The Potterer's Guide To The Frozen Maw: GW2

Where is it? 

Frusenfell Creek in Wayfarer Foothills. 

Nearest Waypoint?

A toss-up between Krennak's Homestead and Vendrake's Homestead. The event starts at Krennak's but if you arrive late Vendrake is closer to the final battle.

I'm freezing! How long is this going to take?

Not long. The Maw has the fastest turnaround of all the Big Chest events. It pops roughly twice an hour. If you ported in and just missed it you might as well stay for the next one.

Is there anything to do while I wait?

Plenty!  You'll probably be asked to gather wurm eggs, build a snow army and fight the ice dragon's corruption. If you don't fancy good works or chores there are a couple of nearby skill points and a cave with a chest at the back to keep you amused.

If I'm off doing all that, how will I know when it starts?

You should be close enough to see the message change. If it says anything other than "The Maw is quiet", it's started. If you're right by Scholar Brogan you'll hear him complain that someone riled up the Grawl again, a useful audio reminder if you're tabbed out, so long as you remembered to leave the sound on.


Ok, so it's started. Now what do I do?

Kill some grawl, follow the pompous Norn "scholar" across an ice field, kill some more grawl, smash an ice sculpture, listen to another pompous Norn rant for a while, kill a few Norns (non-speaking extras but almost certainly pompous too) smash some portals and, finally, kill the Shaman. There's some other stuff but usually everything dies too fast to notice it.

That sounds like a lot of work.

It would be if you had to do it on your own but mostly you'll have your work cut out getting from one phase to the next fast enough to get credit. Don't try and do everything. Just follow the crowd and shoot what they're shooting and it will all come right in the end.

Sum it up for me. Is it worth doing?

For the rewards, of course it is. As often as you can.

Without those you probably wouldn't want to do it very often.The Maw is the least interesting of all the meta-events. All you get to fight are the same ordinary mobs you see all over Wayfarer's Foothills - grawl, ice elementals, Sons of Svanir and there's no huge reveal at the end. He's supposed to be summoning a giant ice elemental but he'll be dead long before you ever see it. It's a cheerful romp in the snow and that's about it.