Guild Wars 2

Build 2/26/13 February Content Update Release Notes
LIVING STORY
Flame and Frost: The Gathering Storm
The situation is getting worse for the citizens of Wayfarer Foothills and Diessa Plateau. Volunteers are helping to ease the burden, but more refugees are hobbling down from the Shiverpeaks. The storm there is gaining momentum, but the forces of good are beginning to rally. They’re sending their heroes to defend the land and its inhabitants. Someone must hold back the gathering storm.
In “Flame and Frost: The Gathering Storm,” the second installment in this four-part series, the stakes are raised, and battles rage, in the foothills of the Shiverpeaks.

Achievements

• Two new achievements, The Gathering Storm and Lost and Found, have been added to the Living Story category.

Events

• The refugees’ oppressors are becoming more aggressive and have shown their faces in Wayfarer Foothills and Diessa Plateau. The refugees need qualified adventurers even more!

General

• Camps in Hoelbrak and the Black Citadel have become crowded. As a result, the refugees have begun moving on to Lion’s Arch.
• Refugees arriving in Lion’s Arch have lost on the road precious objects from their homes. The objects will be difficult to find, but the refugees are more likely to tell their stories to the helpful adventurer who recovers their possessions.
• All content from “Flame and Frost: Prelude” continues, and the Refugee Volunteer achievement can still be earned.

NEW FEATURES AND CONTENT
Achievements

• You can now select the five daily achievements from a list that you will complete to receive the daily reward.
• You can now select which achievements are tracked on the right hand side of the screen through the Achievement tab on the Hero panel.
• The amount of experience given for completion of daily and monthly achievements has been increased.
• Added new daily achievement types.
• Added new rewards to the laurels vendors in all major cities.

Ascalonian Catacombs Explorable

• Many of the encounters in the Ascalonian Catacombs Explorable have been revamped, including all three final boss fights.

Event Scaling

• A new test version of our advanced event scaling algorithm has been applied to four high-level, regularly played events to help us monitor the feasibility of this system in the live environment. This new scaling algorithm dynamically increases the difficulty of events by using the current system of increasing the difficulty of existing creatures, while also adding a new system that substitutes creatures of lower difficulty with different creatures as the event scales up. If successful, this system will be slowly extended to other events across the game during 2013.

Item Preview

• Item preview is now available on the Trading Post. Simply right-click the item you want to preview and then select Preview. The preview panel will open, showing your character with the item equipped.
• When previewing weapons, you may now choose to show the weapon stowed, wielded, or by itself. Use the check boxes at the bottom left of the preview panel to change the view.

Guild Content – Read more about Guild Content updates in the recent blog post.

• New guild upgrades are available.
• The guild mission system has been implemented and includes the ability to earn merits.
• Added new Guild Bounty, Guild Trek, Guild Rush, Guild Challenge, and Guild Puzzle mission types.
• Added new personal rewards for participating in guild missions. These rewards can be purchased with commendations.
• Banner art on existing guild upgrades has been updated.

Structured Player vs. Player – Read more about the new Structured PvP map in the recent blog post.

• A new map, Spirit Watch, is available.

Reward Updates

• Credit for killing creatures is now easier to receive in situations when many players are attacking a single target.
• Increased the loot rewards on many world boss chests, including the chests in Orr temples and the dragon chests.
• Fixed a bug on certain world boss chests that was causing them to drop fewer rewards than intended. These chests can now only be looted once per day, to encourage players to fight multiple bosses and spread out across the world.
• Introduced five new stat combos on Ascended Rings and Amulets, which can be found in the usual locations for these items.

BALANCE, BUG-FIXING, POLISH
World Polish
General

• Updated skillsets for several krait and undead creatures to make them more entertaining to fight.
• Daily achievement tracker now preserves expansion state.
• Changed the way monsters react to players using stealth.
• Eased the restrictions on global leash time.
• Fixed a bug that caused loot chests to spawn incorrectly during group play. Loot chests are now created for items of rarity “rare” and above.
• Fixed a bug where equipment would be destroyed when the player unequips it while encumbered.
• Fixed an error in the Mystic Forge recipes for the exotic level 80 Berserker and Rampager heavy armor box crafting recipes.
• Fixed a bug where backpack pieces on players in transformations would render at an incorrect location.
• Fixed most cases of a bug where players would be stuck auto-running when attempting to pick up a bundle.
• Carmel, the karma merchant in Mount Maelstrom, now sells armor of levels appropriate for the region.
• Added recipes to craft armor boxes and satchels for the Apothecary’s and Giver’s armor sets.
• The door blocking access to the cabbage farm in Harathi Hinterlands should no longer block access when opened.
• Fixed a bug that was causing display issues with rotational achievements.
• The achievement tracker now has an updated UI and behaves differently.
• Lesser air elementals now have legs and a tail.
• Added support for positional audio with the Mumble voice-chat application.

Events

• Bloodtide Coast: Healing turrets created by Lionguard Scratchblade now vanish after 60 seconds.
• Diessa Plateau: Added more fixes to the cowapult to keep it from becoming permanently unusable.
• Queensdale: Fixed a bug in the “Shadow Behemoth” meta-event where the portals could become untargetable.
• Malchor’s Leap: Fixed the event “Destroy corrupted eggs and stop the spread of Risen drakes” so that, after the event is successfully completed, the eggs will no longer respawn until the event restarts.
• Harathi Hinterlands: Fixed a bug in the event “Defend the skritt thieves while they steal harpy eggs” so that skritt thieves are now resurrectable, and the event should restart correctly after success or failure.
• Spears wielded by corrupted Sons of Svanir will no longer persist in the world after the Sons die underwater.
• Timberline Falls: Fixed a bug in the “Partake in the moot” region so that passed-out drunks should no longer enter a comatose state where they ignore being splashed by water.
• Wayfarer Foothills: Fixed a blocking bug in “The Frozen Maw” meta-event where Scholar Brogun could die between events.
• Plains of Ashford: Fixed a blocking bug in the “Kill the Separatists before they destroy the Iron Barracuda” event.
• Fixed three blocking issues with the Temple of Balthazar escort event chains in Straits of Devastation.

Dungeons
Ascalonian Catacombs

• Improved the skills on the hidden cave troll boss.
• Additional ghostly allies will now join Kholer during his encounter.
• Removed breeders from the possible graveling burrows spawns during Hodgins’ search for the first scepter.
• Rebalanced the graveling dungeon army to make them more interesting and fun to fight.
• Revamped the Ghost Eater fight to include Detha’s traps.
• Revamped the Colossus Rumblus fight to give him new skills and abilities.
• Revamped the Howling King encounter and made changes to his army.
• Adjusted the health of dungeon creatures and bosses.
• Explorable mode: Fixed a trap in the hallway from the room with the spider queen to the central chamber so that the trap will now turn off properly.

Caudecus’s Manor

• Story: Added a waypoint toward the end of the dungeon.

Citadel of Flame

• Added safety nets to the lava fields around Tribune Burntclaw and around Magmacyte that will teleport players who die from lava exposure to a safe location.

Crucible of Eternity

• Added a safety net for players who die in lava at the boss fight with the Evolved Destroyer so that they will be teleported to a safe location to be resurrected.
• Laser grid will no longer hurt dead players, allowing them to resurrect at the nearby shrine in safety.
• Explorable: Fixed a bug where thieves and mesmers could teleport through closed doors and trigger events prematurely.

The Ruined City of Arah

• Explorable: Reduced the amount of healing Simin does while she is stealthed.
• Fixed a bug with Giganticus Lupicus resetting combat immediately after players stealth.
• Story: Fixed an issue where creatures would not spawn during the fight with Zhaitan.

Twilight Arbor

• Explorable: Added and modified existing waypoints.
• Explorable: Removed a branch that players could stand on to exploit the final boss.

Sorrow’s Embrace

• Story: Players will now teleport to a safe location if they die in lava.

Honor of the Waves

• Explorable: Fixed an issue where Honor’s Claw would repeat himself when speaking of his lost sons. He has since overcome his grief and will carry on to the fight against the minions of Jormag without stuttering.

Personal Story

• “Deeply Tangled Roots”: Fixed a bug where the final scene was not changing based on player choice.
• “Source of Orr”: Fixed a blocking bug if players killed the Eye while it was trying to teleport away.

Items

• Updated the Superior Rune of the Soldier’s sixth bonus to properly remove a condition from allies affected by the shout.
• Updated the Superior Rune of the Rata Sum’s fifth bonus to correctly give 90 precision.
• Updated the Superior Rune of the Pack’s third bonus to correctly give 50 power.
• Added a 40-second recharge to the skill given by the Depleted Power Crystal item sold in Caledon Forest.
• Transmuted items can now be dyed back to their original colors.
• Black Peppercorns no longer drop from Mature Herb and Verdant Herb nodes.
• The Caudecus’s Manor vendor in Lion’s Arch now correctly offers the Major Rune of the Noble.
• The Charged, Hard, Warm, and Cold Potions are no longer Soulbound on acquire.
• Renamed rare armors from Dungeon reward vendors to appropriately reflect their models.
• Increased the drop rate of Passion Flowers from Passiflora Vines.
• Hovering over a currency icon within vendor UI will now identify that currency.
• Fixed a number of Mystic Forge recipes that had a chance of returning nothing. Zommoros apologizes for his thievery.
• The Extended Potion of Ghost Slaying recipe now makes the correct potion.
• Increased the stat bonuses on Ascended all-stat items.
• Updated numerous item icons.
• Increased the drop rate of exotics in the profession gear boxes sold by laurel vendors.
• Ranger gear boxes no longer drop rifles.
• Food items that give special bonuses upon a critical hit now have an internal cooldown before they can produce the special bonus again.

Profession Skills
General

• Using stealth no longer resets NPC aggression tables.
• Reduced the number of maximum of stacks of Retaliation allowed to five (was 25). Duration still stacks.
• Cleaned up hit detection for melee attacks targeting inanimate objects.
• Fixed a bug where players would sometimes become rooted after cancelling meteor shower, healing rain, or similar skills.
• Signets will no longer lose their passive effects when changing slots on the utility bar.
• Frost Aura: Incoming damage is reduced by 10% while under the effects of this aura. Enemies are only able to be chilled by this aura once per second. This affects all frost auras.
• Flame Aura: In addition to the burning condition, this aura now grants 10 seconds of might each time the player is struck. This aura can activate only once per second. This change affects all flame auras.

Elementalist

• Comet: This ability’s strike now occurs faster upon casting.
• Evasive Arcana: The spell cast while in water attunement has been split between PvE and PvP. This spell’s effectiveness with the healing attribute has been reduced by 50% while in PvP.
• Flame Shield: This skill now lasts 5 seconds instead of 3.
• Flame Wall: The combat region for combo interactions has been increased.
• Glyph of Elemental Harmony: This healing skill now grants three stacks of might when used in fire attunement instead of one.
• Ride the Lightning: This ability’s recharge has been increased to 20 seconds.
• Shocking Aura: Updated this ability to indicate its cooldown on stunning enemies.
• Stoning: This ability’s projectile speed has been increased by 22%.
• Static Field: This field will now properly stun enemies that cross it rather than merely dazing them.

Engineer

• Stow Med Kit: Now works in PvE.
• Elixir U: Quickness is now consistent at 5 seconds.
• Acid Bomb: This ability is now a blast finisher at the start of the ability.
• Super Elixir: Now detonates properly underwater.
• Super Elixir: Increased impact base healing as well as scaling with healing power by 100%. Increased base heal multiplier by 50% and healing power scaling by 100%.
• Flame Blast: This ability is now able to be detonated by a secondary ability.
• Flame Blast Detonate: This new ability will detonate the napalm ball that is launched by Flame Blast.
• Air Blast: This ability now extends burning duration of enemies that are already burning by 2 seconds.
• Flame Jet: This ability now deals an extra 10% damage to burning enemies.
• Pry Bar: Increased the number of confusion applications from three to five and increased duration of confusion from 3 to 5 seconds.
• Tool Kit: Abilities that heal turrets have had their potency increased by 100%.
• Kit Refinement: This trait now has an internal cooldown of 10 seconds globally for Flamethrower, Elixir Gun, Grenade Kit, and Tool Kit.

Guardian

• Pure of Voice: This trait has been fixed to always properly convert conditions into boons.
• Smite: Now displays a radius skill fact.
• Empower: This ability now casts faster. Fixed a bug that caused this skill to heal twice.
• Healing Breeze: Angle of this ability has been increased so that allies are easier to hit.
• Hold the Line: This shout’s range has been reduced to 600, making it consistent with other shouts. It now properly affects allies within its full radius.
• Line of Warding: This ability’s animation has changed and can now be cast while on the move.
• Orb of Light: This ability now heals allies it passes through.
• Orb of Light Detonate: Increased this ability’s scaling with healing power by 50% and reduced its level scaling by 20%.
• Shield of Absorption: Added a skill fact to the healing portion of this ability.
• Symbol of Wrath: Increased the size of the combo field on this ability to cover the whole visual area.
• Bow of Truth: The health of this spirit has been increased by 30%.
• Hammer of Wisdom: The health of this spirit has been increased by 33%.
• Sword of Justice: The health of this spirit has been increased by 30%.
• Shield of the Avenger: The health of this spirit has been increased by 30%.

Mesmer

• Illusionary Counter: The range of the reactive part of this ability is now consistent with its indicated range.
• Mesmer Portals can no longer be interacted with when there is an obstruction between them and the player.
• Mind Stab: This skill will now hit up to three targets.
• Illusionary Riposte: The reactionary strike that occurs when this skill blocks an attack now has the correct distance of the ability instead of half the distance. Added a ranged fact to this skill.
• Mirror: This healing skill now applies reflection for 2 seconds instead of 1.
• The Prestige: This ability is no longer channeled and will automatically detonate 3 seconds after the ability is used.

Necromancer

• Bloodthirsty: This trait now functions with the Vampiric Rituals and Vampiric Master traits.
• Flesh of the Master: This trait now properly affects Jagged Horrors.
• Ghastly Claws: Damage from this ability has been increased by ~10%.
• Locust Swarm: The radius of this ability has been increased by ~16% and now has the range of a normal melee ability.
• Mark of Revival: This trait now functions with the Greater Marks trait.
• Minion Master: This trait now affects Mark of Horror from the necromancer’s Lich Form.
• Necromantic Corruption: This trait now functions with Bone Fiend, Shadow Fiend, Flesh Wurm, and Jagged Horror.
• Protection of the Horde: This trait now functions with Jagged Horror minions.
• Rending Claws: Vulnerability application from this ability have been increased from 5 seconds to 7 seconds.
• Spectral Wall: This skill’s combo field will now appear where the wall is instead of on top of the necromancer.
• Spinal Shivers: This ability now deals bonus damage for each boon that it removes. One boon removed deals 50% extra damage, two boons deals 100% extra, and three boons removed will grant an extra 150% damage to the ability.
• Chill of Death: This trait now deals bonus damage for each boon that it removes. One boon removed deals 50% extra damage, two boons deals 100% extra, and three boons removed will grant an extra 150% damage to the ability.
• Spiteful Vigor: This trait now functions with racial abilities Prayer to Dwayna and Healing Seed.
• Summon Blood Fiend: This minion’s healing effect has been increased by ~80%.
• Weakening Shroud: This trait now applies two stacks of bleeding to be consistent with the Enfeebling Blood weapon skill.

Ranger

• Guard: Pets will no longer guard areas that should be inaccessible to them.
• Crippling Talon: Cooldown of this ability has been reduced from 18 seconds to 15 seconds.
• Empathic Bond: Fixed a bug that wouldn’t apply transferred conditions to pets. This trait now transfers three conditions to the ranger’s pet every 10 seconds rather than all of them.
• Hawk and Eagle now have their own unique icons instead of sharing one.
• Path of Scars: This ability’s damage has been normalized between traited and non-traited versions. Damage has been increased by 85% when not traited.
• Icy Screech: The White Moa activated ability now applies 3 seconds of Chill, and the skill fact has been updated appropriately.

Thief

• Basilisk Venom: Enemies affected by this ability will now indicate it in their boons and conditions bar.
• Cloak and Dagger: The player can no longer use this ability stack stealth by attacking WvW walls.
• Shadow Shot: This ability now allows the player to move while executing dagger strike portion of the ability.
• Venomous Aura: Activating a venom skill with this trait equipped will now briefly display an indicator ring around the thief.
• Withdraw: This ability now scales 20% better with healing power. Base healing per level has increased by 10%.
• Ankle Shots: This trait now applies a full 3-second cripple.

Warrior

• Vigorous Shouts: This trait has been fixed to properly affect allies within a range of up to 600.
• Updated shouts to display the out-of-range indicator if your target is out of range.
• Last Stand: Added a cooldown to the trait’s description.
• Impale: This ability’s cooldown has been reduced to 15 seconds.
• Pin Down: This ability now applies bleeding to targets that it hits.
• Players wielding Banner of Defense, Discipline, Strength, and Tactics will now strike up to three targets with their Stab ability.
• Smoldering Arrow: This ability is now a full projectile finisher.
• Burst Skills: Damage tooltips now properly reflect equipped weapon damage.
• Vengeance: Controlling a turret while using this ability will no longer prevent camera reset on death.

Racial Skills

• Sylvari: Seed and Turret abilities can now be used in conjunction with one another.
• Asuran Power Suit: This skill will no longer incorrectly remove other transforms from the player.

Structured Player vs. Player
Structured PvP Tournament Changes

• Two-team quick tournaments no longer cost tickets.
• Tournament tickets are no longer needed and can be exchanged at the ticket merchant in the Heart of the Mists. The ticket merchant is located next to the Tournament Master.
• There is now a “Join Solo” button in the tournament browser that automates a single-player tournament entry.

Other Changes

• Changed the default PvP builds for new characters.
• Changed the PvP daily and monthly achievement rewards to include Arcane Slivers, Crystals, and Orbs instead of Tournament Tickets.
• Changed the PvP locker to also store Valkyrie’s Jewels, the remaining rank finisher consumables, and PvP Hall of Monuments reward items.
• Changed gold tournament chests to include several new PvP weapons.
• Fixed an issue that could cause PvP glory rank vendors to not offer PvP Trident Tokens.
• Fixed an issue that could cause several PvP weapons to display the wrong weapon skin.
• Fixed an issue that could cause projectiles to sometimes bounce off capture points.
• Temple of the Silent Storm: Changed Commune to interrupt on teleport, stealth, or invulnerability.
• Temple of the Silent Storm: Fixed a bug that would prevent damage from interrupting the last few seconds of Meditation on Tranquility.
• Legacy of the Foefire: Changed gates to hide their name plates when they are destroyed.
• Raid on the Capricorn: Fixed a bug that would prevent players from earning Skirmisher points.
• Heart of the Mists: Added a Ticket Merchant for exchanging unused Tournament Tickets.
• Party members on opposite teams will no longer be able to see each other when invisible.

World vs. World

• Fixed safety areas that extended too far, which could result in some players keeping their no siege/determined buff.
• Changed the orange swords combat marker to show only if more than 25 people are in combat in the area.
• Fixed a bug with Durios Gulch that could cause guards to spawn on the wrong team.
• Fixed a bug on all Hills Keeps that could cause guards to spawn on the wrong team.
• Fixed an issue that allowed NPCs with Righteous Indignation to still take condition damage.
• Removed the ability to use many karma related items in WvW.

BLACK LION TRADING COMPANY GEM STORE
New Items

• The Plush Charr Backpack Cover is now available in the Style category of the Gem Store for 300 gems each. This backpack cover can be applied to any PvE backslot item, or it can be converted to a permanent PvP item. This backpack cover also comes with a basic backslot item with no stats that the Plush Charr Backpack Cover can be applied to.
• Added the Pink Quaggan Backpack Cover and the Tiger Charr Backpack Cover to the Black Lion Chest at a rare chance. These rare variations are available only through the Black Lion Chest. Black Lion Keys are needed to open chests and can be acquired from the Gem Store in the Consumable category.

Improvements

• Nine new hair colors and six new eye colors are now available through the Total Makeover Kit and the Self-Style Hair Kits. These new hair and eye colors are winter-themed and are available only through these kits, which can be acquired from the Gem Store in the Services category. The new colors are marked with a star and can be applied to any race’s hair.
• The celebration mode of Evon Gnashblade’s Box o’ Fun now has a chance to give the Dancing Spirit buff. This buff grants the character temporary access to three short dances. These dances will take up the utility slots on the skill bar, and when they are activated, your character will perform some new dance moves. The Dancing Spirit buff lasts 10 minutes, but entering combat removes the buff.
• Spawning Evon Gnashblade’s Box o’ Fun immediately equips you with an adjuster bundle to allow you to pick a mode. If you lose the bundle, interact with your Box o’ Fun twice quickly to return it.
• Listings for new items will now show up in the Promotions tab in the Gem Store and are now marked with a blue exclamation-point icon.
• Listings for limited-time items will now show up in the Promotions tab in the Gem Store and will show how much time is left to purchase them.
• Sale items will now show how much time remains before the sale ends.

Bug Fixes

• Sylvari who use the Total Makeover Kit can now adjust their glow.

Profile Page Updates

• The “See all messages by User” page design has been updated
• Added a link to user profile pages to show posts a user has +1’d, ordered such that top-most is most recent vote
• Added a link to user profiles to show highly rated posts ordered descending by score
• Both links above are disabled by default and can only be enabled by setting a preference in profile settings

The +1 System

• Added a icons that indicate popular posts based on +1 score
  • Popularity is divided between popular and very popular and by thread or forum-wide
• Changes to the +1 Button
  • The size has been increased
  • Grayed out state more visible and prevalent after a reload

Miscellaneous

• The reply box has been removed for locked topics
• Added the forum category to the breadcrumbs
• ‘Ignore posts by this user’ has been temporarily removed.

Bug Fixes

• HTML codes are no longer shown in topic titles in the title bar of the browser

LIVING STORY
Flame and Frost: Prelude
A mystery presents itself in this first entry in a multipart Living Story series. What could be causing such discord in the foothills of the Shiverpeaks? All those poor homesteaders and ranchers displaced with nowhere to go calls into question if the storms could be that bad—or if there’s something more sinister stirring up the flame and frost. The ground is shaking, and the sky is falling in northern Wayfarer Foothills and Diessa Plateau. Norn and charr refugees, crawling from the wreckage of their homes, are fighting their way to shelter in Hoelbrak and the Black Citadel. Many are in shock and wounded; most have only what they can carry on their backs. A call has gone out for volunteers to assist them in their time of need, when the environment itself seems to have become their enemy.

Achievements

• A new Living Story achievement category has been added, which will contain a series of achievements specific to the storylines unfolding in Tyria.
• The first Living Story achievement, Refugee Volunteer, has been added. Players who complete this achievement by playing the Flame and Frost: Prelude content will be rewarded with the Volunteer title. They will also receive a karma reward via in-game mail.
• More achievements will be added as the Living Story continues to unfold.

Events

• New Living Story events have been added to Wayfarer Foothills and Diessa Plateau.

Heralds

• Starting shortly after the January 28^th^ update, heralds will begin appearing in cities across Tyria. Their task is to keep adventurers apprised of the events currently underway that are driving the Living Story forward. Be sure to check in with them if you need direction.

Other Content

• Persistent world content related to the story of the refugees has been added to Wayfarer Foothills, Diessa Plateau, the Black Citadel, and Hoelbrak. This content will continue to change and evolve as the story unfolds, so be sure to keep checking back.

NEW FEATURES AND CONTENT
Daily/Monthly Achievements
Rewards
A new currency has been added: the laurel. Players earn one laurel for completion of the daily achievement category and ten laurels for completion of the monthly achievement category. This new currency can be spent at laurel vendors in all of the major cities to obtain over 90 items, including:

• A new category of infusion, the utility infusion
• Ascended amulets
• Crafting starter kits
• WvW blueprints
• Obsidian shards
• New boosters, advanced harvesting tools, and crafting trophy bags
• A new, unique miniature: Goedulf, the mythical wolf-cub spirit that protects lost norn children
• A new, unique miniature: Chauncey von Snuffles III, who placed second in the Divinity’s Reach Fanciest Cat competition

UI

• Achievement tracking UI has been added to provide at-a-glance information on daily and monthly achievements as well as quick access to the achievements panel.

Achievements

• New daily achievements have been added.
• Daily achievements now rotate on a daily basis.
• Daily achievements now only have a single tier.
• The number of achievement points awarded for daily achievements has been adjusted.

Dungeons

• Polished dungeons and removed the ability to use waypoints while any player is in combat.

Dynamic Leveling

• Attribute calculations for dynamic level scaling have been rebalanced. In general, this means weaker when adjusted down, stronger when adjusted up. Rewards when adjusted down have been increased to compensate. It is now possible to receive your own level of loot from any level of enemy.

Fractals of the Mists

• Players can now reconnect to the Fractals of the Mists if they are disconnected.
• Players can now connect to a fractal map even if they are not part of the original group that created the fractal instance.
• Players can revive at a checkpoint in fractal maps if the entire party is out of combat.
• Players are no longer prevented from entering fractal maps. The difficulty of the fractals is shared, and players will receive rewards based on their “reward level.”
• Reward level increases as players complete fractal rounds.
• If players have a higher reward level than the current fractal difficulty, they will receive bonus karma at the end of a round. However, item rewards are set to the minimum of the fractal scale and reward level.
• Daily Fractals of the Mists bonus chests are awarded after defeating the kraken. The rewards are now based off of the minimum of the player’s reward level or current fractal scale.

Guesting

• Players may now log in to a world other than their home world as a guest.
  • On the character select screen, click the “World Selection” button.
  • Choose a world you would like to guest on and click the “Guest” button.
  • Select any of your characters and select “Play” to log in to the world you chose as a guest.
• Guesting has some limits and restrictions:
  • You may only guest on worlds in the same region as your home world. Players on American home worlds cannot guest on European worlds or vice versa.
  • You may not participate in World vs. World for any guest world. If you choose to enter World vs. World, you will be moved back to your home world. Only changing your home world using a world transfer can change your World vs. World participation.
  • You are only eligible to guest on 2 different worlds at a time. Each time you guest on a world, that world becomes available to play on for the next 24 hours. After 24 hours, you may choose to guest on a different world. You may log in to any active guesting world as many times as you wish with no restriction.
  • Guesting on worlds that are full or highly populated increases your risk of being put into an overflow map.
  • While guesting, all guild influence earned will be applied to your home world, and you will only have access to your home world guild benefits, including the guild vault.

World Transfer Fee

• It now costs a gem fee to transfer your home world.
• Gem fees for world transfers are based on the population of the world you are transferring to.
• Each account is still limited to one transfer every 7 days.
• Players still cannot transfer to servers that are “Full.”

Orr

• The Risen creatures all across Orr have had their population density adjusted.
• Areas, chests, and merchants in Orr now offer better rewards.
• See “World Polish – Orr” below for more details.

UI Improvements

• Changes have been made to the attributes section of the hero panel to cleanly display more information.
• Several PvP dialogs no longer take UI focus away from chat when opening.
• Players can once again preview armor and weapons that cannot be equipped by their character.

Structured Player vs. Player
January 28th – February 4th Is Temple of the Silent Storm Week

• Instead of 3-round paid tournaments, there will be a 1-round match between 2 teams on the Temple of the Silent Storm map.
• The price for entry will be 3 tickets per player.
• Rewards for the test will be reduced from the normal paid tournaments.
• After the game is finished, both teams will be returned to the lobby, where they can reenter the tournament queue.
• To participate, go to the PvP lobby and speak to the Tournament Master.
• At the end of this period, the Temple of the Silent Storm map will be added to the tournament rotation.
• Skillbars now have team-colored backgrounds in sPvP.

World vs. World

• Character load times in WvW have been improved through the use of preloaded placeholder models.

BALANCE, BUG-FIXING, POLISH
Dungeons
General

• Fixed a bug where creatures in dungeons were no longer becoming invulnerable to players they couldn’t reach.
• Updated the costs of several dungeon reward items to be consistent with their costs in other dungeons. These include leggings, chestpieces, and shoulder armor from Ascalonian Catacombs; tridents and assorted armor pieces from Sorrow’s Embrace; and focuses from Caudecus’s Manor.

Fractals of the Mists

• Swampland fractal: The tripwires have been rebuilt to reflect their names. Several have been lifted out of the ground and made more visible.
• Fractal Marshes: The traps in the first area now scale with the difficulty scale of the fractal.
• Fractals: Added day or night time to specific fractals. Day and night do not cycle.
• Underwater Fractal: The Jelly boss will no longer try to devour NPCs like pets and minions before they try to eat players. If no players are around, it will eat NPCs.
• Fixed various exploits and minor bugs.

Ascalonian Catacombs

• Story—The Lovers: Reduced health for both bosses and damage from Ralena.
• Story—Coffin Intro: Additional coffins cannot be interacted with once the boss shows up.
• Story—Ranger: Damage has been reduced for the trap skill.
• Story: Some enemy group compositions have been altered.
• Story—Adelbern: Reduced damage and modified his melee attack.
• Explorable—Detha’s Chain: Decreased the recharge time for cannons in the final event and modified their attacks.
• Explorable—Detha’s Chain: Adjusted the respawn rate of the groups at the “Defend Detha and her traps” event.

Arah

• Story: Reduced most veterans to regular strength during the ship events.
• Story: Attacking dragons have reduced damage and no longer knock back on their flyover barrages.
• Story: Zhaitan’s acid pools do less damage.
• Explorable: Fixed issues that may have prevented events from starting or ending properly across all paths in the dungeon when an NPC was potentially dying, reviving, or being interacted with.
• Explorable—Seer Path: In the Dwayna fight, the sparks will now target players primarily, and their attacks have been adjusted in a way that should make them chase the player as initially intended.

Citadel of Flame

• Story: The Baelfire fight now has a safety net in case players fall off. If players die in a dangerous area, their body is teleported to a safe location for players to revive.
• Story—Forgefire Armory Boss: This boss’s damage has been reduced.
• Story—Bolok Barracks Boss: The group composition of the reinforcements summoned by Bolok Barracks boss has been modified.
• Explorable—Magg’s Chain: The event to defend Magg while he plants a bomb has been rebuilt.
• Explorable—Magg’s Chain: The respawn rate of creatures in the magma field has been adjusted.
• Explorable—Rhiannon’s Chain: The torch event at the start has been adjusted to only require 3 torches instead of 5; enemy groups have also been adjusted accordingly.

Sorrow’s Embrace

• Explorable—Inquest Path: The infinitely spawning waves have been adjusted to no longer spawn when fighting with the golem miniboss. They will continue once the golem event completes. The group compositions were also adjusted to add more variation.

Crucible of Eternity

• Explorable—Evolved Destroyer: This enemy’s health has been reduced. The time window before the shield turns back on has been increased.
• Explorable—Subject Alpha (All): The enemy’s health has been reduced.

Twilight Arbor

• Explorable: Leurent’s Elite Guard shields have been fixed so they no longer deal damage after they disappear.
• Explorable—Leurent Boss Encounter: The group composition has been adjusted.
• Explorable—Worm Boss: Spit puddles have reduced damage, but more puddles are created with each attack.

Honor of the Waves

• Explorable: Aldus Stormbringer adds are no longer veterans and have adjusted respawn times.
• Explorable: Aldus’s invulnerability shield now properly decrements to melee and area attacks.
• Updated the effect for the Cone of Cold skill used by Controller Andal to match the area affected by the skill when he turns.

World Polish – Orr
General

• Uncontested waypoints have been added to Cursed Shore and Straits of Devastation. Players that have already achieved map completion will retain it without having to discover these new waypoints.
• Updates have been made to the small statues to the human gods throughout Orr.
  • New map icons to indicate the location and status of the statues have been added. Mousing over the icon will display more detailed information.
  • The visual effect surrounding each of the god statues has been updated to be more noticeable and to more accurately reflect the range of its influence.
• Various Risen creatures have had their animations and size updated.
• The music that plays during key events that take place at the Orrian temples to the gods and the Gate of Arah has been updated.
• The difficulty of events to claim and defend the Orrian temples and the Gates to Arah will now scale to accommodate a larger number of players.
• The visual impact of taking control of the Orrian temples has been increased.
• Various Risen creatures have had their skills adjusted to use fewer crowd-control skills.
• Fixed a bug that prevented the “Arah Waypoint” from updating properly when the gate to Arah was open in Cursed Shore. This also caused the Arah dungeon marker to erroneously display as contested. The gate to Arah should only be closed when the events leading up to it are active.

Events

• Grenth Temple Chain
  • “Use portals to fight shades, slay the Champion Risen Priest of Grenth, and protect Keeper Jonez Deadrun.”
    • Clarified event text to provide more guidance on event mechanics.
    • Updated enemy waves that appear when the priest reaches certain life totals.
    • Added several new abilities to the Champion Risen Priest of Grenth.
    • Fixed an issue that would cause enemies to stop spawning if waves were killed in the wrong order.
    • Adjusted enemy wave compositions, start locations, and respawn times.
    • Adjusted the stacks of corruption that enemy shades apply to players during the fight.
    • Updated the visual appearance of the portals to Grenth’s domain and the effect applied to players who step in.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented the Risen Priest of Grenth from attacking properly during the event “Stop the Risen Priest of Grenth from retaking the Cathedral of Silence.”
  • Fixed a bug that would cause Pact troops to stall at points in the event chain.
• Dwayna Temple Chain
  • Adjusted the difficulty of the events that take place inside of the temple.
  • Updated the skills for the Risen Priestess of Dwayna.
  • Updated the skills for the Statue of Dwayna.
  • Adjusted the terrain within the Cathedral of Zephyrs.
  • Added a boss camera during the fight with the Statue of Dwayna.
• Melandru Temple Chain
  • Updated the Risen Priest of Melandru’s skill set.
  • Updated the music that plays during the boss fights.
  • Adjusted the terrain inside the Cathedral of Verdance to allow for better creature and player movement.
  • Added more noticeable environmental effects to the temple’s contested and uncontested states.
  • Updated the participation rewards for the event “Defend the Pact interruptor from Risen attacks” to be more consistent with holdout events at other temples in Orr. Players who participate will earn three times the normal event rewards.
• Lyssa Chain
  • Adjusted the difficulty of the events to take over and defend the Cathedral of Eternal Radiance.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented the force field surrounding the Risen Priestess of Lyssa from resetting properly.
• Balthazar Chain
  • Adjusted the strength of the Risen Priest of Balthazar’s skills.
  • Adjusted the number and compositions of enemies that appear during events to take over and defend the Cathedral of Silence.
• Promenade Chain
  • Updated the participation rewards for the event “Ensure that the Pact holds the Gates of Arah” to be consistent with the holdout events at other temples in Orr. Players who participate will earn three times the normal event rewards.
  • Fixed a bug in the event “Aid the Pact soldiers around the airship wreck” that would cause the event to restart prematurely.
  • Fixed a bug that could cause the Risen High Wizard to not flee after successfully defending the Pact camp at the Gates of Arah.
• The Gladiator Chain
  • Adjusted the start and restart conditions for the event chain.
  • Adjusted the difficulty scaling of the events.
  • Added visual effects to the event area and Risen creatures featured in the event.
• Changed the starting condition and location of the event “Kill the Risen broodmother.”

Items & Rewards

• A new Orrian Jewelry Box has been added to karma vendors across Orr.
• The item “Heavy Moldy Bag” has been updated to drop more frequently.
• Various Risen creatures have had their loot tables updated to provide more varied crafting materials.
• The karma vendors featured in temple chains offer new exotic wares.

World Polish – Other
General

• Fixed the descriptions for some armorsmithing packs that stated an incorrect level for the armor contained within the pack.
• Fixed a bug that caused the Mystic Forge to give inappropriate rewards when given level 80 masterwork swords.
• Updated the Moa Tonic’s Screech skill description to correctly show only one daze stack.
• Bandithaunt Caverns: It’s no longer possible to create an infinite number of bombs in the caves.
• Locking your Windows User Account will no longer result in the Guild Wars 2 launcher being invisible.
• Trait buffs are no longer reapplied after being resurrected while in a transformation that disables traits.
• Renown regions now reward karma upon completion.
• The contacts list has been significantly improved to enhance performance in crowded maps and for players with many followers and friends.
• Loot interactions now take higher priority than mesmer portals.
• Fixed a bug that could cause rectangular skills to fail to hit the correct targets.
• Fixed a bug that could cause chain skills to sometimes interrupt dodge rolls.
• Fixed a bug that could cause projectiles to sometimes disappear if passing through a field that had expired.
• Fixed a bug that allowed skills that steal or remove boons to manipulate effects that they were not intended to be able to affect.
• Weapons now continue to grant bonus stats while bundles are equipped.
• Bundles from player skills (engineer kits, elementalist conjured weapons, warrior banners) now have base damage that is consistent with the highest rarity weapons available at the level of the player.
• WvW & PvE: Our culling system has been updated to use affinity culling, which favors allowing players to see important enemies regardless of the local player population density.
• Lionguard Lyns has returned to Lion’s Arch but no longer has Black Lion Keys available. Donations toward the rebuilding of Lion’s Arch will continue to be accepted until late February, at which time Lionguard Lyns must return to her normal Lionguard duties. Liquidate those Captain’s Commendations while you can.
• Golem in a Box has been updated to have a 20-second recharge and has been disabled in WvW.
• In PvE, if a player is awarded loot by killing a creature and the loot is of uncommon rarity or higher, a chest will appear that contains the loot that would previously have been on the corpse. If the rarity of the loot on the creature is lower than uncommon, the loot will remain on the creature’s corpse.

Events

• Fixed a bug that could cause events around Eldvin Monastery to not run properly in Queensdale.
• Fixed a bug that could prevent the event to fight the Shadow Behemoth from starting in Queensdale.
• Frostgorge Sound—“Claw of Jormag” Event: Fixed a case where the ice shield would not appear correctly.
• Blazeridge Steppes Event: The ogre beastmaster in Sootpan Kraal now heals a limited amount each fight.
• Master Engineer Steelclaw in the Fields of Ruin now uses a consistent gender for her scenes/greets.
• Diessa Plateau: Fixed a bug that prevented players from using the cattlepult if a cow wandered too far away, blocking the betting minigame.

Personal Story

• Fixed Zojja and other NPCs having invisible headgear in cinematics.
• “Armor Guard”: Fixed errant minimap marker.
• “A Tangle of Weeds”: Increased the size of the instance so it’s much harder for the lich to fear players out of the map.
• “Volcanic Extraction”: NPCs are now more durable.
• Norn Chapter 3: Fixed an issue where the wrong cinematic was playing.
• “A Sad Duty”: Strengthened the Pact defenders.
• “Suspicious Activity”: Fixed a minor cosmetic bug.
• “A Grisly Shipment”: Playing the story step with party members no longer prevents progression.
• “Source of Orr”: Fixed an issue that could prevent progression after defeating the Eye of Zhaitan.
• “Fixing Blame”: Warmaster Gurnn should now start his cinematic correctly.
• “On Red Alert”: Fixed an issue that could prevent progress if the player bypassed part of the story step.
• “Romke’s Final Voyage”: Fixed an issue that could prevent progress when playing the story step with party members.
• “A Sparkling Rescue”: Zojja will now help players in combat.

Skill Challenge

• The terror of Ancient Shark Pistrix and his gang of “landsharks” has finally come to an end. Players will now interact with the corpse of Pistrix in his cave in Sparkfly Fen to complete this skill challenge.

Items

• Fixed a bug that prevented Endless Halloween Tonics from being listed on the Trading Post.
• All Halloween tonics have a two-second cooldown for removal.
• Fixed an issue where some rebreather models would cause light armors to display incorrectly.
• Transmuting weapons now preserves the higher rarity of the two items.
• Sigil of Doom: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Sigil of Intelligence: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Sigil of Leeching: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Life-stealing food buffs based on critical hits no longer affect gadgets.
• A Mystic Forge recipe has been added to upgrade the Triforge Amulet to an ascended version with a utility infusion slot.
• The Orichalcum vein in Southsun Cove is now a regular vein instead of a rich vein.

Profession Skills
General

• Cancelling executing skills that have no recharge via the [Escape] key or stowing weapons will now trigger a 0.5-second cooldown for that skill.
• Gadgets placed by players (such as turrets) will now apply boons and conditions based on those players’ stats. Those conditions and boons will not be reduced to level-1 values when the triggering gadget is destroyed.
• Updated skill facts.

Elementalist

• Fixed a bug that caused several spells, including Tornado, Arcane Shield, and most frequently Whirlpool, to sometimes fail to display any graphics.
• Arcane Power: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Arc Lightning: Fixed a bug which would cause this skill’s animation effects to continue playing after the skill ended.
• Evasive Arcana: This trait no longer enables players to break knockback effects.
• Glyph of Renewal: Increased this skill’s cast time while underwater from 1 second to 3.5 seconds.
• Ice Spikes: This skill now appropriately displays area-of-effect rings.
• Rock Spray: Skill facts for this skill now display the proper distance and bleed damage.
• Vapor Form: This skill will no longer allow players to rally off of kills that grant zero experience. This skill will now also properly restore death state on completion.

Engineer

• Removed collision from engineer turrets that were causing player pathing issues.
• Elixir X: Fixed a bug where this skill’s tooltip did not reflect the cooldown reduction from Fast-Acting Elixirs.
• Hair Trigger: Fixed a bug which prevented this trait from working correctly for some skills.
• Healing Turret: Fixed issues with this skill’s description when the Deployable Turrets trait was equipped.
• Incendiary Ammo: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.Reinforced Shield: Fixed a bug which prevented this trait from reducing Static Shield’s cooldown if the Throw Shield skill was activated.
• Reserve Mines: This trait’s area-of-effect rings now display the appropriate area that they can be triggered at.
• Speedy Gadgets: Fixed a bug that prevented this trait from reducing the cooldown of Throw Mine.
• Toss Elixir S: This skill will no longer remove transforms from players.

Guardian

• Absolute Resolution: This trait now functions with Battle Presence.
• Battle Presence: This trait no longer misses pulses or spams “immune” text.
• Empower: This skill now appropriately applies might for 10 seconds.
• Selfless Daring: This trait no longer enables players to break knockback effects.
• Shield of the Avenger: Fixed the damage displayed in this skill’s Command variant.
• Spirit weapons are now susceptible to attacks.
• Sword of Justice: Fixed the damage displayed the descriptions for this skill and its Command variant.
• Sword Wave: This skill is now able to strike gadgets that are low to the ground.
• Zealot’s Flame: Added burning information to this skill’s description.

Mesmer

• Cleansing Conflagration: This trait should now remove a condition at the beginning of The Prestige instead of at the end of the skill.
• Duelist’s Discipline: This trait no longer reduces damage dealt by the Illusionary Duelist.
• Illusion of Life: This skill should no longer allow players to rally off of creatures that grant no experience.
• Portal Exeunt: Updated the skill fact of this skill to reflect the actual duration. Also added a description to the Portal Uses marker.

Necromancer

• Fixed a bug that caused some minions to be overly aggressive.
• Mark of Evasion: This trait no longer enables players to break knockback effects.
• Necrotic Traversal: Fixed a bug which caused this skill’s descriptionto display an incorrect amount of poison damage.
• Spinal Shivers: Fixed a bug which caused this skill to enter its full cooldown if used when facing away from the target.

Ranger

• Fixed a bug where aquatic ranger pets could sometimes get on land.
• Drake Pet: This pet will now activate its Tail Swipe skill on a regular basis, and the casting time of that skill has been reduced by 1.25 seconds.
• Entangle: This skill’s bleed effects now properly scale with condition damage and duration.
• Sharpening Stone: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Opening Strikes: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.

Thief

• Leeching Venoms: This trait no longer affects gadgets.
• Shadow Refuge: Added a radius skill fact to this skill’s description.
• Smoke Screen: This skill’s blinding pulse no longer follows the thief.
• Spider Venom: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Devourer Venom: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Ice Drake Venom: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Skale Venom: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Basilisk Venom: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.
• Assassin’s Signet: The number of uses on this skill’s effect will now decrease if an attack lands or if the attack is negated by Blind, Block, Evade, Obstructed, or Invulnerable.

Warrior

• Arcing Slice: Updated this skill’s description to correctly state the boon it applies.
• Banner of Strength: This skill’s descriptions have been updated.
• Banner of Discipline: This skill’s descriptions have been updated.
• Banner of Tactics: This skill’s descriptions have been updated.
• Empowered: This trait should now appropriately increase damage for the Stability boon.
• Reckless Dodge: This trait no longer enables players to break knockback effects.
• Vengeance: This skill is no longer able to rally a player off of kills that grant zero experience.

Structured Player vs. Player

• Legacy of the Foefire: Fixed a bug that prevented certain melee skills from hitting the front red/blue base gates.
• Legacy of the Foefire: Fixed a bug that allowed friendly and enemy projectile skills to penetrate the red/blue base gates.
• Legacy of the Foefire: Red/blue keep NPCs have been modified to avoid spawning before the match start countdown begins.
• Legacy of the Foefire: Red/blue lords have been modified to remove up to 3 conditions at the beginning of their heal skill.
• Legacy of the Foefire: Red/blue guards and casters have been modified to engage enemies when the lord enters combat.
• Battle of Kyhlo: Fixed a bug that could cause the repair kit to disappear after switching teams.
• Heart of the Mists: Two unused glory vendors have been removed.
• Fixed trebuchets not being targetable by ranged attacks after being repaired.

World vs. World

• Siege is no longer usable while inside a WvW jumping puzzle.
• Multiple areas have had their terrain adjusted to prevent players from bypassing gates and walls to get into objectives.
• Superior siege will now be saved properly when maps restart.
• In WvW, different types of loot chests will replace the bag drop depending on loot rarity. Players should now see bags for loot that is lower than uncommon rarity and chests for loot that is uncommon rarity or higher.

BLACK LION TRADING COMPANY GEM STORE
New Items

• Plush Quaggan Backpack Cover is now available in the Gem Store for 300 gems in the Style category. This adorable skin can be applied to any back-slot item, but it also comes with a basic back-slot item with no stats in case you don’t have one.
• The Riding Broom is now available in the Gem Store for 250 gems in the Style category. Simply equip this toy and activate its skill to ride the broom. Riding the broom does not provide a speed bonus.

Improvements

• Evon Gnashblade’s Box ‘o Fun has been revamped and is now available in the Consumable category for the new low price of 1 for 80 gems or a bundle of 5 for 320 gems. The revamped design offers more control over what effect the box has on those that interact with it.
• All weapon and armor skins now have the option to be converted to PvP skins. When activating a skin you will be given the choice to either apply the skin to a PvE item or convert the skin to a PvP-only item. Either action will consume the skin. This change applies to all unused weapon and armor skins in the game, regardless of when the skin was first released.

As some of you may be aware, we have recently had a rash of gold sellers spamming your forum inboxes. In an effort to halt this activity, we will be implementing new limitations on private messaging. From this point onward, players will have to wait 72 hours from their first forum login before they are able to send a private message on the forums.

We have blocked all the accounts involved and this new limitation will prevent gold sellers from abusing our forum systems in the future.

Thank you for your understanding.