Wednesday, May 24, 2023

A skiff is "What lies within" for me in Guild Wars 2

Yesterday was a big day for Guild Wars 2! The announcement came across Twitter just before noon that a new story quest was available to play titled "What Lies Within." If you owned the End of Dragons expansion, that meant this new content was available to you as a bonus.

For me it's been several years since I played any Guild Wars 2 content right as it released, and so I decided that I most definitely wanted to check it out. I purchased End of Dragons back when a sale was going on, but I still haven't finished my Icebrood Saga content, so it's just been kind of sitting there waiting for me to catch up.

I logged on and teleported to the far away content of Cantha and opened up my very first waypoint in the continent! 

Cantha is pretty. I spent a little bit of time in the original Cantha in the original Guild Wars, so I wasn't surprised when I saw the eastern world, but I was still struck by its digital beauty.

The beautiful views of New Kaineng City

As for the story content itself, it was pretty interesting. I was lost on who a few of the characters were, obviously, since I hadn't even played all the way through a couple of the story quests, but I got the gist. I love that Guild Wars lets you skip chapters and entire books in their story if you want to. Its freeform nature is a refreshing pleasure. 

Lots of people crowding the quest NPCs for What Lies Within

About halfway into the quests asking me to review my past in the game I got stuck because I hadn't unlocked fishing yet, so I spent an hour yesterday going back to the first part of End of Dragons to learn how to fish, and then I just kept going a bit.

Hmm . . . how to fish? Me no know!

My friend John also let me know that the Skiff mount was available from a heart faction vendor there on the first island as well, so I instead made that my goal for my play session instead of going back to What Lies Within and finishing the current content. I was giddy.

The Skiff was surprisingly easy to obtain. Basically you just finish the two heart faction unlocks on the island, buy a Writ of Seitung Province from both vendors and then use those and 700 karma to purchase a Skiff mount. Easy!

Peacefully floating around in Cantha on my new Skiff

The Skiff mount is great! You get a whole freakin' boat that you and your party can ride on together. It also allows you to go out to fishing spots far from the beach and cast your line.

The fishing game found in Guild Wars is not bad. Basically you cast your line, and when it sinks under water, you hook your fish. After this you use your 2 and 3 keys to move a tension bar left and right as a smaller fish bar moves back and forth. The objective is to keep the green fish bar within the tension bar until you've caught your fish.

My first fish!

I'm happy I got a chance to run around and see the crowds taking on the new content en masse. Any time I can play new content in a game and feel the excitement of the players simultaneously, it's just a unique kind of fun.

Happy Dueling!

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