I rather like salvaging ectos for some extra dust, mainly because you get a large amount of essence of luck from them too. Much more essences than salvaging a bag full of blues and greens.
That said, dust is probably cheaper if that’s all you care about.
But apparently your servers run in circle capping each others.
Aren’t all servers like this? People make a lot more WXP and Karma when you capture Camps, Towers, and Keeps over and over. Defending only provides PPT, which doesn’t matter that much at the moment.
Not on SOR. There’s some tower trading and camp trading here and there, but either the servers are putting up a fight, or we just own everything.
You get 2 to 4 shards for capping a camp. Progression of obtaining shards through WvW is superslow. It’s way faster looting Queensdale chests on 4 characters. And then it’s still slow.
If you only take Camps (2 to 4 per), then yes it’s slow. But combine that with constant Tower (6 to 7 per) flipping, and you end up getting a lot of Empyreal Fragments. Add to that Jumping Puzzles with a Dungeon thrown into the mix, and you can get a stack a day for the hardcore farmer. The casual will probably get about 100 to 150 for a couple of hours playtime. That’s not really slow.
Constant tower flipping is not something I put on the “farm” scale because it’s just too dependent on other factors. You need to have towers available to actually take. You need to have a group that’s actively taking towers. You need to have enemies who can’t defend those towers. Those same enemies still need to be able to take those towers back later. And you need to make sure you’re able to tag for the Lord kill to get the mats. Even after all that, you still only get 8-10 fragments.
Yes. It’s slow. Especially for the more casual player.
If you’re managing to tag everything solo that a group would tag, then you wouldn’t see any difference. However, if you are not getting to tag everything but your group is, then you will receive more drops that usual.
Hmm. I’ve been using http://us.gw2stuff.com/ to find events. Yeah, they aren’t happening all the time, but most times I check I can find at least one happening soonish. For instance, right now a Tequatl is about to start in 15 minutes. I’d still say that gathering 500 dragonite ore is a lot easier for players that run dungeons, than 500 Empyrial Fragments are for players that run events.
Yeah keep rubbing salt in our wounds.
The API works and has worked fine for US, but EU API is broken again.
Ah. I didn’t know it was broken for EU. That kind of sucks.
If I didn’t have that little web app, I’d probably would rarely bother with those events.
In WvW the game itself is a timegate. It already has one at 5 minute cooldown on any capture. In reality it is at least 30 minutes or so. They drop at a low rate.
Also the fact that you actually have to hit the lord.
In addition to that. Getting them from dungeons is the fastest way as long as you are doing a different path. I think ArenaNet made it so that you could make at least one mat(non timegated crafting) a day.
TL;DR the way they are now is fine.
I’m well below 1 star a day right now, but I’ll admit that I’m not hitting dungeons hard. I am trying to get to chests, jumping puzzles, and a few WvW captures every day, but that’s still a pretty big grind and it’s a lot of time invested for just gathering those items. Those open world chests and jumping puzzles don’t really reward me the same way that doing champion slayers and big temple events do. Heck, I don’t even get a free rare from it once per day.
No, I don’t think they’re fine the way they are now. There’s already a nice timegating process into making ascended items via the once per day ore/wood recipes, combined with the time gating to actually gather materials to make all the various tiered components.
Hmm. I’ve been using http://us.gw2stuff.com/ to find events. Yeah, they aren’t happening all the time, but most times I check I can find at least one happening soonish. For instance, right now a Tequatl is about to start in 15 minutes. I’d still say that gathering 500 dragonite ore is a lot easier for players that run dungeons, than 500 Empyrial Fragments are for players that run events.
I wouldn’t mind if Signet of Malice healed based on damage dealt, but I think that just might promote more zerker builds for max power, max crit.
Stealing Life on the active also doesn’t strike me as the best thing, since 3k+ life steal could be an awful lot in any fight. Life steals tend to be in smaller amounts from what I know.
Eh. I got the Infinite Continue Coin because it took the pressure off a little of constantly making sure I had continue coins, and it lets me save baubles for more fun stuff.
Since I used gold to buy the gems for it, it doesn’t feel that bad.
Even so, I still think the potion price should be reduced slightly.
Kind of makes sense to me. The last month or so was pretty heavy content wise, so this month we have SAB (which is a lot of content but lighter in context) and an update to some world bosses. It’s a nice change in pace after all the Aetherblade / Scarlet stuff.
Queensdale chest run is about 20 fragments on average. To get 100 daily you’d need to do that with 5 chars. Unless you are really hardcore, you won’t be able to keep it up for more than few days. Which may give you enough for one weapon. One.
Yep. Meanwhile, you can get 100 dragonite with just one character in one day, just by making sure you hit a temple or two and a few world bosses. Don’t even need to have multiple alts. Same with the Bloodstone Dust.
As far as I can tell, dungeons are the only “easy” way at shards, and even those are only 20 per path.
Something tells me the OP hasn’t tried to fight Polar Bears in close combat
Polar Bears are easy enough to dodge around while killing them. I kinda agree with the OP, once you have your weapon upgraded, the whip is mostly useless.
There are a few places where you’re very close to more than one polar bear, and dodging around on the ice usually isn’t a good idea. Some polar bears you can take out from range or easily avoid their attacks, but others you do have to get close to them which is difficult without the whip IMO.
Also whip = easy raft achievement.
Raft is easy without the whip. Stay in the center and spam attacks.
Yeah. This happened to me just tonight too. When he died, I was instantly killed. It was a bit nerve-racking trying to get back before the timer ended, especially since those lily pads are a little buggy with lag.
I’m just glad I didn’t have to use a continue coin as well.
The jumping puzzle rewards are still pretty piddly. You get more bloodstone dust for doing one loop around Queensdale for champ boxes, and you can’t say those events are difficult.
yeah…
Also for some reason, half of the HARDER jump puzz’s I’m doing, their chests aren’t giving anything at all. I don’t know if that’s intentional but it’s pretty lame.
The one behind Hope Falls (malchors) … Griffon Run after getting to it with the Bomb … Goem’s Lab, Dierdre’s Steps … etc. All examples. It seems like “Exploring” puzzles give more. (where you fight stuff more than Jump)
It’s because the ascended material only drops for level 80 characters.
That doesn’t matter in this case. There are jumping puzzles that don’t give anything.
The pirate jumping puzzle actually gives the most from what I’ve seen so far, but that one is pretty simple and tends to have people offering ports every now and then too. Meanwhile, the climb through all the eagles out in Orr, guarded by a bunch of spiritual weapons, and that chest only gives that standard to 3-4.
The best way to get all of those fragments is dungeons. Each dungeon gives 20 Empyreal Fragments. That means all the ascended weapons require 125 dungeon runs. Assuming each dungeon run takes 15 minutes, that’s 31.5 hours of gameplay just for Empyreal Fragments.
The best way to get Empyreal Fragments is wvw, not dungeons. They are ridiculously easy to get just by capturing camps and towers.
For me, Dragonite Ore is much more difficult to get because I don’t enjoy mindlessly farming temple events and world bosses.
WvW is sketchy at best. Camps only have as good of a return as Jumping Puzzles, and I’m a little unsure about towers since I haven’t been lucky enough to be on during a time when we’re capping them.
I wouldn’t say it’s really worth the time unless you’re just steamrolling through all the enemies camps and towers..
They just need to boost the amount give by jumping puzzles in my opinion. Keep it around 5-10 for the regular chests. 10-15 for the simple jumping puzzles, and 20-30 for the longer and more difficult puzzles and mini dungeons.
I certainly wouldn’t mind being able to get them easier but which puzzle/mini-dungeon is actually difficult enough that it should give 20-30? This is in relation to the fact that regular dungeons only give 20. Which JP takes over 20-30 minutes?
Boost dungeons too. I mean, temples are giving 30 dragonite per completion per day too.
As for which JP? That’s tough, because they can take a long time or a short time depending on how often one screws up. That jumping puzzle over in Southsun is pretty brutal about that. Obsidium Sanctum out in WvW also takes a fair amount of time. There’s that one cove jumping puzzle out in Orr, and the jumping puzzle out in Mount Maelstrom as well that can take a large amount of time.
I’ve been spending 2-3 hours a day running around looting chests in the open world / doing a single JP for the last 4 daily CD’s and have over 1400 fragments – so that is probably about 10ish hours of work for almost 3 weapons worth.
Care to give the exact breakdown? 2-3hrs a day ONLY opening chests + 1 JP sounds about right as for 1400 I would like to see how even with alts.
Sure. I do probably 75% of all the open world chests on a main, then do rounds in wayfarer and queensdale only on all my level 80 alts (7 total level 80’s.) I then do one of the jumping puzzles in Caledon forest that gives 6-9 fragments on all 7 80’s as well. I also loot maybe 40% of the “easy” chests in Orr on 4 of those 80’s while gathering wood/ore. It all adds up rather quickly…
If you only had one level 80. obviously it would take a lot longer to gather the shards or you would have to work harder at it doing say, a bunch of dungeon paths. BUT, it’s all the same in the end as someone with a bunch of alts needs to make weapons for those alts eventually, the only benefit is gearing out your main faster.
Thanks for this breakdown.
It’s too bad I only have two 80 characters, but thankfully 1 has all waypoints and the other has 80-90% all waypoints.
Time to play the game, ie. farming chests.
In before empyreal fragment daily account bound locks/nerfs.
If they made them daily account locked, I would sure hope they boosted all the amounts give to 10+.
It’s kind of unreasonable to expect the average player will have 8 alts running around harvesting chests, so I’m really not sure what Arenanet’s thinking was on this.
They just need to boost the amount give by jumping puzzles in my opinion. Keep it around 5-10 for the regular chests. 10-15 for the simple jumping puzzles, and 20-30 for the longer and more difficult puzzles and mini dungeons.
You are severely overestimating the typical player, even the typical hardcore player, if you think five dungeon runs a day is normal. Even two or three is unreasonable, especially in the context that these runs are required.
It would be one thing if this game’s dungeons were fun. But, by ArenaNet’s own admission, the dungeons are terribly designed and mindless.
Anyway, my guess is Empyreal Fragment drops get buffed soon. It’s just too difficult to come by them right now.
Yeah. I would say I never really enjoyed doing the dungeon runs. Now that people know them better to skip mobs or take the easiest path, they’re less aggravating, but I still dislike how killing trash is the hardest part of the dungeon.
Hmm. I don’t think crafting is all that bad. About as good as any other MMO anyway, and better in some ways due to recipes going faster the more you do. Try doing some farming/cooking in LOTRO and basically having to stand there for 30 minutes while you churn out recipes.
Assuming you have the materials, crafting goes pretty quickly. Especially if you have a booster to get the extra crit chance. Just keep doing recipe discoveries. When you get to, do a rare recipe for extra gain.
Though, I’ll agree the 400-500 grind is a bit more annoying. Just not as many things to craft past 450, and the material to craft the exotics are much rarer.
There’s a bit of a grind with the other ingredients, but at least they’re a bit easier/quicker to obtain.
20-30 dragonite per temple/dragon/golem and other daily bosses I’m missing. That means that if I do a few temples, I can usually make at least one dragonite ingot.
Bloodstone Dust is even easier. Yes, it does require farming some champions, but on the bright side, Scarlet Invasions are still happening which is a great champion farm for even casual players. Even without that, one can head to Queensdale and get quite a few champions there. Or you just make sure to kill some champions during the temple and other various events. Still a lot easier than the shards.
Considering these are all account bound materials, I just don’t see why they would restrict people so much. I figured the time gated recipes would be the main hurdle to an ascended weapon, but it’s going to take me much longer to gather the shards for the crystal. I really don’t want to have to park characters at a jumping puzzle just to make sure I’m getting a few a day.
At least scarlet invasions were mostly optional after a point, and in a way, took some of the grind out of the game due to how much gold they gave.
These Shards though are just a pain to get. I might have to start resorting to dungeon runs to get enough for an ascended weapon. It’s just silly how few drop from jumping puzzles. As long as I do a few world bosses/temples, I get enough dragonite and bloodstone dust to make 1 item a piece. But jumping puzzles barely give me anything that I wonder why I bother.
Yeah. The whip is pretty much useless. It’s not really used for puzzles, and trying to stun enemies with it is pretty ineffective due to short range and short duration. Slingshot/Bombs are much more useful since they actually kill things.
I think if they made the range a bit longer, and made the animation quicker, the whip would be a bit more useful.
Well, no use for them, except to use them to continue with more lives than the Infinite Continue Coin. Once you have a stack of them, just turn them all in at once to get 50 lives.
Major story spoilers ahead. Don’t read if you want to see it all for yourself.
The genie in World 3 preview tells you that the True Enemy is actually outside the box. And if you use the code on the machine you will defeat the True Enemy and win Super Adventure Box. If you go the place he tells you to go, you’ll find a krewe working on some experiment, presumably Moto’s old krewe. You enter the code into the machine and sabotage their experiment.
Bonus: If you go back and tell any of this to Moto, he says he doesn’t know what you’re talking about and thinks you’ve been spending too much time in the box.
Having potions doesn’t even help with Tribulation Mode since most deaths are due to instant kills.
I could see maybe upgrading the health it restores to 3 hearts. That would make the final potion upgrade restore 5 hearts. Still, I would rather have cheaper potions rather than more filling ones in general. At least until running out of health becomes the main reason I die in SAB.
No discussions because there’s really not much to discuss. I think people are avoiding the genie discussion due to spoilers.
That said, I’m pretty excited to seeing what World 3 will hold after seeing some of the stuff they added in World 2 (difficulty aside). Looks like World 3 will mostly involve big caverns and such. It’s neat to see them add different environments for each world/zone.
Yeah, I was thinking about that too after I bought it. 2 hearts per potion may help a little as it saves time, but since drinking a potion takes a few moments anyway, it may not save your life anyway. And of course healing 2 hearts in a potion isn’t useful at all when there’s instant death traps around.
10 baubles would be fair, but I’d settle for 15 baubles as well for the extra convenience of healing faster.
Tribulation mode isn’t “hard” so much as costly. You spend a lot of lives, have to learn where the tricks and traps are, and that may require some challenging jumps. Beyond that, I don’t think I’d say there’s a lot of technical skill required. At least not on the pinpoint precision levels of IWBTG, but that sort of thing would be impossible in GW2. I think the mode is still plenty hard from what I’ve seen of it.
Flowers were probably fine….as long as you had room to maneuver around it. Instead of making the flowers always just go to one place, the platforms around the flowers could be made larger, and the landing areas larger as well.
Though I can see where some lag might have made them act unpredictably and make them harder.
Looks like World 2 Zone 1 is much easier now. The bears giving 10 baubles actually makes them worth dealing with rather than running past. The piranha bend was much easier as well.
I’ll take a look at Zone 2 and 3 later, but so far, all the changes sound pretty great.
Edit: And yes, after finally completing World 2 last night, I went and bought an Infinite Continue Coin today. Mainly so I could go do Tribulation stuff without feeling like I was just wasting lives.
Personally there have been about ~10 locations where I preferred to use the dodge-jump. I’m not sure, what the design philosophy is behind the dodge-jump, and if you think this usage is legit or not. The jumps above the bell is one of the locations I think the dodge jump was really really helpful if not necessary.
The dodge jump is never necessary. Me and QA make sure we do all our test passes without it.
I’m glad for that, because I cannot pull off that jump at all. The dodge is basically just a glitch/bug anyway, isn’t it?
