Guild Wars 2

In case anyone feels like arguing that this is intended, I’ve got an example that can prove it isn’t. I recently took an alt up to the temple of Balth. to get the PoI/skill point there to finish off the map, and saw something strange. First off, almost every single mob up there was an acolyte – second, about 1/4 of them were veteran acolytes. The veterans aggro’d at what I would consider “normal” mob aggro radius, but all the normal ones aggro’d from super long ranged: several of them even aggro’d from behind veterans, and ran past the veterans to come get me.

Are you trying to tell me the dev team intended the Risen Acolytes to have a longer aggro radius than Veteran Risen Acolytes? If you really think that’s the case, you’re grasping at straws there.

My experience so far with dungeons, is that the #1 most important part to success isn’t gear, it’s the player wearing the gear. There is a truly massive gap between the average pug player who maybe-sorta knows what he’s doing, and a good player who can adjust to the fight and support the group all while staying alive. There is a pretty decent gap between rare/exotic gear, but it’s not as big as the gap in player skill a lot of the time.

I was in a AC explore run not long ago, and we had a 35 warrior with us. I would assume he was in a mix of blues/greens since he was only lvl 35, and he hadn’t run the place yet. He listened to our tips about what to watch out for on bosses, and he out performed one of the other 80s we had with us, who just kind of derped his way through and got carried by the rest of us.

As a warrior, I do less than half the damage underwater that I do on land. On land, I crit for about 1-1.2k on my first 2 combo swings, and harder on my third. Underwater, I crit for about 500 on the first 2 combo swings, and maybe 700 on the 3rd, AND I also attack a little bit slower.

The real kick in the pants for me though, is on land, my melee attacks cleave up to 3 targets, but underwater they only hit 1 (except for my ~20s CD spinning AE attack). So not only do I hit for half damage, and slightly slower, but I hit 1/3 of the targets I do on land (let’s face it, most underwater combat areas at 80 are swarming with mobs, so you almost never get just 1 enemy). Combine that with the fact that I can’t seem to find anything above a green mask, and going underwater turns me from a strutting warrior, into a cowering peasant.

When you get far enough into your story quest (towards the end) then you can use those gates. I don’t know exactly when they open, as I didn’t remember to check before I had finished my whole story line.