Guild Wars 2

Of the dragon minions…

Branded are best. They’re not obnoxiously annoying like risen, they’re not immune to a damage type or spam chill like Destroyers and Icebrood respectively, and they look awesome.

The Branded Army is an awesome event for 2-5 players out in Iron Marches.

Of all mobs…it’s too hard to say.

BowmasterSol.3457:

I’ve always had this belief that dye drops were more common in lowbie areas. Everytime I did something in a lowbie area I would get a lot of dyes. This may be due to the very few items available to be dropped as random loot, so the chances are higher due to a smaller pool or it can just simply be the case of being able to kill things faster and being lucky.

I always felt that too. I just felt it was a legitimate drop rate thing, since it happened no matter which character I was on. Actual low level or an 80 helping a guildee or mapping.

It was noticeable especially when harvesting nodes.

Hermes.7014:

I’ve noticed a change in dye drop rate only after gaining my full set of magic find gear. Right now I have +85% magic find and I could get 5 unidentified dyes yesterday.

Running no magic find on either character, and pulled 6 dye in an hour on Thursday, 6 dye in a couple hours Friday, and 8 dye while capping my ranger yesterday.

Prior to this patch, if I were lucky I would get 1 dye in an entire night of Orr, Frostgorge, or dungeoning.

Jayne.9251:

Women tend to pick MMO characters that closest resembles themselves. Men pick MMO characters that closest resembles their fantasies (if they play female toons).

True for some, false for many others.

It’s just the two-groups kicking in again. Some choose an avatar of themselves, some make a character fitting their role (which could be sexualized, or might not be).

Although I personally prefer playing female characters (I’m female), and all five of the characters I made were female, I would have no problem playing male or genderless characters. I just tend to prefer female character models and the like, provided they’re not overly sexualized.

My main character is for me just a character I like. Her look and form is nowhere close to my RL look and form, and not what my idealized RL form would be either. My other characters also bear no similarities to me. My previous game, I also had no character that was anywhere close to my look (except for a brief 1 month long reincarnation on my mage, and that’s only because that was the best looking style).

Danikat.8537:

Azoetia.2183:

Teep.5376:

D. The only reason I play male characters is cause I hate being hit on by a bunch of dudes who can’t figure out that the gender of someone’s character does not directly translates to their gender in RL.

I’ve never been hit on in an MMO. It seems to be a common thing based on what I’ve read but it’s never even come up in my experience.

I’ve also never been treated with kid’s gloves or given free stuff while playing a female character.

I used to get hit on a lot in UO back in the old days. Removed ~ Dalmarus
…

It’s happened to me three times, once around 2005, once around 2008, once in 2010. The second and third times, I very vocally went off on the culprit (thankfully was never reported). I didn’t play games where lots of adolescents congregated, so I may have just gotten lucky.

I know several women who do play male characters to blend in and avoid comments when they play a shooter type or a game like WoW.

I know some female WoW and PC game players who don’t openly say they’re women as a number of people believe women can’t play with skill, only play because of a “boyfriend”, should only be healers, call them trans, or are only looking for handouts.

I also know many women who avoid voice chat in those types of games (especially competitive PC games) because of both the above abusive comments, and on top of that the vulgar sexual comments (sometimes the same person doing both!).

Before the Halloween patch, I still did them because you had a small chance of getting T6 jewels (Ruby Orb for instance).

Post patch, definitely worth running IF you enjoy the puzzles enough to want to do them daily.

Staff has a large number of combo fields, but few finishers. That is why Evasive Arcana is mentioned so much in DesertRose’s post, it’s practically essential with a staff build in order to combo well with itself.

Staff tends to be more support oriented. You can play it offensively (say a crit heavy build), but the combination of a large number of combo fields, excellent source of group buffs, and “keep away” defensive skills makes it best for group support.

Sceptre/dagger has only one combo field (Ring of Fire), but a large number of blast finishers. It does quite well at stacking might, but can’t on its own perform healing combos or area frost armour.

S/D tends to do a bit more damage, but at a cost of less support and a bit less defence. S/D is also a little more dependent on damage conditions than Staff.

Both are very effective combinations. Also don’t discount Dagger/Dagger, it’s also a viable (and fun) weapon set (more damage oriented, less combo potential, close range, more mobile).

Esturk.2183:

I ran my first dungeon last night. It was pretty awful and I died 8 times. I will of course adapt by changing my gear/traits/skills, but I did not have a lot of fun. Hopefully it’ll get better. I was expecting story mode to be a little easier though.

In most cases, story mode is harder. It should be an introduction to dungeons, but each dungeon except Arah, and maybe Cadecus’ Manor, have at least one explorable path that’s far easier than story.

The most glaring difference in difficulty is Twilight Arbor, but Ascalonian Catacombs is bad too.

The trait he was talking about was Grandmaster XII (Pyromancer’s Puissance). There are other, more situational, might granting traits as well. Fire Adept IV (Spell Slinger) triggers off cantrips.

He probably also used a rune with a chance to grant might on being hit (Pirate, Fire, Strength, Hoelbrak, a few others), and/or lengthen might duration.

Was he using scepter/dagger? If so, there is a nice chain of skills that combo with Ring of Fire. Dragon’s Tooth, Phoenix, Arcane Wave, Earthquake, and if time allows, Churning Earth are all blast finishers. Each one will put three stacks of might on the group.

Anyone else who used a blast finisher in his Ring of Fire would also trigger three stacks of might.

Finally, Sigil of Might might be used in one of his weapons, and that will give a chance of applying might when he scores a critical hit.

The Ebonhawke chain of maps is fairly dead on Henge, but there are still a few people on each map. Most of the time, we can get a pseudo-group together to knock out the harder DE’s.

Anywhere with a dungeon, anywhere with a dragon(*), anywhere with T6 crafting ingredients, and 1-15 areas tend to be fairly packed. The rest do thin out, but not completely to emptiness of real people.

• Though, my Shatterer the other day was a 12 person fight, and that’s after the 5 of us who started it called for backup from guildmates

Daharahj.1325:

Here’s a pic that’ll clear up some doubts, but yeah, most of them are cooks and homekeepers it seems.

WARNING: If you’re a female Charr in the Blood Legion this might be a bit of a spoiler.

http://imgur.com/6HlRX

Awesome.

I personally have never completed any of the monthlies. That’s because I dislike PvP, and had no desire to do the kills (and yes, I did try WvW, gave it a solid two day test during the betas/stress tests, and still did not like it). WvW kills has been in August, September, and October.

Because I don’t want to PvP to do the monthly, I just accept I won’t complete it and move on. Complaining about it really doesn’t help.

It would be nice if the different aspects of a monthly changed more radically each month. There are a huge variety of possible monthly sub-achievements, some good ones have already been said. Give it more variety, and maybe you will get a combination you will like.

Very few would be happy with absolutely everything, but at least at some point, you will get a monthly achievement you will want to complete.

On this particular topic, the biggest issue with getting people interested in dungeons is that story mode is NOT an effective introduction. Explorable is supposed to be the “hard mode”, and although some paths are, several paths are far easier than story mode. Story mode (outside of Arah, and maybe CM) is less forgiving than a lot of the explorable paths.

The last two days, I’ve pulled far more dyes than I have for over a month. I just attributed it to random luck, but there may be something more to it.

There’s a sylvari with a very similar name in Hoelbrak. I got excited when I saw her last night while taking my little guardian around collecting waypoints, but then noticed when I talked to her that the Hoelbrak sylvari is Seirian. Seirian also doesn’t have our Magister’s happy voice.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

I agree, she’s pretty awesome.
But I did NOT like how at one point it felt like she was coming onto my character….
I felt awkward for him and she was being totally inappropriate!

Would be awkward for other races, but seems like something a sylvari would have no real problem doing or accepting. She just has the natural sylvari curiosity, openness, and lack of social “tact”.

Various possibilities:

Magic.
Infrared vision.
Evolved in an area with natural light sources.
Originally surface creatures that went underground, and took some form of light with them, and hid this history.

StygSec.7163:

The Vigil’s instance is probably the easiest to get out of since the door you go through to get into the instance isn’t solid within the instance. If you do venture in and get stuck. Run through the front door and out of the instance. You will either be kicked back into the instance, or kicked out of it.

This happened many times on my Vigil aligned engineer.

That may be a Vigil specific difference.

Last time I went into there, approximately three weeks ago, on my Ele (Priory member), the front door was not able to be walked through. It blocked me from leaving the instance area, and there were no other ways to get out of the instance area.

The 60-70 area would be Fireheart Rise.

There are four ways to get there.

You can get there through Frostgorge Sound (70-80), via Snowden Drifts. There is a portal in a dredge mine in the northeast, which takes you inside a dredge mine in the southwest corner of Frostgorge. Then, work your way to slightly above east-centre in Frostgorge to reach the portal to Fireheart Rise.

You can go through the north-east (heading north) portal in Wayfarer’s Foothills to get to Frostgorge Sound. You will be in the southeast corner of Frostgorge, and can just travel north along the eastern edge of the map to reach the portal to Fireheart Rise.

You can also get there via Iron Marches (50-60). In the northeastern part of Plains of Ashford, there is a gate to Iron Marches. You will enter in the south-central part of the map. Travel to the northwest to reach the portal to the south-eastern part of Fireheart Rise.

Finally, the long route is to take the Asura gate in the south-eastern part of Divinity’s Reach. That portal will take you to Ebonhawke, in the Fields of Ruin (30-40). Head north to Blazeridge Steppes (40-50), which has the Shatterer dragon fight at Lowland Burns waypoint. Head to the northwest of there to reach Iron Marches (50-60), then head northwest again to reach Fireheart Rise.

The dungeon is in the northeast corner of Fireheart Rise.

Kultz.5763:

Can’t you just teleport to the nearest waypoint or use the PVP interface to go to the heart of the mists?

Teleporting out of an instance, even in a town (where it’s normally free), will cost you. The Heart of the Mist’s portal will take you to Lion’s Arch, and it will cost you either coin or time to get back to where you were.

All gems and upgrades require the ITEM to be the upgrade/gem’s minimum level, not the character.

The basic storyline backbrace, and the two Mad King book back pieces, both have no minimum level, and therefore only accept no minimum level upgrades.

There is a glitch where some people who have completed their personal story often times don’t get an “exit” door in many instance areas.

The Vigil, Priory, charr home zone, one of the sylvari sub-instances, and a few others no longer have a way to get out for me after I completed my story, while I could before*. There was another recent post regarding the same issue.

• I did not personally step into the Vigil instance prior to story completion, so I can’t confirm if the door would have appeared before or not. The others I mentioned all had exit doors until I completed my story.

Have you completed your personal story?

The old camera system would put the camera behind your head (blocking the screen). The only good part was that you could rotate the camera to see where you are standing and a bit ahead.

The new camera system puts you into a pseudo-first person view, and it’s harder to tell exactly where you are standing. The “jiggling” is also way worse with this camera system than the original. I can only do Troll’s End by “muscle memory” on my norn (and my female norn is medium height).

Granted, I run S/D rather than D/D, and concentrate on power/condition along with my defensive stats rather than precision…

Glyph of Storms in earth atunement is one of the best ways to mitigate incoming damage from groups. It’s a reasonably long lasting AoE blindness field (that also does a small amount of damage). Arcane Shield is also a useful thing to use when trying to set up a slower casting ability. I personally use Glyph of Storms most, but swap to Arcane Shield when facing dredge and other blind immune mobs.

Earthquake is a good way to slow down damage, and to set up Glyph of Storms. Note it’s also an interrupt, so that can block some high damage abilities if you time it right. Due to the long cooldown, be sure not to waste it.

If you have Auto Targeting off, Ride the Lightning is an excellent way of getting distance. Just be careful of having Auto Targeting on, glitches with getting caught on terrain, and glitches when it fails to track a mob properly (and ends up CC’ing you).

Updraft can be a bit tough to position (it sometimes glitches), but when it works, it’s an excellent interrupt, control ability, and way to get you away from attacks.

Lightning Flash isn’t the best teleportation skill, but it IS a teleport. It can also be cast when you are channelling another skill, or when you’re under some CC effects. That you can use it while channelling makes it useful in group fights to charge up Churning Earth in a safer area, and then teleporting into the group at the last moment. You apply a lot of damage, but don’t get yourself hit much in the process.

You don’t have quite as many blast finishers in D/D as you do with S/D, but you can still stack a reasonable amount of Might. Extra damage that helps you kill faster means less damage taken. If you have room in your utility slots, Arcane Wave is a useful extra blast (that can also be cast while channelling).

Being defensive is fine, but you also have to be sure to be able to kill things fast enough that they don’t overwhelm your defences. That may also be your issue.

Also confirm yes.

For example, I bought T1 cultural for my Ele at level 35, and kept that skin all the way to 80 and beyond (using the large supply of 1-79 stones you get from map completions, and a few lucky Black Lion Chest fine stones).

The reason why only the bottom tier jewels work is because upgrade item levels refer to the level of the item it can go into, not your personal level. A level 40 upgrade item requires a level 40 item to socket into.

Those basic items, and the complete Mad Memories have no minimum level, so the game treats them at level 0 (or 1). Only the lowest tier jewels have that minimum level.

I love the look and design of The Bifrost (and it would fit my norn). I, however, rarely use staff, being primarily a scepter/dagger user. I got the Citadel of Flame staff for dungeon supporting, but that’s just about all I ever use it for.

I do not like the mechanical look of Metrologicus, and Incinerator is nice but not really the stats I’m looking for. I personally don’t want to spend that much effort on something I don’t really like.

I’m perfectly happy with my crafted exotic weapons, with an Ebonhawke skin on the scepter and the Pirate skin on the dagger.

Hoelbrak may contrast with the other cities (especially the overly busy tight quarters nature of Divinities Reach), but it certainly fits the idea of norn.

People look to the end, and how it rolls over “early”. They forget that it also started the same amount of time before THEIR interpretation of 1 Oct. You had the same amount of time you “lost” before when the month started.

Simply don’t procrastinate, and you won’t have to deal with this issue as much.

As said, UTC is an International standard. For an international game, it’s the best choice of time zones to use (and I say this as a US resident in EDT).

Others mentioned how to see server time. It displays rather prominently in the mini-map, and thus you can always tell when dailies, dungeons, and monthlies reset.

That covers most. Trophy items in general are one of the possible “rewards”

The grey “junk” items are just an extra source of money from mob drops. Their only purpose is to sell to NPC’s. You will eventually get many, many junk bones from Risen.

The salvage items are indeed either a source of money to sell to NPC’s, or something you can salvage for crafting materials. This will be your main source (with “white” gear close behind) of leather and cloth materials, which tend to be among the hardest to get.

Many hearts and DE’s have specific item collection parts, and those items are also considered trophies. All but a few are soulbound (and I assume the ones that are not are just bugs). All but a few have no NPC value, and thus cannot be sold. If you are not doing that heart or event any more, you will have to simply delete the item.

I’m generally good at jumping (and other) puzzles. I’ve done all the pre-update puzzles in PvE, most of them repeatedly while helping others through them. My last game (DDO) had several puzzle oriented dungeons, along with a raid (<3 Twilight Forge), that I loved running.

I just no longer handle the timed pressure that the Clock Tower uses. It’s a great puzzle, I just personally can’t do well at it.

That’s not a problem with the puzzle, just with me.

I would like to see it come back next year, with only minor changes. Block all the griefing methods used. And, make the other player models either the same* or “ghostly” so that you can still see where exactly to land.

• But that can mess up your own jumping, if you’re used to how a charr jumps and get turned into human-like form.

Sylvari’s natural curiosity and openness leads them to be willing to try any profession. Ranger may be the most “fitting”, but any are appropriate and accepted. This is unlike player charr, with their aversion to magic, or possibly the martial professions for asura (through a tactical warrior would fit reasonably well).

The “plant vs. fire” nonsense has to stop. Dry wood and leaves burn readily, but wet/live wood does not burn easily at all. Flesh burns easier than live wood, and you do not see humans fear using fire.

The flamethrowers, fire spells, and the like are heavily controlled uses that are little threat to their wielders, when used properly.

Getting zapped with “Ettin Sized” in Chaos Crystal Caverns is also fun.

I’d also have to go with one of the two quaggan. They’re also the only two I gave candy to.

Yumiko Ishida.3769:

Is this the sound that makes a loud metal bang, like, in a large sewer drain/subway tunnel or something? I think an old pre-GW 2 release blog entry about their sound testing had this loud “crack” noise as a normal sound effect. Its probably bugging out and being misplaced. I hear the loud metallic bang occasionally on long loads.

No. The “bang” or “pop” is a different issue (which also still occurs).

This is specifically to do with pets. At certain times, the ambient sounds of a pet’s footsteps or swimming motion will ignore the volume settings completely and play at full volume. For most headsets, that is incredibly loud.

It most commonly occurs with Ranger pets (bears, spiders, and devourers especially), Necromancer minions (bone is the most common), and Elementalist summons (fire elemental I hear the glitch most).

In very large events, like a Claw of Jormag fight, or one of the champion events in the Mad Labyrinth, the bug can trigger very easily.

I notice it mostly in multi-layered areas. It seems the Z axis isn’t always accounted for when calculating distance.

You’re correct. Upgrades of a particular level require the item you’re placing it into to be that level or higher.

Since this particular back item has no ML, the game treats it as 0 (or 1) and only allows the lowest tier of upgrades.

You will eventually get an equivalent back item (3 different stat combinations available, one that is identical to the event one) that is ML:80 by doing the personal story mission that you can place any valid upgrade into.

This was actually the “solution” for the Kessex Hills event chain that was heavily botted (the bridge). Now, you get 4-5 champions coming in, along with unmanned Trebuchets dropping siege on your heads.

Confirm what Soleiya Starbow said. Experienced the exact same thing today.

The Veteran’s heath bar went to zero, the health meter in the event box was at 50%.

All the Black Citadel needs is a non-flattened map. Even Divinities Reach and Hoelbrak have multi-layer maps.

As for reasons people don’t play charr…

Many GW1 players in my guild hate the charr, and can’t bear to play one. I’m sure this is a case for others as well.

The aforementioned armour clipping.

The larger size that can make it more difficult to do jumping puzzles and some vistas, or see as well in tight quarters.

Charr, female especially, aren’t overly sexualized, which is a drawback to some people.

Some may simply not like felines.

[Edited by Moderator]

I play a female charr (Ranger). I’ve heard a female charr Elementalist at a Claw of Jormag event (the charr female voice is very distinctive). A guildmate has one female charr (Warrior) to go along with his entire warband of male charr. I’ve only rarely seen any others.

I didn’t make my charr’s face look overly cute, but not monstrous either. Looks as close to an actual predatory cat as I could make (with horns).

I also play a “butch” looking female norn (Ele), and a human (Guardian) with as mature a face as possible (and the heavy armour helps smooth out the “barbie doll” look).

Female IRL.

As I understand it, the peace has only existed for a few years. Today’s cubs are the first generation raised in a time of (relative) peace between human and charr. Children are always a bit more accepting, to start, until societal pressures (nurture) affect them.

Lion’s Arch charr cubs are also outside the mainstream society, so that can also affect their behaviour versus the ones in the Black Citadel.

Still, I would assume charr still have a bit of hunter instinct, and a natural tendency toward aggression.

The biggest problem with the Metrica Fire Ele is that it’s very easy to get griefed, whether accidentally or on purpose.

Tequatl and The Shatterer are practically no-fail. They’re just loot punching bags, sadly, with the amount of people that flock to them

Claw of Jormag is a bit tougher, but still falls to a “zerg”. It’s just annoying when half the people afk-range on the “safe” perch, only to come back and whine because he’s not dead yet, because only 3-5 people are trying to manage all the ice pillars.

I feel it’s cute, and appropriate.

I also feel it’s just slightly too loud. Reducing the volume about 5 decibels would be perfect.

Blazeridge has some traffic on Henge, but only because of the Shatterer. Fireheart Rise gets some traffic due to the Citadel of Flame dungeon. The Plains of Ashford always has at least a bit of traffic, but granted a bit less than Caledon or Queensdale.

The other areas, unfortunately, the OP is right. I still prefer running those areas, and with the small population things get a bit more challenging and satisfying. The Branded Army event in Iron Marches is quite fun with 3 or 4 people.

Any sort of puzzle, dexterity challenge, or precise task tends to have very polarized opinions about them.

It was like that in my previous game DDO (people either LOVED or HATED the puzzle oriented quests, with very few in between). Jumping puzzles just happen to be that here.

The good thing is that most are optional. Only three are required to get 100% map completion (for the Legendary parts), and one additional one to get the “Been There, Done That” title.

Those are:
Tribulation Rift Scaffolding – to reach a vista.
Wall Breach Blitz – to reach a skill point and a vista.
Vizier’s Tower – to reach a skill point.

Morgan’s Spiral – to reach the Dreamdark Enclave map discovery point. That is the entrance to the Dark Reverie puzzle, but all you have to do is step into that second one, not complete it.

Are you an Elementalist?

If so, the 10/22 patch revised your down skills. Full details are in the release notes.

It was primarily a PvP change, as you now have a way to immediately “interrupt” a finisher by using Mist Form.

For PvE, you will do a bit more damage in your downed state with skill 1 (due to the Vulnerability), and you have immediate use of Mist Form rather than having to wait 10 seconds to use it. That can help you get out of a champion/dungeon boss’es AoE’s faster so that you can attempt to get up, whereas before it was likely you would get defeated before Mist Form became active.

You cannot re-order the downed skills.

What happened to Sieran made me cry.

The first time any game has done so since the endings of the SNES RPG’s Terranigma and Lufia II.

I did experience a bit of Tybalt’s fun when I helped a few guildmates with their quests. I definitely look forward to him soon on my Ranger.

Yet, do Warrior leap skills let them make those jumps?

My main is a norn, my most used alt is charr.

The change in the camera about a month ago* actually made it worse for me. With the old camera, I could at least turn the camera and see where my character was standing. Now, all I see is that first person view where it’s difficult to tell exactly where I am.

Before, by using camera adjustments, I would almost never miss a jump in Troll’s End. Now, it usually takes me two or three tries to succeed because of being unable to tell exactly where I’m standing.

• Before, you would see the back of your characters head, and have a completely blocked screen, now you are switched to a pseudo-first person view.

Tornado (becomes Whirlpool underwater) is now usable in both PvP and PvE.

It was originally only available in PvP, but that issue has since been fixed.

If that does not work for you, then there is a bug specific to the asura race, and you will need to use /bug to report it. I can use Whirlpool on my norn Ele, and a guildmate can use it on his human Ele.

Aesthetically:
I love norn and I love the look of a snowy mountainous area (but I never want to live in one again). I thus definitely prefer Wayfarer’s Foothills to anywhere else. Second would be Caledon Forest, then Metrica Province (would be higher without those obnoxious asura “infesting” the place).

Queensdale is fine, but seems a bit more plain, and far too close in look and feel to the other “human” areas. Plains of Ashford is too industrialized and polluted for my tastes.

Gameplay:
Wayfarer’s Foothills has a huge number of events, not as many chains but still it’s hard to go for very long without running into an event. The other starting areas feel a bit more “thin”.

The 15-25 zones are in a slightly different order. Snowden Drifts, Brisban Wildlands, Diessa Plateau, then Kessex Hills. Kessex and the rest of the Kryta lands all end up being mostly rehashes of Queensdale, without as much variation in environments, monsters, or events as the other areas.

For the mid levels, I prefer the far east Ascalon zones. Fields of Ruin, Blazeridge Steppes, Iron Marches. While they all have the constant threat and danger of the Dragonbrand, there is enough variety in the surrounding lands to keep them interesting.

Sorry, yes. Forgot that zone completions give you a chance of either three Minor Transmutation Stones or a Key, and it seems to be about 75%/25% stones/keys now.

Jumping puzzles do not grant them.