Professions
There will be 8 professions in GW2, so far only the Elementalist, Warrior, Necromancer and the Ranger have been confirmed, 2 out of the remaining 4 will be classes previously in the original game and 2 will be new professions. There will NOT be a dedicated healing class:
Elementalist
Warrior
Ranger
Necromancer
Healing
As mentioned previously there is no dedicated healing class, there will be support classes but it's expected these will be about prevention rather than cure, each profession will have it's own healing skills and is therefore expected to be self sufficient for healing.
Death and the the 'downed' state
When a player gets close to being defeated they enter in to a 'downed state' their skill bar will change and they will have the ability to use special skills, these are your last chance skills, skills that could save you from death, rallying from this state will take you back to your original skill bar and get you back in to the fray. All players, from level 1 will have a revive skill to resurrect fallen players. The more times a player dies the longer it takes to revive them. If you die and aren't revived you will, for a small amount of gold, be resurrected at the nearest shrine with no further penalty.
Leveling
The game will have a max level of 80, the first few levels will come quite quickly but after a point the difference in levels will plateau so that getting from say lvl 45-46 will take the same amount of time as getting from lvl 76-77.
Skills
Skills can be changed at anytime while out of combat.
Skills will have tiers that can be unlocked as you progress.
The players skill bar will have ten skill slots, the first 5 skill slots are for weapon skills dependent on what the player is wielding (a warrior wielding a mace will have a different weapon skill set to a a warrior wielding a sword), if a player is wielding a sword and an off hand then the skills change accordingly while a two handed weapon will dictate all 5 slots , the player can also use 'environmental weapons' such as rocks which in turn change the weapon skill slots. The next 5 skill slots will be restricted by having one healing skill and one elite skill, the player is free to slot the remaining 3 of those 5 with class and racial skills.
Getting Skills
The majority of skills can be obtained from skill traders while some Elite Skills will be world drops.
Interactivity
Skills will be interactive and offer a synergy between players, examples such as rangers firing arrows through an elementalist's fire wall will add burning damage and in the 'Manifesto' video a gun is seen to be firing through a static field to add electrical damage.
Traits
Trait lines are similar to the profession attribute lines in the original game (as an example, in GW a necromancer had the choice between Curses, Blood Magic, Soul Reaping and Death Magic dependent on attribute points spent). Traits are slottable and can be earned through quests, they are used to modify your skills and attributes, Traits can be used to increase your weapon mastery or decrease time between swapping weapons in combat . Each profession has a couple of 'trait lines' how you slot your traits defines how you choose to play your character.
Attributes
Strength (melee power)
Agility (ranged power)
Intelligence (magic power)
Vitality (health)
Perception (critical chance)
Willpower (energy)
Achievements
Completing or mastering something will provide you with an achievement, some achievements will also provide you with a title that you will be able to display. Achievements are account based rather than character based as some, like mastering all weapons, can't be achieved by a single character. Achievements provide no game advantage.
The demo contained the following list of achievement groups
• Slayer
• Party Animal
• Weapon Master
• Explorer
• Adventurer
• Conqueror
• Trader
• Hero
The achievement groups expanded to reveal multiple progress bars, for example the Weapon Master group had one progress bar for each weapon type.
Combat
Combat in Guild Wars 2 is built around damage, control and support. Damage is simply decreasing the enemy's health, control is preventing the enemy from doing what it wants, and support consists of boosting the abilities of allies. Each profession is able to perform any of these roles.
Combat will be tactical in terms of movement, taking advantage of the environment and by using cross-profession combos (see previous example of elementalist static field being fired through by a warrior using a gun to add electrical damage). There will be many environmental weapons littered about the world from simple rocks to a jar of bees that can be thrown at an enemy, some of these environmental weapons will react differently depending on which profession picks them up.
Body blocking can only be replicated through the use of skills, there is no collision between characters in GW2.
Players will be able to dodge attacks and projectiles.
Some skills will have tactical advantages when used from the side or behind an opponent, other skills will be directional, AoE or a mix of both meaning positioning will be important.
Armour
The type of Armour you wear depends on your profession type:
Scholars will wear Light Armour
Adventurers will wear Medium Armour
Soldiers will wear Heavy Armour
You will be able to dye your armour and players will be able to have 3 separate hues on each armour piece.
Dye System
In the demo an armour upgrade item was rewarded from an event, it's looked like this system might be similar to the current GW Insignia system but instead of one upgrade, the item had several stat boosts.
Weapons
The list of standard wieldable weapons is as follows:
One-Handed: Axe, dagger, mace, pistol, scepter, and sword.
Two-Handed: Greatsword, hammer, longbow, rifle, shortbow, and staff.
Offhand only: Focus, shield, torch, and warhorn.
Not all professions will be able to wield all weapons and some professions will be able to wield more weapons than others.
A weapon wielded as an off-hand will have different skills to that same weapon wielded in the main hand, not all professions will be able to wield a weapon as an off hand.
Environmental objects will also be able to be used as weapons and have their own skill set, which may differ depending on the profession wielding it.
Interface
Everything we know about the interface is taken from demo videos at gamescom. The devs have stated that it's a work in progress and that there will be some player customization.
The interface also had a compass at the bottom right of the screen, it showed pointers to the direction of current objectives.
Guilds
Players will have the choice of either keeping their characters in the same guild or having different characters in different guilds. There will be guild achievements and guilds will be able to hold keeps in WvW PVP, there will be a guild calendar for coordinating events and you will be able to participate in guild chat from any web browser without logging in to the game.
Sidekick System
A sidekick is when a character's level is modified to match the level of the other characters they are playing with. A character wanting to play higher level content will have their power scaled to similar to the higher level characters they are with. This also applies in reverse, a character wanting to play lower level content will have their level scaled down so they do not overly disrupt lower level content but can still experience content they may have missed when they were a lower level.
The sidekick system has been mentioned for characters entering World PvP and also for preventing griefing of low level PvE events by high level players.
Quests and the Dynamic Event system.
There will be no NPC's with exclamation marks above their heads, quests have been replaced with a dynamic events system. Instead of picking up a traditional quest players will need to pay attention to their environment, visual clues such as the appearance of invading hordes or an NPC running out to call for help as well as more subtle clues such as changes to the environment will be the entry points for players to join in these events. Events are set to scale depending on player numbers, player level will not bar successful and meaningful involvement in these events, a higher level player can join lower level events and will find their skill level adjusted so that, while still being a little over powered for the event, they shouldn't be able to steam roll the event.
Events are dynamic and one event will effect other events further down the line, players always have the choice as to their level of involvement and which events to get involved in. NPC's will remember when a player has helped them out in the past and react differently after the event.
Players do not need to party to gain rewards from participating in an event, all players who participate will receive a reward, the majority of these rewards will consist of Karma and Gold, the player is then free to choose what items to spend it on.
It has been stated this events system means a player could visit the same area several times and not find the same events happening.
The events system eliminates kill stealing and encourages group play through the scaling dynamic, the more players the more interesting the fight can become.
There is a 'scout' NPC that will be able to tell you of the potential trouble spots in the local area to help you find possible events
Examples:
Centaurs may attack a village, players can help save the village or let it be captured, the centaurs could then set up base and try to expand without further player intervention in to surrounding territory. If the players defended the village there is nothing to say that the centaurs won't keep trying.
A player may return to a previously visited watermelon field to find the crops destroyed, the farmer may be calling for help to fight off an invader, at the same time the player has noticed the watermelons have gone because the field is over run by rabbits, on further investigation traps/cages may be found in that field, the player has the choice of either fending off the invading mob or help capture the rabbits.
Instances and Open World
The majority of the game will take place in a massive open world, each player also has their own personal storyline, these will be instanced but you can choose to invite friends to help you or just to come visit. Dungeons are also instanced.
Dungeons
Dungeons are designed for five players. Instead of random loot drops players will be able to predict how many times they will need to complete an instance to get what they need. Nothing of 'end game' content has been mentioned, it may be that like the original game the harder instances (like The Deep and Urgoz's Warren) may have an increased player number or it may remain five person.
Personal Storyline and NPC interaction
At character creation you have the opportunity to make choices and develop a back story prior to entering the game, these choices will dictate how your personal story line plays out and how NPC's interact with you. Those choices will never lock you out of nor restrict your content in the open world and main story line.
Your instanced personal story line and the environment in your personal instance will change according to your choices. You could start off as a mild mannered type but later decide you have had enough and decide that the best way to get through is by force, choosing to punch your way to information rather than using diplomacy, that will earn you a reputation in the wider world, so while merchants may not like you they'll still do business with you. In the demo the three character traits that contributed to your personality development were:
• charisma
• dignity
• ferocity
Your choices in the instanced personal storyline also effects your environment within it. Inviting friends lets them experience a different side to the personal story that they may not have got to have seen.
Karma
Karma is a currency, develop it by doing good deeds, taking part in events and helping lower level players and you can use it to buy goods. During the demo successful completion of some events spawned a merchant NPC who sold special items for karma.
You can of course choose to ignore most of these RP elements and just get on with the game.
Player Housing
As part of the personal storyline players will have a home instance, this will be about the size of a city block within your racial city. Within that home instance players will have the racial equivalant of a house (Asura may have an Asuran lab). You will be able to invite other players in to your home.
Crafting
I've seen very little on this subject apart from this quote on massively.com
“Crafting will play a very large role in Guild Wars 2, and while weapons and armor will be a big part of the base of the items that players create, we are doing our best to ensure that players don't have to make a lot of anything that they can use only one of. For example, in Guild Wars 2 you will not have to craft the same sword 10-20 times just to level up your crafting skill. Hopefully our players will find that the only reasons they have to craft any given item more than once are because they can actually use it more than once, because they want to give it to a friend, or because they want to sell it for profit. With this goal in mind it does of course mean we have our work cut out for us when it comes to other interesting items to craft, and we have already spent a lot of time exploring in areas such as upgrade components that can be used to improve existing items beyond the condition that they were originally found or crafted in.”
Mini Games
Each major town will have it's own mini games, these are social activities that aren't dependant on character level, they will vary in their mechanics from complex games of skill, simple target practise, solo games, multiplayer and full on no rules bar brawls. They will carry rewards, for example during the bar brawl you may be rewarded by the local dentist by handing in teeth you've knocked out the mouth of your opponents. It's intended that these are fun past times that can step out side the normal rules of the wider game.
Auction Houses
There will be an auction house and it will be accessible from outside the game, you can monitor and bid from a web browser interface without entering the game.
