Ellen Kiel has done it! After being supported by players in her bid for a seat on the Captain’s Council of Lion’s Arch, Kiel has made good on her campaign promises – specifically, the promise to head up Mists research into the mysteries behind the disaster at the Thaumanova Reactor.

Today’s release brings in three new fractals, two new boss fractals, and improvements and updates to many core Fractals of the Mists systems.

LIVING WORLD

Fractured

Five New Fractals

• Three standard fractals:
  • Thaumanova Reactor: Embark on a brand-new historical adventure, and travel to the ill-fated power facility moments before it explodes. As the fractal scale increases, more potential outcomes will unlock.
  • Molten Weapons Testing: Accompany Braham and Rox through this epic retelling of the Molten Facility dungeon.
  • Aetherblade Retreat: Join Ellen Kiel as she fights off Aetherblade pirates in a fragment of the Aetherblade Retreat dungeon.
• Two boss-tier fractals:
  • Molten Retribution: Battle the legendary bosses from the Molten Facility dungeon in this boss-tier fractal.
  • Sky Pirates: Relive the challenge of Captain Mai Trin and First Mate Horrik.

Story

• As promised during her campaign run for the Captain’s Council seat, Ellen Kiel has begun her investigation of the Thaumanova Reactor disaster in the Mistlock Observatory.
• Players can complete the special story-mode version of this fractal when they enter the Fractals of the Mists for the first time during this release.

Mistlock Instabilities

• Tampering with the Mistlock Observatory to target specific moments in time has destabilized the Mistlock process. Consequently, unique Mistlock Instabilities will begin occurring on fractal level 31.
• Mistlock Instabilities are special modifiers that have various effects on players and their party’s journey through the fractals. These can be anything from simple conditions to insidious extra creature attacks.

Improvements to Agony Resistance/Infused Gear

• All infused ascended equipment now has a special infusion slot for Agony Resistance infusions.
• Agony Resistance infusions can be found in fractal reward chests.
• All existing, infused ascended equipment has a +5 Agony Resistance infusion in the Agony Resistance slot by default, in place of the natural +5 Agony Resistance.
  • Agony Resistance infusions provide +1 or more Agony Resistance.
  • Artificers can combine two identical Agony Resistance infusions with a Thermocatalytic Reagent to create a single, more powerful Agony Resistance infusion.
• Newly created or dropped infused ascended equipment will have empty Agony Resistance slots.

General Fractal Improvements

• Fractal selection is now based on the number of fractals the party has completed on the current run. Longer, more difficult fractals are less likely to be selected as the first fractal of the level.
• Every fractal level now ends with a boss-tier fractal. The Solid Ocean, Molten Retribution, and Sky Pirates fractals are all in this category.
• Unshakable creatures will no longer receive more than 5 stacks of the defiance boon in the fractals.
• The difficulty scaling for fractals has been adjusted. Enemy health, damage, and count now scale more gradually.
• Agony damage has also been reduced at several levels.
• Fractal level 50 is now possible, even with excessive agony damage. However, the fractals are temporarily capped at level 50. Additional levels will become available in the future.
• Fractal progress is now account-wide.
• Numerous bug fixes and balance changes have been made to previously available fractals.

Fractal Leaderboards

• With this release, players will be able to track their progress on a new leaderboard that displays their fractal rank.
• In the case of a tie, the first player to achieve that rank will be listed higher.
• The leaderboard will be posted on GuildWars2.com once they have been populated with enough data.

Rewards

• Daily coin rewards for fractal completion are now more consistent with other dungeons. There are now separate daily rewards per every ten levels of the fractals (1–10, 11–20, and so on).
• The Fractal weapons have been converted to weapon skins.
• Recipes for a new rune and a new sigil will now drop exclusively in the fractals:
  • Superior Rune of Resistance grants bonus toughness, a reduction in condition duration, and aegis upon using a signet.
  • Superior Sigil of Momentum grants a stacking toughness bonus on kills.
• Completing the Fractured meta-achievement awards the player a bag of ascended crafting materials.

Achievements

• Completing a fractal will fulfill a daily achievement each day of the Fractured release.
• Each unique fractal completed during the Fractured release will fulfill a corresponding Living World achievement.
• The Fractured meta-achievement requires players to complete a combination of 11 daily fractals and/or unique fractal achievements.

Exotic Drop

• The Endless Fractal Tonic is an endless transformation tonic that allows players to temporarily appear to be various creatures from the Fractals of the Mists dungeons. The tonic is more likely to drop at higher fractal levels.

The Nightmares Within

Rewards

• The Tri-key Chest has been updated to include more loot bags, more Dragonite Ore, and a chance at Scrolls of Knowledge and Tomes of Knowledge.
• The Toxic Hybrid will now drop a piece of the Tricolor Key every time he is defeated.
• Sergeant Walters, located in the base of the Tower of Nightmares, will now accept players’ Pristine Toxic Spore Samples for the Toxic Spore Sampler achievement. She will accept extra Pristine Toxic Spore Samples as trade for various new crafting recipes, Tricolor Key pieces, and the Antitoxin Spray healing skill.

NEW FEATURES AND CONTENT

World vs. World

• A new area has been added to the Obsidian Sanctum jumping puzzle!
  • The Borderlands Bloodlust effect has been disabled in Obsidian Sanctum.
  • Players can now enter Obsidian Sanctum directly from the drop-down menu of the WvW panel.

Items

• Additional recipes for ascended back-item pieces have been added to the Mystic Forge for players who don’t play the fractals.
  • All of the ascended back-item pieces that required 1 vial of Condensed Mists Essence can now be forged with Bloodstone Dust instead.
  • A total of eight recipes have been added.

BALANCE, BUG-FIXING, POLISH

General

• Sylvari cultural armor updates—light tier 1 (female only), light tier 3, medium tier 2, and medium tier 3: textures, specularity, and dye channels have been predominantly restored to the state before the last update, while balancing them to work with the glow material.
  • For the medium tier 2 leggings, the dye-to-skin area was largely combined to a supporting channel to give full texture and glow-color control. The armor-glow shader has been tweaked to allow full saturation range of the glow color, as will be dictated by the saturation of the texture. This shader affects all plantlike sylvari armors that have glow: sylvari cultural, Nightmare Court, and sylvari town clothes.

Items

• Gathering tools can no longer be unequipped while gathering.

Profession Skills

Elementalist

• Fire Shield: The aura of this skill now applies to 5 targets when traited with Powerful Aura, up from 4.
• Shocking Aura: The aura of this skill now applies to 5 targets when traited with Powerful Aura, down from 6.
• Zephyr’s Speed: This trait now always grants movement speed while attuned to air and also functions with Lingering Elements.
• Stone Flesh: This trait now always grants toughness while attuned to earth and also functions with Lingering Elements.
• Signet of Air: The tooltip now displays the proper movement-speed increase of the boon when this skill has been activated while traited with Written in Stone.
• Stop, Drop, and Roll: This trait will now only go on cooldown when burning or chilled is removed.
• Soothing Mist: Updated the skill fact to indicate the correct rate at which Soothing Mist is applied.
• Healing Ripple: This trait now indicates the correct healing amount when in a PvP map.
• Ether Renewal: Adjusted the skill fact to better describe the functionality of this skill.

Engineer

• Tool Kit
  • Throw Wrench: Removed the healing functionality from this skill. It now applies 2 stacks of vulnerability each time it hits an enemy.
  • Smack: Added a turret-healing fact.
  • Whack: Added a turret-healing fact.
  • Thwack: Added a turret-healing fact.
• Power Wrench: Updated the description and skill fact to indicate the actual functionality of this skill.
• Poison Grenade: These grenades now display a red ring for enemies and a combo ring for allies.
• Grenade Barrage: This skill now launches 7 grenades when traited with Grenadier, instead of having a 50% chance to launch 6 or 8 grenades. These grenades now display a red ring for enemies and a white ring for allies.
• Autotool Installation: Updated the trait fact to indicate the correct amount of health restored to turrets.
• Automated Medical Response: This trait now recharges Antitoxin Spray, the human racial skill Prayer to Dwayna, and the sylvari racial skill Healing Seed.
• Rifled Turret Barrels: The range bonus has been increased to 50%. Several turret abilities have been modified to reflect this change.
• Rifle Turret: The range has been increased from 1400 to 1500 when traited with Rifled Turret Barrels.
  • Automatic Fire: This skill is now affected by Rifled Turret Barrels.
• Harpoon Turret: The range has been increased from 1400 to 1500 when traited with Rifled Turret Barrels.
  • Automatic Fire: This skill is now affected by Rifled Turret Barrels.
• Flame Turret: The base range has been increased from 450 to 500. The range has been increased from 600 to 750 when traited with Rifled Turret Barrels.
  • Smoke Screen: This skill now functions with Rifled Turret Barrels, increasing its radius from 240 to 360.
• Net Turret—Electrified Net: This skill now functions with Rifled Turret Barrels, launching at foes up to a 900 range (previously 600) when traited.
• Rocket Turret: The base range has been lowered from 1200 to 1000. The range when traited with Rifled Turret Barrels remains at 1500.
  • Explosive Rockets: This skill now functions with Rifled Turret Barrels, increasing its range from 1000 to 1500.
• Thumper Turret—Thump: This skill now functions with Rifled Turret Barrels, increasing its radius from 240 to 360.

Guardian

• Symbol of Protection: This symbol now has the appropriate duration increase when traited with Writ of Persistence.
• Purging Flames: Updated the skill fact to show the correct condition duration reduction (33%).
• “Stand Your Ground!”: Added a skill fact for number of targets.
• Binding Jeopardy: Facts from this trait will now show up on skills that immobilize.
• Ring of Warding: Added a skill fact for the light field generated by this skill.

Mesmer

• Phantasmal Warden: This phantasm will now properly try to enter the attack range of its target before using its skill.
• Imbued Diversion: Added a radius trait fact.
• Empowered Illusions: This trait now indicates a damage increase for phantasms.
• Illusionary Duelist: This skill no longer indicates a loss of damage when traited with Empowered Illusions.
• Vortex: Updated the range indicator to use the proper range. Added a radius skill fact. Added a skill fact for initial pull radius.

Necromancer

• Putrid Mark: Changed the description to match the actual functionality of this skill.
• Marks: Fixed an issue that caused staff marks to go on full cooldown when aborted/interrupted.
• Shadow Fiend—Haunt: Updated the blind skill fact to display the proper duration.

Ranger

• Kick: Adjusted the range fact on this skill to match the proper attack range.
• Frost Spirit: Decreased the hit-point value of the underwater version of this spirit to be consistent with the land version. Summoning the spirit will now put its activated skill on a 1-second cooldown; this will fix an issue that caused the skill to begin recharging without firing when activated immediately.
• Stone Spirit: Decreased the hit-point value of the underwater version of this spirit to be consistent with the land version. Summoning the spirit will now put its activated skill on a 1-second cooldown; this will fix an issue that caused the skill to begin recharging without firing when activated immediately.
• Storm Spirit: Decreased the hit-point value of the underwater version of this spirit to be consistent with the land version. Summoning the spirit will now put its activated skill on a 1-second cooldown; this will fix an issue that caused the skill to begin recharging without firing when activated immediately.
• Sun Spirit: Decreased the hit-point value of the underwater version of this spirit to be consistent with the land version. Summoning the spirit will now put its activated skill on a 1-second cooldown; this will fix an issue that caused the skill to begin recharging without firing when activated immediately.
• Spirit of Nature: Added radius and time-interval skill facts. Decreased the hit-point value of the underwater version of this spirit to be consistent with the land version. Summoning the spirit will now put its activated skill on a 1-second cooldown; this will fix an issue that caused the skill to begin recharging without firing when activated immediately.
• Signet of the Wild: Rangers will now be able to interact with objects when they use the active portion of the signet and have Signet of the Beastmaster traited.
• Mercy Shot: Fixed an issue with the trait fact that caused multiple damage facts of the same type to appear.
• Eagle Eye: This trait now indicates the damage increase in its facts.
• Sharpened Edges: Fixed a bug that caused this trait to display an incorrect chance on critical hit.
• Intimidation Training: Updated this trait to display on the activated abilities for the Jungle Spider and Black Widow pets.
• Hide in Plain Sight: Added a camouflage trait fact.

Thief

• Basilisk Venom: This stun will now apply after a strike, instead of on a strike, to prevent crowd-control attacks (like Headshot) from overriding the stun.
• Cluster Bomb: The bleeding skill fact now displays the proper bleed stack and duration. Added a radius skill fact.
• Fire Cluster Bomb: Added skill facts to describe the functionality of this skill.
• Smoke Bomb: Removed the old shadowstep fact.
• Fleet of Foot: The conditions will now be removed at the beginning of the dodge roll instead of at the end. This trait will now only go on cooldown when crippled or weakness is removed.
• Potent Poison: Updated the thief skills that caused poison to reflect the extended duration that this trait applies.

Warrior

• “Fear Me!”: Replaced the range fact with a radius fact.
• “For Great Justice!”: Replaced the range fact with a radius fact.
• “Shake It Off!”: Replaced the range fact with a radius fact. Added a skill fact for removed conditions.
• “On My Mark!”: This skill will now properly use a 1200 range.
• Vigorous Focus: Fixed a bug that was granting 8 seconds of vigor on stance use instead of the intended 6 seconds. Skills affected: Balanced Stance, Endure Pain, and Berserker’s Stance.
• Fast Hands: This trait will no longer trigger a 5-second recharge when swapping to or from bundles.
• Earthshaker: Fixed a bug where this skill would occasionally fail to consume adrenaline.

World vs. World

• Borderlands Bloodlust no longer applies to NPCs.
• Town clothes and toys have been disabled in WvW.
• Fixed a bug preventing some players from unlocking the WvW Dawn of the Season achievement.

Structured Player vs. Player

• The ratings for matchmaking and leaderboard standings in PvP have been reset.

BLACK LION TRADING COMPANY GEM STORE

New Items and Promotions

• Flamekissed light-armor skins, Flamewalker medium-armor skins, and Flamewrath heavy-armor skins are now available in the Style category of the Gem Store. These fiery armor skins can be purchased for 800 gems each.
• WXP Boosters continue to be 10% off until the end of WvW season 1. WXP Boosters can be purchased from the Gem Store in the Boosts category for 135 gems each or 495 gems for a pack of 5.