Guild Wars 2

Shadoekin.3928:

Norjena.5172:

Manuhell.2759:

Dub.1273:

Just throwing this in here again: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2VhmwLwvrM

Whoever argues against the “berserker meta”, is that what you want the game to become? Add some random dodges in and you are invicible, that would make you able to play content blind with one hand, easily. Is that what you want as new meta in gw2, instead of actually a bit of positioning, dodging and supporting?

As if that video even demostrate something. That sustain is due to the class, rather than the gear. Healing signet doesn’t even scale that well with healing power.
And any attack that should have been dodged has been blocked instead. Again, due to the defensive abilities of the classes (hi, Riposte), rather that due of the gear itself. Also dealing a good amount of damage by reflection that wouldn’t be usually done by a tanky gear user, thus speeding up the fight.

It was made up in this way just to make their point.
But the rest of the game, and the classes, don’t work like that.

U should watch a video before u write a comment. U failed.

I’m not sure what the video is supposed to show really, Is this supposed to be faster than running with the current meta group?

People complain over Zerkers dealing so much damage they can just ignore all boss mechanics, making fights way to easy.
People complain over Active mitigation beeing too strong.
Whats the point? Showing what happens when you remove active ways of mitigation.
Showing that stacking defense will let you ignore boss mechanics aswell. Even bugged bosses are no problem for you.

Agony.3542:

People complain over Zerkers dealing so much damage they can just ignore all boss mechanics, making fights way to easy.
People complain over Active mitigation beeing too strong.
Whats the point? Showing what happens when you remove active ways of mitigation.
Showing that stacking defense will let you ignore boss mechanics aswell. Even bugged bosses are no problem for you.

Except the people in the video are still using active ways of mitigation (half the party can use riposte, for example, and it is indeed used in the video – it also reflects ranged attacks due to a trait, dealing a good amount of damage) and even the sustain is due to the class traits/utilities, thus it doesn’t depend on gear. Even a good deal of mitigation is due to utilities (protection/aegis).
And all those utilities and traits could have been taken while using zerk gear as well. While dealing more damage in the meantime.
Especially since it was said they avoided using some “powerful” defensive skills not better specified.
Basically, that video doesn’t prove anything.

Unless the point was that warriors and guardians are extremely good classes, but we could have just seen how many people search for them in the lfg tool if we just wanted to see that.

Norjena.5172:

No it shows u that Zerker gear makes nothing easier, only faster if play good enough. If u are tanky u can facetank nearly everything. U don´t have to know what bosses do, u don´t have to use skill like retreat/blinds/blocks or reflexion u don´t have to dogde

U can faceroll everything. Without using your brain and playing with 1 hand.

It shows u that all arguments “zerker makes pve easier” are foolish. U can ignore dungeon mechanics by just being tanky enough.

Ok, this video is real and recent. This proves that a group which is organized and set up in that manner can achieve a clear for that dungeon in that timeframe. Is that the group setup that everyone prefers and is using? If it isn’t then how will it ever become the new meta?

If people who don’t bother to learn mechanics want to get organized and group up together to have a tanky-prot-blind-block-heal run, then it’s pretty much up to them. It still doesn’t change the fact that a zerker team will clear faster and get more rewards.

The team in the video can probably clear AC2 as well, but it still won’t change the fact that a zerker team will clear AC2 with only one trap needed. When people say that zerker makes things easier, they were referring to the ~15min farm instances. COF1/2, AC1/2/3, SE1/3 are cakewalks with the zerker meta groups.

To assume that Arah and 41-50 Fractals can be done anybody by zerking is oversimplification. In those 2 instances, success really has less to do with gear than knowing one’s profession and abilities and how to apply them to exploit the weaknesses of the encounter. Like Lupi for example, a group of rangers can whirling defense the boss to death in under a minute. That’s definitely not meta, but they pretty much face-whirled spin to win.

P/S: The group in the video was using blinds, blocks, protection, and frost armor. These are all not stat related. If they were all using zerker gear, their blinds and blocks will still negate all damage, their protection+frost armor will still give 33-43% damage reduction. I am not sure I can call a group that prepared well enough before going into a dungeon as people who turned off their brain though.

I will also add support for the ‘critical heals’ idea, for the non-standard ones. It may breathe a bit more life into guardian staff (and similar), though I doubt it. ;-) Not sure how MedKit skills would classify though…

I also like the idea of adding additional mechanics and AI onto bosses and other mobs. I know the ‘stomp’ mechanic for some of the Nightmare Court has had a mixed reception (even within our group), but that and some other changes (like some mobs dodging at times) would make for a more dynamic fight.

I am torn on just flat nerfing Zerk itself; That seems counter-productive (this from a long-time Clerics guardian – though even I have some Zerk stuff in play). Perhaps the first thing that needs to be done is move Warrior’s 100Blades to the Burst skill (and thereby giving a more active choice of DPS at the expense of Adrenalin – which is needed to sustain some of the passive heals). Changing the base HP pools of classes – so they are a little closer together – could also help with diversity in builds.

Nerfing Zerker straight away doesn’t do much for anyone except a vindictive few.

However, I can’t escape the thought that the game is better off with a more diverse mix of styles at the low, mid, and high echelons of gameplay than their absence.

Zerker doesn’t need a nerf. People are rightly and fairly playing the game to their potential with the rules as they stand. The rules just heavily favor zerkers, so change the rules before adjusting any class or role in particular.

Fact is, DPS gains the most from gear stats and Zerker gear gives the biggest bonus to DPS.

Fact is, Defiant as implemented today ruins control as a role.

Fact is, support as a role is not very strong at all, with any form of ability to mitigate damage for a team having relatively low uptimes (short duration, long cooldown).

Fact is, any means of helping players other than killing their targets quickly have very poor scaling.

These things need to be addressed in any solution to the DPS-only meta right now.

I was referring to this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0kDnswWyjY
since they were talking about a reposting. Not that it changes much.

We still have a guardian, warrior and an elementalist like before (and probably using the same setup as before, thus still reflecting damage on warriors’ part via riposte and providing active mitigation via aegis and protection from the guardian at least; can’t say about the elementalist about the other video, since it was from the warrior’s pov and i have no reason to analyze it for any skill used). Also, unless i missed it, traits and stats of the user aren’t displayed in this video, and at 5 a.m. i won’t spend time calculating his gear from the info i can extrapolate from the video.
Still, what i can see from the video is mostly irrilevant to the “tanky gear” argument – just water skills for healing purposes, regeneration and soothing mist as far as healing power – i can see an area block slotted here, though , and the use of magnetic aura with powerful area is mentioned in the chat – again, active mitigation, party wide. With 2 members of the party, i assume, unless they have different builds and it isn’t specified.
They also mention having a lot of protection in the chat, too. And that’s active as well.

And while the ele may not have used its healing skill at the abomination, it isn’t like it wasn’t being healed in other ways. Healing fields were being blasted, as well as water skills used – they’re all active.
And the ele at alphard surely used healing bolts – they are visible in the video – and they used the crates to protect themselves from the big shot. Again, could that do that indipendently of the gear.
And still the party downed quite a bit of times, despite that “passive mitigation” (sure, it could have been avoided if they just killed the alphard clones faster…). They had powerful tanky skills like battle standard to make for it, though. That doesn’t depend on gear at all, obviously.

The only thing i can’t comment on is the necro, basically, cause i won’t spend the night seeing every skill he uses. But the other four already make up for it.
With their active mitigation, not dependant on gear.

So, even for this video, i’ll still have to say there is no relevance with the issue on hand.

Agony.3542:

People complain over Zerkers dealing so much damage they can just ignore all boss mechanics, making fights way to easy.
People complain over Active mitigation beeing too strong.
Whats the point? Showing what happens when you remove active ways of mitigation.
Showing that stacking defense will let you ignore boss mechanics aswell. Even bugged bosses are no problem for you.

People who claim that active mitigation is too strong are probably pointing out how reflects trivialise Lupi but is a legitimate way to play and working as intended. Stacking defenses with perma-prot and frost armor is also a legitimate way to play and working as intended is it not?

Blinds and blocks are active mitigators, so that video didn’t remove it either.

The thing is, no matter what the video showed or did not show, that group did not complete that instance any faster than a zerker group. Did they properly gear and trait and equip themselves for their strategy to deserve success? Yes, most definitely. Will that group build work for all other instances? I’m not sure, maybe. Will that group build work any faster than the zerker meta on certain other instances? Most definitely not.

I’m not sure why people are beginning to ignore the fact that everyone is tending towards providing circumstantial evidence. Every instance and every encounter is different. We have people trivialising AC because of Ice Bows and FGS, but those are also legitimate ways to play. COF1 speed runs clearly favor the zerker meta, and that too is working as intended.

Let’s try to avoid from overstatements. Stacking defensive gear alone will NOT make all bosses in all instances a cakewalk. Stacking zerker gear alone will also NOT make all bosses in all instances a cakewalk. Again we must look at the big picture, in how many instances and how many encounters will zerker gear be better than defensive gear. And here we must decide if we want to define “better” as achieving instance completion all of the time, or some of the time, and whether we want to put a time limit to how long we take to complete it.

To further illustrate the point, let’s say a player only has 2 hours to play each day. He has set the goal of farming X amount of token and crafting material and gold. If he wears zerker gear and gets into a speedclear zerker group, he can probably get X. If he wears defensive gear and gets into a defensive group he might not get X, which means he has failed for that day. This is the case, and will forever be the case because numbers and math will never change no matter what.

And this is why we all veer towards the zerker meta. This is why we tend to repeat the easier instances. This is why people complain the rewards for 50 fractal does not justify the time taken to do it.

The problem for Anet and a possible reason why they need to look into this is because as the community gets more skilled, everyone will slowly shift towards that meta. This creates problems for new players that Anet will want to attract when the community becomes to dependent on the meta. It is fine if 50% of the playerbase engages in the dps meta, as long as there is that other 50% who do not expect speed runs and are willing to help newbies along.

Once speed clears and the dps meta becomes too profitable to ignore and we end up having 90% of the playerbase engaging in it, then it becomes a serious problem as it alienates new clientele. No one new will commit to the game if every person they meet starts lambasting them about their non-meta gear choices.

Even more so if Anet is trying to pull new players who are used to the MMORPGS which have the trinity. Giving them a stepping stone into the active combat system which GW2 employs by allowing “tankiness” or “healiness” isn’t necessarily a bad thing. They can start with what they are used to, learn the system and adapt accordingly when they realize there is a more efficient way to play (and farm the things they need).

Having more styles of play does not diminish any one particular style of play.

Let’s all try to consider the community as a whole, and not be too bent on preserving our own personal styles of play or sources of revenue….and most of all, not to shut other players out (as much as we think they have no business being in certain instances).

Norjena.5172:

Shadokin..easier and faster are two completly diffrent things. U can´t want to be tanky as hell, ignor 99% of all boss attacks and be as fast a squishy party will be. That will be broken.

And how do u want to balance passive defense?
Ever thought about that? If u need for example 20k life and 2,2k amor to survive how should ele/thief ever be viable for pve in this szenario? It´s impossibel.
If the have to build up moredefensive then warriors/necromancers no1 wants them, cause they will do less dmg then (at the moment ele/thief/guard can deal more dmg then warriors).

Pure condition dmg is bad that´s fair, cause power/pre/vita/thou/condidmg is much more defensive then zerkers. Only rampagergear is not balanced. Hybrids using this should be able todo the same amount of dmg as berserker.

U will destroy everything if u try to make zerker runs impossibel (even if u make them impossibel for squishier classes).

Do your dungeons easy or fast, but u can´t get both. Yes most dungeons are to easy, but this have nothing todo with dps gear/builds. And u can´t break them without breaking the whole PvE.

And at last, without defensive gear, the ele wouldn´t survive lupi or alphard´s bombs. So it have something todo with thoughness/vita. All other dungeons will be much easier with this gear/gruop.

I think this gruop is not completly min/maxed more defensive/healing is possibel. And Arah P2 (alphard) ist probably the most difficult/dmg incoming dungeon u can do (except a few 40+ fractals).

We cannot ignore the fact that fast and easy are in fact the same thing for farm dungeons. The prime motivator for doing things fast is to get maximum rewards and farm. A player who enjoys playing the game for the sake of the game will not be too concerned with speed clears because once you clear it, you will have nothing to do.

Balancing defensive stats is no more difficult than balancing offensive stats or balancing them all together. I’m not sure in which scenario will 20k hp or 2.2k armor ever be mandatory, so please elaborate in detail. It’s not logical to posit a hypothetical situation without precedence, and tantamount to saying that all players will need 40k hp to be viable.

Anet does not employ mechanics which need hard numbers. There is no mechanic (other than Agony) that forces player to equip certain things in order to survive. There isn’t even any real dps checks. It’s not an absolute thing where a player must have X toughness or Y vitality, but through a combination of boons, conditions, active and passive effects, that player will dps and survive encounters.

The thing that is absolute is the amount of rewards a player farms within any given amount of real world time.

The ele in the video survives not solely on defensive stats. Defensive stats isn’t even the most important factor. Protection and frost aura provide more damage reduction than gear will ever allow. It is a combination of active mitigators like blinds and blocks with armor and boons, and then a constant stream of healing that allows the ele to survive. To claim that it is purely an issue of gear is not being truthful and blatantly underplaying the significance of the other mechanics intrinsic to the game.

I really wish people do not keep using Lupicus or Alphard as an example as those are the encounters that a zerker meta group can exploit with reflects too well. If we keep harping on it and Anet starts reassessing the damage and even crit damage from reflects to the point of nerfing it, EVERYBODY loses, zerkers and non-zerkers alike. Then without reflects, the mesmer will join the other unpopular professions.

A) It really was a cakewalk. Warriors will have it way more easy of course, du to their already high healthpool and armor, however even eles can achieve enough health to not be oneshoted. The eles featured in this video did not go for soldier armor. Adding 3k more health would have made a difference for alphard and lupi, trust me. The reduced healing? Who cares, we had plenty of overheal anyway.

B) Magnetic Aura is a Joke. The reflects hit for 2k and unlike feedback or wall you will only reflect a very small fraction of hits (2 out of 8 or 10). Players can still get killed by lupis AoEs while having magnetic aura up. This skill is nothing compared to a block.

C) Lupis AoE projectiles almost oneshot zerker eles. Warriors can take two. The swipes definetly oneshot zerker eles. And that is without any grubs.

D) We didn’t bother with pretty much any mechanic the bosses had. Lupi ate 4 grubs. Play it like NP. Knowledge in a game should be rewarded, shouldn’kitten Just c&p a build and roll everything shouldn’t be how things can be dealt with. Making a guide for these builds is way more easy compared to making a guide for zerker builds, since you simply ignore the whole “experience” part.

E) When people refer to “zerker makes bosses do nothing” they don’t refer to making clears faster, they refer to bosses beeing “trivialized”, “made too easy” or missing the “necessary risk”. This is what really kittenes me off. It took me several hours of continously wiping, rezzing, walking back, and wiping again to learn how to solo Lupicus, and what I get in return is “the fact that you can solo the boss just means he is broken”, “Zerker is too strong”, “this ‘Meta’ needs to go”.

F) Regeneration and Protecitons are both buffs that can be permanently maintained. There is little “activeness” in that. Guardian hammer autoattack provides perma protection. Symbol of Faith provides permanent Regeneration.

H)Other healing: There was no coordiantion involved. The run was without ts. Have low hp? Use your healing skill. See someone else at low HP? Drop a shoutheal/waterfield/virtue. Have nothing better to do? Just use the water field anyway, it looks nice.

G) The whole point is to show how far you can dumb the game down. Removing active mitigation will not only make zerkers unviable, it will force you to these passive and dumbed down builds. On the other hand you already can outgear enemies by stacking up these defensive/healing abilities. No judgement required, just spamming heals.

Re-posting this from a different thread, as I think it’s important:

Ahlen.7591:

Because DPS IS everything.

Support does not win fights.

Control does not win fights.

Reducing the enemy HP to zero is the entire goal of a fight, and the most important thing in doing that is damage. Everything else is just a vehicle to deliver as much damage as possible while not dying.

I think this is, and forever will be, the main reason why Berserker’s and raw DPS is king. If ANET want to make defensive stats more viable, they need to create encounters where you don’t necessarily win by damage. The control chamber in the Molten Facility is the most recent example of this – yes, you still need damage, but most importantly, you need to not die to the random crap that occasionally flies at you.
If we had more bosses/encounters/events where the goal was to outlast an attack (Detha vs Gravelings/Magg vs Assassins), or you only had given periods to strike the boss (King Toad), or you needed to withstand damage to create opportunities (Iron Forgeman), defensive stats would actually be useful.

Manuhell.2759:

Except the people in the video are still using active ways of mitigation (half the party can use riposte, for example, and it is indeed used in the video – it also reflects ranged attacks due to a trait, dealing a good amount of damage) and even the sustain is due to the class traits/utilities, thus it doesn’t depend on gear. Even a good deal of mitigation is due to utilities (protection/aegis).
And all those utilities and traits could have been taken while using zerk gear as well. While dealing more damage in the meantime.
Especially since it was said they avoided using some “powerful” defensive skills not better specified.
Basically, that video doesn’t prove anything.

Unless the point was that warriors and guardians are extremely good classes, but we could have just seen how many people search for them in the lfg tool if we just wanted to see that.

Half the party means a single warrior using sword/axe+hammer? I didn’t realise ripose was off-hand axe skill. I would like to see you facetanking alphard or lupi with zerker gear and same traits.

Are we talking about the same video or you are purposefully making things up?

Manuhell.2759:

I was referring to this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0kDnswWyjY
since they were talking about a reposting. Not that it changes much.

We still have a guardian, warrior and an elementalist like before (and probably using the same setup as before, thus still reflecting damage on warriors’ part via riposte and providing active mitigation via aegis and protection from the guardian at least; can’t say about the elementalist about the other video, since it was from the warrior’s pov and i have no reason to analyze it for any skill used). Also, unless i missed it, traits and stats of the user aren’t displayed in this video, and at 5 a.m. i won’t spend time calculating his gear from the info i can extrapolate from the video.
Still, what i can see from the video is mostly irrilevant to the “tanky gear” argument – just water skills for healing purposes, regeneration and soothing mist as far as healing power – i can see an area block slotted here, though , and the use of magnetic aura with powerful area is mentioned in the chat – again, active mitigation, party wide. With 2 members of the party, i assume, unless they have different builds and it isn’t specified.
They also mention having a lot of protection in the chat, too. And that’s active as well.

And while the ele may not have used its healing skill at the abomination, it isn’t like it wasn’t being healed in other ways. Healing fields were being blasted, as well as water skills used – they’re all active.
And the ele at alphard surely used healing bolts – they are visible in the video – and they used the crates to protect themselves from the big shot. Again, could that do that indipendently of the gear.
And still the party downed quite a bit of times, despite that “passive mitigation” (sure, it could have been avoided if they just killed the alphard clones faster…). They had powerful tanky skills like battle standard to make for it, though. That doesn’t depend on gear at all, obviously.

The only thing i can’t comment on is the necro, basically, cause i won’t spend the night seeing every skill he uses. But the other four already make up for it.
With their active mitigation, not dependant on gear.

So, even for this video, i’ll still have to say there is no relevance with the issue on hand.

If it’s 5am why are you commenting a video you didn’t watch? Maybe you should realise that all of this sustain achieved via traits and skills like healing rain is irrelevant to zerker party because they go down with or without it. Unlike tanky builds who need sustain. But of course no one knows about it or pretends to not know about it while praising half-baked posts like that in other thread called “To clear the air about Berserker”.

Shadoekin.3928:

People who claim that active mitigation is too strong are probably pointing out how reflects trivialise Lupi but is a legitimate way to play and working as intended. Stacking defenses with perma-prot and frost armor is also a legitimate way to play and working as intended is it not?

I’m sure facetanking hardest hitting bosses in the game is intended.

Hello,

First of all I want to say that I have no problem with the zerker builds. The problem in this game is that zerkers can do massive DPS and condition builds can’t. Here are a few simple things that you can do to balance this game very quickly.

1st suggestion: remove the cap on the conditions and make fire and poison to be stackable. this way condition oriented people won’t be frustrated anymore. Now there can be only a condition dealer in the team cause 2 or 3 will just cancel each other out and even so the condition dealer is hindered by the other players who play zerk but on their builds they have some conditions that are being applied from minor traits or skills. Right now, for world events, condition oriented people are just plain useless because of the condition cap. If a zerker can be able to burst tons of damage with skills, conditions should be able to do as much dps as regular damage.

2nd suggestion for game balancing: increase the toughness of the monsters. This way condition builds will be far more effective then they are today in comparison with the zerker builds.

3rd fine tuning you can do for balancing is to decrease the condition duration and increase their damage to the point that the best condition build can kill as quick as the best zerk build.

those three suggestions (especially the first one) can be implemented very quickly (in a week or so – first will only take a few clicks :P) and the game will be far more balanced between the zerkers and the condition builds.

Improving AI and redesigning monsters is far more challenging and time consuming then my simple suggestions for game balancing between the zerkers and the conditions builds, but it should be in the works nonetheless.

Why was the condition cap placed in the first place? is there a cap for damage as well? Fire 25 damage skills at a monster and then stop and wait for the stacks to wear off? Why hinder conditions builds so much? Do you fear conditions? Cause personally I love to inflict them.

Sorin.4310:

Shadoekin.3928:

What’s key is to prevent to dominance of any one meta. A berserker focued group should be as good as any other balanced group.

Why? If a balanced group, which presumably means it has more survivability, is supposed to be as effective as a zerker group, why the heck would anyone wear zerker gear? The point of zerker is risk vs reward. The problem is most of this game lacks risk in fights. However, just making the bosses hit for more or more frequently is just lazy design. Better mechanics like lupi is what is needed imo, but is not what expected.

Lupi is one of the worst bosses in the game

His ranged Attacks have unreliable tells…you can stand out of the aoes and still be hit by Flying projectiles hard to see.

Melee is way more easy

The day a player found a way to solo it, few weeks after anyone could do it….there may be a reason….or suddenly everyone became skilled?

Skill is one of the most misunderstood things in this game…..stacking is not skill because is made most about rotations and premade tactics.

EVASION IS SKILL mostly being on reaction……but sadly you don t Always need it…

When i see 0 evasion video i think “nice they found another way to negate mechanics” (see P.S.)….that is skill for the first party to do it and put on youtube…after that no skill is required..

Zerker is an option that totally removes margin for mistake…but as long as there are professions that can totally negate mechanics for themselves (warriors) or for the Whole party (guardians) there is no real reason to go anything but full dps.

P.S. i know some in that video is on reaction i was focusing on the concept….

P.P.S. yet remain the issue that since anet decided to make equipment grindy and tied to stats they can t really change the meta without a huge loss of population….

I m not farming again my Whole ascended equipment…like many Others…

LordByron.8369:

Sorin.4310:

Shadoekin.3928:

What’s key is to prevent to dominance of any one meta. A berserker focued group should be as good as any other balanced group.

Why? If a balanced group, which presumably means it has more survivability, is supposed to be as effective as a zerker group, why the heck would anyone wear zerker gear? The point of zerker is risk vs reward. The problem is most of this game lacks risk in fights. However, just making the bosses hit for more or more frequently is just lazy design. Better mechanics like lupi is what is needed imo, but is not what expected.

Lupi is one of the worst bosses in the game

His ranged Attacks have unreliable tells…you can stand out of the aoes and still be hit by Flying projectiles hard to see.

Melee is way more easy

The day the player found a way to solo it, few weeks after anyone could do it….there may be a reason….or suddenly everyone became skilled?

Fixed.

there is no actual need to change the meta and to destroy zerk. they only need to make conditions better by removing the cap first and inflicting more damage with them. that’s all.

Or they could simply add bosses with super high armor and low health (which would favor condition damage) instead of giving all bosses super high health (with favors direct damage).

But yeah, a game designed by warriors for warriors. What do you expect? ;-)

Fenrir.3609:

Dub.1273:

Just throwing this in here again: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2VhmwLwvrM

Whoever argues against the “berserker meta”, is that what you want the game to become? Add some random dodges in and you are invicible, that would make you able to play content blind with one hand, easily. Is that what you want as new meta in gw2, instead of actually a bit of positioning, dodging and supporting?

I get the impression that a lot of the people moaning about zerker don’t really care about what becomes of the meta/game after a zerk nerf, they simply want those people doing well in zerk to get the shaft.

So as long as people using zerk to clear stuff faster then them get hit with the nerf bat, they will be happy as pigs in muck.

And that’s pretty much how it is.
People that are asking for a zerker nerf are usually people who couldn’t adapt to the meta themselves – that’s what the vast majority of zerker haters is.
for them – a zerker nerf would be a sort of revenge.
It makes me sad to see people like these spamming the forums and not realizing that killing the zerker meta will just bring about another meta that’s just as restrictive.
Build diversity dies out the moment you factor in build efficiency. And GW2 ( unlike GW1) is a game where efficiency matters.

woeye.2753:

Or they could simply add bosses with super high armor and low health (which would favor condition damage) instead of giving all bosses super high health (with favors direct damage).

But yeah, a game designed by warriors for warriors. What do you expect? ;-)

There are other classes who are based around direct damage in the game you know, like thieves for example. Hell that’s one thing out of their very short list of things they can do for the group that is not highly situational (group stealth for skipping and permablind for trash). Your little suggestion would just make thieves as useful as a bearbow in that encounter since the condis are absolutely laughable on a thief.

well i have nothing against zerkers as i previously stated. about adapting to the zerk meta and running in full zerk armor in my opinion is just plain stupid for some classes like necro for example. i refuse to play zerk with my necro! why? cause i like to play with the staff and inflict aoe condition damage. if i want to play zerk it would be on a warrior or some other class, but not necro that’s for sure. some classes are better suited for direct damage others are more suited for condition damage. both should have a FAIR chance to inflict the same amount of damage on enemies. this game shouldn’t favor zerkers. i say DO NOT nerf zerkers, remove the cap on condition damage and let me see how far i can go with my condition dps. just remove the stupid cap and see what happens. cause when i’m running dungeons or fractals and i see 25 stacks of bleed (cause poison and fire don’t stack AND THEY SHOULD!) i grind at the screen knowing i can’t help my team as much as i could cause in my builds i maximize condition damage and if i can’t inflict it i’m useless and i don’t like that. is it that hard for anet do remove the condition cap? i think not. maybe 10 clicks and give condition builds a fair fighting chance in larger groups?

also i good choice would be to reduce the length of the conditions and improve their damage dramatically.

another thing they might do is make 25 cap INDIVIDUAL not collective as it is right now. let me stack my bleeds and poison cause poison is so weak unstacked. fire should also be stackable.

and so after 3 days people start seeing the issue is not “zerker” but PVE profession balance.

Is zerker necro required for pve?
And what about rangers that goes zerk since release?
engi?
A zerk ele without conjured weapons?

And so on….
Obviously is easier to just nerf zerk equip….that will make guard and wars even more valuable because guard support is unrivaled and war can do good dps even in soldier compared to other professions…

And you are giving the perfect excuse to anet for another 6 months of broken pve meta….

It’s the faster thing that is really upsetting some people it seems. They just cannot stand the fact that people who bother to optimize for speed can clear content and thus get shinies a bit faster then them, when they themselves can’t be bothered to optimize for a speed run.

They can do the content with their builds, they can do it easily. They want to be able to do it as quickly as a perfectly optimized speed run group without having to bother to optimize in the first place.

Ideally they want to be able to speed run as fast as optimal groups when using their PVT tank builds so when they port into WvW they don’t have to change out of their gear/builds and they can still be in the dominant zerg meta (tanky PVT).

It’s about cake and eating it.

JonPeters.5630:

We are trying to take steps to address some of the dominance of Berserker/DPS players. More info next week, I think.

Jon

hi jon,

why is there a condition cap limit? why have you limited condition builds so severely? this has made the game so UNBALANCED between pure damage and condition damage.

if you guys would remove this stupid limitation i think the game would be so much more balanced and people would consider conditions as a viable and reliable source of damage as well. just remove the 25 stack limit and the other conditions limits (some only stack 5 times in length) and let condition builds have their say in this game.

poison should be stackable too because it’s such a weak damage dealer unstacked.

make those changes and i’ll guarantee you a much more balanced meta then this currently is. do not nerf zerks just let the condition builds have a fair fighting chance!

just a few clicks and voila! people would have a real and viable alternative source of damage and build variety for groups. zerkers would look with much more interest into conditions then they currently are. zerker population will decrease naturally and not forced by any meta. some of the zerkers will transition into a more balanced build naturally. you’ll see.

thank you.

Valdur.2679:

JonPeters.5630:

We are trying to take steps to address some of the dominance of Berserker/DPS players. More info next week, I think.

Jon

hi jon,

why is there a condition cap limit? why have you limited condition builds so severely? this has made the game so UNBALANCED between pure damage and condition damage.

if you guys would remove this stupid limitation i think the game would be so much more balanced and people would consider conditions as a viable and reliable source of damage as well. just remove the 25 stack limit and the other conditions limits (some only stack 5 times in length) and let condition builds have their say in this game.

poison should be stackable too because it’s such a weak damage dealer unstacked.

make those changes and i’ll guarantee you a much more balanced meta then this currently is. do not nerf zerks just let the condition builds have a fair fighting chance!

just a few clicks and voila! people would have a real and viable alternative source of damage and build variety for groups. zerkers would look with much more interest into conditions then they currently are. zerker population will decrease naturally and not forced by any meta. some of the zerkers will transition into a more balanced build naturally. you’ll see.

thank you.

Because of the impact on pvp given the shared pve/WvW model. The condi meta is already stong in pvp, removing the cap would make it insane.

Fenrir.3609:

It’s the faster thing that is really upsetting some people it seems. They just cannot stand the fact that people who bother to optimize for speed can clear content and thus get shinies a bit faster then them, when they themselves can’t be bothered to optimize for a speed run.

They can do the content with their builds, they can do it easily. They want to be able to do it as quickly as a perfectly optimized speed run group without having to bother to optimize in the first place.

Ideally they want to be able to speed run as fast as optimal groups when using their PVT tank builds so when they port into WvW they don’t have to change out of their gear/builds and they can still be in the dominant zerg meta (tanky PVT).

It’s about cake and eating it.

It’s sad how this community is toxic while at the same time complaining about zerker’s. This is pure hypocrisy.

Id just like to say that in that video I was playing the necro (has no blocks, invulns or evade skills) and it was so unbelievably faceroll that I was falling asleep. I didnt think about a single skill used. I just pressed buttons when they came off cd at random intervals. The game is not easier in zerker gear. Its easier in tanky gear. I didnt even go full tank, i had zerker weapons and trinkets and I was able to facetank alphard and lupis 1hit attacks.

http://youtu.be/aZgRUtK7LkM

You guys are deluded if you think dps groups bypass all boss mechanics. It can happen on some fights but if someone messes up then you have to be ready for those attacks anyway. Ir requires knowledge and skill to zerk many encounters in the game. And that includes the times where bosses melt in under a minute. Its not like bosses take a minute to start attacking.

Because of the impact on pvp given the shared pve/WvW model. The condi meta is already stong in pvp, removing the cap would make it insane.

i don’t agree. so it’s ok for you (probably you run zerk) to have no limitation on damage but have limitations on condition damage. i mean it’s like warriors are ok to fight with 2 hands but condition ppl should have to fight with one hand tied behind their backs.

nice.

spoj.9672:

Id just like to say that in that video I was playing the necro (has no blocks, invulns or evade skills) and it was so unbelievably faceroll that I was falling asleep. I didnt think about a single skill used. I just pressed buttons when they came off cd at random intervals. The game is not easier in zerker gear. Its easier in tanky gear. I didnt even go full tank, i had zerker weapons and trinkets and I was able to facetank alphard and lupis 1hit attacks.

http://youtu.be/aZgRUtK7LkM

You guys are deluded if you think dps groups bypass all boss mechanics. It can happen on some fights but if someone messes up then you have to be ready for those attacks anyway. Ir requires knowledge and skill to zerk many encounters in the game. And that includes the times where bosses melt in under a minute. Its not like bosses take a minute to start attacking.

Lupi vids doesn t impress anyone already…
And yes you can survive a minute with utilities chain….and minimal defensive effort.
You will be able to use your active defenses many times….given their short cd on certain professions.

The question is HOW often do you react to something you see on screen?
in current meta the answer is really few times.

Zerker+stacking meta is there to:

1) reduce the type of answers to boss Attacks
2) reduce the number of answers to boss Attacks
3) reduce drastically answers on reaction replacing them with rotations that has nothing to do with skill

And that is also the reason why people don t like pugging expecially with random professions.

I have no idea what you’re talking about. The videos just prove you dont need any knowledge or active defense to completely faceroll content.

LordByron.8369:

Lupi vids doesn t impress anyone already…
And yes you can survive a minute with utilities chain….and minimal defensive effort.
You will be able to use your active defenses many times….given their short cd on certain professions.

The question is HOW often do you react to something you see on screen?
in current meta the answer is really few times.

Zerker+stacking meta is there to:

1) reduce the type of answers to boss Attacks
2) reduce the number of answers to boss Attacks
3) reduce drastically answers on reaction replacing them with rotations that has nothing to do with skill

And that is also the reason why people don t like pugging expecially with random professions.

Are you doing this purposefully?

The idea of pure stat variance is interesting, btw.

What about:

• Enemies with very high Toughness (shedding 75%+ of incoming direct damage) but comparatively low health? Condition builds would fare comparatively better here. Compound problem which remains is that an awful lot of zerker builds proc bleeds.
• Enemies which cannot be crit, but can otherwise be afflicted normally.
• Enemies with boon-stealing auras, stealing 1 boon every second from everyone in range.

haviz.1340:

I’m sure facetanking hardest hitting bosses in the game is intended.

If a group gears and traits themselves for a certain strategy to defeat an encounter, yes. And the groups that do so do not just stand by the boss and press 1. They actively employ fields to heal, to leech, to protect, to cleanse, all which needs prior knowledge and preparation.

Anyone who tries to claim that just anyone can go in with a random build and setup and merely slap on tanky gear is obviously trying to cover up that fact.

Shadoekin.3928:

Anyone who tries to claim that just anyone can go in with a random build and setup and merely slap on tanky gear is obviously trying to cover up that fact.

Well, on the other hand people seem to imply that putting zerk on 5 players and stacking is an automatic win in PvE.

Shadoekin.3928:

If a group gears and traits themselves for a certain strategy to defeat an encounter, yes. And the groups that do so do not just stand by the boss and press 1. They actively employ fields to heal, to leech, to protect, to cleanse, all which needs prior knowledge and preparation.

Anyone who tries to claim that just anyone can go in with a random build and setup and merely slap on tanky gear is obviously trying to cover up that fact.

So what’s the problem with dps meta? You need to actively use your defense skills, manage your endurance, use reflects, stack offensive and defensive boons, time your aegis and many more.

Also, prior knowledge? Those people probably have never played with tanky gear in this game and they claim it was faceroll.

Shadoekin.3928:

Anyone who tries to claim that just anyone can go in with a random build and setup and merely slap on tanky gear is obviously trying to cover up that fact.

Funnily enough our preparation was literally the following:

-Dub asks in gchat if anyone is up for the epic challenge of play how you want no dodge arah.
-Several of us volunteer.
-We equip random tanky gear and retrait to something defensive.
-We didnt ask for specific stuff or classes from each other, we didnt discuss what we took.
-Enter dungeon, disable dodge key and proceed.

Only communication was in party chat and that didnt involve any strategies. We reset lupi 5 times by running away because it was impossible to wipe. Everything was faceroll and required no active defense other than spamming skills. Only challenging part was skipping the deadeyes with no dodges. And as haviz said we are unfamiliar with defensive builds. Im used to dodging things but that wasnt possible with it disabled.

The last time my fotm49 group had trouble with Mai Trin – I respecced to 0/0/20/30/20 on my guardian, equipped my mace/shield/staff cleric gear and we all stood there facetanking with almost 1,000 hp per second aoe heals excluding the 3k empower, 3k virtue and 10k healing breeze burst healing. The fight became super easy mode compared to the zerker setup where it’s either dodge the shadowsteps or die.

fadeaway.2807:

The last time my fotm49 group had trouble with Mai Trin – I respecced to 0/0/20/30/20 on my guardian, equipped my mace/shield/staff cleric gear and we all stood there facetanking with almost 1,000 hp per second aoe heals excluding the 3k empower, 3k virtue and 10k healing breeze burst healing. The fight became super easy mode compared to the zerker setup where it’s either dodge the shadowsteps or die.

Yes but you had to know it. Preparation and prior knowledge.

spoj.9672:

Id just like to say that in that video I was playing the necro (has no blocks, invulns or evade skills) and it was so unbelievably faceroll that I was falling asleep. I didnt think about a single skill used. I just pressed buttons when they came off cd at random intervals. The game is not easier in zerker gear. Its easier in tanky gear. I didnt even go full tank, i had zerker weapons and trinkets and I was able to facetank alphard and lupis 1hit attacks.

http://youtu.be/aZgRUtK7LkM

You guys are deluded if you think dps groups bypass all boss mechanics. It can happen on some fights but if someone messes up then you have to be ready for those attacks anyway. Ir requires knowledge and skill to zerk many encounters in the game. And that includes the times where bosses melt in under a minute. Its not like bosses take a minute to start attacking.

To say that the necro in the video just randomly pressed buttons whenever things came off cooldown is not being truthful. During the first phase change there was the use of the elite Plague and then Plague of Darkness. Was this random? There was no dodge used but when the necro was standing in a red circle, there was the quick switch into Deathshroud and the use of Life Transfer to refill life-force.

How is this different from dodging?

Then other things like Blinding Flash from the eles when in air attunement, the guardian with perma-prot and popping group aegis whenever there are circles, not to mention all the fields and finishers.

Whether or not this gameplay or a dodging one is anyone’s cup or tea, if a group has a certain cohesive strategy that supports each other through their traits and gear, there is no reason why it should not work.

Shadoekin.3928:

To say that the necro in the video just randomly pressed buttons whenever things came off cooldown is not being truthful. During the first phase change there was the use of the elite Plague and then Plague of Darkness. Was this random? There was no dodge used but when the necro was standing in a red circle, there was the quick switch into Deathshroud and the use of Life Transfer to refill life-force.

How is this different from dodging?

Then other things like Blinding Flash from the eles when in air attunement, the guardian with perma-prot and popping group aegis whenever there are circles, not to mention all the fields and finishers.

Whether or not this gameplay or a dodging one is anyone’s cup or tea, if a group has a certain cohesive strategy that supports each other through their traits and gear, there is no reason why it should not work.

Blind doesnt work on bosses. And i admit i used DS out of reflex but thats a hard habit to break. Besides i allowed him to hit me with the first half of the aoe before going DS. Can you honestly say a total newby would facetank an attack, see his hp drop to half and not do anything to prevent it?

You miss the point though. People are saying zerker is too easy and passive defence isnt good enough. Surely that video shows otherwise? People assume any noob can equip zerker and faceroll content. Thats not true at all. But any noob can equip tanky gear and faceroll content because you dont need to know when to avoid attacks (huge safety net).

Shadoekin.3928:

Whether or not this gameplay or a dodging one is anyone’s cup or tea, if a group has a certain cohesive strategy that supports each other through their traits and gear, there is no reason why it should not work.

It shouldn’t work because you are ignoring bosses mechanics. I think this is one of the silly arguments against berserker’s meta, that they ignore game mechanics.

I didn’t read all the discussion (yea I’m a lazy kitten), did anyone suggest about indogiable attaks that mabie any tipe of mobs can have? For example: If boss X can use attaks that can’t be dodged, stats will be relevant to survive.
So to have nice stats to stay alive, and haven’t only active defense would make difference in PvE.

P.S. : Players already have attaks that are unblockable, to add this option to any veteran/elitle/champion/Boss/World boss attaks ? Stats will have a great valute, but better don’t abuse of it, it’s a skill game, not a stat game :P

spoj.9672:

Shadoekin.3928:

Anyone who tries to claim that just anyone can go in with a random build and setup and merely slap on tanky gear is obviously trying to cover up that fact.

Funnily enough our preparation was literally the following:

-Dub asks in gchat if anyone is up for the epic challenge of play how you want no dodge arah.
-Several of us volunteer.
-We equip random tanky gear and retrait to something defensive.
-We didnt ask for specific stuff or classes from each other, we didnt discuss what we took.
-Enter dungeon, disable dodge key and proceed.

Only communication was in party chat and that didnt involve any strategies. We reset lupi 5 times by running away because it was impossible to wipe. Everything was faceroll and required no active defense other than spamming skills. Only challenging part was skipping the deadeyes with no dodges. And as haviz said we are unfamiliar with defensive builds. Im used to dodging things but that wasnt possible with it disabled.

Retraiting makes all the difference. It’s not like everyone took their current dps specs, or any random spec, put on tanky gear and then expected to achieve the same thing. This is still preparation, which is hallmark to the GW franchise.

GW favors the player who knows the fight, and knows how to adjust their traits accordingly. This has always been the case to the point that GW1 was called “Build Wars”. This is also the reason why players do not have the option to simply switch from one build to another like in PVP. Anet want us to choose a certain build and try to stick with it throughout an instance, or else port out and then pay for to retrait.

That is what GW2 started out as, a game about players going into encounters prepared with the right traits, equipped skills, weapons, and to a lesser extent gear. The active combat is supposed to make gameplay more fast paced and engaging, instead of having players stand to a side and cycle through rotations like in traditional MMORPGs.

Players who enjoy high risk/high rewards style of play eventually developed this dps meta which gave GW2 a (excuse me for mentioning another game) “Dark Souls” feel to it.

Speedclears have always existed in the GW franchise. Soloers have always existed in the GW franchise. This was back when you had to have a max weapon with the +20% enchantment duration mod or else certain builds won’t work.

A big part of the game relies on the ingenuity and creativity of the players to even think up of the build, to counter any and all boss mechanics. The action driven combat is another part. The developers wants us to have both, so why are we slowly pigeonholing ourselves into a single meta?

spoj.9672:

I have no idea what you’re talking about. The videos just prove you dont need any knowledge or active defense to completely faceroll content.

So you didn t have permaprotection..
You didn t get ressed by warrior banner
You didn t have Aegis etc….
You didn t have warriors burst ready for grubs….

You were obviously random build with no party tactic planned before….it wasn t your usual dungeon team and you weren t on TS…..
Can you pug the same strategy?

But most of all…given the amount of your post complaining about PvE why i still didn t find any constructive suggestion?
If the meta is good as it is why do you even complain (but mostly why don t you never pug? but i know the reason to this…..)

We didnt tailor our traits for anything lol. I simply picked lifesteal and general defensive traits that the average “support” necro would take. Shout heal warriors dont think about their traits they just take the stuff which seems like it supports. Thats exactly what we did. I had several traits which were completely useless for what we were doing.

LordByron.8369:

So you didn t have permaprotection..
You didn t get ressed by warrior banner
You didn t have Aegis etc….
You didn t have warriors burst ready for grubs….

You were obviously random build with no party tactic planned before….it wasn t your usual dungeon team and you weren t on TS…..
Can you pug the same strategy?

Did you even read any of our posts or watch the video?

haviz.1340:

So what’s the problem with dps meta? You need to actively use your defense skills, manage your endurance, use reflects, stack offensive and defensive boons, time your aegis and many more.

Also, prior knowledge? Those people probably have never played with tanky gear in this game and they claim it was faceroll.

The problem with the dps meta is that as more and more players migrate to that mode of gameplay, it will alienate new players who aren’t yet as skilled.

Also as everyone starts being about to farm a large amount of gold and materials faster and faster, this will lead to inflation. It doesn’t matter much to the community if a small population is wealthy, but if everyone only speedclears and ends up having a lot of gold/materials, then we will end up seeing even more sinks implemented. This again further alienates new players.

Anet needs to address this because as a developer, it makes no sense to have a game with turns new players off.

Players who can successfully and continually speedclear and amass wealth will not need to support Anet through microtransactions since they can pretty much just trade gold for gems. Players who no longer have anything to craft and still have their speedclear incomes only have gems to buy which affects market prices and could affect real world money. The only people who will need to spend real cash on gems would end up being the people who do not have the skill to speedclear farm, aka the new players….who are more likely to just leave the game than spend on it.

There is also the issue of champ train farmers and how these groups treat new players in Queensdale but that’s not directly related to this thread.

Yes our individual experiences to gameplay matters, but beyond the minutiae of any one particular player’s gaming session, there are other bigger things involved.

Carighan.6758:

The idea of pure stat variance is interesting, btw.

What about:

• Enemies with very high Toughness (shedding 75%+ of incoming direct damage) but comparatively low health? Condition builds would fare comparatively better here. Compound problem which remains is that an awful lot of zerker builds proc bleeds.
• Enemies which cannot be crit, but can otherwise be afflicted normally.
• Enemies with boon-stealing auras, stealing 1 boon every second from everyone in range.

Dire will be OP. Think>Post

Pure Condition should NEVER do the same dmg as Berserker. Because they always have at least 1 defensive stat (thoughness for example means permaprot all the time).

The only builds that aren´t balanced right now are rampager using hybrids.

Xarius.6120:

I didn’t read all the discussion (yea I’m a lazy kitten), did anyone suggest about indogiable attaks that mabie any tipe of mobs can have? For example: If boss X can use attaks that can’t be dodged, stats will be relevant to survive.
So to have nice stats to stay alive, and haven’t only active defense would make difference in PvE.

12k not block/avoidable? Who want to play guard/thief/ele then? Dmg based on maximum health? PVT/Dire and so, they will all get more useless then now.

This idea is not bad but i can´t see a way to make it balanced in this game.

spoj.9672:

LordByron.8369:

So you didn t have permaprotection..
You didn t get ressed by warrior banner
You didn t have Aegis etc….
You didn t have warriors burst ready for grubs….

You were obviously random build with no party tactic planned before….it wasn t your usual dungeon team and you weren t on TS…..
Can you pug the same strategy?

Did you even read any of our posts or watch the video?

What do you expect me to answer?
Maybe you should start being constructive?

While we are here do you ever wonder why devs rarely pass by dungeon section?

Shadoekin.3928:

Players who can successfully and continually speedclear and amass wealth will not need to support Anet through microtransactions since they can pretty much just trade gold for gems. Players who no longer have anything to craft and still have their speedclear incomes only have gems to buy which affects market prices and could affect real world money. The only people who will need to spend real cash on gems would end up being the people who do not have the skill to speedclear farm, aka the new players….who are more likely to just leave the game than spend on it.

There is also the issue of champ train farmers and how these groups treat new players in Queensdale but that’s not directly related to this thread.

I think you will find most speedclearers are very short on gold most of the time. The rewards really arent that great. The only way to make a reasonable profit is to sell arah. Champ farming is far more lucrative afaik.