Defiance

September 4 and I’m still GW:EN-less.

Apparently there was a mix-up of some sorts resulting in a delay getting the game to local stores. I doubt I’ll be getting it by post before Saturday at the earliest. I’m a little disappointed but I did manage to play quite a bit of the expansion during the preview so I’m not as annoyed by this as I would otherwise be.

The Far Shiverpeaks may be inaccessible to me for the time being but I’m still adventuring in Tyria. I’m currently occupying myself by playing Prophecies missions in Hard Mode. Having acquired the Guardian of Cantha title last week, I’m now aiming for the Guardian of Tyria title.

On the face of it, acquiring the Guardian of Tyria title should be an easier task than obtaining the Canthan equivalent. With a few exceptions, time isn’t of the essence in Prophecies missions and it’s possible to do the bonus separately for a number of missions in the campaign.

The thing about Prophecies missions that I find off-putting, however, is they’re lengthy. Some of the mission environments are large, which is nice when you’re exploring them for the first time, but a major pain when you’re replaying for the umpteenth time.

Spark of trouble

I completed Hell’s Precipice yesterday to make it 12/25 towards the Guardian of Tyria title. My first attempt ended prematurely at the 15 minute mark after I learnt the Death Penalty way just how deadly Spark of the Titans were in Hard Mode.

The Sparks pack Mind Burn and Rodgort’s Invocation, two fast recharging spells that hit hard and cause rapid health degeneration in the form of burning. The bottom line is one Spark is trouble, three is potentially a party wipe.

I then spent the next 10 minutes in the mission outpost looking over skills trying to think of ways to cope with those infernal imps. After giving the problem some thought, I changed my Ritualist Hero, Razah, from damage dealer to damage mitigation.

Displacement would help the party avoid taking hits in the first place while Shelter and Union would help reduce the damage incurred to levels my healers would find manageable. Those protective spirits don’t last long but they don’t need to; their main purpose is to absorb the brunt of the initial assault and give the party enough time to fire back.

But Displacement, Shelter and Union were secondary to the one Ritualist skill that would help me beat the mission.

Standing defiant

The key skill on Razah’s skillbar would be Defiant Was Xinrae. This is an item spell which means the Ritualist would be left carrying an urn after the spell is cast. Nothing says badass like someone carrying a vase on the battlefield, eh, ArenaNet?

Anyway, Defiant Was Xinrae.

As you can gather, spells used against the Ritualist when Xinrae’s ashes are held are disabled but crucially, Defiant Was Xinrae also disables the same spells for all allies of the enemy caster. If one Spark of the Titans uses Mind Burn against Razah, Mind Burn would be disabled for up to 21 seconds for every foe in the mob. This would theoretically render the Sparks almost impotent as soon as one of them cut loose on Razah.

And since the item spell has a short recharge and a very short cast time, Razah could keep it up indefinitely.

What I would do was have Razah plonk down Shelter, Union and Displacement, cast Defiant Was Xinrae then move into aggro range of the Sparks. As soon as the imps targeted vase-carrying dork, the trap would be sprung.

There were still several dicey moments during the mission when the party had to retreat after near-wipes caused by miscalculation on my part but I managed to beat the mission and earn the bonus in about 90 minutes.

Thank you, Xinrae, wherever you might be.

I’m not sure why you were deemed defiant — attended a Barry Manilow concert even though parents expressly forbade it? — but I’m glad you were.

Mad skillz

The above pretty much encapsulates what I love about Guild Wars. No, not the part about running around with a vase. The part with the skills and tactics.

Guild Wars can be a tough game at times. There are some spikes in difficulty during the PvE campaigns that might put off some gamers. The previously mentioned Thunderhead Keep is one such spike in the Prophecies campaign.

But If you put some thought into it, play around with your skillbar and try some tactics instead of charging blindly forward, you’ll find the game immensely satisfying.

But even with two years of experience, even after playing through missions multiple times with multiple characters, even with well-equipped Heroes, there are still missions which I find impossible.

Dunes of Despair

Dunes of Despair is one of the Ascension mission in the Prophecies campaign. It can be difficult for inexperienced players in Normal Mode because it comes at an awkward time in the campaign. Players would likely have tissue paper for armour and very few game-beating skills.

Experienced players, on the other hand, would probably find it the easiest of the three Ascension missions. In fact, it can be downright dull during the last few minutes of the mission. This is true even in Hard Mode.

The bonus objective presents something of a challenge. The reason the bonus is difficult is it requires you to accomplish two tasks simultaneously: kill three bosses and keep the Ghostly Hero alive. It can be tricky in Normal Mode but in Hard Mode it seems impossible with a Hero/henchman team. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out a way to do it.

My Hero/henchmen team could kill the three bosses or keep the Ghostly Hero alive but doing both simultaneously was too much of an ask. I tried it many times over several sessions during the weekend before I finally gave up and resignedly went with the only alternative available: using an exploit.

The exploit requires a corpse, the Necromancer skill Necrotic Traversal (or alternatively, Consume Corpse) and suicide. It’s detailed on the official wiki and while that may not necessarily mean ArenaNet approves of it, it perhaps means ArenaNet doesn’t disapprove of it.

Regardles of the official stance on the exploit, I felt a little disgusted resorting to this and later helped two players get the mission and bonus in Normal Mode to atone. I hope to eventually finish this hard Hard Mode mission the straightforward way.

I know it’s beatable; I just need to party up with other players to do it.