Guild Wars 2

Dr Anthrax.4723:

Hey OP, just press “H” for hero Screen. Goto PvP tab (last one, it’s crossed swords). Then click “Enter the Mists”. Once there, run straight ahead into the Lion’s Arch portal. Fast than going into WvWvW, and no queue time.

NOTE: The very first time you go in, you will have to do a 3 minute tutorial. Its per account, so after your first character goes in, you wont ever have to do it again.

Cool reading comprehension. OP already mentioned exactly that in his post. EVERYONE knows this trick. That’s why free travel to cities should be default, because sitting through 3 loading screens is just redundant.

EDIT: Nevermind, I misread OP as well and didn’t notice that he was using a different trick. My point still stands. EVERYONE knows these tricks and all it does is waste a few minutes.

I’m just gonna go ahead and quote myself here because everyone seems to have ignored it and is pretending that everyone saying “No” is doing so without logical reasoning.

Batbro.6859:

I would hate to see mounts. What it does is that it creates essentially two “modes” players in the world assume, a jarring dichotomy that discourages cooperation, one of the pillars of this game’s design.

The first mode is the walking mode players are currently forced into. Even using waypoints, you are still forced to walk, on foot, around the world, past and through dynamic events, world bosses, and hearts. At a moment’s notice you could join in on any given fight, hop slightly out of your way to revive a downed player, or maybe just drop a field for other players to use as you pass on by. It’s highly encouraging of cooperative play and exploration of not just the main paths, but the surrounding landscape.

The second mode would be mounted. You’re on your mount and invested in it, either because you have to keep it safe, or because mounting/dismounting takes time, or because you’re just passing by everything else so quickittenhat you don’t have time to care. Joining that dynamic event would require parking your mount somewhere or wasting time mounting/dismounting. Saving that dying player would mean leaving your mount to reach him, because you can’t traverse the uneven platformer-esque landscape to reach him while you’re on it. You just plow straight by everyone and everything in the game, completely unhelpful to everyone around you.

Unless you want mounts to just magically appear and disappear instantaneously from underneath your character with no cooldowns or penalties, there’s simply no way to avoid this issue. If you have to trek back to a stable to pick up a new mount, there’s a time, or even monetary, investment in getting off it. If there is a cooldown on summoning them, there’s another time investment. If there’s a slow mounting/dismounting animation, more wasted time discouraging players from getting out of “mount mode.” If the mounts themselves are vulnerable, the problem is WORSENED as players will actively AVOID any sort of dangerous area, which is where they would be needed most.

This game is built upon players cooperatively helping each other, even unintentionally. Your attacks drop combo fields on the ground, which other players then use. Two players completing the same heart target the same enemies, and unintentionally make each others’ lives easier. A world boss threatens all the players in the area simultaneously, so they all target it together and, through their combined efforts, take it down. Giving players mounts is giving them an excuse to be deliberately unhelpful.

No.

tl;dr: When you are on a mount, you do not want to get off that mount, because it’s an inconvenience to you. This means that if combat dismounts you, you’ll deliberately avoid any areas with enemies, which is where other players need you. This means that if your mount cannot navigate off-road terrain, you’ll never stray from the beaten path to more remote areas where more players are needed, because it would require dismounting. This means that if you come across a dynamic event or world boss in progress, where other players need you, you won’t dismount and join them because you’re on your mount and you’re in a hurry to get where you’re going, so like hell you’re gonna stop and dismount.

This game is built around player cooperation. Mounts do not encourage this, they encourage plowing past and ignoring anything and everything between you and your destination.

What bugs me most about it is that my guardian pretty much becomes useless underwater. I lose all of my good elites, half my healing options, and ALL of my symbols, which my build is centered around.

I wouldn’t REMOVE underwater quests and combat, as I rather enjoy them in concept. A better solution would be to simply readjust the abilities of classes underwater, some more heavily than others. Give the guardian his symbols back, make them spherical fields centered on the guardian’s location.

Although, on the other hand, engineer underwater is absolutely GODLY if you use grenades.

I would hate to see mounts. What it does is that it creates essentially two “modes” players in the world assume, a jarring dichotomy that discourages cooperation, one of the pillars of this game’s design.

The first mode is the walking mode players are currently forced into. Even using waypoints, you are still forced to walk, on foot, around the world, past and through dynamic events, world bosses, and hearts. At a moment’s notice you could join in on any given fight, hop slightly out of your way to revive a downed player, or maybe just drop a field for other players to use as you pass on by. It’s highly encouraging of cooperative play and exploration of not just the main paths, but the surrounding landscape.

The second mode would be mounted. You’re on your mount and invested in it, either because you have to keep it safe, or because mounting/dismounting takes time, or because you’re just passing by everything else so quickly that you don’t have time to care. Joining that dynamic event would require parking your mount somewhere or wasting time mounting/dismounting. Saving that dying player would mean leaving your mount to reach him, because you can’t traverse the uneven platformer-esque landscape to reach him while you’re on it. You just plow straight by everyone and everything in the game, completely unhelpful to everyone around you.

Unless you want mounts to just magically appear and disappear instantaneously from underneath your character with no cooldowns or penalties, there’s simply no way to avoid this issue. If you have to trek back to a stable to pick up a new mount, there’s a time, or even monetary, investment in getting off it. If there is a cooldown on summoning them, there’s another time investment. If there’s a slow mounting/dismounting animation, more wasted time discouraging players from getting out of “mount mode.” If the mounts themselves are vulnerable, the problem is WORSENED as players will actively AVOID any sort of dangerous area, which is where they would be needed most.

This game is built upon players cooperatively helping each other, even unintentionally. Your attacks drop combo fields on the ground, which other players then use. Two players completing the same heart target the same enemies, and unintentionally make each others’ lives easier. A world boss threatens all the players in the area simultaneously, so they all target it together and, through their combined efforts, take it down. Giving players mounts is giving them an excuse to be deliberately unhelpful.

No.

The thief has something similar, in that he gains a 4th skill if he has nothing in the off-hand.

Personally, I don’t see any reason why every one-handed weapon in the game shouldn’t have an additional two skills. Nothing unbalanced, keep them on-par with the off-hand skills, but an option nonetheless. Naturally, equipping an off-hand replaces these two skills.

Think of it as adding another off-hand weapon option for all classes, except the off-hand weapon is invisible and you do all your animations with your main hand.

I think everyone can agree that it’s not that unreasonable to go AFK AFTER your death though as you lie face-down in the dirt in the middle of nowhere.

So the problem there lies in reviving AFK people, only to have them die again. I think a simple keypress of F to revive would solve both this and OP’s problems.

I have a tangentially related problem, and possible solution. An example scenario:

I wander the world and I see a friendly face having some difficulty with an enemy. He’s downed and dying. I run over to help him, but by the time I make it there, he’s already dead. I focus on killing the enemy first, then start reviving him. Little do I know, however, that this player went AFK the moment he died, possibly in a fit of rage. I revive him and say “There ya go, buddy.” partially hoping for a “Thank you” or “Thanks” or even “TY”. What I get instead, however, is a blank thousand-yard stare from his lifeless shell. Now I’m stuck here, either babysitting his AFK body to prevent him from dying AGAIN and taking even more armor damage, or leaving him as he is, and feeling kinda like a jerk for reviving him in the first place.

My proposed solution is simple: when someone revives you, you have to press F to revive. They will be able to bring your health bar back up and leave as soon as they do, but you won’t actually get back on your feet until YOU confirm it with a keypress. This prevents scenarios such as the one I listed above, and simulataneously solves the OP’s problem (partially, anyway; you’ll never get downed more than once).