Guild Wars 2

i fear our pets will getting nerfed further on with SB.
some pet skills will be heavily unbalanced at start as the pet skills are not meant to be used by the ranger when they were created. for example the jaguars’s F2 (6 seconds of stealth while you can still attack and get +25% crit chance and +25% crit damage) looks a bit op when used by a player especially in PvP.
the SB can add some nice options to ranger’s play, but it might hit the “normal” rangers when they start balancing everything around SB.

you could counter a leeching attack on your pet by swapping your pets, at least in most pve situations.
usually the CD’s of those attacks are longer than your pet-swap timer, so you should be able to counter the next attack the same way.

one tip:
if you have multiple characters to choose from start HoT with one with high viability and a ranged setup. a lot of the mobs in HoT are easier to fight ranged (though you need a melee options especially in tangled depths where there are mobs with range reflect).
i have done the HoT maps first with my ranger (full berzerk) to build up the masteries, which made it easier for my other chars later on.

when the executioner spawned (after the death of the champ) we were 6 or 7 ppl.
during the exe fight a lot of players joined and the executioner was drawn away.

funny thing was that some of us (i guess the ones that were there when the fight started) could not follow as we were trapped in the bubble. they were even outside my ranger’s bow range.
while the ones that had joined later drew the boss away, the players inside the bubble had to deal with the bosses special area attacks and the spawning veteran wizards.

at least we all got credit of the final kill even though he was out of range in the end.

since the spring patch (with DS as selectable option in LFG tool) i don’t get into an active instance anymore. i only see squads (x/10 or higher) advertise in LFG and when i join i end up in another instance of DS than the majority of the squad.
even 1 minute after restart i couldn’t get into a playable (populated enough) instance through LFG tool yet (tried it 5 or 6 times and gave up on it afterwards).

i am on the EU servers and before the patch i usually had no problem to get into a populated instance of DS from LFG group invites (x/5).

Predator’s Onslaught works best if you can keep your target crippled (sword AA2 or traited traps). its a nice trait when you do a lot of melee (with the sword).
if you prefer to stay ranged you better take Lead the wind imo. the increase in attack speed, the shorter LB cool downs and the piercing arrows add nicely to your ranged dps.

i recently went into another flaw of HoT when i grinded HPs for my alt mesmer (taking the solo HPs and the ones where i could find other people around).
VB and AB went very smoothly. i was even able to do the meta in AB. those maps are at least accessible and populated.
then i entered TD and ran into a big problem. from the entering point there are only 2 ways out of the starting area. both are very tight and heavily populated by groups of 3 mobs and several veterans standing near each other and patrolling the area. when i entered TD with my first char there were people around and we could fight our way thru. but as soon as one have access to the further waypoints no one uses the wp in the entering zone.
new chars/players have to solo their way thru, which is really hard with the mob density, the patrolling veterans and fast respawns. my mesmer ended up with agroing multiple groups making it impossible to advance to more populated areas.
nearly all content (if you call high mob density content) is group oriented or favours some classes (my ranger could fight his way thru without to much troubles where my mesmer has runs into problems).

Wander.5780:

Aren’t all of the WPs in DS locked at all times? every time I’ve logged in and tried to travel to one it bounces me to the nearest one available, which is in the northeastern corner of DS, where the story NPC is located. Unless it’s because I haven’t defeated Mordremoth yet, I’m not sure why I’m unable to run to any of them either.

DS is a pure event map. there are 3 zergs starting at the start of the event. when a zerg clears the event-mobs at a waypoint it becomes unlocked (for the event time). all 3 zergs have to reach the main boss area to start the end fight.
the map closes 15 mins after the end fight (or after 2 hours) resetting all waypoints to blocked status.
you cannot explore the map alone as there are a lot of areas gated behind the event phases. and you need to get into the map at the start of the event (try to get a taxi group in lfg-finder).
you need a some luck to get into a map with enough people and commanders to organize the event. and even more luck to stay on the map until the end without disconnects.

i always found jumping puzzles a pain and tried to avoid them, only doing them when necessary (like the one in silverwastes to reach map completion).
especially since the implementation of the megaservers my ping went down. looks like i always end up on US-servers now (instead of a European servers before). its now even harder to time the jumps right.
also some places that are only reachable by gliding are nearly impossible to reach as there is always a delay til the glider opens (even if i keep the space bar pressed) – and so i reach my destination a few inches below the edge (eg. the final reward chest in DS).

nearly everything in HoT includes some jumping puzzles – even the story had a jumping episode (with glint’s egg) which i couldnt master and had to abandon the story.

i would like to see some synergy between the pet and the druid added. the pet is the main mechanic of the ranger class. its weird that for the “elite” class option the pet is of no use at all. that’s like taking away the stealth from the thiefs elite.
for example add a trait like pet swap will fill up AF or make pet damage gain Af too

Here are some pretty good ideas on criticism by Raph Koster (long time game developer).
http://www.raphkoster.com/2013/10/14/on-getting-criticism/

most developers should think about this.

it wouldnt be that bad if the mega servers were working correctly.
yesterday i entered the 2nd map and joined a “zerg” of a commander and 5 people to do an event chain. after that i hardly saw any people at all. there was no post in map chat too. i finally gave up when couldnt advance further in the map as the mob density became to dense.
finally i joined the big main event where you have to defeat 4 enemy groups at the same time. i found that myself with 3 others had to fight 2 champs and a bunch of elites and vets that were constantly respawning at one of the event points.
after the wipe i left and decided to stop playing – there is a difference between hard content and frustrating content.

i usually play solo and join event groups or support people doing stuff i stumble upon.
whenever i got to a spot that i couldn’t solo (champ spawns etc.) i waited for people to show up. this worked pretty well in the open world.
in HoT this isn’t working for most HP challenges. its sometimes hard to figure out where they are and when you finally get there (usually in the upper level) i have to realize that you cannot solo it. after waiting for 30 mins without anyone showing up i usually leave the spot or die trying to solo it.
the problem is that those HP locations are difficult to reach and there is no need to go there beside the HP’s – so you never find people passing by like in the open world or on flat maps that would jump in and help. something that made GW2 special for me.

it also seems the maps are too big for the number of players allowed as the population sometimes seems very thin- and that’s on the first and second day of the expansion?

I miss my old Creature Handler from SWG. Pets could be really huge there (see picture of my rancor pet) – Kimoglias (Dragons) could be even bigger.
Later on they reduced pet sizes in general (to make them usable in inside dungeons) but they offered 2 items you could obtain in the game – one to increase the size of your pet and one to shrink your pet (working as short term buffs).

Something i miss too are the tricks. Each pet could perform 2 tricks (by command of its master) – like my rancor balancing on one leg.