I’m sure anybody who has read ANet’s Beta Weekend Preview post noticed that UI changes have taken place — shape of the minimap and moving the dodge bar so that it curves around the health orb are the ones show.

But that’s not all that has been changed. Here are seven less-noticable UI changes.

1. The top menu has a new HINTS PANEL. This categorizes all of the hints and tips tutorial popups throughout the game, including percentages for completion so you know just how much you’ve explored in terms of the game’s systems. HINTS are categorized under Combat, Events & Tasks, Items & Equipment, Map, Movement & Camera, PvP, Skills & Traits, Social, Story, WvW, and Other. This is a fairly handy resource as quite often the HINTS pop up during the middle of combat and I click them out of the way quickly so I can get back to not dying… At least now I know where to go to find what it was trying to tell me.

2. To go with the new HINTS PANEL, the game now offers you MORE TIPS for things, including profession-specific tips like the one illustrated here for the Guardian.

3. In the previous beta, whenever you wanted to sell the grey trash loot at the vendors, you had to right click each piece in your inventory. Now there is a SELL JUNK button to sell off all the vendor trash instantly. Woo!

4. Speaking of inventory management, I noted way back in my “5 Cool Things…” post that I wished you could deposit more than just basic crafting materials to the bank from anywhere in the world. Whether ANet was inundated with similar feedback, or had already planned to allow this, I don’t know, but you can now deposit Common Crafting Materials, Fine Crafting Materials (the ones with Blue names), Gemstones and Jewels, and Cooking Materials to your Account Vault. This is amazing for keeping a clean inventory!

5. A strange addition I noticed while wandering around Divinity’s Reach this evening were a series of green chevron/arrows on my map. It took me a while wandering around to realise what they are: they guide you to your next Personal Story objective while in cities, where multiple levels can be quite confusing. Another handy UI feature that just offers a little nudge in the right direction!

6. While I’m on the subject of nudges in the right direction and UI clarity, you may have noticed the little “dancing chest” pop up just above your map in the bottom right corner of the screen. This is the new symbol for pending rewards. Hover the mouse over it and the chest will open. Click it, and the chest and rewards will fill the centre of your screen. I completed the Wayfarer Hills area goal on my Guardian in BWE1 but since a lot of stuff was reset or reworked for BWE2, I got given a series of rewards this time: note in the picture it doesn’t say “choose”. You get all of the items shown.

7. One final thing I noticed which really adds clarity, especially in hectic battles, is the new COMBO FIELD hearts. These show you if you’ve been responsible for creating a combo, and give a much clearer visual on screen than the previous plain text notification.

There were a few other tiny improvements I noticed, like the addition of the white ‘rings’ round boon/conditions that gradually disappeared as a timer, as well as the more obvious big changes like skill and trait tiers and the changes to the Gem Store. I’d be interested to hear what other people have spotted, especially at the higher levels.

Oh, and while I’m on the subject of the Gem Store, I’d like to quickly mention Mystic Chests. There is a big hullabaloo about these, but I’ve got a fair few drops of them this evening, but I’ve also been getting keys. The content of the 3 chests I’ve opened have so far amounted to the following:

• 3x Tonics that turn you into a Pig for 15 minutes.
• 3x Tonics that turn you into a Ram for 15 minutes.
• 1x Crafting EXP booster (same as in the gem store)
• 1x Chain EXP booster (same as in the gem store)
• 1x EXP booster (same as in the gem store)
• 2x Instant Repair Canisters (same as in the gem store)
• 3x Transmutation Stones (for level 1-79 items, same as in the gem store)
• 1x Bank Access Express (allows you to access your bank from anywhere, same as in the gem store)

Chances are you’ll spot the pattern here. There’s a distinct lack of P2W gear in the Mystic Chests, at least as far as I’ve seen.

Anyways, time for me to go get some sleep. Happy beta testing those of you pulling all-nighters!

~Demajen