Guild Wars 2

Scootabuser.4915:

So you can see when the bosses hit 75, 50, and 25%.

Dunno why this isn’t a thing already…

I think it’s fascinating that there are evidently people who aren’t neurologically wired to spot “half” and “half of a half” by eyeballing it. That kind of visual approximation would seem like sort of a critical life skill to me.

So how many of these division do we really need/want? Some flags also flip at 90% and 33%…

CureForLiving.5360:

The problem of course being that it’s a conversation ender because (I’d like to imagine) most of us have been socialised not to belittle someone else’s personal tragedies. So yeah, its kinda like meeting a nice girl or guy at a party and then they start talking about their furry-fetish. Most people will be uncomfortable, but it certainly does facilitate conversation.

Thankfully it hasn’t been a conversations stopper. People have been universally polite and I appreciate that, but even better what has followed has been thoughtful. That’s the conversation I was hoping to have and I’m grateful for that too .

Skarpa.8203:

The Shatterer, thank you

I dunno. It might move to chase enemies better than our current pets do. Unless they stand right by its foot.

MikeE.8267:

“you’re rewarded with these currencies through a bouncy chest for playing on the map.”

My mesmer has a bouncy chest

Bouncy chests are surprisingly common in Tyria.

Rognik.2579:

I don’t like using the alcoholism comparison, in part because of your story and in part because it’s not exactly apt

My example was chosen to make people uncomfortable. A story about usurping identities — the theft of all agency — deserves just a little more consideration than “oh, it was just the weak ones.” Maybe not a lot more thought (it’s just a game ) but more than the easy whitewash the preview trailers have given us.

but I’m going to try using it as an analogy. You are a known alcoholic, or at least have the genetic make-up for it.

That, actually, would be describing me. And my little brother.

Do you avoid alcohol entirely?

I’m certainly mindful of it. In my case I drink twice a year – a glass of champagne at new year’s eve and a few cups of sake on my birthday. Always in the company of friends. Beyond that I do not tempt fate. My “will” shall hopefully go on being untested. My brother spent years terrified of the stuff after what it did to his dad. He’s mellowed a bit with coaching, but he certainly absorbed the lesson. He knows the hooks could be inside him. He’s had a few wild evenings but strictly in the company of watchful friends aware of his heritage.

What would happen if someone – for whatever reason – slipped some alcohol into your drink? For reasons beyond your control, you would be exposed to this “corruption”, if you will, whether you wanted to be or not. This is how I’d prefer to think of the sylvari being corrupted by Mordremoth, not just a fight of your will versus Mordy’s. At least, until we have more information.

I agree the analogy breaks down slightly because alcohol is comparatively a slow agent, if a familiar one to most forum-goers. But we have other real world examples to draw on. Replace ‘alcohol’ with ‘heroin’ and now you are dealing with something that can consistently crack your whole world with a single encounter. Mordremoth: the worst of all possible drug trips.

In some ways I’d just like it made more visceral what a terrible thing has been unleashed upon the Sylvari. I guess I’m hoping that we see a little more of a spectrum in the future. Not just a few resistant Sylvari heroes eager to leap back into the fight, but also survivors who emerged unscathed and want nothing more than to flee/withdraw before their luck runs out, filled with doubt that they could resist again if pressed. Warriors in the Pact rear echelons who do not complain or are even happy that they are to maintain watch at the Brand or the far north rather than having their souls risked in Meguma. And civilian Sylvari far from the conflict, terrified that they might be taken at any moment by the faintest whispering of the call. There is no running from this blight: Mordremoth’s grasp encompasses everything.

This is an entire civilization finding out they are all time-bombs just waiting to detonate, tearing apart kin and friend and folk. The hooks… these hooks… are inside every one of them.

I think I’ve only had three instances of verbal abuse in the last month. And while one was in poor taste, I admit I hadn’t been entirely on my game that match. Some people really aren’t used to how anyone other than the happy-kill-lunatic-duelists go about contributing to their team’s score .

And it was pretty hard to get worked up over a thief calling me a no-skill newb while he was lying in a pool of his own blood waiting to respawn after failing to dislodge me from a point long enough that an ally arrived and kicked him in the junk (a bunker build actually defending? preposterous!).

Does a player standing over my broken body wondering aloud how his team is losing against such bad players count as verbal abuse ? (Hint: when I’ve dragged you a third of the map from any capture point and we still hold the one the fight started at, you’re not actually playing that well…)

Weird. I only play unranked and almost always que solo, but I’ve pretty much steadily won 15% more than I’ve lost for the last two months… which seems surprising since I’m presumably being grouped with and against better and better players. I favor bunker and support builds so I’m probably a worse duelist than anybody commenting here (I’m astounded when I beat someone one-on-one. Like, enough to feel kinda bad for them…) but I try to rotate sensibly and steal unguarded points relentlessly. I like to think I have my moments when I can tie up 2-3 players for a really long time without letting them decap – sometimes long enough for somebody on my team to come help me. And I run a mean trebuchet (“This is it, the moment Mr. Grabel prophesized back in grade school, when all our lives would depend on geometry…”). But I don’t feel like I’m actually “good” at sPvP yet.

I wonder why people find the ranked matchmaking experience so much less satisfying?

Jordo.5913:

It doesn’t matter what online game I’m playing, it could be console or MMO, but whenever an expansion gets announced for a game I’m playing, I just kind of shut down playing it for a while.

…

Anyone else get like this?

For me at least there is usually a period close to a patch or expansion’s release (closer than HoT is now) when I find it very hard to work up the motivation to play knowing my limited playing-time will be so much more rewarding after the change over.

Its like, “Why bother running instance X when next week the loot tables will be so much better?” or “you know, I could spend two hours leveling a new profession Y soon instead of two hours today just grinding some coin…” or “You know what? I’m NOT logging in on my main who is a Class Z (*cough*Spellslinger*cough*) when the Devs have acknowledged the class is a free-roaming clusterf#(@ and I could just wait two moths to play again after the fixes drop with the next big release. I have better games to play today.”

I already took a long break for GW2 this year so I’m still pretty fresh and actually really enjoying sPvP which I hadn’t gotten into before (16% more wins than losses – go scrubs!). The hype train is slowly wearing down my positive waves but I think that more because most of the news strikes me a goram trivial compared to “What EXACTLY do Specializations offer?!?” Information I know they’re to sit on as long as possible.

Basically, I suggest you moderate your hype intake. HoT looks ‘new!’ and ‘improved!’ so of course the current build smells a little ‘old’ and ‘inferior’ by comparison .

Gilosean.3805:

One of the few upsides of the current system is that precursors and legendaries can be bought with the game’s main currency. Tossing that out the window and adding extra gathering/quests to the process? Sounds like more work for a lesser reward.

I’m betting the people who are willing to put in the effort for one of the new Legendaries won’t agree that them not having a little TP price tag dangling off them is a bad thing…

Justify your own reluctance how ever you like.

Lazaar.9123:

What you quoted is incomplete, I added the rest of my post before you posted. Maybe you should jump the gun less.

Now wait a second… I couldn’t have quoted you unless you had hit ‘post’.

Who jumped the gun here?

Lazaar.9123:

What you quoted is incomplete, I added the rest of my post before you posted.

Ah. But the joke still stands. In truth, as other have mentioned, the long term averages create a hard link between the prices of the two tiers.

I’ve done it a number of times, and a great roll can be pretty exciting, but for the most part its a brutal, soul-crushing road.

Lazaar.9123:

Upgrading mats to the higher tier in mystic forge is guaranteed.

Please allow me to complete that statement~

“Upgrading t5 mats to the higher tier in mystic forge is guaranteed to net you fewer than if you’d sold them and spent the resulting coin on buying t6s…”

Between the terrible return ratios, burning a t6 mat AND t6 dust as part of the inputs, and the skill point item fee, its a thing, but its not a good thing.

I have 2 precursors, a gift of mastery, stacks of ecto, 77 clovers, & 100 icy runestones sitting in my bank. While I don’t Dungeon much these days I’ve meticulously amassed dungeon tokens from sPvP for the requisite gifts.

I know full well what’s stopping me from building my first Legendary – I’m not aggressive enough about chasing after t6 mats (and was easily sidetracked by getting grandmaster in all crafts with a 500 cap). I don’t begrudge the prices, but I don’t intend to pay them either. So the other mats sit while the t6s trickle in. I finally felt like I was on top of my Laurel rewards and started cashing out some for the t6 bags.

But I’m in no rush, so I don’t go around fountaining nerdrage. I chose to make Infinite Light and Volcanus over any of the Legendary skins and I don’t regret that.

Artanis.4963:

Calling it now, underwater legendary weapons will be planned for the last batch, never released, and then quietly forgotten.

What are these “underwater” weapons you speak of?

But more seriously while you’re probably right it won’t matter much… until they cave and give us a “Paragon” Guardian specialization that uses Spears on land .

My understanding is each precursor (old and new) has its own individual 3-stage track. Finishing (or being grandfathered) track progress on old precursors isn’t going to get you any closer to a new one or different old one.

Dancing and drinking and eating fine food (step 3 for the Moot) doesn’t exactly flow as a step in building the precursor for the Predator…

Re-reading your original post, you seem to be concerned that you have to finish some or all of the old precursor tracks before you can start pursuing the new tracks. My understanding (and I’m very confident in it) is that you will not have had to have crafted one of the existing precursors before you can go about learning to make one from the new set. The new Legendaries have their own unique precursors.

Because if they were awarded it would lock them out of getting another one by the new method .

Keep in mind, for people who have a precursor or legendary already, they will be getting the new progression weapon skins automatically and for free come launch day. So that aspect of the rewards is fully retroactive.

They will NOT be awarded the 3 levels of mastery and they shouldn’t want to be!

Players who already have precursors can still pursue those mastery tracks to get their 1-per-account crafted precursor in addition to the one they already have.

Obtena.7952:

Yeah, I got my pocket of ‘we told you so’ waiting when people start QQing that T6 mats are too expensive now they can craft precursors.

Oh yes. Precursors are going to go down in value, but the complete product will likely stay the same (if not rise slightly). And all of that value is just sliding around under the umbrella of the finished Legendary. It has to go somewhere and that somewhere is the other components that can be bought from your fellow players.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Hopefully the devs have enough foresight to not require T6 mats for crafting the precursors… that could get out of hand quickly regardless of how many T6 you have saved up.

I don’t think you’re grasping the concept. This isn’t about crafting the precursor. They could GIVE each and every account in the game a precursor just for buying the HoT box and it would only make what I’m talking about worse: There is NOTHING in the new article to suggest that you won’t still need a Gift of Fortune and the 2,000 t6 mats that requires…

Expect ectoplasm to trend upwards for the same reason.

My well-mancer feels pretty tanky. Group-wide 18 seconds of protection and AoE syphoning has turned a couple of sPvP death-matches into one-sided blowouts. If I could get a Elite Well skill (e.g. “Well of Oblivion”) I’d be in whatever kind of heaven necromancers are allowed into.

We don’t KNOW, but as a matter of principle they’ve been good about making anything the game already tracks count towards future requirements.

We know enough to start making money right now. Amongst other things, this new process only generates PRECURSORS. Its a good enough guess to speculate on big time that the other components (Gifts) still follow the same overall format.

More precursors in people’s hand means the demand for (and price) of T6 materials to complete them is going to skyrocket. Even with map rewards. All the money people were throwing at getting a precursor will now be freed up to target other parts of the ‘journey’.

Does the majority of a freedom-loving and heroic race getting turned into soul-gnawed shocktroopers for the greatest genocidal menace of our age not fall somewhere pretty far down the dark spectrum? Too big? Not personal enough? I thought the prospect of finding a beloved sibling hanging broken and mangled like some kinda of devilish lamppost in the aftermath of a battle you thought you’d won to be just a bit of a downer…

My read is that we will NOT see 19 new Legendaries covering all weapon-types on Heart of Thorn’s launch day.

How often do you refer to nearly twenty larger-than-a-breadbox objects as a “handful”?

Not often, I’m thinking.

kny.3789:

so are the crafted precursors account bound or no?

I suggest reading the article.

I think (as seen in the first episode of Log Horizon) that total makeover kits would become very precious.

Karizee.8076:

Kudos to ArenaNet for the new Precursor mastery system!

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/a-legendary-journey/

This announcement is composed of massive amounts of highly compressed WIN.

Its so dense with WIN it’s almost a wingularity .

Smart money says they’re doing stuff they’re not gonna share where the hackers can read about it.

Just pick a category for the insta-report. Then open a real ticket after the match where you can add some detailed explanatory text..

Test.8734:

Then people could have a real size Karka Queen attached to their backs but it wouldn’t bother those who don’t wan’t to see it.

You’ve got… kinda of a… stuck.. it’s… licking… no, nevermind. I just hope you’re happy together.

Admit it. The image is terrifying.

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Nike.2631:

Sorry. I’m pretty sure they have zero interest in reigniting the Queensdale Train for 80s.

You mean the one that they literally removed from the game by turning the mobs to veterans?

That particular train won’t be coming back. Could a new train appear in any zone for any reason? Absolutely. That’s not a reason to not make game-wide decisions, however. Why? Because the fix is as simple as slapping a specific hard nerf on the abused content. Remove the event status on one of the chain events (like the Boar, for example), mess with spawn timers. It’s pretty easy, and much more sensible than “sorry, but these entire zones don’t use this reward system because reasons.”

Eh, if you can’t extrapolate to the broader case they were fighting and its impact on decisions like this, I’m not gonna draw you a map.

You can’t imagine how little of a pile of skritt poo I give about the tidal motion of swarms of MMO players. If another game is making them happy right now or for some stretch between now and HoT’s relase… Good for them. Happy people make all games better. If they come back, then cool, I’ll see them here.

The core issue affecting my choices is “Does HoT look like it’s going to deliver fun new gameplay and possibly fun new situations in which to experience it?” To me the answer is a resounding “Yes!”

I’m interested in specializations. I’m Interested in a new profession. I’m interested in the new WvW and PvP maps. I’m interested in the new region and the new advancement systems. I am VERY INTERESTED in a task-based path to Legendaries both old and new.

They are hitting many, many of the right notes with me. I’m confident that they’ll also pick a price point I can accept and that I’ll be playing GW2 when the mood takes me for a long time to come.

Toxsa.2701:

I’m hoping the reward will be lodestones..

Then you may want to read the article.

Sorry. I’m pretty sure they have zero interest in reigniting the Queensdale Train for 80s.

Rox can’t afford high level armor because she spends all her money on poison for her Toxic Barrage skill .

Which is 10 times more awesome than flashy armor.

As a general rule I approve of more choices.

I think the phrase you’re looking for is “Precursor prices WILL tank.”

There are many, many players who would happly slog through some Sisyphean hellhole of a task list as an alternative to throwing one bent copper into the economic PvP vortex of the Trading Post .

General class balance changes have yet to be announced and may come out even before HoT’s release.

Nothing to report. Yet.

Very pleased with this direction for future Legendaries.

I have two precursors sitting in my bank. Sounds like we get some nice perks for having gotten even that far.

Windsagio.1340:

I bet you that they’ll end up working the other way at the end of the day.

Whatever the intent was, there’s a massive amount of feedback about how confusing it is, and designers hate that.

With the time available to them, most designers will pitch it back to have a better UI and tutorial/hints attached to it LONG before they’ll give up the key time sink at the root of all future character progression.

Ashen.2907:

Were you Nike there as well ? I have some vague recollection of something like that.

Yup . I wanted a laurel crown for my main (for somewhat obvious reasons). What manifested in game was very nice. They even made a few changes I requested to make it compatible with more hair types.

I was certainly pleased when the Wreath of Cooperation appeared here. I won’t say there’s a direct correlation, but I like to think there’s a happy coincidence at work. I know my screen name “Nike” came up in several group meetings at the ANet offices. Maybe the classical imagery wormed its way into the office collective subconscious .

Oh, so not only is the sky falling, it fell almost two months ago.

Er… what buff?

Just curious as to the source of this info.

Sarie.1630:

By “Grind XP”, do you mean “Stockpile writs of experience between now and HoT release”?

Presumably Tomes of Knowledge would work too.

In the face of relentless questioning they did announce that Tomes of Knowledge will work on day one Revenants and that they had not decided yet if Tomes would advance mastery tracks.

As a matter of clarity in design I hope they do (an XP is an XP is an XP…) but we’re all awaiting a final decision while some of us continue to stockpile .

Windsagio.1340:

I’d bet the mushroom thing was a mistake, you’d expect first ability to come with the unlock, as works with some of the others.

As it works with some of the others in the demo.

The mushroom track is the one working as intended. The others are gimmies to improve your odds against the wyvern when the world is going to implode within the hour…

Sarie.1630:

Perhaps he could just straight up pay ArenaNet to develop a dungeon!

Player-funded requests. The future for MMOs. You heard it here first.

Actually, a few years ago I publicly offered to fund the creation of some costume items I wanted in Champions Online (a superhero MMO with a very flexible costume engine). The items would be made available to everyone freely. My offer was based off of my best guess of the designer’s time and the approval testing process. A dev even contacted me and said it was a pretty reasonable offer as the items I wanted were very simple.

Players on the boards went insane.

OTOH the discussion did such a good job of wedging the items into the designers’ heads that they did end up making and releasing several of them within 6 months.

Worked out nicely, I’d say .

If you can kill them with 7, why would increasing the cap above the current limit of 25 even remotely matter?

I understand the impulse to panic now and avoid the rush… but squelch it.

Reward after effort.

Radical!

Is there some reason you’re not packing them down into vision stones?

BlackBeard.2873:

Jalis elite is a stunbreak, and uses no energy if you cancel it after stunbreak! Revenant has INFINITE STUNBREAK!

And you think that’s going to last for even one more build?

The rest of the class team already made the Revenant design lead buy them all lunch for letting such a laughably bad loophole make out into the public eye. Or they should have. Either way, its not going to last.