrafts at least?

HtFde.3856:

maddoctor.2738:

Daddicus.6128:

Odin of Ark.4860:

Regular masteries can be lvled anywhere in central tyria. And its not hard to level maguuma masteries at all. Dragons stand is pretty great for XP.

Did you read his post? He CAN’T GET THERE because he’s been gated out. For crying out loud, read before you post something so stupid.

You can get to DS only using gliding. You don’t even need bouncing mushrooms.

And how do you get to the islands and the chest without updrafts at least?

The post was about getting to DS… see those caps? And really if you run all the way to DS and ignore all the previous maps in order to “farm” DS that’s your fault. If you go to DS normally you should have everything you need to play there, of course including Updrafts. Updrafts is Gliding 2 you can’t possibly say someone can’t reach Gliding 2 before they reach DS. The OP is just lazy that’s all, he probably farmed in CoF the Pact masteries and wants to farm HoT masteries in his wonderful CoF farm too.

Daddicus.6128:

Rasimir.6239:

What level masteries are you on? With just two points (basic gliding and mushroom jumping) you can already explore the vast majority of the new maps just fine, the rest really is just bonus and niche use.

I’ve got those two, but I’m currently mastery-gated in AB. Get your facts straight before posting.

Oh, don’t worry, I have my facts straight. In fact, on my secondary account (this one) I have exactly two HoT mastery points spent, one each for gliding and mushroom jumping. So far, I’ve played my mesmer through the introductory instance of the story to unlock masteries, run her through VB and into Tarir to join my guild in liberating our guild hall, done a couple of hero points around Tarir to help out a guildie, and ran down to the beginning of Tangled Depths to open up the Nuhoch mastery line just in case I accidentally get too much experience and would rather put it there than into more advanced gliding .

And from that experience I can tell you that you can explore the vast majority of the new maps just fine without farming masteries. I won’t be able to check many of the finer details though, since just running through those maps, opening up waypoints and some stray hero points, pois and vistas that crossed my path, I’ve already gotten so much experience that I’ll pretty soon have filled my bar for updraft, and I guess once I start exploring earnestly, nuhoch wallows won’t be far behind .

Rasimir.6239:

Kraggy.4169:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

So, ArenaNet spent time and resources designing content, that they knew, beforehand, no one would play? So, in order to waste more resources, they designed, again, more content they knew, beforehand, many would complain about? This is your take on it?

Seems a bit strange to me, to do all that work they knew, beforehand, would be wasted. Hmm.

Not at all .. they designed HOT for the vocal minority that say they want 1990s group-or-die over world content then implemented Masteries in such a way everyone else who doesn’t particularly care for that type of game has to endure it or give up and they know most won’t give up due to their addiction.

Have you played those games back in the 90s? I have … and believe me, HoT is nothing like those games. I doesn’t even come up to most of today’s “harder” games in that respect.

But you’re right in one aspect: it does give off faint vibes of the exploration and discovery we had to do in games back in the 80s and 90s, which may in fact be why I enjoy HoT so much. Finally a game where the focus is on getting to know my way around the new content rather than just grabbing a guide and going off to farm the latest shiny.

Yes, I played EQ ‘back in the day’ and still play FFXI .. which was released in 2002 and was Squre Enixes FF ‘take’ on EQ.

As for exploration, I LOVE exploring, it’s one of my great delights in RPGs whether online or off to explore the world for the first time .. no idea what your ‘grabbing a guide’ put down refers to .. sadly HOT isn’t like that as most of the maps are locked behind XP and MP grinds to unlock the skills you need to be able to simply explore.

Rasimir.6239:

So far, I’ve played my mesmer through the introductory chapter of the story to unlock masteries.

That’s not true, you CAN’T play the story on its own because you don’t get enough XP to even unlock the first gate simply from the story, let alone the other stuff you claim to have accessed playing only the story.

My first level 80 to play Torn from the Sky is parked because that gives you only 63% of the XP needed to unlock the gate to carry on the story and I have no desire to do the ‘meta grind’ for XP.

Kraggy.4169:

Rasimir.6239:

So far, I’ve played my mesmer through the introductory chapter of the story to unlock masteries.

That’s not true, you CAN’T play the story on its own because you don’t get enough XP to even unlock the first gate simply from the story, let alone the other stuff you claim to have accessed playing only the story.

My first level 80 to play Torn from the Sky is parked because that gives you only 63% of the XP needed to unlock the gate to carry on the story and I have no desire to do the ‘meta grind’ for XP.

Sorry, by chapter I meant just the tutorial instance and the “torn from the sky” story episode. The rest of the experience came from running to Tarir, participating in the guild hall claiming, and doing a couple of hero points around the place.

Now to your post above, I still fail to see all those mastery and experience gates. My main account (not this one) is at 39 HoT mastery points spent, with 3-4 in all lines, and I’ve yet to start thinking about farming experience. I have however finished the story on one character and brought four or five more into VB (one full exploration), with two of them having unlocked a good part of AB, too (again one full exploration, last hp with the help of a friendly mesmer), and as such have found that just exploring the maps, experience came in abundantly. And if there was a place I really couldn’t get to with my current kitten nal of masteries (or even just my knowledge of the area at that time), then I’d just come back later and try again.

I’m not big on meta events either. I only play them when I have more-than-average game time (which usually is on the weekends), and only if I stumble upon them. I’ve been in a few Tarir defences and some VB cycles, but haven’t even started on DS yet (aside from sending my ranger through the story instances).

Maybe our definition of exploration is just different … I was thinking more about late 80s/early 90s games (both single player and muds), stuff like early Ultima titles, Bard’s Tale, Wizardry and so on, where you were still drawing your own maps because there was no internet to look them up nor in-game auto-maps . I know a sizeable number of people in game today who, upon release of new content, head over to Dulfy, grab their guide on how to get the goodies of said content, and won’t find their way around on their own even after they’ve “finished” said content. That’s not so easy with HoT, and I find myself enjoying this immensely.

Half the fun of playing this kind of game to me is figuring things out on my own, and HoT is giving me a lot of that, while still making it easy to progress without going out of my way. Maybe it’s really an altoholic-thing that’s giving me all these xp flows, but whatever it is, it’s working for me.

Daddicus.6128:

Odin of Ark.4860:

Regular masteries can be lvled anywhere in central tyria. And its not hard to level maguuma masteries at all. Dragons stand is pretty great for XP.

Did you read his post? He CAN’T GET THERE because he’s been gated out. For crying out loud, read before you post something so stupid.

How is he gated? Just use a teleport to friend like me. Literally just look for a DS party, add one of them as a friend, and teleport. Done.

meta grinds and gutted wvw are leading to the early death of this game

Wander.5780:

meta grinds and gutted wvw are leading to the early death of this game

No, they’re not.

You’re locked in, but people would rather not be? I don’t see why people couldn’t choose to level anywhere.

Wander.5780:

meta grinds and gutted wvw are leading to the early death of this game

You can’t possibly believe “gutted” WvW is a leading factor of anything in GW2. WvW was already a small subset of the GW2 population. Yes, it is dead for the most part (compared to years 1-2 when it was still sorta fresh), but it’s hardly dead from being gutted. I’m not even sure what you mean by that. They’ve only added content to WvW, not taken anything away. WvW died because it sat stagnant for too long and the serious WvWers got bored and moved on.

Either way, they could eliminate WvW entirely and it would likely do very little to the overall GW2 population.

Draknar.5748:

Wander.5780:

meta grinds and gutted wvw are leading to the early death of this game

You can’t possibly believe “gutted” WvW is a leading factor of anything in GW2. WvW was already a small subset of the GW2 population. Yes, it is dead for the most part (compared to years 1-2 when it was still sorta fresh), but it’s hardly dead from being gutted. I’m not even sure what you mean by that. They’ve only added content to WvW, not taken anything away. WvW died because it sat stagnant for too long and the serious WvWers got bored and moved on.

Either way, they could eliminate WvW entirely and it would likely do very little to the overall GW2 population.

There isn’t a lot of population to play with, let’s not cast off a group of people when the game is trying to retain everyone.

maddoctor.2738:

Doam.8305:

maddoctor.2738:

Wolfeng.3784:

runeblade.7514:

You don’t need HoT masteries anywhere outside of HoT content.

And because of it I need to level them in those maps?

Yes. You level the relevant masteries doing the content that requires them.

The Pact is in HoT infact the entirety of HoT revolves around the Pact so if relevancy was important why can’t a person level Pact mastery while doing official Pact business while in HoT maps!? You are the Pact commander after all.

Relevant for the zone you play in not lorewise. There are no bouncing mushrooms in central tyria nor you can glide. HoT masteries are leveled in HoT maps because that’s where they are used.

^That, Jungle masteries shouldn’t affect your core gameplay nor other game modes.

kuritsutian.2987:

maddoctor.2738:

Doam.8305:

maddoctor.2738:

Wolfeng.3784:

runeblade.7514:

You don’t need HoT masteries anywhere outside of HoT content.

And because of it I need to level them in those maps?

Yes. You level the relevant masteries doing the content that requires them.

The Pact is in HoT infact the entirety of HoT revolves around the Pact so if relevancy was important why can’t a person level Pact mastery while doing official Pact business while in HoT maps!? You are the Pact commander after all.

Relevant for the zone you play in not lorewise. There are no bouncing mushrooms in central tyria nor you can glide. HoT masteries are leveled in HoT maps because that’s where they are used.

^That, Jungle masteries shouldn’t affect your core gameplay nor other game modes.

I think Explorer Metella takes pains to note, during Torn from the Sky, “in case you hadn’t noticed, sir, there is no Pact.” And then later on, despite being the “Pact Commander” you can’t even promote someone to leader at the Pact Encampment. They vote on it! So, I’m skeptical that the Pact is really a going concern in Heart of Thorns…

This seems to be another instance of people not having the right mentality for the material. Rather than just playing the game and gaining Masteries in a fluid and gradual manner, they grind them out to complete them as fast as possible, then get frustrated when there is nothing left to do.

Kal Spiro.9745:

This seems to be another instance of people not having the right mentality for the material. Rather than just playing the game and gaining Masteries in a fluid and gradual manner, they grind them out to complete them as fast as possible, then get frustrated when there is nothing left to do.

Well it really depends on what arbitrary numbers Anet have plucked out the air for the levelling doesn’kitten I mean level 80 is what 250k exp, what is the first level of a mastery? 1m? What’s the last? 4m? Is there enough content to make it feel like you’re not progressing like a slug for no other reason than just numbers? That’s one hell of a curve for a team who originally wanted a set time levelling curve to make it feel fun.

Sicarius.4639:

You’re locked in, but people would rather not be? I don’t see why people couldn’t choose to level anywhere.

Already explained. Repeatedly.

Because one of the track progressions is completely corrupt and until they fix it there is ZERO possibility of linking other tracks to the corrupt engine. End. Of. Discussion.

Kal Spiro.9745:

This seems to be another instance of people not having the right mentality for the material. Rather than just playing the game and gaining Masteries in a fluid and gradual manner, they grind them out to complete them as fast as possible, then get frustrated when there is nothing left to do.

If you were capable of reading you wouldn’t spill such stupidity. I leveled all my central tyria masteries by just playing the game and doing the things I enjoy.

Someone else even talked about how HoT masteries are tied to that content because they are only used there, SO WHAT? Pact Commander is used everywhere, and yet you can only level in central tyria, fractal mastery is only used inside fractal and yet you can level in all central tyria maps.

Saying that HoT masteries are tied to those maps because its only used there is completely bull.

HoT maps are not enjoyable, but I still need to eventually complete those masteries. And that will take months because I’m forced to spend hours upon hours in those maps, doing the same events, OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

What fluid and natural way is that? Please enlighten me.

Wolfeng.3784:

Please enlighten me.

We are all Gods, we are part of consciousness but forgot about it! —Jokes

Just the fact that this thread has gone to a second page and continues to receive debate indicates the OP might have a valid point. It’s another post in the long line of “Unhappy” vs. “Anti Unhappy” threads which seem to be piling up.

The comical ones are the people complaining about people complaining though, this sort of thread is becoming old hat very quick.

Anet knows whats going on in their game guys, my issue is with how they intend to fix the unintended.

smiling.9028:

Just the fact that this thread has gone to a second page and continues to receive debate indicates the OP might have a valid point. It’s another post in the long line of “Unhappy” vs. “Anti Unhappy” threads which seem to be piling up.

The comical ones are the people complaining about people complaining though, this sort of thread is becoming old hat very quick.

Anet knows whats going on in their game guys, my issue is with how they intend to fix the unintended.

—Achievement unlocked—
I am sick of people that get sick of people, that get sick of people, that gets sick of people that complains

…lol sorry I got up in a good mood, last night finished HoT story mode (I know it’s not big deal, but here I am having fun).

To contribute to the topic…. maybe some more general should be leveled everywhere, such as commander tag, others shouldn’t …. everyone is a Game designer in the forums! easy to come up with suggestions over things that are already made.. there’s always room for improvement tho, hence the forums and suggestions.

Celtus.8456:

My theory is that most people don’t really enjoy playing the new maps, but they need to do so in order to level the masteries and experience any sense of progression in the game they just paid $50 for.

I think it’s more because they knew people would abuse easier content to level their masteries for easy XP. People will always flock to the path of least resistance.

Wolfeng.3784:

Kal Spiro.9745:

This seems to be another instance of people not having the right mentality for the material. Rather than just playing the game and gaining Masteries in a fluid and gradual manner, they grind them out to complete them as fast as possible, then get frustrated when there is nothing left to do.

If you were capable of reading you wouldn’t spill such stupidity. I leveled all my central tyria masteries by just playing the game and doing the things I enjoy.

Someone else even talked about how HoT masteries are tied to that content because they are only used there, SO WHAT? Pact Commander is used everywhere, and yet you can only level in central tyria, fractal mastery is only used inside fractal and yet you can level in all central tyria maps.

Saying that HoT masteries are tied to those maps because its only used there is completely bull.

HoT maps are not enjoyable, but I still need to eventually complete those masteries. And that will take months because I’m forced to spend hours upon hours in those maps, doing the same events, OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

What fluid and natural way is that? Please enlighten me.

I’m slightly confused why you feel like you “need to eventually complete those [hot] masteries”. Hot masteries are only used in Hot maps —> You don’t enjoy playing on the Hot maps --> You shouldn’t play on the Hot maps —> You don’t need any Hot masteries to have an enjoyable experience playing GW2.

I personally have 51 mastery points spent right now and have done very little grinding (I think I spent like an hour or so in CoF just to finish up my fractals masteries?) I’ve just spent time doing content that was fun for me in the hot maps (lots of exploring and unlocking elite specializations for alts – I’ve literally only done DS once) and just sort of take the experience as it comes. As people have already mentioned, you literally need 3 masteries to explore the jungle (gliding, updraft, bouncing mushroom), and I’m almost positive that you can run to any map without further unlocking.

I’ve seen some people complaining about the story being gated behind those three masteries, and not receiving enough experience from the story itself to complete them. I’m pretty sure I finished my story instance, unlocked like 2 waypoints and a hero point on the map, and then I had it done. It literally takes like max 30 minutes to run around a bit and collect that extra experience. No meta-events required.

Honestly, I’m a giant fan of the fact that as someone who has put a TON of time into hot, I only have 51 mastery points spent. It makes me feel like I am constantly being rewarded for the content I’m playing and gives me things to look forward to and think about what I want to work towards next. I really think this system was designed to give players a sense of progression for quite a while after the release of hot and not to be completed in a week (which clearly some people did anyway XD).

tl;dr I love hot not because I automatically love whatever anet throws at me, but because I genuinely have fun playing these new maps. The map design is better than anything I have ever seen from an MMO and unlike the tyria maps which I have no desire to return to after completing, I’ll return to the hot ones again and again. Also masteries are great.

Rasimir.6239:

Kraggy.4169:

Rasimir.6239:

So far, I’ve played my mesmer through the introductory chapter of the story to unlock masteries.

That’s not true, you CAN’T play the story on its own because you don’t get enough XP to even unlock the first gate simply from the story, let alone the other stuff you claim to have accessed playing only the story.

My first level 80 to play Torn from the Sky is parked because that gives you only 63% of the XP needed to unlock the gate to carry on the story and I have no desire to do the ‘meta grind’ for XP.

Maybe our definition of exploration is just different … I was thinking more about late 80s/early 90s games (both single player and muds), stuff like early Ultima titles, Bard’s Tale, Wizardry and so on, where you were still drawing your own maps because there was no internet to look them up nor in-game auto-maps . I know a sizeable number of people in game today who, upon release of new content, head over to Dulfy, grab their guide on how to get the goodies of said content, and won’t find their way around on their own even after they’ve “finished” said content. That’s not so easy with HoT, and I find myself enjoying this immensely.

No, we agree on what ‘exploration’ is, but in HOT you can’t even explore much without coming up against a gate in the form of gliding/bouncing needed, not to mention poison and at least one other (ley lines?).

Without any of the Tyria-type questing the only content I see to get XP is meta grinds or other group-or-die content which can’t be done on empty maps now, and I’m not going to do that simply to be able to explore the maps .. exploration is my great joy in RPGs, the gating in HOT prevents that fun!

I loved exploring pre-HOT, I’d love to do it post-HOT but locked gates prevent it.