Hey, duders! As I didn't want to spam the forums with hype threads ala the pre-launch information, I'm going to attempt to gather official news, dev blogs, articles, particularly insightful analysis, and so on in a weekly HoT update. So let's get to that!

First and foremost, content designers Steve Hwang and Anthony Ordon will be on GW2's biweekly PvE livestream today to demo some of the environments and feature additions recently unveiled by ArenaNet. This is happening on the game's Twitch, here, at noon PST (an hour from this post). There will be a half-hour pre-show and post-show discussion by some community streamers, as well.

Two developer blogs were posted on Wednesday and Thursday. The first (by Anthony Ordon, Sean Hughes, and Matt Wuerffel) covers the initial experience players will encounter when they venture into the Heart of Maguuma, and emphasizes that map-wide event phases such as are found in Dry Top and the Silverwastes will be a focus for the expansion's new zones (with a nod to the assault on the ancient karka). Content hotspots known as "outposts" will be the centerpiece of these zones, wherein interlocking event chains around an area will contextualize a local narrative that progresses according to player success. Unlike the pass/fail chains that largely populate vanilla Tyria, performing well in these outpost events will mechanically advance the outpost itself with new types of NPCs, reward options, and opportunities to explore. In the secondary phase of each map, the progression of regional outposts will determine what resources are available for players to use in overcoming the challenges of a retaliatory environment.

"Adventures", on the other hand, are ArenaNet's solution for the exploratory downtime between events, during which you might now be starved for activity if you've already achieved map completion and conquered any local jumping puzzles. Depending on the development of nearby outposts, new adventures will unlock for play in the area. Essentially, these are semi-competitive PvE challenges that test your ability to perform a certain piece of content skillfully. This could include jumping puzzle time trials, brief mini-games, or activities similar to the ones currently available in-game. Upon completion, you'll be able to compare your score to those of your guildmates and friends.

Again, the blog made an allusion to more difficult content than players are used to, but it's hard to know what this means until we get some solid examples. Here's a trailer with dinosaurs!

Their second blog (credit to Crystin Cox and Nellie Hughes) explains in greater detail how masteries are meant to evolve the endgame experience of GW2, and how they will function. Upon reaching level 80, players will no longer accrue skill points at experience intervals as they do now. Instead, those who own Heart of Thorns will find that their progression bar changes to represent their current mastery training. At this point, the level indicator on your nameplate will also change to show the number of mastery points you've gathered. By selecting your mastery training bar, you will open a mastery tray that allows you to both unlock new mastery tracks with the points you possess or switch your training to another mastery track that you've opened. Specific tracks could grant you anything from knowledge of languages that will reveal hidden locations and enemy vulnerabilities, to jump pads spread throughout the environment, to collection achievements that will earn you a legendary precursor. The blog delves especially into the hang-gliding mastery and how advancing it will affect your access to new content.

At the launch of HoT, there will be two regions in the game: core Tyria, and Heart of Maguuma. Each mastery track is associated with a specific region, and can only be progressed while you adventure through the zones within it. Mastery points, themselves, will be obtained from accomplishments relating to story, exploration, map completion, boss encounters, achievements, and so on.

There was an IGN article published on Tuesday, which mostly relays information from the expansion's unveiling and the two blog posts. They use the Metroid call-out, so there's that.

Lastly, it's been announced that Heart of Thorns will make a playable premiere at both PAX East and EGX Rezzed. I know @shinboy630 has his PAX tickets locked up, already, and it'd be interesting to hear some reactions from you community attendees!

I welcome any feedback y'all may have regarding this update-thing. Suggestions for other writing? Other video? Should I eat a butt? Leave your comments!

EGX Rezzed is the weekend before my revision week otherwise I would go there and check this out. Oh well.

Yup, I am running right to Anet at the start of PAX (keynote be damned!), so hopefully I will get to play a decent chunk of what they have.

So, the livestream didn't showcase much new content, directly, but we got a few things from it.

• A couple of new types of mordrem enemies, including humanoid "guards" and a wurm-like "breacher" that spawns additional mobs.
• Some enemies were able to dodge, seemingly in response to a certain DPS threshold.
• The defiance mechanic may have been reworked to give greater flexibility to PvE crowd-control. My best guess is that the blue bar will empty (or fill) as CC hits the enemy - likely scaling with players - and trigger a period of total immunity when it's depleted.

• An event involving Laranthir and the Pale Reavers taking up a sniper position on a cliff to pick off mordrem below.

• You appear to have automated speech bubbles after giving certain dialogue responses to NPCs. Perhaps the player character will be voiced for events.
• Showcase of an adventure in which you equip a flamethrower to burn as many mordrem vines out of a crashed Pact airship as you're able to within the time limit.

• There's a quick way to reset adventures through the UI, likely for high-score attempts.
• The map they were in was named The Verdant Brink, and looks to be directly west of the current Maguuma Wastes.

• A profession symbol for the revenant (hooray for iconography).

• What appears to be another F-key skill for the warrior. Maybe to do with their specialization?

There will be another PoI next Wednesday to discuss masteries, and show off some hang-gliding. Also, during the World Tournament Series stream tomorrow, there will be a demonstration of the new Stronghold PvP game-type for each NA and EU.

My Sylvari Warrior needs to find Caithe. I needs to find her!

In the meantime, I'm just going to clear out zones on my neglected characters before this expansion comes out.

@insane_shadowblade85: I don't know. Caithe's probably hiding because she's realized that every time she shows up, there's a boss fight.

Revenant icon! Squeee!!