Guild Wars 2

Based on your comment SHM, I am thinking you really haven’t tried all options available to the Guardian and this is a mistake! My suggestion would be to buy some cheap white gear from your nearest weapon vendor and headout in the field and just try them out. But don’t forget that your utility skills should change with your weapon. This is something people forget, they change their weapon but not their utility skills and what utilities complement the GS will not complement the, for example, the hammer.

To take the hammer example, hammer doesn’t have a teleport skill. No leap of faith, no flashing blade etc. So I usually pair the hammer with meditation skills that allow me to port to mobs.

So yes, we can say try this and this but we’ll only be giving you weapon recommendation. Not our full build, including utilities and traits. Not to mention adaptation we make to our build under special circumstances. So best thing to do is experiment yourself and I am sure you’ll find a weapon combination that you like.

I must be missing something, we got nerfed? goes and reads patch notes Oh, right, the GS symbol got moved. Don’t use GS, don’t run a symbol build. To quite Trehearne: “moving on”.

Edit: I just remembered that I do in fact use a GS in sPvP. Recently switched to it from a hammer. Still not raging though because I still don’t run a symbol build and switched to the GS from a hammer because of whirling. So the change is actually better for me.

Server: Boris Pass
Zone: Bloodtide Coast
SP bugged: Two-Eye Ignatl the Pirate – the quest is active but no Two-Eye Ignatl to fight.

I just need this skill point to finish that map. I hate it when I have a bug preventing me from getting map completion. I hope it get’s fixed soon.

Nox Aeterna.2965:

rickshaw.5279:

Learn to LOS like a boss.

lol

I don’t go anywhere alone. Guards are designed to run with a pack. If you’re trying to run lone wolf you rolled the wrong class.

I care for myself , i play alone mostly.

Do i support other … sometimes, like in dungeons , only time i actually need a party aside from farming. Im always impressed people make builds that care for others not in your party.

Fact is guard can hold his own, if you cant, you are the one who need to take a better look at the class you are playing.

I mostly solo too but I do put on “help others” skills as I am running to events like the dragon and actively try to shield and protect others. The way I see it, if the random stranger next to me survives that much longer because I shouted “hold the line” or took conditions off of them with “save yourself” – well, the event gets done sooner! It doesn’t take long and can make a difference.

Guardians can hold their own and do not have to run with a pack but I think a good guardian should adapt, especially since it can be done quickly, when they find themselves in a pack.

But then again, I was a healer in a the old trinity. So maybe its just the healer in me ^.^

I think that if we were allowed to have new elites, I would keep renewed focus but maybe buff it a bit. Something like turn conditions into boons or just remove conditions. I would get rid of the tomes and have a super spirit weapon – something like the Orrean Juggernauts that is a sword and shield combo and maybe a elite shout and/or a signet. I don’t know. I don’t think we would be overpowered if we were given better elites.

I am not unhappy but I could be happier. Outside of dungeons and PvP, and sometimes even inside dungeons, I am running around with the human racial elites as opposed to the Guardian elites. I don’t generally find that with, for example, my engineer. With her I am mostly using engineer elites and mostly to mix things-up I’ll use the Asura elite.

The Guardian elite I use the most is Renewed Focus. It’s pretty great. The books are good but you do have to get your timing right. Especially with the healing one.

Iason Evan.3806:

@OP: Fortunately for you EVERY other MMO on the market has a trinity system. Enjoy the myriad other games out there for you with that system. You have a TON to choose from.

Thank you! This is pretty much what it comes down to. If you miss the holy trinity, well every other MMO on the market has the holy trinity. But in those MMOs your experience is limited by the holy trinity too. No healer or tank → can’t do dungeon.

So you basically you have two choices, either forget everything you have ever learnt. Go back to basics, read tips and tricks from people who have mastered GW 2 dungeon, watch youtube video guides etc, etc and try again. Otherwise, go play an MMO that does has the trinity.

This is how I am interpreting the majority of this whining, “I used to be DPS in the old trinity system, I used to be able to just stand there spamming my attacks while the tank and healer did all the actual hard work and I could rage about bad tanks and heal fails when things go wrong!”

Like seriously, the majority of the whiners never comes across as people who ever played a healer or a tank. They were DPS and only thing they had to worry about was watching big numbers pop on the screen. Preciously why the majority of players are running around in +power and +precision specs and wondering why they hell they aren’t surviving long enough to do something.

You want to have fun in dungeons and PvE in-general – go for +toughness, +vitality and see what that simple change does for you. The other thing to do is maybe, just maybe, switch your build around given your group and the dungeon you are going into. You can change your build on the fly, so even if it is your first time in a dungeon, you can change things between encounters until you find something that works.

I mean, I don’t use the same build inside dungeons that I use when I am PvEing solo. On my guardian I have a lot of shouts in dungeons that give boons to my allies or spirit weapons that remove conditions and defend not just me but also my teammates. Hell I even put on the shield of absorption trait that procs when I am trying to res. However, if my group is heavy with rangers with search and rescue and the healing spring, I don’t have to worry so much about protecting and giving buffs to my allies and I can be more damage.

The game is only as good as how you play it. If you make yourself into a glass cannon, do not try to synergies and adapt, it’s not the game’s fault for you having a sucky time.

Sincerely,

A Former Healer

PS. It is possible to melee all dungeon bosses and mobs but it is harder to melee a lot of bosses, even some mobs, because you have to watch carefully for telegraphs and dodge. So if you are tired/not feeling very alert or just suck at dodging (I am not the best) ranged is the safest option. But do not for a minute thing that every melee out there has to switch to ranged. Some players are good enough to melee 100%. But the key word there is “players” -> in GW you bring the player not the class.

Fred Fargone.3127:

How do you recognize a bot? I mean, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen a few but I’m not 100% certain. Just idling in some area doesn’t make ya a bot.

Oh you can’t miss them. The most blatant one are like 3+ character all of whom who look the same, is the same class (or hunter + 2 warriors) and running together and just attacking everything in their path. Not really reacting to the environment or behaving in a way a human player would. Also remember that even the most hardcore “game mechanic” enthusiast, as opposed to say something who takes their RPG seriously, has some attachment to their avatar. They are very unlikely to name them “asfasfasf” <— actual name of a bot I reported.

The most disturbing bot I encountered was in Forstgorge Sound. The bot, an ele I think, was just standing on a cliff and attacking all the mobs near it as soon as they spawned. There were also half a dozen dead avatar at its feet. The whole thing had a weird, creepy vibe to it. I ended-up avoiding that cliff top for the rest of my time in Frostgorge Sound just because I didn’t want to risk running into that bot and its corpse pile again.

Cirth.1543:

snip Key words—————> “SAVE YOU MONEY IN THE LONG RUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”<————-

I am level 80 too! And you calculation is seriously flawed because you are not taking into account the opportunity cost of travel time. Mount travel is NOT free. It costs you in time.

WP = instant travel, mount = takes time. Even at 100% speed boost they will take time to make that journey. WP costs increase based on distance and the further the distance you have to mount the more time it will take. You only need to spend the fraction of the time you would take journeying from point to point be on a mount taking part in an event or even randomly killing drakes outside of Lion’s Arch to get the money you need to make-up the WP cost.

Unless you are really unlucky with drops. There is just no way the opportunity cost of you spending X amount of time travelling is going to be cheaper then just farming or just doing an event and getting WP costs + more!

In addition, this does not take into account that fact that WP costs drop if you use the portals to go to the nearest major city to whatever dungeon/zone you want and travelling from just outside the city. Heck the WP costs drop even if you just zone out of a city into the “wilderness” and returning to Lion’s Arch is always free. You just have to go through the Eternal Battleground.

Plus now only one person has to enter a dungeon and the rest of the groups get a dialogue that teleports them directly into the dungeon and later returns them to wherever they were. If with all these things you still think that your time is worth less then 2s… well I just don’t know what to say to you.

I support mounts but only if they cost $100 real dollar equivalent of gems! That way it can really be the unnecessary, luxury status symbols that they are. Irritating individuals who can’t be bothered walking 5 minutes from the known waypoint to the unknown waypoint or can’t be bothered paying minimal fee of WP can get their bloody mounts and the rest of us can shake our heads and marvel at how some people have way, way, way too much money.

Mojo.2691:

I’m not a fan of dungeon finder. I feel it trivializes the content to some extent and causes mixed emotions from many players. With so much innovation, it would almost feel as if GW2 sold out if they created a LFG queue.

With that said, I would like to see a lobby area in or around Lion’s Arch that would allow people to gather and look for groups. This area would have a gate to each of the dungeons and could be cross-server.

Making groups needs to be easier but I would prefer we still LFG and created groups ourselves.

Very good point and very good idea with the lobby! But even without random match-up if we just had are more “sophisticated” status setting option, that too would be useful. I mean, all I can do now is change my status to “looking for group” but what am I looking for group for? If I could just say “looking for Citadel of Flames: Story” AND have my status visible to every body currently online when they open social dialogue, that alone would go a long way I think. Would also avoid getting caught in the SPAM filter and wouldn’t be intrusive either.

So cross-server lobby would be very nice! But in the short run, anything is better then sitting around spamming in Lion’s Arch IMO.

I am a little surprised that despite years of innovation in this field in other MMOs we have an LFG system in GW 2 that’s actually inferior to GW 1. This lack of a good LFG system will start to have an impact as the population “matures”. Already its become and issue to find groups to do story mode dungeons.

However, across all the servers, there would be more people with common needs for dungeons. So I think it would be great if we could have a cross server “dungeon LFG” that allowed parties to be formed cross server. I mean, with no tank and healer, GW 2 is one game were random match-up actually work!

DragonFly.5849:

In pvp : no good range weapon , in dungeons : you get only idiotic team that don`t know that you are there to protect and heal them , and don`t come into your bubbles , don`t stay behind your walls , when you cast tomb 30 skill point one and you say : CLOSER for full heal , they don`t understand why … so whats the point ? Are they gonna buff him , or what ?

No you are not! You are there to do what needs to be done! There is no point in being healing and protect if you party make-up doesn’t require it. Respec as needed! By respec I don’t mean retrait. I am running 10/0/30/20/10 but I don’t have the same trait bonuses selected. It depends what I need to do. If it looks like the group needs healing and protection from me, I change my trait bonuses to that. If it looks like they need DPS and/or control, I do that. You can only have a fixed role if you have a fixed group. But if your group make-up is fluid, you have to be fluid.

Aphix.9846:

‘’There are other rewards in the dungeons, drops from enemies, chests and gold from enemies/chest/final reward.’’

No there is no other rewards in dungeon. Please play the game before commenting.
You can’t possibly call 1 silver and 3 blues a reward. Please don’t.

Only 2 reasons for dungeons – the skins ( easy to get, takes a week or 2 to get everything you want) and legendary weapon – 500 tokens needed, also about a week for that. That’s IF you want a legendary weapon. There’s your endgame. Two weeks. Have fun.

Last night I ran TA explorable and CM explorable back to back and got 60 tokens for each. I don’t have any particular use for the tokens as there isn’t anything I am going for specifically. If I get enough tokens, I’ll get something but I have no plans to actively farm either of these dungeons (or any other). But that’s hardly all I got out of these dungeons.

I got golds, greens and yes blues from chests and mob drops. Not to mention crafting materials. I don’t generally keep a lot of money on my characters so in each case I went in with no more then 5s and came-out with a lot more cash and that’s BEFORE I sold my loot haul on either the TP or vendor and after I had paid for whatever repairs I needed to make. If you are getting 1 silver and 3 blues then you are clearly very unlucky. I suggest getting some strawberry pies, they give a very decent magic find bonus.

Lyuben.2613:

Zaber.5609:

The armor looks pretty sick on an asura warrior with the right dyes. If you don’t like the armor/stats/weapons the dungeon has to offer, its your own fault for running the wrong dungeon :/ nothing more.

Is that really the attitude arenanet wanted?

‘the right dungeon’.

Ought I not to be rewarded with something useful?

Well, there are two reasons why you would run a dungeon in explorer. Firstly, the experience of it all. Most dungeons would have about three paths and so that’s three times to get the full experience and yes, that would net you X tokens that you could use to get gear for alts, for mystic forge or something nifty for your main.

Secondly, you actually want the full dungeon armour or a particular weapon and thus you go out farming for the tokens.

If you ran TA for the first reason, surely the experience was its own reward and along with the experience you would have also got non-token drops from the dungeon. As well as some money. I don’t know about you but I usually end successful (or even semi-successful) dungeon runs wealthier then when I started.

Now if its the second… well, it doesn’t sound like its the second reason because surely you would have researched the dungeon armour options before farming the tokens.

Turial.1293:

Gurt.9368:

In AC Adelbern mistakes Rytlock, a living charr, for his own son; at the very least this would imply that Adelbern has some sense of self and can distinguish that not all beings are either charr or traitors. If Solothin had been given to a human to take the role of the prince maybe the curse could have been lifted, undone by the same person who cast it. It certainly would have made for more interesting writing in my opinion.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. He mistakes a living entity wielding Sohothin and mistakes him for Rurik showing that he does not who is around him really which mean he cannot distinguish. He already knows that his son is not coming home but in death still thinks he will. The official lore has rumored that a descendant of Doric (Queen Jennah) will quell the ghosts if wielding Sohothin, nothing else.

So… Logan and Jennah are gonna have a baby to whom Rytlock will pass on his sword? Makes sense to me!

I suspected that there would be a few of separatists among the migrating GW1 players. I mean, some of the GW1 players strongly identified with their Ascalonian characters. Possibly because of pre-searing. Leveling was slow in GW: Prophecies and so if you didn’t leave pre-searing until you had done everything you possibly could. You spent a lot of time in Ascalon and since you could never go back once the searing took place… I think a lot of players shared the sense of loss that the Ascalonian NPCs like Gwen felt.

But you know, things have changed in the last 200 years and the Charr are neither as insular or “apart” as they were in GW1. The three orders of Tyria especially have been bringing Charr and humans together, as have the Lion Guard and Lion’s Arch in-general. Plus with the truce in-place, we are likely to hear more of the type of conversion we hear between Leyah and Jordyn,

Leyah (Charr): Do you ever wonder why our nations used to fight?

Jordyn (Human): I don’t really care. All I know is that your my best friend.

Leyah: You are mine too. Just don’t tell my parents, they’ll kill us!

Jordyn: I know. Grown-up act so dumb sometimes.

DreamThief.9812:

“Seize the moment!”
“Never let a wrong ripen into evil..”
“Seize the moment!”

That’s me trying to cook and realising I am out of flour or something. I can generally tune out NPCs and I don’t craft that much at one stretch and I like the random conversations as it makes the world feel alive but even I am getting tired of the repetitiveness. I mean, if there was a bit more variety and you heard the “out house” conversation once a day it would be something but it’s like once every five minutes! So either increase the length between idle conversation or have more conversation variety to really liven-up the world!

I think people just don’t know about some of the food that gives better buffs. I mean, during dungeons I actually notice when my food buffs wear off because the extra boost to power, endurance and stuff is so high!

Rolo.9248:

Pneumothorax.2964:

Asura Elementalist, now 80 – So far I’ve the felt the difficulty is fine. Bugs are another matter, but I’ve found the difficulty perfectly reasonable.

Good for you but that doesn’t negate others having much difficulty and little fun.

But this is just it though, there is no “winning” in this argument. We say “we aren’t having issue no matter the mission” and you go “good for you but we are” and its either the games fault or its your fault. Possible the truth is something in the middle.

My Guardian didn’t have as much fun when fighting the big dragon thing in Claw island because Guardian ranged isn’t the greatest and I don’t have reflexes fast enough to dodge well while in melee range. But not being able to dodge fast enough is MY issue, not the games. Possibly I can say its the games fault that Guardians don’t have as powerful a ranged option as other classes/sceptres need a buff. But it is also a fact that my Guardian had little difficulty until the dragon boss. So what is it exactly that you want Anet to do?

I mean, the solution to this problem seems to be to give players the ability to adjust the difficulty of their personal mission. An easy mode, if you like, for those of you who keep getting steamrolled even when your character is X levels above the recommended. Conversely, a hard mode for the leet gamers (not me) who find the personal missions a cake-walk, with the rest of us just doing it in normal mode.

I mean, at the end of the day its all about the stats. What’s the % of people who can’t complete their personal story mode and are they mostly a certain class? If the % is high and/or the % is all cloth wearers or something, then you can say “Yes, there is a problem”. Otherwise, it’s not the game.

Shooopa.5632:

You have any idea how hard it is to keep NPCs in this game alive? They just stand still and attack something until they’re killed. And because of their suicidal nature, they’re impossible to revive because enemies are waiting right next to them.

Don’t you even start. Lots of people are having trouble not because they’re not playing well but because the game is throwing completely adverse situations at them like level scaling the player two levels below the enemies. The only “strategy” is kiting.

And you are trying to keep NPCs alive because….?

This is part of the problem. If it is not possible to keep NPCs alive, don’t keep them alive. Not like you fail the mission if they die. I mean, a lot of people have difficulties with the final mission of the “did not join the circus” quest chain of the human personal story and it is difficult. You have three veterans and a champion and while you do get Logan and your friend, they can be hard to keep alive. Well I have successfully completed this mission both as a engineer (during beta) and on my guardian following release and you know what I did? I let Logan and my friend take the punishment and used them to separate the bosses and take them on one by one. If they did, they died and I didn’t bother reviving them.

Tactics and strategy means looking at everything you are given, including terrain and NPCs, and using them to your best advantage and yes that might mean thinking of NPCs as not something to keep alive but to use in a specific way to maximise you chances of completing the mission.

Edit: I also don’t want to imply that you should never keep NPCs alive. If you have a tanky NPC and you are specced in a way that makes it more sensible to keep them alive then keep them alive. But the key is to use the NPCs in your tactical planning in away that you can get the maximum benefit out of them. That may mean keeping them alive or that may mean leaving them to die. Assess the situation as it is presented to you and adapt accordingly! That’s the key to success of those of us who are not struggling with personal story or even dungeons and it is not because we are all Greatsword spamming warriors or whatever class you think has it easy. (I for one would not be caught dead playing a warrior)

Ptaki.3715:

I disagree with other threads and say the difficulty level for personal story is fine. I’m having a lot of fun. I die sometimes but other times I survive and it’s a blast. My last mission was shutting down the corpse factory. Pulled too many enemies. All my npcs died. I hid. Rezzed them all. Regrouped and won.

Usually I die as a result of a mistake. I pull to many enemies or don’t keep the npcs alive. Yes doing that helps a lot, keep that in mind.

It’s fine the way it is.

I am with you and I don’t buy the whining either. I never have difficulty on my Guardian but apparently the Guardian is one of those classes that are supposed to find the personal story easy. Well I also have a relative cake-walk on my ranger and engineer. I haven’t played my necro much but what little I have played with her, she hasn’t had too many issues. Hell, I have been taking my ranger through her personal story one to two level below the recommended and she is yet to die once during any of her missions and that’s including the zerg fests!

I think the problem is that people don’t think enough in terms of skills. If you are making friends with the dirt too much, the thing to do is look at your skill bar and think “what do I need to put on here for this mission”. Too many people have the one skill bar setup that they try to run in every situation and then when it doesn’t work, they come here and cry about dungeons being too hard or personal story being too hard. >.<

Now this is a request I can get behind! I want to be a sniper!

Most Guild Wars 2 players know about Caladbolg but most refer to it as the “Trahearne’s supposedly powerful sword” as only Sylvari players actually get to yield it. So I made this video to sort of show what Caladbolg is capable off.

The Nightmare Court is the same as the Inquest. They believe the ends justify the means. The end they believe in is the rejection of the tablets by the Pale Tree and believe that if they increase the nightmare content in the dream, the Pale Tree will be corrupted and abandon the tablet. There is no proof that this is will actually happen – i.e. Pale Tree will ever abandon Ventari’s tablet even if the entire dream is just one big nightmare. From what I have seen of the Pale Tree, I am thinking more likely she would destroy herself if the nightmare overwhelmed the dream.

However, the Nightmare court truly believes they are doing the right thing. That’s why they attract the honourable as well as the brutish sadists. But that’s what makes the Nightmare court, even the Inquest, realistic. Only a few people in the world go out there and join Evil Inc. More likely, they join organisation whose philosophy they believe in because the philosophy seems “right” and in order to achieve said philosophy, they end-up doing evil things.

Now what is an “evil deed” anyway? If you exclude religion, laws and even philosophies (Ventari Tablets) and anything else that defines “evil deed” for you, at its most fundamental an “evil deed” is to wilfully bring suffering and harm on another. The Nightmare Court goes out of their way to kidnap and torture Sylvari. They use honey to recruit impressionable idiots and then once they get brought back to the base, do sadistics things to them, all short of death, to break them. The sadists and the brutish among the Nightmare Court do not need a reason other then “it’s fun” to do these things. However, others rationalise their evil deeds with empty reasons like “this is all for the greater good! This will free the Sylvari.”

At the end of the day, you are what you do. Not what you say and certainly not what you believe. It doesn’t matter what the Nightmare Courtiers say or how they justify their heinous acts, they do terrible, terrible things and that’s what makes them evil.

I think what bothered me about Logan’s decision was that I honestly believe that Logan did not care about Destiny’s Edge as much as Destiny’s Edge cared about him. I got this impression most strongly when Caithe was visited by Faolain. Logan’s reaction to that, when contrasted with those of Rythlock made it clear to me that Logan simply did not think of Destiny’s Edge as being as close to his heart as Rythlock did. I might be wrong here but that’s the impression I got. That’s my big problem with Logan’s decision because I don’t think that decision was ever much of a dilemma for Logan. The life of all of Destiny’s Edge simply didn’t matter to him quite as much as his life did to his friends, if that makes sense…

Lutinz.6915:

bluejay.6739:

— SPOILERS —

In a later part his spirit reveals that he did it because he was in love with her and couldn’t let the woman he loves die.

So we have the entire planet being eaten by a elder dragon versus the death of his love. Not an easy choice, but I think the fate of the entire planet is clearly the bigger ‘good’ in this case.

Of course, this entire story REALLY went wrong when Gwen married Keiran, who other than having some over powered bow was a complete tool and couldn’t even make his own freaking picnic.

If Gwen had just married your character, Tyria would be a dragon free paradise now… which would admittedly make for a very boring game.

Keiran needed your help because he was tied up with patrols. Also how would Tyria be a dragon free paradise? What if the GW1 character was female? What was wrong with Keiran anyway? I liked him. God knows he had the patience of a rock when it came to dealing with Gwen.

O yeah! Keiran showed amazing patience and loyalty towards Gwen. I personally wished he would have ditched her and went off with Miku while I was doing the “what happened to Keiran” portion of the Hearts In The North content. But then again, I didn’t like Gwen.

You CAN buy items form the Trading Post but they are not cheap because of the low drop rates.

For example, I wanted to level my leatherworking on my Asura engineer. She had just hit level 40 and that meant 1G for a trait book. I had 1G 30S something saved-up in my bank and Asura took it all out. After trait book she had about 40S left (she had some money on her). 30 small claws form the Trading Post cost ~32S but thankfully, after making two rare items, Asura hit 150 leatherworking. She could then start using cotton and next tier of leather and make herself items appropriate for her level. But this is only after I had hobbled my way very close to 150 leatherworking.

More importantly, she used-up all my savings to the point when I logged on to my Guardian and saw she only had 2S something on her, I was literally like “Can I even waypoint somewhere useful?” Fortunately, next task on Guardian’s list was doing CM story with guild and since my guild is awesome, we got it done without the Guardian dying and thus having no repair costs etc and I was back to solid ground monetarily.

In addition, I also had the option to dipping into my guild’s shared fund for repairs and travel. Not everybody has that luxury and for them, buying expensive mats from the Trading Post to level crafting is just not an option. Besides, some people just like going out there and hunting for mats themselves.

I do however, realise that some people are better at playing the Trading Post game then others and these people would not like their game spoilt due to increased drop rates.

This is my level 60 human noble guardian Tinni C.

Thanks to the generosity of the my guild mates, who stacked the guild bank full of rare stuff – as soon as I hit level 60 last night, I was able to start wearing level 60 rare armour. I believe the set is called the “Branded” set. I am only missing the gloves, shoulders and helm of the set. The gloves in this picture has the heavenly bracers skin I got from the Hall of Monument. I am not showing my helm or shoulders.

I personally got a little insulted when I received the “Ascalon Catacomb’s Dungeon Invitation” and it mention Logan as my mentor. I was like “mentor? him?”. I am sorry but going through the human storyline, he just didn’t feel as mentor like as Zojja, Eir, Caithe (and Trehearne as well for the Sylvari) or Rythlock (although I only played Charr during Beta). Maybe its just me but Logan just doesn’t feel mature enough at any point in the game, especially since the human char seems to be more mature then my other characters. I don’t know…

My human is a noble who’s childhood dream was to become a circus performer. But her noble parents put their noble foot down and explained that circus performer was not an acceptable profession for the descended of the legendary Ascalonian Monk who helped Prince Rurik searing guide survivors to Kryta, who helped save Cantha and Elona etc, etc.

She was depressed for a while but then she received the Conqueror’s Pauldrons and that motivated her to focus on her studies to become a Guardian. She has since abandoned the Conqueror’s Pauldrons, feeling that she no longer needed it to remind her to be all she can be but still wears Heavenly Bracers in memory of her ancestor and to honour her patron goddess Dwayna. She also joined the Priory because she likes reading as much as she likes exploring.

So yeah, I really have a proper back story going between my GW 1 monk character and GW 2 guardian. ^.^

I also have a human thief who is sitting pretty at level 2 but I gave her the same name as my Canthan Necro from GW 1 and a canthan appearance. Her story is that she’s the descendent from my Necro from GW 1, who could not return home for one reason or another. The last 200 years hasn’t been good to her family and that’s why my human thief grew-up in the streets, an orphan who never got to know her real parents but was told of them and her famous ancestor by a mysterious old woman who looked after her when she was very young…

I think they should put these rare crafting items back on the karma vendors list. I mean, I don’t exactly have an infinite supply of karma and every drop of karma I have, I earned by doing stuff. So why can’t I use them to level (non cooking) crafting?

Basically what everybody has been saying. Asura who are moral do not like the Inquest but the Arcane Council is not moral and don’t even pretend to be moral. I mean, trying to kill each other is considered part of how council politics works. They have a secret police force for crying out loud! With the Arcane Council being so shady themselves, is there any wonder that they turn a blind eye to the Inquest?

That said, the Peacekeepers of Rata Sum do seem to have some measure of independence from the Arcane Council and so they fight the Inquest. Of Course, almost all the Krewes do not like the Inquest and so fight them as best they can.

My reasoning was that a Sylvari should have a tree based name. I am also South Asian and wanted to give her a name in my native tongue and of a plant native to South Asia. So I wikied Native Indian Trees and picked the Asvattha Tree, aka Sacred Fig, to name my Sylvari after. She’s female so I changed Asvattha to Asvatthi. I am really happy with her name!

Well during the Beta I played a Sylvari and chose “Shield of the Moon” and that was a guy whose girl had been taken by the nightmare court. So hetero romance there. At launch I choose “White Stag” and there is no romance in that quest chain.

Walking around in the grove, I heard a conversation between two guys about one of them losing his girl to someone else and wanting to duel the new boyfriend with his friend discouraging him from doing anything that stupid and telling him to find another girl.

There is also another guy who complains about being bored and suggests to his female companion, most likely his girlfriend, that they go find a human or a norn to have dinner with them.

So the only homosexual Sylvari, and I am avoiding the topic of whether homosexual and heterosexul even apply to the Sylvari, I have encountered is Caithe and Faolain. So I don’t know what choices you and your friends have been making but I haven’t seen homosexuality among the Sylvari being either pointed and certainly not forced.

This is my Asura Engineer Eyomi. I tried to get a Asura like name for her and Eyomi seemed to fit. Although I guess it would have been safest to call her Eyomii since most Asura seem to have double letters in their name.

I also tried to maximise her cuteness during character creation and I think I succeeded in making a lethal little plushie! She’s wearing Tier 2 gloves, chest and shoulders transmuted into exotics. Pants and boots I didn’t bother transmuting from their crafted exotics look because they don’t really show.

Firstly, Lord Faren is not gay or there is nothing to indicate he’s gay. Indeed, if you play through the human storyline you find that he’s romancing two women at the same time.

As for the Sylvari, as the others have said – most Sylvari couples you encounter involve a man and a woman. I suspect that you have been caught by a stereotype and because of the Sylvari accent and the register in which they speak, you think they might be homosexual – just like Lord Faren, when they are not.

I have so far chosen an order with two of my characters. My level 60 Human Guardian is a member of the Priory and my level 39 Asura Engineer just got made an Agent in the Order of Whispers.

I didn’t really have an Order pre-selected when I started the “choose you order” chapter of the personal storyline. I was leaning towards vigil for my Guardian and I was thinking that the Asura should probably belong to the Priory. However, I changed my mind during the “choose your order” quests.

See, with my human I first worked with the Vigil (because I was leaning towards them) but got to experience the Priory branch through helping my brother on his Human Mesmer. I thought the Priory method was really clever. I then worked with Order of Whispers but hell if I can remember what I did with them. Next I choose Priory over Order of Whispers and went to the Grenth Priestess but also got to experience the “talk like a pirate” thing while helping my brother. But I was like meh.

So when it came for my Guardian to choose, I immediately ruled out Order of Whispers and had to choose between Priory and Vigil and Logan swayed the day in favour of Priory saying something like “I have no use for books but I like the idea of exploring”. Me: “-.- Freaking ignoramous! I am going to become a scholar and read books all day!” and joined the Priory.

With my Asura, I started with the Priory but the priory Asura rep really was not impressive. But Agent Batanga on the other hand was awesome! The Vigil Asura was also pretty cool and very dignified but Agent Batanga > all of them! So even though Engineer was leaning towards Priory, she ended-up going Order of Whispers.

What about you guys? Did the order reps have any influence on your decisions? Or did you just know from the onset what order you wanted to join and just went with them? If so, why did you join who you joined?

I am with the minority about Trahearne. I like the guy.

Although, I am with the majority when it comes to Logan. Now I really regret helping Gwen and Keiran get married.

I don’t think Queen Jennah is mind controlling Logan but I do believe that Jennah being a shrewd politician, took advantage of Logan’s infatuation. Logan sees Jennah and because she’s beautiful and powerful, he is smitten with her. He stumbles over to Jennah, who finds out that he’s the younger brother of her very capable captain and is making a name for himself as a skilled fighter. She would have been dumb not to try to hook him and hook him she did with her scarf and later put him on the spot to make that bond and make that statement to her court. Thus implicitly warning them all that if she is attacked, she can summon him.

Does she have any true feeling for him? Who knows! Maybe they are an item behind the scene or maybe Jennah is like Queen Elizabeth the First who was famous for always flirting but never going beyond that and using the men who were in love with her to keep her throne secure and further the interests of her nation. I also think that Rythlock saw through Jennah and that’s part of the reason why he’s upset. I mean, “love” is not unheard of in Charr culture afterall. But I do believe Logan is, by now, genuinely in love with her.

Devildoc.6721:

He’s an expert on Orr, but is not a military leader. I’m a Centurion in the Charr High Legions, I’m in the Ash Legion (Charr Intelligence), and a member of the Order of Whispers, I should be well connected to lead a campaign, Trahearne can be my advisor on Orr. What is wrong with one of the order’s and races taking some precedence in a personal story? It would make the player feel more central to their personal story with their choices mattering, and it would make each playthrough with different races and different choices feel different. Homogenizing them and making Trahearne central strips away all semblence of “personal” from the “personal story”.

You are a spy. You are not a general and I can maybe see Charr + Vigil combination is a bit more general-like but most of the other race + order combination does not yield a result more logical then Trahearne. Indeed, the only person I can think of who would have made logical sense as the leader of the pact is Almorra Soulkeeper as the leader of the militaristic Vigil.

However, Almorra Soulkeeper being in-charge means that Vigil is in charge and that might not go down well with the other orders. That’s also why Trahearne makes sense and you do not. You are a member of order X. You being in-charge means order X is in charge. You do not have friends in the other orders. Only people you know in the other orders are the people who you got to meet when choosing your order and you snubbed them! Trahearne on the other hand is well respected by all three orders and he is neutral. He makes the most sense diplomatically and he has enough military people around him who could advice him on military matters should he need it.

I really don’t see how it makes you a sidekick. You are not his subordinate. He’s not your boss. My boss is Gixx and yours is whoever the Master of Whispers is these days. You are Trahearne’s ally, as Trahearne is yours. Neither of you can do this thing without the other. That’s the way I choose to see this anyway. But then again, I liked Oblivion.

This is my Sylvari Ranger – Asvatthi. I named her after Asvattha Tree, figuring that a Sylvari should have a tree based name. ^.^

Well Trahearne is a Sylvari. I mean, my newly born Sylvari is hell of a lot more mature then Logan and Zojja put together. Maybe even Rythlock on a bad day. I mean, he’s a necro and necro’s use greatswords. So nothing magical about him being able to use that weapon. He’s leadership is probably innate due to what he learnt in the dream. Probably not a explanation that will satisfy people but I am happy to go with the flow. I mean, okay, he’s no Tybalt-I-love-apples-Leftpaw or even a Magister-it’ll-be-cherry-Sieran but he’s not that bad! Now Logan on the other hand…

I don’t really get the criticism that Trahearne has somehow taken over your story. You are still the protagonist but for this chapter, the protagonist has to help the guy who spent a life time studying Orr, who was born with a quest to cleanse Orr and who spent more time in Orr then anyone else, complete his quest.

The story is still about you! Had your and Trahearn’s path never crossed, he wouldn’t really enter the story. But just because it is your story, doesn’t mean you have to be the most important person in every single instance. It doesn’t even make sense! I mean, okay, great! My guardian is a Magister of the Priory. But she’s been a Magister for how long? A few months maybe. What does she know about Orr? Trahearne on the other hand knows Orr as well as he knows The Grove. Probably better! It only makes sense he takes the lead. No one leads a 100% of the time.

However, Trahearne couldn’t have done it without you. Your order wouldn’t be game for this without you. You are still the vital cog in this system and the story is still focused on you and how you helped Trahearne achieve his wyld hunt. I might point out, it’s not just you who will be doing things not in keeping with the characteristics of your order but the rest of your order has to be a bit less like themselves for this part of the story as well. But you know, once the dust settles, you’ll move on and your story will continue as you tackle the other dragons and perhaps figure out any ultimate mystery behind the dragons etc. Trahearne would have exited the story because his story starts and ends with Orr. That’s really the point here.

Orr and Zaitan is one or two chapters in your story. But it is pretty much the whole of Trahearne’s story. So if it looks like it is more important to him then you, it is because it is. For Trahearne, this is his life’s work. For you, it’s just another stone in the monument of your legend.

Here is my level 80 Guardian. She’s wearing Durmand Priory armour except for the gloves. They have been transmuted to be Exotics.

Edit: Just thought I would update my post to show off my guardians new look. I made her lose some weight using the Total Makeover Kit and while I was at it, dyed her hair and she also now has a new eye colour but of course that’s to subtle to see. She’s still mostly in Durmand Priory armour but now with Radiant Mantle and Gloves, plus the wind aspect helm.

Lutinz.6915:

Strictly speaking the Charr arent Athiests cause they accept the existance of powerful beings called ‘gods’. The human gods have had a very real presence on Tyria in the past and much of their legacy remains. However the Charr refuse to worship gods regardless of their source.

‘The Charr kneel to no one’.

Much of this is born out of the fact the Charr have had really bad luck when it comes to gods. There experiance with religion has been quite negative. Its to the point where a charr who actually wants to worship a god would potentially be treated as a dangerous criminal or at best an dangerous outcast.

Pretty much this. Charr have never had gods of their own. “Who made the Charr?” is not really a question the Charr ever bothered asking and while the Charr were around when the Human Gods actually lived in Tyria, they saw the gods as someone powerful to fight and conquer. Not kneel down and worship. It’s only after the Charr lost to humans that they started thinking “we might need gods on our sides” and that’s when the Flame Legion went and found the Titans. But of course, Titans were false gods on par with the Mursaat and Flame Legion used their new religious authority to do some terrible things to the Charr society. End result, Charr have gone back to their “no gods” way of thinking.

So no, Charr are not atheists because it is really not a matter of whether they believe in gods or not. They just don’t have gods of their own but they very much know that the human gods are very real and once inhabited Tyria. I would say Asura are more of an atheists while Sylvari are just agnostic. Both don’t have religions but philosophies they follower and the Asura eternal alchemy don’t actually have a deity per say. It’s more a statement of how the universe is a closed system and we are all part of that closed system.

Overworld.9613:

How family orientated are the Norn? Because in most of the stuff we’ve seen Norn tend to live alone as adults, yet random dialogue in Hoelbrak suggests they do get married.

Some lodges in the world seem to have whole families living in them, while others are businesses or just a random house people stop in to rest while adventuring. Is there any culture about what kind of lodge you can walk into?

I don’t know about most of your questions but there is a Norn family you have to help in Wayfarer’s Hill and it seems that either the man or woman can be primary care giver. In this particular case, the husband seems to be the one who get’s left home to watch the kids. He complains, and I am quoting as accurately as I can, “Wife away on adventure, kids need watching and I need to hunt, how is this going to work!” at which point he gives you an event quest to go kill Dolyke for meat.

As far as I can tell the Norn are basically old Norse/Angle culture. So basically, multiple generations in a lodge, possibly even in-laws but also they are more inclined to take in visitors, because visitors = stories plus the Shiverpeaks is not the kind of place you can turn away visitors in good concious, and certainly some lodges are basically inns.

I mean, in one of the lodges you get a drunk who insults the lodge owner and get violent. A woman, most likely his wife or at least a close relative, tells him off and starts crying due to his brutish behaviour. He becomes a boss you have to take down and then he decides his Svanir brother’s understand him better and go off to join them. The Svanir promptly try to use him in one of their rituals, you have to go rescue him and then he meekly returns to the lodge. So my guess is that he lives in the lodge with his wife and the lodge is either his relative’s or, most likely, his wife’s relative’s and they live together sharing the work load etc. Pretty much like how the old Norse/Germanic tribes used to live.

Overworld.9613:

Also are they called Kittens or something adorable?

Cubs. Charr call their kids cubs.

That’s pretty much all I know.

Thanks for your input guys. I suspect that the case is that Charr who live in Lion’s Arch, but more generally just outside of the legion controlled areas, have the choice to raise their kids differently and more often then not, do. There might be ways for these “outside” Charrs to join a legion at some point in time but that is assuming they even want to. I imagine the cubs of the, for example, the Charr commander of Claw Island (assuming he had cubs) would be more keen to join the Lion Guard then the Legions. Who knows!

Although, from what I have seen, Charr cubs growing-up outside of Fahrar still seem to have the concept of a “warband/Fahrar” but happy to have it made-up of their friends regardless of what race their friends are. So maybe Leyha will grow-up to form a warband with her human best friend. I would like to see that!

I am suffering from a bit of confusion regarding Charr cubs. Supposedly, and I am quoting from the wiki here, “As soon a cub is weaned (at around one year of age) they enter a fahrar of one of their parents’ legion. The fahrar is the cubs’ first warband and they are trained as a military unit under supervision of an adult and are considered an adult when the warband no longer needs supervision.”

If you are in the Black Citadel, you see this clearly. Cubs are with Fahrar and doing stuff with their Fahrar. However, Lion’s Arch seems to have atleast two cubs, one who teams-up with a Asura child and a human child to give you the background on Destiny’s Edge and another Princess Leyha (behind bank) who are clearly old enough to be in Fahrar but are not. Leyha also talks about her “parents” – indicating that she lives with her parent. There is also the Charr orphan in the Shiverpeaks but we don’t know exactly how young he was when his parents and those of his Norn friend got killed and he made his way to the Shiverpeaks with his friend and joined the orphan homestead run by a Sylvari.

Now I am perfectly happy to assume that Charr in Lion’s Arch don’t send their kids away and live very differently then Charr in the Black Citadel but Leyha also talks about joining the Ash Legion. So what’s the deal? Do the Legions even take older Charr from outside the Charr areas who didn’t grow-up in Fahrars etc? Or is Leyha just dreaming about that as well and she has about as much chance of joining the Ash Legion as her human friend?