Guild Wars 2

[Threash]

I'm addicted to that character builder, they need to be taking my money right now.

[Kageru]

That thief video was fascinating. Admittedly they're just talking while getting beaten up by a couple of random mobs, but the idea of a rogue as being movement and trickery based integrates into the game-play so much better. The classical perma-stealth and massive ambush build sidelines them and is a balance nightmare. And the weapon switching allows them to have some meaningful ranged options.

[kildorn]

I'm addicted to that character builder, they need to be taking my money right now.

I spent entirely too much time on it. As much as we like to say the skill collecting is out (and it is, you just buy them with points from special quests now instead of capturing elites), the end result of only really having 5 (healing, 3 normal, 1 elite) free slots and the rest based on weapon combos causes me MUCH ANGST trying to make builds.

[Kitsune]

- Any sally port doors? I.e. doors on side or in rear of keep/castle for defenders to enter during an attack.

The videos show glowing portals in the castle wall that the defending team can use to enter it, so yes.  In fact, I've never seen the main gates open, which leads me to suspect the gates never actually open until an attacker blasts them open.  Which sort of makes sense; you don't want some idiot or troll on the defense going and opening the gates.

[Nevermore]

That thief video was fascinating. Admittedly they're just talking while getting beaten up by a couple of random mobs, but the idea of a rogue as being movement and trickery based integrates into the game-play so much better. The classical perma-stealth and massive ambush build sidelines them and is a balance nightmare. And the weapon switching allows them to have some meaningful ranged options.

If you played GW1, it's mostly the Assassin only without the attack chains and somewhat less Assassiny flavor.  But a lot of the attacks and utility stuff looks to have carried over from the Assassin to the Thief.  To be honest, the only two classes that look interesting to me are the Necromancer and the Ranger.

I spent entirely too much time on it. As much as we like to say the skill collecting is out (and it is, you just buy them with points from special quests now instead of capturing elites), the end result of only really having 5 (healing, 3 normal, 1 elite) free slots and the rest based on weapon combos causes me MUCH ANGST trying to make builds.

Yes, but it looks like the tradeoff on having set weapon skills is you have access to 15 skills instead of 10 by swapping weapons.  So at least there's that.  I'd kind of prefer the free-form method of picking all my skills to combo together, though.

[Kageru]

I hate pet-classes... and mostly ended up being the healer in any attempts at playing GW1.

I still hope they do a steam sale on the trilogy though. I never fully explored the mechanics of that game since the PvE was so boring.

[Nevermore]

I hate pet-classes... and mostly ended up being the healer in any attempts at playing GW1.

I still hope they do a steam sale on the trilogy though. I never fully explored the mechanics of that game since the PvE was so boring.

I actually don't like pet classes much either.  In GW1 you could play both while ignoring the pets though, so hopefully you can at least mostly ignore them in GW2 as well.

[01101010]

Elementalist looks a bit interesting... god damn it.

[Kageru]

I actually don't like pet classes much either.  In GW1 you could play both while ignoring the pets though, so hopefully you can at least mostly ignore them in GW2 as well.

I noticed that in the necro keep-PvP video and ranger video there appeared to be multiple pets, so it doesn't look like that's the trend... but it would be good if the system allows that.

[Tyrnan]

Last I read the Ranger must use their pets as they are the unique mechanic for the profession (their F1-F4 keys are various pet commands). Necros on other hand can completely ignore pets if they so choose since they are all tied to healing/utility/elite skills.

[Sky]

From what I've seen, you're giving up a lot of power if you ignore necro pets. Even just the one where you can port to the pet's location seems like a bit more than 'just utility' and more along the lines of 'get out of death free card', breaking LOS or range or whatever.

[kildorn]

From looking, you can make non pet builds (I think the mesmer is the only class that can't not take a pet skill from what I can see, if you count illusions/clones as pets), but I'd need to see the beta to see if it's viable. HINT HINT ANET.

The well skills for necros look absolutely brutal though. So many builds are based around stacking and spreading boons, and they have a cute AE that mass converts them to conditions. Woo!

[Tyrnan]

I don't know that you're necessarily "giving up" power as much as you're swapping it for a different type of power. Minions are just one facet of the profession.

For soloing and just playing through normal content I think they will be very handy to have around, to serve as distractions if nothing else. For the more team focused content I could see how dropping the pets and picking up some more supportive skills like the various wells, Epidemic, Corrupt Boons, etc might be a better idea. Watching some of those dungeon videos, I can see a minion army being obliterated in seconds by some of that AoE.

Oh well, hopefully it won't be long until we can get to find out these things for ourselves. I spent a huge amount of time playing a Minion Master in GW1 so I'm dying (ooh pun!) to get my hands on one in GW2. There's a good chance it'll end up being my main (depending on how the Mesmer pans out) and I plan on trying out both a minion build and one that abuses life stealing and Death Shroud to see how survivable it can be made.

[Nevermore]

Minion Master could be fun in GW1 but one of the reasons I loved companions in that game so much was because I could let them micromanage all the minions, especially with the Death Novas that would have broken my will if I had to apply them myself.

[kildorn]

Minion Master necros were a bit much for me, upkeep and micromanagement wise.

Pet ritualists however, were freaking awesome.

[Quinton]

oops. wrong thread...

[Kitsune]

Has anyone seen if there are mechanics to deal with aggro?  I know that they're trying to do away with the holy trinity concept, but a lot of the combos seem to require careful positioning like you ----> big circle of fire on the ground ---> target.  And if there's no way to keep your distance from the target while doing this, a fight's going to disintegrate into a chaotic clusterfuck with no real point in trying any fancy moves.  So it's my hope that melee fighters have at least some ability to root their targets so the ranged fighters can set up the combos and shoot through the fields.

[Tyrnan]

From what I've read one of the factors (and probably the highest priority) dictating who a mob will attack is proximity. So as long as there's some melee keeping the mobs attention the ranged should be perfectly fine to unload on it through combo fields. In fact, if it's like the first game it will likely be some combination of proximity, current health and armour level.

[Nevermore]

To this day I still have no idea how aggro worked in GW1.

[Fordel]

Aggro in GW1 was pretty simple, first person in the aggro circle gets it. Then someone AE's and it all goes to shit 

[Furiously]

I think they mostly target based on how much max health someone has.

[Tyrnan]

Here we go... http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Aggro

[Nevermore]

It's been explained to me before, but in the actual game when I play it just seems like chaos with mobs bouncing back and forth between half my team.  It's even more fun when I have a minion master companion, with all the pets and death novas and general pandemonium.

[Numtini]

The warrior has some kind of spammable aggro thing doesn't she?

[Fordel]

Which GW2 class is my Dervish alternative?

[Nevermore]

I didn't see a direct transfer of the Dervish but maybe some of their stuff is in the Guardian?

[Furiously]

My guess is one in an expansion in a couple years.

[Lantyssa]

The Guardian strikes me as more a cross between a Paragon and a Monk.

[Ingmar]

The warrior has some kind of spammable aggro thing doesn't she?

Not in GW1 that I can remember - there is some voodoo involved with how close you're standing to the mobs that makes them more likely to go after warriors (and also is why I always die playing an assassin) I think though.

[Phred]

Aggro in GW1 was pretty simple, first person in the aggro circle gets it. Then someone AE's and it all goes to shit 

Then someone cast a tiny little heal and got jumped by every mob within 100 yards.

[Segoris]

Here is a blog post about squads from Jordan Massey. IMO, it reminds me of a restricted alliance chat from DAoC where only the guild leaders/alliance leaders could speak - only scaled down - with a combination of public groups from WAR/Rift. I kind of like it, hopefully it will find use to its fullest extent

Also - pre-orders start tomorrow.

[kildorn]

http://www.guildwars2hub.com/features/interviews/traits-and-builds-interview-jon-peters

Interview with one of the devs, goes into skill changes for necros in depth, and how they're trying to rebuild the weapon skills (basically tuning each mainhand/offhand to a dedicated type of play, so the skills in the calcs will be moving around a bit.) Kind of interesting if you're chomping at the bit for more information prior to preorder madness.

[Sky]

basically tuning each mainhand/offhand to a dedicated type of play

That sounds like a good change. When I was looking over the sets, I was trying to see the overall picture of how they wanted things combined for different roles. Then I saw a squirrel and ran after it.

[Zetor]

The preorder page and the registration page are up for those of us who still don't know better than to preorder MMOs on day 0. Like me. The preorder page works fine, but the registration page is timing out with 502 errors.

It seems that 1 EUR = 1 USD in ncsoft-land... even for a fully digital purchase. Oh well!

[Mosesandstick]

Are collector's editions always this expensive?