Kormir played a vital role in starting Nightfall. However, if it had not been her it would have been someone else eventually. All that was required was for someone to dig around in the forbidden ruins and awaken the Apocrypha. There was no one cause to the start of Nightfall. A trap was set and eventually someone fell into it.
I did not realize blind caused it to miss. I guess that makes sense, though. Thanks!
If you fight underwater as a thief with the spear 5 skill against several foes, you will get dodger very quickly. If you fight as a greatsword ranger, you will get dodger very quickly. Dodging twice during hylek poison dart spam, krait hypnos poison cloud or Son of Svanir archer 10 arrow rapid shot will allow you to get 3-5 dodges out of one attack sequence. As mentioned above, drake breath, skale spit and wurm loogies are reliable for this, as well. Mesmer “distortion” should allow this (never tested it, though).
Generally, regular dodges won’t cut it since I am usually out of there too fast for it to count as an “evade.”
I didn’t particularly get Tonn’s death. How is he considered an ‘innocent’ when he’s a full fledged member of the pact, enjoys blowing up buildings with explosives, likes hanging around other races such as Charr without any complaints (he even compliments them), invading Inquest labs, etc? He’s pretty much a soldier on the front lines (in fact, even behind enemy lines, haha).
Unfortunately, this is often the case IRL. Very often times even invaders see themselves as innocents preyed upon by the poor, scattered civilian partisans. A couple of particularly glaring examples:
Caesar wrote that his men were outraged by the deaths of all the innocent Romans in the battle he lost during the Gallic Wars (btw, the Romans committed multiple genocides in this war and the Roman Senate tried to disband the army because of its repeated atrocities).
The dread pirate Roberts (the real one, Bartholomew Roberts) was captured and forced to work aboard a pirate ship. After the captain was captured and executed, Roberts was elected captain and avenged his “innocent” former captain, kidnapper thief and murderer by killing every male civilian in town his crew could catch and burning the town to the ground.
Seeing a soldier fighting in a war and blowing up ships as an “innocent” is perfectly realistic. In this case he was killing people who were already dead, anyway, so it is easy to see how your characters thinks Tonn is innocent.
But Guardians can take on all the mobs and come out just peachy. Seems a little unfair that it is ok for one class, but not ok for another class for some inadequately explained reason other than simply stating up front that the mobs are unrealistically strong and your character unrealistically weak.
Every profession has a different play style. Guardians stand their ground extremely well.* Warriors not as much and have to retreat more often, but warriors hit much harder and have better ranged attack options. Mesmers can distract with clones and phasms, thieves can lay caltrops and keep melee enemies continuously blinded, rangers can send in their pet to take aggro, etc. Every profession plays differently, and they often have multiple, different play styles.
*Note: you cannot always take on all of them at once. 5 dredge and a mining suit would force a retreat very quickly.
Nothing about GW2 is realistic. You would not like it if you were surprised and spent the entire fight hiding behind a barrel with an arrow in your leg while your companions fought and the enemy retreated after one of them was cut off from his formation, surrounded and cut down.
This dynamic event in western Sparkfly Fen involves keeping a Vigil Crusader alive long enough to travel to a tower and set a bomb. Increasingly large groups of undead spawn to attack doing both direct damage and conditions. I could handle that. I interposed myself to keep them from attacking the crusader and used healing and condition removal to keep the crusader alive. Then, a risen plauge carrier spawns beside the crusader, explodes and the crusader dies instantly. How, exactly, does this event work? It seems like an automatic failure.
In human personal stories, my character’s friends showed up frequently in levels 1-10, as well as several times in the “Floating Grizwhirrl” storyline. If you choose the “Dead Sister” background and help the Vigil in Orr, you see someone from that storyline show up again. In the Asura storyline, your krewe plays an important part in the level 1-10 story, but for the most part don’t show up again (if you choose Statics and go to the Temple of Grenth in Orr, your krewe shows up again).
There is a lot of variance. The Charr story places more emphasis on your warband than others do on your early acquaintances. However, in Charr society (at least for members of the legions), your warband is your life. In Asura societies, krewes are joined and left (although you are expected to be completely loyal while a member). Human society work like our own. Sylvari associate with who their Dream tells them.
I would defend this two ways: First, either you like a given 10 level story or you don’t. If you don’t, extending it with those you dislike would lead to lots of complaints more than compliments. E.g., you see a lot more of the people who don’t like Trahearne complaining than those who do like Trahearne complimenting. Second, if people from your past keep showing up as storylines converge and diverge, this limits the stories. For example, your childhood friend and friends you make along the way can never die or later stories become more and more cumbersome as alternate versions must be developed for whether or not your friends are around (or, alternatively, they MUST die or be removed no matter what you choose). In some PS in some races, your starting acquaintances can die depending on the choices you make.
There are no game mechanic effects. All racial skills are available to all characters of that race. The spirit’s philosophies don’t necessarily reflect a profession. For combat, wolf represents teamwork, bear personal fortitude and self-reliance, raven cleverness and deception and snow leopard fighting dirty. I would say this reflects more choices in personal story later. Often you will be asked to choose a direct fight or sneaking and striking from behind (bear or wolf v. raven or leopard), or to recruit a lone legendary warrior or a Charr warband (bear or leopard v wolf or raven). That said, you make whatever choice you like.
You need to find your Order mentor to exercise the other option. Seiran hid quite well from me when we did this, but I found her and took the other option.
I’m on Defense Contract, which is set for level 53. I’m level 57, and I have tried every solo strategy I can imagine to beat Exaerix Infernus, with no luck. Trahearne seems to do almost no damage. Snarl and his group don’t seem to do much damage either and pretty quickly die. If I get anywhere near the boss or stop moving, I’m dead in about 3 hits.
I have done this one twice. The first time was on my guardian and the second time was on my elementalist. Obviously, a guardian is a harder nut to crack and is better at keeping allies alive, but does less overall damage.
What I found was the second time I downed once, but was never defeated, and I kept my allies alive longer. This is NOT because the elementalist is better at this than a guardian. In fact, this is exactly the type of mission where a guardian excels with his strong, omnipresent AoE support for all the NPCs. I just became better at playing and dodging and kiting. I learned better when to stand and when to retreat.
I found the personal story brutish the first time through. Every time it has gotten easier, almost regardless of profession (it took me longer to figure out thief than the others). Up to about level 20, I still get beaten down a lot because every profession is different and I am still learning to play it.
BTW, if you play a lower damage, attrition-type character like a guardian, Trahearne and the Snarl boys’ damage is much more noticeable. The elementalist far outdamaged them, but that is the ele’s schtick.
Also, I am not trying to pick on anyone. This was just a specific example of a later-stage personal story I did on more than one character (because I could not see a Vigil character going to recruit one Norn when he could recruit two entire warbands instead).
(edited by JohnLShannonhouse.1820)
The question about the moot affects the level 11-20 storyline. I chose blacked out, and if you can survive it without restarting as a level 11-20 ranger, you have learned your profession well. However, I hear the others are brutal, as well.
The Spirit of the Wild question seems to not matter any more than the Human god, Asura mentor or Sylvari cycle questions (all Charr questions matter, oddly enough). They may matter some time in the future.
And what alternate means of air transport do the Charr posses? Somehow I think airships have the edge efficiency wise over Charr choppers for long range supply work.
If we use real life physics, we can compare helicopters and airships. I used the Chinook helicopter and Hidenburg-type zepplins to compare flying cargo 500 miles. This is about 2.5 hours of flight requiring 6000 pounds of fuel, a crew of 3 and it can carry 4000 pounds of cargo.
The most efficient airships ever made, Hiddenburg-type ships,* could make the journey in about 7 hours at 2000 pounds of fuel. The amount of cargo it could carry with a normal crew compliment of 40 (assuming average crewman + personal equipment 175 pounds) would be about 13,000 pounds.
*No, further research has not made them substantially more efficient, and not for a lack of effort.
Sounds great, right? However, remember the helicopter can transport this with about 3 crew in 2.5 hours while the large airship takes 40 crew 7 hours. This kills airships economically unless fuel is far more valuable than crew time.* Furthermore, the Chinook can land in a small clearing and offload in minutes with a ground crew of half a dozen. It can be easily refueled and out of there in no time. The airship requires a ground crew of dozens and specialized landing platform. It cannot even land in certain kinds of terrain and requires a special frame to land for extended periods. It takes an hour to unload under the best of conditions, and a similar time to refuel. Without a specialized landing platform, your fuel economy in killed because it has to stay aloft (using fuel) and becomes much harder to unload and refuel. Maintaining that huge frame is a huge job.
*In which case, you would not be using air transport.
You can get by with smaller airships, but those are less efficient in terms of fuel per pound cargo by about 40%, and even less efficient in terms of man-hours per pound cargo by about 50%.
We have already seen the Charr don’t care squat about energy economy (otherwise they would use more wood and stone and less metal in construction – wood and stone last longer, too). I conclude that the Charr would use choppers for cargo over airships. Furthermore, if you are worried about fuel efficiency, you are NOT using airships. Pack bulls run on grass, and can be eaten when they wear out.
There are reasons airships fell out of use whenever airplanes or helicopters could be used instead. Today they are relegated to air cranes and a few, highly specialized cargo and passenger applications.
All this assumes real life physics.
Fighting a tough veteran and his buddies in PvE with an engineer. I formed a portal to escape if we got into trouble. We overaggroed and fled and he downed on conditions on the other side of the portal. I went up to revive him, hit F… right in the middle of about 6 heavy hitters with only a sliver of health left. Not pretty…
@Dustfinger
That implies they aren’t the best at non-magical technology. Which they clearly are.
Charr tehcnology is not real world and definitely not non-magical. I have looked at the designs. Every machine where you can see its mechnisms would not perform IRL. The chopper is particularly comically bad in design in every aspect and would likely tear itself to pieces in seconds. Either Tyrian physics is different and/or they use magic to make those contraptions work.
Once the Charr get enough airships free from fighting dragons though, they could be set for a major expansion, since airships would be able to rapidly deliver supplies to armies far from the Charr centers of supply.
That depends on how Tyrian airship physics work. As a turbine engineer I used to know liked pointing out, IRL airships are woefully inefficient (speed, energy efficiency, maitenance, reliability) compared to alternative means of air transport for nearly every purpose.
I’ve always thought the asura were written to think they were smart, but the way they come across (or are written) they seem no different from anyone else. The same for the charr. The only race which seems mostly less intelligent than other races are the norn. The asura seem like a lot of hot air.
I’ve never found the charr to be more intelligent than other races.
I have seen no indication the Norn are less intelligent. They don’t show much racial chauvanism, so they don’t claim to be smarter than other races.
There are differences in the priorities of the various races. Given Zojja’s quote about the Snaff prize (Statics storyline) and embarassment of the Arcane Council being worse than murdering some of them, it is clear the Asura do not place a high premium on safety. Therefore, if you judge intellect based at all on concern for safety (i.e., not being “Too Stupid to Live”), Asura and Norn would be at the bottom, Sylvari in the middle and Charr and Human the smartest.
Much of what would be required to judge their intelligence is not covered in the game.
IRL, judging intellect is a LOT trickier than most people think. Some examples:
If an animal is able to judge and remember distances and angles well, he is smarter than other animals, right? Well, no. That is what we call “habit learning” in neuroscience, and if you lesion a rat’s hippocampus it becomes better at habit learning. This is because brain areas actually compete with each other, and the hippocampus does spatial learning but not habit learning. Therefore, basing a test on one type of learning alone means severe, crippling brain damage makes the animal smarter…
Everyone knows memory declines with age on average, right? Well, it turns out that is based on what kind of test you do and what time of day you test. Older people are worse at learning random strings of words in the afternoon, but just as good in the early morning. However, suppose you designed a test to review lists of prices of groceries from several stores for a few minutes, take those lists away and give them a grocery shopping list. Ask them which store they should go to for the best prices. Older people out perform younger people even though this is clearly a memory test.
Little kids are geniuses at learning languages, but not so smart at learning to avoid danger. So, is the 6 year old a genius because he can pick up a new language super fast, or a fool because you need to constantly watch him to keep him from doing something he is told over and over again is dangerous and only seems to learn if he is injured?
Well, first of all, this is not Earth technology. Most Charr machines would just sit there or immediately break in real life. The choppers are probably the worst. The most effective way to use it would be to let the enemy surround it and turn it on and let the ensuing flying debris hurt the enemy.
However, just because they have other machines for transport does not mean they are cost effective. Automobiles were favored over horses in real life because they required less care, did not panic and did not produce droppings. It was not until automobiles had been around a long time that they became cost effective with respect to horses. Automobiles use denser fuel and have more compact engines than the steam tech the Charr are aesthetically based on (emphasizing aesthetics, because it is clear that these machines would not perform well if at all IRL). Transporting cargo by air has never, ever been cost effective compared to ground transport. Air freight is used when time is more valuable than fuel or weight. Helicopters are not cost efficient compared to airplanes, either. Airplanes are most efficient when they reach very high altitudes where wind resistance is low.
There is no good IRL reason why the Charr should not be using rails. They are clearly willing to splurge on producing excessive metal for purposes where wood or stone would be much cheaper, low maintenance and last longer IRL. Rails are economical even with using pack animals to pull cars (the earliest railroads were drawn by pack animals IRL, dating back to ancient times). However, I have seen no indication that ANet has given much thought or care to realistic economic considerations, either.
Best just to assume that with the available magic and differences in Tyrian physics, biology, etc. v. real universe, this all somehow makes sense.
Only a guardian replaces a sword and shield with a hammer when he wants to fight more defensively.
Only a guardian protects his allies by falling on them.
Only a guardian would throw a bonfire on you or blast you with a blowtorch to stop you from burning.
Only a guardian would think “I still have 4000 health left. I’ll use my heal skill if I need it.”
Only a guardian is chasing the elite boss around with a club and a flower while the other players are trying to run away from it.
Only a guardian would say “I can give everyone in the party stability, but only for 28 of the next 31 seconds” and think he is not doing much.
Only a guardian says he wishes the monster would attack him instead of the ranger’s pet.
Only a guardian thinks karkas’ quintuple-shot attacks makes them easy to farm.
They are not the same. They deal with the Orders past level 20 because the story calls for your character to join an order. The level 21-30 order story lines are definitely not the same for the different races. If they stayed as diverse past level 20 that they were before 20, they would have had to say at some point, “by the way, join one of these 3 groups you know so little about.”
I’ve seen monsters respawn right after I’ve killed them, so the timers are often 30 seconds or less.
I think the timer is independent of kill time. I have seen this as well, but after defeating the respawn, nothing appear again. So, for example, an enemy on a 100s timer:
9:00:00 – repsawn if defeated
9:01:40 – repsawn if defeated
9:03:20 – repsawn if defeated
If you defeat it at 9:01:35, it respawns right away. If you defeat the second at 9:02:15, you don’t see the next enemy for 65 seconds. If, on the other hand, you defeated it at 9:01:45, you would not see another enemy for 95 seconds. This is consistent with my experiences in almost every non-dynamic event part of the game.
I did notice the Inquest seem to respawn much faster, as Jeff confirmed early in the thread.
Obviously Tyria works differently than Earth, so comparisons only mean so much. That said, suppose Ascalon and Kryta had roughly the population equivalents of 11th century England and France (roughly 5 million). Suppose Orr sent a huge army of 10,000. Some of them died in the bloody war, so let’s say 8,000 were left. This means Orrians consisted of 0.16% of the population (about 1 in 800). They were presumably left destitute with no land and no family connections in Kryta and struggling with the natives in a seared Ascalon. Likely most never had children. How many would you expect to be around about 260 years later?
Many of the non-[Group] events I see listed here I have successfully soloed. I have not been successful 100% of the time and often it takes so long that it is not really worth it*, but they can be soloed.
*E.g., most clearing camps in Malchor’s Leap fall under this category.
All true. But the sturdiness of the Pride is clearly demonstrated in the fight with Zhaitan. It can stay in the air even when big chunks of it are missing. So yes, maybe it does use toddlers as fuel. But it sure is sturdy enough to weather a storm or a dozen, if it can survive a direct hit from a flying mountain.
Zhaitan is much smaller than a mountain. A tiny moutain is a thousand meters across at the base. The danger of a crosswind = cross sectional area/mass. I remember driving across the midwest during a windstorm and seeing tractor trailers lying on their sides more than 20 meters from the sides of the road. The largest bull elephant, or even something several times the size of a bull elephant, could not do that if it charged into them, but it probably could if it charged into a Miata which would have no trouble with a windstorm. The size that makes a large airship more sturdy to attack would make it more vulnerable to crosswinds and turbulence (if we used Real Life physics, anyway).
To state a few obvious things: Tyrian Airships are clearly not like Zepplins. Even if the metal were enchanted to be as light as balsa wood and the balloons were filled with vacuum, they don’t displace nearly enough air mass to maintain buoyancy (by the same token, Charr choppers are clearly not like Earth helicopters, Tyrian trebuchets are clearly not like Earth trebuchets and don’t even get me started on some of those weapon and armor skins…). Either physics is different in Tyria and/or magic is involved.
We have no idea what Tyrian Airship range is. We don’t know if it can withstand turbulence or crosswinds. We don’t know if the pilots can survive extended periods on board. For that matter, maybe even the builders don’t know. “See how far you can fly out to sea before you crash.” – Not such a good idea.
Any technology made from unobtanium that the creators are smart enough to not specify otherwise has the range of plot, travels at the speed of plot, has the firepower of plot, is as expensive as plot and generally conveniently fits the needs of plot in every possible way.
Trahearne is pretty tough. The problem is missions with NPCs are scaled up, so if they go wrong the NPCs will get ganked no matter how tough they are, and you got to work through them. I gnereally focus more on keeping the NPCs alive than killing and they work out. Most of the time…
Why would a Norn listen to the Pale Tree? The same reason a Norn would agree to listen to non-Norn Orders. It might have something useful to tell you.
Why was your Norn not impressed with the the Pale Tree? She had just shown you a vision of the future, let you talked with a centuries-dead king and showed you the layout of Zhaitan’s home turf. Furthermore, you are talking to a single being who had spawned an entire race. Not the ancestor of an entire race. The sole parent of an entire race. If a Norn is not impressed by those feats, then I question if your character thinks like the typical Norn. The Pale Tree is skald A-list material.
Except the quaggan are slow-moving melees that tend to walk back and forth inside AoE during the mission where they “help” you. The hylek were okay, the grawl kicked butt and the skritt ripped the risen to shreds. The grawl arc was pretty funny, too, listening to grawl argue about whose god was greater.
I really only PvE and Dungeon, so I cannot speak for sPVP or Wv3. If you want to get into PUGs, pick a profession that PUGs like (elementalist, guardian, warrior, engineer) or prepare to get passed over more often.
Ranger’s largest issues are (1) an unusually large number of still unresolved bugs and (2) your class feature (pet) is an AI and suffers from AI stupidity. Also, (3) F2 pet skill is usually not responsive within a 2 second window. You can deal with 3 by picking a pet whose skill is more forgiving of bad timing (e.g. black bear weakness, jungle stalker might or fernhound regeneration). Deal with #2 by being aware of when the AI will make a bad decision and be ready to deal with it. #1 will be worked out eventually.
Like other professions, certain skills are not easy to use to good effect (looking at you spirits), but can be effective after you learn when/how to use them. The ranger doesn’t have many no-brainer, easy to learn utility skills. Signets and Lightning Reflexes are easy standbys, but more so than guardians, necromancers, elementalists and mesmers (my other mains), there is no utility set that is both awesome and easy to use. Be prepared to be disappointed a lot by utilities during a longer than usual learning curve.
Other than that, the same general rules for every profession: learn all your weapon sets, when they are effective and, more importantly, when they are not the most effective choice. Learn when to stand your ground, when to dodge and when to run (which can be so different for each profession).
I try to solo [Group Event]s frequently and usually fail. However, those are clearly labeled for groups. I usually check if it is a group or solo event. The clearing Quandry Scratch of Nightmare Court event in Mount Maelstrom doesn’t look solo-able, at least on any of my level 80 characters. I don’t recall it being labeled [Group Event].
That said, I feel many events are not worth the time you spend to solo them. Sinking the Ash Horizon was done eventually, but it was rough and long.
Early in the game, during my early learning curve, I was not able to solo most Dynamic Events, but have soloed several of those on newer characters after learning more about playing (e.g., the Flame Legion Shaman in Plains of Ashford).
The Maguuma Jungle became the Maguuma Wastes when it dried out a lot during the period between GW1 and GW2. A dragon is suspected. Maybe the centaurs abandoned Maguuma for their homelands a la the Charr in Ascalon.
The longest cutaway scenes are less than 3 minutes, and you can skip any of them. Most are far shorter. There are occasionally issues with 2 people doing a PS together, and there are threads dedicated to these specific problems. File a bug report if you are having problems. Progress blocking happens in online games. GW1 had few, but there were almost no options.
GW2 makes it harder for people to miss the story entirely. In GW1, a common complaint I heard was “this makes no sense.” Like in the Nolani Academy mission, despite the fact it was explained in the handbook, by the soldiers in Fort Ranik, on at least 3 quests and partially explained in the Nolani mission itself, on multiple occasions I heard players saying a rainstorm helped defeating the Charr was “stupid” or “made no sense” (the city was burning down, and the Charr’s power came from their magical fires). Personally I like them explaining why we are doing what we are doing, rather than a random string of quests.
I understand the logic behind it. However, that last mission is very often an array of really stupid choices. For example, in the human storyline, there is absolutely no reason given why they cannot protect the queen using both Vigil troops and the mortis verge. That was setting the mission up to fail.* Still, in a Sylvari mission, I went with an Order of Whispers plan and the Vigil said they would have troops standing by in case we failed. Makes sense. Why could no reason be given to exercise multiple plans? It would have been a simple matter of saying:
“The Risen are attacking on multiple fronts to distract the Seraph while sneaking 3 forces into Divinty’s Reach. They are sneaking in here, here and entering the Queens’ chamber. [Name], the order you choose will defend the Queen while the other two will take care of the other locations.” Then, it would have made sense.
This reminded me of getting a DVD and watching “Deleted Scenes” and saying, “Oh, including that 45 second scene makes the protagonist’s action make so much more sense!” I often try to pick out where scenes were deleted and zero in on scenes where characters make huge logic leaps or do something that does not exactly make sense, and if this were a movie I would pick that scene.
I let this pass and not interfere with my enjoyment of the game, but a little more thought could have gone into making that last choice make more sense without changing the mission at all.
*That one was especially vivid for me because the mission bugged and the fighting continued during the cinematic. When the cinematic ended, the first set of guards had nearly all fallen and I was fighting what was clearly a larger group than I would be intended to fight solo.
SPOILER ALERT…
Once again, I’m not necessarily talking about main characters. The bomb expert, the guy with the dog, the sylvari who marks the giant-making machine, the norn who guards the door and gets turned to risen… are all only in about one story step each…they are introduced and killed. I felt nothing at all when I was sent to explain to the bomb experts wife…no connection. It just seemed annoying and artificial. I knew he was only added so that he could die… they really serve no purpose and there’s no emotional connection. All the rambling Trahearne does about this or that person and their death meaning something…it just ends up being annoying and repetitive when I never got a chance to know the characters.
I don’t think someone introduced during a battle and dying is dramatic effect. People die in wars, there are ambushes, Zhaitan corrupts… It is like a TV show episode where the story needs deaths, so they intorduce someone in order to not kill a major character. Generals going on about the deaths meaning something is a hallmark of real world history. Ever watched a press conference of a general when he talks about the casualties? Or read any generals’ war memoirs? ANet just has Trahearne acting like real world generals in the face of casualties.
Oh, I mentioned the “bomb expert,” Thom, who was the only named character in that storyline to die. I remember the guy with the dog but note he was the only major character in the story arc to die, and it contained a BUNCH of major characters who were introduced and given names. I did not go through the other stories you are talking about.
(edited by JohnLShannonhouse.1820)
Also, in the Quaggan personal storyline: Quaggan, sounding personally hurt and insulted: “The Jotun are Foo, and won’t share with Quaggan” You: “The Jotun are Foo, alright.”
The Grawl comparing their various gods in that racial sympathy storyline was funny. Demmi Beetlestone: “Now I know why it’s called the Order of Whispers. Nobody would brag about this plan.” The “Blacked Out” during a moot Norn personal storyline. Anything involving your friend Lord Faren in the human noble personal storyline. Several parts of Asuran Statics storyline: from the Snaff prize: “If entries that nearly killed us all were disqualified, it’d be a pretty lonely contest.” During the atmospheric invention storyline, Zojja says something along the line of if he embarrasses the Council, or even if he only kills a few of them, the result would be chaos. If your sparring partner in the Charr storyline is Reeva, she is always good for laughs. The Snarl and Galina dynamic is entertaining in the Iron Legion storyline and the Vigil storyline.
Note: Spoilers follow
It would be helpful if you listed the people that die. Your Order mentor dies and there are a few others: Howl, from the Charr storyline, Thom or Apaia, depending on your Greatest Fear choice, some long-running enemies in various dungeons, etc. However, the human storyline sister never dies. Demie Beetlestone, higher ranking Order members, new warband recruits and your sparring partner from the Charr storyline, the leader of the racial sympathy group, the person you recruit for your order after losing Claw Island, etc. all survive. My Sylvari killed the one his Dream sent him to help in the Sylvari storyline, but that was a choice on my part (save the village, v. possibly save one person from making a bad personal choice).
I found that ANet has used death sparingly. Maybe 1/4th to 1/3rd of the major characters in your personal story end up dying in a war against a world-destroying enemy.
You know, Jay, went I went to the thief forum to get questions answered about my thief, one of the things I looked at was stealth. It was not working for me as advertised. I read what some people posted and figured out other stealth mechanics. Now it works well. Yet, on the thief forum, you will find people complaining:
Complainer: Stealth rarely/never works!
Helpful poster: Try A
Complainer: A doesn’t work! Stealth never works!
Helpful poster #2: Try B
Complainer: B doesn’t work! Stealth almost never works!
Yet, I have seen both A and B work and use B myself…
I have rallied myself from downed using uninterrupted skill #4 with the aid of the pet and watched the pet take damage from the enemies surrounding us, yet you insist that does not happen. I have used stone spirit in dungeons with AoE flying about and in nearly 50% of cases, it has lasted its full 60 seconds, yet you insist otherwise. I have watched people using blocks or stealths try to rescue a downed player near AoE using enemies have to retreat, while the pet stood there the entire time and kept the player alive, yet you insist otherwise.
As far as I can tell, you are a player that won’t try what others say and won’t try to figure out how a mechnic works. You are no different from those that say stealth never works, with weapon set X half your attunements are useless and warriors cannot stay standing long enough to do any real damage in dungeons. Those are simply untrue. I have seen them. I have done it. I have trouble taking your claims of comparing other professions I have played less as credible when you insist the very things I have seen don’t happen.
3. Search and Rescue scales HORRIBLY at the higher levels. Using this move at 80+ and in dungeons is such a waste of time and only slightly useful at high level Jade Maw. Using it anywhere else is a waste of a utility bar. Oh and Lick Wounds is good if it works; and if it works then there’s even more of a chance a mob will go after to you since your pet is on top of you. I’m better off with a thief for reviving
4. Pets can’t tank in dungeons AT ALL unless you do 30 in BM;
6. Nature Spirit is killable. It also takes you out of the battle to summon it in a safe position. Even then when you do summon it in a decent position, most likely than not, your allies will not get the benefits of it… meaning the passive and the active.
If I know I will need to frequently revive other players, ranger is my best choice. The elite healing spirit is excellent healing support and a free revive. Search and Rescue works well in areas where I am being pounded by AoE. Pet dying is less of a big deal (usually) than me being downed. Sure, Thieves are sometimes better, but not always. If times of AoE damage pressure, stealth does not help. If it does help, it only helps as long as stealth stays up. The pet often takes ranged and melee pressure off the downed character because they attack the pet. Sorry if you had bad luck with Search and Rescue. I used to think the same about it until I was in Twilight Arbor Fwd/Fwd (ouchies) with a ranger going support and she saved us with it multiple times
Pets can tank fine in dungeons with 15 in beast mastery. They are great at taking damage pressure off of other players. If they are dropping too fast and my swap is not recharged, I put them on passive. The enemy either chases the pet (meaning it is not attacking the party) or it redirects fire and allows my pet to recover. Sure, my guardian and necromancer tank much better, but if the pet is defeated it is not a problem like if my guardian and necromancer down. If pets could tank like a guardian, they would have to be nerfed.
I carry stone spirit frequently. It lasts an average of about 45 seconds in dungeons (never more than 60 seconds when it expires naturally). I put it down if I happen to be standing in a good place for it. I almost never run off to place it. If I am running off to place it, we REALLY need it. It keeps protection up on the party better than my guardian can. Also, if the spirit dies from non-AoE (which is often), I do not mind because the enemies are attacking my spirit instead of a party member. I also watch my party member’s boons (played monk often in GW1 and and used to looking at my fellow party members) and yes, they do benefit from it.
Warhammer is so not portraying humans as ancient or being pushed aside. They’re the youngest of the races of civilisation and the only one that isn’t portrayed as having been in decline ever since a golden age that predated human civilisation.
I was being generic. I mentioned various stories that strayed from the Tolkein or young humanity model. In “I Am Legend,” as far as the reader knows there is one human left and everybody fears him as a super intelligent, deadly primordial monster. In “Gamma World” humans are the ancient race and the others are new. In “Warhammer,” humanity is one of several races declining and being inescapably pushed towards extinction and many races are newer than humans. Sorry if that was not clear.
I have found with 15 points in beast mastery that my pet survives well. There are situations when it falls like being badly outnumbered or facing a hard-hitting champion.
Ridiculous physics and biology are part of the game. Just look at the charr choppers. But going with this particular example…
Realistic speeds for the animals that do exist would just not be fun at all. Even under +33% speed if you were an Olympic sprinter (<10 meters per second raised to about 13m/s by swiftness), you would easily be caught by all the cats (24 m/s), dogs (15m/s) and bears (15 m/s) (not that they chase humans). Ditto if moas could run like ostriches (20 m/s). You would never, ever be able to out swim any of the fish or bears, and the jellyfish would never reach the enemy before the battle was over.
However, assuming centaurs run at horse speeds (about 12m/s), the swiftness catch phrase “I could outrun a centaur” would be accurate, at least if you were starting as fast as an Olympic sprinter.
I would like to know what my pets boons and especially conditions are. This is extra true in large group events where I cannot necessarily see my pet or its damage. Is it immobilized or crippled? Blinded? And I hate it when that F2 attack misses because the pet was, well, who knows why? I just know it went off and the condition did not appear on the enemy.
“Order of Whispers is way too obvious to be a secret order. Everyone knows of them, they wear clothing that’s rather obvious to spot, even outside their hideout and letting newbies save hostages?”
It might help if you looked from the perspective of the average Tyrian. You were introduced to an Order representative, so they were not so secret to you. Just because people know a secret group exists doesn’t mean they know where to find them. I have heard of the Hong Kong mafia. They are still secret to me. The Order wore recognizable outfits while working with the Pact. Although Tybalt was a newbie, your character was not and had just run a series of successful missions. Tybalt knew the Order, but your character knew how to rescue people. Furthermore, you should consider the possibility that they thought Beetlestone was lost and sent out a couple of expendables to try and find her just in case she was not. Tybalt also went ahead with a rescue although he probably should have reported back to Order HQ.
“somehow they work without destroying everything despite being untested”
This has a long tradition in comics, many kinds of science fiction, in fantasy and on TV shows such as A-Team and McGuyver. It is just running with the genre. In real life this would be a very, very bad idea.
(edited by JohnLShannonhouse.1820)
Sometimes it is painfully clear that I am listening to a recording and not listening to someone talking to my character. It hurts the suspension of disbelief/immersion in the game world. During the Asura storyline, the Asura display a casual attitude towards the idea that experiments sometimes kill researchers and bystanders. However, in the Priory storyline my Asura talks about how reckless testing an invention where it could hurt other people was. A sylvari tells my human that Grenth is the human god of death.
I suggest for every bit of spoken dialogue in the future, ANet chooses at least 2 cases where the dialogue changes to reflect who they are talking to. For example, a story about trial by combat you might choose different dialogue for a Norn (telling the difference between this trial and Norn trials) and Order of Whispers (talking about how the Order used to rig these trials).
It is straightforward if you are playing a charr. Blood Legion fights straight up, Iron Legion invents, Ash Legion subverts and Vigil fights straight up, Priory invents and Whispers subverts. I liked all 3 after joining them. However, I found Priory off-putting when Gixx said my Asura did not think like an Asura, and my Asura expressed very non-Asuran attitudes about using inventions* (kind of like when Trahearne lectures my human characters on human culture).
*compared to what was said in the Snaff’s prize competition
I found all 3 problematic in racial storylines. Usually the one I wanted to join had the stupidest plan in the last mission (Priory defend Queen mission in human line bugged, too, the risen had killed all the support by the end of the cutscene). Often I did not understand why we had to choose one when we could have easily done 2 plans at no extra risk, or even reduced risk. Why not have Vigil soldiers and Priory Mortis Dirge defending the Queen?
I often group with friends. However, for the personal storyline I have often had to act deliberately non-socially.
At the end of the storyline in Timberline Falls where you meet the smiths and rescue the Priory team, Trahearne gives you your next mission based on a choice you made talking to the Avatar of the Pale Tree. However, you must take the leader’s choice or redo the mission. This is fairly common in personal storylines. If you do not care what storyline paths you take, this is fine. I try to experience all content and read all storylines. The game should not punish you for grouping like this. Other grouping in storyline punishment issues:
1. You lose your choices about your storyline, or have to redo it (see above).
2. Other players step on the dialogue. When I did the grawl mission, grawl would start a dialogue and the party leader barged ahead and started the cut scene and immediately ended it. I asked to restart so I could see all the dialogue and we did restart, but he only allowed us to see the cut scenes and cut off the individual dialogues. I would prefer the freedom to watch all the flavor dialogue and the cut scenes. Unfortunately, this almost invariably means playing alone.
3. Other players step on the dialogue, part 2. Only the party leader can read the dialogue boxes. They often rush through them. I have no idea what the person said or why we are doing what we are doing.
4. Other players step on the dialogue, part 3. Sometimes the enemies are talking and the other players do not let them finish. (This is the least problematic issue for me since it is omnipresent in multiplayer games.)
5. NPCs are crushed in multiplayer personal storyline. Some PS missions have groups of NPCs supporting you. In some missions (I am looking at you, Blacked Out During a Moot) the NPC support is a crucial balancing factor. But the NPCs do not seem to scale or don’t scale as fast as the enemies, causing you to get crushed under a tide when 3 players are present.
I suggest allowing everyone to choose either the lead player’s or their personal path instead of forcing a repeat. I suggest making the cut scene dialogue independent for each player. I suggest a button you have to press to skip to the next dialogue box to see what the party leader chose. I suggest looking at PS scaling.
Keep up the great work!
I prefer torch as an axe offhand to warhorn. You get a lot of damage from torch and it can be fire and forget with skill #5 (enemies walk into the flames, you shoot or throw across the flames). Skill #4 provides a long lasting, high-damage condition. In groups I prefer warhorn because I can group buff and many other professions lay down fire fields for the combos. For solo PvE, I normally run around with short bow and axe/torch, although I vary this as the situation warrants.
In general, unless you are standing in one place and getting a boon from a symbol, getting swiftness, regeneration, protection or retaliation up 100% of the time or close to 100% is costly in exchange for what you could be getting instead (even from a symbol, too, because you are standing in one place). ANet has clearly worked hard to make you have to think about when you want to use your limited boon time. Getting nearly 100% swiftness is easy with enhanced 2-handed weapon recharge and boon duration using a staff. My general advice to those seeking a boon 100% of the time is it is not worth it. (With 2 guardians working together stacking their boons – that is a different story and often totally worth it.)
You can easily attain continuous regeneration, almost as easily attain continuous protection and can attain pretty good retaliation solo… providing your enemy follows your plan and stands in one place.
I have 2 armor sets. My boon duration set has 2x each of superior water, superior monk and major sanctuary.
In order to make it viable, stack up with the most boon-heavy weapons and utilities. I find shouts and standing in symbols* with the writ of persistence trait especially nice for this. Hammer with +50% boon duration and writ of persistence can keep up protection indefinitely with skill #1, and you use skill #2 for the retaliation combo when it comes up.*
Duo guardians with boon durations, boons that stack by adding durations and the correct skills and weapons can keep up protection, regeneration and retaliation continuously or nearly so.*
*With the obvious limitation that you are standing in one place. Having protection and regeneration continuously makes standing in one place less hazardous, but it is not always possible even with the champion hitting you for 6000 damage a pop instead of 9000 a pop. When you need protection and regeneration the most, you will not be standing in one place.
(edited by JohnLShannonhouse.1820)
I felt the game should have treated humans in GW2 like the forgotten in GW1: an ancient race with many strange, powerful magics and secrets who used to rule a lot more territory than they do now. I think GW2’s take on humans had more to do with making room for other races and providing the devastation necessary for lots of lands to adventure and fight in.
GW2 is certainly not the first game or setting to portray humans as ancient or being pushed aside in games or stories (e.g., Warhammer fantasy, Gamma World, I Am Legend novel). It is not the first game where players had to play humans (Ultima 5 and later, and probably others, as well).