Guild Wars 2

It’s almost definitely confirmed that it’s a live birth— I think it was in Metrica where one Asura was talking about how his progeny was talking the day it was born— if [Blah] was a word, whatever it actually was. (Aha, here it is, courtesy of another forum: http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z163/Minu_Kitty/gw168_zps7de7fd78.jpg) I suppose he could be referring to the day after it HATCHED, but…

And, courtesy of the same forum: "The asura at Wintersday that talks about her progeny and having her pride “almost be worth the pain of childbirth” also suggests that it’s most common for asura to give birth to one progeny at a time."

Given the size of Asura, I’d guess that it’s either one progeny at at time, or they’re born very early, in marsupial fashion and fed somehow else. (Bird crops? I still like oozes as baby food.)

Oh hey! You’re still around~~ I’ve been popping in every few weeks to see if you were still around so I could finally donate a bit for a drawing from way back early, now that I no longer feel totally destitute. =)

Erasculio.2914:

I’m at more or less 100 gold, for the records. After more or less about 800 hours of play… Which means, 12.5 silver per hour?

That’s not a bad scale to measure things with…

About what I’ve made per hour, based on my current assets, with each category being independent of the rest:
Non-specific: 20s/hour
Materials: 24s/hour
Investments (sold/unsold@bid): 53s/hour
Karma: 1440karma/hour (unknown average rate of conversion to gold via Orrian Jewelry Boxes)

Materials are a fair chunk lower than actual values since I didn’t count up everything; just the more expensive items (T6 fines and lodestones, specifically.) The hours spent are also inflated by 10% I’d estimate, from times spent logged in but not actively playing. (Or just with it open, doing other things like writing this post and doing the math.)

Notable expenses include crafting one character to 80, 2 purchased sets of exo gear, the ~1m karma for parts of a legendary and approximately 12,000 gems worth of gold (valued at 413 gold at the time of posting, though most was purchased at a FAR lower rate).

Viking Jorun.5413:

I must be missing something. When and where did this contest happen, and what does it have to do with Lord Faren?

“Why did you leave the mainland in such a hurry?

Oh, just some tedious feline contest in ol’ DR. I was hosting and adding a touch of class, but the partisan crowd turned ugly when their local hero wasn’t fancy enough to win the top honor."

“Cat–Wait, were you involved in that cat show riot in Divinity’s Reach?

Er, I’m sure you must be confusing me with another master of ceremonies that was driven from DR by an angry mob. One far less dashing than myself."

(From the chatter in Southsun.)

Personally, I side with the belief that somebody pressured Faren (not hard, it seems…) into declaring the other cat the winner.

I was thinking it kind of lets everybody look like an engineer, with a giant set of patched bags on their back…

Yes, it was changed, as per Anymras’s description. Among other things, this meant that engineers could no longer drop turrets in a safe spot and afk.

Yet another reason Asura are superior to the common bookah. We expect to go swimming at a moment’s notice, and are thus constantly equipped with our swimwear!

I don’t remember which game did this, but they dealt with the issue of “practical” male armor vs “sexualized” female armor with a solution I haven’t seen before— just make the armor, armor, and let everybody wear it. Which meant that some portion of the male population ran around in bikinis.

I actually rather like how the male and female armor for Asura are the same— the bodytypes are very similar and practicality is dominant. (As the set somebody above alluded to, I actually wear pit fighter… partly because it amuses me, partly because it’s part of my full berserker set. If I’m going to be squishy, I want to look the part. http://www.gw2armor.com/asura/female/named/heavy/front.jpg) Though, on a fashion-related note, I wish we had more hair styles…

The null armor swimsuit look intrigues me— if they just made the male trunks unisex, I wouldn’t’ve batted an eye at it. (Personally, I like the idea that Asura traditionally fed on slimes when young… one reason why there’s so much experimentation that goes on with them. Long cultural history with them. [Grub pulp is another theory I’m fond of.]) Rather than hiding anything, the swimsuit actually raises the issue and further sexualizes them in such a fashion that they look even younger. They don’t have nipples; they don’t even have mounds. (See above armor…) It might just be based on the models that I noticed, but the males seem to have larger chests than the females— hopefully in the form of pectoral muscles, but a largely irrelevant point.

I find the bandeau idea interesting from a conceptual and visual standpoint. Not exactly sure what the point would be unless more physiological details are pinned down.

There are physical preferences when it comes to Asura, though generally speaking, they come second to a meeting of minds: http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Oggy

But, I think I speak for the majority when I ask to please keep the D-cup off my Asura…

Tamashi.5647:

- bigger bags

“Mystic Rune of Holding – 50 gems – Apply to your backpack to increase its size by one permanently.”?

Obscure One.4357:

Though I had an interesting thought on a hammer concept that wouldn’t use a new set of skills at all:

New Gadget: Magic Stick “This new gadget randomly equips the user with a Hammer (Guardian) or a Conjured Lightning Hammer.”

not that I particularly enjoy RNG skills but having more of them, maybe even enough to fill out the utility bar, and add a trait that all RNG skills grant 5 seconds of Stability (20 second cool-down) that may make room for some truly weird and off the wall play styles.

That WOULD be interesting… could setup an entirely new branch of engineering— we’ve got Charr engineering aesthetics for most stuff, but we can use the often-unpredictable (explosive) Asura engineering for skills with unpredictable effects… like your magic stick which either turns into a Conjured Lightning Hammer or a Spirit Weapon hammer. (Not exact copies of those skills, but something along those lines.) Just a bit of random idea vomit.

Sagramor.7395:

1) Round Peg > Square Hole: Should have the ability to repair turrets like Smack. It’d be nice to be able to repair turrets on demand without having to sacrifice a turret slot.

I thought about that, but decided it would be kind of weird to incorporate a direct synergy with utility skills on the base weapon. Though, on the other hand, it does kind of fit with the rest of the side comments I made, about just hitting things to fix them…

Sagramor.7395:

4) Hammer Down: What you describe is equivalent to Hammer 5 on Warrior, but immobilize doesn’t fit the description. We don’t want to completely duplicate skills so…

Still fitting with the Hammer Down name could switch to a combo field.
“Thrusts hammer into the ground kicking up a cloud of dust.”
No damage, Combo Field Dark, and a Blind. (field and blind duration would have to be scaled to the cooldown)
And it works with your overall theme of nothing magical about the Hammer. Just a large blunt object.

Is it? I never ran a hammer war. The image I had from this was in the vein of the WB cartoons where they get hit over the head and shoved into the ground. This would also roll directly into original version of my #5 if you’re still on the offensive. I like it though; an AoE blind would be useful, fits with some of the control elements of the hammer and works thematically. Also, it gives a third class access to dark fields.

Sagramor.7395:

5) Deconstruct: Too easy for someone to just dodge. You could make this work similar to Flurry on Warrior’s Sword Burst, which immobilizes, since I’d imagine an ability like this would have you rooted in place.

Ideally, it’d be against a stationary target or a mass of targets— this skill hits hard, but it suffers from the long cooldown of #5 and the difficulty of actually landing the entire hit. I’m thinking the final AoE blow does something around a third of the total damage, making it vital that your targets don’t flee. At least it has a consolation blast finisher though.

Maybe my creativity was just running dry at this point, since it really is just a buffed Hundred Blades with an increased cooldown to match. Still, I rather like the idea of a tiny, furious Asura with a hammer the size of its body venting a rapid series of rage-empowered blows on a console that didn’t work (because somebody tripped over the cable and unplugged it)…

Edit: Actually, on [whatever the next number is] thought, I’m sold on the idea of #1 repairing turrets.

My image of a hammer-class Engi is entirely different than what most people seem to have… that is, there’s nothing special about the hammer. No hidden gadgets. No secrets. What we have is a glorified slab of metal on a stick, guaranteed to make any broken components work after a few strikes. Or not, nothing’s guaranteed.

All of these attacks, with the exception of the obvious bits, are designed for single combat. Main things I kept in mind was to keep this direct damage-centic and primarily melee while keeping a variety of types of attacks present.

Skill 1, chain attack: A classic one-two, guaranteed to make any component fit.
Round Peg – A quick hit with the hammer head on the upswing; low damage.
Square Hole – A slower, but heavier, downward swing; moderate damage.

Skill 2, leap attack: Getting to the location quickly is a vital part of repairs. Using the haft of the hammer, vault yourself to your location and use your momentum to deal a blow.
Hammer Dive – Targeted, very small high damage AoE, leap finisher.

Skill 3, range-based: With aim honed by years of broken equipment, fling your hammer precisely into their gut.
Fling (short range) – At melee range, moderate damage, short knockback.
Fling (mid range+) – Ranged attack, low damage, interrupts.

Skill 4: Sometimes, you need to put a stop to things.
Hammer Down – A hard downward strike intended to drive the target into the ground. High damage, moderate activation, immobilize.

Skill 5: In many cases, equipment is beyond repair and destined for the scrap heap.
Deconstruct – A rapid series of moderate blows, culminating in a PBAoE high damage blast finisher. (Like a buffed HB.)

I find the reactor to be an interesting one, based on my personal story choices. There’s mention of reactor malfunction tearing a hole in space which gets more interesting with the steam ogre in the prominent position at the center of the reactor.

According to the Asura personal story with the Infinity Ball, the steam creatures were created by the PC, under slightly different circumstances. I’m inclined to see the world that, er, I created, even as scattered region in the mists…

>Glasses that are not town clothes.

Yes. Please. I would cheerfully pay 800 gems for a combat-wearable set of reading glasses. More if we can dye the frames. (And lenses too, though I’m not so interested in that.)

A portable portal to your own home would be nice too, since it seems that we’re actually getting additions there now, and how many people actually head over there? Most people I know just park an alt there for the daily quartz nowadays.

Way too cute! How long’d it take you? (Hah… not that I could ever make something like that; fabric work isn’t my forte…)

Or just let us wear town clothing into combat. I just want to wear my glasses…

marnick.4305:

As far as real or fake Quaggan leather/fur… I never go for fake.

Definitely. 100% Genuine Quaggan Fur* for sale!

*Contents may vary.

After finishing off Snowblind, I wasn’t moved to Ocean with the rest of my party. I did get the loading screen… which left me exactly where I was standing before the loading screen.

I’ve been getting this sporadically too, ever since the Wintersday updates. In my case, it tends to happen in native LA or Fractals most often.

(Also, using W8. Seems to be a lot of W8 people reporting rather similar problems.)

I’ve also been getting mysterious disconnects and even full CTDs on W8 since the Wintersday updates. Prior to the Wintersday updates, I did not have a single disconnect I could not attribute to an external cause.

As far as I can tell, my version isn’t a connection problem as everything else remains working. It appears to happen most often in native LA (fine in overflows) and Fractals. (Where it’s actually problematic.)

Not sure if you read this story, but it covers the first (?) time Mr. Sparkles was activated: http://www.arena.net/blog/mr-sparkles-a-tale-of-the-asura

Alternatively, turn the mortar into a Siege Kit. Still occupies the elite slot, but gives a bit of flexibility in the kind of weapon to drop.

Fsnowzombie.4352:

Venthus.6137:

Attached is Ambera, an Asura Engineer!

yours was a challenge lol, that asura face is so much thiner than the ones ive done, i quite liked it tho
here you go!

Wheee~~!

I’ve been away from internet access for over a week and coming back to this is quite a delight!

I’m… glad it was a challenge? After all, that’s what makes for good practice… or… something? =P

The over-all effect is lovely: there’s just that bit of egotistical long-suffering that all Asura should bear with a much more obvious ‘oh no, another bookah’s dripping stupid from their stupid-hole…’ embedded in the expression. And the armor… I do so love that armor. =)

I’m currently travelling at the moment and can’t really justify expensive pay-per-hour internet to participate but I’m still interested in knowing what is and isn’t limited edition content… do I have this right?:

Limited:

• Consortium Chests and all items spawned from it
• “The event will culminate in a one-time only event chain that will run multiple hours with a finale of defeating the Ancient Karka. Players will receive a special reward at the event completion.” (As per the wiki)

Unlimited:

• Most (all?) maps, including zone, dungeon, PvP, JPs, etc.
• Ascended equipment
• New crafting recipes and resources

I think part of the problem with coming up with an answer is that ‘farming’ is quite vague. I run different skills, gear and traits depending on where, what I planned on doing and if I expected to be grouped. My loadout for Plinx at a busy time, for example, is very different from when I was sitting at the tunnel.

And maybe it’s just me, but I find the flamer a LOT easier to use with autotarget off.

I prefer using the flamethrower AND being in a group when doing the Plinx loop. Also, turn off autotargeting when you use it, so it’s easier to just sweep across a group.

If I recall my lore correctly, dwarves and Asura were trading partners.

After The Great Destroyer showed up, and Primordius started showing action, the dwarves underwent a rite that basically turned them all into animated stone so they could engage in perpetual warfare against him.

Side note, but as I recall, the mortar doesn’t require LoS, but it DOES require an open firing arc. So many times I’ve fired my shells straight into the ceiling…

Indeed; Asura aren’t really RACIST… just discriminatory based on intelligence. (And, well, it just so happens that their race pushes for intellect, so it’s a developed trait for them…)

I always thought that Asura and Charr would actually get along rather well together— their current cultures have a very strong engineering focus with completely different backgrounds and emphasize strength, though in different ways. And, well… the first time that a Charr picked up an Asura for a late-night snack and got a mouth full of explosives…

My guess is that the patch included a lot of internal changes relating to the Nov15 content update that they’re just not talking about. I’d rather see more comprehensive notes though… I miss the GW1 notes where they’d even mention obscure typo fixes.

In my case, I’ve noticed the dropping out of parties randomly, but it only appears to be on one side. (The rest of the party can still see you… it happened in one of my dungeons yesterday and they still got to loot corpses and chests.) Relogging didn’t do anything to me; it required a full client restart.

Unfortunately, none of the bookah out there have equipment made to fit our delicate sensibilities. Why— I’ve had to cut holes in every pair of boots I’ve bought from them. Seriously, what kind of insane designers do they have, that don’t accommodate their betters…

Alternatively: Not really. Most gear, even if it does allow the ears to show through, just have them clipping through the helm, rather than actually having it built for ears.

Indeed. If there was a stupid Asura, he’d be the first to be given the boot too.

Here’s another thought, which I’ve toyed around with a bit: 2/Dwayna, 2/Monk, 2/Water. Gives +30% buff, +20% regeneration duration.

You don’t get protection the way you would with Earth, but you get good uptime on pretty much everything that gets thrown on you. Can also get a decent number of might stacks on you by yourself (10+) which helps mitigate the lack of damage you’ll be doing with this build.

What keeps me off a 6/Dwayna+Medkit is the sheer fiddliness of it. I already have to deal with Elixir B, Toss Elixir B, Healing Mist, Super Elixir (KR), Super Elixir, timing the various fields that I want to set off and doing whatever attacks I want… I don’t want to add turning the Medkit on and off every 10 seconds too; I’ll just stick with Elixir H.

It could be just busywork by the krewe leader to repeatedly have the computer throw up stupid errors just to keep them from destroying the lab in off-time tinkering.

Not a bad idea really; give them something stupid to do while you get to the serious work of blowing up the world (through an accidental failure… or opening a portal to the wrong place…).

Well, we’ve confirmed that Asura like getting as drunk as much as everybody else does… (But probably still less than Norn.)

It sounds more like an attempt at a joke, based on Asuran ideologies. Sort of like the “The optimist sees the glass as half full. The pessimist sees the glass as half empty. The engineer sees twice as much glass as necessary.” etc.

The link from Ryuujin’s post a few up is probably Asuran after they came to the surface and were influenced by the other languages; the wiki article ‘Cultural Diffusion in Contemporary Kryta’ discusses how language in Tyria has changed along the way.

Personally, I like the octal system… and just disregard the toes.

In practical terms, the college influences the first set of starting missions (L1-10, or thereabouts).

The ultimate goal of Synergetics is understanding of the Eternal Alchemy, or what makes the universe operate as it does. Generally speaking, they operate more in the fields of pure research and, while don’t come up with much in direct results, unifies a lot of the ideas developed in other fields.

The college of Dynamics tends to explore unorthodox solutions and tend to be particularly unstable. More of a “Hey, I have a idea! Lets see what happens!” kind of a place.

Statics are closer to “do it right the first time”. On the more conservative side, their research is more evolutionary than revolutionary, but, on the other hand, they’re the ones who keep society running, if not particularly growing.

Seetoo.9316:

Does backpack regenerator stack with the dolyak (6) rune?

Have not tested it myself, but I read elsewhere that it does.

Dokyak6 is really expensive in terms of slots though: 160toughness/50vit/horrible regen. Not sure if you read the fine print, but Dolyak6 is NOT full regen; it’s only 30hp/sec. You’d probably get more mileage out of Mercy6 or, well, pretty much anything else.

Well— I tend to mix up my slots and traits with a slight mind towards what I’m encountering in a particular place. Like, I ever have a problem with conditions in CoF, but the bleeds in CM tend to shred me, so I take that into consideration.

I haven’t specifically tested for this since I haven’t hit any condition-prone areas lately, but according to the wiki: “While not mentioned in-game, Super Elixir also removes conditions on impact.”

Another thing to consider about running a build with AoE heals is that, well, they’re AoE heals. In you’re travelling in groups, you’re supporting a lot more people than just yourself.

Most “advanced” technology on Tyria right now comes from either the Charr or the Asura. Humans haven’t done particularly much in this field, Sylvari are relatively young and probably wouldn’t’ve forked their studies dramatically yet and Norn… just… no.

Out of all the skills, none of them have a particularly Asura feel to me; the turrets are all clunky and mechanically-based, the kits tend to go either way, but they don’t have an Asura visutal style to me either. The gadgets… their effects feel more like experiments of progeny, but there isn’t much visual flavor there either.

The elixirs can pretty much go any way: Sylvari probably have an innate sense for some chemicals, Charr have experimented more with chemicals in fueling and developing their tools, Humans have a longer history with magic and Asura are known for experimenting on oozes and who knows what else. And Norn have probably tried to brew everything remotely edible. But these don’t really have any visual impact, which is kind of a major influence in how things ‘feel’.

Nothing wrong with sharing skins— but, at least to me, engineer technology feels overwhelmingly Charr in appearance. Changing the appearance of a turret or two, or one of the kits to make it feel like it’s drawing from the best of both cultures would feel a lot more appropriate in my opinion.

Random example, could replace the healing turret with a crank that sprays a healing mist with a blue version of those Inquest lightning turret that emits a pulse that rejuvenates the body. It’s not like Asura technology isn’t available elsewhere; it’s perfectly reasonable for an engineer to use the best tool for the job.

Ghost Quaggan for me… I just find it too adorable. ‘Coo… I mean, OOOooooOOOoo!’

Never even stopped to talk to the poor Holler… Hollow… charr though. I should throw some over sometime.

While backpack regenerator doesn’t heal that much, it IS always active. You don’t have to waste any skill activation time to set it going and you’re still getting healing while you’re dodging, putting up your shield, or even just plain running away.

Kit refinement is EXCELLENT with Elixir gun. You drop a light field with condition removal and healing with a decently short CD. I don’t really use Rifled Barrels much; none of the relevant weapons are really that good at long range. Depending on where you are, Elixir/KR and Super Elixir may be enough to deal with conditions, rendering F409 less valuable, as well. Still, high Alchemy 30 has lots of other goodies you can swap in as needed.

Between the male Asura appearance gallery and the female pit fighter armor (both of which give a clear view of the abdomen and MOST of the chest), there’s no sign of, well, anything anywhere.

I remember reading one unofficial comment suggesting that #1 is the cause [‘Asura look too much like children’…] but I’m still holding out for some kind of lore that makes sense. (Double checked the art— evidently what I thought were male glands was just shading or skin markings or something… pity.)

Yeah; I disagree as well: In the case of Asura engineers, it’s more about the non-discriminatory application of magical energies.

Unlike most of the other classes that use magical/divine/spiritual/etc. forces, there’s minimal training required to use engineered equipment. While the Asura may complain about bookah damaging their stuff through improper use, pretty much anybody could pick up a golem remote, energy beam or oozinator and put it to use, unlike, say, commanding the elemental forces of fire.

Bug carapaces like… wurm husks! Weren’t carapaces even used for armor and housing at some point in GW1? Those guys are probably deep underground…

I suspect they’re more concerned about running out of magic energy, much as people are concerned about running out of oil…

I’ve been experimenting with a defensive passive-heal engineer setup: Healing bombs, backpack regenerator, kit refinement, elixir gun.

Took Elixir B in the last spot for lack of anything else and to help bolster the rather mediocre damage this lineup offers. I also prefer taking a shield for the additional blocking in emergencies. Currently rolling water/monk/Dwayna runes for the buff duration bonuses, but that’s not a big deal.

As this is, it offers a ridiculous amount of sustainable AoE healing [upwards of 1kHP/sec, I believe, though that may be just on myself] and potentially leaves the elite, healing and one utility slot free for whatever.

Right; I totally forgot about lichens and oozes. That might give a bit of explanation as to their size as well: very limited nutritional resources. (Or, I guess the other easy answer is: Caves are small.)

Oozes are an interesting idea. They might have been cultivated to break down specific types of rocks and minerals into more usable forms. Probably wouldn’t’ve been used as a primary diet though; don’t need much in the way of teeth to eat them. Alternatively, deep oozes might have a tougher exterior, so they had to be punctured before sucking out the goodness. Also might make for good baby/geriatic foods too. (Assuming any managed to survive all the failed lab experiments to an age where that’d be a concern…)

Well… what’s known is that they have sharp teeth, so they probably had a primarily meat-based diet.

They were previously deep subterranean with connections to dwarves and dredge, but given the existing relationships, I think it’s safe to say that they were at least tolerant of both, so eating them’s out of the question. (At least, routinely…)

Destroyers are out, since they weren’t really around.

What do we have in the surface subterranean pockets? Spiders, large lizards, fungi… maybe lakes in some of the caverns for fish.

No idea about progeny though… female Asura have a distinct lack of breasts, and I believe the only nipples encountered so far are on male Asura, so there might be a kind of seahorse deal going on here…