[A Conspicuous Trend Among GW2's Cast of Characters *Spoilers*]

9 hours ago, mandala.8507 said:

So I'm guessing you also love Avatar: The Last Airbender, but can't stand Legend of Korra.

Got it. 🙂

I'm not really a fan of anime/manga, sorry. Akira was pretty good though.

[A Conspicuous Trend Among GW2's Cast of Characters *Spoilers*]

Games - Not many to be honest, obviously it tends to be best found in RPGs or the equivalent. For characters specifically, I think Shodan is a pretty standout antagonist in System Shock. I ought to throw Prey (2016) in as well, because like System Shock, it really blended an atmospheric and terrifying game world together with its character(s) and lore. Actually Prey might be my favourite game of all time; When I played it I got that 'Half-Life' moment I thought I'd not experience again in my life. It's hugely underrated.

TV - I'd say the Expanse trumps everything in recent memory, especially Naomi's arc after she gets herself out of a very, very dire situation in the final season. That one hit home particularly hard for me, because I disliked her intently until that moment, and I finally realised just how much she loves her son.

Books - Much easier; almost all of my 'favourite characters' and story comes from books. That makes sense, obviously. My favourite book of all time is Blind Sight by Peter Watts. He has a pretty interesting blog, too. The book explores the meaning of consciousness, and wonders how important a role it plays in the evolution of intelligence. It altered my perspective on life. When I was younger I enjoyed Iain Bank's entire catalogue, may he rest in peace. His books were decidedly more childish, but The Culture is a very interesting society.

Guild Wars 2 specifically, I thought the LS arc with Rytlock's son slowly losing his mind was really, really good. To transition from that to EoD. Ouch.

And yes, Bridesmaids is atrocious. It's like a spectacularly unfunny rendition of The Hangover. The Hangover - dudes pushing a smashed up car with an enraged tiger in it up a hill. Comedy genius, the writers must have worked backwards from that scene to piece it together. Bridesmaids - chick in a bridal dress craps on the road. Oh. Hilarious. My 4 year old sings songs about farts and poop that I find funnier than that film (actually, they can be pretty hilarious and oddly psychotic at times).

[A Conspicuous Trend Among GW2's Cast of Characters *Spoilers*]

Thread necro, but I kinda feel the same way as the OP. It's taken me a looong time to get through the GW2 story; in fact, way back during LS1 all my RL mates quit on account of how bad it was. The whole Destiny's Edge nonsense was so childish, it was a real turn off. Thankfully we got some really good characters in the end, and to me the highlight of GW2 was doing the legendary neck piece collections, as the story really got quite good. But now in Cantha, sweet Jesus. It's all so on the nose, for all the reasons players have mentioned. I'm not sure why one would intentionally destroy such a good run lore and story wise, did the story stuff change hands maybe? It really does not feel like the same quality. It's almost, dare I say it, like the bridesmaids film - where they just take all the bad stuff about a male only cast and flip it on its head. I'll keep soldiering on, because GW2 is a darn good game, but it's become a proper slog.

[Weaponmaster Training Beta Feedback: Revenant]

2 hours ago, Za Shaloc.3908 said:

 

That is my fear too actually. Elite specs that do more damage getting weapons that do more damage...well that just sounds like a nerf waiting to happen. And a good way of ruining weapons that have otherwise been fine. I'm conflicted about the whole thing.

Yep let's face it; All they really need to do is nothing, which is precisely not what will happen. It's gun get wrekt.

[Weaponmaster Training Beta Feedback: Revenant]

3 hours ago, Shagie.7612 said:

shortbow vindi feels pretty crazy, especially if cata and tempest see nerfs in the future

i basically only play renegade currently because i like the weapon kit, but this frees up my choice a lot which is kinda cool, but also feels a bit weird cause part of what keeps the weapon in check is renegade being a crappy traitline. i'm not sure power cares that much about the lack of pierce, at least in spvp, and vindi traits + the legend are waaaay better than renegade's.

also it being a better power weapon than hammer in most respects is kinda rough (poor shao lol), maybe it's time to change shortbow to lean more heavily towards its condi application so there's a distinct choice for what damage type you want in your ranged weapon. 

I think you got it a bit backwards - shortbow doesn't need specialization, it works brilliantly and compliments many builds which is a huge plus. What we need is to buff Hammer as well, so it is as useful as Shortbow. The distinction can lie in what effects the weapons have other than damage. Maybe hammer projectile absorb could be traited to reflect for example. Hammer also has the longer range and auto-pierce, so perhaps some changes can capitalize on this.

[Weaponmaster Training Beta Feedback: Revenant]

I ran Retri, Corruption, Vindi in WvW with Celestial stats and SB/GS then later, Mace/Sword. Being able to combine SB's AoE with Alliance AoE produces a huge pile of damage, and you can easily poke/escape using road, triple dodge and both Alliance leaps. It's a pretty superb combination. The backup weapon's not really needed.

[Weaponmaster Training Beta Feedback: Revenant]

4 hours ago, Yasai.3549 said:

I only care about Greatsword on other builds than Vindicator. Greatsword is such a good and balanced weapon after they totally killed Staff in competitive. 

Oh and at least our prayers were answered early by allowing all builds to access Shortbow, which is awesome option for Core Condi or Herald QuickCondi builds. 

Yup GS replacing staff should be interesting, I'm looking forward to checking that out today on my Rev. This is for WvW btw. I am using SB right now running Renegade, Invocation and Salvation/Retribution (depending on zerg or not). Staff has always been an 'oh kitten kitten kitten' swap when suddenly being jumped or accidentally eating some wombo combo. GS has the block and some mobility in the leap, but can also do a bit more offense. I might have just been using staff wrong, but I feel like GS will take a more even share of time with the SB instead of being a backup.

[Secrets of the Obscure - Weaponmaster Training: Revenant]

Shortbow won't be all that good without the Renegade traits, but the extra weapon choice could be interesting. I kind of loathe taking staff as a defensive weapon in WvW, so maybe x + shield could replace it. Scepter as the mainhand new weapon is interesting, but unfortunately every single scepter skin is unbelievably ugly. I'd say it's the ugliest weapon class, but Warhorns and Maces exist, so it's a close second.

[Nomad´s Advance animation doesn't make sense for Revenant]

5 hours ago, Esufer.8762 said:

I don't find Nomad's is any louder than other skills?

That said, when Nomad's Advance bugs out and my character leaps forwards still holding the greatsword it looks absolutely awesome and I wish it was just how the skill was meant to look.

Weird, for me it is noticeably louder, especially the tail end of the choir chant's sustain, right before release. There are some percussive sounds too, I think, but the lower frequencies are not over powering, it's the mids and up where the choir lies.

[Nomad´s Advance animation doesn't make sense for Revenant]

Yep Nomad's Advance is much louder than the other sounds, it could do with an adjustment.

[Guild Wars 2 on Reddit Blackout]

Eventually Reddit will forcibly reopen the forums by replacing 'inactive' mods with those willing to carry on. This is what happens when you bring a generation up on 'free' stuff. All these companies have had their seed money dry up, and now they have to monetize a userbase that is used to complaining about how much everything costs. First target - greedy API sponges who have made a pile of cash off of Reddit's back by selling subscriptions to their 3rd party tools. Kind of on Reddit's side here - eject the idiots who don't understand how money works.

[June 9 – June 23 World Restructuring Beta]

Had good fun playing this evening, bonus to rewards is nice though it really should just be kept this way. It's not as if the game mode really shits rewards on you, and the current bonus isn't so crazy that people would join purely to farm like Edge of the Mists. By the way, was Warclaw always this easy to obtain? I thought the gold sink used to be higher. Not that I am complaining.

[June 27th Revenant Balance Preview]

Yeah but forced engagement once again goes further than arm's reach. Rejoice, ye plebs!

[Map change stole my rented beetle...]

7 hours ago, Noah Salazar.5430 said:

geting donation from random tp baron is easier

Mate... I dropped my renta beetle too, and now it's lost...

[Suggestion: Stop Making Jumping Puzzles Mandatory]

5 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Sorry, but when it comes to jumping puzzles, I learn by doing or by observing and figuring it out, not by sitting around twiddling my thumbs having my time disrespected in a box where I can't even see the puzzle. I have better things to do with my time than spending half of it staring at someone else's progress bar.

It's your progress bar as long as you don't fall into the soup.

[Housing System]

It would depend on how it is implemented. I'd love housing, but only if I could build the entire structure as well as decorate it.

[Suggestion: Stop Making Jumping Puzzles Mandatory]

9 hours ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

The thing that gets me with clock tower is that if you do attempt to practice it, you spend half your time waiting around while other people are going up. The average wait between attempts is long enough to be aggravating while being too short to do anything else between attempts than stare at the progress bar and be annoyed.

It'd be a lot more pleasant to attempt if you could get your own instance where you can just try again immediately if you fail.

The time you spend in the naughty box for falling into the acid is supposed to make you think about your mistakes.

[Legendary regrets]

2 hours ago, Vilin.8056 said:

Doesn't matter really, no matter what legendary you go for, they all look dull after possessing for a week or two.

What? I got Bolt yeeeears ago and still think it's one of the best looking swords in the game.

[unreal Engine 5 mmos hard times for gw2]

Bad coding? Lol. GW2's engine is pretty solid if you ask me. Unreal Engine games are like Unity - you can practically immediately spot them. Unity games, because they're full of bugs and strange UI choices owing to how scenes and behaviours work. Unreal games, because they always tread into the uncanny valley and are more style over substance. No; we don't need more Unreal Engine games. We need less.

[Vindicator dodge is still bugged]

^ Not entirely correct; you learn, later, that there comes a tradeoff between ultimate code reuseability and just getting the work done in a timely manner. Furthermore, you can end up in a bit of a nasty coupling situation where one change affects multiple systems because of code reuse. With things like skills, which need to be adjustable on a class by class, game mode by game mode basis, it probably makes sense to 'copy paste' the 'code' (whatever that code actually is) because that also means you can make minor configuration alterations to a particular skill without affecting anything else. Unfortunately, one does need an effective way of documenting all of this and ensuring that, as you say, identical skill descriptions across the board should lead to identical (as far possible) behaviour.

[SAB General Fedback]

1 hour ago, Solvar.7953 said:

One thing that I think makes the frog harder is that if you lose all your health and restart at the checkpoint, the frog is also at full health.

For the storm wizard/dragon, that is not the case - if you got it down to 30% and loose all your health and restart at checkpoint, it is still at 30%.

So this could make the frog incredibly frustrating as if you just miss the jumps/get hit by the tongue, you could be in the case where you are never seeing any progress and don't see any way to do it.  Where as for all the other SAB bosses, you can grind them down, as long as you have enough continue coins.

 

You shouldn't be able to succeed at something by smashing your head into it until it breaks, though.

[SAB General Fedback]

W2Z2 length is fine; it does not take significantly longer than the other zones. This is similarly the case with W2Z3, you just need to learn the shortcuts. Tribulation mode is another matter, but cloud skip potentially solves that issue for W2Z2. What I find concerning so far this year is that there appears to be a significant variability in the player's rate of movement. I have found pixel perfect jumps to randomly fail quite often. I have tried with frame limiter set to 60fps, and set to unlimited, and 60fps helps a little. The most egregious occurance of this for me was jumping the big flowers in W1Z1 trib, after landing on one I would inexplicably gain what appeared to be super speed and my follow up jump would launch me for miles... and into the grass. Which as you all know, is lava. I also found wall jumping to be almost impossible, it took me 10 minutes to get my one and only success, and of course dodge jump failed afterward. Actually dodge jumping has a pretty high failure rate now too. It seems like the dx11 upgrade did something to the rate that the game updates the player's position maybe? In any case, it's actually quite infuriating to play trib mode right now because of this.

Also please rename exploration mode back to infantile, we all know that anyone playing that mode isn't seriously interested in SAB and just wants the rewards. Better to call a spade a spade than somehow validate it. It's even more on the nose because the cloud walkways get in the way of any serious exploration anyway.

[Seven Reaper's Pauldrons listed twice on BL Statuette Vendor]

The pauldrons are up twice for 25 statuettes, it seems like perhaps one of them should be the trousers, which no longer appear in the recent BL items tab.

[Here is a very fun Vindi build for PvE]

Holy crap I'm gone for a year and apparently in the meantime this forum has descended into ripping players to shreds for posting builds that aren't rated five out of five caws on snow-crows (or whatever the goto site is now). 

[What GW2 really lacks to me (in comparison to WoW)]

6 minutes ago, Arnox.5128 said:

I think we've all cleared what OP was talking about. Now what the REAL problem is is that GW2 PvP is just not as good as WoW Classic's PvP at all. World PvP in WoW was super fun and added some danger and excitement to the world. My only problem with it was that you weren't allowed to chat with the other side for some weird kitten reason.

 

I played WoW Classic for a bit to see if it truly lived up to the rose-tinted window I was comparing it to. It did. Whatever magic WoW had back in the day was not just fond memories, it was a genuinely good game and still is. It's sort of funny now because the only thing better in the newest WoW expansions are the cinematics and a couple of graphical effects. The game probably peaked at Wrath, but even then... I hated Arenas, dailies, crit reduction in pvp etc. Maybe I only liked Wrath because it wasn't Burning Crusade. In any case, I still hold GW2 far higher than even Classic for PvP, because GW2's action mechanics put emphasis on positioning and active damage avoidance instead of simply range and LOS.