Guild Wars 2

So I want to start off with saying I don’t really play engineer all that much, despite the fact that I have 3 different armor sets for different builds for my current engi. There’s a lot of bookkeeping with several of the play styles I’ve tried and quite frankly I’m not enamored with the rifle, and really only thematically pleased with pistols.
That being said, I friggin’ love the scrapper. The static damage built into the hammer attacks is monstrous. When I play, it’s mostly PVE and I obliterate single enemies with reckless abandon. The combo fields that engi can already produce play so very nicely with the hammer skills readily available. With the whirling drone, and hammer, I can do so much simultaneously it almost seems unfair. I love the damage alone, but the playstyle is so much more fun and captivating than pistols, rifles, grenades, bombs, and so on that my engineer will DEFINITELY be making it into my forefront of heavily played characters.
The hammer skill set I feel is very solid, so much synergy and utility with them, I love the damage output and it will completely change how I run my engineer. I have no complaints whatsoever on hammer skills.
The gyros might need a little work. I think their functionality is great and them blowing up afterward for a little light damage and a daze is some nice icing on the cake but tweaking for their little recharge skills are in order.
The medic gyro for instance can end up being a little spotty for it’s follow up heals. While the initial heal is great and it’s cast time is very responsive (very good for melee) I find that if I need to back off a little from the fight, it tends to miss its follow up heals. I can see the field go down while I’m still moving and not in it.
The blast gyro seems cool, but is a bit clunky in execution, specifically against pretty darty enemies. Sometimes it seems more like a lost puppy in some cases hopelessly following after enemies too fast for it. I don’t if it might be specific enemy types it has a problem with as I didn’t use it extensively but it might need to increase speed. It might play out just fine, but ultimately, I didn’t use it that much.
I didn’t seem to find any problems with the purge gyro
The stealth gyro seemed a bit slow, I’m not sure if that’s by design or not but it’s somewhat aggravating to stop my pace to wait for it. I don’t know that I see myself using this frequently, but it’s current use doesn’t have me desiring more.
All in all, I’d say the scrapper was a big success. and right out of the gate, no less.

I was surprised not to find this started anywhere (perhaps it’s way back) But I figured I’d start this here. So I want to start off with saying I don’t really play engineer all that much, despite the fact that I have 3 different armor sets for different builds for my current engi. There’s a lot of bookkeeping with several of the play styles I’ve tried and quite frankly I’m not enamored with the rifle, and really only thematically pleased with pistols.

That being said, I friggin’ love the scrapper. The static damage built into the hammer attacks is monstrous. When I play, it’s mostly PVE and I obliterate single enemies with reckless abandon. The combo fields that engi can already produce play so very nicely with the hammer skills readily available. With the whirling drone, and hammer, I can do so much simultaneously it almost seems unfair. I love the damage alone, but the playstyle is so much more fun and captivating than pistols, rifles, grenades, bombs, and so on that my engineer will DEFINITELY be making it into my forefront of heavily played characters.

The hammer skill set I feel is very solid, so much synergy and utility with them, and honestly I wouldn’t be upset if you neutered the damage (a little). Personally, I like it as is, but I can foresee it getting nerfed. However, currently, I have no complaints whatsoever.

The gyros might need a little work. I think their functionality is great and them blowing up afterward for a little light damage and a daze is some nice icing on the cake but tweaking for their little recharge skills are in order.

The medic gyro for instance can end up being a little spotty for it’s follow up heals. While the initial heal is great and it’s cast time is very responsive (very good for melee) I find that if I need to back off a little from the fight, it tends to miss its follow up heals. I can see the field go down while I’m still moving and not in it.

The blast gyro seems cool, but is a bit clunky in execution, specifically against pretty darty enemies. Sometimes it seems more like a lost puppy in some cases hopelessly following after enemies too fast for it. I don’t if it might be specific enemy types it has a problem with as I didn’t use it extensively but it might need to increase speed. It might play out just fine, but ultimately, I didn’t use it that much.

I didn’t seem to find any problems with the purge gyro

The stealth gyro seemed a bit slow, I’m not sure if that’s by design or not but it’s somewhat aggravating to stop my pace to wait for it. I don’t know that I see myself using this frequently, but it’s current use doesn’t have me desiring more.

All in all, I’d say the scrapper was a big success. and right out of the gate, no less.

This is probably the most angry an event has made me.

Last time the selfless potion was around, I didn’t have time to tediously collect heirlooms. I was excited it was finally back, but this event is actually even more tedious. I couldn’t play Thursday, because of intense lag, disconnects and even guild chat wasn’t working properly. When I asked my guild mates what was going on in terms of the event no one had responded. Later I found out that guild chat was buggy. I was livid with guildmates because they weren’t being helpful, but they were mad at me, because I was passively aggressively thanking them for their “helpfulness”. All because chunks of information were not making it through. I gave up for that day because the game wasn’t letting me have it.

Basically, through 12 hours of grinding today, I’ve gotten almost a whole quarter of the way through! Yeehaw? This is also after disconnects, a few crashes, and one time, coming back from a crash and getting 10 buffs to get 10 blooms, where I was awarded with nothing.

Most have already discussed how the format doesn’t lend to teamwork or optimizing groups or strategizing. It’s simply tagging events, which is not the GW2 creed at all. New players should at least be getting experience for these events, It would be a great way for them to level up.

If you even so much as allowed daily chests to be for characters instead of one’s account that would very much ease the burden of having to stay up 48 hours over the weekend to the point of hallucination to be able to get a potion. If I bothered to do the math, I could probably figure out that I’m not getting this selfless potion this weekend. The only reason I’m still gunning for it is the hopes that Anet will be able to either extend the event, mail out some “sorry blooms”, or even having more than a daily chest for blooms. This has eaten up way too much of my time as it stands. Will it eat up more of my time? Jesus, yes it is because there’s something wrong with me.

I love you guys, but this is not your usual fair.

Personally, I’m thinking that a Mary Poppins umbrella would be perfect.

I do feel like the enemies were easier this weekend than the last, though I’m not sure to attribute that to if they were actually easier (as either damage they produce or HP they have) or if I’d gotten better with the new traits or the damage output of the new classes. I KNOW necros got a huge damage boost with gravedigger and it is delightfully sexy as it is. I imagine it will be toned down a little as things get balanced out, but currently I feel rewarded for using gravedigger which is what they were aiming for.

I had a good time with the difficulty with the prior beta weekend. However, this is only the first map, I wouldn’t want to discourage players right from the get go. I love tough, I love a challenge and I don’t mind if you make the later maps as difficult as people were complaining that they were last time. I know a lot of people solo, myself included and that level of difficulty turns them off. It’s a hard area to bridge the gap between people who like challenging content and those who play casually.

But here we have opportunity. In the original content of gw2, there’s virtually no need to group up with anyone when roaming maps unless you’re behind on your equipment. (ah, the level grind) This is fresh, level 80 combat so you’re supposed to have your equipment situation figured out by now. Now is the time where stuff is supposed to get challenging, and so I feel more people will be grouping up in maps and making more of the community that people talk about. I like the idea of grouping up in our small little deathsquads and taking on what Mordremoth has to offer. I can ask people from my guild, but I’ve been meeting up with plenty of people in the map areas easily enough. I would say continue to make things more difficult as people have asked, but make the transition almost unnoticeable and people will accept it.

I think the current difficulty I had encountered this weekend is a good starting point. Let’s have later maps be just as awesome but give ’em some steroids

I wasn’t completely opted out, but I really like how this class is supposed to play. I feel I have to agree with a lot of players when they say that the animations often don’t fit the graceful feel we’re supposed to have for the character. The stomp at the end of a dodge trait is pretty clunky aesthetically and pragmatically I feel only works when facing crowds in pve and most specifically in the new content. Somebody had mentioned that the damage portion would be better at the beginning of the dodge roll instead of at the end and I would have to agree. Perhaps striking the ground with their staff to dodge backwards and impacting the folks around him.

All in all, while damages, ranges distances and mechanics for the staff will need to be fine tuned, I think the animations must really have a sense of agility to them to make this a really striking class. I would think that Kilik from the Soul Calibur games would make for great inspiration. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7iN18u7pYE

I am a little disappointed that there wasn’t a sweep the leg staff skill as Cobra Kai would dictate.

I feel the difficulty is good.

It’s not like the monsters are levels above us and just beat us with hard math. It’s being more dynamic than it has in the past where harder is simply they have more hit points and defense. Even if I’m tanky, i have to pay attention to what I’m doing in this beta, and realize what monsters I’m fighting. The update with traits you guys had given us allows us to do so much more and it’s something that we’ll need to the level of difficulty you’ve given us. I don’t know how newer players would take it, (it took me a long time to get dodges) but I feel you’ve given us the skills we need to succeed when it comes to taking on these mobs. I think it’s just going to take time for people to get acclimated to them.

I hear a lot of nay saying tempest, I quite liked it a lot. I have an ele who kinda hangs out and looks lonely most of the time, the direction that they’re heading with the tempest is exciting in a fashion where my old now likely misanthropic ele will finally get some face time. I think that the overloads are a great new mechanic, but need to be a bit more worthwhile to opt in to, instead of doing anything else. I would use my water overload to run the hell away in, and personally, i think it’s hilarious and fun. I like the aesthetic of the earth one, but the damage is way too poor for the pay off. I’d actually left the celestial set on (laziness) and was surprised with the general damage I could pull off. I loved the warhorn as well, super fun with water and lightning attunement. Lightning warhorn skill 5 is just a lovely idea. However, I honestly felt that Dragonhunter was the most lacking. I think making the virtues more of a big deal is a great thing. However, when it came to the actual longbow weapon skills, I found them lackluster. The guardian barrage skill 5 was great control, but general damage was slow and low and though skill one “can” bounce, it’s never worthwhile when it doesn’t. skill 2 just needs to have all the damage if you’re forced to stay in place, or just more damage if you could move. It’s just heavily unsatisfying to have a charged shot and do mediocre damage. Ranger skill 2 can (depending) easily get 10k while stacking vuln on multiple hits. I think maybe longbow skill 4 works, I don’t know what I’d add to make it better, it feels a bit meh. I had some fun with the traps, and with the way you guys are working maps now, I feel it will be a lot more useful than it would have been in the original game.

But please, keep up with the immersion of the story. I felt in the previous original storyline (zhaitan) it was very cut and paste. As you’ve been continuing to do Living Story you guys are really starting to keep me immersed. The conversation cutscenes weren’t working because with the dissolve that would always take me out of the immersion for a second. Now, we have our character actually interacting with npcs with audible dialogue, and giving us a bigger scope of our character’s personality. Telling Bram off for running off was just such a small thing, but it makes my character engaged, and therefore me engaged as well. Your storytelling has vastly improved, and with the scope of the maps that we have now, with our new ability to glide fill me with wonder and a sense of exploration for the sake of exploration (not gettting map completion)

Thank you.

And god, those snipers are awful. I love that.

The main thing is that different mobs have a different attack mode attached to them. Mushroom people are menacing. During the story I died a lot, but that’s because I was learning new skills at the same time as learning new enemies. Yes, it is more difficult than anything they’ve provided thus far. It’s not discouraging, however. It’s actually more engaging than everything they’ve done before. Loads more dimension, directionality actually being important, fights that engage a whole area instead of just stacking on a dude. This Beta showed me a LOT of promise. Also, gliding is pretty much the best thing ever. I actually felt a greater sense of exploration and wonder than in any of the maps they’d created before. I feel like I don’t even need combat to make the game exciting, I could just glide, all the time. But please, give me that awesome combat too!

I have to say, I really liked necromancer. I was using Blood to stay alive as is my want and opted out of soul reaping, so I missed out on wraith form a bit more. I also love the new mechanic of chilling and it dealing extra damage while stacking vuln. I set myself up to be a chill monster while seconding with staff. That being said, I played only in PVE and I don’t know that gs would be effective in PVP at all. Even the trait that gives greatsword life siphon isn’t super great and the cooldown for other skills seems negligible, especially since gravedigger can get an 80%. Since the Greatsword is so slow the life siphon seems only useful to supplement Blood Magic (maybe worthwhile on skill 3 on gs) and personally, I would love to get more opportunities with gs skill 4 as that just lets me wade into enemies like a lunatic. I think perhaps just a solid reduced recharge rate for Greatsword might be in order for that trait. That being said, I continually used the extra crit % trait against vulnerable instead, all day. I do think there needs to be more reward with gravedigger, even if it’s just more damage, as it’s very slow and I feel like that’s what you were aiming for. I was doing ok living in a few of my wells, but I imagine especially in PVP that’s going to be very easy to dodge and would be more worthwhile to spam 1. I do enjoy the new elite in PVP as well

I figured it out. I have a magic infusion on my amulet slot. I thought that would have gone away with the update, but apparently ascended magic find infusion stayed.

I can definitely say it isn’t that. I have no buffs, and I’ve had this amount for days. 39% is among all characters, but essence shot my main guy up to 59%
I have another character with buffs, who is as high as 54% but there is still a huge difference between my main and all others.

I’ve been consuming essence of luck on one character and it is not showing up on any other characters. He’s ahead 20% of everyone else. I was under the impression it showed up the same amount on all characters. What precisely is the deal here?

I too had this problem, in addition to the achievement chest hint. I’ve done both extensively, basically.