People love to complain. I know I do. But too many people complain about GW2 and don’t provide any solutions. I’m not one of those people; I enjoy problem-solving, and I find myself often coming up with ideas to improve on many aspects of GW2. I think the best solutions are the ones with realistic limitations, though, and it’s this understanding that often leads me to agree with ANet’s decisions more often than I do the player community. That said, they definitely could have done things better, and sometimes you have to go a little on the extreme side for the sake of progress and science.
I imagine if I were in charge, I would also introduce ridiculous things designed to torture the players for nothing more than the lulz. I do find it hard to tell the difference between things I think other players hate and things I genuinely want for myself though.
And so, submitted for no one’s approval: the 100 things I would do if I were on the GW2 dev team.
General
1. WE FUCKING FIXED FIERY RUSH! Its damage now properly reflects its tool tip.
2. The Benevolence effect has been reworked as a separate stat seen on the Hero panel. Only the current sources of Benevolence (traits, upgrades, and food) can add to this stat.
3. The trait point system has been reworked. In HoT, you will be able to spend a total of 18 trait points into three specializations. Under the new system, you will still be limited to three specializations, but you now will have a maximum of 40 trait points. Adept traits will cost one trait point, Major traits will cost two trait points, and Grandmaster traits will cost three trait points. Just equipping a trait in every slot of your three lines uses up 27 trait points. What about the other 13? All major traits will now be able to be upgraded twice with scalable effects. With those 13 points, you can have two level 3 Grandmaster traits and one level 2 Adept trait, or one level 3 Grandmaster trait, one level 3 Master trait, one level 2 Master trait, and one level 2 Adept trait, or… well, it just goes on and on.
4. New condition: Jitters. This is sort of the opposite of Torment and Confusion; it ticks a substantial amount of damage if you are not attacking or in motion. Highly impractical in most situations, but deadly when combined with stun or immobilize and daze. Also makes for pick-your-poison decisions if combined with Torment and Confusion.
5. All consumable bundle weapons are now turned into charges. Create a new option in the Hero panel called “Bundles.” Similar to how the Finisher system now works, you can now use up all your bundle charges and activate a bundle whenever you want via the Bundle panel.
6. Lv. 500 Jewelers will now be able to craft Ascended Aquabreathers. You’re welcome.
7. School Uniforms now available for purchase for 800 gems!
8. The 30-day Log In Reward will now have the added option of receiving a Black Lion Key.
9. It will now be possible to use your regular helm in place of your Outfit helm.
10. We are proud to introduce Golden Lion Chests, which can only be opened by Golden Lion Keys, available on the Gem Store for 300 gems each! Golden Lion Chests have a guaranteed Black Lion Ticket Scrap and a reward pool with a higher concentration of premium items by removing several common drops and all boosters.
11. When you receive an item from the Mystic Forge, if you still have enough materials you can click “Repeat” to forge again with the same items. This will not work with “four of a kind” type forges.
12. Trait templates! You can now save your favorite builds and ping your templates to share them!
13. Some skills will now create Earth Fields, a new type of combo field. Blast: Grants Area Protection; Leap: Grants Stone Aura; Whirl: Shrapnel Bolts (inflicts Bleeding); Projectile: Knocks back.
14. Frost Aura now makes you immune to new applications of Burning, Fire Shield makes you immune to new applications of Chilled, Stone Aura makes you immune to new applications of Bleeding, Chaos Armor makes you immune to new applications of Confusion, and Light Aura makes you immune to new applications of Blindness.
15. Healing and Condition Damage can now critical at rates determined by precision. The extra amount of condition damage is determined by Ferocity, and the extra amount of healing is determined by Benevolence.
16. You can now change the color of your character’s undergarments.
17. Objects and structures that are not immune to conditions and critical hits will now have an effect called “Structural Integrity,” similar to Defiance. Structural Integrity increases a structure’s resistance to damage. Knockbacks, knockdowns and launches will lower Structural Integrity, reducing the target’s resistance to damage and adding vulnerability to critical hits. For example, a target with 50% Structural Integrity will be critically hit 50% of the time, regardless of the attacker’s precision.
18. Retaliation now stacks in intensity up to a maximum of 5 stacks.
19. Skills such as Confusing Images, which have no effect if no enemy is targeted, will not activate if no enemy is targeted.
20. Now on sale for 1000 gems: the Toxic Harvesting Sickle! Unlimited-use plant gathering plus a chance to gather a Pristine Toxic Spore Sample!
21. To better see the effectiveness of your condition clears, pop-up icons will appear whenever you clear a condition. This can be toggled in the options menu.
22. The current active world boss and upcoming scheduled world boss windows can now be viewed in the Hero panel.
23. You can now toggle the option to make ally or enemy health bars always visible.
24. All Conjured Weapons now have “on cast” effects. Ice Bow will now cause a Chill effect on its conjure location. Lightning Hammer will now cause a Daze effect on its conjure location. Lava Axe will now cause a Burning effect on its conjure location. Earth Shield will now cause a Blowout effect on its conjure location. Fiery Greatsword’s landing is now a Blast Finisher.
25.You can now drag individual achievements out of the “Nearly Completed” category.
26. Players can now enter Downed State from level 1. Instead of informing the player that “this is a thing that exists,” we felt it made more sense to teach the player about Downed State by including a Downed State tutorial in the starter area.
27. Starting areas will now be individually instanced.
28. Spirit Weapons now scale to the player’s stats.
29. The internal cooldown on Signet of Vampirism’s active effect has been removed.
30. Enfeebling Blood is now a Blast Finisher.
31. Now introducing the Blighter’s stat combination: Condition Damage / Power / Toughness.
32. Marks can now be triggered manually so effects that help allies can take effect without waiting for an enemy to step over the mark.
33. Right-click on stackable consumables and select “consume all” to use up the entire stack. Containers (such as bags) do not count as consumables.
34. Elixir Gun now has higher damage coefficients.
35. Signet of Undeath, Glyph of Renewal, and Signet of Undeath have their casting times reduced to 2 seconds to match Battle Standard.
PvE
36. Repairs are still free! And armors now have three stages of damage levels, meaning it takes longer to damage someone to the point of nudity! But! Each stage of damage eliminates a stat’s effectiveness! So, on an Exotic Berserker’s armor, stage 1 damage negates the Ferocity stat. Stage 2 damage negates the Precision stat. And finally, stage 3 damage negates the Power stat. Lower-level armors will just have less damage stages.
37. Level up Gathering masteries to increase the radius in which you can spot nodes on your minimap. Use a new tool that can detect specific node locations and mark them on your map!
38. Taimi has made a breakthrough during her studies! Interact with an uncontested Waypoint to activate Dimensional Shift, which allows you to switch to a different instance of the same map you’re on – for a small fee.
39. Golem Mark II overhaul! The Golem’s static field damage has been reduced to 1/3 of its former damage. To make up for the drop in raw lethality, every pulse will apply 10x 3s stacks of vulnerability, 3s of cripple, and 3s of daze. In addition, every 90 seconds, the Inquest will drop Champion Unstable Golems on each of the four corners of the platform. If any of these golems are struck by the Mark II’s static field, they will freeze in place and count down to an explosion that deals significant damage and delivers a powerful shockwave that knocks players back (similar to the Mark II’s ground pound).
40. Shatterer overhaul! It will now be possible to repair the turrets on the hill, which will now be the most effective way to destroy The Shatterer’s crystals. The Shatterer will now drop 5 crystals at the beginning of the battle, and each of those crystals will respawn after 90 seconds. Each crystal has a different effect: 1) Grants The Shatterer an unremovable Regeneration boon, 2) Grants The Shatterer an unremovable Protection boon, 3) Grants The Shatterer an unremovable Retaliation boon, 4) Creates Branded Terrain on the west side of the field, and 5) Creates Branded Terrain on the east side of the field. Areas on the field marked as Branded Terrain will lightly damage players and apply 5x 2s stacks of Confusion with every pulse.
41. The Claw of Jormag’s second phase will now summon visible, physical ice walls that can be targeted, but cannot be damaged except by golem bombs. The victory chest now has a high chance of awarding 1 Icy Runestone.
42. Explore the new Zhaitan’s Corpse map in Orr! Investigate the magical energies spilling out of Zhaitan’s body and navigate the jumping puzzle!
43. Claw Island is now a permanent explorable area.
44. Risen Giants now count toward Giant Slayer.
45. New Dynamic Event! Dry Top, during sandstorm, T4 and above: Escort Peacekeeper Maxx as he tries to outrun the Inquest’s escaped test subject: the unkillable Mordrem, Jo!
46. A Bounty Icon will appear on the map where your active bounty is if that bounty is currently in battle.
47. In order to reward more competent play, in addition to stacks of Might, the Karka Queen will now regenerate armor stacks each time its roll attack successfully strikes a player.
48. The Frozen Maw meta event now has a fail event. Should players be unsuccessful in defeating the shaman within the time limit, the giant ice elemental he summons will swallow the shaman up, then burst. A blizzard will rage throughout the area for the next hour, summoning ice storms and suppressing dynamic events.
49. Nicole the Traveler appears at the end of a random jumping puzzle each day. Find her to trade 50 Dragonite Ore (up to 5 times per day per account) for Gifts of the Traveler!
50. New Guild Bounty: 4-MULT!
51. The Legendary Sand Giant now scales better and has significantly less HP.
52. Charr’s Artillery Barrage now has 180 cooldown (down from 240) and a range of 1000.
53. In addition to Racial Skills, you can now gain Order Skills by joining an Order in your Personal Story.
54. In PvE only, you now have a “Summon Hero” Elite skill. This summons a random holographic Hero from the new Hero Deck to fight by your side for 60 seconds. You unlock Hero Cards by meeting allies in the Personal Story, Living World, world map, and Black Lion Chests. After collecting enough Hero Cards, you can create your Hero Deck of 15 Heroes. Each Hero has different abilities, and more powerful Heroes will put the Elite on higher cooldowns. Depending on the value of the card, the Elite’s cooldown can be anywhere from 60 seconds to 240 seconds.
55. The Polymock Arena is finally up and running! Polymock battles are now essentially 3 on 3 Mini arenas fought on a 5 x 5 grid. Each Mini has three out of a pool of 30 simple skills, and battles are determined by a combination of positioning and skill combinations.
Fractals
56. Whenever you complete a Fractal, a Fractal Selection wheel will show up on screen, showing the potential Fractals you will be sent to next. Players can vote for which Fractal they want, which increases the likeliness that the Fractal will be picked. However, because this is a wheel, it’s possible to get a Fractal no one voted for due to bad luck. Have fun!
57. Now introducing the Tower of Nightmares fractal! Climb to the top of the tower and defeat the Toxic Hybrid!
58. Now introducing the Southsun boss fractal! Chase the Ancient Karka into its hive and kill it!
59. RNG Gods not favoring you after your 500th fractal? Trade in those Pristine Fractal Relics you’ve been stockpiling! Trade 1 in for a +1 Agony Infusion, 5 for a Superior Sigil, and 50 for a Fractal Weapon Skin!
60. You can now trade Fractal Relics for Agony Extractors to… well, extract Agony upgrades from your Ascended equipment!
Dungeons
61. Dungeon paths have been added to the Daily Achievements rotation, rewarding chests that include 10 dungeon tokens.
62. The troll in Ascalonian Catacombs has been nerfed so its bouncing projectile daze attack has a cooldown of 30 seconds as the troll was considered “overkill,” and “unfairly difficult considering the appropriate level of the area.”
63. Gold rewards for dungeon paths have been redone to properly reflect the difficulty and length of each path. We apologize for the 1 gold placeholder values persisting for so long.
64. Join Sayeh al’Rajihd and do battle with pirates, Inquest and karka off the coast of Southsun Cove in our new fully underwater Sea of Sorrows dungeon!
65. After defeating the boss of the dungeon, a results menu will pop up, displaying player stats such as which player delivered the most damage, did the most healing, revived the most players, downed & died the most, and delivered the final blow. For now, this will serve no purpose other than flavor.
66. The totems in the Honor of the Waves Path 1 boss chamber will now take 1 minute to respawn.
67. Twilight Arbor’s Forward-Up path has been reinstated. The boss’ spawn-summoning attack now has orange warning circles.
68. In Crucible of Eternity’s Story Path, a warning mark will appear above a player’s head when that player is being targeted for Kudu’s Mega Blast attack.
69. Clearing a dungeon path now also rewards the player with a bonus rare crafting material (once a day per path per account).
Ascalon Catacombs: Crystal Lodestone
Caudecus’s Manor: Onyx Lodestone
Twilight Arbor: Sun Bead or 5x Pristine Toxic Spore Sample
Sorrow’s Embrace: Destroyer Lodestone
Citadel of Flame: Molten Lodestone
Crucible of Eternity: Charged Lodestone
Honor of the Waves: Corrupted Lodestone or Glacial Lodestone
Ruined City of Arah: Giant Eye or 5x Putrid Essence
70. Invisible walls have been added to seal up map exploits.
Personal Story
71. Personal Story missions can now be replayed in the story journal for limited rewards, and previous choices are locked.
72. Personal Story steps that take place in Lion’s Arch will put players in a copy of the old Lion’s Arch as it looked before Scarlet’s attack, as originally envisioned.
73. Clearing Victory or Death will now award a Black Lion Chest Key.
74. Several missions where it became too easy to unfairly overwhelm the player, such as The Ghost Rite, have been toned down.
75. Personal Story rewards are now split into Gold, Silver, and Bronze rewards affected by how quickly you complete the instance, how many times you die, and the completion of a special task for the mission. Replay missions to retry for Gold rewards! Previous default rewards are classified as Silver rewards.
Living World
76. Living World Episode 1 is now replayable through the Story Journal. Some events have been recreated as scaled-down instanced versions.
PvP
77. Dishonor has been re-enabled.
78. Say hello to Build Templates! Build Templates save your specializations, traits, weapons, sigils, runes and amulet to save time when switching builds!
79. Don’t like the map choices on the selection wheel? If a majority of players choose it, you can Mulligan (just once per match) and hope for a new draw!
80. Welcome back, Raid on the Capricorn!
81. The Skyhammer now has two extra skills. Overload will fire a more powerful beam at the cost of rendering the Skyhammer inoperable for 15 seconds. Self-Destruct will start a 10-second countdown which, upon completion, will render the Skyhammer inoperable for the rest of the match (as well as kill all players still standing on the Skyhammer platform). Self-Destruct can be canceled by using the Cancel Self-Destruct skill, but the Skyhammer may need to be recalibrated first, and the cancel skill takes 3 seconds to activate.
82. New Deathmatch map: Watchwork Marionette! The teams will be split up into 5 platforms where players fight 1 on 1 while avoiding attacks from the Marionette!
83. New Deathmatch map: The Source of Orr! No terrain, no tricks. Just a wide open space to brawl!
84. New Stronghold map: Jade Quarry! Spawn jade collectors and escorts! Be the first to reach the point cap or have the most points at the time limit to win!
85. There are now low-hp allied dummies in the lobby so you can test your healing effectiveness!
86. New Conquest map: The Underworld! The first map with five capture points! Now teams are spread thinner than ever! Trigger bonuses like Open Grave, which eliminates respawn time, or Death Nova, which causes lethal explosions whenever players are defeated!
87. Apostle Armor, Stalwart Armor and Tribal Armor are now obtainable through the new Mystic Reward Track.
WvW
88. WvW title achievements will now be tiered, with progressive titles available before the “Ultimate” variants. We honestly thought this was already the case and are surprised no one pointed out the obvious bug.
89. WvW Mists Defense! We’re bringing over a concept from the Silverwastes to WvW: Time Out! WvW matchups will end precisely at reset Friday, and all winning realms will have access to an activity-like instanced version of Stonemist Castle. The goal will be to defend the castle against 10 waves of randomized attacking enemies. If all 10 waves are defeated, a final boss will appear on the roof of the castle. Once the event ends, players will be rewarded with bonus chests: 1 for each successful wave cleared and 1 with a rare chance for a special weapon skin for beating the boss.
90. If all 5 ruins are held by one realm, a channeling event will begin. Hold the ruins for 2 minutes to grant a stack of Applied Strength and Applied Fortitude to all allies (lasts 60 minutes). This event can be continually repeated, and players can receive up to a maximum of 5 stacks. All stacks will be lost individually upon death. Losing control of the ruins will not remove stacks, but another force taking control of 3 ruins and triggering Bloodlust for their realm will remove all stacks from all players.
91. A Dragon Champion will randomly descend upon all garrisons, causing chaos. Realms will have to choose between defending their own garrisons or exploiting the resulting chaos and attempting to capture an enemy garrison.
92. WvW Tournament Claim Tickets have been changed to WvW Reward Tickets and can now be rewarded outside of tournaments.
93. WvW Reward Tracks! Select a reward track and repeat the same tasks to complete the tracks for rewards! Fort Toppler Track: Gain points by contributing to destroying gates and walls, killing tower NPCs, and capturing towers and keeps! Fort Defender Track: Gain points by fending off invaders from towers and keeps, repairing gates, walls and upgrades, and simply keeping watch inside a tower or keep. Supply Disruptor Track: Gain points by killing dolyaks and their escorts, capturing sentry points and capturing camps. Supply Defender Track: Gain points by escorting dolyaks to their destinations, fending off attackers, killing sentries and defending camps.
94. Commander tags now come in green and cyan. Those who used the Commander’s Compendium will now be updated to be able to use the new colors. Limited Commander’s Compendium (color)s will now be sold for 100g. These compendiums will only grant Commander status to one character (rather than account), and are limited to only the bought color.
Holiday
95. Talk to Magister Tassi in the new Lion’s Court and relive the Ascent to Madness dungeon!
96. In commemoration of Lion’s Arch’s rise after the attack of Scarlet and Mordremoth, we now welcome the return of the Dragon Bash!
April Fools
97. Players under the effect of Fear will have their models changed to Logan Thackeray.
98. In order to show a majority of our players a new experience, all player models have been changed to female Charr.
99. Equipping six Runes of Vampirism now triggers a secondary set bonus: your character sparkles during the daytime. Characters under this effect will become top priority for hostile Skritt.
100. Moto’s Super Adventure Box has gone out of control and is starting to pixelize Tyria! Enter the special limited dungeon to return things to normal – but not before doing battle with the ultimate final boss: a pixelized Zommoros riding a shark!
Huh. I’m surprised I actually made it to 100. I’m sure I could think up a few more if I really thought about it.