Guild Wars 2

Knives Chau.4863:

The only thing I could not try so far is deleting that nefarious local.dat, as I don’t appear to have such a file in my Documents/GuildWars2 folder.

I believe you said you’re on Win 8.1? To get to the appropriate folder:

1) Move mouse to upper right corner of screen.
2) Click Search.
3) Type “\%appdata\%” without the quotes and no back slashes (it’s percentagesignAPPDATApercentagesign as one word but this forum formatting won’t let me type it properly).
4) Click on C:\Users\YourName\AppData\Roaming
5) In the pop-up window, open Guild Wars 2 folder
6) Delete Local.dat
7) Restart GW2 game client and it’ll download a fresh ~3MB Local.dat

Apologies if my instructions sound overly simplistic, I just got Windows 8 and have been struggling with it for a few days so I thought if anyone else reads this, they’ll need the step-by-step.

I have an Nvidia card too and it sometimes still blacks out momentarily, but so far has always recovered. Mine is a brand new computer so there shouldn’t be any problems with overheating; the interior’s clean and Speccy says my temps don’t go above ~70C. Not sure if it’s going to get worse.

Specs:
GPU: Nvidia GTX 750 Ti SC 2GB
Drivers: v. 337.88
CPU: i7-4770
RAM: 8GB
Win 8.1 64-bit
Mobo: no idea, computer is an Alienware x51 r2.

Anyway, hope deleting Local.dat helps somebody.

Took me a few attempts to log in too. I have internet connectivity as well. Came here to see if anyone else was having issues.

I’ve used Privateer as a placeholder rune and for fun in open-world. I like the parrot and unpredictable aggro; adds spice to mapping and world bosses. One of my favorite things about the bird is how it does a drunken loop in the air before attacking something way across the map.

I used to use these runes more when they had magic find stats on them for farming dredge in Frostgorge, simply because it was fun to aggro as many things as I could in the area and kill them all. Good times.

Rune of the Privateer is cheap partly because it’s not ideal for dungeons as others have said (can interfere with pulling or kill something you don’t want killed) but also because people level tailoring by crafting it.

I just want someone to clarify if dyes we don’t own can be previewed with armors that we also don’t own. I tried watching the video and reading the press releases and I’m a little overwhelmed. Anyone, help?

Anybody who’s already decided rangers suck unconditionally isn’t going to change their minds on anyone else’s say-so. Kind of funny that rangers are often seen on recent speedrun/speed record teams though.

As to why the ranger hate, Danikat’s post on the first page is right on. +1

That’s how guesting works.

You can access the end instance through a purple portal located near Lionguard Turma by Diverse Ledges WP, by the way. According to Dulfy, your character needs a soulbound spinal blades backpiece (fine/masterwork should work). I was also told that you can access it if you already made it to the Prime Hologram fight once, so if you have, it’s worth a try.

What you can do if your attempt to kill the holos simultaneously doesn’t work out is keep track of which holo was killed first, and rally the zerg to wipe out the minis from that holo quickly before the others spawn. Then focus the zerg on the next color holo that died, wipe out those minis, then the last.

Updated to note changes to Knights.

Also added note that getting all three color buffs (= white) in Scarlet’s Phase One fight with Prime Hologram helps you do insane amounts of damage compared to only having one or two buffs.

I was kind of hoping some other people would chime in to add their observations, actually. I added some other details to the part before the holo split.

I’d say if you aren’t getting max number of people on the platform, try to get into the portal as soon as you can. Sometimes though, you get a group of people who just can’t do it. :/

Kasmeer clearly gets an invisible Enrage buff when Marjory’s hurt since she stops hiccuping.

I thought the hiccups were a clever way to show Kas’s state of mind too, especially when it can be so hard to convey otherwise with expressionless character models and potentially iffy voice acting. IMHO Janell Cox (Kasmeer’s voice actress) did a decent job here.

I’ll take a stab at it.

Knights.
RBG is the order we used, but I see there’s a guide to the Six Minutes achievement here. (Kudos to GLaDOS) Update: ArenaNet wants us to split up into three groups.

More details! (via Elrey)

Each Knight is essentially the same. As far as I’m aware, the blue knight is special because menders spawn that heal it. Details here. (via Warlord)

When you see the massive ground covering AoE, wait until it disappears and dodge to evade the subsequent pull. Also remember to buff your allies (the usual: Might, Fury, banners, shouts, spirits on the edge of the field, etc.), rez them, and get the color buff corresponding to the knight you’re fighting so you do damage.

When done, get color buffs and you’ll see it turn into a white buff. Run into portal.

Scarlet: Phase One: Prime Hologram.
Laser Attacks – Large Area of Effect
Run around, get color buffs to do damage to Prime Hologram. Scarlet appears at 75%HP and is only there to harass you and throw up reflective bubbles.

The more color buffs you have, the more damage you do, but the buffs wear off fast. If you have the full white buff, attack and let others rez. You’ll be doing HUGE amounts of damage compared to when you only have one or two buffs.

When Prime Hologram starts splitting up the color buffs, you can dodge/shadowstep/evade through her to get them. Stay in the back half of her model area as you do this; her laser seems to start midway inside her hitbox. Melee if you can, dodging her PbAoE (Prime Blast) and Prime Light Beams.

If you are targeted by a bomb, dodge out of it. You may have to count to two and then dodge. Buff & rez allies where possible. Dodge ground lasers.

Scarlet: Phase Two: Red, Green & Blue Holograms.

There are two strategies.

1) Kill all three holograms at the same time, like the way similar guild challenges are structured. If you succeed, it’s much faster since you won’t have to kill the subsequent mini holograms. Video by Kyban. If you fail killing the holograms at the same time, however, you can end up awash in mini holograms scattering all over the field.

2) Kill them one at a time. This feels easier to coordinate, but you lose time. If you do one at a time:

Focus one hologram at a time. The order doesn’t matter, but for simplicity’s sake, we used RGB. The hologram will eventually split into six miniature ones. It’s best to get the appropriate color buff and kill the minis before defeating the next hologram or your zerg can be confused and overwhelmed.

Red, a.k.a. Static Hologram
Fiery Area of Effect – Stomps
Get red buff. Refresh buff when it wears off. Dodge fire blasts, use condition removal. Kill minis before moving to the next.

Green, a.k.a. Synergetic Hologram
Reflective Shield – Summons – Player-Based Area of Effect
Get green buff. Refresh buff when it wears off. Watch out for exploding toxic plants and your projectiles being reflected back at you. Kill minis before moving to the next.

Blue, a.k.a. Dynamic Hologram
Condition-Weakened Shield – Large Cone Attack
Get blue buff. Refresh buff when it wears off. Use conditions(!), DPS, dodge AoE. Kill minis.

If killing holograms one at a time, then the key to progressing is killing the six minis from each hologram before defeating the next hologram.

If your zerg attempt to kill all the color holograms simultaneously but doesn’t manage, keep track of which hologram was killed first and focus the zerg on the micro-holograms of that color that spawn. Then move to the next color hologram that was killed and do the same, and then the last.

Scarlet: Phase Three: Ultraviolet Hologram.

Simply kill the adds as quickly as you can.

He forgot to equip condition removal skills and he’s not traited for it? Happens to the best of us, then we get locked in combat…

I’m not in CoF2 a huge amount and only recently found out soloing this run on warrior is a thing. The few times I tried, though, I thought I had to run straight across the fires and I had rubber banding + immobilize + die in a fire issues—same as Miaire, I imagine. So I’m glad they asked. I’m going to give the suggestions in this thread a try.

Enaretos.8079:

Might do a teaching run by the end of the week. Would some people be up ?

I could do Saturday from 6 p.m. UTC, but no pressure, not sure when you had in mind.

DigitalKirin.9714:

The most important thing is to learn the path. Run along the edges so you don’t touch the fire.

I had the same question as Miaire, and tried searching for a video but couldn’t find much. Is the path basically the same as the one this thief takes?

Yes, please! I want to jump as a quaggan too! /upvote

Enaretos.8079:

To celebrate this sticky, here is the video of the teaching run on YT : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYQ6KWxJnqI

Wow. This is fantastic. I was sad that I couldn’t make it to this teaching run when it was announced. I learned so much from watching the video, it was like being there! Looking forward to the next one.

Jure, this person has a list of near-meta, PUG-friendlier builds (Nov. 2013).

In regard to their guardian hammer build link (Brazil’s, from June 2013), obal has more current builds, including Balanced/PUG, Balanced/DPS, and Max DPS options, here.

Just a starting point.

I’m in the EU region and I have a Lv80 ranger and warrior in full exotics/ascended. I’m usually on after 6 p.m. UTC for at least a few hours most days. I’ve flopped through all the paths and up to Fractals 21, but I’d like to learn to run them more effectively. Could I also have an invite as a student, please?

Lightning—

What I would not give for a main-hand DPS weapon option that lets me avoid pushing mobs out of a stack and allows me to dodge cleanly.

Durzlla, thanks for checking, I was ready to file a bug report but I figure if something’s broken (particularly against a boss), it might really be intended behavior.

TurtleDragon, that’s a small consolation.

I’ll pass your response along to my friend, she was a bit upset at not-blocking as she felt she was stuck with a bad weapon choice. Thanks.

. . . ranger greatsword #4 skill, Counterattack?

I haven’t played my ranger much the past few weeks, but yesterday I was in level 1 or 2 Fractals with a good friend who was on her ranger, and we both got pummeled during Mai Trin’s cannon barrage while using GS #4. The fact that it didn’t block cannon barrage—for both of us—does anyone know if it’s always been this way or it’s a recent bug?

cranos.5913:

TBH I don’t get why ppl rage about this.

There are lots of answers to this. But, uh, yeah.

cranos.5913:

As for Alphard, we tried stacking at first but our mesmer wasn’t too experienced with keeping reflects up 100% of the time and maybe we did something wrong but wall wasn’t working at all, so we ended up pulling her to the left and strafing. That way it’s really easy to see the pull and dodge it.

Cool, I never actually did that before, always kited her around boxes. Now we just make our mes Reflect All The Things that the guardians can’t. Anyway, glad to hear your run went well!

You are correct about Alphard. Don’t crush her in the corner; give her some breathing room. Reflects may be a bit buggy when they intersect with objects. Mesmer’s phantasmal warden, for instance, might not block her projectiles if the spherical reflect is partly in the wall. Temporal curtain should be dropped on top of her; guardian’s Wall of Reflection might be the same.

You can hide behind the barrels when she moves back to the center and fires her lightning balls.

That said, I think she was quietly fixed in yesterday’s mini-patch. (I hope . . . I really do.) I happened to get a group together since one guildie wanted to see the “new” Alphard. Her red AoE reticle showed up a second before the bomb attack during this run and we had enough time to dodge. Prior to yesterday’s mini patch, the red reticle showed up after, or instantly detonated 2-3 times.

The Divine Piazza WP shows up after you beat the abomination.

It doesn’t take long to skip the golem part as long as everyone can run the spider room. Jump up some boulders on the left near the final turn in order to hop through a tunnel and bypass the electrocution station, whatever it’s called.

Edit, edit, edit. Anyway, I’d be interested to hear what you find on your run, if you can update here.

I bought the Braham armor skin set for the leg piece and have been tempted by others (Aetherblade heavy, and the FlameKissed light armor that was recently removed) but I don’t feel the current non-permanent system provides value for the money. Also, the five Braham pieces I haven’t used are sitting in my bank, taking up slots.

Long story short, I refuse to buy any more armor skins for one silly piece that I can only use on one character, and have to destroy the other parts because they’re taking up too much space. When ArenaNet implements something closer to what Kamui describes above is when I’ll start buying again.

Getting the same error code as OP and crashing out to the character select menu seemingly at random. As far as I know, it started yesterday. If it matters, I’m an Oceania player on the EU server Aurora Glade.

Something similar? Related? happened to me just now. My guildmate said she couldn’t see me on the guild roster at all, but I was able to use guild chat. I stood down to see if re-representing would fix it, but couldn’t represent any of the guilds I tried.

Not sure if it’s related to the above, but I was also getting a login server error every few minutes. Unfortunately, it’s late here and I didn’t have the presence of mind to write down the code. Going to sleep now; maybe it’ll be magically fixed in the morning. :P

p.s. I’m on the EU server Aurora Glade.

Yeah, I’ve gotten anywhere from 0-3 dark matter when salvaging Lv80 exotics with BLTC kit. It feels like it evens out to about one dark matter per salvage after a while, but those zeroes are painful.

If you don’t want to see it, set Postprocessing to None.
Options > Graphics > Postprocessing.

I can’t check at the moment, but try turning off post-processing.

Zoralink.9836:

I also would find it ridiculous that the game would be rendered unplayable by something such as that, after a game update.

Yeah, I wasn’t too happy about it either, since only GW2 was freaking out and everything else on my computer was fine. (For what it’s worth, my previous BIOS dated from 2010. The 2013 version came as an executable file from my computer’s manufacturer.)

I’d noticed my game performance degrading for a while now though, but it only came to a head with the Tequatl update. I was getting framerates like 6-8 in LA, 4 at Lyssa, and 18 in Hoelbrak with nobody around prior to a BIOS update. Good luck. :/

Have you tried updating your BIOS driver? I had similar FPS drops; updated my graphics drivers but that did nothing. Upgraded BIOS yesterday, and so far everything seems back to normal . . .

{insert obligatory warning about BIOS update risks here}

henry.1420:

My observasion:
If you don’t disconnect at all during the event, stay on the map for the full 45 minutes and participate in each wave, achievement will correctly credit.

I have stayed fully connected and participating in invasions and not been credited. Last night (Aug 21) I ran Frostgorge twice, once on overflow and once on home server (Aurora Glade) back-to-back, stayed fully connected, and Vorpp’s Portal Invasion Closer did not advance. (I’d run Frostgorge on release day so I wasn’t sure if it had already been credited under Worldwide Invasion Responder and Portal Canceler.)

Today I ran Mount Maelstrom before the patch, was fully connected throughout, and was credited under Vorpp’s Portal Invasion Closer, Worldwide Invasion Responder, and Portal Canceler. I know I ran this map on release day so it must have been one for which I had not been previously credited.

Khisanth.2948:

For Vorrp’s stuff are you using a character that has done the Closing Ceremony instance and the follow ups for the invasions?

Yes. Same character for everything.

Josh Davis.6015:

Another question: For those that aren’t receiving credit, did you disconnect or swap characters during the event?

No. Same character, no swapping, no disconnect—when I disconnect during an invasion and go back, it’s usually to a world that Scarlet isn’t attacking. So it’s really obvious I’m not getting credited there and I’m not counting that.

Only once was I able to reconnect to an active world. I don’t remember which or when that was, only that I was surprised I actually reconnected to an active world. Reread my notes, and I recorded this: Aug. 21, post-patch that day, ran Harathi for the first time. Disconnected and reconnected. No advancement. Prior to Harathi and also post-patch that day, I’d done Dredgehaunt for the first time, stayed connected, and also not been credited.

Ayrilana.1396:

How about how many people who went to the map the first time (after the living story status updated) and then tried to go to another overflow, disconnected, or in any way just left the map that they originally started on?

See above. Also, I’ve never clicked on the popup window to move from overflow to home server, if that’s what you mean. I figure the only reason why a popup window would appear within an invasion timeframe is if it finishes on the home server.

Rhialto.8423:

Here’s the problem: THIS IS A GATE TO THE REST OF THE CONTENT.

Yes. I am also not too happy with having been locked out of Gauntlet achievements because of this. Some friends ran me through Scarlet’s Playhouse today so I have regained access, but I find that I lack interest in fighting the game’s technical difficulties in order to progress the game.

Updating my post above: just did an invasion in Bloodtide. We popped Scarlet with a few minutes to spare, I WP’d over but didn’t manage to tag her. I got 1 watchwork (whatever it is) scrap and nothing else. I was fully connected during this time.

Also, Vorpp’s Portal Invasion Closer did not increment.

—
In regard to Worldwide Invasion Responder and Portal Canceler, I previously did:

Frostgorge
Iron Marches
Bloodtide
Sparkfly
Mt Maelstrom
(and today, Bloodtide again so that doesn’t count)

These two achievements have not incremented past 3/X. Definitely bugged, and I’ve wasted hours on this what with a server patch after an invasion’s started, and not realizing initially that I had to be on the invasion within 10 minutes, and no one telling Scarlet to show up to a Frostgorge invasion announced in the upper right event window.

Okay, while sitting in the Fireheart invasion for a few minutes and writing this report, I got disconnected and have been kicked into a world that Scarlet isn’t invading. So, uh, yeah.

Same as above, I have the Holographic Communicator and have finished First Portal Invasion Responder and Invasion Witness Interviewer.

I am not getting credit under Worldwide Invasion Responder, Portal Canceler and Vorpp’s Portal Invasion Closer. I’ve participated in five invasions so far and they are all stuck at 3/X and not incrementing.

In the third and fourth invasions, I was either in Sparkfly or Bloodtide. I don’t remember much about the third invasion. In the fourth, we managed to get Scarlet to pop. I waypointed over and tagged her before she died, and only got her “world boss” reward (one scrap and two rares).

In the fifth, we also succeeded in getting Scarlet to pop and killing her, but I didn’t waypoint over. I was in Mount Maelstrom. I got the invasion reward (50 scraps + some boxes/bags), no Scarlet reward, and no incrementing on the achievements counters mentioned above.

Another person in my guild mentioned a similar problem with not getting credit on the achievements counters. Clearly, neither of us will be able to progress the story or return to the gauntlet until this is fixed.

Take out the WP fees/repair costs/corpse runs/queues and I’d be more generously inclined towards the Liadri/gauntlet fights. Those are the really alienating elements to me, especially when coupled with one-hit KO mechanics on top of FPS drops, skill lag, lag spikes, and bugs.

Oh, and since I’m making a wishlist, the devs could return gauntlet admission tickets to account bound too. >_>

Frozenpants.5491:

The fight is fun i enjoy the challenge… what i don’t enjoy is :

One shot mechanics in a fight that’s put above the most laggy zone in the game.

Buggy camera which makes it very annoying.

Semi transparent floor that makes the Aoe harder to see.

Bugged Rifts that get the obstruction bug.

Poorly balanced and favors certain professions/builds.

Resource cost+long corpse run to try again.

But yea.. other then all that it’s “fun” i guess.

All of this. The lag is the worst, I’ve hammered ‘F’ before trying to pick up crystals when I’m well within range, and dodged out of shadowfall to a clear spot only to die anyway. I have seen my character appear to move forward and “snap” back a few steps, just enough to die again in another shadowfall, and visions that should be too far away exploding and killing my character again. Last night, I dodged and got “Invulnerable” messages on my screen and still died.

So then I get to WP, repair armor, run back, and wait in a line to do it all over again 5-10 minutes later or whatever. What part of this was fun again? It’s like the gauntlet was designed for an offline console game—and if it was, I could hit a restart key or load a save game and be right back in the fight again. But this? No. It’s as if its entire design is intended to be an aggravating and contrived way to extend the life of the gauntlet.

Happened earlier today before the patch. I think I’d just killed the first rift before seeing a psychotic quaggan in there with me. http://youtu.be/g0rh58jA0Mw

eekzie.5640:

It’s only immobilise.

Ranger elite Entangle immobilizes and applies bleeds. I usually use it more for bleed burst, but that did not work on Windcaller Kieldia. No immobilize, no bleeds either. It was only after I reviewed a recording of my fight that I saw the IMMUNE messages popping up and I assumed she was bugged.

Hickeroar.9734:

That seems….a little nuts. You basically invalidate control-based builds because they do exactly what they were designed to do.

This.

Edit: rather, the dev’s move to disable immobilize invalidates a number of skills, including an elite (that doesn’t see much use anyway), without the kind of notification players expect, such as a note in the subtext below a boss name, or as a set of rules woven into the “plot” and perhaps announced by the Ringmaster—except that players I know don’t expect even that much anymore and assume everything’s bugged.

Also, if the affected bosses stealthed, they could likely get out of Entangle after 1.5 seconds. >_>

@ Sephil, yeah, I tried to keep an eye on my boons bar to see if stability was even showing up after I used it, but I don’t think it was.

@ Rawrpants, that’s possible. I don’t show on the minimap as being directly over the nearest champion event, but who knows. This really has to get fixed; when I left the house earlier today, one of the other arenas was already disabled with a bunch of ooze spawns and no player inside, and no players lined up outside—I hear the next person who enters gets to deal with oozes in addition to their tier enemy.

Anyway, I’ll try the arena over the centaurs when I get home. Assuming that isn’t the one still filled with oozes and no player inside.

Are we supposed to get knocked down right at the start and by invisible tornadoes? I’m playing with ~400ms ping so maybe that’s an issue.

Anyway, I recorded some of the fight here:
http://youtu.be/NZZxBmmgP_w

Also, as you can see in the video, Entangle does not apply bleeding nor trap her, she’s immune. Working as intended?

And in case you’re wondering why I didn’t use stability, I tried Signet of the Beastmaster + Signet of the Wild and Rampage As One, and still kept being knocked down as though stability wasn’t there. I’ll see if I can get a video of that at some point.

Hey, just wanted to clarify—so Mai Trin still resets even with four stealthed and one decoy, which is why you used a five-guardian team?

Celestina.2894:

I love how this thread turned into another zerker vs P/T/V kitten fight.

Sometimes I feel I’m the only one who prefers to balance the two.

I prefer zerker when I can get away with it, and I use knight’s when I need to tank; I’d get a PVT set but I’m short on inventory space and knight’s usually suffices.

AR taught me that tanky/support characters in PvE can still be useful. Two guardians are a thing of beauty there.

I had my brown bear and murellow tank Mai for an Aetherblade Retreat run a couple days ago, to take the heat off the rest of the team. Funny how Mai prefers to beat on bears when they’re out. The brown bear was for conditional removal and murellow for poison field (+ blast finisher = area weakness).

I had zero points in Beastmastery but I was running all signets: stone, wild and renewal. If you’re really on your toes about swapping, those pets last a good long time and let the rest of your team beat on Mai scot-free. They’re also helpful for distracting her if others have to rez.

If I’m in a dungeon team of light-armor-presumably-high-DPS players who continually die, I like to bring out the bears or devourers as distractions to buy them a little breathing room. One of the great things about ranger is having a magical pocket full of pets to customize to the situation.

Sword/horn’s my preferred weapon set, but I was curious about how I’d fare with my secondaries. That said, when I tried sword on some unsuspecting mobs, I indeed got 12 stacks of might on my pet easy. Good god. It seems rather… stupidly powerful?

I never was that interested in running a power-precision build until this last update. Been using a variant of Chopps’s defensive build (30/20/5/15/0) over the past couple days. I have ~46% base crit chance with my gear and I saw highs of 10 might stacks on my pet when unloading Axe #5 vs. a single young karka. Axe auto-attack gave me about 4-5 stacks. Not too horrible. I imagine those numbers can double with two enemies close enough together for Ricochet or Whirling Defense.

Since I’m mainly concerned with PvE, it works for me.

Dungeons? Aetherblade Retreat? It’d be timely.

Taku, have you maybe tried turning off post-processing in Options? (It’s a sucky solution but I leave mine off so I have a better chance of seeing the essentials during combat.)

Lopez.7369:

The red circles need to be a lot thicker.

This.

RedOctoberZ.8049:

i just reach level 80 and use 30/30/5/0/5 with LB/SB and all berserker’s equipment, but i find myself very fragile and my pets also dead a lot.

is there any other choice for ranger in dungeon?

Yes, try a build with more defense. Or keep this build for now and get a set of Soldier’s or Knight’s trinkets. Masterwork greens are fine as a start. You can upgrade, mix/match or switch back to Berserker once you feel comfortable with the dungeon.

Get into the habit of swapping pets at around 40% health, or calling them back if you can’t and they’re losing health too rapidly. Try carrying Signet of Stone and/or Signet of the Wild to help them out too.

RedOctoberZ.8049:

i want to try SB/AXE+X bleeding method, does anyone know its working or not??

It can work with some condition gear. You can see how well bleeds perform in open-world PvE, where something like Southsun reef riders will melt from shortbow’s high refire rate and stacking bleeds.

In a dungeon team, however, the problem with focusing on bleeds is that most (all?) professions can stack them quickly and overwrite yours. So you’ll want to take note of what else SB/AXE+X offers, such as chill, poison, AoE, daze, etc., and think about how to use those too.