Guild Wars 2 Heart of Thorns

[Sledgstone 8,672]

 

That shortbow doesn't even look like a shortbow. x_x It must have some amazing effects to be a legendary tho. Just when I was about to shelve this game for a while I see that legendary back piece / glider.. I must have it. I'm already have 50% of it done but to finally be able to finish it.. I might have to go OCD on that.

 

Reference pics are in the tenton article:

http://www.tentonhammer.com/news/guild-wars-2-teases-spring-update-with-new-video

 

 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

That's def Mega Destroyer. Funny they don't recognize him because it wasn't til the last visual nerf patch when you could see him. I wonder if they'll update him to where the pre event isn't so damn long anymore.

We were promised new world bosses in the original HoT trailer, and they showed a big ogre walking through lava with a 4 legged beast that kinda looks like that one in this trailer. I have a feeling it was repurposed for a raid or something else. I hope this update gives me a reason to be passionate about the game again. Right now I don't have the drive to play until LWS3.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

Random thoughts on the spring quarterly update

HoT Map rewards are a lot better and more abundant now. The grind has been reduced for many things, including the armor sets that were exclusive rng drops for beating the metas. The hero's choice chests are a nice bonus especially the key bag that gives you 12 more keys. This is great for maps like TD and DS that dont generally reward keys like VB does.

The DS tweaks are outstanding. AB was the most profitable map and now DS rivals it if not surpasses it. The after victory map stays open 25 minutes instead of 15, and 6 pods are immediately available at each checkpoint that started the old path runs. The HC chest has the best selection of ascended mats and machetes drop way more than ever before. DS was the most visually stunning and epic experience of the game, and now its rewards feel justified for the effort.

Ranger sword play is amazing now. It may not be as powerful as Revenant, but its def better than other professions. Its always had high dps, but it locked you in place and made you super vulnerable to one shot attacks. Now it feels great, you can kite and dodge without having to rely on skill 2 and 3 to do so. Axe 5 is beastly now with its 100% damage buff. Its great to finally have melee that is powerful and functioning.

WvW is finally profitable. I spent a few hours on EoTM tonight to build my my badges so I can get a Gift of Battle before the vendor goes away. Junk sells for a few silver now instead of mere copper. The rewards track is way more grindy than PvP tracks. Its based on your participation in 4 minute intervals. Every 4 minutes you are giving a score based on your participation. I got 50pts when I was at 10% and 138pt at 100%. EoTM is probably the best way to sustain your 100% because it drains pretty fast if you don't do anything. We'll see how the pop balance works out for the borderlands. Either way its a nice bonus when you need to K-Train.

DH bow buffs are really nice. I'm disappointed that True Shot got a 20% nerf, but all the other LB skills hit harder now, which makes up for it. Necro well CD reductions are huge. I got so many bags on EoTM from spamming wells and marks. It felt like my wells were coming back so fast as i looked upon a sea of combo finishers popping all over my screen.

LFG finally got its much needed rework. SAB was so bad for LFG, open world was full of trib sellers. Trying to find a VB taxi when Teq is in 10 minutes? Good luck with that a few days ago, now there are so many categories, it reduces a lot of clutter. Despite these massive improvements, I'm sure we'll still see "p2 80 exp full zerk" in open world LFG still.

Big ups to Anet for making a zero new content update this exciting. A ton of QoL changes, and a free shared inventory slot is amazing. Mike O'Brien killed it and I'm looking forward to see how they deliver the first real content pack.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

4 hours ago, DeathscytheX said:

WvW is finally profitable. I spent a few hours on EoTM tonight to build my my badges so I can get a Gift of Battle before the vendor goes away. Junk sells for a few silver now instead of mere copper. The rewards track is way more grindy than PvP tracks. Its based on your participation in 4 minute intervals. Every 4 minutes you are giving a score based on your participation. I got 50pts when I was at 10% and 138pt at 100%. EoTM is probably the best way to sustain your 100% because it drains pretty fast if you don't do anything. We'll see how the pop balance works out for the borderlands. Either way its a nice bonus when you need to K-Train.

Wow. No wonder they said the reward tracks are in beta. 4 minute participation sounds like they took the HoT meta event participation scale and applied it to WvW. I don't see how that would work well. Maybe the reward tracks build slower than in PVP because in WvW you still get loot bags while in PVP all you get is some chump change 30 silver. They need to give us WvW reward track potions for WvW dailys like they do for pvp dailys and that would probably even it out quite nicely.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

It's going to be the standard. I'd pretty generous to keep getting rewarded every 4 min. They may even increase the timer. Your participation doesn't reset on the timer, so as long as your commander keeps you in fights or capping, maintainingisn't an issue. They could be more forgiving on the decrease timer though. 

[Sledgstone 8,672]

WvW on our server is starting to pick up. I already saw queues for EB and Jade Quarry borderlands a couple different times tonight. The potential for big wars in EoTM and in EB are getting my hyped. I really need a new graphics card. I keep holding out for these new ones that are coming out this summer to drop the price of existing ones lower, but I don't know how much longer I'll hold out for.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

You need to invest in a gaming laptop since you're always on your laptop.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I really should. lol. I'm on my laptop for about 90% of my PC gaming. But thats usually when I'm farming GW2 while watching tv.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

I played some real WvW tonight. I've been doing EoTM just to fast grind my way to 500BoH and get my Gift of Mastery... now that I did that I spent time in the borderlands and it works a lot differently.

The timer is 15 minutes for rewards and at maxium participation you get 550pts. So every 15 min you get rewarded as opposed to about every 20 min (138pt every 4 min) on EoTM. I made significantly more progress on my reward track.

Porting between borderlands doesn't reset your participation. This is huge. I ran with a 50 person squad and we skipped between BG and JQ's borderlands after spending a bit of time in EB. Big fights are back, and its amazing. Siege going off, bags falling everywhere, death and destruction surrounding you. WvW is def back and better than ever. My only gripe is that the desert borderlands run as bad as HoT maps. I had to turn down my shaders and other settings because it was like HP rush all over again. Lag spikes are not good when 50v50 zerg clash is going on. I def prefer the alpine BL. The desert BL is really cool looking though.  

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I wonder how many people are streaming WvW now. WvW is really unique too. I've never seen something like it in other MMORPGs.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

There really isnt. T1 and T2 may have more world trading going on in the future. Blackgate is destroying everyone this week... and this is like the 3rd week JQ has finished last in a row. JQ could drop to T2 in the future with more performances like this. Its a hell of a lot of fun though. It was hard pressed to cap anything earlier today. The Keep on EB is a lot harder to take now with that airship destroying everyone if you dont cap in time. BG kept a zerg guarding the champ so they could stall us enough for the airship to come out and wreck us. Its kind of broken TBH. It seems impossible to take unless you have overwhelming numbers.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I noticed that JQ hardly has any queue at all now. I bet BG is at 100% capacity during peak hours at this rate.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

At reset it will be two years since I bought this game. I never knew I'd play almost 2000 hours and mostly on one character. GW2 is definitely my favorite game of all time. Its been a long journey.

 

[Sledgstone 8,672]

Congrats!

What greatsword is that you were using 2 years ago?

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

The flame greatsword skin. No idea where I got it.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

 

Living World Season 3 comes out later this month! 

[Sledgstone 8,672]

We'll finally get some new content.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

Cool... but it Sunrise... not Caladbolg. Odd that WP would get this wrong..... but if this means broken Calabolg can turn into a Green legendary GS, I'll feak.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I'm really surprised he thought this was Caladbog, even in the video he swaps over to some screen shots of it and it looks nothing like this. I'm guessing he came to some new legendary sword conclusion because every other gift hes gotten from NCsoft was a teaser for something taking place in new content. But this is definitely sunrise or eternity. It does look pretty cool tho. But I think he might have been right about a new legendary GS. The gift he got was a legendary, the picture shows a sylvaria holding it. His previous gifts were hint at new content and Caladbog was pretty much a legendary weapon, except lacking footfalls. Reforging it into a legendary would have been fun if the legendaries weren't all canceled. Alot of people thought the new HoT legendary GS would have been plant based like Kudzu, and having it be Caladbog or a newer version of it forged from it's broken hilt would have been fitting.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

Legendary GS Lay-Infused Caladbolg. To restore the broken Caladbolg we will take you on a legendary journey.  Complete the PS as a sylvari character, complete LWS2 and 3, complete HoT, cap every fort in WvW, beat every fractal and dungeon, finish all JP, obtain gold on all adventures, and find all diving goggles.  

[Sledgstone 8,672]

And that would be just the first part of the collection. the next part would need more wood than nevermore. Wood prices would quadruple within hours of someone finding out the requirements. but with anet they'd probably also require stacks of herbs and produce to so they can increase the value of those items. Omnomberries could go up to 1 gold each.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

And there would be a new gift where you had to collect all the coins and badges is DT and SW.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

Even with gliding making collecting those coins and badges way easier I still rage quit both collections after numerous failed attempts at getting a couple specific ones. 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

 

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I'd like to see the Mursaat come back into play. They were as intertwined with the white mantle as they were to Glint.

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Mursaat

Theres quite a bit of GW1 lore alot of people may not know about. I know I need a refresher course on it. I think I'll look thru some of wooden potatoes videos and find some good ones on the white mantle.