Gravity Geyser
Overview
Gravity Geysers are special objects in the Shadow Shard and the Ski Chalet which cause characters to jump to a particular destination point, usually much farther away than their own powers are able to reach.
Geysers exceed the "hard cap" for Jumping Travel Powers. Using a geyser while such powers are active will often send the character wildly off course.
Getting Around via Geysers
The first person a character will see in Firebase Zulu is General Hammond and the first mission he will give is a tutorial on how to use the gravity geysers. Gravity geyser travel is very different! Teleporters don't need this mode of travel, but super jumpers and super speeders will. Fliers don't need it, but the geysers can shorten travel time quite a bit, so it's worth learning.
Unfortunately, what the General says is not entirely true, which has caused a lot of player confusion.
Stepping on a geyser is much like stepping on a cannon. Each geyser has a 'slot' in the rock that leads up to the geyser itself. To use the geyser, slowly move up that slot and be sure to go straight up the center. These things shoot a character a long way, so being even a little off is bad. Once in the air, controls are limited. If a character tries to go backwards, they will immediately stop moving forward. If they try to go left or right, then they will lose most of their forward momentum fall unless they also have the forward key pressed down. However, if the forward key is pressed down, a character can steer themselves quite a bit by pushing the left and right keys. Make sure to keep that forward key pressed down! Holding down the forward key will cause you to go faster forward, but will not break anything.
Despite what General Hammond says, characters with superjump and superspeed should keep their travel power activated as doing so increases the ability to steer. Given how often geysers will drop a character into a hostile Rularuu spawn and how easy it is to be a few degrees off going up the geyser, the ability to steer is very important. Turning on a flight power will stop a character's momentum so a character doesn't want that on when geyser jumping, but turning it on after you miss a jump can save lots of frustration.
Vertical geysers can be particularly difficult. There's a geyser just south of Point Charlie in Firebase Zulu that can be greatly frustrating to new Shadow Shard players. Done correctly, the geyser will shoot a character almost straight up and they will land on an outcrop of rock sticking out of the island above. If a character comes at the geyser wrong though, they will fall to either side of the outcrop. Also, if the forward key is held down just a little too long, they'll go too far forward and bump their head on the bottom of the outcrop of rock. Having a travel power on magnifies this effect. However, even if a character messes up a bit on the geyser, they can still easily correct the jump by steering. All a character has to do is watch where they are going! In fact, with superjump or superspeed they can steer themselves right to the next geyser's slot and save themselves some time!
It's not too hard to tell where a geyser is going most of the time. Simply look down the rock slot and to see where it is going. The only exception to this are the vertical geysers.
It does take practice to learn how to do this. If a player has never used a geyser before, don't try to learn them when people are waiting. Go in solo and set aside some time just to learn the system. Enemies in the Shard are difficult for a single player, so it might be prudent to wait until a character has a few levels past 40 and/or some stealth to help tame the wildlfe while practicing. Once a player gets the system figured out and some practice under their belt, a character will rarely fall and will be able to get around the giant zones fairly quickly.
Note that there are two geysers (one in the Chantry and one in the Storm Palace) that shoot straight up. If a character doesn't steer, they will land right back at the geyser they jumped from! Both of them shoot a character very high, so they'll have plenty of time to steer, assuming superjump or superspeed is on.
