Guild Wars 2

They haven’t said anything yet.

I saw some people mention that they said a group of 3 was mentioned during the chronomancer reveal, but I don’t recall myself. I know that Ten Ton Hammer mentioned it in one of their blots (I think about the DH).

They may mention it tomorrow during Ready Up, or it may be a 1-3 week break to show off other stuff before they go back to elite specs. All are going to be previewed before HoT launches, but we still have a bunch of other stuff that can be covered.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/this-week-on-the-ready-up-livestream-wvw-automatic-upgrades-and-dragonhunter-pvp-demo/

This Week on the Ready Up Livestream: WvW Automatic Upgrades and Dragonhunter PvP demo

demo != beta

JoshuaRAWR.4653:

The revenants utilities HAVE to be interchangeable, otherwise that’s just bad.. you’ll be fighting a revenant and you’ll instantly know what abilities to expect from him, and that’s really, really bad.

I’m hoping to get an underwater style thing going on with the revenants utilities where say “x ability can’t be used with x legend”.

You mean like you already know when you see the weapons that a current profession has? Usually but just the weapon you can know if it’s power or condi and a decent idea of the utilities, even more so if you see any signet passives. I can’t recall the Rev from all that long ago, but each legend is only getting 3 (maybe 4) utilities, they never mentioned otherwise.

I’d assume how “Signets” will be a skill line, each legend will be a skill line, with one legend’s heal being the “free” default heal that all 1st level characters get. Then as you get hero points you can unlock your utilities for that legend or start learning a different legend.

For a not tome rushed character, you still need to be lvl 13? to unlock your first utility, and presumably you’ll get enough hero points before then to make sure you can unlock at least your first one, I don’t see a problem.

No matter what they announced some people would be upset. Rubi could have been referring to any of the three things we got this week.

We got news about LA, that’s fun, and even if it’s just a poll I enjoy them asking for our thoughts. The in-game reason for everything being fixed in one patch was also cute.

We also got news about WvW which is gonna be a great QoL update, get people used to how the new borderlands will work (yak’s and sentries for example), and also test the new system before the new borderlands go live. And you really can’t complain too much about the proposed features. Who knows, we may also get news of another Tourney, now that the PvP one is over. Or, as I’ve seen suggested a few times, weekly gains for those WvW tickets based on rank.

The third thing is the new Ready Up version of PvP 101, or at least that’s how I’m going to remember it.

Plus, Ready Up is the competitive side of the gw streams, I don’t know what people were expecting. Personally I thought it’d be about the WvW beta, cost/pre-order dates, or another Stronghold beta/release ahead of HoT. Plus everyone likes different things; despite the fanatical posts I see people wanting GvG, I could not care less about it, nor do any of my friends/guildmates.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Either way I don’t see why this announcement displaced a specialization reveal. The WvW team clearly isn’t the same as the class mechanics team, so why didn’t we get a specialization reveal this week?

While it wasn’t on the forums, in any of Anet’s blog posts, or in any of the vids, I think it was Ten Ton Hammer’s post for the DH said that it was the “second of three planned specialization reveals.” Or something to that effect. So, people that saw it, and spread that info all kind of assumed that it was correct and we were only getting a group of three anyways.

As why they don’t do another spec, well they need to space them out.

1) They may not be in a place where they can be given a full show (remember the base engi still had a number of TBD traits ~1 month ago).

2) I think people would get bored after 8-9 weeks of just specialization reveals

3) They have other stuff that they want to reveal so it’s a good idea to break up one big topic with other ones to keep things feeling fresh.

Sure it sucks that we still don’t know the name/weapon/anything much about the remaining specs, but we’ll get that info at some point (and apparently be able to play with them in the coming betas). Everyone cares about different specs too. If the Tempest ends up using a sword, I couldn’t give a pack bull about it, really. And unless the warrior spec gets Taunt I don’t really care about it either.

Also, this may be something that can go into the game “now”. Which we desperately need. Considering the only updates we could assume that were coming before HoT were various “feature pack” stuff (trait changes in another 1-3 months, personal story reworks, ???) it’s nice that we’re getting something. Sure, it’s just WvW QoL stuff, but I’ll take what I can get.

This also make my hope that they will release the new WvW borderlands and Stronghold “when they are ready” instead of waiting for HoT closer to reality.

DarkOcean.8746:

I don’t want to be mean or rude, but… I’ll just hold my tongue. These changes look undesirable.

I also sincerely hope this is not the special announcement.

Well it’s either the WvW changes, or the announcement could refer to the new “Ready Up” version of “PvP 101”

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Here’s the “special” announcement:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/upgrading-world-vs-world-upgrades/

In summary:
removed a bunch of WvW abilities
Simplified WvW so you no longer need to really participate or organize, everything is now automatic.

For a majority of the Zerg blog they won’t notice the difference, outside of maybe the max supply being less. For the defenders and the people that have spend tons of gold and time upgrading, it’ll be a wonderful QoL save. Not to mention having it stop being a gold sink for the same players (outside of the cost of siege). So I like the idea of things auto upgrading. It also helps to “fix” the problem of someone starting an upgrade while under attack, wasting valuable supply, but at the same time makes it harder for attackers to drain a keeps supply by taking the camps/killing the yaks. Plus the sentry changes will give roamers/defenders more to worry about and for us to get used to for the new borderland.

A little sad about the loss of Applied Fortitude and Applied Strength, and angry about the changes to Supply Capacity just because I just hit ~830 and was finally able to dump the 300 points to get my +5. At least I’ll get to put the points into other lines.

Daddar.5971:

Player A loves PvE, and has full map completion on the alt
Player B loves Dungeons, and has completed every path in every dungeon many times
Player C loves jumping puzzles and fractals and has completed all
Player D loves sPvP, and is very highly ranked
Player E loves WvW, and is a commander with a high WvW rank
Player F used tomes and scrolls to get to lv 80 very recently, and has done nothing else but ‘skill challenges’

Ummm, the way I see it.

Player A: Will have everything

Player B: Should have enough, they still had to run to the zone with the dungeons, you’re telling me that they ignored every other thing to do in every map and just ran straight to the dungeon WP?

Player C: Again, Should have enough, how hard is it to spend 2-3 sec on your way to a jp.

Player Won’t need any hero points inside of PvP because everything will be unlocked there. If they want to start doing WvW or PvE then they are at the same disadvantage of a new player to either game mode, except the experience behind the class.

Player E: The only one who’s really “hurt”. And must spend a whole hour or two to go and earn back “everything”. Or, they could look at their favorite builds (I assume one commanding, one roaming, and maybe one solo), see what skills they don’t use; because they will not use all of them, ignore those skills/traits and get everything else and move on.

Player F: Is a player spending the time now so they don’t need to do it when the trait changes launches, which every player who has read about the change can go do.

Again, really it just “hurts” WvW players who now need to go play an hour or two of PvE. My guard, who I leveled almost completely in EotM and with about 30 tomes (and the insta lvl 20 scroll) with only 7% world completion still has 14/189 skill points. If I actually cared about player her I could go do more skill points, again, very quickly.

You aren’t going to get an official answer, outside of what they’ve already said (which pretty much does say you are losing everything). Until they say anything about a grandfathering system (like they mentioned before the first trait change) or a reimbursement system (highly unlikely and they’ve strongly hinted at a “no” here), the answer is:

Yes, you lose everything and must spend the ~1 hour to go get ~65 skill points to have everything unlocked (less if they keep the hero points from WvW in there, but those may also be gone when they introduce the new borderland). But you will most likely not need everything unlocked. How often do you switch your build into using all 5 different trait lines, or use each and every category of utility skills.

The only thing I could maybe see happening (and it’s a long shot). Is if they calculate how many skill point scrolls each character has eaten (and spent on skills), and refund those with mystic forge currency. But, I don’t really think that’s necessary, and they may feel the same way.

Why? Because, to paraphrase Gale, they can’t reimburse everyone everytime a change happens. They are streamlining the new system and changing everything.

1) There will be a finite amount of Hero Points in the game
2) There will be a set order in how you unlock each skill in a given trait specialization or skill line

How do you let an Ele keep Tornado if they never unlocked any other Cantrip skills?

The only other solution that I can think of would be to let people keep what they have but still charge them, putting them at a negative amount of Hero Points, thus to unlock your elite spec you first need to break even and then earn more points to unlock. And I doubt the system is programed to allow any of this.

You have more than enough time to get the skill points before they release the new traits.

Pure Heart.1456:

Turamarth.3248:

That would make condition builds even weaker in pve.
For example a condi thief would be completely useless against an undead enemy.
Out of curiosity why should spiders be immune to blind?

Yes, condi. builds may be less effective against certain foes – but then, this is part of the point in adding variety. In a similar fashion, certain enemies should have high toughness countering non-condi. builds.

What about professions that don’t get access to every condi? What are they suppose to do, if that’s how they want to play? Completely ignore an area because they cannot hurt any of the enemies?

It’s bad enough when I have to fight Destroyers on my War, 2 of my 6 attacks (both AoE) do nothing to them, and it is my only AoE long ranged weapon. What happens if I had to fight something immune to bleed, my sword would do nothing. In PvE, zerker is the meta, by running something else, you are sub-optimal, I do it anyway because it is fun for me.

Condis already have so many negative against them,
long build up time
shared, limited stack totals (thankfully this is changing soon)
still do less damage than direct attacks
can not crit (3 traits affect direct damage, only 1 for condi)
can be cleansed (or have reduced duration via food/runes in WvW/PvP)
will soon be completely countered by resistance

They do not need more penalties. Why should we be forced to change weapons in between encounters just so we can kill the next mob group? And what happens if they mob types get mixed together (anti coni and anti direct damage, or anti the 2 conditions that you can put out), you’re left not being able to hurt them.

BrooksP.4318:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

BrooksP.4318:

It is a shame that they made races homogeneous due to balancing reasons, instead of allowing diversity. Not sure if that fault is from a dev standpoint or a player’s mindset.

What diversity is there in all power classes play Norn, all condi classes play slyvari, all tanks play charr, etc. And if you tried to go “off type”, an Asuran power character, you’d get booted out of a dungeon party or a GvG guild, more so then you get the “zerk exp only” in the LFG already.

What they did is a much better option to not have your cosmetic look (or the first chapter of your story) effect game play in the slightest (why do you think 99% of the racial skills are all rubbish).

Diversity in regards to the races outside of just cosmetics, not professions they choose. As I stated the min-max ideology, which you referenced too, is the fault of players mindset. Not to mention the fact that GW2 profession system is designed to be a jack of all trades, where individual stats aren’t just useful in a singular profession or build.

There is no diversity if everyone is forced to min-max their race, again outside of non-optimal playstyles, which a lot of people in the game won’t tolerate. Even if somethings just 5% better, people will want that little extra bonus (for example ascended armor, completely unnecessary outside of high fractals but still people get those extra tiny attribute bumps).

So, it’s the players mindset that caused Anet to willingly separate from the trinity and do their own thing, not their own design philosophy? Who knew. I for one am happy for it. If you want your race to change your stats there are plenty of games out there that do that. Gw2 is one of the few (the only one I know of) that lets me know if I beat someone it’s because I was the better player, not because the other player thought the idea of an Asuran guard was cute.

lordkrall.7241:

Ashen.2907:

Which one of those two has numbers to support a position?

In GW2 it is an objective fact that norn are no more physically powerful than humans. Feel free to pretend otherwise if you like.

Might I suggest you actually spend some time listening to what is said and watch what is shown in the game? In this very thread there is an in-game example that shows that Norn are stronger.

There is also examples from the official books.

Another thing that is a pretty good indirect indicator in game is the Norn city. Take a look at how huge the buildings are. Either the Norn are technological geniuses able to device machinery to help them build that, or they’re just that strong. Compare that to the humans who have been trying to repair broken brides in LA for over a year (har har).

Besides, common sense has to tell you that bigger (with similar proportions) usually means stronger (their legs have to carry more weight for example). Add on top of their lifestyle of traveling, hunting, and fighting, which also points to their increased physical attributes (lore wise). Then you have the dev’s saying that the Norns are stronger (and stronger than they look like they should be) because they are not just big humans.

To the OP:
I feel like if the humans rallied an army to invade the Shiverpeaks, they would lose. The Norns would rally under a chieftain’s guidance to defend their homes in mass and drive off the humans. They would have the home field advantage, including being used to the cold climate, compared to the temperate Kryta. Plus the humans would need to deal with the other natural inhabitants, Jotun, wolves, and Sons of Svanir for example. Oh lets not also forget, that unlike the human gods which fled the world, the Norn spirits still answer their people.

But the Norn also would never go out with an army of their own to conquer the humans.

BrooksP.4318:

It is a shame that they made races homogeneous due to balancing reasons, instead of allowing diversity. Not sure if that fault is from a dev standpoint or a player’s mindset.

What diversity is there in all power classes play Norn, all condi classes play slyvari, all tanks play charr, etc. And if you tried to go “off type”, an Asuran power character, you’d get booted out of a dungeon party or a GvG guild, more so then you get the “zerk exp only” in the LFG already.

What they did is a much better option to not have your cosmetic look (or the first chapter of your story) effect game play in the slightest (why do you think 99% of the racial skills are all rubbish).

I’m happy there’s so little condition immunity for most NPCs.

Things don’t need to “make sense” like they did in gw1. Going back and playing during the 10 year, made me said that I kept seeing “can not bleed, no skin” on most of the enemies in the game.

dietzero.3514:

There will only be a condition ele if Tempest somehow does it. Same with Auramancer, due to the bad trait layout, and the ‘only from weapon skills’ aura sharing trait.

I said the condi ele might come out as an option, they do have 2 traits that can give them extra condi from power and toughness. I was thinking if Soldier’s gear would give a celestial “feel” after the trait changes happened, though the fire trait is in a really bad spot.

And if you listened to the live stream, they said that they were considering auras from all sources not just from weapon skills, thus making an auramancer very viable.

You keep talking about eles like they are the same as other professions. They are not. They have the lowest health and armour, and have to use every single trait point and utility for survival in PvP. NOTHING has indicated this will change. All Anet has done is force 99% of eles to once again spec water/arcane, and drop Evasive Arcana.

I never said they were the same. Every profession has their different mechanic, hp, armor, weapons, traits, and utils that separate them.

Eles have a ton of skills that provide them with utility
Necros have a bit of fear and a 2nd hp bar (which are honestly in a much worse place compared to ele)
Mes have clones and steath
Rangers have range, and a few evades
Thieves have steath and spamable skills
Engis have kit versatility
Guards have high armor, protection and aegis
Wars have high hp/armor and a decent amount of blocks and invuls

And again I point out that you could just go straight up damage, which is also getting a boost with the new traits. You’ll die just as quick as a necro (who doesn’t have an evades or many helpful boons). And you’ll be able to ~2-4 shot a thief, guard, mes, necro. When the new traits come out, you can also go auramancer, or try something new that’s fun.

If you think an ele is only viable with 75% uptime on protection then either you need learn to dodge/try a ranged version or the entire class needs a rework.

Valmir.4590:

I would love to try to find some way to cleanse them from Mordremoth influence

Cleanse them with FIRE! (They deserve their weak willed fate.)

dietzero.3514:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

snip

Your list is pointless. Every class has utlity skills. You also listed some horrible skills, which leads me to believe you just wikied and copied them, without understanding what you were saying.

And no, it is very much unique to Elementalists. Having the lowest health and armour does that.

There will not be a viable PvP build without Arcane and Water, unless Tempest is ridiculous.

I did wiki to make sure I got them all, and I realized that some were trash, but they still provide what you’re asking for baseline: ways to help you survive.

Yes, if you want to be tanky, you will most likely take Arcane and Water (and earth). If you want to be an Auramancer you will most likely take Fie, Water, and Earth (maybe air instead of water if you want to be selfish auramancer, which the Earth trait means you can live without Elemental Attunement). If you want to do the most damage you’ll go Fire, Water, and Air. And I’m sure there may be an attempt at a condi ele, Fire, Earth and ???. It’s called tradeoffs. Kill something quickly and you don’t need to worry about protection, for example. Or go auramancer, it seems to be what the new meta is going to be to finally replace d/d eles.

If you think eles should have 6s of protection (even if it’s just self protection) on a 10s (8s in arcana) cd baseline, I just can’t agree with you. The trait is powerful, if you want it go trait for it. If you don’t want to be in Arcana find other ways to fill the hole (like the plethora of diverse weapon skills eles get or a different trait line) and move on.

The Dragonhunter has some good damage traits, and a high damage long ranger weapon, along with an attempt to add more condi. Overall I love the traits, love the new F1-F3 (still want to hear if F3 will block melee or just ranged, I hope it’s just ranged), and love the new weapon. I think the heal trap is kinda useless. The elite trap is kinda lackluster compared to the Chrono, the only benefit is that if you set it up early you may get it off cd before it goes off. I think they may see some use in Conquest on the points or Stronghold to lock down the center, maybe at stack points in dungeons, but are kinda meh besides that. The traits have nice synergy with themselves, but I think the guard only has access to two other knockbacks (hammer and shield/shield skill on revive). I really see a potential for bigger damage spikes with Big Game Hunter and the lb. Honestly, I really just want to make my guard a spear thrower.

Chrono: Honestly, of the 3 I think they are getting the biggest “this is a direct upgrade trait line”, especially for WvW with the movement minor. So far it is the only one to just gain a class mechanic with a 4th shatter, which can allow double heals (if you take the meh well) or double (or triple with the shatter recharge signet) elites/shatters/utils. Gains access to a double block/phantasm generation, and superior in every way version of Engi shield 5. The wells are are pretty long cd, and the trait for them is weak, but can provide some powerful buffs, I can see having maybe one or two. Plus the elite is just a break bar/stability melter. Also it promotes 3 different mesmer playstyles, clone shattering, interrupts, and phantasms. I really hate my mesmer, so I can’t comment on much besides that though.

Reaper: It will shine in PvE open world to no end. WvW I can see it having it’s place. It may do well in dungeons, but in PvP I don’t think it will be too useful. Perma chill on the aa is really strong. 0 cd spamable high damage skill on <50% hp enemies is crazy, along with the ability to cd every other skill. Perm 12 stacks vuln, pulsing blind, and a 5 man pull. Dang that’s nice. DK, looks like it can keep itself perm going if there’s trash to be killed, has a useful closer with whirl/leap finishers, stability, and a super spike. Also the Reaper can “close” 1200 gap (DK 2 —> GS 5); very useful. Honestly, it makes me think of a Dynasty Warriors muso attack. Able to kill hoards of little guys with no real effort. Shout heal is only “good” vs. 5 targets (compared to consume conditions with 3 of them on you), then it’s half the heal vs. half the cd. Only reason you’d take this is for extra LF or the faster cast time. I’d say 2 shouts are really nice, one is okay for MM, but I think I still may rather have a minion slotted there. The elite is also a nice AoE 2s stun. But I can’t see these getting a lot of use in PvP besides some organized groups, that makes sure the Reaper is always part of a 2v2 or 3v3. The traits are pretty solid (Chilling Nova seems like too short of a duration and/or too small of a radius) and seem like they can augment a coni or power necro, not so much a MM though. But with the other changes to the core necro the Reaper may also be a good life stealer. But even with all these cool things, I’m still really luke warm about the spec. Comparing it to the necro, you can get piercing 4-5k crits in DS from a range of 1,200. Yeah the DK will do a bit more damage, but it will still take 2 hits to kill a light armor, low hp profession, but now you need to be in 170 range. It also seems like it will be heavily countered by an interrupt (thief, mes, or war), high evade (thief, mes, or ranger), or anyone that is good at keep their 600+ distance while using ranged attacks.

TLDR: Of the three I’m most excited to play DH. Least excited to play chronomancer (mostly because I hate my mesmer). I don’t think I’ll stay a reaper on my necro (in PvP) because I feel like the reaper may have gotten the short end of the useful stick with slow melee stuff, in WvW though I may stick with it.

Yeah, I assume they are the “fallen” (not dead) Pact Sylvari or maybe home grown Jungle Sylvari.

I’m loving the spec vids not only because we’re getting lots of juicy info, but also because we get to see a glimpse of the new monsters. I can not wait to fight a brickleback from the chrono reveal.

And the pocket raptors are already making my friend scared.

dietzero.3514:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

dietzero.3514:

One With Air? Uh…

Your friend uses a Lava Tomb troll build in PvP. I use it as well, sometimes. It is hilarious.

Nope, if I recall: Internal Fire? (I know it isn’t lava tomb), Pyromancer’s Alacrity, Pyromancer’s Puissance, Bolt to the Heart, ??, Lightning Rod, and for PvP I think Eath’s Embrace, for WvW sometimes Blasting Staff others Shards of Ice maybe. He enjoys arcane wave and blast.

People can enjoy any build. That does not mean it is comparatively viable. Without Elemental Attunement, an ele explodes.

On the staff an ele has, 1 knockback, 2 interrupt fields, immob, chill, heal, heal and condi cleanse, reflect, an evade, and a blast finsiher (for either might, healing, swiftness, or frost arua).

Having the versatility on the weapon skills frees up what you need to fill on your utils. If you want more defense you can take it, just like other classes have that option to spec for more defense.

If you want protection/defense you can:
Glyph of Elemental Harmony (earth)
Glyph of Elemental Power (earth)
Arcane Shield (block)
Armor of Earth
Mist Form (invuln)
Conjure Earth Shield (which will be getting a buff)
Signet of Earth (Which is 16% less damage in exotic zerker gear)
Use skills that apply blinds or evade skills or skills that let you kite better (chills, immob)

Or you know, just take Elemental Attunement

Any class that doesn’t take any survivability traits, utilts, or both will be blown over by a stiff wind, that isn’t unique to the ele.

scerevisiae.1972:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly

No it’s pretty key actually. EAtt doesn’t change the way you play (the generally accepted test of whether something is a good GM trait), it just makes the class mechanic feel right, and provides the baseline survivability/sustain the class otherwise lacks.

All you’re saying is that the ele needs the protection from that trait. I’ll agree that it kinda sucks being in a grandmaster spot against Evasive Arcana, which I’d say is slightly better (~2k heal with condi cleanse on dodge (plus the other effects, including a blast finisher) vs. perm regen, but you lose the 5s of protection on ~8-10 sec cd if you dance into earth constantly, which is a bit too powerful really). I think all the master level traits in arcane are incredibly bad too, so really Arcana has a bum wrap.

But I can list a bunch of GM traits that do not “change the way you play”. How do any of the Fire GMs “change the way you play”, were you not blasting your fire fields before? Were you not stacking might before? The only argument can be made for wanting to burn your foes more. How does Bountiful Power “change the way you play”, it doesn’t. It’s just a dps buff. Does Diamond Skin really change how you play, other than wanting to stay above 90% hp (which you want anyway if you run scholars runes), and it’s a had counter to some builds and completely useless vs. others. Stone Heart just means you camp earth, I guess good for a condi build, but not really “build defining”. For Ranger’s Marksmanship, all 3 are just a dps boost, but just in different ways, you just pick the one most relevant to your play style, again not build defining. I can go on a lot longer……is your argument that all of those other traits need to be change so they are more “build defining”. [To be fair, some GMs are really awesome, build defining traits, but there are so many that don’t fit the bill.]

By your logic I could quote many other wars saying that Fast Hands, Cleansing Ire, and Dogged March should be made baseline because “every war takes them” (cough). Or that Fast Hands and Cleansing Ire make the “class mechanic feel right.” Guess what, before Cleansing Ire was introduced warrior had no real useful condi cleanse outside of a single build. It would be crazy if they made it baseline, freeing up a spot for wars to take more +damage traits.

All you want is it baseline, so you don’t have to spend a traitline to gain some sustain, like other classes have to.

I’m hoping for Phalanx, Knight, maybe Tactician, or something defensive in nature, (presuming the screen capped F2 skill will be for the offhand, but man I’m still hoping they make it baseline otherwise I will somewhat feel forced to get another burst skill).

No clue what the weapon should be (considering the only physical options are Shortbow, Pistol MH/OF, Dagger MH/OF). Thought I could see Venoms working for either sb or dagger, but neither goes that well with a defensive theme. Survival skills are another option, as some of those function exactly like venoms. But anyway you slice it I want Taunt.

So far of the new conditions (may have missed some):

Slow: Guard, Rev, Chronomancer
Resistance: Rev, War, Reaper
Taunt: Rev(50% uptime), Ranger (pet F2)
Alacrity: Chronomancer

The only options to me that made sense for Taunt would be either a heavy or a high hp profession. We already know Rev’s get it, and the Ranger pet getting it also makes some sense. I was shocked that the guard spec didn’t get it, and before Friday I was laughing to myself thinking “they’re going to give the necro spec Taunt because the devs think they’re punching bags.” Again happy that they didn’t get it either. Of the remaining professions:

Theif: I don’t think so
Druid: That doesn’t really make sense (again outside of their pet getting it)
Tempest: If they give ele’s taunt I may cry, plus nothing about the name Tempest makes me think “hey you come over here and attack this raging storm”

Engi: A potential contender, but I don’t see great synergy with a hammer
War: The more likely candidate

So unless they want taunt to be pretty much a rev only thing, which I would not enjoy, they have to give it to another class. War makes the most sense to make use of it. High amount of blocks and invulns and would supplement some more of the defensive weapons that don’t see much love.

Hell I would love a GM trait for ~600 range AoE taunt on use of block skill. Or just getting taunt some other way, shield F2, a venom/survival skill, a weapon skill, trait for when you use a shout skill (makes the least sense since shouts won’t be a spec thing). Personally, I love the first idea because I would love some might stacking synergy via Shield Master.

Sorry about the build up to the meat of my idea, but I haven’t seen anyone mention this yet and could maybe solve a potential problem with removing attributes from traits.

So, I was thinking about what would be included in the Fractal Mastery line. I vaguely remember them talking about increased rewards, to me that means either extra MF in fractals (kinda meh) or a collection hunt (like a smaller version of the precursor hunt) for each fractal skin or maybe for some ascended armor or new infusions. Another idea was “free” passive AR this way you didn’t have to worry about +10 AR infusions or extra ascended armor for alts. They’ve also said we would be getting new infusion types in the futures.

Combine those last ideas, free AR with some new infusion types, and that opens up possibilities.

What about +Boon duration and +Condi duration infusions. We have 14 infusion slots (6 armor, 6 trinkets, 2 weapons), give it +2% per infusion and we could have the option of getting back our 30% boon or condi duration. Unless Anet plans on making extra runes or gear sets that have these stats it’d be a decent way to include them back to players who want them. To fit into the Mastery line, just have it unlock a vendor from Dessa that lets us buy some purified insatiability to bring with us.

Thoughts?

Not a bad idea, but there are just a couple of problems that would need to be addressed. For effectiveness, it’s hard to say what is 100/75/50% of baseline. If something just gives base boons/conditions you can just reduce the duration, easy enough. Would you also reduce the stacks of boons too though?

Warrior shout healing: does it gives less healing further out (I’d assume so, so that’s doable). Same goes for the Ranger shout trait, but this trait has it’s own, smaller range, should it be increased as well?
Guards shout condi —> boon: How do you change that to make it less effective? Removing 25 stacks of bleeds from someone 1200 units away is really strong, even if it only gave them 50% duration of vigor. Same goes for the runes.

Not saying I don’t like the idea, but it may be stronger than you realize.

Honestly the DH bow is much more comparable to the Ranger bow. As others have stated the War bow is about hybrid utility. Ranger is about straight up damage and mild control, and DH is in about the same boat.

Also OP, go back and look at the DH lb 5, it (currently) has a 60 sec cd, and those barriers can most likely just be walked through with stability.

My only sad point is:
DH arrows pierce by default (and have annoying anti-melee kb, but Big Game Hunter is just better so I doubt it will see too much use, but it does have passive +10% ranged damage and +10% crippled dam)

Ranger arrows pierce with a trait (that also increases attack speed by 10% and cd by 20%, but they lose 10% damage vs. impaired movement). Btw, that trait reduces the ranger rapid shot cd to 4.8 sec vs. DH 4, but it also is designed to get around blind, Aegis, and dodges more, plus gets a lot more out of combo fields, plus with the Quick Draw you could have the CD be 0.84 sec.

Warriors get: 20% cd and burning on the AA, which I can’t wait to use btw, but…..

Compare the traits and it does feel a little like warriors are left out. Without seeing how burning is going to work with stacks (both damage and scaling) I can’t tell if it’s lacking or not. In WvW with the anti condi runes and food it already feels like condi’s run out too quick, and there has been no mention of what’s happening with +condi/boon duration from trait lines, so 1s of burn will do hardly any damage with the partial tick. On paper I’d still like something. Maybe increased projectile speed, so you can hit with the #3 better, maybe just faster attack speed so it’s easier to actually pin down someone with the trait. But if we get to some crazy burn stacks my war should be happy with that.

Also, as you pointed out the stat difference isn’t that big. If I recall it was ~20% dps increase for full zerker, ~14% for soldiers, and ~5% (direct damage, all from weapon strength) for condi. And most of those stats come of the trinkets, which is laurels, WvW badges, and fractals. The armor itself gives a pittance of the actual increase, outside of the extra armor value.

I remember I took the slow/cheap way of crafting the 1/day 450 ecto refinement recipes for a month or more each to get mostly to 475 on each of the 6 crafting professions, because there was no reason to rush it. There still isn’t.

Anet has said that they were unhappy with how easy it was (and surprised at how quickly everyone got) to get exotics, thus ascended gear. They wanted it to be “hard” (time gated) to get. I believe they also said that they also had no plans on introducing a higher level gear at the time (not “ever”, just for the immediate future).

If you want alternatives, anet also has those.

While very random (and not a good option), I have gotten ~6-8 ascended armor chests (of usually random types) and about ~4-6 ascended weapon chests (again of pretty random types). I think most of them were from the WvW bonus chests and PvP, but I can’t remember anymore.

A better option to get 2 chests of chooseable ascended armor comes from achievements. I think it was the Ambirite weapons collection and the Bioluminescent armor collection (which in doing will get you some unique ascended trinkets, I think nomad’s and sinister), so if you feel that it isn’t worth farming the gold you can do a ton of PvP for the ambirite fossils and geodes or do Season 2 and silverwastes a bunch and get the more expensive chest and legs for “free”. Though, this will take longer than just doing ~10-14 dungeons in 2-3 days or farming the silverwastes for 2-3 days for money and just buying what you want outright.

Honestly, most of the things in the game that you think you need, really aren’t necessary, and once you get them you go “huh, now what?” Either way, as most people will say, you can do most content in this game in Masterwork gear, so exotic armor is fine for alts or not your main build.

BrotherBelial.3094:

Albadaran.1283:

Hmmm, but isn’t this expansion only? I mean, vanilla players won’t get expansion skills, so not everything can change in the core game…

Not all masteries are only for HoT, there will be some for the core game. What they are we do not know.

Actually, we know 2 of the lines. Precursor crafting and a fractal line. I really hope there’s more on top of that, but you’re comment is a bit misleading. If you do not have HoT you can earn mastery points in the core game, but you will NOT be able to spend them on mastery lines or train the masteries to gain any benefits.

So yes, there will be masteries in the core game, but people who do not own HoT will gain no benefit outside of saving some time (earning core game Mastery Points) until they purchase HoT.

dietzero.3514:

One With Air? Uh…

Your friend uses a Lava Tomb troll build in PvP. I use it as well, sometimes. It is hilarious.

Nope, if I recall: Internal Fire? (I know it isn’t lava tomb), Pyromancer’s Alacrity, Pyromancer’s Puissance, Bolt to the Heart, ??, Lightning Rod, and for PvP I think Eath’s Embrace, for WvW sometimes Blasting Staff others Shards of Ice maybe. He enjoys arcane wave and blast.

Just as a preface, I only have ~120 games in PvP and ~200 hours on my ele. All of the time in PvP has been on a cele staff 6 in water and arcana, with a healer/bunker style gameplay. I think this sugesstion is just silly borderline stupid (OP) along with some of the suggestions I’ve seen for traits other warriors want to make baseline or near baseline (make dogged march minor, or fast hands baseline).

Yes I use Elemental Attunement, at first it was because I wanted more swiftness in PvE and because I always tried to max out the profession mechanic line of each of my alts. I kept it because well there really isn’t any other Master trait that I liked. As others have pointed out the only reason you want this baseline is because of the protection. The 1-2 stacks of might you get in fire is pretty meh, and the regen isn’t that great either, outside of great synergy with Cleansing Water. If you’re using Sig of Air or have One with Air the swiftness isn’t as important either. The regen is nice when stacked with other healing abilities, but really the protection is all you care about. Your argument of “everyone takes it, so it should be made baseline” is just silly, by that logic some would said that warriors should have cleansing ire, fast hands, and dogged march baseline (and of those 3 I only use CI). My war has never gone more than Adapt level into discipline for sig mastery and I’ve loved every 4,000+ hour on him.

On the “but it what makes the class feel right” I’ll say this. My friend mains a zerker staff ele, in PvP, WvW, and PvE. He goes 6 into fire and air, and has never once used Evasive Arcana or Elemental Attunement, nor does he feel the need to. Plus he’s already decided to go into water (for the damage traits) or maybe replace air for tempest if it strikes his fancy, but he’d hate to give up lightening rod. He doesn’t like the stuff in arcana and he’s done just fine for his life as an ele. And as he puts it, he’s gotten really good at dodging.

The only complaint I have is that we have to choose between Attunement and Evasive Arcana, which is a tough choice. I like Attunement more, but Evasive Arcana is more useful, so my ele will need to decide when the time comes. If they want to make Attunement more competitive they should mess with the numbers a bit and maybe increase the might stacks and/or maybe give water a small duration resistance instead of regen (though that’ll compete a bit against Diamond Skin). Plus all the master level traits kinda suck imo, I’ll most likely just take Elemental Contingency shrug, but then again I do get to get the entirety of earth to make up for it.

Link.6157:

Can’t we get SAB as a little compensation for the waiting? I can see no harm in opening it tbh.

Short answer: It’s broken, so no.

Longer answer: They’ve said that they had to jury rig a lot of things to get SAB working the first two times, and since then those shortcuts they took don’t work anymore. So SAB would require a lot more effort on their parts to bring back, thus it isn’t happening any time soon.

I really was sad/shocked when the three LS teams that were rotating content out to us ended up disappearing (most likely to work on HoT) at the end of Season 2. Plus the desire to have HoT pick up right where Season 2 left off. From a story point it makes sense, from a real life having to wait 8-10 months it makes me sad.

I’d love for a return of Dragon Bash, I love that song and still sing it from time to time. And it wouldn’t hurt it it came with an item that can eat dragonite ore to try to deal with the ~20k+ I have sitting on alts (and yes I already have 245 bricks ingots).

All that being said, when they first announced it I was already planning how they could fill the time with info between now (Jan) and release. Then around March (maybe April) the info started slowing down. They could still have HoT by late Aug, but it’s looking like it will take longer, especially if they want to add in the new trait changes/break bar/etc. before hand.

After this week we still have:

5 weeks: 5 more base professions elite specializations to discusses.

1 week: Potentially another week for the Rev to show us the other trait lines, 2-3 other legends, and weapons.

1 Week: The Rev’s elite specializations.

1 Week: Guild halls. How do we earn/build them. Why would we want to other than a hang out spot? How hard will it be for small guilds? How much can we customize them? We know pretty much nothing about them.

1 Week: “Challenging group content”. What does that entail in detail? Fractals/dungeons/raid bosses/world bosses/instances?

1-2 Weeks of revisiting the trait system. Maybe go over everything for a potential feature pack like update.

1-3 Weeks: “Other” PvE stuff. New armor/weapon skins, new legendaries (how do we get those and their precursors?), new collections, Activities and their rewards, etc.

0-1 Weeks: More indepth look at the WvW map.

0-1 Weeks: Showcase another map or another biome.

0-1 Weeks: Showcase more masteries besides gliding, mushroom jumping, and an overview of precursor crafting? I’d love to learn more about the lore ones. Or just do a more indepth look gaining them. “X content in the core game will retroactively give them, so go ahead and get started earning those core Tyria MP” perhaps.

0-2 Weeks of potential recaps.

0-5 Weeks (doubt this would stop their other news flow, unless they changed the info to be about it directly, so those not involved could get a look see) of Closed/Open beta for PvE, Closed/Open? beta of WvW, another look at Stronghold.

So I’d argue minimum 11 more weeks of heavy content. That brings us to late July-early Aug with no breaks. Plus they could have some “filler” weeks (I use the term filler here loosely, I liked learning about the frogs, but just not after such a long dry spell.): who are the Exalted? How are things going to progress after HoT is released, start date for Living World Season 3? Of course this is also assuming that things won’t pick up when we’re closer to release date, but I think it did for the core game. I could see them dropping big things on us every day for a week or two like they did with the Feature Pack 2 towards the end.

Either way, I’m still hopeful for a late Aug release, and maybe a late June trait revamp.

BrooksP.4318:

Wallace MacBix.2089:

snip

I really hope they are much further indev then what you assume or what they have shown. What you listed would imply that they really don’t have much at all done, outside of concept and outline. If so and with specializations being one of the core aspects of HoT, it would mean A LONG time before it is released. Considering how long HoT has been talked about being indev.

Oh I also forgot from the list.

Decide what they want to do about the cost of SP items (ie make things cheaper or more expensive).
Decide if they want to make SP (whatever the new wallet item will be called) easier or harder to earn
Convert everything in the game that gives SP to give the new currency or at least have them removed from the loot tables.
————————————————

Well, I’m just going by what they showed/told us and a bit of assumption. For the engi, they may have had more unstable builds that they weren’t confident enough to show us for one reason or another, so we got the powerpoint.

And because I can’t remember if I said this, and if I did to emphasis it, I greatly appreciate what Anet did. It was awesome to see stuff in the development phase and get excited to plan new builds. Anything that comes off as negative is just me sad that we can’t get this tomorrow.

Also, I may be a bit misleading, just because the OP expected us to get these traits after ~2-3 weeks. All the stuff I list is not done by the same people, so the work is being done in parallel. Now I don’t think we have any knowledge of who’s working on what at Anet outside of what we’ve seen on Ready Up and POI. So those designers could also be working on HoT work besides just the new traits. Plus some things listed are decisions you can make after an hour or two meeting.

But from what I recall, they showed 3? (head?) designers for the 8 classes (and I wouldn’t be surprised if there were 3-5 people working as a group on 3 classes with different people being in charge of a different profession, using made up numbers because I’ve seen ~300 Anet employes thrown around on the forums before). So the number crunching/balancing work total can be “cut by 3”. The artists are completely different people, and the designers of the UI/layout could be completely unrelated as well. The coders behind the HP system and the new wallet could be unrelated to each other, and/or unrelated to the profession people. Etc.

Did you actually watch the live stream? The community, at that time, was asking for some sort of information about what was going on, we had ~3-4 weeks of light “fluff” pieces and recaps. Anet answered our pleas and showed us a lot of stuff that was rough around the edges and still has a lot of work to do.

They still have to:

Artwork for all of the traits
Artwork for the UI of each of the core specializations
Artwork for the UI of each of the branch of skills
Take any feedback they deem appropriate that we’ve given
Apply all the changes they’ve mentioned for our weapon/utility/heal/elite skills
Balance the heck out of the numbers
Test everything to make sure it’s not broken
And do that for each of the 8 professions.
Then change all skill points to hero points
Decide the set in stone number for HP to max everything
Remove skill points from our Hero Panel
Have us loose all skills and gain the correct amount of HP
Gain the correct amount of the new unnamed wallet Mystic Forge currency
Expand the wallet so it can fit the new item (and I assume they’ll also add other currencies at this time, geodes and bandit crests please! and place holders for anything new with HoT)
Decide if they want to change how any number is calculated, for example precision is going up to 1000, do they just want to increase the baseline crit chance of all players, or will they redo the formula so even with 1k precision we still just have a 4% crit chance.
Figure out if they want to do anything with condi duration and boon duration that is being removed from trait lines.
And I’m sure I’m missing stuff….

On top of that, the engi stuff wasn’t even in a state to show us in the game, just via a powerpoint, which had about 4-6 TBD traits or just “general idea” traits. Plus they said that they’d show us their work again at a later date before it goes live so they can get some final feedback/number balancing.

Don’t assume that we’re getting this for a couple of months. Maybe 1-2 months before HoT launches. Just enough time for most of us to play around with builds, and get new gear if we want it.

Heck, it all could be combined into a 3rd feature pack. Defiance changes, expanded wallet, hero points, new trait system, please some other QoL features (tonics and toys? in the hero tab like finishers), etc.

inocencio.1734:

I hope they will patch Core Specializations in few days cause player want something new and need to prepare new gear.

I wouldn’t plan on it any time soon (in the next month or two). Remember the four hour livestream, (which many of us are greatful for Anet)? They still said they needed to do a lot of artwork, for the trait pictures and for skill learning, and still come up with ~4-6 engi traits, test a lot of numbers, etc. They also said after they worked on it and got it into a more solid place that they’d show us it again. So I figure that won’t be for another month or two, could also be inbetween the 2nd and 3rd groups of elite spec (assuming 3 per group if Tentonhammer was correct) showings to help fill the gap. So I doubt it is coming anytime soon.

You can look at that_shaman’s (and Dufly’s?) trait spec if you wish to plan your build now with what we know about the traits. But remember that the numbers and even the traits themselves are subject to change.

Considering the beta portal drops either stopped Sunday night or Friday (all they said was that last weekend would be the last weekend, not the last day). So portal drops could still be going on.

Also, this is what so many of you wanted. This is what happens with an xpac; you get months of nothing to do. We could have been fishing up LW: Season 3 by now. We’ve had no real content update since Jan. And technically, I don’t consider a beta “content”, as it’s only for select players, for a limited time with the intent to test their new stuff, plus you don’t keep anything that you get while playing.

We’ve had:
2 weeks of an old mini game, with 2 new back items, a reskin of WvW and DR (why is everything so bloody human centric, I miss the first Wintersday when they visited every racial city), and some firework items (which only provided a temp magic find buff)
A very, very long PvP tourney (I bet they’ll do a WvW soon too, to pass another ~5-8 weeks)

The only way we are getting any new content is if they decide to release the things that will be “free” when HoT comes out. Meaning, Stronghold will come out when it’s ready, instead of waiting for HoT launch. Same with the new WvW borderland. Most people assume that we’re getting HoT with the 3rd year anniversary in late Aug, so you’ve still got a bunch of months with nothing new. I just hope that HoT is actually worth the wait (and the cost) compared to what we could have had if they kept up with LS releases every 2-4 weeks for free.

The only reason I plan to use the new elite spec is if hopefully both of these things happen.

1) They get access to taunt. Currently only ranger F2 can get traited for taunt of the core 8, with Rev getting 50% uptime on it. Since the Dragon Hunter didn’t get it (kinda shocked about that) war is the only one left that makes sense. [Though we’ll see by the end of the week, in the back of my head I bet they gave it to the necro spec because they feel that necro’s jobs are to take a punch].

2) It is the only way to get access to the F2 that was screen caped (assuming I like the skill). Maybe give the shield a 1/2/3 sec block with AoE taunt (work amazingly well with the combined shield master trait).

My current build got shrunk into two trait lines, so I’m just picking up an entire new line and getting stronger (or picking the spec if it turns out to be better), either way I don’t think any weapon would make me want to switch from my current s/sh & lb set up.

latinkuro.7304:

lordkrall.7241:

In fact this was probably the safest way to do it, because coding something that shuts off the drop after you got it the first time could lead to very dangerous bugs.

oh you mean like what is happening now with people getting as many as 8 portals ! (sarcasm)

Good job, not understanding what he said and just repeating yourself.

Sure, some may say it doesn’t affect anyone else, (sarcasm they prob already have their portal)

You mean how Gaile has confirmed it (I think at least twice), and it’s how all other loot in the game works (besides, again basic probability)?

But all this [censored] aside my point is this:

A very minuscule percentage of people getting 8 copies of an item so many are after with such a low probability of dropping seems to indicate a very LARGE issue with a.net RNG systems.

Now come and tell me it is working as intended !!!

Yes, that’s exactly how random distributions work. Guess what, there’s a chance that someone grinded without sleep and still wouldn’t get one, and a chance that someone can get it after 5min on their first kill. And with the tens of thousands of players we have, both are bound to happen multiple times; same as people getting more than one stone.

Just playing devil’s advocate here, but what if they DID make a boo boo with the code that suppose to make sure people only got 1 portal, and instead what the code does is keep giving them portal after portal ?

To go along with your ill conceived notion. If that was the case, on day 2-3 when someone reported that they got 2+ stones, they would have “quickly” resolved the issue. There is no benefit to them having less people in the beta. And as people have pointed out numerous times, in numerous threads there is absolutely no reason for them to have coded it the way you wanted them to other than to placate yourself. It is extra work for no benefit. Why do you think they have a vendor value instead of some item you “consume” to have your account flagged? They planned for people to get more than one of them and gave them a value so you get a tiny bonus (25s) for getting another one to drop. Where in this game does one person getting loot change another person’s chances of getting the same thing, it doesn’t exist.

Please go learn about basic probability before you say that things can’t possibly be working as intended. For example, there was a thread years ago during Dragon Bash of some guy dropping $100 on the gem store dragon coffers to try to get a skin or something and failing. He cried outrage over it, because he didn’t understand basic odds and was willing to dump money on something 1-2 hours old without thinking about it.

Anet is monitoring the drop rates, because after the first day they increased the odds of them dropping. They most likely have a target number of accounts they want to have beta access via portal drops, and plan to fill the rest with the newsletter subs.

Also, they flag accounts, not the number of portal drops. One person getting 2+ stones does not take a spot from another player.

If you flip a coin twice. The first flip has no effect on the outcome of the second. It’s the same here. Also this is the 3rd-6th thread about the same topic from people who don’t understand probability.

Knighthonor.4061:

Engineer Drones are Minions type,

You think?

Could be. I initially thought it was just going to be a trait for allow for mobile turrets. But I wonder what they are going to be now, minions could be a valid sub-type. I was thinking something between the guard’s Spirit Weapons and ele’s Conjurations.

They could be more defensive in nature compared to the offensive turrets, but that doesn’t sound like something a lot of people would like to have. I heard another suggestion of them being mobile mines/bombs, but I wouldn’t be too happy with that myself.

Knighthonor.4061:

nacario.9417:

They said all specs are meant to be on par. Tbh I wish they’d call it something else than “elite” spec as it sounds as if its the better spec.

it is better than a normal spec. it just has a trade off that balancing it out.

What is that trade out? I’m pretty sure we’ve been told that the spec isn’t losing anything that the base class has. It’s just getting added to.

A mesmer loses nothing (besides from the 3rd trait line) to gain an F5 and access to a cool down decreasing effect that can be shared with a party. They can still run most of their normal build, just change a utility, and they gain a lot more versatility. If each spec gets something as cool as alacrity why would we want to be our base class?

Build’s that focus on 2 trait lines only need to decide do they want a 3rd core line or to become the specialization and potentially gain a lot more. My zerker ele friend is happy to go into Fire, Water, Air. But he’d happily lose Lighting Rod if it gets him an F5 for becoming a tempest. With my War build, I can recreate 90-95% of what I have now with just 2 trait lines. So, I only need to compare the warrior spec to one of the new lines, and I’m getting stronger, and if I’m forced into the spec to get an F2, it’s kind of a no brainer.

Well what we know

Ranger’s spec is called Druid
Ele’s spec is called Tempest (was confirmed on the AMA)
Mes’s spec is called Chronomancer

Necro’s get a greatsword
Druid’s get a staff
Engi’s get a hammer
Chronomancer get shields and wells
One spec gets shouts
One spec gets traps

What we assume from dataminers/freeze framers
Tempest get’s sword (really hope they get pistols instead)
Guards are getting a bow
Thieves are getting a riffle???

Personally I’d love if there were “magical traps.” I really thought the chronomancer was going to get some kind of “time trap”, but we learned that they get wells instead. So I’d like the Tempest to get traps, but I assume it’ll go to engi’s.

For shouts, I think the necro spec will get them. There aren’t really other options that make sense (ele, engi, thief, rev). Though I do love the silly idea of a Thief getting a “I’m flanking you” shout, that makes them revealed and taunts someone.

I assume Tempests are gonna get an F5, maybe a focus on CC/control.

As for the warrior getting an F2, I know they didn’t mention anything about it, but I hope if it does get added, it goes for the base class (like how engi’s are getting an elite tool belt skill).

As for traits, I think we can assume 3-4 of the 9 traits for each spec. One will give the new weapon reduced cd and maybe another bonus. Another will do the same for the new line of utilities. A 3rd trait will most likely affect the new/shifted profession mechanic (maybe longer time for the chronomancer to time shift, or if they are at more hp when they have to revert they keep 50% of the difference). The last trait really depends how complicated Anet wants to get with the sepcs. If each profession gets a specific status effect (they didn’t call alacrity a boon), there will be at least 1 trait involving it.

For guessing the new line of utilities it comes down to will they pull from the existing types or add new ones.

I could see Druid’s getting either Glyphs or Symbol skills.
Necro’s getting Shouts (maybe necrotic Traps).
Engi’s getting Traps (obvious) or maybe something new, that involves those moveable turrets we saw in the vid.
Tempest’s getting elemental Traps (maybe Shouts).

And without names it’s really too hard to speculate further for me.

EnergySlam.2793:

Keep in mind we don’t know the numbers and exact traits yet. It might be underwhelming. Also consider that the shield has no phantasm + you trade in your focus interrupt/reflects.

New spec looks really, really cool though. I hope they don’t make the others boring compared to the mesmer.

The thing is though, you can be a chronomancer and still use a focus (no word on elite specs losing anything from the core class, other than the 3rd trait line). To be a chronomancer and gain access to F5 all yo need to do is lose a trait line, you can run your build exactly the same otherwise (plus whatever new traits you pick up) and still be your old mesmer, but (most likely) better.

They also still have several Engi traits that are TBD (or at least were not in any state to show us). And they said that they would have another session (though less than 4.5 hours) with us before they shipped the new trait system, so until you hear that they aren’t doing that just wait until we get version 2.

What? How can it go both ways?

It means that if you gain beta access to any event, it doesn’t exclude you (or include you) from any other beta event. You have just as much chance to get into the next beta as anyone else. (this way people from the stress test aren’t automatically precluded from an actual beta event)

I can’t wait to get my hands on this new shield trait. I’ve always used the CD one, so getting access to reflects and might stacking makes me very happy. With Cleansing Ire I’ve never felt too pressured to have Dogged March to begin with. Plus, the incoming Resistance to Healing Sig and the mending trait buff, I see no loss here.

runeblade.7514:

Cleansing Ire should have been a minor trait.

The other two master traits will never be able to compete with Cleansing Ire unless there is a massive power creep.

It’s too strong to be a minor trait. But I agree, Cull the Weak is gonna need a buff to be competitive, Last Stand can be good (if you go for a different condi cleanse route, and it seems wars are getting a bit better there, Resistance on Healing Sig and increasing Mending via traits, for example), but they said they were thinking about removing the vigor, which may make it not as useful to take.

FrozenChinchilla.5249:

rotten.9753:

I wonder what’s the point of tomes then, if you already have the maximum numbers of characters or simply don’t want to create another one.

To level up new characters.
Probably 99.99% of the player base doesn’t have 8 lvl 80 characters.

I’d say a large portion (maybe not majority) do. Considering it is so easy to level, I don’t understand. Not using tomes, I’ve seen people get to 80 in 3-4 days, when the game first out it took me ~1 month or so to get to 80. The only negative changes to hurt leveling since then have been the trait scavenger hunt and bumping grandmaster traits from 60 to 80. It is not hard in this game to level, even without tomes: 20 events = 1 level (including WvW and EotM), 1 dungeon ~= 70% of a level, map completion gives X% of a level that I can’t remember. Plus tomes are super easy to get now thanks to PvP. I’ve already used over a stack and still have a spare one (plus almost 2 stacks of writs).

If I recall they said (paraphrase), “tomes will still do what tomes do now” and I’ve seen somewhere else quoted “tomes and writs will not contribute towards the mastery track because it doesn’t use EXP”. My assumption of those two combined things is that whatever the new “level” mechanic post 80 will now apply to tomes. I thought this would just be more mystic forge currency, otherwise they kinda are screwing over 2 groups of people; those without HoT and those who have used all their Mastery Points/trained all their Masteries and don’t have one “equipped” to level. Besides if they makes tomes useless post-80, you can just throw it on the pile of (mostly) useless things the game gives that only have very niche uses (instant repair canisters, most boosters, etc.)

Besides if the whole point of HoT is to give us content post-80 (all masteries and the new maps), why make a change that makes tomes and writs, which are both given out like candy, useless post-80.