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sharri21's Guild Wars 2 (PC)
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| [October 13, 2012 07:08:06 PM]
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The other day I got the chance to get back into the world of Tyria in Guild Wars 2. I decided to play my level 35 Ranger as he is my highest and fastest progressing character so far.
When I logged in I decided to try out a new zone, so I ventured to a place called Harathi Hinterlands which the game recommends to characters of levels 35-45. Being at the bottom of that bracket made the quests a bit more challenging, which was certainly a nice change of pace. Something great about Guild Wars 2 is the higher level monsters you fight relative to your own level, the better chance you have of getting more rare loot. During my few hours of play in this zone, I actually got a piece of “rare” armor. A MMO veteran may scoff at this, claiming that they get rare pieces of armor from completing quests all the time; however, the rarity system in Guild Wars 2 is a bit different. In Guild Wars 2, an items’ rarity is determined by color as well as whether it is “junk,” “basic,” “fine,” “masterwork,” “rare,” “exotic,” and “legendary.” Normally, I’ll come across a good amount of masterwork items when I play for a few hours, but never have I received a rare item until yesterday when I was battling against enemies 7-9 levels my senior. What stunk was that I couldn’t even use the item that dropped! It was a pair of cloth boots, and I can only wear medium weight (leather) armor on my ranger.
Other than loot, I had an amazing time the other day and definitely experienced what I felt was the most intense dynamic event I’ve been a part of so far. It involved myself and about 20 others running around a campsite that had been taken over by a Centaur tribe in an effort to take it back for Humans. Once we had killed several named commanding officers among the Centaur tribe, there was an overall leader with the power to control wind or something along those lines. He was extremely powerful and had a TON of hit points. Even with ~30 players, it took us all about 10-15 minutes to bring him down. The scale of the entire event is what really drew me in, though. I felt like I was part of something that required teamwork and coordination, not just a mass of bodies throwing themselves at another raid boss.
I hadn’t even noticed that while doing all this that I had leveled 5 times! It’s rare that I don’t pay attention to leveling up, so for me this meant that the game had drawn me in to a degree I can’t remember the last time I experienced.
Another great day in the world of Tyria, for sure.
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| [September 23, 2012 03:29:51 PM]
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As I played over the weekend, my Sylvari Ranger ascended to level 33. This is significant because at level 30, a player is able to begin adventuring in instanced dungeons. This basically means that once you enter these specific parts of the world, you and those in your party have a zone all to yourselves with monsters and a storyline where no outside players can intervene. These dungeons are set up in such a way that monsters inside are much stronger than monsters outside. They take on an elite form, so to speak, that a single player would have an extremely difficult time dealing with by themself. The bonus to this additional difficulty is exceptional loot, of course!
Another interesting thing Guild Wars 2 does with dungeons is split each into 2 modes: story and explorable mode. Story mode is available upon a player’s first visit to the dungeon and focuses on telling the story of the game via cut scenes and dialogue that develop the “Destiny’s Edge” storyline.
On the other hand, explorable mode is unlocked after players complete story mode of a dungeon and is progressed through with fewer cut scenes and dialogue and is no longer associated with the “Destiny’s Edge” storyline.
The dungeon I participated in with 4 others is called Ascalonian Catacombs (story mode). I really enjoyed my first dungeon, although the players I was partying with had done it before so I felt things were going a bit fast. The story itself involves the players trying to stop a Norn named Eir Stegalkin from angering spirits in the catacombs while she is looking for the remains of an ancient and extremely powerful sword called Magdaer. While this attempt ultimately fails, players inadvertently learn of something much more dangerous and deadly building up beneath the very catacombs they stand in.
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| [September 16, 2012 11:37:13 AM]
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Recently I have been playing the ranger class in Guild Wars 2, which is a nice change from my engineer. Although they are different classes, I find the change in terms of class and battle mechanics to be subtle to the point where the switch was not overwhelming and I wasn’t getting killed enough to get teary eyed. To fully understand the workings that unify and separate these seemingly similar classes, I’ll first discuss the engineer.
As this GameLog is being written, both my engineer and ranger are level 22. The max level in Guild Wars 2 is level 80, so they are still very young in relation to completing the game but are fair to compare and contrast to one another as they are equal in progression. Unfortunately, I haven’t quite decided if I want to build my characters to have an edge in PvE or PvP, so I haven’t jumped into the skill and trait systems as much as I should. This hasn’t proved to be a problem yet because 5 out of 10 abilities are learned swiftly by switching weapon combinations and using them to become proficient in each, granting you the ability itself.
That said, my experience as an engineer tells me they are meant to be played as a ranged physical damage dealing class. Weapons available for use as an engineer include rifles, pistols, shields, and a harpoon gun for underwater combat. ArenaNet, however, has thrown a few monkey wrenches into the class that take the forms of turrets, backpack kits, and weapon kits. While kit and turret abilities will occupy ability slots 6 through 9, actually using them often revamps ability slots 1-5, creating an entirely new dimension of gameplay for the engineer. Whatever weapon(s) you were using before are thrown out temporarily while using the flamethrower kit, for example. There is no time limit on these weapon kits, so the player has all the time in the world to adapt their gameplay to the new kit.
Something I think most of these kits, packs, and turrets have in common is that they promote something referred to as “kiting.” Kiting is an acquired skill a player can learn that involves running from an enemy while keeping them a good distance apart from you. This is definitely something that takes practice, but once the skill is mastered it’s very difficult for any player or enemy to catch you. Usually there will be an ability or two that applies a stun, snare, or some type of immobilization within these kits/packs. These increase your chances of successfully kiting an enemy without being caught if used with timing and execution order in mind. Furthermore, I believe kiting is a useful skill to have when playing any class, but I find the methods available to rangers and engineers similar to one another more so than other classes. This may change over time as I explore the other classes and advance into the skill and trait lines of course, but as of now I think the similarities between rangers and engineers is what makes them each appealing to me. In the next GameLog I will cover my findings as a ranger after some more playtime with him.
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| [September 9, 2012 02:20:42 PM]
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Over the past couple weeks I’ve used all five starting character slots to create different combinations of races and classes. What ArenaNet has given players to choose from in terms of races are Humans, Asura, Norn, Sylvari, and Charr. As for classes, you can choose to be a Thief, Necromancer, Guardian, Elementalist, Mesmer, Warrior, Engineer, or Ranger. What does this mean for players? A seemingly limitless mixture of choices!
The class that sparked my interest the most was the engineer as I’ve never played an MMORPG where engineer has been an actual class versus a crafting profession. That said, he quickly became my highest level character who is currently sitting at level twenty. Leaving class mechanics and details for another log, I’d like to discuss in further detail something truly unique and amazing to Guild Wars 2 in this entry.
World exploration in an MMORPG has never seemed so vast or interesting to me. Also, if vast and interesting aren’t enough to draw players in, they even reward you simply for roaming around the deepest darkest corners of the world you’d probably never look in! Scattered around Tyria, the world available to players in Guild Wars 2, there are hundreds of small, unique marks on the world map. These marks include what are referred to by the player base as “hearts” (quests), points of interest, waypoints, skill points, and most recently added, vistas. When the sheer size of the world map sets in, it does seem a bit overwhelming. As you get further into the game, however; you discover that it’s overwhelming in the best and most exciting way possible. Quests are pretty self-explanatory. When someone needs help, you run along and lend them a hand for some experience points and rewards. Points of interest show up as small squares and are there to let you know how the zone as a whole is divided up into sections, and also helps players let other players know approximately where they can meet one another. Waypoints are similar to points of interest but allow players to actually teleport to them from anywhere else in the world, saving you tons of travel time. Skill points are somewhat of a different animal in comparison to the rest of the map markings. They signify a location where a player can go to possibly earn something called a “skill point” which can be used to gain abilities and later on be used as a form of currency. Lastly, vistas are red pyramid shaped marks on the map where a player goes for a nice little cinematic that shows off the surrounding area. To actually reach the point to activate the cinematic, you must first complete what is now known as a “jump puzzle!” Personally, I really enjoy these and I think it adds yet another feature that is entirely refreshing to the MMORPG experience.
Overall, world exploration is something that immediately drew me in from the start of the game and is still addicting on each character that I create. From zone to zone and character to character I strive for 100% map completion for great rewards and a recurrently fun experience.
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| [September 3, 2012 07:14:20 AM]
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Just recently an MMO that’s been in development for over five years was released, inviting millions of players to immerse themselves in Guild Wars 2’s world of Tyria. Before I delve into my journal entry, I think it may be worth mentioning that this isn’t my first MMO experience, making my opinion on ArenaNet’s new game seem less biased and a little more worthwhile for those considering Guild Wars 2 or even just massively multiplayer online games in general.
As the game was just released on August 28th and I have much to do in the way of overall progression, I feel an overview of my beginning thoughts would be appropriate for the first journal entry followed by more in depth logs concerning narrower topics.
Majoring in Graphic Design, the first thing I noticed was the amazing artwork and painterly style of Guild Wars 2. Let it be noted that when I refer to artwork, I am not talking about the in-game graphics, but instead the background images, wallpapers, opening cinematics, and even the logo for the game. I felt that the art style they used was extremely innovative among MMO games and was definitely very refreshing. My past MMO experience includes some big name titles such as Rift and World of Warcraft to name a few, neither of which used this specific style to portray their liveliness.
The second thing I feel Guild Wars 2 does successfully is character customization. Although I remember Rift having a well-crafted character customization system with numerous options, I think it’s safe to say that Guild Wars 2 matches those options and goes on to exceed them. Also, perhaps as a subcategory of character customization, I think the fact that your characters (if you choose) are able to be given first and last names is a step forward from other MMORPGs.
After you create and name your character you are able to pick from several preset questions which may or may not differ from class to class or race to race (haven’t tried all combinations yet) which determine something referred to as a personal story quest line that changes depending on your answers to those questions. I’ll probably expand on this in a later game log.
After character creation is completed, you’re free to set forth on your journey into the amazing and beautiful world ArenaNet has laid out, begging to be explored. After playing a bit more and checking out multiple zones I will write a separate log on this topic. Until then, I’ll say that the game is truly surpassing my expectations and I’m thoroughly enjoying it thus far!
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sharri21's Guild Wars 2 (PC)
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Current Status: Playing
GameLog started on: Monday 3 September, 2012
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