Last instructions from the Game Director are meant to ease the launch into the Guild Wars 2 expansion for all players.
Guild Missions in the First Week
Shortly before Guild Wars 2 is expanded by Heart of Thorns, Game Director Colin Johanson gives some tips in the official forum that players should keep in mind when logging back into the game after the update.
The guild missions can be chosen freely with Heart of Thorns (between PvE, WvWvW, and PvP), but not in the first week. The settings will only take effect for the following week. After the launch, this option is set by default to “Mixed”, meaning a random mix of all options. In the first week, there will be 3 missions from PvP and WvWvW, this has already been verified on internal servers. Guilds should therefore be able to prepare for this already.
Changes to the Graphics
Particularly colorful effects will be toned down in Heart of Thorns. Many animations have been revised to not display as many particles during high player and/or enemy counts, which not only slowed down many computers but also significantly limited the overview of the battle scene.
In conjunction with this, the symbol for engineers has been revised – it should now be more distinct from that of the elementalists and thus also contribute to better clarity.
Fractal Leaderboards Are on Hold
Although the developers wanted to introduce the new leaderboards for the Fractals of the Mists at launch, they were not finished in time for the release of Heart of Thorns. They will be added in a future patch. As a small consolation, it is promised that these leaderboards will be significantly more interesting than previously planned. The longer development time will definitely have positive effects on the players. However, it was not mentioned whether this will happen in the form of rewards.
For more information about the Heart of Thorns expansion, you can visit our Guild Wars 2 topic page.
