Hardest "Return To..." Achievments?

[SlitheSlivier.1908]

I decided I'm finally gong to try to do all the Return To... achievements for the legendary.  I've done the first 2.5 out of 24.  I'm curious, just so I know what I'm getting into and maybe what to keep an eye on during prime-time, what are the hardest ones to do?

[AgentMoore.9453]

It definitely took time and patience to get through these, but ultimately I didn't find the Return To stuff hard because I jumped at it while it was active (this meant lots of people doing the same thing, helpful Mesmers, widespread FAQ in mapchat, etc.) For the most part, the Return To achievements won't pose a problem for you and are just a matter of time invested.

What I did find, however, was that some of the tasks were finicky, took a bit longer, or would be more annoying to do without sufficient numbers on the map. I've got those listed below:

Return To Dry Top - Treasure Hunter
This one isn't particularly difficult so much as tedious because of getting lockpicks and then waiting for a sandstorm and further making sure you're in the right part of the map when opening a chest (as this determines which part of the achievement you're getting credit for).

Return To Hidden Arcana
Tedious, buggy. It's not a super popular story step, but if you know what you're doing ahead of time it can move a little faster.

Return To Arcana Obscura
Similar to above, longish instance.

Reconquer The Retrospective Runaround
Quite a long puzzle, best done with a guide, made much easier with mounts.

Unbound Guardian's Revenge
Bloodstone Fen isn't a super popular map (or hasn't been during my visits), and so getting to this boss at all can be something of a challenge. You may get lucky with LFG around reset time, but catching this guy on the fly might be annoying.

Reconquer The Chalice Of Tears
Fairly long jumping puzzle notorious for its unclear pathing, slippery geometry, and high rate of failure. Some Mesmer guilds take pity on the people who get frustrated with it, but you can also try guides and carrying a prototype position rewinder with you.

Return To Confessor's End
You have to look at Caudecus' face. Like, a lot. My condolences in advance.

Revenge of the High Sage
This is a boss in Lake Doric that is a serious pain in the butt both to get to and to defeat with insufficient numbers. Even at the height of this achievement's popularity, people were reporting a lot of difficulty in getting to populated instances.

Bounty Hunter - Domain Of Istan
Half the time, the bounties will turn out to be ambushes which makes completing this one quite annoying.

Forearmed Is Forewarned
Long, fairly boring instance.

Revenge Of The Wrathbringer
This is the Thunderhead Peaks northern meta, and it fails quite often.

Revenge Of The Ooze
One of the Grothmar Valley metas; it can be difficult to find populated maps, but LFG may help you here

Treasure Hunter - Drizzlewood Coast
This map closes after every meta and these bosses only spawn after the first half of the meta which can take upwards of an hour. Additionally, people spawncamp these bosses or fly very quickly to them, making it easy to miss out on killing as many as you need. You may need to visit a few Drizzlewoods before getting them all.

Return To Champions
You have to do DRMs again. I'm so sorry.

So yeah, mostly no issue getting these done, but some of them will grind along more than others. Best of luck on your journey.

[Rasimir.6239]

3 hours ago, SlitheSlivier.1908 said:

what are the hardest ones to do?

That differs from person to person. Some have a tough time with certain story steps, others with jumping puzzles, again others find specific maps or meta events hard or tedious.

 

If you've already played the living stories before, your best bet is to go through all of the achievement panels and note down the ones you think you'll have to keep an eye out for, because you probably wouldn't do them in your natural way of playing the maps (e.g. do lots of bounties in a map, I seem to recall that Sandswept Isles gave me some extra work here).

[The Boz.2038]

Paying 2g for the Ember Bay JP tour is the hardest part.

[Tiamat.8254]

3 minutes ago, The Boz.2038 said:

Paying 2g for the Ember Bay JP tour is the hardest part.

I got ripped off 😂 but seriously, do this!

[BunjiKugashira.9754]

Some of these require you to craft map specific backpacks. Especially the druid stone takes a long time to craft due to daily cooldowns. I recommend starting the crafting process early as you will complete many other achievements like harvesting or participating in events along the way.

 

Also for Ls3 and Ls4 look at your dailies. The maps are on a daily rotation with extra rewards and the daily map tends to be a bit more populated on that day.

[Rasimir.6239]

15 minutes ago, BunjiKugashira.9754 said:

Some of these require you to craft map specific backpacks

No they don't. These are part of the legendary trinket collections (Aurora & Vision), NOT part of the return-to achievements (for the legendary amulet).

[BunjiKugashira.9754]

8 minutes ago, Rasimir.6239 said:

No they don't. These are part of the legendary trinket collections (Aurora & Vision), NOT part of the return-to achievements (for the legendary amulet).

Oh, my bad. Since I did both achievements simultaneously, I attributed these to the wrong achievement.

[jokke.6239]

6 hours ago, AgentMoore.9453 said:

 

Return To Hidden Arcana
Tedious, buggy. It's not a super popular story step, but if you know what you're doing ahead of time it can move a little faster.

Return To Arcana Obscura
Similar to above, longish instance.

 

It was one of these for me.

Tried it 2 times but didn't understand the mechanics on the boss.

Asked in LA if someone would help me for 5G, and I had it done fairly quickly though.

Oh and ofc ember bay puzzle

Overall it's quite easy to get done. Easiest legendary ever 😄

Perfect for getting mats for skyscale and vision/aurora also.

[Gibson.4036]

I think the hardest one for me was getting the bounties in Domain of Istan. People in the map seem very focused on the metas, and it was hard to get a group together to do anything else. Oddly, I ended up finding a group to do bounties in the early morning NA. Maybe being so far off NA prime time meant too few people there for the meta?

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

The metas and bounties will be the hardest part now that the rush is over, but LWS3 and LWS4 have rotating dailies on the maps. Just do those maps when they are dailies and you shouldn't have as much trouble. Otherwise keep an eye on the LFG tool for impromptu groups, or even better make one yourself.

[Gorem.8104]

3 hours ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

The metas and bounties will be the hardest part now that the rush is over, but LWS3 and LWS4 have rotating dailies on the maps. Just do those maps when they are dailies and you shouldn't have as much trouble. Otherwise keep an eye on the LFG tool for impromptu groups, or even better make one yourself.

What I ended up doing, Needed bounties to finish the achievement off  so just made a group and kept going till they were all done for everyone, great way to both benefit yourself and others 

[Cuks.8241]

I've been doing some Aurora and Vision achivs lately, after finishing the Return to and it looks like the maps are still more active than before.

If there is one thing to point out where help can be really appreciated are the jumping puzzles in Ember Bay and Draconis Mons. Even if you like JPs like me, these can be very frustrating. Not because they are particulary hard (even though a guide is almost required, can't imagine figuring out all the glides and strange jumps by yourself) but the design is just annoying. But with a friendly mesmer or at least more people around knowing the way in Ember Bay and a simple tp to friend in Draconis Mons these can be a breeze. If you're going to tackle them by yourself at least get your position rewinder first.

[TheQuickFox.3826]

The Chalice of Tears jumping puzzle if you're not into that. (One of the hardest jumping puzzles in game)

Some achievements require you to slay big bosses which can sometimes be hard to find groups for nowadays. (That's why I did the return to ... achievements when they were released)

[Faccina.5091]

Quote

Treasure Hunter - Drizzlewood Coast

youll need a flying mount 🙈

[Fuchslein.8639]

For me personally it was the end, all the freaking DRM's. I did them in Primetime EU and was in almost everyone ALONE. Not in the term of hard, nothing of the achievments are really hard in my perspectiv. But in the annoying apartment, the drm's go number 1 for me. They are so long~ and boring and ugh. I finished the last part with story and DRM's in one evening because I just wanted it to be over xD.
When you have the chance, wait and do them with friends so you can atleast have fun.

Edited February 10, 2022 by Fuchslein.8639

[ugrakarma.9416]

On 2/9/2022 at 6:46 AM, Rasimir.6239 said:

No they don't. These are part of the legendary trinket collections (Aurora & Vision), NOT part of the return-to achievements (for the legendary amulet).

the druid backpack alone is harder then entire return to achievs.

[ugrakarma.9416]

3 hours ago, Fuchslein.8639 said:

For me personally it was the end, all the freaking DRM's. I did them in Primetime EU and was in almost everyone ALONE. Not in the term of hard, nothing of the achievments are really hard in my perspectiv. But in the annoying apartment, the drm's go number 1 for me. They are so long~ and boring and ugh. I finished the last part with story and DRM's in one evening because I just wanted it to be over xD.
When you have the chance, wait and do them with friends so you can atleast have fun.

yeah the DRM's is the lowest point of all history modes.

also:

most DRM's bosses have useless time-spending mechanics at each 25% hp they loss, to they dont appear just hp spounges.

Edited February 10, 2022 by ugrakarma.9416

[Luthan.5236]

Some eventing in maps with not too many events felt annoying. Then the JP in Ember Bay of course. And some bounties. But merely a matter of time.

Edit: Oh of course ... DRMs also took a lot of time.

Edited February 11, 2022 by Luthan.5236

[SlitheSlivier.1908]

Thanks for the help all! I took much of your advice. So far I've done all the meta events since they might require people that may not be on the map after EoD. Then I did the bounties for the same reason since you guys said they can be tough. I actually was able to lead a bounty train with a Handful of people that didn't care what bounties we did, so finished this achiev nicely. 

 

Next I'll do the (annoying) jumping puzzles. Did I see there is a way to pay gold in order to not do them but get credit? Not looking forward to Emery Bay one. 

[Gibson.4036]

On 2/11/2022 at 9:19 AM, SlitheSlivier.1908 said:

 

Next I'll do the (annoying) jumping puzzles. Did I see there is a way to pay gold in order to not do them but get credit? Not looking forward to Emery Bay one. 

Do you have TacO? I found both of the JPs totally doable with it. I know some say they can't do them even with TacO, but it's worth trying.

I'm guessing the "pay gold" was someone saying you can sometimes find Mesmers to shortcut it for a tip?

Edited February 13, 2022 by Gibson.4036

[SlitheSlivier.1908]

29 minutes ago, Gibson.4036 said:

Do you have TacO? I found both of the JPs totally doable with it. I know some say they can't do them even with TacO, but it's worth trying.

I'm guessing the "pay gold" was someone saying you can sometimes find Mesmers to shortcut it for a tip?

I haven't used it...yet. but I got lucky and found people to guide me through one, and teleport the rest haha. Slightly cheating but holy moly do I hate them. 

[LSD.4673]

The JPs are long, and Draconis Mons' is ugly and terrible, but by far the hardest is enduring the story steps. Eugh. Anime-quality voice actors reading anime-quality lines which, after S2, can't even be skipped.