Well, after all this time, 100% map completion is mine! You may remember from my last GW2 post that I was pretty close to completing it - just one zone and one wayward skill point away. Guess what? That skill point in the Temple of Lyssa that is always contested and that I thought would take forever to get because no one runs that event can actually be activated by just carefully sneaking around the back and grabbing it! So, if you happen to be silly like me and didn't know otherwise, perhaps that tidbit of information will help you toward your map completion, too. For everyone else, don't mind me - I'm just happy to be done either way even if it could have been sooner! :D
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| 100% World Map Completion finally! :) |
After that, we ventured on over to the Cursed Shore which was, naturally, such a pleasant and enjoyable experience to play through. If you like not being able to move two feet without the entirety of the map aggroing all onto you at once that is. Yes, that's an exaggeration, but, really, not by much! Orr in general is not a fun place to be - in my opinion it's a very emotionally draining area to play through because there is very little relief from the tightly packed mobs. You can only take so much of it at a time before you need a break, but I guess that is the point of what they wanted it to be like! Although I kind of think it's a shame that you play the whole game in these beautifully designed environments and then you end up in that hellhole right at the end. :( Luckily, according to the recent
MMORPG livestream interview with Colin Johanson, he tells us that in as early as the
January 28th Content Update, not only will they be tweaking some of the temple bosses in Orr to make them more exciting for large groups, but they will also be thinning out the density of mobs, making more waypoint always active, and adding new rewards from both vendors and drops. This is a really welcome change and I was very pleasantly surprised to see this addition while reading through the transcript linked above. Check out this other
dev livestream from January 17th for lots more insight into where they are going with the game in the future.
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| Ahh yes, this looks like the perfect place to take shelter from that pesky acid rain! |
Anyways, thankfully I did not have to play through any of Orr alone, and today we were able to quickly finish up this last zone together which granted me the Been There, Done That achievement. :) If you have completed any zones 100%, then you'll know of the letters you receive from the Tyrian Explorer's Society telling you how awesome you are and what a great job you did after exploring each one... Well, I have to admit, I was quite disappointed that we did not receive a final letter from them after exploring all of the maps, since it is quite the feat in my opinion. Hey, Tyrian Explorer's Society, I thought we were friends. Why don't you ever call or write me anymore :*(
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| Working our way through one of the vistas in the Cursed Shore. |
Because I was already having all of this fun exploring, I decided to also work on the other Explorer achievements since they were pretty close to being complete, too. These are different from the Been There, Done That achievement in that they do not take into account any of the POIs, Vistas, Hearts, etc. that you can collect, but only the areas that can become unfogged on your map. There is a separate achievement for each section of the world (Kryta, Orr, Maguuma, Shiverpeak, and Ascalon), but there are no outside rewards from completing them besides the achievement points they give. A lot of the areas required to explore are easy to miss, and you'll probably not have gotten them all even if you have 100% map completion. There are a few ways to go about finding what you are missing, but I think the easiest method is using this page created by wiki user Bluestone, where he lays out all of the
Areas Needed for Explorer Achievements. Yes, it does seem time consuming having to crosscheck each map, but think of all the time you would have probably spent running around aimlessly looking for spots. This way you just open up your map and make sure all of the area names in his list are also unfogged and labeled on your in-game map. Easy! I was able to finish all of the Explorer achievements doing this, except Kryta which I am saving for some other time.
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| My virtual life in now complete. Literally. |
In other news, I recently transferred off of Northern Shiverpeaks and have since made my home on what has become the unofficial role playing server, Tarnished Coast. I don't consider myself a role player by any means, but I have no problem with other people who wish to do so. The main draw for switching servers, however, was because of the excellent server community we heard TC has and I have to say that this is quite true! It's like night and day comparing NS and TC... before I would hardly ever encounter other players out in the lower level PVE zones, and when I did they would just run by and do their own thing. But now, there are players all over the place, willing to help with events or other general activities. Map chat seems more active. People are more friendly to one another. Overall it's just been a much more pleasant experience. The only thing I will really miss from Norther Shiverpeaks is the fact that I felt ties to it for whatever reason. This is probably mainly because our guild (even though we are super tiny) did end up putting time and effort and influence into upgrading our guild bank and such. Also, I do usually end up having that feeling of 'home' on a server after I have been in the same place for awhile. But I know I'll start feeling like Tarnished Coast is our new home soon enough, in fact I already do a bit. :)
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| Quite the group of adventurers! |
For example, tonight while trying to get to an area in Dredgehaunt Cliffs called Tribulation Caverns for one of the Explorer achievements, I unexpectedly met up with a very helpful Sylvari. Now, I'll just throw this out there that I'm usually terrible at jumping puzzles. That said, I was not looking forward to having to do this part of the puzzle again (I had already completed the first part called Tribulation Rift a long time ago, and did not know that if you continued on there is also a separate puzzle afterwards). As I ran up to the puzzle I was already confused about exactly where to go, but then the Sylvari called out to me that it was, "Over here!" so I quickly thanked him or her, I'm still not sure, and followed along behind him. Another player, this time a human, eventually joined us and every time either of us fell, the Sylvari would wait patiently until we caught back up so (s)he could continue guiding us along the best path. You could tell this was someone used to helping others through these puzzles all the time and they enjoyed every minute of being able to play 'tour guide' for us.
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| A carefully placed jump in the Tribulation Caverns. |
Even though I still fell a few times, I had much more fun and everything seemed much less frustrating than the first time I originally tried this puzzle because of my companions. We were able to complete both puzzles and it was most enjoyable! And this is just one example of the nice, friendly, and helpful players I have met so far on Tarnished Coast. How does your server compare? Are you happy with your current 'home' or will you be trying your luck someplace else before paid server transfers are put into place. I'd love to here your thoughts in the comment section below. Happy adventuring! :)
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