Guild Wars 2

@konig – nope, that’s definitely glint. it’s all in the details: the dragon pictured is small. very small. the dragon pictured is obviously standing on land, not flying. kralkatorrik only landed when snaff crashed him on the ground. when that scene plays in the cutscene, caithe is saying “we stood beside glint, ready to face an elder dragon”, as the teal dragon stands up, not facing destiny’s edge, but facing something in the distance. glint is the only dragon that is clearly shown in all instances of that scene, and in all of them, glint is teal.

on the other hand you have kralkatorrik, which displays a head bigger than all of the teal dragon from that shot, and has a completely different color (dark green and black, rather than teal). if the teal dragon from that shot was kralkatorrik, he’d be smaller than the shatterer, and have the power to change form and color at will. however, glint’s look on the other two shots are a perfect match of the teal dragon. notice that the “glint beard” you mention is absent from the teal dragon is also absent from the shot that shows glint dead.

as for the GW1 shot, still looks black to me. the only bright areas are the sun’s reflections.

Narcemus.1348:

I would also like to point out that as far as we know Zhaitan, from concept art, is the only dragon so far to be made of flesh and bone. All the other dragons seem to be made of much tougher stuff, with the exception of bubbles because of the lack of knowledge as to his actual form.

kralkatorrik bleeds, so that implies some sort of flesh under the scales. what the scales are made of is anyone’s guess though (probably crystals, though). i’d guess the same applies to the others.

and as zhaitan has proven, early concept art is hardly a directive of how a dragon will look like.

a lot of the lore of the game comes from talking to every kitten NPC and interacting with every object with a non-generic name you can find, reading out all dialogue options, and even talking to the same NPCs multiple times throughout different segments of a single story mission.

that’s a lot of work, yes, but that’s how you get to really dig into the lore.

dungeons will present most of the story told in destiny’s edge (or at least the break-up part), and ghosts of ascalon is essentially lore exposition: a guide to guild wars 2.

cities are a major source of lore too.

last but not least, this board is full of topics that cover a lot of the lore already found in GW2, and the wiki covers a lot of it as well.

my issue is mostly with how fragile zhaitan himself was after he was weakened through the story. he should still be extremely powerful AND resilient, even when weakened. the fight should still be incredibly tough.

this is one of those cases where poorly designed gameplay interferes with the lore, and i’d gladly accept it if they redesigned that battle to present a tougher zhaitan that even with state of the art technology and a fleet’s worth of airships (with Tyria on the lead) he still presented a challenge. preferrably, do that before any other dragons are introduced, as to remove the sense of non-threat that zhaitan gave to the other dragons. i mean, they just stay hiding in their places until we bust the door open and easily kill them, right?

^^ (god i hate broken quote buttons) of course i know that, i’m just pointing out how absurdly powerful those lasers are, to the point it makes the dragons feel almost unthreatening.

primordus could be dealt with the same way as zhaitan, just replace airships with tanks. jormag and kralkatorrik, assuming they don’t have some magic power to reflect the laser (what with lasers being a kind of light, and ice and crystals being known for refracting and reflecting light), you’d just have to mass-produce the stuff destiny’s edge already used against jormag’s champion (powdered grey energy crystals i believe they were?) and i can’t say i recall what defensive measures they took against kralkatorrik. if anything, i remember snaff beating kralk down with sheer willpower, using his mind reading gizmo helmet. of course, snaff was an exception, but the point stands: there are relatively simple ways to deal with the mind control powers of the dragons, the difference is how to approach them offensively, which seems like a case of fine tuning those kitten lasers.

of course, those lasers wouldn’t even be brought into the discussion if they just packed a punch and really damaged the dragons, rather than tearing through them like they were made of papier mache.

^ like i said on another post, the problem with making it non-instanced is that it would mean zhaitan never actually dies. it works with the dragon champions because they’re disposable. they die, the elder dragon makes 3 more. but with zhaitan, it would either mean that he was never truly defeated, and would just run away after each fight, or that he couldn’t be killed for good, essentially turning the entire story into a lost battle against an immortal being.

so THAT’S how the repairsmith in lion’s arch ended up swimming around, and how the banker took a stroll by the mystic forge.

oh god that DOES look bad. the hell?

i wonder if there isn’t any customer support ticket you can apply to to fix that faster.

i managed to do just fine on the recommended levels. by the same token, i’ve seen lv80s ragequitting AC and CM exp.

fony.5102:

this actually took about an hour(for half the dungeon), and they’re not “less experienced”. i was “less experienced” when i started out, and when things were explained or kitten went bad i tried to change and tried to coordinate.

there’s a difference between inexperienced and horrible. it was as if they all had learning disabilities. hell, two of them were level 80.

getting frustrated won’t help, and while i get the annoyance of “you’re level 80, act like it” (in other words, expecting a player that got that far to know how to play and listen to others), some level 80s might have never played a dungeon before, and even worse, they might think that their level means they know how to handle dungeons, even if they really don’t.

arrogance can be a pain, and it leads to a bunch of those “nerf dungeons!” threads. still, try to be calm and patient, and explain encounters in as much detail as you can. in many runs, you’ll spend more time talking than fighting, even during bosses. and don’t forget to always be polite. people don’t listen to angry people.

but only to story runs. explorables get tokens, and story gets karma.

now people have a good reason to rerun story dungeons. you could even implement a DR system to have people cycle between various different dungeons for the karma rewards.

give karma on story mode, tokens on explorable mode.

everyone’s happy, and story modes get encouraged.

the problem with PUGs is unreliable coordination. people may not be willing to follow the group leader’s orders, and this can cost the entire run sometimes.

i’ve both led groups and been led by other players (more the former than the latter, being the leader of my guild), and when a group is well coordinated, even first time runs feel easy. when someone isn’t paying attention, or is just too inexperienced, it can even lead to people ragequitting the party.

this doesn’t mean you should give up on newbie, inexperienced players. everyone’s been in their position before, and if they’re willing to learn, you should teach, so they can be better players, and the community grows.

^ damaging the tooth of jormag is a sign, a ritual of sorts. it doesn’t require a specific weapon to be wielded to damage him, so we CAN engage in direct combat with him. it would be pretty cool if the hero that damages jormag’s tooth actually breaks it, or at least causes some big scratches to it, and then we can see them in-game. kinda like how we only see our nodes being cut, only the people that have been through that part of the mission would see that version of the tooth.

what i think will be interesting, is that jormag has historically been fought and pseudo-defeated by a group of norns on foot. that could imply some SotC-esque fight where we fight on foot an enemy much bigger than us, and have to climb it to hit specific spots. can’t see how the norn hero ended up with a tooth of jormag otherwise :P

but i’m hyping myself too much. look what happened to the previous elder dragon fight >.>

OH. i forgot to ask you to post some pics. it’ll help knowing how exactly your game is looking like at the moment.

torbjorn.9642:

like the stories behind whats up between logan and rymlock, and why they dont work so well togheter

as you progress through the dungeons, you’ll learn more about it.

@LordByron kitten i hate it when quoting is broken) – like i said, i roll a thief. i’m pretty kitten squishy. but the only annoying one-shots i remember are from snipers in caudecus manor, and you can try and obstruct them, or even better, use some anti projectile/projectile reflection skills, or blind them.

link to the spike gun i mentioned

actually, watch the entire fight (that’s part 2 of 3 videos), because that’s how i thought the zhaitan fight would be, and to an extent, that’s how the fights preceding him go.

notice how even the music changes on part 3, when they hit him with the side spike. that change in tone to the battle does wonders. THEN you should let zhaitan go in his “omg i’m dying” clinging to a tower moment. almost more than 20 minutes of constant struggle against zhaitan himself, THEN he shows he’s starting to fall, and even then, he still puts up a fight.

i think the problem is with the battle itself, not the fact that it’s instanced or that zhaitan is just a beast of destruction (which i think is just fine).

you can’t have zhaitan as a DE, or else he’d just keep sprouting back to life, and there would be no conclusion to the story. what i propose, instead, is adding more visual flair to the battle (after redesigning the whole thing, because that battle is boring as hell).

what i mean by that is fix the sense of “only 5 of us and a laser cannon are enough to take him down” by adding more background effects. you know those ship-vs-dragon-champion thingies you can see on the sky in orr? add a bunch of those. that’s for starters.

then, add a bunch of other airships, just as big as ours, some small too (why not), and show them attacking zhaitan. they don’t have to actually do any damage, they just need to look like they are attacking. give the illusion that it’s a much bigger battle than it is. you can even have zhaitan blow up one or two of them every now and then.

last but not least, give zhaitan more presence. instead of dividing his fight in two segments (fight his minions and shoot him when he’s down), interlace those segments, and add segments where we fight zhaitan while he’s still strong. make the mutilator laser and the pink tether beams stun him rather than nearly kill him, and make the players manage those (like how in monster hunter 3 you had this huge spike gun the players had to time right to use, which would deal massive damage and stun the monster, and go on a really long recharge).

long story short, make it look like zhaitan was downed because there was a huge collaborative force during the battle itself, and give players more things to do and to look at during the fight. a little visual flair goes a long way to sell the setting.

mucco.1867:

relevant links.

Also, Kormir 2!

hey, i DM’d a bunch of games, and i’m proud to have my own player character in the party at the same time! :P i’d usually leave him as a secondary character though, letting the party handle the bigger decisions.

Chadramar.8156:

I like having NPCs as my peers and superiors because I’m sick and tired of the constant Only You Can Save Us O Godlike Chosen One ego-stroking and stories in which no one else is allowed to be remotely intelligent, competent or involved.

What is an absolute, non-negotiable no-go, however, is giving an NPC credit for the player’s actions. Doing that absolutely murders, butchers and mutilates any sense of immersion and coherence — not to mention it really ticks people off. People you met before, people you helped and saved, people who were close to you, people who awarded you a special position … if you meet them again and they treat you like a random, generic stranger, then the devs might as well just delete the earlier story-missions in which you met them. Because they apparently never happened.

Seriously, I can’t believe that this even needs to be pointed out. That sort of thing is kindergarten-level knowledge for anyone who wants to tell a story.

that’s got more to do with the game’s poor structuring in storytelling than with trahearne, though. the whole “isolated story arcs that pseudobranch at the end of each arc” structure leads to stuff like the need to kill your mentor, and to retcon any characters you’ve met on previous arcs.

and i didn’t have time to post before, but if this is the cutscene/concept art you’re talking about, then notice that it’s actually glint that is shown as blue, the only time we see kralk is that snip where destiny’s edge is looking at a giant dragon face, and that face is black with shades of green (which could still mean nothing, zhaitan looks nothing like his concept arts, much less in color, even if you look at the art shown at the arah dungeon)

LOL, this is amazing.

i’ve had the opposite happen to me once. i was on normal PvE, but the maps shown were the WvW maps. if i zoomed out A LOT, you could see that the WvW maps are located far to the southeast of tyria (though i could swear that it should be elonian land by then :P

looks black to me

but that’s beyond the point.

the initial laser did very little to him because it missed. it mutilated him clearly and easily. a direct hit to the chest, or even the head, would’ve been lethal, but instead it hit the tails.

and zhaitan has the advantage of being a voltron dragon.

Dutch Rental.8360:

afaik it will be removed again after 1 hit

of course it will, but if you keep diving and surfacing, you could potentially exploit it to have infinite aegis. every time you lose it to a hit, just leave and reenter the water for another charge.

that is, if it works like described in the OP.

the one last thing you could do is do a full reinstall, but do not do that until you get someone from ANet telling you to (or if the low textures are too unbearable).

LordByron.8369:

i agree most story modes are really hard….
Also most people here won t admit that huge difference that makes lvl and equip.

I had to try it for myself, using “the squishy” class known as elementalist……

So many people say “learn to play you go glass cannon etc etc” without even considering that you don t have ANY choice unless you have gear and level to put traits into….

So yes playin a lvl 80 explore mode (tried 2 or 3) is way easier than playing a lvl 30-40 story mode.

i’ve done most story dungeons on their recommended level :/

gear and traits are equivalent to EV training in pokemon, to make a comparison. it gives you an edge, it maximizes your potential to success, but it’s not something you’re required to do. no matter how well you EV train your pokemon, it’ll still be stupid to put a pure electric type against a ground type.

in other words, if you’re not playing it right, traiting and having gear won’t save you. dungeons are harder than normal PvE and there is a learning curve, yes, but they’re not cheap. they’re not “omg too hard”, you just need to get used to the idea that dungeons play on a different level.

gold sinks. non-intrusive punishment for dying.

beats death penalty by a mile.

not a bad idea, especially considering that the prices you suggest cost way more than you’d ever spend in gold on waypoints, given the current cost of gems per gold :P

you know that thief hood that you can get at the character creation and absolutely nowhere else? what about those guardian shoulderpads? wouldn’t it be awesome if you knew beforehand that you’d never see them again, so you could save those for once you got armor that actually went well with it?

my suggestion is simple. just place a vendor somewhere (lion’s arch, home instances, anywhere) that sells those skins for a small fee. just the skin, no stats, no nothing, like the hall of monuments vendor, but with fees.

while we’re at it, give us the option to preview weapon and armor skins. you can’t preview how the guild armor will look with the rest of your set until it’s too late, for example.

first time i saw a commander was on queensdale. i actually ported all the way to him to find out WTF was going on.

it should be disabled on PvE, yes. it’s completely pointless and only clutters the minimap.

that would make kiting OP, simple as that. you can strafe and fire at the same time, as i’ve learned to do with my engineer, and strafing is almost as fast as running forward (except movement boost signets don’t affect it, and i think swiftness doesn’t either).

as an alternative, rangers have a shortbow skill that lets them fire with their backs to the enemy.

that would allow you to bypass content way too easily, and break any remains of PvE balance there are.

you already have a movement speed signet, use it. together with dodges, it does the job 99% of the time.

they’re not actually missing, you can still kill a stealthed mob. keep slashing around until it reappears, you ARE dealing damage to it.

stealth should not mean invincibility. that would make thieves OP, and the mesmer’s mass invisibility elite skill would be the most absurd skill ever.

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/news/824-new-items-coming-soon/

technically still a rumor, but those were in GW1, and are basic premium items of any MMO, so look out for them.

like i said, before the nerf it was still doable by first timers.

and i did after the nerf. because my guildies asked, and because i find dungeons enjoyable. i agree that there needs to be some sort of incentive to replay story mode, but i disagree that it should get nerfed to the level of your personal story quests.

then again, there are people complaining the personal story is too hard >.>

EdwinLi.1284:

Ya Trahearne probably will remain in Fort Trinity to finish restoring Orr since there is still a long way to go. Fort Trinity will most like expand into the Pact’s main base of operation against all Elder Dragons. Of course he will be getting all the paper work as leader of the Pact while we are free to take the fight to the Elder Dragons as the Pact expands. Most likely a new character will take his place for each Elder Dragon we fight.

we’ll probably work as an ambassador/emmissary of sorts, taking the pact to new places, putting someone in charge of that place, and moving on to the next (like we did with trahearne, basically).

so that’s what it is. i’ve had problems too, pretty sure even my thief has had it (and i use dagger mainhand and pistol mainhand)

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Superior-Rune-of-the-Noble/first#post456137

someone else has a thread on it. your pictures could be helpful there.

infinite aegis? :o

well, that was my best guess, because the game looks fine to me. try setting it to best performance, applying, restarting the game, setting to best appearance, applying, and restarting.

that’s the only other guess i have, and i’m not very confident in it.

Disconnected.9253:

’it’s fine as it is’. Tell me that after my PuG took 2+hrs, 10+s and endless frustration in a CoE story pug… all for a hat and 5s? come on, get real.

there’s a reason it’s nigh-impossible to get groups for some of these. there’s no point, and it’s not worth the effort. I’m done it so now I can do explore, and will never go back there again.

CoE was kind of annoying before the nerf, but even then my group only wiped like twice (talking about pre-nerf, first time runners). after the nerf we didn’t even get anyone killed.

even with a PuG, there has to be some level of coordination and preparation. they’re not hard, they’re just more challenging than standard PvE and require some thought behind what skills you’re bringing for each individual encounter.

Ohoni.6057:

other people on the other team dont see the house icon, or least I never have. This is also fantastic for getting commune points and rich veins in pve setups without having to fight champ mobs etc.

Yeah, if you’re on the opposing team you won’t see any graphics for Shadow Refuge at all, you’ll just see a bunch of people vanishing. Now, a smart player who’s paying close attention could probably figure out what happened in a mass PvP situation, but it’s better than nothing.

at least on WvW, you see a big red AoE and the house/shack thing when an enemy pops one.

Ohoni.6057:

Yeah it’s really more of a “Hide” than a “Stealth”. The best possible use of all that stealth is to heal people. If someone’s downed, drop a Refuge on them, get to Rezzing them, and you should have plenty of time to do so while being fully stealthed.

that’s what i usually use it for, but when you want to get out of it and backstab, it wears out instantly, so what i do is switch to my pistol and fire, at least i didn’t waste a stealth attack.

problem comes when you’re trying to group-stealth for a dungeon mechanic, like on the seraph path on caudecus manor. if you get your group stealthed for 9 seconds, you could make the “place barrels on buttons” part of it easily. but more than once has shadow refuge backfired and unstealthed everyone at random times, causing massive agro on us. it’s worse that it actually changes depending on the game’s mood, apparently.

i just want reliable tooltips.

that’s amazing, any chance you might do one accounting for the condition damage? running a CD-centric build, raw power doesn’t quite concern me, so those coeficients aren’t as helpful to me.

signet of malice + high initiative regen + high healing power + unload = you’ll never have to press 6 again.

i carry my pistols exactly for that reason. if i get low on health and dagger storming, caltrops, and death blossom spamming don’t cut it (usually because there aren’t enough enemies around to make the area effect strong enough), i just move to range and start using unload.

Dendail.4896:

I think thats normal… some pieces of a light & dark overlay on them.

doesn’t make it less annoying.

thieves learn the hard way that stealth doesn’t mean immunity. people should take note of that and start dropping AoEs whenever a boss becomes invisible.