Skill Challenges
Skill challenges are indicated on the map with a blue arrow. You need skill points to buy new skills with from your Hero menu, and while you earn a new skill point each time you gain a level, you'll need to seek out the 200+ skill challenges around the map in order to purchase most of the skills that are available to you. Skill challenges, like tasks and events, can take a variety of forms, but most often will see you asked to take down a powerful enemy. Like an event, many skill challenges can be tackled by any player in the area, even without being grouped together.
Points Of Interest
Points of interest are marked by small squares on your map. These are simply areas that you can explore to earn a bit of experience and mark off your map completion percentage. They can sometimes also act as markers for events if they're well off the beaten path.
Waypoints
There are no mounts in Guild Wars 2, and there's no need to bind yourself to a home location. That's because of the game's waypoint system, marked on your map with blue and grey diamonds. Seek out these waypoints, and you'll be able to instantly teleport to any of them in the future for a small fee. You can't warp to a waypoint until you've encountered it for the first time, though, so you won't be able to make any shortcuts around exploration!
Jumping Puzzles
Jumping puzzles aren’t tracked on your map, and don’t count towards map completion goals, although you do get achievements for completing them. Jumping puzzles are pretty much what they sound like: an elaborate set of jumps that are difficult to pull off, often with traps and enemies to deal with, with the promise of a treasure chest at the end. If the vista point jumping puzzles frustrating you, then the real jumping puzzles are going to drive you crazy. They can be very, very difficult, especially when you consider that there are often enemies that will do their best to knock you off the path that you’re attempting.
The penalty for failure is...death!
These can be found throughout the game, but if you’re looking for an early example, try heading to Morgan’s Spiral in the southeastern section of the sylvari starting zone, or perhaps Shaman’s Rookery along the western edge of the level 7+ part of the Wayfarer Foothills, near the Norn Capital. There are even a few jumping puzzles located in the easily-accessible city of Lion’s Arch.
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