History VideoGame / GuildWars2

* ReptilesAreAbhorrent: The krait, a sea-dwelling race of lizardmen that seem to be AlwaysChaoticEvil, and have quickly gotten most of the fanbase [[KickTheSonOfABitch howling for their extinction]]. Given how they are (they're especially fond of being mean to player-favorite quaggans), and just how often a player dies when fighting them [[ZergRush underwater]], this is understandable.

* DropTheHammer: A two-handed weapon for Soldier professions, providing some [[PunchedAcrossTheRoom flashy attacks]] for all three professions. As of Heart of Thorns, unlocking the new engineer specialization, Scrapper, allows them to equip hammers.

** At least twice during the expansions, Canach heads off to a casino to bet on the Commander's success.

* DarkestHour: At the end of "All or Nothing" the plan to kill [[spoiler:Kralkatorrik]] fails, leading to the death of [[spoiler:Aurene]]. With her gone the Commander and his allies believe there is no way to prevent the end of the world [[spoiler:until she comes back to life]].

** End of Dragons: [[spoiler: No matter how good of a player you are, you will eventually fall to the waves of Void enemies while trying to repower Joon and Taimi's siphon cannons. Aurene reaches out to you from her mind-scape, then infuses you with her own magic to get you into the fight. When you get back up, you're larger, [[PowerGlows glowing]], wielding the Aurene-themed legendary version of your weapon of choice, and your DPS shoots so high that even Elite mobs get killed in ''seconds''. [[TheLastOfTheseIsNotLikeTheOthers And you have extra jumps]]. ]]

*** Also from the Super Adventure Box event, other than the many references to older video games, the asura in charge of the whole event is named Moto, and the princess you must rescue within the game is called Mia. [[Creator/ShigeruMiyamoto Mia and Moto.]]

* BonusBoss: The Legendary Bandit Executioner, who ''may'' show up if a player has a certain item when a unique bandit leader is killed. Proportional to the level of the characters fighting them, they're absolutely brutal -- and completely optional.

** The Mesmer skill Portal can be just as good for those who have trouble with jumping puzzles. So long as the Mesmer can navigate the puzzle on his own, he can ferry dozens of friends to the end to collect the reward through the Portal. Later jumping puzzles integrate a flag method to ensure people actually do the puzzle instead of getting warped to the end.

** And when wielding a sword in the offhand, the Warrior can throw his sword, impaling his target. Then he runs up and rips it out for even more damage.

** Engineers can accomplish this on a metagame level, on account of their status as an odd sort of JackOfAllTrades. A given engineer can be good at one or two things depending on specialization, but what those things ''are'' can be pretty much anything, with viable specs for ranged burst damage, close-up condition damage, area control, endless kiting, and everything in between; you won't know which sort of engineer you're fighting until you're already taking damage. In a large-scale [[PlayerVersusPlayer PvP]] fight, getting in a melee fight with a defensive bomb-dropping "bunker" engineer is almost as bad an idea as ''not'' chasing down an elixir-and-grenade-lobbing support engineer before he can hide behind his allies.

** The airships are pretty nice, part zeppelin and part magical ride. The prologue to Path of Fire makes a joke about how the main character tends to crash whenever he rides on an airship.

* EveryoneIsBi: This is confirmed to be in effect for sylvari society, for whom PurelyAestheticGender is rather literal. Gender is irrelevant to the sylvari, including in matters of love. In addition, several non-player characters in the game make flirtatious remarks towards the player, regardless of gender ([[AnythingThatMoves or race]]).

On June 27, 2023, [=ArenaNet=] announced the fourth expansion, "Secrets of the Obscure". Now that the Dragon Cycle has ended, a new threat to Tyria's safety has emerged. The expansion is scheduled for an August 22, 2023 release.