Guild Wars 2 Halloween update hits October 22

Halloween has always been a merry time in Guild Wars, with the Mad King Thorn visiting the capital cities of Tyria to dole out tricks and treats. It seems he'll be returning in Guild Wars 2 as part of "the first major game release" for ArenaNet's subscription-free MMORPG, which shall also bring paid PvP tournaments and gobs of new stuff to see, do and kill.

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Halloween has always been a merry time in Guild Wars, with the Mad King Thorn visiting the capital cities of Tyria to dole out tricks and treats. It seems he'll be returning in Guild Wars 2 as part of "the first major game release" for ArenaNet's subscription-free MMORPG, which shall also bring paid PvP tournaments and gobs of new stuff to see, do and kill.

The Halloween festivities will kick off when the Shadow of the Mad King update drops next Monday, October 22. Except spooky decorations, macabre mini-games and dastardly dynamic events, taking place over four 'acts' until October 31. Halloween costumes and goods will be on sale at the Black Lion Trading Company too.

If you want serious business, you'll be able to get into five-person paid tournaments by winning normal tournaments or buying tickets in the Gem Store. These will give better prizes than regular rumbles, and you can earn qualifier points to compete in upcoming larger tournaments.

As for plain old new things, ArenaNet says the update will see "new events, jumping puzzles, bosses, mini-dungeons, and achievements appearing across a variety of maps."

Do check the event page for more information.

From The Chatty
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    October 15, 2012 10:15 AM

    Alice O'Connor posted a new article, Guild Wars 2 Halloween update hits October 22.

    Halloween has always been a merry time in Guild Wars, with the Mad King Thorn visiting the capital cities of Tyria to dole out tricks and treats. It seems he'll be returning in Guild Wars 2 as part of "the first major game release" for ArenaNet's subscription-free MMORPG, which shall also bring paid PvP tournaments and gobs of new stuff to see, do and kill.

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      October 15, 2012 10:19 AM

      Awesome. I'm still loving the piss out of this game. I have 58% world exploration done much to my amazement. I was waiting to do the dungeons with some people and then I found out they did them without me, cockhats. So this weekend I finally did the LVL 40 and 50 dungeons. I want to do the 60 and 70 story mode before I go on to the final one.

      I was also up to 10G before buying mats to get the high level armour and staff :(

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        October 15, 2012 11:21 AM

        Is anyone else still playing?

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          October 15, 2012 11:22 AM

          I will be once I get a reliable internet connection/desk to use. Right now I'm kinda on a coffee table / bed and it is difficult to play for more than 10-15mins at a time that way :(

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          October 15, 2012 11:36 AM

          Yes, and that's the beauty of the no subscription model: no digging out credit cards or asking for scrolls of resurrection before updates. Just log in and go when new stuff pops up!

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          October 15, 2012 11:37 AM

          I've got a level 70 mesmer, 50 guardian, and 40 thief. Been spreading my time out trying out the different classes which have all been fun.

          Haven't had time to play in the last few weeks though, although I really wanted to.

          I really hope theres a costume brawl for Halloween & snowball fights for Wintersday.

          If not, I might have to load up some GW1

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          October 15, 2012 11:37 AM

          [deleted]

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          October 15, 2012 11:46 AM

          lv80 mesmer and loving it.. i just don't get to play often because class schedule :(

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            October 15, 2012 11:58 AM

            Let's talk Mesmers, last week's update increased some phantasm recharges so they're all pretty much in line at around 15-20 seconds. Of course the Mesmer player base cried that we're completely borked because of it, but once again I noticed no meaningful impact on my style of play.

            Basically this thread is about how I go to the official Mesmer forums and get mad at the sadbads :(

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              October 15, 2012 12:18 PM

              Question, is it better to level up the power stat line (first one) or the condition one (last one).

              I was tossing between the two and I ended up with the power because I liked the passive abilities better, but now I feel like my condition damage is poopy.

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                October 15, 2012 12:36 PM

                Personally I've never gone straight condition but I try not to ignore it. Power is additive, you do more damage you get a bigger slice of the pie no matter how many people are around. None of the vagueness of poison or burning which don't stack like bleeding.

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              October 15, 2012 12:20 PM

              i play a shatter build, so it didn't really affect me either.. but I can see you needing to take at leat 5 possibly 10 points in Illusion tree now to counter-act it.

              It did seem a little powerful before though, I can see why they did what they did.

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                October 15, 2012 12:27 PM

                Meanwhile I went the other direction and got out of Illusions recently and decided to use the master weapon traits to reduce recharges on a per weapon basis but mainly for Focus' reflect. Along with Feedback I'm throwing back 100 percent projectile damage back at ranged classes in WvW with a pretty healthy uptime. IWarden and Temporal Curtain are still pretty amazing.

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              October 15, 2012 1:15 PM

              Hahaha you have not seen elementalists forums.

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          October 15, 2012 11:50 AM

          i still log in to level every day or so. no need to rush

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          October 15, 2012 11:52 AM

          I do, but xcom and bl2 are eating up most of my time.

          I still want to get to 100%

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          October 15, 2012 11:53 AM

          Hit lvl 75 last night, roaming around Fort Trinity. I'm starting to get a hang of Engineer class.

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          October 15, 2012 12:00 PM

          [deleted]

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          October 15, 2012 12:22 PM

          Daily (usually).

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          October 15, 2012 1:13 PM

          yep. Still playing

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          October 15, 2012 1:14 PM

          I would have joined you for cm too if I wasn't invited to another dungeon literally 5 minutes after you were looking for a group :(

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          October 16, 2012 3:41 PM

          Aye

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        October 15, 2012 11:27 AM

        Im liking it quite a bit. Though after doing the first lv 40? i think dungeon, it kinda turned me off a bit. Just seemed way to inclosed and spammy. Ive heard the others aren't that way so ive still got hope.

        The game itself seems spammy in general though, but im assuming its due to my class (necro) and probably half ass knowing what im doing.

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          October 15, 2012 11:38 AM

          Since I'm a MMO noob I don't know any different. I enjoyed the dungeons and the lvl 50 dungeon is a bit different. I hope to do 60 tonight.

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          October 15, 2012 11:39 AM

          [deleted]

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            October 15, 2012 11:54 AM

            Story wise, are you supposed to do them as you get them in your Inbox? Do the dungeon storylines and the personal storylines meet up?

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              October 15, 2012 11:58 AM

              [deleted]

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                October 15, 2012 12:44 PM

                There is some overlap but very little.

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              October 15, 2012 12:46 PM

              I did the level 30 dungeon @ 30 and got pwned. (It didn't help that I was a noob and a necro) So I held off until I had better gear and the I just never got around to doing them. There was always something else to do.

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              October 15, 2012 1:11 PM

              the stories technically meet but you don't have to do any dungeons except one (final level of the game) if you don't want to. the point of dungeons is you can repeat them and get their armors/weps in Lion's Arch with the tokens, if it's your thing.

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            October 15, 2012 1:26 PM

            actually it gets better the more you keep at it since you learn how the mechanics work. I used to think that about the first dungeon too, but now its pretty simple. I think the only reason why it was so difficult was because AC was the first dungeon you were able to do and before that everything else was a cake walk. When the difficulty suddenly jumped it just seemed impossible to do

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      October 15, 2012 12:00 PM

      [deleted]

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      October 15, 2012 1:27 PM

      i hope they fix at least some of the bugs for elementalists :\

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        October 15, 2012 1:27 PM

        what issues are there? i don't think i'm high enough level to notice

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          October 15, 2012 1:47 PM

          https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/professions/elementalist/NEW-Elementalist-bugs-and-glitches-thread

          I can't speak for the other classes (except for necros, probably bugged more than elementalists) but some of these are really annoying (like the skill ride the lightning. it rushes toward your opponent only to stop right before it hits them... but the cast is still going so you're just stuck unable to move and yet free to take hits)

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            October 15, 2012 1:48 PM

            oh, yeah, i've definitely noticed that about ride the lightning. i guess i just thought it was lag

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              October 15, 2012 1:50 PM

              yeah... the arc lightning one too. i've learned to put my weapons away immediately after a kill so that the stupid visual effect and the sound effect don't keep going as i run away

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        October 15, 2012 2:08 PM

        the worst are skills that teleport you to a random location (thief has a few, mesmer has a lot). i've ended up inside invisible water pits, boulders, trees, inside shrubbery. you can't teleport to a waypoint cause theres usually an enemy nearby, and you can't die cause the enemy can't target you.

        the only thing to do is exit the client and start back up. its so annoying.

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      October 15, 2012 1:51 PM

      I always loved GW Haloween events. If I was playing GW2, I'd be alllll over this shit.

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      October 15, 2012 2:16 PM

      mini-dungeons sounds interesting

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      October 16, 2012 12:42 PM

      I love how they're pushing paid pvp tournaments when their pvp format is missing about a billion things more important - like balance.

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