Jimbru.6014

I don't care if it's different teams, it's the same company and priorities of management.

So, I went to Gyala on the character I completed the story with, and where the first log is supposed to be for Sleuthing a Solution there is...nothing. I can see the object that I think is supposed to be the log, but it's not interactive. Help?

On top of nerfing the loot while somewhat fixing the key issues, neither of the "listen to the log" collection achievements is working for me. Ongoing Investigations, I tried all ten logs and it's not tracking at all. For Sleuthing a Solution, the log isn't even showing up. Congratulations on already ruining your brand new map, ANet. How about focusing less on shiny stuff for the store, which we already have more than enough of, and more on making a properly polished game so that the profitability will take care of itself? Novel idea, I know...

Same here. Not working. Did all ten and got zero credit. At least I know where they are for when they fix it, I guess.

They're not as mentally prepared because what's going on isn't just a physical threat of death. People in the real world can actually deal with overt physical threats surprisingly well when necessary; we've only been doing it ever since humans first evolved. What's going on is two things: - The Enemy (whatever it is) is attacking everyone differently that most other threats we've faced, by way of intrusive thoughts and emotional weaknesses. It's like Jormag's whispers, but much more aggressive. Perhaps what Mordremoth did turning the Sylvari into the Mordrem might be a better comparison. But it's different from both of those in that The Enemy isn't necessarily trying to gain servitors; rather, it seems to be hungry and feeding off everyone's internal chaos and fear. - If you read the chapter text in your story journal, The Commander STARTS the story physically and mentally exhausted, and Gorrik even comments on it in the opening scene. All the intrusive thoughts and emotions, the mourning, the self-blaming, the what-iffing and so forth that The Commander has put off processing for years while fighting the EDs , are returning in the post-ED silence and demanding their turn. Basically, The Commander has severe, untreated PTSD, and The Enemy is targeting that because The Commander is probably the strongest source of such raw mental negativity in the area.

You have to open the chests if you want to get what's in them. The guy who told you to only open the red ones was wrong. Personally, I don't measure the game as an economic exercise in gold efficiency, so I bought keys and opened chests throughout the meta. In one run of the meta, opening all the rewarded chests, I ended up with over a hundred greens, like 40 rares, a couple of Luxon weapon boxes and other stuff. The relatively large number of rares definitely helps.

Honestly, speaking as a long time MMO player who came into the GW world with GW2, all the Stockholm syndrome nostalgia for GW1 is one of the biggest drawbacks of playing GW2. I've gone back and tried retroactively to play GW1 and can't stand it. GW1 isn't even a true MMO. It's a glorified lobby game with a more primitive interface than EverQuest. You can't even do basic human things like jumping because it doesn't have three fully functional dimensions. "Oh yeah, all that stuff you've been selling? You should have been saving it because here's a quest to collect it that you were never told about." Seriously, I don't get the hype for GW1 at all, and I would gladly buy and pay 8000 gems to unlock the Hall of Monuments in GW2 just so I never have to think about GW1 again.

To me, much of this release felt sort of like an apology for the flaws of IBS and EoD. Things I liked: - I like that the map is easy to navigate and explore, and exploration mostly follows the path of the story and meta in a natural way. The scenery is great, plus there's a few interesting sidetracks for dedicated explorers and two nasty surprises that I won't spoil. - I liked that the story was short and to the point, instead of taking us all over the place with a bunch of time wasting artificial sidetracks and delays like Joon's house. - I like that the meta is relatively straightforward. It doesn't have fifty steps and seventy mechanics like Dragon's End. It doesn't have an overload of random AOE and CC effects like Dragonstorm. It doesn't have a massive overload of visual noise on its own; that mostly comes from shiny players. Like the map and the story, it leaves off the needless extras and gets to the point of fighting the boss. - I liked that Joon was left silent off screen. She honestly is the worst character in the game. She is an arrogant, petulant, self-absorbed adult child who rightfully should have been turned into a fine red mist in the second episode of EoD when Soo-Won broke out. Then we could have saved Mai from Ankka, and Mai and "Scarlet" could have improvised the solution from there. It would have been a much better story, leading to an interesting prolonged dynamic with Scarlet's echo running through the rest of the episode and tying back into prior content. Things I DIDN'T like: - The "Shots Fired" achievement and its associated event need rework. Right now it feels like "Shots Fired" is probably the hardest achievement in the episode, which I don't think was ANet's intention. - The achievement is tied to one specific event with a limited number of repeats per meta cycle, which is fine. Not everything has to be done in one run of the meta. But sometimes the event bugs out and doesn't happen in a given cycle, which is NOT fine. - Assuming the event spawns like it should, there are only a limited number of the snipers per event, which is fine. But the snipers don't behave like other sniper mobs in the game; if you dodge their "lock on" like other snipers, THEY STILL HIT YOU ANYWAY and instantly down you, which causes you to lose your rifle and thus lose credit for the achievement. Super annoying, especially given the limited number of targets and opportunities. - I don't like the limited number of keys available for chests. Only certain events drops keys, and only once per day, and even if I buy the maximum number of additional keys per day, I'm still going to be walking past a lot of chests I can't open, and that's frustrating. Oh look, the Agitator I just killed dropped a chest! Oh wait, it didn't drop a key for it, so now I have to just walk away from loot. That's a real dirty thing to do to players, to be honest. The key paradigm needs to be like Dragonfall, where all the events drop keys so you can work for them as you need them.

How do I hate EoD, let me count the ways... - Terrible story. Joon is the most dislikable character in the whole game. She should have died and Mai Trin should have survived. Having Taimi, Mai, and Scarlet via Mai improvising to save Tyria would have been much more interesting and morally satisfying than fulfilling the oversized ego of a self absorbed brat. The whole maze thing in Joon's house was clearly designed just to keep players busy and frustrated. - Speaking of which, way too much content in EoD was obviously designed just to force players to grind and kill time. I already made a thread about how much it sucks to have to do strikes to get ascended Dragon and Ritualist gear. Let's also talk about all the currencies and crafting items EoD introduced that we need too much of for different things, especially resource notes. - NKC and Echovald are two of the worst maps in the game, period. Also , the population limits on the EoD maps are too low. The emptiness of players for events and the constant map changes are frustrating. - Fishing is frustrating and really needs discussed in its own thread. Many problems. - The elite specs are a mixed bag at best. Some are interesting, but others just seem designed to be complicated for complication's sake to satisfy a minority of hard-core button mashers on whom nothing should EVER be based.

The guiding plot of the next story will be the saga of Rama's hat being stolen and us helping him to recover it. Everything else that happens in the story, including saving the world, will just kind of happen around that as we go. Totally absurdist, GW2 version of The Big Lebowski. 😉

That particular Inquest experiment got shut down by the Peacemakers for "humane" reasons (specifically, the Skritt smelled too bad to keep in the city). The Inquest then built Rata Primus in the Sandswept Isles to continue their Skritt power experiments unhindered, and the rest is history. 😉

I am a reasonably skilled but casual player. After 11 years in WoW, I have sworn off ever being a raider in any game ever again. I would rather quit GW2 entirely than be forced to raid in this game, and I am far from alone in that regard. On my personal list of most hated things to do in GW2, raids are definitely at the top, and strike missions are close behind since they're basically just raids with less preamble. Now, follow the bouncing ball: - To finish the collections for my class specialization weapons on EoD specs, I have to do EoD strike missions, which one depending on the specific weapon. - To get ascended EoD jewelry for builds, AFTER completing my class spec weapon, I have to beat Harvest Temple, the hardest non-CM strike mission in the game, TWICE to get both necklace and ring, and I have to do all that on TWO characters to be able to get a full set because the rings and trinkets are unique. - The only way to get EoD stats on an ascended backpiece is either through Harvest Temple (again, the hardest strike mission) or by praying for a random drop from the Echovald meta. All this loot locking behind strike missions is just one of several reasons why EoD is THE worst GW2 expansion and one of the worst expansions for any game I've ever played. EoD stats should be made available on existing stat selectable gear, without forcing casual players into hardcore group content. That is all.

There's hardly anyone doing this event anymore so it's really hard to get a group together for it. So when we finally did get a group after waiting all day, it bugged on us in multiple ways. 1. The turtles kept getting stuck and freezing in place. 2. The base acted like we were already at the end in "everybody get out" mode right from the start, with constant burning stacks, throwing downed players out in midair and so on. 3. The NPC for getting into the lower level was bugged, so we couldn't get down there. 4. This is blocking progress on multiple achievements with targets inside the base, including lighting jade lanterns and the "Fate of House zu Heltzer" collection. Which having those locked behind this base meta event frankly is kitten poor game design. Fix this, please.

Bumping this since it has not been fixed. I just did it again and still did not get credit. THIS BUG HAS BEEN BLOCKING AN ACHIEVEMENT FOR OVER A YEAR NOW. FIX IT!

I just finished this a few days ago myself. What I got out of it basically is that Cantha was already engaged in a period of "culture wars" when the Zhaitan Disaster happened. The consequences of the disaster gave a push to the societal change that was already in progress, leading to the falls of both the Celestial Ministry and the Ministry of Purity. What I find interesting is that only two of the Ministers (Earth and Air) are specifically stated to be dead, both with mysterious causes of death. The implied possibility is that Nai, the Minister of Water, and particularly Zal, who was both the Minister of Fire and a Purist, might still be alive somewhere thanks to the Celestial Blessing. And of course, the Purists already exist as a social and military force. So there's you a future plot hook: Zal returns at the head of a Purist army, and Nai emerges to help stop him. The nations lived together in harmony, then everything changed when the Fire Ministry attacked...

About 90% of the game as we now have it didn't exist in 2012, and many things existed in 2012 that no longer do. It's been quite a journey for GW2 to get from where it started to where it is now; some of us are still playing the same old characters, but truth be told, it's almost an entirely different game now, and I mean that in a good way.

I remember buying the original commander tag for 300g and then doing the catmander tags in WvW afterwards, but that was years of alcohol ago so I might have that backwards. Either way, I get a lot of mileage out of the commander tag in PVE, so it has definitely been worth the investment just for that. I deliberately DON'T tag up in WvW because I lack both the knowledge and attitude for it; a good commander knows their own limitations.

At least one of them appears to me to be an EoD style Leviathan, which would make sense that some of them would be frozen in the Jade Sea.

I'd wager those ARE karka. They were just known by a different name two centuries ago.

As of our last conversation with Taimi at the end of EoD, she and Joon and Aurene were already working on the energy problem and optimistic about a solution. I expect they'll end up merging jade tech batteries with Asura ley line tech, because I can't imagine Aurene allowing herself to be used like Soo-Won.

The impression I had after watching Mukluk's video about the announcement is that the first big installment of each expansion would be bought, then the additional quarterly extensions of it would be free. But we'll see how it actually plays out in execution. What worries me is that ANet has committed to the players to maintain a certain schedule and pace of development, and being an engineering type myself, I know how dangerous creating expectations can be. As mechanics would say, every "twenty minute job" is just one broken bolt from becoming a three day ordeal. So I just hope they're not biting off more than they can chew, and their plans leave suitable allowance for Murphy's Law. Once again, we'll see how it actually plays out.

That's right in line with my idea that maybe critters in the Jade Sea are just in some sort of suspended animation. They were frozen into stasis by the jade like Han Solo in carbonite, and they could come back to life as it thaws out.

The GW1 Leviathans use a model similar to the Junundu in PoF. The Jade Wurm uses a model similar to the various undersea wurms, plains wurms et al that are found all over GW2. The GW1 Leviathans are nothing like the EoD Adolescent Leviathans, which are basically shaped like big spiky walruses. EoD type Leviathan skeletons can be found in various other places in the GW2 world as well...Desert Highlands, beaches in Orr, and there's one hanging in the Durmand Priory of all places. Confusing to have two prominent but very different critters with the same name, but real world "possums" in America and Australia are completely different critters too, so it's not like such confusion is unprecedented. Not really trying to say anything here, just thinking out loud through my keyboard.

The majority of the Jade Sea is still a solid mass of jade, so unless there's some kind of magic suspended animation thing going on, "what's in the Jade Sea" is probably a lot of dead critters and it's gonna stink like sin as they thaw out. If those dead critters have been corrupted by Zhaitan magic running loose via the corrupted jade, they might be Risen or Void enemies. Inconvenient. Another thought with an older basis is that if the Jade Sea retains still retains any of Shiro's influence, perhaps the sea thawing might revive the Affliction, and of course we'll have to stop that. We'll probably also have to be dealing with the political aftermath of there being no more Elder Dragons to fight. The common enemy is gone; now what? The Pact, the peace between the five races...serious potential for everything that's been built over the last ten years to fall apart. Oh, and the effects of jade tech beginning to disperse to the larger world; Tyria is no stranger to technology, but still...

In game lore, the big ol' cube that is Rata Sum hovers above three things, the first two known and the third implied: - A major ley line junction that Rata Sum taps for power. It's safe to assume there's vital machinery below the cube that keeps the city afloat, makes power and all that, hence the ultra-tight security down there. - Some old fortified ruins of unknown origin. It was speculated in prior arguments about the Asura's origins that maybe they were Mursaat ruins, but I remember someone else saying that you can see those ruins in GW1 and they don't look like Mursaat work. - All the waste, junk, failed experiments et al, dumped from Rata Sum. It's probably a Superfund site down there, which is a good reason to keep people out for safety reasons.