September 2014 Feature Pack

Feature packs in Guild Wars 2 focus exclusively on in-game features, and this one is bringing in brand-new systems, improvements to existing features, balance updates, and more. — Official website

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Feature packs in Guild Wars 2 focus exclusively on in-game features, and this one is bringing in brand-new systems, improvements to existing features, balance updates, and more.

— Official website

September 2014 Feature Pack is a release focusing entirely on in-game features that was launched on September 9, 2014.

Features

Combat log

The new combat log introduced with the Feature Pack.

• The combat log will receive a major overhaul in its design and functionality.
• Instead of being just toggled on/off, the channel can be further configured to show the following action separately:
  • Incoming Buff Damage
  • Incoming Healing
  • Incoming Damage
  • Incoming Interrupts
  • Incoming Mitigated Damage
  • Outgoing Buff Damage
  • Outgoing Healing
  • Outgoing Damage
  • Outgoing Interrupts
  • Outgoing Mitigated Damage
• Critical hits are separately labeled
• Damage numbers will be shown in different colors: Green for healing, orange for damage, red for critical damage, purple for condition damage
• Player skills are displayed as chat links and provide more information on hover.
• Ranger pets, necromancer minions and other summoned allies show up in the log but for now appear as if the player does the damage.

PvP

Standard enemy models

• All enemies will appear as human models with a distinct weapon and armor set for each profession and gender.
  • Can be toggled in the Options window.
  • Only functions within Team Arenas and Custom Arenas that allow Tournament Commands.

PvP-exclusive armor

• Two new armor sets, Glorious armor and Glorious Hero's armor, will be added as PvP-exclusive rewards.
  • Glorious Hero's armor is a prestigious award for top-tier PvP tournaments.
  • Glorious armor can be unlocked through the repeatable Glorious Reward Track.

Commander

• The commander tag will become an account-wide feature, instead of being character-based.
  • To balance this, the cost of a Commander's Compendium will increase to 300  and 250 .
  • Players who have already unlocked at least one commander tag will be upgraded into the new system.
  • In addition to the existing blue tag, three new tag colors will be introduced: purple, red and yellow. Commanders can switch between the colors at will.
  • Players who have bought more than 3 commander tags (have spent more than 300 ) will receive an automated refund when the update goes live.

WvW

• New ability: Siege Golem Mastery that improves Siege Golem skills (total cost 75 points).
  • 5 points: "Increases your piloted golem's movement speed for 15 seconds after destroying a gate or a wall" (grants Superspeed)
  • 15 points: "Increases your piloted golem's base power and precision by 15%"
  • 30 points: "The shield bubble now also heals nearby allies"
  • 50 points: "Increases your piloted golem's base vitality and toughness by 15%"
  • 75 points: "Your piloted golem will safely eject you once it's defeated"
• New trick consumable: Siege Disabler that disables enemy siege for 45 seconds and golems for 20 seconds. Cost of 10 supply and a 1200 range.
  • Stealthed characters are revealed when using the trick.
  • There is no cooldown on the use of the trick, so players can continue using it as long as they have enough supplies.
  • The Siege Disabled effect does not stack.
  • The price will be around 5  and 15 .
  • This is a thrown projectile, and as such, can be countered by abilities that block or reflect projectiles (Shield of Absorption, Swirling Winds, etc).

Balance Changes

Primary article: September 2014 Feature Pack/Balance changes

New Runes and Sigils

Three runes and three sigils are newly added. The recipes can only be learned from recipe sheets.

• Superior Rune of Evasion (recipe sheet)
• Superior Rune of Radiance (recipe sheet)
• Superior Rune of the Trapper (recipe sheet)
• Superior Sigil of Cleansing (recipe sheet)
• Superior Sigil of Cruelty (recipe sheet)
• Superior Sigil of Incapacitation (recipe sheet)

Guilds

• Guilds will now be global and shared regardless of the world you are on.
  • Influence and the merits earned by a guild in each world will be combined into one pool.
  • Any upgrade or unlock will be combined into one guild, any duplicate unlocks or upgrades will be refunded.
  • Any consumables already built will be combined into one guild.
  • The largest guild vault unlocked on any world with the most items will be the new global guild vault and all items from all guild chapters will be located in that vault. Any items that go over the limit will be placed into special extra slots and will disappear after withdrawing the item.
  • After the patch, merits and consumables can temporarily go over the normal limits, but a guild cannot earn more until the extras are used.
• A reservation system will be enabled that will prioritize adding guild members to a specific map for guild missions. There is a limit to the number of reservations.

Crafting

• Crafters will now be able to open recipes as well as that recipe's sub-component recipes at the same time.
• New progressive back items are being added as a visual reward to crafters. Each crafting discipline will have a new unique back item that can be upgraded as a character advances in that discipline.

New Player Experience

• A new content direction system is being implemented to point players towards level-appropriate content, or into the next map. This is intended to provide more structure for players that need a guide.
  • A literal arrow will be added to the notifications in the upper-right to point players towards the next objective.
    

    Objective Compass.
  • This system can be turned off in the options under User Interface, in the Content Guide drop down bar. It can also be set to "world complete" and point players towards the nearest content for 100% world completion.
  • This system will not point players towards bonus hidden locations such as jumping puzzles, mini-dungeons, or pipe organs.
• Level progression has been changed
  • A new notification and reward screen have been added. This screen will show the rewards for this level and rewards for next level. It will also teach important game systems, including any system that was unlocked that level.
    

    Level Rewards.
  • Statistical progression now comes in larger amounts at milestones instead of a small boost every level.
  • Rewards for leveling have been improved and made more relevant.
• Unlocking of gameplay systems have been layered along the level progression.
  • The downed system will now unlock at level 5. Characters will be immediately defeated before then.
  • Weapon swapping and skill slot unlocks have been moved to different levels than before.
  • Notifications and icons for WvW and PvP will be displayed at levels 18 and 22. Players can access them before this time if they already know what to do (portals or hotkey).
  • Weapon skills are unlocked for all weapons simultaneously as the character levels. Replaces the current system of unlocking as enemies are defeated.
• Personal story progression in the Story Journal has been changed.
  • Several steps will now be unlocked at once as chapters on specific levels, preventing the need to level up between each story step.
  • Rewards for major chapters have been reviewed and updated.

Wardrobe

• A new search box has been added to all Wardrobe and Equipment panels.
• Outfits have been separated into their own section.
  • All outfits are visible and can be previewed, even locked ones. Owned outfits are sorted to top.
• Finishers are now their own section in the Wardrobe.
  • Each finisher can be previewed within the wardrobe window, and rotated for a better view. Unlocked finishers are sorted to the top.
• Miniatures have been moved from the Account vault into the Hero Panel/Wardrobe as their own section.
  • Existing miniatures in the Vault are now in temporary slots that disappear as they are withdrawn.
  • The miniature item can be traded, summoned, and un-summoned as normal. Players can permanently unlock any miniature for their account, consuming the miniature.
  • Players can equip a miniature that will remain visible at all times, even when changing maps. A checkbox allows it to be summoned and un-summoned.

Achievements

• Item Collections have been added.
  • New set of achievements earned by finding items and skins.
  • Collections can be automatically visible, discovered by finding one of the items in the collection, or added from using an item.
  • An item can be collected by binding it to your character or account, using the item (e.g. a consumable), or unlocked as a skin. A collection can include up to all three methods.
  • Completing collections reward various equipment, recipes, items, and unlocks (e.g. skins).
  • Existing bound or unlocked items will contribute to collections as soon as each character logs in for the first time.
• The existing Collections panel in the bank has been renamed "Material Storage".
• Existing achievements have been moved around into different categories.
  • WvW, PvP, and Activity achievements are grouped under the Competitive category.
  • Region, Boss, and Dungeon achievements are now in the General category.
• The UI for Item Collections achievements is now the standard UI for achievements.

Trading Post

• The Trading Post was re-built on a brand new browser engine for better performance.
• Redesigned categories have been implemented in a persistent panel on the left side.
• Expanded filtering options are now available.
  • Category
  • Subcategory
  • Rarity
  • Level
  • Available Now (active listings)
  • Attributes
  • Profession now a filter for armor and weapon categories, assigning appropriate useable armor weight or weapons.
  • Bag size
  • Crafting discipline
• Filter results are returned as they are entered.
  • Active filters are displayed at the top, allowing you to remove individual filters by clicking on them.
• Buying/Selling UIs have been combined into a single order overlay that does not remove your current filter.
  • Proposed buy or sell listings are displayed alongside existing listings for comparison.
  • Items for sorted in same order as inventory, with your bags displayed on the left side like categories. Invisible bags are not displayed.
  • Listing and Successful Exchange fees for using the Trading Post are displayed.
• Pick-up tab has been changed into a Delivery Box section of the UI, available on every page of the Trading Post.

Miscellaneous

• Dungeons no longer have an instance owner. The instance will only close when all players have left the instance.
• Several performance increases are being added, notably affecting large combat situations like WvW and at the PvE world boss events.
• Loot drops are being tweaked so characters are more likely to receive items they can use. The changes are subtle and the changes may not be easily noticeable, but over time the loot will have more items that character can use.
• Special new rare/exotic items are being added for leveling, and are more powerful than the items normally available for their level. These account-bound items are exclusively under level 80, will allow you to choose between 2 stat combinations, and will be available via crafting or found as loot.
• Icons of Junk rarity items have been newly changed.

External links

• Announcing the September 2014 Feature Pack
• Official release page

Week 1 - Competitive Week

• Aug 13 - Announcing the Guild Wars 2 World Tournament Series
• Aug 14 - PvP Visual and Reward Updates
• Aug 18 - Balance Changes in the September 2014 Feature Pack
• Aug 19 - WvW Improvements in the September 2014 Feature Pack
• Aug 20 - Big Changes are Coming to the Commander System
• Aug 21 - Announcing the World vs. World Fall Tournament 2014

Week 2 - A Fresh Start

• Aug 25 - Continued Improvements to the Megaserver System
• Aug 26 - September 2014 Feature Pack: Improvements Galore
• Aug 27 - Crafting Backpacks, New Leveling Items, and More
• Aug 28 - A Fresh Start: The New Player Experience in Guild Wars 2

Week 3 - Collecting and Trading

• Sep 2 - Miniatures and Finishers in Your Account Wardrobe
• Sep 3 - Introducing the Collections Achievement Category
• Sep 4 - Introducing the New Trading Post

Trivia

• Originally, ArenaNet announced at gamescom that the additional colors of the commander tag would be individual upgrades, available for 300  each. Based on player feedback, this was changed so that all colors are available from a single Commander's Compendium instead.

References

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Feature pack releases

April 2014 Feature Pack September 2014 Feature Pack Winter 2016 Quarterly Update Spring 2016 Quarterly Update June 2017 Competitive Feature Pack