I'm so impressed with the regular events in Lowland Shore so far. I think they're the best in the game excepting maybe Grothmar. Just like that zone they managed to make almost all of them have some little gameplay twist or gimmick that makes them more interesting than bog standard versions we've seen a hundred times before.

I'm honestly having so much fun exploring this map and just taking it in as it comes. Such a great feeling after years of repetitive meta events that all boil down to the same zerg rush gameplay.

Janthir actually makes me want to log in and get lost in the world in a way I haven't felt for a while.

So to preface/disclaim, I love the new zones. JL is a gorgeous zone with great music and reminds me strongly of Grizzly Hills from WotLK back in the day (still one of my favorites there), and JS has serious Diablo vibes, which I absolutely adore. The encounters are interesting, and at least the first of the antagonists was interesting. There's a lot to like here.

That makes it worse, then, to say I am done with them after just a few hours. Story quests done, map complete, got my Falling Star, did the meta. Could always grind more mastery XP, but I've got the ones that mattered to me.

With the old "full" expacs, you had elite specs and hero points that pulled you back to those zones on alts, some- eg guano, frogs, shroom, chak- that were actually fun challenges to tackle. I've been back to HoT / PoF / EoD a dozen times and more over the years.

It just really seems a shame, then, to spend all of this time on awesome art and music and encounters for it to be rendered pointless so quickly. There will be a legendary back at some point in the cycle that will be interesting for a bit of poking like the living world legendaries, but even that's just a 1-off.

At least in SotO there was the prospect of obsidian armor to give it some legs, but unless interior decorating is your thing, this one really just doesn't have a shelf life. I finished up, looked around, and immediately went back to working on stuff elsewhere in the game.

Can't seem to find a definite answer for this...

I tried it a bit with my reaper in pve and it seemed okay, but I wasn't doing anything challenging that really put it to the test. I haven't tried the others classes yet.

Embark on a new adventure in Guild Wars 2: Janthir Wilds, the newest expansion for the award-winning MMORPG Guild Wars 2. Learn to wield a spear in combat, cultivate and decorate your Homestead, master challenging encounters, and more as you explore new lands and learn more about the mysteries of Tyria's past.

Could be an expansion release, guild drama, random encounter, etc.

Mine would be when I was a newer player doing a Twilight Arbor dungeon run with veterans and I enabled "Plant Mode".

I was the classic Longbow ranger with Stalker who had no idea wtf was going on. We got to the wardens on Leurent's path (up) and it was not going well, I kept going down. The others in my party kept reviving me but in doing so were downed and then killed. The champ probably had about 2% health left when I was the last one standing and I am sweating IRL - mainly nervous that I'm going to get chewed out by the other party members if I can't finish the fight.

One of the party members types "Just spam all your buttons!" so I start clicking anything and everything (yes, was a mouse ability clicker back then... how times have changed).

I don't think I had ever used my elite at that point, mainly because I didn't understand it. I just knew it said something about plants. Ended up clicking Take Root and was instantly felt dread. My character was locked down and I couldn't move as I became enshrouded with plant matter.

As if to further cement the absolute embarrassment that was washing over me, the same party member goes "Plant mode?!".

I seriously considered alt+F4'ing to hide from my shame - only to realize that I wasn't taking any damage anymore... And that there were seed turrets spawning all over as if to save me. They started attacking the Champ and it ticked down another % or so - it was so close to dying!

Then my protective plant shroud disappeared and I was running again, desperately trying to live. However, I was still so low from before I had initially cast the elite that I was quickly downed. Instantly I spammed "Lick Wounds" (As many downs in the open world had taught me).

As I inched closer to death another party members says "OMG It's so close". Fractions of a second before I was about to die my pet starts reviving me - and it happens. One of the slow arching shots of the plant mortar near me lands the final blow on the champion and I revive - I was absolutely stunned.

My party was absolutely ecstatic and kept typing things like "Plant mode ftw" and "Salad mvp". In that moment I felt like I was a seasoned GW2 player just like the rest.

Definitely died to the root attack from the nightmare tree just moments after that though.

Picture of my character roughly around the time

Free emote ans spear

So I finally bit the bullet, installed a second SSD and put Linux on it to test the waters. Tested out GW2 as a non steam game via Wine and while it runs, it runs very poorly with constant frame drops. Did anyone else try? How was your experience?

I have Nvidia GPU which I gather might be the most likely culprit but was interested in what your experience might've been.

Welcome to the Weekly Question Post on c/guildwars2!

This post is dedicated to those questions that you might not think is worth making a whole post about, but sure is worth getting an answer to ;)

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I really hope this revitalizes the community