Infusion.7149

Plated staff is a requirement for Machined Staff. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Machined_Staff_(achievement)

I think having yet another class compete for a spot in the "healer" role is pretty pointless. It's been _proven_ boon thief in encounters where it is usable WILL be taken. _Look_ at all the "healer" roles: * Heal firebrand (a staple in fractals, strikes, WvW) ... mace is a heal weapon by definition , staff has heals, and heals on symbols make all weapons into heal weapons * Heal druid (a staple in raids and strikes , decap druid is a thing in PVP) ... Celestial Avatar is not reliant on weapon , staff is a heal weapon * Heal scourge (a carry class in PVE , cele scourge has seen use in WVW and it has been meta in PVP previously) ... barriers not reliant on weapons whatsoever * Heal tempest (a staple in WVW and PVP to an extent , less common for PVE) ... with dagger mainhand or staff * Heal scrapper (a staple in WVW , quite rare for PVE) ... with med kit * Heal Renegade (mostly niche uses regardless of mode) ... with staff * Meme "heal" chrono ... minstrel chrono is more for tanking in PVE but in WVW sometimes is used with shatters (Restorative Illusions) , wells (All's Well That Ends Well), and mantras (Restorative Mantras) for heal procs --- there's a reason why people ran chrono + druid in the past * "Heal" tactic spellbreaker/ core warriors (mostly WVW now that PVP variant is nerfed) ... much more narrow due to lack of a real healing weapon , you're more or less reliant on the heals from bursts and shouts To top that off you want to make a _stealth_ healer, which is absolutely useless in PVE most of the time and likely will make WVW/PVP even more of a nightmare to balance. Having party quickness in the Trickery line (particularly procced off of steal) however, will mean three things: * easy acceptance by the general playerbase since boon thief is already a thing * no real re-gearing for existing players of boon thief * a real reason to bring a thief in any instance where healing demands aren't particularly high In addition, it is incredibly easy to balance this because you can just have a base 8+ second party quickness in PVE (Detonate Plasma is 4s but with all boons basically ; Improvisation allows double use of stolen skills but not the steal skill) but only 0.25 , 0.5 , or some arbitrary low number in competitive modes.

I don't understand this obsession with changeable stats for the overall userbase. There's only two main reasons you'd want swappable stats right now: A. you WVW (because pretty much nobody runs toughness in PVE as a DPS) B. you raid They (arenanet) could nerf every build to the ground and likely it will still be Berserker (or some variation to hit crit cap if it's fractals) +Viper for most of PVE. For most everything else if you aren't running berserker or viper (unless you are running support for fractals/strikes/DRMs) it generally means you are build testing. For build testing you can use exotics from things akin to bladed armor boxes , runic armor boxes (strikes), or warlord armor boxes which are stat select. If swappable stats _were_ such a hot thing outside of legendary items then equipment templates would also likely fall out of favor. It is not in Arenanet's best interest to inflate the number of items in the game for a very narrow section of the playerbase while also hurting their gemstore offering. edit: also I'd say the flood of mid level crafting items that are intended for use in legendary gifts (mystic tribute) is a testament to the fact that the goal is to move everyone onto legendaries for the Legendary Armory

Would rather thieves get quickness sharing on **Bountiful Theft** in PvE (make competitive mode duration 1/2 second or something) so that it isn't reliant on Detonate Plasma as much. When paired with **Thrill of the Crime** and some boon duration (or fractal potions) it'd make for okay boon coverage. Since some people that raid already have gear for boon thief it is probably the best path forward rather than healing. Unless PvE quickness is hit in efficacy , it's better to have multiple potential sources of quickness so even if isn't meta you have options. Healing doesn't make much sense thematically... Right now you have an evasive spec like acro (daredevil) , a stealthy spec like shadow arts (deadeye) , but not really strong condi (bleed/poison probably not burn/ confusion/torment ... analogous to deadly arts) or boons (right now it's mainly trickery) So I'd look into traits that augment boons in some way maybe giving up stealth entirely if condi instead because nobody wants to play against a stealth condi build... "condi damage increased while revealed" , pistols apply more bleeding while closer, or "dual attacks do more poison" . You're looking at pistols and daggers mainly right now if we're talking about PvE condi. Stealth traits are pretty useless in PvE except for skips and make competitive modes harder to balance.

No, a _joke_ would be "they don't want mesmers to be glamorous" ;) And the mirage one dodge meme.

For WVW: Guardian, Engineer, Elementalist, Necro. * Guardian can run as support FB (the highest stability output) , condi "offheal" FB, power DH/core guard ... _stability is pivotal_ * Engineer can run as holo DPS or scrapper support / DPS. As long as superspeed and bulk cleanses are relevant it is a solid option. _Caveat: if you run support scrapper you won't get many tagged enemies while in med kit_ * Elementalist can run as power DPS weaver, support tempest , or condi "offheal" tempest ... _the existence of elementalist in the meta is iffy at times but the un-strippable nature of auras remains strong and Soothing Mist affects 10+ people_ * Necro can run as power DPS reaper if people can deal with shroud well, or scourge as a corrupt source (both power and condi variant as well as hybrid offheals in the form of barrier) --- _due to boon corrupt interactions with Purity of Purpose on scrappers, it requires wells to be dropped in a well timed manner_ Honorable mentions: * Warrior can run as support spellbreaker (CC/boonrip) or DPS _... part of the original GWEN comp_ * Revenant (herald) is typically run as power DPS with boon output (including stability via Inspiring Reinforcement), but sometimes some people run it as a condi rev with boon rip (more common in roaming) --- _it is important to note that the boon interval is 3s which is why it remains relevant even in a corrupt-heavy or boon rip heavy environment_ * Mesmer ... Chrono is rarely run as DPS , usually as boon rip and roaming is mostly core shatter or core condi (mirage is one dodge so needs energy sigils) Probably not a good idea: * Ranger is mostly run as power DPS with immob (soulbeast) unless people are roaming (insert lone ranger memes) * Thief is almost always power DPS with a staff , there's some fringe roaming psitol condi thieves

I would recommend running double axe or even mace+axe (more CC / defiance bar damage) instead of sword+axe , since greatsword is a power weapon which means any weapon swap should also be a power weapon. Most players run **discipline** (for the faster recharge on weapon swap , Axe mastery) + **strength** (the highlight being peak performance + Forceful Greatsword) + **tactics** (leg specialist + Empower Allies or Warrior's Cunning) unless they are running an elite spec. If you're not playing instanced content the build specifics aren't as particularly important as gear. You want to run berserker stat gear (power precision ferocity) or marauder gear (power precision , ferocity vitality). Regardless ,**weaponsmith** is the crafting profession you would want.

Firebrands are popular with good players. Just because new players want to play ranger thinking WVW is PVE doesn't make them more useful. Firebrands actually tag more things than support scrapper which in med kit has no decent way to tag things = less bags / WXP. The only tome where you get nothing is Tome of Resolve. You can reflect in Tome of Courage and retaliation counts as damage (use "Stand Your Ground" and Daring challenge).

If people have done fractals hundreds if not thousands of times, why would they use condi except in a handful of fractals such as Sunqua Peak? The only condi build remotely decent in most fractals is condi firebrand due to the low ramp time on burning and the strong power damage output. I also disagree power alac renegade needs nerfing, condi RR (full viper double renegade with Righteous Rebel) is the only outlier and requires two of them. If alac renegade is nerfed then people will just run chronos, as the damage output of StM chrono is higher and using a full boon chrono you have more role compression. If you've been playing long enough you would remember we had full warrior + ele in core and then druid+chrono comps. Let me guess, you don't play Guardian, Revenant, Ranger, Elementalist or Warrior? If you did you probably would not complain about HFB/alac/BS/SB/weaver... There's nothing wrong with holo as DPS or staff daredevil as DPS (especially in fractals with skips), chrono has a bit of a ramp time for its power damage due to he way shatters work and people still use it outside of LFG. Scourge is common in fractal 100 , Mai Trin (95), and sometimes in Siren's Reef (78) at the end boss (Arabella Crowe) but generally anywhere you would bring reaper you'd want holo unless your party's quickness is horrendous (especially because places with low adds will mean your shroud uptime is poor).

Know the counterplay to whatever you are thinking of playing and make sure you address it in your comp. Make sure you have stability in some fashion or party/squad level stunbreaks. Know the maps well (or familiarize yourself with them) and which builds work in certain situations (i.e. you won't use line-of-sight reliant builds on steps or across a gap). Know how coefficients work and how damage works (find out if you don't). Get legendary armor ,obtain ascended trinkets from Bjora Marches (trade for LS4 currencies because WvW players have a ton of karma) or legendary ones. ---- Performance optimizations: Use model limit low in WvW , shadows + reflections off.

https://massivelyop.com/2020/11/17/flameseeker-chronicles-first-impressions-of-guild-wars-2s-icebrood-saga-truce/ > We asked ArenaNet’s representatives why this new type of instance is capped at 5 players rather than 10 like Steel and Fire. Their reason was that Steel and Fire, while designed to scale from 5-10 players, becomes much more challenging in smaller groups, a frustrating experience that I think a lot of players have shared. They found that the mechanics scale much better in the 1-5 player range. While ArenaNet did not mention this, I think it is also important to note that allowing the player to complete this content solo also makes it possible for the dragon response missions to become part of the story without feeling like a content type bait-and-switch. ... > ArenaNet was quick to assure us that the purpose of dragon response missions was not to replace fractals or strikes, but as something new and different, and that they have no plans to discontinue work on those any time soon. See article

> @"Ashantara.8731" said: > Oh, I have a new answer to the OP's question: better teammates. :lol: The first week you would find highly skilled players with decent damage (i.e., above 30k), but ever since, I experienced one disappointment after another. People not reading chat, not following target calls, standing in AoE etc. > > What's going on? ;) What's going on is the Ebon Vanguard marks aren't awarded after 3 response missions anymore. There's no incentive beyond the daily DRM. The second DRM you do will still take as much time and you only receive 2 Prismaticite crystals extra. The 3rd DRM you do each day is even more worthless now, you get a total of one extra Prismaticite crystal. ----- As I posted above a few days ago, the best way to "fix" the DRMs is: * once the instance completes the pre-events and has 5 people lock the mission immediately and start the rest of it * weekly reward for them that actually helps with the Dragon Slayer weapons (Amalgamated Gemstone) or Charged Stormcaller weapons (Amalgamated Draconic Lodestone would be the likely material) * a better non-RNG way to obtain Volcanic Stormcaller weapons with tyrian defense seals as a currency (similar to the strike reward system), possibly requiring the Dragon slayer weaponset to be completed * relocate the mastery point currently behind Volcanic Stormcaller weapons to the Dragon Slayer weapons to make it more of an incentive to do DRMs as the Dragon Slayer weapons are accountbound essentially --> Even doing DRMs daily I'm about half way to the 480 Prismaticite you need for the full Dragon slayer weaponset ------ > @"Zaxares.5419" said: > I more or less support all of these suggestions. While I don't know if the Dragon Slayer weapons and Volcanic weapons are basically intended to be THE long-term goal for Champions going forward (that is, there are actually no more weapon sets coming in subsequent chapters, and these two sets are basically intended for players to slowly acquire over the next 5-6 months), I think the speed of acquisition could be looked at and improved. Assuming you're just doing 3 DRMs a day, it would take you 5 days of farming to acquire 1 weapon. It's fair enough if you were just after one particular skin, but I think there should be other avenues for players to acquire Prismaticite if they wish. Perhaps the Ingots could be made tradable, as you suggested. If nothing else, it would at least give some inherent value to Prismaticite for a player who might otherwise be completely uninterested in the Dragon Slayer weapons, and for whom the Prismaticite is a literally worthless currency just piling up in his bank. > > This actually ties in to a bigger gripe I have with the Icebrood Saga currencies; all of them generally have no resale value whatsoever and once you've acquired whatever skins/recipes/collections you want, Hatched Chilis, Eternal Ice etc. are completely worthless. Yet you get so MUCH of it. As a player, I totally despite getting loot that I basically have little choice but to just trash because the effort or return to turn them into something valuable is just not worth the hassle. This was an issue with the LS4 currencies too, but at least those could be consumed for Volatile Magic. I would really, REALLY like for the LS4 and IBS currencies to be given some kind of merchant value so we can just sell them to vendors. Naturally, stuff like Hatched Chilis or Eternal Ice would not be worth much because the supply for them is crazy, but they should still be worth SOMETHING. > > Finally, I agree that Volcanic weapons in particular need to be looked at. I'm not sure what the drop rate for them is now, but I feel that they should be buffed to the same as what the SAB blue weapons are (which is a 1 in 50 chance from a Normal mode end zone chest.) Secondly, there should be other ways to acquire the Volcanic weapons. I propose the following system: > > 1. There is a 1 in 50 chance for a random Volcanic weapon to drop from the Event Completion bouncy chest when you complete a DRM. These weapons can be sold on the TP. > 2. There is a 1 in 20 (open to debate, but it should be roughly about the same chance to get, say, the Otter chests from the Tribunes in Drizzlewood Coast) chance for a Volcanic weapon box to drop from the large ground chest. The weapon box lets you pick a Volcanic weapon of your choice, but the choice is account bound on acquire. (If you already have all the skins, the Volcanic weapons can be sold, salvaged or Forged, as you please.) > 3. Players can also purchase a Volcanic weapon box from the Tyrian Seals trader in Eye of the North. I'm unsure what the cost should be, but I'm guessing it would require a bunch of Tyrian Seals (50?) plus gold plus maaaaaybe something else like a Destroyer Lodestone or 2 Prismaticite Crystals. > > Between the 3 methods above, it will give more incentive for players to do the DRM missions (either for direct loot to sell, or to farm Tyrian Seals to acquire boxes for your collection.) Hatched Chilis are a problem but I don't feel Eternal Ice is. Eternal Ice can be traded for LS4 currencies and then either consumed for Volatile Magic or made into Ascended Trinkets. Unless you plan on making Spicy Moa Wings for negligible profit (it's less cost effective than Cilantro Lime Sous-Vide Steak per hour) there is not much use for Hatched Chilis.

Take transfer "funding" (bribes) /s

More rewards honestly (_weekly_ Amalgamated Draconic Lodestone or something akin to that for CMs) and a simple cut to the chase once it's 5 people in the instance and all the pre-mission objectives are completed. Maybe a high tyrian defense seal count for Volcanic Stormcaller weaponboxes at the vendor (or a recipe requiring all Dragon Slayer weapons unlocked), they are too rare right now if a mastery point is going to be linked to the collection.

> If you’re a fractal fan, you might be understandably worried about the future of your favorite mode. ArenaNet was quick to assure us that the purpose of dragon response missions was not to replace fractals or strikes, but as something new and different, and that they have no plans to discontinue work on those any time soon. https://massivelyop.com/2020/11/17/flameseeker-chronicles-first-impressions-of-guild-wars-2s-icebrood-saga-truce/

Build storage is basically never necessary because you can copy paste chat codes. Equipment templates are necessary if you don't want to character swap (i.e. from Heal Firebrand to condi Firebrand to DH) ; build templates are necessary if you want to have hotkeys for builds. Generally if you don't play PVP or WVW (or have a dedicated character for those game modes) you can use all three build templates for PVE. Edit: Unless you're playing a support build or WVW, generally speaking you don't need to buy anything. Warrior - Power/Condi Guardian - Power / Condi / **Heal** / Condi QB (alt to Condi) Revenant - Alacrity / Condi (also condi RR) / **Heal** (very rare) Ranger - Power / **Heal** Druid / Condi Engineer - Power / Condi / **Heal** scrapper (rare in PVE) Thief - Power / **Boon** thief if you raid Mesmer - Power / **Boon** chrono / Condi / Condi Boon if you raid Ele - Power / Condi / **heal** tempest (less common in PVE) Necro - Power / Condi / **heal** scourge

Jennah's outfit is slightly different. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/File:Queen_Jennah.jpg

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Lady_Madeline She's a noble Of course there's human female noble NPCs with this appearance instead: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/File:Human_female_8.jpg per https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Noble Baroness Jasmina seems to have altered color for the typical human female Central Tyrian noble: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Baroness_Jasmina

Well you can take the stability trait (Harmonious Conduit) and either play auraspam DPS or some sort of hybrid off-healer (since ~500 heal power is about 70% effectiveness for soothing mist). Cleansing from auras that come from overloading and attunement swapping (if you run fire attunement) isn't affected. I'm surprised 4s shock aura (2s ICD on the stun) hasn't been touched or cut to 3s since none of the other auras are particularly strong on their own without some sort of _on aura_ trigger (whether it is healing, boons or otherwise). Rock solid giving stability on every attunement swap would be a nice change but unless it's split to some extremely short duration in PVP it would likely be deemed overpowered.

Content-wise take a look at https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Release Unless you're doing raids , 100cm (new Sunqua Peak Fractal), or some select instances where the boss runs around (whisper of jormag) it's pretty much berserker gear everywhere in PVE, that won't change for the most part. Condi is still not meta in WVW for the most part due to level of cleansing that is currently amplified by scrappers and support spellbreakers and tempests. The burst isn't high enough to counter sustain. In PVP some classes run condi (guardian, necro, mirage), but generally most people are power or bunkery (holo, daredevil, reaper, spellbreaker, druid/soulbeast , herald). Celestial shortbow renegade was a thing before Dec 1 patch.

I'm almost certain it has to do with the number of challenges you turn on. If you play all CMs on you get 3/3.

> @"Heibi.4251" said: > Actually this being an achievement isn't the bad part. The bad part is that a Mastery Point is locked behind a LOW RNG DROP item. While I agree that having a mastery point behind it was ill decided and should have been for Dragon Slayer weapon set, I doubt that it will be necessary to have that mastery point in order to max masteries.

For everything that isn't armor/weapons it's a non-issue. See the number of legendary armory threads (the legendary armory is what is supposed to share accountbound legendary armor). Infinite gathering tools have a similar "issue". The best use cases for shared inventory slots are: * Mist omnipotion (fractals), * copper fed salvage kit (quick salvage all masterwork+lower), mystic salvage kit / runecrafter/ black lion salvage kit , * mistlock sanctuary portal scroll if you're PVE player / Armistice Bastion if you're a WVW player, * bank access express * common/uncommon unid gear if you play multiple characters so that you can salvage all without using an invisible bag for each character * White Mantle Portal device for speedclearing * Mystic Forge conduit if you don't want to salvage all the garbage medallions * power food/utility if you play fractals or raids (magic find food if you play openworld) * Permanent Portable Provisioner if you play WVW and don't want to carry superior siege some other ideas: * United Legion waystation if you do _many_ Dragon response missions * Living Story portal scrolls if you're too lazy to use a bank * Maguuma and/or World boss portal device if you're too lazy to use a waypoint and check event timers * ascended "eater" gizmos to use up empyreal fragments, dragonite ore , bloodstone dust if you're too lazy to use a bank (includes Gleam of Sentience , Spearmarshal's plea , Ley-Energy Converter , Karmic Converter) * merchant express (if you don't have 24+ slot bags on each character) * trading post express (if you're a power trader or do many buy orders) * revive orb + repair canister if you are terrible in story and openworld (it can't be used in WVW/PVP/raids so it's pretty useless elsewhere) * prototype position rewinder if you have a portal mesmer * Teleport to friend * Ornate Rusted Keys (if you kill underwater krait regularly) * Treasure Hunting Kits * candy corn gobbler

> @"Linken.6345" said: > Ìf they do wvw they get marks for free in their reward track, I know since I got afew of them when grabing the silver pip chest for weeks when I wanted the armor skin there. > > Edit > Highest tier fractal people earn more then raiders since theirs are locked to once a day. > and drop ascended aswell. > I do agree that wvw could use some more love, with achievements giving ascended boxes of weapons and armors. Don't drag WvW into this. You're patently wrong because you only get grandmaster mark **shards** (10 for only one mark) with a maximum of 3 shards per week. Anyone that actually plays all 3 game modes (PVE, WVW, PVP) knows that WvW is least profitable.

For both thief and ranger in WVW it's usually marauder stat gear (not marauder armor skin). Regardless , you should probably not play those in WVW if you're new as they aren't highly desired classes. A good choice if you only play medium classes is scrapper engineer , both DPS and minstrel support are sought after due to superspeed and decent group utility (stealth gyro , med kit + cleanses with Purity of Purpose for minstrel versions). In addition, remember that food+utility are present in WVW. **WvW** Reward tracks you should focus on are: * Warclaw reward track (obviously you want a warclaw to navigate) * Guildrider Warclaw reward track (also includes 2 week Armistice Bastion pass) * Triumphant Armor Reward Track (to unlock Triumphant Armor tiers) * Gift of Battle Reward Track , once you have all Triumphant Armor pieces unlocked (also used for Warbringer backpack) * Hero Weapon Track , if you want the Mistforged hero weapon skin(s) only **PVP** reward tracks you should focus on are: * Glorious Reward Track (you need this for Mist Cores as well as to unlock Glorious Armor tiers) * Any reward track that is one off rank reward track for 7+ mystic clovers , in the long term (see https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mystic_Clover ) * Ascalonian Catacombs if you plan on running a minstrel support build (Monk runes) Other notes if you only play PVP + WVW: * Getting ascended accessories other than Mist Band (not unique so you can have two), Mist Talisman (not unique so you can have two), Mist Pendant is difficult without PVE * Warlord's armor boxes are a good way to get stat select exotic armors * Mist Lord's weapon set , Mistforged obsidian, and obsidian weapon sets are obtainable from PVP (using ranked ascended shards of glory) so you don't need to WVW for those * The stat gain from exotic armor is far less than that from weapons and trinkets , prioritize trinkets and weapon * For classes you don't normally play in PVP you can save up the tomes of knowledge to instant level 80 a class that is sought after in WVW * WVW infusions can be removed using the infusion extractor from Fractals of the Mists , it costs you silvers only * For all intents and purposes the Grandmaster Mark shards are amazingly slow to create marks, you're better off crafting them in addition to the ones you obtain from PVP seasons * If you see Armistice Bastion Pass available in gemstore , buy it if you intend to WvW regularly. It's the only place to properly test damage in a standardized test environment (the golems there). Unlike PvP lobby where the golems are available to everyone (in the PVP lobby) and in PvE where the Special Forces Training Area is accessible from Lion's Arch you are at a disadvantage without the pass. Skills and traits function differently sometimes and this is the only way to account for it. ** The functionality of the Armistice Bastion Pass is similar to the Mistlock Sanctuary in that you can return to the area you came from.