I'm super cool right now, yo. Not overwhelmed or anything. Here's something you may want to see; I dunno.

(uncompressed version here)

Fuck. Yes.

Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns is the first expansion pack for the 2012 MMO, and as of now, these new features have been announced (additional art behind the spoilers):

• Masteries: These seem to be a refinement of the skill points currently found across Tyria. Specific challenges will accrue you some resource that you'll be able to spend on post-80 character progression. This includes hang-gliding, lost language translation, and the creation of legendary precursors.

• Specializations: Described as similar to GW1's secondary profession system, profession specializations will allow you to further branch your character's playstyle with the availability of a new weapon, unique traits, and a different set of utility skills.

• The Revenant: A third heavy armor profession, the revenant will channel the spirits of powerful figures from the world's history to alter their abilities.

• The Heart of the Maguuma: Following the obliteration of the Pact airfleet, your character will travel into the deepest regions of the Maguuma Jungle in search of a way to defeat the Elder Dragon, Mordremoth. Three primary environments are to be featured: the jungle core, the roots, and the canopy.

• Guild Halls: You know what these are! Besides a place for your guild to gather, socialize, and form groups, it sounds as though you'll be able to evolve your hall over time. #LincolnForceRevengeance

• Stronghold PvP: A new game-type for player vs. player, the focus of this mode will be the building of NPC resources to assault your opposition's fortification. It will probably be incredibly similar to GW1's GvG, and the addition of guild leaderboards bolsters that notion.

• New WvW Borderland: An additional borderland map will be added to a world vs. world rotation, centering around vertical map design and mechanics unique to each keep you control. This is likely the result of testing ArenaNet did with the implementation of the Edge of the Mists in 2014.

Find further details and updates at the official site.

similar thoughts Jack, exciting to hear but not super hyped. Eager to hear more though for sure

No new class? Where is my fucking Dervish from GW1

Yup. I'm back in.

Gimmie a date goddamnit!

@slyspider: The Revenant is the new class (professions = classes).

Nice, this will actually make me play it longer than a day every two weeks like I've been doing with the living story stuff. I'm more excited to just explore a new area that isn't just a small section of a zone.

@thurbleton: I'm actually pretty pumped, but my irony game is off.

No Tengu? C'MON.

I'm gonna buy this and I'm gonna hate every minute of it. But it looks SUPER PRETTY and the new class stuff sounds like it might be fun for a time, so I'll be there when it launches.

just a few updates

While there is no new class they're doing what looks like the different class system from Destiny. The example they made was a Ranger could become a Druid completely changing the playstyle. (and like @theht said it seems to be through this new profession)

As for a date - there will be a playable build at Pax East
Also NCSoft the publisher said during a report to shareholders they foresee a big spike in profits from Arena Net during Q3... maybe that is just preorder but still this seems pretty close.

Lastly Colin Brohanson (worlds 2nd best smile next to Brad Muir) said ANet will be doing "Deep Dives" focusing on the various aspects of the expansion in regular intervals in the coming weeks.
What I translate that as is blog posts and them talking about it ever other week on their Points of Interest show they do on twitch (which as far as game developer streams go, isn't to shabby) which you can just watch the vods on youtube a few days later.

@theht: I'm just going to sit in my corner so I don't hurt myself with my own stupidity lol. Thanks for the clarification

To clarify: the new "class" is the revenant. Presumably, the revenant will also receive its own specializations separate from those of other professions.

@slyspider You are correct - there is no new class. They're just making another playstyle for each existing class (and hopefully letting each class access a new weapon type. Some people are theorizing thieves getting rifles as 'assassins').

While this is still a challenge balance wise, I imagine adding a entirely new class to the pot would be even more of a headache
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so dont sweat it

The revenant is basically a ritualist from the first game that allows you to channel NPCs from the first.game. I'm pretty impressed by how blatantly fanservicey it is and it's probably my favorite part of the announcement.

ummmmmmmmmmmmm. Revenant is a new class.

Yeah. The specialization system seems pretty much like sub-classes (or sub-professions). Each profession will be able to specialize in a way that opens up new weapon types for that profession, new skills, and it sounded like even profession ability might change as well. In the trailer you can already see a Mesmer using a sword and shield, an Engineer using a hammer, and a Ranger using a staff.

The Revenant is a full-on new profession, and sounds pretty awesome. Almost like a heavy armor summoner (or... invoker?), but without pets. You channel the power of a specific legend from GW lore and it changes your skills. Also, it looked like he was whacking an enemy with a staff. I really, really hope it's actually a new polearm weapon type.

Pretty excited about this news actually. I may have missed it but any word on pricing?

Oh guess I was wrong, the intro was tough to follow with all the presenter jargon... so does revenant have its own sub-class as well?

@bedouin no word of pricing (or even release date) Wager standard 50-60 dollars USD. I do know this weekend they're running a 75% off sale for the base game if anyone is on the fence or has friends... and just a reminder that is it for having to pay... no sub and while the cash shop has useful items it is definitely not pay to win / pay to fix (apart from buying the expansion of course)

@bedouin: Nothing yet outside of the fact that it will be a paid expansion.

Very exciting. Guild Wars 2 is quite good even for as flawed as some parts of it are.

@raios: @thurbleton: Thanks!

If this announcement has you thinking you should pick up/get back into the game, might I suggest the Giant Bomb guild, over here!

There's a few additional details in this interview by Massively. Specifically,

• the living world is for-sure continuing in the wake of HoT
• mastery points will be implemented throughout existing zones, as well
• they're aiming to have guilds of all sizes be able to progress a guild hall

EDIT: Additionally, John Ryan has mentioned that guild halls will have some sort of narrative arc.

Have the PvE got more interesting and less zergy? Is Mesmer still awful at getting credit in events? Many things drove me away from the game. I also get that they will never move away from "everyone are DPS" but are conditions and buff more useful and needed? Basically, is it still a game that is only fun if you enjoy mindless DPSing while waiting for massive healthbars to slowly trickle down.

Furthermore, did they move away from single fire events that were always super laggy and you would pretty much always miss forever if you had a life outside of videogames?

@gike987: Okay, it's difficult to respond effectively to super-loaded language, but I'll try to answer as well as I can.

Open-world content: less zergy? Not really, though usually the zerg will have to split to complete larger meta events. More interesting? Yes, they really stepped their game up with encounter design starting midway through Season 1. While many random boss spawns in the new zones are still walking DPS magnets, they'll generally share some mechanics with basic enemies that break up the pacing of the fight. Gated fights and newer world bosses, however, demand that you watch what the hell you're doing if you don't want to end up a useless pile of slush. Scaling has also been tuned, so you're far less likely to obliterate a boss in four seconds and also less likely to have to stand around and feed it DPS for fifteen minutes.

I haven't gotten my mesmer to 80, but from what I've seen its staff, greatsword, and main-hand sword skills could each be sufficient for tagging in large events. Again, I just don't have a lot of experience with it.

Condis and boons aren't inherently more effective than they were at launch (though there are more to apply, and a confusion buff is coming to PvE this month), but there are instances where they're necessitated to perform well in an encounter. For instance: during the Triple Trouble world boss, enemies known as husks - incredibly high toughness; low vitality - will continuously spawn as take virtually zero damage from power specs. A well-coordinated team of condition users will be able to mitigate these enemies, however. Husks also feature heavily in the Maguuma Wastes, though they aren't quite so impervious there. Upkeeping stability and stacking might also become incredibly important for a zerg in more-challenging content. Note that I've mained a condi damage + might stacking spec for a while, now, and no content has really felt out of reach.

The last truly lag-hindered event was the Southsun update in Nov. 2012! They've both bettered server architecture and refined design such that load isn't really a problem other than when some group or another decides to try and DDOS game devs. Time-limited content is sort of relevant, still, in that various NPCs, pieces of dialogue, and environmental cues in the open world only stay for a few weeks at a time. That was part of their promise when initially building the game, though, so I don't see it being a huge surprise. Season 2 of the living world campaign does add permanent story instances to the game, though, which arrive in chapters that are free if you log in during the two weeks they're active and cost $2.50 otherwise.

If you're indeed looking for information, I hope that helped.

Interesting. I wonder if that stuff'll be free for original players, or if you'll need the expansion to take advantage of all of them.

@jack_lafayette: Cool, I'm ready to give the game another chance. The game and hype surrounding it burned me pretty hard, so I told myself that I would never play it again. Although the expansion announcement got me kind of interested again as I liked everything about the game except the group combat. It will probably still be weird to not be able to play as a healer but if the encounters these days are indeed better designed maybe I will be able to enjoy it.

More news from around the interview circuit:

• 80 will be the level cap for the lifespan of the game; ascended gear will remain best-in-slot
• new masteries and mastery points will be added with living world releases
• revenant channels will somehow affect your healing, utility, and elite skills; I expect this will resemble elementalist attunements to an extent
• changes will be made to WvW mechanics to increase the relevance of defending your held objectives
• one Stronghold map will be implemented at launch; match sizes haven't yet been determined but it's sounding like 5-8 players per team
• guild halls will physically exist in the world map, unlike in GW1 (perhaps some sort of phasing mechanic?)