Guild Wars 2's Tequatl Rising update will improve a dragon, add a looking for group tool

Dragons! Guild Wars 2 may have just re-opened its Super Adventure Box , but that hasn't stopped ArenaNet from giving fans at PAX an early preview of the next update. Tequatl Rising will overhaul the open-world boss battle against the titular plague beast, adding new phases and attack patterns for a more challenging encounter. ANet also revealed that the update, due September 17th, will finally add a much anticipated looking for group tool.

Why update one of the game's boss encounters? Because currently, you and your fellow players can defeat Tequatl using the following tactics:

  1. Stand off to the side, hitting the thing.

  2. Occasionally move left or right to dodge an attack and/or walking pus balloon.

  3. Win.

This, at least, is marginally better than The Shatterer dragon, who skips the middle step.

The new Tequatl will be able to summon a protective Bone Wall, which will render him invulnerable, along with a knockback-inducing tidal wave and other crowd control effects. He'll also trigger an "event phase" throughout the battle, requiring players to defend the batteries of the "mega-cannon". In all, it sounds like a more involved variation of the Claw of Jormag battle - Guild Wars 2's third, and most interesting, dragon encounter.

As for the LfG tool, it's largely what people hoped for. Players will be able to find groups for dungeons, fractals, open world bits, living world dungeons, personal story quests, PvP, and WvW. The tool will work cross-server, but be region specific. You'll also be able to merge groups - meaning two small existing bands can be squashed together into a single dungeon smashing machine.

Tequatl Rising is due out September 17th.

Thanks, Duffy.net (via the PC Gamer Guild Wars 2 guild)

Phil Savage
Editor-in-Chief

Phil has been writing for PC Gamer for nearly a decade, starting out as a freelance writer covering everything from free games to MMOs. He eventually joined full-time as a news writer, before moving to the magazine to review immersive sims, RPGs and Hitman games. Now he leads PC Gamer's UK team, but still sometimes finds the time to write about his ongoing obsessions with Destiny 2, GTA Online and Apex Legends. When he's not levelling up battle passes, he's checking out the latest tactics game or dipping back into Guild Wars 2. He's largely responsible for the whole Tub Geralt thing, but still isn't sorry.