[So how much longer?]

@mortrialus.3062 said:I said before that I think the smartest and best change Anet can make to Holosmith is to lock them out of their utilities and toolbelt skills while in forge just like how Death and Reaper Shroud and other transforms lock necromancer out of it's utilities.

Either that or they can just remove the entire toolbelt from holosmith and have only Photon Forge as their F1. This will reduce any sustain that the toolbelt provides for holosmiths especially with regenerating mist and toss elixir s. I know not everyone is going to agree with my opinion, but holosmith is after all a glass cannon specialization that is easier to play than core engineer, but it is nowhere near as fragile as a glass cannon should be.

[A returning player's questions]

@Rend.5794 said:@"Hoodie.1045"

They're more in favor with renegade simply because it's a support build that applies might, fury and the most important boon of them all, alacrity.

Is this a power build? or is there another setup for alacrity?

It's a hybrid build that uses berserker and diviner stats, both stats from core gw2 so they're not that expensive to craft. When you look that build up on meta sites, the stats are all over the place so for the sake of consistency, I would recommend you make full berserker armor and weapons while the backpack and trinkets are all diviner. This is how I make my hybrid builds, crafting the armor and weapons with the cheap core gw2 stats while the backpack and trinkets are with the more expensive stats from the expansions.

If you're overwhelmed on which backpack and trinkets to get, I would recommend you getting these:

Backpack: Quiver of a Thousand Arrows/There with Yakkington: A Traveler's Tale or Icebrood Horn Backpack.

The first two backpacks are both the same and you can select any stat prefix. The second backpack is only available if you own the HoT expansion with LWS3, also available to select any stat prefix. Most people would go for the second backpack since it's easier to get, but I always preferred the first two since you don't have to farm for two currencies to get them. All you need for the first two backpack is gold mainly for purchasing vicious claws and globs of ectoplasm which you can also get by salvaging rare level 68 or higher gear.

Accessories: Two Mist Talismans (not unique so you can put two of the same item, all stat prefixes available to choose).

Amulet: One Mist Pendant (all stat prefixes available to choose)

Rings: Two Mist Bands (not unique so you can put two of the same item, all stat prefixes available to choose).

If you enjoy playing fractals on a daily basis, then getting the trinkets I listed are by far the easiest to get and don't cost any gold. Keep doing your fractal dailies and recommended (left overs) and you'll get the pristine fractal relics for purchasing these trinkets and thankfully the Mist Band rings are already infused when you purchase them so it's less of a hassle trying both attune and infuse ascended rings.

The other alternative is farming currencies in LWS3 maps, but I don't find this process enjoyable since most of the currencies are based on luck as to whether or not you get them and the nodes you farm are in the same order and they reset after 24 hours. Winterberries are by far the easiest currency to get since they are guaranteed drops every time. Just get to the "A Crack in the Ice" chapter of LWS3 and start farming them there.

[A returning player's questions]

@"Rend.5794" said:Also, being a power rev,

• Is there ONE build which I can use to play for Wvw, Fractals, Openworld? Or would I be expected to change my build around appropriately for each situation?(Doesn't have to be a meta build, as long as it provides decent sustain and damage)

Well unfortunately, there is no one build that is good at all three game modes that you mentioned. The power assassin (Shiro) build that is widely used in PvP can be used in PvE as well, at least in open world and dungeons. You can use that same build in fractals as well, but not everyone is in favor of having an assassin herald on their team. They're more in favor with renegade simply because it's a support build that applies might, fury and the most important boon of them all, alacrity.

The good thing about all of these builds whether it's assassin herald or alacrity renegade is that they all use sword/sword and staff. Yes, I know you mentioned that you don't like staff, but don't dismiss it simply because you don't like it. It's mostly used for CC and for healing which is only useful for alacrity renegade, but for assassin herald it's only used for CC.

• Would playing a power Rev (herald or Renegade) be harder to play now than it used to be?

Revenant has received minor changes, nothing too major. If you haven't played revenant in a long time and I mean in a really long time, then it will be somewhat different. Other than that, it's still the same profession with both elite specializations. One thing that is worth mentioning is that ArenaNet have taken the whole "elite specializations having major trade-offs" route a couple of months, reworked some of the elite specializations like berserker and chronomancer and have given core revenant the Ancient Echo skill which gives you boons based on the legend you're invoking. It's nothing spectacular, but it's at least something.

• If it's not really recommended to play power revs for inexperience players, are there any other possible professions I can play as a power sword/sword user?

The only professions capable of using two swords are warrior and mesmer. Sword/sword warrior is just awful and it's only used in very niche condition builds that are lackluster compared to condition berserker with longbow and sword/torch. Sword/sword mesmer on the other had is fantastic and while most people prefer having more utility such as the shield with chronomancer or the focus for the powerful pull, the off-hand sword is a solid replacement for either one of the other off-hand weapons at least in open world and dungeons.

What I would recommend you do is practice in open world. Try out all of the legends, try out every single weapon, though I don't recommend using anything except sword/sword and staff in any power build and take your time learning how to play revenant. You can look up guides on how to play it, but to me that takes the fun away from learning a profession. You will feel dumb in the future for not using a specific utility skill or a trait in a specialization, but learning from your mistakes is the only way you get better at playing a profession.

Thanks all for taking the time to read!

[easy play Engineer for specialization?]

The easiest engineer elite specialization is holosmith. Though by the time you reach level 80, you're going to be playing core engineer and not everyone is willing to take on the steep learning curve that is present with condition engineer, so here is a fairly easy to play core power engineer build that will get you to level 80.

If you already are level 80, then you've probably got holosmith fully unlocked from collecting HoT and PoF hero points and at that point you'll most likely be using full berserker gear with rifle, grenade kit, rifle turret, laser disk and prime light beam which is the most common power holosmith build in PvE.

[(delete topic)]

The easiest engineer elite specialization is holosmith. Though by the time you reach level 80, you're going to be playing core engineer and not everyone is willing to take on the steep learning curve that is present with condition engineer, so here is a fairly easy to play core power engineer build that will get you to level 80.

If you already are level 80, then you've probably got holosmith fully unlocked from collecting HoT and PoF hero points and at that point you'll most likely be using full berserker gear with rifle, grenade kit, rifle turret, laser disk and prime light beam which is the most common power holosmith build in PvE.

[warrior war crier build]

You're not the only one who isn't a meta slave. Reading the warrior changes for the upcoming balance patch had me interested, mainly because we could finally have a support warrior build. Whether it will be as good as druid, firebrand or any other support build I don't know, but I'm very excited to see an actual support build for warrior.

The build is good in concept, but not in execution. For one, some of the weapons don't fit the support playstyle. Replace the greatsword with the hammer for CC and the sword with the mace for applying weakness, counter attack that applies vulnerability, daze and stun. For specializations, replace Strength with Arms 321 for stacking even more vulnerability and use Defense 332 for the 7% damage increase on weakened foes, lower cooldowns on mace and faster adrenaline gain. Replace "On My Mark"! with Banner of Tactics for the increased healing power and longer boon duration. The armor stats are a mess, mostly zealot, two magi, two minstrel, two marauder and one grieving. Why not full harrier or even mix harrier with cleric stats? It would be more consistent.

[Elite Specs Trade-Offs. Your ideas?]

@"Pterikdactyl.7630" said:

@Hoodie.1045 said:I was thinking about how to make Core Engi a little better and it already having a full set of F-skills makes it a little trickier. I don't play Engi much but I have been playing around with it a bit lately, and utility slot feels extremely competitive when trying to include kits. I was thinking, what if Core Engi got a kit included not as a utility skill, but as a weapon swap feature (with no CD to swap)? It would essentially give them 4 utility skill spots, and would give a clear benefit to playing core beyond just the F5 toolbelt.

This is similar to how I was thinking of making kits exclusive to core engineer. Instead of them being utility skills, they are the toolbelt skills. You know how the healing turret, elixir h and aed healing skills are located on the 6 key? The med kit's healing skill is on the F1 key, so if you take the healing skill from F1 and bring it to the 6 key it'll function the same as the other healing skills. So yes, I do believe that making the kits exclusive to core engineer and swapping the toolbelt skills with the utility skills is a good idea. It will take time for those who've been playing core engineer for years to get used to using the toolbelt keybinds for the kits, but we'll be more than happy to do it if this change makes core engineer better.

[Elite Specs Trade-Offs. Your ideas?]

Ever since the Berserker rework, ArenaNet made it clear that they want elite specializations to have actual trade-offs. Some people may not like this, but I do because an elite specialization should give a profession a different playstyle and not a specialization that is objectively better than the core profession. I'm a core engineer main and seeing it neglected for such a long time hurts especially since we went from almost nobody playing engineer to suddenly everybody playing holosmith and nothing but holosmith. I understand that ArenaNet wants more people to play the engineer profession by creating an elite specialization that is easier to play, but doesn't perform as well as core condition engineer, unfortunately that's wasn't the case when PoF was released and it still isn't the case today.

I've been thinking about this for a while and I came up with two solutions: either remove the toolbelt skills from holosmith and just have photon forge as the F1 skill or make the kits exclusive to core engineer. Before anyone freaks out about this, hear me out: holosmith is designed to be a glass cannon specialization, yet it has plenty of sustain thanks to some of the toolbelt skills like regenerating mist and toss elixir s. Removing the toolbelt skills will significantly nerf holosmith's sustain and rightfully so. No build should be able to deal a ton of damage, while also having stability, stealth, quickness, blocking and invulnerability skills.

While on the subject of making kits exclusive to core engineer, understand that the elite specializations don't rely on kits as much as core engineer does. Scrapper only uses the elixir gun for support builds in PvE and for sustain in PvP, holosmith only uses the grenade kit in PvE and no kits in PvP. I know that a lot of people will disagree with me on this and say that this will nerf both of the elite specializations, but really what else can you do to improve core engineer? Aside from buffing/reworking the kits, there's nothing much you can do.

I could go on and talk about trade off for the other elite specializations, but that'll take a long time. Most of the elite specializations are fine as they are and the only thing left to do is to buff the core professions, like elementalist applying quickness instead of swiftness from the elemental attunement trait in arcane, guardian getting the 20% damage increase from the unscathed contender trait in virtues if you have retaliation instead of aegis etc.

[Keybinds]

@"chaosdurza.3291" said:Those all sound pretty reasonable and easy to reach. Something I've been concerned about is using skills while on the move, particularly ground target. Do you ever find it's hard to move around while aiming skills? It's very easy for me to do with all my skills on my mouse, but using the keyboard for movement AND skills is something that seems like it's going to take ages to get used to.

As the old saying goes: "practice makes perfect". Trying to use ground target skills with the keybinds I use especially when using Look Behind for kiting purposes can be a bit difficult to get the hang of, but if you practice enough, you'll find yourself smoothly turning your camera while holding your Look Behind key, using your ground target skills and be able to move forward and sideways. You don't have to stretch out your ring finger to use the 1 skill and you don't have to move your middle finger from the forward key to the 2 skill.

[Keybinds]

The following keybinds are the ones I use without using a 12 side-button mouse:

Movement: WASDJumping: SpaceDodging: ShiftAbout face: ZLook behind: Mouse 5Special action: Mouse 4Tab-targeting: XInteract: GHero panel: HInventory: IWeapon skills: FC345Utility and elite skills: TQERVProfession mechanics (F1-F5): Mouse 3, Ctrl + F, Ctrl + E, Ctrl +R, Ctrl + T

Now you might be wondering why I use F and C for weapon skills 1 and 2. The reason is because I'm a core engineer main and I use a lot of ground target skills mainly with the grenade kit. Spamming ground target skills over and over with the 1 or 2 key is very tiresome and stretching your ring finger puts your hand in an uncomfortable position which affects your ability to kite.

With F and C especially as core engineer, you can comfortably spam grenades and be able to kite enemies effectively. And I'm glad I use these keybinds because it has helped me across every profession.

[Cancel Greatsword skill change]

Replacing Crippling Throw on Counterattack with Counterattack Kick is a good change. As for Power Stab, I don't see what's so "fun" about it. Sure the evasion is nice and all, but it requires no skill. That auto attack chain is more luck based than anything else because it all comes down to you getting lucky enough to start that auto attack chain right as a hard-hitting attack is about to hit you. Replacing it with endurance is much better because it makes you dodge instead of having the weapon dodge for you.

The damage is not being reduced, cooldowns are not being increased, they're just replacing the pointless cripple on Counterattack and replacing the evade with endurance. Relying on an auto attack chain to avoid attacks is a bad habit, so please don't be lazy and just press a button to dodge.

[For PVE Power DPS or Condition DPS?]

It depends on the profession and the type of builds you're going for. For end-game PvE, most professions work better with power builds but there are some who also have viable condition builds. I would recommend using power builds in open world because it's faster to kill them yourself than waiting for conditions to kill mobs. As for condition builds, every profession has one however some professions don't have enough condition application or weren't designed with condition damage in mind. You can certainly play those builds, but they're lackluster compared to power builds.

Let's take for example burn guardian, whether it's core guardian or firebrand they're both good builds, but there's the problem: condition guardian builds only have that one condition. No poison, bleeding, torment, nothing but burning. Burning is the highest dealing damage, but it doesn't last for long and it takes longer time to deal burn damage that's close to power guardian build. The reason why condition engineer has the highest condition damage is because it has a ton of conditions: bleeding, poison, confusion, burning etc. However it is the profession with a highest skill ceiling. Achieving the highest condition damage with core engineer requires using four kits and learning lots of skill rotations.

[Thoughts on Elite Specs and their Future?]

Simply reaching level 80 is enough to unlock every core specialization, utility skill and traits with 0% map completion. 100% map completion can only get you to about 80% of one elite specialization meaning when you start getting hero points in either HoT or PoF zones you should have enough to unlock every elite specialization. For those who are lazy and just want to start unlocking the HoT and PoF elite specializations, they can just reach level 80, skip the Central Tyria hero points and jump straight to the HoT and PoF hero points. I'm fine with the way you unlock specializations as it is.

My thoughts on elite specializations is fairly mixed. Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of a profession having a different playstyle, but the problem comes from ArenaNet poorly thinking through that elite specialization and making it overall better than the core profession. A good example is holosmith. Before holosmith was created engineer was and to a certain degree still is the least played profession in the game. But ever since PoF, everyone started playing holosmith and nothing but holosmith. It is easy to play, doesn't require as much skill as core engineer and can accomplish more. Whether it's in PvE or PvP most people play holosmith because of the simplicity.

[10-1 Engineer changes]

@Vagrant.7206 said:

@Hoodie.1045 said:This is the third time scrapper's been the main focus in a balance patch. There are still no buffs core engineer buffs and no reworks for certain kit skills or even the turrets. The only changes that I am happy with is making the med kit useable underwater and the nerf to holosmith's holographic shockwave.

It's really not the core focus. Warrior and Scourge were.

I was specifically talking about scrapper being the main focus of the entire engineer profession. Every profession gets buffs and nerfs and all engineer got was buffs to the scrapper's hammer, some tweaks to the scrapper traits, nerfs for holosmith (which is great) and nothing for core engineer.

[10-1 Engineer changes]

I don't understand why they would increase the scrapper's hammer damage. The whole point of a tank is to endure the damage, not endure that damage and be able to deal a noticeable amount of damage. Reducing cooldowns sure, but increasing damage on a weapon that's designed for tanking? I just don't get it.

This is the third time scrapper's been the main focus in a balance patch. There are still no buffs core engineer buffs and no reworks for certain kit skills or even the turrets. The only changes that I am happy with is making the med kit useable underwater and the nerf to holosmith's holographic shockwave.

[Upcoming Balance Notes - 10/1/2019]

@Irenio CalmonHuang.2048 said:

Here are my thoughts on the upcoming balance changes:

Elementalist

No surprises here, just a few tempest trait reworks and minor buffs to Signet of Air. Come on ArenaNet, you have to do better than this. Elementalist needs actual buffs, not minor buffs to utility skills that most people don’t use. Buff Conjure Fiery Greatsword, rework the scepter fire and earth auto attacks just something, anything than this.

Engineer

How many times are you going to solely focus on scrapper, ArenaNet? Sure, it's nice that you buffed the hammer, but that also creates another problem. You're making scrapper deal more damage even though the whole point of scrapper is to be a tank. Reducing cooldowns sure, but buffing the damage?

And what about core engineer? No kit buffs or turret buffs? I know turrets aren't as important as kits but come on! It's been like 2-3 balance patches and core engineer barely got any good buffs. However I will say this, the following two changes are really good:

• Holographic Shockwave: Reduced range from 600 to 300.
• Med Kit: This kit can now be used underwater.

This is how you properly nerf professions. Holographic Shockwave's animation isn't accurate to the actual hitbox, so many times I have seen the shockwave fade out yet I still get hit. And while you're at it, please remove the barrier and stability from Crystal Configuration: Eclipse and remove the health gain from Heat Therapy. The amount of sustain holosmith has is insane. Also, please buff core engineer in the next balance patch.

Guardian

Why would you nerf the scepter’s damage by 10% in PvE only? If there’s one thing that the guardian’s scepter didn’t need is a nerf. People have been asking for a scepter auto attack rework for a long time and now you’re just going to nerf it?

You even said it yourselves:

We're also reducing scepter damage and increasing sword damage in PvE as the best melee damage option should not be a ranged weapon.

Well, if you don’t want that to be the case, rework the auto attack and make it an actual range weapon instead of it firing slow projectiles that makes it difficult to hit moving targets and forcing us to get up close so we can hit the targets.

Mesmer

The rework for Chaotic Interruption is much appreciated; I’ll take this new version of the trait than the old one anytime since it was so annoying to fight against. As for the chronomancer trait changes, they’re all solid and I especially like the changes given to Lost Time and Seize The Moment.

Lost Time is the better trait in my opinion mainly because of the alacrity, but Seize the Moment is also a viable option. Sure, most people would say that firebrand is better at applying quickness to allies, but at least the trait is no longer going to be the selfish trait that only grants quickness to the chronomancer.

Necromancer

Buffing the Death Magic specialization is not enough to fix the major problems necromancer has. Necromancer gaining more toughness from Death Magic isn’t going to help much considering that a thief, guardian or revenant can burst them and die within seconds so the only option they have in terms of survival is kiting and getting on non-teleport spots.

As for the sand shade changes, what is even the point of changing it like this? Scourge is already dominant in both PvP and WvW so why would you buff it even further? Also, no buffs for neither core necromancer or reaper? Come on ArenaNet, don’t have them sitting there and collecting dust.

Ranger

Amazing changes to ranger’s melee weapons. The sword will no longer be clunky, the off-hand dagger’s power and condition damage is increased and it will synergize with Crippling Talon.

I also think that the greatsword changes are really great, no pun intended. Replacing the pointless Crippling Throw on Counterattack with a manual Counterattack Kick is much better and replacing the evade on Power Stab, while not favored by many I still like it. Relying on dodging attacks with an auto attack chain is more luck based than skill based. If you want to dodge, just dodge yourself instead of hoping to have timed an auto attack chain perfectly in order to avoid that one hard-hitting attack.

Revenant

Nothing major, just some minor buffs to Mallyx and Jalis which is always appreciated.

Thief

Solid changes to the Shadow Arts specialization. What I would like to see changed are the venom skills. Since Leeching Venoms is getting changed, what if the venom skills got buffed? Either by having their skill cooldowns reduced in PvE only or by implementing the ammo system. Doing so could make core thief viable in end game PvE content.

Warrior

The changes to the Tactics specialization are very interesting. They aim to give warrior ways of healing, buffing and cleansing allies which I’m all for it. Giving warrior a support build is a really neat idea and I can’t wait to see how it turns out.

Whether or not it’s going to be as viable as other support builds like druid I’m not sure, but it’s always nice to see traits that are either niche or terrible be replaced with something worthwhile and something that has the potential of creating new builds for warrior.

[Thoughts/Hopes/Ideas about Engineer's rework on Pistols, Turrets and Kits]

@Vagrant.7206 said:

@"Matoro.9708" said:I agree with all these changes. I would be happy to see even nerfs to the damage of 1 corresponding to the attack speed because at least then you're more likely to get a hit off. It feels slower than rev hammer. 2 as well, it being body blocked by stuff severely reduces your cleave potential. Seeing as we already have some pretty good (shameless self plug) threads about kits and turrets, assuming all we'll ever see are numbers changes and not an elite gadget or whatever, I don't have much else to say. I just wish taking gadgeteer felt like it had as much impact as taking HGH does for Elixir X, you know?

Also, recently I've been playing a lot of core content, and my turret/gadget build actually feels pretty fresh again since I can kill stuff. Just goes to show how much numbers can affect someone's experience.

Pistol 1 has one of the

lowest power coefficients of any autoattacks

in the game (0.4). Only one that's lower is

necro scepter

, which has way more utility in its autoattack. No need to nerf it further just to meet its

stated

cast time.

---

As far as kits go:

• Med kit is fine after rework. No complaints.
• Tool kit's #2 skill needs to be change to have more utility. I would suggest increasing the radius, duration, and duration of bleeds/cripples of the attack. Rest of the skills are fine.

You forgot about the auto attack. The tool kit is the closest thing core engineer gets to a blunt melee weapon and it's incredibly lackluster. I would recommend reducing the cast time to be the same as the scrapper's hammer and replace the cripple with confusion. Box of Nails already applies cripple in a radius, so why would you have the auto attack also apply cripple?

• Bomb kit needs to have short fuse as a baseline. The delay is too long to be useful in competitive formats.

Not just in competitive formats, but in PvE as well. It takes 1 second for bombs to go off, but also an additional half a second to plant them so it takes longer for you to deal damage with them. Making Short Fuse baseline is a step in the right direction, keep the fury boon and replace the delay with an increased explosion radius and 20% cooldown reduction on bomb skills, similar to the Forceful Explosives trait.

• Grenade kit should have the flight speed increase as baseline. I would also suggest adding some kind of resistance to projectile hate/retaliation, because these REALLY hurt grenade kit.

I think retaliation should be reworked as a whole. I understand it when it comes to melee attacks, but ranged attacks? It doesn't make sense how ranged attacks, especially ground targeted skills like grenades manage to damage you from far away. Yes, I agree the throw velocity and explosion radius should be baseline, so replace those with 20% cooldown reduction on grenade skills and increase the throw range from 900 back to 1,200 similar to the old Grenadier.

• E-Gun is mostly fine. I would like to see its #1 and #2 improved though.

Me too. Tranquilizer Dart should have the same cast time as the hopefully future Fragmentation Shot cast time buff. Glob Shot should apply swiftness to allies if you hit your target, not just if you use it within 400 range and apply it to 3 allies which is not mentioned in the tooltip at all.

• Flamethrower #1 should have burning interspersed throughout the attack, not at the end. This would make it way more dangerous (and useful) in competitive formats. I also think the #4 skill should destroy projectiles, and the #5 skill should have ammo (2 count seems right).

Napalm should be changed into a radius instead of a rectangular wall of fire. As for Smoke Vent, I think it would be nice to bring back Backdraft so core engineer can have a little bit more CC than just Air Blast and Big Ol' Bomb. As for the auto attack, it would be great if it applied burning per tick instead of at the end of the auto attack. But one thing you forgot is retaliation. Similar to the the grenade kit, retaliation can hurt the kit as well since it attacks multiple times.

[You engi players have lost your way]

@ellesee.8297 said:Ya'll kill me with all this praise for holosmith as good as nades been to you. Back when you was core engi where was holosmith? You don't abandon ya folks that's been down from day one. You got a little xpac now so you too good for shrapnel nades? You gotta drop at least 12 hip shots chaith style for holosmith, but nades used to be 1500 range AND you get carpel tunnel from kit swapping. A lot of ya'll forgot where you came from and it's sad... Not me though. Nade kit until the day I die.

Luckily for you, there are still a few remaining good core engineer mains. I'm not talking about the players who claim that they are engineer mains but play nothing but holosmith in every game mode, but a real core engineer main who uses multiple kits. I've been playing the profession since 2013, the year I started playing GW2. There were very few engineer players back in the day, ranging from most of them being really bad to the very few good core engineers that use kits, the classic piano playstyle. It's the profession with the highest skill ceiling in the game (with elementalist having the second highest) and ever since the release of PoF, we went from very few people playing engineer to everyone playing holosmith and nothing but holosmith.

I hated Holosmith from day one because I find it insulting that they would make an easier to play spec that not only doesn't require as much skill to play, but also achieves more. But no matter what, no matter if Holosmith is meta in all game modes and it's easier to play, I still play core engineer in both PvE and PvP to this day. Everytime I perfectly execute my skill rotations, I'm still motivated to keep going and to never abandon the skills I learned while playing core engineer years ago. In general, core engineer with kits never gets boring unlike holosmith.

[Cape Requests [merged]]

Who needs capes when you've got backpacks? You were probably expecting me to say wings, but I don't like wings. I prefer backpacks. Function over fashion.

[SAB: Flute song not working, blocking boomerang progress]

@"Vethaera.6319" said:Is there anything else I can do? Because I don't know what else to do at this point.

Are you sure you didn't miss out on one song? The only reason you can't release the raccoon from the ice block is because you didn't unlock the third flute song, Shatter Serenade or 133133. When you reach the top of the ice mountain, you have two portals: one that takes you straight to the yeti and one that leads you on the longer path where you can unlock Moto's Finger.

After you take the portal for that path, keep going until you reach the second checkpoint, the bit where there are plenty of ice spikes. In the middle of the area, you can play the song 332331 to unlock the hidden door on the wall to your right. Climbing up the stairs will lead you to a maze in which you need to exit. Once you're outside of the maze, kill every banana you come across in order to unlock the door in that open space. Use your torch and you should find the old man with the 133133 song. If you prefer watching a video, here's one from

(go to 10:18 for the third song).

[Catching the kegs - Wayfarer Foothills Heart (Help Kevach maintain his lodge)]

It's a common bug that Volden no longer hits players with barrels, hence making the mini game impossible to finish. Your internet connection can somewhat affect the minigame, but what you need to do for the most part is to jump right before the barrel lands.

[A Good Substitute for Marauder Stats?]

The only other stat that comes close to marauder in my opinion is valkyrie. It lacks the precision stat, but offers more power, vitality and ferocity. All you have to do from there is to buy/craft precision food to compensate for the lack of precision in valkyrie stats.

[AMAZING fan cover of Fear Not This Night]

I applaud your guildmate's talent and effort that he put into this amazing cover of one of my favorite GW2 songs. Also, R.I.P. Tybalt.

[So Why Do Players Do World Bosses? [POLL]]

When I first started playing GW2, I did world bosses for the high level equipment, for dragonite ore and/or the rare gear that I salvaged to get globs of ectoplasm since I needed them for crafting. Nowadays, I do world bosses mostly for the dailies. And for fun.

[Spirit Watch]

I feel the same way. I never figured out why players seem to either hate this map or just ignore it entirely. Maybe it's because of the orb and how it slows down the carrier that other players have to protect the carrier at all times, resulting in both teams clashing against one another until the orb resets, wasting everyone's time. The second reason could be that both spawn points are relatively close to each other that within 10 seconds, some players are either going to begin the team fight or everyone starts attacking each other next to the orb instead of getting to the mid point and fighting there.

I for one, really like how Spirit Watch looks and how it is designed. It's not too big, it's got plenty of open space while also having enough teleport spots for professions like thief, mesmer and elementalist can use to traverse the map. It's not like Eternal Coliseum where there's so little cover especially on the mid point where ranged professions can almost shut down melee professions. It's got just enough that it doesn't favor ranged professions over melee professions or vice versa.