Guild Wars 2

I can already see all those story mode dungeons. Revenant goes into snaff legend – zojja goes:
“If you change your legend i will burn every cell in your body only to revive you and conduct further experiments on you. Oh and where is my mists essence link solidifier when you need it?!”

Ayrilana.1396:

Yeah. Because people who play berserker are only able to survive because of those powerful heals…

Have people who ask for berserker to be nerfed, whether directly or indirectly, ever actually played with that stat combo?

hand risen Didn’t feel that much harder then playing more tanky version. Mobs fell fast so didn’t get that much damage in vs me. If zerker was hard (as it should be) you wouldn’t get dungeon runs wanting zerks across the board, because it would be a build only few elite % would be able to sustain under fire.

Fear in itself is a control effect. It’s a condition too, but non damaging one unless terror is traited. That’s why terror is in curses, while master of terror in soul reaping that is generally about control aspect of necro (foot in grave, fear on downed, master of terror)

Sartharina.3542:

Actually, neither of the instances of “Broken Trust” had anything to do with A-net. Instead, they were assumptions made by the community. Guild Wars veterans expected a free character slot with the new expansion despite no promise of such, due to precedent. The “Need core to play Xpac” wasn’t a Bait+Switch by Anet – The company’s line has ALWAYS been “Buying HoT includes the base game”. But veterans of every other MMO out there made the assumption that the base game was required before purchasing the expansion. (Frankly, I’m not sure why they didn’t go with "all new Full Game activations after that date include baseline HoT, though)

Sorry but you’re wrong. The “must own a core game for xpac” was a pure bait & switch, deliberate or not. For quite a while there was a notice one must own a core game to play xpac, nothing about core game becoming free to play or free if you buy xpac.
The core game refunds for ppl who fell victim to this change in the sale system are the best proof – multimillion dollar gaming projects don’t happily toss money back at ppl cause they’re “good uncles”. They do so because otherwise players might have a easy to win case in court.

@Vayne – well i’m shocked at your post. My hat goes off, sir. But I will correct one mistake you made – free slot was not for pre-orders as far as i recall. It was for pre-purchases, ensuring a-net gets their money before you get a say. Pre-order can be cancelled and you pay majority or all of it’s price once it’s shipped to you.

It’s about looking for a scapegoat and whining like a baby instead of fixing the problem by taking matters into your own hands and organizing a team. If you don’t build it, they won’t come, simple as that.

Game mode: PvE

Goal of this proposal
Making each healing skill unique and competitive with the rest.

Proposed Functionality

Heal as One - If pet is alive, then its healing x 2 is added into healing value formula. If it’s defeated, then only ranger’s healing is used, but pet is revived and healed for that value.
cooldown increased to 30s.
Base healing value lowered.

Note: check my pet’s secondary attributes rewamp idea.

Troll unguent - instant cast. Removes 1 condition with each pulse. number of pulses reduced to 7. Healing coefficient increased to 0.25. Cooldown reduced to 20s.

Reason for change - “keep yourself alive” is the song of troll ungent. Adding condition clensing to regeneration is doing just that, and giving healing spring some competition. Instant cast is a must because danger of death is not going away the moment you sucessfully cast it. You still have to keep yourself relatively unscathed for next few seconds to be out of danger.

Healing Spring no changes needed. It’s great as it is.

Water spirit - passive effect refreshing each 4 seconds , lasting 20 seconds. Unused passive charges can stack up to 5 times. healing value adjusted to give same average healing per second given shorter refresh rate.

check out spirit rewamp suggestion affecting spirits.

Game Mode: PvE

Zef’s Trap skills PvE improvement

Goal of this change
Improving trap gameplay for PvE, in terms of utility, damage and group oriented play.

I. Manual trap control
Goal of this change:
Giving the ranger option to fire off trap combo fields without monsters around and to trigger trap manually for smarter usage then plain auto.

Proposed Functionality
Manual trap control could be achieved by pressing trap button once the trap itself is set. First press stops trap from triggering, second triggers it manually. That of course works only if trap wasn’t placed under a monster triggering it instantly.

II. Utility trap skill improvements
Goal of this change:
Improving each traps performance based on it’s combo field and general purpose.

Proposed Functionality

• Flame trap - increase duration to 5 seconds (for combo field), increased physical damage per pulse (210). This is the straight up raw damage and fire combo field trap.

• Spike trap - add 5 stacks of torment lasting 5s each. This trap is about brutal burst of condition damage and movement crippling. Tormet fits like a glove here.

• Viper’s nest - add 2 stacks of confusion (3s) per pulse for some serious condition damage.

• Frost trap - no changes here.

III. Trap related traits tweaks

Goal of this change:
Easier access to trait supporting trap group play, and clear separation of this trait from the one
focusing on offensive benefits for traps.

Proposed Functionality

• Trapper’s expertise: trap cooldown reduction 20%, Traps last 2 seconds longer (including combo fields). Traps can be thrown in 900 range (no ranger weapon matches 600 max range playstyle).

• Trap potency. Increased damage, radius, condition duration of traps. Traps immobilize on activation.
  Physical damage per pulse +25%.
  Trap & combo field radius +90.
  Base condition duration +100%.
  Immobilize duration:2 sec (PvE), 1 sec (PvP).

As you can see trapper’s expertise is the party play upgrade – longer combo fields, shorter cooldowns, and ability to toss it into the fray.
Trap potency offers far greater offense giving conditions 2x their base duration, and making trapping easier with increased trap radius (combo fields included) and immobilize on activation.

Like pre-sales of $50 expansion, with 0 information on release date, progress of development, planned size of it and plans post launch?

Can’t argue there;)

Fivedawgs.4267:

I disagree, you couldn’t be further fro truth, Let’s look at warrior for instance, the Defense line is more OP than zerker or discipline. Same with Guardian, their core lines are better than DH, hence why most of them are running core guardian.

Riiight, no one sees trapper DH in pvp these days…
I also wholly agree with topic starter about OP and easiness of HoT specs – just look at meta scrapper. That thing is so easy to play and powerful at the same time i could not believe i’m still playing engineer and not a warrior. Any core engi build has to deal with massive kit juggling and pay extreme attention while doing so to be actually efffective. Not scrappers!

Or how about DH? Their difficulty curve is legendary…

I would say that smallest offenders here are chronomancers and druids – these two actually demand some skill and higher control level then their core versions in exchange for stronger powers. But some specs are blatantly moar power for moar ease hands down..

The expansion itself fun wise is great. What kills it are just few terribly misguided decisions such as:

- huge exp walls to balance out content shortage of HoT
- guild halls and scribe killing off small and probs some medium guilds
- unjustified price point
- not making at least core game elite specializations to give non xpac players somewhat of an even fighting ground in spvp.

I’m not sure i even want any beta access. I mean having whole pve spoiled for me is pretty much a buzzkill.

This issue has reached even kitten germany already…
http://captiongenerator.com/46396/Hitler-reacts-to-HOT-pricing

Jackalope!! With bloodied horns!!

I’m from Poland and i bought original gw2 as a key from key online store roughly 4 months after it’s launch. It was around 43$ at that time, compared to 60 euros on official site.

Needless to say all worked, else you wouldn’t see me post this;) So i don’t know about arena.net’s official website, but i’m pretty sure there will be other options springing up if not immediately, then soon after HoT launches.

OP, you’re panicking too much. They will 100% not give you pay to win kitten.
They will sell it to you for money See? Your worries were unfounded:)

The problem with necro is not that condi build is overperforming, only that power builds are drastically underperforming. Before deathly chill becoming 3 stacks of bleeing necro didn’t exist in raids. Now at least he can go in there as condi dps.

What they need to do is address the power necro damage numbers and while there address his core spec, especially death shroud.

What? Mesmer shield block duration decreased? Really? Seriously?

As a necro main i am peeved. The shield block is the good, healthy aspect of mesmer gameplay. 2,5s means there is a reasonable time window for a profession with counter measures (like my reaper!) to take action and make itself an opening!

It’s the sick amount of evades/blurs and wells of gravity that are the issue here, as they have no counterplay whatsoever! Way to go fixing the car with engine trouble by replacing perfectly fine wheels!

Well jaysin, it’s gonna be a lot more fun when you evade for that moment of clarity, rather then wait on two 25 sec cd or so skills:) 1 hit per 10-13 secs being 50% more power is not what i call grandmaster trait worthy.

As an experienced HoT player i will say that you should appreciate Tangled Depth’s complexity. When other maps are done (and there’s a looot to do in’em) it’s TD that will keep you busy with it’s complexity, yet at the same time amazing beauty and unexpected paths. This one is truly great once you give it time and take on the challenge of truly discovering it.

Also nothing funny about the impressions you got when first time visiting VB. What you said is very spot on. Feeling of epicness and completely new possibilities is exactly how i felt first time I entered and wasn’t dissapointed.

This is also exactly why i’m so underwhelemed by Crystal Oasis. VB is how it’s done, Crystal Oasis would be a good starter zone for let’s say 6th race in core game, not an expansion map.

Instead they’ll watch many ppl hold on to their money, until “they’re ready”

usually on their heads. It’s super effective!

I can bet this has been touched upon 100 times but just in case:

Make fractal achievements (like 100 fractals done) etc reward fractal skin boxes where you pick your skin. RNG is bad, especially with fractals. There should be sure rewards for those who aren’t blessed by RNG star.

Let’s not go overboard with the flattery, quite often it’s necros saving your kitten . Hell in pve i often run blood magic instead of spite squarely because without transfusion to mass ress ppl, it’s a bloodbath at bigger bosses or some fractal runs..

Got back from a break some 2 weeks ago or so – it’s pretty kitten fun. Lotsa things to do and master (like collections, map discovery, adventures). There are things to work torward to, just be patient, you can’t have it all at once.

Druid healer: heals you, boosts your dps
Guardian healer: heals you, screws over your dps (light field bonanza)

I’d say lets start repairs there.

New condition + condition system adjustment

New possibilities and layers of fun can also be achieved through fixing what’s broken or not used to it’s full potential. As i already mentioned in this thread such a thing is condition system. I have two ideas reagarding it:

1. The before mentioned moving of 25 stacks cap from monster to attacker. Each player has a 25 stack cap of bleeding/confusion/torment on any given single monster, but monster itself doesn’t have any cap of how much it can take. So any other player who puts those conditions on it contribues to damage and is not a waste of space for being condition specced.

This makes all those PvE condition builds accually meaningful, may give “zerk warriors” a run for their money, and gives underdogs like necro some teeth. Not to mention all that condition damage gear becoming a viable option.

2. New condition – enfeebled. This is my idea for a new condition. This is a critical-hit and hard cc degeneration condition that stacks in intensity.

Each stack is 2% less chance to critically hit, 3% shorter fear duration, and 4% less chance for hard cc to work. The basic idea behind it is that not everyone has stability in bulks (necro!) and if there’s a boon vs control effects, then why not condition?
On top of that it would challenge all those zeker buids.

The stacking nature of the condition also provides for both a challenge and strategy. You go for full 25 stacks if you want stability level protection from the target, but it’ll cost you cooldown on all those skills you used to get there. Or you can whip up less stacks for more of a gamble, but some stacks in reserve for emergencies.

With this it would also be advised to alter weakness condition. Returning it to former mechanic – chance to half attacks’ damage if it’s not a crit (crits doing full damage always) would be logical as now enfeeble would serve to deal with criticals. Still higher activation chance or larger damage reduction for such a weakness would be advised to balance out the danger from criticals, as well as the fact that enfeeble would be reqired to make it truly shine.

By hard cc i mean:

• knockdown
• pulling
• stun
• blowout

As for distributing between professions, the clear top dog must be necro – he’s got hardest time with knockdowns. I belive rangers should have a few meaningful options for it too.

Thieves, warriors and guardians shouldn’t get much of it, if at all. They all have very viable defense options (stun breaks, thieves tons of evades in skills, guards + wars stability)

Engis, Mesmers, Eles i don’t know so i leave no recommendation here.

Agreed. The only thing more stealthy then a thief trying to land backstab #10 on your rear end, is the kitten cursor for casting aoe, when you just simply want to drop down a well/trap under your feet here and now.

If there’s one thing a-net bad at it’s making a sale. Here are few simple effective methods to get these xpac sales going and players wanting.

1. Time Trials.
No. Not betas. Not demos. No gutted content. Just time limited access to the whole thing, bells and whistles included. That’s how you guys sold me core game in 2 days.

Removing parts of gameplay, makes the experience washed down, less attractive, and giving off wrong impression of the final product. Is that what you want? People walking away saying “meh, not impressed.”?

With time trialed full version, you are giving players accurate assessment of what’s to come, throw everything at them with far greater chance to hook’em. They started their spec weapon collection. They got themselves their new pet. They unlocked an armor skin. They saw epic part of map #3, which they can’t get to yet, cause mastery! So much more to do, if you buy and continue on after the trial period!

2. Remind core tyria players of xpac – *THE FUN WAY!

Add events in core Tyria when you can rent a glider and do some cool HoT style gliding minigame. With updrafts, ley line gliding, leaning etc. Remember, core players only see regular glides. They don’t see updraft puzzles, ley lines to glide on and the real fun that it brings once you venture into maguuma.

Better yet – make a “Jungle Preparation camp” where you can try things the HoT style. Some mushrooms, a small map that has a lot of verticality, how to read a map for hints if something is way up, way below etc.
Few itzel NPCs here, few Nuhoch there, Exalted in between.
A small slice of maguuma for regular players to bite into and see if they’re up for it, and prepare them better.

Since it’s only limited to this zone and it’s events you can add things like “automatic glider”, “jump boots” etc that act like HoT masteries, letting players know that they will learn all these in the jungle without need for any assistance and be able to use them whenever and wherever possible.

That is what I’d do to get ppl to not forget about xpac and experience stuff for themselves rather then rely on word of mouth.

3. Keys to maguuma/crystal desert.

You just returned from 4 moths break from GW2 and find out that xpac trial and discount were 1 week ago? Wouldn’t you get kittened if that happened to you? And it’s not uncommon to see ppl going on such breaks.

How about if instead you got a nice mail saying, “Dear player, the vast jungles of Heart of Maguuma/sands of Crystal Desert await brave adventurers to take on their deadly challanges and help Pact forces push forward!”

“Here is your key to maguuma/crystal desert which you can double click to start your 24 hour trial period, during which you can enter it’s respective zones and partake in any of it’s activities!.”

Better yet is that time is counted only when you’re actually online and in xpac maps. There are ppl with not that much time (work, other real life stuff) that would end up getting maybe hour or two outta two day regular trial. But making it bound to actual time spend in xpac zone you’re letting them get a real feel of it and a chance to get hooked!
Such key would obviously be account bound.

You could also occasionaly make a gemstore key sale, with limitation of one key per account (to prevent gem exchange from going batshit crazy), and on set time intervals (if you used one gemstore key, you cannot use another for set period).
So that the players who got the free key but are still on a fence can get another shot, but this time for putting some $ in a-net’s wallet (via gem exchange).

How much time a key would give is up to you, numbers suggested here are just a rough idea.

That’s the 3 things i would get to get players hooked, lined and sinking into xpac purchase.
Bottom line – if you don’t let them experience the real deal, instead keeping it behind gates 24/7 or giving a watered down experience, they will walk away, forget it or rely on outside reviews, instead their own hands-on and get dicouraged, as these tend to be…mixed.

Elvirais – but ofc. Beating dragonhunter is all about 3 things:

1. not getting pulled in/surviving if you do.

Firstly you can harass him at range as mentioned. You can use Rise! when near him. It’ll spawn a minion where he stands, usually setting off all the traps. You lose a minion, he loses half of his traps (cause he probs has them off cooldown and can set new wave of them).

If he spears of justice you (you’ll be on a glowing chain) use death shroud. You’ll get 3s of stability just for popping it, and you can follow up with #3 to get some long kitten stab after. That way you won’t let him forcibly pull you into the traps. Watch out for his true shot – he’ll charge it up a sec – doging is advised.

If kitten hit the fan and you got pulled in, popping shroud is higly advised. Not only it will soak up some damage, it will grant you insta stab to get out of there. especially if you got caught by dragon’s maw. other then that don’t be a Gohan and DOOOOOOODGEEEEEEE!
Getting out if they immobilized you might be bit trickier. You will need to cleanse it or transfer it with staff #4. Also insta popping your Rise! before ds is also a live saving idea.

2. Or just do what i do – cc his kitten Good news! This build is stuffed with unblockables, and good cc, specifically for dealing with dragon hunters. All your marks are unblockable, well of corruption is unbockable, your shouts are unblockable. And you got Nothing can Save you to literally make everything unblockable for few secs.

Pop marks under his rear, watch the condi damage flow. But be careful with reaper’s mark. 95% of time it goes in, but when dealing with a good dragon hunter you need to to check if stab is up. If it is, rip it/corrupt it (focus #5, “Nothing can save you!”,Well of Corruption) or wait it out, if not enjoy watching him eat terror and chill damage.

Chillblains is also crucial. Asides sweet sweet chill damage it poisons them – guardian are all about healing and blocking. Kill these two avenues of sustain and you got yousrself a dead dragon hunter.

3. Finish the job! Scepter will make quick work of what’s left (as long as poison is up). I highly recommend using Nothing can Save you! right after you’re done with staff. Your scepter does not have unblockables on it’s own and getting that poison off auto and torment off #3 is crucial.

Or you can make a turn here and go to RS, again after “NCSY” and (if you’re sure you can handle the traps/already dealt with them), and mow him down with #4, throw in #5 for good chilling measure and in between maybe you’ll get away with lucky fear from #3.

Usually by this point further discussion is void as the dragonhunter is just waiting to be offed:)

Also remember about chilled to the bone! as a move to use when you’re in “unblockable time frame” after NCSY. It is “bit” visible to enemy, so they might dodge it, but used bit later in the fight there’s a fair chance their dodges already got used up. So chill them to the bone! if you’re not in RS.

Don’t know about any of that (did not buy HoT so far), but i think it’s fair to say that soon the complain threads about it being too grindy will make room to threads saying it’s too short. Which for me will be far bigger turn off. I’ll just wait and see (pulls out popcorn).