Guild Wars 2

Also, if you look at Mesmer’s signets, the newest signet (Signet of Humility) shares exactly the same pattern and background as all the other signets. Why was the newest guardian signet (Signet of Courage) made so differently from the others? It looks so out of place. Yeah it looks more “modern” but then at least change the others too please.

@zealex:
Yeah maybe it was an accident but now that I’ve shown it they could fix it.
You mean the elite signet of guardians? Look at the elite signet of warriors, it doesn’t differ from the “normal” ones.

@Lagg:
I was talking about their art direction with e.g. the “brush effects” or their artwork, not about armor. Also I never used “ArenaNet” and “artistic consistency” in the same sentence. It’s not a huge effort to fix these skill icons, it would mean the world to me though. But yes, clipping is an issue.

Guild Wars 2 is a game for people who love art and aesthetics.
Almost every detail seems to be well-thought-out.
ArenaNet’s love for good design doesn’t even stop at the individual skill icons.
Unfortunately, there is inconsistency with the skill icons for signets.
A handful of icons have wrong or unfinished backgrounds around the signet symbol.

I made some schemes to illustrate these for you and to show ways to correct the imperfect skill icons.

a) Warrior signet skill icon inconsistency
http://imgur.com/rBCTqel
http://i.imgur.com/rBCTqel.jpg

b) Guardian signet skill icon inconsistency
http://imgur.com/9OviA00
http://i.imgur.com/9OviA00.jpg

c) Necromancer signet skill icon inconsistency
http://imgur.com/WlwAkND
http://i.imgur.com/WlwAkND.jpg
__________________________________________________________________

How do you guys like it? Are there more incorrect skill icons?

I hope ArenaNet will see this and maybe thinks about correcting the skill icons,
it’s really not that much work and would satisfy our eyes.
-> “Organization is half the battle.”

You forgot the Chronomancer’s trait ‘Time Marches On’ which basically gives you the desired +25% movement buff (PLUS reduction of movement-impairing conditions).

Totally disagree.
They want us to make bigger decisions, to actually think.
People have to stop seeing the new system as restriction. Quite the contrary!
→ Traits got merged, you save space for other useful traits
→ Ability to use 3 grandmaster traits
→ You can trait into defensive traitlines without losing damage stats

“Tradition is the illusion of permanance.”

First of all I want to throw out this quote.
It means that tradition is a way of trying to preserve the possibility of permanance and thus stable security. But guess what, changes are unavoidable, even if people try to hang on to something for fear of losing the pleasant feeling of habituation.

What I’m trying to tell you is that yes, you will lose some of your usual builds, but please don’t react narrow-minded, don’t fail to see the other refreshing changes. ANET tries to break with tradition, the company wants you to get out of your comfort zone and rethink your routine playstyle.

New and exciting builds will make you forget your dusty ones.
Traits got merged together -> more space for other important traits;
Traits got reworked in a way of rewarding active playstyle, e.g. Staff skills only reload faster while under the effect of “Chaos Armor” -> you have to make important decisions while fighting, e.g. Save “Chaos Armor” for defense purposes or always use it to be able to use the other offensive skills more often?;
Ability to use three grandmaster traits -> More meaningful combinations, the feeling of having a bigger impact in fights;
Stats and traits seperated -> Traits that do not directly increase damage but offer advantages in a different way (healing, boons, CC) gain more respect and status

So please, break with the tradition, break with the idea of the more DPS I have the more fun I have!
Recognize the excitement this new system has to offer, and start to acknowledge the work and cleverness that was put into this.

The good thing is, there are so many people reporting bugs in the forum, I guess with the next update they’ll all get fixed. So… no problem for me at all, just keep reporting the bugs in the forum and you will be heard! :P

Hi,
after the new patch I experienced two new bugs:

• Sometimes when I try to assemble stacks of e.g. boosters, instant repair canisters or black lion claim ticket scraps, they won’t fuse. They just change their position.
• When I want to use my hall of monuments portal stone the game crashes.

Despite these problems I really enjoy the new patch, I just hope the bugs will be fixed sometime.

Maybe I’m pessimistic, BUT consider this:
In the base game, all classes have 3 elite skills (+ racial elites) and there is no reason to give more than 3 elites to the Revenant. So as stated in the blogpost, every legend has a unique elite skill, this implies to me → THERE ARE ONLY 3 LEGENDS.
(The specialization may get others too…)
My logical point of view.

Glacial Heart cooldown reduced to 15 seconds, chill duration reduced to 3 seconds.

Do you like the change?
Will you use it now?

nicknamenick.2437:

there is no counter to ileap now.. how do you see that when a clones spawns in your FACE!! and boom..

Damage buff for GS.. why? wassnt it already strong?

But most of all..

AA torment!?!?? what??!?!??!?!?!?!?! are you sick ANET???

Warrior tears are the most delicious! Yum!

Will the distortion finally work with the reflection trait as it should?

I hope there will be more changes? These are cool, but few.

Traveller.7496:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

Thanks everyone for giving us some feedback on this system we’ll meet internally and discuss this system some more as I think there are a lot of valid points being brought up here.

I’ll give you my bullet points:

- Revert the trait system so it once again starts at level 10. One trait point every five levels
- Scrap the trait acquisition system EXCEPT for Grandmaster traits. Those should be hard to get. If you can’t scrap it completely on Adept and Master traits, at least tone down the difficulty on those tiers.

The current system leads to a lack of experimentation and fun where people will only cherry-pick the traits they absolutely want to use and forget about the rest. This is probably what you were not going for.

+1

I’m always sad, especially during summertime.

I should write a song about it…

Here an example for you to think about:

If you destroy an ant nest, the remaining ants will build a new one.

Think about it.

Take it as it comes, we were born to die anyway.

Allarius.5670:

Not to incite unwarranted hype, but I was curious … did anyone else notice something odd about the Mesmer/Necro picture on the blog post this week that gave us a vague outline of what is to come?

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/balance-changes-in-the-september-2014-feature-pack/

Namely, the picture shows the Mesmer has cast Illusionary Leap at the Necro. There are a full set of illusions (2 clones and 1 phantasm) out. Notice, however, that the back Mesmer (where you would expect the player to be) has no animation showing, something you would expect considering: (1) the distance between the Mesmer and Necro, (2) the lunge animation of the other two Mesmers, and (3) the animation/timing for Illusionary Leap you currently see in game.

I suspect the back Mesmer is actually a clone, and the ability has been changed to leap the Mesmer forward. What this means for Swap and the immobility I don’t know. What do you think?

Great observation!

Maybe we’ll now summon an illusion on the current position of the target and then leap to them on the second activation…
Interesting

Ross Biddle.2367:

Esplen.3940:

Mimic is on a 25s cooldown. It’s 20s traited.

Also, unless it has no cast time, it’s probably going to be hard to use effectively, especially versus auto-boon procs, because they don’t tend to have long durations. Although it will be nice to use it vs SoR (maybe that’s why they dropped the duration to 25s? dundundunnn)

I can actually see this being nice in HotW so that I would get 6 stacks of Permamight instead of the normal 3. Heck, if the fight lasts long enough, I can give myself 25 stacks of Permamight (only for the Guard to use Empower and make me flip out).

Woah…
What if Mimic copied their boons… and Echo placed them on you? O.O Stab on command!

If you can get stab on demand, Mesmer’s no longer need to rely on having multiple stun breaks on their bar.

In the past I’ve always run the golden three, decoy, blink, arcane thievery. Lately I’ve forgone on a condi remove in place of Mantra of Distraction, and had traited torch in a 5, 4, 4. I to am skeptical about a new Mimic who’s function is to steal all boons. It’ll be a great counter to thieves steal, but if the CD is high I won’t be taking it. If all it does is steal all boons, I won’t be taking it. If Arcane Thievery has its CD reduced, I’d probably take that instead. We’ll just have to wait and see what it looks like.

-> COPY not steal

Noah.9654:

I literally just said a prayer. To Dwayna. I’m not even religious…

I’m REALLY hopefully about the new changes. This could be a really big turning point for Mesmers in PvP. Here are the things I’m really hoping for:
-AoE in offensive Mantras
-AoE in GS#3 (we all know it could be a thing ) this will give us a huge leverage against thieves and SR.
-Bug fixes. We may finally have a fix to iLeap or iWarden
-MH Pistol……A guy can dream, right? XD

I don’t think Mimic will “root” us. Just look at how they changed LB for rangers and thief’s Unload.
But I hope it’s going to be more interesting than just stealing all the boons…

Sounds cool, but how would you attack with a focus/warhorn/torch?
Additionally, what would happen if your mh-weapon is a ranged weapon and your oh-weapon is a melee one?

Esplen.3940:

Kelthien, you bring up good points. They’ll probably just state that Mesmers are in a good spot and that they will continue doing small bug fixes while improving build diversity.

Jump to actual patch notes:
We get some skill fact updates and trait changes that remove diversity.
Most skills that get affected will harm Mesmer gameplay.

Well, looking at the last patch, I hope it’s just the silence before the storm and we’ll actually get buffs and “real” fixes. I mean, rangers and engineers got love too…

I hope they’ll rework Mimic and buff Arcane Thievery.

I want claws like Wolverine, in pink.

Sors Immani.8429:

No, I’m not high or on any type of drugs.

No, I’m not part of ANets dev team (I promise)

I’m a gamer whose “career” spans 20,000 hours across GW1 from Factions to EoTN, and WoW that OTHER MMO from TBC to Cata. The competition aside, I’ve watched the mesmer community for a long time across both iterations of GW and for the longest while, I simply couldn’t “get it”. I attempted mesmering in GW1 and felt like a cheap elementalist knock-off who had armor-ignoring damage like a necromancer (chaos damage ftw, but that’s another story). I checked out mesmer in GW2’s beta, saw great improvement from its predecessor but still couldn’t figure out the class, and went to main a necro, warts’n’all.

I recently rolled a mesmer and am having a blast playing it. I know you’re demoralized from consistent nerfs, and as a necromancer and former WoW pally, I can empathize. However, it’s in this weakened state that we find our strengths. When a class is weak, its players will make it strong . Eventually the devs will buff the class, as well, and leave the players who suffered through the nerf days in a better place.

Now is the best time to roll a mesmer if you have never played one before, or if it’s been a long while since you have. The class is weak, so you will have to learn your own ferocity & resourcefulness. The string of nerfs, in my eyes, is only a slow redesign of the class.

The class & its players have earned my respect. As it sits, it is a high risk class that punishes missteps.

Wow. Never saw it from that point of view, I must have been blind by anger. Like, you are absolutely right? We should stop crying about what we don’t have and start appreciate the things we already got, even if it seems that we’re “not as powerful” as other classes might be. So what. It’s our game, don’t care about the others. You’re here because you love playing a Mesmer, then what are you waiting for? Do what makes you fun, play your Mesmer with your heart. And kitten, show the world that pink butterflies hurt!

FrostSpectre.4198:

Well, NCsoft has been avoiding on developing expansion to GW2 with ANet.

Hopefully the resent rumours and news are true, and we get an expansion…

Um, do you have any sources that would support this?

Capped.4675:

This is a post detailing a select few things i would love to see from GW2’s first large content release. It is bound to come eventually, people want new zones, new classes, new races and Anet are sure to know and deliver this.

This is what i want but i would love to read your posts on this subject too!

1) One additional race.
I would love to see one new race implemented, i say one because i believe the 5 we currently have are amazing and i want to keep it that way, 1 new race can be perfected and crafted to success like the others were. I’m not sure what, something exotic, something different. Ive always been a fan of the Tengu, personally.

2) More player interaction.
I say “player interaction” because currently we don’t do a whole lot for our teammates. It’s all passive-effect from our skills, our field combos. Its very rarely in GW2 that you use a skill or do something to specifically benefit one of your teammates. Sure you spam your boons, helpful condition removal and aoe fields for the greater good but you never stop to think “crap Capped has X and needs me to use Y for him!”. GW2 suffers from a complete lack of this. Player interaction is essential to making a game difficult IMHO. Anet tried this with the combo fields but they just have too little effect on the easy content the game has to offer.

3) Two additional classes.
I would make these classes more to do with the above #2, player interaction. Bring back the original GW classes focused on “holy”, religion, buffing, healing. Combine the dervish and the paragon to make some sort of inspirational religious zealot with huge buffing potential. Bring back the monk entirely reworked to have better offensive capabilities yet effective focused healing. Things like this could work wonders with GW2.

4) Challenging content.
I mean, come on, is your idea of challenging content really rushing through everything spamming everything you have on cooldown? The original guild wars had some truly challenging PvE content. Even if people could speedclear it or had it on farm it didnt take much to die or wipe in many of the end-game areas, they required careful pulling and routing to even complete “easily”. GW2 really lacks in challenging end-game content, Its all rush rush spam spam zerg zerg.

5) New zones!
Bring on the crystal desert, the ring of fire, shing jea island, Istan, vabbi, the jade sea, new undiscovered lands! All of these places have such great potential within GW2’s engine and creative design. I simply can’t wait!

I really hope Anet’s silence is a good sign, that it’s on purpose, to land a big surprise. Maybe the next feature patch, given that we’ll get one, will solve many important issues.

Even the Charr don’t need any “hobosacks” to reload their Charrzookas.
Meh.

Simple but classy.

Galphar.3901:

zenleto.6179:

Lana Del Rey.1873:

Boneheart.3561:

Lana Del Rey.1873:

Beldin.5498:

Ashen.2907:

Serophous.9085:

Lastly, if you haven’t noticed yet, the second anet says they are going to ‘try’ to implement something, it is taken as a promise.

And sometimes they state that they are going to do something, and then do not follow through.

Yeah .. they did that in the past and learned like all other MMO developers that its not good to say anything in the forums, since whatever they say .. some people will complain forever about anything that happens and they dislike , or about things that don’t happen because they don’t happen, even if they would dislike it if they happen.

So .. thats why devs are very active in Beta .. and still after release .. but the longer a game is running the less they talk.

I think it’s essential for the relationship between developers/players to have a functioning communication basis. For a healthy and satisfying developement of a game, developers should ask for feedback, organize surveys and interact with the community. I don’t want them to make big promises, I want to see that they actually care and that they noticed our opinions. It’s so depressing to get no reaction. I mean, what is wrong about a short “Hello Players, thank you for your feedback, team Anet will discuss over it.”? It is so easy.

They haven’t?

Lately not, best example: this thread/topic.

Yeah, because on the weekend they should jump into a thread with players having a grizzle.

I think what is being referred to here are the number of post started by devs asking for input/discussion on certain aspects of the game. I can think of 1 that pops immediately to mind:

Game Updates: Traits- https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Game-Updates-Traits/first

3 months and the only post by a dev in that thread is the post to create the thread. If they’re gonna ask for input then they should at least post saying they’ve seen our complaints/suggestions.

Exactly.

Boneheart.3561:

Lana Del Rey.1873:

Lately not…

Oh so they have?

I’m not clear on the issue, do you want them to respond to every single thread, regardless of veiled insults and snark? Drop any family/personal plans to connect with the people that really matter?
These are actual questions, I am also under the assumption that ArenaNet is operated by androids, so I’d be alarmed if their A.I. broke protocol and allowed them to form families.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Game-Updates-Traits

32 pages feedback, 90% criticism, not a single reply from Anet.
And please, it takes 1 minute to even answer with “Thank you for your feedback, we are aware of the critics.”.

butch.8136:

The only problem is the illusion that there’s no content because of the LS approach. If they’d release an expansion every 1.5 years you would burn through it in 1-2 weeks.

Also people keep forgetting the feature packs. We already got one and they said they’re aiming at a feature pack per quarter so that would be 4 feature packs a year + 26 (probably less ’cus of breaks) LS updates a year.

Feature packs?
You mean the one that circumcised the trait system and disrupted communication through a megaserver system?
Yey.

Boneheart.3561:

Lana Del Rey.1873:

Beldin.5498:

Ashen.2907:

Serophous.9085:

Lastly, if you haven’t noticed yet, the second anet says they are going to ‘try’ to implement something, it is taken as a promise.

And sometimes they state that they are going to do something, and then do not follow through.

Yeah .. they did that in the past and learned like all other MMO developers that its not good to say anything in the forums, since whatever they say .. some people will complain forever about anything that happens and they dislike , or about things that don’t happen because they don’t happen, even if they would dislike it if they happen.

So .. thats why devs are very active in Beta .. and still after release .. but the longer a game is running the less they talk.

I think it’s essential for the relationship between developers/players to have a functioning communication basis. For a healthy and satisfying developement of a game, developers should ask for feedback, organize surveys and interact with the community. I don’t want them to make big promises, I want to see that they actually care and that they noticed our opinions. It’s so depressing to get no reaction. I mean, what is wrong about a short “Hello Players, thank you for your feedback, team Anet will discuss over it.”? It is so easy.

They haven’t?

Lately not, best example: this thread/topic.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Game-Updates-Traits/first

My new album “Born To Die: The Mesmer Edition” out now!

Beldin.5498:

Lana Del Rey.1873:

. I mean, what is wrong about a short “Hello Players, thank you for your feedback, team Anet will discuss over it.”? It is so easy.

And then people jump on them and say : “Hey .. you haven’t answered WHEN it will happen and IF you will do something against that and HOW it will look. All Anet can do is post answers that don’t say anything it all”

Right now I think unclear answers are better than clear statements.
Honestly, I feel deserted.

I don’t understand this thread, like we already have mounts? Most prominent examples: Blazeridge Mounts, Shiverpeak Mounts, …

Beldin.5498:

Ashen.2907:

Serophous.9085:

Lastly, if you haven’t noticed yet, the second anet says they are going to ‘try’ to implement something, it is taken as a promise.

And sometimes they state that they are going to do something, and then do not follow through.

Yeah .. they did that in the past and learned like all other MMO developers that its not good to say anything in the forums, since whatever they say .. some people will complain forever about anything that happens and they dislike , or about things that don’t happen because they don’t happen, even if they would dislike it if they happen.

So .. thats why devs are very active in Beta .. and still after release .. but the longer a game is running the less they talk.

I think it’s essential for the relationship between developers/players to have a functioning communication basis. For a healthy and satisfying developement of a game, developers should ask for feedback, organize surveys and interact with the community. I don’t want them to make big promises, I want to see that they actually care and that they noticed our opinions. It’s so depressing to get no reaction. I mean, what is wrong about a short “Hello Players, thank you for your feedback, team Anet will discuss over it.”? It is so easy.

Beldin.5498:

Aomine.5012:

To whoever think dual shield is not possible and viable, check this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRPQFHEruyE

One of the most boring videos i’ve ever seen that only proves that it
1. looks totally stupid
2. makes no damage
so no .. its not really viable

+1

Additionally, shields in GW2 are worn on the back, where would you put the other shileld? On the hip? They are too big for that.

Playing a mesmer feels like always playing on friday the 13th mixed with a constant inferiority comlex and bipolar depression.
But the pink butterflies are somehow cute.
Yey.

Also,
how would a warrior wielding two shields look like?
That’s not really “historical correct” (even though magic isn’t either).

I don’t understand why Anet ignores the huge wave of criticism and feedback, I mean, sure you can’t react to every opinion here, but over 1.500 players sent their feedback and ideas just in this special thread. So, why Anet, where are you? Why don’t you listen to the majority of players instead of being focused on making much money through GW2? We have so much hope in your abilities and in the game, so please change what needs to change.

RyuDragnier.9476:

Thinking on this, they really should have gone all out when it came to the trait rework, not a mess like this. The traits SHOULD have unlocked as you play through the game normally depending on what you do and how you play your class (meaning most class traits require specific actions), starting when you unlocked traits for the first time (level 30 in this case). It would turn from the mess it is now into a case of pure brilliance as how you played would equal what you got. Below is an example using just the traits in the Thief Shadow Arts traitline and the Engineer Tools traitline to illustrate how I would make it work.

Shadow Arts
I Master of Deception: Use Deception type skills 30 times.
II Slowed Pulse: Suffer the Bleeding condition 100 times.
III Shadow Protector: Give 100 allies stealth.
IV Shadow’s Embrace: Use Hide in Shadows 20 times.
V Infusion of Shadow: Use stealth 100 times.
VI Cloaked in Shadow: Use Blinding Powder 30 times while in combat.
VII Power Shots: Kill 100 enemies with a Shortbow or Harpoon Gun.
VIII Hidden Thief: Steal while in Stealth 100 times.
IX Leeching Venoms: Use 200 charges of Skelk Venom.
X Patience: Spend a total of 3000 seconds in stealth (meaning over all stealth uses)
XI Shadow’s Rejuvenation: Use Shadow Refuge 200 times.
XII Venomous Aura: Use Venom skills 1000 times.
XIII Resilience of Shadows: Get hit in stealth 1000 times.

Tools
I Always Prepared: Use Med Kit ability Drop Bandages 50 times.
II Static Discharge: Use offensive tool belt skills 30 times.
III Speedy Gadgets: Use gadget skills 50 times.
IV Kit Refinement: Equip an offensive kit 30 times.
V Deployable Turrets: Use 50 turrets (meaning actually throw them out, not their ability after they’re out)
VI Speedy Kits: Equip a kit 100 times.
VII Packaged Stimulants: Use the Med Kit skills 1000 times.
VIII Power Wrench: Use Tool Kit skills 1000 times.
IX Scope: Get 200 criticals with the Pistol and Rifle.
X Leg Mods: Spend 10000 seconds total under chill, cripple, or immobilized statuses (not at the same time, of course)
XI Armor Mods: Get hit over a million times.
XII Adrenal Implant: Dodge 1000 times.
XIII Gadgeteer: Use Gadget skills 500 times.

Things like that. It would be basic for the Adepts, Masters would get a little more specific and tedious, and Grandmaster…hoo boy, that can require some serious work.

Brilliant idea! Even though it might get a bit grindy, it sounds like a lot of fun to collect all traits without being bound to a certain event, zone or enemy. Thumbs up!