Avraham.8504

Obviously, I missed that. Didn't even think about counting remaining mastery points in the saga...

Well, that's good news. Glad to be wrong :)

Logged in today for Icebrood Champions and saw we can earn 6 Mastery's in this latest chapter *however* the new Mastery Line requires more than six Mastery points to completely unlock. I was disappointed by this...

In earlier Icebrood chapters, it was possible to earn enough Mastery points (per chapter) to unlock all the new Masteries. I'll admit, we were given "just enough" MP's. There were only one or two extra Mastery points to earn and sometimes no extra Mastery's at all. I found myself completing achievements I'd normally pass up or returning to prior Icebrood chapter Masteries, just to completely unlock new Mastery lines.

Now it appears we *have* to go back and earn all the past Icebrood chapter Masteries we passed up (some which are a long grind), Is that accurate?

I know its all optional content and skippable. Please understand, I don't mind "earning things" in my video games (that is the point of playing, no?) but it almost seems like this chapter's mastery line was created to force a longer grind, which is annoying.

You can *choose* to purchase gold via gems but IMO you'd be missing out on a lot of fun. There is something to be said about earning your equipment/weapons/items/mounts. I personally, haven't used the lv. 80 boost for my alts. I'd rather run around and level up. That's me, though.

Also, I've been playing since the beginning (2012) so I've got a lot of gold and materials in my bank (and I'm a dirty casual). So lets say I've got some excess gold to burn, I still go out of my way to earn them unless it's super annoying (like making Ascended Diviners gear). Then, I might cash in a bunch of fractal pages but then again, I still earned those....

I suggest taking your time and play the game. You'll appreciate the items/gear/mounts you earn a lot more.

Been playing since 2012. HoT was (and still is) very difficult, especially if you are playing solo. Even Map Completion can be a challenge! Before Mounts we sometimes had to wait until a specific event to reach a Poi or Vista. Assuming you have a flying mount, map completion is much easier.

I believe ANET's intended for HoT was for level 80 group content. Even the pre-zone living world for the HoT expansion (Silverwastes) was challenging, I'd suggest joining squads for HoT content or HP Trains if you need hero points. There may even be a guild or two that still farms HoT zones.

Very disappointing.. can't dive due to bug.

I have a daredevil, maybe I'll try spamming speed too?

So I downloaded a dps meter for GW2. On an Idle Fractal practice Golem, I'm pulling approx. 9k damage per second. No idea how that stacks.

Then, I loaded up my Power Daredevil (per the Meta build on Metabattle) and he's only doing approx 5k damage per second.

Not sure what I'm missing... While I'm not an expert on DD yet, it has a 5.0 Meta rating on Metabattle, while my Condi SB has a 4.2. I would have thought the DD would have better numbers.

I'm not sure why I only did 5k dps, either. I have no idea if the players DPS meter was accurate or not. I've never used one.

I've been using the rotation as suggested by Metabattle.com, along with the gear. I hadn't heard any complaints before (while as Condi SB). I've even received praise!

Here's an embarrassing story:

**Some background**: I've played GW2 since 2012, but as a casual *and* I've taken long brakes every now and again. As most of us "old time" players know, the game mechanics can change dramatically from patch to patch. I have been back playing since January 2020 and just recently got back into Fractals. I have one character maxed-out with Agony and has a fractal reward level of 100. Back when PoF came out, I was a power Ranger (I came back a few months after that expansion released) and caught flak for being the "wrong build" for T4 fractals. So, I spent time and gold and changed my build to a Condi Soulbeast. Once done, I got little push-back and was able to join T4's with no problems.

**What Happened**: I was excited to run a T4 team this morning and *not* paying attention, joined a CM 100 group. My mistake, I thought it was a requirement for the fractal run *not* that the group was running CM fractal dailies. I have run CM 99 and CM 100 (I've got the titles) but only once, with my guild and about a year ago.

I saw the group activated the CM for the fractal but, thought "_oh well. I've done this before. I should be okay_." We cleared the first boss easily enough but then I was called out for only doing approx. 5k dmg!?! I honestly thought the other PUG player was kitten'ing with me (he/she wasn't), so I responded with a bit of attitude. The group leader (who was kind and spoke with me afterwards) also chimed in, questioning if I had done CM 100, before. I got annoyed and ended up bowing out. If the group didn't want me, I'd find another. It wasn't worth a fight.

**What I didn't know**: CM bosses apparently go invincible and wipe all conditions off, which explains my low DPS

**Why I'm even posting this message:** Because I was rude to another player and I don't remember his/her name, so I can't apologize directly. I know probability is low they will see this message but I felt an apology is due and I had to try. It was my mistake joining that group. It was my error in judgement taking offense. I should have given the group a benefit of the doubt and asked a few questions. Then I could have bowed out with grace, instead of like a punk.

So I'm keeping my Condi Soulbeast as I don't want to put the effort and gold into switching him *back* to a power build. Who knows when Anet will change the mechanics and Condi will be viable again. However, I am building a Power Daredevil. The Daredevil was already in the works, so it won't take much. And it was only an hour ago that I remembered the armor for my Daredevil can be used on my Soulbeast....

Thank you TheQuickFox & Ashantara for the suggestions!

3rd (and last) update. I was able to play w/no further issues.

If anyone else receives the Disk-I/O Error, I highly suggest you check your HDD or SSD first.

However if you don't find a problem, try uninstalling and then reinstalling GW2. It seemed to work for me.

2nd Update: Uninstalled GW2 and re-installed it in another location (Program Files (x86).

re-installation was successful and I was able to log in and play.

Will try again tomorrow to see if I have any issues (again).

Update: I downloaded CrystalDiskInfo 8.1.0 and both my SSD and HDD have a rating of "Good."

Thankfully, I don't think my SSD is going bad (from what I've read, that's a prime cause of a Disk-I/O Error.

As of today (5/28/19) I'm getting this error (see Title) every time I attempt to download the new update. Thus, I cannot play.

Anyone else have this issue or know of the fix? I've already tried re-starting my PC.

Anyone else suffering random game crashes (usually in a major city)?

The game randomly shuts down. Sometimes it freezes when loading into a new zone. I don't use any third party add-on's.

I'm repairing the data archive now because I had to force close GW2. I was in an endless loading loop.

Any advice is appreciated.

Thank you,