So, as I stated earlier in the thread, now that the WvW tourney is over I wanted to create a new alt "for real" to see how the NPE is (rather than just a quick disposable one just to see what all the fuss was about).
I'm happy to report that Pilikia Facepunch, the Asuran Warrior, got to Level 15 in about 2 hours, with the content compass, tooltips and new level up rewards (gathering tools, back items, etc.) making to feel so so SO much better. And I say that as someone who enjoys being thrown to the wolves and figuring stuff out for myself (i.e. Dark Souls'ing it). Hearts give you almost a full level of XP until Level 10, and even at 15 they're still filling the bar pretty substantially (there is literally an explosion of golden sparkles that floods your XP bar). My only complaint is that the weapon slots do seem slow to unlock, but I get why they did it that way.
Oh, and Rata Sum map chat was having a creepy little discussion between people who like the Elin and can't understand what's so wrong with wanting to play as sexy children (one guy was lamenting how censored they were in the North American release too).
/shudder
Also GW2 heals feel satisfying, especially when you heal via blasts.
Not to mention the Rally system is a thousand times better than "Oh, you're dead, wait there on the ground until we wipe", especially when you Banner / Elixir R / etc. multiple people at once. That change alone makes GW2's entire heal / support system the best.
Add in dodging, self-healing responsibility and various pre-emptive support options (Aegis, Blind, etc.) and it's just.... so good. Somehow the stacking and zerker meta needs to be quietly invalidated, and that's going to have to come from solid encounter design. You can already see the little experimental steps towards that in the Living World chapters, nibbling about the edges.
