Celeste and Allona settle in for a relaxing chat about GW2 and rely on our friends in the community for this week’s show.

Allona

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• Redesigned Allona’s look (armour and weapons only)
  
• Fractals with Romo! Other than some ‘agony’ agony it went really well.
  
• Guild missions with the guild Amazon Basin. They did four, but I had to miss the last one.
  
• Unlocked one of the new grandmasters in Orr with mah guildies. It was at the Ship of Sorrows chest … which, yeah, I didn’t know existed.
  
• Update on the previous week’s gem rampage: I forgot to mention I also got the Basic Ore Node. Go me!
  
• A few world bosses … more than I usually manage to hit.
  

Celeste

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• Thief PvP Fridays
  
• Dailies, including more world bosses
  

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http://kormirshighroad.wordpress.com/2014/04/21/boon-or-bust-the-april-feature-pack/

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• The Wardrobe
  
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  • A lot more flexibility and customization options
    
  • More bank space!
    
  • Harder for new players early on as transmute charges are harder to get
    
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    • Allona: Unless they buy them
      
    • Celeste: How so? You still get them from map completion and certain parts of the personal story!
      
    • Allona: You previously got three stones for a city map completion and now you get one charge. Three chances to transmute items have been reduced to one.
      
    • Celeste: This really only seems to harm players who are new to the game and less likely to have an excess of skins.
      
    
    
    
  • Tonics = pointless
    
  
  
  
• Megaservers and Event Bosses
  
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  • More players = more dynamic experience = more opportunities to take on champs and lesser fought world bosses
    
  • Guilds can — if they’re able — take control of boss fight times
    
  • Loading screens of death (not literal death, just no fun waiting)
    
  • Higher travel costs due to waypoint hopping because of ‘contested’ waypoints … plus with added benefit of more loading screens!
    
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    • Allona: I’ve actually been pleasantly surprised that this hasn’t seemed as bad as I was fearing. I was in a party with people already in Orr, so I wonder if that made the difference.
      
    
    
    
  • World boss times are less flexible and lack spontaneity.
    
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    • Celeste: While this is true, it feels like you’re able to get a rotation going on whichever megaserver you’re on. Pick a time to be on and you’ll likely end up playing with the same group of people.
      
    • Allona: Agreed. I get the lack of spontaneity, but I really like the regularity.
      
    • Speaking of world bosses… http://howar31.github.io/GW2Timer/ awesome little timer!
      
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      • Allona: Got my new homepage!
        
      
      
      
    
    
    
  
  
  
• Runes and Sigils
  
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  • Complete rune sets are more rewarding at the 5th and 6th tiers
    
  • Healing builds should be a viable option for players who want to play support
    
  • Boon durations are lowered
    
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    • Allona: Really! I had no idea this was a thing.
      
    
    
    
  
  
  
• Miscellaneous
  
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  • Champ bag loot scales with magic find
    
  • Free armour repair
    
  • Champ train in Frostgorge dissolving (boon?)
    
  • Champ train in Queensdale going strong (bust)
    
  • Champ loot changes devalue loot for new players
    
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    • Allona: I need a bit of clarification, I feel dim that I don’t get this one.
      
    • Celeste: because the bags are dropping based on your magic find, players who are new to the game aren’t going to have a whole lot of luck getting good drops from these bags, combined with the lowered guaranteed gold, these bags and champ farming in general is less of a draw.
      
    • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2lYvJwbb5A&list=UUSzOtbN2xTsI8aQPM2sMmpQ Feature Pack Primer Video for those that may be in need of explanations (easy to link up to people who may be returning to the game)
      
    
    
    
  
  
  
• Traits and Acquisitions
  
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  • Simplified point system for traits
    
  • Resetting trait points on the fly is a thing!
    
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    • Allona: I keep forgetting to try this … I still swap out traits but only within the lines I have set
      
    
    
    
  • http://thepaletree.net/2014/04/18/trait-disappointment/
    
  • http://thepaletree.net/2014/04/19/trait-disappointment-a-followup/
    
  • More possibilties for remedying the situation http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/23lyzh/idea_for_trait_unlocks_tie_them_to_unique/
    
  • And Verene isn’t the only one to notice it… http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/23lca6/new_players_are_screwed/ There’s been a slew of other posts regarding these trait unlocks on twitter, in map-chat and various other platforms
    
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    • Allona: On the difficulty getting the traits unlocked. I sort of feel like it won’t be as bad as a lot of people are fearing. With the maps being more populated, I would imagine there are a lot of other people who will also need the same traits … not to mention players who may just be helpful.That said, I haven’t gone through with a brand spanking new character yet.
      
    
    
    
  
  
  

http://imgur.com/a/1M9lc

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• I want to preface this with a general love for the new system. I am playing with looks waaaay more frequently than I had in the past — as in, I’m playing with mix and match looks which I never did in the past. I just find one small part of the implementation annoying … (sorry anet)
  
• The initial view for the Hero UI looks like it’s not done loading; it’s very barren … and pointless. You need click on one of the three options (equipment, wardrobe, dyes) before you can actually do anything useful. If you need to navigate between any of the three, you have to click to leave the panel you’re on and then click again to go to the new one.
  
• I’m not a fan of having to click twice when once would work. I took extreme liberty and cobbled together something I think would work better (equipment pane should be the default view as it was previously).
  
• Finally, I wonder if there’s some back-end reason for why the UI isn’t streamlined like I’m suggesting. As it is, while not a deal-breaker, it feels clunky. Particularly in relation to the rest of the game’s stellar UIs.
  

https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/pvp/pvp/New-to-PvP-Start-here/first

New to PvP thread has been updated with more information for people who may want to get into PvP now that there are exclusive rewards available through that avenue of play.

Take Celeste’s approach to PvP:

http://youtu.be/Hh5zjK7ITpQ

1. 
   
2. Don’t be afraid to laugh at your failings. You’re a noob. Deal with it.
   
3. Pick a class that’s unfamiliar. PvP is unfamiliar to you so why not make it completely weird?
   
4. If you start to not have fun, quit for a while. Jerkfaces are at every PvP rank.
   

Periodic dye-drop weekends … for special events or holidays. It would be a throwback to GW1 a bit. Awesome idea? YES!

(of tyriantomes.wordpress.com where they catalogue NPC conversations)

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/22ur7m/lore_did_you_know_1_there_was_once_a_golem/

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/23omdd/lore_did_you_know_2_there_is_a_myth_of_a/ three-tailed devourer

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• Allona: These are great! I’m so glad Plagiarised is pulling these together.
  

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/23ra9d/new_lions_arch_proposal_fanmade/

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• Allona: Mad props to Leon1e, this is crazy indepth. And there is some good feedback in the comments.
  

Quick shout-out to redditor Commando_Joe, who — we just discovered this week — has been linking the podcast to the GW2 subreddit for the past month. Thanks buddy!

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