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Guild Wars 2 - The Joys of Exploring - MMORPG.com
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Guild Wars 2 - The Joys of Exploring - MMORPG.com
Path of Fire has been a big win of an expansion so far for the majority of the active player base and reviewers, with some of the best new content and gameplay of any major update the game has ever released. Compared to the poorly received Heart of Thorns, Path of Fire has been the ‘golden child’ of the game’s life, and a huge factor in delivering this great experience has been the beautiful exploration available within the Crystal Desert.
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I've been playing since launch, but I've been taking me time, taking it all in. Others blazed through, got their griffons, and are *then* exploring, but there's something to be said for not being in a hurry. Each day has brought new discoveries, lore throwbacks, and just general goodness.
One of the best experiences is going to some of the highest points in the game and flying a really long distance. What a view.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
You could also get into the start of the Desolation map but you want the skimmer to function well after the first bit there.
You need 3 in raptor to get the skimmer, I don't think you need anything for Mr Bunny (the Springer, my buddy at least picked it up yesterday with 2 in raptor so that is the max req)) but you need to either do a few story events to get into the zone or teleport to a friend there.
Anyways, I really like what I seen so far, my concern is just the long term fun of the expansion. I also hope they unlock Kamadan in the Living story, I miss that place.
Spending 250 gold for a mount is crazy. I am not sure I will actually get it.
That's been my approach to all of the big goals these last couple years. I've crafted Nevermore and Chuka and Champawatt with minimal frustration because I saved up most of the materials and went into the crafting with the intent of treating them as long term goals.
* Run Fractals. Healthy amounts of direct gold are complemented by uncommon free ascended gear and plenty of stabilizing matrices and ectoplasm to sell on the tp.
* Explorable dungeons are a fast source of liquid gold. You can also salvage the armor pieces gained from dungeon tokens for crafting insignias that sell pretty well.
* Use all characters to farm the flax farming spot directly below Jaka Itzel Waypoint in Verdant Brink if you own Heart of Thorns. This results in about 30-50 silver per alt per day, depending on luck and the price of flax. With my 15 characters, I earn about 5-9 gold per day, depending on flax prices in about 10 minutes of essentially not even playing the game. If you own an unlimited harvesting tool, you can use any level character to do this farm, so long as you can get them to the waypoint safely - which isn't hard to do.
* If you do not own Heart of Thorns, the elder wood cluster near Pagga's Waypoint in Malchor's Leap would earn a decent, but lesser income.
* Every 8 weeks, Frostgorge Sound offers Powerful Blood, Charged Cores, Charged Lodestones, and Giant Eyes as its map rewards. When it does, it becomes arguably the most profitable farm in the game. If you do not have time to farm it, you can use karma to buy https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pact_Scout's_Mapping_Materials and consume them all for instant, massive profits when the Frostgorge map rewards change to the aforementioned items.
* Excellent farming locations include: Cursed Shore event trains, Tarir meta in Auric Basin, and elder wood farms in all level 70-80 maps, among other farming locations. I currently don't know much about the profitability of Path of Fire maps to judge, but they seem to have pretty solid material profits.
+ Hot give u access to elites for all the classes and tons of content , i was cathing up since summer, and took me 2 months to finish lol , casual play tho , still have TOONS of content to do on HoT (finished story and did some map completition Hero points mostly)
If you don't like it don't play. What game isn't grindy? Rift, FFFX, TSW, SWTOR, WoW? They are all grindy - give me a break.
The map design is literally the exact opposite of Heart of Thorns. These two expansions could not be more dissimilar if Anet tried. None of these maps even have "boring grindy meta events" to grind out. Each of these maps prioritizes exploration and smaller scale events, much like the maps of core Tyria.
Kindly use spoiler tags when discussing story spoilers, alright?
Balthazar is not even a god anymore. The story made this pretty explicit. He's been stripped of his rank and powers. His power is only a fraction of what it was, and he was only able to achieve some semblance of godhood by stealing a majority of the magic contained within a bloodstone.
Even with these limitations, the story makes it explicitly clear that you are not on the same level as Balthazar. Attempting to fight him fairly resulted in him effortlessly killing you. It is only with Sohothin - a legendary sword blessed (and quite possibly originally forged) by Balthazar himself that you are even able to defeat him in the end.
Also, the original Guild Wars also had the players kill a god - Abaddon. And Abaddon was quite possibly even stronger than Balthazar, given that it took all 5 of the other gods to cast him down. At least Guild Wars 2 goes out of its way to explain why the player character is capable of this feat.
Maybe do something other than grinding the same dynamic events/story on five different characters? There is enough content that I took the week off of work to do nothing but play this expansion and, despite beating the story and getting map completion on two maps, I've barely even scratched the surface.
Elite specializations have always been this. It isn't "stealing" the mechanics of another profession. Most elite specializations have been described as "class x through the lens of class y". The Dragonhunter is a Ranger through the lens of a Guardian. The Mirage is a Thief through the lens of a Mesmer. The Spellbreaker is a Mesmer through the lens of a Warrior. The Druid is a water Elementalist through the eyes of a Ranger.
Yes, you get entirely original elite specializations like the Soulbeast and the Holosmith, but they do not need to make up the majority and that is fine. That's great, actually.
Elite specializations are a means for professions to ascend to a higher discipline of their class, but they are also a means to achieve something similar to the dual class mechanic from Guild Wars 1. Dual classes were amazing. They turned an impressive build system into a completely unrivaled one. And since they exist in the lore, it is important that Guild Wars 2 acknowledge that. It has done so in an elegant way.
But on that note, just because an elite specialization borrows themes from another class does not make said elite specialization even remotely similar to playing that other class. They didn't rip the Ranger's Marksmanship traitline and traps out to create the Dragonhunter. Their longbows have completely different skills. Their traits are completely different. Their traps have different effects. The two classes have very little in common, outside of light thematic influences.
Did they rip out Mesmer traits, weapons, or utilities to create the Spellbreaker? No.
Did they rip out Ranger skills to create the Deadeye, like you claim? Hell no. The Deadeye's kneel mechanic, malice mechanic, and playstyle are unlike anything in the game.
The elite specializations ARE new. Every single thing about them is new. That's just an objective fact.
Which are goddamn amazing.
The maps are objectively huge. You do not have to travel at full speed on a mount all the time. Maybe, just maybe, stop and actually explore, instead of zipping through from point A to point B all the time. The game will feel a lot less grindy and the maps will feel a lot bigger if you stop treating it like a checklist.
What? Are you sure you are talking about the same game?
Aside from the personal story (which is a small part of the game), there are no "quests" in GW2.. You have to go out in the world to find most of the content (hearts, events, poi, puzzles, etc.). You have to explore to reveal the map and there is always something happening somewhere.. Just following NPCs around can lead to pretty fun things/events/lore.
This is very different than, FFXIV, SWTOR and ESO for instance, which are games filled with quests that lead you from place to place until the end. (but even for these, one could argue that you can explore if you really want too, but to me, there are way less incentive to do say in these compared to GW2).
HOT was difficult for me on my engineer but in POF with holosmith the game still is challenging but I am able to enjoy instead of dying over and over again
As a fan of GW1 there are definite moments " wait a sec I remember this place " and some story line pay subtle homage to gw1.
.story is strong in POF.
Now next expax bring the MONK back
I've found a good build for Holosmith and it's now a lot of fun now. They really should have template switching as the elites are situational, some are great for support, others great for solo.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
A few facts.
-Enemy AI in PoF is much more intricate,the mobs use more abilities,are more mobile,and apply a lot more crowd control,than before.
-Aggro range in PoF is greatly increased.
-Mob concentrations are as dense as in HoT,even greater in some cases.
Although this results in mobs behaving in a more "natural" way than the ones in the older maps,it also results in way too much combat interrupting exploration and gathering activities,and the duration of combat it self is greatly increased.This is also augmented by the seemingly decreased re-spawn timers of enemies.
Most of the time I've spent in PoF so far,I'm either in combat,or running and trying to avoid getting in combat.I've even devised ways to handle my inventory while on the move,because if I stop for 10 seconds,chances are I'll have to waste my time fighting a couple of vets and their extended families,that all followed me from the other side of the map.
So here we have the case that for exploration/roaming/gathering,PoF is not as enjoyable as the core game,and for combat/fighting,it lacks the map wide meta events of HoT.
My advice to new and returning players.
Use the lvl80 boost,play PoF(you don't have to play the story)first,unlock the mounts,and then use them to explore core Tyria.If you like exploring like me,nothing can beat the base game,yet.
Hmmm, I have after 2 weeks 100% at 2 maps and over 80% in the last 3, completed the campaign and have a griffin... And have been working a lot in that time so I havn't played as much as I could.
I just don't see the mob concentration as a big problem, you just have to be careful when pulling mobs and play better to kill them fast. The mounts help me avoid almost all battles I don't want to fight unless they stay at a point I want to cap or farm at
As for the mobs better Ai and agro range it feels closer to the original GW and I do have to be more careful then in the nowadays nerfed base game but that is fine with me.
Then again, we do all like different things and I agree that new players probably should stay in central Tyria until they learned their characters but people comming back should be well equipped for it.