Guild Wars 2

There’s absolutely no excuse for leaving players in the dark about how long an achievement category will be available for. ANet know exactly when achievements will run out, and have been asked on the forums to share the info in numerous threads. So much for “we read everything… we just don’t have time to reply” – when it literally takes 5 seconds.

Secondly, 2 weeks turned out to be not enough time, given that getting the right fractals was based on luck and the good will of four other players, on content that was not designed to be casual and couldn’t be soloed.

I managed to crank out the achievements just in time, but I know others weren’t so lucky.

I’m with the OP. I don’t feel downscaled enough.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Can somebody please explain to me…

… what does the game need a party “leader” role for at all?

The only implemented functionality seems to be to end instances / kick people (which is clearly not desired). The termination of the instance should take place once the last player, not a specific player, leaves it.

The leader position is a mechanic – cinematics etc, need to know which character to use for conversations. Yes most people skip them, but there are those of us who would rather not have a random placeholder stand in for us during conversations.

Good point, I forgot about the cut scenes. What do you mean with “etc.” – is there anything else at all?

Gummy.4278:

So it appears anet does not need to add a mark after all, seeing as you just identified a way for people to know who is the leader is.

This, then, only applies to instances that have cinematics – i.e. personal story and dungeon paths, but not fractals and most living story instances.

And to be honest, the dialogue in those is so generic that I see no harm in random party members speaking them – it would certainly spice things up a bit and gave everybody the feeling to be involved in a group discussion, rather than watching someone else’s dialogue.

Can somebody please explain to me…

… what does the game need a party “leader” role for at all?

The only implemented functionality seems to be to end instances / kick people (which is clearly not desired). The termination of the instance should take place once the last player, not a specific player, leaves it.

munkiman.3068:

I did the aetherblade one last night and got the achievement for it. Just FYI, you can still get them, you just can’t see the ones you are missing or get the meta. Nto sure if that’s intended or not…

That’s two different achievements.

In the hero panel, under “Dungeons —> Fractals of the Mist”, there is two achievements per fractal. One for completing it and another for fun. The five new fractals were rightly added to this category with both their completion achievement and a new special achievement. These achievements are permanent.

The living story category for fractured had additional achievements for completing each fractal (old or new) once. These are now gone.

Turns out it was pretty difficult to get all fractals to show up during the 2 weeks that the achievements were up, unless you played for several hours each day.

illo.5106:

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Now I am an allrounder/generalist and a very social gamer – and you might not be, but honestly, I don’t see this as unreasonable at all.

Don’t take it personal, but all people I know would call people like you anything, but never a “social gamer”. You are in different guilds for your own advantage – because you want to have more store, because you want to trade minis, so on. It’s just pure oppurtunism, nothing more, nothing less.

I think you didn’t read all the words of my post: I said I was a generalist and a social person.

*As a generalist, *I want to experience all aspects the game has to offer, and that’s why I joined TTS, GC, Arah vets etc. If want to label me as selfish for that, go ahead I guess? Am I being selfish for both joining a soccer team and a movie club in real life?

However, shared storage with my boyfriend is *a social tool. *Guild chat with my best friends, many of who I know in real life despite the fact that they’re spread out all over the world, is a social tool. It’s not my fault that some of my best friends are part of different guilds. In real life, I can be part of several circles of friends. I can hang out with my work mates on a week night and spend all Saturday with my BFFs, and neither of them get jealous. Picking one circle of friends over the other doesn’t show commitment: it just means that you have to pick some people over other people, that you get to hang out with some and abandon the rest. How that makes you a more social person, I don’t know.

All this being said, our different philosophies are really not the issue here. The question is, what philosophy is the game designed to facilitate? The developers themselves encourage and support the creation and use of guild for specific purposes such as tPvP match/ups. The guild system was specifically set up so you can play soccer with some and go bowling with others, so if you want to criticize people, maybe start with the source.

+1 to the original suggestion.

Since

1. people are no longer “looking for group” by standing in front of a dungeon entrance and shouting, but using the LFG tool, and
2. fractal parties are cross-server, so people don’t even have to meet up in front of the entrance,

I don’t see why the entrance to the mist can’t be decentralized.

Secondly, I’m not a big fan of LA – it’s too busy and it takes too long to get around, so I do most of my crafting, banking etc. from Rata Sum whenever possible, and use the PvP Mystic Forge. The only thing that forces me back onto LA (other than special events´and living story chapters, which I’m fine with) is the Fractals entrance.

Please add a consortium outpost to each one of the capitals. Allow players to decide where to do their business.

+1

I <3 dolyak

I support this.
+1

The problem is that the game (not just the chat) rightly displays the character name. You can then use that character name to /whisper, /join a party, send private messages (that can include items and gold attachments), I’m assuming /block and such.

All of this only works because the character names are unique.

I agree that it kind of sucks for character creation, and I’m really not happy with the influx of nonsensical names and especially nonsensical over-use of accents. Anyway, I wrote something on character naming that might help you pick lore-conform names (if you wish) by adding titles, middle initials, etc.:

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Every single name on the “Gaelic baby names” website is used up? Be creative and find something of your own. It could be more awesome.

I’ve had no problem so far creating unique characters with unique names.

I am not 100% happy with how character names are handled in GW2 either: I think

• the name field should be longer
• capitalization shouldn’t be enforced (thinking of my good friend Mcallister here which looks 100 times dumber than McAllister would have)
• allow for apostrophes and hyphens (you may think that apostrophes, aside from RL examples like O’Brien or d’Agestino, would make many players take on really dumb fantasy names only consisting of apostrophes and the letter y, but it cannot possibly be worse than all the “Jóhñ ?mìth” type of names we already have in game now)
  _________________________________________

However, as long as these restrictions are in place, we can still easily come up with unique character names. Here’s some practical advice:

Humans

If your desired name is taken, give them a middle name or middle initial. “John Smith” may be taken, but “John N Smith”, “John Sterling Smith” or “John Smiths” may not be.

Charr

If you want to name your Charr according to Charr lore, your name will consist of 3 different parts, so it will be very, very easy to find a combination that hasn’t been done before, even IF you have your mind absolutely set on the first name or warband.

“Zeera Cinderwind” may be taken. “Zeera Ashenwind”, “Zeera Cinderstorm”, or “Veera Cinderwind” probably won’t be.

Norn

Even if you follow the pattern and create a norn with a real-life Nordic first name, you can take some creative freedom with the spelling. Secondly, as norn like to boast about their life achievements, how about a last name that reflects that?

If your first choice “Olaf Kegbrawler” is taken, how about “Olav Kegbrawler”, “Olaf The Kegbrawler”, “Olaf Barrelbrawler”, “Olaf Keghurler”?

Asura

Naming asuras can be the most or the least difficult to do, depending on your willingness to go with a title.

Strategy number one: randomly double a consonant.

If “Klicks” is taken, try “Klikks”, “Klixx”, “Gliccs” etc.

Strategy number two: since asuras typically have short names, they can “afford” (in terms of maximum letters) a title. That opens up hundreds of more combinations and also gives the character some nice “flavour”.

Is your new character “Genius Klicks”, “Master”, “Prodigy”, “Stipendiary”, “Advocate”, “Agent” or “Scholar”? I haven’t even gone into the titles that are used in game already such as “Peacemaker”.
I really wanted “Glitch” for my asura warrior because she is such a klutz, so I went with “Apprentice Glitch” and I’m quite happy with it.

Sylvari

I don’t think the Gaelic connection is particularly relevant here because nobody understands a word of Gaelic anyway, so you might just as well make something up that mimics the general “soundscape” of existing sylvari names. (Also, I’m not convinced that that is a general rule anyway: Pretty sure that NPC Leurent is pronounced in French.) If you feel particularly uncreative, use an existing name (NPC or whatever) and just change one or several letters to similar ones.

For example, you like the name “Gamarien”, there’s “Camarien”, “Garmarien”, “Gamarian”, “Galarien”, “Gavarion” and any combination or variant of those. Now Gamarien is a pretty high-profile NPC so people may already have done many of these variations and finding the one that works for you may be a bit annoying, but if you pick a less prominent NPC I predict that you won’t have any problems with this approach.

And also…

And my last bit of advice is: If you don’t feel particularly creative yourself, discuss your new character’s background, concept and personality here on the race subforums – other people may have awesome ideas.

Well, there goes my plan for christmas presents out of the window…

Mikael Sanford.7634:

Does anyone know when is the Living Story meta going away?

ANet knows.

ANet, any reason why you don’t share the information with us? It only takes a few seconds of your time to post it on here and we’ve been asking since the first day of the release.

Every other release, the same story.

Mikael Sanford.7634:

That’s why we need a timers on those achies as we have them on dailies and monthlies.

This.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

I am a little bit disappointed by the way Aetherblade Retreat and Molten Facility were turned into dungeons. Large chunks of the original dungeons were cut off, and this is a terrible shame. The dungeons in their original design were really good, and it is a terrible loss when bits and pieces get shaved off just to fit it in the Fractals system.

I agree very much with this. The Molten Fractal in particular feels too short, and too focused on the first tunnel. It should have included the ice room with the effigy as end boss.

As for the tower, no need imo. However, the toxic hybrid instance already feels like a level 1 fractal, and I’m fairly sure that it was designed with fractals in mind. I wouldn’t be surprised to see it as a fractal and I’d be okay with that. It would be interesting to see what additional mechanics the devs come uwp with for the different rooms for higher levels.

I was so much in a hurry yesterday that I didn’t take the time to thank the people who offered their help in this thread. Re-reading it now, I feel so rude. You’re all lovely. /bow

Update: 5 hours of re-rolling later we got it.

I don’t think I’ll enter fractals again anytime soon. -_-

Wicked Rin.1972:

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Wicked Rin.1972:

In case you guys are not doing this already, roll for the urban fractal to get a higher chance for the molten fractal to show up. Good luck.

Really? How does that work? I thought it was random

There are different tiers of fractals: shortest, medium, longest. Urban is under tier 1 and tier 2, so if you get urban for tier 1, it will not show up for tier 2. This increases your chance of getting the molten fractal.

Makes sense. Thank you!

I’m with a group trying to roll it; no luck so far.

Wicked Rin.1972:

In case you guys are not doing this already, roll for the urban fractal to get a higher chance for the molten fractal to show up. Good luck.

Really? How does that work? I thought it was random

I had an unexpectedly busy day today. I only just got around to booting into guildwars.

Here’s hoping that I get many a message ^^

It’s the last achievement I need in the living story category, and if I don’t get this before Tuesday, it’ll always bug the hell out of me.

I rolled this fractal exactly once – and two people in the party decided to kick the instance owner and out we all went.

Now I’m desperate and you want money. Solution? Easy!

If you plan to play fractals on Monday (i.e. tomorrow):

1. Add me to your friend list
2. Should you roll the Molten Fractal: check if I’m online
3. Should you see me online, whisper me
4. If you leave the party and get them to invite me in your stead, I’ll give you 5 shiny gold. Pinkie Pie promise!
5. I’ll make room for you after the Molten fractal so you can get your daily end boss chest if you want.

I will try to be online at different points throughout the day.

Fractal level: I think the highest fractal I played so far was level 19, but I have 25 AR on me so use your best judgement.

To clarify: the person who leaves the party gets the gold, not any of the remaining party members, so no kicking anybody without their consent please.

sorudo.9054:

why the hell would you join more guilds, if it’s for alliances then they should simply add alliance…….

My guilds:

• a 2-people guild with my partner for shared storage
• a guild with people from the clan that I played various games (including GW 1) with for 12+ years, as sort of a nostalgic contact list
• GC, for guild missions (as my other two guilds are too small)
• TTS, for Tequatl fights
• honorary membership in another guild

I’ve also been a member of, but had to leave to make room for the above guilds:

• a guild that serves as a contact list for dungeon runs during off-peak hours (I live in Europe but play on NA server)
• Arah vets
• A temporary guild that my circle of friends used to fund and share series 1 minis for the achievement

I would also like to join the following guilds, if I had any free slots:

• giant slayers
• a guild to set up tPvP (as suggested by the devs)
• and possibly a WvW guild
• another honorary membership of a clan I’ve been friends with / allied with for 12+ years. I can currently partake in their forum discussions but not guild chat.
• a guild that I know several players of really well and that I have been informally invited to and that would be awesome to join so I would have easier access to people to run fractals with.

Now I am an allrounder/generalist and a very social gamer – and you might not be, but honestly, I don’t see this as unreasonable at all. The game itself is now designed to favor either a) super big guilds that do everything or b) several, specialised guilds, such as TTS or, as suggested by a dev, guilds specifically used for tPvP matchmaking.

The limitation of 5 guilds seems arbitrary (why not three? why not eight?).

And yes, I would pay the same price for additional guild slots as I would (roughly) for bag/bank/character slots.

I support this.

In addition to my actual guilds, two of my guild slots are permanently used up by GC and TTS. I would love to also join Arah vets and a giant slayer guild, but can’t without playing switcheroo all the time.

My OCD wants to see all of them, including those that I didn’t do.

Incomplete lists = what’s the point of them?

They’re not historically accurate.

Lothirieth.3408:

Why did you bother making this part of your update announcements then, considering you weren’t even implementing it yet as said levels don’t even exist?

I don’t think there is a satisfying answer to this question.

I like the nightmare one better, but I already owned the Aetherblade one and didn’t feel like paying EUR 12 just do update its looks.

When the monthlies reset.

This wouldn’t work for the simple fact that player charactets and mobs have vastly different ratios to of hitpoints to damage output.

Players: few hitpoints, high dps
Mobs: many hitpoints, low dps (so that a group of 5 or more players can hack away at them for a while)

Players would take each other out at the speed of PvP while mobs would barely scratch each others’ skin with the damage meant for players.

For the same reason, when you have a few stacks of confusion on you and do burst damage, you can easily take out half your own hp or more; but when you stack confusion on a boss, have you ever witnessed them losing 50 percent of their bar in one attack? Not even close.

Good thread. I hope that most if not all of these issues get addressed.

Electro.4173:

Blue fire is still fire, at least to me. Changing the color wouldn’t really make it a different element.

And I suspect changing the color of a particle effect is something that would require a lot more technical changes than you’d think.

But if you look at the recently released flame* sets, there’s no fire on them. It’s really orange smoke, if anything. And that smoke could be a hundred different things if dyed a hundred different colors.

If it was actual flames, I’d agree. But it isn’t.

zaneber.6908:

You recently introduced the flame armor to the gem shop, why not continue with this.

Or why not NOT continue with this and instead put the particle effect on a dye channel.

This way you can dye it into flame (orange), smoke (grey), ice (white), water (blue), necro (green), mesmer (pink), nightmare (black) or whatever else type of magic you fancy at the time.

It would be infinitely more useful and I’d be infinitely more likely to buy the armor. I change my style often and I probably won’t ever buy an armor that only suits one style / can’t be re-used / re-combined with other elements. So, putting out 4 different gem story armor sets for four different elements will NOT make me buy 4 different sets (not even one of them), while releasing ONE versatile set will definitely make me buy it.

I think it would be more exciting if we unlocked skills by playing through part of the story (for example, “learnt” a skill from an NPC, similar to Belcher’s Bluff).

But if we’re simply using currency to unlock new skills, I’m just glad that it is via skill points and not gems, gold or whatever new collectible is introduced every two weeks.

I got a charged quartz today.

Nope.

So regal. <3

JoeStapish.4871:

Drink damages me for 20% while Water heals me for 10%
In these guides, Drink damages them for 10% and Water heals them for 20%

That issue has been raised as a bug when Belcher’s Bluff was first released, but remained unanswered.

Here’s one example

As a player who mains an engi, I totally agree that kits should scale to whatever weapon you have equipped in your main hand.

i.e.,

• if you hold an ascended rifle, kits should do ascended damage.
• if you hold an ascended pistol and an exotic one, kits should do ascended damage
• if you hold an exotic pistol and an ascended shield, kits should do exotic damage

Alternatively, ascended damage as soon as you equip at least one ascended weapon.

I’d be okay with most of these accidents if anybody bothered to comment as much as an “oops, we didn’t mean to” about it. Things go wrong all the time, but the silence is just insulting.

To clarify, any of these would be totally fine with me:

• “We didn’t mean for this to happen, and we’re looking at ways to fix it / compensate / future solutions / …”
• “We didn’t mean for this to happen, and we’re sorry, but won’t fix it now due to budget / being busy / …”
• “We totally meant for this to happen and hope to communicate such changes better in advance in the future”

This is not ok:

• Silence… = “lol deal with it”

lordkrall.7241:

Kerishan.8460:

All years same things? This is not funny

And yet when they did it the other way around at Halloween people raged like mad

No, at Halloween people got mad because only part of the original content came back, and the original achievements weren’t available. No one hated on the Halloween patch for introducing new stuff.

Well, I plan on getting my masterwork crafting monthly mostly from crafting luck this month.

Wethospu.6437:

I think it’s fair. Those people you kicked didn’t actually kill the final boss so they don’t deserve any final rewards (if they complain they are just entitled). And they also had fun during the run while getting rewards from that.

That’s an interesting perspective. So if I was to kick you out of your job, hand your 90% finished project over to a new hire and gave THEM your month’s wage for finishing the last 10% before the deadline, you’d be cool with that?

Okay then.

Mystic Starfish is correct, the Stalwart (medium) armor is available only in PvP. Select armor pieces (not all of them) drop from personal story chapters, the rest is completely unattainable in PvE.

We believe this to be a bug, and it has been discussed here on the forums a lot, but to my knowledge never commented on by ANet.

That is the only armor set that comes to mind (if you don’t count the order armor sets, which can only be obtained once your character has joined an order).

I don’t even get the notification messages half the time – just links that go dead.

I never go down in the cannon phase, but for some reason Mai Trinn really has it in for me. I drop a lot. (Not from shadowstepping either)

Seriously, the Molten bosses fractal feels much too easy and Mai Trinn much too kitten the same level.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Again, there’s an NPC in Metrica who says that the Inquest lab was underneath the town, which means that it was underground at the time of the fractal. I’d agree with Konig on this- the fractal just didn’t copy the roof, or any of the upper portions.

Then what’s the massive UFO in the sky over the fractal? Part of the reactor core I thought? Why was that copied but not the rest of the “upstairs”?

LunarNacht.8913:

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

I found the Thaumanova Fractal disappointing for a completely different reason.

Whenever I visit the reactor today, I find myself wistfully staring into the sealed-off area to the West (with the waterfalls in). I fully expected to be able to go there when I visit the fractal.

The reactor map from the fractal is completely different from the reactor today, however, and to be honest, I have no idea how one morphed into the other. Where are the poison, water and ice chambers? Or, I don’t know, the floor? Is this really supposed to be the same facility? How?!

I imagine the facility we see in the fractal is the underground part of the open world facility. The asura building a plate on it to stop the radiation to come out makes sense. Back than the facility had no roof but afterwards they built not only one. They built the floor of the open world facility and a roof above that to contain the left over radiation. When we now stop the shield and jump into the light we would get to the fractal area but because of the dense chaos magic we will be portet instead.

I think I can live with that.

Barely, but ok.

Yeah but they don’t typically change a large open room into a much smaller enclosed one. The opposite – maybe.

Dear PUGs,

when you have to replace someone in your group, please state the name of the fractal – thus making it easier for people to join the ones they still need for the LS achievements.

I am doing the same.

Thank you

But it’s open… you can see the sky.

The facility from the fractal looks nothing like the facility in Metrica.

I was hoping the fractal would allow us to go into the walled off area to the west (with the waterfalls). Instead, it looks like a completely different place.

Did I miss anything? Lore buffs, what’s your take on this?

Nope, human main here.