Game updates/July 2019

July 2019 updates
Wednesday, 31 July 2019 Tuesday, 30 July 2019 Wednesday, 17 July 2019 Tuesday, 16 July 2019
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Update - July 31, 2019

Bug Fixes

• Crafting: Fixed an issue that allowed some items to be incorrectly destroyed when used as ingredients.
• Fixed a bug that caused some festival vendors to still require the non-wallet version of Festival Tokens.
• Fixed a client crash.

Guild Wars 2 Wiki Notes

• Build: 98,306

Late Notes - July 30, 2019

World Polish

• New Faction Provisioners have arrived in the major cities, and they are seeking additional components and materials. Several items they offer have had their prices reduced.

Profession Skills

Thief

• Preparation Skills: Fixed some issues that caused preparation skills to behave inconsistently when players mounted and dismounted.

Guild Wars 2 Wiki Notes

• Faction Provisioners in the Heart of Maguuma also now accept additional materials.
• Bloodbound weapons have been reduced to 10 , and the Bloodbound Adjuster has been reduced to 1 .

Update - July 30, 2019

Festival of the Four Winds

On behalf of Queen Jennah of Kryta and the Captain's Council of Lion's Arch, you are cordially invited to participate in the return of the Festival of the Four Winds!

High atop the Labyrinthine Cliffs, our Zephyrite friends have been working in tandem with Lion's Arch to host an incredible variety of fun vendors and events to entertain visitors from all across Tyria. This celebration of unity and peace between our cultures is more important than ever before, and we hope that you will join us in the festivities.

In this spirit of cooperation, Queen Jennah has personally overseen the reopening of the Crown Pavilion, featuring a variety of challenges for Tyria's finest to test their mettle!

Transportation to the festivities couldn't be easier! Special hot air balloons are now stationed in each nation's capital city. Visitors can also sail directly from the ship from Lion's Arch.

We look forward to seeing you at the festival!

—Captain Ellen Kiel

• The Zephyrite bazaar has returned to the Labyrinthine Cliffs! Visitors to the Labyrinthine Cliffs can try their hand at many festival activities, including adventures, races, and scavenger hunts:
  • Show your skill with the Zephyrite crystals in the Flying Dolyak race!
  • Enjoy the sights of the sea in the bay-spanning Skimmer Slalom race!
  • Team up with your friends to plunder lost treasure in the Treasure Hunt meta-event!
  • Scramble to set a high score in the Crystal Collection adventure!
  • Demonstrate your aviation ability in two griffon adventures!
  • Compete to take the lead in the Sanctum Sprint activity!
  • Challenge the competition with unique Zephyrite skills in the returning Aspect Arena!
  • Leap across the Labyrinthine Cliffs to recover Zephyrite crystals and discover the fate of the bazaar's fallen star, Kookoochoo the Incredulous!
  • Trade materials with the Zephyrites for a new Zephyrite Supply Box containing a wide variety of possible items, including exceptionally rare skins and equipment from distant lands.

• For combat-inclined festivalgoers, the Crown Pavilion has reopened in Divinity's Reach. Challenge re-creations of humanity's greatest foes, legendary champions, and notorious figures!
  • The renowned Boss Blitz returns! Organize your companions to challenge six legendary foes—they'll gain strength as other bosses fall, so plan your battle carefully!
  • Adventurers yearning to show their skills at a solo challenge, rejoice! The Queen's Gauntlet has been reopened!
  • Between blitzes, blow off some steam in the most hazardous festival race since Halloween: the infamous Pavilion Pursuit!

• New updates and prizes this year include:
  • Annual achievements have been added to the Festival of Four Winds[sic]. Complete the annual Four Winds Customs meta-achievement to earn a splendid new backpack!
  • The Flying Dolyak race, Skimmer Slalom race, and Pavilion Pursuit races have been overhauled with associated adventures and more responsive checkpoints. Race for the fastest time and earn bonus daily rewards!
  • Bosses in the Boss Blitz group event have been rebalanced. Their maximum health amounts have been reduced, and they now have unique defiance bars that give boons to players fighting the other bosses when their defiance bars are broken.
  • Five new weapons have been added to the Zephyrite weapon set.
  • Eleven new weapons have been added to the Divine Sovereign weapon set.
  • New guild hall decorations based on the Zephyrite style can now be crafted for your guild hall.
  • Markers have been added to mount rental vendors to make them easier to find.
  • Whistles are now included in your mount rental, making it easier to resummon them after dismounting.
  • A new weekly vendor has been added, trading limited supplies of rare goods for Festival Tokens.
  • Numerous bugs and glitches have been fixed to ensure a safer and more pleasant festival for all participants.

• Complete festival daily achievements to earn the Four Winds Zephyr daily achievement, contributing to the Four Winds Gale achievement that rewards your choice of weapons based on Zephyrite crafts!
• Earn Festival Tokens and Favors of the Festival throughout the festival events to trade for exciting prizes, including Zephyrite backpacks, the illustrious Sovereign weapon set, and items based on the latest wonder of the Crown Pavilion—the Watchknight Mk II.
• Zephyrite Kite Baskets have been scattered across Tyria. Open them to claim prizes from the Zephyrite stockpiles.
• The Festival of the Four Winds will be available for three weeks, from July 30 until August 20. Enjoy the festivities!

World Polish

• Fixed a bug that could prevent the Choya Pinata from dropping Crystal Oasis: Hero's Choice Chests.

General

• Grandmaster Craftsman Hobbs in Lion's Arch has some new information about unlocking legendary runes and sigils.
• Grandmaster crafters in Lion's Arch are working to unlock Legendary Runes and Sigils by offering Satchels of Loot to citizens who donate repeatedly to the cause.

Profession Skills

Elementalist

•  Bolstered Elements: Fixed a bug that could cause this trait to stop granting stability after Lesser Stone Resonance was cast.

Engineer

•  Spectrum Shield: Fixed a bug that prevented this skill from properly listing its damage reduction amount.
•  Laser's Edge: Increased the maximum damage from 15% to 25% in PvE only.
•  Glass Cannon: Increased the damage bonus from 5% to 7%.

Guardian

•  Wall of Reflection: This skill now uses different effects depending on whether the caster is an enemy or an ally.
•  Purging Flames: This skill now uses different effects depending on whether the caster is an enemy or an ally.

Mesmer

•  Portal: This skill now uses different effects depending on whether the caster is an enemy or an ally.
•  Time Warp: This skill now uses different effects depending on whether the caster is an enemy or an ally.
•  Mantra of Distraction: Fixed a bug that prevented this skill from reducing the recharge of Time Sink.

Necromancer

• Scourge Shades: Shades now use different effects depending on whether the caster is an enemy or an ally.
•  Plaguelands: This skill now uses different effects depending on whether the caster is an enemy or an ally.

Black Lion Trading Company Gem Store

New Items and Promotions

• The new Gallant Lightbearer Raptor Skin is now available in the Style category of the Gem Store for 2,000 gems.
• The new Zephyrite Paraglider is available in the Style category of the Gem Store for 400 gems.
• For a limited time, the Storm Gloves and the Zephyrite Aspect Helm Pack return to the Style category of the Gem Store for 500 gems each.

Black Lion Chest

• The Black Lion Chest has been updated to the Zephyr Sanctum Chest and can be previewed for a full list of its contents.
  • The Gnashblade Zephyrite Supply Box has been updated and is returning as the guaranteed item.
  • The new Gallant Lightbearer Raptor Skin is available as an uncommon drop for the duration of this chest.
  • The new Starborn Outfit is available as an uncommon drop for the duration of this chest.
  • The Soaring weapon set and Fused weapon set are available as uncommon and rare drops respectively for the duration of this chest.
  • Unused versions of the Glyph of Flight and the Glyph of Industry are available as rare drops for the duration of this chest.

• The Self-Style Hair Kit and the Total Makeover Kit are no longer available as drops in the Black Lion Chest.
• The items available in exchange for Black Lion Statuettes have been updated. Black Lion Statuettes are redeemable by using the statuette itself or at any of the Black Lion Chest Merchants located in every major city.
  • A new collection of hats has been made available for redemption.
  • The exclusive Storm Dagger, Exalted Shoulders, and Exalted Gloves have been added.
    • Additional item updates include the Mini Blue Skimmer Pup, Magitech Medium Armor Skin, Phoenix Light Armor Skin, Braham's Heavy Armor Skin, and the Reap-r-Tron, Log-r-Tron, and Mine-r-Tron gathering tools.

Guild Wars 2 Wiki Notes

• Build: 98,248
  

  The new Customize panel.
• All equipment items gained a "Customize" option in their right-click menu, allowing to change stats (for stat-selectable items) and swap upgrades all in a single window.

Update - July 17, 2019

Bug Fixes:

Thief

•  Even the Odds: Fixed a bug that caused the thief to not receive might when executing certain sneak attacks.
•  Deadly Ambition: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to not apply extra poison stacks with the Potent Poison trait equipped.
•  Basilisk Venom: Fixed a bug that could cause this skill to grant more than one stack of basilisk venom to allies.
•  Rending Shade: Fixed a bug that caused sneak attacks to apply fear without this trait equipped.
•  Shadow Portal: Fixed a bug that caused this skill to fail to grant stealth to allies using the portal.

Elementalist

•  Power Overwhelming: Fixed a bug that could cause the bonus power to linger longer than intended when stacks of might fell below 10.
•  Raging Storm: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to incorrectly grant a 5% damage increase.
•  Burning Rage: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to incorrectly grant a 10% damage increase.
•  Strength of Stone: The bleeding inflicted by this trait now has a 3-second cooldown per target.

Guild Wars 2 Wiki Notes

• Build: 97,999

Update 2 - July 16, 2019

Bug Fix:

• Fixed a bug that prevented the World Boss Rush bonus event from starting.

Guild Wars 2 Wiki Notes

• Build: 97,970

Late Notes - July 16, 2019

Profession Skills

Elementalist

•  Power Overwhelming: This trait has been reworked. It now grants 150 bonus power when the elementalist has at least 10 stacks of might. This power bonus is doubled while attuned to fire.

Update - July 16, 2019

Items

The effects of the legendary trinkets Aurora and Vision have been adjusted to ensure they are not removed at the start of PvP matches.

Profession Skills

General

In today's update we're adding tradeoffs to some elite specialization lines with changes to chronomancer shatters, an overhaul of scrapper specialization traits, and some improvements to the base necromancer Death Shroud, all in order to make the choice of an elite specialization more meaningful. We're also doing some follow-up work on the changes to berserker from the last balance update to tune up a few areas. The other main focus of this update is adjustments to core trait lines on several professions to address some pain points and power imbalances. Finally, in this update thieves are getting an entirely new skill type that replaces traps. For full details on these changes, please see the individual profession sections.

Elementalist

In addition to various tempest improvements, this update includes a major change in how core elemental specialization lines work. The weapon-cooldown traits are being merged into the grandmaster minor traits for the four primary elemental lines. Previously, the cooldown trait and other available options were mutually exclusive, and its nature of letting you use abilities more frequently tended to crowd out those alternatives. By folding this functionality into a minor trait, we are recognizing that taking an elemental specialization represents an investment in that element's skills. The traits that used to host the cooldown reductions have each been adjusted to account for these changes.

•  Overload Air: Increased damage of the Static Charge effect provided by this skill by 20%. Fixed a bug that prevented Electric Discharge from firing.
•  Earthen Blast: Increased the number of targets from 3 to 5. Fixed an incorrect damage tooltip and added a missing tooltip for Combat Only.
•  Electric Discharge: Added a missing tooltip for Combat Only.
•  Sunspot: Fixed an incorrect damage tooltip.
• Tempest Overload Skills: Casting these skills now triggers the traits Sunspot, Healing Ripple, Electric Discharge, or Earthen Blast, depending on the element.
•  Pyromancer's Training: This trait has been moved to the grandmaster minor slot, and its functionality has changed. It now reduces recharge on fire weapon skills by 20% and causes the elementalist to deal 10% increased damage to burning foes.
•  Burning Rage: This trait has moved to the master tier as a major trait, and its functionality has changed. It now grants +180 condition damage and augments the attack from the Sunspot minor trait to have 60 additional range and apply 2 stacks of burning for 5 seconds.
•  Aquamancer's Training: This trait has been moved to the grandmaster minor slot, and its functionality has changed. It now reduces recharge on water weapon skills by 20% and increases healing to other allies by 15%.
•  Aquatic Benevolence: This trait has been removed, and its functionality has been combined with Aquamancer's Training.
•  Flow like Water: This new trait takes the slot previously occupied by Aquamancer's Training and increases damage dealt by 10% while the elementalist is above 75% health. Additionally, it heals the elementalist when they block or evade an attack. The healing effect has a 10-second cooldown.
•  Piercing Shards: This trait now grants half its 20% bonus damage to vulnerable foes when not attuned to water. The full bonus damage is still applied while attuned to water.
•  Aeromancer's Training: This trait has been moved to the grandmaster minor slot, and its functionality has changed. It now reduces recharge on air weapon skills by 20% and grants 150 ferocity. The ferocity bonus is doubled while attuned to air.
•  Raging Storm: This trait has been moved to the master tier as a major trait, and it has a new icon. The ferocity bonus granted by this trait has been reduced from 240 to 180.
•  Geomancer's Training: This trait has been moved to the grandmaster minor slot, and its functionality has changed. It now reduces recharge on earth weapon skills by 20% and reduces incoming damage by 10% from foes within a range of 360.
•  Geomancer's Defense: This trait has been removed, and its functionality has been combined with Geomancer's Training.
•  Strength of Stone: In addition to its previous effects, this trait now also causes the elementalist to inflict 3 stacks of bleeding for 10 seconds when immobilizing a foe.
•  Earthen Blessing: This new trait takes the slot previously occupied by Geomancer's Training. It reduces the duration of movement-impairing conditions by 33% and grants 10 endurance whenever the elementalist is affected by one of these conditions.
•  Burning Precision: Increased burning duration from 2 seconds to 3 seconds.
•  Primordial Stance: Reduced ammo recharge time from 25 seconds to 20 seconds.
•  Swift Revenge: Increased bonus damage from 7% to 10%.

Engineer

Scrappers are seeing a comprehensive rework in this update, targeted at improving the Function Gyro to be more of a core mechanic and unifying some of the disparate themes present in the trait line. These changes aim to refocus the scrapper as a tank-like character that utilizes personal barrier applications to stay in a fight. The reworked Impact Savant trait links barrier with dealing damage, making the scrapper a durable combatant as long as they can keep dishing out damage. The refocus on barrier led us to the removal of the Rapid Regeneration trait, which was offering too much health recovery while remaining protected by barrier. Players will still want to have swiftness and superspeed, though, to help dish out that damage with one of the new traits: Object in Motion. Beyond focusing scrappers more clearly around their personal barrier application, their unique Function Gyro mechanic becomes a ground-targeted skill in the F5 slot, which can be enhanced based on trait selection and acts as a general-use ability rather than a niche option for sometimes reviving an ally or finishing a downed enemy. In addition to reworking the scrapper traits, we're also slightly increasing the penalty for holosmiths overheating, as it wasn't commensurate with the level of power granted by holoforge mode.

•  Overload: Overloading [sic] now disables all toolbelt skills for its duration.
•  Blowtorch: This skill now applies 4 stacks of burning that scales dynamically between 3 and 6 seconds based on distance from the target. This skill now scales damage dynamically based on distance rather than using distance thresholds.
•  Blunderbuss: This skill now respects line of sight.
•  Bulwark Gyro: This skill now scales the initial personal barrier it grants with the number of allies you are redirecting damage from. The base barrier granted has been reduced to account for the higher potential initial gain. Barrier amount is no longer split by game mode as a result. Fixed a bug with an incorrect skill fact for barrier amount.
•  Elixir X: The cooldown is now 105 seconds in all game modes.
•  Hip Shot: Fixed a bug that could cause this skill's projectiles to follow their target.
•  Net Shot: Fixed a bug that could allow this skill to be fired backward.
•  Invisible Analysis: This trait now applies 5 seconds of fury when it activates.
•  Laser's Edge: The bonus damage from this trait is now calculated dynamically based on the amount of heat you have rather than activating after passing a specific heat threshold. Because of this change, the effect icon will no longer be displayed. Bonus damage is now multiplicative instead of additive.
•  Enhanced Capacity Storage Unit: This trait now increases the bonus damage maximum from Laser's Edge by 50% in addition to its previous effects.
•  Scrapper—Function Gyro: While scrapper specialization is equipped, this skill now occupies the F5 slot. Recharge has been increased to 30 seconds. This skill trait is now ground targeted at a range of 600 and creates a lightning field at the target point with a radius of 180. Within this radius, it spawns up to 6 function gyros targeting up to 3 enemies and/or 3 allies. Enemies are finished while allies are revived. This skill's recharge is increased by 50% for each function gyro spawned beyond the first.
• Scrapper traits have been reworked and repositioned. The specialization line has changed as follows:
  • Minor
    •  Function Gyro: The Function Gyro skill has been reworked. See previous note for details.
    •  Speed of Synergy: This new trait causes all leap finishers to give superspeed to the scrapper, and all blast finishers give superspeed in an area around you.
    •  Impact Savant: This trait no longer increases damage while you have barrier. Instead it converts 15% of all outgoing strike damage into barrier and reduces vitality by 300.
  • Adept
    •  Gyroscopic Acceleration: This new trait causes wells to give superspeed when they end and increases well radius. Additionally, it causes your function gyro skill to give superspeed in an area when cast.
    •  System Shocker: This new trait causes your function gyro to inflict daze in an area for 0.5 seconds when cast. Improves effectiveness of all lightning field finishers by 50%.
    •  Mass Momentum: This trait has been moved to the adept tier. It no longer grants power based on toughness. Instead it causes your function gyro to grant stability in an area when cast in addition to causing stability to pulse might.
  • Master
    •  Damage Dampener: This new trait causes 20% of all damage dealt to you to be dealt after a 2-second delay from the initial strike. In PvE only, the damage delay is increased to 33%.
    •  Expert Examination: This trait has received no changes.
    •  Object in Motion: This new trait increases outgoing damage by 5% if you have swiftness, superspeed, or stability. Each boon increases the bonus damage by 5%, up to a maximum of 15% if you have all three.
  • Grandmaster
    •  Adaptive Armor: This trait no longer gives barrier when struck. Instead, it increases the barrier received by 15%, in addition to reducing condition damage by 20% while you have a barrier.
    •  Kinetic Accelerators: This trait is no longer triggered by Function Gyro. Instead it increases the duration of stuns and daze effects by 25%. It also grants stability and superspeed when disabling a foe.
    •  Applied Force: In addition to its previous effects, this trait now also grants +200 power while you have quickness. It now grants quickness when at or above 10 stacks of might rather than only when above 10 stacks. Fixed various bugs that could cause inconsistent trigger behavior.

Guardian

For guardians, some power from various trait lines is being shifted around in order to create better tiered trait options. The Retribution trait in the Radiance line had a lot of power and was crowding out other options. We're transferring this power over to the Zeal line, along with a few other trait reworks to make that type of damage bonus more reliable. While most symbols will become more powerful as a result of these changes, we're taking special care with Symbol of Punishment due to its low recharge. For this symbol, we have reduced the damage of the extra strikes rather than the symbol itself, as they cause the skill to have unpredictable damage based on the size of the target. Overall, these two changes net a small enhancement to the skill. Additionally, we are tuning up a few dragonhunter skills and traits to both improve their use cases and clarify their descriptions.

•  Spear of Light: This skill now scales damage dynamically based on distance rather than using distance thresholds.
•  Leap of Faith: This skill now heals you for each foe hit in addition to its previous effects.
•  Deflecting Shot: This skill no longer deals bonus damage if a missile is reflected. Increased base damage by 80%.
•  Symbol of Energy: Increased projectile speed by 25%.
•  Symbolic Avenger: This trait has been reworked. It now increases the guardian's damage by 2% stacking (max 5 stacks) for 15 seconds whenever a symbol hits a foe.
•  Symbolic Power: Increased the symbol damage from 10% to 30%. This trait no longer has a chance to inflict burning. Instead it causes symbols to charge your Justice passive effect twice as fast.
•  Symbol of Punishment: Lowered the damage of extra strikes by 25% in PvE.
•  Symbolic Exposure: This trait now increases damage to vulnerable foes by 5% in addition to its previous effects.
•  Protective Reviver: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to not increase revive speed.
•  Zealous Blade: This trait no longer heals when combined with a light field or grants 10% bonus damage when wielding a greatsword. Instead it grants +120 power plus an additional +120 power while wielding a greatsword in addition to reducing greatsword skill recharge by 20%.
•  Eternal Armory: Increased burning stacks from 1 to 2.
•  Retribution: This trait no longer grants bonus ferocity.
•  Radiant Power: This trait now grants +150 ferocity.
•  Pure of Sight: This trait now scales dynamically based on distance from the target. Scaling has been adjusted from 5% to 15%.
•  Spear of Justice: This skill has been updated so the tether aspect doesn't fail against world bosses as frequently.

Mesmer

In this update, we are revisiting the chronomancer specialization and adding a tradeoff in the form of new chronomancer shatters. These shatters behave differently than core mesmer shatters and gain extra properties in exchange for requiring more planning to use properly. Furthermore, we are reducing the number of shatters from 5 back down to 4 in order to match the other mesmer specializations. Dune Cloak for the mirage specialization is also undergoing a minor rework to make it more utility focused in order to differentiate it from the more offense-focused Infinite Horizon and the defense-focused Elusive Mind.

• Illusions: The illusion counter that tracks clones now decrements immediately when a shatter is cast rather than waiting for the clones to be destroyed.
•  Speed of Sand: Instead of granting superspeed when dodging, this trait instead causes Mirage Cloak to grant +66% movement speed.
•  Spatial Surge: This skill now scales damage dynamically based on distance rather than using distance thresholds.

• Shatter Skills: Mesmers who are using the chronomancer specialization now receive new shatters that replace the four core shatters. Chronomancer shatters require at least 1 clone to activate, and unlike core shatters they do not replicate the shatter effect on the mesmer.
  •  Split Second: This skill replaces and inherits traits from Mind Wrack. This skill deals damage for each clone shattered with additional bonus damage when striking slowed foes.
  •  Rewinder: This skill replaces and inherits traits from Cry of Frustration. This skill deals damage and inflicts confusion for each clone shattered. Additionally, it recharges itself by 5 seconds for each clone shattered.
  •  Time Sink: This skill replaces and inherits traits from Diversion. This skill dazes foes and applies 2 seconds of slow for each clone shattered.
  •  Continuum Shift[sic]: This skill now replaces distortion in the F4 slot instead of taking the F5 slot. Additionally, it applies 1 second of distortion when cast. Duration has been rescaled based on the number of clones to 3/4.5/6 seconds. This skill now specifies that it cannot be reset by other mesmer skills.

•  Signet of Illusions: The description for this skill has been updated.
•  Mimic: The boon that allows faster skill recharge is now removed prematurely if the caster enters or exits a transformation or uses a mount.
•  Veil: Fixed a bug that could cause this skill's effects to not line up with its visual elements in some situations.
•  Temporal Curtain: Fixed a bug that could cause this skill's effects to not line up with its visual elements in some situations.
•  Dune Cloak: This trait has been reworked and new visual effects have been added. It now attacks at the end of Mirage Cloak rather than the beginning. Additionally, its damage has been increased by 100%, and instead of inflicting bleeding it now removes a boon from up to 5 foes on hit. The mirage gains a copy of any boon removed.
•  Auspicious Anguish: This trait has been reworked. It now causes up to 2 damaging conditions on the mesmer to be converted into boons whenever the mesmer gains distortion or becomes disabled.
•  Flow of Time: The alacrity per clone shattered has been increased from 1 second to 1.5 seconds.
•  Seize the Moment: The quickness per clone shattered has been increased from 1.5 seconds to 2 seconds.
•  Master of Fragmentation: Due to changes to chronomancer shatter skills, this trait no longer inflicts slow when Continuum Shift is activated. Instead it adds projectile reflection to distortion in the same way it does for core mesmer.

Necromancer

While reapers were designed to be durable frontline fighters, the Soul Eater trait is providing a little too much survivability, so we're removing the ability for this trait to heal while in a shroud. We are also making some changes to core necromancer death shroud skills. These changes are aimed at improving the uptime of shroud skills to put them more in line with their elite specialization counterparts.

•  Death Shroud: Fixed an issue in which the UI icon displayed while in shroud incorrectly used the icon for Dark Path.
•  Dark Path: Updated the icon for this skill. Reduced the recharge from 15 seconds to 8 seconds. Reduced chill duration from 5 seconds to 3 seconds. This skill now damages, chills, and inflicts bleeding on all foes in the area, rather than only damaging and inflicting bleeding on the first foe hit. The projectile fired by this skill now travels in a straight line rather than following the slope of the ground. This skill no longer shadowsteps to the target by default. Instead it flips over to Dark Pursuit when the projectile hits.
•  Dark Pursuit: This follow-up skill to Dark Path shadowsteps the necromancer to the first foe stuck by Dark Path and increases the recharge of Dark Path by 8 seconds. Dark Pursuit can be cast for 3 seconds after the Dark Path projectile hits a target.
•  Life Transfer: Reduced recharge from 40 seconds to 25 seconds.
•  Tainted Shackles: Reduced recharge from 40 seconds to 30 seconds.
•  Dark Water: Reduced recharge from 15 seconds to 8 seconds. Reduced pulses from 7 to 4. Reduced duration from 6 seconds to 3 seconds.
•  Wave of Fear: Reduced recharge from 25 seconds to 20 seconds.
•  Gathering Plague: Reduced recharge from 30 seconds to 25 seconds.
•  Unholy Martyr: Fixed a bug that could cause this trait to prevent cleanup of Death Shroud boons.
•  Soul Eater: This trait no longer heals while shroud life force replaces health.

Ranger

In this update we've made some reductions to tone down the strength of some soulbeast PvP and WvW builds. While we believe the builds and playstyles have a solid place in the game and don't want to take them out of play, certain elements are a bit too far over the edge. The skill "Sic 'Em!" is providing a damage modifier that is significantly higher than any other single persistent bonus damage increase, so we're reducing the bonus to match other similar skills in a competitive setting. This reduction only occurs while merged with your pet. We're also reducing access to the unblockable effect provided by some skills and traits in order to create more opportunities for others.

•  Long Range Shot: This skill now scales damage dynamically based on distance rather than using distance thresholds.
•  Point-Blank Shot: This skill now scales knockback distance dynamically between a range of 100 and 600 based on distance from the target.
•  Barrage: Reduced recharge from 30 second to 20 seconds. Lowered cripple duration from 1.5 seconds to 1 second. Increased damage by 25%. Damage floaters for this skill now show total damage instead of damage per hit.
•  Sublime Conversion: This skill now grants 5 seconds of regeneration to allies who pass through the wall.
•  Ancestral Grace: This skill no longer evades attacks. Increased recharge from 18 seconds to 20 seconds. If at least 1 ally other than yourself is healed, the recharge is reduced by 5 seconds.
•  Call of the Wild: The unblockable boon provided by this skill now lasts for the next 3 attacks within 5 seconds instead of all attacks within the next 4 seconds.
•  Clarion Bond: The unblockable boon provided by this skill now lasts for the next 2 attacks within 5 seconds instead of all attacks within the next 3 seconds.
•  Frost Trap: Increased the number of pulses from 4 to 5. Decreased chill duration from 3 seconds to 2 seconds. Increased damage by 100% in PvE only. Fixed a bug that prevented this skill's ice field from lasting the full duration.
•  "Sic 'Em!": Reduced the bonus damage applied to a merged soulbeast from 40% to 25% in PvP and WvW only. Damage bonus for pets remains unchanged. Fixed a bug that caused this skill to not grant the listed movement-speed bonus.
•  One Wolf Pack: Fixed a bug that could cause the second strike from this skill to fail if the player jumps.
•  Verdant Etching: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to not function with Glyph of the Stars.
•  Light on Your Feet: This trait now also grants its damage bonus when dodging using Quick Shot.
•  Twice as Vicious: Increased the duration of the damage effect granted by this trait from 4 seconds to 10 seconds.
•  Second Skin: Reduced condition damage protection from 33% to 20% in PvP only.
•  Unstoppable Union: This trait no longer grants an unblockable boon. Instead, it removes movement-impairing conditions in addition to its previous effect of stunbreaking when activating beastmode.

Revenant

When we reworked sword skill 5 from Grasping Shadow to Deathstrike, we also carried over the slow and chill conditions it inflicted. However, since Deathstrike is a damage skill rather than a control skill like Grasping Shadow, we are removing this component because it muddies the new purpose of the skill. Similarly, we are reworking both Embrace the Darkness and Unyielding Anguish in the Mallyx stance that both act as pulsing areas of effects, with the intent of better differentiating when they should be used. Embrace the Darkness is being focused on inflicting torment. Unyielding Anguish is being revamped, becoming a setup skill that gathers up enemies, and it has been renamed Call to Anguish. Beyond these changes, we are also scaling up skills and traits that looked like they were just marginally out of play and reducing some might generation in PvP.

•  Impossible Odds: Instead of pulsing superspeed, this skill now increases your movement speed by 50%. Reduced damage of the secondary strike by 19% in PvP only.
•  Hardening Persistence: Increased the damage reduction per pip of energy from 1% to 1.5%.
•  Focused Siphoning: Increased power scaling by 400% in PvE only. Increased healing scaling by 400% in PvE only.
•  Spear of Anguish: This skill now scales torment duration dynamically based on distance rather than using distance thresholds.
•  Notoriety: Reduced might duration from 10 seconds to 5 seconds, and reduced the number of stacks applied by 1 in PvP only.
•  Icerazor's Ire: Increased damage by 30%.
•  Elemental Blast: Reduced recharge in PvE from 12 seconds to 10 seconds. Fixed an incorrect radius tooltip.
•  Shining Aspects: Removed the internal cooldown from this trait.
•  Rapid Flow: Increased base healing by 50%.
•  Shackling Wave: Reduced the damage of secondary strikes by 20% in PvP and WvW.
•  Deathstrike: This skill no longer chills or slows.
•  Burst of Strength: Reduced the damage of this skill in WvW to match the PvP version. Increased the bonus damage boon from 15% to 25% in PvE only.
•  Unyielding Anguish: This skill has been reworked and renamed  Call to Anguish. It is now a leap finisher skill that pulls foes to the center of your landing point and chills them. This skill has an energy cost of 35 and a 5-second recharge.
•  Embrace the Darkness: This skill is now a mobile dark field. Increased recharge to 10 seconds. This skill no longer grants a stat increase and is no longer unblockable and unblindable. The amount of torment applied per pulse is unchanged, but using a skill that costs energy now increases the stacks of torment applied on the next pulse by 2. This skill now deals a small amount of damage each pulse.

Thief

In this update, we are reworking the Shadow Arts trait line for thieves. As a support- and survivalist-focused line, we wanted to refocus it around stronger themes as well as improve the potency of its minor traits. Many of the more passive traits have been adjusted or rebuilt to have more active effects, while some of the more niche traits like Merciful Ambush have been adjusted to have more general-use applications. Meanwhile, new traits like Shadow Savior and reworked traits like Rending Shade will help to provide new ways to approach combat. Thief trap skills are being retired for now and replaced by a new type of ability: Preparations. See below for their more information on those skills.

•  Dagger Storm: Reduced the casting time by 30%. Increased damage by 33% in PvE only.
•  Smoke Screen: This skill now creates a ring instead of a line.
•  Infiltrator's Signet: Increased range from 900 to 1,200.
• The following skills have been removed: Needle Trap, Tripwire, Shadow Trap, Ambush.

• Traps (Skill Category): This category has been replaced by a new skill category: Preparations.
  • Preparations will function in a similar fashion to trap abilities, but they will not fire unless the thief chooses to trigger them. Each preparation will have a radius of 240 and will produce a variety of results, including the introduction of a portal-type utility that can ferry allies to a location.

•  Prepare Pitfall: This new skill will mark your current area with controlling magic, readying the location to crush enemies when released.
•  Pitfall: This new skill will unleash your pitfall on an area, knocking down foes and delivering constant damage over time.
•  Prepare Thousand Needles: This new skill will mark your current area with inhibiting magic, readying the location to poison enemies.
•  Thousand Needles: This new skill will unleash a hail of needles that immobilizes enemies on impact and repeatedly strikes foes over a short period of time.
•  Prepare Seal Area: This new skill will mark your current area with stifling magic, readying the location to seal enemies in.
•  Seal Area: This new skill will seal your marked area, blocking projectiles and preventing enemies from entering or leaving.
•  Prepare Shadow Portal: This new skill will mark your current location with shadow magic.
•  Shadow Portal: This new skill will unleash the shadow magic at your prepared location, creating a one-way portal that you and your allies can take. Allies traveling through the portal will be granted stealth, and foes around the portal's exit will be weakened. This skill is split between game modes, allowing 5 allies through in PvE and WvW, while only allowing one ally through in PvP.
•  Uncatchable: This skill now also casts Lesser Caltrops when you take falling damage in addition to when dodge rolling, and it also reduces falling damage by 50%.

• Deadly Arts: This line has had some traits reworked due to the removal of Traps as a skill category. Preparations will not be receiving a trait at this time and will instead be balanced as though they are traited already.
  • Adept
    •  Dagger Training: This trait no longer inflicts poison on dagger attacks.
    • Trapper's Respite: This trait has been reworked and renamed  Deadly Ambition.
    •  Deadly Ambition: Inflict 2 stacks of poison for 3 seconds when striking a foe, with an internal cooldown of 3 seconds in PvE, 5 seconds in PvP. Gain +120 condition damage when this trait is equipped.
  • Master
    • Deadly Trapper: This trait has been reworked and renamed  Even the Odds.
    •  Even the Odds: Inflict 5 stacks of vulnerability for 10 seconds on targets you steal from. Gain 5 stacks of might for 10 seconds when you hit an enemy with a stealth attack.

• Shadow Arts: Shadow Arts traits have been reworked and moved. The new traits are as follows.
  • Minor
    •  Concealing Restoration: With this new trait, casting your heal skill grants 2 seconds of stealth.
    •  Meld with Shadows: In addition to extending the duration of stealth, this trait now also increases movement speed while in stealth by 50%.
    •  Shadow Siphoning : This new trait causes all stealth attacks to siphon health if they hit. Cannot occur more than once per second per target hit.
  • Adept
    •  Merciful Ambush: This trait has been moved to the adept tier. It no longer increases revive speed and instead causes applying stealth to an ally to heal and revive them over 3 seconds.
    •  Shadow's Embrace: This trait has been moved to a different slot in the same tier. Its functionality is unchanged.
    •  Hidden Thief: This trait has been moved to the adept tier. It no longer increases movement speed while in stealth. Instead it grants 20% recharge reduction to deceptions.
  • Master
    •  Shadow Savior: This new trait causes you to heal yourself after shadowstepping. Nearby allies are healed for double the amount you are.
    •  Leeching Venoms: This trait has been moved to new slot in the same tier. It no longer reduces recharge of venoms. Instead it causes the thief to stack spider venom automatically while in stealth.
    •  Flickering Shadows : This new trait grants 33% damage reduction while revealed.
  • Grandmaster
    •  Cloaked in Shadow: This trait no longer grants immunity to critical hits. Instead it causes blinding a foe to siphon health.
    •  Shadow's Rejuvenation: This trait has not changed.
    •  Rending Shade: This trait no longer reduces damage from boonless foes. Instead it inflicts fear in a small area if it hits a boonless foe.

Warrior

We like how the gameplay changes in the last balance update have turned out for berserker, but we've also heard your feedback and recognize that the damage has been lower than expected for the amount of investment involved. In this update, we're tuning up some berserker skills and traits to give these builds a little more power and longer windows to stay in berserk mode. The Bloody Roar trait changing its stacking method will result in a net increase in damage, so we are also lowering its values in competitive modes, since berserker burst in those modes is already difficult to deal with. Similarly we are also making adjustments to Rampage to rein in some of its excess power in PvP.

•  Wild Blow: Increased berserk extension from 3 seconds to 4 seconds.
•  Shattering Blow: Increase berserk extension from 2 seconds to 3 seconds.
•  Mariner's Shot: This skill now scales damage dynamically based on distance rather than using distance thresholds.
•  Headbutt: This skill now removes all stacks of stability when casting and does 50% more damage if stability was removed.
•  Fear Me: The duration of fear applied by this skill now scales dynamically based on distance.
•  Rampage: Changed recharge to 120 seconds in all game modes. This skill no longer grants bonus toughness. Damage reduction has been increased from 25% to 50%. Damage reduction is now calculated multiplicatively instead of additively.
•  Last Blaze: Burning duration has been increased from 3 seconds to 4 seconds.
•  Sight beyond Sight: Increased duration of reveal applied by this skill from 3 seconds to 5 seconds.
•  Bloody Roar: This trait now stacks damage multiplicatively instead of additively. Reduced damage bonus from 20% to 15% in PvP and WvW.
•  King of Fires: Detonating a fire aura now deals damage in addition to burning.

Structured Player vs. Player

Djinn's Dominion: Some line-of-sight obstacles have been added around the map's midpoint. Djinn's Dominion is no longer in beta status.

Black Lion Trading Company Gem Store

New Items and Promotions

• The new Skyscale Hatchling Logging Tool with the Glyph of the Crucible is now available in the Utility category of the Gem Store for 1,000 gems.
• For a limited time, the Arcane Marksman Rifle returns to the Style category of the Gem Store for 600 gems.
• For a limited time, the World Boss Portal Device will be available at 20% off in the Utility category of the Gem Store for 320 gems.

Guild Wars 2 Wiki Notes

•  Revealed Training: This trait now grants a baseline power of 80 with an additional 120 granted if the thief is revealed.
•  Function Gyro Charged effect was removed from the game.
• Build: 97,950