Guild Wars 2

Yikes, the forum censor got me—yeah, it doesn’t really have the best… name—look up “the GNU Image Manipulation Program” and it should come up for the free alternative to photoshop.

Hi!

There’s a ton of digital art programs out there that you can use. Photoshop (any version of it—CS6 and CS5 is what I’m familiar with) is not what I would call an art program by far, but it is a very popular choice and there are lots of tutorials out there for how to get started using it for digital art. If you like the feel of photoshop but can’t afford it, kitten is a free alternative (and it was my first art program!). In my opinion, it’s relatively clunky and hard to get into, but if you can get past that it can work for you. I personally use Paint Tool SAI, although compared to other art programs it may be lacking for your needs. Clip Studio Paint is a relatively new one I’ve come across that seems much more extensive and fantastic than other programs I’ve come by if you are interested in also being able to create comics. Some other programs you might want to look into are Corel Painter and Art Rage.

Also, digital art can be difficult if you are using a mouse. While it’s possible to make some fantastic artwork with it, you should look into purchasing a tablet if you don’t already have one. I recommend Wacom’s bamboo series if you are starting out. Monoprice tablets are cheaper but I can’t guarantee how long they will last.

Good luck!!! You can message me if you have any questions about working with digital art c:

I did find the new system to be…strange? But I think the solution to it would be rather simple!

I appreciate the set amounts of gems/gold for set amount of gold/gems, I think that it does simplify things and tell you directly how much it will cost for 400 gems, etc. without you needing to do the maths for it, which IMO is a convenience! However, it is also extremely limiting, but I don’t think that would be too difficult to solve. I highly appreciated being able to fine-tune how much I wanted to convert x currency into y. My suggestions are as follows:

-Bring back the ability to go for exactly how many gems/gold you want. This does not necessarily mean you have to also remove the new interface; it only means that you have to add it as an additional option.

-Return the charts to the interface. Perhaps tab it, if it might make it cluttered. I personally didn’t use them very much, but that’s because I have been a fool. I know that they are a valued part of watching currency conversions, and so I think that they are something that would be a benefit to the majority of the playerbase. They might be a little confusing for new players, sure, but I don’t think that newer players would pay attention to them, either! Especially if it is tucked away somewhere—like, as aforementioned, a tab.

-Add a confirmation screen. “Trade a amount of b for c amount of d?” should stave off most accidents.

-Make the minimum amount of gems you can purchase (conveniently, through the system that was put into place) something like 100 or 200. It would give players a baseline, and besides it is a nice and small number.

As I said I think it’s not a bad change persay, but removing options is always limiting. Sometimes it’s good, but not here. Bringing back the old options while keeping this system in place is a good compromise!

Both of those leaves sound like they’ll be fantastic colours. What sort of armor colours are you going for, and what is your glow colour? Or, if you’d like to change it up a lot…I’d suggest the turquoise ones, because they may fit slightly more colours.

I have a blue sylavri elementalist and a purple sylvari mesmer. My thief is very dark. I’m an artist, so I work with colour a lot and it’s one of my favourite things to do. For me, persay, I don’t feel locked into a set colour so much as I just really like one set scheme with them.

If you want to get into some nitty-gritty art instruction, look into basic colour theory. For example, let’s look at the colour red on the wheel. The closest colours to it are orange and purple. These colours will automatically look good with red. If you want a bolder scheme with red, look on the opposite side of the wheel and you’ll find greens and teals. This is a complimentary scheme, and each colour will bring out the other. A triad scheme involves three colours on opposite sides of the wheel. This would be in this example red, green, and purple. All of these colours, when used in the correct shades, can give you great results for a red sylvari if you do not want them to wear red. And the correct shades part is really important. To start, it may be easier to stay away from bright playground colours and to lean on colours of that hue but not of that saturation.
So, yes, it’s more than possible to give your sylvari clothes that do not match their skintone that still look great! You will not have to feel ‘locked in’ so long as you practice and play with dyes. Once you get really good at it, you can throw a whole bunch of colours at your sylvari and still get gorgeous results.
http://imgur.com/a/2rYrj is a photoset of my elementalist in her regular scheme and then in purples. Excuse my calculator graphics!

I was in a party today doing some fractals at scale 5. We got to the underground facility fractal and got to Rabsovich and his little dredge buddies, and all was well until Rabsovich died. After he died, the amount of dredge remaining stayed at around 50%. We looked all over for the rest of the dredge, but as it turns out we had apparently killed all of them. Killing the dredge scattered at the floor of the fractal didn’t do anything to the ticker. I also looked around a bit to see if this was a bug or a mistake on our part, but found nothing on the subject. We left, and were unable to complete the fractal.
Firstly, is this a bug? Has it happened to anyone else? And what happened if it did?
Thanks!

I support this without a second’s hesitation.

Long ago, we started with a dream.
A dream to encapsulate the joy that is Lord Faren’s fighting coiffure.
The two of us banded together on a quest to study this character and bring him to the world in a light that must be explored, a light that shines only on his handsome features.
We present to you one of the many fruits of our labour, the Lord Faren Archive.

As the other disciple studying Farenology, it’s my honour to provide you all with a link to a compilation of screenshots accompanied by witty commentary of the always-fancy Lord Faren, put together by the Fanciest Cat herself, Sam. Since she does not have a forum account, mine will suffice.

Here is the link to the post on her tumblr blog.

Should you have any questions about Lord Faren, we are here to answer all of them. Nothing will go under our radar.

Nothing.

My 1, my number 1, my number one please please please please use this is, “Please use what we already have to develop the story”!!! There’s SO much I am so curious about and at this rate, it doesn’t look like we’re ever going to get any update on it. What about the Wizard’s Tower? The largos? Why did Lord Faren step down in the ministry? What’s chasing the quaggans out of town? There’s one nice centaur, could we see more? Do more exist? And what about the tengu, the kodan, or Malyck's tree (honestly, every time I think about Malyck's tree I get irrationally upset and want to cry. What the heck! There's another pale tree!!!!!!!!!! And it's never ever ever touched upon! I PRAY that season 2 of the living story will at least hint at it because my LIFEBLOOD depends on this tree!) At this rate I’m just going to have to rely on my own fanfiction and speculation.

My 2…would be to please please please please please expand on the personal story of the character. I want to have an arc for myself. One where I can do something with my character and have it have meaning. Maybe as a human, I could join the seraph. For an example of how it could affect my character, I could earn a new title from that—“Seraph”, perhaps. Going up in the ranks earns physical rewards like special armor skins.
But for something like this, going up in the ranks would be something you do outside of the personal story. Instead of it being level-based to go to the next instance, you’d have to work on doing seraph-things until you got to the desired rank (i.e. instead of saying that it is a level 40 instance it would say you need to be a soldier). There’s a LOT of ways you could tackle lore and story, and touch upon towns and the personalities inside of them that would need seraph help, with something like this. And I was only using the seraph route as an example! You could come up with almost anything, and with an arc like this it can be used to refer to your character in the living story, too. This suggestion isn’t really for the living story though, but I still care about it so much that I absolutely had to put it here. Please. I will send Arenanet cookies and drawings of Logan Thackeray all the way from Canada!

And 3…as other people have stated in this forum, guild wars 2 IS a dark fantasy. As I was doing an escort mission the other day, I realized that for the quaggan, no place is safe. Even for the humans they were with, no place is safe. There is no true sense of safety because someone or something can attack at any time. No matter where they go, their safety is only temporary. I mean, Lion’s Arch was left in ruins, Divinity’s Reach had been attacked by Scarlet (and is constantly under threat anyway, according to the personal story). That’s really, really dark. But it’s not touched upon in the way it should be, I think. Going more over this theme, going over the core would really bring out all of the light moments that we do have in the game. All of the little jokes and funny characters would shine a lot more and have more meaning and would contribute to the bigger theme of triumph in dark times. For right now, they usually seem out of place, or like they’re just there to have a party while the world erupts into turmoil behind them. (Which, honestly, wouldn’t be a bad thing if it were executed differently.)

Gosh, apologies for the enthusiasm, I just have a LOT of passion for this kind of thing, being a teenage girl on the internet and all. I love storytelling and I know guild wars 2 can have INCREDIBLE storytelling! I just don’t understand why we don’t have it yet and I hope that all that turns around this year! I’m rooting for you guys!

A bump for an EXTREMELY important post!
I really want to provide helpful criticism or just some sort of general construction that could help improve this idea, but I can’t. I can’t because it’s amazing already and I’m overwhelmed! I’ve never felt so excited from reading about something that is only an idea. And yet…I’m also so disappointed that I could, quite literally, cry because this isn’t already the plan for how GW2 is to continue its story.

I am desperately hoping and praying that something good comes out of your suggestion, that it is read and carefully thought about and discussed and taken into consideration, because it’s full of good ideas. You touch up on old lore, ensuring that the core themes of gw2 are not left untouched. There’s plenty of room for character growth—YOUR character’s growth, even!—and you even brush up on letting your character move on past just the orders storylines and working towards things like the Seraph and fighting the Nightmare and just. wow.

Really good job all around. I checked out a few other posts of yours and you really know what you’re talking about. Please continue to do so!!!

Hey, just saying if it is Lord Faren…well, I can tell you that I have never seen him go downed during my (countless) replayings of the noble personal story. If he IS Mr. E, Mr. E can very well handle himself in a fight.

I’m rooting for Lord Faren, a) because it’s hilarious and b) because I am hopelessly in love with his character and want to see more of him.

Novomundum.8325:

On a side note: what about the other races? (except sylvari cause their opinions about the matter is obvious) What are the other races’ laws and opinions of same sex relationships.

Oh, forgot to answer this part too:
There is a Shiverpeaks heart you can complete, and the letter involves the heart guy essentially saying, “Hey, I think my friend has a crush on you.” His friend is female. He’ll say that whether you male or not.

I’m not sure about the charr and asura, but I sincerely doubt it matters to them as well. I think you can hear asuras talking about their same-sex lovers in street conversations…charr seem to care more about meat and war than a partner though.

Gonna ignore where the thread went:
I don’t think Krytans care much about that kind of thing. In the human noble storyline, you can accompany Countess Anise as her date to Minister Wi’s party…as either sex. People at the party will take note, one of them will ask if she should dye her hair red (i.e. to be attractive to you.) Plus, your best friend Lord Faren flirts with your character a bit regardless of gender, and at the same aforementioned party there is a girl who seems to be a…big fan of you. Again, regardless of gender.
(I only know so much about the party because I’ve played through it at least three separate times.)
There’s plenty of evidence that humans literally do not care about it, and why should they? On a meta level, I don’t see why it should even be an issue in a fantasy world. They’ve (and especially in the case of GW2) got bigger things to care about other than who kisses who, like the constant threat of their world ending.

Personally I’m not a fan of “gendered” armor in the first place.
A slightly prettier version of asuran armor wouldn’t hurt, though, but I’d rather it was still spread out across both of them.

I may hold an unpopular opinion, but to be able to mix and match armor and town clothes would be pretty cool for me…To have a system where you can transmute the appearance of one clothing item onto another (either town or armor) would be interesting. I’m really excited for the update, but I’m extremely concerned about this technical downside because it’s a HUGE downside for me. If there can be a workaround in the future, I’d be happy.

Super pretty!!!!!! I love your brushwork, and your work flows really nicely.

Hello all!
Here are some examples of my work. If you have a tumblr, you may have already seen some of them…they are mostly sketches really, I am capable of doing more full paintings but I don’t have any examples with gw2 (the semi-painting of scarlet is the closest here, but I always refine my paintings a lot more than I did with her). And yes, I’m outing myself as one of the artists of the Lord Faren askblog…don’t hurt us, we mean no harm but to bring awareness to the sheer loveliness that is Lord Faren.

click this cool blue text

I’m considering doing gold commissions for gw2 on the side of actual commission work (which means I’d be offering artwork of guild wars 2 things in exchange for gold while I also do regular commission work). Would anyone be interested and how much would you offer for it, or for certain styles?

These responses are cracking me up. I’m glad to know that the existence of horses is debatable on more ends than just mine.
On the topic of invisible creatures, do gorillas exist outside of corrupted risen gorillas? Are they out in Maguuma? In Cantha?

Where are they?
I mean, I’m not asking to ride them or to have them give bonuses to my character. I just want to know, do horses even exist in GW2? There are abandoned wagons in DR that seem to be the type that would be pulled by horses, and the Iron Horse mine didn’t get its name from nowhere…so what happened? Were they all destroyed in the searing? Did Zhaitan corrupt every last horse on Tyria and drown them? We have centaurs, which are kind of close, but I don’t think a human would want a centaur pulling their cart…

Hello! I was curious about the design of the avatar of the tree. I wanted to know about how her design came around, what was the idea that was wanted, etc.

If anyone has any information I’ll be Really Into It. I put this as a q/a just in case.

I love the Tengu and I would love to see more of them. I also love the Kodan…they are my top two for right now. (Actually, I am also head-over-heels over the Skritt, but I don’t see them as being playable because you would be incredibly stupid. Poor Skritt.)

If I had to choose, I would say Tengu. I don’t see undead as an option for the reasons listed in the thread but oh man. Nobody can feel my love for the Tengu as much as I do.

Umut.5471:

Personal story or home instance isn’t a problem. they can just make it work like a character “reincarnation” with zero personal stories completed, zero memories of the character’s previous life. basically you will start from your new race’s home instance as a 80lvl(or whatever your level is) without any stories completed. your map completion and gear will stay. i don’t think this is that hard to code, it must be because of their policy.

But…why would you want to do that? Maybe I am just the type to be particularly involved in stories and characters, but to me that sounds like just starting over at a higher level. (plus if you want to work it in like “reincarnation” i think that your level would probably at least change somewhat! it must be disorienting in a new body.) I think it’s possible to start over and transfer gear if you are interested in that, that way when you do get to level 80 on your new character you can wear whatever you want and be an Asura while doing it.

Race change is not necessarily cosmetic. It affects core aspects of your character, including your home instance, your personal story, your cultural armor choices, your elite skills—heck, even dialogue with NPCs. Changing your race would be like changing your class. It can’t happen because it affects too many huge aspects of the game. As interesting as it might potentially be, it is really a lot more than cosmetics, and in my opinion if you do not like your character’s race, it might be better for you to just start over on a new character. There is a lot of fun stuff to do when you are leveling, and it only gets more fun as you go on.

In GW2 there is quite a bit of focus on aesthetics (especially endgame!), but they also focus on lore and storytelling (even if it isn’t always handled very well). Another reason I don’t see this happening is because of that fact: it would go against one of the big selling points of GW2. I suppose you don’t see this as a bad thing, but imagine talking to Caithe and learning that she is now a human. Not only would she look disgusting, it would be really strange and how would you explain that in-universe? (Although, then again, sex changes in GW2 are extremely well done…but at least you are still connected to the Pale Tree afterwards. I don’t know if a human Caithe is.)

I understand wanting race changes, but like I said I think that it is probably better if you simply start a new character with the new race you want to try out.

I’ve played more than my fair share of games where there would be a well-known enemy that, once defeated, would drop a piece of armor or a weapon. I liked it especially when it was related to who I killed—and even moreso when it was something that they were wielding or wearing.

In GW2 I don’t see much of that. With the new LS update there are the new weapon skins, but…it’s not the same. Some bosses also drop unique weapons—which is great! But I’ve seen them all in the trading post beforehand :P. What I am suggesting is the introduction of either new bosses (around the level of champions, probably—perhaps higher or lower depending on the drop) that will drop weapons related to them, or armor that they were wearing, or an armor set related to them. And I don’t mean for it to be found in a RNG box—I mean for it to drop purely on its own. It could have a rare chance of dropping or be there no matter what.

In other games, and I find this to be a huge plus with the quest system, you can have “trophies” of sorts from your quests in the form of these unique and often interestingly designed weapons and armor. They are trophies because they are a one-time thing, and you will always have a 100% chance of them dropping.
So, no matter what, after murdering Mario in cold blood you will receive his hat. And then, you can wear said hat. Said hat may or may not be tradeable (usually it isn’t). I wanted to suggest that this could somehow be incorporated into the PS, but I don’t think that is possible and instead I will go back to a point I have brought up before—please introduce more personal stories, ones that do not follow the main storyline. Then, perhaps this could be introduced. I think it would add to the overall appeal.

agree with everything. also I would love some sort of at least slight redesign for some of the NPCs, mainly the generic ones. I am fine with seeing the same thing over and over, but man, sometimes that same thing is not a nice thing to look at.

Narsil.6579:

thats Caithe lol hahaha she uses daggers and clearly has boobs, no man has bobs.. that perky and size wise

I have been laughing for hours at this post. I don’t know why.

In any case, I doubt it’s Caithe’s daughter as has been suggested (Sylvari cannot have babies). But who knows! Maybe it is Queen Jennah in a mesmer disguise. The world is mysterious.

The reason that race changes can’t work is because racial changes aren’t simply cosmetic. Unlike your name or appearance, the race of your character determines a lot about them—personal story, home instance, racial skills…even conversations with NPCs. As much as I like letting other people do their own harmless things, a race change would cheapen the PS and so forth even moreso than I feel it is right now. It wouldn’t be a race change in GW2, it would be more like a character overhaul.

I understand wanting a race change for cosmetic reasons, but if that’s the case really it’s better to just start over on a new character. Personally, I am happy with my characters. If I’m not, I remake them. I’ve done it lots of times. Arenanet doesn’t seem keen on racial changes at all, and I don’t think they will change their stance on that. I am sure that, if worst comes to worst, there are games out there that will facilitate your want for a new race, but really your race is absolutely not mere cosmetics. It doesn’t make any sense to switch races—it would break the core of your character.

I love this game. I love it dearly. I find it fun and engaging. I know I make a lot of petty complaints about the game (lots of them are not too serious haha).

But this…this cannot stand. Holy heck, who on Earth designed the default human NPCs?

The default “villager”, “citizen” etc. NPCs are what I’m talking about. Why do so many of the girls walk around in pigtails? Granted, quite a few of them don’t, but of all the available hairstyles to make a staple of the human NPCs, why the pigtails? The men tend to look a lot more generic and therefore believable for me. And the orange-clad, dark-skinned NPC with the not pigtails works! But…that one. Why?

Also, there is one human male voice actor that whenever I hear I get irrationally upset. He just sounds so sarcastic and hilariously out of it that once I get a whiff of his voice I am upset. I am in tears. I have flooded my city with rivers of frustration. And he is EVERYWHERE!

(Also, in my opinion, Petra’s design is really boring compared to Lord Faren and Quinn. I guess that might have been intentional, but the dang pigtails strike again! I do not have a problem with player characters having them and I don’t have a problem with some npcs having them but when Petra has them…and seemingly half of all the females in the world, I feel a sadness in my heart. I cannot remove my suspension of disbelief for these people. Why do you wear pigtails. There is no reason for this nonsense. You are an adult and they are not even adult pigtails, they are pigtails you see on five year olds.)

Ahem. Other than that I don’t have too much of a problem with the NPCs. They are hilarious and, sometimes, sad. I suppose this is just a pigtail rant, but interpret it as you wish.

+1 from me.
When sylvari throw parties, do you think that they say they’ll have a chloroblast?

Bringing this back because I just came into the waypoint. There are a lot of risen around here, but no matter how many you kill off the waypoint remains contested. It’s a kind of strange area because the merchants here sell…odd weapons/trinkets and are not affected by the risen around them. Also, I would expect that there would at least be a dynamic event correlating to the waypoint, but there isn’t—-there’s just lots of risen, some oozes, etc. and therefore it is always contested.

Dude, I’ve been seriously considering making a character named Sonic whose sole purpose is to be fast. Now I’ve learned about a speed cap! I’m curious about this too, why is there a speed cap? I just want to be the fastest hedgehog in Tyria ):

Why am I looking forward to another personal storyline? Because there is so much that can happen after Zhaitan’s defeat. There is so much that can happen that does not require me to be another (albeit much more powerful) soldier on the front lines. I might be able to go back and actually talk to the people I was good friends with back home, or perhaps something entirely new altogether. I don’t know if there will ever be another addition to the personal storyline, and honestly the best improvement to the current storyline would be to scrap it and start over, but I stress my point: my favourite part of games is the story! I don’t like playing games where there is none, or where it falls apart quickly. And I am a bit disappointed going through the personal story, since it was always my main motivation throughout the game.

*Please, please, pleaaaaaase somehow allow the characters to appear OUTSIDE of the PS. Once, I was exploring, and some punk thought it would be funny to tell me that Tybalt’s waiting for me. That was very memorable and I wish there were more details like that. Better yet, having entire stories around characters would be awesome—but I mentioned that in another thread.

*So much of the PS does not feel personal, because I am only a part of a horde of people that want to kill a dragon after a time. The PS remains the same for everyone after the Orders arc, with perhaps a few minor tweaks I suppose. Why was I even called Commander? I might as well have changed my name to Orders Agent and joined the club. Yes, I made vital decisions, but they certainly didn’t feel that way.

Please share your opinions. Thank you for reading this text wall.

Gosh, I had so many gripes about the personal story. After playing through it once I’m already pretty sick of it. The only new, interesting parts of it come shining through when you first start leveling a character, because that first ‘arc’ was, in my opinion, far more engrossing and investing than the rest of the story.

What I am a little upset about is that, as a heroic character, I was never allowed to falter. I was never allowed to have fears or doubts or really go through any sort of a dark time. When I played through on a sylvari alt and met Waine, I was kind of hoping I’d get a chance to take a look at that nightmare court business. He was so friendly about it, I thought I’d have an interesting friend. Instead, we ended up wiping him off the face of Tyria. I never once wanted to really turn entirely to the ‘dark side’, because I knew arenanet’s vision was to have a heroic character. But I did want to have a chance to explore the option of delving into it, perhaps only later to realize how wrong it is. There was a lot of potential that was left behind in my cliché hero. I would’ve liked an opportunity to have my character grow, after all—right now, they’re all inhumanely fearless, ready to take up any challenge, no matter what happens.

I liked having characters where it felt like they were actually interested in my existence, where I had an impact on the smaller lives of people. I realize that the plot of GW2 is about Zhaitain, and perhaps arenanet was striving for a more ‘realistic’ approach to his defeat in the way the storyline was handled. That is, you were another soldier, and this part of your life wasn’t about you, it was about the dragon. Except that all my would-be friends died before I knew about them, I met extremely interesting characters only to never have contact with them again, and at many times the potential for a really heartwrenching scene was ruined with the speed at which things were handled and the way my character reacted to them. I mean, come on. This poor little asura loses her husband and really hates me, and my character handles it by going ‘well ok just have this thing and bye’. She even acted like it was painful when she later explained the incident to Trahearne. In reality, she barely flinched. I suppose that’s what happens when she wasn’t even attached to the guy in the first place; she just did what she was told and let him blow up.

I was always fighting hordes of Risen that weren’t really doing anything other than being obstacles, yet they were the main focus of many storyline missions. And who could forget the well-loved Priory Scholar, or Vigil Crusader? I have many fond memories of Whispers Agent and Whispers Agent and also Priory Scholar. (sarcasm).The NPCs that followed me around weren’t useless, per se, but I really could have done some of them without them. I felt bad for them, you know—they were just these little side characters that were like, ‘Alright, this person is doing something, so I guess we should help them.’ At least most of the time they rez’d themselves when I beat up their bullies. I would have loved for them to stay with me if they were capable of actually dealing damage. Generally, they were helpful with deterring aggro, and that is the end of their use.

There might be a Kodan named Flamethrower for all we know.

Their legs are fairly long in comparison to the average real life human’s proportions. Not that there is nobody with those legs, of course, or that they are necessarily wrong; just that the lack of shorter legs is probably what makes them stand out so much.

All of a sudden, I spot this guy.
did you think i wouldn’t catch on to your name, you little fart

(and yes, i am well aware of my calculator graphics)

Warning: Some spoilers for the PS.

I thought of this while I was dealing with Malyck in my personal story on my sylvari alt. In it, I met Tiachren, and after we’d killed Ysvelta I found him by accident in Caithe’s home instance. He was mourning, clearly, and I could speak to him, too. I thought that it would be interesting if later on—or perhaps now—he would ask me for a favour so that he could feel better…or something along those lines.

Now, on my human main there were many characters who came through my personal story, only to disappear after completing a mission, never to be brought up again. For instance, we could mention Lord Faren, who was…quite a character. * ahem * I found him to be rather cliche and 2-dimensional, as he had very little personality outside of “I’m rich, you know.” Now, what if instead of just ignoring his presence for the rest of my life, he came to me to ask for help on a serious manner, one where he learns a very valuable lesson…maybe there is someone out there that isn’t impressed by his curse of riches and flat personality, and he is horrendously upset that there appears to be no way to get them to like him.

I could mention the same thing about Quinn. There is a point in your story in which he could either die, torn in pieces, at the hands of a bunch of jerks, or you could save him. I imagine that this situation would be absolutely traumatizing for Quinn if you saved him, and that could perhaps unlock a part in your story where you can talk to Quinn and learn about what happened to him after the incident. I mentioned only human characters here, that is because I am rather biased towards humans when I make characters :P However, I know that there are other characters who suffer this same fate and are not human-specific. They are all capable of having more interest developed towards them and not being forgotten later.

The key things I want to mention about these is that they would be optional. Yes, they would provide some sort of reward, but it would not be like the rewards we get in the main PS, and they would also be geared towards/themed based on what happened in the instance. As well, they would explore the character and give you an opportunity to develop a better relationship with their character (no, not necessarily a romantic one). They would be able to be completed at any point in time after “unlocking” them in your PS; therefore you could wait until you were level 70 after a level 20 story mission and still be able to start them.
Some of them would also not be available based on decisions you made in your story, or they would be changed. I would even go so far as to say that your choices in character creation could have the potential impact exactly what happens in the story, ignoring that you have to have certain choices for certain characters, anyway.

I am also going to address why I think that they could work for the design mechanics of GW2. I remember Anet specifying that they don’t want quests because they have no effect on the world, and that they can also provide a boring grind. I want to counter that by saying that these are different kinds of quests (I wouldn’t even call them quests; that’s just their term for this thread). They are different because they allow a growth of characters and story entirely outside of the main story without having to change the PS at all, and they would not be implementing a grind, only a few tasks. They have the potential for creative and engaging content that we don’t usually see in the story, examples being that instead of fighting off risen, you are hosting a party. Instead of protecting Fort Trinity, you are being your friend’s wingman. (For example, of course. I’m merely mentioning possibilities). Lastly, they would have an effect on the world, or at the very least, your character’s home instance. If you had to help someone grow a garden, it would slowly grow in your instance and you could harvest herbs and trees from it. The character’s interactions with you thereafter would be permanently changed.

To summarize, I would love the option of having a way of really interacting with characters outside of the PS when it is possible. Not a simple dialogue box, but a short story mission, one that is entirely optional and does not revolve around your story so that characters have relevance beyond three missions.

Title is in scare quotes because I don’t think they would be side quests, but at the
moment I can’t think of a better name.

I would like to take any suggestions or criticisms, too. Please tell me what you think!

hey, you forgot that fangirls might say something, too! and that something is that while i find jumping puzzles to get incredibly frustrating after a while i don’t think they should be removed. they don’t need to be removed, either, as they are not a required part of map completion, a mandatory part of combat or dungeons, or necessary for your PS; they are very much optional content and if you don’t like them you simply don’t have to do them. or you can ask a mesmer to help you out, if your secret love for all jumping puzzles is that obvious.

Does anyone know what it looks like? So far, all I’ve seen is the image attached—and…those don’t look very golden, like they’ve been described. If anyone has any information on this it would be much appreciated!! Images are suuuuper nice, if any can be produced.

I disagree with this idea. While fairly…creative, I prefer a portal-type system—or really, any system that isn’t about taking a random house in the world that can also be claimed by many other players. Even if you can’t see the other player’s doors, the idea seems kind of weak to me and I don’t think it would be used. Having housing integrated into the environment is very ideal, but the game has to be built around that for it to be done well.

I play with a friend most of the time, but before that and sometimes even then I still play by myself. I like to do things at my own pace sometimes. Also, I am incredibly introverted and shy, so joining guilds is generally pretty scary on its own.

Zacchary.6183:

I thought it was part of Trahearne. This whole time I thought he was tackling the problems of Tyria naked. Now I see thats plant armor.
o .o

Technically, sylvari wearing sylvari armor are wearing themselves. It’s stated that sylvari clothing and hair are basically just parts of themselves that have grown out and shaped in a certain way, and they can be adjusted or cut in any way they want…So, really, you are looking at Trahearne naked. Your eyes aren’t fooling you.

As for the OP, it does look pretty neat. There are a lot of armor and clothing sets in game that are worn by NPCs that I would kill to be able to wear.

I can’t believe you made this thread

Just…Male Charr

My extremely important and urgent question is, what the heck is this. I’ve seen a few images of people getting carried bridal style around in Fractals of the Mists, and if that isn’t the cutest thing, I don’t know what is. However, I’ve yet to see an explanation—the details are fuzzy. Agony resistance? Completing a dungeon? What on Tyria is happening here? I demand answers. How is this incredible feat of strength and cuteness achieved?

Note: I haven’t done FotM yet, if you couldn’t tell.

I used Prayer to Dwayna for a while, and then I just switched back to my regular elixir. I’ve never used Prayer to Lyssa or Prayer to Kormir, simply because I haven’t experimented with them yet.

On human skills in general, I use Hounds of Balthazar just because 1. they look awesome and are hilariously named “demon dogs” by my friend 2. they do decent damage for me (most of the time) and 3. they distract the aggro of mobs. Mostly #1 though.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I think the thing is that Cantha uses a mixture of Asian cultures, and it’s that mixture that offends/offended folks; on the flip side, Largos and Orr seem to take only from Arabic culture as an influence.

There are, of course, tons of different Arabic cultures, too! There is a difference between Lebanese and Saudi Arabia cultures, for instance. But they are both considered Arabic. It’s the same with, for example, Korea and China—they are completely different, but they are both considered East Asian.

Mine only works in Divinity’s reach, I think that’s how it’s supposed to work though.

I don’t think they’re too expensive, though the price fluctuates a bit more than I’d like for it to sometimes.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

illictic.6183:

-snip-

Orr uses Arabic influenced names :P

immediately after writing that I realized that too. More reasons to be pleased!!! And more reason to be confused about the decision behind the Cantha district.

talking about the Cantha district and why it never came up, I am a mixed arab and I found it interesting that Zhaitan was closely named or named after Shaitan, the Arabic word for the devil. I also found it interesting that we met a Largos in our personal story, who had an Arabic name and an Arabic accent. Upon further research I found more of them, and I was interested because for once there was some fantasy representation of “me” that was…well, interesting. Not once did I find it offensive; they even made the race basically a race of assassins, which that in itself has Arabic origins. Though it could be problematic, it wasn’t offensive, and so to me I think that the executive at NCSoft was just being cautious. Hopefully we will see that Cantha district.

I’d totally buy into any theories about the Great Collapse being caused by upper-ranking human nobles, by the way.