Okay, I'm still sitting here at the courthouse, waiting for the jury duty overlords to decide if I should actually do something today or not. While I'm waiting, I'm going to lay down some cold, hard opinions about the last 6-8 months of updates (about when I returned from playing a crapton at launch, then taking a break).
I got back into GW2 right as the Queen's Jubilee was underway (reason: I tried the FFXIV beta, didn't like it, and ended up wishing I were just playing GW2 again). One of the things I liked was that GW2 was doing these two week updates, and really doing a good job of focusing player attention and giving new stuff to do. I remember Queen's Jubilee hitting my framerate pretty hard, harder than any content since at least (my opinion is skewed here since I upgraded my processor, mobo, and RAM shortly after this patch). My favorite part of this patch was the Queen's Gauntlet. It was a great way for me to sharpen up my dodging and skills, and the fights never felt too unfair or cruel. The Liadri fight was exceptionally rewarding when I finally beat it. My only complaint about Queen's Gauntlet was the camera feeling claustrophobic in the respective domes. I rate this update 8/10; this really lit a fire in re-dedicating myself to this game, and Queen's Gauntlet was probably the best possible tool across every LS update I've played for resharpening my skills.
After that was Clockwork Chaos. This event seemed pretty fun. I remember 'killing' Scarlet in a mini-dungeon sort of event (Scarlet's Playhouse), but then she returned later I suppose? I thought that was weird. Of course, the big highlight of this patch happened to be Scarlet's Invasions. These were great fun for a while, even when players as a whole decided to no longer even try for the ending. Simply farming aetherblades for as long as possible seemed like an organic game of optimal farming all on its own. I give this update a 7/10 because it was fun traveling all over to stop Scarlet's armies and get good lootstuffs at the same time.
The update after that was Super Adventure Box World 2. I wasn't really a big fan of World 2, but I did enjoy Tribulation Mode in World 1. No sarcasm: It was really fun dying 1,000 times the first day it came out, discovering the appropriate routes and hilarious hazards Anet put into the mode. However, after the first day, YouTube videos would be released of the paths in which to travel in Tribulation Mode, and that sort of deflated the pioneering experience. World 2 didn't keep my attention in any of the modes. 3/10 because this update mostly fell flat for me.
The update after that, however, was Tequatl Rising. A remastered bossfight sounds pretty light for a content update, but in practice, the new Tequatl fight turned out to be the single best PvE content in GW2. It's really the orchestral climax of what PvE in GW2 should be: Perfectly tuned difficulty, interesting dynamics that vary across the entire fight, multiple roles for all sorts of playstyles, rewards for playing with armor that wasn't Berserker, and rewards that reflect the effort and skill involved. Plus, unlike a lot of other updates, this fight is still around. New Tequatl is the thesis of what I want all of GW2 endgame content to be. I I think the only thing this patch was missing was a way to autokick AFK players in Sparkfly Fen. 10/10 because this is the best PvE fight in the game.
After this patch came Twilight Assault, which was basically a new hardcore dungeon path in Twilight Arbor. It's solid content, but only if you're playing with pals - and even then you probably want to be in a voice chat service of some sort. To be honest, this dungeon path isn't quite my style. Compared to type of difficulty present in the previous Tequatl Rising and Queen's Gauntlet patches, this seemed to be a different sort of difficult - one that required almost too careful of coordination in certain parts to try and work around dungeon puzzle mechanics that just seemed to be more of a pain in the ass than a fun experience. I give this patch a 5/10 - I ran this path probably 3 or 4 times and that was enough for me forever.
After that was Blood and Madness, which was the second coming of the Halloween content I basically missed the first time around. I liked the Halloween stuff here! Even the weird hide-and-seek zombie game was a hoot. I think I tried the Clock Tower jumping puzzle only a few times - I'm sure I'll get it next time after I dedicate some time to it. I remember this patch seemed to last forever, even after Halloween. Still, it was just good fun for the most part. I liked all the candy corn silliness and Mad King Says (even if the Mask you get for playing Mad King Says was sort of a let down). 7/10 because it was a lot of new content for me, and it was all decent fun.
After that point was Tower of Nightmares / Nightmares Within. I'll lump these both into one rating because my brain just remembers them as one big patch. The whole Kessex Hills transformation was really neat, and I look forward to Anet pushing the envelope into changing other familiar areas in the future (though I must assume it's hard to push the envelope any more than obliterating a zone like Lion's Arch). I really liked how this patch let me use my finishers on downed NPCs - something small like this shouldn't be a big deal but it makes me feel great every time I land one of these. The tower itself felt really fun to go up once, but I didn't really feel like getting to the top more than once either (at this point, I was pretty heavily invested into WvW, so the PvE content wasn't pulling away my attention too much anyway). I can tell you that I liked the Tower content much more than the new Twilight Arbor path, though. I'll give this patch a personal 7/10, though I didn't get as much out of this patch as I could've. I think this was a plentiful release for those that weren't into WvW as much as I was.
After this was a Fractals update patch. I don't really play Fractals so I can't comment on this update. Maybe I should get into Fractals, but honestly I can't see myself doing so until the carrots get a little more juicy. No rating
Then came the Wintersday patch, was was all good fun. I missed the first Wintersday patch, so there's a lot of stuff here I wasn't able to do the first time around. I love the present jumping puzzle, though the wintersday giftboxes seemed a bit tame in terms of what they awarded (so many ugly clothes tokens that really didn't give anything great). I also found out I'm terrible at the choir bell mini game. I liked Hoho-tron. This was just fun, themed content that filled space between the WvW I was heavily still into. 6/10, would Wintersday again.
After what seemed like ages thanks to the rate of updates that Anet has spoiled me with, the Origins of Madness update released. This update included two major new PvE bosses: The Great Wurm and Twisted Marionette. I've fought the Wurm a few times, but I think Anet overtuned the difficulty on this one. Tequatl hit such a sweet spot in terms of how hard content should be, but this fight just seems way harder. And way hard content is fine for tightly formed groups! But for entire servers, it's a level of difficulty that just appears to be asking too much. Twisted Marionette, however, was a wonderful fight. In fact, it's probably my second favorite PVE experience, right behind New Tequatl. I believe this fight also hit near perfection when it came to difficulty scaling. It got the entire server involved in big 'Tower Defense'-like gameplay, and the platform fighting has mechanics that are unique, but able to be overcome with wit and skill. My biggest problem with Twisted Marionette is that she isn't around anymore. Even with the Wurm being a difficulty misfire, I give this patch a 9/10.
After this patch was a big WvW update - hey, that's what I play most! Edge of the Mists came out and, at least for the first 2-3 weeks, was some of the most fun and focused WvW I've played in a while. The population of EotM thinning out since those first few weeks have exposed some Quality-of-Life issues in this mode - mainly, the Overflow system creating population imbalances at certain times, and the fact that the map is so damned big that getting to the action can take 10-15 minutes of walking, but I think these are things that can be fixed with small tweaks. If Anet evens out the Overflow system for EotM somehow and manages to create some sort of fair taxi system so players can get to the action faster, then this mode just may make standard WvW completely obsolete for me. Its mechanics already put the Borderlands maps into a state of feeling old and stale. A few QoL issues pull back my rating on this patch a bit and turn it into an 7/10 experience for me.
Then came Escape from Lion's Arch. What a great update! While there weren't any big-bads like Marionette or Tequatl to fight, seeing what they did with Lion's Arch was really a treat. I also think the way they kicked people out for 10 minutes at the end of every hour to 'regroup' and then pour in at the top of the next hour was great game design. The chaos of events happening and NPCs running around and people needing help was great. The 'gamey' part of it began to really show itself after a few days, but even that was okay because there were always things to do and folks to save and enemy clusters to fight at regular intervals. The way Anet eventually made 1200 the magic number of civilians to save was the highlight of this patch, and they made it really fun to work server-wide to help reach that tally to get an opportunity at some rare skins of patches-gone-by. I think this patch really delivered on everything it was supposed to be, but it took a tiny bit of rebalancing after it came out to get it right. This was a full on 10/10 two weeks of content.
After that came the Battle for Lion's Arch, and that brings us to present day. We're less than one full week in, so I don't want to give a full rating yet, but this update seems to have had more problems and glitches than previous updates. I'll have more to say when this patch is over.
And with this writeup, my time with Jury Duty is over and I'm dismissed! Off home to play GW2.
Engineers really get shafted when it comes to legendaries and backpieces.