Just Picked up HoT+PoF - Can I get Mount Before Starting HoT?

[Thedenofsin.7340]

Hello all,

 

I'm returning after a long hiatus, and wanted to play the expansions. It seems the mounts would be really beneficial. Is it possible to obtain a mount before starting the HoT quest lines? If so, how? I'm completely new to the expansions, so I don't even know how to get a mount.

 

Thanks in advance!

[Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.294]

Yes, but it requires doing things out of order. You get the mount as part of the first story mission of PoF. Similar to getting gliding as part of the first story mission in HoT. My advice would be to go ahead and do the first PoF mission, the raptor will make moving around in the rest of the world much less tedious.

 

Please note: Core Tyria is less difficult that PoF, and PoF is less difficult than HoT, even after the nerfs to HoT. Good luck and welcome to the jungle. And remember, in the jungle, EVERYTHING is trying to kill you. Even the plants. :)

[starlinvf.1358]

Also note that Mounts are something of a liability in HOT maps, due to its vertical design. Raptors in particular need a LOT of careful handling to not accidentally throw yourself off a cliff; in which you're unable to dismount, and can't use your glider since you're mounted.

[Thedenofsin.7340]

> @"Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.2946" said:

> Yes, but it requires doing things out of order. You get the mount as part of the first story mission of PoF. Similar to getting gliding as part of the first story mission in HoT. My advice would be to go ahead and do the first PoF mission, the raptor will make moving around in the rest of the world much less tedious.

>

> Please note: Core Tyria is less difficult that PoF, and PoF is less difficult than HoT, even after the nerfs to HoT. Good luck and welcome to the jungle. And remember, in the jungle, EVERYTHING is trying to kill you. Even the plants. :)

 

Thanks for the tips. I would hope for nothing less than such a challenge. As a D&D DM who's been running a campaign through "Dinosaur island", it sounds exactly like what I am running. Everything is trying to kill you - perfect. :-)

 

[Thedenofsin.7340]

> @"starlinvf.1358" said:

> Also note that Mounts are something of a liability in HOT maps, due to its vertical design. Raptors in particular need a LOT of careful handling to not accidentally throw yourself off a cliff; in which you're unable to dismount, and can't use your glider since you're mounted.

 

Good to know. Thanks!

[Linken.6345]

> @"Thedenofsin.7340" said:

> > @"starlinvf.1358" said:

> > Also note that Mounts are something of a liability in HOT maps, due to its vertical design. Raptors in particular need a LOT of careful handling to not accidentally throw yourself off a cliff; in which you're unable to dismount, and can't use your glider since you're mounted.

>

> Good to know. Thanks1

 

Well even if you throw yourself over a cliff only the raptor will die when you smash into the ground leaving you knockdowned before you can get back up

[Biff.5312]

> @"starlinvf.1358" said:

> Also note that Mounts are something of a liability in HOT maps, due to its vertical design. Raptors in particular need a LOT of careful handling to not accidentally throw yourself off a cliff; in which you're unable to dismount, and can't use your glider since you're mounted.

 

I couldn't disagree more. Mounts are a HUGE help in HoT, both in terms of moving without having to stop and fight every mob on the way, and in terms of simple mobility. You can raptor jump across Hylek platforms, bunny-hop up to difficult rises, etc. Griffon makes the whole place easy.

 

The starting mission in PoF is very brief and doesn't spoil anything story-wise really. I'd DEFINITELY do it first.

[Thedenofsin.7340]

How about getting the mount before finishing the Season 2 quest line?

[Steve The Cynic.3217]

> @"Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.2946" said:

> And remember, in the jungle, EVERYTHING is trying to kill you. Even the plants. :)

 

You got that wrong.

 

Everything is trying to kill you, *especially* the plants.

 

[Steve The Cynic.3217]

> @"Thedenofsin.7340" said:

> How about getting the mount before finishing the Season 2 quest line?

 

As long as you have an adequately equipped level 80 character, of course.

[Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.294]

> @"Steve The Cynic.3217" said:

> > @"Kaltyn of Torbins Deep.2946" said:

> > And remember, in the jungle, EVERYTHING is trying to kill you. Even the plants. :)

>

> You got that wrong.

>

> Everything is trying to kill you, *especially* the plants.

>

 

ROFL. Good point. :)

[Corax.7692]

I did all of the Path of Fire story and got all my mounts before beginning Heart of Thorns. I also ran all the Heart of Thorns maps and metas quite a lot before doing the HoT story, and there were more "spoilers" from having done the HoT metas, than spoilers between the expansions' stories—in that the story made sense of things I didn't understand about some of the metas. Then again, some of the story directly contradicted things in the open-world maps!

 

Having mounts in HoT maps makes a huge difference, as others have said, especially the griffon. By the way, Heart of Thorns has its own pre-mount mobility thing, the glider, which you can get with a mastery point. Gliders give you a limited-time glide through the air if you fall or jump from a height (unlimited with mastery training).

 

To get your first mount, just start Path of Fire and do the first chapter. That opens the maps; the raptor is available right near where you start after the story chapter, and you don't need to do any story to get any of the other mounts except the griffon and beetle. Each map in the Crystal Desert region introduces its own mount with a new movement mechanic, and the maps are essentially set up to require you have the prior mount to get each new one:

 

* Crystal Oasis: Raptor—can leap forward very quickly to cross gaps. Easy to acquire by doing a renown heart.

* Desert Highlands: Springer—can jump up high. You need to train the raptor far-leaping mastery to be able to get to where the springers are (north-center on the map), or use a teleport to a friend. Easy to acquire by doing a renown heart, but you can't do the heart until you get the raptor far-leap mastery (thanks to Tanek.5983 for this).

* Elon Riverlands: Skimmer—floats over land, water, and most importantly, quicksand and sulfur pits, which are all over higher-level PoF maps. Easy to acquire by doing a renown heart. I think you can just get to skimmers (south-west on the map) without an earlier mount, but I could be wrong.

* The Desolation: Jackal—can teleport through sand portals, which are the only routes to certain areas in PoF maps. Requires doing a renown heart with tasks that are a bit tricky to master. You need a skimmer to be able to get to where the jackals are (kind of south-westish). This mount's special abilities are perhaps the least relevant outside of PoF maps, but note that timing teleports well means your jackal will survive a very long fall.

* Domain of Vabbi: Griffon—can fly, sort of. It can't gain much altitude, but if you creep up to a high location, you can glide over very long distances and maintain your altitude with mastery training. You have to do a long, involved scavenger hunt and pay 250 gold to get it. The beginning items for the scavenger hunt do not drop for you until after you finish the Path of Fire story, and they give you hints about where you have to go to begin the scavenger hunt proper. (By the way, one handy thing about the griffon is you can switch to it while using your Heart of Thorns glider—but not vice versa.)

* Doumain of Kourna: Roller Beetle—it just rolls around, but it has a ridiculously fast turbo mode that, if you can steer it, will get you across a map the fastest of any mount. You have to start the appropriate living world season to open the map, and do an involved scavenger hunt to get the beetle. The story itself leads into the scavenger hunt.

[Thedenofsin.7340]

This was wonderfully helpful! Thank you so much!

[Gaile Gray.6029]

@"Corax.7690", I agree with @"Thedenofsin.7340". Thank you for taking the time to share your experiences -- that will help many other players, I'm sure. The sharing of this kind of information and support is one of the biggest reason that I'm delighted that we have forums for our players!

[Matt H.6142]

Of course the choice is yours, and you may feel left behind by others rushing to events on mounts, but there’s something in exploring the maps and the danger on foot and glider. Survive a raptor swarm, get gooped by Chak, and feel ripped by Mordrem snipers.

[Justine.6351]

Maybe just do HoT first and Max out your glider and do the personal story.

 

The mounts only start to feel amazing and overly useful in HoT when you start doing map completion which is obviously not immediately necessary.

[DeanBB.4268]

I wish I'd had mounts when doing HoT. I'm one of those "HoT maps are annoying" kinda guys. So I recommend doing the first story in PoF for the raptor, or even the bunny.

[Zushada.6108]

I am always on the fence answering this question because HoT maps hurt like heck but for me the biggest help was unlocking gliding. As others have said the mounts can be a bit of a devil in disguise in HoT maps and unless you are willing to complete PoF first to get Raptor, Springer, and Jackal (Skimmer isn't much help in those maps) then the Raptor alone will help you get past certain enemies but exploration will still be on foot and through gliding/mushrooms for the most part. Both of which have to be trained in HoT maps in order to acquire. For me now, when I am training new professions the Griffon mount has been the biggest help in HoT maps but I understand new players won't have the 250 gold to invest in that mount. My only wish is that the Griffon could use updrafts because I have died A LOT forgetting that I am on the Griffon and not gliding and you can't dismount midair.

 

I got HoT about a year after it released and started LW2, jumped into HoT to unlock the masteries started training basic gliding (an XP boost and GH boost really helped there) then went back to LW2 to hone my skills with tougher than central tyria enemies. In the end, I bounced back and forth between LW2 and HoT because of Mastery training and because I got frustrated with dying in HoT. However, I am not big on the stories on first run through a new game so for me it was the best decision and to take a hybrid approach as I learned more about the post-80 content - plus Gliding really helped in Dry Top.

 

As others have mentioned it is personal choice of whether the story fluidity means more to you than the masteries themselves. At the same time, mounts have kind of left new players with no choice but to obtain at least one because everyone whips by those on foot and sometimes players without mounts note that it can be hard to even get a hit on the NPC (in central Tyria especially). Finally, HoT maps, particularly Verdant Brink (the first HoT map), really relies on gliding, updrafts and bouncing mushrooms before mounts, so I think in the end I would likely train those 3 masteries first and then get a mount for Auric Basin (the second map but it isn't that bad on foot) and Tangled Depths (the third HoT map which is also the most cursed and hated map).

 

If you choose to go this route, make sure you have gear with vitality and some toughness along with equipping a skill that grants swiftness. These really help you get through the initial learning/training stages. Also, in LFG there are always Hero Point trains and some even do the Mastery Points. This will help you get the training done faster if you use the GH XP boost and a regular XP boost. Plus, you will be running with a squad so you will get WPs and most of the maps opened up. Finally, each of these maps have a meta associated with them so look at the Event Timer on the GW2 wiki and join an active map. Other players around you always makes things easier.

 

Not sure if any of this is helpful, but you definitely don't need mounts for LW2 as it is played out in DryTop and Silver Wastes along with Central Tyria. Plus story instances in LW2 and HoT don't allow mounts so you aren't missing out on anything. Granted, the Raptor does really help in Silver Wastes particularly if you want to run the map meta events and go for the Central Tyrian Mastery points.

 

It really is a 50/50 argument in favour of both ways and if I was getting started like you, I would likely go get the mounts and then do the HoT stuff. But that is because I am impatient. :smile:

 

[Corax.7692]

> @"Zushada.6108" said:

> My only wish is that the Griffon could use updrafts because I have died A LOT forgetting that I am on the Griffon and not gliding and you can't dismount midair.

 

This is one of those chinks in game design that really irritate me. Obviously a griffon should be able to use an updraft! But no, arbitrary game logic applies rather than sensible physics.

 

Then again, I sucked at jumping puzzles for so long because it never occurred to me that I could use the movement keys while mid-air. :-D Now that I know that, jumping puzzles are almost fun.

[Sojourner.4621]

> @"Corax.7692" said:

> > @"Zushada.6108" said:

> > My only wish is that the Griffon could use updrafts because I have died A LOT forgetting that I am on the Griffon and not gliding and you can't dismount midair.

>

> This is one of those chinks in game design that really irritate me. Obviously a griffon should be able to use an updraft! But no, arbitrary game logic applies rather than sensible physics.

>

> Then again, I sucked at jumping puzzles for so long because it never occurred to me that I could use the movement keys while mid-air. :-D Now that I know that, jumping puzzles are almost fun.

 

It's a seperation of expansions. If Griffons could use updrafts then it would make gliding, the entire Heart of Thorns core mechanic, completely obsolete. It's NEVER a good idea to make content exclusive to the second expansion so useful that it effectively removes content exclusive to the first expansion from the game.

[Evil.1580]

If I were you, I wouldn't get the mounts for HoT and I would experience this content without them.

It is the hardest open world in GW2 and you should try it like that.

If you don't like challenges get the mounts.

Welcome to the best MMO :)

Hope you like it!

[Corax.7692]

> @"Sojourner.4621" said:

> > @"Corax.7692" said:

> > > @"Zushada.6108" said:

> > > My only wish is that the Griffon could use updrafts because I have died A LOT forgetting that I am on the Griffon and not gliding and you can't dismount midair.

> >

> > This is one of those chinks in game design that really irritate me. Obviously a griffon should be able to use an updraft! But no, arbitrary game logic applies rather than sensible physics.

> >

> > Then again, I sucked at jumping puzzles for so long because it never occurred to me that I could use the movement keys while mid-air. :-D Now that I know that, jumping puzzles are almost fun.

>

> It's a seperation of expansions. If Griffons could use updrafts then it would make gliding, the entire Heart of Thorns core mechanic, completely obsolete. It's NEVER a good idea to make content exclusive to the second expansion so useful that it effectively removes content exclusive to the first expansion from the game.

 

That is a marketing argument. As a player, and someone who cares about design and immersion, I find it arbitrary and pointless.

[Sojourner.4621]

> @"Corax.7692" said:

> > @"Sojourner.4621" said:

> > > @"Corax.7692" said:

> > > > @"Zushada.6108" said:

> > > > My only wish is that the Griffon could use updrafts because I have died A LOT forgetting that I am on the Griffon and not gliding and you can't dismount midair.

> > >

> > > This is one of those chinks in game design that really irritate me. Obviously a griffon should be able to use an updraft! But no, arbitrary game logic applies rather than sensible physics.

> > >

> > > Then again, I sucked at jumping puzzles for so long because it never occurred to me that I could use the movement keys while mid-air. :-D Now that I know that, jumping puzzles are almost fun.

> >

> > It's a seperation of expansions. If Griffons could use updrafts then it would make gliding, the entire Heart of Thorns core mechanic, completely obsolete. It's NEVER a good idea to make content exclusive to the second expansion so useful that it effectively removes content exclusive to the first expansion from the game.

>

> That is a marketing argument. As a player, and someone who cares about design and immersion, I find it arbitrary and pointless.

 

And yet another player who only has HoT and not PoF might feel that it is horrendously unfair if PoF players can, through buying another expansion, do all the things their expansion exclusive movement buff can but better. It's not just marketing, it's about a single person's immersion not being the only opinion that matters. There are no updrafts on PoF maps either. They segregate their expansions and mechanics so that someone who can afford one but not the other doesn't feel like the other has the advantage.

[Tanek.5983]

> @"Corax.7692" said:

> * Desert Highlands: Springer—can jump up high. You need to train the raptor far-leaping mastery to be able to get to where the springers are (north-center on the map), or use a teleport to a friend. Easy to acquire by doing a renown heart.

 

Quick note on this in case anyone goes to try it. The renown heart that you need to get the springer will not be available until you get the 3rd raptor mastery.

We thought the same thing about the teleport, but apparently Anet does not want us using that particular loophole. ;)

[Corax.7692]

> @"Tanek.5983" said:

> > @"Corax.7692" said:

> > * Desert Highlands: Springer—can jump up high. You need to train the raptor far-leaping mastery to be able to get to where the springers are (north-center on the map), or use a teleport to a friend. Easy to acquire by doing a renown heart.

>

> Quick note on this in case anyone goes to try it. The renown heart that you need to get the springer will not be available until you get the 3rd raptor mastery.

> We thought the same thing about the teleport, but apparently Anet does not want us using that particular loophole. ;)

 

Thanks for pointing this out. I've updated my response with this info.