The Winter 2016 update landed yesterday, and I’ve spent the last twenty-four hours gliding across maps I’ve run on foot since 2012. That alone is worth talking about. But there’s more here than a quality-of-life feature - this update is ArenaNet walking the walk after a January blog post that made a lot of promises.
Let’s get into it.
Key Highlights
- Basic Gliding is now available in all original open-world zones and cities for anyone who unlocked it in Heart of Thorns
- The Shatterer is fully revamped: breakbar added, new achievements, flying platform mechanics
- Dulfy’s Shatterer guide covers every achievement if you’re going for the meta - defiance bar, new phases, gliding integration, improved rewards
- Squad UI expanded with Lieutenant roles, map markers, and commander broadcast tools
- Lunar New Year 2016 (Year of the Monkey) runs through February 9 in the Crown Pavilion
- PvP Season 2 begins February 23
What We Don’t Know Yet
- Whether gliding restrictions in specific areas (jumping puzzle endings, certain instanced zones) will be revisited
- The full raid Wing 2 timeline - ArenaNet confirmed it’s coming but hasn’t given a date
- What the “Spring quarterly update” will contain beyond the vague previews in Colin Johanson’s State of the Game post
Gliding in Core Tyria
This was the most-requested post-HoT feature. Not more raids, not more maps - players wanted their gliders to work in the world they’d been playing in for three years. And now they do.
Basic Gliding - the first mastery you unlock in the Maguuma line - is now active across every original open-world map. Queensdale, Wayfarer Foothills, Sparkfly Fen, the Shiverpeaks. All of it. If you’ve unlocked it in Heart of Thorns (HoT), you’re set. Pop your glider off any cliff in Orr. Coast over the Fields of Ruin. It works the way it should have from day one.
There are restrictions, and they’re sensible. Jumping puzzle completion areas auto-close your glider so you can’t bypass the actual puzzle. Certain instanced content keeps the same rules as before. But in the open world, it’s open. You’re not going to get a loading screen error trying to catch air in Gendarran Fields.
What this does for HoT’s value proposition is meaningful. A lot of the post-launch frustration centered on the feeling that gliding was locked away in Maguuma - that you’d paid fifty dollars for a mechanic that disappeared the moment you walked back into core content. That friction is gone now. Gliding belongs to all of Tyria. That’s how it should feel.
It also makes revisiting old maps genuinely interesting. I spent an hour in the Frostgorge Sound last night and found angles I’d never seen. Veteran players will do the same. This is one of those additions that costs nothing to return to - it just keeps giving.
The Shatterer Rework
The Shatterer has been one of the weakest world bosses in the game for years. It was simple, it was static, and most players had stopped running it because the rewards didn’t justify the time. ArenaNet rebuilt it from scratch - MassivelyOP’s write-up called it the most promising world boss redesign since Tequatl - and the result is the clearest preview we have of what the “depth” philosophy looks like in practice.
The new Shatterer has a defiance bar - the breakbar system from HoT - integrated into a core-game boss for the first time. To deal with his new protective shield phases, players need to coordinate crowd-control abilities to strip the bar and interrupt his attack sequence. If you ignore it, the fight gets harder fast.
He now uses the Blazeridge terrain in ways the old version never did. Gliding players can attack from the air during specific phases. Crystal pillars emerge from the ground that the group needs to destroy while managing the boss. There’s a proper cadence to the fight now - phases, transitions, mechanics that reward coordination rather than just hitting a big target until it dies.
The rewards are improved too. Better drop tables, more relevant currency. Running the Shatterer again is actually worth your time.
This is what I wanted to see ArenaNet do with old content. Not abandon it. Not replace it. Rebuild it with the better systems they’ve developed since launch. If this is the template for future world boss updates - and I hope it is - the original maps have years of relevant content ahead of them.
Squad UI Overhaul
The commander and squad tools got a meaningful upgrade. This is the one most players will skim past, but WvW commanders and organized PvE meta runners are going to feel it immediately.
New features:
- Lieutenant role - commanders can now promote up to five players to lieutenants who share access to broadcast messaging and can mark rally points
- Configurable squad markers - three map-marker types (Arrow, Circle, Heart, Square, Star, Swirl, Triangle, X) that commanders can place in real time for squad coordination
- Broadcast targeting - commanders can now message subgroups or the entire squad selectively
This makes large-scale coordination meaningfully better. Zerg commanders in WvW have been working with tools that haven’t changed in years. Having lieutenants who can relay information without cluttering chat, and map markers that tell your squad where to push or rotate, reduces the organizational overhead of running twenty-plus people through time-sensitive content.
For meta event trains in Verdant Brink and Auric Basin, squad markers mean players can track objectives more reliably across the full map spread. It’s a tool that makes commanders more effective and their squads more informed - both good things.
What “Depth” Actually Looks Like
Two weeks ago, Colin Johanson published the 2016 look-ahead on the official ArenaNet blog outlining the development philosophy for the year. The core of it: ArenaNet is shifting from breadth - experimenting with new systems and content types - to depth, which means building on what works and polishing what doesn’t.
That post was met with a lot of skepticism. Players had heard promises before. The post-HoT content gap was real, and a philosophical statement doesn’t fill it.
The Winter update isn’t a knock-down answer to that skepticism - one update isn’t a year’s promise kept. But it’s a meaningful start. Gliding expanded to core Tyria is exactly the kind of depth that post was describing: taking a system that worked in Maguuma and integrating it into the broader game in a way that makes existing content feel more alive. The Shatterer rework does the same thing from a different angle - old content rebuilt with new tools rather than abandoned.
The quarterly update cadence is the thing to track. Spring is next. If that update delivers something comparable to what this one delivered, the “breadth to depth” framing will have real credibility. If it misses, the skepticism will be justified.
Watch the pattern, not just the individual patch.
Who Should Pay Attention
Active HoT players: You got your core-Tyria gliding. This is the one you asked for. Enjoy it.
Players who bounced off HoT: The Maguuma vertical design frustrated a lot of people. If you’ve been spending your time in core maps, you now have something from Heart of Thorns that feels native to the game you were already playing. It might be worth revisiting the expansion with fresh context.
WvW commanders and organized meta groups: The squad UI changes are meaningful for you specifically. Run them for a few weeks and see if the lieutenant system and markers solve the coordination problems you’ve been working around.
Casual players and holiday returnees: Lunar New Year is live. Dragon Ball PvP, Lucky Envelopes, fireworks in the Crown Pavilion. If you’re logging in for the festival, take an hour to unlock Basic Gliding if you haven’t already - you’ll be glad you did before the next major content hits.
What to Watch For
Raid Wing 2. It’s coming, timeline unconfirmed. The Spirit Vale community has had months to run Wing 1 - the r/Guildwars2 raid megathreads are the best place to track static recruitment and training runs right now.
Spring quarterly update. The next milestone in the depth-over-breadth commitment. Based on the January post, we’re expecting WvW improvements, more world boss work, and continued systems polish. What actually lands will tell us a lot.
PvP Season 2 (February 23). The first season surfaced matchmaking problems and the beginnings of a win-trading culture that the community found troubling. What ArenaNet changed between seasons is worth watching closely.
World boss rework candidates. If the Shatterer is the template, which boss is next? The Claw of Jormag, the Tequatl, the Triple Trouble - all have room to grow. One of them would be a strong follow-up signal.
2016 is off to a better start than I expected. Let’s see if the pattern holds.
See you in Tyria.