Guild Wars 2

I just discovered that I can no longer get the Gift of Battle with my stockpiled Badges of Honor, and now I have to grind WvW to get my legendary weapon. I was just crafting it when I discovered this. What a let down and a disappointment. It wasn’t bad enough I grinded endlessly to craft nevermore in maps I do not enjoy, now anet in their infinite wisdom has created more grind, I am really bummed.

Does anyone have any insight on how to level up the fastest way in WvW, do I have to belong to a guild that does WvW, or can I just pug it? I am majorly sad, I thought I was going to have my staff today.

Sad news for you: Gift is attached to the Reward Track and there is no way you can ifluence its gain, beside 10% guild buff and daily potions you get for doing WvW dailies. All in all you are looking at 8 to 12 hours of playing WvW at maximum participation. Time will vary based on what you choose: Real WvW or Edge Of The Mists.

Hop into WvW just after reset, that’s when there’s the most activity so you’ll be able to max out participation. Just find and follow the tag.
Once participation is maxed, its a purely time-based progression… a tick every 5 minutes or so.

I had planned to post a reply about the GoB change to a different forum discussion, but the thread was locked about 20 hours ago, with a statement from ANet that they won’t bring back the ability to purchase GoB from the merchant, but will enhance the related reward track with clovers and other items, at some undisclosed future time. Gee, thanks??? Given previous replies in this thread, maybe I can AFK my way through much of the GoB reward track. I don’t enjoy killing other players; I prefer cooperative efforts. To avid WvW fans, I apologize in advance for taking up a spot.

You can’t really AFK it as you will have to do something every 5 min otherwise you’ll lose participation progress rapidly.

Don’t forget that each WvW Dailies reward 250 points toward your current track.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Potion_of_WvW_Rewards

Also if you are in a guild with a guild hall, you should be able to get the guild enhancement at the tavern that will provide bonuses cashing in your participation every toward the reward track.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Guild_Enhancement:_World_Reward_Tracks

Don’t open your exotic WvW daily chests yet. Anet is planning on having them award two potions just like the PvP ones.

Earning rewards in WvW is pretty quick and easy. You don’t need to join a zerg (which actually slows you down). Go to whichever BL is least populated, cap every camp and sentry you can, hunt and kill Vet creatures (Harpy, Wurm, Warg, Ascalonian Ghosts), kill Dolyaks. Capture ruins. Kill guards at towers. Repair damaged walls/gates. If you run into too many enemies or run out of things to kill/cap , go to a different BL and continue.

Each of these things increases your contribution, and thus your progress per tick. Also, be sure to use the guild WVW Reward Track booster if you belong to a guild that offers it. Don’t confuse gaining WXP with gaining reward progress. They are 2 totally different things.

Once you max out you reward progress rate (195 point per tick), take it easy. Don’t go afk, just do something that adds to reward progress at least once every 5 min to prevent progress from decaying.

Another option is to run EOTM. The max reward per tick is only 160 points, but if you get on a map with a decent commander, you can do pretty well.

A full track with no potions takes between 8 and 9 hours. Remember to get your wvw reward track buff from the guild hall, it will turn your 195/tick into 214/tick. It’s not much but it ads in the long run. Try to do as many wvw dailies as you can, since a potion gives you 250 points towards your reward track.

I hear ANet will change it so that some dailies give 2 potions instead of one, like in pvp, but I doubt that will affect unopened old daily chests.

SkyFallsInThunder.8257:

A full track with no potions takes between 8 and 9 hours.

This assumes that:

• You quickly ramp up to full participation.
• You maintain full participation throughout those 8+ hours.

This isn’t trivial for initiate and adept WvWers, at least, not without joining the zerg (which isn’t everyone’s cup of tea). The 8+ hours is also unrealistic for those who only have an hour or so to play WvW — the ramp up time takes a larger chunk of their time than it does for “dedicated” mist warriors and they won’t benefit from the final 10-20 minutes of tick.

I’ll try to time it next time I’m spending a lot of time outside the zerg refreshing siege (which doesn’t count) to estimate how much longer “non optimal” progression takes compared to the ideal. It wouldn’t surprise me if it takes twice the time (although to be fair, it won’t surprise me if it’s only an extra hour or three either).

tl;dr the 8+ hour estimate assumes efficient WvWing; it will take longer for short-timers & those new to the game mode

I wanted to thank everyone for responding. I did get Nevermore done. I really appreciate all the responses.

Ophidia Moonstone.2587:

I wanted to thank everyone for responding. I did get Nevermore done. I really appreciate all the responses.

Excellent! congratulations.

I really hope they change this… it’s one of those changes for the worst.

At least put the track on pvp as well.. so I’m actually not bored to death

Not sure 10+ hours (or a bit over 8 hours if you do it through a single session, a bit less if you have the guild booster on) of mindless dolyak escorting is Anet’s idea of fun, at least with badges of honor you have to do some proper WvW to get it.

I would say, yes, making a reward track for it really helps out those ppl in worlds that get ‘bullied’ to get their Gift of Battle done.

However, just my thought from a PvE only perspective and do not do much WvW, and barely any PvP, I think Anet have to recognise the fact that not everyone enjoys WvW or/and PvP, and capping how much progress per tick is not really helping.

I think if Anet can introduce bonus reward track points upon capturing a WvW objective, it could benefit activities in WvW. Helps players to complete their tracks a bit faster, and may also generate some more incentive for non WvW players to play WvW.

How are any of the things that reward participation for the reward tracks not doing “proper WvW”? You could obtain badges from the AP chests without having to ever step foot into WvW. So no, badges were not necessarily earned by doing “proper WvW”.

Legendary weapons are not a PvE only task. At launch, players had to do WvW to get badges. This often took longer than 8 hours to get enough badges for the gift.

The good news is it only takes a fraction of the time to do the reward track vs. map competition.

I’m surprised no one else has mentioned the following: open your wallet, mouse over the Badges of Honor icon on the right side, and you’ll see a tool tip that says:

“Earned and spent in WvW to purchase various WvW items, including the “Gift of Battle” component…"

-) It’s hard to catch everything when you make a change ….

Hesacon.8735:

The good news is it only takes a fraction of the time to do the reward track vs. map competition.

I fail to see how they are related timewise. We have to do both. Some players prefer PvE and would enjoy map completion more than a WvW reward track. Others prefer WvW and would enjoy 5+ reward tracks compared to map completion. But either way both players have to do both the reward track and map completion.

At least while doing map completion though you can go about collecting materials for the collection achievements for legendary crafting. You can’t do that in WvW

OriOri.8724:

Hesacon.8735:

The good news is it only takes a fraction of the time to do the reward track vs. map competition.

I fail to see how they are related timewise. We have to do both. Some players prefer PvE and would enjoy map completion more than a WvW reward track. Others prefer WvW and would enjoy 5+ reward tracks compared to map completion. But either way both players have to do both the reward track and map completion.

At least while doing map completion though you can go about collecting materials for the collection achievements for legendary crafting. You can’t do that in WvW

Not directly, but there is a small amount of items dropped and don’t some of the WvW tracks include mystic clovers?

I’m putting all of my legendary weapon projects on indefinite hiatus because of this. Zerged around for a while in WvW, barely made any progress, and left feeling utterly drained.

Ayrilana.1396:

How are any of the things that reward participation for the reward tracks not doing “proper WvW”? You could obtain badges from the AP chests without having to ever step foot into WvW. So no, badges were not necessarily earned by doing “proper WvW”.

Legendary weapons are not a PvE only task. At launch, players had to do WvW to get badges. This often took longer than 8 hours to get enough badges for the gift.

I haven’t been playing this game since launch, but my understanding of Legendary Weapons is that they are primarily a PvE activity, which makes sense because most collections are PvE endeavors.

Quarktastic.1027:

I’m putting all of my legendary weapon projects on indefinite hiatus because of this. Zerged around for a while in WvW, barely made any progress, and left feeling utterly drained.

If you did an hour of Edge of Mists each night for your Dailies you get WvW potions, these potions give you track reward points, each one gets you a chest. Of course getting those Dailies means finding a player with a commander tag that also knows what they are doing, depending on your server it shouldn’t be that hard to do.

Seera.5916:

OriOri.8724:

Hesacon.8735:

The good news is it only takes a fraction of the time to do the reward track vs. map competition.

I fail to see how they are related timewise. We have to do both. Some players prefer PvE and would enjoy map completion more than a WvW reward track. Others prefer WvW and would enjoy 5+ reward tracks compared to map completion. But either way both players have to do both the reward track and map completion.

At least while doing map completion though you can go about collecting materials for the collection achievements for legendary crafting. You can’t do that in WvW

Not directly, but there is a small amount of items dropped and don’t some of the WvW tracks include mystic clovers?

Reward tracks in WvW are only a couple of weeks old, and those mystic clover rewards were probably added to entice legendary crafters to grind WvW. I get why anet has made this decision. WvW is dying because it lacks rewards, so they are giving WvW players PvE rewards and making PvE players do WvW in an attempt to keep it alive. What would work better is to have more quality loot, but for some reason they do not want to make WvW economically attractive.

Honestly… I just went my home borderland maps and started taking the nodes on the middle one by one… Once I had max participation by doing this I would afk for 5~8 minutes at a time next to a node. Once my alarm went off I’d tab back into gw2 & reclaim the node I was standing next to & that would reset the timer… Did that for a while & finally got the gift…

The reward track is complete garbage and a waste of time for anything other than GoB… Honestly Anet put zero effort into this & should be ashamed..

Edit: I did this at very late times so the chances of some random person finding and killing me was extremely small . I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone unless your just so sick of WvW or have constant computer issue while in big fights.

Allison The Strange.4519:

Honestly… I just went my home borderland maps and started taking the nodes on the middle one by one… Once I had max participation by doing this I would afk for 5~8 minutes at a time next to a node. Once my alarm went off I’d tab back into gw2 & reclaim the node I was standing next to & that would reset the timer… Did that for a while & finally got the gift…

The reward track is complete garbage and a waste of time for anything other than GoB… Honestly Anet put zero effort into this & should be ashamed..

Edit: I did this at very late times so the chances of some random person finding and killing me was extremely small . I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone unless your just so sick of WvW or have constant computer issue while in big fights.

Well Anet could remove BoH from AP chests, dailies, and nerf the drop rate off enemies. They could enforce a new version that can be spent at a vendor to obtain the gifts.

Ayrilana.1396:

Allison The Strange.4519:

Honestly… I just went my home borderland maps and started taking the nodes on the middle one by one… Once I had max participation by doing this I would afk for 5~8 minutes at a time next to a node. Once my alarm went off I’d tab back into gw2 & reclaim the node I was standing next to & that would reset the timer… Did that for a while & finally got the gift…

The reward track is complete garbage and a waste of time for anything other than GoB… Honestly Anet put zero effort into this & should be ashamed..

Edit: I did this at very late times so the chances of some random person finding and killing me was extremely small . I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone unless your just so sick of WvW or have constant computer issue while in big fights.

Well Anet could remove BoH from AP chests, dailies, and nerf the drop rate off enemies. They could enforce a new version that can be spent at a vendor to obtain the gifts.

All they honestly had to do was change the currency used to buy it from badges to proofs of heroics… Maybe tweak the the # needed to buy the gift & done…

That way I could still do a decent reward track instead of one that gives so many garbage crafting materials as rewards… Honestly when is the last time any of us have needed a T1~T5 molten shard or whatever…

Ophidia Moonstone.2587:

Quarktastic.1027:

I’m putting all of my legendary weapon projects on indefinite hiatus because of this. Zerged around for a while in WvW, barely made any progress, and left feeling utterly drained.

If you did an hour of Edge of Mists each night for your Dailies you get WvW potions, these potions give you track reward points, each one gets you a chest. Of course getting those Dailies means finding a player with a commander tag that also knows what they are doing, depending on your server it shouldn’t be that hard to do.

That was my initial intention, but I just can’t bring myself to spend an hour a day doing something I don’t enjoy; for however long it would take me to earn 3 gifts of battle.

Today’s patch allows Experience Boosters to add 50% to WvW reward track progress.