Guild Wars 2

They specifically designed the game around not having to target allies so that support effects were more about watching the field and situational awareness than hotbar whack-a-mole. This is because all support effects are onGW2 classes, and in GW2 there are no “support classes” that aren’t expected to hold their weight in terms of engaging the enemy directly. Ally targeted support is fine in a game where classes are designed around doing just that, but in a game that expects support effects to be carried by characters who are also primarily responsible for DPS, dodging attacks, and throwing control effects at enemies it would simply muck up combat mechanics in to a mire of rapid and annoying target swapping.

Some items are only achievable through corresponding special effort in specific content. This is a fundamental game design element to any game with loot, as varying the means and location of acquisition ensures players are incentivized and rewarded for playing different content.

This is why dungeon armor requires playing certain dungeons, why world completion is a requirement for legendaries, fractal weapons can only be picked up from fractals, and why all of the S2 zones have area relevant special rewards. It’s why wintersday themed rewards are only available during wintersday, why you can only get tequatl slaying skins from actually slay tequatl, and overall the reason that people do a broad variety of content.

In a game in which cosmetics are the primary reward structure, putting them all on a vendor somewhere makes content unfulfilling in the same way that loot in diablo 3 was unfulfilling before they killed the trading post. Players simply grind for currency as there is no other measurable reward for doing challenging content, and no real value to do a variation of content. it results in a very boring loot game, and difficult content that feels like it’s just giving you the finger when it rewards you with 3 common greens and 10 AP.

As long as players have a repeated or permanent chance to acquire items from difficult content, they shoyuld absolutely be required to complete content for its associated rewards. That loot is both a badge and memento that indicate the player actually accomplished something special rather than an indication they had more time on their hands to run a champ train or otherwise farm currency in the easiest and least challenging way possible.

I develop software for the rift at work for construction visualization purposes and independantly for a little game I’m working on.

What you have to understand is that you can’t simply ‘click button add support’ for the thing, which is precisely why a lot of the injection based drivers are so finicky.

A VR headset is not a 3d TV, and in order to get a good exprience out of VR you have to design a lot of your experience around it. First person stuff tends to work best, but third person is managable, however it requires a lot of work to design a control scheme that puts your head tracking in a natural position for the user, position UI elements so they’re useful but not intrusive, etc. In addition your controls need mapped to be a lot leaner than most MMOs allow, as you can’t see your control device when using it.

In addition your world has to be generally designed around it. Rapid and unexpected camera movements cause motion sickness in most people when using a rift, and ccertain techniques commonly used for things like skyboxes and LODs can be visually problematic, while the overall performance of the application had to be pared down so that your game runs at 70+ FPS at all times with a roughly +60% perfomence overhead due to head tracking and double rendering interpretation.

Essentially, no, I wouldn’t expect any official GW2 support, it would require a massive overhaul of the UI and camera control systems to work in a comfortable and polished manner. You might be able to play it with some third party injection drivers, but for it to actually be in any way fun to play, your injection driver would have to modify a lot of the UI so you could see basic stuff like UI text, boons, etc. as 3d panels rather than 2d overlays as the 2d overlay techniques used in most games do not work in VR (they sit at the periphery of your vision where they are unreadable, and they do not respect world depth which causes incongruent depth perception of the UI)

For that kind of modification, you’d be crossing over in to bannable third party software territory.

More wings? I thought we were past this lunacy.

Karka are minions of bubbles. Except the Karka lead by the queen that came to southsun. That queen is good because she read an ancient Quaggan tablet by a Quaggan of peace name Vootooroo.

They were never attacking us, they’re just so big that smashing lighthouses is their primary form of communication. They wanted to help fight Zhaitan, but we just murdered their mother.

Now they’re biding their time on that island, training to climb its highest peak for the blue flower that will signify the one true karka champion destined to make us all pay for our evil deeds.

Bat-Crab

It’s in the works for the next patch.

Also, it’s a club.

The Gates Assassin.9827:

PopeUrban.2578:

Mega Skeleton.8259:

Simon.3794:

and people saying on crit sigils should be brought down, i mean, it’s not the sigils.
it’s thief and mesmers…

just like it’s not might.
it’s engis and eles

I say just add more on-hit sigils than changing the crit ones. More variety is better and it gives a unique value to precision. (and fury)

Precision and fury already have a unique value in the form of on crit traits and greater DPS. Those are far easier to balance as they sit in a more controlled design space, where as sigils do not. Those sigils don’t add variety at all, and in fact they actively decrease variety by requiring builds that want to utilize them to emphasize critical hits in ways that may not be internally consistant with their class design simply to be able to use a crucial sigil.

Contrast this with all other sigils, which are universally applicable regardless of build. Sure, you might not want to put a + bleed duration sigil on a build without bleeds, but your build does not directly control the access to the sigil’s effects. Crit sigils require, rather than incentivize over-reliance on a particular stat setup because of the double-rolling nature of first having to crit, and then having to roll the dice on the sigil, making them completely unreliable and unusable unless your build includes an inordinately high amount of crit chance.

An on hit sigil is universally accessible to all builds, despite not being overly useful to some and an on-crit sigil is not. In a combat system which prizes active defenses and a lack of passive defenses, and a lack of randomness influencing the outcome of battles, crit sigils are design anomalies that work against rather than in favor of the overall design of the combat system, and the potential for build variety.

This is interesting. Let’s take an example though. Let’s say Sigil of Fire was turned into an on hit sigil. It would need to be nerfed in some way to allow for this extra power (less dice rolling):

1. Reduce the damage
2. Increase the recharge
3. Reduce the chance to proc.

I definitely don’t like #3 or #1, so #2 sounds like the most viable version.

1. If it went to like 10-15 seconds, do you think it’d still be taken?
2. Would it break anything to let basically any build regardless of crit chance take a fire sigil?
3. What about other crit sigils like nullification, generosity or blood? I could see nullification or generosity being pretty good on some builds. Especially Purity + Generosity on a support/bunker build. Even maybe just the defensive set of an offensive build.

Recharge timer increases seem to me like the best balance, as they make the sigils similarly avaliable to all builds without over-emphasizing critical chance or RNG. This would allow them to function similarly to how they already do on crit builds, but would allow non-crit builds the option of using those sigils the same way.

In addition, they don’t weirdly add a certain “more DPS sigil” option that is only applicable to builds that have already traited specifically for more DPS anyway whilst simultanteously removing a “more support or sustain sigil” option from builds that already built for support or sustain. This in stead give those builds the option of that using the sigils to minmax further toward their build focus, or fill holes in their build as personal preference inclines..

Kicast.1459:

PopeUrban.2578:

All I see is good in this change.

CCs actually mattering in WvW: Good.
Monster CCs actually mattering in PvE: Good
Boon Rip not being required to deal with heavy Stability Stacks? : Good.
CC focused builds actually being able to overpower 1 button’s worth of stability: Good.

No good
CCs actually mattering => it already matters but now Hammer war train will be insane
Boon Rip not being required to deal with heavy Stability Stacks? => No good to get boon rip less usefull (it is already sub-par in regards with boon generation)
CC focused builds actually being able to overpower 1 button’s worth of stability => ok no counter to CC…what for class not able to deal spammy cc ? good ? really ?
I see you are a thief…I can easily see what may sound interesting to you…but no ..it is not good

Hammer warrior train: Can no longer pre-stack absurdly long stability that protects them from an entire zerg’s worth of ranged CC, and can actually be countered without bringing an absurd amount of boon stripping.

Boon Rip: Boon rip is not sub-par, boons with no natural counter are too powerful. Stability is one such boon. Ripping should never be the only way to remove any “lockout” boon. “Hard boons” like aegis or blind which completely prevent an action should always have a natural counter (spam attacks in this case). “Soft boons” like Protection or swiftness don’t need a natrual counter, as they do not completely prevent actions, and thus the natural counter is simply apply the corresponding counter-move (more burst DPS, or cripple in this case)

CC focused builds: A build designed around CC should logically sacrifice damage to do so. Opting to put oneself in a controlling role, and having that role completely invalidated because your target hit one button with plenty of room to fill his bar with far greater utility than you have access to is not balanced. It is skewed in the favor of the build with better/longer stability access. You can not counter that stability, despite the fact that your target has multiple ways (stunbreaks in addition to stability) to counter your CC. This is badly designed. Stability should be a buffer, not an invulnerable shield.

Thief: This opinion has nothing to do with being a thief, and in fact stands to hurt rather than help my survivability, as I have exactly one skill that grants it, and must channel that skill to benefit from it. As a thief I am MORE likely to experience the negative effects of this stability change than classes with more regular access to the boon, yet I still believe this change is better for the game as a whole.

Mega Skeleton.8259:

Simon.3794:

and people saying on crit sigils should be brought down, i mean, it’s not the sigils.
it’s thief and mesmers…

just like it’s not might.
it’s engis and eles

I say just add more on-hit sigils than changing the crit ones. More variety is better and it gives a unique value to precision. (and fury)

Precision and fury already have a unique value in the form of on crit traits and greater DPS. Those are far easier to balance as they sit in a more controlled design space, where as sigils do not. Those sigils don’t add variety at all, and in fact they actively decrease variety by requiring builds that want to utilize them to emphasize critical hits in ways that may not be internally consistant with their class design simply to be able to use a crucial sigil.

Contrast this with all other sigils, which are universally applicable regardless of build. Sure, you might not want to put a + bleed duration sigil on a build without bleeds, but your build does not directly control the access to the sigil’s effects. Crit sigils require, rather than incentivize over-reliance on a particular stat setup because of the double-rolling nature of first having to crit, and then having to roll the dice on the sigil, making them completely unreliable and unusable unless your build includes an inordinately high amount of crit chance.

An on hit sigil is universally accessible to all builds, despite not being overly useful to some and an on-crit sigil is not. In a combat system which prizes active defenses and a lack of passive defenses, and a lack of randomness influencing the outcome of battles, crit sigils are design anomalies that work against rather than in favor of the overall design of the combat system, and the potential for build variety.

flipyap.5789:

A character from your GW1 account!

I hadn’t even considered that, but it’s a fantastic idea.

Unfortunately, with 10 classes and no guarantee that every GW1 player had any given class I can’t see it happening, or if it did I can’t see it working in any way that’s more than just a name change on some skills.

Also, RIP Hall of Monuments. I’d at least hoped for a quest line or something.

CureForLiving.5360:

Syione.3046:

It wasn’t Ventari’s Tablet that “turned” the Pale Tree “good”. It was the environment , Ronan found the seed and brought back to his home, finding his family killed vowed to live in peace and started a colony. As the seed matured it became sentient and this was the only way it knew. The tablet is just a physical reminder of that way.

To be clear, this is speculation. We haven’t been told in game our out (as far as I know) what turned the Pale Tree good.

It is literally the only explanation that makes any sense. Otherwise there is no reson for them to have written the entire thing in to being in EOTN in the first place, no reason for sylvari to so heavily revere ventari’s teachings, etc.

It’s pretty clear that the tree valued ventari’s philosophy, and when grown passed it to her offspring. Like any parent/child relationship, some of those children adopted that value system, and some did not.

This indicates that succumbing to Mordremoth or not is a function of equal parts individual will and sylvari shared consciousness with their hivemind aspects. The tree itself decided to break away, much like glint did, is what allows less willful sylvari to remain free of corruption now that mordremoth is awake. More willful sylvari (like our player characters and anyone the plot deems important enough) have the ability to resist that influence on their own, but doing so is extremely difficult without the psychic bulwark of a shared mind and tree to call upon for support.

This is similar to addiction psychology. Sylvari are born predisposed to be Addicted to doing whatever Mord tells them to. Because Mord was not present, they didn’t realize this addiction trigger prematurely for the same reason alcoholics can’t develop a drinking problem when there is no alcohol around. They literally don’t know what they are missing. The dream itself is a support group, though it is unclear if this is a genetic quirk common to all sylvari, or if the Pale Tree is unique and specifically created the dream for this purpose. At any rate, that support group is vital to most sylvari’s ability to resist their genetic addition, but, like all addictions, certain exceptional invidivuals can handle that challenge through individual will, conditioning, or other techniques to remain clean of Mord’s influence without the support group.

The existence of the soundless indicates that while all sylvari come from trees, those trees may be far less involved and active parents than the one we know personally. If those trees know and accepted their purpose was to simply birth disposable minions, they would have no inclination or reason to create dreams of their own, as they expectation is mord directly controls those minions, and their role is to simply produce them.

Lurker.3609:

PaxTheGreatOne.9472:

Kilroy StoneKin?

How would be this skill called then, “Another Legendary Dwarf Stance”?

“Legendary Drunkard Stance”

I’d like to note that in EOTN the Iron Forgeman was retconned as to have been designed by Oola (an Asura)

Oola’s lab prominently features many prototype and half-finished forgemen.

You’re both arguing over semantics at this point. In the 250 years since GW1, “golem” has, indeed become synonymous with Asuran magitech constructs, despite the fact that its in-universe historical etymology describes any self-locomotive entity comprised primarily of non-living base material.

You’re BOTH right. Asura have simply co-opted the term “Golem” over the years as theirs is the pinnacle of the art, and as the cultures of tyria melted together the word “Golem” became shorthand for “Asuran Golem”

Thus while it is technically correct to call any self-animated construct comprised primarily of of nonliving matter a golem, people don’t use the word that way any more in modern times. This is why, in modern times, if people describe such things they generally do so with a qualifier to denote it does not fit the commonly accepted etymology. Thus, when people say “Golem” they generally mean “Asuran Golem” but if they say “Flesh Golem” they’re qualifying the term to denote they are deliberately breaking away from the normal verbal shorthand.

They don’t like to design indoor content in small spaces because their camera is not kind to it. That’s why certain JPs are a camera nightmare, as the JPs were designed before the finalized the camera collision.

In addition, their entire combat system is structured around high mobility, and the more cramped you make an environment, the less fluid it makes combat in that environment.

I wouldn’t expect to see much going on in “normal” sized buildings, but take a look at the exaggerated size of structures in GW1 and extraploate that art style forward. They designed pruposely large strcutures to accomodate the gameplay there, the same way they did here when they need an indoor/cave area.

My members don’t generally find a NEED to rep outside of the POPE tag unless it’s for the ease of special event guilds like TTS, or if we’re on our top secret cult guild to mess with people.

Point here is: If you join a guild with a 100% rep requirement, you chose to join that guild. If you don’t like the way leadership handles it, quit. Honestly, why is that so hard?

I think all “on crit” sigils should be brought down to
“on hit” and balanced around the more reliable application.

It severely hampers sigil choice for builds that don’t stack crit like mad, which are generally the builds in need of more utility due to less damage output.

Has anyone considered that there are likely entire weeks devoted to existing classes, and their wholesale reworks alongside the specializations?

Think about it this way: You got a rev update alongside explanations of some pretty fundamental changes in the form of boon/condition behaviors.

It’s likely that 3/4 of what we see on the new specializations is reworks to existing skills, as specializations draw heavily from their base classes. The remaining 1/4 is the new skills, weapons, or mechanics that the specializations grant. Remember, a specialization isn’t a NEW class. It’s a SUBclass. It’s like switching from R/W ro R/Mo.

If you want an “easy” roaming build, go P/D

It was my first pvp build and the first one I reccommend to new thief players as it is very survivable, but gets you used to the idea of timing steals, paying attention to initiative, and getting a feel for the duration of your stealths.

If you’re looking at getting good, however, start rolling around with S/D evade. It’s a very high skill floor build since the last round of nerfs, but when played properly it can efficiently 1v1 pretty much every meta build. The catch is that you have to play it perfectly to do so.

Saturn.6591:

Jayden Ennok.3687:

You cant equip 2 same rings but if you infuse one in MF with fractal essences, you can equip 2 zerker rings.

You can also do that if you take one with a defensive infusion slot, which in this case would be Crystalline Band.

This.

There’s an offense/defense pair of matched stats for every ring/earring. if you want to match the infusions you’ll have to omni one of them.

Last refuge still sucks.

Hard.

MH/OH shield.

So I can dual wield shields.

You’re a journalist. Do some research. Like a journalist does.

We brought this up multiple times over multiple years. I think it’s safe to say that they’re not changing it. Learn which skills are channelled and which are not. Learn to properly time your stealths and evades.

The entire Thief community already figured this out a long time ago.

I stopped playing meta thief builds because I wanted to prove I could build a bunker thief.

I’m still playing lifeleech unicorn because I find soloing massive hordes of trash more fun than quickly bursting bosses.

I secretly cheer a little inside every time thieves are adjusted because it always buffs my build and nerfs the meta.

Jerus.4350:

That’s the thing, Engi is a completely viable profession if they run the meta build (or one of it’s variations, but basically 660XX with nade/elixir gun/X)

It simply isn’t meta for record times, though they’re right up there and a great profession to bring to a dungeon tour.

Necros are useless in dungeons, they bring absolutely nothing unique and nothing that can’t be done better by other professions. I can stack vuln better on my engi while doing more damage. I can do the same with warrior. I can stack might, vuln and bring more dps with my Ele, ohh and perma fury. Necros are quite literally the only profession that doesn’t have some niche they can fill that would make them a nice addition to a group. It’s unfortunate but true, here’s hoping for the specialization to turn out well with HoT.

And I run what I like, personally I love 66002 Nade/EG/FT Engi

Consider This:

If you have a necro stacking vuln and blinds, perhaps you don’t need to run those traits and specs on other party members.

Our party runs a condi/well necro specifically because it allows other off-meta builds to function.

Yes, I could spam blinds on my thief. I really could. That’s the meta build for a reason. however, having my necro buddy tossing out an endless supply of dark fields means I can actually play my off-meta unicorn/lifeleech build, and handle an obscene amount of aggro due to the extra healing resulting from the combos. This also allows our mace/shield/hammer warrior to effectively use his favored skillset and lock out the most problematic foes, our staff ele to build less for water fields and more for bringing the pain, and our fifth member to still play whatever the heck they want to.

Non-meta builds are only useless in meta parties. Meta parties exist because of efficiency, not viability. If you’re not concerned with efficiency, but simply concerned with completion, there’s no reason to run the meta. Dungeon meta exists specifically for speed runs. For some people, churning through content as quickly as possible is where the fun is. For others, completing content while using builds they like is where the fun is.

No class is truly useless in a dungeon, it’s just a matter of building a party that synergizes well internally. Sometimes the less efficient non-meta parties are easier to run, or more fun, or just plain more forgiving of mistakes.

I’d prefer if all the sylvari just, you know, protected the pale tree until this was all over.

I mean, that’s literally the only thing keeping the lot of them from turning full-on minion, and if something should happen I think it would be in everyone’s best interest if they were all in one place we could carpet bomb as a last resort.

Put your money where your mouth is sylvari. If you want to fight for your independance from Mordremoth so much, go protect the one thing that supplies it rather than endangering people not explicitly bred to serve dragons that are trying to save your ungrateful leafy backsides.

You can pull off any dungeon in this game with any combination of classes. However, if you’re looking to get fast and easy PUG runs, be prepared to roll a meta build.

If you want to run dungeons with people interested in playing characters they like and still completing content, consider joining/forming a guild with other like minded folks to do content with.

People will tell you, for example, necros are worthless in dungeons. Those people are wrong. Necros are just fine, as is every other class, as long as you build those classes to work well as a group.

So, if you want to get easy groups, do PUG speedruns, etc. then be prepared to roll one of a few very specific builds. If you want to have fun on characters you like, and get runs done slightly less quickly, play what you like and find people that compliment you to do dungeons regularly with.

Some guilds recruit characters. Some guilds recruit players. Some guilds expect to be your main focus. Some guilds expect to be your focus only for specific events or content.

The guild isn’t being pushy. You’re overreacting. You joined a guild That expects to you represent them, as you’re a member of that community, and for the guild to benefit from your membership you have to be repping.

Some guilds aren’t designed to be a community, and are just organizational (for example, world boss or champ run guilds) and thus only use those rep tags as communication, as the influence they gain from people only repping for thos events is sufficient for those guilds needs (generally they don’t need to spend much inf)

If you are not interested in being in a community that expects its members to treat it as their primary community, find a guild that more closely meets your expectation of what your relationship with a guild should be.

Have you considered that they don’t want to come back? It might be nicer where they’re at.

badboyzpwns.9807:

PopeUrban.2578:

The shoulders in both images are CoF dungeon shoulders. These do not display if you’re using the CoF chestpiece.

In the second image he’s also using the CoF gloves, Magitech chest, krytan pants (I think) and Magitech boots (again not sure, hard to tell with charr leg deformation)

Cof medium shoulders look diffrent than him
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Flame_Legion_armor_

The shots on the wiki are of the full set, with chestpiece. When wearing the CoF chestpiece, your shoulders are hidden.

Those are in fact CoF shoulders. Go visit the token merchant and preview them if you don’t believe it

Well, yes and no. Keep in mind Scarlet’s… aptitude for such things.

While it may not be called Golemancer (as Golem generally refers to Asuran Magitech constructs) A “tinkerer” or “mechanic” spec doesn’t seem too far fetched. Essentially an engineer more focused on the upkeep of mobile assault hardware/vehicles and melee attacks rather than the base engineer’s stationary hardware/ranged attacks.

Having a version of the asuran battlesuit summon that is a class skill (and thus, does not totally suck as racials are designed to suck in comparison) Seems a natural fit, as do more Wearable or mobile augments (like the drones seen in the trailer) for this kind of spec.

After all, What is a Charr tank, Pact Heli, or other such device if not a slightly different looking golem?

All I see is good in this change.

CCs actually mattering in WvW: Good.
Monster CCs actually mattering in PvE: Good
Boon Rip not being required to deal with heavy Stability Stacks? : Good.
CC focused builds actually being able to overpower 1 button’s worth of stability: Good.

Keep in mind that all current stability skills will likely not grant just one stack. Keep in mind that lack of stability/stability reliance was making certain elites and utilities more manditory than they should be.

Keep in mind that keeping a pocket boon ripper as a requirement for PvP is no more fun than requiring a dedicated pocket healer for PvP.

Keep in mind that Stability is being changed because it is packaged with Fortitude, and having fortitude combined with the current stability would just plain cause too many problems in the world of CCs and conditions. Lengthy frames of “Immune to everything except raw damage” would hypercharge the already giant problem of stability/boon ripping being far more important in most PvP encounters than every other mechanic in the game

In addition, keep in mind that breaking stability now requires a larger effort by your enemies. Wherin before they would simply keep all CCs ready to fly until stabilit ended, now it’s going to take multiple strips, or multiple ccs to remove it completely (unless necro, because corrupt boons is pure insanity)

The overall result is CC used more tactically rather than “NO STABILITY FIRE ALL CCS NAO”

I honestly can’t see why anyone is complaining about this change, unless they were using heavy stability stacking as a crutch to completely ignore the fact that CC exists.

The shoulders in both images are CoF dungeon shoulders. These do not display if you’re using the CoF chestpiece.

In the second image he’s also using the CoF gloves, Magitech chest, krytan pants (I think) and Magitech boots (again not sure, hard to tell with charr leg deformation)

Invictus.1503:

Potato Slayer.3107:

I concur with Rexx. But one of the reasons I liked Shiro was because he was believable in the sense was that he was human. He made mistakes and wasn’t just the “unkillable bodyguard”. Reminds me alot of Logan Thackeray actually. What if Queen Jenna died? Would he go insane?

It would be more like, what if Logan discovered that Queen Jenna was plotting to kill him and he was 100% sure of it. Would he go insane the way of Shiro too?

Actually, more like some old lady told Logan that she was going to kill him, and he believed her because… reasons?

tekfan.3179:

Why was the idea of an internment camp so “interesting” in this thread, when we could have a prison instead? I can’t speak for every country here on earth, but where I come from a prison is a place where the inmates are treated humanely, while they are imprisoned to punish them for crimes and protect the society from them.
A prison gives us a place to depict this struggle between fear-induced racism and protecting the innocent, which includes uncorrupted sylvari too.
So why would we need an internment camp? A place that in our real history always involved the mistreatment of people, just because they were of a certain ethnicity or religion?

You mentioned that for heroism and virtue to exist we would need evil. We got 5 terrible dragons with corrupting abilities left. Why would we need to add the most possible amount of racism from formerly free-minded beings to the evil?

You need to consider a few things:

1: The annihilation of the pact and the splintering of mutual trust between major racial powers is a major plot point. This is done specifically to undo the total and unshakable unity we were left with at the end of the original personal story. This was done to ensure this next leg of the story has room for us to be heroes again.

2: Internment camp does not necessarily equate to graphic depictions of torture. It is a place where individuals of group X are rounded up with the (often misguided) idea that the general populace needs to be protected from them. The United States ran such places filled with American Japanese at the same time they were mobilizing the the wake of pearl harbor to go fight you-know-who. The only major difference is that people were treated much better in the american camps, although establishing such places is generally viewed from a historical perspective as wrong. The people in power mistakenly thought it was the right idea at the time. If it makes you feel better to call it a “Sylvari Prison Camp” go right ahead. The inquest called theirs a “laboratory”. The fact remains that there is a place that sylvari, based solely on the fact that they are sylvari, will be sent for the good of everyone else, and this action alone will create the primary conflict that cuts us off from the military resources we would otherwise have access to as a necessary function of the plot.

3: It isn’t just theorized that sylvari, by nature of simply being sylvari, are a threat to the general populace. It is a physiological fact. The conflict over what to DO about it is obviously at the heart of the HoT storyline. The leaders of the world’s major races will not remain staunch allies at the outset of HoT. We are not unified. The primary conflict is that some feel the Sylvari need to be imprisoned, controlled, or eradicated, and that some do not.

4: The trailer has multiple scenes depicting Sylvari being on the short end of the stick, and Player Characters and the Biconics choosing the third option of killing Mordremoth, with little to no assistance from the world’s major powers to quell a world that is in dire conflict over the issue. This is why Glint’s Egg and the Sceptre of Orr are so integral to that plot. This is why we find ourselves making alliances with new factions within the jungle. These objects and allies are force multipliers to offset the fact that we no longer possess pact or racial leadership support of our actions.

5: This entire series of events is a good thing for the story. It places us as heroes once again rather than rank and file troops. When you think about LA (or any other location) housing sylvari prisoners, you must consider it in the greater scope. Such misuses of power are evidence of an insurmountable public opinion that prevents us from relying on our old alliances and armies to combat the threat. They are what drives our story to taking such an outlandish risk. Obviously they will not impact player Sylvari.

Specializations fill the same role as secondary classes did in GW1.

Think of a Ranger as a R/W, and a Druid as a R/Mo. You’ll lose potential build tools from one in exchange for potential build tools from the other, and there’s a lot of overlapping core skills/mechanics that will always be present between both.

Think about it less in a bubble and more in terms of how it stacks with similar effects.

Alone it’s not a great choice, but paired with Signet of malice, life sigils, mug, etc. it starts to shine.

I personally use it alongside Signet of Malice and mad king runes to turn basilisk venom in to a pretty effective auto-hit heal+stun with a fast recharge. I lose damage this way, but I gain a pretty effective harassment tool and some sustain that lets me be a little more aggressive and save some of my cooldowns so I can apply them a little more strategically rather than reactively.

In any case, you’re always going to be trading burst, other utility, or DPS for sustain, but it is a worthwhile option for thief builds looking to be a bit more tank and a bit less spank, which is its entire purpose. One set is better for 1v1s and roams, while the other is a batter bet in team fights and zergs.

Druids in this universe aren’t known for shapeshifting as much as they are known for hanging out in forests and using nature magic.

GW1 rangers had a lot of druid in them, and spirit summons and general nature magic were important parts of the class. I’d expect GW2 druids to play a lot like a R/Mo wheras a Ranger plays a lot like a R/W (only both of them are saddled with a pet as a requirement rather than an option.)

Subutex.2416:

Despite also being easy and soloable, Shadow Of The Dragon was a way better fight than Zaithan. Personally I’d prefer if Mordremoth was an Open World event like Vinewrath or the Marionette.

Honestly I doubt it.

The reason they didn’t make zhaitan a world event is so that they could have a custscene heavy and story focused final fight that they can direct you to as a final story step so you don’t just stumble across it on accident, and that he doesn’t miraculously respawn so the game world can treat him as “dead”

This is also why the official stance on world bosses is that they are all actually different creatures, or that they retreat rather than die when defeated, and that they allow the dragon’s minions to persist after it dies. This lets them have a dead Zhaitan while still treating his zones like a constant battle against the risen, as it makes chronoligcal sense no matter where you are in the personal story, or what content you have done.

Ditto with silverwastes, or any other enemy faction stronghold.

I would assume that the final mordy fight will take place in an instance, either group or solo with massive NPC reinforcements for this reason.

Have you considered that maybe some players like the option of having pets that don’t look “pretty and well taken care of”

Hell, both of my real life pets are quite ugly, just due to their genetics, but I still love them.

Not all animals, pets or otherwise, need to look “cute” or even “well fed” this isn’t a “problem that needs to be addressed” it’s why rangers have such a massive range of pet options.

If the LS2 boss fights were any indication, they seem to hagve made lots of strides in giving players fun ways to fight bosses that massive scale. The pale tree fight and finale fight are both great examples of a boss encounter with a massive foe where that foe doesn’t just stand in one place like all of the super boring world bosses, of sit in one place while you pelt it with cannons.

Oh I won’t fault the mission design in factions at all, and the shiro boss fight was a great encounter.

But I’ll say it, as a matter of opinion (and we’ve all got them!) Shiro is easily the least well written villain in the entire franchise.

Aside from the writing my only real issues with factions were the long fetch quests. So many fetch quests in Kaineng that required you to walk back across a zone you had already completely cleared of bad guys on the way to the quest. Ugh. Luckily those were mostly side quests but man, some of ’em got pretty tedious.

Still, back on topic, Rev Shiro stance is probably a thing, or at least should be. Despite his writing he’s easily important enough in the lore to qualify for legend status, and has a set of abilities unique enough to build some cool mechanics around.

The thing you need to realize is that GW2’s story content is a limited edition affair, similar to other games with special events. The difference is that the primary content model since release has been a series of special events.

People didn’t like that they couldn’t go back and play these special events, so Anet, based on community feedback, added a convenience purchase for people that missed story events to re-play them for most of their associated rewards.

This was a win/win. Players still got semiregular story updates for free, and on top of that new permanent zones added to the game. Anet got an additional revenue stream.

LS episodes are, in fact, DLC, the difference is that Anet is nice enough to give you the option of acquiring them for free during their release period, unlike every other themepark that has used this model (DCUO, LOTR, etc.)

This is precisely why you don’t pay a subscription fee. Gem store sales replaced it. In order to keep development on more new content rolling, they need to monetize the game beyond its release content.

Just like any other game, if you really enjoy it, you might consider purchasing some DLC. If you’re not that big of a fan, maybe you’ll just play the base game, then go play something else.

LS is a work in progress. Mechanically, I think they nailed it with Season 2. In terms pof writing it was significantly improved.

I’d also like to remind everyone that this expansion is not a new idea. They structured their staff specifically to support LS releases while working on the expansion they led up to. S1 was really where they were working the kinks out, then we had a lot of CDI, and they switched strategies to what we have now:

LS updates (semi-regular)
Feature packs (less regular)
Expansions (even less regular)

The net result is that they’re making good on their vision of pushing content at a rapid pace and creating what their vision of a living world looks like.

Expect a feature pack release a month or two after HoT release, and a new LS season to start after that, foreshadowing events (with some unrelated smaller plotlines) for one or more seasons until their next expansion is ready to release.

This is their new deal, after taking all the community feedback, and I’d expect it to run until such time as it becomes financially unsoluable to do so, and they decide to start work on another game or all get fired.

At the time it was written, there was no Abbaddon, that was a retcon added later. As written, said fortune teller had no apparent power, real or imagined.

She “poisoned his mind” by simply telling him stuff. There was no literal hex, curse, or other metaphysical influence on Shiro. There was no mind control. This was the equivalent of me telling you that your history professor or wife is planning to murder you, and you believing it for absolutely no reason.

The fact remains that Shiro’s entire story is a series of inconsistancies and contrivances, packaged at first as a sad tale of a powerful man used as a pawn, escaping fate because the plot demanded that a guy who isn’t smart enough to figure out he’s being manipulated (blatantly) by an old woman he barely knows somehow manages to outsmart an entity that has been in charge of the GW Universe equivalent of the river styx for hundreds of years.

He is a more poorly written and conceived villain than Scarlet Briar, and people like him because he is the living embodiment of anime fanfiction bad boy tropes:

Scar? Check!
Long hair? Check!
Dual wielding? Check!
Long coat? Check!
Magical powers? Check again!
Apply the same story, not set in an asian themed continent, to any other person with more conventional arms or appearance and people would still be crying about how badly he was written.

The plot paints him simultaneously as history’s largest idiot and it’s greatest general. it simultaneously paints him as a tragic pawn and a calculating and cunning operator.
At the end of it all, his entire story arc is one long string of plot convenience after plot convenience to no purpose whatsoever, and is written specifically to find a way to funnel players in to the kurzick/luxon mechanics and explain some really neat set pieces for map design.

Factions was a beautiful environment and had a lot of fun mission design, but the story was absolute trash when held up to prophecies or nightfall.

You spend the entire game chasing one man, who according to all avaliable sources is simultaneously the dumbest and improbably strongest human to ever live. There are no surprises, no twists, just a long and tedious string of exposition to shuffle you along to the next mission marker.

So, basically, what you’re saying is you’d like a way to completely prevent armies from pushing each other out of the field, remove the already extremely slim incentive for actually holding any given position in WvW, and generally add to the Zerg vs Door problem that Anet themselves have realized destroys the fun of the game mode, and are actively changing in the expansion?

Because you don’t like running.

Every class but thief has the exact same swap-enforcing design though. You will output more DPS by swapping weapons/attunements/kits at the earliest opportunity, unless you specifically trait in a way that rewards you for not swapping.

Rev is no different in this respect, aside from the fact that its base energy mechanics actively reward you for not swapping at the earliest opportunity as a base design rather than a traited design.

Expect to be swapping a lot, just like everyone else (except thieves, who gain no core benefit from swaps due to initiative), if you want to run your most efficient builds.

Also, event chains to open up dungeons are supposed to be a core part of the zone meta events. In case you hadn’t figured it out already, chain-running dungeons isn’t something Anet wants you to do. That’s why they capped out the rewards, and also why they implemented fractals.

If anything, more dungeons should have associated assault meta events to unlock access to them. It’s not as if walking right up to the flame legion stronghold when the flame legion controls the entire map is something you should logically be able to pull off. After all, what’s the point of fighting them in the field if you can just get a guided tour directly to the root of the problem?

Astralporing.1957:

PopeUrban.2578:

He literally does every evil thing ever because some random old woman told him to. There’s no other reason for him to betray the emperor. Then he goes on, supposedly tortured about the experience… on a quest to come back to life, raise an army of shiroken, in order to what… murder everyone for no discernible reason?
There’s no clear or consistant motivation for anything Shiro ever does. Ever.

His motivation is extremely simple and stays very consistent both during his betrayal and return. He simply wants to keep living. If you haven’t noticed, the whole Factions affair is his attempt to resurrect himself. It’s clearly explained throughout the story (but, of course, you need to pay attention).

No, he wants to return to life and MURDER EVERYONE.

For no discernible reason outside of his obligation as the villain of the piece to spread murderchaos.

And, again, he murdered a man he respected and admired at the insistance of an old woman he barely knew.

Also, he killed an old lady because she said something disparaging about his lord, then regretted that decision, then immediately acted upon her upsetting prophecy.

Let’s be clear here. Even with the “Abbaddon did it, lulz!” retcon later on, a man in Shiro’s position, taking life changing advice from a nickel and dime fortune teller is a pretty kitten poor motivation.

He wasn’t ensorcelled to commit the deed, and this wasn’t some long standing friend and confidant. This wasn’t a carefully orchestrated shell game by players behind the scenes using shiro as a pawn.

This was one lady (or, you know, demon after they retconned that) with a crystal ball and no other apparent skills. Shiro didn’t even have reason to believe she was an ACCURATE fortune teller.

He was a victim of his own boundless stupidity, and in the end decided that he’d punish all of Cantha for the fact he’s a class A moron.

Behellagh.1468:

PopeUrban.2578:

Behellagh.1468:

Except gold has no direct value to ANet. Paying for a Gem Shop item with gold doesn’t help ANet meet payroll. And since you aren’t paying them in a currency ANet can use to make payroll, you are getting that item for free.

It’s not that hard of a concept.

It does though. The gems on the exchange aren’t magiced up out of thin air. Each and every gem you’ve ever purchased with gold began life when someone whipped out a credit card and put it there.

The echange didn’t being life with a stock of gems. It began life with a finite stock of gold.

In fact, the supply of gems in the exchange is what affects the gold price of gems. When you buy a gem item with gold, Anet is making the same amount of money they would have made if someone bought it directly with cash shopped gems, and in fact, that money was already made before you even bought the item, the moment the original purchaser of those gems completed their transaction.

Your ability to buy gem items with gold is absolutely of value to Anet, because it encourages people to buy gems so they can sell them to you. Thus, your ability to reliably make and spend gold is of value to them because for that transaction to be attractive to the gem-buyer it has to be reasonably affordable in terms of the time and difficulty required to gain the gold to buy them.

Yes I know how the exchange works, made and posted diagrams over two years ago on the working of the exchange and have argued with players thinking gems or gold are created by the exchange ever since.

My treatise is simple. You did not spend cash, real currency to acquire that item. Therefore you got that item for free, as in no real world currency spent. Yes it took you time to acquire enough in game money to trade for that item but it cost you zero real world currency, therefore free.

You could argue that someone else bought that item for you, indirectly buy selling gems that they bought with cash. But once bought, gems have no real world value since it’s a one way transaction. And if gems have no real world value then the gold you used to buy them have no value either.

Gems, and by extension, gold, have value specifically because of the nature of gem purchases. I bought a new coffee maker last week with a gift card. I can’t return it to the store for store credit any more, and I didn’t personally pay the retailer for it in US dollars. That doesn’t mean it has lost its value. I can still sell it to someone for US dollars if I want, and I could use those dollars to either buy a different coffee maker from the same retailer, or buy another gift card.

Or, I could keep it, and use it to make coffee.

Or I could sell the coffee maker for USD, use that USD to buy gems, and use the gems to buy gold.

My coffee maker is worth, at the time of this post, 365 gold, 30 silver

Just because anet doesn’t accept coffee makers as a method of payment doesn’t change the fact that my coffee maker is worth a very specific amount of gold, and with a little currency exchange and a willing buyer I could turn said coffee maker in to gold.

Furthermore, just because I can’t exchange gold directly for a coffee maker doesn’t change the fact that 1 gold is worth ~0.00273747604 coffee makers