March BWE- new changes

Well, I'm not sure if I'll get all of them off the top of my head, but here's some of the things that have changed or been added since the February BWE.

Economy Changes:
Gold prices have been multiplied 10x. All the gold on your character should have been similarly increased, and gold drops from creatures and via item sales are also higher. However, now you can get drops like 13 gold, which would have been rounded down to 1 gold previously.

Crafting Materials are dropping again- Some of you might have noticed that no crafting materials dropped from monsters last month, making some materials such as pelts and fibrous tangles impossible to find. They are dropping again, though the rate might be lower than it was previously.

Skill Charm Crafter, Trader, and Gambler have been removed. I'm not sure what is intended for this system, but unfortunately, that means that it may be impossible to create charms to have your friends learn skills that you have, and some skills are likely impossible to find currently in the game with the removal of the charm gambler.

Merchant interfaces have changed: Instead of dragging items from your inventory to the sell window in order to sell them, the merchants now have lists of the items in your inventory which you can choose the items to sell from. Above the list, there's several buttons which you can use to toggle which containers(and items on your character) that you can see in the trade window. Likewise, the merchant's inventory is listed similarly. When you select an item to buy or sell, a box comes up in the sell window, letting you see the stats of whatever item you have selected, so you can double-check if it's something you wish to buy or sell.

Identification Kits now have 25 charges.


Character Creation Changes
You can no longer create a level 20 role-playing character, and PvP character creation has changed significantly. When you create a PvP character, you can choose to make a Ready-Made character as in the previous events. However, you can also choose to make a "Custom" character, who has access to any skills and runes that you have bought or identified with your role-playing characters. You can choose between the different top-level armors available for your class, and apparently you can choose between some different item modifiers, though that appears to be locked right now. We'll have to see what ArenaNet does with that, but it should be great, allowing people to make PvP characters on the fly that have access to the skills and runes (and hopefully items) that they have unlocked.

The character creation process has changed considerably, and I'd recommend everyone look at creating a new character, just to see the new menus and options available.

PvP Changes
There are now 6 different Guild Halls, which you can preview by talking to the Canthan Ferry Captain at the docks at the Southwest side of Lions Arch. They are:

Warriors Isle: basically the old GvG map- oriental architecture with a flagstand in the center.

Hunter's Isle: Similar layout to the old GvG map, but with Krytan-style architecture.

Wizard's Isle: Again, a similarly layed-out map to the old GvG, but with pre-searing Ascalon appearance.

Frozen Isle: Very different map layout- the flagstand is far to the east, while paths lead to the enemy base either via the flagstand, along the western edge, and there's a path down the center that is origionally locked off by doors. If you go east, there's a staircase up to the center of the map, where you will find two gear levers- one will open the center door on your side of the map, and close the corresponding door on the western path. The other will do the same, but on your opponents side of the map. This can lead to some interesting strategy concepts, determining the accessibility of the opponents base.

Druid Isle: Jungle setting, interesting map layout. I will have to play some games on this map to find out all the different possibilities of the map, but it promises to be quite different from the old GvG matches.

Isle of the Dead: A very different map than the others, with a pre-searing Ascalon catacombs-like appearance. Lots of little corridors running through a large Labrynth, with a flagstand off to one side. Again, I'll need to play this map to find out all it's quirks.

All of these maps appear to have an attacker and defender side, rather than the two forts facing each other. You still have a defensible position as the defenders, and still get your NPC's and have the Guild Lord that you have to protect, but instead of having a castle, you might have some barricades thrown up along the beach, or a ship to defend. I would assume that in a match, one team is assigned as attackers and the other as defenders, and the map that you play on will likely be determined by which guild hall the defenders own.

Along with the new GvG features, there are 2 new Arena areas. The first is off the Yak's Bend outpost, which offers 4vs4 action for level 15 and lower characters. The Arena on the island south of Lions Arch is now the Coastal Arena, and the old Gladiator's Arena is now near Denravi(there's a NPC in the far reaches of Denravi who will take you there).

Miscellaneous Changes

The skill list now lists skills in a similar method to the merchant interfaces. There are now options to sort skills by name, recharge time, cast time, energy cost, and linked attribute.

Monster levels in Post-Searing Ascalon and the Shiverpeak Mountains have been increased(probably due to characters being higher-level after leaving pre-searing Ascalon)


I'm sure there's several changes that I missed, but here are some of the highlights. Feel free to post anything else that you've found that has changed, or ask questions about any of the changes!

<3 Great post. Very helpful Freyas.

Many skills have been changed, and hopefully we'll be able to get them all updated this weekend. One big change, however that I feel is worth mentioning is that Nature Rituals have undergone a large change. They no longer give you death penalty, but instead have a longer recharge time. When you cast a nature ritual, a spirit will appear where you're standing, and so long as that spirit stays alive, the nature ritual is in effect within a fairly large radius of the spirit. Your enemies can kill the spirit, however, so you might need to pay attention to where you cast the ritual- close enough to the battle so that you get it's effect, but not so close that the other team can kill the spirit and remove your ritual.

Thanks for this writeup... so many things have changed!

The new custom pvp char thingy looks like an awesome idea that will totally work great in retail, with the skills anyway, don't really understand how it will work with items yet.... you have to find the items you want your pvp char to have, you can't trade for 'em?

Pity about the charm traders... how will I get BiP now?

Exhastion bug has been fixed it does now actually affect your maximum energy

Arcane echo hex stacking was fixed. When you cast an archane echoed hex on a target that has already been hit with that hex it has no affect on the timer whatsover and does not hex the target again.

Ranger Rituals dont cause death shroud and are similar to the elementalist wards now, except they have a much larger range than is shown by the graphic. (can the spirit be attacked?)

casting times can be displayed as fractions! 1/2 woot

Here's some more. Spirits count as creatures for the purpose of soul reaping, so low spec spirit spam will give a team of necros whole tons of energy.

All the sacrifises are % based now, so no confusion about Awaken the Blood as the text on Dark Pact has been changed to: Sacrifise 10% of your max HP, do 51 damage(at 16 blood for instance).

Caps have been put on effects that stack:
Run Buffs: 33%
Run debuffs: 50%
Attack speed debuffs: 50%
Casting speed debuffs: 150%
healing reduction: 66%

That means shadow of fear doesn't stack with faintheartedness any more.

Here are some mesmer changes:
Energy Drain: 1s cast
Ether Lord: 5 energy



Here's a short list of necro changes off the top of my head:
- Plague sending now transfers condition into adjacent AoE of the target
- Necrotic Transversal is now bound to death magic and not only teleports you but also poisons nearby enemies for x..20(at 15 death magic) seconds.
- Putrid explosion AoE increased
- Minion spells now have cast time of 3 sec and their level has been increased by 2.
- Verata's sacrifise now gives minions 10 regen instead of direct heal. Regen lasts 20 sec at 15 death.
- A lot of touch spells(vile touch, blackout, vamp touch,...) are now skills instead of spells
- Vampiric gaze now has 1 sec cast time, cost 10 en
- bunch of cast times decreased

- Throw dirt no longer elite
many more..I'm too lazy and will leave it to these guys to update them all.

Voice is in, at least for the intro cinematic when you start a new RP char.

Other skill cahnges:
-Hundred blades is elite
-Conjures now only work if the weaopon damage type is the same as the conjure damage type, so for Conjure Frost you need an Icy sword edc.
-Wards have their casting time and cooldown decreased, much more spammable now
-Warriors Cunning no longer adds base armor penetration - instead your attacks can't be blocked or evaded

...and many many more small changes.

Some more skill changes:

Healing Touch- less healing, but double divine favor bonus when you use it. Now useable on self too!
Orison of Healing- reduced healing(and seems to take longer to cast)
Remove Hex- 5 second recharge
Divine Spirit- reduced duration, minimum cost now 3 energy
Blessed Signet- 2 second cast time
Life Bond- works on all damage, not just physical
Shield of Deflection- now 15 energy
Holy Veil- now only affects hexes
Purge Signet- 3 second cast

Order of Pain/Vampire- only trigger on physical damage
Grenth's Balance- Only takes effect if you have less health than enemy, if used on a target with more hp(guild lord, etc), it only deals the amount of damage that it takes to heal you to your maximum health.
Offering of Blood- reduced cast time


Shields up- now gives % chance to evade projectile attacks along with armor bonus.
Bonetti's Defense- now 8 adrenaline
Pure Strike- now 5 energy
Deadly Riposte- lower recharge
Thrill of Victory- no longer heals- instead does extra damage if you have more life than your opponent

Arcane Mimicry- copies the elite skill of an ally
Blackout- lengthened time opponents skills are disabled
Spirit of Failure- now works on every miss(including ones caused by blind, etc)

Obsidian Flame- now 5 energy(still has exhaustion for 10, though)
Lightning Touch- now a skill, deals extra damage if enemy is suffering from water magic hex
Ward against Harm/Melee/Foes/Elements- cast time reduced to 1 second, recharge reduced to 20 seconds.

Quick Shot- now elite, no longer disables skills
Greater Conflaguration- now elite
Blizzard- now "Winter", and is no longer elite


If I find any more changes, I'll post them here, as well as the values that I can find. I've found the best way to find out is to get the skills that have changed unlocked, and look at them in the PvP creation menu- you can play around with your attributes to get the stats at different attribute levels without worrying about refund points.

Can't u simply look at them on the dev server?
If you can't, I can probably list all changes lately it is only the matter of looking into some dev posts.
Watch Yourself is 4 adren now.

Have any other necromancers noticed the life siphon no longer stacks if you keep casting it on a single target they will not gain anymore degain bars.

... but I dont remember this stacking on the same target at the last BWE. It only stacked your health regen if you cast it on different targets with a cap of +10.

- Iczer

I always thought that they stacked but i could be wrong.

Don't forget that you signed an NDA
You should know what you are allowed to do and what not.

The conjure thing makes sense...in effect what it means is you can only get one conjure...unless you want to carry around and equip a variety of swords.

but erm...hundred blades is elite?...I really don't see...how 1 extra attack, which for sword users means what...35-40 damage max can be an elite skill. Some illusionary weapons characters are gonna have to reconsider their choices...

They have also removed auto-run. So you can no longer type while running.

It's still there, just hit "r" instead of double tapping.

Dunno if it's just me, but I could have sworn you used to get 10 attribute points per level, and I'm only getting 5.

And the PvP character creation system's pretty good, though I wish you didn't have to BUY a skill to unlock it, only see a skill trainer who has it, or have its skill charm, or something... *sigh*

you can always capture it

Many times skills can be made elite to protect a potential dominant combo from being used. In the case of Hundred Blades, it now does full damage, hit's twice, and hits everyone around you twice. It's probably the best skill I have on my sword Warrior. If you have two people in front of you that's 4 instant attacks + 4 strikes of adrenaline, it is quite powerful. Also, swords didn't have an elite before.

Matt

As Spooky said the default shortcut is now 'r'. If you want to re-enable double tap auto-runnin you have an option for it in the controls setup window.