Bloodstone Fen is my favorite map, but...
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: AliamRationem.5172
Lol, I finally saw the hammer today – luckily I dodged before it got me. I agree the ranged attacks are way, way out there.
I did get all the aerial skills but the 1 and 2 were useless to me as you get killed long before you can target anything much less figure out where it was coming from. Targeting while moving was very hard for me. Half the time I was past what I wanted to hit before I could get a bead on it. I actually made a hit once and they took me right down immediately. I assume I should have used skills 4 and/or 5 right after. Definitely something that needs practice.
Skills 4 and 5 were pretty good as far as getting out of the way or dodging while flying. I was able to avoid a lot of stuff as well as closing and redeploying the glider helped but not when there was a lot of stuff thrown at me. Stealthing does nothing even if you do it before you think you are in range. Also there are enough enemies that if one doesn’t see you all the others do….
I wish we had a practice area to work on those skills. Possibly an area in Heart of the Mists could be dedicated for that.
I got a bad feeling we may need these skills later…….
I must have forgotten to mention glider 5 also applies stability that lasts a couple of seconds after the 4s evade wears off. So, here’s your strategy:
When you take to the air you won’t be able to stealth, so use glider 5 shortly after takeoff. The lingering stability buff should protect you from most stray projectiles that slip in between the evade and stealth. Then you can either chain stealth if you have the endurance for it, or switch back to glider 5 and repeat.
Using this strategy you can close distance quickly and safely. A knockdown with glider 2 followed by a shot of AA should take out most non-veterans if you’re using a power build, and then you can either land and take it to the enemy on foot or glider 5 and continue the aerial assault.
So I played with glider skill 5 and I have to say this is a really nice ability that I’ve already found a number of uses for. It’s a long range aerial dash evade that lasts 4 seconds, on kitten cooldown. Here are some cool/fun things you can use it for:
Zoom into an updraft and your super speed 4s dash goes vertical, lifting you far higher than the updraft alone.
You only need a brief moment of glider deployment to activate the glider skills, so you can use this as a long-range dash evade on the ground as long as you’re fighting in an area with some protrusions or an incline to leap from. This is also useful with the offensive abilities – the glider AA does pretty high damage at point blank if you just hop off of a rock and hit them at melee range!
And of course the obvious chaining with stealth to fly through the sky without fear. It’s also great for quickly closing distance to ambush white mantle. With those dangerous projectiles you really feel not having this skill when you approach a large group of them!
Very cool. I’m liking this more and more! Nice work, ANet!
Okay, so I unlocked glider skill 5 and that’s what I was missing. It’s a 4 second evade + stability on a 5 second cooldown. So here’s a rough idea of how to survive flying around this map, for those who are feeling like a sitting (err, flying?) duck in the air:
When you first enter the air, use glider skill 5 to cover the projectiles that are already in the air. Then stealth to prevent more projectiles from coming. By the time you get out of stealth, glider skill 5 is ready again or you can re-stealth.
Also, it appears that retracting your glider and dropping out of the sky reverts the enemies to their normal aggro and range rules. So if you’re running out of endurance and glider skill 5 is on cooldown, you still have your trusty ability to drop like a rock to prevent additional projectiles from being launched in your direction. Of course, you would ideally reserve this tactic for when you actually want to head downward anyway!
So, amending my previous position. Everything is fine. Better, even! Because gliding in the new map has become a little more interesting. I’ll post again once I’ve unlocked all of the skills and really gotten a feel for it. But it looks promising with just skill 5 unlocked. I no longer feel defenseless in the sky!
I think I’m going to grab skill 2 next. It sounds like it’s a short cooldown area knockdown that applies random conditions. Between that, stealth, and the 4s evade I should be able to not only survive but effectively fight back from above! I’ll let you know how it goes.
Conclusion:
1- if you don’t have Ascended armor and weapons, don’t buy the expansion yet, the will have discount in future again.
2- However, Glider makes your life a little easier in old world. if you are interested buy HoT.
3- Season 3 is here and if you have HoT you can unlock it for free (I’m not sure if you need to have it to unlock it others might comment on this)
4- Some of Hero challenges will spawn a freaky Champion and you will need a group of 3~4 people to complete it. The later you buy the expansion, people will get tired of HoT areas and move on to new areas, so you won’t be able to find enough people and will take longer to complete maps.
You don’t need ascended armor for anything other than high level fractals. Exotic gear is plenty good enough for raids and open world HoT. If you want ascended items, go for the collection weapons. That’s worthwhile and you get to explore the new maps and familiarize yourself with the events!
I agree that the glider is just great to have even in the core maps, but it’s especially nice in HoT!
I believe much of the storyline takes place in the new map, which is decidedly vertical. They also added gliding to the storyline instances. I’m not sure at this point whether the story is designed to allow players to access it without access to HoT and HoT masteries. Does anyone know the answer to that?
Most of the HP champions can be beaten solo or in a small group (1-3 players). There are a few that might require up to 5, if the group skill level is fairly low. Even assuming a low future population, finding 1 or 2 other players to show up for a champion shouldn’t be difficult and there are more than enough communes, veterans, and easier champs you can complete if you just want your elite spec right away.
The range definitely needs to be toned down at least to where we can see the knights. But really anything over 1000 units is still too far imo
One potential issue with this solution is the impact on player glider attacks. I noticed the auto attack skill has a 2500 range, dealing more damage the closer you are. I haven’t unlocked any of the others just yet, but one possible explanation for the seemingly excessive range is that range values that make sense on the ground may be inconvenient in the air in practice?
Just a guess. This is too new for me to wrap my head around just yet. I at least need to unlock the new skills and play around with it more. Right now I feel like I’m at quite the disadvantage in the air and utilize stealth far more than I do offense!
So next question: Has anyone unlocked the new glider weapon skills? Are any of them defensive in nature? More to the point, do any of them offer a counter to these mechanics?
I really like the idea of adding in some glider combat, but if we’re just going to get taken out of the air from range with no ability to prevent it, you can keep it!
I haven’t unlocked the new aerial combat skills yet, so maybe there’s a solution there? If not, this really needs some attention.
Stealth gliding works. The problem is that the aggro/attack range on surface-to-air attacks is ridiculously long and as a result the attacks have to seek if they’re to have any chance of striking the target.
The moment you deploy your glider, anything within that range (and it has to be at LEAST 2500 range if not even more because I swear I get attacked from enemies that I can’t even see yet!) will aggro and launch a seeking attack at you.
Even if there weren’t a 1 second cooldown between deploying your glider and going stealth, the first round of attacks is already in the air the moment you deploy.
This needs to change. I understand that aerial combat requires a longer range to be useful, but getting turned into a pin cushion by a hundred enemies that are so far away you can’t even see them is just obnoxious.
Possible solutions:
Make players non-targetable by these extra-long-range surface-to-air attacks for 2 seconds after deploying the glider. This would cover the gap between deployment and stealth, ensuring that players don’t get immediately destroyed the moment they take to the air. After the two second period, however, it’s open season and you’d better use your stealth wisely. I prefer this option.
Alternatively, the attacks seek through stealth, but stealth makes you immune to stuns, etc. that would cause you to fall from the sky so you only take damage from the attacks.
You guys need to show some respect! You think you had to bust your hump and risk your neck for the Pact? You have no idea what Trahearne did, do you?
Seriously, do you? Because I have no idea whatsoever and furthermore…
I don’t see why we should have to take orders from mice and talking cabbages.
I get why some people would not agree with this way of farming. Talking from experience in the past, some exploits, like the one on the Lyssa temple in Malchors or the beach in Cursed Shores, these particular farm method were found to be disruptive to others who wanted to simply play the zone’s event.
However… and this is just a question… With people also finding a way to do this in AB with the Tarir event, I have participated myself, I have stood aside and just played it regularly while others multi-mapped, and my question is: Is Tarir Multi-Mapping in anyway interrupting the way the others who are NOT multi-mapping, is it interfering with their game play?
By my experience, it’s not, and if it truly isn’t, then what’s the problem? Why would some want it stopped? You can’t freely toss around the “It’s just not fair!” complain, because it’ll be poorly received.
I been playing MMOs since 2001 and I can honestly said not a one of them are 100% fair, and even if it was eliminated, it’s only gonna be a matter of time before the players find something else to exploit. So, if it’s not disruptive to the regular game player, then why campaign for it’s removal?
It doesn’t matter. The fact is it’s an exploit. The developers don’t design rewards to be collected repeatedly for a single event completion. But it also doesn’t matter what we think. It isn’t up to us to determine whether or not this is a problem that requires fixing. It’s up to ANet.
But I do think it’s funny the lengths players will go to defend their cash cow. The guy who copy/pasted the other definitions of “exploit” was internet gold! What? You think we’re too stupid to understand which definition of the word we’re using in a sentence? LoL
Some exploits in other games have become legal things that can be done in a game and cease to be exploits.
So while it may be currently exploiting the game’s mechanics, it doesn’t mean that ANet can’t come out and say that while it wasn’t intended for the game to work like this that they have no problem with players doing so since it does take work and cooperation to pull off and has no significant impact on the economy. And then boom, it ceases to be an exploit, but becomes emergent game play.
PS: I’ve never been to Auric Basin so I’m not defending my cash cow before you claim I am.
Not at all. I think we’re in agreement. My point was that it’s up to ANet to kitten the situation and make the call. Their decision has no bearing on whether or not this is an exploit, however. There is no sound argument one can make to explain why the game developers would have assigned rewards to this event with the intention that players collect those rewards multiple times per event completion. That was clearly not intended, regardless of whether or not it creates a problem worth fixing.
Paywall? Sort of. It’s an expansion. Buy it and you get everything included in the expansion. The elite specs and all that comes packaged with them should definitely be considered a power upgrade, though. And they are only available by purchasing the expansion.
Predicting whether or not you’ll enjoy HoT is difficult because to many players it’s a “love it or hate it” kind of thing. A few things to know about HoT:
If you dislike exploration challenges and find yourself easily frustrated when lost, you may not like HoT.
If you consider yourself on the lower end of the skill spectrum when it comes to combat, you may find the difficulty is a bit much for you.
If by “solo” you mean 100% solo, you won’t like HoT’s event-based maps. Many of these events actually can be done solo and entire event chains progressed from 0-100%, in fact. But you can only do so much to progress events map-wide yourself. Inevitably, you will have to cooperate with other players. Fortunately, GW2’s system makes it easy to play solo and still seamlessly cooperate with other players without having to interact with them.
If none of that sounds like a barrier to your enjoyment, I would say HoT is worth the money. For me, it doesn’t get any better for open world PvE than the expansion maps.
I get why some people would not agree with this way of farming. Talking from experience in the past, some exploits, like the one on the Lyssa temple in Malchors or the beach in Cursed Shores, these particular farm method were found to be disruptive to others who wanted to simply play the zone’s event.
However… and this is just a question… With people also finding a way to do this in AB with the Tarir event, I have participated myself, I have stood aside and just played it regularly while others multi-mapped, and my question is: Is Tarir Multi-Mapping in anyway interrupting the way the others who are NOT multi-mapping, is it interfering with their game play?
By my experience, it’s not, and if it truly isn’t, then what’s the problem? Why would some want it stopped? You can’t freely toss around the “It’s just not fair!” complain, because it’ll be poorly received.
I been playing MMOs since 2001 and I can honestly said not a one of them are 100% fair, and even if it was eliminated, it’s only gonna be a matter of time before the players find something else to exploit. So, if it’s not disruptive to the regular game player, then why campaign for it’s removal?
It doesn’t matter. The fact is it’s an exploit. The developers don’t design rewards to be collected repeatedly for a single event completion. But it also doesn’t matter what we think. It isn’t up to us to determine whether or not this is a problem that requires fixing. It’s up to ANet.
But I do think it’s funny the lengths players will go to defend their cash cow. The guy who copy/pasted the other definitions of “exploit” was internet gold! What? You think we’re too stupid to understand which definition of the word we’re using in a sentence? LoL
I would advise using the boost on the guardian only because the engineer has a more complex playstyle. My reasoning is that you’ll be better able to focus on learning how to navigate and survive the jungle as a new player if you aren’t simultaneously trying to wrap your head around a relatively complex class.
Also, do yourself a favor when you begin unlocking HoT masteries. Once you unlock gliding, grab updrafts, bounce mushrooms, Nuhoch wallows, and exalted markings before the rest. Updrafts and bounce mushrooms especially are critical for getting around in HoT and you will use them everywhere you go. Get those two first.
I agree with you. I also wish gw2 had a way to tell everyone in the party, squad, or open world event how they did at the end of completing something, and then shared that info for all to see. Lots of MMO’s do it. To me it just adds a bit of competitiveness to do your best while these different events are happening.
However, this idea has been brought up many times before. And most people don’t want it. They believe some players will abuse it, and use it as a way to justify kicking someone out of a group or point fingers at someone for holding the group back. On flip side, it’ll only encourage players to do better, or point out that a specific player is doing a great job and maybe even carrying the group.
So who is doing better? The one that did the most damage and at the top of the list or the one who had lower damage but also rezzed 20 people so they could continue appling damage during the fight.
Not that I support a damage meter for GW2, but the ones in WoW recorded everything – rezzes, cleanses, interrupts, activity time, and so on. So, if you know what’s really going on in a fight, the information on how your raid failed is there in the logs.
I think daredevil is the class you want for solo PvE. High damage, high speed, and even high survivability once you get the hang of dodging. It’s the best solo open world class, in my opinion.
However, if you don’t do well with active playstyles, you may want to give this class a pass. You’re nearly as squishy as elementalist with less healing and very few passive defense options. Standing in place taking damage is not something daredevil does well.
I like the idea of a base +25% movement speed out-of-combat (only!), if not as an automatic boost then as a mastery option. I generally prefer major QoL upgrades like this be separate from combat-relevant choices. Let swiftness be the combat-oriented speed boost.
Well, you say you like gliding and you have a level 80, right? I’d jump into the HoT storyline and go up until the point where you unlock gliding and enter the Verdant Brink. Then I’d take a little break from that, do some exploring, find some mastery points, and gain some experience to unlock bounce mushrooms, updrafts, Nuhoch wallows, and exalted markings. These masteries along with the basic gliding mastery will allow you to explore almost everywhere in the jungle (you’ll need poison mastery and possibly leyline gliding for full 100% map completion on all 4 maps).
While you’re gaining experience and unlocking masteries, you’ll also want to complete hero challenges to unlock your elite spec (dragonhunter for guardian).
I gather we’re on separate time schedules as I’m about to head to work and you’re just now downloading the client, but if I happen to be around at the right time feel free to contact me in game. I know the maps well and can help you find some objectives if you’re having any trouble.
D/D is good for dealing damage in group PvE (raids, etc.). However, D/P is preferred for PvP, generally. Staff is a great all around PvE weapon, and would probably be a better choice than d/d if open world or WvW is your thing. Shortbow pairs well as a backup for open world, WvW, and PvP and is your only ranged option outside of pistols.
What do I see? I see a bunch of players that want rewards without “time spent”. I see so much about no new content.. It’s weird to me that people want the best stuff for their meager investment of play cause “well I just deserve it”. I have 7 full suits of Ascended armor and 3 are full Celestial, over 30 of the ascended weapons, Runes and sigils that are 25 gold apiece and many of them.. 1300 gold and materials to choke a dragon.. Am I a good player? No. I’m old, my hands are crippled (no feelings) so jumping isn’t my thing. I play PvE only.. So how in the world could I have done all this? Time spent.. Time spent learning how to overcome problems I have found.. The Elite armor and weapons were good but I couldn’t survive to beat champs. I read that ascended armor can give you a 20% advantage over elites so I became a master crafter (Grand Artisan title). Now I’m a better player. GW2 is a game built for “time spent”.. I don’t want drops by chance and I’m thankful that I don’t need anything BUT player vs. the world. Spend time my friends, hangout, build a legend with your time. Stop complaining and enjoy yourself. If this old man can do, so much think of how much more you can do being young and smart. Life is work, reward is sweet.
How unfortunate that you chose to spoil what was otherwise a perfectly good message by beginning with your assumptions regarding the character of other players. If that’s what you’re hearing, you haven’t been listening. If they want something for nothing, it’s only because they have no desire to work toward an objective if it involves playing HoT!
Personally, I love HoT. I signed up for this game 6 months ago and I’ve already put in a lot of time in the game. In addition, I’ve become a daily contributor here on the forums. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for HoT. So it does bother me a little, I think, when other players trash the expansion from the perspective of a person who took one look at it and walked away.
What you say about overcoming obstacles and working toward objectives is highly relevant to me. I was new to the game and not just HoT when I arrived there. So naturally, I fell flat on my face when I first entered the jungle. But I was determined to give it a chance and I really wanted to persevere – over both the enemies and the environment!
I imagine some of the players with complaints about HoT could have learned to love it, but were so turned off by the harsh landing they just never really got comfortable with it. There are still plenty of players who haven’t managed to learn their way around TD, for instance. Why? Because they never go there unless they absolutely have to.
That isn’t being lazy. They’re just legitimately intimidated by the place! Initially, it’s an unruly maze crawling with monsters trying to kill you. That sounds like a lot of fun to me in a game like this, but not everyone is so keen on it. I can’t really blame them for wanting the rewards, but wishing they could work toward them anywhere but HoT.
Daredevil. For solo open world PvE daredevil moves faster, hits harder, and is more difficult to pin down and kill than most classes. The trick is learning how to avoid damage as the class is not designed to take hits well at all.
The only reason it wouldn’t be worth it is if you just don’t find it appealing.
If you enjoy lots of combat and exploring, HoT is for you! But if you like your maps relatively flat and easy to navigate and your enemies dead without putting up a fight, you may be disappointed.
Also, thinking ahead, what happens when the next elite spec comes along? Another weapon type, 5 more utilities, and a new class gimmick?
Actually, that’s exactly what we expect with future elite specs. The choice of which elite you run is a trade off. Its about making choices. The elite lines are a “package” that changes your class into something slightly more than what it was; however, you can only be one specialty with all that it entails. In the long run it “should” help keep some potential power creep issues in check, but we’ll see.
Are they going to rework the old specs to feature the same?
I’m assuming you’re asking are they going to change the core lines to have some weapon or skill locked to them? So you can’t use that weapon and skill set if you don’t take it? I doubt it. They’d have done it with the revamp of the system, and from what they said when they introduced “specializations,” locking was something special to elite specs for assorted reasons.
Ahh, so they intend to add more “elite” specializations, which will be mutually exclusive? That makes more sense. With just the one it’s a bit awkward, since you lose out on a lot of power/utility by not taking the elite spec, even if one of the other specializations would be a better fit if only taking into account the traits themselves.
That should work, as long as it’s balanced properly.
The problem as I see it is that you essentially make the elite spec mandatory. Unlike the other specs, if I don’t take this one I lose the class gimmick, 5 utilities, and 1 weapon type. That’s a lot harder to give up than the specialization itself and I see no reason why it must be this way.
Also, thinking ahead, what happens when the next elite spec comes along? Another weapon type, 5 more utilities, and a new class gimmick? Are they going to rework the old specs to feature the same?
I was thinking it might be a good idea at some point to uncouple the elite spec from the associated utilities and the new weapon unlock. Tying all three together makes sense in some ways, but it strongly favors builds featuring the elite spec. It would be nice if we could use the utilities and the new weapon without having to actually use the specialization.
I’m sure this would go along with some other changes to traits to balance things out again. Whenever the “showcase” period is over, of course.
It’s only bad because you haven’t really figured out how to do it. But lots of people have and many say it’s not as bad as the naysayers make it out to be.
This could be the new marketing slogan for HoT.
“It’s not as bad as the nay-sayers make it out to be!”
….that would be more convincing than a free trip to lvl 80 for that character I have to pay an extra $10 to create.
I think what they meant was that some of the complaints appear to be coming from people who took one look at the jungle and walked away, more or less. From players claiming that champions spawn spontaneously right on top of them to the way the map “doesn’t work” in TD. I keep hearing complaints that are either so misinformed or exaggerated, it makes me wonder whether some of these people have actually played HoT.
Having said that, I’ve helped enough players to know that it doesn’t take a champion to give some players a tough time and not everyone has the patience for an exploration challenge like TD. So it isn’t at all surprising to hear those sorts of complaints. It doesn’t make them accurate, however. It isn’t as bad as they say.
That’s my take on it.
Great news! Can’t wait to see even more new people in the jungle!
If anybody needs a hand, let me know. I’m a good jungle guide!
Also, to the newcomers, a piece of advice:
Unlock bounce mushrooms, updrafts, wallows, and exalted markings (with bounce mushrooms and updrafts before the other two!) before the rest if you want to make your life easier in terms of navigation. Itzel poison lore is also required for 100% HoT map completion, but is otherwise of minor importance.
And watch out for pocket raptors!
Unfortunately, they give you a set of survival gear with power/vitality/toughness on it with the 80 boost. The thinking is that this should give players the breathing room they need to learn the class after boosting straight to level 80. Sounds reasonable, no?
The trouble with this logic is that not all classes utilize a similar defensive strategy. Thief, in particular, is almost entirely based on active avoidance. The idea is that you have huge burst that allows you to take down enemies quickly, using evasion to get out of harm’s way.
A typical daredevil has endless evasion, which you don’t have yet. They also tend to use invigorating precision from the crit strikes line to give them enough healing while on offense to hang in just that little bit longer to finish off an enemy before having to evade out. But this is based on crit damage and your gear has no precision.
So I expect what you’re encountering as a result is that it takes far too long to kill an enemy and the survival stats are inadequate because you’re simply taking a lot more hits than you would as a daredevil, even if each hit deals less damage against a larger health pool. Further, you have insufficient healing because your best healing trait is based on criticals.
Pre-HoT a stealth build would have been a good answer as you can effectively get in close and burst without taking much damage, then disappear again as needed. In HoT there’s quite a bit of cleave going on, so you’d probably just get chewed up anyway and taking shadow arts would knock your damage down even further.
I’m not sure what to recommend here. I think the 80 boost leaves thief in a tough spot, gear-wise. It probably doesn’t allow you to play the class as intended.
The good news is that daredevil with berserker gear is a beautiful thing for solo HoT, in my experience. You kill faster, cover ground faster, and straight up avoid ridiculous amounts of damage. It’s fast, fun, and effective.
If you need help getting that elite spec unlocked, feel free to contact me in game.
I’ve always thought people wanting the game to be harder, were steering this game into a ditch. Simply put, an MMO, or any game really, should be fun.
Heart of Thorns for me was basically Cursed shore all over again, 4 whole zones of it, with a new set of living story chapters glazed on top. Back in “vanilla” most players hated Orr. The only reason people even went to Orr outside of map completion or Obi shards was because of Anet’s amazing ability to keep the player base poor which soon ended when people discovered that world bosses and CoF could make them more gold with less effort.
So here we are with Orr 2.0. Meta-events with grindy rewards keep them populated to some extent, but for how long? Ever since the Teq revamp it seems like Anet’s been on a mission to “make the players get better” or to play the way they want you to instead of how you want to.
I loved “vanilla” GW2. I spent a lot of time and money into the game at that time. Leveling/PvE was by far my favorite aspect, but I enjoyed some PvP, WvW, and occasionally dungeons as well. I guess when I heard about the HoT expansion my hopes were that it was going to be more zones and content like I’d enjoyed when first playing the game. Sadly it seems like they really threw their winning formula away.
The simple fact is, nobody wants to drudge through a game. There’s no love or nostalgia for most games that are annoying to play. It’s this design vision that has hurt more MMO’s in the last 5-7 years than helped they retain their player base. I had high hopes for HoT, but after everything GW2 is a completely different game now, one I don’t really find a lot of enjoyment in sticking around for.
You’re right. The game should be fun. I find the HOT zones more fun than the core Tyria zones. Unfortunately no one demographic has a monopoly on what fun is. You assume easier is funner but that’s not true for many. How many? No one really knows.
Assuming the ridiculously easy open world is enjoyable to everyone (particularly when we see so many complaints about how boring leveling is), is a misnomer. Assuming you’re talking for some sort of majority might well be a misnomer too.
It’s true that most people who were playing the game before the expansion hit were probably enjoying the more casual content. It’s also likely true that many who wanted harder content walked away from the game, only to return when HoT launched.
Since neither you or I have the numbers, it comes down to what it’s always come down to. Finding a middle ground between ridiculously hard and kitten easy. Unfortunately the balance is different for everyone.
Make it too easy and you lose a percentage of people. Make it too hard and you lose a different percentage of people. The trick is to make it so that you lose a minimum number of people.
I don’t think HoT is as hard as people are making it out to be, and there were plenty of people complaining when the first Orr was nerfed too. Orr is a joke today. It’s not more fun…for people like me.
You make a lot of fair points, but I can’t take to many of them to heart. I’ve seen it happen in multiple MMO’s where dev’s make the endgame content “challenging” and after the initial hype of “new” content/rewards, people stop playing those aspects of the game, or the game overall. You don’t have to make content “hard(er)” to make it engaging.
I watched as people wanted dungeons to be less of a kitten. They were abandoned and the Dungeons subforum became a cesspool of people wanting to enjoy content and ultimately not being able to. Devs stopped posting in it altogether. It went from people trying to drudge through it, to people selling runs for harder paths (mostly Arah), to practically a ghost town.
Players level in vanilla all the time. Sometime because they “have” to because they want to get a new class to 80, but it’s so easy to get level boosts and tomes anyone who finds leveling boring can skip most/all of it anyways. Many enjoy it just because it’s laidback. People are running the old world bosses constantly, but Temple of Grenth? Not as much. I thought people wanted challenging content? I remember people were furious with Teq and Wurm Trio.
While only a few aspects of the game, it’s almost like a metaphor for everything else “endgame.” Any new players that enjoy the easygoing style while leveling vanilla are going to hit a wall or try to bust through it when they get to HoT. Likewise anyone who left they game feeling it was grindy, unrewarding, or annoying is not terribly likely to come back when there’s new content released, let alone for any nostalgic value.
You’re right, I don’t have the numbers. But I don’t need them to use sound logic. This game’s not new anymore. The initial hype of a new MMO is gone and we’re in the adult phase, and I find it hard to deny that the game’s not continuing to lose steam, especially after the move to Free to play and the mixed to poor reception HoT has received.
They may have missed their mark with HoT, but I think they’ve made it a lot more palatable since then. The thing is they’re trying to attract/retain players who want that level of challenge while also catering to players who find core Tyria more their speed. That’s a difficult balance to strike and you can see that conflict playing out here on the forums and in the game.
For instance, the other day I decided to try one of the classes I hadn’t tried yet (warrior). So I used a bunch of tomes to bypass the leveling process, used some bladed armor boxes to gear up, and hit the jungle with no idea what I was doing with the class (but plenty of experience in HoT!).
I ended up running into my total opposite in TD. I happened to ask in map chat if anyone wanted to run around and grab all the HPs/WPs and this guy responded. Nice guy. We ran all over the map unlocking those HPs and I showed him a lot of tricks on how to get around. But it quickly became apparent that we had very disparate skill levels and ideas of what constitutes “fun”.
He was getting caught up and killed by chak, every veteran was a fight for his life, and he quickly died on every single champion, leaving me to carry the fight. No big deal. It turns out warriors are pretty hard to kill. But I can only imagine how this guy must feel trying to tackle this place on his own. Always lost and dying to every pack of chak that comes walking through.
Based on my experiences helping other players so far, I’d say this guy was on the lower end of the skill spectrum. But it illustrates the point that ANet is trying to balance between vastly different interests. I’m taking on champions and diving right into the maze, while others are stuck at the first WP, wondering which way to go and how they’re going to survive long enough to get there.
How do you design maps for players who like the TD experience, for instance, while also catering to the “Queensdale” types? I don’t see it happening on the same map! So maybe the next expansion they’ll do a split and offer different types of maps instead of all one way? I don’t know what the answer is. I just hope we see more of TD, even while I completely understand the frustrations of players who would rather burn the current TD and never speak of it again.
Don’t be another victim of the very small but very vocal minority that shouts down their more-casual opponents. ANet changed HoT because HoT was an absolute disaster. If the harder-core people were right that they are the majority, ANet wouldn’t have made any changes, because their bottom line wouldn’t have suffered. They listen to money talking (which is fine — they’re a business).
The fact that they DID make changes (although not nearly enough changes) conclusively demonstrates which side of this argument had the majority of dollars spent over time.
Hopefully they will make a few more changes to get the game back to where it was.
Hopefully, they will. But don’t be surprised if it quickly reaches a point where you find yourself in the minority.
As it happens, I enjoyed HoT before April and I enjoy it even more now because it has so many more players in it. So although I enjoyed it previously, the changes during the April patch were still to my liking.
This isn’t really “us vs. them” or “me vs. you”. It’s ANet tweaking things to (hopefully) be more agreeable for everyone. I think the April patch shows they can handle that and they’re moving in the right direction.
I hope for the future it means that we’ll continue to see event-driven (whether HoT or SW style) maps that feature the exploration and combat challenge of HoT. But also maps that would be more to your tastes.
Thanks, guys. Ended up going with a power greatsword/rifle build with defense/discipline/strength. So far, it’s been an effective combination and greatsword is pretty fun to use, although somewhat on the slow side with so much damage behind GS 2.
It’s unfortunate that the ability locks you in place. I would prefer a design that allows movement. Perhaps with the same overall damage, but less damage per hit, loaded back into the final hit if you land all of them.
So far my weaknesses seem to be heavy projectile damage and I’m not doing as well as I’d like with breakbars. Damage could be better, but my frame of reference is thief, so that may be an unreasonable expectation.
All in all, though it seems effective. I’m having no trouble battling through the jungle. I’m even able to solo many of the champion hero challenges. So no complaints there!
Any recommendations for other builds? What about once I finish unlocking the elite spec?
Thanks for posting this. I got some good info from it.
I skipped the leveling process and was just looking for some advice. I suppose the first thing I want to do is unlock my elite spec, but what would be fun/effective for solo open world HoT?
I was thinking berserker gear, greatsword, and…I don’t know. Is it a good idea to have a ranged weapon set? Or if you’re frequently swapping is it better to go with all melee?
Utilities? How much stability and/or stun breaks do you typically run with?
Traits? Defense looks solid. Strength packs on the damage boosters, especially if I take greatsword. And discipline? How much should I be traiting/using the burst skills? Is quick-swapping weapons and using bursts the way to go? Or…?
Just trying to get an idea of what works well in open world HoT so I can have some fun learning this class against some tougher enemies while I unlock my elite spec.
I only started playing this year, but I really like the HoT content. I just wish there were more of it. The maps especially. They’re beautiful and they all have a unique feel that brings something new to the game.
It isn’t really my thing, but I haven’t seen anything like the DS meta before. That hour-long zerg to the boss and the final battle. Where else can you find that?
TD is the first time in any game I’ve entered a zone and literally spent weeks exploring it before I started to really understand it. VB was a nice introductory exploration challenge, too.
Then you have gliding and the other masteries, which you put to extensive use in exploring these maps. And the elite specs. I haven’t unlocked them all as I don’t have a stable of characters for every class at level 80 yet, but on my thief the daredevil spec is game-changing. It makes the class a lot more powerful and fun to play, especially in the jungle where you can really put those skills to use!
Your mileage may vary, of course. But if the price isn’t a prohibitive factor for you, I’d definitely recommend giving HoT a try. It may be light on content, but the content that is there is different in a lot of ways from what you’re used to. For some that’s not a good thing, but for players like me I can’t get enough. Just wish there were more!
And if you get bored of it, that core Tyria stuff is still there for you to do things like map completion (I just did crafted my first legendary so I had to go back and do that myself!). Only now you’ll have gliding and a new spec to play with.
Edit: By the way, if you (or anyone else) would like some help finding their way around the jungle and/or completing the HPs to unlock your elite spec, feel free to contact me in game. I run HP/MP trains in TD for fun anyway.
(edited by AliamRationem.5172)
…Until someone at ANet with a high enough position comes out and says that what is happening is intended behavior, I will consider it an exploit.
What do you classify as being an exploit? To exploit something is to take full advantage of the resource. Check, that is correct meaning, people have found the most efficient and profitable way of doing the AB Meta.
It is also to make use of a situation in an unfair or underhanded way. I don’t think that is possible because there is nothing underhanded about it, underhanded means secret, and it is not unfair to anyone as all can participate. An exploit is also a bold or daring act… Not exactly.I don’t see how you can declare this an exploit at all. Perhaps in your opinion it is not in the spirit of the game, but that is a personal thing not reflected by the developers.
I think if they wanted to fix this situation, they have had many opportunities to do so and they have not, because as it is, it’s a good situation for the game economy as its generating a huge influx of materials that have high demand, the prices for which would have jumped up even further.
Another definition of exploit – and the one pertinent to this discussion – is to utilize a design in an unintended way. That is clearly what is happening here and the fact that they have not addressed it is not, in fact, evidence to the contrary.
It doesn’t really matter since there’s a built in limit to chest loot, and that limit is keys. The contents of those chests aren’t balanced around time spent to complete the meta. They’re balanced arount time spent to acquire those keys, which is constant. No matter how many alts you have you won’t acquire keys any faster than someone who only plays one character.
Then perhaps they should increase the key cost until the loot rewards from AB are more in line with the other maps? Or, you know, just fix the exploit.
Thief is squishy, but also not-so-squishy. They have low health and armor, but the ability to endlessly dodge can more than compensate for these shortcomings. It all comes down to how comfortable you are with anticipating attacks and timing your evasion. If you’re particularly good at that then you should find thief to be among the most survivable classes.
Also, try not to get hung up on the AA spam. It’s just a side-effect of the initiative system. If you shift the damage away from AA and into an initiative-based weapon skill, the result will be spamming that skill a few times until initiative runs out, and then back to the (now weaker!) AA. Not exactly productive!
Instead, I use thief weapon skills more for their utility. Consider vault. It often deals even better damage than the staff AA. But I most frequently use this ability for movement/gap-closing, sometimes for the evade, and of course in situations where there are more than 3 enemies grouped closely together.
Hello guys,
I have been playing GW2 for 2.5 years, expansion included, and left 5 months ago. I have experienced almost everything the game has to offer, and I always loved it. Regarding my main character, it is lv80, I managed to grind my full ascended set and 4 ascended weapons, ascended accesories and rings and backpiece. I finished expansion story, unlocked and finished every map and metaevents, and experienced the new raids.
I really want to return, but the feeling I had when I left is still there: having my ascended gear, the most important masteries learned, and having experienced and “finished” the expansion, what is there in term lf progression for me? A part from legendary, which is not really needed stat wise if I have ascended, what interesting rewards are there to make me want to grind metaevents at the expansion maps, or doing raids and more fractals? The only reason I find is to get gold and more gold to buy legendary in a near future, but that is not enough to make me log in every day for hours after being a player for 2.5 years. So is there something that I am missing that I dont know about expansion rewards or coming features-content to give some sense of progresion for a player like me?
In other games they have a gear treadmill. Players are always searching for their next upgrade. But when you’ve beaten the last boss and you have the best loot, you always find yourself asking, “What’s next?”
Maybe you just need a change of pace? I won’t say it’s worth it, but legendary items are a decent distraction. They keep you busy for awhile and force you to explore more of what the game has to offer. And you get a cool skin at the end!
It’s true you don’t need the stats. For that matter you don’t need to play this game. But if you like it, want to play it, but find yourself lacking the drive to continue playing, the only solution is to find a goal you find meaningful and work toward it. If the game has nothing meaningful left to offer, well, you probably know what that indicates.
In any event, I found myself asking the same question, took up my first legendary project (recently completed!) and it solved my problem for a bit.
Take the tunnel leading downward from Teku Nuhoch waypoint. When the tunnel splits off in two directions, keep to the left. Follow this path downward toward the large underground lake which is visible on your map. You fight the champion skelk up on the platforms above the water.
On the other hand for VB/TD(DS also but that is a bit different) you don’t need complete the meta to loot the majority of the chests on the map.
That’s true. But looting the chests associated with pre-boss event completion is not a good incentive for participation in the boss event itself. This may be a contributing factor that could be improved with better rewards for the event.
I love TD. It’s my favorite map in the entire game and the chak gerent is the most enjoyable boss event in HoT for me as well. But can you please do something about the boss rewards? It’s probably the most likely event to fail and provides hardly any loot for failed attempts. But the maximum tier rewards seem very low, too.
With people pulling upwards of 70 rares per run using AB multi-map, getting only a handful of rares from a T5 chak gerent with a win ratio of maybe 50% seems very unrewarding.
Fast-paced and easy to play sounds like daredevil to me. But Shiro revenant has a fairly similar feel.
Tangled Depths: Where is the Minotaur?
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: AliamRationem.5172
I would be terrible figuring out fermats second to last therorem let along his actual last one but if someone said to me “look it’s complicated, just remember this formula and write down these things in order to pass your exam” I wouldn’t be all hostile and stuff..
I don’t see how objecting to someone basically saying “its too bad you’re having a hard time but its actually easy” is “hostile”. And you gave a vague answer about “run down the middle and turn left” or whatever. That isn’t exactly helpful in the huge maze of TD. Do you really think that if someone said “here’s a couple of hints” someone would suddenly be better at math? Nor are some people going to be any better at finding their way around TD. I have gone round in circles and found myself completely at the opposite side from where I was trying to go. It is hugely frustrating and not at all fun to do that while being frozen constantly by Chak or whatever. Never anywhere you can stop and breathe in the Jungle, nevermind alt-tab and consult something about how to get where you want to go.
It might be easier than you think. Much of the map – notably including the entire event cycle – is contained within the lanes and associated camps and connected by wallows.
Until last week I didn’t have the wallows unlocked. I did other Masteries first and only recently had enough points to unlock wallows. I’m sure other people are in the same boat.
If TD is easier with wallows that’s great. But without them it is really terrible.
Wallows require 3 mastery points and 1.5m experience (equivalent to 6 levels using 79-80 as the standard). You may prefer to be able to explore free of the constraints of the mastery system, but I think the effort required to unlock wallows is fairly minimal given that TD is the third map out of four in the expansion. But for the sake of argument, let’s say you don’t have wallows.
Start at Order of Whispers waypoint. Head south, taking the central path that slopes downward into a narrow high-walled canyon. Glide off the shelf and follow the canyon around the bend and straight toward the mastery point marked on the map east and slightly south of Order of Whispers waypoint.
Next to the MP is a waterfall that drops straight down into the end of Nuhoch lane. Hug the left wall of the passage and follow the path upward toward the northern confluence tunnel. The path will fork left toward a cave exit marker on the map that lets out just outside Teku Nuhoch and the associated WP.
Take the cave back to the northern confluence tunnel and follow the other path at the fork leading directly into Rata Novus lane. Take the passage directly across from where you enter the lane into Rata Novus itself and follow the path (marked on the map) to the WP.
Head back to Rata Novus lane and follow it south to the leyline confluence WP.
This time you will take the southernmost passage east rather than the SCAR lane wallow, but it will still take you straight to SCAR camp WP.
WP back to leyline confluence. Head west down ogre lane. Take the passage north (it’s the only one). Head to the far side of the pool and up the vine (once again it’s the only path you can take). Don’t go into the chak hive (you’ll see the clear signs of a bug nest at the entrance), but continue upward. There are two paths when you reach the top of the ramp (the ramp is marked on the map), one of which heads directly east into ogre camp WP and is easy to follow on the map.
WP back to leyline confluence. Follow ogre lane west to the end to find dragon’s passage WP.
Done. Round trip time: 14 minutes. Wallows were 6 minutes faster and cut out a lot of running around. But TD is still easy to navigate entirely on foot and via WPs like a traditional map. In fact, I’d imagine it’s still a good bit quicker to discover all of the WPs than a core Tyria map.
The map is not as convoluted as it appears. As I said before, the waypoints and the events are contained in areas of the map that are fairly easy to navigate. It’s the map completion objectives (HPs, MPs, vistas, and POIs) that are hidden in the maze.
I’d be glad to show you around some time if you’d like. Contact me in game.
Tangled Depths: Where is the Minotaur?
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: AliamRationem.5172
I would be terrible figuring out fermats second to last therorem let along his actual last one but if someone said to me “look it’s complicated, just remember this formula and write down these things in order to pass your exam” I wouldn’t be all hostile and stuff..
I don’t see how objecting to someone basically saying “its too bad you’re having a hard time but its actually easy” is “hostile”. And you gave a vague answer about “run down the middle and turn left” or whatever. That isn’t exactly helpful in the huge maze of TD. Do you really think that if someone said “here’s a couple of hints” someone would suddenly be better at math? Nor are some people going to be any better at finding their way around TD. I have gone round in circles and found myself completely at the opposite side from where I was trying to go. It is hugely frustrating and not at all fun to do that while being frozen constantly by Chak or whatever. Never anywhere you can stop and breathe in the Jungle, nevermind alt-tab and consult something about how to get where you want to go.
It might be easier than you think. Much of the map – notably including the entire event cycle – is contained within the lanes and associated camps and connected by wallows. It’s only the POIs, HPs, and MPs that are hidden in the maze.
If you just wanted to reach all of the waypoints and participate in the events, for instance. Here’s a fairly easy description of how you would go about doing that:
From Order of Whispers WP, head toward the nearby wallow to the south. It’s marked on the map and you can simply walk right over to it. This will take you to a cave. Take the tunnel heading upward and you will find another wallow very close by (again, marked on your map and you can trust the map in this instance by following the path!) to the east that will take you straight to Teku Nuhoch waypoint.
At the waypoint, take the wallow to confluence passage and take the downward path to Rata Novus lane (it’s visible from the wallow so you can’t miss it!). You’ll see a wallow directly across the passage upon entering Rata Novus lane that will take you to the Rata Novus WP.
Take the wallow back to Rata Novus lane and head south down the lane to find the leyline confluence waypoint at the center of the huge cavern at the southern exit of Rata Novus lane.
Take the SCAR lane northeast from the leyline confluence. Hug the right-hand wall of the passage and you’ll run right into a wallow (marked on your map!) that leads straight to SCAR WP.
WP back to leyline confluence. Take the southernmost path west from the confluence. You’ll see a wallow along the way (marked on your map!) that will take you to the ogre camp and WP.
Take the wallow back to Ogre lane and continue west to reach Dragon’s passage WP.
That’s it. That’s all the waypoints in TD and a straightforward explanation on how to reach them. I feel confident that anyone can follow these directions and unlock every waypoint on the map in significantly less time than it would take to unlock every WP on a given core Tyria map.
Don’t believe me? I just tested it out myself and the round trip took 8 minutes. Please show me a core Tyria map that you can navigate that quickly. You guys need to give this map a chance. Seriously.
I wasn’t around prior to HoT, so I don’t know all the angles. What do you expect the pros and cons of making that switch would be?
I didn’t play GW1 and I didn’t play GW2 pre-HoT. I’m 6 months into my GW2 experience and HoT has been excellent. I heard a lot of complaints initially, but since the April patch things have been a lot more positive and the HoT maps are full of established players who are exploring HoT for the first time.
Angry customers yell louder than satisfied customers. What can you do?
Not understanding whats going on in Maguuma
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: AliamRationem.5172
A little advice on masteries. All of the must-have basic navigation abilities are 1-2 points totaling 8 points. I recommend unlocking the following abilities before anything else: gliding, bounce mushrooms, updrafts, exalted markings, and Nuhoch wallows. They won’t get you 100% map completion, but you can reach the vast majority of objectives.
Daredevil. Yeah, it’s squishy. But you hit like a truck and you can dodge endlessly. I actually find this to be my most survivable class for solo open world due to all the evasion and the ability to take down enemies before they have a chance to deal much damage in return.
I also agree with reaper or chronomancer. Chrono is a bit weak on damage, but the survivability and utility makes up for it and then some.
Tangled Depths: What were they thinking?
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: AliamRationem.5172
Can you clarify what you mean by “karka lane” given the lack of karka in the map? Also given that the four lanes are Ogre, Nuhoch, SCAR, and Rata Novus? I think you mean the chak area northwest of Nuhoch lane.
I ask mostly because people already confused by the map will be further confused by looking for anything that could be a karka lane.
I took it to mean the bottom level water tunnels (Karka are those sea creature things, right?), which can be used to reach the chak stronghold at the end of Nuhoch lane (among other areas). Of course, you’re much better off just using the wallow to Nuhoch lane at Teku Nuhoch WP and then taking the nearby wallow straight into the chak Stronghold.
Don’t have Teku Nuhoch yet? Starting at Order of Whispers WP, find the nearby wallow to the south to the undergrowth connector (it’s on open ground and in plain sight so you can just walk over to it). You’ll find yourself in a cave. Continue upward along the passage and you’ll find a wallow (you can see it marked on the map just east of your position) very close by that goes straight to Teku Nuhoch.
Teku Nuhoch WP has wallows next to it that lead to Leyline passage (Rata Novus/Nuhoch lanes) and Nuhoch lane.
As mentioned previously, starting from Order of Whispers WP you can take an updraft (head southeast from the camp, under the big tree and keeping the mordrem to your left as you pass under, then directly ahead across the stream is a rock you can climb to glide over to the hole in the tree and the updraft chain on the other side) over the great tree to Ogre WP. You can then take the nearby wallow to Ogre lane. Head west for Dragon’s passage WP or east for Leyline confluence WP. From Leyline confluence taking either of the two eastward paths (SCAR lane or the one to the south of it) will take you to SCAR camp WP.
I’ve just explained how you can reach every single WP in TD. You barely touch the maze at all to do this. That doesn’t get you every objective on the map, but if you want to know how to get around quickly just follow these directions to snag every WP on the map easily.
Give it a chance, guys. There’s a method to the madness. Map completion, HPs, and MPs are hidden as part of the exploration challenge. But the event cycles are conveniently located near WPs, wallows, and take place mostly out in the open in easy-to-reach places.
If exploration isn’t your thing? Just hit up the guide on dulfy.net. It’s a video with maps, so it should be pretty easy to follow. Once you have the objectives you want, you can just stick to the straightforward portions of the map where the events take place and use wallows to get everywhere you want to be in no time. That’s the magic of TD! Great design!
Good ideas! In addition, I suggest converting the projectile animation into Tony the Tiger.
Tangled Depths: What were they thinking?
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: AliamRationem.5172
This map was a nightmare to me at first as well, but then I discovered you could drop down even further from the underground camp- the one near the zone entry- into the karka lane. Once I knew that it was easy to get to the ley line hub, and from there you can access any part of the map you really want to. Granted I’ve still not done full map completion, as I hate map completion as a rule, but general navigation became dramatically easier.
Actually, in typical TD fashion there’s a better way!
The water tunnels will take you all over the map provided you (or someone with you) has exalted markings. But it’s the slowest path to take, generally.
From Order of Whispers WP, find the nearby tree with kitten in it. Take the updraft chain on the other side to the great tree. On the other side of the great tree you can glide down into Ogre WP.
From Ogre WP there’s a wallow that will take you into Ogre lane. Head west to reach Dragon’s Passage WP. Head east to reach Leyline confluence WP. Continue east from Leyline confluence and you’ll reach SCAR camp WP. Head north up Rata Novus lane, take the tunnel east into Rata Novus and the WP there. Use Nuhoch lane and the wallow there to reach Teku Nuhoch WP, which has wallows leading all over the place.
Honestly, as far as the meta event cycle goes, that’s about all you’d need to do navigation-wise to participate. Most of the “maze” portions of the map (like that mess of caverns in the southwest) actually don’t have any of the events. They all take place near the camps (WPs) and the boss meta happens in the leyline confluence area, which is every bit as straightforward as any core Tyria map.
Map exploration would require you to delve into the “maze”. The events don’t run there, but many POIs, HPs, and MPs are hidden there.