Earlier today, ArenaNet released their second developer diary for Guild Wars 2: Path of Fire. As the title would indicate, this particular developer diary decided to focus on a major addition to the series, mounts. Sure, you'll be able to move around on them, but they are so much more than that.
That seems to be a bit of a different take on the role of mounts in an MMO, which seems rather neat.
It’s All about the Mounts
During testing, we found that manually dismounting to attack foes felt clunky and bad. We developed engage skills—offensive skills that allow your mounts to engage in battle—for an awesome, smooth transition between riding and combat. You can ride straight up to enemies and use these skills to damage them, setting you up for battle, or you can aid allies as you dismount.
Your mounts each have their own stats and health bar, which allows us to play up their different strengths and to balance engage skills without the need to take character stats or gear into account. If your mount’s health reaches zero, you’ll be forcibly dismounted, but your character will be at full health.
Upgrading Your Mounts
We felt that gliding Masteries were a good example of meaningful upgrades that progressed alongside you as you played—you unlocked something awesome and then made it even more awesome. In Guild Wars 2: Path of Fire, you’ll gain access to a Mastery line for each mount you unlock. These lines are filled with improvements to the engage skills and movement abilities, along with some other goodies. When you unlock the final Mastery tier for a single mount, the first Mastery unlock is then shared across all mounts. That way, you’re earning progress for your favorite mount as you max out the other mount lines.
During testing, we found that manually dismounting to attack foes felt clunky and bad. We developed engage skills—offensive skills that allow your mounts to engage in battle—for an awesome, smooth transition between riding and combat. You can ride straight up to enemies and use these skills to damage them, setting you up for battle, or you can aid allies as you dismount.
Your mounts each have their own stats and health bar, which allows us to play up their different strengths and to balance engage skills without the need to take character stats or gear into account. If your mount’s health reaches zero, you’ll be forcibly dismounted, but your character will be at full health.
Upgrading Your Mounts
We felt that gliding Masteries were a good example of meaningful upgrades that progressed alongside you as you played—you unlocked something awesome and then made it even more awesome. In Guild Wars 2: Path of Fire, you’ll gain access to a Mastery line for each mount you unlock. These lines are filled with improvements to the engage skills and movement abilities, along with some other goodies. When you unlock the final Mastery tier for a single mount, the first Mastery unlock is then shared across all mounts. That way, you’re earning progress for your favorite mount as you max out the other mount lines.
That seems to be a bit of a different take on the role of mounts in an MMO, which seems rather neat.