Guild Wars 2

Why isn’t this event just a month or so long as a lead up to the expac dropping? Someone did the math on reddit and supposedly you’ll get 1.5k blossoms if lucky, if you’re on an intense grinding spree.

Four days (including 1 day that was buggy and didn’t give proper rewards) just feels like S1 all over again, limited time to experience an event and maybe get some goodies. :|

There are people who think this game is p2w?

What items give crazy good advantages cus… I’m not seeing it…

You can survive with the base amount of bag slots, the extra bags are just convenient, less stopping and vendoring between content. Can’t really speak for bank slots because it was one of the first things I bought Gold→Gems wise, but I don’t even have the max amount of bank slots, I do fine with what I have.

I wouldn’t mind if they changed how bag slot purchasing worked though. I’d rather they made it unlocked account wide (you’d still have to buy the X-slot bag for the alt), evenif it meant a gradual increase in gem cost per new bag slot you bought that’d be fine.

I’d like to see any number of these, it’d be amazing if most of them were added:

1) New zones (4-5 at least)
2) New class
3) New race
4) New weapons
5) More weapon choices for classes (sword for ele, mace ofr engie, bow for guard, etc.)
6) More guild content (GvG, Guild halls, more guild missions)
7) JC/Cooking to 500
8) Precursor scavenger hunt
9) New legendary set
10) New dungeons
11) Love for WvW and PvP (can’t say what all that would entail, but they need love too)

And I’d still hope to see the Living Story continue. Expanions + LS to supplement.

Tons of tonics, a basic salvage kit, weapons to swap to. Fireworks, SAB boxes o’ fun, kite, birthday cake gun. Consumables for tequatl/wurms (fire ele powder, pet whistle, engineer turret, sylvari turret, jar of bees) Misc food/sharpening stones/dungeon potions.

The same thing that happens when any hype train crashes and burns when its dreams are crushed. >_>

I already have my boxes, but I do hope the coat gets added to the vendor at a later date, along with an eye and kidney extractor (or are the extractors there?). That way those who are unlucky can use their badges to buy the rest of it.

I’d like to see an exchange system for boxes we already have. I’ve gotten a few shoulder boxes, but I have them all.

I find it useless myself. Why bother going to my home instance when I can get more bandit chests out in SW? Compared to 1 thats once per day and [still] needs a key. Why bother going to my home instance when I get some buffs that increase the loot from chests out in SW? Not to mention I’m getting plenty of crests in return for doing a few events here and there while hunting for chests, which means plenty more keys to keep myself busy in SW…

It’s just people who don’t know the mechanics, commanders who (for simplicity sake) just tell people not to AoE and then people get this idea that AoE heals him. I’ve had people cry no AoE and saying noobs are going make us fail red when no one even was AoEing and it was a combo of bubbles hitting the boss and him deaggroing briefly. It’s just a bunch of people who don’t take the time to learn.

There was at one point people also saying not to AoE the thrasher, because they thought the poison bubbles healed him. But I think that’s stopped.

Ideally in the red fight, a couple people would hop down into the ‘pit’ with the red boss. Someone usually gets the little adds aggroed onto them and someone else sometimes get just the boss onto them, allowing them to move him around and away from bubbles. (And to keep him from deaggroing)

Achievements/Meta/Dailies — I myself had no problems with them, but I would’ve liked to see either one of these options for the meta:
1) Daily Counting towards a tick of the Meta
2) More options, allowing some choice in what you do for the meta
When we were still in LS1, I myself enjoyed having the option to pick how I completed the meta. Wintersday has so much to do and people excel at various activities. What about adding some Snowball PvP Activity to the mix? (I didn’t even bother playing, though I like the game, because there was no real reason to do it)

I also would like if the dailies rotated options (if it’s coming back next year), break up the monotony a bit. Daily Tixx Infini, Daily Snowball PvP, Doly Escort, ect. ect.

Bell Choir — Was a little buggy this year. If you joined mid game, you got a bug where the notes weren’t counted, correct or not. If you survived you’d be rewarded with points for 100% completion (but it wouldn’t count) and still be unable to hit notes. The only way to remedy this: join a game just starting, quickly leave the stage and hope you can get back on stage to participate, fail and wait for the next song.
Another thing that occasionally happened was that when the game was finished, it wouldn’t send me to a new bell choir, it’d say the game was full (or something) forcing me to exit and rejoin the activity.

I think free play should be removed or shortened, most people leave to requeue, meaning people trying to get in for a game are put in games that have 3 mins left and no songs to play. (Or at the very least, make it so a person is less likely to join a game that’s pretty much finished)

JP Not much to say, except I hear the candy cane slope can cause fall damage, which really screws up a run.
Probably just me, but I really don’t see why the snowflakes/candycanes (first half) need to melt with the JP being switched from a race like mad king’s to a free for all.

Tixx’s Infinirarium — It’s fun, but I don’t feel the dungeon has a point beyond achievements. Perhaps if there was a set of interesting items for the dungeon with its own unique loot table after finishing. Maybe bring back glue, stuffing, frames and cogs with low chance to drop (I don’t know if glue or stuffing still drops this year, considering I could turn in them in for presents).

Toypocalypse — Aside from the bug that would have you join at the end of the game (I think it was fixed though), not much to say.

Grawnk/Orphans — Nothing much to say, enjoyed it. Liked the ‘quests’ and rewards.

Ho-Ho Tron — Nothing much to say, but I do notice the defense event doesn’t run much now, meaning people who are late to the party are going to to be waiting for a while to get achievements.

Snowball PvP — Didn’t play this year, haven’t bothered. Can’t comment on it.

Rewards — I have never felt there was anything interesting from the vendors. I get tons of sweaters, socks and hats for nothing. The only nice thing are the prettier versions that salvage into cloth and then into them.
Weapons (the wooden/princess wands/candy cane mace/whatever) saturated the market with the first Wintersday, they barely sell for anything and I delete them every time they drop. I always hope I don’t get them. They’re junk (I have them all already).
Wintersday gifts… for the love of god… where do I begin? The clicking… it was a lot of clicking last year, it’s A LOT more clicking this year. Please just cut the ‘middle man’ and remove the boxes within boxes at least. Just let runes, sigils, tonics, clothes drop out of the boxes. I really only want to click luck that drops. It hurts my hand to open all the boxes, selecting runes/sigils, getting luck, salvaging. It’s too much. And again, most of the loot is junk worthy. You get so much, everything that comes out of those boxes is worth nothing. I delete a lot of the stuff that even pops out.

Other The doors that send you to the activities are buggy. Sometimes after you leave, you get instantly ported back in to the activity because you’re too close to the door.

I think that’s it.

Ok, I was wondering why I couldn’t do an easy song when I joined a game already in progress.
One of my guildmates said they had a related problem where it was counting it as wrong, but the progression bar was going up like they hit the correct notes. So after hearing them tell me that when I vented my frustation at failing an easy song, I chalked it up to being some kind of bug.

After 3 sets of dailies I’m on the fence with the new system. On the one hand, it’s nice that they’re trying to get people to go to certain places and do things, explore new content, etc. But on the other hand, I find the new set of dailies limiting. I think if the new system had 1 or 2 more options for each category that’d be better.

I think the puzzle could use some tweaking overall due to the changes from being a race like Mad King JP to a free-for-all.

— I think random disappearing snowflakes should just be removed in the beginning, because it is no longer a race. I sometimes find myself just sitting there waiting for the flakes/candy canes to respawn, stopping mid puzzle.
— The presents seem to be broken? Half the time the blue ones don’t reappear so you are just better off leap of faithing. Then presents pop for random reasons just as they respawn. I’ve seen people sacrifice themselves to try and get the presents to start fresh.

Sounds like the candy cane damage is a common thing though that happens with slopes, random fall damage and that’s been a bug that’s been around forever. :\

Yep, keep getting put into maps already finished with 10-20 mins left.

I have low expectations for facebook games and browser games in general, so when people say one of those games steals art to promote their game I’m not surprised.

It’s understandable, but that’s a problem with the design of SW that Anet would need to consider fixing. I’d say throwing in 3 RNG pieces this time around just further adds to the problem. The Silverwastes have been out for? Weeks now? Nothing new has really been added in comparison to Dry Top, its the same defend event, same 4 bosses with a random organ drop.
I just now started playing the patch because I have finals. I did maybe 3-4 defense events over the weekend from near start to finish, maybe 5? I don’t quite recall. Out of that amount, I got 1 piece of a bladder… I can understand the frustration and why people would taxi instead of sitting through 1 hour of the same thing just to get nothing or maybe a piece of something.

If there was maybe more to do (like if they added more objectives overtime like Dry Top) and it was more like a WvW for PvE, maybe it would be more enjoyable. But right now its just predictable. Maybe adjust some of the event rewards while they’re at it so people actually help, watching 5 people run past a dead doly and not help clear mobs, along with other things I’ve observed while playing this weekend just makes me not enjoy the Silverwastes.

I have a sort of core set of JPs I do, but there might be a few that differ on occasion. I also space out when I do them, they’re not in 1 go, I do 3-4 a day for my monthly. In no particular order:

1) All the Caledon Forest JPs (Dark Reverie is a maybe) — Caledon Forest is a great cluster of JPs, perfect for knocking out the monthly. I start with Spelunker’s Dive, then Morgan’s Leap, continue on into Dark Reverie (I give it a few tries before I move on) then the lab.
2) Demongrub Pits in Queensdale — Quick and short, with additional mini chests should you decide to stray off the path.
3) Lion’s Arch JPs (Troll’s End is a maybe) — Again, another good cluster of JPs. I sometimes opt out of Troll’s end because I hate the camera angles and stuff. I sometimes switch to a mesmer just to go through it faster. As with Reverie in Caledon, I give myself a set amount of tries before I move on.
4) Under New Management — A WP right by the JP, quick and easy? Sign me up.
5) Loreclaw Expanse in Plains of Ashford
6) King Jalis’s Refuge in Snowden Drifts
7) Fawcett’s Bounty in Hirathi Hinterlands

The other JPs I consider doing:
Skipping Stones (on my mesmer alt)
Pig Iron Quarry
Swashbuckler’s Cove
Hidden Garden
Vizier’s Tower
Shattered Ice Ruins

The bug goes both ways for both villagers and courtiers. A villager with full skills can wipe a Lunatic, a Lunatic with full skills can wipe a villager. Its a game breaking bug regardless that needs to be fixed. Although I do hear it also comes with an unfair advantage in the Lunatic Courts favor, because people who die before the game starts get converted into Lunatics, meaning you could have 5 right off the bat as the game starts.

In terms of items, I had no problems with this when Halloween first came out. Ideally, the villagers should be working together, traveling in packs and collecting items — calling out when a defense is almost ready to be completed. Most of games tended to be a fair amount of wins and losses on both sides.
Then midway through Halloween, villagers just stopped collecting items, it became this “I’m so smart, I’m gonna just AFK and hide in this spot.” But in reality you are hindering the villagers when you do this, the less people helping build up the defense, the less benefits they get. No food tables to heal at, no monster allies to kill Lunatics on sight.

The Halloween last year saw people willingly throwing themselves at the Lunatic Court to get games done faster and get loot from chieves. When you have so many Lunatics right off the bat, defense doesn’t really help.

At this point, most games currently only last 5 mins at most, because most people are just hiding in corners, not doing objectives, died due to bugs, or willingly throw themselves at courtiers to try and get the game over with.
I’d say most of the Lunatics know 90% of the hiding spots at this point you’re going to be found if you just sit there. Hiding in one spot is not the best option, I feel it should be your end all option and that you do it strategically, most people don’t. In the end the villagers lose.

I really honestly used to like the game back when it first came out, but the love waned with the 2nd Halloween.
All-in-all, I think the game could use a rework, tweaking penalties for Lunatics, making for strategy involved being one, giving people a reason to want to win as villagers, not throwing themselves to the Lunatics to get things over with faster.

Yeah, I want to say its some weird thing with Outfits, but I’m not 100% sure. I was plopped into a game and was fleeing from Lunatic Courtiers, only to get snared by a guardian and someone else and promptly wrecked by him and his GS. I targeted the guard to see he was in the Mad King outfit. Again, not sure if outfits are what is doing it, but it does make playing a bit cumbersome.

Just headed over to the forums to see if anything had been posted about this for a similar reason. Felt like crafting all the backpieces, realized my JC required ingots she can’t craft.

Not a big problem though, considering I crafted them for her on another character.

I would agree with:

— Rescue injured Zephyrites from the Inquest inside the mine and escort them outside
It seems like no matter what size the group is that attempts this event, it always fails. I admittedly have always been there either when there’s only a few people or when there is a large group (at least 10), I’ve just stopped trying to bother.

— Protect Serene as she recovers crystals lost in the crash
I agree, she does have some pathing issues, as do some of the inquest, and she is a little on the slow side, perhaps a small speed boost when she collects a crystal could remedy that.

— Drive the Mordrem from the Vine Planting area
I think this event does have some slight issues, I always seem to pull at least 3-4 mobs somehow. The husks have fairly high aggro ranges. It’s a death sentence if you dont have a few people with you (3+ as mentioned).

— Champion Sand Giant
An issue of time spent vs. reward. Normally in the time it takes to finally down him, you could complete: 3-4 champions and multiple smaller events.
I also wouldn’t mind seeing the sand giant do some more unique things, unlike the few other giants out there. I know he does little dust torndoes, but that’s it — he throws boulders, fears, stomps like every other giant.

— The Dust Monster
May be overtuned? The few times groups ever bothered to fight him (and beat him), it seemed like his adds took forever to kill. (I can’t fully speak about this boss though, because I don’t know if itsa lack of players caring or not)

I have had no problems getting to T4 over the past few days that I do pop into Dry Top. I normally go to http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/2auf8b/updated_dry_top_events_timer_with_positions_and/ and post times so people know what events are going on.

Most of the events don’t need massive amounts of people, it’s just a matter of having those few players that are willing to go to those events and do them. If too many are just sitting there AFK, or refuse to pitch then, then obviously there’s going to be problems.

I’m thinking, hoping, SAB will return during the LS2 break for Sept.

I noticed him do this the other day when I was passing by. He drops the same things as he did before.

All giants in this game are time consuming and almost pointless, imo. The sand giant is no different, I can do a ton more events in the time it takes to kill the giant. Until he is a bit more savory in terms of time invested→ reward, I imagine he’s going to get ignored.

Someone had suggested this elsewhere, but I’d honestly be fine if they added the exclusive hairstyles/whatever to character creation for everyone to see, they’d be previewable, but there’d be a note that you have to buy a styling kit for them or something along those lines. And maybe it can be taken a step further to allow someone to use a kit should they actually have one on hand.

I’ve kind of been wondering if the Green orb as Mordy and the fact that it strikes the center was signifying the Nightmare’s entrance in the Dream of Dreams? Admittedly, I’m not very up to snuff with the lore though, so I’m not sure if the placement in terms of the current timeline we know works out.

I found the achievements easy as well, I had even done some of them already — in a sense — before they were unlocked. A few off the top of my head: I had 0 clue what was going on in the first LS instance of ch. 1, my workers lived even without me going to help the north pass, I saw the lightning aspect and hit Aerin (catching him by surprise), I shot down numerous packs of Inquest in Ch. 2 that could’ve counted.

I will say though, Ch. 2 has been a bit better though considering having a group to defend at Concordia seemed to work out best.
Do I think the easy achievements need to go away though? No. I just would like to see some more of them and more variety because a lot of it is a no-brainer. Maybe there’s a speed achievement that needs you to be in a group to do it fast enough, maybe one of them requires scouting the instance area to find — and its off the beaten path, etc. Maybe some of them will be too hard, but I’d really love to see some varying difficulty.
And again, Ch. 2 seems to be a bit more interesting in terms of its chieves, but I’d love more.

I’ve gotten 2/50 chests thus far. I have neither any interest in the weapons nor any of the recipes thus far (partly also due to the rumors of the grind some of the items have) — I mainly just open boxes after getting a bunch of geodes from the events.

If i could, I’d sell the fossils I’ve found and any I got in the future. I really don’t see the issue in having the fossil sellable, considering you still have to buy the recipe for the weapon and nomad insignia as I understand? Then you have to craft the weapon with whatever mats it needs. Afterall, the only item I truly covet — the adventurer’s items, is buyable off TP.

I was pleasantly surprised by the update, I was coming back to LS2 with some hesitance The story is an improvement so far from LS1, I’ll say. More dialogue and an attempt to tell a story.

There’s still room for improvement though.
— This is just a little nitpick from me, and while I do understand that LS2 starts expecting you completed the PS, the fact the zone is 80 exclusive does kinda bum me out, in a sense. It does keep new players out (until they hit 80) and I mean, China did just join the GW2 community about a month or so ago… Don’t really see the problem in letting uplevels in to experience the story right now [so long as they get fair warning that completing the PS/being maxed would be best].
— The multiple reward paths, between replaying the LS/doing “harder” content and the zone achievements are a good start. Admittedly, I would like to see a tiny bit more in terms of options for different goodies, but this is a good start. I think we are again at the point though where achievements are able to be done quickly — within the first few days.
[And while it seems exclusive items are something they want to do away with, I did kind of like the idea of having an item that was special for that story. Multiple items through chieves, with one special item that goes away doesn’t seem like a bad thing to me.]

That would be horrible, I’m normally sitting at a low amount of money, with a (what I consider high) AP. That’s like a punishment for going out and exploring and getting chieve points.

Here’s the one thing though about AP vs levels though. Levels have a cap, AP is something infinite that you always earn and will always go up.

My cosplay mesmer fits the bill of Mix and Match.
Here’s Homura Akemí.

Head: Gem Store Glasses
Shoulders: CM shoulders
Chest: Magician’s Coat
Gloves: CoE gloves
Legs: Cabalist Legs
Boots: Seer’s Boots
Backpiece: Holographic Shattered Dragon Wings

Even though you upgraded it, you should’ve still had the green backpiece in your inventory.
If you do not have it on any alts or in your bank, you could perhaps try to explain it to ArenaNet. Although, I was in a situation similar, the person I talked with said I would not be able to get the items back.

I don’t mind some “feminine” options for the F Charr/Asura, but I feel the window is just out of place on the charr outfit. It’s not as bad on the asura, but it’s weird looking on charr. There’s this tiny random bit of cloth missing on the outfit.

More of my issue also stems from the fact that female charr dont get the dragon on their tail. When the information about the outfit was first mentioned, people were saying charr got a dragon on their tail. Of course when I go to preview it on my female charr, they dont get the option.

While I appreciate the fact that the Crown Pavilion was adjusted to be less of a cash cow, make it rain, all teh moneys type of thing, I feel like the Boss Blitz was a step in the complete polar opposite direction. Although I welcome the challenge, the reward this year is not very good and there is almost no reason to even bother finishing the blitz should you not make gold. Admittedly, I myself have not donated to Hobo-tron, but if its a large money sink, I think that just further adds to the poor reward this year. The Boss Blitz is also a giant AFK game. I sat AFK more often than not waiting for the Blitz to finish because the scaling is nightmarish and I’d be hindering my fellow players…

The Gauntlet rewards are also a little on the lacking side. I burned through about 200 tickets with 2-3 (a few rare 4) gambits, only to open a bunch of bags with 1 token…

I don’t care for the (sovereign?) skins, but I don’t see why they’re tied to those favors + gold to get them. In my opinion they should require the festival tokens, but that’s just me.

In terms of the Crown Pavilion’s achievement options, it feels like a grind. I’m a little surprised there are no daily options anymore (I’ve been gone for a few months, so I don’t know if anything changed in regards to those daily achievements either)

I don’t really have many complaints about the Bazaar, on the flip side. I like doly races, sanctum sprint, and I like jumping around the bazaar with aspect powers.

I will mention though I have some slight conflictions when it comes to re-releasing items for tokens for NA/EU. I understand China getting a chance at the items since they missed all of LS1 and while I think it’s nice that NA/EU does get a second chance, I can understand why it might bother some people when some of these items were supposed to be special exclusive items to show you were there for that. And on the other hand, it does take a lot of tokens farmed up to get these things…

Logged back in to preview the outfit when I heard Charr get cute little dragons on their tails. Was rather disappointed my Fem Charr doesn’t get one.

I would be fine with the female variant on my lady charr, minus the tiny “boob window” gap and if she got a cute dragon on her tail. But uh… yeah… the hole in the clothes look a bit out of place.

[[Admittedly, while I was long awaiting the release of the item, the fact that its just an outfit means I’m not interested.]]

I’ve been stuck at 4/5 for the past couple days. I had originally assumed Phase 3 was the one I was missing, but after a successful run of this boss in my lane, I’m unsure what boss I could have left. So either this is bugged (I had a similar problem with Defender, where I had to redo all the lanes again to figure out what didn’t count) or I’m somehow mistaken on what phases I’ve completed with flying colors.

I had gotten a fairly decent load time when it was my turn to go through the portal, so I was able to react to the circles (I’ve had a few problems where I load in insta down or with no time to react from a loading screen and my character not moving as soon as I load in), but tonight I loaded in fairly quickly, killed the champ and avoided the circles. However, one group didn’t have enough dps (be it they had a small group or too many dead), so we failed. I go to double check my achievement progress and am deeply confused when I don’t have another dodge achievement done, only to read from several sources that the chain has to be successfully severed to get credit for a dodge chieve.

I think it’s kind of strange honestly that an achievement about me dodging attacks should depend on 4 other groups of people successfully killing their champion and regulator. Win or lose, I just think it makes more sense that the achievement would count after your fight.

If anything were to maybe be tied to the chain being broken, I would think killing the champion would’ve been the better option here.

NA “World First” perhaps?
As I understood from a reddit post, FSP EU got a kill.

Regardless, still a good job.

Can’t think up any good names.

Thief:
One with the Shadows
Cloak and spawn a shadowy figure that mimics your moves for 15s(?). Does the same set of attacks, but at reduced damage (perhaps even make the shadow killable).
Fairly long CD (120s at least)

Mesmer:
Mass Confusion
Over the next few seconds, the mesmer summons various clones/phantasms which seek out nearby enemies — they shatter and cause a random condition. The clones/phantasms can seek out the same target multiple times.
Short CD (90s or so)

Yep, already known. It seems most people were too focused on human t3 being sold in the gem store, when all three sets suffer the same problem — already in game, not new, just had flames slapped on them.

I had been hoping to see all three sets get new and unique designs, but apparently that’s not going to happen because the message people sent is that putting T3 in the gem store is a no no, rather than reskins shouldn’t be put in the gem store.

I would really like to see the medium and heavy set get a similar treatment to the light — temoprarily pulled off the BLTC and remade into something unique. It’s understandable there was a lot of outrage that T3 was being sold in the gemstore with the only difference being flame particles, but let’s not forget that medium heavy of the flame sets can already be found in game as well (and just had flame particles slapped on as well).

My issues with the new Flame armor, which is not just exclusive to the Flamekissed light set, is that it’s just a bunch of armor we already see in game, just spruced up with flames. When I see new armor being released on the gem store, I expect something… new and unique, I don’t feel adding particle effects makes them worthy of being sold in the gemstore. I feel it’s disrespectful to your customers to sell armors that are pretty much already in game, in the gemstore like that.

In all honesty, I think it was a good move to remove the light off the BLTC, but I would like to see the same treatment done to the medium and heavy. I want to see interesting flame themed skins that would make me buy them, you know?

Now, if they want to make cultural available to all races now, I’m fine with that, but I would maybe keep it as the same method of gold sink. I don’t think it’s fair to those people who spent the time to get it and I can understand why people are mad, in particular with the light armor.

Well, I know there was a lot of replies to the new gemstore armor and so yesterday I decided to doodle what new concepts could be done for the armor. This was before the [light?] armor was pulled. It’s probably not the prettiest bunch of drawings out there, and I really don’t have any ideas for the heavy armor, but I digress.

I tried to keep the same feel the armor has now and Anet’s recent post about pulling the armor seems to indicate they wanted a similar feeling armor to those we’ve already seen, but still unique.

Female version: http://i.imgur.com/5VrIqZ7.jpg
Male version: http://i.imgur.com/qCz1xH9.jpg
(Was a bit lazy on the male, because everything that isn’t shirt/pants is pretty similar to females)

(Starting with light, which is on the left.) So, like I mentioned I tried to keep a design that’s still close to T3, but a bit more with the flame theme. The helmet is a metal band, maybe an intricate design, that wraps around the head. Instead of just a couple flaming gems here and there, perhaps instead it could be a cluster of molten rocks, which pulse with magma on one side of the face.
The female chestpiece lost a little of the skin it shows, with a bandeau that just goes straight across the chest. It also instead has a jacket kind of piece, which would be where the flame effects are. The bottom is lined with another metal band.
The shoulders are instead a cluster of molten rock, with metal, still pretty similar to the t3 shoulders. The gloves would be similar to their t3 counterparts, still keeping a metal design, but with molten clusters making up part of the “glove.”
The skirt/pants part would possibly show a bit more skin, given the flame designs for the cloth instead. (Maybe some short shorts underneath). The sides would have molten rock, keeping with the theme of course.
For the male counterpart, it would still be a sleeveless top like the t3, with a molten rock design in the center, metal framing. The “skirt” would have pants underneath.

For the medium, I went with something less… trenchcoaty… just a leather top with the molten metal/belts around the waist, just like the armor currently has. The chestpiece is what determines whether or not the belt is there — an imp sort of design for the buckle and metal on the sides, with tattered cloth underneath. The chestpiece also determines whether the cut off sleeves are there.
Instead of just having a skull on the skull on the shoulderpiece, I made an imp/demon crouched on one side, the other shoulder would be metal.
There’s nothing I really changed on the gloves, they’re still covered with a bit of metal and have the molten claws. The same goes for the pants, with the exception of an added pouch, to take the place of the trench coat pouches.
The boots have metal by the knees, and little imp/demon faces at the toes.
As for the mask, I had a couple ideas. It would keep a mask of sorts, the mask covering the face at an angle. Over the mask would be a demon/imp designed metal mask (many masks…). I had started with a full mask, melted and cracking on one side, showing off the eye more. I also made one which is at the bottom, which is just part of the mask, again melting at the side where it’s broken.
The male counterpart is also a bit more revealing with a tank top of sorts instead. There’s still belts/metal running every direction of the top and meeting in the middle at a piece of metal.

I think that pretty much covers it, but yeah, I just felt like doodling some ideas.

Not a bug. The flashy bits are portals. So far from what I’ve seen, the first bit gives you a hint. Pay close attention for an ambient spider. It will go through the right portal.

Second part doesn’t seem to have any spiders skittering through the portals so its just a guessing game.

Achievements
I think there’s a nice variety of achievements, with nothing being too grindy. You should get a fair chunk of them done by the time you reach the top of the tower for the first time. Theere’s achievements for exploring, just clearing events on the various floors, doing nightmare chambers, reaching the top. However, there may have been too few achievements. I had guildmates who were already almost done after only a few hours.

Rewards
I think the Gas Mask is cool and this is probably one of coolest minis I’ve gotten so far. In terms of the Tri-key chest, I think the key fragments have a good drop rate, the best chance seems to be 50% from nightmare chambers, but I have had a fair share of keys from floor mobs. I can’t really say if it’s because my magic find or not, but I’m getting 1 yellow, ore, seed pouch, and something else each time. I think the chest is worth it (but I’ve been hearing people say they’re only getting blues/greens.) I think the backpack, other mini, and waterbreather skin as rng from the chest is fine, there’s plenty of rewards to find both from easy achievement acquisition and being random drops.

Gameplay
I’m finding most of the gameplay to be pretty solid. You have a mix of small scale fights, in terms of nightmare chambers/final boss counter, and more zerg-like fights in the tower. As it stands, zergs are spread out pretty evenly across floors, so the groups are maybe around 20 people. The bosses aren’t mindless zerg loot pinatas and have decent mechanics to keep people on their toes (spider was really obnoxious first go before people knew the mechanics).
Running solo to the top is also possible, but it can be challenging.

Story
It’s just not there… We got a recap, which might help new players, but it adds nothing to people who have been playing from the start. I still have questions, nothing has really been answered for me in terms of anything Toxic Alliance (both these patches)

Favorite Element
Nightmare Chambers, probably the only thing where there’s some interesting NPC interaction. I can talk to Rox, Braham, Kasmeer, and Marjory. Sometimes the two teams find themselves mixed together (Rox and Marjory, Kasmeer solo, etc.) and I enjoy the way they react. (Marjory: Charr hallucination, try harder Scarlet. and then Rox gets mad) It’s exciting to see what you face. I’ve fought Trahearne, Tybalt, Sieran, Logan, and Caithe. If I had higher level alts of the other races, I’ve loved to see the Rytlock, Zojja, and Eir hallucination.

Least Favorite Element
Pretty much the anticlimatic cut scene at the end. Here’s how it went for me, I fought the final boss with guildies and didn’t see a cutscene. I went back in solo because I missed the diving goggles. Then I heard rumors of there being a cutscene and had to run a third time, only to be greeted with nothing new. I went back in expecting answers, but got a recap instead. :|

I took it more as a love in terms of friendship. And I found it more along the lines of what LanfearShadowflame just mentioned, sure Logan might think my character is a good friend, but if the queen were in trouble, her problems would take priority over me.

I find it more as Scarlet is trying to drive a wedge/fuel doubt between you and your relationship with DE. Sylvari for example, when a Caithe hallucination appears, Scarlet says, “I’ll do you a favor. You can’t trust Caithe. She’s not the perfect bloom she pretends to be.” I assume Scarlet says things that might make you think twice with most of Destiny’s Edge, but I don’t have any other high level races.

Other LS arcs, part 2:

Cutthroat Politics: 2/5
+ Really seemed to bring out something in the community
+ Gave us a hand in choosing future content

~ No real sense of candidate loyalty with the ability to play both sides
~ Nothing unique for the achievements on either side
~ Ok rewards, in terms of two minis and backpieces

- Activities were buggy, leading to frustration (mainly looking at Southsun Survival)
- Story feels weak, it seems a bit hidden
- Reasons to vote for one candidate over the other were weak, still hoping to see a big impact on my choice later in the months besides the fractal choice
- This didn’t happen to me, but I had friends who had problems with the Aetherblade defense game; this favored certain classes.

Queen’s Jubilee: 3/5
+ Multiple rewards
+ Additional challenge mode via Queen’s Guantlet that provides additional rewards on top of this.
+ Decent, gradual story
+ Plenty of stuff to do, new rewards from champion overhaul

~ Vendors way of selling items is really goofy, please make all the special golden items sellable through all vendors, with unique race weapons and recipes staying as is

- A lot of killing in the name of X city
- The cost of skins that weren’t the special new golden skins was a joke (they can be bought cheaper off tp)
- Gauntlet had its fair share of bugs that made certain encounters harder than needed
- Account bound tickets made me a sad panda when I had a large collection on low-level alts

Clockwork Chaos: 2/5
+ Birthday gifts
+ Interesting ‘story dungeon’

~ Story was a bit so-so. It had ok parts, but other areas were lacking/felt hidden.

- Grindy… 5 45 minute events to progress the story?
- Failure is more profitable than winning. If you didn’t do you 5 portal closing achievements in the beginning, you were out of luck. Failing the Aetherblades and zerging for more champs gave you more loot than letting the invasion run its course.
- Tonic has that long cooldown

Tequatl Rising: 3/5
+ What a giant dragon fight should feel like

~ Rewards are ok

- Story is almost non existant. Rox is just… there, Teq is suddenly stronger out of the blue. There is really nothing to indicate why he’s stronger, it just happens.
- Fetching dragon teeth and scales is not clear, and it just further adds to questions about why its relevant to the LS
- While I think dragon fights should be epic, I can understand it does suck not having enough people to do the fight.

Twilight Assault: 2/5
+ Dungeon has interesting encounters

~ The additional after dungeon tasks are decent, but there is no real interesting reward for it.
~ Rewards are meh, a slick pack and a mini, a slim chance of recolored Nightmare weapons

- Not feeling the story, almost non-existant and leaves so many questions.
- Aether caches are a joke, super rare key pieces unlock nothing but greens and blues.
- Puzzle encounters seem to favor certain compositions and can make the dungeon take longer than needed. (Mainly the ooze gear part)

Blood and Madness: 2.5/5
+ I like all the costume choices this year
+ Bloody Prince is a likeable new addition to the Thorn line
+ Introduction story was great

~ Ok amount of rewards. Candy corn mini is pretty much mandatory to finish the story. It’s good to see new rewards for the jumping puzzle.

- Story feels weak, we get a little bit of it then I felt like I hit a wall because it was a bunch of achievements until I got a candy corn mini.
- Anticlimatic story, in addition, it just feels like the Bloody Prince was barely around before we lock him back up. He’s there for a little, and then back in the box he goes.
- Grindy weapons. I had stockpiled for Arachnophobia last year, only to find out I need so much more to even get it. I don’t feel the grind justifies it for the skin, it’s not a legendary, it doesn’t do anything super flashy. I crossed it off my wish list because my resources are better focused elsewhere.

Tower of Nightmares: 2.5/5
+ Introduction story was fantastic
+ Hallucinations are interesting
+ NPCs are likeable

- Story feels a bit hidden, we only get a little bit of information
- Fetching shards is unclear
- The whole killing spore champions is silly; a rare chance on an event mob for 25 mobs in total? To me it felt like it promotes running with a zerg to get it done (best chances are from queensdale champions). All-in-all this achievement felt grindy.

Other LS arcs, Part 1:

Wintersday: 4/5
+ I liked making minis from those special components, it’s a nice blend of easy to obtain via gemstore or requires a little work if you dont buy via gems
+ Tons of activities and things to do (jumping puzzles, mini-games, dungeons)
+ Likeable characters
+ Multiple rewards (skins, tonics, minis)
+ Multiple achievements to finish the meta
+ Ability to replay should you have missed a day

- Dungeon was buggy, sometimes it wouldn’t switch to a new day
- Dungeon was sometimes long and reptitive (I think some of the problem was from bugs)

All Flame and Frost: 3/5
+ Gradual story, sense of progression
+ Decent amount of things to do
+ Multiple rewards for various tasks
+ Plenty of NPCs to interact with about the story and what to look forward to (we first learn about someone else pulling the strings behind the alliance!)
+ Great dungeon with interesting encounters

~ Good rewards for the dungeon, but not really the best in terms of time it took. Jetpack was a nice incentive.

- Long, could have been done within 1-2 months instead
- A lot of temporary content
- Big finale reward was a little anticlimatic (I’m talking about the bonfire)

Dragon Bash: 3/5
+ Decent amount of things to do (Moa Races, activities, pinata smashing)
+ Both exclusive rewards for being there and non-exclusive rewards (dragon helm was exclusive, wings non)
+ NPCs to interact with
+ Decent story

- Felt a lot like “Collect X items” for a lot of the achievement
- Dragon Ball promoted AFK with its achievements and the fact AFKers weren’t removed from matches
- Grindy — Holographic dragon wings just weren’t worth it via Jorbreakers. You were better off buying them for cheap or getting lucky with drops. (Achievements, as mentioned above).

Sky Pirates: 2.5/5
+ Decent mix of temporary and permanent content (New jumping puzzle) (Don’t know if its still around, but the SoS scavenger hunt)
+ I like the optional challenge-mode feel to some of the dungeon achievements (defeat final boss in 15 mins, do laser boss without getting laser’d)
+ Good amount of achievements to do to finish the meta

~ An ok dungeon, with ok encounters. I think mechanics were over thought and too much was shoved in.
~ As with F&F rewards were ok, Monocle is an ok reward, but I don’t think there was much beyond that in terms of time it took to do the dungeon.

- Holograms having a 50/50 chance for aetherblades made it feel grindy, as well as most of the achievements just being “Kill x in this zone”
– Deja vu in the terms of achievements, due to them using some of the dragon bash stuff
- Not much in terms of reward

Bazaar of the Four Winds: 4/5
+ Good mixture of permanent and temporary content (Blecher’s Bluff, but the title can’t be done anymore? Memory is fuzzy)
+ Fun, new place to explore
+ Special powers add a new layer to jumping puzzles
+ Achievement overhall adds incentive to do them
+ Lots of things to do (activities, events, gathering stuff, exploring)
+ Armor/backpieces are priced well enough

~ Ok rewards. Personal Quartz is an interesting addition, zephyrite model is meh, a title which is only available if you like the activity.

- Not really feeling a lot of the story about the Bazaar, feels hidden.
- A lot of “find a kite out here” achievements

I’m going to list my favorite and least favorite, but also rate the other releases with some pros and cons if that’s ok.

Favorite: Shadow of the Mad King (Halloween 2012)
SotMK had this gradual progression of the story, split into acts — where each act added more to the story and additional things to do were unlocked. There were multiple rewards — good at jumping puzzles? you got a treasure chest for it (would’ve been cool if there was unique skin for it back then, but I digress), a reward for killing the big bad boss in the labyrinth (see above), two backpieces which had decent hints at where to find the pages to make them, a title for the meta and title for a side achievement.
The most amazing part of the story was when the Mad King blew up the statue and we got a dungeon out of it — with a chance at weapon skins should you not be someone who enjoys crafting.
It did start a little slow, but there was plenty to do by the end of the week. Also, as mentioned I think it would’ve been cool if there were special Mad King skins at the time for doing the jumping puzzle. There were also only one or two achievements that were optional for the meta back then, but this has been remedied with latest additions.
All-in-all though, I think this was a solid content patch with multiple things to do, a great of sense of story through each act, likeable characters, and optional content that had rewards should you be brave enough to venture through it.

Least favorite: [Tie]: The Lost Shores (Nov. 2012) and Last Stand at Southsun (May 2013)
I can’t really differentiate between either Southsun releases, they both bother me and leave sour tastes in my mouth.
LS has come a long way and has learned from past events, but I still have to mention that I hate the exlusive one-time events that happened when it came to the original Southsun. I had a terrible experience, in an overflow, laggy as all hell and having a hard time “defending” LA from Karka. As well, the Ancient Karka was an equal nightmare. I had an unexpected event come up and was fairly demoralized to log in when I realized I was late for the Ancient Karka, but I did log when my friends told me it was still going on. I get into an overflow only to deal with another laggy encounter that lasted 3 hours. My reward was random greens, blues, a bag, and a trash +all stat ring?
Karka are obnoxious to fight, in the sense that they have large health pools and the time it takes to kill them doesn’t justify the reward they give (nothing or grey items). As well, the second update has similar problems, its hard to keep the settlements defended, because they are contested again within minutes. The reward for killing the karka queen is not very good for all the work it takes, plus its hard to get back out there when all the settlements are contested again, and the vendor that sells armor is ridiculous — 70 shells + gold on to of that is outrageous. I always dislike having to do guild rushes out here because the settlement near the end of the rush is a death trap.
I really don’t remember the characters of the story. I vaguely recalled Canach in the first installment, but his motives weren’t clear to me. With the second installment, I felt deja vu just because I think Canach was the one that had angered the wildlife before? There didn’t really feel like there was much development with the second installment, besides the fact the Consortium had hired the refugees from F&F.
The dungeon in part 2 wasn’t very good. Crab toss wasn’t very enjoyable either, I find both dungeon and activity chaotic.
On the flip side, I like that we were given a new zone, we got some goods rewards in the second Southsun LS, with the two backpieces we could pick from and a couple titles (although majority came from Crab toss)
We also got Fractals in the first Southsun, which was a fun addition.

I think one of the big things I like with recent Living Story patches, are the little teasers we’re seeing in game. Things as simple as Kessex’s forest being chopped down or the tent in DR for construction of the pavillion are great little goodies for what happens next, it really makes the world feel like it’s changing.

At the same time, however, I think the stories just need more oomph to them. We get a little story, a bunch of achievements to do, maybe a tiny bit more story after, and a lot of questions left on our plates. If there was a bit more guidance, a gradual trickle of the story via these achievements, it’d be better. (Someone recently posted unused sound clips on Reddit for some of the LSs past, please put this stuff in, or try to fit it in, we need the story, we need interaction, silence leaves too many things unaswered.)
As a bad example, the 2013 Halloween. We get the story, meet Tassi and then the Bloody Prince leaves. Then the only thing we get from then until the next ounce of story is achievements to hunt for a candy corn ele. I know his name was wiped from history, but maybe Tassi sends us on a hunt to try and learn more about the prince, only for us to learn his name was wiped from history (maybe we find some strange history books that had pages torn, or writing erased via magic, you know?).
I’m going to use the entire arc of F&F as an good example, albeit it was paced out far too long. We start learning that people are being displaced from their homes, we help the refugees find shelter. There are strange steam vents in the zones in questions. Next, we continue efforts, now there’s portals and we’re starting to see who is responsible. Third, we meet the heroes and now we find the Molten Alliance is getting more aggresive, we attempt to protect two towns from the threats. Last we have the grand finale where we find our enemy and take the fight to them.
Just as F&F had this gradual constant story with a lot of its achievements, we need to have similar for what’s been going on now. As a fix to the current Kessex LS:
Maybe just before we revealed the tower, there have been reports of sickness in nearby cities. You are sent to investigate there first, eventually pinpointing the cause to Kessex Hills. As you get out there, the scene suddenly cuts to the tower magically becoming visible, you are approached by a guard and they give you the story — Marjory and Kasmeer were out here investigating and then this mess happened, cue the story instance and helping save them. Once that is out of the way, the PC can talk to the NPCs and be given multiple leads — finding obelisk shards**, checking/culling infected wildlife, etc.
Perhaps some of these said leads add to small trickles of information, maybe you find a Toxic Alliance member in the act and manage to spy on them, giving you some inside information. Maybe you overhear some krait talking about the shards they have been given and they talk about Scarlet. Or perhaps there are additional story instances that can be unlocked — such as capturing an enemy and getting information from them. We need little bits of the story here and there with these achievements, to answer at least some of the questions.
**Also, please give some direction to where fetch achievements are. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to use an outside source because there’s dragon tooth hidden in some grass on a random mountain top. Maybe Marjory mails a note with possible areas, or the device you’re using can contact the NPC and give you hints.

Other things:
A mix of temporary and permanent content. Maybe people do miss out on a good story, but they need something they can come back to. If there’s nothing new for them to do, why would they bother coming back? Zones, jumpings puzzles, pvp maps, wvw stuff, more guild missions, dungeons, you know.
A decent mix of the current arc and just for fun arcs. I think this is sort of in-game, or starting to become a thing. Do tell the main story, but have some breaks, maybe we need to help Destiny’s Edge one time while the big bad from the main arc is pushed back and in hiding, or maybe a dragon minion is growing stronger.
Return to Elder Dragon’s at some point. Please.