Guild Wars 2

I’ve nailed a winning scenario…

Super adventure box fractal!!!

Either a new level with jumping bits and fighting mechanics based on the weapons in the SAB (eg thrwo bombs into King Toads mouth) or a collage of bits from SAB – so rapids + say yeti then some jumping then World 2 boss.

:D

Have a look on the TP and see what is popular atm. Then ask yourself can you farm it. eg iron or silk or soft wood or truffles or dill etc etc. It’s boring, but effective if you invest the time.

6g/hour is an average based on running it a long time. You wont make that every hour, you make less or more (if lucky). It balances out. Dont forget LA has a very high champ bag rate with all the bosses in there atm. And the ascended back items upgrades are 1-2 g a pop as I type.

Rallar.2986:

Trial of Ascension

It would be cool to have the 3 fractals be each mission required to be completed to access augury rock in GW1 and culminating in the boss fractal that is essentially your parties doubles.

That would be awesome

I think I could live w/o the trials again – about to do that in HM and not looking forward to it lol!!! Love the boss fractal idea though. Us Vs Us would be epic if it could be done in a way that so that the fight wasn’t over too quick.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

In regard to topics I would like to see (if that’s ok):

- Continued discussion about lore in fractals.
- Suggested scenarios (boss, encounter and level design) based on current mechanics and systems in fractals.
- Anything else that takes your fancy.

I am pretty well versed in all of your thoughts around rolling, rewards and leader boards now.

Chris

Putting aside your dev hat and any indications of inetntion etc etc

Out of nothing more than curiosity and get discussion back rolling…what would you personally “as a player/fan” like to see as a scenario. Given the whole the GW lore and history to pluck from?

For eg, I’d love something similar to the Ascalon fight, but with Ebonhawke and Kralk flying overhead branding half the area and you as soldiers fighting off branded so people could escape. That would be iconic!

I would have given it a an easy 7 for the attempt to try something new and the overall improvement between Tower of Nightmares and Escape from LA. However, this patch brings it down to about a 5. From an epic POV I can see what they did, but from a gameplay POV it was messy and gated and just not the right sort of content to lock a story behind after such a long drawn out story.

Improvements;

- Vary the content so its not all zerg stuff. There are some good bits in there like the investigation stuff, but they are massively too short

- More story per chapter. Even looking back over the year, there really has been little story progression if you spread it out over 12 months. It did improve since Jan, but it wasn’t enough to make up for we didn’t get imo.

- Make it less a linear story and more about little stories around the world

- Expand the world. Southson was a good start. Bazaar was fun, but disappeared. Temporary content should be the exception, not the rule.

- In game communication. About halfway through the LS, it was much clearer where you went, who you spoke to, what was going, where the achievements related to. This last one…took that hard work…and throw it out the window in favour of no direction whatsoever. It was summed up in map chat when ppl said that Dulfy was more helpful than anything the game itself provided. That should never happen. External sites help with fight tactics, visual on rewards etc. Never, ever, ever directional guidance.

- Tell your playerbase when achievements will end. DOn’t let us assume it will end in 2 weeks, as it isn’t always the case. There is no reason I can fathom that a note in the patch notes or a UI timer (like the daily/monthly) can’t cover this.

- release content when it’s ready. 2 weeks, 1 month, 3 months. Regular conten is great, but rather than rush it or cram things in or leave things out…make it perfect…then release it.

- Remember you have an awesome game and keep it fun, rewarding and accessible. This should stand firm over all your other pillars and guide the LS overall. It hasn’t always done that, but there are times when GW2 has shone brightly (SAB, Tower of Nightmares, burning down LA, the Bazaar and ofc Marionette stand out for me)

:)

All the minis seem unusually small in comparison to other minis. Thought it was just me!

Still seems to be happening. Only seen it on overflow so far

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Spinal_Blade_Pack this is the one you need.

Spinal Blade Pack is the right one

Yes you are forced to make an item. If it helps, you require very little to forge it (blueprint + 250 shards + 50 iron ingots + 10 radiant dust), but I understand if you feel it doesn’t make it any better

As the Smooth Penguin says there are two ways;

1) the short route, which cuts out the battle side of the story but gives you access to the finale. That requires the spinal blades of lowest quality – you don’t need exotic or ascended for it, just the basic. You miss out the massive boss fight on the drill, but still get the cutscene we were all waiting for..

2) the long, epic and gated method. WHen it works, it is excellent. You get a series of fights in LA vs 3 Knights, then off to the airship for the big battle – a fight I really enjoyed, although the server gets split into groups and if you end up in the smaller group, you can fail the boss and not progress.

Having done both methods, the battle route is the most fun and epic, but overall it is just a frustrating idea. A year long story suddenly gated behind a server dependant fight – something which will become harder and harder to complete as time passes and people give up. It was quite frustrating to be in the group Vs Scarlet who was victorious only for my guildies to be in the lower population group and fail after all their hard work.

I imagine they took into account the Zhaitan complaints about not being epic enough., but perhaps went too far on this one.

First this time! beat you Danicia
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Color-pools-not-appearing-after-Knights-defeat/page/2#post3716497

Ive been told it could be due to a rapid disconnect and then a bit of lag on the reconnect message as it thinks you are still in the game.

AN interesting situation – was in LA and suddenly disconnected from main server. A message popped saying my client was being accessed elsewhere. Then reconnected fine, back to main, then disconnected, same message. All as Knights popped in LA

I reconnected back to overflow, no further issues.

Obviously I’ll change passwords etc, but seems a bit odd?

It might be buggy. We tried to get in as a group, but failed to get a pop up. People are getting in as a group tho, so it is clearly possible

You really, really want to remove the Elder Dragons bit from your title. You can’t write spoiler then put something from the end custcene in it…

Also, there is (somewhere) a massive thread on this subject already. I think it is located somewhere in the lore subforum.

I like the idea and it was starting to get quite interesting, but this last chapter was probably the worst for me and really let it all down. The idea was sound, but the reliance on group server dynamics for story progression and especially for an important, hyped season finale was a bit of an anti climax (final cutscene itself aside). Yes it could be entered solo, but then you skip an epic bit. So you end up trading off a bit of story vs being gated. A bizarre thing to do.

Whilst I have no major objections to continuing the LS as it is an intersting experiment, it needs a radical rethink in implementation. The story was too slow and remained so even during these 4 patches. Even looking back on the last year, it all feels a bit contrived and laboured to tell a reasonably straightforward story.

There are also many unanswered questions. A great deal in fact which were never tied up. They may still, but it has been drawn too far out now and as a community will probably cease to care less and less about any hangovers now the finale is just about ovcer.

One of my other problems is how the NPC’s seemed to either
1) act like idiots to progress the story. We all saw the lair. There were enough warnings in there to present to the council to mobilise their defences. There was no logical reason for them not to, but they ignore all warnings they did. This is Lions Arch – the one city which wouldn’t be complacent given its history.
2) Not care about the story they were in. The final cutscene has an example, although I can’t say more for risk of spoilers.
3) Seem unaffected by the global threat. Kryta didn’t care after the Jubilee attack nor seek much retribution – even after LA was attacked. The Orders didn’t really care much at their HQ’s either.
4) Carry on doing as they were a year ago. A truly evolving world would show signs of change – eg the Treaty camp outside of Ebonhawke. Why show some progression in negotiations and be discussing the wider world affairs.

Hopefulyl big, big lessons have been learned from all this and we can have a smoother ride next time.

skullmount.1758:

Ignavia.7420:

skullmount.1758:

Sorann Peace.9056:

At the top of the hour, every hour, three assault knights spawn in Lion’s Arch which you have to kill. Kill all three of them, get all three color buffs, and you’re able to go through the white portal. After that there’s a hologram and i’m not sure what else other than that the ending is awesome (I used the purple portal which skips you to the ending given you have the spinal blade pack and doesn’t require the assault knights to be killed)

How long does the buff last? (Don’t all three spawn at the same time?) At work so I can’t test the new stuff out yet.

The buff lasts 5 minutes.

Do you only need one of the buffs to enter one of the portals or do you need all three?

All 3 Knights must be killed to enter portal

Caveth.3268:

Ignavia.7420:

DavyMcB.1603:

Just craft the spineblade back piece. The basic one with no upgrade whatsoever. And enter the purple portal.

This only grants you entrance to the very last part of the story, while skipping the actual battle. So to do that, you still have to defeat the Assault Knights.

I just did the instance, and yeah… it skipped some pretty important story parts… I don’t understand why Arenanet would gate the end of the entire season 1 living story behind zerg content that has to extremely organized. It’s so stupid. I’m probably done with GW2 after this season of the living story. What a disappointment.

I have to say, I’m a bit annoyed about gated story. Its not like MArionette etc with a timer on the zone – you can be stuck on overflow for ages and never finish the fight. Yes you can skip to the cutscene, but you have to find that out for yourself and you miss a small chunk of story from the battle.

Ours kept healing…not sure if thats intended – we had blue almost fully reheal.

Do we actually have to defeat these to get through to the big story reveal? Seems ludicrous for a story progression to be locked that way (hoping Im wrong ofc..)

I agree. The pattern for content changes has varied a lot (eg Origins of Madness was extended). So much map chat asking whether events and heirlooms etc will be continuing tomorrow – it would be fab to have this communication in the patch notes just saying when achievements will disappear.

However, we have asked for it on at least a dozen threads, incl a CDI w/o a response. Here’s for try 13

Blade Syphon.4325:

Randulf.7614:

As they said, there will be a big feature patch sometime after the season 1 ends (prob mid-late march)
What will be in that? They haven’t given any clue yet, although the forums have been rife with speculation pretty much every day since the announcement. I suspect we will know more after this patch lands.

I’m pretty sure the Feature Patch contains all the sweeping balance and system changes they announced a few months ago. They’re probably not going to start adding more LS content until after the second season of WvW, as they said they’re taking a break from it at the end of Season 1.

Hopefully that means they’re revising whatever content they originally had planned to be less awful, temporary content and more peramenent, good content but we’ll just have to wait and see.

Either way, I’m almost positive the Feature Update is just going to be the system changes that were previewed.

You are probably correct about the balance changes, but I believe they said “other” things were being added as well, but were non committal about what. Perhaps as much hope on my part!

As they said, there will be a big feature patch sometime after the season 1 ends (prob mid-late march)
What will be in that? They haven’t given any clue yet, although the forums have been rife with speculation pretty much every day since the announcement. I suspect we will know more after this patch lands.

Zoid.2568:

Henqquli.5078:

I don’t think that would be a good idea. If you could get X amount of weapons with ONE legendary, older legendary owners would feel betrayed :l

The old legendaries should be improved then and made into all types of weapons.

Imagine…a disco shield!!!

mmmm shineeeeey

In the book Kralk is described as being a thousand feet tall. Not sure if Zhaitan was quite that big in the game

darkfiremew.5937:

So in conclusion, we don’t know exactly how much time until season 2 because we don’t know how long the feature/ maintenance patches will last or how many of them there will be. We just know when the WvW tournament is held but not how long the break between seasons is.

Correct. Anything else is educated guesswork on our part right now.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/livingworld/escape/Scarlet-and-Tequatl

I liked this connection

The only patch date announcement I can find is the WVW tournament on March 28th https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/wvw-spring-2014-tournament/?utm_source=client

Rezz.8019:

When is super adventure box patch coming?

No announcement on this either yet

Escadin.9482:

Pie Flavor.1647:

darkfiremew.5937:

Pie Flavor.1647:

There will be no patch at march 18th

This doesn’t answer my questions.Maybe I was unclear, how many patches are between season 1 and season 2?

Anet has not announced anything, thus we suppose there will be no more updates to the game and that the current version of the game is “Final”

Alright, mr helpful. OP and I are still looking for an answer.

We don’t know how many patches to come as they haven’t announced this information yet, but I suspect (or hope) for an announcement of what is to come following Season 1. It is very long overdue now.

Occasionally it bugs – if it takes more than 2-3 days, email support. They have fixed this issue in the past iirc.

It is as intended – they want all trading to go through the TP as much for player security to prevent scamming and it also doubles up as said gold sink. This has been directly communicated by the economist of the game and will probably never be a feature they add.

JoeytheHutt.1742:

I would like the orders to come more in play. In LA there could have been some quests for every order, priory study the miasma, wishper scouting or vigil escort/evacuate missions, just to name a few possibilites.

Dailies based on this would have been an interesting approach and much more in keeping with the game than what we have now.

Seems a continuation of escape from LA, so an extra sub forum just seems needless when it can be easily discussed in here

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Randulf.7614:

Chris apologies to post in this thread about a sep issue but, it might be worth post weekend some additional attention in the Ranger CDI. The community is trying to keep discussion moving, but it has lost direction and management. Could really use the “pep ups” this thread has had since inception.

Hi Randulf,

Thanks for the heads up. One thing for sure is that it is a much bigger thread (-:

Personally i think Allie and the team are doing a good job. I know the team has been discussing the proposals and discussions that they have seen in the thread.

Please note that I agree with their needing to be a guiding hand but do remember that the devs consider themselves peer members of the CDI group and thus there really shouldn’t be an expectation for them to comment all the time. Like me, they probably read, digest and evolve their own design philosophy based on the discussions. And at its core that is the huge value the CDI brings to GW2.

One thing I would like to point out is that whilst I spend portions of my weekend on the CDI that does not mean that this is expected of other team members. If anything my behavior is bad because as it sets an example to the community that they then expect to see replicated by other staff members and thus puts undue pressure on the team.

Chris

No criticism intended and no one expects a reply over the weekend, but it had been a while since a previous guiding hand from the lead dev of that thread. Sure they are doing a great job, but also there was expectation of much greater interaction hence the delay in getting the threads up and running. I don’t think the thread has derailed, it would just be a shame to see probably the leading CDI topic not get the direction it desp requires and thus have negative impact on the reputation of future threads.

More of a heads up really, where it goes from there is really in someone else’s ball court – I’m happy just reading atm

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Excellent exercise in terms of ‘reduction’ of the proposals and re factoring of your opinion in light of the discussions.

In a similar way to the exercise that Orpheal has under taken it would be wise now to ask you all to pick 1 area that you would prioritize above all others having has the chance to have seen everyone’s opinions around each others proposals.

Chris

I would have said new fractals, but different sized group fractals would be a great boon to myself and others who belong loyally to small guildsand have had only bad experiences via lfg.

So thats my 1 pick!

Chris apologies to post in this thread about a sep issue but, it might be worth post weekend some additional attention in the Ranger CDI. The community is trying to keep discussion moving, but it has lost direction and management. Could really use the “pep ups” this thread has had since inception.

I hated World 2 and Tribulation was a bizarre concept….

…however, I find myself missing SAB regardless..so welcome it’s return!!!

Beast Sos.1457:

Randulf.7614:

What can’t you get that isn’t obtainable through time spent? ie accumulation of gold or crafting?

I’d hate to return to the “/roll for a diff piece of loot in every diff instance” days of mmos….I loathed that system – the weeks and months I spent in some games just to get an item which became obsolete a few patches later was heart breaking at times.

Well there is a difference with being able to buy a item and getting a item for doing content which rewards it. In gw2 if I want something I HAVE farm gold, rather than playing the actual game. This makes it more of a job than a game.

I understand your feelings about the roll system but I am sure alot of game have improved it. For example when I played Tera, if i were to go into a dungeon with a party of 5 and I get bad rolls the first few times, most likely on the next kill my roll will be 90+.

True on the farming gold, but it does mean everything is obtainable with time and more so than most MMO’s allow. It just gets locked behind the “non essential grinding” factor discussed above. I ultimately prefer this system, but would welcome improvemenst to the RNG system to make it less unforgiving.

Azreell.1568:

Jski.6180:

Beast Sos.1457:

Dahkeus.8243:

You must be new to video games…

Well this is more about MMO games, not games in general. I played a couple MMOs and whenever I wanted something in them I would be able to get it. It wasnt dependant on my luck but on my effort/time spent.

MMO even rpgs are just like that unless they are the super easy hit one button receive bacon type games. You just make of grown up with the free items games. GW2 is a very low grind game there are games out there that have a mob that only pops every 2hr has a .005% chase to drop an item AND can only be taged by one person and or one group. There even worst mobs that only pop. every 72hr with a chase to be a super version that only drop “good” items in that super version. You have no ideal what real RNG is or what real grind is.

Gw2 is not a very low grind game.

It borders on being one of the most grindy games on the market atm.

Think that idea has been proven in multiple threads below.

That comes down to perspective. There’s no “necessary” grind in this game really – nothing you need, whether it is basic gear or levels etc is grindy. It is however, grindy in relation to the cosmetic stuff that you want and that’s partly what they wanted. I agree they went too far with what you need for some things, but it’s debatable whether it is the worst mmo for grind.

..I’m playing TSW as we speak and that is FAR worse.

What can’t you get that isn’t obtainable through time spent? ie accumulation of gold or crafting?

I’d hate to return to the “/roll for a diff piece of loot in every diff instance” days of mmos….I loathed that system – the weeks and months I spent in some games just to get an item which became obsolete a few patches later was heart breaking at times.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Just a quick note to let you know i am up to date.

I am assuming that you all feel that for example a Dredge rework is higher priority than say a rework to rolling?

Chris

Personally yes. I like the rolling as it is and as a lower lvl fotm player I’d prob baulk against any suggestion to kick more fractals up to the higher tiers and be in accessible. One of the big selling points on FOTM was that it was a series of random dungeons of up to 20mins each (approx.). Dredge doesn’t fit that. It would also need to ensure no skipping can be taken – that’s just completely against the nature of the game and needs discouraging at all costs.

The LS will continue. It’ll change and adapt to feedback, but it’s the path they wish to follow. I personally am not a fan of it, mostly because it isn’t a true living story – it’s still an unnaturally structured linear group/personal story which doesn’t really seem to affect the the World as much as it could. That said, it is certainly improving – Marionette was an exceptional piece of content and LA has been a blast so far, so I’m happy to stick by it and see where it goes. There is more than enough content in the game for me outside of the LS to dip in and out of.

We have no idea what is in store for us though – and that is probably my biggest complaint about the game. A regular update of what is to come builds excitement and much of the flatness ppl feel towards the game could be swept away with a monthly or quartely update of what they are working on. This veil of secrecy seems baffling to me.

I believe it is currently global. As for the China release? Only Anet can give that info

This happens on every server and in every MMO. Doesn’t make it any more right, but don’t take it personally – these games are full of ppl who forget they didn’t know once upon a time as well.

I second the suggestion of finding a friendly guild. There are thousands of them some good, some bad. It can take a few tries to find one you will mesh with. And don’t forget you can join several guilds as well, thus increasing your chances of finding a good one.

Failing all that, maybe guest/switch servers/ We’re mostly pretty nice on Gunnars Hold as Morrigan says and there are some excellent commanders who run things like World Tours etc for its community

Trixie’s advice is pretty sound if you get stuck on choosing

As a stat it continues until 300%, but can be buffed above.

As for how it works, I quote from wiki;

“Everytime you kill a monster you roll on a number of tables, inside these tables are different rarity categories. Magic find increases the chances you will get higher categories. For example if there is a 1 in 10 category, and you have 200% magic find you will have 3/10 chances to get that category. This improves not just the rarity of the items you get but can also improve your chances at getting trophies and rare crafting materials like lodestones.”

ie it will improve your drop rates, but marginally and only noticeable over a period of time. Many people will give anecdotal info about how their drops are or aren’t better (mine have improved for eg, but some haven’t noticed anything) – only you can decide if you are benefitting from it.

Many servers have World Tours for the meta bosses, which include almost every meta boss in an evening run. It is certainly not the case no one is doing them, it might be more a case on your server during your play time though and that can be fixed with guesting.

You will probably also find that interest in LA is starting to decrease somewhat as achievements tick off, heirlooms are collected etc and this weekend they are back out in the wider world before the next stage of the fight on Tuesday.

Tyson.8492:

ColinJohanson.2394:

spoj.9672:

But on to the point of explorable modes not being heavily story driven. Why does the new aetherpath in Twilight Arbor still have unskippable cutscenes and needlessly long dialogues? This is a major reason a lot of players avoid the path.

This is a perfect example of why heavily driving a lot of lore and story into something that is intended to be a group re-playable experience isn’t a great idea, and something typically we try and avoid. Thus the challenge here, to get across these cool stories, without the cost of the pacing of the fractal experience!

An idea would be to incorporate Lore Scrolls that can be earned by completing achievements within the fractals or made to be a drop kinda like the blueprints from bags that when you piece them all together, you get the Lore story told either through a cinematic or a simple slide show with text, similar to the new Atlas content. This would allow players to experience the Lore outside of the fractal and not weigh down the team waiting on a cinematic to complete. I think it would be really cool to have the chance to experience some lore like the Edge of Steel in the Arena fighting gladiator style, or even reliving a dragonspawn battle with Destiny’s Edge. Seeing the dwarven race driven underground…..I am sure you get the picture. Have the scrolls pertain to the story related to the fractal in which it came.

I personally think a well made fractal either tells its own story in the case of the Ascalonian city fractal, or allows you to conjure up a story in your head for it. The cliffside fractal does this to perfection for example.

Having said that, I like the lore blueprint idea. That gives re-playability for casuals like myself with no interest in higher tiers.

I also love the idea of Destinys Edge fractals, maybe as a playable set you can choose inside. The arena, the dragonspawn fights, battling Kralkatorriks minions and the death of Snaff – all key moments in the book which could be played out.

Well, we definitely exist

Never heard this request before now have to say. I’d personally rather they improved the skills on the weapons underwater first. I love the underwater stuff, but the combat can be a bit hit and miss