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The original was posted on /r/guildwars2 by /u/Bodkin-Van-Horn on 2025-07-17 18:15:13+00:00.
TLDR: Wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be. Took me a week of playing 2-3 hours every night.
I’ve started playing in November, and have been working my way through the story on my main character (a Guardian Dragonhunter). I finished Living World Season 4 about a week ago, and decided to go for the Skyscale before moving on to Icebrood Saga. I got my Skyscale last night. It took almost exactly a week. I play about 2-3 hours every night, so I would estimate it took about 12-15 hours of playtime, since I didn’t quite dedicate every session to 100% Skyscale acquisition.
This is not a guide, but I’d like to share my observations and maybe a few tips if you’re still going for it. It wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. Everybody says that the Skyscale grind is real, but I don’t really think so. It really wasn’t that bad. Mostly it involved running around the world and doing pretty simple tasks. The biggest pain was definitely Skyscale Lost (majority jumping puzzles), but I have a few comments about that below.
As always, the Wiki is invaluable. If you’re playing this game and not using the Wiki, then I just don’t know what to say to that. Also, I used the CommonTate Guides - Skyscale Collection playlist on YouTube, which is basically a step by step guide. It’s a tiny bit out of date, because some things have changed, but the changes are mentioned in the comments for the appropriate videos, so it’s pretty straightforward. The biggest difference I noticed is how the skyscale food task is time-gated. Apparently it used to reset every 2 hours, but now it takes a full day until server reset, so it will take 2+ days just for that task since you have to do it 3 times. That was the biggest bottleneck for me. I ended up making my own food rather than buying it, but I did have to grind for about 50 piles of Bloodstone dust, because Mawdray had eaten recently, so I didn’t have a lot of excess. I did that during one of the cooldowns, so I didn’t lose any time doing that grinding.
For the Saving Skyscales collection, I know that Derilect Dive / Rune Locked Doors is a problem for a lot of people. I had already done it in the past, so I just popped into each room, got what I needed and got out. It’s definitely a longer puzzle if you have to do it the first time for the Skyscale (Still haven’t gotten all of the Dwarven Artifacts from there).
As I said, the biggest challenge was Skyscale Lost. The 2 world bosses were easy. I had done them a few times before, so they were not new to me. I just checked the event timer and showed up when I needed to. The two biggest pains were the Branded Layline Anomaly in the Domain of Vabbi and Goemm’s Lab in Metrica Province. Most of the other JPs I had done at least once, and a couple of them were pretty easy to cheese.
I had a hard time even getting to the Branded Layline Anomaly and when I did, someone was fighting him. It was at 60% health or so. I used my Extra-Pungent Skyscale Treat immediately, since that’s the suggestion on the Wiki, but it turned out to be a waste. I hung around and helped fight the Anomaly, and we actually defeated him, which meant I hadn’t needed the treat. It took a while to beat, but the two of us handled him. I stupidly opened the chest then, which triggered him again, so we both bailed.
For Goemm’s Lab, I tried to do it the right way, but after several deaths and getting kicked out because I wasn’t attuned right, I decided to just cheese it and went in the back way. Someday I might do it correctly, but not today. The other JPs I cheesed were ones that I had finished before, and one of them (Coddler’s Cove) I actually did the right way this time, because the only other time I had passed it was for a weekly and I had gotten Mesmered to the chest.
For the jumping puzzles, having the Prototype Position Rewinder was a big help in some of them. If you don’t have it and you’re going for the Skyscale, you should go get one. You can get it pretty early in Living World Season 4, so whatever prerequisites you need would have already been done.
For the saddle, I had almost all of the map currencies already, because I’ve been trying to do the “Return to…” achievements as I play. I was short for Domain of Istan, but I was able to do a quick adventure and finish harvesting wood to get the 250 map currency I needed.
For the final task where you have to fly to 28 rifts, I just used the YouTube guide to find them and it was super easy. The only one I had a problem with was the one in Desert Highlands. There were a bunch of harpies guarding it and they kept shooting me down. I had to clear a few of them out first, then rush back to the “Flying Lesson” circle at the top of the cliff and then race back before they respawed. They still knocked me down after I cleared it. I enacted vengeance on a few more of them before leaving the area.
Anyway, my takeaway is that if you’ve been playing the game and didn’t just try to rush to the Skyscale, it’s really not that difficult. You should have all the currencies you need (or at least be close), and all the gold. You could definitely do it faster than me, or you could take your time and spread it out a little more. Either way, it wasn’t really that tough. I can't imagine what it was like in the old days doing it without a guide, but now it's really not that tough.
