Guild Wars 2

Will any of those new stat combos make it into PvE?

I’d like to know the answer to this as well. Is it in a different thread somewhere?

I have access back, and my map is fixed. Yay and thank you!

I’m super happy that this is getting fixed, but super nervous that I haven’t gotten an email about it yet. I hope I’m included in the NA fixes!

Dahlia.5638:

Hi! I was wondering how the resetting was coming, it looks like my account hasn’t been reached yet, and I haven’t received an email either so I’m starting to get a little worried, haha. Any update would be appreciated!

I’m in the same boat. It would be nice to know whether or not my account is going to be disabled at some point tonight… and when my map is going to be fixed.

All of my Magus Falls maps have been reset. The zones are fogged out. If I mouse over the number, it shows my hero points as having been captured, but everything else is 0/x. I replayed Torn from the Sky to see if entering Verdant Brink would fix it, but no effect. I completed the story, and had started mapping, but now everything from Verdant Brink to Dragon’s Stand is reset.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

There’ll be more supportive damage for Celestial Avatar by launch… possibly from trait modifications or from skill changes.

An issue which should not be decoupled here is that Celestial Avatar felt gated behind staff use (and troll unguent), which left a ranger with one damage-focused weapon option and one support weapon. I’m making some changes to astral force rate gain to try to address this. Ideally it should be possible to build up your astral force without -needing- to run staff, but running staff should speed up the process by nature of the heals it provides. This would yield the option of running two non-staff weapons while still having Celestial Avatar available.

Celestial Avatar healing is the best available by a decent margin right now. One issue that came up is that the healing coefficients are so insignificant that running with healing stats yields very little reward.

The best healing in the game being available without using any healing power; this is not good for the game.

The berserker meta not be the only consideration requires that other stat combinations be rewarding.

Being able to run two more damage-focused weapons (if that’s your thing) and still have Celestial Avatar available should address some of your offensive concerns if you want to play a bit more offensively as a hybrid. If you want to focus on being the top offense then you probably shouldn’t be selecting the Druid specialization.

That’s all I’m going to say on the subject for now (though I will continue to read constructive feedback here and elsewhere) as there is plenty to be done in order to address these and other issues. /me ducks back to work on Scrapper and Druid.

I will be content with this if the core specializations also get the boost they need (and were promised). Its already hard enough for Rangers to find teams for tougher content. My concern is that if core Rangers can’t keep up with other professions, we’ll be instantly kicked from team unless we run Druid. I don’t mind having Druid be a specifically healing class (although I still think apothecary Druid would be awesome), but please give core Rangers a viable role in post-expansion gameplay.

Since the last patch, ranger spirits sacrifice themselves when you activate them, so you can only activate each one once. I hope this is a bug and not intentional…

Further thoughts, now that I’ve had a chance to play more thoroughly.

I’m still underwhelmed by glyphs. Glyph of Empowerment would be great if the range were just a bit bigger and the duration longer. I like the idea of it as a party-wide DPS boost to replace signet of the wild, but positioning makes it impractical with such a short range and duration. The other glyphs don’t offer enough to make me want to equip them. The elite glyph is ok, and I’d equip it in certain situations, but that’s the best I can say about it. Condition removal from wilderness survival still solidly beats condition removal from glyphs, partly because the heal glyph is so weak, partly because survival skills are generally better, largely because the activation is faster and moves with you, whereas the seeds stick in one spot and you have to wait for them to activate. I dislike the idea of seeds in general. Both ranger and druid are all about mobility and positioning, yet druid condition removal basically requires that you stay in one spot and watch the grass grow. This makes no sense.

Avatar mode reminds me of the elite guardian book that was removed from the game. I never get around to using glyphs in celestial form because I’m too focused on skill use before time runs out. Perhaps that will change with practice. Right now it feels very uninteresting, but I can see how I might change my mind in a raid or a high level fractal.

Staff seems like it has great potential as a support weapon, but the damage is terrible. I still feel that it needs to either drive home the healing thing and improve the heals, or keep the heals as they are and add something else to make it more interesting. Someone suggested condition damage, and I think that’s a really neat idea. Staff/shortbow would be lots of fun if the staff had better synergy with condition damage builds. An apothecary druid might be neat. Also, I will echo what others have said about staff animations. Eew.

The pets are alright, I suppose. There are so many issues with ranger pets, I guess these pets feel like they fit right in with the issues they have. I think it would be better if the wyverns would activate their skills on their targets rather than at their location. Pet location is too finicky with the AI as it is now, and the fields often end up in a spot that is not very useful.

The one trait I really like is Live Vicariously, since it works with any heal I choose to equip. Ancient Seeds is another great trait, but I like it less because it narrows your build. Lingering Light is so weak by comparison, it’s just silly, and Grace of the Land is narrowly situational. Even though Live Vicariously is only a minor trait and weaker than Ancient Seeds, I like it better than the whole set of grandmaster traits because it better supports build variety.

The more I play the more I can see the potential for very strong druid builds, and I have mixed feelings about that. On the one hand, I do want the druid specialization to be strong enough to be worth running. On the other hand, I don’t want it to be so strong that you have to run it to have a viable build. We’ve been promised some improvements to the core specializations, and I think that’s key in keeping the profession balanced as a whole. I’d like the option to run high level fractals as a Ranger, and the option to run high level fractals as a Druid, depending on what I feel like playing. As long as that balance can be achieved, I’ll be a happy camper.

These are just first impressions, as I haven’t really played through in depth yet. So far I agree with a lot of what others have said. Also it’s worth noting that I almost exclusively PvE, so I can’t speak to how things will work in PvP or WvW.

One of the things I loved about Guild Wars 2 from launch was the absence of a dedicated healer. I loved that each profession had its own ways to contribute to healing, damage, and control. It was a huge part of what made Guild Wars 2 unique among MMOs. Druid seems to be changing that, which is dramatically decreasing the overall quality of the game for me. It’s becoming more and more like every other MMO, and not in a good way.

On a more personal level, I really enjoyed the class identity of the ranger that carried over from Guild Wars 1. As others have expressed, I main ranger for a reason, and it’s certainly not to be a dedicated healer. The big reveal about druids being necessary healers for raids feels very much like “surprise! you are the new monks!” and that sucks. I wouldn’t mind an option to run druid as a dedicated healer if there were other interesting ways to build druids, but as others have pointed out, the druid so far is an incredibly monotone specialization. There is very little synergy with existing builds and/or trait lines. For example, even the suggestion from the livestream of running signet of stone with gylph of unity is largely impractical because the recharge time on the two is so different, and in general glyph of unity is fairly useless on a primarily ranged build since it affects the area around your character rather than the area around your target. Running glyph of empowerment seems moderately interesting, but, as others have pointed out, there are other skills that are far better, and don’t require you drop a specialization in order to run druid. Traiting glyphs for condition removal is interesting, but nowhere near as strong as traiting survival skills, with their faster activation and generally better utility. If glyphs were on par with survival skills, I’d be extremely tempted to run glyphs and signets, but glyphs lack a stun break, and the heal is tremendously weak compared to core heals. Ultimately it doesn’t seem worth it to run druid for a balanced PvE build, because it simply isn’t stronger than what any of the core specializations offer.

Perhaps raids will be the exception, which is the next bit of content I plan to test out. I am on the fence with regard to what others have said about healing. On the one hand, if you’re going to make druids the new healers, you might as well make them good at it. On the other hand, I’d really rather not have a dedicated healer at all, so generally speaking I’d rather the healing stay where it is and add better utility to staff skills and druid traits.

If you have your heart set on making druids strong raid healers, then it would be nice if you’d re-balance core rangers a bit to keep non-druid builds viable as well. Right now druid is so monotone, it’s going to end up dramatically decreasing build variety if it really does end up being absolutely necessary for raid success. You risk replacing one monolithic meta with another.

TL;DR: The existing core specializations and skills are stronger overall and have better synergy with each other. Druid feels like a one trick pony, and I didn’t even want a pony when I started.

Another thought: part of the problem is that the transmutation buttons look exactly the same as the dye application buttons. While it’s wonderful to be able to preview dyes you have unlocked on armor skins through the wardrobe, having the buttons look and function identically makes it too easy to mistake the free unlimited service with the currency-based (and sometimes paid) service.

When previewing new skins in the wardrobe panel, it is far too easy to missclick “Apply” instead of “Reset”. The buttons are small and close together, allowing you to accidentally transmute very easily. I suggest adding a confirmation step before transmuting. It’s very strange to me that this is not already part of the game, particularly given that transmutation charges can be bought with gems. I have to type out “Revive Orb” every time I want to delete one of those, and yet it’s stupidly easy to accidentally waste transmutation charges. That makes no sense at all. Please fix this.

As much as I love the new Viper armor, what is with the strip of metal in the left armpit (on the right as you look at the character)? Is that a graphic bug? At first I thought it was part of the shoulder, but it’s not, because it doesn’t hide with the rest of the shoulder when you choose not to show it… so what’s with the armpit metal?

If this is supposed to be part of the shoulder, could it please be made to hide with the rest of the shoulder when you elect not to show it?

digiowl.9620:

Was the render assembled from pieces or found as a single model? If it is the latter, then it was intended for a NPC.

I don’t know if it was assembled from pieces, but I do remember seeing the mesh for different body types. I hope it is player armor and not NPC armor!

I agree! I hope it does get into game eventually.

It seems lately everyone is discussing the new ascended armor skins, but I’m just confused. What ever happened to this mesh?

http://i.imgur.com/L9nNq21.jpg

It looks like medium based on the asymmetrical sleeves. If it’s not going to be ascended armor, will it be in game as some other set? We desperately need more medium armor options that are not long coats!

I also love this hairstyle concept (the one with a flower for female humans), but the clipping is horrible! I mean, I can tolerate a /little/ clipping (everything in game clips somewhere), but this clips so much it just looks messy. It’s just not worth buying until it’s fixed.

RoyalPredator.9163:

I miss the Vulnerability on Hunter’s Shot.
Now we have even less damage, sicne we can’t start on 10 stack of Vulnerability on the foes.

My suggestion:

• Hunter’s Shot: Applies 10 stack of vulnerability and grantss the ranger stealth for 5 seconds.
  Why? It’s not OP, we can decide to attack the target within 5 seconds, or stay back hidden.

I would like to see more skirmishing and stealth abilities in the future. – for the Hunter game style.

I love this idea. It lets people who like the new functionality of Hunter’s Shot keep it, and it lets people who enjoyed the old functionality keep that as well. Please, Anet, do this, so that both PvE and PvP players can be happy, instead of one getting screwed for the sake of the other.

In particular, I like the idea of moving Remorseless to 30 Skirmishing. That would open up many, many more possibilities for build variety.

Well put, Shiren. I agree completely.

I’ll also point out that the ten stacks of vulnerability that used to be applied with hunter’s shot are now spread out onto each of rapid fire’s ten shots. Before the patch, you could fire hunter’s shot for the 10 stacks, then fire rapid shot, allowing all 10 shots to reap the full benefit of the vulnerability. Now the vulnerability gradually grows throughout rapid shot, which amounts to an overall damage decrease. This -again- puts pressure on longbow rangers to trait for Remorseless so that they can make up for lost DPS.

What I used to love about Guild Wars 1, and even (for a while) about Guild Wars 2, was the viability of different builds within a profession. If you really want to give rangers a stealth option, or make Remorseless a better trait, fine, but why attach that to a weapon skill that does very little else? What use is pet swiftness when pets -still- rarely survive an encounter, especially when playing more challenging endgame content? I think that’s really my big problem with this patch – hunter’s shot now exists solely to allow rangers to take full advantage of remorseless, but that means all longbow rangers will feel a huge pressure to trait that way, and rangers that use other weapons will not be able to take full advantage of the trait. As many others have pointed out, shortbow builds would greatly benefit from Remorseless if they were given equal opportunity to utilize it. In my opinion, this gives rangers – especially longbow rangers – less build versatility, not more. If stealth broke agro, this might be a different discussion, but as is, stealth is useless to a ranger that does not have the Remorseless trait, and thus so is Hunter’s Shot.

I cannot believe Anet said they want to help rangers be more useful in dungeons, and then go and nerf the most useful dungeon utility. I’m just… speechless.

Will this be fixed in the upcoming patch?

I know Lick Wounds and Search and Rescue are already terribly buggy, but they seemed to work about 80% of the time for me… until today. This afternoon and evening I was not able to get either of those skills to work at all. They seem to have gone from buggy to flat out broken. Has anyone else experienced this? I spent most of my time in FotM, so could it be something specific to that dungeon?

Forgive me if this has already been addressed elsewhere. I did search the forums, but found no answer to this specific question.

I will be unable to attend the Sunday ‘Finale’ event from the beginning. If I happen to be home before the event chain ends, can I join part way through? Or do I miss it if I’m not there from the start?

On October 15th, the response was that they would be “in an upcoming game update”:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/bltc/Makeover-Kit-Gone

To my knowledge, there’s been no ANet response related to this on the dev blog (although I could easily be wrong), nor has there been any further information from ANet about the kits since last month. My biggest question now is whether or not the kits will be included in the November 15th update.

While I’m not diametrically opposed to one time events, I don’t exactly like them either. I will end up missing most (if not all) of them, not because of my work schedule, but because my real life schedule is already busy enough without one more thing to plan around.

The most important factor, in my opinion, has already been stated by others:

Snoring Sleepwalker.9073:

How about they take the money used to create the one time events and instead use it to produce better content for everyone.

I could not agree more. Frankly, I don’t think there should be any extra events or additional content at all right now. It absolutely blows my mind that ANet is spending time and money on special events, when the list of bugs in the basic game is so insanely long as is. What about the re-balance patches? Or fixing the blocked progress story missions? Or the Black Lion items so many people are waiting for? Or, hey, if you really really want to make something new, how about more variety in weapon and armor skins? Of course, there’s no shortage of clipping issues to fix in the existing skins.

I think all of this is doubly frustrating because I see so much potential in GW2 for a really excellent game. I’d much rather see ANet devote time and money towards refining the quality of the existing game, rather than simply making a broken game bigger.

I keep hoping the kits will be in the next patch… Will the next patch be on the 15th? Or might we get one sooner?

Count me as one more customer eagerly awaiting the kits. Please can we get an update on when they will be released? Or at least a status update?

I love this idea. Honestly, I’d be happy even just with an indicator on the world map for each zone, showing which are at 100% and which are not. Everything else would be icing on the cake.

As I’ve posted elsewhere, I’m also pretty upset that the makeover kits were not included in this patch. Honestly, I was much more excited about the makeover kits than the Halloween events, so now I’m quite disappointed.

Anet, can we please get a concrete response as to when these will be released? Vague answers like “soon” or “later this month” really just make people feel like they’re being strung along. I don’t want to be another whiner in the white noise of dissent surrounding this update, but nor do I feel it’s too much to ask for a little clear communication.

I’m also extremely disappointed that the makeover kits didn’t make it into this update. Given the community’s response when the kits erroneously appeared earlier, I’d hoped Anet might recognize how many people are waiting for this feature, and put them out ASAP. Now I’m feeling pretty foolish for buying gems in anticipation, and without a straight answer as to when they’ll be released, I’m wondering if I should just get a refund.

Will the makeover kits be part of the Halloween update?

…please?

I was very excited to finally do the story mission to get a commando’s coat, and then equally disappointed to find that it clips with my character’s body. Did anet really make armor that clips this badly? Or do I need to update my graphics drivers or something? I’m so tired of clipping! The one Norn cultural armor I really like clips horribly with long hair, and now this clips with my character’s stomach? Ugh. I was so happy to have finally found an armor piece I like in the endless parade of coats, but the clipping issue makes it too irritating to wear. I was already disappointed by the homogeneity of GW2 medium armor. Clipping on rare sets is like rubbing salt in the wound.

I also have a Sylvari with the same problem. It’s extremely irritating, and I just don’t enjoy the character as much because of it. I hope it gets fixed soon. I really don’t want to reroll.