Guild Wars 2 is approaching its next regular patch date, and it is time to start getting excited. The living story is getting its final chapter in Flame and Frost with Retribution, shifting the focus from defending against the Molten Alliance’s attacks to aggressively taking the fight to the dredge and Flame Legion instead.
On the PvE side of things, this means an entirely new dungeon (the Molten Weapons Facility) for players to run through and wreak general havoc. The dungeon was designed by entirely new people from the original set of dungeons and is set to function in an entirely new way. Players will be given new forms of challenges such as jumping over ground attacks or knocking enemies out of beneficial auras in order to progress, with the final showdown of the dungeon bringing all of these mechanics together at once to test how well they have been mastered.
The dungeon also promises to offer impressive rewards to give incentive to re-run it. If the new type of dungeon mechanics stick, it might be worth re-running anyway just for the extra practice before they start applying the mechanics less obviously or with higher stakes.
PvP Updates? PvP Updates!
Even more exciting than the new dungeon for many of Guild Wars 2’s playerbase, the PvP side of the game is seeing some much-wanted updates as well. The inclusion of custom arenas should finally be going live with this patch, allowing players to set up and run their own PvP battles or events.
These arenas do need to be paid for, preventing them from being spammed or from being started and then largely abandoned, so with the cost they will likely see specific uses rather than simply being created for the sake of existing.
Also coming to PvP in the new Guild Wars 2 patch is spectator mode. This is huge. Being able to genuinely watch games in progress is essential to Arenanet’s eventual hopes of becoming an e-sport, but it looks like they are including additional functionality as well.
A specifically-mentioned ability of spectator mode is the ability to see what traits and skills are being used, allowing players watching to see exactly what players in the actual battle are doing, right down to their cooldowns.
The groundwork is being set for a resurgence in the Guild Wars 2 PvP community. Here’s hoping it is going to be enough to bring the players back who have already left.
Published: Apr 23, 2013 05:10 pm