Diary of a Reluctant Revenant: Levels 35-45

Jeweler crafting station Guild Wars 2

One of the joys of leveling a GW2 character is all the events and characters you run into along the way.

At level 35 I moved on to Gendarran Fields, where I helped escort a merchant named Denton the Durable and his sidekick raccoon Chief Cherpa through the dangerous swamps of The Lawen Ponds. After I finished helping Denton, we stopped to chat, and he told me the charming back story of how he met his raccoon pal.

Is this game for real? #bestgameever

Meatoberfest

I like Meatoberfest so much, I felt it deserved its own section.

Core Tyria is chock full of unique and interesting events. Much more so, I feel, than “the new maps” (which are, like… five years old at this point, so I guess I should get over it).

But of all those events, Meatoberfest is unquestionably (UNQUESTIONABLY) the best.

Meatoberfest happens in the village of Butcher’s Block in the northwest corner of Diessa Plateau. When is Meatoberfest? Always! It’s never not Meatoberfest in Butcher’s Block. You have to admire their commitment to the festival.

If you haven’t yet, I encourage you to join in the revelry. Grab a whole entire roasted cow’s leg and call it a “snack”! Wield it as a weapon!

Meatoberfest Guild Wars 2

Then give it it to a “Bottomless Stomach Soldier” charr who eagerly confesses she often vomits in order to eat more!

Meatoberfest is the most charr thing that ever charred.

Leveling With the Boss Train

Guild Wars 2 doesn’t just scale your character’s level, it also scales the amount of XP you get for events. This means in order to level fast, you always want to be pushing the boundary of events you can do. The higher-leveled the event, the better.

To a certain extent, you can fudge the levels when it comes to World Boss events. There are so many other players at these events, they can usually carry you. As long as you keep your wits about you, you can usually clear the event and end up with a ton of loot and XP for your trouble.

TIP: Depending on the event, other players might not want to revive you. Reviving another player takes two players out of combat, and if you lie there dead, you’re just upscaling the event for everyone else. Be sure to unlock a nearby waypoint before the event starts, and waypoint if you die.

This is how I ended up doing Modniir Ulgoth in Harathi Hinterlands as a level 37 scrub.

TIP: The hardest part about doing an over-leveled world boss event is getting there without being killed by mobs along the way. This is where mounts really shine. Not only do mounts like the Griffin and Raptor let you zoom past enemies, they also serve as a second health bar. It’s not until your mount takes a ton of enemy damage, vanishes, and dumps you on the ground that you actually have to engage the enemy mobs.

Later, I did Shadow Behemoth in Queensdale. This event is well below my character’s level, but it’s easy enough to do. I have a soft spot for Queensdale, and the design of the Shadow Behemoth monster itself is frankly amazing.

Godslost Swamp Queensland Guild Wars 2

While waiting for the event to start, I wandered around the area doing map complete tasks. While fighting the nearby Veteran Marsh Drake to get the Hero Point, I discovered too late that my underwater weapons were sorely lacking.

TIP: As you level your character, periodically check your gear to make sure it’s level-appropriate. This includes your trinkets and underwater weapons!

Later, I got cocky and decided to try Shatterer, which is a level 50 event. I was level 38 at the time. It… didn’t go well for me. That’s when I decided to hop off the boss train and go back to something a little easier.

Crafting to Level

Work has been intense for me lately (this site isn’t my day job, it’s just a hobby). After I hit level 40 and finished the chunk of story, I was in a mood to kick back and do some easy leveling.

You can get up to 10 character levels by leveling a crafting discipline to 500. I wasn’t feeling that ambitious, but I fixed a rum rickey (it’s zero carb!), grabbed a Crafting XP booster from the guild hall, and settled in to level up Jeweler while watching Netflix on the other monitor.

Jeweler is my favorite choice for leveling a character, for two reasons:

1. Most of the time when you level a crafting discipline, you’re losing money. However, the stuff you make while leveling Jeweler sells for a somewhat decent amount of money. You won’t earn money leveling Jeweler, but you’ll get close to breaking even.

2. My materials storage is stuffed full of gems and metals I can’t stop harvesting, but have no other use for. (Especially gold and silver, which have no other use.)

Jeweler is easy enough to level. Craft six [metal] [item] and six [metal] fittings, then switch to the Discovery tab of the crafting interface and mix-and-match to identify all the variations. Repeat as needed.

I was pretty drunk by the end of the night, but I was also level 45. I toddled off to bed, ready to return to doing actual Revenant stuff soon.

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