Guild Wars 2

Edit:
I should have said trait manuals up to Grand Master are unlocked already (I didn’t buy them) but I don’t have enough trait points to even get to Grand Master in any trait tree, yet the ones already unlocked up to Master(according to the trainer ARE actually unlocked) but I can’t add any more traits in the Domination or Dueling traits trees.

I have a question for Anet devs.

I have just returned to GW2 after a two year hiatus and I had 3 toons, a Mesmer (Miz Terio) , Elementalist (Cathbadb) and a Necromancer (Qute Morte). Only the Necro is an 80, the other two were level 40-ish.
Now according to the new feature pack all pre-existing characters had their traits unlocked already, meaning one did not have to buy the trait manuals for each character. Unlocking traits is only required for characters created after the feature pack. I went to the trainer and it showed all trait manuals unlocked except for Grand Master which I find odd since I didn’t purchase them, BUT at level 54 the Mesmer has only 5 trait points, 4 of which can be used and the fifth is locked. The tab says I am required to purchase a manual which costs 3g and 20 skill points which seems to be a Grand Master trait (rare) yet I didn’t purchase the previous ones and my characters have been around before the feature pack was released. The issue is that the number of points I have to spend don’t even add up to Grand Master in either of the trees, so one would think they would be unlocked (as the trainer shows they already are) but they aren’t.

Some help is much appreciated.

Hello Everyone:

I took a hiatus from GW2 back in March of 2013 after having played through the Beta and into the Launch.
I am curious as to what I should expect. I played a Mesmer, Ele, Necro and Guardian.

I have read in the forums that A.Net gives out account birthday gifts. What do they consist of? I have read about a change to the Trait system.
Any tips or comments are greatly appreciated.

@ Justin

If your computer is shutting down after 10 minutes it just means your fan isn’t working properly due to being clogged or it’s just worn out. The computer shutting down is a safety feature that most modern OS have to prevent core overheating. If the computer won’t boot up at all then you’ve fried the core(s).
You can try cleaning it with a can of air (most fans can be accessed by removing the keyboard which just lifts off, but be careful about the keyboard connection strip as it can be very difficult to reinsert if disconnected).
The other option is to simply replace the cpu fan (same fan) which is a pretty cheap fix.
tigerdirect.com has pretty much everything you need parts wise and if you decide to build your own desktop, you can buy a barebones kit (cpu, ram, harddrive, power supply for pretty cheap). A 1 GB-2GB video card won’t set you back much.

I was specifically referencing the issue with the Necro profession.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Necros-Pulling-to-much-threat/first#post39239

“Everything that everyone has complained about has now been fixed. To allow each and every player to experience the game the way he/she likes we have instituted a $30 a month fee to pay for a server for each person to play on by themselves.
To ensure quality assurance please see past patch notes and send us an e-mail via your account to notify us of what changes you would like on your server, be it PvE or SPvP (where player will actually compete against AI’s players).
Guesting has been removed.

Please enjoy these updates as it seems the only way to please everyone.

Try being a Hybrid specced Necromancer with only short ranged weapons (i.e. scepter/focus, axe/dagger) and have the Ice elemental Boss in FotM chase you around (along with his adds) right on your heels. Makes for some interesting game play and no amount of frustration for the other players in the group who try as they might cannot pull aggro off you unless you’re dead.

I think i would be an Anet Game Designer aka Condition Specced Necromancer, the most broken class in the game. In short because power builds will always have better loots drops because of more overall damage output and they do not have a limit on how much damage they can apply on a certain NPC (unlike Condition-Mancers who are limited to 25 stacks).

Yeah I’d be that and then pretend everything is fine and ignore suggestions from other players who are only trying to help.

I just realized that per Colin’s response to how loot drops work in this game there is now an explanation as to why many players have been getting crappy or no drops, despite the amount of time they spent on a boss or DE. If loot is determined by how much damage is done to an NPC, where does that leave Tanky specced Guardians/Warriors, Engineers and condition based professions like Necros and some Mesmers/Elemetalists, etc. The higher the damage the better the chance of getting a good drop. The lower the damage though specced for toughness, vitality, etc the less chance a player has for good drops or any at all.

So basically if you want good drops, create a glass cannon build or re-roll into a high dps profession, because there is no love for those who don’t play those professions and no immediate plans to change this system.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Update-on-Loot-Drops-Investigation/first#post1462956

When I made my Asura Necro I deleted the skull mask. I like the skull mask better than the Lone Ranger mask they wear with the Light Armageddon set. So I created another Necro, took the mask off her, transmuted it to the Armageddon set and gave it to my level 80.

This is what I got from this post.

“There’s a cap on condition stacks of 25. In a scenario where you have two thieves attacking a boss and one of them can achieve a stack of 25 by themselves, the other one essentially becomes useless because they’ve got nothing to stack on. Is anything being done to address that to make them less redundant?
Colin: Currently no.”

Which means that if you have two Condition based professions and one is slightly quicker than the other (gets to the boss sooner) and can apply their bleeds, poisons, etc before the second player and will ultimately have a better chance at better loot.

How do I know this?

Colin said this in another thread.

" Please note, it is still possible to kill a creature and not do enough damage to qualify for loot "
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Update-on-Loot-Drops-Investigation/first#post1462956

So we have a stack limit on conditions and depending upon how many player 1 has versus player 2, one of these players will get better drops simply because they were able to apply more conditions quicker or they are more powerful. So if you’re a level 80 Condition-Necro for example in full Exotics versus a level 80 Mesmer (Power build) in Exotics, the Necro will get worse drops because of of the condition based stack limit, despite both having started the event at the same time.
So same amount of time on a boss but less or no drops based upon how much damage is done overall which is limited by the current system.

This is very wrong.

Asura female : Miz Terio
named after a character from the Spiderman comics Mysterio who is an Illusionist. Come to find out Misterio is Spanish for “Mystery”.

I deleted my 80 human female Elementalist (even completed the Personal Story) because I wish I had made her an Asura. My only regret is that she had 400 Jewelcrafting and was only a few recipes away from Master.
I also deleted my level 80 female Norn Guardian with full exotics. Just wasn’t feeling the gameplay anymore and quite honestly found the profession boring. Smack, smack, smack, heal, smack, smack, smack, heal, etc I had 400 Armor smithing on this character but since I never ran Fractals and didn’t get ectos often it was fairly pointless.

Ranged classes are much more fun.

I also deleted a level 51 Human female Mesmer (kinda regret that one) and remade her into a female Asura which I have to level 40 at the moment. If Anet had offered race changes then I wouldn’t have deleted any of them. They could have reset my Personal Story as a consequence and I wouldn’t have minded one bit.

The aggro system on this game needs some definite work. In most MMO’s it’s based upon damage done. In WoW when on my Mage I often had to stop dps to keep from pulling threat off the tank.

In GW2 the amount of HP and Armor you have seems to be the determining factor in who does and doesn’t get threat.

There is a post in the Necromancer forums about this very issue. It’s rampant in every dungeon and Fractals. My Necro for instance currently has 2607 armor and 23k HP, far more than any Guardian or Warrior than I group with and I don’t even have full exotics.

Because of these high numbers the Dungeon or Fractal Boss will ignore the other players and come straight for me. Even if I don’t attack it, it just somehow knows and comes for me, which makes MY game play interesting but ultimately annoying as I don’t have the heals a Guardian does. To be sure I can heal myself quite a bit but not on the scale a “tanky” profession like Guardian has.

In WoW I played a Priest, Paladin, Druid (tree) and Mage. Eventually I played a Warlock as well. The thing though about playing a Healer or tank is you pretty much have a guaranteed spot in the raid so long as there was enough room. Also depending upon the dungeon being done at the time. With DPS it wasn’t always so cut and dry. They had to compete for spaces or lots of times it depended upon who you knew as to whether you got a spot or not. On my Priest I could bubble the tank or on my Druid I could insta heal the entire party if I needed to. My Priest healed differently than my Druid. The Priest healed damage as it occurred whereas the Druid stacked heals that ticked waiting for damage. I enjoyed both equally as well and a Druid was nigh unkillable in PvP because of the stackable heals.

Most dungeons required the use of addons to anticipate boss mechanics. In GW2 there is no such feature which makes the game more dynamic/enjoyable. You never know what a boss is going to pull out of his kitten and that’s part of the fun. To be sure he has certain attacks but so far I haven’t found any way to prepare for them with some sort of timer addon.

DPS in WoW were often shafted because if they couldn’t bring the boss down fast enough they were “obviously” doing something wrong, same was true in Rift. In rift I healed as a Warden and it was a tough class to play as mana regen was difficult to find on gear, whereas Mages (I forget the exact name of the class but they used life based spells that had to do with plants) had it in abundance and in the 3rd month of release could out heal Wardens with ease, which meant re-rolling for many people if they wanted to be viable in dungeons. Which of course meant yet another gear grind.

In this game there no such gear grind unless you absolutely must have Best in Slot. A player in rares can do just as well as a player in exotics because game play is more about player skill than gear in this game. There is no gear check, no dps check, no WoW Armory to look at another player’s gear or accomplishments (have they even done said dungeon yet) or gear score which I am just fine with. The fight may take 30 seconds longer but in WoW or Rift if you didn’t have the BiS then you weren’t running the dungeon.
In GW2 every person is responsible for their own selves and if I want to do something besides dungeons I can (try that as a dedicated healing class in WoW or Rift). I’m not gimped as to what I want to do and I don’t have people whispering me asking me to stop what I am doing and get on my healer because someone wants to run a dungeon.

As a healer I found that I was only valuable when a dungeon was being done. If I needed help with quests then I was out of luck (this was before secondary talent point trees in WoW ) as I rarely if ever got assistance. I was told to respecc, change my armor and then quest. Of course the sheer expense and trouble of carrying around two sets or armor was irrelevent to people who didn’t play my class.

None of that in this game and I’m quite content with it. Sometimes I miss being a healer but that’s just when things went well. On my Elementalist I still switch to Water to throw out heals for others because if the team goes down then I’m next. Or on my Necro or Mesmer I’ll put down a field that removes conditions, but that doesn’t make me want to return to the headache that was being a healer.

In my opinion the best thing Anet could do is revert all classes to pre-launch specs and never touch them again. In Beta and the first days of Launch Ele’s were dps kings and since they have the lowest base health of any class they still should be. A medium to heavy armor class should never be able to out dps a cloth ranged class. Compare Ele’s to 50 Caliber Sniper Rifles and Melee to just that. Rifle wins every time over a sword.

I don’t think this will cause people to all play cloth classes because some people just prefer the in your face combat rather than the kill from a mile away style. Also cloth classes (with the exception of Necros) have less survivability than medium to heavy armor classes. In a real world situation the sniper will get you long before the guy with a knife, but the guy with a rifle has less chance of surviving if spotted. The guy with a knife has the armor to protect themselves.

If memory serves Ele’s were nerfed 4 days after launch. I know because I played one all through Beta and at launch and recall the patch that came out and the outrage that ensued.

Every MMO I have played, knife wielding classes (Rogues/Thieves) out dps their cloth counterparts. In WoW I lived in fear of farming on my Frost Mage because I feared a Rogue might come and get me. Sounds funny now but was a really big fear then. If I was lucky I would get away but most times no such luck. Farming in the PvP areas was a huge risk as there were always rogues waiting in the shadows to come gank my little cloth wearing kitten.

Pretty much the same in this game because of their dps and the culling issues.

I was on Northern Shiverpeaks in beta and launch and two months ago switched to Tarnished Coast when I was shopping for a better guild. I found one (Wolf Demon Tribe) which has been around since 2005 in GW1 with same members for the most part. Fractals are very active as are every dungeon. I see people spamming for AC all day long in LA and in front of the dungeon. CM is active as well as every other one except for perhaps HoTW. No idea why.

Events in Orr are cleared regularly though not as often as on NS. The Grenth temple isn’t cleared very often though I’m on late at night most times.
The biggest draw seems to be that TC is a Role Player’s paradise. Pure RP guilds and people RPing everywhere. Also a lot of WvWvW goes on here. I’m glad I made the choice to transfer before it cost gems.

I don’t miss dedicated healers or tanks at all. In WoW and Rift I played healers and hate the attitude that I should be able to keep a tank healed when they pull an entire room including the Boss. I bought GW2 BECAUSE there are no dedicated Tanks/Healers. everyone is responsible for themselves though Elementalists can give a small regen or Mesmers can give life for 15 seconds in battle to all downed players. Guardians can do super heals with their Elite Skill books, but in the end whether you live or die is completely your fault. It makes for a better dungeon experience in my opinion because healers aren’t being griefed by overzealous tanks who think they should be able to live through anything. Not everyone has the best gear nor should they be bullied into grinding for said gear just to fulfill a certain role.

In WoW and Rift not only was gear difficult to find but as a Healer you were expected to have the very best gear (even if the tanks were undergeared they were allowed in) and the very best mana regen potions, which meant many hours farming instead of actually playing the game.

If Anet changes their mind and follows other MMO’s I can guarantee you will see a mass exodus or very few people willing to fill those roles. I know I won’t and the money I spend on the gem store will disappear along with me.

Some type of Canine race. I mean we have Cats (Charr) why not their counterpart?
Quaggans I suppose.
Dwarves (another puntable race besides Asura).
An amphibious race (since we do not have one), perhaps a Hylek type race?

I thought a Necro Minion that works correctly was the most rare item in the game. Color me surprised.

/bump

I joined this Guild 2 months ago and can say I am very happy. No drama, helpful friendly people and a can do attitude. More than willing to run people through dungeons as long as they meet the level requirement (i.e. 80’s with level 35’s in Ascalonian Catacombs). Lots of friendly advice and most importantly no cliques (excluding other players).

I wish more people could find a Guild like this one. Of course it helps to have Mature officers (we have them in spades) who can deal with any potential problems (which I am pleased to say there have been none).

So join today. You won’t be sorry.

I came over from Northern Shiverpeaks.

@Clairette.5396

If by chance you’re on Tarnished Coast whisper me and mention this post. I’ll run you through along with several Guild members from WOLF. We never kick people because of being low level. It’s a low level dungeon and so in my opinion it’s perfectly acceptable to run people under level 80 (all the way down to level 35 of course).

I see people wanting level 80’s only and that’s fine. In WOLF (Wolf Demon Tribe) the experience, having fun with friends is more important to us than making gold. The only way to learn these dungeons is to actually play. Since I have played a Thief I would however suggest you get yourself a Shortbow (if you don’t have one already) and stay ranged as certain Bosses can be tough on squishy professions. I run on Scholar Professions (Necro, Elementalist and Mesmer) for the most part. I use my 80’s for Fractals.

My Elementalist has the same name as I do here so whisper me for an invite, mention this post and we’ll go from there.

As to being level 80 in AC. Complete rubbish. My 40 Elementalist totally kittens up other players when it comes to the Graveling Burrows. The only thing an 80 has over a lower level player is slightly better dps and armor which doesn’t mean kitten if you’re caught in the Howling King’s Primal Scream. It’s player skill, not so much their level that makes a difference. I’ve run through AC path 1 in less than 10 minutes with a complete noob group because I guided them the entire way and told them what works, how to defend Hodgins, etc. It’s elitist nonsense that makes people believe that your level has much to do with how quickly and efficiently these dungeons are completed. There is a reason you are leveled down in these dungeons. It’s to encourage the community to play together. If people ask me if I have an 80 I say yes, (3 in fact) but I’m working on this character not my 80’s which are geared already and I only run fractals with. I’m not interested in speed runs. I’m here to have fun, which is why the majority of people bought the game in the first place.

The next time anyone wants to exclude another player because of their level they need to stop and think how they felt when they were rejected by someone in real life. Be it an employer for not enough work experience, someone they liked as a potential boy/girlfriend or whatever. No one likes to be rejected and even though it may be only a game there are real people playing those characters.

Real people like you and me who have feelings.

I ran AC explorable multiple times today on my 40 Elementalist and 38 Mesmer and every run was pretty fast, perhaps under 10 minutes even with groups who had never done it before (I asked). With me leading we blew right through them pretty quick. So no I didn’t see any issues. If anything Kohler was easier than normal.

What about Portal Guns? A few nights ago I was on my lowbie Elementalist and was left behind because I forgot the correct path to the Howling King (been a while since i ran AC) and a party member came back, told me to stand next to the Reliquary Waypoint and watch for the portal. Not knowing what to expect I did as I was told and low and behold a non-Mesmer Portal appeared which took me to the entrance to the HK’s lair. Apparently this player had stood “underneath” the WP and used the Portal Gun to bring me quicker to the main party without me being griefed by mobs they refused to kill. I just don’t get why people skip over these mobs since many trash mobs drop loot better then what’s in the chests. I even had a friend pick up a precursor from AC trash mobs, yet they are skipped on a regular basis. Not to mention the obvious hard ship it puts on a single player who gets killed and who has to run back through all these mobs.

Perhaps Anet should make dungeon content unskippable? High and roaming aggro tables when in a certain range?

My Necro is specced currently for Power/Precision/Toughness, no condition damage (or very little). Now the thing is I would be right beside others doing damage, but still have aggro even though my DPS is less than theirs. I would run out of range (clear across the room) and not attack it for several minutes while everyone else did and still he would come after me causing me to be unable to rez anyone and having the leader of the group constantly berate me for “going the wrong way”. Which this of course is a Guild matter and will hopefully be addressed.

I felt that perhaps on this particular encounter it would have been better if I pulled the chains that dumped the lava since the Ice Elemental would come to me anyhow, but the leader ( a Guardian) was doing this and sighing over people’s lack of coordination.

I was a kitten for doing it but finally got fed up and left the dungeon since my armor was completely broken by this and I was frustrated beyond all ability to play well with others.

Go here (first post) for all your Necro needs —--> https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Necromancer-tutorials/first

Yeah I have no AR currently but neither did the Ranger with the Legendary bow (I asked) and he couldn’t even get aggro if I was next to him. Nor did one of the Guardians.

So it must be armor and HP that determines aggro and not so much DPS because you know Necros aren’t high DPS machines.

Tonight I did my first FotM level 10, though I am actually only level 7. My Guild asked me to run it though to be honest I don’t care much for them (in case people wondered why I’m only level 7).

The last Boss we had was the Ice Elemental that you have to dump lava on. Now I have done this in lower levels of course but in level 10 the NPC’s move faster.

Playing on my 80 Necromancer (21k HP,2607 Armor) I kept getting and keeping aggro. So if someone went down I couldn’t rez them. No biggie I suppose.

However no matter what anyone else did, they simply could not pull aggro (unless I went down and died).

So my question.

Do you think the reason I pulled aggro so much was because of my high HP and armor? As far as I know it’s higher than anyone else in the group including both Guardians, (no Warriors), 2 Rangers (confirmed by one who also had Legendary bow).

I apologize if this seems or is a stupid question but in other MMO’s aggro is usually gotten by how much damage is done, though if memory serves Warriors in WoW gained aggro because of high armor.

Just curious.

I would love to see phasing implemented in this game. As I recall after Wrath of the Lich King (Cataclysm), areas such as the Eastern and Western Plaguelands slowly started to come back to life, Stratholme was slowly coming being renewed and being emptied of Undead. Though to be honest it would be a huge undertaking and change the game play for many. Vanilla WoW still had for many years bandits in the starter areas of the human areas and the Horde areas remained unchanged through many expansions until Cataclysm where politics (in game) and new races being introduced changed the overall feel. New players wouldn’t have known about what existed before except in conversations they had with WoW veterans. Originally there were no mounts, then they were introduced but were Profession specific. Later on you could get any mount you wanted but still had to wait to be a certain level. Originally you couldn’t fly in the starter zones on your flying mounts but this was later changed as well. But this took years to implement. To make changes such as these in a small space of time would ruin the immersion feel of the game (mounts, be it ground based or flying) and major updates to the world environment.

I consider the Undead in Orr to be like landmines in WW2 and South East Asia which are still being found and disposed of many decades later. So it’s to be expected that there will still be many years of Undead activity in Orr, though there should be less in the intermediate areas such as Blood Tide Coast and the Sylvari Starting Zones because it would seem logical that there would be fewer left around to travel to these far away locations. Unless of course a later update introduced the concept of some sort of Undead reanimation factory in an unknown location or a portal system used by the Undead to travel from Orr (perhaps through the Asura gates, but on a different “frequency”?). Then I could see (from a lore perspective) the idea of the Undead still being quite rampant in Orr and other areas.

Asura: female, Necromancer
Asura: female, Mesmer
Asura: female, Elementalist
Asura: female, Guardian

The rewards vary. You do not always receive a Black Lion key. Do your Personal Story and you will receive 1 at level 10 and another later on.

Female Sylvari Mesmer, Morgain Leafey.
Female Asura Guardian, Rokim Sokim Robot
Male Asura (Anything) Cntrl Alt Dlt

I don’t even bother with them anymore since the drops are so terrible. It’s not worth the silver to port there nor the incredible latency I experience with so many players in one area.

I’m going to try to keep this as respectful as possible.
There is something obviously wrong with the coding in this game. There are literally hundreds of posts about terrible loot drops, all which started with the November 15, 2012 patch, so I suggest Anet look there first. Something is rotten in GW2 and it’s not the players. When you have a consensus of hundreds, if not thousands of customers complaining about a specific issue and you (Anet) chalk it up to not getting kill credit, RNG or bad luck then it seems something is quite wrong here.

“If you’re not receiving loot from a champ/vet, it’s most likely because you’re not getting kill credit.”

Oh I just had to respond to this. Killed the Blood Witch yesterday in Kessex Hills map along with three other players. I tagged the Boss first and we beat him/her down. All I got was a soiled rag for my trouble. Killed all the Vets inside the cave, got a big repair bill but no loot. The barracudas dropped better loot than the boss. Nonsense.

Did many events yesterday including the Behemoth Boss in God’s Lost Swamp twice. best reward out of it? Copper dubloon, everything else was blue armor/weapon that I couldn’t even use for my character. Thanks. (Yes that is sarcasm).

The easiest way to figure out what you want is pick a profession, go to the Heart of the Mists and engage in SPvP. I did this with a Mesmer and loved it. Took 5 people to kill me and I had no idea what I was doing.
I’ve played an Elementalist to 80 and ended up deleting the character. I know some people love the profession but compared to Necromancers and Mesmers they’re utter crap. Same amount of DPS, less bas health (Necros have 36k base health, just make one and go to the HotM and see what I mean). Mesmers dominate in SPvP and WvWvW whereas Ele’s are very squishy. However as mentioned above when traited properly they are nigh unkillable end game.

As I said though make what you think you want, go to the Heart of the Mists and try it out. You’ll have all your skill points (no traits though) and can figure it out.

Oh and if you have the money later on you might look into a Solid State Drive (very expensive). Their loading speeds are exceptional. right now for my computer to boot up it takes 60 seconds. My friend has an SSD with a slightly faster processor and it takes 7 seconds to boot from a cold start. From what I hear most games run much faster with an SSD because it takes less time for the computer to access the information on this type of drive than it does the regular magnetic disk HDD found in most computers today.
An overview.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid-state_drive

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7651297&Sku=B69-0951

This site even allows you to build your own PC if you desire.

You can go to the drop down menu and pick Computers and choose either Bare Bones (you build yourself) or PCs already put together or an assortment of other choices. You might also mix and match components though to be honest I would stick with a certain manufacturer as you are less likely to have issues with compatibility when mixing/matching.
I would look at Asus which makes very reliable computer parts for people on a budget and or AMD motherboard, processor. I would also look for AM+3 socket on the motherboard, processor as later on when you upgrade parts will be easier to find.

My current setup is a Gigabyte Motherboard and Dual Core (2.0) CPU with 3 GB RAM, and a 1 GB ATI 5200 Radeon video card. I can do dungeons just fine but WvWvW present an issue with severe latency because of not having enough RAM or processing power.
I would also suggest when choosing an operating system to get Windows 7 Ultimate (64 bit) because 32 bit only supports 3GB of RAM or less. the 64 bit version enables you to use more RAM. I wouldn’t choose Windows 8 because many people have complained about issues with just getting the OS to work the way they want. Use what has been tried and tested.

Also when choosing a processor (CPU) keep in mind that everyone has their opinion about them and you must decide for yourself exactly what you want your rig to do.

AMD is better than Intel, because of both: price and price/performance comparison. You can get much better computer based on AMD chipset with the same total cost which you require to waste on Intel platform. It starts on mainboards and finishes on processors. However, high end Intel processors are of course better than AMD. The second is Intel often changing their chipset making older motherboards incompatible with newer processors. This is much more rare in AMD (AM3 processors are i.e. compatible with most AM2 mainboards). This means, after 2 years you must just buy additional RAM (or change some) and buy new processor for AMD, while changing entire PC for Intel (mainboard, memory cards, RAM type, processor). Of course, Intel-based mainboards are more expensive than AMD…

No I would not.
My reasons.
We as customers have been repeatedly misled by the company that designed/owns this game. While I will say there is no grind if you are content with not having the best gear I will say I am unhappy with the November 15, 2012 patch that nerfed most every t6 crafting materials into the lower depths of Hades. This means that those who may want to craft a Legendary, their own gear or even just sell the materials on the TP they are in for a long hard road of disappointment.
The solution offered seems to be to buy Gems, buy gold and then buy mats from the TP. However RNG will still prevent many from being able to use the Mystic Toilet,..err Forge to craft what they need with any degree of reliability. Then of course even using the MF causes problems because so many materials are needed for a single item. Precursors and the Triforge Pendant come to mind.

I played WoW for 4 1/2 years and I had no issue paying a monthly subscription because I knew that if I did "X " I would receive “Y” or at the very least I could craft my own gear in a reliable manner without worrying about rare mats being subject to high RNG.

So my answer for now is an emphatic “NO” because I feel I have been lied to over and over and I only play this game presently out of sheer boredom. Once I find an MMO that I like I will go to that and never touch GW2 again.
I’ve also made it a point to steer my friends away from this game. I tell them to come to these forums and read for themselves and every one of them has stated they will not touch this game in it’s current state.

I have to agree that the ban without notice is a little extreme, especially in cases where people made a name they didn’t know was inappropriate or demeaning to others.

For example I was running around on my Asura Ranger the other day when I was whispered by another player and asked if I was Muslim (which I’m not). When I responded in the negative they asked me how I had chosen my name, to which I replied “I made it up.” Apparently my character’s first name is a racial slur in Arabic (which i was totally unaware). My Asura also just happens to be dark skinned which only compounded the issue. I would like very much to be able to change my character’s name but there exists no option to do this other than deleting the character (which I am loathe to do).
I won’t say what the name is for fear of upsetting someone, but it weighs on my conscience because I am not by nature a bigot at all. So for now I simply do not play the character.

I used to think the game was a grind fest but then I realized that I don’t “have to have the next best BiS”. Sure to some people they want these things and Fractals and endless dungeon runs are the way to go. Most every piece of gear can be crafted (there are exceptions like the Khilbron armor for Condition-Mancers which I believe drop in Fractals) but I can gear my character up in greens and still outperform someone in full exotics because I have a better build and my play style is different.

Exotics and Legendaries are really for those people who do not mind endless hours grinding. Personally I don’t care. I’m content to have slightly less stats on my gear because I’m confident in my ability to outperform others and it’s not based upon gear stats.

Outside of level 80 gear the only real grind I see is crafting. Low level crafting requires three of X item to make an inscription and then you have to make several of them to get a skill point. It should be ONE skill point per item made. Not the way it is now.
But in order to get to the next level of crafting you need an obscene amount of materials. Just out of curiosity I leveled Tailoring up to 50 with mats I had picked up. My character made it to level 26 (thus out leveling any armor I could make for myself at that time). I have found it much cheaper to simply sell all my mats and buy what I need from the TP. Most often people just want to get rid of items to clear bag space up and they sell the gear/weapons for much less than the mats it took to craft them costs.
The thing I like about this game is the OPTION to either craft, use karma or tokens from dungeons to purchase armor. To my knowledge anything that can be crafted can also be bought with Karma or tokens, though you cannot salvage these last two.

So no, there really is no grind, unless you choose to have the very best equipment and understand that in order to obtain it you have to put in X amount of hours of work to get it.

Sort of like real life.
The only thing I would change is the amount of material needed to craft in the first place. I mean 30 Karka shells for ONE Apothecary Embroidered Insignia seems a bit much. I mean if the drop rates of the Karka shells were reasonable then sure no problem. But after the November 15, 2012 patch all drops were nerfed into the ground. So people instead opt for the Karma gear (unless they have oodles of gold because they bought Gems or are just really good at playing the market) or dungeon token gear. But with the right build and play style you really don’t need the BiS items anyway. Also Ascended gear seems to only be relevant in Fractals and no where else (unless that is changed in the future).

But as has been pointed out many of the nerfs came about because A-net needs to make money since this is a F2P game. A-Net can deny it all they want but to proof is in the game itself. There are many threads to show that this isn’t in our minds but a hard reality which the company refuses to admit to.
To openly admit they did this would alienate their consumer base and cause many people to simply stop playing or not buy gems any longer. So it’s good business to not admit anything of the sort on their part and just let the consumer believe that he/she is experiencing bad luck.

For a moment let’s compare World of Warcraft and Guild Wars 2 economies. WoW was (when I stopped playing after 4 1/2 years) $15 a month and most everything had a high price tag on the AH, but you could make a large amount of gold in a relatively short period of time if you simply farmed mats and sold them. I farmed herbs, ore and leather and sold them for huge profits. Blizzard didn’t really care how the economy fared so long as they got their $15 a month and at the time with 12 million subs that was a tidy sum.
GW 2 on the other hand doesn’t have half of those subs and is forced at the moment to control the economy directly by imposing nerfs so that the market isn’t flooded and prices go down. If prices go down then people won’t need to buy gems and convert them to gold, hence hurting A-Net’s bottom line. Remember A-Net has bills to pay the same as any of us and so if it means manipulating drops through stealth nerfs and how much gold you get for gems, then so be it.

I’ve only bought gems once and the exchange rate was so horrible I decided never to do it again. it was like handing the company a US dollar and getting a Russian Ruble in return. One US Dollar is equal to 30 Russian Rubles. Pretty good is you have many Dollars (Gold) but not so good is you bought Gems (Rubles).

Anyway I digress.

Several things I would do.
I would have my entire team required to level any Profession to 80, preferably the hardest to play. Elementalist, Engineer and Ranger come to mind. I say hardest because they have the least armor, DPS and health pool (not in that order). This way they will have a better understanding of what people are complaining about.

Second I would roll the game back to how it was on launch day and when players say X profession is OP I would ignore it and tell the community I was ignoring it. Any class can be beaten with the right build and play style.

However because of the nerfs that went out right after launch, certain professions are more difficult to play in dungeons than others. Elementalist’s Fire damage was nerfed four days after launch. I would make all the Elemental Attunements equal in power except for Water attunement because it also heals. Anyone who has played an Ele knows that Fire does more damage than any other stat, but because of the nerf to Fire it’s damage is mediocre at best. If a profession wears cloth armor, then their DPS should be higher than those who do not. I’m thinking of Elemetalist versus a Thief.

Rarely do I see Rangers or Engineers in dungeons because other professions have better Support/DPS. I would look into this and adjust accordingly. Or I would do as below.

I would buff all professions to the exact same DPS (basic skills) and whatever work around players find to increase it, I would leave alone. If the devs don’t like players doing this, then they should simply remove the trait point system.

A happy customer is a customer who is more likely to be a repeat customer. A disgruntled one will tell their friends not to buy your product and you will lose sales.

I would keep in mind that as Lead Developer I may have the power to develop the game to my vision but that doesn’t mean diddly if I alienate my player base to such an extreme that no one plays/buys anything from the Gem Shop and I find myself unemployed. Games do fail, this one is not above it no matter what awards they have won.

I need to actually listen to what players have to say and do my best to implement them if they are reasonable. If for any reason I think they aren’t I would post about it and ask for input. Just because I’m Lead Developer doesn’t mean I have all the answers. Anyone who thinks otherwise is looking for a repeat of Wrath of The Lich King.

I would also make it a point to comment as much as possible on the Official Forums and not on some other forums that the player base may not know about. I’m talking about Reddit.

I would also create a Test Server where all upcoming patches can be tested by the players and any kinks worked out before the patch goes live. Remember what I said about happy customers?

I would un nerf the drop rates that were done on lodestones. and T6 craftables. Seems rather unfair for the people who came after the initial release date to be subject to DR when people before them weren’t.

For every type of armor that exists pre level 80, I would see to it that the same type of Exotic Armor sets exists, be it Cleric’s Knight’s or whatever and that it can either be crafted or gained by karma so that people can play as they like and not be pigeon-holed into a role they find unsatisfying (healing stats come to mind).

In short I would keep the promises I made before the game was released, which in my opinion has not been done.
I would make sure all existing game bugs are fixed before any new content is released.

Yeah well we have that already (the Official Forums), though as stated above any complaints are against the ToS. Sounds rather Communist to me, but whatever. To not want to hear the bad as well as the good shows a company that really doesn’t care what it’s players think. Though to be fair the Devs do respond on occasion to complaints even though they don’t have to as per the ToS (Terms of Service).

Wanna complain without the thread being removed or locked, post on http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/

I would suggest that if race change is implemented then the customer agrees to forfeit all rewards from Personal Story up to the level at which they made the race change. This would be fair all around.

Confirmed on Mossman tree trick. Fixed. A few downed players but pretty easy kill.
One thing though. Imbued Shaman fractal freezes random players in place, though no “shackled” debuff appears on player and then Burning ground usually erupts under them. Then if you die, other players cannot rez you while in combat, that is to say they can apply heals but the bar just constantly resets after moving 15%. Also you can’t rez at checkpoint after the Boss is defeated without getting a “Burning” debuff that hits for 10K a tick. Even Necromancer’s “Remove Condition” heal doesn’t pull it off, though it’s supposed to. I finally had to port back to LA in order to rez, and repair myself. Did so much damage the debuff completely broke (see repair icon) my armor. Only 11 silver repair bill but still annoying.

Every time there is a patch and I do mean every time there is a lot of work for the developers to do sorting out bugs. Why not have a dedicated test server that players can copy their characters to and test out the new patch before it goes live.? This would eliminate a lot of the player frustration on the forums regarding patch bugs and help to get player feedback on what they think of the new content.

Simply moving players off the lowest population server and to another one would be the way, unless you guys have another server just sitting around somewhere not being used.

Oh I should also mention that trash mob loot consisted of white rags, blue armor and level 65 rubies.
Really? I thought you guys updated the loot tables somewhat? I can get better drops in PvE.

I’m in a level 8 Fractal and we’ve just completed the Imbued Shaman boss. Unfortunately during the event several members of the group were unable to move despite having no movement impairment debuff on them. Also When I died several members tried to rez me but it wouldn’t work at all. After the fight was over they still couldn’t rez me. I would get some healing and it would repeatedly drop back to zero on my rez bar. to top it off when trying to rez at the checkpoint I would immediately be struck with the “Burning” debuff that even my “Consume Conditions” heal couldn’t remove.

So no chest nor Boss loot for me. I don’t see myself in Fractals until this is fixed. it means no loot at all for the people who are struck with this bug.

DreamOfACure.4382:

ReginaBuenaobra.6953:

Check in with the heralds for updates. There are hints of things to come already in the game.

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The playable Living Story content will start appearing tomorrow (January 29) at around noon Pacific Time in Wayfarer Foothills and Diessa Plateau. When the events start in Diessa Plateau, you’ll be sent an in-game mail letting you know about it. However, if you’re already logged in when that happens, you need to change maps to receive it.

Why do events always start at Noon when most people are having lunch at work or in school?

Why not have it later in the day, during peak hours when more people are free?

Because they need to debug the new patched content before they release the event by throwing their customers to the Wolves of Disconnection Errors and the Clan of the Bugged Events.

Same on Tarnished Coast.