I found it very interesting as I was mind-drafting this post to find that Jeromai had already covered just about everything I had to say about Dragon Ball. It’s a good read, and I want to reiterate some of the points to both players and ArenaNet.

Hints to Players

Your First Team Will Suck – Jeromai goes in to considerable detail on why, but consider it a warmup and also a reason not to quit matches to find a different pool of players. Your first team will suck there too.

Jump Pads Don’t Dodge – as awesome a mobility feature as the jump pads are, they will not stop a dragonball from hitting you. I love chasing players down the chutes and kill them as they jump upwards.

Corners and Pillars Do – taking tight turns down the chutes and using the pillars on the top level are some of the best ways to make sure that an opponent’s dragonball is obstructed.

Know Your Health Escapes – in a firefight knowing when to dodge, fall, jump in to a health pickup will make you win.

Don’t Be Chased – my favorite kills are when players try and run away from me down the chutes. I am just getting free shots at your backside. If you have to run away, at least use your other skills. You can throw #2 behind you, for example.

Duos Are Best, Threes a Crowd – I find that sticking with one other player is best. You can take down solo opponents with ease, and not hangup on one another.

Hints to ArenaNet

Rewards Commensurate with Skill – good PvP is hard on the player. Make it justly rewarding. Right now the rewards for mindlessly chasing down holograms are a magnitude greater than a Dragon Ball match. Giving rewards to top players on both sides will keep the losing side playing.

Random Arenas Need Randomness – I don’t understand why there is a switch team function to being with. The only reason to switch to a team is if that team is winning, and those people are not the ones that are going to leave the match. There should also be a wider pool of players to shake up matches a bit more too, but that might be a server limitation.

Personal Achievements Triumphant – 20 wins is edging on too many for an achievement, and it is weighed down by the reliance on a decent team. Having that replaced with personal kills, for example, would have decreased the reliance on an oft-horrible team and given more reasons to stick around.

–Ravious

The newest Guild Wars 2 festival is upon us. The Dragon Bash Festival is a couple week event centered mostly around Lion’s Arch and surrounding areas. It is beautiful, fun, and tiring all at once. There are some fantastic moments and rough edges as is likely to be expected in an MMO where new content is flying down from on high every two weeks.

The highest point of the festival is the art. Jeromai has a nice post with a lot of screenshots showing off the beauty of Lion’s Arch in dragon festival form. Bhagpuss also decided to post on the festival in screenshot form, albeit in a more comical sense. It is amazing, and I’ve stood around for many minutes just watching the holographic dragon. It’s so much to take in I keep finding neat little things all over the place even if it is just a placement of a dragon target or a new sign. If you haven’t signed in to Guild Wars 2 in awhile, I would say that updating and logging in just to walk around Lion’s Arch is worth it. Continue reading →

Where ArenaNet has hit the highest marks for their live-game updates, in my opinion, is where it affects community interaction. For content on its own, even good content such as the Cragstead instance, it’s neat, and then I move on. It is where the Living Story has changed the momentum of daily playing where I feel ArenaNet’s dev energy has had greatest positive effect.

With The Secret of Southsun update Southsun Cove was turned in to the place to farm. It was a comfortable farm too. One could join a snake of players through the northern Southsun Shoals as they train along running over young karka. There was also the skelk wading pool, which just became too bloody efficient. My favorite was farming the instigator events. Continue reading →

The Living Story sun is setting on Southsun. Canach has been apprehended. Next week contracts will be saved and karka queens will be killed. Then off to the revelry of Dragon Bash to forget all the issues remaining settlers will have to face. This portion of the Living Story was actually pretty good. There are a lot of things going on with the story throughout the island. It’s telling was hit or miss.

The story speaks of Canach, returned from the Molten Alliance “war” where he fought with the Pact against the enemy. He has a standing vendetta against the Consortium, and he feels the best thing to do is free the bonded refugees on Southsun Cove from their contracts of servitude. The best way to do this, of course, is to rile up the local, dangerous wildlife to attack everybody, settler refugees included. Tempers rise and settlers and the Consortium’s goons start to skirmish themselves. Continue reading →

Temporarily, the crazy refugees of Southsun Cove have come up with possibly the most masochistic game in Tyria. Surrounded by hostile wildlife that is attacking each and every settlement (at least the omelet-free ones), the free peoples have decided to design a game around a small Succulent Crab, which seems like one of the favorite foods of the karka. A mad game of solo keepaway ensues with planks, fishing poles, mad karka hatchlings, and giant rolling karka. Life imitates art, and the insanity of this game bleeds through to the Guild Wars 2 player.  Welcome to Crab Toss. Continue reading →

There are many ways to view the Secret of Southsun update. The most objective is ArenaNet has added an hour or so of content, and then you are done. This is the worst way to experience Guild Wars 2. In another view, it’s easy to see that Southsun has become the de facto hotspot for some time. Ignoring the checklist-type content, this zone is alive with players now. Finally, Southsun has received a much needed injection of life, love, and polish.

Guild Wars 2 continues to use achievements to replace quests. For Secret of Southsun players are tasked to explore the updated areas, talk to a few key individuals, and find a bunch of samples around the island. I find it to be a poor guide especially given the dozens of achievements in the Secret of Southsun achievement category. The mail sent to all players tells them to get to Southsun to talk to the Inspector, but the real guide to the content is the achievements. I feel that if ArenaNet is going to continue to focus on achievements as the quest-like director for new content serious iteration needs to be done to make it a better means of communication.

Anyway, savvy players seemed to burn through the quest-like content pretty quickly. I would not suggest focusing on the achievements to such a narrowed degree. Might as well enjoy the passion fruit flowers on the way. Continue reading →