Guild Wars 2

peasant.8926:

Do you read the last chapter of a book and nothing else but the last chapter? It’s sort of like that.

However, I agree that it kind of stinks. Only because doing story mode in dungeons more than once gives you absolutely nothing.

I was on the second to last story mission when a pug opportunity to do the dungeon came up. There was no indication that doing it at that point would not give credit for the personal story. Had I known, I would not have wasted 4 hours doing something that was designed to be done once and I now have to do again. If I’m not supposed to read the last chapter of the book whenever I want (and all the other dungeons are like that) then why does the book let me do it only to pretend that I didn’t afterwards? All I want is for them to warn people somehow that this dungeon has a different relationship to the personal story than all the others – either by making the story mode unavailable to people at the wrong stage of the personal story or at least putting some warning in the text somewhere.

As as aside, since that run I have never seen another group for Arah story at all, including within my guild. Nobody wants to do story mode dungeons at all now, and its only month 3 of the game.

This is not a situation unique to the Charr. For a game otherwise so lovingly crafted its really strange how the story stuff feels like it needed another round of voice acting and 2-3 months of hard work before release.

Still wish the characters would stab with the scepter and shoot beams of light at people instead of lobbing glowing tennis balls gently to them but other than that, yeah, agree completely.

Every class can solo without any problems, really.

kingslayer.1342:

They won’t answer that.

But I agree with you that there should be some kind of warning, or have Arah locked until you either finish Source of Orr or do all the previous dungeons before that. It’s so simple, and really strange for a game so heavily focused on immersion to have such immersion-breaking mechanics.

Yeah, I know, I don’t mind if they don’t answer me, I just hope they do as you suggest.

1) Tailor for armour and artificer/weaponsmith for weapons would cover you pretty well though really the only ones to avoid would be leather worker, armoursmith and huntsman.
2) Artificer and Cook are the only ones likely to make much money long term since they produce consumables but really, no crafting makes any money to speak of.
3) Start whenever you want, leveling crafting to 400 is a good source of xp, the first guy to legitimately get to 80 in this game went from lvl 60 to 80 by crafting.

1. Mutually exclusive high level recipes – You can choose to craft this amazing item OR that one but you cant get both. Cuts down the overabundance of supply a little by individualizing every crafter. No two lvl 400 crafters should be the same.
2. More consumables for every class esp high level ones that you cant get anywhere else – Increases the amount of items for which there will be long term demand.
3. Legendary Armour – So we can throw armor pieces into that bottomless pit too.
4. Rare materials as well as exotics dropping in dungeons. Give people more reason to do them and drops the price of raw materials a bit.
5. Crafting being about xp up to lvl 80/400 is good but its not much use after that. It has to be either gold or the ability to make something nobody else/few people can. See point 1.

Why is there no warning of this if you enter the story mode before you have that personal story quest active?

You want to see someone elses gear? Ask them to link it.

Terazeal.1976:

Wow. I thought the dredge were actually unique and interesting and it turns out that they’re simply another case of the game ripping off reality. Great.

Everything you think is unique and interesting is simply another case of something ripping of something else. Ever.

nosleepdemon.1368:

Thankfully their awful personalities are kept mostly out of your personal story missions. Eir is really the only likeable and halfway sensible character of all of them. You can catch up on their inane squabbles and hissy fits by doing the dungeons, although I’d personally find discussing the meaning of life with a Murloc more fulfilling.

Caithe isn’t bad either.

When I was first told about the Arah dungeon I assumed that completing it was simply a perquisite for the last story mission where you would have a personal instance involving going in on the ground and finding the last remnants of Zhaitan after he fell and making kitten sure he is finally dead. To my mind this made a lot of sense, in the dungeon you fight and defeat Zhaitan and send him crashing to the ground, then in your last personal story mission you go in and finish him off for good.

Given how well thought out 90% of this game is it never occurred to me that they would just tack the last story mission onto the dungeon AND set it up so you have to do the dungeon at the right point in the story to get credit for it AND not tell you this. The whole setup of the last story/dungeon is flawed in just about every element of the design.

FYI Blossom targeting has been fixed and they have been made bigger too for ease of targeting. I used to hate those things but now they are working as intended I really like them in TA. They can be a danger if you are inexperienced but very useful if you know what you are doing and they add a bit of flavour to the dungeon which is very welcome. I think a lot of the problems with explorable dungeons is they don’t feel as polished and immersive as general PVE. More dialogue and environmental features and interesting characters to meet (including bad guys) would be great changes. Cosmetic, but don’t underestimate the value of good presentation in the having of fun.

Aireroth.7596:

I understand your point. Story modes are a bit lacking, especially if doing them more than once.
I also apologize, as I didn’t consider the bug part that may stop story progression and mistook it for lack of interest in it (people rushing to 80 skipping everything).

Regarding story mode dungeons, I’ve done quite a few of them multiple times, mainly to help guildies out with it. Yes, it might not be as beneficial for me, but the feeling you get when you help someone out is worth it.

Anyway, I can imagine re-designing this would not really be worth the cost and this topic can serve the informative purpose for people who haven’t reached that part of the game yet.

I was just about to start the second to last story mission when a pug became available for the dungeon and, very happy with my good luck, I jumped in thinking I could do that first and then finish of the rest of my personal story without having to find another group later. 4 hours later when I discovered that for being one mission short in the personal story I would have to do it all again I was not impressed.

Like you say the dungeons are not closely linked to the personal story, but despite the Arah dungeon being different in this respect there is no indication of this in the game. When you hit 80 in game Arah becomes available to your character same as all the other dungeons and the in game email sent to you makes no reference to being at the right stage of the personal story. It woulnt be that hard for them to either make the dungeon unavailable until you finish personal story up to that point or simply add text to the dungeon available message and entering dungeon message to let players know they may want to wait for their personal story to start. They make bigger changes than that in just about every patch. Anything but letting people go in there under the mistaken impression that their killing Zhaitan will count for anything outside of the dungeon.

Its very easy to say just do it again when you haven’t been in this situation because you don’t feel how frustrating it is to think you are achieving something that you are not. I would happily run the dungeon two times if it was to help people out or for loot or whatever reason but I don’t want to do it again just because killing Zhaitan once doesn’t count unless Traherne has done his whatever thingy in the wherever place.

Really really encouraged by the nature and quality of some of the content in this special event esp MK and the clock tower – both big steps up on some of the content in the game as it shipped. As long as the super hard stuff is fun and totally opt in as far as achievements and completion is concerned the more of it the better. Bring on the expansions!

What if the human gods and the pale tree and the great dwarf and the norn spirits are all champions of the eldar dragon of order that oppose all the other great dragons and is known by the Asura as the Eternal Alchemy? We are all dragon minions then, oh noes!!! P

As I understood it once a Sylvari enters the world the link to the pale tree is more about emotions, rather than actual concrete memory. From what Ive read its pretty easy for an indiviual Sylvari to have secrets.

Yeah, perfect transmutation stones are what you want here.

As I understand it Tome of Wrath is really good for keep defense. Might want to give that a try, I’m not experienced myself so I don’t know much beyond that.

I cant imagine any sort of technique to skip animations is not a bug of some sort. I remember reading a developers post about how the damage for different weapons is delivered at various keyframes in the animation, in other words the animation itself determines when and how fast a weapon hits. Since all of the weapon/skill balancing must have taken into account the different animation lengths and times what this technique does, if I understand it correctly, is make a weapon attack/cause effects more frequently than it was designed to. I wouldn’t have a go at anyone using it because its obviously not an easy thing to master and it was very clever to discover its effectiveness in the first place but I would definitely expect it to get fixed at some point.

Vicarious.3047:

i dont know what youre talking about OP…..

i got the last quest, the arah dungeon one, and was waiting for a friend of mine to catch up but go tired of waiting and decided id continue. i warped to the closest wp i had to arah and simply ran up to the gate past the mobs, saw someone saying “LFM ARAH STORY!” i whispered him “ill go, first time,” we entered the dungeon, and i killed a dragon in about 30 mins…..

whats your issue? and i dont think the event beforehand is even necessary for the story, simply to get into the dungeon like most other 70+ dungeons.

Basically you got lucky.

Leonard.2867:

The first three screen shots are of ‘My Build’; an attempt to emulate the attack abilities of my PvE, full Support Guardian. The runes I used are of …Water, …Monk, and Dyawna. I did not add ….Strength because I did not want to give myself more power in the test.

The last three screen shots are of ‘Your Build’.

Cheers for that, very interesting stuff.

What gear did you run the tests in?

Which one didnt you get credit for?

I enjoy helping people.

How is the story step and the story mode of the dungeon different? The story step just tells you to go and do the dungeon. If a player has already done the dungeon and killed Zhaitan why does the game not recognize this?

Or to put the question another way, why is there no warning not to do the Arah story dungeon until you have done the personal story up to that point?

Just FYI the deadly blossoms in TA have been increased in size and the targeting bug has been fixed. With those easier to see and hit it is lot less frustrating to run now.

^This. Filters on the purchase windows same as the crafting window has would be great. I would love to have a filter that removes all the items my character cant use.

Guardian goes really well with the whole Arthurian thing they’ve got going on. Mesmer is another great choice for the whole mystery element.

I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t make those mistakes again. This is the first big even for GW2 and Anet are generally pretty good at learning from their mistakes.

So its power then? (and precision/crit dmg for when it crits)

DIKIY.9507:

guys u r great! i hate puzzle inventor and love u all!

but i have 1 prob. when i jump from the double stick down to the circle i always die. why!?

Are you dying from the fall damage or the green wave engulfing the platform as you land on it? If its the second its the same problem I had for a long time, you’re not fast enough through the first section of the puzzle and need to speed up by a couple of seconds. If you can get off that platform onto the half cog in time then you can take your time to get up to the top.

Great guide, thanks so much for taking the time to make it! You may want to update the description of Renewed Focus at some point since the added mobility it has now is a pretty big buff. I really liked how positive the guide was, seeking to emphasis what works as opposed to complaining about things that don’t but it may be worth adding a section for things to avoid, combinations that lack synergy, useless stat bonuses and so on, just to help people know absolutely what to stay away from and to avoid giving the impression the class is OP.

Also, by the way,

-I can’t switch traits without summoning up vast quantities of gold.

Free rechoice of traits out of combat for any slots that you have unlocked and a grand total of just over 3 silver to completely respec. Oh yeah, that must really hurt your bank balance.

Im not an expert myself but generally speaking at max level the stats from traits are not very significant. You should choose where to put your points based on major traits first, minor traits second and stat bonuses last. In general there are no stat caps in this game and you as a player should be able to perform any role your party needs, your build should reflect that. Practically every (sensible and intelligently synergistic) build is viable. Also, respeccing costs 3 silver at lvl 80 so dont be afraid to experiment. Hopefully some of the more experience guys can give you better advice.

Edelweiss.9815:

Guardians are not Mage Knights. They can’t hurl bolts of lightning and cause earthquakes, they can’t fire magic missiles or polymorf.

Not important at all but interesting to me but don’t you think that’s a very limited definition of mage? Guardians clearly use magic and while a lot of it is protection based there is a lot that isnt either. Scepter and staff are not weapons that associated with standard cleric/paladin concept either. If it combines using magic (of any type) with hitting people with weapons I would say it is some type of fighter/mage class. Guardians and Mesmers both fall into that category.

KnarleyMarley.6937:

Works great in pvp too. I’m running a crit/burn build and I use scepter/torch and GS. It’s unreal.

If you dont mind would you be able to share the build? Im running a similar weapon setup which I love but having a lot of trouble working out good traits and utilities to back it up.

Took me 8 hours on an internet connection from china and a 2 year old laptop. Wouldn’t do it again but loved the whole experience and the payoff from finally completing it.

I do understand though why it is annoying that something like this is available only for a few days. Given how difficult it is for some people, and the completionist nature of MMO gamers in general it would be nice to give people more time to practice and get used to it before hoisting that achievement out of reach for at the least 1 year and at the most ever.

Sylvari Guardian, 80

8 hours nonstop, speedboost for one hour in the middle of it helped me get the hang of the first part but all other attempts without any sort of aid. I refused to stop until I managed it and the satisfaction of completion was immense. Thanks Anet and thanks to the designer of this great puzzle!

PS Located in Shanghai and Playing on a 2 year old Macbook pro. Even with framerate and latency issues it is possible!

AresOnasis.4703:

Okay… First of all, separating the group is tedium? Picking off individual members of a group that would otherwise insta-gib you is tedium? Really?

Yes, it is. Its not a GW2 problem per say but if this is an intended mechanism rather than the unintentional and undesirable side effect of a necessarily simplistic AI then MMO design has gone backwards in the last 10 years. If I am stomping his face into the ground in full view and earshot of his mates and they don’t notice that’s a massive immersion breaker right there and I find this mechanical, vaguely cynical gameplay to be very tedious, even if it does only take a few minutes on account of it being so easy.

AresOnasis.4703:

You can’t complain about a group being too hard, and then say that picking them off is too easy. And then complain that you can’t just rush in and kill them as a group.

Yeah, actually you can. Something being too easy if you do it the right way and too hard if you do it the wrong way is a serious problem that will jade experienced players and alienate newbies. Given their MO to shake up MMO design and their obvious skill at game design I hope Anet stays away from the pull individual mobs from the group as the best approach technique. Its easy and dull and immersion breaking and they can do better.

AresOnasis.4703:

I agree the mechanics need a bit of tweaking, But the original argument was that story mode is too hard and saying that people are bad is a “cop-out”. They then go on to list the Knights as a reason why it is too hard. Then in the very next sentence admit that it is easy.

I have no comment on the original argument expect to point out the threat title makes no mention of difficulty. In terms of difficulty though I do completely agree with you, dungeons are easy. I have run the various story and xp dungeons with many sub-optimal groups including groups with people below the level requirement and have never failed to complete the run. I’m not a great player but I do keep my eyes open and try to figure out the best way to do things. When that way happens to feel artificial or slightly exploity I find it tedious.

AresOnasis.4703:

Do you not see the problem here?

Frankly no, you have failed to convince me. You seem to not only think of easy and difficult in black and white terms but you also seem to view them as a much greater factor in the fun/boring scale than most other people in this thread do. Whether or not something in a game this complicated is easy or difficult is a phenomenally difficult thing to determine and how much that affects enjoyment even more so. I would suggest a little more respect for the opinions of others and a little more awareness of the limits of your own knowledge.

PS To save you from being predictably tedious and replying by saying how little I know as well I will do it for you. I don’t know how to fix dungeons, I don’t know if they are too hard or easy and in general I don’t claim to know much or have any solutions or truths apart from my own personal experience and ideas about design. Based on nothing but my own opinion I disagree with you and am perfectly happy for you to disagree with me. Have a nice day!

AresOnasis.4703:

Individual mobs have cool mechanics – the Knights in TA have a leap-knockdown-flurry combo which is fun to watch for, neutralize, avoid, and position against.
Then they put 3 of them with a boss in TA E.
That. Is. TEDIOUS design. NOT fun, NOT challenging: Tedious.

You can pull them individually, or a couple at a time. You don’t HAVE to fight the entire group at once. This is why people like you are bad. Because you don’t try to separate the enemy group. Any class has the tools to do it.

People should selectively read even less than they should selectively quote. The guy says in the very next sentence of his post that he knows you can pull them individually and that its not hard. You insult him for not being able to do something he states in his post to be quite easy. Did you just not bother to read the rest of it? And by the by, I agree with him. That fight is either A) easy and tedious as you pull them one at a time or impossible if you are stupid enough to try and fight them all at the same time. A happens a lot more than B, in my experience, and its just as much of a problem in terms of gameplay. Slightly less powerful mobs, but ones smart enough not to run back to their original positions while one of their mates gets pounded into dust IN CLEAR VIEW of them would be a lot more fun.

Wish I had known this before I wasted 4 incredibly unenjoyable hours of my leisure time last night. This surely has to be a bug, there is nothing else in the game that punishes you like this for doing things in a slightly different order.

From personal experience, yes, you will have to do it again. I am extremely pissed off about it right now.