Guild Wars 2: Path of Fire

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I'm going to try to be optimistic and assume anet will balance spellbreaker a bit to increase it's dps. It's not optimal in pve because the daggers do to little damage. But I think anet balanced them to be that way because of their might generation. When I was testing it in the pvp lobby I was able to consistently get 25 stacks of might within 4-5 seconds. While that is good and it increases dps the low damage of the daggers is only more emphasised when I swap over to greatsword and accomplish far more damage. And that might generation isn't that impressive either considering a normal berserker with greatsword can generate that much might themselves in an additional 1-2 more seconds. But it's not just the dagger dps that disappointed me it's also the traits. It really feels lackluster in synergy compared to other elite specs like dragon hunter, reaper and scourge. I still think warrior needs a complete rework of their traits or they'll never be anything more than a might generator with phalanx strength and banners.

Spellbreaker will be amazing in wvw though because of the elite skill but that's only because anet never properly balanced wvw to begin with. 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

I beat the story. It took me about 12 hours. If you tried to hardcore speed run it, I doubt you could do it faster than 9-10. I only got side tracked doing hearts once, other than that I was going from chapter to chapter in between getting mounts. The only time it was gated was getting the Springer mount. You needed to get the canyon jump for the raptor to get to that area. The skimmer was only needed for one part, and the jackal is just extra for story... it seems a good bit of MP are gated behind it's abilities though. Once you get the Springer a wealth of MP become available, and you get one for each part of the story you do. You never really feel impeded by these. Each of the 3 mounts after the Raptor require a renowned heart to do, they offer the unsummonable mount and get you to practice its abilities to complete the heart. If only they'd have a CC heart. I'd say the Raptor is my favorite, its upgraded jump covers a lot of distance as long as you aren't going up hill. The Jackal is pretty neat, but seems situational.

The story was damn good. Bravo to Anet for the voice acting, and the writing. Canach and Rytlock were epic with their back and forth banter. I had a lot of good laughs. Steve Blum and John DiMaggio were on top of their game. You'd never be able to tell it was Spike and Bender. There was comedy, drama, suspense, surprises, and action. There was a large amount of variety as well. It wasn't a rinse and repeat "beat this enemy, defend this gate, talk to this person". Some of the achievements were pretty shit though. They either required 2 play throughs to do the opposite thing you did before, required a mount you wouldn't have had access too yet, or they were only soloable with a high DPS class. With how long the story was, it would be tedious to grind this. But I'm glad the story was long... and that the final boss wasn't bugged like Mordy.

 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

Ok yeah, the Jackal is pretty awesome, but outside of the PoF maps its not as awesome. It can teleport through the air 3 times as it gets a DD type endurance bar, but it does lose some height so its not as good as the raptor jump. The Sand Portals are what makes it interesting. I've been wondered why there was a mastery point in the Desert Highlands that said it was above when all I could see was sky. Later i found a sand portal when I got as high as I could in that area. It took me through 2 sandy sky roads that ended in portals until I got to a platform way up in the stratosphere with the MP. I'm looking forward to all the hidden areas these portals will take me.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I just got my skimmer last night before I went to bed. I'm loving this campaign so far. The plot is significantly better than Heart of Thorns. I finally got to hear Rytlock's story about what happened in the mists. Thanks alot Rytlock. I'm glad all players get to see the re-enactment of how Kormir takes god powers all on her own without asking anyone else if they want to take the burden. lol. She power grabbed so fast that she sprinted right to her goal.  I can still basically hear the hero "Wait Kormir!.... I deserve this, not you!"

[Sledgstone 8,672]

Its been about a month and a half since the expansion came out and theres no replayability here.  I've done every event in the new maps at least once and the rewards are horrible and not worth the time to do again and again. Outside of the campaign there are no map wide events or even any events that require any of the new unique mount mechanics which is the biggest shame. With as easy as it was to get the mounts and level them up, we don't even need a basic raptor to do anything event wise. Not having big meta events like what we got with Heart of Thorns was one thing, but its another to not need the mounts or their abilities for over 90% of the new maps. The only thing we really need is raptor canyon jumping for one area and a springer high jump to access 2 other locations. In Heart of Thorns we needed the jumping shrooms and ley line gliding to get everywhere and grinding those masteries gave us something to do along with all the map wide meta events. I hated tangled depths at first and pocket raptors were a complete pain in the ass in verdant brink to begin with, but in Path of Fire, it went a bit too casual. Sure the desolation map can be brutal until you get the waypoints unlocked, but once thats done its just a bunch of enemies to avoid. The bounties can be fun the first few times in a zerg, but some scale horribly and are unable to be beaten in a massive blob. There are adventures again but they are in such out of the way locations I've only done one of them, one time and never bothered doing anymore. I don't know if there are mastery points locked behind them or not, but I'm glad theres enough MP that I don't have to drive myself insane trying to beat anymore adventures with a gold rating.

I really like the mount system. It adds some amazing functionality to the game, but it also makes legendary weapons loose some of their luster and prestige. Since we're all on mounts now the footstep effect and trails of running around with a legendary aren't noticeable anymore. Instead we have to buy mount skins on the gemstore to be more noticeable. And that leads us to the RNG mount skin setup. The halloween mount skins in a 5 pack bundle was nice and reasonably priced. The mount adoption license for 400 gems to get a single random mount out of a pool of 30 is a bit much when there is only about 10 of those 30 skins that are really good looking or have fancy effects. I had some gems saved up and I converted a bunch of gold to gems and bought a 10 pack last week. I lucked out and got the legendary looking griffon mounts and a decent jackal skin.. but I also got 4 plain skimmer reskins and a recolored raptor. I wanted a decent raptor skin so I converted all my laurels to gold, sold all my t6 mats, mystic coins, etc. I just hit my 15k acheivement chest and got a free 400 gems and I got another 10 pack. I really lucked out that time and got the fire and lightening raptor skins, the flame and icy bunny skins and more crap. All in all I got about 8 skins out of 20 that I will use. 12 skins I have no interest in using at all seems like a huge waste of gems. I'm glad I didn't drop cash on this as that would have set me back about $80. If I paid $80 I'd have probably been pissed to get so many pointless skins. Anet said they won't do mount skins like this anymore, but the only other stand alone skin is a jackal skin for 2000 gems aka $25. If these skins I bought for 6,800 gems were actually 2k a piece I'd have been out 16,000 gems instead. In comparison to that this random mount system is a much better deal. But thats assuming they'd all be 2k gems a piece. I hope not because that will make mount skins so damn costly in the near future.

Its a shame that we can't earn any of these skins in game. Those 2 griffons I got were basically legendary quality and make my legendary weapons unnoticeable by comparison. The end game of guild wars 2 is fashion wars and now the mounts are the biggest fashion accessory. And they can only be purchased instead of earned. Until a new map / living story episode comes out there is no end game except for farming existing content from the previous expansion or farming gold to convert to gems to buy more gem store mount skins. I feel bad for kids or people that don't have the ingame currency like I had to convert to gems. With christmas right around the corner I'm sure some people would have loved to gift a particular mount skin to one of their kids or to a friend, but thats impossible since its all random adoption licenses. It'd be like gifting someone a lotto ticket. Sure the rng mount licenses are a guaranteed mount and it wont just give you some random booster, but its still gambling imo like all the other loot box rng crap in every game now. I've seen people compare this style of in game rng to physical game rng like buying a pack of magic the gathering cards. But those can at least be traded and sold in real life, while these mount skins are account bound and can't be sold on the trading post. If they could be sold on the trading post like the contents of blt chests I doubt there would have been anyone complaining about this. The real kick in the ass and outrage will happen when elite looking mount skins are released as an account bound rng drop in blt chests like some of the glider skins are now.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

After almost a month of not playing I jumped on to finish up the Griffon mount since LWS4 was announced. Overall the collection was enjoyable. Its a shame they didn't make more adventure style collections like this, but at the same time once this content gets old, its going to be a bit difficult for solo players to obtain. The biggest hang ups being the champions and bounties required. It took a good 15-20 min to get a group for the Facet bounty, although Deadhouse seems to still be very active. Luckily I already had all the MP I needed and maxed it out catching a bounty train in the Riverlands. I dropped 3 Hero banners and a Karma bonfire to everyone's delight and grinded it out in one sitting.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

Omg that must have taken hours upon hours.  Now all you have to do is get used to flying with the griffon now. lol. Not just flapping, but actual flying using the 2 mount skill buttons. As long as you have enough height to start with you can dive down with V and then hit and hold C and space bar at the same time to regain all that altitude. As long as you keep doing that you can stay in the air indefinitely. I practiced the hell out of it with my captains airship pass because its so high up. You have the lava lounge pass so I bet that would be a great training area too. I don't see many people actually flying around so when I do it I'm usually the only one in the air flying over all the plebs while constantly diving down in front of them to show off.  

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I love these new mounts. Flying has never been so much fun. 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

I love unfogging all the maps super fast. I found my favorite points to start from on each map and send a alt there to swoop the whole thing in a few minutes.

I went ahead and collected all the new Ranger pets tonight. Out of all the new specs, I think Soulbest is my favorite because it offers the most improvement to Ranger's fighting ability. Base Ranger's utilities were never that great for offense, and I really like some of these stances you get. Beast mode adds a nice touch offering new and useful F1-3 abilities the class never has had since the pet occupied that area. The Jacaranda is great for beast mode because it gives ranger a second heal much like Guardian's F2. Outside of beastmode tho, the little tree monster is a bit too aggressive. Holy cow, it chases things down way far off putting me into combat undesirably. I don't know if its a bug just for it, but it seems to want to just fight non stop.

There is no reason not to be DD still. I took my thief into Crystal Oasis and ROTFLstomped every forged raiding party I found in seconds, and then melted some Vet Hydras like jokes. Sometimes those Forged Assemblers can do some damage with those spinning blade attacks, but my DD never even gave them a chance to perform it. The Hydra barely could get off one meteor strike attempt before its heads went flying off. With no pocket raptors to mow me down when I'm not paying attention, PoF enemies can't touch me on this character. I may have gone down once, but instantly rallied because everything was almost dead already when it happened.  I mean Staff DD does more damage spamming 1, while spamming 5 off initiative regen, than 2 DH traps, and the GS4-2 combo. So much DPS.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

Are you using this build for soulbeast?

https://qtfy.eu/guildwars/ranger/condi-soulbeast-build-guide/

I looked at mettabattle but they don't even have a condi soulbeast build on there. Is dagger main hand worth using? I have soulbeast completely unlocked for my ranger but I still need to complete her condi build and get the new pets.

Did you try deadeye? I didn't unlock it yet but from what I've seen of it in pvp I don't think it's worth using in either pvp or pve. It must be meant as a wvw roaming build. I don't see why I'd ever use it over daredevil just like ill never use spellbreaker over berserker for warrior in pve.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

I'm still using the condi druid build with Soulbeast swapped out for Druid, seems to work just find. I didn't know dagger was a condi weapon, It didn't seem like it in the beta. I guess I'll have to check it out.

I have no interest in trying Deadeye. DD is just an OP class and will always remain the best spec, not only for its raw damage output, but its sustain. I could never play base thief because of how squishy it was, but that healing signet is a difference maker.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

Overall I'm pleased with this release. Its way better than the first episode. The new map is littered with nodes and VM orbs are more abundant than Istan. The events are more isolated and lead to big bosses rather than big metas full of trash mobs. Plus its not a freakin' desert finally. The map has sizable verticality to it, but it's not too bad. And there is a 32 slot box meta achievement which gives me something to work for.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

Now that sounds way better. I'm really burned out on the desert. I didn't have the chance yesterday to get started on the new episode, I should have the time later today.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

The price to make these 32 bags are outrageous. Inventory space isn't a vanity item. They really should have more ways to get these runes of holding in the next map. Spreading out the mat farm across multiple LWS4 maps would be a great way to keep them relevant. Having to drop 100g on a gamble to get these is stupid.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

I'm so hyped for that new mount! It looks freakin awesome!!!!!!

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I'm so confused about that mount. lol. Its a hover bike that is somehow connected to the beetle via magic or something. That thing looks so huge it'll be an eyesore once they release a stardust skin for it. Anet has gotten much better with their trailers. I'm getting a bit hyped for this.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

WP said it was from some roller beetle racing from GW1 Nightfall. But in the original the beetle ate you and you rolled around to get power ups like speed boosts... it wouldn't make since to get eaten and regurgitated every time, so I guess the seat is the power boost.

[Sledgstone 8,672]

I just watched a quick video of GW1 roller beetle racing. I don't remember ever playing that race. I can definitely see the resemblance to the new mounts tho.

 

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

 

[Sledgstone 8,672]

Ouch. I feel bad for the devs that got laid off but at the same time their overall studio must have gone in a completely different direction than what was laid out to the consumers over a year ago. We were supposed to be getting another expansion released months from now and not only was there no announcement for one but it also sounds like it was never even being worked on. Whatever their other side projects were must have doomed them. It sounds like it was mostly a mobile game and some other game.. but with the NDA we'll never know. I just hope the other game that was canceled wasn't actually a new updated engine for GW2 or an actual GW3 sequel.

[DeathscytheX 9,732]

It will leak eventually. They better hope they were working on an Expac still. Otherwise this game is going to be in serious trouble with just recycled festivals, and small LWS5 updates... LWS5 is going to have to be significantly more to keep the game interesting. LWS4's story was fantastic, but the actual content was pretty trash TBH. All of those maps are forgettable, and the small meta events aren't really fun enough to keep grinding out outside of Istan which got old pretty fast, but is still profitable. With how many Fractal and Raid people were let go, one or the other will become the new dungeon "dead content" it feels like... and it would most likely be raids. There will have to be a new release cadence.