Guild Wars 2

Well who doesn’t? Actually those who don’t do raids or those who only do them when asked like me don’t. But that’s irrelevant to those who do – so here is your answer:

You have to wait until all 3 wings appear.
Yes I know they could just add the Raid LFG with just 1 sub-group but the thing was probably already coded for all 3 just like the legendary armour collection.
And recoding it 3 times rather than 1 would probably be inconvenient.

Think about it do you honestly think ANET doesn’t realise it would be very useful?
Well I mean I’m wodering meself if they have any self-awareness left at all after HoT.
But that would be beyond any level of stupidity thus far.

Eldvin Monastery Brew of the Month Club collection allowed me to figure out the secret – GW2 is an endurance test.
It’s suppose to test us on how long we can take getting half finished and/or promised for a long time content.
Like:
- new legendary weapons – 3/19 only so far
- legendary armour – can’t even finish collection for part 1 yet (oh yeah it’s just the beginning else it wouldn’t have the roman 1 in the title)
- legendary backpack – yeah because even back items have to be given in piecess if they are legendary
- SAB – need I say anything?

Oh but of course we can’t have that because people would just finish everything in 6 months and go back to their lives. And then simply wait another 3 years for an “expansion.”

Ok the collections were a good idea at first, but as with everything else too much of something is not healthy.
ANET obviously has the belief that once they get a good idea and players have an initially positive reaction toward it then they should expand it as much as possible.
But there is a major difference between most of the first collections and those that came out now:
THEY WERE A REWARD IN ITSELF! Most of them were collecting weapon and armour skins which we can reuse through the wardrobe. I used to make fun of the Black Lion collections but even they seem self-aware when compared to the new ones.
Because if someone was really serious about collecting them all they at least get a head start for the next one that will appear.

Now we get collections for everything, even better we get collections for finishing other collections. Yes I’m talking about the Specialization collections where we have to do Machined weapon collections too in order to finish them. When I was getting Yggdrasil I thought the plated weapon was all you needed, but no it was just a prequel for another collection I need to do in order to get the Machined weapon. (as if getting the plates to drop wasn’t hard enough)
Well of course the “Dungeoneer” title is in a way a collection for collections but each of them were a reward in itself.
These new collections however are mostly garbage we collect once and then throw it away. But new dungeon weapons/armours can still come in handy even if we have all skins unlocked.
However ANET no longer has any items they could make into collection items. So the only idea they could come up with was to invent the items and make them as useless as possible. Because nothing can stop this roller coaster of a ride from moving.
And they are so confident it won’t derail itself that all new legendary items are gained through collections only.

At first it was like ANET made us cook a soup for ourselves which we could eat.
And when we were done gave us some salt we could add to the brew for flavor.
But now they dump a whole pile of salt and tell us to dig in it to find the soup underneath. Which obviously is a huge waste of effort not to mention the soup is oversalted to the point the brew got absorbed by it. And all that’s left is an empty plate which we are suppose to admire for how pretty it is.

Ok so this has probably been already mentioned but why is it that experience for central and HoT mastaries cannot be the same?
I mean they are already separated by different mastery point’s so why does the experience has to be too? We can’t even gain Spirit Shards anymore with any experience we gain now so what is the point?
Actually these are rhetorical questions – I know why. (And before you even say anything you should know I already have them all unlocked)

So why is that so? Well because it’s a cheap move to make people believe that HoT has actually a lot of new content. How does that work? Well if you want to master all the Maguuma masteries you need to spend a lot of time in the new areas. Thus it creates the illusion that there is a lot to do there.
Same thing goes for the new currencies – 3 (well actually 5) new currencies each earned in a different area. Yeah because grinding one area until you are ready to fall over isn’t enough.

So yeah this is all just to pretend there is a lot of content out there which actually doesn’t exist.

Now for starters everyone should know that this is only theoretical based on a few facts from LS2 and HoT so it doesn’t mean anything. But based on these facts it is possible to deduct which race makes the most sense.

OK so which of the 5 races is it? (drum roll)

To the surprise of absolutely no one on the planet the Pact Commander is most likely HUMAN!

But of course you all want to know how did I come up with this conclusion so here goes:
First hint is in “Fallen Hopes” at the very start of the mission Taimi says that She, Braham and Rox cannot go along for this one due to their weight. Of course Taimi is the lightest of everyone but she cannot move long distancess without Scruffy.
So that eliminates both Charr and Norn in one go as for a fact they aren’t even that big for their own race standards. Braham is in fact slightly shorter than Eir so he probably isn’t even a fully grown Norn yet. I did LS2 with each race and both my Charr and Norn characters are much bigger than them. Heck I would say my Charr Engineer when placed near them looked like he would weight more than the 2 of them together.
Same goes for my Norn Warrior – well he would be lighter than my Engineer though.
So when I did this on my Engineer (he was the 2nd character I did this with) I was like “LOL how is my char not too heavy for this?”

Ok so now we have 2 races less what remains are Asura, Human and Sylvari.
Next is pretty obvious as there is no way the Commander is Sylvari if you look at this from a logical point of view. No one would trust the commander if he/she was a Sylvari after it is revealed they are servant’s of Mordremoth. I mean how would the pact trust a leader who at any moment may lead them to their doom?
In fact a good leader would know that himself and give up his command to someone else – at least until Mordremoth is defeated. For example he/she could give leadership to Rytlock Brimstone – he is a tribune which makes him experienced at leading armies. And he is the only member of destiny’s edge that remains in the game during HoT. Well apart from Caithe but you can probably guess why she does not have the right qualifications.

So all that remains is Human and Asura. Well while Asura would fit too most dialogues do not speak in their favor. I mean like every race they have a few of their own. But most of the time even if the commander is Asura he/she still needs everyone to explain everything despite the fact they are suppose to be smart.
Also the Asura only dialogues are inconsistent sometimes. Like when they find Scarlet’s secret room the comander makes fun of Scarlet’s early Steam Golem design. Yet when Timi decides to stay he tells her he would love to stay and document this too.
Another thing is when they find Omadd’s device which allowed Scarlet to see the “Eternal Alchemy” the commander has no unique dialogue related to it. And probably every Asura would love to see it yet the commander is not excited about it before or after witnessing it. The commander also does not seem to have any unique dialogue when talking to Phlunt or any of the other Asura with him.
And before you ask yes I know that if you play Asura the commander will know about Rata Novus – that would be strange if there was no different dialogue for that.

And that’s why the commander being Human is most consistent with the story – at least thus far. But as I said before all of this means nothing and the race is not specific lore wise just like gender.

A lot of people at first thought it’s an additional bag slot which now works account wide when bought. I instantly knew something isn’t right because you could only have 3 additional bags not 5. So I read the description carefully and deducted what it is.
It works like this – whatever you put in such a slot all your characters will have access to it from their inventory. So if you put Revival Orbs and Instant Repair Canisters you can use them on any character without the need to move them into your account bank.
Well most of you probably know that by now but what items are best for them?
Well obviously items that have infinite uses and I will tell which are probably the most useful and which are not:

Very useful:

- Copper-Fed Salvage-o-Matic – what a surprise eh? If you own only 1 of them like me you can now make it so all your characters can use it without moving it through the bank. If you have 1 of each class that makes 9 and if you wanted to buy a Copper-Fed Salvage-o-Matic for each for convenience it would cost you 800×9 gems which is 7200 gems. However if you buy one of these slots for 700 gems and put the Copper-Fed Salvage-o-Matic in it then all 9 have access to it and it only costs you 1500 gems rather than 7200.

- Permanent Bank Access Contract – if you have one of these then after putting it into one of these slots you can exchange items between characters wherever they may be.
This includes any other items I will mention here. Really its like turning 1 of these slots into many so its obviously a good idea if you have one of these.

Semi-useful:

- Silver-Fed Salvage-o-Matic – its mostly a good idea if you don’t have the Copper-Fed Salvage-o-Matic but obvously since Silver-Fed only appears occasionally while Copper-Fed you can buy always then that’s not the case. This only is useful if you are expecting to get so many Rare and Exotic items that you will not be able to fit them in your inventory. Like doing CF all day long. But even if thats the case then you are probably holding it in that characters inventory anyway.
And using it to salvage fine and masterwork items is a waste. Well you may have higher chance at getting higher tier materials but that can be a problem sometimes as Gossamer is worth less than Silk. Also you will still mostly get lower tier and a single Mithril ore is not worth much more than the cost of the salvage.
But if you bought 5 of these slots then obviously you can put this thing in one of them.

- Permanent Black Lion Merchant Contract – this is only useful if you really want to get rid of junk whenever you want to. Materials you can sell on TP or send it to the bank wherever you are. But really I doubt you can get so much junk items during a single Fractal run or Dungeon path. And you can go to a merchant right after before doing the next. If you are doing things like CF however there are merchants in these areas too who you can sell junk.

- Not really useful:

- Infinite Gathering Tools – contrary to what a lot of people think it’s not much use at all. Because you still have to unequip the tools on 1 character and then re-equip on another. Having the tools in these slots will not make them work – I checked to confirm. So this is no more convenient than using the bank unless you are really too lazy to use a WP to return to a city.

- Mawdrey II and other items that consume ascended materials or currencies – they have limited uses per day. So using them on more than 1 character is pointless.
Also even if you can’t throw more materials into the bank you may end up using it anyway as on 1 charcter you will have like 30 portions of dust while on another 40 so you still have to use the bank to reach the 50+. While those that consume currencies have absolutely no point as currencies are account wide so it’s not like 1 of your charcters has more than the other.

- Permanent Trading Post Express Contract – I have no idea why would anyone want this. This would only be useful if you need some consumables like for TT and you forgot to buy in advance so you need a TP to pick it up – well thats just your own stupidity if thats the case. Same with wanting to pick up your gold wherever you are – seriously are you afraid it will vanish if you wait too long?

- Infinite Continue Coin – I heard people consider this. I mean rewards are per account not per character. Even if SAB returns you won’t have time to do all worlds more than once a day especially if you do Tribulation mode too. And your character class has no influence on your performance in SAB.

- Permanent Hair Stylist Contract – I heard this one too. This is probably the stupidest of them all. For real how often do you change your hair style? Even more so when in an explorable area or Dungeon?

- Infinite Tonics – unless you really like a form and use it as much as possible while in town there is no reason to use them on more than 1 character. Here your class has also no influence if you use them for costume brawl. So this may only be useful if you favor a certain form and wish to be ready to brawl any moment.

Conclusion is there is really no need for more than 5 of these slots. I have no idea what people are so angry about it is very useful but only if you use it wisely. It only is uselss if you use it for stupidities. Or perhaps you are angry because you already bought a lot of Copper-Fed Salvage-o-Matic’s.

EDIT: Ok so some people are pointing out things like Captain’s Airship Pass. Well I’ll just make a short explanation concerning usefulness. Getting into the Airship or Royal Terrance is only convenient because everything you need is stacked in one place.
But you will only use these things when you are not busy. You are not going to use Mystic Forge or craft anything in middle of a run. Yeah if you have 4 or 5 chars each with 2 different maxed crafting skills it’s convenient. However moving the pass through the bank will not waste you so much time. And it’s not much more convenient than just entering WvW or just going to LA to do it. Same goes for Gathering tools if you forget to move them from one character to another it will annoy you of course. But when you are gathering materials around the world you can take a break any time.
On the other hand a Salvage kit is something you need almost all the time. If you use more than one character to do daily Dungeon and Fractal runs you need salvage kits on each of them. And if you join a team and suddenly realise you don’t have a salvage kit on you because you forgot to buy or transfer from one character to another then you are in trouble. However having a Copper-Fed Salvage-o-Matic in one of these slots solves the problem permanently. You no longet have to worry you will forget to transfer it before joining a team. No you can always salvage now.

clarkcd.6532:

I guess if you bought it all it would be expensive in terms of gold. I have a guildie who has the skin and didn’t spend one copper on getting it. YMMV

Yes I also didn’t pay a single copper for it. Well actually I did buy like 20 mystic coins and a few packs of Snowballs as I was missing a few of those for last collection item.
But I did not buy a single drink. However I am very good at jumping puzzles so it wasn’t hard for me to farm Winter Wonderland as I often end up the top scorer.
But I also realise not everyone is in the same situation so I understand the frustration with acquiring this skin. TBH I never cared about it myself I wanted the “Spirited Drinker” title so obviously after getting it there was no reason not to finish the collection.

Seriously.7953:

Rikimaru.7890:

I also used the trick where you run ahead at the end and jump on the small platform to the right instead of waiting on the closer platform on the left.
So there is no question it’s impossible to score any higher than this.

Makes me wonder if 21 is possible …

At the end, you can save around 3-5 seconds by jumping directly into the presents rather then jumping back onto the trail after waiting for the boulder to move past. Its a tricky jump that might be a little tough to hit 21 times in a row though.

Oh you are overestimating that little trick at most you can save up 2 sec unless you get the bad falling snowball spawn where you have to wait for 2 or 3 sec then continue. But I had a good spawn thus I didnt have to. However 21 could be possible as I had to let the first rolling snowball pass so if someone can somehow save up 2 or 3 sec on snowflakes and rush against the snowball then maybe.
Even so that would probably be pushing your luck as I doubt you would be able to succeed every time. I have seen a lot of people who push their luck like that and they ended up falling and as a result had worse scores than me. More over by rushing the snowballs it’s harder to reach the platform on the right at the end as the snowballs will be slightly ahead than normal. So I doubt anyone would be able to pull it off 21 times in a row.

So much for that.
Ok let’s be honest what is there really to do that is suppose to be that “fun”?
WvW as far as I know had gone for the worse lately and I am not going to focus on PvP for obvious reasons.
So what remains is PvE and right now that falls down to 2 things only Fractals and Raids. Dungeons are dead and no one is going to be exploring the world as endgame.
So my question is how is that policy in the title suppose to work with that?
Both require full asceded gear which takes time to get especially if you are a new player.
Well you can do them without it but you wont be able to get very far in Fractals without it. And as for Raids you will become the weak link without it and most likely be blamed for failing even if it’s not your fault. That is if you manage to find a team that will take you in the first place. (As a side note I probably should mention it never happened to me as I never did that but I do know how others react).

But really Fractals have become boring they go down to this now – do 5-6 swamps, 1-2 molten, and the 2 recomended fractals each day. Unless you include grinding for essence’s and/or encryptions. I mean before the update at least people did daily level 50’s. I reached level 100 but tbh I also don’t see a reason to do level’s at 80+.
Supposedly I will have a better chance at getting an ascended chest from end chest.
But knowing my luck I would probably have to do levels 90-100 each day just to get 1 chest a month.

As for Raids I don’t think they are worth my time thats why I only ever go if someone asks me to. What is the great appeal of Raids? The rewards are kitten so it only goes down to Legendary Armour (whenever it will actually appear – probably in a year or 2 if not better). But what do I need Legendary Armour for? Will it be better than ascended? No. For the skin? I hate all Legendary Weapons for looking like they were designed by mattel so the armour will probably be no better. And I have no intention on lookng like a chistmas tree with lens flare generators. So maybe for the stat changing?
Maybe but unless you have full Legendary gear including trinckets its still not worth much. And tbh even if we get full Legendary gear it still will be worthless because there is still 1 thing blocking you from being able to change your build at will – upgrades.
Of course we could just change those but if those are expensive runes and sigils it hardly will be worth it and extractors would be even more expensive so no not a good idea. Well if you intend to change builds like once every 6 months then its not a big problem but if only so rarely then I don’t need Legendary gear for that as I can change my stats on Ascended gear too using MF.
But let’s assume we also get Legendary runes and sigils. Well ok I can change my build at will on 1 class ok maybe 3 because its account bound but armour is still limited to weight class. But I think equiping each class with Ascended gear will take less effort than making 1 with full Legendary. And I could just have each class specialize in each role i.e. damage, conditions, tanking, healing etc. So instead of changing builds I can just change chars and viola.

Ok so really I just want to know where is that “fun” I’m suppose to have? Can anyone tell me? Because I don’t see it.

nekretaal.6485:

Since you have what appears to be a private instance, I’m fairly sure that anybody can score higher than that if they get their own private instance.

A private instance is an instance that doesn’t kick you when the timer ends because “map full.”. You can farm in there basically forever.

Actually no you can’t I know because I was in an instance like that several times.
When the timer reaches 0 and you get full instance you can stay inside and redo the JP as many times as you want indeed however the score will no longer change.
Everything else works the boxed and snowflakes respawn and you keep getting presents on completion but you no longer score any points as the match is over.
So if your score was 10 when timer reached 0 it remains 10 forever even if you redo +100 times.

I was all alone in the instance each run took 90 sec exactly but I saved up a few at the very start as I started before the timer appeared. I finished with around 14 sec on the timer this is due to the fact that after last run I no longer need to run to the teleport.
I also used the trick where you run ahead at the end and jump on the small platform to the right instead of waiting on the closer platform on the left.
So there is no question it’s impossible to score any higher than this.

We went toe to toe during most of the instance using same path – center.
Because the instance was nearly empty for nearly half the time we didn’t have to wait nearly at all and saved up lots of time. So yeah we had the luck required to do the impossible and we did it.

Ok is that really the best you can do ANET? Timers really?
That’s really the cheapest trick in the book.
If you give a tight enough time limit then any boss will become “hard”.
But that’s not what real difficulty is about.
More over we can do it atm as we have found a meta that can. BUT! There is one problem – ballance updates. The meta can do it but it can only just so one update and it can fall apart. And then what? Well we need to find a new meta thats what. So that means changing gear stats, upgrades, and perhaps even class. Well if we can just give our ascended gear to a different class then it’s not a big deal but if that will be a different weight class then it won’t work. So then what? Another 1000g for a new ascended armour?
So now every ballance update announcement will make everyone tear their hair out eh?

Also I thought GW2 was so anti-holy-trinity. This was the great pride of the game yet now we returned to it.
You can make boss fights difficult without timers. Since Vale Guardian is the first boss I will use it as example. The green circle lightning attack could be an instant kill attack but only to those that are not inside the circle. So everyone would need to run to it or die. Also the Vale Guardian could attack players on random rather than the one with highest toughness. And the Enraged mode could be random but deactivated through the break bar. But no time limit seriously.
Finally there should be no retries i.e. if whole team dies you start whole thing over – just like it was in the elite missions in GW1.
I fought my fair share of difficult bosses and super bosses in video games and I know from experience that in a difficult fight time works against you anyway so why make it literal?

HoT did indeed fix the problem of “inferior classes” but now it’s brought back in raids.
And everyone should be fair game. In a difficult fight everyone should be able to play the class that they feel best with otherwise one cannot really pull out their real skill level.
Yeah some teams would still be able to do it faster but this should be about doing it at all and not how fast.

EDIT: Ok so the reaction is mixed – as it always is. But just as the timer mechanic is cheap there are also some cheap arguments against me.
1) I can’t beat Vale Guardian so I’m complaining (I can and did )
2) What I’m saying is outdated (yeah because we all know raids were introduced 5 years ago – oh wait I commonly mistake weeks with years sorry)
You know these 2 arguments remind me of the “Grammar Police” trolls.

I DON’T CARE got it? I am allowed to state my opinion regardless of how old it can be and/or whether or not I can beat something.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

You might consider adding ‘Spoiler’ to your title.

It’s unfortunate you did not like the story.

I think it should be obvious but you are right I did forget the warning

First I need to say something about the new allies we have as they are suppose to be part of the story.

The Nuhoch

I think the Nuhoch at first were suppose to be Skritt. Ok let’s be honest the Nuhoch Wallows are the exact same thing as the Skritt tunnels in The Silverwastes. But they are not because they were added before Magus Falls and that would cause a conflict by making them a mastery now. I mean we could use them before now we can’t? Or we can use the ones in the Silverwastes but we can’t without the mastery in Magus Falls? I suspect this happened because the Silverwastes were added before the real concept of mastery’s was fully established. So rather than have more Skritt deeper in Maguuma we got a 2nd Hylek tribe instead. Also look at what the Nuhoch actually look like – they look like offsprings of Frogger and Pacman. How exactly do they move through these wallows themselves? They are bulky and have small limbs so moving through such tight corridors would be naturally difficult for them.

The Exalted

These guys are a real mess. Ok first of all Tarir is exactly where The Falls used to be in GW1 so it’s obvious it wasn’t there before. So that means it was built around the time the Zephyrites underwent their transformation i.e. 200 years ago. So that would make it around the time Primordus awoke. But why only just then? If the Forgotten survived the previous awakening of the Elder Dragons why didn’t they built it sooner? I mean they had around 11000 years for that and they only take action around the time of the next awakening? Also Glint was a prophet right? are you telling me that in all these years she never could predict when the next awakening will occur? I mean I understand she might not be able to predict a specific event when she just wants to but seriously no hints at all in 11000 years? And what’s with the location? It seems it’s only for plot convenience. I mean I understand Rata Novus as Zinn did have his old hiding place in the area but I don’t get Tarir. We can argue that it was specifically to fight Mordremoth. But if that’s the case then the whole thing was based on luck – I mean if Mordremoth was one of the Dragons to awaken before the events of GW2 then Tarir would most likely be in ruin now as I doubt the Exalted would be able to hold off the Mordrem for 100 years or so not to mention the Exalted till not long ago were all hibernating or something. It seems they were just added to solve the issue of what to do with Glints egg once we get it back. Because if they were planed long ago then wouldn’t it be more logical if they resided in Glint’s lair? We visited it in LS2 and it’s where we learned about the egg. We could have met them already there and their leader or whatever would say something like “bring the egg safely back here and we will be at your disposal to help fight the dragons”. Also they are suppose to guard Glint’s legacy but they sure as hell weren’t much use when Glint was killed by Kralkatorrik. Wasn’t she more mportant than the egg really? You are not trying to tell me this offspring will be more powerful than her are you? Well more powerful I can muster to some extent but I won’t buy it if it’s going to rival the Elder Dragons themselves as that will be BS. And considering how many Dragon champions like Glint we killed already I don’t see how this baby dragon will be of much use. It seems to me the Exalted were just added so we can have a 4th Mastery line for the 4th component to make the Gift of Insight. I mean all the other HoT mastery’s have something to do with getting around better except the Exalted lore. Gliding is 100% all about that, Itzel gives us the use of the mushrooms and poison resistance and Nuhoch gives the wallows. The Exalted lore only really lets us use portals that are in Auric Basin and of course the enchanted armour in north path temple in Dragon’s Stand. It is in fact so useless that it’s the only HoT mastery line for which ANET couldn’t come up with a 6th tier. Oh but wait we need tier 5 to mine our collection items – yup that sure is an original way to make it look useful. ANET is just saying “level this to the max and please forget it exists”.

Right so now the actual plot

First Faolin and Eir – really now the only 2 that were of any significance at all ended up in a cage together? What are the odds? Another cliché plot really – 2 family members finally make up (Eir and Braham) but soon one of them dies. Also reaching her in time just to have her die soon after was cliché too. I mean she should have been dead already if Mordremoth really uses the blood of fallen victims as a nourishment for his army and same goes for Zojja and Logan. I understand Faolin as she being a Sylvari could be corrupted by Mordremoth – which she later is anyway. But really it seems she was just added there because it was the time for it yet the story writers couldn’t come up with anything better. We fought her in Twilight Arbor but she managed to escape so it was obvious another confrontation had to happen in the future. And with Mordremoth being the creator of Sylvari it was obvious there was no time like the present plot point. But the whole execution was very poor including her new form ripped off from some Japanese anime. I mean am I really suppose to care Eir died? Well there is one thing on my mind concerning her death but I’ll get to that later. Next we get a lot of deus ex machina first with the Exalted who we meet right after reclaiming the egg and it turns out their job is to guard it. Then with their help we find Rata Novus where we find out that each dragon has a “weakness”. I made a topic in the past about why bother fighting the dragons at all when obviously we could just build something like an atomic bomb and blow their lair’s along with them to kingdom come if ships with giant lasers are the way to fight them. You can read it here if you like:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Why-are-we-doing-all-this-anyway/first#post4608990

So I guess the developers noticed that too so they decided to go with a deus ex machina instead and that Mordremoth would just grow back if destroyed. But the execution again was very poor and besides there were many other things that coud have been done instead of this which I will mention last. Finally the ending or lack of it – whats up with that? Each campain and the expansion in GW1 had something like a celebration. HoT didn’t even have any end credits.

Lose ends:

For all HoT tried it’s best to cover as many of them like the egg and what to do with it when we reclaim it there are 2 things that bug me.

Malyck what happed to him and his Sylvari people? Their tree was suppose to be somewhere in Magus Falls so why didn’t we meet him or any of his people yet? It’s been 3 years since the Grove Sylvari met him so what’s taking him so long? I understand they all could be mordrem now and his tree is one of the blighting tree’s but no reference at all?

Magdaer – yes when I said there is one thing on my mind concerning Eir’s death I ment this sword. What happened to it? It’s been 3 years I understand a powerful magic sword like this may take time to repair but after all this time it’s still not repaired? Logan was suppose to get it but since Eir was the one that reclaimed it what will happen with this plot point now that she is dead?

Other plot examples

Use Orr to communicate with the gods

This is how I imagined the figth with the remaining dragons will go and I think it would have been a better plot than the one we got. First of since we defeated Zhaitan and cleansed Orr why not use it? What I mean is it’s the place where the gods decended to tyria. So it’s very likely it’s the place with the strongest connection to the gods and we could use it to finally communicate with them. After all as one of the options to find the heart of Orr we needed to summon one of the reapers of Grenth in his temple and we did succeed so using the temples to communicate with the gods now should be possible. If Zhaitan feared us getting our hands on an artefact of Abaddon who is dead then imagine just how much the dragon’s must fear the gods that are still alive. Well it doesn’t have to be like we will get them to fight the dragons but we could get advice from them and some power ups. Like they could grant our characters resistance to the dragons corruption – this would be also a good option to solve the issue of how the pact would trust the commander if our character is Sylvari. Also if we are going with the “weakness” deus ex machina the gods could be the ones to reveal them to us. And give us the means to open the link into Mordremoth’s mind once we reach the heart of thorns.

Livia and the Scepter of Orr

If she is indeed somewhere under Divinity we could ask her to take control of the Risen now that they no longer have their master. The scepter has the power to control the undead after all so we could use them to refil our troops. Ok so maybe she wouldn’t be able to control the dragon champions but at the very least a portion of the foot soldiers. This could also be done with other dragon minion’s like the Pale Tree could take control some of the weaker mordrem now that Mordremoth is dead. And later Glint’s child could control some of the branded once we defeat Kralkatorrik. Yeah that’s cheap I know.

I have the Pact commander mastery maxed however today I noticed my speed boost is not working while in a city. I do have the buff on me and have the haze effect like when you have swiftness but I do not move any faster.
When I noticed this I made sure by using other speed boosts and they did make me move faster. Then I tried leaving LA and re-enter and going to another city but this bug persists.

So now we know each dragon has a “weakness”
hahahaha ok so Mordremoths weakness is pulling a “Freddy Krueger” on him eh?
So Zhaitans “weakness” is battleships and huge cannons?
Oh boy what luck we have they were invented just in time for his awakening else there would be no chance of winning ever.

Reminds me of something I once saw on youtube:
One guy runs in and says “I discovered the zombies weakness”, the other asks “what is it?” and he answers “bullets”.

Well not exactly there is no collection like that, this is just a prediction on some of the things which will probably be needed to transform “Unbound” into “Ad Infinitum”.

First of all we will probably need another Fractal Journal – easy to predict as what will we be doing with all the Fractal Research Pages once we complete Ad Infinitum III?
Sell the journal? Maybe but 20 silver every 2 weeks is hardly worth the effort I think.

Next we will probably need an item awarded for a time challenge in Captain Mai Trin Boss Fractal. Now how can I claim to know that? Well it’s the only boss fractal we did not have a time challenge yet and just look at the order of the previous time challenges -10-15-20. Yes I know thats not really correct but thats due to a mistake.
I wrote in the bug section about it so if you are interested why the order is actually 20-15-10 you can go see it here:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Timed-challenge-mote-little-big-mistake/first#post5780438

So if the order was correct and we add Mai the order will be 10-15-20-25. Yes because Captain Mai Trin Boss Fractal is only on levels 25, 50 and 100.

Next we will probably need a +10 infusion charged in a mist geyser somewhere.
This again I predict due to the order first we needed a +4 then +6 and now +8, so the full order would be 4-6-8-10.

There will also probably be another item we need to buy from the Aetherblade Quartermaster which will cost 4 Balls of Dark Energy. Again the sequence implies it – 1-2-3-4.
The amount of Balls of Dark Energy we get for salvaging “Upper Bound” implies it too – 9.
Remember when we salvaged “Finite Result” we got 5 and we needed 2 to craft “Upper Bound” and 3 to buy the Aetherblade Secret Handshake Tutorial Book for the Ad Infinitum III collection.
So the situation seems similar – we will need 5 to craft “Unbound” so the remaining 4 would be used to buy the next item from the Aetherblade Quartermaster.

There will probably be other items for doing fractals with challenge motes and ones you buy for relics etc. But unlike previously these will not be used for a collection but rather in the Mystic Forge to create the required gifts and we will be able to acquire them all the time in case we decide to make more Legendary back items in the future.

I know what happened – the time challenges from Ad Infinitum I and III had been swapped by accident. Notice that 3rd collection requires 5 min on level 20 (Molten Boss faractal) while 1st requires 5 min on level 10 (Solid Ocean fractal).
And it’s the exact opposite because level 10 is Molten Boss while 20 is Solid Ocean.
And everyone will agree that doing Solid Ocean boss in 5 min is the hardest of the 3 timed challenges. Heck I did Thaumanova Reactor Timed Mote on 15 in like half the time needed and same with Molten Boss Timed Mote which is did on 40 due to this mistake. Also notice the sequence if we swap the 2 it will be 10-15-20 while we got the other way around 20-15-10.
So yeah those who like me reached 3rd stage should be doing Solid Ocean boss 5 min challenge now instead of during 1st stage. It’s a minor mistake by logics but it’s a huge mistake as far as difficulty is concerned.
In other words the scales listed are actually correct only the fractals and their collection items are misplaced.

It says you have to do Molten Boss fight in under 5 min on level 20 fractal.
But 20 is Solid Ocean while Molten Facility is 10 or 40.
I did 40 and got the timer and yes I finished it – took only half the needed time but really this was confusing. The description should say “above level 20 scale” and not level 20 exactly.

First of a lobby and its own LFG section – yes very original of me but we do need that.

However the problem starts here – the Vale Guardian is timed before he gets enraged.
So there seem to be only 2 solutions, either use as much DPS as possible to kill it as fast as you can, or use as much resistance and healing so you will be able to survive even while enraged but kill it slow. Obviously no one likes doing things slowly so most will select the first option, plus I don’t even know if option 2 is possible.
But if we take max DPS then we will be going back to where we were before HoT. We will find the class that does the most normal damage and conditional damage and go like 5 of those 3 of the other and 2 healer types. Lets be honest HoT did make players care less about what others play. It’s hard to find now a team which will say things like “no necros or rangers” or “war guard only”.
Mixed teams are more common now but Raids can now cause a new domino effect that will degrade some classes. It might not be the same as before but what difference does it make who will be the underdog when there should be none? We will just be back to where we started.
So I propose to give some passive effects to each class while in Raids that will effect all 10 players. What I mean by that each class will give a different effect for the whole party. Like Warriors could give increased damage, Necromancers could give life stealing (but I mean stronger than vampiric aura so like 100 points per hit at least), Guardians could give damage reduction and so on.
These effects could not be duplicated so there would not be any more damage increase for taking 2 warriors or more and same for any other class. So the best idea would be to bring a full team containing each of every 9 professions as then there will be the most synergy. These effects could also be unlocked through the new raid mastery that we just got.

Ok so I finished HoT story and all I got was some dumb cutscene and my “reward”.
So thats it? No celebration like after defeating Zhaitan?
Shouldn’t we like rally the remains of the pact and claim position as the new marshal since Trahearne is dead?
I mean LS1 had a more proper ending where everyone gathered at the bar for a small celebration.
So did I miss something or is that really it?
If so then it looks like this – we kill Mordremoth and the game says:
“TY hero of the day here is your reward and now get lost!”

Get Itzel Lore rank 3 to use speed mushrooms ……………
Nah I’m just kidding but you do need that too.
I do have a small tip on how to make it more easy. I don’t know if it was already mentioned by someone but then I’ll just repeat for others that never heard or thought of this. I have 2 extra buttons on my mouse which I can use with my thumb. So for this adventure I changed controls so that using skill 1 was assigned to one of them and skill 2 to the other. It made controls during the run more convenient as I didn’t have to use my left hand nor the cursor in order to use the 2 skills when I needed them.

So maybe this will help you if you are still having problems even with the speed mushrooms.

Rezzet.3614:

agreed
some of this gold challenges rely way too heavily in luck

yeah luck has nothing to do with skill it’s chance

Ok first of I will be using this video for reference as many of the things I will mention happen right in it:

1) First issue is the environment – many targets are covered up and the icons don’t help as they gain distance from the targets the further they are. Also some of the targets like 4 and 5 are surrounded by tangible obstacles and thus the shots don’t always hit even if they seem to be going in right direction. I once had to shoot target 4 like 5 times before it hit and no I did not change position or shifted the shot direction. No they all went in the exact same direction only 4th one finally counted.

2) It’s the random spawns. That would not be a problem if it was not for the environment. Like if we were in a real shooting range where you have all the targets up front or in a circular room where we stand in the centre and shoot. This is a problem because for some targets you need to get to the right position in order to shoot them.
Some targets are very bad most notably target 5 at the end of the cave and 15 which is behind that stone pillar which I call “the d*** targets”. I call them that as for these 2 you need to be in right position so they require more running around.
But sometimes during phase 2 we don’t get them and thus it’s more easy to reach phase 3. Notice that in that video the player gets the best start for phase 2 – he gets targets 1,2,3,7,8,9. He does not get any targets inside the cave nor target 15 thus he does not have to run back so far to fire at target 13,16 and17.

3) There are bugs most notorious is the bug where the blue icon does not disappear even after you shoot the target. Which is bad if the target is far away or covered up as then you can’t be sure if you hit or not unless you keep checking the score for which there is no time. This bug occurs in the video when the author shoots targets 11 and 12 to score his 37th and 38th point both targets have these icons remain on them.
Also phase 3 is bugged in overall as it starts randomly. In this video it starts after scoring 29 points which is the earliest I have seen when I did it too. However sometimes phase 3 does not start till the score reaches 32 points. And in fact I once didn’t get phase 3 AT ALL – yes I’m not kidding I scored 34 and phase 3 didn’t start and I couldn’t make it to score 35 because my next target was target 15.
Phase 3 is also picky about multiplying the targets as sometimes I have to shoot 3 or 4 before the number of targets goes beyond 2 at once.

But now look at the video – he gets very easy 6 shots starting phase 2 and after the next 3 targets phase 3 starts. Yes right after scoring 29 points phase 3 starts for him, after scoring 30 the targets go instantly from 2 to 3 at once and after scoring 32 it instantly jumps to 4 targets at once.
So yeah the author of this video does get gold, but he gets the best start for phase 2, phase 3 starts for him at 29 points and at 32 he has 4 targets to choose from. While some of us only start phase 3 at 32 and more often than not get crappy target location during phase 2.

CONCLUSION! Getting gold is based on luck rather than skill. Seriously it would be more simple to just run phase 1 twice – wouldn’t you agree? I mean it is possible to hit all 20 targets in less than 1 min so you would have the other to run the course again.

EDIT: OK so I did manage to get gold but I still stand by what I said here.
During my round I had a semi-lucky phase 2. I say semi-lucky as I did get target 15 which would noramlly make me restart, but this time my phase 2 was similar to phase 1 as I got targets 12, 13, 14 so I was much closer to the right position than usually.
Also I had a feeling it will appear thus I ran it similar to phase 1 so you could say I took a gamble that payed off. My phase 3 was also semi-lucky as it started at around 32 points scored, but I got good target locations in my proximity.
In overall it was mostly luck as before my best score was twice 37 so it’s obvious my skill did not suddenly skyrocket so high.
I’m posting a screen not to brag but to show how few can do it with all the luck needed. Notice my lifetime position is/was 124 with my time being 1:58. So if we include all those that got 1:59 how many actually did it? 200 or so?
“Salvage Pit” was so easy I got gold first try not knowing exactly what to expect.
All adventures should be more or less same difficulty i.e. gold requires a bit of practice.
Instead of some being so easy it’s disappointing while others being a frustrating lottery.

Yes why is there no title for doing Fractals of the Mists?
I mean look at Silverwastes achievements they give 6:
- “Drak Traveler”
- “The Annihilator”
- “The Demolisher”
- “The Executioner”
- “The Tormentor”
And for getting all 4 of the above (“Drak Traveler” does not count) you get one more title – "The Be-All and the End-All "
We also have the “Dungeon Master” and “Dungeoneer” titles which we can earn by doing dungeons but despite all the new focus on Fractals they still don’t earn us any title?

Why not have the “Casual–Fractal Hero”, “Core–Fractal Hero”, “Elite–Fractal Veteran”, “Elite–Fractal Master” achievements give us a title each?
And/or there could be an additional achievement which gives a title for completing all 4. The title could be something like “Fractal Champion” or if it was up to me then I would pick the title to be “Mandelbrot”.
I’m not going to explain the meaning of this title look it up yourself and how it relates to fractals.

Every class gets some unique weapon and armour piece skin when fully mastering their elite spec.
So the thing is are the weapon skins going to to be the ones used in the artwork of the elite specs or will they be something completely new?
I know this is a rethorical question as no one really knows atm, but the reason I’m saying this is because I would prefer a different skin. What I would want is the “Everliving Blade” or “Belinda’s Greatsword (Imbued)” as they call it too.
I mean it’s the GS of the first Reaper – Marjory and I really have a thing for Japanese swords.

So what are your thoughts?
And yes I know about the regular Belinda’s Greatsword skin and I have it unlocked, but a nodachi with ghostly effect is simply my dream come true.

Ah so that’s why a lot of them look like toy’s
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/a-legendary-journey/

So in other words there are no evil looking Legendary skins as their precursors would require something evil to do. Like burning down the Queen’s Heart Orphanage – as awsome as that would be.
But in the end we have to settle for making a fool of yourself in front of the queen – epic clap.
But why am I doing this? Well because I would really like to see some evil looking legendary skins but the new info indicates it will never happen.
And before you say it that new staff is not evil either. I have in mind things like blood, skulls, demons etc and not some ravens or crows.

No I’m not saying it should be stronger than ascended no I am in fact talking about the skins. Yes they suck and I don’t care if you agree with me or not. If you think the same as me that fine, if you like them thats fine too. But why am I saying it now? Well because legendary armour is on the way and I don’t want it to be just like the weapons.

I have a solution how to make them better but first I will rant about them a bit in part 1, if you don’t want to hear any of that just go to part 2.

1) First of all they all look like toys thats why I call them “Mattel weapons”.
I mean whats with all the glittering and rainbows?
These weapons very often are mismatched for a certain class or some do not fit any really.
Like the “Incinerator” – what does it look like? Like a welding torch right? so who would a welding torch fit best? An Engineer right? Yet they cannot whield daggers.
Or the “Bifrost” ok so it may look good on an Elementalist or Mesmer, average on a Guardian or Ranger (Druid), but on a Necromancer, Revenant or Thief (Daredevil)? NEVER!
“The Moot” is a disco ball on a stick, it doesn’t make anyone look cool but like a complete dork.
“The Quip” is literally a toy only a Mesmer may find this fitting but no one else.
“The Minsterel” is a harf it’s just another weapon that may look fitting for a Mesmer only.
Now the “The Dreamer” does not fit anyone especially if the character is male, it fires rainbow unicorns – whatever that means. Not only that but it’s annoying as hell, I did fractals not long ago with a Thief that used it, when he started spamming it at the Dredge Power Suit the sound it made gave me a headache.
As for “Twilight”, “Sunrise” and “Eternity” sorry but I don’t share your love for them. They are cool and all but I’m a Japanese sword freak so the best Greatsword skin in my opinion is “Belinda’s Greatsword”.

2) Right so even if you don’t agree with my opinion on them, most of you will probably agree with what I’m about to say.
My Idea is simple these weapons and armours should have multiple forms. What I mean by that is they take on a different form depending which class whields it.
But would that not make problems with the wardrobe? No these specific looks would be profession locked – if there are race exclusive armour skins why can’t there be profession exclusive skins too?
So in the hands of a Necromancer these weapons and armour would look like something forged in the pits of hell.
An Elementalist could have weapons and armour with 4 different effects i.e. it would change depending on which attunement is active – I find that fair as they can only carry 1 weapon set at a time.
An Engineer would get gear that looks futuristic, you know laser guns and stuff like that, their shield could look like a personalised forcefield etc.
A Revenant could get weapons that are related to his/her legends like the hammer would look like the “Hammer of the Great Dwarf”, swords like “Shiro’s Blades”, while the Heralds shield like a piece of shell from one of Glint’s egg’s.

You get what I mean right? Would that not be better than having everyone running around with same look which constantly vomits brightly colored bloom in your face?
Otherwise there will only be a total of 3 armour skins once they come out. Now I know each armour looks different on each race but the difference is not that that big as you can clearly tell which skin is which.
So yes it would still be possible to pass your armour and weapon to another character through the vault but their looks would change if that character is a different class.
And creating a Legendary weapon or armour would unlock all the skins available but each skin would be exclusive to a profession. So a Mesmer would not be able to use the wardrobe to wear an Elementalits Legendary weapon or armour skin and vice versa.

Now don’t tell me you don’t like this idea at all, because I know a lot of you want new legendary skins.

I hate it but there is no escaping it. HoT is not really going to change anything, I mean more professions may become viable but as zerkers only so what difference does it make? However something occured to me the last time I did CM. I played an Elementalist and as you probably guessed my team used the Thief’s invisibility to skip lots of mobs. My thoughts on that was “this is so cheap” but then I’m thinking I’m here for the end reward anyway and I want to get it as fast as possible myself.
So yeah I guess skipping is the right idea as why would I want to waste time fighting mobs if there is no additional reward for it?
And then it hit me that’s exactly what dungeon’s are missing.
What I mean by that is adding additional rewards for not being cheap.
How would that work? The additional rewards would only apply to the daily chest and they would be awarded in a similar way to how Dry Top meta event works.
There would be a performance bar the team can fill by performing normal and additional tasks. There would be a certain number of tiers, for reaching a certain tier the daily chest will give a double reward, an even higher would grant triple and reaching the max tier a quadruple reward.
But there would also be penalty’s for things like dying.
So how would that work as a point system:
- killing normal mobs would be worth 1 point each
- veterans would be 5 points
- elites 10
- champions 30
- legendary 50
- epic 100
While penalty’s would work like this:
- each player getting downed is -10 points
- each player death -100
- a full wipe -1000
So now as an example I’ll use AC:
Remember all those champion gravelings, cave trolls and the graveling mound no one ever destroys at the start? All these things could be used to get additional rewards at the end. Also all the boss fights that cannot be avoided could give additional points for things like time. Like when you fight the Spider Queen there will be a timer added to this event and if she is killed before it runs out she will award double points.

Fractals however could get a slightly different mechanic. There would only be like 2 tiers to reach in each fractal and the daily reward would depend on the average performance in each fractal. So if the party manages to reach tier 2 in all 4 fractals the reward will not only be quadruple but also the possible bonus will no longer be just “possible” but guaranteed and there would be an option to select it i. e. get to choose which ring, fractal skin, ascended weapon/armour chest you want.
The tiers in fractals would work like this T0 would be normal, T1 good and T2 excellent. 2 T1 performances would count as 1 T2, so if the team does 2 fractals with a T2 and the other 2 with T1 the daily reward would count it as 3 T2 performances.
And the system would be rounded down so if the team does 3 T1 and a T0 then the final score would count as 1 T2.
A 3 T2 performance would make the the bonus also guaranteed but it would be random unlike with 4 T2. Of course the reward would also depend on the level of the fractal so at scale 1-10 there would only be additional relics and gold even with a 4 T2 performance.

So what does this have to do with the meta? Well the meta is really all about killing as fast and as little as possible i.e. minimum survival but max damage and skipping with invisibility.
But with this system survival will be more important, even more so as skipping will no longer be the best idea.
Yeah you can still do the usual but there will be more to gain for not being cheap.
And let’s be honest most of the players that do meta only have no skill at all but they get a free ride for having the right gear and class. Mostly no one cares if they die or not
but if dying becomes a problem the free ride will be over and berserker only will no longer be the best choice. Yeah there will be those that will be able to pull it off with the current meta but only those that have skill aside from the right gear and class.

Ok so probably most of the comments will be negative, so yeah bring on the hate if you really have to, I’m prepared for it.

I tried to pre-purchase via in-game in the BL trading post.
But nothing happened I did not recieve any title, did not recieve any e-mail and no change occured on my bank account.
However there was no indication that something went wrong.
Should I try again or should I wait for now?

KotCR.6024:

Eldbrand Charging.8902:

maddoctor.2738:

Eldbrand Charging.8902:

maddoctor.2738:

Eldbrand Charging.8902:

maddoctor.2738:

Buff have higher priority to affect party members. For example, if all 10 players stay together, each party will use a different might stacker to get might stacks. AoE support traits will affect the party of the user.
In other words it will be 2 isolated, different groups in terms of buffs.

10 players 1 party in Raids.

Since Raids will be instances it will not work with 2 parties in the same instance.

Source?

According to this: http://heartofthorns.guildwars2.com/game/raids
It’s 10-player content, not 10-player party. That might well be 2 parties of 5.

It will be an instance so it will only work with 1 party, they did the same in GW1 when Urgoz and The Deep had 12 player parties

We are in GW2 though… not to mention how having 2 parties eliminates the problem the OP mentioned.

Raids will be instances so it will not work with 2 parties.

Why will it not?

To continue using GW1 examples, seems GW2 is an upgraded version of the same engine, therefore it should still be possible, GW1 had two story missions (which, like everything else in the game outside of cities and outposts, is instanced content), that consisted of two different 8-player parties for a total of 16 players. Vizunah Square, and The Unwaking Waters, for reference.

Err ehm you are forgetting that these 2 missions were done with 2 parties to be consistent by lore. The first is Mhenlo and co. Catching up to Master Togo while the other is Mhenlo and Togo getting the support of Kurzicks and Luxons respectively and meet up in the same location.
So what is the story behind 2 party raids in GW2?
More over don’t you remember what happened if there was no party on the other side?
You would get a team of henchmen only as this is a 2 team mission for the better or worst.
So are you sure you want to run raids with a team of 5 players and 5 NPC’s?

I know I’m a bit late so don’t tell me that.
Now the first thing that came to my mind when I heard about 10 man teams was this:
But our aoe effects stack only up to 5 targets, be it support or offense.
So this will make current meta builds which rely on buffing the whole party with aoe buffs almost useless. Think about it if you have a party of say 8 wars and 2 guards the aoe buffs will be unpredictable and thus unreliable. If all the wars use FGJ on whole party it will be random stacks, some will get more than they need while others less if any at all.
The guards will also not be able to protect properly as they can’t control who they can use their skills on, thus relying on a guard to keep everyone alive won’t be a good idea.
Unless the party separates into 2 teams but its hard to think it will do much good during a boss fight.

So maybe this is a good thing as aoe buffs will be less reliable while self-buffs more reliable. In other words it will be the time where “selfish” classes will be able to shine like necros.
But on the other hand the aoe support traits like Healing Prism or Vampiric Aura will also become unreliable – and that’s bad.

Spare me the comment’s that it never was a problem during epic boss battles for +100 players. As during those the amount of players makes the instance so messy that no one cares who does or does not get buffs. Usually it’s only about who is dead as they keep scaling the event.

So what are your thoughts? Is it good or is it bad?
Or do you think anet will make aoe buffs for up to 10 targets?
Well maybe not all but I think the trait buffs should work on the whole party.

Yes that’s what I think the Engineers specialization will be called.
Based on the “demolition operative” or"demolition expert" job or simply a member of the “demolition team”. You know those guys that ehm demolish or blow up old buildings, salvage materials etc.
They use hammers and the wrecking ball so the hammer fits their theme.
I think it’s also a typical move in the “opposite direction”. What I mean is Engineers build things while Demolition operatives dismantle them.

OK so probably most of you heard the Reaper is going to be improved.
Among other things the GS is going to get Life Force gain on it’s main attack chain in the amount of 1/1/3%. I assume that is per hit foe (if not then thats terrible) so up to a total of 15% per chain. Now the Reapers chain is about 1 sec more time consuming than the other professions GS chains, so since their chains take an average of 2,5 sec it’s fair to say the Reapers chain takes about 3,5 sec.
So if we compare it to the dagger chain which gives 8% per chain which takes 2,1 sec then then the GS will generate more Life Force in 21 sec:
GS 15% x 6 = 90% and 3,5 sec x 6 = 21 sec
Dagger 8% x 10 = 80% and 2,1 sec x 10 = 21 sec.

OK that’s great but it’s still only if we hit 3 foes each time so in PvP or during a boss fight it will only be 30%. Not to mention that during a fight with groups of enemy’s the foes will die which will restore Life Force on it’s own.
So it’s great when fighting group’s but only ok during a 1 vs 1 fight.

I’ll give you my personal experience on how Life Force can be invaluable during a boss fight. A while back I was doing a pug FotM (don’t remember which level might even been 50) the last fractal was Mai Trin. So my party wiped on last cannon phase except for me and a mesmer but Mai teleported to him and downed him. So I tried to revive him with my signet but he teleported away so I missed and while channeling it Mai kicked my kitten too so we all wiped. So then we try again and this time everyone except me died on last cannon phase. So I’m thinking it’s no use trying to revive anyone when I’m alone, thus I decided to try to finish her on my own. And I was doing OK only my weapons could not generate enough Life Force for my need to survive. So I swapped to my staff which was not the best weapon for this fight but it generated a lot more Life Force (4% each hit). So yeah in the end I managed to finish her off though it took like 10 – 15 min. But if I couldn’t generate my Life Force fast enough it would never work.

So tell me what good would a mere 5% per chain that takes 3,5 sec do for me in that situation? NOTHING!
So I propose to triple the amount of Life Force to 3/3/9% and remove the per foe hit thus the GS will generate the same amount of Life Force regardless if it’s a group or 1 vs 1 battle.

You say you don’t want the elite specializations to take over, you forgot to add “yet” there haven’t you?
OK I’m speculating a bit now but more or less something like this will happen when there are 2 or 3 specializations to choose from.
For now we have to sacrifice a core trait for an elite, but once there are more hardly anyone will choose a core as their 3rd trait. So at that point you will say you are improving the game mechanics again blah blah blah and you will separate the core traits from the elites. And we will be able to choose 3 core again + 1 elite. That alone will make the elites more powerful but you will probably also improve them too.
I mean what makes them “elite” if they are not suppose to make our characters more powerful? They are for aesthetics only?

Ok so just cut the crap with the little white lies and just do it already, don’t wait 3 years or so. Yeah people will be outraged again, but why would you care after what you pulled already with HoT price and the fact veteran players will be paying again for the game they already own? If this was able to sink in then any other lie will too.
And if there are any people here who do believe ANET on this one then keep it to yourself. In fact I cannot believe that there are actually people who believe anything ANET says at this point. How stupid can you be when we were lied to multiple times already – at this point it’s easy to say we cannot trust any of their words.

So were was I? A yeah elite specs. So what about things like PvP? Well there will probably be something like an “arena of tradition” where only core traits will be allowed for those who don’t have access to them. But what about pve? Um old content can be done without them (probably the new will be too) and you won’t get new content without the elites as they come as a set.

So yeah can we just skip this stage please? I know this or something similar will happen sooner or later so just make it sooner.
Besides many players (most notably necromancers) were hoping these new specializations will allow them to become more powerful. So I think a lot of people will forgive you that lie and perhaps even the one with HoT price too. As a lot of players will now say they do get their money’s worth for it.

Yes the new weapons cannot work in such a plain manner like any other weapon we can use – 3 reasons.
1) they are the symbol of our new mechanic and since there will be new elite specs in the future they will be a waste of time as they are now. I assume there will be 5 in total (1 for each remaining dragon) so an engineer will have more weapons he cannot use without the right spec selected than he normally can. Thus if we are using an elite spec the new weapon should be the best one.
2) weapons give less skill selection unlike the other skill slots as they use up 2,3 or 5 so we have to be more certain that we want to use them.
3) hey they are weapons we need to acquire them right? Which might become a real problem if we want them to be ascended/legendary. So why would we want them if they suck?

So I say these weapons need more synergy with their elite specs. In other words they will give benefits to the new game mechanics and skills when they are equipped.
Like the Reaper would deal more damage if he/she enters RS while using a GS or something like that.
A Tempest could have reduced overload activation and increased aoe when using a warhorn – let’s be honest this is clearly based on the good old “storm caller” from GW.
And they would also have some effect on the new skills or vice versa. So for example a Tempest will have increased range and effect on his/her shouts by using the warhorn as a megaphone. While a Reaper instead would get some buff from the shouts if using a GS, like “nothing can save you” would grant the Reaper increased attack speed for like 5 sec.

In other words we need motivation to use our new weapon as our weapon of choice otherwise they wiII mostly be a waste. We can use them only while using the specific elite spec so we should be thinking “yeah I will definitely be using it” instead of “maybe” or “nah it sucks I’ll stay with my core weapons”.

OK so the Tempest shouts made the Reaper look pathetic and you know what?
It’s true in fact the Reaper was broken from the start.
Now for starters “shouts” are starting to look unoriginal, but they indeed fit the Tempest as it gets the warhorn. A greatsword however doesn’t seem much related to shouting. Of course I know a Necromancer can use one by default but that ruins the reason of how they learned to use them now.
Necromancers need something more related to them, but before I suggest what I will make it clear why they were broken from the start.

LIFE FORCE GAIN is broken for the Reaper. Almost every other weapon which a Necromancer uses can restore life force much faster than the GS.
Which is absurd as Death Shrouds is a ranged attack form while Reaper Shroud is melee oriented. Thus by logic gaining life force should be an even greater priority and yet the only GS skill that gives life force is the pull “Reaper’s Grasp”. Which gives 4% for each foe hit (max 5) so up to 20%, but it recharges 25 sec.
A daggers main attack chain which takes 2.1 sec gives 8% so in these 25 sec it can give up to 96%! 2.1 × 12 = 25.2 and 8% x 12 = 96%
An axe’s Ghastly Claws gives 12% and recharges 8 sec, so in 25 sec it will give 36%.
The staff’s Necrotic Grasp gives also 4% for foe hit so up to 20% but it only takes 1.4 sec to recast, thus in 25 sec it will give at least 72%.
1.4 × 18 = 25.2 and 4% x 18 = 72% but that is the minimum while at maximum Necrotic Grasp would restore 100% in just 7 sec! 20% x 5 = 100% and 1.4 × 5 = 7.
Of course we cannot expect Necrotic Grasp to hit 5 foes each time now can we? But neither can we expect that from Reaper’s Grasp – right?
So yes the GS is a self-nerf to Reapers Shroud. It won’t be a problem when fighting lots of foes at once as their deaths will give Life Force too but what about boss battles?

OK so I was wrong Death Spiral also restores Life Force but it’s even worse as it gives only 2% per foe hit up to 3 so max 6% and recharges 10 sec. Thus in 22 sec it will give at most 12% (22 due to 1 sec cast time). So in best case i. e. 5 foes to hit it will give us a total of 36% if both skills are used so only half of what the staff can give while hitting just 1 foe. So again what about boss fights? Both will only give a total of 8% (Death spiral used twice) while a staff will still give 72% and a dagger will give that lousy 8% every 2.1 sec.

OK I think you get what I mean. And don’t tell me we can change weapons to get LF yes I know but shouldn’t our “best” weapon which we get with RS as a set to be our best way to recharge it?

So now my suggestion – replace shouts with hexes. All those that played GW probably rember that “hexes” is one of the things Necromancer’s were best known for, the other was the fact they draw power from death.
So I propose a bit of both, what I mean by hexes is skills that will place a hex on the Reaper and any foe close enough to him/her will get hexed with up to 5 foes max.
Thus it would make the Reaper a cursed object – fitting his relentless pursuit character I would say. So these hexes would have an initial, duration and ON DEATH effect.
It could work like this the hexes would have a 10 – 20 sec duration on the Reaper and 5 – 10 sec duration on any foe that gets hexed.
As an example how they would work I’ll start with the healing skill.
The reaper would steal like 1000 health from each foe that gets hexed (so up to 5000), then every foe that is hexed gets a condition transfered on him from the Reaper or nearby ally each sec.
And if the effected target dies while hexed it will create an aoe heal which will effect up to 5 allies in range.
Another example would be a replacement to “Rise”. The hex would first deal damage then apply 2 stacks of vulnerability each sec and if the target dies while hexed it will create a minion – can be random or not or a new one.
Now I know you would want to hear other suggestions (especially for an elite) but I’m not going to waste too much time on this. As I’ll probably be ignored or even bashed for it anyway, so sorry but I’ll pass on making up other skills.
So yeah these hexes would only work on enemy’s that get too close to the Reaper – put a “do not touch” sign on him please!

As I recal same thing happened when GW2 came out.
We were promised a lot of things like homes for our characters, naming an ancestor etc.
I said this once before “fooled me once shame on you, fooled me twice shame on me”.

But let’s just get to the point. From what I heard the same thing will happen every time an expansion comes out. I assume there will be 4 more – 1 for each dragon. So does that mean players that played from the start will have to pay 300 – 600$ for the whole content, while those that start then only 50 – 100$?

OK so you want to give a free character slot, but how do you know someone needs it?
I don’t I already have an unused slot. And most players will wish to try out the specializations at first, so it will only be of use to those that will want to play the Revenant.
More over it’s only for those that prepurchase, so what about those that don’t?
I know I won’t as I won’t be playing again no sooner than October. Not that I intend to buy HoT anyway but assuming I will then what?

I think the best compensation for this would be giving free gems to those with already existing GW2 accounts, like 4000.
Then those who purchase standard version will have enough to upgrade to deluxe for free. Those who buy deluxe will be able to spend them as they see fit. While those that buy ultimate will then have a total of 8000.

But really anet nice going I know that you know that the veterans won’t start a new account to have 2. Because you know they will want the new content on their old account, otherwise it would take a while before they get geared up again, especially for fotm. So yeah really good job on screwing them over.

Well maybe not literally but their functions will have to change.
Let’s be honest if Chill will stack just like Burning it will only cause problems.
Like with it’s natural effects – slowing down movement and skill recharge.
Will those stack too? Doubt it. Other problems will be lack of synergy with other Reaper traits like Cold Shoulder. Well if each stack added additional damage reduction that would be awsome but it would probably break the game.
But most notably why it wouldn’t work well is the general idea behind the Reaper – relentless persuer. Meaning it attacks slowly thus uses Chill to stop enemies from running away.

So the answer to this enigma is most likely a change to how these traits work.
Deathly Chill could just increase damage against chilled foes – it could even be a trait that effects party members damage too, that would be pretty awsome eh?
Terror however could simply cause fear to remove multiple stacks of Stability on each use.

Part 2

There are 2 things which cause the core of the problem:
1) THERE IS NO SYNERGY! Yes SYNERGY for which the original Guild Wars was famous for. Don’t even try to tell me that stacking Might is synergy coz it’s not.
Thats only a way for pseudo-pros to get hard by getting big numbers on their display.
Who think hitting for 10k once every 20 sec is better than hitting for 2k each sec.
Many skills in GW had synergy with one another, there was class synergy and multi-class synergy.
An example of class synergy would be “Searing Flames” the Elementalist elite which caused burning on foes and fire damage on all foes that are already burning.
So it had synergy with “Mark of Rodgort” an Elementalist hex which caused all foes that took fire damage to burn, which removed the problem of reapplying burning and thus “Searing Flames” delt damage every time.
Then there was also Glyph of Immolation which instantly applied burning by your next spell thus “Searing Flames” delt damage on it’s first use.
Or you could do both to make it even more effective. And then other synergetic skills like Fire Attunement, Glowing Gaze, Aura of Restoration etc.
Now multi-class synergy – what I mean by that is skills from different classes working well together for mutual benefit. Like the Rangers “Winter” which created the “Spirit of Winter” which converted all elemental damage into cold damage. It had synergy with the Mesmers “Mantra of Frost” which redused all cold damage the user took and gave energy each time the user got hit by cold damage. (This combination was used in the elite mission “Domain of Anguish” which is why the team build was dubbed “Frostway”) Or “Spinal Shivers” a Necromancer hex which caused the target to be interrupted every time he took cold damage.
Another example is the Nectomancer hex “Mark of Pain” which did nothing to the foe hexed with it but delt armour-ignoring damage to nearby foes if the foe hexed with it took physical damage. So it had synergy with a Warriors “Hundred Blades” which delt AoE slashing damage combined with “Whirlwind Attack”. As Hundred Blades would srike for each foe hit by Whirlwind Attack and thus Mark of Pain would cause massive damage. Same was for the Dervish “Vow of Strength” in combination with “Eremite’s Attack”.
Now I could go on and on but you probably get what I mean. We do not have such skill synergy here in GW2. And thus we will never have such class cooperation, which I would like to point out is quite hypocritical. The story constantly asks us to make others cooperate and yet we can’t even get our skills to do so.

2) There is no failure – we cannot fail at all. How do you expect anything to be challanging if we can’t fail no matter what, but simply try and try again untill we get it right. In the original GW if the whole party died during a mission be it normal or elite you had to redo the whole thing. There were also other factors often like an NPC you had to keep alive. If we had this then maybe some people would start using some other stats besides berserker. But obviously we are past the era where challange in gaming is no longer a common thing, but only rarely appears in games like “Dark Souls”. Now we are back to the “Ursanway” build which got nerfed in GW only now it’s called “Zerker”. Yeah something that was considered bad in the original is now ok in the sequel.

So yeah these are the causes why GW2 is so bad right now – no synergy and no failiure as without it there is no challange.

HoT is not going to change anything, all it does is try to cure the symptoms rather than the cause.

Before I get to the real core of the problem I will also point out 3 other problems.
If you don’t want to read that go to part 2.

Part 1

1) the races – why are there 5 races? Why, tell me why? It makes to difference which race you play except visual. You know I probably did not play every game where you can select your race, but each one I did play did make some difference depending on the race you select. I even played old 2D 16bit which had such things.
Don’t believe me? “Ninja Turtles” – well that wouldn’t be different race but each character differed a bit. Most notably each had a different special attack.
So what are they for? The recial skills which hardly anyone uses?
Because they are all bad except maybe the Sylvari Elite “Take Root.”
Or maybe the story? Well thats problem 2.
2) Yes the story makes no sense. Why? Because we constantly resolve disputes between others. Really? Are we not facing the apocalypse? And instead of getting all together on their own, they need us to convince them to do so. The 3 orders, the 5 leaders of each race and Destiny’s Edge. Or if it isn’t that then someone is just caring about his own interests instead of the greater good. Like Caudecus, the LA council or Phlunt. More over some of the situations were absurd, I think the dumbest was the escape from LA. Not only did the council not listen despite suffering 2 major attacks before, but the best was when Scarlet attacked with the miasma.
Can anyone explain to me why we were evacuating civilians each time the miasma thined? I mean once it got thick enough we had to run or else we would die.
So how did any civilians survive? They learned not to breathe? LA should have looked like an etermination camp from WW2 – there should be bodies everywhere not survivors.
3) Why do we level up? We get scaled down anywhere we go so it makes no difference if there were 80, 200, 30, or no levels at all. It makes the feeling of making progress rather dull. We may as well just have item rarity while rest i.e. attributes and traits unlocked from the start and it would be all the same. In the original GW there were only 20 levels, but the difference was that most of the areas there were for those that are level 20. While only a few like the “noob islands” were for those under level 20.
Here however most of the areas are for those under level 80 while only a few for level 80. That is why we have this scaling system as the “noob island” is now the majority of the game rather than just the warm up.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Who would win in a fight? Debate!

No scoreboard this time, it’s not a Dawnbreaker vs Anet topic

err maybe it’s time to grow up?

zapv.8051:

Staff is really bad dps, it might be useful in open world for tagging stuff, but in dungeons you want to avoid using it as much as possible (except maybe laying down marks before a fight starts, then switching to something else). The meta will probably be d/f gs or d/w gs. Also Frailty really won’t be worth itDarwec, focus 4 and gs 3 is 24 vuln almost instantly, so anything that actually deals damage would be better.

I agree but I was thinking about bosses like those found in FotM like in the Vulcano where there is lots of moving around during the fight. While if you stack there won’t be much use for another weapon as the GS is the only melee weapon a necro can (rather will be able to) use that cleaves i.e. hits multiple foes.

I would say a staff as the other weapon as a ranged weapon always comes in handy.
Plus the primary attack of the staff recharges life force quite fast.
So it will be very good for fights with bosses that hit hard at close range.
If you get kicked out of RS just back away and hit with staff, then when full again re-enter RS and engage in melee again.

TyPin.9860:

I personally would like that. DS with F1 and RS with F2. Now mind you, I would share cool downs between DS and RS for skills and the transform itself. Meaning that when you use #2 DS #2 RS goes also into cool down and so on. Also leaving RS would set DS on CD and leaving DS would set RS on cool down.

I’d just like to have a choice, which shroud to use depending on the game situation…

Now having said that, I doubt it’s ever gonna happen. Even though a chronomancer gets an additional shatter compared to core mesmer, having two version of shroud form available might be too strong for Reaper compared to Necromancer.

What do you think?

It doesn’t work that way – if you use the Reaper specialization then RS instantly replaces DS. And all buffs related to DS are added to RS, like “Unyilding Blast” which gives Life Blast Vulnerability will now give that Vulnerability to Life Rend.
Besides there is one key factor which makes having both pointless – they both run on life force. So if you run out of it you won’t be able to enter either anyway.
So it’s not like with Elemetalists attunments where you can swap between them all the time.

I don’t want to be splitting hairs here, but this isn’t really the best time to be rebuilding LA right now lore-wise.
I mean even if they won’t take part in rebuilding it there are Sylvari living in LA.
And since after LS2 they are being taken over by Mordremoth you would think they would be sabotaging the works. The Orians did the same with Fort Trinity remember?

Or maybe that is the point? And I just spoiled the surprise?

I think using already existing weapons for the specializations isn’t a very good idea.
Most notably because there is a disbalance among professions on how many weapon types they can use. A Warrior and Guardian has 11 types available while an Engineer only has 4.
That is why the Dragonhunter phahahahaha “dragonhunter” hahahaha ehm got one of the things thats left i.e. a longbow.
Now lets look at the Warrior – the only thing left for them is a short bow, torch, pistol and dagger. As a Warrior will certainly not get a caster weapon into his hand – that would be absurd.
While the Engineer will now whield a hammer as it’s the only weapon kinda related to his theme.

But wouldn’t it be better if each elite specialization gave the ability to whield a completely new weapon which would be unique?
Like the Chronomancer rather than a shield would whield an hourglass – in fact I have no idea how a shield can be more related to time than a focus?
The Reaper could whield an actual scythe.
The Dragonhunter phahaha “dragonhunter” hahaha would get a crossbow rather than a bow – no couldn’t think of anything better on the spot.
While the Engineer would get a bazooka or a machine gun.

And same with the rest – you get my drift right?

Now this is no big problem but I am curious.
As we all know only projectiles can pierce but skill 1 of Reaper’s Shroud inherits effects from Life Blast. And as we know the Unyielding Blast trait gives Life Blast the pierce effect and Vulnerability condition.
So what will the pierce effect do to these melee attacks?
Will it have no effect? Or will it perhaps give the ability to hit more foe’s?

Since HoT is coming a lot of people had already complained that they will probably have to change their gear. If said gear is ascended I understand the frustration – my armour cost me nearly 500g to make. So now paying that much again will not make anyone happy. And what about the old gear? Give it to another toon – maybe.
But what if the stats will be of no use to that other toon? I’m suppose to throw it away then? So just keep it along the new gear? Ok but even if we don’t count spare weapon sets thats 14 – 16 used slots in your inventory. It’s 8 – 10 if we throw away trinkets as they are easy to get, but does that make sense? I mean if we intend to use that gear some time we will need them again, so now buy new ones just to throw them away again later?
Ok now someone is going to mention exotics which are much cheaper.
But that still doesn’t solve the throwing away old gear or using up too much inventory space problems. And it also brings up another problem which is FotM.
If the player intends to use the new builds/gear there it will have to be ascended.
Unless he/she only intends to do levels 1 – 9 or 1 – 19 as 10+ are still doable without infusions.
And there is one more problem – ascended gear chests. I’m not a person who really has this problem, as I only have 1 chest with which I don’t know what to do, because I don’t do FotM that much.
But I know a lot of you do because I have guild mates who have like 10 or more ascended gear chests which they are hoarding not sure of what to do with them.

Ok I rambled long enough and I think you all get the picture.
So my solution to this problem is something that was probably already proposed – give ascended gear the ability to swap stats.
NO IT’S NOT WHAT YOU THINK HEAR ME OUT PLEASE.
No I’m not saying make it like legendary weapons where you can change stats to any you want at will. No that would be unfair I admit.
What I have in my mind is something more ballanced. The ability to add new stats to ascended gear by merging it with other ascended gear or a insignia/inscription in the mystic forge.
What I mean is say you have an ascended sword with Rampager stats and you wish to add to it Knight’s stats to it. So you have to merge it in the forge with another asceded sword with Knight’s stats or a Beigarth’s inscription.
The sword you would get back would now have the ability to swap it’s stats between Rampager and Knight. The the process could be repeated to add a 3rd type of stats and then again to add 4th and so on. So in other words it would be possible to have an ascended weapon/armour which can swap between all stats available but it would be a very expensive to do so. I’m not exactly sure but it would cost around 700 – 1000g just for one piece of equipment.

And of course the process should be a bit harder when using an inscription/insignia rather than a full piece of gear. Which would be determined by the remaining 2 ingredients used in the mystic forge.
Like when merging leggings with other leggings you would need to add a Lesser Vision Crystal. While if you merge the leggings with only a new insignia it would require a normal Vision Crystal.
And then there would also be the 4th ingredient like I don’t know a gift of ascension maybe?
The process could be done with trinkets too.

So how does this solve the problems? Well let me use the Necromancer/Reaper as an example. I’m speculating a bit so forgive me if I’m wrong but the Reaper sounds like it will work best with a Power based build. But on the other hand the condition caps are suppose to raised or removed so Necromancers may have a future as “conditionmancers.” But if that happens there will probably be teams for both types.
And if the Necromancer can alter between Barserker and Carrion stats on his/her gear then they won’t have problems with joining either types of teams.
And same goes for any other class which will be able to do multiple types of gameplay.

This will also solve the problem of all those “useless” ascended chests.
As even if the weapon/armour you get will have stats which you find useless, you can still find use for it by adding stats you desire through the mystic forge.
For instance you may have 6 armour chests each with different stats but now you can add to all 6 pieces a Zojja’s insignia. So now you have a whole Berserker armour set.
Yes 6 insignias will still cost you but much less than forging the whole armour set and not to mention you now have a use for your previously useless armour chests.

And you no longer have to hoard alternate gear sets as you have one set with all the stats you may need (excluding alternate types of weapons of course).