Guild Wars 2

I heard that the Heart of Thorns maps are very good for making money, even in comparison to the Silverwastes (which are somewhat dead nowadays). I played a while ago, when Verdant Brink still had the whole “daytime” and “nighttime” participation. Now it looks like daytime participation has been removed, and I’m not sure what other mechanics have changed….

The other maps I have no experience with at all yet. Auric Basin I have at least traveled around in, and I have heard that it’s the greatest money with some LFG multiple instance chest opening thing that I can’t ever seem to find…and the other two maps are just way over my head at this point…I was wondering if anybody could give me a hand on learning the new content, or could at least point me towards some VERY informative guides, as the guides that I have found so far have been very lackluster. :/ Thank you in advance!

Elarion

There are two main ways to turn the HoT maps into gold, in my opinion.

1. Gathering. Flax sells well; so do flax fibres, which drop from it, and linseed oil, which is made from flax. Mussels sell reasonably well in large quantities; what sells really well are the Freshwater pearls they ( rarely ) drop. Equally as rare are Maguuma lilies, which drop from jungle plants.

There are two flax farms that I know of, and several hotspots for mussels: find these spots and send one or two toons there daily to gather, make linseed oil ( from flax ), sell mussels, sell fibres, profit. For the lilies, just hit every “Jungle Plant” you see. It takes some dedication and you will not suddenly have hoards of gold within hours, but you can make a pretty penny.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Flax
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Jungle_Plants
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sd0gmOjbYNM ( I picked the first vid I could find )
http://degeneracygw2.tumblr.com/post/133882663279/verdant-brink-mussel-farm-map-courtesy-of ( again, picked first thing that came up after googling )

If these do not suffice, google: gw2 flax farm, gw2 mussel farm

2. The SW principle. It’s the old ‘open bags, salvage, sell/sell rares and/or exotics’ principle. In an earlier update they increased the loot from participating in HoT meta events. Opinions on this may vary, as regular participation in meta events should ideally take place in a map that you enjoy and know how to get around on: for me, personally, Verdant Brink and Auric Basin are the maps I enjoy most, with Dragon Stand ranging behind. I can and have done the meta in Tangled Depths, but that map annoys me, so I tend to steer clear of it unless I absolutely need the map currency for a recipe or collectible.

In order to successfully participate in the meta, you’ll want to be familiar with the maps, and you’ll want some masteries. I’m not sure how much use guides will be there, as each player has a different level of comfort when it comes to navigating HoT. Again, personal opinion, the HoT masteries ( https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mastery ) that helped me the most to move around the maps were Nuhoch Wallows, Itzel Poison Lore, and fully unlocked Gliding. I would prioritize Gliding over Wallows, and Wallows over Poison Lore.

Guides on where/how to get mastery points:
http://dulfy.net/2015/10/30/gw2-verdant-brinks-mastery-insights-and-strongboxes-guide/
http://dulfy.net/2015/10/31/gw2-auric-basin-mastery-insights-and-strongboxes-guide/
http://dulfy.net/2015/11/01/gw2-tangled-depths-mastery-insights-and-strongboxes-guide/
http://dulfy.net/2015/11/02/gw2-dragons-stand-hero-points-and-strongboxes-guide/

On to the meta events.

Participating in any meta event on any HoT map should net you: loot ( lots of bags ) and/or map currency and/or keys to unlock the map-specific loot nodes after or even before meta.

Loot is self-explanatory; if you’ve done SW, you know what to do with loot bags. Map currencies in HoT work the same way as Geodes and Bandit crests. Collect, spend at vendor for collectibles, recipes, keys. Just like in the Silverwastes, each HoT map has one or several map currency vendors:

Itzel Mastery Vendor @ Shipwreck Peak WP in Verdant Brink – airship parts
Exalted Mastery Vendor @ Forgotten City WP in Auric Basin – aurillium
Nuhoch Mastery Vendor @ Order of Whispers Camp WP in Tangled Depths – Ley Line Crystal
Whispers Keeper @ Pact Base Camp WP in Dragon Stand – Crystalline Ore

Keys in the HoT map work like Bandit Skeleton Key and Zephyrite Lockpicks. Note that the Verdant Brink keys, Pact Crowbars, are currently the only keys that cannot be bought from any vendor; generally though, I find that even semi-regular participation in meta events gives me more pact crowbars than I know what to do with. YMMW.

The only thing that changed about Verdant Brink is that they removed the participation for the day cycle, but you still do events to strengthen the outposts and work toward the night cycle. Auric Basin works much the same: do events to power up pylons at the respective north/east/south/west outposts to work toward Octovine. Tangled Depths, the same: work toward Chak Gerent. Dragon Stand is an exception in so far that it requires a concentrated effort of three lanes, south, mid, and north, to work your way toward Modremoth.

In the beginning, I found it easiest to just pick an outpost in VB, AB, or TD, and do the events there until I was familiar with them. Hopping around madly on a map and participating in events all over the place is just going to be confuzzling, especially if you find that map hard to navigate or haven’t unlocked all the waypoints yet.

All HoT meta maps are on timers: http://dulfy.net/2015/11/09/gw2-hot-maps-timer-famme/

LFG is going to be your friend. Use it to find squads that are taxiing into maps where the meta is underway. Pick an outpost or area, find other players, and then do what they do. I could link guides, but I think actually doing the meta helps you more than reading about doing the meta. Poke around and familiarize yourself with the maps. Don’t be afraid to die – horribly, in some cases. Actually, going into the HoT maps with an attitude of “hey, I’ll probably bite the dust at least once” takes a lot of frustration out of them. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, either. There will be kittens, but there will also be players who help you.

Be prepared to fail events, too. The nifty thing about the Hot maps – the exception is Dragon Stand – being on a timer is that the meta WILL happen. The trick is to find a map with enough players to make it happen successfully.

Last thing: multi-loot. There is currently some squabbling about whether or not multi-looting is intended gameplay, but that aside…

Check LFG for “multi-loot” or “multi-map” for Auric Basin. Multi-loot/multi-map squads tend to look like this:

Main Group 1 – Lobby
Sub-Group 2 – Map 1
Sub-Group 3 – Map 2
Sub-Group 4 – Map 3
etc.

If you’ve done SW, or joined squads in general, you know how clicking on a player and selecting “Join in ______” works. Just as you’d join players in a different instance of the Silverwastes map to find one where there are enough players to do the events, in Auric Basin you do the Octovine event on your map, and then join other players in their map. It’s basically a lot of players doing the same event, but on different maps. In the end, you map-hop and loot in as many successfully completed Octovine maps as possible.

I’ve seen multi-map squads with 8+ subgroups. So I join, for example, sub-group 2 on Map 1. I do the meta. I loot. Then I click on a player in sub-group 3 and join them in Map 2, if they have announced in squad chat that they have completed Octovine. I loot again. Then I join sub-group 4 and hop into Map 3, and loot again. The idea behind multi-loot is to get a ton of loot from different instances of the same map, but only doing the meta once, in your map.

/wall of text