Guild Wars 2

I’m surprised Zommoros doesn’t know. If he was around long enough to know about the Karka, he’s certainly been around through more than one Elder Dragon rising.

Perhaps all the deaths in Lion’s Arch from Scarlet’s attack has created pain and suffering on a massive enough scale that it weakened the barrier’s of Thorn’s prison so he can spend more time in Tyria?

“Your punishment for trespassing is deeeeeaaaath!” -thunk-

Glad to see that the greater flexibility players wanted is being added. And thanks for being here and bearing the brunt of the wrath, Gaile. I know it can’t have been easy.

It’s a clever way of farming, and while I do think it seems borderline exploity, I think in the long run this is actually a good thing. Having these balms means that players can farm ToT bags all year around, which means a non-stop supply of Halloween mats and rare goodies.

I do agree that it should be tradeable, yes. However, if not, can you confirm if Gwyn will be back every Halloween so players can keep trying for her, Gaile? (Similar to how you could try farming for the Mini Polar Bear every Wintersday in GW1.)

While the skin is nothing to write home about (although it fits a Necromancer!), the story and the hunt was really fun. Thanks for doing this, John.

Also, Zommoros really is a kitten. :P

Malediktus.9250:

Only the functional value stayed the same. If you can get it for a pocket change now it will loose all meaning to you and to collectors. An item which everyone can have is worthless to collectors. Why do you think some people specialize on lets say 100 year old stamps. The rarity and exclusiveness makes it attractive to them, otherwise they might as well collect recent stamps which are worth nothing because millions are printed of them.
Sentimental value is also destroyed if you had to work much harder for something than everyone else who was too lazy to get it in year 1.

I wrote a ticket to request a refund yesterday, still waiting for a response.

I disagree. I feel that if a collector feels that their collection is “ruined” just because it’s suddenly cheaper or easier to get now, then they weren’t really interested in that item as a collection in the first place. All they wanted was something rare/expensive that only THEY (or a select few) had; a trophy to show off to others as a means of displaying their wealth or status. As soon as that trophy ceases to become a status symbol, they are no longer interested in it.

But all that said, I do sympathise with your loss of the 500 gems, and I do hope you get your refund.

Check out the Strider gem store armor skin.

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Again: different people want different things.

Just release a toggle option, or two separate sets. Everybody would be happy.

It’s not so hard.

This. (It will mean more work for the artists though, so I can understand why ANet just took this route.)

It looks like prices have settled back down from their peak. (Alas for me, since by the time I got back home, I could only sell 100 gems for 12g. Since that’s below my new sell point, I passed on it for now.)

The interesting thing to see is if gem prices have reached a new permanent higher plateau, or whether they’ll fall back to below 100 gems for 10g as it did after the 2nd Anniversary sale.

The ToT bags have chances to drop some really rare and expensive gear (see the Cat necklace, with potential upgrades that can sell for hundreds of gold), but of course, such drops will be extremely rare.

ANet have said they do intend to bring back Season 1 one day, but it’s a long way off with no due date right now. (Maybe they’ll start working on it once Season 2 is complete.)

That’s easy enough. The Priory researchers examining the Marionette remains discover that it’s not destroyed, merely dormant. It possesses advanced self-repair mechanisms (along with its powerful map-wide energy cannon) that they want to research to see if it can be used against the Elder Dragons. So, with the players’ help, they reactivate the Marionette and have them battle it while they collect data.

@Surbrus: Yeah, I know what you mean. But I still don’t think it’s worth the toxicity and hostility that sprang up after a failure. I saw people yelling at low-levels to “get out of the map”, blaming Rangers/Necros for their pets etc. Sometimes they would even single out specific players.

I feel that if the walls came down after the consoles were destroyed, the entire group showing up to Marionette would have to underperform in order for a failure to eventuate. It also allows for better players to feel that they “saved the day” (whether accurate or not). I know that I certainly enjoy the feeling when it’s obvious I’m one of the better players in a dungeon/Fractal/PvP and it’s due to my efforts that the team is succeeding.

Everytime you use one of the consumable 5-use Mad King or Scarecrow finisher items (they drop really often!), it switches your finisher to that. Is that what’s happening?

@Myss: Back in the Box, Upset Stomach and the other story-related achievement do not count towards the meta-achievement. (No idea why, but there it is.) Neither does the Lunatic Inquisition achievement.

Yes, I’ve been meaning to make a post about this! The STITCH golem NPC at the Tailor crafting station near Mariner’s Waypoint is completely missing. It’s not a crucial issue as the Master Tailors at the other two crafting clusters are still there, but it’s annoying since the Mariner cluster is the one I normally go to.

Also, to any devs that see this, there’s a bug where the Master Tailors no longer sell Runes of Holding. Leatherworker and Armorsmith NPCs still do, but the Tailors do not. This is an oversight that should be corrected.

The Gift of Candy Corn was the meta-reward for last year’s Halloween, I believe. It is no longer awarded during this year’s Halloween. However, you can still purchase it from the Laurel Vendor under Season 1 rewards. (It’s pricey though!)

I completed the Back in the Box achievement last night and I was awarded the 2 Candy Cobs correctly. Hope you guys manage to get it sorted. :/

Yeah, I made a post about this on the main forum. Still, it’s extraordinary just how BIG the jump was, and it actually lends strength to the arguments of the players who took offense to the claim that “players who buy gems in quantities below 400 are low”.

Still, latest word is that they are looking at changing the UI and putting in an option to buy/sell custom gem amounts, so let’s put down the torches and pitchforks.

Malediktus.9250:

I already said before. Items have a value beyond their currency value.
I dont give a crap about the currency value of an item. Currency (both ingame and in real life) is just a tool to get what I want to have for me.
There are more values such as sentimental value or collectors value or functional value. And reducing the amount of resources to get an item by around 90% without even accounting for inflation of the required resources definetely also hurts the non currency values.
But I know that economic specialists like John Smith have no clue about things like that. Those people only care about currencies and metrics.

Sentimental/collectors/functional value would remain completely unchanged regardless of how cheap/expensive or common/rare an item is.

Sentimental value means that the item has personal meaning to you. Maybe it was gifted to you by your girlfriend. Maybe it was the first Exotic that you ever found. Maybe it was even because you spent hours farming for it. (Back in GW1, my Icy Dragon Sword fell into this category. Even as time went on and it became more and more common, I never threw it out because I remember the time, after hours of killing Ice Imps, that the sword finally dropped for me.) Sentimental value is not at all affected by an item’s price or rarity.

Likewise, if you’re collecting something, what’s truly important is that the item is part of your collection. The collection is incomplete without it. Even if the item became super easy to get later, it’s STILL part of your collection, so it’s still fulfilling its role.

By functional value, I’m assuming that you’re talking about the intended use for items such as picks etc. If ANet decided to change, say, the Watchwork Pick so that it no longer dropped sprockets (as an economic decision), then yes, you have the right to complain and ask for a refund because the item no longer does the task you bought it for. But if after 5 years ANet decided to slash prices for the Watchwork Pick and reduce it back to 800 gems, and you paid 1000 gems for it, the functional value of the pick is still exactly the same. It still lasts forever, and it still gives you sprockets.

Pixelpumpkin.4608:

Wanze.8410:

People, who trade in those skins, would be able to pick up a box, then a couple of months later be able to choose, which weapon they want (obviously the most expensive one). Not sure, if that is a good change or not.

So all weapon skins of one set would even out in price over time and all be the same price – what’s bad about that? Does a trident HAVE to be cheaper than a greatsword? If that’s the worst that can happen, I completely don’t see the issue.

/Shrugs.

Yeah, you made a good point, Wanze, but I would agree with Pixel here. I think in the end this system would end up bringing greater market equilibrium for Black Lion Weapon skins. Demand is higher, price goes up, speculators/keyfarmers increase the supply to account for the demand, price stabilises.

Weindrasi.3805:

The difference is that the female gaze is not all-encompassing to a male’s identity. Ugly or handsome, sexy or not, a man is still afforded a certain respect by society—and still has respect for himself. Women’s worth, on the other hand, is tied directly to their appearance, and to whether males “approve” of that appearance. Tellingly, most women base their self-concept and self-respect, to some degree, on the male gaze.

The male gaze and the female gaze -SHOULD- have equal effect for both sexes. In a perfect world, they would. But it isn’t a perfect world, nor an equal one. I’m not saying that males aren’t sexualized—they are. What I am saying, is that females are objectified as “things for sex” in a way that males, sexualized or not, aren’t. And that is apparent in the gender disparity between male and female armor—how much is covered, and what is covered.

I agree that attractiveness and “sexiness” go a long way into society deeming a woman’s worth, more than should be reasonable. There should be a broad range of clothing and armor options for both males and females to suit various tastes and preferences. We are in complete agreement about that.

I think I should point out though that for men, society deems their worth via “power”. A weak or powerless man is almost universally derided and mocked; even if they are portrayed as victims, they are usually viewed as being failures for their inability to protect or stand up for themselves, or to achieve their goals. They might be protected or cared for, but in the same way that the children or elderly should be cared for. They are accorded little or no respect and their opinions are usually ignored or brushed aside.

The key difference here between the way society accords men and women status is that while attractiveness is usually fixed, there are many different ways a man can accrue power. It can be physical (such as being a sportsman or athlete), socio-political (politicians, actors/singers), financial (wealthy CEOs and businessmen) or intellectual (scientists, authors).

I say all this not to try and make a point that “men have it tough too!”, but more to say that I think society puts too much emphasis on putting “successful people” (that is, men or women who exemplify power and/or beauty) up on pedestals, and I feel a lot of people are unhappy because they are trying so hard to meet these ideals when they honestly don’t need to. It’s all well and good to strive to better yourself, but you can be a happy, productive person without defining your life’s worth by the (often impossible) standards of society.

As an aside, I believe this is why so many of the MRA activists are so angry. They feel, or view themselves, as falling into this category of weak/failed men. Trouble is, they’ve latched onto women and the feminist/equality as the source of their problems, when actually the root cause is much deeper than that.

Apparently it is a very rare drop from ToT bags.

A Massive Headache.1879:

what would you consider the noise karka make when they move, if not clink?

The same noise that crabs make. A kind of clicking/clattering noise.

Heh, I’m actually considering giving myself another gold infusion. I did promise myself that my next time I’d sell gems would be when I could get 15g per 100 gems. I didn’t expect it to be this soon though!

What are these mobs dropping that’s so valuable? Halloween mats?

I’m not sure that the gem price spike is anything particularly suspicious. It underwent a similar spike back during the 2nd Anniversary sale, and reached similar peaks. This time around, ANet has announced:

1. Chance to get the super rare (and expensive) 2012 Halloween skins again. You can get Foil Wrappers from ToT bags, but if you really, REALLY want to pad your chances, buying Foil Candy in bulk from the gem store is the way to go.

2. New Noble Count outfit, which is almost universally loved, plus the old outfits are back. There is usually a surge of returning players during festivals, who may only now be seeing the Mad King/Witch/Executioner etc. outfits and thus are only buying now.

3. Lovestruck/Fused etc. weapons have been announced to be retiring soon. This may cause a surge in people buying gems for a last chance to gamble for scraps/tickets before they disappear.

Taken altogether, it’s logical that demand for gems would be up.

EDIT: Although, I just checked gw2tp, and wow, it actually shot up to 20g! That IS pretty remarkable, and could indeed be attributed to the currency exchange change.

Someone made a comment about Ectoplasm, which reminded me of something.

One of the karma vendors (I think it’s the one in Godslost Swamp) sells Frozen Ecto, a reference to Wintersday in GW1. Has anyone tried using that in the Forge?

My own feelings about recent game changes notwithstanding, I have to concur with Mark here. The vast majority of cases of players who claim “Your game sucks! I’m quitting!” are usually just people who say that in order to try and inject urgency into their post. In truth, they have no intention of quitting at all; they just think it’ll make their grievances seem more important.

The people who DO quit a game for good because of changes they don’t approve of usually do so quietly. They just stop logging in and never look back.

If he’s been farming the karka for 2 months, then the item he’s after must either be an extremely rare drop (Arthropoda? Crustacea? I sure hope not…) or something that requires a lot of Karka Shells to trade for. The Ancient Karka Shell perhaps? (Obtained for 1000 Karka Shells from a trader near Levvi’s camp.)

Same. I’m more than happy for newer players or players who missed out to have the chance to get the same stuff we did.

I’ve never understood or supported exclusivity; it smacks of a “I want something that you can’t have, just so I can feel superior to you!” stance. To me, that’s a selfish and poisonous attitude which should not be tolerated or encouraged.

The way I look at this, the odds of me winning are about the same as me winning an ACTUAL lottery. So, I’m not going to waste real money (or my gold) buying tickets for it. I’m just going to give the skritt any Foil Wrappers I do get from loot (got 2 from opening ToT bags after an hour of Labyrinth farming for the achievements last night).

If I happen to get a windfall, awesome! If not, it’s not like my life is adversely affected anymore than if that random person who won had instead found Dusk through a super-lucky loot drop from a level 1 Bandit.

The Last Man Standing game mode IS supposed to be weighted towards the Courtiers, with the idea that as more and more ghosts appear, it gets harder and harder for the survivors.

However, I do agree that it could be made a bit more fair to give the Villagers more of a fighting chance. Here’s my suggestions:

1. Mad King Says spam. This is probably the biggest issue. Basically, once a Courtier gets within range of you, a villager is doomed because the Courtier will just spam MKS at you, forcing you to either take the damage, or stop and emote which gives the Courtier enough time to catch up to you and decapitate you.

Solution: If a villager successfully performs the MKS, the COURTIER is the one to take the damage and stun instead. This makes MKS more of a calculated gamble, used when the villager is close enough to get some attacks in and hopefully kill them before they can successfully perform the action.

2. Death Penalties. Currently, if the villagers do manage to kill the Courtier (no easy feat), the Courtier simply respawns in their current spot a few seconds later at full health. This means that no matter what, Courtiers will win in a fight due to attrition.

Solution: When a Courtier is killed, they respawn back at the Mad King’s location. This gives the villager(s) time to retreat, regroup and rearm. Unless the villager is very, VERY skilled, it’s impossible for them to kill a Courtier one on one. If the villagers are smart enough to band together and organise a defense (2 or 3 villagers with hammers while 1 or 2 more use Bones/Torches for stunlock are extremely dangerous), they should be rewarded appropriately. (And even so, considering the massive damage that ghosts do, it’s likely they will still manage to kill at least one villager per attack.)

It’s currently locked while ANet patch an exploit. Just be patient.

Yeah, it’s a bug that needs to be fixed, but the Ghosts are arguably still better for killing villagers. They do incredible damage with their skills, much more than most builds are capable of doing.

To be fair to ANet, they actually listened to us and made the “grind” this year MUCH more bearable. Halloween mats drop like rain in the Labyrinth; requirements for old stuff like the Mini Bloody Prince and the Halloween Pail got massively reduced. (It’s actually worthwhile now to buy the Pail as a cheap 20 slot bag if you need more storage!) I spent just under an hour in the Labyrinth last night and I walked out with more than 1500 Candy Corn, plus loads of other loot.

Finally, you also get 3 Candy Corn Cobs for completing the meta and the story, which is enough to get the Hexed outfit for free if that’s what you like. (And if not, spend it on the aforementioned Halloween Pail or just sell the Cobs.)

The only thing I would change about the Marionette is that once a platform destroys its console, the walls should go down so that they can jump over and assist the neighboring platforms. That way, stronger platforms can assist weaker ones. The old way did have potential issues with players abusing other players who were weaker or more inexperienced.

You’re supposed to pick up Sun Aspect crystals and then target him and Dash into him to break his shield. Watch the Master of Peace on the cliff; he’s the one throwing crystals down to the ground.

If no Sun Aspect crystals are spawning at all, then you may have encountered a new bug.

Yeah, the strategy to beat the Lich is as follows:

1. Pull the Lich inside the house and stack there to avoid aggroing most of his spawned mobs.

2. Mesmers and Necros should bring boon strips and use them whenever they see it up. (Illusionary Disenchanter is great for this!) If the Lich has both Protection AND Regeneration up, when combined with his life steal healing he can outheal even a massive zerg’s damage.

3. Keep Poison on him at all times to reduce his healing.

Interesting… Thanks for the information, Pixel. That would explain why my Regular count was one off last night. Hopefully this bug gets fixed, but in the meantime, to progress the achievement (farming up 50 AP from completing the Activity achievement 10 times), I’ll just suicide ASAP.

I suspect it is a lag/desync issue. Players with lag are able to exit the starting location without the script that switches their build triggering properly.

Yeah, I’d say it’s a lag/desync issue. As Mork says, a telltale sign is whether or not the gears exploding out of the tower at the start do so smoothly. If they jerk or stutter or seem to suddenly appear out of nowhere, you are lagging and will need to compensate for this by jumping earlier than expected.

Last night I had about a 1/2 second lag that I timed based on the gears. Accordingly, once at the top of the tower I jumped even before the lightning had struck the window and I made it in fine.

You ARE meant to be able to repeat the instance. However, it seems that a goof is causing the first-time reward for beating the Bloody Prince every single time. Some people have been quick to exploit this to get lots and lots of Cobs, so the entire instance has been locked down to stop it until they can patch it.

Yes, after learning about this exploit, this is undoubtedly the reason why they locked the instance and stopping others from being able to play the story or complete their achievements. Stupid exploiters ruining things for the rest of us.

OK, so the second item is a “scroll” of some kind. And it sounds like it’s located in a town that’s near a bay. (The mud suggests that it’s an actual bay too, not just a name.)

Aha, right. Considering how easy it is to kill the Bloody Prince in a group, I can now understand why it got temporarily locked. Shame they didn’t tell us what was happening though.

Yes. I will give plenty of kudos to ANet for listening to feedback about rewards this time around. The sinks are not only smaller and easier to access, but they also crucially put the loot drops back into the Labyrinth. ToT bags drop like rain, from what I hear, and the massive supply means that over the course of the two weeks, it should be easy for anyone actively playing to get what they want, either through direct farming or just buying it off the TP. And the large supply means that people who miss Halloween should still be able to buy the items throughout the year, just at a slightly more expensive price.

Indeed. My suggestion to them was that if space is an issue, then restructure the way the skins are given out.

1. Instead of having each separate skin listed there, combine them all into a single Weapon Box (e.g. Fused Weapon Box, Lovestruck Weapon Box). You open the box and you pick the skin you want.

2. Consolidate all the different Weapon Boxes into categories. For example, you can have a “Season 1” category for Fused/Sclerite/Dreamthistle skins, a “Festivals” category for Lovestruck/Halloween/Wintersday skins etc.

You now have saved a lot of space, and you can still keep all the weapon skins permanently available.

Wasn’t there a trick to beating the Lich? Something like spreading out so that his AoE’s heal him for less health due to less targets?

For extra hilarity, if you see a player trying to kill Svanir/Chieftain, Moa the NPC and watch it just WRECK the player with its crazy-fast attack rate and super-powered NPC damage. XD