Guild Wars 2

And at risk of double posting, I did a lvl 10 fractal daily run (pl 12) and got 1500 karma again. I have no idea what’s going on anymore.

Wicked Rin.1972:

Here’s an idea, trading in pristine relics for 100 normal fractal relics

THIS. Or something like this.

I need more ways to get the crap I want like obi shards or boxes. Fractal relics, great. Pristine? I have all the rings I want, tyvm.

Alright, did another run at lvl 3 (pl 12) and got the correct amount of karma.

Weird, I have no idea if I was bugged or I didn’t record my previous karma correctly.

No idea if this has been discussed yet, but has Fractal Karma been changed?

On the wiki it says Fractal karma is based on this formula: 6400 + 8 * Completed difficulty * (Personal reward level – Completed difficulty) = Karma awarded

Yet, when I did a lvl 9 fractal run (personal level 11) I got only around 1500 karma, when the formula clearly says you should get at least 6400.

So is this because of a changed formula, or because I am bad at math?

Subjective, of course, but I was quite entertained seeing this match. And this is on a limited skill set.

Skills are limited so it forces you to actually value them. In GW1 there were many, many skills which no one used because frankly, they were either situational or complete crap. When I put in skills for GW2, I consider what benefits are harm I would get by putting them on. I can take WoR as a guardian, but that means I’ll be less protected on my shout guardian against non-projectile foes. I can take GS/Staff, and while it’ll give me much more mobility and support, I’d be missing out on damage compared to GS/Sword+Focus. Stuff like that.

Now that does not mean I do not want new skills. I just feel like I’m okay with the skill system as it is now. New skills would be nice, but I do not want it to be like GW1, where you have skills up the wazoo and 90% of them you don’t use. When I played GW1 as a Paragon, I always ran Imbagon. Sure, I could try other things from time to time, but Imbagon was the best possible build for that time. GW2 has builds that are better than some, but the low skill count means that more things are viable. My Hammer Warrior going full offensive skillset means better damage/control but crappier survival. I could kit in more survival skills but that would mean losing crit chance and added kds.

Just because you spent hundreds of hours grinding does not mean you should be able to get a random drop. That’s not “fair,” that’s “entitlement.”

If it was like that, what would happen to the people who have far less time to play? They should just kiss their chances for good loot goodbye? Very fair, that.

A 1/1000 chance for everyone is fair, in the sense that we all roll on the same table. If people are getting lucky, that’s not a flaw. They just rolled the correct number. You see all the people getting the lottery, you think the lottery system is flawed because you didn’t get it and someone else did? They were lucky and you were unlucky, in the sense of they got it and you didn’t. There is nothing that favors certain people over others. This is the way RNG works. Over all the data across all the servers and players, the numbers average out, thus RNG is working as intended. It doesn’t care about individuals. Statistics are like that.

And for the person who said that rolling a for a six on a die isn’t exciting, you don’t know how gamblers feel. It’s the knowledge that they may get that sweet jackpot or go home penniless that gives them their rush. In GW2, it’s the same. You play the mystic toilet because you are either a masochist or a gambler (or both), or you don’t and either wait for a rare item to drop or save money for buying it off the TP, which is guaranteed. And hell, if you grind as much as you say you do, then buying a rare item or a precursor shouldn’t be much of a problem. Or hell, you could not care about legendaries as many people do, and they’re much happier about it.

azurrei.5691:

At the moment, a large amount of excess karma is being sucked out of the system. I’m secretly hoping that the significant Karma nerf is a prelude to:

1) a buff to Karma gained from open world events / WvW
2) Ascended armor available with karma

I’m hoping for this as well. Either that or decreased prices on all Karma exclusive items.

I once could spend some excess karma on the racial weapon skins. Now I don’t touch them at all because either I’m saving up or because I don’t even have that much in the first place.

More emotes. Seriously, where are my /flex or /taunt? Or the ever so cathartic /fistshake?

Better non-human armor. It’s just sad to see how few sets of armor actually look good on Charr or Asura.

Karma nerf needs a slight rebuff. It’s way too inconvenient to get karma now. Or at least buff the karma from DEs. I mean, only 200-300ish karma on my lvl 80? Good luck now trying to get any karma exclusive items.

There are problems with this game, as there are any game. But most of what is listed above keep me going through all the problems. I’ll just reiterate some and add a few more.

1. MUSIC. MUSIIIIIIC. Jeremy Soule you are an amazing, amazing man. It’s even better when I can hear the tunes from GW1 that brings memories of the Prophecies campaign. Also, you can change it if needed. Getting tired of the same battle music? Change some tracks.

2. Versatility of choice for professions. I can pick any profession and still be as equally useful on all of them in some form or another. And I can solo with any of them.

3. Random conversations. It’s always interesting to go through a zone and catch conversations npcs are having about the nearby area. It’s also much more engaging than looking at quest logs from npcs you’ll never visit again, like in most other mmos.

4. GUARDIANS. Everything I want in a support profession, and snazzy blue fire to boot!

5. CHARR. Yeah, ok, I may be in the minority here, but I’ve been wanting to play as a Charr since GW1 and now I can. I also love the new dynamic between Charr and humans: They still hate each other, but they’re willing to put aside their quarrels for the greater good of the world. Also, I reserve judgment about the voice acting the game has since everyone has their own opinions, but man do I love the female main character Charr VA. I was originally going to go male Charr when the game came out, so I decided to try out a female Charr in the betas. One listen to that awesome voice and I was hooked. I sometimes equip Battle Roar (Charr racial skill) just to hear her go “Ashes and death!” or “Crush! Maim! Kill!” (The only thing I don’t like is the majority of Charr armor, but that’s a different story altogether.)

This is the one thing I feel the karma nerf did really badly.

Sure, ok, there was karma up the wazoo before the nerf. Yes, it needed nerfing. But not to this extent! I would have been happy having the nerf just be that boosters don’t affect consumables anymore. Or heck, ok, maybe a jug was too much karma for a day after the adjusted amounts. But to go from 4000ish karma a day to 600? What the heck? And Monthlies are now 6000 instead of 10xjugs? Come on. If you’re gonna nerf it this badly, make sure there are ways for people who don’t have a lot of time to get at least some decent measure of karma.

Karma is basically the new Legendary currency. Everything else can be gotten with farming just the same, sure. But at least you could buy materials as well for crafting and whatnot if you had the spare money. But if I want to get some more obi shards, or to maybe get some exotic trinkets for alts, it suddenly went from “oh hey, got some spare karma here, maybe I’ll get some new armor” to “holy crap, now I’ll never get some new gear.” For people with little gold, karma was an alternative to get gear. Now, it seems like gold works the best and thus anything exclusive to karma is now almost inaccessible.

To restate my point, I do think the karma nerf was needed. But not to this extent!

Khisanth.2948:

That blue flame is the least supportive thing the Guardian provides. It has probably killed more players than Risen Thralls.

But it supports my ego!

Alipius.4783:

People that see heal as an interesting part of a gameplay : Gw1 players.
People arguing it would make harder to find a team : random MMO players…

Just because you only experienced boring healer roles doesn’t mean it can’t be more…
It depends on the gameplay (not only “+XXX Hp”… cf conditions, enchantments, hexes…)

I was a hardcore GW1 player back in the day. First rolled necro, then warrior, then gravitated towards monk. I like healing things. I like being depended on. It was somewhat satisfying to see red bars go up and down.

But here’s the thing. In GW1 you had henchmen and heroes. You could solo things (in a sense) as a monk there. Many other MMOs with healer classes have to tough it out waiting for other players in group designed content. Also, though I liked to heal people, it got boring after a while. Watch the bar go down, heal. Oh hey, condition/hex, remove. Run around trying not to attack or get hit. This is why eventually my preferred profession was the Paragon. Lots of support capability, awesome, awesome effects (wings ftw) but yet I had some room for damage skills.

Now, other people have different opinions than me, but this is why I feel the Guardian is everything I could ask for as a support role in GW2. It’s basically the Paragon and Monk rolled into one. I can heal others, provide buffs, deal damage, and have awesome effects (blue fire wooo).

The real question is, where are my angel wings Anet?!

Honestly, I like the dynamic event system in GW2 faaaaar better than any other MMO with standard quests. Things are happening while I’m exploring, rather than “go to NPC, get quest, kill things, woot exp, never visit that npc again”. Implementing much more content to the dynamic events when they have so many already is a bit much to ask.

Does it have problems? Sure. Still better.

Vayne.8563:

Farran.3607:

I never understood the obsession with mounts.

Ok, so you have a large cat you can ride on while I have the basic horse or something. So?

To me, mounts are another way to customize your character and differentiate. Some of my characters would want a more graceful mount, some a more powerful/scary looking mount. It’s like a new outfit. I don’t care about getting around…I care about what mount my character would choose.

And, of course, it’s another thing to collect. Sorta like big minis. lol

I get that it’s just… well look at it this way. I like new armor sets and stuff because it lets me choose my appearance why still actually impacting something about my character’s stats. Weapons are the same thing.

But mounts… you ride on them. You don’t need them. Especially in a game with WPs.

Maybe it’s just me but… eh.

I never understood the obsession with mounts.

Ok, so you have a large cat you can ride on while I have the basic horse or something. So?

Sorry, Rabbit finisher is still best.

You just got owned by a rabbit.

Hate a pure healer role because of how BORING it is. You sit around and do nothing but heal. Played TERA, rolled a Priest, people attack me if I actually try and attack mobs because omg don’t draw aggro heal us plz.

With my Guardian, I can take a support role by providing buffs, rez downed players while taking less damage, and mitigate damage with aoe heals, all while still being able to attack and be a part of the team. Also, I CAN SOLO. Pure healer classes suck at that. I tried soloing a BAM as a Priest in TERA, able to do it, but took friggin forever because of my crappy damage. My support Guardian can still deal respectable damage to any mobs.

Came to GW2 because I loved GW1. Stayed until now (and will) because although there is a lot I’m not happy with (mostly because of how GW1 worked) there is still a lot more I do like with its variance from the tried and true formulas of other MMOs.

Put this into perspective. After getting a new comp with better graphics a month ago, I decided to give TERA a try because it’s now FTP, rolled a priest. At first, I was all, oooh look at the graphics, the huge kitten monster fights, ooh third person skillshots! Then I was all, wait, why can’t I run while attacking? Why is dodging a skill instead of double tap? Good god, what the hell do I do with all these skills at the same time… why is leveling so boring? Oh god, QUESTS?! Kill X monsters, find X items, I’m not really reading any of the quest dialogue, I’ve got like 50 random quests sitting in my log that I’m not doing because of crappy exp… I’m in a dungeon, doing healing stuff, oh god this is boring, I just sit there and don’t attack to not get aggro and watch bars go up and down… kitten this I’m going back to GW2.

Seven Star Stalker.1740:

Farran.3607:

Seven Star Stalker.1740:

I would have to disagree with that last part of yours. A lot of people have experimented with an RNG and it’s sort of a general consensus that the RNG is streak-coded. It sort of functions on a “One good turn deserves another” system. Problem is, good luck getting that one good turn to begin with.

Well that’s interesting. Where exactly was this found?

Whilst there’s no actual access to the coding, there have been actual experiments done by players where they’ve tested various things, such as salvaging for Ectos, toileting things (People bragging about forging 5+ precursors in LA /Map aren’t always bullkittenting), even your little bags where you get your mats from.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Ecto-Salv-Rate-decrease-after-TEQ-patch/first#post2902345

Whilst this thread is largely revolving around ectos rates, notice how a lot of the posters talk about how their drops come largely in streaks.

I see the thread, and it really doesn’t change my reasoning. Sure, maybe there are streaks in RNG. But those streaks themselves are random. People can get almost nothing by salvaging rares or MFing exots, or they can get the best drops possible. It still doesn’t matter, because they could just as well not gotten those at all. The way statistics works is that while there may be streaks of good or bad, it all settles out eventually after numerous trials at a certain percentage. Someone may get nothing, but another may get everything. Its just one got lucky, and another got unlucky. If you put all the lucky people and the unlucky people together and record their results, the statistics will still show a certain percentage, and that percentage is whether or not you get anything. People complain in that thread that they get no ectos from 7 rares. Gee, that’s pretty sucky. And perhaps they keep getting no ectos. But play the luck game long enough and things will average out. It may not help your money or time woes, but you’re no different from anyone else.

Seven Star Stalker.1740:

I would have to disagree with that last part of yours. A lot of people have experimented with an RNG and it’s sort of a general consensus that the RNG is streak-coded. It sort of functions on a “One good turn deserves another” system. Problem is, good luck getting that one good turn to begin with.

Well that’s interesting. Where exactly was this found?

Yenn.9185:

Isn’t that why people are complaining? Because of luck, the RNG. Someone who spent 10x the effort as you cannot get the item he wants, while you who put in a fraction of the effort got it?

But the thing is, like I said before, I could have just as well not gotten anything at all. It’s like me doing Teq events for a while and getting greens all the time even though I spent hours organizing with my server, teaching people mechanics, and yet there are those people who just randomly decided to drop by and get carried by us and get mini teq or the ascended weapons.

In that case, yeah, I feel bad about it. But it could have just as well been the opposite. The RNG does not discriminate.

Randomly decided to spend 60g to the mystic toilet, ended up with Spark. Immediately sold it to fund my making of the Bifrost, whose precursor randomly dropped for me out of a chest waaaay back in October.

Seriously, it’s all chance. There are ways to get slightly better drop rates, like farming bonus world boss chests, or MFing exotic weapons of the same type. But it all boils down to either you’re lucky or you’re not. Hell, I’ve been playing for the whole year and even now if I didn’t get lucky with the toilet I’d be strapped for T6 materials because I can’t spend as much time as a lot of people mindlessly farming bosses and dungeons. It could also have been that my 60g would have given me nothing to show for, and I’d be stuck even farther away from crafting The Bifrost. People talk about spending hundreds of g to try and get a precursor… I didn’t even break the 100g area until Scarlet’s invasions.

Point is, people get lucky or they don’t. What does it look like to someone like me, poor, not a lot of time to play, and dreaming since day 1 of a legendary when everyone else prances around with thousands of g? The drop rates don’t care who you are, or how much you’ve spent. It’s like a casino. You put the money in, and who knows, maybe you come back rich or in your underwear. If you don’t want to play the toilet, don’t. Save your cash. But don’t blame it when you don’t get anything, because you yourself decided to.

(On another note, since karma is nerfed now, good god is getting karma for the legendary difficult though. Shouldn’t have listened to my friend to spend it all on Orri boxes before the change… WvW farming can get tedious after a while. And why the hell doesn’t the birthday booster boost karma?! It says it does, but the bonus doesn’t!)

On my asuran warrior I’ve went from Entropy to an Ascended Warhammer, and they look pretty decent.

Not gonna respond to the survey because it is inherently flawed.

Otherwise, I’ll post my thoughts. I had only two emotions when fighting Tequila. Extremely gratified and very, very, annoyed.

First comes from a Teq kill. Working together with so many others on chat, the feeling you are part of a team going towards a grand purpose, screaming into your microphone… this is why I play MMOs.

The second comes from the stupid circumstances surrounding the event. Overflows, afkers, trolls, people who refuse to work with the group, GREENS FROM CHEST, all serve to deaden this otherwise really interesting event.

All in all, I approve of the event itself, but hate the bad environment.

So, what exactly do you build on a Hammer Warrior? PVT, or can you go Berserker? Or a mix of the two?

Asking because I just recently became more interested in my Warrior (Main is Guardian, just got Entropy from random drop) and there seems to be no real place to find this. Currently in full Zerker gear because I was originally going to be a GS build, but when Entropy dropped, couldn’t resist the call of the hammer. I know how Guardy Hammer builds are, but how are Warrior ones different?

JPs are cool. Frustrating sometimes, but doable. One thing I hate the most though is the FREAKING CAMERA. A large number of jumps would be so much easier on JPs if the camera didn’t screw your vision by forcing closeups on certain areas. Yeah, I know, a necessity, blah blah blah, but that still doesn’t soothe my rage. >:(

I wish on JPs there was an optional control setting that allowed your movement keys to change depending on your camera angle. You know, like how 99% of 3rd person rpg games are done? (disclaimer: statistic may or may not have been pulled out of my kitten .) Then I could swivel the camera angle to get a better view and then have my keys compensate.

It’s not just ascalon ghosts, it’s pretty much any “ghost” npc. I’m doing the personal story event where you go explore orr with the pale tree and all the ghost npcs (Trahearne, his men in that one battle scene) and the pale tree aren’t glowy anymore. Strangely, the orr ghosts are still ghosty.

So exactly as the topic says. Got one as a drop, no idea what it does. Rare for some reason, and doesn’t say consumable.

Does Evon get one too?

Seriously, please. Someone get on this. It’s so bad that I have to resort to the Cultural armors if I want anything to not have the tail look like its poking out randomly from the clothes.

Oh, and fix pauldrons too, but that’s another story.

Just as the title says. Forgive me if this has been discussed before, I had to put this down somewhere.

Now before some of you go “BOO HUMAN SYMPATHIZER” (What are you all, Renegades?) I love the Charr race, have since GW1. In that game, the place I spent the most time was the Eye of the North expansion Ebon Vanguard lands, and I just loved Pyre Fierceshot because he represented a whole new take on the Charr rather than the old “Grrr kill all humans durr” outlook.

So when I came to Ebonhawke on my Charr in GW2 recently (One of the very last places I had to do for map completion) I was just overwhelmed by the sheer amount of nostalgia. This was where Charr and Humans have been at war during the past hundred years. And yet, now they are willing to have peace. The dynamic of this relationship could not be more appreciated as my Charr went around the area, being hounded by Separatist sympathizers and convincing them (as a Charr!) to stand down, or going through the Charr camps and having to convince them (as a Charr myself, again) that truce with the humans was a good thing.

I just loved that the areas there had different dialogue if you were a Charr or human or not. I don’t think it would have had such an impact on me if I were, say, a Sylvari, with the Separatist sympathizers. As a Charr, I walk down those streets and the citizens call ME out with insults because I am their ancient enemy. It was the best experience ever. I loved it too when I went to the secret Order of Whispers base there and talked with the Charr in charge. My Sylvari friend got a generic response when he talked to her, but to me she was all “Nice to see you could walk in the front door. I have to sneak around to avoid kitten ing off the humans.” It was all amazing, and it really made me feel… Charr.

So I got myself an Ebon Vanguard staff and now am an unofficial Guardian of Ebonhawke! Separatists and Renegades beware! (Seriously, they kitten me off.)

And now that my self kittening has now finished, what do other Charr users think about Ebonhawke and its portrayal in GW2?

Really nice mostly, though I would think that you’re a necro, not a mesmer lol. Love the face and the chest/legs. Gauntlets look a bit off with the rest of the armor, though. And the pauldrons… ugh, though it’s not your fault. Charr pauldrons mostly suck due to levitation. 7/10.

Here’s my Charr Guardian. I tried to give her a Priory Look because I like Staff the best, hence the blueness. (Oh, and Ebonhawke staff is sexy.) I usually have the Southsun Sclerite shell on, but took it off for these shots because while I like tentacles, they clash horribly with my look lol.

Ortumbra.7490:

Farran.3607:

I’ve considered making a Charr ele because of this thread (have too many Charr characters but oh well) and I couldn’t help but notice some pics have the Charr with cool effects, like a flaming tail and such. What exactly makes that happen?

The flame tail is from the CoF pants, and if they also have molten arms those are from the CoF chest piece.

Ah, cool, thanks. All the more reason to make an Ele Charr, since I don’t have any other Charr that is light armor class.

I’ve considered making a Charr ele because of this thread (have too many Charr characters but oh well) and I couldn’t help but notice some pics have the Charr with cool effects, like a flaming tail and such. What exactly makes that happen?

If you’re having issues with the golem pull, just keep running. They can’t pull you if you’re constantly away from them. And yes, they can pull you off of a crate when you’re waiting for a small laser wall to pass, but chances are, if you’re doing it correctly, you’ll only take damage from the wall and be able to escape from the golem after. just maintain your heals, make sure you have enough endurance to dodge if you do get pulled, and you should be fine. And yes, long range weapons are a must here. You want to be as far away from the golems as possible.

In fact, the thing I worried the most about was not the walls, or the golems (though they were really annoying at times), but the CONFUSION. Seriously, half my party died because they didn’t realize that they had confusion on them, and kept auto attacking until they died. You’re going to want to bring some condition removal, and if you can’t get rid of the confusion, stop auto attacking until it goes away, and keep running. That should improve your survival chances.

Basically, this fight is a huge skill test. It’s to see if you can not only press buttons and hit monsters, but also if you can pay attention to everything around you. I played this fight on my rifle Warrior, and basically kited around A LOT (and I mean a lot) and paid minute attention to the position of my character, the laser walls, the crates, and the golems. And, I was the last person to die on my team countless times, lol.

It’s frustrating, sure, but I think the boss fight is one of the more well designed ones. Anyone can kill monsters. This fight forces you to think on your feet. It’s as if I’m a monk playing GvG in GW1 again, that’s how much effort I had to put in paying attention to everything, and it was pretty satisfying when the boss fight finally finished.