Scleameth

I've not eaten it personally, but looks like the Fiery effect of Volcanus (a possible aim before getting my legendary sword) comes partially from the 250 Ghost peppers required in a crafting component of Vial Of Liquid Flame.

Did I miss something in the notes? I don't see anything related to the Area of Effect nerf? Not that it bothered me much, but I'm sure if it's not nerfed Kiy will do a little dance in the living room?

Thieves I can take, Mesmers I can handle, but when I see a ele with 2 daggers I run! not that it helps much, because they chase you down and lay down the hurt. You can't get away!!!! And the damage starts, slowly at first, but then more, more, MORE! While I'm franticly trying every trick in the book to stay alive, the ele is there running around me with full health just spamming the hurt.... A very effective build to anyone interested in the not-at-all-squishy elementalist. Nice portrait there Lujate and a good few tips you lay down. *I think I should bring up some portrait pics in my build too*

Welcome to the Dark (Matter) side!

1st: Welcome aboard Ferguson's Crossing! I'm sure you won't regret it! And, since you me are on the same time zone (well, more or less), I'm looking forward to seeing you online regularly! Your build is nice and solid, but just an opinion about the greatsword: skill 1 - grants might on every third blow. You'll only have 1 continuous stack going at a time before the 1st runs down and the next one kicks in, but if you have 5 points in virtues you gain 1 stack of might with Virtue of Justice. That makes 2 stacks. If you throw in a "Save Yourselves!" - that's 3 stacks of might... Not that much but "Save yourselves" is just such a nice skill! According to wiki you'll gain 105 power with 3 stacks --> 0.375 * Level + 5 = Power and Condition Damage per stack Skill 2 - lots of damage and works well with the order of skill 5, another 5, then 4, then 2 (combo finisher cleansing bolts which removes conditions), then 3 (combo finisher retaliation just as skill 4 is about to run out) skill 3 - blinds your target skill 4 - damage + retaliation! skill 5 - this is a good DoT skill, but I let it run for only a few seconds before pulling the crowd in toward me, with a 4 for damage and a 2 for some more excessive damage. But those signets are nice and I also used to have them up all the time. There is just something nice about pounding your apponent to the ground and then applying vulnerability. I also use signet of resolve, but don't discount Shelter. Although this does not heal as much as signet of resolve does, it does offer 2 seconds of blocking while healing. Since your build does not have Renewed Focus for that 3 seconds of blocking, you might wanna see if Shelter can help you supply that emergency block while your shields and blinds are on cool down.

Here is a good argument from against trying to focus on defence in WvW as a guardian: https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/pvp/wuvwuv/Incoming-Area of Effect-nerf-and-rezzing-in-WvW/1230452 So far my glass cannon build gets a ton of kills and unless I'm doing something real stupid, I even think I'm lasting longer in fights and falling back to group more regularly. This is probably because I'm paying a lot more attention to the conditions on me and how much damage I'm taking.

I'm suddenly rethinking my approach to "Stand you Ground!" being one of my default skills in WvW. I should really be recording my game play and do more analysis on where/when I'm using this skill to it's best effect. But I find myself using it mostly to bypass the tons and tons of stuns/knock downs when trying to enter a keep/tower that is under siege. OR I'm using it as a means to escape the hurt I just got myself into by porting into an enemy group swords ablaze. These two scenarios are not really using the Area of Effect stability to any useful effect and though the 3 sec retaliation is nice, it's not really my main reason for using the skill. So what am I trying to say here... Well, since I'm now on the path of dealing high damage and actually defeating opponents rather than scratch them a little, I also find myself in a lot if serious 1v1 and 1v2 battles. Especially mesmers and thieves. these guys like to linger after huge battles and can easily rake in one or two more deaths which can even often swing the battle back in the opponent's favour if a 10v10 is turned into a 8v10. Although these thieves and mesmers don't cause a ton of damage to you as a guardian, they are still insanely difficult to get off your back! Then you run around behind the carrot on the stick with SYG and not needing it. Most of these guys don't have any lockdown skills and at that stage you're thinking that if only you could get MORE damage done FASTER, perhaps the battle will swing back into your direction. Even more damage = retaliation. But wait, you're getting that with SYG I hear you say. True, but what else are you getting? Stability? Reliable retaliation for the guardian comes in 4 forms: Stand Your Ground! = 5 secs, but it's got a 30 second cool down and stability is not required in these fights Symbol of Wrath (GS4) = 1sec retaliation (but actually continuous as long as you stand inside the circle). Good argument to use this one because this build does use the great sword! But you have to ask yourself if you really want to stand in one place and let the mesmer toy with you? Signet of Judgment = 3sec, but you also apply 5secs weakness. And since we have signets traited, the cool down is reduced from 20secs to 16secs. Also SoJ passively reduces incoming damage. Save Yourselves! = 10secs of retaliation. With a ton of other boons, including regeneration (1300 health) and fury (+20% crit chance). The negative effects are that you draw conditions from friendlies to yourself, so using this in a large group can be suicide. The cool down is 60secs, so you have enough time for a sarmy and a bit of coffee before hitting that skill again. So you've got to think about the situation. Use Stand Your Ground! when: To run past the enemy zerg into your keep. To keep your guys on the cats while under counter cat fire. Taking an enemy camp with a few friendlies and the champ swinging the hammer is getting the better of the 3 of you. Use Save Yourselves! when: You are on the prowl and want to maximise your initial burst. You are following the carrot from a thief or mesmer encounter. Hit this baby, port on top of them and hurt, reflect, regen, crit, chase - get the job done. 10 sec swiftness boost to get away from a potential mess. I say potential, since you're not getting away once already trapped in a mess. If so, then "/sleep". That single, unbeatable ele is still there at the centaur camp and he beat you twice already while not ever dipping below 50% health. See if you can get him to 20% health this time and feel all proud of yourself there face down on the floor... beaten for the 3rd time. Use Signet Of Resolve when: You generally want that 3rd skill to swing battles in your direction. You want to take less damage in fights before hitting this skill for the retaliation. You see a 1v2 battle comin your way (normally after taking a keep and franticly chasing around the straggling mesmers and thieves). You can apply weakness to them every 11secs and have retaliation up every 13secs. You want thieves and mesmers to turn and run rather than seeing if they can capitalize on the weak and gain 2 more kills. I reiterate that I should be recording my gameplay to see which works out better - Signet of Resolve or Save Yourselves!, but I'm pretty sure that Stand Your Ground! will, after a long and loving relationship, be removed from my skill bar in WvW. Save Yourselves just gives so many booooons!!!! If it was not for the insanely long cool down, it would be the obvious choice. PS. another new favourite party trick of mine since the revelation of Judge's Intervention struck me: Equip yer hammer, hit Hammer 5 (Ring of Warding) and immediately port on top of your target. This forms a nice little arena for the two of you to settle yer differences. Since your opponent runs right into the wall and falls over 90% of the time, this is a good time to take out the driver and hit them into the wall (again) with Hammer 4 (Banish). I'm actually looking forward to doing this with Save Yourselves! running, since I'd be critting every blow in our comfortable ring I just created for the 2 of us.

This is not so much hilarious as it is just plain odd... But some real funny bits. The Beatles' "Revolution Number 9" from the White Album. Cudos to you if you listen to the whole thing! http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=LVf5Cr4M-F8

Very nice indeed!! Looking at the legendary, Bolt, just gave me the sudden shock again about all the components required to craft a legendary!!

Nice posts Max! 1st Time I see that charrzooka equipped and I like it!

Happy Birthday!!!

Moving on from my previous "Jack of all trades, master of none" build... In my previous build, I stated that "The Guardian is not best suited for burst damage or ranged damage". I still stick to the "ranged damage" part of my statement, but I was soooo wrong about the "burst damage" part. TL;DR skip to the actual build - but first a little bit of background that lead me to this build. I was getting more and more involved with WvW battles and thought my mighty tough guardian can take any amount of punches no problemo. 'Bring it' and see what I care was my motto. Result: Downed, death, run back, charge in, downed, death, rinse and repeat. The thing is, in any 1v1 scenario, having a bunch of shields and damage mitigation is a handy trick (the sudden cling-cling, ching-ching of a thief attacking was like a fly to me - shoo fly), but when you're charging into a battle with 20 other players who most likely a more skilled player than you, your shields only help to postpone you death by a few seconds and then it's oh-so-over. All the guardian shields have a fairly long cool down, so when you're all proud of yourself for not taking any damage that first few seconds of a fight, the next few seconds is just a battle for survival to see if you can get back to your team mates. And death is very frustrating for an all powerful guardian, trust me, I've died many, many times in WvW. So I tried the support guardian which deals very little damage, but buffs the friendlies like crazy and gaining life for every buff. Sounds great and works great in large groups. But fails in small groups and also fails my playstyle. Quick note about my playstyle: Apparently I can't help myself from rushing headlong into any battle shouting "FREEEEDOOOOM!!!!". I've tried holding back and staying close to the numbers, but sooner or later I'm back in the thick of things, dying with a sad face. I had to reconsider what I'm going to do about my horrible WvW situation. I got a level 80 ranger just for the sake of dealing reasonable damage from a distance, but heck, even my ranger was charging headlong into battle when my bow skills were on cool down... Back to playstyle... Then I started thinking that I should probably try and kill my apponents as fast as possible and call that damage mitigation, rather than see how big and strong I can pretend to be on the field. So I thought about an all out crit damage warrior. I played a little PvE warrior and just missed my guardian so. So I started thinking about an all out crit guardian! Thoughts at work, thoughts at home, thoughts on holiday, even thoughts in my dreams! So back to the build: A note first: this guy (called Uncledolan from here on) created a build that is 99% what I had in mind, and after reading his build, I adjusted mine to be 99.99% like his. So for a better build read, follow the link and forget about mine. I just feel like carrying on with my post, since it adds 1 to my post counter and I spent too much time thinking about this build not to at least try and get some credit from it. So back to the build (again): The crit guardian. ROTFLOL I hear you there from across the pond. No, I'm quite serious. And it throws me far off my beaten track of locking down enemies to give 'em my two scents worth of damage. I'll list a few things that I unfortunately had to do away with. No knock downs, stuns or snares.(rather unfortunately, but there are not enough skill slots available for the whole shabang). Only the greatsword "Binding Blade & Pull" remain and it's more difficult to land than a 747 on a WW2 aircraft carrier. My automatic 10 points in the Virtues trait for the extra effects on virtues and added cool down of virtues. (real sad about this one). No swiftness (unless roaming out of combat and equipping staff). So getting around is a bit of an issue, although in large groups swiftness is cast often by players. But I'm thinking that if I have to turn tail and run for my life, the fight is probably already lost and I might as well "/sleep". Two handed mastery (two handed weapon skill recharge 20% faster). Not such an issue as I initially thought. This was another trait that existed in all my previous builds. A good chunk of vitality. My "can't touch this" attitude. Things I gained: A new best friend in my short sword. Daaaaamaaaage!!! Again the theory of Getting close and stying close: Bear in mind this build is formed from a WvW point of view. Actual RL players sees you running at them with a bad attitude and have ample time to prepare for a bit of a skirmish. Now a ranged attack is ideally suited to keep your distance and apply whatever damage you can within the safety of friendly numbers. The guardian's ranged attack does not offer that luxury since the sceptre might be good for slaying rabits along the way, but for WvW you might as well be shouting insults at enemies. Sceptre (apart from the 1 sec stun) is useless in WvW. So I thought a lot about closing the gap between me and enemies as fast as possible without giving them time to react. Teleport perhaps? Enter "Judge's Intervention" and short sword's "Flashing Blade"! These 2 were so far out of my mind for general PvE play, that I actually totally forgot to even think of them as being any use in WvW. Weapons, Skills, Traits Skills: Judge's Intervention is a meditation skill that teleports 1200 range and burns nearby foes. hmmm... meditation... burn.... So I based my build around these 2. Add Smite Condition as another meditation skill that removes a condition and damages foes. We want to reduce cooldowns on meditations fer sure! And as Uncledolan kindly pointed out: Traited meditation skills heals you (for 2K mind). So loosing a block might not be so bad at all. Smite Condition traited has a 16sec cool down, with 2K heal and damage dealt with condition removal. A single block does not do all that! One good hit from an opponent is probably 2K worth, so replacing that 2K as a heal rather than mitigate it as a block actually sounds a whole lot better if you're dealing damage and removing a condition to boot! 1 skill left.... "STAND YOUR GROUND!" - probably the one skill always in my skill bar. In WvW stability is such a necessity, but having some retaliation along with that is is even better! And take into account that you're giving these boons to allies - nobody ever complained. Healing skill remains Signet Of resolve traited with cool down reduction. Elite skill is renewed focus, although I found that you have to use this not as a last resort just before dying, but actually when your health is at 1/4 and dropping. The 3 secs invulnerability is purely from direct attacks and not any conditions you're already suffering from. Also, I found that I still get the effect when dodge rolling "out" of my stationary position when this skill is activated. I can't really say that this elite feels more elite than "Save yourselves", which I would like to have in my list of skills in place of Renewed Focus. Alas. In dungeon runs, this elite skill will be swapped for "Tome of Courage" which gives a 100% heal to all allies within range. Damage: This is where the hurt has to step in once you ported right on top of your target. So ordinary damage of weapon and strength is NOT the way to go in WvW at close range (and I learnt that the hard way). Since the only real condition the guardian spits out is burning, don't even rely on condition damage. We want increases in critical damage and critical percentage. Crit percentage above 45% is good, but get this above 50% and you'll be critting basically all the time. (well, half the time in theory, but it feels a lot more since we all like button mashing). Weapons: Short sword & Focus Problem: how to maximise damage with this little feller? Sollution: TRAITS! Right hand Mastery adds 15% critical chance to one handed weapons Powerful blades adds 5% damage on swords Fiery wrath adds 10% damage to burning foes (and they will be burning if you ported on top of them with Judge's Intervention). If they stop burning, then activate virtue of justice for just a little more roasting and turn them from medium rare to well done. Add a Sigil of force in yer sword for a reasonable 5% more damage and I think you've done about as good as you can hope for. The focus adds a blind and regen as well as a shield. Not bad at all and I prefer this to the additional burning a torch might provide, since you're not staying on the short sword for too long before swapping to the great sword (after using the short sword teleport). Shield is nice, but as you'll read later - you don't want to linger around cowering under a shield just postponing your inevitable death. Greatsword Problem: how to land all of yer Whirling Wrath (normally easily avoidable by little children) Sollution: (thanks to Uncledolan) insert Sigil of Hydromancy. Now when you swop weapons to yer greatsword after a whole lot of pain your short sword just dished out, this sigil freezes enemies and slows them down long enough to bask in the glory of all your whirling wrath. Watching those damage numbers fly around always gives me a nice big fat smile. In PvE this is not really such a rewarding feeling since mobs will normally just stand there until dead. WvW is all about that triumphant feeling you get when you bested a "smart" opponent. When your weapon swap timer is close to finished, use GS-3 to get nice and close to release GS-5 for your best chance of landing it. Pull enemies close, switch to short sword and release the pain again! Traits: 10 Zeal with Fiery Wrath (+10% damage to burning foes) 30 Radiance with Signet Mastery (20% CD on signets), Powerful Blades (5% damage with swords), Right-hand Strength (15% crit chance with short sword) 30 Valor with Meditation Mastery (20% CD on meditations), Purity (loose a condition every 10 secs. But swap this out for whatever you like), Monk’s Focus (meditations heal you) Gear: Ok this is always the big question! Is my gear good? Heaven really knows. Wear your pajamas if you feel comfortable. Uncledolan prescibes Knights Armor. My thought is (the same as Uncledolan) to get hold of 6 Beryl Orbs for your crit damage increase. Strip down to yer jocks but leave on yer jewellery! We don't want to be exposed to all yer au' natural glory! Jewellery is expensive so see what you can "make do" with and replace only sockets where you it would be to your real advantage. Ok so now yer nekked, loving the breeze and wondering if you should head into battle? No, we're gonna get you dressed. We want crit % to at least 45% when equipped. So slowly add pieces of armour until you reach your goal. Keep in mind that you can buy Bowl of Curry Butternut Squash Soup for a reasonable amount (5-ish silver) and Superior Maintenance Oils also adds some precisions. Crit % is more important than crit damage, since there's no point in doing 200% crit damage if you only land a crit 20% of the time. Gearwise you want as much items that offer precision to get your crit chance as high as possible. But don't leave health, power and toughness out of the equation. Get dressed with any item you already have with precision modifiers. If you have to buy items, do it on an order basis at the trading post and save yourself 50 silver a pop but then buy Knights armor pieces. I suggest getting gloves, shoulder and boots, since your chest and legging pieces offer the most modifiers to power and toughness (which you might already own). The Beryl orbs are for adding crit damage, but if you prefer any other items that might boost crit chance or crit damage then go for it. Crit damage has a baseline of 150%. so anything you add to that is a bonus. +10% from Fiery Wrath + 5% from Powerful Blades + 5% from Sigil of Force +12% from Beryl Orbs +10% from Curry Butternut Squash Soup +30% from the Valour trait line That's 222% crit damage WITHOUT any modifiers from armour or jewellery A reasonable argument to give your crit chance preference? No? Play style: Uncledolan gives you a fairly comprehensive solo WvW approach, but mine is more of a ninja-sniper approach. You don't want to run around WvW alone all the time:) And sometimes culling just get's me into all kinds of trouble so, until that is sorted out, I am very cautious about rushing at a single red name. WvW - the ninja-sniper: In a group: stand, look, search, identify. Now that you have your target picked, port right on top of them and let go with sword 3. Then sword 2 to port right back on the poor flabbergasted, retreating suspect and switch to great sword to slow them right down to snail's pace and let go with GS 2. Give the sorry soul a few more flurries of some great sword goodness and watch your weapon swap timer, while making use of your virtues F2 and F3 to negate a little damage. When the timer reaches 3/4 use GS 3 to jump at your target and do a GS 5 (only once). When the weapon swop timer is ready to equip yer terrifying short sword of fury, plant a GS 4 at your feet and hit GS 5 to pull your target in again. Swop to short sword, hit F1 for some burning, and let go of another sword 3. Result = man down. At this stage you should be almost dead yourself from the enemy group giving all they have one you alone. If you think you can plant your target to death, then shout "Stand your ground", get the job done and retreat back into the safety of your group. PvE - the superhero: Here you can let loose with all kinds of hurt. change you skills to whatever suits you best, because surprising an Npc is not really important, they all die fast. In zones above level 70 the teleports can be used to great effect to save your sorry dying hide, by (thanks to a tip from Uncledolan) selecting an enemy in the distance and using your 2 ports and GS jump to open up a 2400 gap. Dungeons - the 5th party member: Something I should really pay more attention to. In early dungeon runs I tried my best to play the "role" of the guardian and get as many buffs to my party while trying to take the bulk of the damage. Later on I've come to appreciate that the need to stay alive out weighs the need to buff party members. So treat your uber damage dealing guardian with respect in dungeons. Go in, do damage, take a few hits for the team, but stay alive! Retreat and cower around the corner if you have to. The 10 seconds you are out of battle with 4 party members still in full battle is better than the 10 seconds spent for one of 'em to rez you and only 3 are in battle and the one rezzing you taking damage rather than avoiding damage. Granted, I only did one FoM run with this build so far but I came to appreciate that the damage output is still astounding by my guardian and I finally feel that I'm the 5th party member and not the 5th wheel at times. Damage = in any RPG. This build has a ton of hurt goin out. I had a 10K hit combo on a WvW Keep Lord and I think that's pretty good. Lot's of other better skilled players than me do probably double that, but for me that was a first and I felt pretty proud (well my chest was touching the desk). I'm yet to do a full analysis of my current gear with Max's tool, but that will come in a day or two... And here we go with the stats (no under water stats...)

Sign me up!

WOOT!!! Good to be back - now I can rest easy at night... finally!!

erm... that's a question I guess could have multiple answers... I know in the early days of cell phones, you we're advised to charge the battery for 24 hours. these days, the batteries already carry a charge out of the box and it's been a while since anyone advised me to charge it for any period of time before using it for the first time. So I would guess, just charge the controller until it's fully charged and start using it. I don't suppose you're looking to get a 10 year life span out of it anyways? I started using my ps3 controllers right out the box while still charging and my main is still going strong. I only charge it about once a week if I game often (I estimate about 20 hours per charge) and once a month or so if only using the console as a media device.

heh my guardian had pastel blue and pink for a short duration... that was a "just for kicks" experiment to get my usual dye inclination reset... soon I reverted EDIT: spelling checks

is the dungeon run still happening?

Last night I got a chest from Anet in mail. So to top off an already upbeat evening with my graphics all boosted up, I got some nice loot to boot! The 20 slot bag and the earring are the only two items I'm holding on to. I got an exotic medium armor coat and exotic heavy chest piece. I won't be using the chest piece so that is up for grabs and I doubt I'll reach level 80 soon with my necro or ranger, so the coat is also up for grabs. It was a bit late last night when I got the mail, so I did not note exactly the items I received, but I did not put these items in the guild bank, because if there are no takers, then I'm gonna sell for a bit of gold.

Thanks Kiy, I've made the recommended adjustments but will test tonight. Although I'm doubtful that I'll get any significant performance increase, I'm still hoping that frame rates will stabilise a little. Just a note for AMD users: I was unable for a long time to use the game's "Native" render sampling mode. This option would cause all graphics to result in a weird black-ish screen. The “Anti-Aliasing” checkmark “Use application settings” setting fixed this. EDIT: Later that night... OH WOW!! These few tips boosted my FPS by about 20fps! (that is unless Anet suddenly did some more optimization). But I can now increase the gfx by a substantial amount and still be able to play at more than 25fps. Time to head over to WvW and see what happens!

Have not played yet after the update, but there some concerns with jumping and the clones response times?

I might make it, but I'm probably going be tied down with some family event 'cause of my sister's visit from Aus. How about moving the time later by about 5 hours? Then I know we'd be home from any family event and the kids and wife would be asleep.

happy birthday!!

voted save

Done with the game as in stop playing all together? No never! Just throwing a few thoughts out there about getting the lower level zones populated and what to do with all my skill points because a legendary is still months and months away. I'm finding the lower level zones so much more entertaining really. More beautiful scenery, better matched mobs, more events which flow into other events. Orr is just a back and forth mishmash karma race IMO (nerfed karma race lately). The low level zones are very deserted. I finished Snowden Drifts today and again had to skip a few group event bosses. I asked in map chat if anyone wants to assist... just to check if people weren't just ignoring my chatter, I offered a free rare sword to the first taker... still no response. But after map completion it's basically just going to be farmin' or dungeon runs if I have the time (but I mostly just pop in for a few minutes and then out again to sepperate screaming kids). But there's nothing really much else to do or strive for apart from legendaries at the moment. I'm basically just thinking out loud what could be done for solo players. If I could craft some nice items other than weapons, armor or trinkets then that would be something to keep me going, unless of course would cost like a gazillion this and a trillion that mixed with 100 generally unobtainable gifts of some sort... I have a level 22 ranger in the works, but I'd rather get 100% map completion with my guardian and complete personal story before getting serious with any alts. I think I'll play 10 lvls with ranger and 10 lvls with necro until they're both level 80 then do the same with some other two. By then I think there might already be new classes introduced.

I appears there's a lot of negative feedback about the new Ascended gear and the grind it involves. Since I've not even started with the supposed grind, I'm not really phased by what lies in store, but I've been thinking more and more about where I'm heading once I've 100% explored all the PvE maps. What gear I'm working toward, what legendaries I really, really want and how many decades will it take me to obtain. I understand that GW1 & 2 was never about levelling, but I would still like to have spent more time levelling to 80. For the most part, I'm happy with the gear I have and there's only the T3 cultural or Twilight Arbor that I would really like to acquire. As for weapons ... I'd really love Twilight, but it's just soooooo far from my current investment in the game, that I'm quite content with the exotic sword I have at the moment. Let's say I have the above, then what? WvW is a bit of a mess for me with low frame rates, I've never even played SPvP so I can't comment there. I seriously doubt I'll do 100% map completion with any of my alts. I'll still enjoy the game very much by playing with guildies, but my timezone forces me into single play most of the time. So a few thoughts about bringing the numbers back into all areas: Introduce a hardcore game mode. Immali got me thinking in this post, but I just can't see myself reaching level 80 without any deaths without any real consequence upon the eventual death (huge respect Immali). This might also ensure lower level zones to be populated a little more. I recently started 100% completion on the charr high level zones and in Iron Marshes at one stage there were two players on the entire map! Me and some guy who left minutes afterward to go play with guildies somewhere else. With a few bugged events it took me aaaages to complete my daily reward there because I had to pass on all the group event bosses. After this map was complete I headed to Fireheart Rise. Only about 3 replies on a map chat "anyone here?". "I'll do it later" was my initial thought and I've yet to return to Fireheart Rise. Introduce Ultimate Elite skills So what am I saving my skill points for if I know Twilight is still months and months out of my reach? I'll probably have 500 skill points by the time I actually need them. Why not introduce more Elite skills that take 100, 150, 200 skill points to unlock. Limit these skills to specific zones if you have to, but if I have to play alone on lower level maps as a level 80, then give me the means to prove it and wipe out large and powerful mobs with an ultimate KABOOOOOOM!... and a grin of satisfaction! I'd have something to look forward too, put it on a 24 hour cooldown if you have to, but make it worth it! Introduce henchmen I never played GW1 so I'm not 100% sure how hired NPCs worked, but I'd like the option to hire, or even permanently buy and upgrade, henchmen to accompany me in Orr where the events are mostly un-soloable. Just having anyone else around that can stand their ground in a 1v1 mob fight in Orr would be a great asset. The NPCs are totally useless IMHO and the only ones that serve any purpose are the armor repair guys, unless you want to spend a bit of karma on an accessory here and there. (Genereal vendors sell the salvage kits and gathering tools, but the same chainmail heavy armor skins since lvl1). Sure the karma vendors at temples are great but there's never enough players around to open them up for vendoring! (And I only want the stats 'cause I hate the spiky heavy armor.) If I had a group of about 5 henchmen, I could do these things alone, but I can't. I'd even think of 100% map completion with my alts if I had a group of henchmen tagging along. Slow down crafting and/or add new items A little late to slow down now, but if crafting progress was a little slower, it would add more incentive for high level players to visit lower level zones. I've reached a bit of a stalemate with crafting at the moment, because the things I can craft at high level are probably cheaper to buy at the TP than actually buying the various crafting components to reach level 400 and so I don't need high level crafted items other than making a bit or profit, but since I'm exploring lower level zones for map completion, I'm not really getting the high level crafting goodies (blood, totems, bone shards, etc.) But what do people craft after level 400? The little WoW I played, I only dreamed of one day owning a Mechano-hog. I know that mounts are not part of GW2 (yet), but crafting items above and beyond standard profession items would actually motivate me to save my money for crafting rather than spending +- 15 silver a day on teleporting costs. If there was more to crafting it could be incorporated into the guild. Say you need 5 level 400 crafters in order to craft a guild limmo and travel in style! Does the "Guild" in Guild Wars 2 mean you get a bank? Give use the guild castle with stuff to craft! Benches, paintings, beds, the whole shabang! So there. I really don't mean to cast hate against the game, but it seems that a number of people have some issues with the game lately. Even ol' , and this is a guy who promoted the game more than anyone I've seen.