McQwak.1459

I was able to fix this after running into the same issue on Air of Mystery. Quitting chapter, relogging, and closing the game didn't work. I was able to fix it by changing my active story to The Cycle Reborn and then changing it back to What Lies Beneath. It reset my story progress and I had to start over from the beginning of On The Case, but I can progress now.

So far there is nothing that can't still be completed solo. My point on it was that it required pretty drastic changes to my existing builds to make up for the nerfs to personal sustain, and the necessary changes result in builds that are measurably less capable than their previous versions. And the nerfs to personal sustain mechanics don't appear to have any practical effect. Reducing the ability for self sustain doesn't affect group play when you already have dedicated healers. In many metas you don't have healers so it certainly has no benefit there. The idea to reduce some classes' abilities to give boons to a full party and cap their boon share at 5 targets was a good idea that helped ensure there weren't only a handful of builds cornering the market on support in group play. I've seen LFGs demand specific classes and builds for support very often, effectively locking people out of using other capable classes in group play just because there are more efficient builds, so most of the boon changes stand to do a lot of good. However, I fail to see how reducing any player's ability to heal themselves aids in any capacity in group or solo play. The nerf to sustain seems like it only serves to try to artificially push players into group play by relying on others to make up for their lost sustainability. Basically, the short of the point is content is still soloable, but with changes that should not have been necessary caused by sustain reworks that don't appear to have been beneficial in any way.

I would honestly really like it if Anet reversed some of the changes it made for EoD. In their push to increase focus on community and group play, they nerfed a lot of solo capability for people like me who don't have active friends and don't generally use LFG to find groups to play with. Because of this, I have developed solo builds capable of running most content that doesn't require multiple people to complete. Many of the EoD changes that centered on shifting Guild Wars 2's gameplay focus to group play hit the sustainability of many classes pretty hard. It seems like Anet made these changes because they wanted groups to strategize more with their build composition to provide necessary support, but it came at the cost of almost requiring a group to maintain viable levels of sustain. My main solo capable builds were hit hardest with these changes. Torment runes lost heal on inflicting torment and gained regeneration instead, forcing me to change whole builds to compensate for the massive loss of sustain. One of those classes was Renegade, which was doubly affected by the nerf to Battle Scars as well. The number of changes they made that affected solo-ability and sustain on builds I used are to many too go through here so I'll stick to just those examples. In short, while I like the increase in group focused gameplay (I do like to run strikes pretty often and would eventually like to get into raiding if I ever have an active friend group to play with regularly) I feel Anet has made this focus shift at the cost of the players who enjoy playing solo. The changes they made seem as though they are almost intended to push solo players into group play, and I don't believe that should be necessary for the non-group focused content.

I was super disappointed in this expansion. I was originally very excited for some of the new elite specs and being able to go back to Cantha. I didn't have much expectations on masteries so I honestly wasn't disappointed much when they turned out to feel more like fluff and just an excuse to farm exp and mastery points. What really got me was just how the ball got dropped with EoD across the board. The story was short and characters that should have been memorable had very short, very forgettable character development arcs. The best villain, I believe, was Ankka. I liked her approach to the problem of the heroes constantly making the world worse in their effort to save it: just let it all die so the world could start over. It was an understandable goal. But even Ankka's arc was short. The screen time was minimal and her potential was largely ignored. I understood, though. ArenaNet isn't a wealthy company. They don't have a big budget. Their budget is dependent on the gem store. They basically get by on donations from the player base. So it's understandable and acceptable that they don't have the money and manpower to focus so much on long, solid story lines. Not unless they wanted to release the expansion story episodically like a living world season. What I didn't understand was some of the game changes they made. They wanted to make the game focus more on community and group play, which is admirable, but they did it at the expense of the solo players like me. I have maybe 2 friends I play with. The new balance patches for skills and runes that forced a more team-based play style drastically affected the characters I've been playing solo for years. They locked some of the new gear behind strikes and made all the new strikes private only with no option for public play, forcing people who don't have 10 active friends to use the LFG, even though I'm sure Anet is well aware of how elitist the LFG can get. I still haven't run the Harvest Temple strike and I spend a few hours a day trying to get into groups but getting kicked because my build isn't min maxed or my only "experience" with the strike is watching in-depth video guides on the mechanics. And all I want to do the strike once to unlock the ascended gear. I'm also irritated with how they handled the two new stat combos. I looked forward to both, and was understanding of the grind you have to put in to getting the new recipes. It makes sense to have to put in a little work for them. But then I find out there are no trinket recipes for them? They added the materials for them, the petrified wood and jadeite, but no recipes to craft any of the exotic trinkets. Instead they hid them behind achievement walls that force you to grind even harder for trinkets than for armor and weapon recipes. And because they're obtained through achievements only and aren't craftable/purchasable, you're limited to how many build can test or use those trinkets at one time. And also, how did they miss back pieces? There aren't any new back pieces with the new stat or that are stat selectable so even if I grind out an entire set or armor, weapons, and trinkets, I STILL can't have a complete set of the new gear because I will be missing a back piece. Even though I am disappointed overall with the expansion, I will admit I am equally impressed with it. The new maps are great and beautiful. The metas continue their tradition of adding to the story rather than just being grindable group events. There is a notable increase in difficulty on the new enemies that makes combat a little more engaging and a little less mindless-mob-spanking. It's a fun time, and fun enough I haven't left Cantha since the expansion dropped for any of my other daily grinds. I just wish Arena net had done some things better with it, and at the very least hope they will address some of the shortcomings in the near future.