Guild Wars 2

As I’ve mentioned almost ad nauseum in my posts by now, I’m at my mom’s house for this month with GW2 on an older computer and a new but very cheap monitor in terrible lighting conditions for viewing. She’s not a gamer; she plays logic puzzles without timers to relax. She is a gifted photographer and F&SF fan, though, and has excellent taste in craft-show style art.

So I was testing this clunky rig by running in SW and she came in the room and exclaimed about how beautiful the game looked (it helps that she lives in Arizona by choice and loves the desert). I hopped over to DR to show her a bit of the city and she was amazed again.

Her appreciation was purely for the art design. So kudos to you, GW2 artists!

Loving the music here as well. I have to keep my sound low because I’m in my mom’s house for a bit, so I’m looking forward to hearing it at home in a few weeks. Assuming of course that it’s not just for the beta.

The position people are referencing is that while Charr jump with their front paws reaching out, it’s where the hind paws are that determine what the Charr is standing on. So you have to learn to allow for the foot area being what needs to land on the target jump spot. The trick of looking down at your character from above suffers thanks to the Charr leaning forward and obscuring the feet. It takes practice.

I think it would be nice for them to do that (I did already get my heroic chest thanks to being in the first beta stress). I don’t know if it would be easy for them to do it; the beta people were auto-flagged for it as a consequence of having to revert their account when the beta ended.

For searching, it’s been long acknowledged the forums are in poor shape. The contractors that made them are long gone and until all-new ones can be implemented this is what we have. The search feature is useless. I think there is a sticky on how to google search for desired posts, and it offers a better method than mine which is to google for “GW2 forums (keywords here).”

I don’t think the request is to have the game select the weapons for us, but to let us slot in a weapon set attached to each Legend as we prefer, and then be locked to that set choice until we choose another while out of combat. Then a Legend swap also swaps the weapons (preferably stored in the Hero Panel, not in inventory). Voila, tons more flexibility and weapons suited to the utilities.

I like the idea of having the tablet auto follow akin to how a mini does, but then be directable in combat as it is now. That way you keep it with you when running, you can move it around a bit just by roaming in the combat yourself, and you can micromanage it for full effect at need.

Azure.8670:

I’d date her. If you’re reading this Rubi, me and you, date at a city of your choosing. Preferably ebonhawke

She’s married with at least one kid. Gerroff!

I’m sorry I couldn’t watch most of the PoI today, my mom’s housecleaners came in my bedroom to vacuum during it … So I just saw bits of the part with Colin, which I suspect were pre-recorded since the blog announcing the PoI had a still image from their conversation. Unless that was from rehearsal.

You could make two Incinerators if you reeeeeaaaally wanted to and had a lot of resources, or could buy them for thousands of gold off the TP. They’re Legendary weapons and not easily come by. However the actual Incinerator, as opposed to just the skin, will offer you BiS stats that you can freely swap out of combat.

You will need to transmute each weapon separately with one transmute charge per. That specific weapon will then retain that skin until further transmuted. You don’t transmute your gear slot, you transmute the gear itself. So if you have a few looks you want to mix between, you need gear (of good stats) with those looks in your bags to swap out.

I’m not sure this counts since it’s only a temporary character, but I spent some time on a female human Revenant today:

Bunny Ears
Carapace Shoulders/Chest/Legs
Mistward Gloves
Ascalonian Boots
Back: Hidden (White Wings when showing)
Weapon: Ley Line Staff

Not sure on the dyes atm but I think Glint’s Purview, Celestial, and a darker blue, maybe Spruce?

I did a round of SW on my Revenant today. Breach and VW both went quite smoothly. My only hitch was when I tried to hammer two Menders into paste and they laughed as they healed each other to full. Otherwise things went well.

Riku.4821:

So I can spend all my cash on worthless items, drop all my collections, and delete all items in my bank and it will all be there after the beta? good to know.

It will (should) be if you do that with your beta character — if you do it with a live character, you are affecting your live account.

Obvious, I know, but well worth making sure everyone is quite clear on that.

It is permanent until deleted. That deletion will likely occur not long after this beta weekend ends. Ie we don’t choose when we lose it, it is for this weekend only. That’s the impression I got from what I was able to hear from Colin on PoI today; I got called away for a few minutes and then a vacuum ran in the room for a while ><

Update on my Rev look. I’m hoping burning my makeover kit really does stick with the beta, based on the person who may have had their Rev eat their silver-fed.

Uh oh. Based on assurances that the Rev bank is only a copy, I’ve used a makeover kit, a number of transmutes, and snagged an unused item from the bank to toss in the forge to make a fourth item .. now I don’t remember what the unused item was.

I will have to check my live bank to see if there are empty slots.

Yep, I used a complete throwaway name for the weekend. My main is Donari Mal Di Bette so I made a fem Rev named Donarelle Beste.

A guildie made “Revving It” and was psyched no one else took that

Soule’s soundtrack is almost all the same. I have trouble when hearing random snippets with associating them with a game location. I like it fine, I have the 4 cd’s and all, but Diemer and Chappelle have far more soul in their work (pun intended); they care about the game and it shows.

drkmgic.9583:

So I didn’t get my slot yet. Should I be worried

It’s still July 10 for ANet for 11 more hours. Be worried after that time has elapsed.

I agree with the need for better weapon/legend synergy. I set up Jalis/Ventari today — haven’t had time to test it in combat yet — and realized that hammer vs. staff are quite different in their combat focus. It didn’t matter so much for Jalis/Malyx as both were more damage oriented albeit in different manners, but that staff seems meant for support far more than for beating things up.

I like Morfedel’s idea even though it would be more complex to balance and play, akin to Ele attunement swaps changing the skill bar.

Will they be copied over after the initial creation of the beta character? Or do you just have what you had at that moment?

I was called away from the computer while Colin explained the humans-only on PoI so I thank Menadena for that recap of the explanation.

I did manage to hear him tell us to go wild spending stuff on our beta alt since it won’t affect live. So I have a preliminary look for my weekend Rev (bunny ears in honor of the bunny ears thread):

It may be the same thing that happened in the Portal beta stress. Some people managed to get in early, until ANet noticed and crashed them out so they’d have to start at the correct time.

How are you creating anything yet? The beta doesn’t start until over 1.5 hours from now.

My understanding is that the beta slot uses a copy of our bank, not our actual bank. So I suggest you just don’t gather mats while on the Rev, and if you feel the need to earn stuff while playing, get on a regular alt for that.

At home I have dual monitors and an SSD. Here I bought a cheapy Acer monitor that bounces when I type, has a ripple across the middle when I scroll forums, and has a shiny reflect from the windows to my left … but it’s only for July and then I donate it to charity and go home to my real set up. I’ll junk my old Dell that I replaced in April 2014 and shipped out to my mom to use while here, slow and noisy beast that it is. And then I will Never Travel Again.

I’m just glad I got the speakers working so I can hear the game. And I have my old HEX mouse (bought a new one to use at home) so I can control movement and combat. I would have been sorry to miss out on beta stuff even though helping my mom matters so much more. Dad was her soul

I have to question the wisdom of scheduling PoI and the beta start at the same time. I guess there are people with Twitch access who can’t get in game? Me, if I am at a computer to use Twitch, I’m also at a computer with GW2 on it.

I know that while normally I love watching PoI I am far more likely to be working on Rev creation. … Then again, it’s Colin, there might be juicy tidbits and the beta is all weekend long …

/torn

BolkovonHarnfeldt.1372:

I noticed there is an option to target nearest ally. I’ll try that.
As to the depositing of materials: again I wonder why there isn’t an option to automatically loot materials into storage…

But there is. Click the little cog wheel in the inventory, select Deposit Materials, and almost all crafting mats will vanish from your bags and appear in your bank, at least until you have a full stack of them in materials storage.

Annnnd triple post. I have an actual question!

I’m using a much slower computer than I’m used to. Assuming I’m able to play at the time the beta starts (I’m helping my mom with all the aftermath of my dad passing away on July 1 so I might be running errands), will it be a new build to load or will it just activate? If the latter I can take the time to log in before noon and then just head to character creation. If it’s a build, I’ll have to log out anyway so I might as well wait for the patch before sludging through the process.

Is there a way to “target nearest player?” I think there is not since there are no targeted heals, but that would help with rezzing. The main solution is to leave enough space in your bags to hold the stuff you’ll get in your play session (not at all easy, I know), and to periodically Deposit Materials to glean a slot or two.

About the junk: When they were developing the game they found that people wanted the junk drops instead of just coinage because otherwise players felt they weren’t getting rewards in combat. So it’s a gaming psychology issue. Personally I kind of like getting the junk drops in my daily four events because they are proof I tagged something enough to get credit for the event … hard in a zerg.

You won’t need tomes to be 80 this weekend, the beta Rev starts at 80. As to gear, it will come with sets (I don’t know if they’ll be Ascended). You might be able to get copied Ascended Sinister from your bank for your Rev. Nothing on the Rev should affect your main inventory (but I suggest screenshots of anything vital that you give it, just in case of a bug that wipes out nice stuff from your live account).

I’d say since you have all weekend, take time to mouse over all the skills to see what they do and consider a “rotation” that might be effective (eg Guardian GS you want your symbol down before you spin to win, if possible; Rev will have similar synergies to make use of). Set up gear and traits to your liking without worrying if they are min-maxed. Then go fight some easy stuff and work your way up as you figure out what the skills do.

In my Rev test, the first stress test, I think I was one of the few that selected non-default traits. I always want a fall damage trait so I nabbed that. So cool, when I landed I got a purple dome that traveled with me as I ran. I don’t remember what the dome did but it was a Rev skill that triggered on fall. It may have been a missile blocker.

Double post because I want to give time-zone-confoozled people a heads up:

The revenant beta starts in 3.5 hours from this post.

cocowoushi.7150:

If I prepurchase after the beta has started (like later today) would I still get into this test?

I don’t know the answer, as past results do not guarantee future ones

However in vanilla beta weekends people were able to join in at any point during the weekend, as soon as they had purchased and patched. On the other hand, ANet did stop purchases when they were getting too many for the servers to hold.

There is a little old lady with a knife in Gendarren (and I think in other locations). She has no name that I know of, she just stands there creepily. But she’s certainly a unique model!

The unlock is account wide, ie you buy it once and every alt gets it in the Outfit panel. But which outfit you have on a character, whether it is toggled on, and what dyes you have on it remain character specific.

They made it clear in vanilla beta that characters would be wiped, even between the beta weekends. At the end of the beta process they did allow some saving of characters between sessions but there was no question it would all go away (except for the pre-purchased gems, which they had us spend like crazy on gem store stuff during beta with the promise we’d have our full 4K at launch).

Getting a sneak peek and helping with the iteration process is its own benefit. Use it to test out ideas and give feedback, not to make something to hold onto forever.

I’ve played since headstart and never gotten one from any source. I have been grouped with guildies who got them — a GS precursor from the first karka event (legit from the chest itself, as she and I never DC’d in that event), the Moot precursor from a trash spider while following Dessa in AC, and another GS precursor from about 100 g worth of mystic forging by a guildie who really wanted Dawn and now has it.

I can’t post pics because the screens are on my computer at home. /weeps

My design has been of faces, though, not of armor and weapons (I have collected a number of neat hammer skins in anticipation, just watch me prefer other weapons once we know them all).

I have a chiseled dark blond human male that I’ve used for the first beta (would have for the second if my portal wasn’t bugged) and have actually made in game as a name place holder. If we still can only do humans this weekend I’ll likely make him again in my beta slot with some random but appropriate name … oy vey, I can’t, my screenshot of his sliders is at home ><

I also fiddled with a red headed human female, an icy blue stern looking sylvari female, and a super pale bald norn female.

I’m waiting for inspiration to strike as to personality; so far the sylvari has the most starter-RP ideas swirling around for me. Though I might use one of my existing sylvaris to explore the salad story that comes with HoT.

Dyaon.7381:

yakuza snowdragon.4639:

Anyone know of any Beta countdown timers? I live in NZ and I’m always unsure of times because we’re on the start of the timeline.

It’s in a little less then 21 hours, if that helps.

Yep, it’s currently just past 3 pm Pacific. So dial back your clock 3 hours (and 7 minutes) from now, add 24 hours, and that will be the start time.

Other than the seasonal outfits it seems all the outfits remain in the store indefinitely. Scroll through the Style tab to see what’s there; it looks like everything stays in stock if it’s not themed to a holiday.

There’s tons of RP going on, but it helps if you are flagged as Tarnished Coast (NA) or Piken Square (EU). Look where Stellatrix linked, also check out guildwars2roleplayers.com for their guild recruitment section. That’s the website where the vote was made to select TC and PS as the unofficial RP servers, and that was done in spring of 2012

The changeover did mean they had to lock everything and have you spend the points, but you got enough points just from being 80 to do a full unlock. I felt the time it took me to review the changed traits helped me pick out the ones I wanted and reminded me of some passive effects that I would want to take into account when using skills.

Now, if you want the elite spec with HoT, the current wisdom is you will want to have a pile of hero challenges done so you can buy it right away as it won’t be included in the points gained from getting to 80.

It’s not just that the terrain is fundamentally different now. The reason for all the complaints over the years about not getting original LA in the PS was that PS used to use whatever the current status of LA was as the backdrop. So you’d have children playing in the middle of a firestorm, or Tybalt selling apples while civilians ran in terror from the miasma.

I think it’s great that we now have past events properly set in the past (though I did undo post processing so I could get non-sepia screens of old LA for the nostalgia factor). Meeting Destiny’s Edge at the start of the level 40 PS feels better when they are by the lion fountain with all its parts in proper motion. I could imagine people “parking” alts at that PS step and offering tours to new players who didn’t get to see the old city.

I believe you must have just one trait spec line active at a time until you get to 45, then you can have 2 at once. But if you have the Hero Points (which you can get by doing the challenges in the maps), you can unlock more than you can use at once, then freely switch between them.

My only non-80 is 43. He got defaulted into Water (as an Ele) but had enough extra points I was able to unlock all but the GM level trait of Fire, and I activated that instead as a bit more helpful in leveling. However I have not actually played him because I was busy with other things, so I don’t know for sure that I was wise in my re-allocation of traits. The point is that it is possible, though.

It’s too subjective. One person loves what bores another person to a keyboard faceplant.

That said, I personally find Mesmer the most all-around fun. I have 3 of them at 80, and use two of the three quite often for fractals and dungeons. I’d find them handy in SW as well if I hadn’t set up my Thief with all my keys and shovels since he gets first dibs on any new content (plus he’s fantastic for the Labyrinth thanks to stealthing past the wolves).

The thing about Mesmer is it easily sashays between melee and range and with all the clones and phantasms you’re a one-player army. Unlike pet classes as a rule, its “pets” are more autonomous fire-and-forget spells that you dispel for extra benefits at the right moment, you just have to juggle which ones you want to keep out when.

And when HoT arrives, Chronomancer is looking like a super fun specialization.

In another thread someone linked Colin’s Reddit post (and there is also a red post somewhere in this forum) saying the test Revenants will be 80 with a set of gear choices in their bags. I am on an unfamiliar computer (a Mac) so I can’t really easily search around for the link but I bet the dev tracker has it.

Check the sticky at the top of the General forum, as well as the big patch notes from Jun 23. The PS got restored, with months of warning, and there were certain chapters that would toss you somewhere else once the restoration went live.

There is a thread for feedback on the PS change, hopefully someone can link it as I am about to crash before a long day’s travel. I think you can also post in the sticky, but take a peek at the last couple of pages to see if that is where people are putting in their feedback.

Oh right, I remember that now. I suppose it depends on how much we care if a bad person manages to make a name anew (after all, they’d be keeping themselves readily identifiable in game). Then again … yah. A new player might be very sad if they picked a name that had previously been that of an exploiter or harasser and found themselves getting hate whispers or getting insta-blocked by everyone for no reason they know.

(Though note in Gaile’s comment she says they won’t release names from “valid accounts.”)

Stress tests are short weekday events. Wait until you see an actual beta weekend event. If they match what we had in vanilla beta, you’ll be all “pfff, who cares that I didn’t do the stress test, this is awesome!” Especially if they do their signature wild and crazy weekend closing event.

I didn’t get to do the rabbit hunt or the hunger games because I had to get up for work the next day, but I heard great things. I did get to do two sessions of the Shatterer over Ashford as they did a special repeat of it in a later event. I have to say that those events make it easy for me not to mope over missing a short session when the really juicy one(s) will be so much better.

I could see them releasing names from banned accounts since by definition those players can’t come back. But for accounts in good standing? Thomdane states it well.

What Vayne said.

It’s one thing to point to something cool coming, another to claim it will eradicate the cool things already here. Besides, the OP is looking for something comparable to what we have in GW2, not something to play a couple of years from now. (I still think that if GW2 hits all the marks, nothing else will satisfy, but the tacos/pizza analogy above makes some sense. And the OP can easily come back to GW2 later, which isn’t so true of most any other MMO).