Game Update Notes: March 15, 2022

[Rubi Bayer.8493]

03/15/2022—March 15 Release Notes

World Polish

• A few more cats have made their home at Zen Daijun's Cat Island. Please pet accordingly.
• Enneca Havocstriker will now accept interview requests about her change of vocation.
• When the last battery is found in the chapter "Weight of the World," needed batteries will be marked with pickup markers so players don't need to remember where they left them.
• Fixed an issue in which it was possible for Taimi to have cloned herself in the Eye of the North during the story step "Convergence."
• Qualification for the For Lion's Arch achievement will now start at the very beginning of the Aetherblade Armada instance in the chapter "Old Friends."
• The letter from Caithe now contains a Single-Use Eye of the North Portal Scroll.
• Added speed-boost skills to the items players can throw at naga looters in the "Drive naga invaders and looters away from Kaolai Tower" event in Dragon's End.
• Made fixes and improvements to markers in the "Help Xunlai Jade prepare their jade shipment" and "Stop Void Corrupters from tainting the jade shipment" events in Dragon's End.
• Added achievements for completing the highest tier of completion in the "Help Xunlai Jade prepare their jade shipment" and "Stop Void Corrupters from tainting the jade shipment" events in Dragon's End.
• Rumors abound of revelers getting footloose somewhere in the Echovald Wilds. 
• Fixed an issue in which players did not get an achievement eligibility effect when mounting up at certain locations.
• A diving location in Dragon's End can now be interacted with to exit its location.
• Fixed incorrect icons and item names for certain items in the Jade Sliver Recycler's inventory.
• Ah-Reum and Bomi's discussion of a more inclusive Brotherhood will now play properly.
• Several mining nodes in Dragon's End have been unearthed and no longer appear below the ground.
• Notarized Scrolls of Jade Heroics now use the correct icon.
• The tengu in Mori Village who was hiding in the bushes has been reprimanded and is now standing in the open.
• Fixed an issue that caused the spirit of a certain character to appear more often than intended during the Battle for the Jade Sea meta-event.
• Fixed an issue that caused a jade bot technician to appear early in the Jade Brotherhood Outpost in Dragon's End.
• Fixed an issue that sometimes caused dialogues from Aurene to overlap during the "Quell the Void corruption" events in Dragon's End.
• The interact cooldown for rubble piles in the "Help the archaeologists extract relics from their magical wards" event has been adjusted to encourage more varied treasure hunting around the entire event area.
• A ley line will now appear near the Harvest Temple after completion of the Battle for the Jade Sea meta-event that leads players to an area to the southwest.
• Fixed an issue that caused the residents of the fishing hamlet in Seitung Province to occasionally ignore naga attackers during the "Defend the village's supplies from naga raiders" event.
• Security turrets will no longer target laser walls during the Seitung Province meta-event.
• Added a new conversation option to Fisherman Benyo in the fishing hamlet in Seitung Province that allows players to purchase fishing supplies before completing the renown heart.
• The overall meta-event timer will now pause during longer exchanges of dialogue between characters toward the end of the Dragon's End meta-event.
• Fixed an issue in a collection that prevent Xiuhtonal's marker from showing up on the map while on a specific step.
• Made fixes and improvements to markers in the "Defeat Janin" event in New Kaineng City.
• Fixed an issue that caused Officer Roz to occasionally linger on the crashed airship during the "Defeat the Aetherblade Champion" event in Seitung Province.
• Reduced the size of the event broadcast for the "Unmask and thwart the Purist agitators!" event in Seitung Province.
• Fixed a bug in New Kaineng City that briefly removed collision on the consoles in the Nahpui Lab during the Kaineng Blackout meta-event.
• The human MinSec NPC has been replaced with a tengu MinSec NPC in the "Protect the technicians" events in New Kaineng City. 
• Corrected Mizuki's pathing when she exits the Sunjiang Lab during the Kaineng Blackout meta-event in New Kaineng City.
• Adjusted the scale of the final boss's defiance bar during one specific phase transition of the Battle for the Jade Sea meta-event to address a potential exploit. Overall time to complete this phase transition should not be impacted significantly.
• Fixed an issue in which the environment zone present in the chapter "Fallout" could persist through to the public version of Arborstone.

General

• Looking for Group: Added mouseover tooltip text to End of Dragons entries.
• Cleaned up fishing and jade bot item opacities so they no longer look improperly grayed out when unselected.
• Added better tooltips to the map region navigation buttons.
• Fixed a bug that could cause jade bot modules to sometimes show an incorrect state in the Hero panel.
• Added a skill to the siege turtle mount that will open the passenger slot to players that aren't in a party or squad with the pilot.
• Increased the Memories of Aurene reward for the Battle of the Jade Sea meta-event.
• Slightly increased the Memories of Aurene reward in the Dragonstorm and the Battle of Dragonfall meta-events.
• Added a small Memories of Aurene reward for replaying certain episodes from Living World Seasons 3 and 4 in which Aurene had some degree of involvement.
• Added a small Memories of Aurene reward for replaying the chapter "To Kill a God" in Path of Fire.

 

Personal Story

• Added additional hint text to the Premium Tour achievement.
• Fixed an issue that allowed Rama and Ayumi to talk over each other inside Arborstone.
• Updated faction representatives to prevent them from being killed in Dragon's End, which could block completion of the Competent Commander achievement.
• Fixed an issue with the eligibility effect that tracks the I Brought Flowers achievement.

 

Profession Skills

Engineer

• Fixed a bug in which the mechanist's mech could get stuck repeating an animation after using a skill.
• Fixed a bug in which the mechanist's mech would not animate for a few moments after being unstowed.
• Fixed a bug in which the mechanist's mech would sometimes appear that it was taking enormous amounts of damage to its defiance bar.

Guardian

Willbender

• Searing Pact: Updated the condition damage skill fact to use the correct icon.
• Crashing Courage: Updated skill facts so aegis is properly removed when Deathless Courage is equipped.

Ranger

• Jade Cannon (Siege Turtle): Fixed a tooltip issue with the soulbeast variant of this ability that labeled this attack as a blast finisher.

Revenant

Vindicator

• Added additional voice-over lines to Legendary Alliance Stance and Legendary Assassin Stance.
• Legendary Alliance Stance: Fixed a bug in which reviving or dismounting would cause the incorrect faction to be present.
• Balance in Discord: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to activate twice off of Energy Meld instead of a single time from Alliance Tactics.

Thief

Specter

• Triple Threat: Fixed a bug that caused this skill to grant might to the user when targeting an ally.

BLACK LION TRADING COMPANY GEM STORE

• Check out www.guildwars2.com every week for the most up-to-date information on Black Lion Trading Company Gem Store releases.

Improvements and Updates

• Recovered Black Lion Goods from the Knife Tail Gang Hunting Bond have been updated with more than 500 new items.
• Items skins that haven't been obtained yet that are part of an achievement will now display "Collectible" in their tooltip.

[Rubi Bayer.8493]

03/15/2022—March 15 Release Late Notes

World Polish

• The guards in the "Outreach" story chapter will now stop you from climbing in the throne while they are present. This will also disqualify you from the "All Due Respect" achievement.
• Some tengu in Mori Village who were prone to start talking over story scenes have been moved.
• Fixed an issue in which the hitbox indicator for the final boss of the meta-event "The Battle for the Jade Sea" was subject to culling and would frequently be invisible.
• Fixed an issue in which the event UI wasn’t properly displaying the champion boss health during the “Defeat the naga leader before it withdraws” event in New Kaineng City.
• Fixed an issue that caused the Unchained Champion Kingpin to speak in encrypted text at certain points during the "Defeat the Unchained Kingpin" event in Seitung Province.
• Fixed an issue that prevented the "Defeat the Void infecting the chamber" event in the final room of the minidungeon in Dragon's End from granting participation if there were 3 or fewer players present when the boss was defeated.
• Fixed an issue that prevented the Valdhertz Crypts minidungeon in Echovald Wilds from resetting after completion.
• Fixed a rare issue that could cause the "Eliminate the enraged kappa" event from starting properly.
• Fixed an issue with the "Tracing the Tapestry" achievement that prevented players who completed the Dragon's End step before the Seitung Province step from progressing.

General

• DirectX11: Fixed textures sometimes becoming corrupted.
• DirectX11: Fixed a client crash.
• Fishmongers now offer mackerel baitfish in exchange for 5 Fine Fish Fillets.

Raids

• Glenna's Mystic Clover weekly trade has now also been added to the Exchanges tab on the Basic Magnetite Exchange Operative in the Lion's Arch Aerodrome.

Spirit Vale

• Vale Guardian: Distributed Magic, also known as "greens," will no longer deal damage to player pets.

Profession Skills

Elementalist

Catalyst has landed strong in group content and currently has damage-dealing potential that is higher than intended when compared against other professions. We've realized that we made a mistake with the specific durations of quickness in the catalyst's kit, as our other professions require a damage tradeoff in trait selection to bring a strong boon support role while the catalyst currently does not, leading to the catalyst dealing about a third more damage than other quickness support options. With this patch, we're tuning the catalyst to parity with other professions in damage and setting up Sphere Specialist as a strong trait choice to enable boon support builds in PvE.

Catalyst

• Deploy Jade Sphere: Cooldown increased from 5 seconds to 15 seconds in PvE, matching PvP and WvW.
• Shattering Ice: Damage coefficient reduced from 0.3 to 0.15 in PvE only.
• Relentless Fire: Damage bonus reduced from 15% to 10% in PvE only.
• Empowered Empowerment: Elemental Empowerment effectiveness increase changed from 100% to 50% in PvE only.
• Sphere Specialist: Raised the base duration increase of Jade Sphere boons from 20% to 100% in PvE only.

Engineer

Inventions

In this patch, we're increasing the effect radius of Reconstruction Enclosure and Soothing Detonation so that they synergize better in healing and support builds with other existing Inventions and Alchemy traits which have a radius of 360.

• Reconstruction Enclosure: Radius increased from 240 to 360.
• Soothing Detonation: Radius increased from 240 to 360.

Mechanist

We've found that the mechanist's Energizing Slam is locking players in its animation slightly longer than it needs to, and as a result it's a little clunky to use and not as impactful as it should be compared to the mace's autoattack chain. This update slightly speeds up Energizing Slam's animation, removes the fraction of a second after impact in which players can't move or begin another skill, and makes some other slight fixes and adjustments to the mace to synergize better with condition and support builds. While the Inventions and mace changes make it easier to keep up some support effects on a moving group in combat, we're slightly reducing the power of the support F3 skill, Barrier Burst, to match the strength of other mechanist barrier pulses, as well as removing the vigor boon from it, as the mechanist already has strong access to vigor via the mace and specific core engineer traits which we do not wish to invalidate, such as Experimental Turrets.

• Mace Strike: Fixed a bug that caused this skill to not apply its confusion condition.
• Mace Strike, Mace Smash, Barrier Blast: Duration of applied confusion stacks increased from 4 seconds to 5 seconds in PvE only.
• Energizing Slam: Total casting time reduced from 0.94 seconds to 0.75 seconds. Boon application radius increased from 240 to 360. Damage coefficient increased from 1.8 to 1.85 in PvE only.
• Recall Mech: Fixed a bug in which manual activation of Recall Mech could be interrupted if the mech's defiance bar was depleted.
• Crash Down: The mech's landing animation has been updated.
• Crisis Zone: Fixed a bug that caused the ring indicating the area in which this skill grants boons to appear around a targeted enemy instead of around your mech. This bug was visual only; the boons were granted in the correct location and radius.
• Barrier Burst: Removed the vigor boon. Reduced barrier per pulse to match other mechanist barrier pulses.

On the competitive side, the mechanist is one of two elite specializations getting adjusted in this update. We're already planning some additional competitive balance changes for the next regular live update, but both the mechanist and the vindicator stood out as the main outliers in early post-EoD data, and we wanted to get in a few adjustments at the first opportunity. The jade mech's defiance bar is something that we were initially concerned about in competitive modes, and we've been keeping an eye on it during beta events and now through release. We've confirmed that defiance bars are not a mechanic that we want to have on profession abilities in competitive environments, so we've disabled the defiance bar in both PvP and WvW. In PvP, we've also adjusted the toughness and vitality inheritance of the jade mech to make it a bit easier to bring down. The tankiness of the mech is something that we will continue to watch and will continue to tune as needed.

• The jade mech no longer has a defiance bar in PvP and WvW.
• Mech Fighter: Reduced toughness and vitality inheritance from 100% to 70% in PvP only.
• Shift Signet: Increased cooldown from 40 seconds to 50 seconds in PvP only.

Guardian

• Renewed Justice: Now has a 1-second internal cooldown.

Willbender

• Searing Pact: Fixed a bug that caused the burning this trait added to strikes from Willbender Flames to use the PvP/WvW duration of 2 seconds in all game modes instead of the intended 1-second duration in PvE that is on the trait tooltip. 
• Willbender Flames: Now has a skill fact to show burning inflicted per strike if you have Searing Pact.
• Phoenix Protocol: Increased alacrity duration from 1 second to 1.5 seconds in PvE.

Mesmer

Virtuoso

Virtuoso's condition damage options are intended to be a high-sustain build for general play. However, we'd still like to bring it a little bit closer to the power builds in damage, so this patch increases the bleeding duration from both the Jagged Mind trait and the F2 Bladesong.

• Jagged Mind: Bleed duration in PvE increased from 3 seconds to 5 seconds.
• Bladesong Sorrow: Bleed duration per hit increased from 3 seconds to 5 seconds.

Ranger

Untamed

Untamed is getting a large damage and defense improvement in PvE with an adjustment to the third minor trait, Vow of the Untamed, and we're also correcting Restorative Strikes to be in line with other healing based on damage-dealt traits in other professions.

• Fixed a bug that caused the third minor trait Vow of the Untamed to apply even if you have not trained it yet.
• Vow of the Untamed: Damage bonus percentage increased from 15% to 25% in PvE only. Damage reduction percentage increased from 10% to 25% in PvE only.
• Restorative Strikes: Percentage of damage dealt converted to healing reduced from 10% to 5% in PvE only.
• Ferocious Symbiosis: Fixed a bug in which this trait would stop applying effect stacks to the player's pet in some cases.
• Unleashed Pet Skills: Fixed a bug in which activating these skills would trigger confusion damage on the player.

Revenant

Vindicator

• Forerunner of Death: Fixed an issue in which the warning effect could be shown to allies.
• Vassals of the Empire: Fixed an issue in which the warning effect could be shown to allies instead of the intended blue circle.
• Saint of zu Heltzer: Fixed an issue in which the warning effect could be shown to allies instead of the intended blue circle. Removed the white indicator circle for enemies.

Vindicator is the other elite specialization that we wanted to address in competitive modes before the next update. Eternity's Requiem was significantly out of line with other high-damaging abilities, and we've accelerated the damage falloff on consecutive hits against the same target. This will allow the skill to still maintain its wider AoE pressure while ensuring that it isn't too punishing in smaller scale engagements where all of the guaranteed hits land under the same target. Saint's Shield is another element of the vindicator that has been overperforming, particularly on the aggressive damage-oriented builds. We've brought down the base values and increased the healing contribution for both the healing and barrier component, primarily targeting the potency of this dodge when not invested into any healing power.

• Eternity's Requiem: This skill will no longer create guaranteed impact areas underneath enemies who are in stealth. Reduced the damage falloff per additional hit from 10% to 40% in PvP and WvW. Reduced the minimum power coefficient from 0.3 to 0.1 in PvP and WvW. With these adjustments, the total power coefficient when being struck 5 times has been reduced from 3.6 to 1.82.
• Saint's Shield: Reduced base healing and barrier from 3,099 to 1,738 in PvP and WvW. Increased healing and barrier attribute scaling from 0.5 to 1.0 in PvP and WvW.
• Death Drop: Reduced power coefficient from 2.67 to 2.22 in WvW only.

Thief

Specter

Similar to the catalyst, the specter has been dealing a little more damage than other professions' DPS builds. However, the scepter autoattack chain is underperforming and awkward to use due to a long pause after the final hit. We're buffing the scepter's autoattack chain with a total of 2 more seconds of torment for completing the entire chain, reweighting the torment durations so that the third attack is the most powerful, and cutting out a 0.3-second pause after the final hit that delayed restarting the autoattack chain. These scepter polish changes should make the specialization more fun to play in general while we're also making the necessary damage reductions elsewhere with the traits Larcenous Torment and Strength of Shadows.

• Shadow Bolt: Torment duration reduced from 4 seconds to 3 seconds in PvE only.
• Triple Bolt: Torment duration increased from 4 seconds to 5 seconds in PvE only. Removed a 0.3-second pause after the final bolt that prevented players from immediately restarting the scepter autoattack chain.
• Larcenous Torment: Fixed a bug in which this trait was giving 1% shadow force when you apply torment rather than the intended 0.5% specified in the trait description.
• Larcenous Torment: Torment damage increase reduced from 20% to 10%.
• Consume Shadows: Fixed a bug that caused this effect to heal downed allies.
• Strength of Shadows: The duration increase to torment instances applied by Rot Wallow Venom has been reduced from 2 seconds to 1 second.

Warrior

Warhorn Skills

• Charge: Number of targets decreased from 10 to 5 in PvE, matching the current target count in PvP/WvW.
• Call of Valor: Number of targets decreased from 10 to 5 in PvE, matching the current target count in PvP/WvW.

Bladesworn

• Unsheathe Gunsaber: Fixed an issue in which characters below level 80 were unable to equip the gunsaber in PvP.

 

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue in which charr female characters would roll their eyes into their head while fishing.
• Fixed an issue in which the skiff skill Depth Charges would not appear in maps outside of Cantha.

[Rubi Bayer.8493]

Bug Fixes:

• The Avid Fisher collections are enabled.
• Fixed a client crash that occurred when using fishing rod skin items.
• Fixed a server crash.
• Mechanist: Fixed a bug in which the Jade Mech would have higher stats than intended in some cases in PvP.
• Hero's Choice Chests have been added to End of Dragons meta-event rewards.
• The Turtle Egg, which unlocks the collection for the siege turtle mount, can now be purchased from a vendor in Dragon's End for 200 Writs of Dragon's End.

[Cobalt Flame.8056]

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed an issue in the "Collect parts to repair the broken mech before the technician is overrun" event in Seitung Province that would sometimes prevent the Jade Mech Component event objective from appearing correctly.
• Quarrymaster Xiu of the Xunlai Jade Quarry in Dragon's End has had a disciplinary review and will no longer set completely unrealistic shipping targets that are impossible to attain.
• Fixed an issue that prevented the Jade Tech offensive and defensive effects from working as intended when you had both versions active.
• Fixed a server crash caused by the Champion Unbound Spirit of Destruction's Wave of Destruction skill.
• Fixed an issue that prevented some players from getting progress toward the Resting Heart achievement and being able to loot the final chest in the Valdhertz Crypts minidungeon in the Echovald Wilds.
• Fixed an issue that allowed players to spawn more than one skiff at a time.
   

[Rubi Bayer.8493]

Bug Fixes:

• Updated the defiance bar mechanic of the final encounter in the Battle for the Jade Sea meta-event to be more consistent and not reliant on chance. This change should ensure more opportunities for players to engage with the defiance bar mechanic and allow for additional damage phases.
• Reduced the amount of control effects needed to break the defiance bar of whirlpools in the final boss encounter of the "Battle for the Jade Sea" meta-event.
• Fixed an issue that could cause the Igne Mossheart event chain to stall.
• All light refuges while fighting Igne Mossheart will now correctly protect players.
• Fixed an issue with the Cleansing Resonance skill in Seitung Province that could sometimes cause server crashes.
• Fixed a server crash.
• Fixed an issue that could cause Verasha's scouting party to get left behind in the Igne Mossheart event chain.
• Fixed an issue that could cause the "Defeat the corrupted moa before it escapes" event chain in Echovald Wilds to stall.
• Fixed a crash that could occur when reviving repair crew members during the "Protect the repair crew" events in New Kaineng City.
• Fixed a rare crash in the Seitung Province meta-event.

[Rubi Bayer.8493]

Bug Fix:

• Fixed a bug that was not always allowing players to reach the maximum of 30 total Build Storage Spaces.