Not everything in WvWvW needs to be a part of the “zerg”. An important part to taking another server’s keep or tower is denying supply lines to that area, choking off their ability to build defenses and repair damage. For this purpose, you may find yourself in a small squad of four or five players on a mission to interrupt reinforcements and supply.

Good Friends To Have

While I recommend playing with your friends regardless of their class, I do understand some people might be looking to assemble a specialized squad. If you’re a Mesmer then what classes might you be looking to bring?

The two-headed gank monster of WvWvW is the Mesmer and Thief. The main reasons for this being burst, deception, stealth and get-away speed. In regard to speed, the Mesmer itself is not as fast as either an Elementalist or Thief, but they can use portal to bypass this disadvantage of theirs. Portal can also help you and your squad escape a bad situation.

The Thief and Mesmer can trade-off stealths to increase their survival time, but need to focus targets together. The Thief’s burst is some of the highest in the game, but glass cannons don’t tend to live long. The Mesmer can survive longer, but takes much longer to kill a single target. If focused and adaptive, the Mesmer/Thief duo can cause havoc even while outnumbered. I have torn through 2-1 and 3-1 odds with some of the better thiefs on Stormbluff Isle.

When I assemble a friendly squad, I do not worry too much about classes, but I have found the Engineer, Elementalist and Guardian to be great assets to go along with skirmishing style of the Mesmer. These classes bring area heals and instant rezzes, but also great control and buffs.

Hit N Run

Hit and run is the typical small squad playstyle. Your primary targets will be supply yaks and snagging lone stragglers between points. I would say it’s not always a good idea to attack strays if it would give away your position. An example of this is if your group is doing a run of continuous supply camp capping in a borderland. The commanders on the other servers will be watching what’s getting hit and if they see crossed swords and people calling out your position between targets, chances are you’ll run into a larger force sent to wipe your squad out.

This makes learning the layout of the map important to a gank squad. There are often more than one way to enter a camp and taking the quietest route is often best. Your movement is also important to the rest of your server-mates and their movements are important to you.

Was that a DUH statement? Yes, a bit, but it can alter which route you take into an objective. If you know the larger group of allies will be running towards your position then you can plan for that by leading straggling into the larger group or leading foes away from the group. If the large group is coming in the bckdoor to a supply camp then you can trap any fleeing defenders by going in the front door. For these reasons, it’s always good to take a quick look at map talk and ally movement on the map before heading off to your next target.

We Dine On Yak Tonight

Supply Yaks are an important target that even a solo player can take down. As a Mesmer, it’s best to bring a build that has burst and snares to slow the Yak down. Generally, I like to solo Yaks when they are directly beyond the reach of supply camp guards or along an otherwise empty area between supply drops.

For Yak Slapping, I tend to always equip Portal for one of my utilities, along with Mass Invis as my elite. The key to these hits are stealth and escape, so taking these sort of hit-n-run skills is vital. You can often find a safe, hidden spot near a Yak’s route to drop your Portal Entre before going into hit the yak. Any large rocks that hide you from the road or areas hidden below cliffs are great Portal retreat areas. If you find yourself suddenly joined by three or four enemy players you can drop a Portal to quickly escape, wait a second to heal and then Portal back to finish off the Yak. Since the enemy players won’t see the other Portal you went to from their position on the road, the misdirection will allow you to hop back into battle with a second or two to spare before they recognize where you are.

Skirmishing Stragglers

Fighting stragglers solo or with a pair involves the Encounter Rules shown in the previous guide. What I would add to this is that doing this solo or in a pair needs a lot more attention directed towards counting and recounting your number of foes. Just as its easy for you to sneak into battle via teleports or stealth, it’s easy for your foes to jump on you while you’re engaged in what was previously an even numbers fight. As you get better at WvWvW, you will die less and less often from losing open duels and more from not paying attention to your odds.

As a Solo Player…

As a solo player in WvWvW, I like to flow in and out of zerg combat and into small squads or solo mischief. (This was a lot easier to do with the Phantasm build before the engage time on Phantasms was reset to molasses-slow in the last fix.) When and where I make these hops depends on the battle and map, but also the strengths of your server. If you’ve been trying to siege a Keep for your server and been getting nowhere, it may help your allies more to split off and pick off yaks and player reinforcements.

Pack a big sword and Portal Bomb to PVP Heaven

WvWvW As A Mesmer

This post will hopefully help players with tips on how to play a Mesmer in WvWvW and also go over the two builds I use in WvWvW as a Mesmer. I will first link two builds I use, along with a summary of their purpose and playstyle, and then go over how I play these builds in different WvWvW situations.

The Phantasm Mes

http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mcmz0mzzMmanbomLnboaG0pVcMmzR9M8kiC707kiG

The above link will take you a rough sketch of the build. You may recognize the Greatsword and Sword/Focus combo. These two sets are quite common in WvWvW, though a lot of Mesmers run them with a shatter based build. I do not for I find the Phantasm build to be more suited for sieges and zergs. The following rundown of the build will be based on the status of the build before the December 3rd patch which removed the quick-attacking Phantasms. As of now, this build is not as effective as the Shatter build, but once they put Phantasm attacks at a .25 delay the build should begin to function properly again.

The key traits for this build are Empowered Illusions, Phantasmal Strength, Phatasmal Fury, Sharper Images, and Warden’s Feedback. Other parts of the trait setup you can switch around a bit, but I feel the traits I listed are highly important to the build. With these traits you get 30% damage increase from your Phantasms, constant crits from your Phantasms which lead to bleed stacking, and you get easy access to projectile reflects from your Focus skills. This means that dropping a Warden at the head of an opposing zerg will create a whirling reflect bubble that will cause a zerg to back off or die within the fury of its own arrows.

Other traits you may consider are Greatsword Training or Compounding Power. You can shift trait points around to acquire these or sacrifice one of the main traits for one of them. I originally had Greatsword Training, but dropped it in favor of other traits. I found having better access to Leap/Swap and Blurred Frenzy a greater tool than more frequent access to the Berserker or the knockback on Greatsword.

Your utilities in this build allow you escape and stealth through Decoy and Blink. If you get snared, especially by a Warrior or Ele, you can blink out and away to safety. You can also use Blink at the start of any journey between nodes to quickly cover distances. Mirrored Feedback is for siege and zerg fights, allowing you to reflect damage back at doors or at bridges. Cycling through Feedback, Warden and Curtain can effectively cutoff any bridge you are fighting at. Blink,Feedback or Decoy can be swapped out with Portal for doing Portal Bombs. In certain situations, swapping Mass Invisibility for Time Warp as your elite is pretty important.

The Shattering Reflect Mes

http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mcmmzMczMmaLnomMLnoaa0GxzmzRzmq8kiH707khd7kiG

This is a shatterbomb Mes, but it carries Scepter/Sword as its secondary weapon set. you may see other shatter Mesmbers that carry Greatsword or Staff as their second weapon set. The reason this Mesmer carries Scepter/Sword is for the two block skills. What this Mesmer build does is reflect and block a lot of incoming damage. You can see that it features the same Inspiration trait line setup as the Phantasm Mesmer, but also carries a full Illusion line with Illusionary Persona and Masterful Reflection.

What I. Persona and Masterful Reflection do is allow you to do the usual shatter bomb and then follow it up with a Distortion bomb. After a full distortion shatter, you have 4 seconds where you are invulnerable and any projectiles aimed at you or in which you are along the path of are reflected back at their source. This makes you an unstoppable reflect circle within the battle. You can help push a group forward with a full Distortion Shatter as well, giving your group a moving relfection bubble for 4 seconds at the start of a push, then following it with Blurred Frenzy to allow yourself a second of further invuln to have your group catch up to you and then blink or portal back away out harms way.

Just as an aesthetic note, the Masterful Reflection trait comes with its own unique spell effect that differs fromt he Distortion effect. This can clue in your allies that you are in invuln & reflect status.

Your utilities are similar to the Phantasm build with Mirror Images added and Decoy removed. You can swap Blink with Decoy to put out more clones for shatters if you want, but I do often find Blink vital to escape and movement. For the purposes of Portal bombs, I replaced Feedback or Blink with Portal, but rarely Mirrored Images as the clone factory element of Mirrored Images is so important to the build. As with the other build, Mass Invis can be swapped for Time Warp depending on situational use.

Using Your Mesmer Within A Siege

If you are defending a wall against a siege, you can use your reflect skills at the head of a zerg or on Flame Rams at the door you are defending to reflect projectiles back at the attacking group. Always be careful of not spending a prolonged time at the edge of a wall to do this or you may be pulled off the edge and down into the battle. If you are yanked off the edge then make sure to quickly blink towards portal near your door or blink away and follow with a Decoy or Mass Invis. If the enemy is setting up a line of catapaults or trebuchets to hit your walls and doors, you can drop a Portal at a safe spot behind the wall (On the stairs for example) and then stealth into the middle of the siege array and drop the portal exit, allowing you to quickly move an army to the primary target. [See The Mesmer Zerg below.]

If you are attacking a wall with a siege then you can be the one yanking players off of walls and into the maw of fury and death of your siege. The key to doing this is setting your Temporal Curtain spell at the top of a wall where you can see enemies attacking and then triggering the second part of your 4 key spell Into the Void and yanking multiple foes off the wall and down below. Otherwise, swap your Mass Invis Elite skill for Time Warp as you approach a door. If your siege is using Flame Rams then pop Time Warp as soon as the Flame Rams are built. If your siege is using Golems then swap in both Time Warp and Portal and wait until all Golems are portaled in. Once all your golems are portaled in you can drop a Time Warp on top of them.

The Mesmer Zerg

The rules of using your Mes in a large battle where one side is fghting another upon a more open battlefield is much like how you use your Mesmer within a siege except that you portal far more often, and more at a whims notice. Instead of waiting for a Golem to show to portal, you lay your portals within the battle field, first (Portal Entre) at the back or middle of your group and then second (Portal Exit) in the middle of your enemies group. Sometimes you can put your Portal Exit at the side of an enemy group to flank or in certain cases behind the enemy group to pincer. The pincer is often very effective at break a zerg v zerg stalemate by splitting up the opposing group with ocnfusion. Half of your group is at the back defending the line, while the other half materializes behind the enemy boxing them in. The resulting chaos of the suddenly split force can often lead to your enemies splitting in multiple directions and de-turtling their turtle.

The turtle concept is based upon the AOE rules of the game, where AOE skills can often hit a max of 5 enemies. By grouping up in a turtle, it limits the amount of allies a single aoe can hit within its radius. For if there are 30 allies within a radius that an AOE can only hit 5 allies therein the radius, the turtle has saved a sixth of your allies from damage. The portal’s purpose then is to surround the turtle, pincer it quickly and cuase enough confusion to split it. If the pincer tactic doesn’t work then the portal bomb into the middle of the turtle will often cause chaos along with triggering the dreaded culling effect.

Culling is what happens in the game when too many targets appear within the same area. Culling makes the targets furthest from the player invisible. This lightens the load on each packet carrier so that the game can continue to function with minimal lag and framerate loss. The problem is that Portals create the culling effect at will and thus create an invisible army within the middle of a battlefield. This is great at portaling into a siege array of your enemy, but extremely frustrating for the other side as they can not see what is hitting them. This issue has made Thiefs and Mesmers popular due to stealth and portal skills triggering the effect on command.

The Mesmer’s Portal is still valuable within a zerg fight even without the culling issue being present. It still creates a sudden movement of reinforcements or allies that is valuable in winning a large battle. Key to this attack within the zerg is what I personally call the Mesmer Reflect Encounter rules.

The Encounter Rules

The encounter rules graph to the left is a rough draw-up of the process I follow in a typical WvWvW encounter. The zero point marked by 0 on the image shows the player as the dark square shape. This is where the Mesmer player enters into the fight. In front of the Mesmer is an assortment of enemies marked as red circles. The closest enemy is marked with a 1 to signal them as initial or primary target. The secondary target is marked as an enemy to the far side of the first target, and the following targets are any group behind the initial target, marked by the number three. This creates a four step process, process the battlefield (0), acquire first target (1), check for secondary targets to your side and diagonal (2), check for targets behind your primary (3), and neutralize all targets.

If you notice those pink and purple marks on the graph you will see how I typically use my Mesmer skills. In both Mesmer builds I listed, there is a Sword & Focus weapon set, and that is the set used for this encounter graph. Your first encounter (1), uses your Phantasmal Warden. That is the W on the graph with a pink bubble around it. When you cast your Warden, it will often show up behind the target, but sometimes to the side or in front of the target. The Warden creates a reflect bubble  for you to to hide in while you melee away at your foe. So your opening attack will be casting a Warden on your target, followed by illusionary Leap, and then the following Swap skill to teleport and snare the target, and then finally Blurred Frenzy while your target is snared, following with basic Mind Stab attacks with the Sword primary spam attack. If done correctly, the Warden’s spin attack and bubble protection will be hitting at about the same time as your Blurred Frenzy channels. This creates a large damage spike on a single target or multiple melee range targets, while also providing invulnerability and reflection upon yourself and the target area.

If you see a secondary target to side or diagonal of your primary target then before Leaping into your primary target you cast Temporal Curtain infront of the Secondary target to reflect projectile damage back at them or to cripple them if they to engage you at melee range. (2)

If there is a second group behind the target or only a second target or gorup behind then you can cast the Temporal Curtain in front of them or cast Mirrored Feedback upon a foe within that group to reflect all projectiles from them back as you attack your primary target.

This allows you to engage three different enemies at once before even switching to your second weapon set.  I’ll go over the graph and process again.

The Graph

• Dark Square – The Mesmer
• Red Circles – Enemies on the battlefield
• Dark Lines – Movement steps via Leaps, Swaps, Blinks and good old fashioned running.
• Light Pink W Circle- Your Warden and its Pink reflect Bubble
• Pink Lines – Your Temporal Curtain lines
• Dark Pink Circle – Mirrored Feedback AoE
• Yellow Arrows – These are to note the way projectiles may reflect off your reflection spells. As you can see, the Warden is a circular outward reflection and the Mirrored Feedback bubble reflects projectiels back in, while the Temporal Curtains reflect directly backwards,
• Numerals – The Process Steps

The Process

Zero Point is where you process your battlefield according to the graph.

1. Find Primary Target and engage with Phantasmal Warden and Sword Leap –>  Swap.
2. Identify Secondary Targets to your side or diagonal and neutralize them with Temporal Curtain
3. Find next set or group of targets behind your primary target. Neutralize them with Mirrored Feedback or Temporal Curtain.
4. Dispatch Primary Target after snare with damage spike from Blurred Frenzy and then proceed to Secondary Target.
5. Disengage if you do not have the reinforcements with you to proceed onto further targets. Escape via blink, stealth, or portal.

Following this sort of thought process is how a Memser multiplies itself and makes great use of its tools to take on the fog of war in WvWvW. This process can be used within a large battleifled or within small skirmish encounters. The basic concept is to hit weak targets while protecting yourself and allies from the vast volleys of arrows and fireballs that litter the WvWvW battlefield.

Next up, Part Two!

This is an initial foray into my WvWvW Mesmer. Next up will be some ideas about playing the Memser as a skirmisher and yak-slapper.

I liked it. There, I’ve said it. Sue me.

Sure the first event was laggy (maybe being spread out throughout Lion’s Arch rather than just around one area would have helped) but after coming from years in Second Life the kind of laggy I experienced in that event was nothing compared to the klusterfokken of lag Linden Lab inflicted upon us again and again and abloodygain. There was a lot of whiny QQing about Arenanet being a bunch of under-skilled simpletons with carnal knowledge of their mothers and that annoyed me greatly. Sure some folks couldn’t play it for various reasons, but this was the first time an event of that size has been tried in that way and it was always going to be somewhat of a test – now if in twelve months the events are still a mess of low FPS and skills that stop working you can call the devs fit to burn all you like but for now stop with the mewling and just enjoy the experience of newness I say!

After that the treasure hunt was a damp squib for me, mainly because I didn’t know it was going on so I missed it all. Had I have known I would loved to have have done it but I hear the events were largely bugged so it couldn’t be finished and that would have ticked me off. Actually this does worry me about not only these large showcase events, but the whole system of dynamic events the game is built on, after all they do seem to crap out a hell of a lot and that is really not good.

Anyhoo, the next day saw the building of the trebuchet, the defending of Lion’s Arch again and the sailing off to the new island to secure the shores and camps there. I missed the first part but the sailing off and forging a path through the new land-mass was great fun! My one gripe – and this I share with Dontain – is the sheer fucking hardness of the Karka! Even normal ‘young karka’ are pretty hard to tackle on their own, never mind the Veteran young and upwards! Oy Vey! It’s hard to pick one thing that makes them so tough as it really is a combination – they shoot shit out of their tail near the start of the attack that is hard to dodge completely due to the length of time they continue to shoot it and whatever it is hurts and it hurts a lot. Add to that their ability to mitigate a lot of attacks and the need to burn down their health bar twice (once for their shell, once for their yummy tasty flesh) and pretty soon you are on a fairly tough battle for little reward (they almost never drop anything!). Still I really enjoyed this phase and there was noticably less QQing (that or I stopped noticing it).

Now the final day was a curious mix of the previous two. Lag was evident, although nowhere near as bad as the first day, but the fun of running with a zerg was intoxicating. We had to escort some Lionguard sappers into the HUUUGE karka nest and lay bombs and then leave the nest to find the king daddy Ancient Karka so we could drive him back into the nest and blow the bugger up. HOLY CRAP this was a marathon! Three bloody hours it took me! I was knackered! I’m not, have never been and will never be a hardcore gamer and that kind of session is gruelling. Still, it was also great fun (excluding the two grinds when the King Karka called up reinforcements) and the stand out parts were some of the mechanics used to drive the brute to the next, the nest itself which was just amazing looking, the mass-wipes when the Karkas would barrel-roll 90% of the players into the downed state (brilliant fun!), the epic ending with lava & squeeing and the loot from the chest at the end. All in all I thought it was a bloody brilliant evening and you can shove that in yer pipe and smoke it.

Have I been back to the island since? Once and it was both boring and hard. The karka are too tough and the loot is too thin on the ground and the gathering mats are crap so there is no reason to go back – hell, it cost me more in in repair bills than I made from the visit! Hopefully Arenanet will do something about this zone that makes it worthwhile visiting but until then I still have the memories of a great weekend-long event. That and a cool 20-slot box! Hoohar!

In the end the subscription is what drove me away from LOTRO, not directly but in so much a series of bad decisions (in my eyes) made me wonder why the hell I was paying for something that made me so mad. Easy solution to that – stop paying and feel better. Stop playing and feel *much* better. Goodbye LOTRO.

Now with Guild Wars 2 I have paid for the game and now need to pay for no more. Except I’m loving the game so much I actually want to pay them something akin to a subscription to ensure they stay afloat and keep the game going. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to pay them an actual subscription because I never, ever want to pay another game company a recurring monthly fee – I feel it damages the relationship between developer & community by making the company complacent (if not down right hostile) towards the players whilst making the players into entitled QQers. No, the subscription model is a very unhealthy way to fund a game and I’m much happier with micro-transactions and an in-game cash shop than I am with a funnel from my wallet.

Obviously cash shops and the micro-payment model also has problems (*cough* SWTOR *cough*) and can slip from a convenient & flexible way to support your game to a rather unpalatable pay-to-play rip-off (*hack* SWTOR *hack*) but when done right they can be a beautiful thing. Except when not quite done right. Guild Wars 2 I’m looking at you.

Fuck a duck but the GW2 cash shop/gem store is dull. Apart from extra bank & inventory space and the extra character slots there is literally nothing I want to buy from it and that irks me. Look Arenanet, I bloody well want to give you my money but you have to put something of value in your shop first! Aviators and boxing gloves are, sadly enough, not floating my boat so instead of expensive, dull outfits why not offer a shit load of clothes piecemeal for a few quid each that I can tailor to my needs. There is no way I’m spending a tenner on an outfit unless I customise the crap out it otherwise I’d just look like the doofus who spent a tenner on an outfit that makes me look exactly like the other 15 doofuses (doofi?) who bought it too. For the love of all that is holy open up the town clothes options and offer a good range of role playing gear (and the stoopid aviator & boxing gloves kind of crap too if you must) that I can buy from in a mix’n'match style. Do that and make them cheap enough that I will drop you some moolah without thinking about it and you will have cracked it. If you are going to charge me over £2 for a bloody hat I’m not likely to spend another £8 or more buying the rest of the outfit. Ten quid for one outfit? Do me a lemon! £5 for a complete cosmetic outfit is cheap enough that I’ll buy the bugger and then probably another one as well. £2 for just fucking bunny ears I can’t ever role play in (at least not in any way I care to imagine) and I’m not buying anything from you. And that just covers town clothes! What about armour & weapon skins? What about facial & body scars? Holy crap, the list of stuff I would buy is huge and if a tight fisted get like me would part with hard cash for it, you can bet your life other players would too!

So for gawd’s sake Arenanet, get some good stuff in the gem store & drop the prices. I want to give you some money to keep your amazing game going, but you have to meet me half way.

No, you can not really sell your celery for 600g. In fact, certain materials have become account bound, but it is just funny what rich folks like to do with their money.

Screenshots of the BLT as of December 2nd below.

If you’re a Guild Wars 2 player then you may have heard about the new Ascended gear added to the game with the Lost Shores patch released this past weekend. The release of information on a new tier of gear being added to the game caused a major uproar in the community. People have quit the game or are threatening to quit the game over the addition of new gear with better stats.

I think the first important thing to do is to present what Ascended gear is, how it will grow into the game, and why people are angry.

Tiers of Grief

Ascended armor has been explained as not a new higher tier, but a tier to bridge a gap between exotics and legendary items. What is new with Ascended gear is a stat increase over exotics and the infusion upgrade slot. The Ascended items themselves are unique, meaning that you likely cannot equip two of the same Ascended item, and in addition to this, the secondary stats of the items cannot be modified in the same way current items can.

The only types of Ascended gear in the game currently attainable are back pieces and accessories. Previously, each of these slot types of armor had an upgrade slot that could be interchanged with gems of various types and statistical benefits. In the case of Ascended gear, the upgrade stats are built into the item and cannot be changed.

Instead, Ascended items have infusion slots that can be changed, and come in different types. There are offensive, defensive and omni infusion slots. How this operates is not entirely known, but we have seen that the infusion slots can add Agony Resistance as well as stats like power, vitality and precision.

Agony is a new Damage over Time effect that occurs in the Fractals of the Mists dungeon starting at the level 10 difficulty tier. The Ascended items and the Fractals dungeon go hand-in-hand, as earning the items requires playing the Fractals dungeon, and so far the Fractal dungeon is the only place in game that has the Agony condition.

ArenaNet has stated that they plan to add more ways to acquire Ascended gear, including through WvWvW, but currently Fractals of the Mists is the only way. They also plan to slowly introduce each new type of Ascended item into the game piece by piece. There will be Ascended helms, shoulders and weapons, but these will be introduced months down the line.

Why They Scream You Lie

ArenaNet has been unwisely quiet in response to the anger about Ascended armor. They have spoken once in response, but the explanation provided did not truly quell the fears of the populace. One claim in particular has been a bone of contention.

Ascended items have been explained as a way for ANet to bridge the gap between Exotics and Legendaries, but people have challenged that assertion by saying there never was a statistical gap between Exotics and Legendaries. In response, the gap alluded to can be explained via rarity and the general ease of acquiring an Exotic versus the long trudge of attaining a Legendary. This too has not held up as people have pointed out that not all rares or exotics are equally uncommon or attainable.

There is a large gap between a crafted exotic such as a Pearl Broadsword and that of something like Legend of the Foefire or Vision of the Mists. For example, the Pearl Broadsword might run you 3 gold on the Trading Post, while the Foefire or Vision of the Mists will cost you at least a 100 gold to buy. Below the level of these status symbol swords are craftable weapons of the Corrupted and Destroyer type that require rare, expensive materials. Higher up in costs from these weapons are the Legendary precursor weapons that can often go for over a 100 gold.

Even rarity between statistical tiers are not consistent. The tier 3 cultural armor is much less common and harder to acquire than crafted Exotic armor or karma armor or even the dungeon sets. Much of the populace doesn’t have the 100 gold it takes to get the full set. So, while statistically the armor is weaker than my gear it is far more of a status symbol or reason to brag due to its high cost and consequential rarity. This holds true for tier 3 cultural weapons. My Peacemaker Greatsword gets more oohs and ahhs than my dungeon exotic scepter even though the original item itself is of only rare quality in stats.

All of these are examples of tiers within tiers that act as gap bridgers in rarity that have nothing to do with statistical differences, so ArenaNet’s explanation struggles to really hold up to criticism. Many have claimed that they created the gap themselves by introducing Ascended items with a new ceiling of stats.

And Why They Keep Yelling You Lied

The heart of the issue though is the claim that this introduces a gear treadmill to a game that promised no gear treadmills. This argument then sort of swindles out of control into dismissal of the game as a new WoW’-clone.

Overall, There’s too much histrioics within the anger and I worry it damages the legitimate concerns of the game’s core audience. And that core? I would describe them as a mix between Guild Wars veterans and those who had tired of the way things have been done in MMORPGs for so long. Both sides want a statistical plateau to tiers and skill over stat based gameplay.

However, is this now a treadmill game? No, not at all, but it does open the door to the treadmill, and the situation really makes me wonder why ArenaNet would even let that door get kicked ajar. There are multiple issues the game has in its current form and many things people want addressed or improved, but new statistical highs doesn’t seem to be high on that list.

Areas of Concern

The sPVP side of the game is struggling to retain players and it is easily the least developed side of the game. It also suffers from there being only one type of map, so while they did introduce a new map in beta form, its still the same type of ruleset with the same issues as the rest of sPVP. As long as structured PvP remains Cap Point mode, the game will be a never ending meta of bunker vs roamer, and tanky versus spike. I feel I have gone over the issues with Cap Point quite a bit here, but it’s the larger PvP playerbase that is starting to feel the limits of the map type.

WvWvW players are looking for incentive to keep playing, but as well, they are the group suffering the most from the game’s culling issues. It is known that culling is a top priority for the team and likely wont be an easy fix, but WvWvW issues go beyond culling. Players are starting to question whether they should keep dumping gold into upgrading and taking keeps for their Guild only to have all their investment vanish overnight.

PVE on the other hand requires more bug fixing and more variety at endgame. Orr is a jump in difficulty but a step down in variety. Lost Shores introduces a new max level area, but again has little in the ways of variety of events or enemies. Loot drops have also been a problem with far too much RNG involved and rather poor loot tables, but that at least began to be addressed with the Lost Shores patch. New bags of goodies were added to dungeon chests, new items with a rare chance off bosses, and the Fractal dungeon themselves offer more chances at valuable loot. Yet, beyond this, the game needs to make exploring more rewarding, that again being an issue of incentives. There’s a lot of great areas of the Tyrian world not being populated because the zerging of mobs that increases chances at valuable loot and the high-end gathering nodes that are essential to money making are only available in max level areas.

Somewhere far below these concerns lies new gear to chase. To some, those used to the old MMO model, that concern for new shinies may be much higher, but its hard for me to envision let alone support gear treadmill addicts being drawn to Guild Wars 2. Once you realize that power creep puts you in the same place in vertical progression game as you are in a horizontal progression game, that gear treadmill loses all value.

Horizontal Boogie Time

So how did the original Guild Wars support continual PvE gametime? How did the PVP and PVE continue to be populated and active without new statistical tiers? There’s one major element as to why: skills and encounters.

The card game-like skillbars of Guild Wars allowed the game to continually progress via new build ideas and strategies for many years. As well, new encounters that involved new situations and limitations created the need for new build ideas that again refreshed the play experience.

For Guild Wars 2, the original idea was that traits would provide this customization and variety that skills provided the original game, but the traits themselves have needed a serious overhaul since beta.  Too many of the traits are outright boring and uninteresting stat increases of no difference from gear changes. My Phantasms do 15% more damage? That doesn’t change my play-style anymore than stacking more power into my gear. My Glamour skills blind, oh wait, now all blinds confuse? Now my Glamour skills provide extra functionality and versatility. My Engineer’s pistol range is further? Well I suppose that makes my character more functional. My bombs heal? I create a bomb on dodge? Now being a bombing Engineer is also a support Engineer.

These are the differences between traits that have limited the horizontal progression in the game. There are some traits that add functionality and thus add variety to playstyles, but there are too many traits that only add vertical increases or functionality that should probably be there to begin with.

Beyond this, the traits are often bugged for many classes. The Necromancer class has suffered the most from this problem, but even my beloved Mesmer is not free of these issues. Hilariously, ArenaNet stated in their patch notes that Phantasmal Fury “now works”, but in actuality it still doesn’t work with Phantasmal Mage which was one of the main parts of the trait that was not working previously.

Overall, the issue with traits are holding back the side of the game that should be adding interesting options for daily players. Due to this, the game has not opened up like it should be opening up at max-level.

What To Do Now

I really feel ArenaNet needs to come out and directly address the elephant in the room. They need to announce whether or not there will be more statistical increases in gear between now and when a new level cap is introduced. They need to answer the gear treadmill question with a firm yes or no and stick to it. There is too much PR-praddle and silence coming out of their offices.

Part of the reason this has not happened yet is because ArenaNet has been poor at communicating with the public. A Public Test Realm like server would do the game a great good in bug testing and in letting the public in on what’s going on and what will be going on. Seeing is believing, so let the public see whats in store, and take it hands on for themselves. I imagine the PR disaster that Ascended has been could have been avoided if the Public had a chance at Fractals and seeing the stats themselves. The great misinformation that exists about Guild Wars 2 can be blamed a lot on ArenaNet’s dismembered communication lines. Not everyone is going to read the forums, reddit, twitter and random in-game chats to figure out what exactly is going on.

After that, the traits need an overhaul that sweeps the vertical progression and functionality traits off the table and replaces them with new interesting options that reward smart combinations and builds.

Once these things are done, the game will smooth out and the audience will be a bit more sure of where they should be. T

Doesn’t matter. Just listen to this. “The Gamescom Trailer” song, Fear Not This Night: An anthem of hope of  the Sylvari sung by the mystical Pale Tree -butchered quote from somewhere.

JUST LISTEN OK. I HAVE IT ON REPEAT.

Fear Not This Night – Jeremy Soule ft. Asja

Still, little time play is not no time to play and I have been dipping in and out of Tyria when I can and I can confirm that I’m as in love with this game today and I was the first day I played it. God Almighty it’s good! I mean, really, really good. Just fun and more fun stuck together and decorated with fun! So much to tell you though, where do I start?

First off I’m now at level cap (80) and still haven’t finished the personal story with my main (I’m still only playing him) and it’s still bloody good fun! Halloween has come and gone and was a total blast (the first holiday event I’ve actually enjoyed and got good gear out of!) and now The Lost Shores expansion is upon us – it’s a good time to start playing if you haven’t yet

In this post, I’ll post pictures of my current set-up and suggestions/explanations/advice. Some of the settings (esp. Graphics and Controls) are personal preference, or dependent on your computer (Graphics) so please keep that in mind. ^^

Let’s begin!

The most important settings in General Options are Autoloot, Show All Enemy Names, Show Skill Recharge, and Double-Tap to Evade.

There’s no reason to not turn Autoloot on, as it’s so much better than spamming F every time you kill something.

Show All Enemy Names makes it easier to see enemies around you, and it helps gauge how dangerous your situation is because you can easily see how many aggressive enemies are nearby, and if anything is sneaking up on you or something.

Show Skill Recharge is also something everybody should have on. It shows a countdown timer for your skill cooldowns so you can see exactly when your heal is going to become available again, or how long until you can do another combo. Also for things like “Is your Elite Skill ready yet?!” “No, 20 seconds left!”

Double Tap to Evade is important to turn off because if it’s on, you can’t tap-tap-tap the keys to make small adjustments in positioning! This is especially annoying when you’re trying to do Jumping Puzzles because you’ll randomly roll off your platform and you’ll want to punch a hole through your monitor and flip your desk over. Turn that thing off and use a separate key to evade.

I’ve been playing with the options at the bottom to see if I can get around the problem where you kill something, and then your character autoattacks another enemy that you didn’t want to attack and then you’re forced to fight again. For this reason I turned off Autotargeting, Promote Skill Target, and turned on Stop Autoattacking on Target Change. But as I said I’m still experimenting.

Your Graphics Options will vary depending on your computer. Obviously, you’re aiming for the best compromise between graphics quality/eye candy and performance/frames per second. If you Alt-Tab back and forth while in-game at all, you want your Resolution to be Windowed Fullscreen. Now, the biggest performance-killer options are Reflections, Shadows, and Shaders. At least, that’s what it should be. I don’t see as much of a difference between Medium and High settings for these as with other games so I’ve been playing with High Shaders recently, as you can see from the screenshot. Play around with these. Some of the options have obvious effects (Environment/Textures/Shaders) and others have subtle differences. (Shadows/Reflections/LOD Distance/Post-Processing) If you’re really desperate for performance, go Fullscreen at a lowered resolution, or use Subsampling under Render Sampling.

Aim for a minimum of 30FPS in all areas if you can. (If your computer is capable) Note that running around and swinging the camera around is going to be more demanding than leaving the camera on a close up of your character, pretty/badass as they might be.

Movement options. Ok, UNBIND Turn Left and Turn Right. Put Strafing on A and D. You should be turning by moving your camera, anyway, and this frees up Q and E for skills, which is immensely helpful for the majority of us who use WASD and don’t have a mouse with 30 buttons on it.

I’m not sure what key is default for Dodge, but mine is V and I hit it with my thumb.

Autorun is relatively unimportant because you won’t ever use it in battle, so I put it on Z which is hard to hit in a fight but not too bad otherwise. This frees up R for skills.

Walk is on Alt+Z (remember you can use CTRL and ALT as modifiers for controls!) because it’d be a shame if they put in a Walk function but nobody ever used it. (Also good for roleplaying, which I don’t do, but if you do you’ll probably want to bind Walk to something.)

I feel like About Face should be important so I bound a key to it, but I’ve never really used it. Maybe X is too hard to hit.

Remember how we freed up Q and E and R? Now Heal goes on Q, and E and R get to be utility/elite skills. I suppose if you were comfortable hitting 6 or even 7 as numbers you could put Q as Utility 1 or 2 correspondingly, but 5 is the maximum of my comfort zone.

I have two side buttons on my mouse so I put two utility skills on them. If you don’t have side mouse buttons, well, you should get a new mouse.

If you still need more keys, consider using F, G, T, V, B, Shift. If you main an Engineer or Elementalist, you could try making ESDF your movement to gain access to W and A for skills. Also, this shifts your hand over to make 5/6/7/T/Y/G/H/etc easier to hit, at the cost of hitting 2 on accident when trying to press 1. (Not recommended for other professions as hitting ` for weapon switching becomes difficult and awkward.) Of course, if you do that, you’ll probably have to rearrange and rebind the rest of your keyboard.
You want to be able to use all your skills without reaching across the keyboard or looking down at the keys.

Don’t click your skills. DO NOT FRICKIN’ CLICK YOUR SKILLS! DON’T DO IT

You should have Nearest Enemy bound to a key. In Guild Wars 1 it’s C, so mine’s on C. I’m not sure if it’s bound by default or not, but make sure you set it regardless.

Call Target and Take Target are very important and should not be left unbound.

I’m not really sure what Lock Autotarget does… but it sounds important so I put it on Shift to play around with it.

EDIT: It works like “Deselect Target”. Huh. Pretty handy!

Not really much to say here except Look Behind is good for seeing behind you and checking for people sneaking up on you/pursuers! So I put it on B, and also N in case I overshoot B with my thumb and hit N instead.

Show Enemy Names is set to Always On in General Options, so we can unbind that. I think Stow/Draw Weapons is neat so I bound it to CTRL+F. (Good for roleplaying as well, you’re a roleplayer)

Then there’s Toggle Town Clothes. Right now you’re probably thinking “WTF are town clothes?” Look at your Hero Panel and there’s a button to change into your Town Clothes, which are for, obviously, walking around town in. Cosmetic/Roleplaying feature. I put it on Right Ctrl because it’s a key that’s way out of the way and hard to hit, but it’s there if I ever want to use town clothes…

…or if I ever find any cool town clothes, to begin with. Sylvari default clothes = not very cool.

That’s about all I wanted to say, I think. Happy adventuring~

Playing Guild Wars 2 has been an amazing breath of fresh air, however. I was tired of WoW and certainly tired of looking for a good MMO to take its place. I originally made a Charr Warrior and while I still have her, my heart now lies with my amazing Norn Guardian. Here are some of my favorite screen shots that I’ve taken while playing the game.

My Charr Warrior Azkadellia speaks with a zombie of some sort. Charr have the coolest horns!

A gorgeous Windmill view from one of the awful and annoying Vistas. I hate them with a passion.

My lovely Norn Guardian, VanillaFrosty, showing off her Halloween Devil Horns.

This dog looks exactly like my dog Bubba, except Bubba has a brindle coat.

I discover that there’s a reason my Guardian can’t wear Elementalist armor – it looks ridiculous.

VanillaFrosty is almost level 4o at this point and I’m so glad I re-rolled after my Warrior because Guardian is so much more fun! The Norn areas flow very well and I love all the snow! Finding dye and changing the look of my outfit is still one of my favorite elements of GW and I love to see how much easier they’ve made the dying system this time around (I mean, they’ve made everything so much more simple). Mini pets are also one of my favorites elements of MMO’s, so I look forward to more being done with those in this game.

Hope you enjoy the snap shots, hopefully I’ll have some more fun ones to share soon!