Guild Wars 2

lioka qiao.8734:

For the most part I’ve seen a serious lack of vision among Asura in how their technology progresses.
What they have:
Robotics
Computers
Teleportation portals
Particle accelerators

What they should have had
Flying saucers (or other space ships)
Advanced weaponry (why am I using a sword and not a lightsaber! and no laser guns?)
Awesome robotics: I’m talking 100 meter tall mechanical dragons, not tiny humanoid “golems” that all look the same.
Hover Tanks: So we can make any number of stone platforms float but not make a tank?
Wireless communication (obviously)

They should have given the pact these things. Mordremoth would be powerless against an army of mechadragons (as would the rest of tyria for that matter).

If i had the choice I would have joined the Inquest and set that lack of vision straight but alas I was told to hate them and never given the chance to think for myself in that regard.

Yeah the Asura are too much about inventing for the sake of inventing, very little thought is put into practical applications or improving existing designs. I think the fact that in 250 years the height of golem combat tactics is still “punch things” should tell you all you need to know about how they appreciate military inventions/designs.

That said don’t count on the inquest to create revolutionary designs, they’re still asura after all. Only difference between them and the rest is the lack of ethics, they’re still in it purely “FOR SCIENCE!” so don’t expect much other than the golems to be red colored instead of blue.

Someone mention a squirrel army?

As others have said Elementalist is probably the best fit for what you’re looking for. High damage at both range (staff) and up close (daggers), and they’re also welcome in most areas of play. All that said they are the squishiest class and you might get your butt kicked a lot starting out if you’re new to GW2 in general, especially if you’re coming from a more traditional MMO.

I agree with Malin, if you want a safer pick while you learn the basics of the game Ranger is probably the way to go, they’re great at range and have good options for melee as well.

So I’ve taken some lengthy breaks from GW2, didn’t really play all summer, now I come back and start to enjoy things. I honestly didn’t even realize what a travesty the trait system had become for a while as I leveled up my Mesmer who was sitting at lvl 25 since sometime last year.

Since he existed before the NPE he had all vanilla traits unlocked arleady. So It wasn’t until I’d levled him up to 80 and started a new alt engineer that I got slapped in the face with this new trait unlock system.

Firstly, what’s with the skill point cost? Not sure if you noticed but the most people with tons of spare skill points are lvl 80’s that are played a lot/have done a lot of world completion. Putting extra skill point grind on low level characters isn’t the way to do it, most people spend their first 100+ skill points on, get this, their skills.

Secondly, why are so many adept level traits for events in level 40-50 zones? You unlock the ability to get an adept level trait at level 36 last I checked, really about four levels before one should worry about going into said zones. Why aren’t the adept level traits linked to things you’ll be doing leading up to level 36 so you can at least have some traits unlocked when you get there?

Also what’s with the super specific do X event stuff anyways? If I’m an asura playing through the zones in Kryta why would I want to drop everything I’m doing and go to the boonies in Ascalon for some trait event that I might have to wait a half hour for? Zone completion/world exploration used to feel organic and fun I could go where I wanted and it didn’t matter the progress was all the same, now it feels like I’m being led around by the nose.

I think the thing that irks me the most about this however is how much of a grind and or gold/skill point sink it is to unlock all of a profession’s traits. Wasn’t the trait system supposed to be about customizing playstyles and discovering cool new ways to play? Yes? Then why put such a massive price tag/barrier to entry on them? As I see it I’m best served figuring out my level 80 build before I get my first trait point so I can plan out either what I need to buy or what hoops I need to jump through to get the traits for that build then never bother experimenting with a build ever again.

I just…why Anet? Why? Customized character builds was the single biggest selling point of GW1 for me and the Traits were supposed to bring that depth to GW2. Why are you now punishing new players for wanting to have fun and experiment with the customization?

I really really want to be optimistic and believe that such things are in the pipeline, I’ve been wanting more weapon variety in the classes for nearly a year now. But the truth is we’re now 2 years in and all we’ve gotten are new healing skills and a handful of new traits.

I don’t mean to be pessimistic, I’d love new weapons for all professions, new skills, anything to shake up the basic gameplay and open up new builds and strategies. It’s just that I’m getting a bit tired of waiting for it.

I agree, the charr also have pretty bad time of certain headpieces that cut off their horns.

charr in a hood

As others have said the charr were originally feline inspired but the more recent faces added to the makeover kit are decidedly canine. At least so far the doggy faces don’t look to out of place though imo.

Bizarre. I take it that was added for the Chinese launch?

So I was in Rata Sum just now minding my business at the bank when I heard a strange thumping sound behind me. I turn around to see someone in an idle pose with a staff periodically thumping it against the ground, no big deal until I clicked on them and saw it was a ranger. “A ranger with a staff?” I thought incredulously. I then looked closer and realized the ranger was under the effect of an unlabled “transformation” and the creature that stood there was not of any player race, or indeed of any race I’ve yet seen or heard of on Tyria. I managed to snap a screenshot before they left, which is fortunate as I failed to catch it’s name to ask directly.

So I must ask you all, kitten am I looking at here? A visitor for the planet of the apes? Sasquatch’s blueish shaved cousin? The fabled blue bookah of legend?

I imagine having a militia would be standard practice in villages in Kryta. I think Claypool is the only one we specifically see due to circumstances. Sheamor is on the doorstep of Divinity’s Reach and is such probably watched over by the Seraph from DR. Beetletun has Caudecus’ Ministry Guard in place of militia. While Nebo Terrace and Ascalon Settlement both have their defenders supplemented or replaced by Seraph due to the war.

kolompi.1287:

You guys are trying to make sense of a lore that will never work simply because it made sense in the framework of GW1 where we could play only humans and – unless we throw away 90% of that lore – cannot be applied to GW2’s attempts at creating a framework.

Five races, five different belief systems and since arenanet never presented us with a framework in which all of these belief systems would fit, we are left with speculations.
Eternal alchemy? Gods? Spirits? These can all be dismissed as racial beliefs but we would need something that explains how the world of Tyria works, preferably without totally disemboweling GW1 lore and with tons of retcons.

Technically speaking the Eternal Alchemy is how everything fits together. It’s not so much a religion of worship as a scientific theory that there is an overarching structure to reality and that the deities of other race’s religions do fit into that.

Well for most things you should hit up the wiki or browse the update changes on the forums here.

For specifics, not sure exactly when you left but if you missed the end of the the first season of the Living Story the changes to Lion’s Arch will be quite a shocker. The place is quite a mess these days.

The biggest gameplay/mechanics things I can think of are the changes to traits. They’re free to change now at any time, they’ve also switched to a 1 point = 1 trait system to no more dumping 5x points per trait silliness. Along with that traits are the biggest thing to recieve balance changes and they’ve added new traits to all traitlines of every class so you’ll probably want to revisit your builds to see what’s changed and what’s new there.

Also if you switch to a non lvl 80 character or start a new alt the leveling system is completely different now. Every level up now you get a reward chest-like popup that has different things every level. Often you’ll get some free loot or gear for your character others you’ll get skill points or trait unlocks. They also usually have a tooltip informing you of some aspect of the game. The new leveling rewards are kind of annoying in that you don’t get access to traits and things as early as you used to but getting loot just for leveling up is quite nice.

I think one reason mesmers are generally tied to upper class humans comes from how intertwined mesmers are with theater/dramatic productions. The drama/masquerade mask is iconic to the mesmer for a reason. In GW1 mesmers are synonymous with theater/performers, such entertainment is largely intended for upper classes especially in the roughly medieval societies of GW1 human nations. From these traditions I think it’s natural for mesmer to become a profession that is more common in upper classes in modern Kryta.

As for female preference for mesmer, that I can’t really explain. It certainly wasn’t so one sided in GW1 for every female mesmer there was usually a male somewhere as well. Maybe it’s a new Krytan thing or maybe it’s just a case of chance where the most notable mesmers are all female.

Zaklex.6308:

This might be an amusing thread, but the huge chunks of metal are staying put(that’s a fact), they’re much to large to be removed. So you’re going to have to rebuild around them, work them into the architecture of the new, improved LA, which of course should begin with the infrastructure(bridges, walkways, etc.). However, since 35k of the 45k population was killed during the attack, all workers will have to be brought in from outside sources(and we know how easy that is).

I don’t know, I think if they got the charr to help they could salvage it and build Lion’s Arch into a new Black Citadel, there’s certainly enough metal there.

If that offended you be thankful you never got to meet Gadd…

It took me a long while before I would even consider making an Asura character after everything I saw of them between EoTN and GW2.

Really I probably would never have given them any consideration were it not for Snaff. That guy not only bucked nearly every stereotype his people are known for but did it while also being one of the most brilliant Asura of all time.

GrandmaFunk.3052:

SpinDie.9105:

Scaling players levels down in a game that is centered around leveling up is ridiculous

well there’s your problem right there… that’s not what this game is centered around at all.

Bingo. GW2 might not even have levels if it weren’t for the desire to appeal to the wider market of MMO players.

If the OP is still around I’m genuinely curious. A lot of your argument comes from the fact that you can’t one-shot overkill monsters half your level. But…in a traditional MMO why would you even bother doing that in the first place? You won’t get XP, lots of them won’t even give you loot for one-shotting underlevel mobs. So why? Just to give you a weird power trip?

Well if it’s just to see big numbers and feel superior you can still do that in GW2. You might not have noticed them but there’s lots of small white/gray named mobs around that you can one shot at any level. They’re called “ambient creatures” and there’s even achievements for slaughtering them.

Yes, you’re stomping on bugs and kicking bunnies, but that’s just GW2’s way of more accurately illustrating what you’re doing in other MMO’s when you attack underleveled creatures.

You kidding? I haven’t played since the end of the LS, been waiting for this and am very happy with the new wardrobe. I am going to be playing a lot more again. That’s also not to mention I recently got myself some gems for my birthday and got a couple new character slots.

I have a hard time believing Divinty’s Reach isn’t on the megaserver, it was more packed than LA was during holidays on my server. Also the Grove is definitely on the megaserver, saw a bunch of people posting their home servers.

Hopefully I’ll be able to test the finer points of the megaserver sometime soon as far as grouping up with friends from different servers and having the server sort us into the same district of a city.

At least as of last night I wasn’t able to meet up with a guild member from another server without grouping up before entering a megaserver zone.

Haven’t done a lot of reskinning yet but so far I’m infinetly happy by being able to have my ele wear the pirate outfit as armor. No more is she stuck with lacey princess dresses, no more mini-skirts, no more prim and proper! She’s a pirate and proud! Yaharr!

Unless something has changed Anet doesn’t do E3, they feel it’s too exclusive. To them it’s a matter of, why go to the time and effort of making a big booth and presentation that won’t be seen by fans but instead be translated to them through TV and Website reviews. They prefer GDC and PAX as those are more accessible to the public.

Yes, must say I’m loving the wardrobe system, it’s also fun right now unlocking the skins for any and all drops I get. Will probably never use them but you know what they say, “gotta catch ’em all!” lol

People don’t like the 3 to 1 from old transmutation stones but at least for me I had over 100 of ‘em and struggled to find a use for them as I found it too much of a hassle to reskin my character’s gear every 10-15 levels and of course they didn’t work on lvl 80 gear meaning the crystals were always at a premium and were roadblocking a lot of my character’s getting the skins they wanted for their lvl 80 gear.

And the outfits! Probably my favorite part of the new system, it’s not perfect but it’s close enough to the GW1 costume system for me. My ele can be a pirate! My necro can actually wear the witch outfit for more than goofing around in town!

Only part I don’t like is the tonic clothes, can’t dye em so they’re more like “town uniforms” than personal clothes anymore. :-/

That’s a really good question actually. I would think the legendary would still be unbound as it’s a separate item, but you never know.

@ maestrochino: If that is the case where can I get the non-precursor version of the Hunter?

Lot of hate over the outfit system, and I can understand why if you built a custom town clothes outfit from lots of parts. On the other hand, however I must say I’m already getting more use out of the outfits I had than I ever did before by virtue of being able to use them as an armor skin.

Also, this is my elementalist. I went and bought the pirate outfit because she can finally use it as an armor skin. No more is she forced to suffer mini-skirts and princess dresses. She has PANTS, she has dirt, wear and tear! She can finally be the rough and tumble pirate she was always meant to be!

So yeah, I’m quite happy with the new system the only thing I don’t like is the tonic-form of town clothes since it prevents custom dyeing the outfit (unless there is something I missed).

So minor bug I just saw with the “last online” section of the guild menu. My guild leader logged off to get the new build and while she did the guild menu said she was last online “132 years, 2 months, 1 week” ago.

go go power rangers!

This is a step in the right direction to be sure but I won’t be satisfied until they get rid of the stupid NA/EU divide. I have some old guild mates from GW1 that were EU and I can still chat with them and send mail/items but we can’t actually play together, it’s maddening. Especially coming from GW1 where it was a complete non-issue.

It has confused me a bit as well, mostly on account of free trait resets. The trait system is the direct successor of GW1’s attributes and they learned long ago in that game that free attribute resetting is a much better system for everyone. Why there was ever a cost to reset traits is beyond me.

Now with the megaserver we’re essentially getting closer to the district system GW1 had where everyone from everywhere could play together. But the megaserver still doesn’t offer the “international” districts and ability to move from NA to EU districts as well. I still find it stupid that I can chat and send mail to my old EU guildmates but can’t actually play with them without one of us buying another account

I think a lot of Mortar’s problems could be solved by making it a kit instead of an environmental weapon. Same functionality but it can be picked up and repositioned easily and can’t be destroyed before you can do anything with it. Could probably use more range and/or damage with that even but just being able to use it on demand would help a lot imo.

Again I have to wonder why the Pact are the only ones with airships at this point. The Aetherblades have proven time and again over the past year that air power will have a major impact on all future wars in Tyria, not just those involving dragons. Why hasn’t anyone but the Pact built any more airships? Seriously you’d think the Vigil at least would be fielding it’s own air wing out of Vigil Keep by now.

I just find it stupid that a splinter faction of pirates/Inquest could reverse engineer, then produce an airship fleet to rival the Pact’s within a year yet the factions that make up the Pact have yet to utilize any of their own designs outside of that coalition.

At least for humans I would argue that the Krytan indifference to same-sex pairings stems from the fact that Tyrian humans have never had rigid gender roles in any of their societies. If gender doesn’t have the same sort of expectations attached to it that we have in our society then what gender someone is attracted to also becomes less of an issue as well.

Sort of skimmed through here so sorry if this has been brought up but it occurs to me that all the jointly developed tech for the Pact should really probably be trickling back to the groups that make up the pact by now. Especially the airships, considering that the Aetherblades have quite literally had free reign over the skies of Tyria for months now, why haven’t the orders and nations started building their own fleets?

I mean, if the Aetherblades could build a fleet of that size in the intervening time since they acquired and reverse engineered a Pact one surely the groups behind the pact would be building up their own ships for use outside the Pact.

I can understand the Pact itself not intervening they are strictly anti-dragon but I find the fact that the Battle for LA was fought without any air-support to be absolutely absurd. It really is a miracle we managed to win at all, and I daresay without the sort of assassination we pulled against Scarlet we would not have been able to win through sheer military might.

Did she actually have knowledge about a dragon’s location though? Mind you I haven’t followed the details as closely as the lore buffs around here but everything I encountered led me to believe Taimi/PC’s observation was accurate. In that she didn’t plan to poke a sleeping dragon but rather poke the Ley Lines and stir up all the dragons, the side effect being that it’s disturbed a still sleeping one.

I can totally understand being worried bout GW1 relics getting destroyed. One of the first things I did during Escape from LA and in the Aftermath was to go check on the ruins.

That said, I cannot understand those who decry GW2 as completely divorced from GW1 lore. Pretty much every major race and character has had their story concluded and evolved naturally, almost all of which is found in game. And moreover, cataclysmic dragon risings aside, the world has evolved in very comparable way to earth.

I mean really consider if Earth history was featured in this way. Having one game set in revolutionary-war era Boston and having the sequel set 250 years later in modern day Boston would be quite a shock as well. Or a more comparable example might 1500’s England, still transitioning out of the middle ages to the Reniassance, then jump forward 250 years and you’re in the middle of the Industrial Revolution. That’s a massive shift as well.

I don’t think they would ever add something that could directly interfere with the profession mechanic of another class. However I DO very much like the idea of giving necros the ability to mess with endurance. Perhaps even allowing us to straight up vamp endurance would be a fun way to give necros better mitigation abilities.

The dialogue in question is what you get if you did not personally kill Scarlet, and if you are a sylvari you can object to it and she apologizes.

Well all signs point to Tengu becoming playable at some point, and I’m very much happy for that, they were the one non-human race I really was looking forward to playing in GW2.

As for more classes, I’m going to say no. Almost every archetype can be achieved by expanding the abilities/themes of the existing classes.

Also as much as I loved Ritualists and Dervishes almost every single one of their mechanics exists within the GW2 professions already. So if they did ever return they would be absolutely nothing like their GW1 counterparts.

I agree with the OP. While I do enjoy being a MM in GW2 (AI bugs aside) they are a far cry from the “horde of undead” feeling that made me love minions so much in GW1.

And in GW1 minions were my thing, I created countless MM iterations over my GW1 career, even had a hero MM team build that could maintain 30+ minions indefinitely (to the point they would start leveling up during vanquishes).

It’s interesting that you mention Malign Intervention as I actually made extensive use of it in my favorite Alliance Battle build. Essentially it utilized Malign intervention as an opening hex in a chain that inflicted persistent degen along with respectable direct damage. Once the target died I would catch the minion with Verata’s Gaze and have a free meat-shield/extra damage and be able to use them as potent self-healing with Taste of Death.

I would like to see more options for that sort of thing in GW2, namely new minion skills or traits that make going hybrid/half MM a viable choice. Currently many non MMs use Flesh Golem but that’s more on account of it offering a constant effect whereas Plague & Lich are more situational.

DejaVu.9825:

What? Stability makes you immune to all CC.
Look at the warrior as much stability using…

CC conditions still work through stability (except Fear)

Also given that trasmutation stones as map completion rewards were usually in groups of three and the new conversion rate of stones is 3 to 1 I’d say future map completion rewards will be simply 1 charge.

YES please! This has bothered me so much, especially bad if you’re fighting at 900+ range using ground targeting and even target selection gets blocked by the enemy display UI so much. I had completely rearranged my GW1 UI, why can’t we have this option in GW2?

I agree the racial skills really could use a second look at. Especially the elites. That said there’s a lot of variation across them, some are rather decent if niche in use. (Snow Leopard, Charrzooka, & Take Root come to mind) While others are just so downright horrid that I can honestly say Ive never seen anyone else use them (Artillery Barrage I’m looking at you).

Really it wouldn’t take much to make them appealing for niche use or at least justifiable for those who enjoy the racial flavor.

kta.6502:

She didn’t need to command her minions to kill the people who weren’t a threat to them. She could of just commanded her minions to set up the miasma containers to keep people away from the drill. She could of also commanded her lackeys to troll the survivors in LA. There is a good chance that someone is paying Scarlet to do these horrendous acts. Her payment: She gets to drill the bay in LA for the leylines.

Idk, when your minions include cut-throat pirates, twisted magi-tech kill-bots, Nightmare Court (who are literally puppy-kicking evil types), and Krait (who’s usual m.o. when dealing with anything not krait is to kill or enslave it). I’d think it would be rather difficult to get them to NOT go on a murderific rampage through LA when you tell them to attack it.

I know that most of the evidence is pointing to Mordremoth/Elder dragons, but I still really hope it’s Mursaat.

I have a question, why the hell does it matter either way? Would Jory or Kas being male change the story in any way?

Kalavier.1097:

Fafnir.5124:

Riot Inducer.8964:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Windwalker.2047:

Well i sure hope someone died in the attack,for now it seems everyone and their grandmother survived-its kinda silly.

Where did you get that idea? All the main characters survived… but of course they all knew the attack was coming so that makes sense.

Otherwise we only saved ~1500 people lore wise. Since the city has a population of ~50,000 I’d say that quite a few people died…

Let’s not forget the enemy casualties… I’m pretty sure i’ve killed more aetherblades then come countries have people.

I’m just wondering how Lion’s Arch even had a population of 1500 before let alone 50k, there couldn’t have been more than 2 dozen residential buildings in the whole city.

Consider what percent of population is military force. How many lion guard do you see and speculate on how many citizens it takes to support that kind of military. and from that you can get a rough size of LA population.

Also consider we don’t see inside of many of the buildings, and there is always a form of gameplay limits. IE, it doesn’t really take less then ten minutes to go from vigil keep to LA. Also travelers. who knows how many people in the city each day are there on business from another city through the gate, arriving/leaving by Boat, or simply land travel hiking into town.

Yeah there’s gameplay limitations but look at Divinity’s Reach, that is a city, buildings everywhere. Within the Lion’s Arch zone most people past the Eastern Ward waypoint consider themselves “outside Lion’s Arch” By all rights the city of Lion’s Arch proper takes up maybe 1/3 of the actual zone, It’s not much larger than the Ascalon Settlement all told.

I guess I’ve just always been disappointed with the in game Lion’s Arch after reading about it in the books and being teased with how impressive a city Divinity’s Reach is. Hopefully when they rebuild it it’s an actual city.

Vespertilionidae.5018:

I consider this a wasted opportunity to add a little bit of personal rp to the event. Each character has a personality choice. A small rotation of text statements that pop up during encouragement interactions would have been a lot of fun and easy to add in because they wouldn’t have to be voice acted.

I like this idea. At least when I’m in voice chat with my friends while rescuing citizens I’m already subbing in more character appropriate lines. Although I’m not sure my necromancer is much more encouraging than the weird grunting, “I am death and I am here to save you!” “No, no, don’t fear the reaper!”

Each info box has the name/logo of the living world update it was part of in the top left corner.

At any rate anyone find the last “hidden” thing? scouring LA plus the “hidden” coordinates from MMORPG unlocked all but one thing int he library. curious what I missed

I’m sorry but unless you’re on a RP server and do lots of random RP with those you encounter I really don’t understand why you’re so upset over the Overflows.

Idk, while I would love to gut her myself part of me really does hope she gets completely shredded by whatever has been messing with her head when she finally encounters it in the flesh.

A little bit off topic but technically speaking a golem is any object or device that has been enchanted to be animate and follow orders/carry out specific functions, the G.O.L.E.M. acronym and asuran golems are merely the asuran technomagic take on such devices.

The charr Flame Legion utilizes effigies which are assault golems for all intents and purposes. In GW1 the Forgotten and Mursaat both utilized enchanted armor of varying types as warriors. I think necromancer minions and elementalist summons would even fall under the broader definition of a golem.

So while other races might not use asuran golems almost every race utilizes some form of golem.