Guild Wars 2

Thanks, that was it. There was a small sliver of map fog along the southeast corner of Queensdale. I wandered over there, opened up Demongrub Pits, and my achievement completion flashed on the screen. Here I thought all along that it was related to points of interest and other map items. My bad.

I have visited each of the zones for Kryta listed in this table, but my “Krytan Explorer” completion is stuck at “174/175”.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Map_completion/table

Every zone (except for Southsun Cove) shows that I have completed every single goal. I visited some zones twice, just to make sure my eyes didn’t misread the map numbers. Yes, I even went inside Chantry of Secrets, and the map shows “1/1” completed. Southsun Cove seems to be irrelevant, because I captured 2 points of interest and 1 waypoint, but my exploration badge numbers did not move at all.

What am I missing? Surely I’m not the first person stumped by this oversight? Is my character bugged?

Hi, me again. I was gone during the holiday break. I came back this evening to play again. Apparently the camp where I last logged out was only temporarily safe. All I know is that it was contested this evening when I appeared there.

I logged in and died immediately. I paid to teleport to yet another camp. I skipped repairing the damage. I just logged out again.

Yes, penalizing occasional players needs to stop. See you next week… probably.

As I play less and less frequently, I think I’ve identified the small annoyance that wears down my enthusiasm: the teleport fee.

1) I login after a few days. I decide on a new activity. I pay $ to teleport there and start adventuring.
2) I play an hour or two. Usually, character death makes for a good “stopping point” for the evening.
3) I pay $ to teleport to nearest camp to sell inventory and repair, then I logout. I realize almost immediately afterwards that I probably spent half of my earnings on teleport and repair.

So every single time I play (and yes I have been an occasional player in recent weeks), I end up feeling unenthusiastic about my time in Tyria because of being “taxed to play”. It’s a small and nearly insigificant issue, yes, but it is the one issue that keeps coming to mind when I wonder why my enthusiasm fizzles for what is obviously an interesting game.

1) The obvious solution is to make all teleports free, but that idea isn’t very creative.
2) Another solution is to make the first 3 teleports in a day free of charge, but that also seems boring.
3) Instead, I propose making only teleports within a zone free. Then add one special portal to each zone that has a match in the nearest racial city; and that teleport is also free of charge. That foot traffic (as people use racial cities again as travel hubs) would bring some more immersion into the game. I haven’t visited my ancestral home in ages. (Why waste the teleport fee to get there and back again?) You can still pay money to jump instantly across the world to any waypoint.

Travel for occasional players should not be a disincentive to playing again.

1) Shareability: What if the bank Collection included a section just for non-combat clothing? Unlike existing collections which stack items, these items would be binary on/off toggles. When you buy the clothing, the item toggles on permanently. All characters can then access that bank Collection. When a character pulls an item from the bank, it generates a soulbound copy of the item. Destroy it when you’re done with it. The bank Collection item remains there. Simple, yes?

2) Convenience: I wish that the Hero equipment tab included better display toggles rather than just the Armor and Town Clothes options. I’d like to see toggles for Armor, Adventure, Town, and Home. Adventure items overwrite the armor display mesh while out in combat-land, and it can be populated with clothing items or actual armor items (with stats ignored while placed in that slot). Town displays only work in towns, of course. Home displays only work in personal or guild homes, whenever areas like that get added. Managing appearance is a lot easier that way (I used it in EQ2) than with this “skin” item micromanagement.

Overall, I liked the Halloween event.

1) Convenient maze. I enjoyed that the maze was a one-stop-shop for hunting, carving, and mining.
2) Continuity. I enjoyed the tie-in with the Mad King Says game between the last two acts.
3) Artwork. I like the look of the 3 special inventory items. I wish I owned one. I like the books too. I own it.
4) Writing. I like the jokes that the Mad King tells on his walk around town.
5) Acting. I liked the Mad King’s voice and expression. Well done.

My complaint list, though, evokes more passion from me.

1) Much too short. Real life interfered at the beginning, so I felt very rushed to accomplish anything. Why not a month-long event? I spent October playing a different game that did offer more time for their Halloween event.
2) Much too obscure. I ended up reading webpages to figure out what I was supposed to be doing with my limited time. (See #1.) I suggest an NPC at the plaza that players can interact with for suggestions on how to accomplish achievements that the player character has not yet finished.
3) Poor loot opportunity. I dunno, it seemed really bad. I wanted a bow (I’m a ranger) or medium armor skins. I got bupkis. I couldn’t really farm anything either. (See #1 again.) Maybe a year from now I’ll be free to play again for another chance at satisfaction? The witch hat should have been a reward for laughing at all of the Mad King’s jokes on his entire tour of the town. Something better should have been rewarded from the simon says game, possibly with loot probabilities scaling with number of holiday achievements completed?
4) Audio clipped. The Mad King teleports at the plaza, and several times I made it to the next part of the plaza circle where I heard only a command, but I couldn’t hear “Mad King Says” beforehand. I missed my Gold completion several times to this “feature”. He needs to broadcast to a much larger radius.
5) Jumping puzzles. I hate them anyway and am so glad they got moved to their own tab so I can ignore them altogether. Moreover, this clocktower jumping puzzle was especially crafted so only a minority could ever complete it? And it supposedly offered the best loot opportunity of the holiday? There’s a reason I don’t play “twitch games” like first person shooters. I am bad at them and they stress me out. Challenge is not the same as absurdity.

P.S. The Preview text here is cut off on the right margin in my Firefox 16 web browser.