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[SPOILERS] Season 2 is still better

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I never quite figured out why there was a special “Lazarus Resurrection Room” in Abaddon’s reliquary, and why Balthazar trapped the place.

Yeah, that was really weird. I feel like the episode should have ended with the White Mantle fort instead of starting with it. It would have made more sense to find a resurrection circle there.

My only issue with season three was Livia. I would have liked to met her alias in ep 1 and again in ep 4, before her reveal in ep 6. It bothered me back when ep 4 was released that Livia wasn’t in it considering her devotion to Kryta.

Yeah, that was weird as well. You don’t even get the name of her alias right away, and then it’s revealed to be a fake name not long after. It’s an odd way to deal with a reveal like that, when there would have been context to introduce her earlier.

I actually remembered something else I was going to say in my last post. This is a bit wish listy, but it occurred to me that Season 3 would have felt really cohesive not just if Lazarus was Lazarus all along, but if the Exalted in Heart of Thorns were Mursaat like many of us originally assumed. Of course, this wouldn’t have tied into Path of Fire, but it would have created a direct line between the various plots of Heart of Thorns and the Episodes of Season 3.

The Mursaat, always obsessed with self-preservation, would have been able to mostly fill the role of the Exalted. The Pact and the Commander, having actually defeated an Elder Dragon before, would be people that the Mursaat would actually have reason to support, especially if they don’t want to join the fight against Mordremoth themselves. We could take care of their problem, and they’d have reason to believe we could do it.

Then the Season could pick up with Lazarus revealing that was there and he’s back, but he’s interested in true redemption, not simply supporting us in a mutually beneficial situation. We’re still highly suspicious and keep him at a safe distance, with Marjory still keeping an eye on him.

Ultimately, most things would still play out the same, with him ultimately revealing that his intentions aren’t as noble as he claimed after all, and we have to stop him from destabilizing the world. At the end, Livia would still help us get revenge on him specifically. The biggest difference here is that it wouldn’t be the end of the Mursaat, but it would only take some dialogue changes to get that to fit.

Mini Heart of Thorns Review

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I said I only lost Auric Basin once (and all of the octovines were at a sliver with a couple minutes to spare, everyone was pretty baffled about what happened at the final lane). I understand the confusion though cause I threw it in with the list of less positive experiences. Part of my point though was that you can have a great experience in one zone and the complete opposite right next door.

I also realized that most of that post ended up being pretty generic things that have been mentioned many times. I feel dumb because I know I had all these little things I wanted to give feedback on that I just can’t remember.

Another one did come to my head though, and it’s related to the biggest frustrations I had. For the most part, I made progress on the things I was aiming for, and I didn’t have much to complain about. When something did get me though, it tended to get me in a really annoying way.

Usually this involved me trying to get to a Hero Challenge or Point of Interest on the map, and either running into a frustration with a path that wasn’t really a path and having to go all the way back around, or some really bad luck once I had gotten there. One time I had to deal with the turrets in Rata Novus because I was trying to do something and the event didn’t come up for a little bit (although it did before I could finish), one time it was with the key card in Draconis Mons, and another time it was with the centaur Point of Interest in Lake Doric.

Each of these situations involved me being practically an inch from my goal, only for damage to come in a lot faster than it had previously, catching me off guard and downing me the moment I hit a defensive ability that would have saved me.

Those were really frustrating, though it’s hard to say they were much more than bad luck or sub-optimal planning. There is one thing they had in common that I’ve wanted to bring up though.

The Downed State

I like the idea of the Downed State, but I feel like it hasn’t really kept up, and sometimes I feel like the game is afraid of it. For instance, it seems almost a given that any boss nowadays will drop a red circle on anyone who is downed that not only hastens their defeat, but makes sure no one can help get them up. It’s to the point where I wonder why those abilities don’t just instantly defeat you to begin with, since the chances of you ever escaping are microscopic (especially if you’re not one of the classes that can control some movement while downed, and I don’t count Mesmer because the number 2 always teleports me further into danger).

In Heart of Thorns, this seemed to apply to most enemies in general, and might contribute to the impression of it being anti-solo. A good chunk of the enemies are tough enough in Heart of Thorns that, if you get downed, your pitiful downed state damage is never going to finish the guy off unless he was almost dead. Even the weaker enemies, like Pocket Raptors, tend to swarm in such a fashion that even if you rally, you’re down again before you can heal, so it didn’t really matter.

It seemed like if I got downed in Heart of Thorns and I wasn’t near other players, I was defeated. It was a pretty frustrating experience, because it turns the downed state from a potential for a second chance into a time-wasting tease.

While writing this, I also remembered another thing I was going to say about the specifics of Hero Challenges.

Hero Challenges
Some of the Hero Challenges just seem oddly placed. To elaborate on what I mean, I’ll use a specific example. There is a challenge in Auric Basin where you fight this Champion Quetzal and his two guards. Any one of these guys is a pretty nasty opponent on their own, but getting it down to the Champion isn’t that bad. The really nasty part, is that this challenge takes place right in the middle of a Quetzal camp filled with veterans. Essentially this guy gets adds, and pretty dangerous ones, constantly throughout the fight, because with only two or three players fighting this guy, it can take the duration of two or more local respawns to take him down.

This just seems like an odd level of difficulty. If the intention was for him to have respawning adds, I don’t know why the challenge couldn’t just be like that one in Tangled Depths near the portal to Dragon’s Stand.

The challenge is certainly doable and isn’t too far out of the way (I’ve done it on all my characters that have passed it without incident), but it comes across as way more dangerous than it was intended, and requires a much higher level of play with small player numbers than comparable challenges.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Character Observations

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

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I just played through Season 3 all in a row, and it gave me some different perspectives than I had just following them as they came out.

Braham
First off, Braham storming off didn’t seem quite as sudden when I didn’t have downtime between his appearances. What interested me though, is it felt like he was hiding something. I don’t know how to explain it, but some of his dialogue came off as someone who is really, really frustrated about something else. The death of his mother is obvious, but it felt like there was something else, and something he might not even realize himself and is projecting it onto everyone else. It might sound baseless at the moment, but it makes me feel like there might be a future reveal for him.

Something that bothered me this time around, was the exact way the Commander responded to him. Braham was being a jerk about the whole guild thing, but I really feel like the player character was overly harsh about his plan. At the time, all you have is an idea from Taimi that she might be able to come up with a plan to pit the dragons against each other. It’s not for two episodes until she even intends to start experiments. Nevertheless, your character treats Braham’s plan, which he ultimately proves to be viable, as an offensive waste of time.

This is one of those places where it feels like the characters know where the story is going, because while Taimi’s plan is certainly preferable, it was not anywhere near solid enough at the time to start dismissing viable alternatives. The logical thing to do would have been to let Braham keep researching his plan in case Taimi’s thing didn’t pan out, not to tell him off, even if he wasn’t in a bad mood.

Anise
It’s no secret that I’ve been suspicious of the portrayal of both Jennah and Anise for a long time. After seeing Season 3 in this new light, my perspective on it has shifted a bit. I’m a little less suspicious of Jennah now. While I’m still not fond of how she handled the events of Episode 4, in the greater context of the season, they feel more like a situation in which the heroes and villains are black and white so the heroes can get away with more, if you know what I mean. I also think the situation was influenced by the culmination of that arc being known for a long time.

Anise, however, set off even more flags for me. While her being much older or not who she seems has been offset by Livia’s role, that doesn’t rule her out entirely as having some dark secret, it just offsets the two instances of her age coming into question (in the Personal Story and Season 2, the former of which I guess can now be explained as information Livia gave her).

In Episode 4, there’s quite a few things. The Commander gets upset about her sending Canach ahead without informing everyone, and even Demmi calls this out. Those fears turn out to be fairly justified, as well, since Canach’s squad was taken out and he was being tortured. Anise also infamously gets pretty violent on multiple occasions and the other characters have to talk her down, culminating in her attitude toward Valette.

Then there’s the Shining Blade stuff in Episode 6. Livia lets all this information out about the Shining Blade, and Anise is not happy about it when she finds out that Livia told us. The thing that I found odd, is that Anise is initially angry that Livia told us about the whole oath thing, but then suddenly brings up the idea of us taking it. It’s this weird moment that feels like she didn’t want things going that way, but then suddenly realizes that she can use that as part of her plan after all.

When Anise vouches for you, she talks about how much she’s watched everything you’ve done, and the Commander gets upset about that little revelation. This reminds me of back in Season 2 when Anise told Canach to spy on the Pact, which still seems like a suspiciously unnecessary thing to do when she’s friends with important people in it already.

On top of that, despite this whole story about getting inducted so the Shining Blade can share secrets with you, one of the other Shining Blade members talks about how Anise keeps secrets even from the rest of the Shining Blade.

Maybe Anise is just supposed to be a somewhat amusingly secret-obsessed but otherwise heroic character, but I feel like this Season laid it on a bit thick when it came to her darker side.

Canach
Canach is my favorite character by this point. I feel he not only gets the best dialogue, but he knows the right way to deliver it. I’ve critiqued the sarcasm in many characters, but I’m okay when he does it for two reasons: first, he tends to direct his sarcasm to the topics that are actually deserving it, and second because he delivers that sarcasm with an appropriate frustration rather than the arrogance that many others do.

I want to see him again as his own person, and if I’m right about Anise, it would be awesome to have him along for that (as long as it didn’t turn into a Demmi situation, because that was unfortunate enough as it was).

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

[SPOILERS] Season 2 is still better

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I followed Season 3 as it came out, but I just played through it all at once myself finally.

I definitely agree that Season 2 was better. Honestly, Season 1, 2, and Heart of Thorns still play out a pretty decent arc. It starts out as seemingly disconnected events, has the big reveal that Scarlet planned it all, then she wakes up Mordremoth. Then you deal with Modremoth waking up, the consequences of that, you set up a counterattack, then everything falls apart. You pick up the pieces and take the fight to Mordremoth directly.

There were some side plots, like the egg, but once it was revealed that there was a main plot, it stayed pretty focused.

Season 3 is a lot better when you play it through all at once (and when you know where it’s going), but it seems to dawdle around a lot more. Episode 1 continues pretty well off of Heart of Thorns, but Episode 2 is practically filler. Sure, there’s a good reason you want to stop the island from erupting, but that part of the story could easily have been cut. The relevant parts of Primordus are addressed in Episode 5.

Episode 6 is a really weird finale, seeming to have almost nothing to do with the rest of the season. The Shining Blade stuff is almost certainly going to be really important in the future, but for now it really came out of nowhere, and the map had almost nothing to do with the story so far.

I don’t think there’s an innate problem with them running multiple stories: the Dragons, the White Mantle, and “Lazarus” going at the same time certainly help to build the world if handled well. The problem was that it felt like the story somehow knew both too much and too little about where it was going.

The whole, Lazarus reappears, takes part of the White Mantle and tries to redeem himself, is suspected to be an impostor, suddenly loses his White Mantle and replaces them with mercenaries, then turns out to be Balthazar with his own worshippers and wanting to destroy the world after all, just feels really disjointed. A lot of it also feels like the characters knew where it would go before it went there, which could be seen in all the speculation about Lazarus at the end of Episode 4, and how many people disagreed with the player character that it was suspicious.

At the same time, if feels like certain things weren’t planned entirely and left some jarring twists that felt entirely unnecessary. As I’ve said before, the whole thing would have made a lot more sense if Balthazar really was just Lazarus all along. The entire Season would have felt cohesive then, and the finale would have been a finale to the Season’s story.

Alternately, it being Balthazar all along without any deception could have been equally cohesive. The White Mantle try to start something, and then one of the actual human gods arrives (thanks to hearing news about us taking down another Elder Dragon), making Caudecus look even worse for his accusations of false gods. We still might have been cautious, but would have accepted him as an ally, with his only deception this time being that he’s hiding his diminished power.

Balthazar doesn’t help much with our investigations of Primordus and Jormag because of that, but gives an excuse, and then Caudecus makes his move out of desperation, since a god has now allied against him. After the White Mantle is put down, we think the coast is clear and we start to enact Taimi’s plan. She realizes it’s actually a bad idea, but Balthazar finally reveals his true nature when he reveals that he doesn’t care. We try to stop him, but all of the worshippers that have begun to follow him since his return become his new army.

I’ll admit this version would still have an issue with the final episode, but it at least would have had a cohesive topic from the beginning that would have smoothly transitioned into the expansion like Season 2 did.

The fact that I think you could change so little to fix Season 3 means it’s not as bad as it sounds, but those little things add up to making it a lot more jarring than the previous outings.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

PoF Centaurs?

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

My memories of the centaur in Nightfall is something that has disappointed me in GW2 (although I’ll admit I don’t remember the specifics very well, and I never knew the lore that well).

It’s always bugged me that the centaur in GW2 are just portrayed as beasts that may be able to talk, but only can say horrible things and no one is treated as bad for hating them all back. In Nightfall, I felt like it examined how completely unfair that idea was, but also how that would make the centaur understandably bitter.

I kinda held out hope that an Elona expansion would add playable centaur (they’d require some special stuff, but I really want a company to meet that challenge; centaur used to be a core fantasy race but it seems game design limitations have made them disappear outside of the occasional generic enemy), but I really hope we at least see them at all and get more characterization than “horrible people it’s okay to kill.”

How long to play the newest season?

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I just did Episode 1 and 2 one day, 3, 4, and 5 the next day, and then 6 the day after that, and that included doing map completion. Also, I did all the story stuff solo.

If you just rush through the story, it probably shouldn’t take you that long. Even some of the nastier story fights can generally be pushed through by constantly respawning.

Mini Heart of Thorns Review

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

Well, I’ve completed the Heart of Thorns story now as well as all of Season Three, so I’m going to follow up on my review.

First, I want to thank all of the responses and advice here. I actually haven’t come back to this thread until now, but I appreciate it all nonetheless.

Onto the review, I think my new overall impression would be: What Heart of Thorns does well, it does really well, and where Heart of Thorns hurts, it really hurts.

The Really Well
(This section is a lot shorter, but that’s because it’s harder to describe. Heart of Thorns was still fun overall, but like I said, where it hurts, it really hurts, so it’s easier to say more about that).

Verdant Brink is still my favorite zone, and I have a new reason to add on for that. When you first start, the zone is dangerous and a bit confusing, but perfectly navigable. As you gain more Mastery, it becomes easier and easier to traverse until you earn the ability to explore it completely freely. It’s a liberating experience that you really feel like you earned.

Gliding is just amazing. It’s already weird to imagine that I couldn’t glide just a week ago. It feels amazingly natural and fits right in. Heavy gliding areas, like Verdant Brink, Bloodstone Fen, and Dwayna’s Reliquary are some of my favorite places in the game now, but it has applications everywhere without breaking the game.

Some Adventures are really fun minigames that are a breath of fresh air and are a nice way to get some extra Mastery Points. I want to keep seeing these.

The Hurt
Some Adventures are just not fun at all, weirdly difficult to even get Bronze, or are simply broken. The Adventures are almost symbolic of the overall nature of the expansion hitting the extremes.

When things got hard, they got really frustrating. There’s a lot in the expansion that isn’t so much challenging, as “I hope the train is nearby, or else I am a very specific profession and build”. My Mesmer was able to solo certain Champion Hero Challenges in plenty of time that my other characters couldn’t even hope to, but even my Mesmer ran into many situations where I was dead in the water unless there was a train nearby.

This isn’t to say I shouldn’t have to play with other people. In fact, the spontaneous cooperation is one of my favorite parts of the game and something I think it does really well, but I think Heart of Thorns… expects it too much?

I was having enough trouble right now when there is a huge influx of new players to those areas, but I’m very concerned how this stuff will end up when Path of Fire is the new content, and even more when there’s stuff after it.

I think this is one of the things that still bothers me about Tangled Depths. In Tangled Depths, I feel there’s less chance than anywhere else in the game of someone happening to be wandering by and deciding to stop and help you with the Hero Challenges and other difficult stuff there (I ran into more people helping with what we could in an empty Dragon’s Stand). That spontaneous cooperation, like I said, is awesome, but it’s unlikely here because of the nature of the zone (not just it being confusing, but the places it funnels people into). It’s even worse in that it seems to have some of the most difficult opponents when you’re already less likely to get casual help. It’s like the opposite of Verdant Brink, where it’s hard for someone to not be nearby, and a simple matter to join up.

The meta events are related to this. I haven’t had really bad experiences with the meta events, and I like the idea in theory (I loved Silverwastes when it came out), but I think there’s a critical mass. I’ve yet to see a group take the Verdant Brink meta seriously, I’ve only ever lost the Auric Basin one once (which is a weird story), and the only time I’ve seen people do the Tangled Depths one, it was super toxic. Their nature makes them disappointingly unreliable for something that’s otherwise cool and pretty much defines the open world of Heart of Thorns.

I got a group together quick for a Challenge in Tangled Depths, and I’ve seen Hero Challenge trains, but I just think it’s contrary to the game’s greatest strengths to require that as much as Heart of Thorns does.

Side Note
I haven’t really mentioned the story, and one reason is because it can kinda be its own whole topic. I enjoyed the story overall and was actually relieved that it went by pretty fast for my own reasons, but I’ll admit that it stood out as being quite concise. I don’t think I can say it was done really well or done really poorly, it had its own ups and downs.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Ideas and Suggestions for Renegade changes.

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I keep hearing the elite specializations being described as things that completely change the class. In my experience, they feel more like secondary professions, but even then, there’s one place where I don’t feel like that is true: the Revenant.

The Revenants just get to choose between which extra legend they get.

When we first learned about Revenant and the Elite Specializations back in Heart of Thorns, I was really looking forward to the crazy things Revenant could get in the future. I speculated about a Dervish parallel if we ever went to Elona.

I still think we should get that. Dervish should be a Revenant Elite Specialization that trades out channeling legends with channeling gods (not literally, but a similar mechanic). With the gods relevant again, and all races joining in on the fight (and visiting their most sacred places in Orr), I don’t think this is out of place.

Kalla Scorchrazor should just be added as a base Legend, increasing the skill options for the base class.

This would obviously be too late to implement by launch of the expansion, but I really think the Revenant Elite Specializations should be a little more ambitious to fulfill the goal of the system and to prevent the Revenant from getting stuck in a pattern.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Mini Heart of Thorns Review

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

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Disclaimer: I called this a mini review because I’ve only been playing it for a few days, not because it’s short.

As someone who held out on buying Heart of Thorns until excited enough by Path of Fire to pick up both, I thought I’d say a few things about how Heart of Thorns feels after having avoided it.

I’ll start off by saying I’d give it a thumbs up. I’ll get to the rough spots, but overall it really felt like an evolution of the core elements of Guild Wars 2.

The first thing I did was start up the story in order to unlock the Mastery system. It’s been a long time since I did season two, but I still felt like I was walking in on the aftermath of that devastating finale.

Zones
Verdant Brink is really cool, and I think is the highlight of the expansion. I had a lot of fun exploring as much as I could even without gliding or any other mastery. It’s a great zone that really sells the idea of picking up the pieces of the failed attack, and it’s pretty intuitive to explore. I just finished exploring it and I had a lot of fun. The canopy gave me a little trouble thanks to how the meta effects it, but once I got a hang of it, it was the best part.

Auric Basin is pretty cool, but I have some more issues with it. The waypoints are more annoying in this zone. I traveled down the entire western side of the zone on one character, only to detour to help some players with an event before I got any waypoints, and then found myself stuck in that area because I didn’t have the Exalted mastery to get out, forcing me to travel all that way again.

Tangled Depths is an absolute nightmare. I’ve heard this is not exactly a rare opinion, but I find it a huge shame since Verdant Brink did the same multi-leveled concept so beautifully. I’ve seen a lot of discussion about the map not displaying the layers well, but I think that’s only a symptom. The zone itself is designed less intuitively than anything else in the game. Huge, epic paths that look like they’d go somewhere, just abruptly turn into dead-ends. The map has some really nice areas, but it’s just not fun to traverse.

I only showed up for the tail-end of the meta in Tangled Depths and we pulled it off, but the chat got extremely toxic. I was surprised, as I haven’t seen that level of anger elsewhere in the game, and not even in the other Heart of Thorns maps.

I haven’t done anything in Dragon Stand yet except step inside the zone. I’m not looking forward to it though honestly. It sounds like a really nerve-wracking meta. I like the big bosses, but I hate having so much riding on a fight.

Mastery
The Mastery system is a lot more intuitive than it sounded when I heard it described. It’s a neat little system that really does an interesting progression that doesn’t have the bad parts of an increased level cap while still giving you something to work for. Also, it doesn’t make me feel guilty about playing alts, which this game has always been better about than other MMOs, but occasionally has its moments.

The one concern I have about the Mastery system is going forward. Mastery being divided by area makes sense considering the context of the abilities you unlock through it, but it’s already kind of annoying that I only make progress on the next mastery I need for the Heart of Thorns story while I’m in those zones, and while I’m in the old zones I’m making progress on completely different things. It’s going to feel really weird playing Path of Fire and essentially having Heart of Thorns completely frozen while I’m diving into the new stuff.

Elite Specializations
So far I can’t say much about these. I’ve decided to wait for the Path of Fire one on my main, and I’m still getting a hang of them on the two characters I’ve picked the Heart of Thorns ones for. I’ve never been very good at making builds or decks, so it’s hard for me to really appreciate what new options I might have. Despite things I’ve heard about them really changing the class, they don’t feel that different so far. Berserker feels the most different so far, and only in the fact that it’s super flashy, not that it plays differently.

The one thing that bugs me, though, is how many skill points they need. For my main, who has World Completion, it was no problem at all. For my alts, especially my newest one, it felt like the game had raised its level cap. Suddenly these characters I had that were more or less on par with my main, suddenly had to scour the maps for hero challenges in order to try out the new stuff that I wanted them to be defined by going forward. It’s nice that the Heart of Thorns hero challenges give 10 skill points, but this only helps so much. On my newest character, I quickly ran out of challenges that he could easily get to or accomplish without significant assistance. I ended up just spending a whole evening grinding out old skill points one by one.

General
I like the expansion overall. I probably would have been underwhelmed if I had paid the launch price, since I feel the frustration gets too far once you enter Tangled Depths, but there is a lot of great evolution here, and I hope that the rough spots were learning experiences that are improved in Path of Fire.

When I first walked into Verdant Brink, it was magical. I really felt like I had stepped into something new. It might be funny for people who got Heart of Thorns when it was new to hear, but I was legitimately surprised. I’ve been logging in fairly regularly this whole year and doing stuff that’s been around forever and been content with it, but this really opened my eyes to what can be done in the future.

I actually wasn’t that excited about Path of Fire when I bought it, looking at it more from the perspective of “well Nightfall was my favorite campaign and this looks interesting enough for its price”, but now I’m a lot more interested to see where this game can go, not just where it is.

Done S3 E6 and not hyped?

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

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I’m less hyped than the last few episodes. I really have no idea how this was supposed to connect to anything, and the teaser certainly didn’t help.

It was just some random scenes of things burning and a dragon that I thought was Primordus because it was all black and lava-cracked, but apparently it was Kralkatorrik (looking at it again, I can see crystals briefly before he turns all lava-y, but I wasn’t really about to rewatch something that made so little sense to me before people pointed this out)?

I don’t know how the player character even knew it was showing the Crystal Desert, but even with that information I don’t have any reason to be hyped about that. Balthazar, a weakened god who we already defeated, is running off to a barren area. I don’t know anything in the lore that would make that exciting, and I’m not aware of anything in this season that would help.

(Spoiler) Living Story S3E6 Discussion

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

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Yeah, it occurred to me that this whole season would have felt more cohesive if it was about Lazarus all along and didn’t try to lead into the future.

Imagine if the real Lazarus really was resurrected at the beginning, and he’s loose and doing something we don’t know, but he plays nice and we’re busy with the Dragons and a Caudecus who doesn’t care about him. Then once we deal with Caudecus, Lazarus makes his move and steals from us. We hunt him down, foil his plan, and then follow him to Orr to finish him for good, end of story.

I think that would have tied the season together better and given us a reason to kill a guy who could only escape because we let him. At this point, bringing back the real Lazarus only to immediately kill him just comes out of nowhere and doesn’t really accomplish anything except resolve an old plot I really don’t care about.

One thing I want to say about Guild Wars 1 is that, I played all of the campaigns, and that’s pretty much it. I’ve seen a lot of people talk about them starting to involve GW1 more, but it almost all still seems to come from the War in Kryta and such, which I never saw because it was way too hard (and I vaguely recall Arena.net admitting that after getting feedback from a survey back in the day). None of this GW1 lore means anything to me because it keeps being brought from the hardcore parts of the game, instead of the main story, so even people who played GW1 aren’t guaranteed to have connection to these plots.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

(Spoiler) Living Story S3E6 Discussion

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

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Post Chapter Spoilers

I watched the chapter play out, and Livia's characterization was one of the most insufferable yet. Your character rolls their eyes at it a couple of times at least, which is nice, but for the most part it seems like you’re supposed to accept it as heroic.

Yet again, I have to question the morality of the heroes. A hero brags about committing genocide this episode. Are we supposed to be happy about that? What kind of a threat was Lazarus at this point anyway? His people used to be a threat because there was a lot of them and they conspired to manipulate things in their favor. He’s just one person who never did much to begin with, and he couldn’t until this episode anyway, and only because the hero’s actions. It makes her come across as dangerously obsessed to me far more than it does him needing to be stopped.

Caudecus was a much bigger threat to Kryta than someone who had been sealed away and had no more allies (even the White Mantle hated Lazarus by this point), where was Livia then?

Also, I felt like the reveal for Livia was tailored to counter speculation about Anise, but all it did was make it feel more weird. Why have this running thing about Anise being way older than she appears and her trying to keep some questionable actions on the down low, when it’s actually a completely different, entirely new Shining Blade member who has that backstory. That’s dramatically strange, to say the least.

Finally, the ending was a big letdown compared to last time. Last time we had a huge build-up and a direct lead-in. This time we got a vision that was way too vague for me to understand or care (was quite surprised to see the player character be so confident about what they got from it), and then (what felt like an ad) teasing the real tease. It felt contrived because the chapter itself was essentially Livia's personal vendetta that hijacks the plot, with you only essentially only getting back on track as a reward for helping. The actual plots we were dealing with didn’t really get a climax in the climactic episode.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Bouncing Attacks from Corpses

in Bugs: Game, Forum, Website

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

Hmm, you’re right, it doesn’t seem to happen with other enemies. I guess I must have just always switched weapons before fighting the dredge in the past, so I never noticed before. The door behavior might be a similar situation.

Bouncing Attacks from Corpses

in Bugs: Game, Forum, Website

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

After the latest patch, my Thief’s Shortbow’s main attack is bouncing off of corpses, even for a short time after those corpses visually disappear. It’s certainly nice, but it’s never worked this way before and I didn’t see it in the patch notes.

Also, in case it’s related, I also noticed that after being downed, I had less max Initiative when I got back up (I have Preparedness equipped), and it didn’t fix until I was downed and rallied again.

EDIT: I’m in Dredgehaunt Cliffs as I noticed this, and there have been some other odd behaviors. When attacking the dredge-held bases, if I shoot the doors with Trick Shot, it seems to reliably bounce inside and really mess up the enemies inside the door. Plus, Choking Gas at least seems to visibly fly right through the door (it’s hard to tell if it physically is, as I’m not seeing a circle for it at all, but the enemies certainly seem to be getting poisoned on the other side).

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Profession change, please.

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I really wish there was a Profession Change. I’m sure it wouldn’t be easy (though theoretically easier than other character changes), but it would solve a big problem I’m having right now.

When the game first came out, I wanted a Sylvari and a Human, and a Mesmer and a Thief. I wasn’t sure which should be which. Eventually I just picked Sylvari Mesmer and Human Thief even though I wasn’t really sure yet, and told myself that I’d forget about it eventually.

For the most part, this wasn’t a problem because I’m not much of an alt person and thus, even with the issues I had with Mesmer, I was able to stick to one character. However, recently I started playing my Thief a lot because I was trying to make back up money I spent and I consider him more of my gathering character. During this, I finally actually started to get the hang of Thief, and realized I was finally having fun with the game without having to force myself to play.

It might sound like the answer is easy: just switch to the Thief as my main. The problem is, when it comes to the character himself, I just can’t really seem to like him. There’s just something about the human male. Meanwhile, I still absolutely love how my Sylvari turned out, and my favorite armor set on her is the wedding dress anyway, so her appearance wouldn’t have to change at all.

The other problem is that I have a huge amount of investment in my Sylvari, from map completion to story to crafting. I could get a new character up to 80 in a second, but that’s the easy part.

If I could just pay to switch the professions of my Sylvari and Human though, it would fix everything. Then my human would be a reference to my GW1 Mesmer and I could hop over there when I felt like it, but I could continue to spend most of my time on my Sylvari, who would end up being a lot more fun.

Jumping Puzzles are getting out of hand

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I agree that they’re getting out of hand. I liked the jumping puzzles that came out with the game because they were fun and showed off some amazing environments. I don’t do jumping puzzles to prove anything or to even do something challenging.

It really bothers me that jumping puzzles have turned into another kind of challenge that just keeps getting more and more difficult until it surpasses any given skill level. They remind me of old school puzzle games. They don’t get more interesting or show more variety as the game goes on, they just get harder and harder until you just have to give up.

That’s never even why I did jumping puzzles to begin with.

When the game first came out, I did a few, but never really went after them. Recently I’ve been getting through most of them as they show up as dailies, and they’re really cool. It’s amazing how many interesting locations in the game are hidden right beneath your nose. The best part about them, though, is that that’s all they really are. An interesting location that you get a neat tour of.

If I have to tear my hair out to see the thing, it’s just not worth it. I’m not even saying those jumping puzzles shouldn’t exist, but I feel like that’s exactly what’s happening with the ones I like: arguments and development that they shouldn’t exist anymore.

Can we at least occasionally still get jumping puzzles that are about the environment and not challenging yourself?

Patch notes - the irony

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

My Thief has been an alt for a long time, and I’ve kept a Shortbow on him just for Infiltrator’s Arrow for the traveling I use him for. Whenever I encounter serious combat, I switch to his main weapons.

Now the Shortbow is awesome. It took the way I always wanted to use it, and now that actually does something. I think it might have even been chewing through enemies faster than my old tactic as long as I was trying to make the most of Choking Gas.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

What are you on about, M.O.X.?

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

It’s an easter egg, it’s very easy to miss altogether (I certainly wouldn’t know it’s a thing if I didn’t frequent the forums)

Same here. It kinda reminds me of Pepe in World of Warcraft. They started adding content for that little bird like crazy, and ended up making real plushies and stuff, but he’s intentionally hidden and (without having actually cared to look it up) I still don’t know how to actually get him.

I like cats in real life, but care needs to be made about not taking the ubiquitousness of content for granted that’s intentionally hidden.

Human gods and human characters [spoilers]

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

This makes me think about how, apparently one of the mercenaries can be overheard saying that it’s good Balthazar hired them instead of people who would be blinded by faith.

Isn’t that backwards?

Wouldn’t followers who don’t question your orders be more useful to someone like Balthazar than someone who might hesitate and demand more pay? I mean, what if Balthazar needed them to jump into the volcano? How much is he going to pay them for that? On the other hand, someone faithful enough would do it without question.

There seems to be an odd outlook on gods here outside of just the lack of different reactions for human characters.

I feel like his weakened state and perhaps some future reveal about his nature are accidentally being written as already common knowledge to the populace, even though there’s no reason anyone has to know anything that would make them doubt him.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

*Spoiler: Episode 6 speculation

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

You don’t but like I said anet changed how stuff works. They need to get that money in, and would make no sense for the expansion if the story doesn’t connect on some level with S3.

Oh sorry, I didn’t mean that Season 3 wouldn’t connect at all, just that the final map doesn’t need to be geographically relevant.

For all we know, it could be all the way over in the Isles of Janthir, and just have a hook at the end that ‘uh oh, some ley line thing that happens there stirs a dragon on the other side of the world’ or something.

The most dramatic ending to LWS3 I can think of off the top of my head would be us rushing to stop Braham from killing Jormag and failing, thus like someone mentioned releasing his energy that’s absorbed by Kralkatorrik (or another god?) and setting up the scene for the expansion i.e. deal with Kralk before things get out of hand.

For the sake of the Norn story, I almost hope that doesn’t happen because it would seem a bit of a sudden and anti-climactic conclusion, but I think I could see it happening. It would also tie into the team’s previous episode while also coming off pretty logically from this one.

We could go to Braham to tell him that Primordus and Jormag are dormant again and we don’t want to mess with that balance, but either we don’t get to him in time or he simply doesn’t want to give up his revenge, kills Jormag, and completely upends the stability we just managed to narrowly obtain.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Zhaitan's Weakness

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I don’t think the “weakness” thing is innately a problem, but it’s been applied so oddly.

For Zhaitan, we didn’t exploit a weakness. We starved him over a long period of time, and then used anti-dragon technology against him. It was all thoroughly explained over the campaign, logical, and was really hard-earned in a way that was appropriate for a first kill that we might refine in the future. I’d like to imagine that he had a weakness that would have made things a lot easier, but we managed to take him down without it.

For Mordremoth, he destroyed our anti-dragon stuff in the airship fleet, presumably along with a good chunk of the manpower that built and maintained it. Without such a universal solution, we discovered the concept of weaknesses, and while we exploit it awfully fast after learning about it, it was his mistake for letting someone in on his secrets before fully corrupting him. It even made some sense that, being a lot more expansive and infest-y than other dragons, that you’d have to kill the “hive mind” itself rather than a body that could spread anywhere.

For Primordus and Jormag, I always assumed that pitting them against each other was less “this is literally their weakness” and more “hey, their powers are opposed to each other, why even bother finding an individual weakness when we can just have them take care of each other.” Saying that a civil war is their weakness just seems a little odd, as if the weaknesses are literally the only way to defeat them, even though we took down one dragon and nearly another before even knowing about the weaknesses.

I mean, I imagine that pitting Primordus and Mordremoth against each other would have been pretty effective too, since burning the whole place down would have been an effective way to get rid of Mordremoth’s infestation no matter where he tried to migrate his mind to, but obviously that wasn’t his “weakness.”

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

*Spoiler: Episode 6 speculation

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

Balthazar lost his godhood based on his dialogue in the final instance, so it’d be weird if we see multiple gods in Tyria (and stranger if they’ve suffered similar fates).

To be fair, since the gods have been missing, and one now returns with a tale of having been attacked, it’s not an unfair guess to assume that the attack could be the reason why all of them have been missing. In other words, they may not have all suffered the same fate of losing their godhood, but whatever attacked him could easily be why the others haven’t showed themselves in a long time.

I think it’s a definite possibility that at least one other god has been under our noses this whole time. I think it would be a huge coincidence though, if they all decided to disguise themselves the same way, and all as people we know, no less. For instance, if Lyssa gave Balthazar the mirror and he didn’t just acquire it, then she might be in a similar situation as him, but we’d need a pretty good reason to start picking people out.

Of course, I (and others) could also simply be missing something from old lore or bits of dialogue in this episode. I didn’t even know a bunch of the optional dialogue existed at first, and I could be missing something important.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

*Spoiler: Episode 6 speculation

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

Do you need to own Season 2 to enter the Silverwastes? With Season 3, the maps have all been gated by the story, but Dry Top and Silverwastes are just normal zone lines. I guess the final map could always be accessible for free if they want it to, but since I’ve been unlocking everything as it comes out, I’m not actually sure how it worked.

*Spoiler: Episode 6 speculation

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I’m really not sure. Episode 5 resolved most of the open plot threads, for now at least, and didn’t give a direct cliffhanger to speculate on (we’ll certainly see Balthazar again, but even if we see him right away, we don’t know enough of what was going on with him to make any guess as to what he’d do next).

The fact that the Episode 2 team went back to the Ring of Fire suggests that the Episode 3 team might go back to the Shiverpeaks, but there’s no guarantee, and since Draconis Mons feels more Maguuma than Ring of Fire most of the time, it could even technically end up in the Shiverpeaks but not feel like it, or vice versa.

Even considering the rumors of the next expansion, I can’t think of what would bridge things. One thing to keep in mind is that it can’t physically be a bridge, because Season 3 is purchased separately from the expansion, so it can’t be required. In other words, even if the next zone is close to the expansion areas, it can’t be connecting anything (or at least be the only connection).

As for the gods, I don’t think we can assume that they’re all incognito, or that we know all of their disguises. However, I don’t think it’s a stretch to assume we’ve met one or two, and that might come out soon.

Lyssa is a good candidate for having disguised herself among us, whether she’s been de-powered or not, because she’s been known to do it in the past.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Queen Jenna identity [spoilers]

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I’ve speculated about Jennah and Anise being Lyssa before, but I honestly don’t know.

What I’ll say is that we definitely know Anise is hiding something, even if it is just her age.
During the World Summit, there was this exchange:

Canach: I have a thick skin. I also learn from my missteps. For example, you fooled me once with your illusions, so now I wonder if you’re truly as young as-
Countess Anise: Do not finish that sentence. Not here, not ever.

It isn’t the first time, though. During The Trial of Julius Zamon, she said something normal and then backpedaled, even though it was innocuous on its own.

Countess Anise: Trial by combat? Who’d have thought it? I’m surprised Zamon even knows it’s an option. There hasn’t been one in over fifty years…or, at least, that’s what I’ve been told.

Anise is almost certainly older than she appears, but that could just be an aged sorceress being vain.

Her dialogue throughout The Dragon’s Reach: Part 2 is extremely suspicious and openly disturbing (saying she doesn’t care about noble intentions for instance), but I’m not going to assume anything right now.

As for Jennah being watched, that actually has been called into question before, during the Closing Ceremony.

Queen Jennah: Forgive the deception, Logan. Countess Anise’s security measures depended on as few people as possible knowing about them.
Logan Thackeray: I’m glad you’re safe, but I’m your cap—a Seraph captain. How can I serve if I’m not informed?
Countess Anise: Don’t be petulant. My job is to protect the queen from her enemies. Yours is to seek out and destroy those enemies.

So there’s been at least one point in which very few people knew of Jennah’s true whereabouts, likely Anise and the most trusted of her Shining Blade (if not just Anise). I want to make it very clear that I don’t believe this happened, but just as an example, Anise totally could have offed Jennah at some point and replaced her, and since she and her loyal agents keep information from everyone else, no one would know.

Jennah’s state of being hasn’t really been that suspicious outside of that one instance, but her power is definitely of note. She managed to create an illusion of Kralkatorrik so convincing that even the Branded fell for it, and that also included an illusion of branding the defenders so convincing that they truly believed they had been branded. I think it would be hard to imagine an illusion more powerful than that.

I can believe that Jennah is simply naturally that powerful (even though I think that’s a risky precedent if you don’t want your story to escalate out of control), but it certainly sets up the possibility that there’s a reason she’s that powerful.

The final note I’ll make about Jennah, is that while Anise is generally the much more aggressive and suspicious one, Jennah has her moments. It’s tradition to blame Logan for Snaff’s death, and I did as well, until someone pointed out specific quotes to me from the novel.

“You are bonded to me, now, Logan Thackeray,” she pronounced, speaking to everyone. “If ever I am in mortal peril, I will call to you, and you must come to me.”

As Eir explained her plan, Logan stepped back from the others. A sudden voice spoke in his head: Come to me, Logan Thackeray. I am in Ebonhawke. I have need of you.

“She’s calling to me,” Logan muttered. “Queen Jennah is calling to me. . . .” His knees buckled, and he dropped to the floor. “No!”

Logan has no choice but to follow Queen Jennah’s commands. It wasn’t a request, it was a magical compulsion. Also of note, it was after this that Jennah created her unprecedentedly powerful illusion and saved the day herself. She didn’t even need him to be there. Maybe Jennah just didn’t know if she’d be able to pull it off, but magically forcing someone to do your bidding and causing them to abandon their allies is not a bright moment for any character.

Of course, alongside all of this is the Krytan royal locket mentioned during the Concordia Incident. Narratively speaking, it’s unlikely you’d bring something like that up if it wasn’t relevant. I certainly remember it being sort of jarring when I did the chapter. Among mostly standard dialogue, the Magister decides to be specific about one particular artifact for no particular reason, even admitting they shouldn’t be talking about it. This heavily implies that needing to know the current heir to the throne of Kryta will become relevant at the some point.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

[Spoiler] Lazarus' identity a poor plot twist

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Jokubas.4265

If you want to have a good plot twist in your story, you should leave crumbs beforehan, that hint to the twist, without making it obvious. After the twist the audience should be left with a feeling of “how did I not see that?”, because then they realize you basically gave away the answer before the twist even happened.

Definitely, and this is an oft-missed element of plot twists when people want them. It’s not a plot twist if you couldn’t possibly see it coming, it’s just a random event.

As I mentioned over on the lore forums, I think the problem is that Guild Wars 2’s writing seems to be largely focused toward an end goal. In other words, the story is planned to get to a certain point, and it’s arranged to get there as efficiently as possible.

Unfortunately, this means that the actions of the characters up to that point aren’t natural, because they don’t react or care about things that won’t end up being relevant. I’ve complained about the use of the White Mantle, and I think that was an example, too. Because Caudecus and the White Mantle were eventually just going to culminate in a climactic chapter where we defeat them, none of the heroic characters cared about the legitimate issues that they brought up, because those issues were never planned to be relevant, even though it makes the heroes look dismissive of the people hurting in their society.

I think it’s why so many plots have been black-and-white with no moral ambiguity. The confrontation is already planned, so the story focuses on getting to that confrontation, not on exploring the conflict and whether or not it’s really that simple. It’s a bit like reading a story backwards. You know how it will end, so everything before it that isn’t related to that ending can easily be ignored.

I’m willing to bet that Lazarus’ identity will eventually make a lot more sense in hindsight, because the reason he did what he did is probably related to things that we don’t know yet. Again, the problem with that is that the heroes should have treated this situation a lot differently because they don’t know those things yet either, whereas instead, the whole situation seems to be treated as this routine villain smackdown.

Just like, it’s really weird that Balthazar would use a Lazarus disguise, only to throw away the White Mantle and then hire mercenaries with their money. Why not just use the White Mantle if they worship you? And since you are a god, why disguise yourself to begin with? When someone’s god physically manifests in front of them and asks for them to do something, there would be a ton of people who would be itching to help no matter what the goal was.

I don’t know if that will be fully justified, but I’m expecting that a lot of it will make more sense in the future, but it’s something that more characters should have been questioning and looking into already.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

(Spoiler) Living Story S3E5 Discussion

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

For Lazarus’ identity:


Lazarus is Balthazar

Overall, I think it was a decent episode, but the ending kind of fizzled out, which is disappointing in the penultimate episode. There are some lingering questions, sure, but it seemed to resolve most things, and wasn’t the huge cliffhanger that the last episode was.

What bugged me though, is how everyone seemed instantly up to speed on what was going on and were talking like they knew it would come to a head soon, but no one seemed to care to ask any questions once it did. I’m starting to feel that the biggest issue with the storytelling is that it is written with the end goal in mind, so the characters don’t react naturally to the events happening in front of them, because they already know where they need to be in the future.

Considering the reveal for Lazarus, it really stood out to me that no one seemed to have any questions. It was just treated as the next black and white, let’s go confront the big bad, even though the reveal should be a big deal. Time was of the essence, but the urgency itself was the result of actions that we really should have been more surprised and curious about.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

"No it can't be" (possible spoilers)

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Jokubas.4265

I’m wondering if we’re looking at it all wrong. The end of the previous episode and the trailer for Flashpoint are really hammering in the idea that this can’t possibly be Lazarus. This could totally be a red herring, but if it isn’t, then it still brings up a lot of questions, especially when it comes to the resurrection ceremony and the bloodstone event.

However, it’s a lot simpler if the resurrection ceremony is taken out of the equation. Arena.net insists that the raids aren’t important to the story. It’s possible that we’re not even supposed to think the resurrection ceremony worked in any fashion. Caudecus’ surprise might not have been that Lazarus appeared despite him having the aspect switched out. His surprise could have been because he knew that the resurrection ceremony failed altogether thanks to his switch.

The reason there seems to be an assumption from our characters that Lazarus can’t be Lazarus, even though he was fine like this in Guild Wars 1, could be less about the aspects, and more about the resurrection not actually having happened to begin with because of the sabotage.

In this case, the mystery of Lazarus is entirely about who is impersonating him, like the trailer is focused on, and not whether or not he is partially resurrected or living with someone else’s mind.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Episode 5: Flashpoint trailer

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Jokubas.4265

I made a post about Lazarus being Palawa Joko before, but honestly I don’t know. I saw speculation about him being Khilbron based on him dying on a Bloodstone, which shored up some things that felt contrived if it was Joko, but neither of them really feel like they’d have impact here.

The thing is, I’m not sure if we can use Kasmeer’s reaction. It’s exactly the kind of fake-out line that trailer’s love, and she could be talking about something completely different than Lazarus’ identity.

Why take SAB away?

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

Seasons one and some other stuff isn’t so simple to bring back, but I agree in general and about Super Adventure Box. Sure, it started as an April 1st thing, and it’s called the Super Adventure “Festival” now, but there’s nothing inherently seasonal about it. It’s even justified fairly decently in-universe.

I see no reason it can’t stay around, and that actually gives a reason to keep more things on the store longer, and makes it a safer investment if they ever want to do more in the future. At the very least, I feel like it should be able to come back once a month for a week or something like that.

Cosmetic Realization

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Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I wanted to tell a story of something that happened to me recently in Guild Wars 2. I want to say it not because it’s my opinion, but because it was something subconscious that even I only realized recently.

I recently got my final alt to max level. I’m not usually an alt person, so that was a big deal for me. Once I hit max level, I wanted to give the character at least some set of 80 Exotic gear to get him started. Once I had done that, I realized that I had never done so with my previous alt, despite having thought I did. After that, I realized that my main had some incomplete elements of their set that I had let happen for so long that I had completely forgotten about it.

What this led to, however, was that my main and my first alt’s wardrobes were all messed up. This wasn’t initially a huge problem, since I had been wearing the Wedding Attire on both of them, but I didn’t want to wear it all the time.

The problem came, when I realized how many Transmutation Charges it would take to fix this on my existing characters while creating a look for my new alt. Then realizing that they weren’t exactly final equipment sets, and I’d have to do it again at some point (I’m not kidding when I say that skinning three characters completely would take about half of my Charges).

It was at that point, that I realized that, while I’m usually a huge collector of cosmetics, I’ve barely thought about it in this game. I realized this was probably another reason why I wasn’t in a hurry to get Heart of Thorns, and while I’ve found it easy to ignore the Gem Store for the most part (I bought the Wedding Attire on a sale with Gems I bought with gold). I appreciate that this game has cosmetic rewards for many of its challenges, but I realized that they don’t feel like real goals to me as long as Transmutation Charges are limited.

I just don’t feel like putting time or money earning things that I’ll have to spend another currency on to use, and then hope I don’t get bored of the outfit and want to change it again. I’d love to experiment with different outfits over time, and I’d be looking for a lot more skins then, but I won’t as long as that is a finite resource.

I’ve been given some advice about how to earn Transmutation Charges, but they’re far too limited. I’m pretty casual, and I’m a PvE player. I take long breaks from this game, come back when something big is going on, do the dailies for awhile, and then stop again. The thing is, that rewards you about 3Transmutation Charges per month. As it is, most of my Transmutation Charges came from back when I used to do the PvP dailies, but I only really ever did those because I found them simpler at the time.

Certainly, I could devote more time to the specific aspects of the game that reward Charges and spend my gold on Gems to buy more, but it’s already made me put a very low priority of cosmetics, so it’s not worth the effort.

I guess my point is just to raise awareness, that Transmutation Charges are a barrier that can easily discourage hunting cosmetics, which are one of the main rewards in this game. I really want to care about cosmetics, but it’s just far too easy for me to not to in the current system.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Why didn't you buy HoT?

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

The biggest reason for me, is simply that I haven’t felt like there’s a reason to. It’s been on my radar on and off, but I’ve managed to pass every time so far.

The things that tend to get me most excited for expansions are things like new races and classes. Heart of Thorns did not have the former and the Revenant just isn’t my cup of tea. The elite specializations are okay, Chronomancer seems neat, but it’s not enough on its own.

Similarly, I don’t really care for the Maguuma Jungle. I’ve seen Heart of Thorns played, it’s certainly a beautiful location, but it doesn’t grab me (it probably doesn’t help that it’s where I stopped playing Guild Wars 1 until some friends got me back in during Factions).

I don’t hate it or anything. I’m upset that they added raids after all, and that they gave closure to an old story (and I’m still more interested in the old stories than the Elder Dragon ones), but it doesn’t look like it’s dominated the game yet.

Also, there was the thread I made elsewhere, where Heart of Thorns makes me feel like I have to make some choices that I’ve really had a hard time with (and they’ve only gotten worse since), but that’s more on my end.

Otherwise it sounds like more of the same to me, in a good way, but there’s not an exciting enough draw for me to prioritize it over other things.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Red SAB weapons... future of W3&4?

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Jokubas.4265

Super Adventure Box is the only time I can get some old friends to return to the game, and they normally hate jumping puzzles.

I really think they should reconsider and try to find a way to justify resources for it. The first step I’d take, is to make it more than annual. Maybe not all year, but have it run multiple times a year. This way it wouldn’t be resources used on something that’s barely ever actually playable.

Otherwise, I think it’s a great use of resources. The thing is, while it may not be main content, it’s fun content. You need to be able to justify some side, fun content, in order to keep the playerbase happy and relaxed enough to want to spend money on other things. They can’t spend money if they’re bored and spending their time elsewhere.

It seems odd since it’s so different than the rest of the game, but it really hit something special. Also, it makes enough sense in-universe as an Asura thing that I don’t think it’s any more out of place than some of the more odd store items.

Anyone else loving Canach now?

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I was there when Canach was first introduced, but I honestly don’t remember it. I can remember having done the boss fight, but that’s it.

I’ve liked him for awhile though. He’s one character who’s not afraid to tell it like it is, and his actor just has the perfect way of delivering the lines.

If you had to design a new LW Character

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I would add someone like a Separatist or a Renegade to Dragon’s Watch. Perhaps someone with a very direct tie to someone we knew from Ascalon in Guild Wars 1. Alternately, it could be someone from a White Mantle faction.

The point would be to have a character who still recognizes the Elder Dragons as a threat that needs to be stopped, but who doesn’t just instantly forgive past atrocities or dismiss legitimate differences because of it. Right now it feels like the story goes “either you agree 100% with the main characters, or you’re a cackling villain”, and I’d like to see that be more morally ambiguous.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Heart of Thorns Dilemma

in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I’ve been around on and off since the beginning of Guild Wars 2, but I haven’t felt like getting Heart of Thorns yet. The recent sales have made me consider it, but then something occurred to me.

For the longest time, I had only played my Sylvari Mesmer. She’s the only character I’ve done anything significant with the story on (caught up to what I can do without the expansion) and she has World Completion (with no other character coming close).

I was originally planning on continuing that trend, especially since there are such heavy Sylvari themes in the story (none of my other characters are Sylvari). However, after finally getting my Guardian to 80, I’ve started to have some serious doubts.

My Guardian showed me that I made the wrong choice with my first character. All these years of Guild Wars 2, and I’ve been having way less fun that I could have due to how absolutely tedious and powerless that Mesmer feels to me (relative to other professions with my skill at least).

This is a problem for me for two reasons:

1) I still like the overall theme for my Sylvari character the best out of all of my characters. That matters a lot to me. There are other MMOs I could never even get past character creation because of how bland and uninteresting the race or other customization choices were for me.

While I have made my other characters within the realm of interest for me for alts, they don’t capture the imagination enough to focus on.

2) I don’t want to redo all of that stuff again. World Completion was one of the most tedious things I’ve ever done. I appreciate the world and exploration in this game, it was one of the things that I was looking forward to before it came out. However, I don’t quite naturally explore. I don’t know exactly how to put it, just that I was missing whole zones I didn’t even realize existed when I first set out to do World Completion.

I feel it’s important, though, to at least getting all of the waypoints. I did what I could for Bloodstone Harvest recently, and I almost missed one of the targets on my Thief, because he didn’t have half of the zone that it popped in and barely made it in time. I ended up switching to my Mesmer to finish off what I could do since she has all of the waypoints, and it was miserable.

In other words, despite how much of this game unlocks cross-account (and I very much appreciate that), what still isn’t cross-account makes me feel like I’m starting over on an alt, even one that’s max level.

Even though this new character might be able to explore all of the Heart of Thorns zones as they go along without repeating anything, I would have to redo everything in the old Tyria on that character.

Also, while I wouldn’t have to replay any of the story, having different parts of the story completed on different characters would just be plain confusing for me, especially if there was ever anything I wanted to redo for achievements or whatever.

This might feel like a small issue, and it is, but it’s enough to hold me back from the expansion. Right now I feel done enough on each character that I’m more or less content. While I’d like to have more content, I don’t know how I’d tackle that new content. Tackling that content is going to take a lot of playtime, and I don’t want to feel like I’ve wasted it, like I feel like I might have already wasted years invested in my Mesmer.

Right now I’m just wondering if anyone has any advice about how I should tackle this problem. Continue with my Mesmer who already has everything invested in them, but I can’t seem to find a fun build on, or my Guardian who seemed a lot more fun to play, but doesn’t really capture my imagination and barely has anything unlocked? Is there something else I’m missing that would make it easier to catch alts up on the content that my main has spent years finishing?

How would you redesign the mesmer?

in Mesmer

Posted by: Jokubas.4265

Jokubas.4265

I’m biased because the Mesmer playstyle has never really seemed to work well for me… but I keep getting drawn to it in GW1 and GW2 regardless.

I like both of Lonami’s ideas. I assume the idea for targeted illusions is that they’re supposed to be in that person’s head, and it vanishes when they’re defeated, but it makes for a frustrating mechanic that requires more planning than other classes without any extra benefit.

I’d much rather Illusions just be a thing you summon, help you in a fight, and are tied to you. I don’t know how much control you should have over them, because that could get ridiculously chaotic fast, but there could at least be some sort of smart targeting.

The idea of being able to switch between Illusions as the Mesmer’s main defense, is an idea I really like. Honestly, I feel like that should be the true mechanic for Illusions. They don’t feel powerful or intimidating enough to fulfill the imagined nightmares that I think they were supposed to represent from GW1. As a “which one is the real one” mechanic, though, they could be a lot more interesting.

I also like Shriketalon’s idea of making clone creation more of a passive thing based on the Trait lines you’ve picked, rather than something that takes up weapon skills. This would also put the planning on more active combat than on Illusion management, which I don’t enjoy and is a stretch from the GW1 version of the class.

(Spoiler) Living Story S3E4 Discussion

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Jokubas.4265

If Lazarus isn’t the real Lazarus, who is he? Obviously someone really powerful but the reveal of the Horcrux plot really makes that whole scenario confusing. Could it be Palawa Joko? I really don’t know who would disguise themselves as mursaat to fool the play protagonist to gain access to the dragon.

In hindsight, Palawa Joko seems to be a definite possibility.

This episode seems pretty confident that Lazarus is an impostor. People have pointed out that the logic doesn’t necessarily follow, but it seems unlikely they’d end the episode with this revelation as a cliffhanger if they didn’t mean it to be true.

“He’s touched death, Commander, and now he’s back… There’s something… The necromancer in me wants to find out more.
And…who knows?
There’s something about him… Makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.”
- Marjory Delaqua, Dragon Vigil

She’s basing her feelings off the assumption that he is a Mursaat back from the dead, but we know he probably isn’t now. That means he’s setting off her Necromancer sense for completely different reasons than “he just came back from the dead.” Palawa Joko, however, is just undead. That would be a reason he’s making her feel weird, and she’s looking in the complete wrong direction for an explanation.

Lazarus has insisted he has good intentions, and if he’s Palawa Joko, then I don’t think he’s entirely lying.
“The human seat of power and its current monarch are inconsequential. We are destined to face more virtuous pursuits.
My true believers, you’re welcome to seek shelter in my light. To those who doubt… you’re welcome to burn.”
-Lazarus, Confessor’s Stronghold

“The salvation of this world.
The White Mantle is splintering. Those who follow Caudecus, and those loyal to me.
I can make them a force for good; another spear in an army against the dragons.”
-Lazarus, Dragon Vigil

Palawa Joko is an evil tyrant, but a competent one. He lost the first time around because he outran his supply lines, so his second conquest was calculated and made sure to keep his troops supported. He also gave support to anyone willing to betray their comrades for his gifts (which also lines up nicely with that second line). He helped us in GW1 because Nightfall wouldn’t have been good for him either.

He’s not going to want Kryta wiped out by Elder Dragons, because those Elder Dragons will be his problem one day too. With Kralkatorrik likely on his border, he may be having trouble and looking to recruit some dragon slayers.

Obviously this is all circumstantial, I’m not setting out to prove Lazarus’ identity, but it definitely works with Palawa Joko in this place.

Canach describes the person as “Deceptive, tactical, and powerful. Not the greatest combination.” This can describe many villains, and Palawa Joko is certainly not ruled out by it.

“I can make them a force for good; another spear in an army against the dragons.”
-Lazarus, Dragon Vigil

While the White Mantle are no strangers to spears, neither would anyone from Elona. He could have said this instinctively, and it wouldn’t stand out to us. Palawa Joko even has ex-Sunspears in his army.

The biggest question would be, why would he impersonate Lazarus? While he probably wouldn’t be welcomed himself, choosing another suspicious character doesn’t seem smart. On the other hand, that could exactly be his plan. Impersonate someone similar enough to himself that he won’t act too out of character, but one that can make up just enough of an excuse for us to not kill on sight.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

(Questions) The Situation in DR

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Jokubas.4265

- Is there rioting? Looting? What effect has all the propaganda had on everyday citizens? Hopefully most of the Reach is like London in the Blitz, staying calm and loyal, but I’d think there’d be an angry element the broadsides and pamphlets might have persuaded to strike against a perceived despotic Crown.

I obviously can’t give the canon answer, but if you want to do in-depth roleplaying, keep in mind that a lot of the propaganda is based on legitimate issues. The effects of the border skirmishes with the centaur and such can be experienced in game, and the difficulty of accepting the Charr treaty can be appreciated more if you play through the Searing in Guild Wars 1.

The game has seemed to try to simplify the moral ambiguity of this by having anyone openly upset about those things have some other skeleton in their closet so you don’t have to worry about killing them, but from a realistic perspective, it’s not that simple.

A citizen of Kryta wouldn’t have to agree with the White Mantle’s methods to feel that they have been left to fend for themselves against the various threats in the countryside. That’s not even getting into how some people would just take advantage of the chaos regardless of where their loyalties lie.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

The Zephyrites

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Jokubas.4265

I have fond memories of the Bazaar of the Four Winds. It’s hard to believe they were all prior to Dry Top. I really hope someday they rebuild and we get a close recreation of that zone back.

@ Grant Gertz: Advanced Vending Changes

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

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Jokubas.4265

I was thinking the same thing. Crafting is a different “game mode” itself, in that it is an optional playstyle that is not otherwise required and not universally appealing. I’ve ignored it on all of my characters except my main because I hate it, and I only did what I did on my main because I wanted a sense of completion (which I gave up on because of how much of a sheer wall the Ascended crafting was).

Official Feedback Thread: Episode 4 -- Head of the Snake

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Jokubas.4265

The reveal about Caudecus’ wife was completely unnecessary. He can be a villain because he’s gone too far, not because he’s just evil and crazy.

Jennah and her secret police that suspend the rule of law at the drop of a hat need more than just Canach calling them out.

(Spoiler) Living Story S3E4 Discussion

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Jokubas.4265

I just watched through a majority of the episode and it turned out roughly how I expected. Fairly straightforward, but nothing really new this time, only a tease for next time.

What I didn’t like was how moustache-twirling Caudecus was. It seemed every step of the episode had to rub it in that he was the villain, as if we didn’t already know. I think it would have been a lot more interesting if he was just a rival politician with legitimate concerns, but the wrong way to carry them out. At this point, I’m wondering how he ever got the title “Caudecus the Wise.” It doesn’t even seem like the kind of thing he’d call himself.

Also, Jennah and Anise continue to act ignobly and no one really seems to care. It’s kinda scary that Jennah has the power to just instantly kill people, and her doing it one by one while taunting came across as pretty creepy. The whole “I will detain you against your will for your own safety” thing was disturbing too. The fact that there were infiltrators isn’t even the point. Jennah and Anise continue to openly defy the rule of law and suspend people’s rights whenever they want, which seems to be any time the topic comes up.

Anise was really violent this episode, but at least she got talked down. If Anise had her way, no one would have known where Caudecus went. Then, after having to be talked down again from outright murdering someone who had surrendered, she suspended their right to a trial so she could control their every movement for the foreseeable future.

Laws and rights exist for situations like this. Situations in which people’s immediate reaction is to want some revenge instead of actually judging what the person did and giving them a chance to reform.

Jennah and Anise really don’t seem to like people having free will, and I don’t like that.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Run Speed Increase as an Elite Spec trait?

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I don’t remember if I ever said it on the forums, but this was something I remember worrying about when Elite Specializations were announced. A lot of people, not just Mesmers, were hoping for base class fixes in their Elite Specialization, and I was worried what that might mean when we have multiple Elite Specialization choices and may no longer be able to take the one with the fixes.

Obviously, a new one could solve the same problems in different ways, but it’s definitely something to keep in mind. I feel similarly about Chronomancers, worried about not using it to its full potential, but wanting the run speed and such.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Lore-wise, what would surprise you the most?

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Jokubas.4265

I would be surprised if Jennah and/or Anise were revealed to have ulterior motives.

I’ll admit, I’ve disliked Jennah since the beginning, but it’s because she already seemed sketchy to me, and Anise spent almost all of Season 2 being sketchy. However, the only time anyone questions their actions, they end up being a bad guy, or on the side of the bad guys.

I made a post in the past about this, and I recently found some other observations that I missed. There is a huge list of things that we normally wouldn’t consider heroic coming from Jennah and Anise, from bypassing the rule of law, magically forcing people to do things for them, and secrets they keep from the other heroes.

A good chunk of the propaganda posters were right. Certainly the White Mantle doesn’t have the best methods either, but that doesn’t mean that the complaints against Jennah aren’t based on actual issues.

The fact that the good guys never question these things, however, make me wonder if we’re not intended to either, so I would still be surprised if something finally came of all of it.

Biggest fear of next expansion?

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My biggest fear is that they’ll finally do something closer to a ‘campaign’, which I want, but it will be treated like a linear continuation of the story so far. One of my favorite parts of the Guild Wars 1 campaigns was that (even considering the Abaddon thing) they were more or less standalone, and explored each area from its own perspective.

I don’t want to return to Cantha or Elona with the Pact and Destiny’s Edge 1&2 in tow. That’s not to say that I want plots to be unresolved, but that when we do something new, I want it to have its own perspective.

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Orr Expansion, Playable Risen

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I’m not familiar enough with the lore to remember if there was an example that contradicts this, but they really just feel like corpses animated by Zhaitan’s influence to me, without the original person in any relevant sense. If any of that person is left, cleansing Orr is just about laying them to rest.

I’d sooner expect to see Ascalon ghosts regain their free will. That could be a twist on the ritual and have more meaningful consequences, but it would be hard to make them playable either, since they’re just human, and their gear would lose its color and be transparent (at least with their current design).

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Who will be the villain in the 2nd expansion?

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If we’re heading toward Kralkatorrik next, I actually hope Palawa Joko ends up being the villain and it’s an Elona expansion. I don’t want to just run down the list of Elder Dragons slowly, and as someone who couldn’t get into GW1 during Prophecies, I really want to see another land.

Next xpac discussion

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I really want to see a new race next time. I didn’t need other races in Guild Wars 1, but now that we have them, I really want to see some of the other races playable. I don’t mind the Norn or the Asura or the Sylvari (my main is a Sylvari), but it baffles me to this day that they invented them for Guild Wars 2, when they had existing ones to choose from. Tengu seem the most likely, especially considering they clearly have a zone. We can do them.

Yeah, a new race is a lot of work, but I still want to see it happen. Also, new races are always an easy thing to market to new players, which is something Heart of Thorns lacked, and would be good for GW2 to do now after all these quality of life changes.

I’d like to see some more Elite Specializations inspired by old GW1 professions, though I still think there is room for more classes. I understand skipping Monk to get across the idea that this game doesn’t have healers in the same way, but I think Monk could be brought back and reimagined as a martial artist class that fills a unique niche.

I also think it would be neat if the next expansion wasn’t a linear continuation from what we’re doing, but a new perspective. One of the things I liked about the campaigns in GW1 is that each part of the world had their own problems and dealt with them in their own ways. Even if you brought over an existing character, you were a guest helping them with something.

That’s not to say I want existing plots dropped, but many of them could be dealt with through the Living Story instead.

For example, imagine an expansion that took place in Cantha, and involved them having to overcome their empire’s xenophobia in order to unite their own races to take down the Deep Sea Dragon, without ever dealing with the Pact (I don’t want every plot to be about Elder Dragons, but I think it only makes sense that the other lands have the potential to rise up to the challenge).

(edited by Jokubas.4265)

Spoiler - Future Story Arc?

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Some sort of Krytan Civil War actually seems likely. For me, it’s not because the White Mantle, but because of Jennah and Anise. Something is really, really suspicious about them. And then the Living Story decided to bring up the Krytan heir for no apparent reason.

A Civil War would become quite complex if we initially see the White Mantle as bad guys trying to overthrow the rightful ruler, only to find out that Jennah isn’t. Not that it would make the White Mantle good, but that the solution wouldn’t be as simple as just defeating them.