Queen’s Jubilee
6th August, 2013
A celebration of ten years of Queen Jennah’s rule is about to kick off in Divinity’s Reach! The queen has commissioned a new gladiatorial arena for the occasion—the Crown Pavilion—as a shining symbol of her people’s endurance.
Take a hot air balloon ride with dignitaries from across Tyria to the capital of the Krytan nation, and be there for the opening ceremony. Join in the festivities and compete in ceremonial combat in Her Majesty’s honor!
Events
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Developer Livestream – 5th August
Enjoy an early look at the Queen’s Jubilee release with ArenaNet devs during the preview livestream on our Twitch channel on Monday 5th August at 9PM CEST.
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Hot Air Balloons – Begins 6th August
Need a lift to Divinity’s Reach? The Queen’s court has sent out hot air balloons to transport celebrants! Find one of these balloons out in the open world, and use it to find the party in short order.
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The Opening Ceremony – Begins 6th August
In honor of her Jubilee, Queen Jennah is opening a new gladiatorial arena! Attend the dedication of the Crown Pavilion arena and watch its inaugural contest!
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Ignite the Beacons – Begins 6th August
Special Beacons of Kryta, symbols of humanity’s hope, have been set up in Divinity’s Reach. Take a torch from a torchbearer, then race around a course to light all of the Beacons of Kryta!
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Enter the Crown Pavilion – Begins 6th August
Test yourself in an entirely new mini-zone featuring mighty representations of humanity’s enemies. By representing various cities of Tyria, you can be named champion of a nation and gain access to unique reward vendors.
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Fight in the Queen’s Gauntlet – Begins 6th August
In the special Queen’s Gauntlet, you will face increasingly difficult challenges of
single-combat against unique bosses. Cheer on your friends or show off your skills to the world. Take a risk with special gambit conditions to earn even more
prestigious rewards!
New Rewards
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Watchwork Mechanisms
Watchwork tech is the latest and greatest innovation in Tyria. Watchwork parts can be used in new crafting recipes or as currency in the Crown Pavilion to buy items like new rune and sigil recipes, or the new Sovereign Weapon Set. You might even find the recipe to assemble a Watchwork Portal Device, allowing you to create a personal portal!
A Guide to Queen’s Jubilee
Want to know how to get started? Check out our spoiler-free mini-guide to this release!
New Gem Store Items
Royal Terrace Pass
Get two weeks of unlimited access to the Royal Terrace, where you’ll find gates to other capital cities, crafting stations, merchants, and a magician!
Jubilee Mask Skins
Celebrate in style with three new mask skins – the Mask of the Queen, Crown, or Jubilee – that can be applied to headgear of any armor weight!
Permanent Finishers
Make your enemies rue the day they met you with one of our new Permanent Finishers! Use the Cow, Spectrew, Thornroot, or Whump the Giant Finishers to trounce your enemies with flair.
Copper-Fed Salvage-o-Matic
The new Salvage-o-Matic has a 10% chance of salvaging rarer materials and a 20% chance of recovering upgrades. This chatty salvage kit consumes just three copper per salvage and is guaranteed to never break down.
New Features
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Account Wallet for Currency
Keep all of your currencies in one easy-to-find location! This Wallet holds dungeon tokens, coins, karma, laurels, Guild Commendations, Fractal Relics, Badges of Honor, gems, and glory and makes them accessible to any character on your account. Upon logging in with each unique character for the first time after the Wallet has gone live, that character will have all of their currencies deposited into the account-wide collection.
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PvP Solo Queue
Solo Arena matches allow you to get right into the action of PvP matches in a competitive environment without gathering a full team or finding yourself fighting against a pre-formed group. Solo Arena has its own leaderboard so players can earn rank without affecting their Team Arena standings.
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Bonus Rewards for Dungeons
Each day when you finish a unique path for any explorable or story dungeon, you’ll receive a bonus reward for completion—1 to 3 gold for explorable dungeons depending on their length and difficulty, 50 silver for story dungeons. Guaranteed coin rewards that previously dropped from bosses in dungeons have been removed in lieu of these new rewards for dungeon completion; all other drops off of bosses have not been changed. Now you have even more incentive for braving the hazards of the dungeons of Tyria!
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Mini-Game Rotation System
Both Captain’s Council candidates have promised to introduce a new rotation of exciting competitions each day. The initial rotation includes the well-loved Sanctum Sprint, Keg Brawl, Southsun Survival, and Crab Toss. Speak to the activities NPC in Lion’s Arch to participate in the competition of the day!
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Improved Effects Level of Detail System
Effects like fireballs, streaks that trail behind a sword, players’ footsteps, and even the fiery breath of dragons are all part of the beauty of Guild Wars 2. In situations where all of that beauty can start to take away from the visual clarity of the battlefield, this new system will slowly start reducing the detail of each effect in order to increase combat visibility when many effect types are overlapping. When action gets intense in dungeons, PvP, the open world, and WvW, this system will let you see more of the action.
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Permanent Finishers
We’re adding support for permanent Finishers! With this release, you’ll be able to sort through your available Finishers and choose the one you’d like to use as a default. Change your mind and change your Finisher! Rank up for rank Finishers, or keep an eye on the Gem Store for a new selection of Finishers. Finishers can be used in both PvP and WvW!