Guild Wars 2

Rising Dusk.2408:

Lastly, any “power creep” classes are experiencing has come more from elite specializations and new gear stat combinations. None of it originated in ascended gear. Seriously, guys, the top guilds are clearing all of the bosses with minutes left before the timers run out. The ~2% gain from ascended armor and the ~8% gain from ascended weapons is nowhere near enough to lose you 1-2 minutes on the clock even if everyone is suffering that same loss. It’s 90% about the mechanical skill and awareness. You can train yourself and your friends to be better, and you can overcome the content.

I’m sorry Rising but Ascended started the power creep with just its original addition to the game. “How much” or “how little” is irrelevant. It was the initial introduction of the next level of power. Infusions add “a little bit more.” The statement was made that yes, ascended is the ‘last’ tier, but they fully intended to ‘continue a small power curve’ through stronger infusions. We have not yet see those, but that’s exactly what power creep is. Now we’re adding whole new gear stats like viper that also add to the power creep.

I’m not even looking at it from the elite spec perspective. That imbalance was entirely expected, and if Anet can achieve their (supposed) initial plans of making them ‘just another option’ as opposed to an ‘upgrade,’ then power creep there is a non-issue. That will just take time to sort out.

Tbh from the stand point of coming back after 2+years to try HoT I kind of like that you need some ascended stuff and to clarify I had no ascended equips. I equipped my warrior good enough to raid and it wasn’t that tough. The rings and necklace were easy to get and the trinkets even through the laurel vendor weren’t the end of the world. Then the weapon was pretty cheap (GS). My weapon swap is still exotic since all you use double mace for is break bars. I also crafted my chestpiece, legs, and helm because they gave reasonably large stat boost and for a similar cost to the others. Overall One Weapon and three pieces of armor + rings and stuff which are easy to get are all you really need (the other armor pieces give you a total of 18 offensive stat points…if someone really cared about that get 4+5 stat infusions for 5 laurels each and boom higher stats than most people are bringing). Tbh 5 classes only need to craft 1-2 weapons so I feel like people just make it seem like its so difficult. I saw one guy said that it would cost 500+ gold to make all the weapons……I mean if you got everything then what rewards are you really looking for. I think its great through raiding I get a 30-50% chance to get ascended equips as drops followed by a guaranteed ascended piece every couple weeks from the vendor. I feel like this will give the game a nice level of progression especially as we begin to see players learning the mechanics of the fights and equipment expectations will decrease overtime.

BrotherBelial.3094:

Agemnon.4608:

Since HoT mobs are stronger some power creep is justified.

Sorry no. once you work out how the mobs behave HoT is quite easy. I found HoT hard on my first play through, I was a Warrior in ascended Knights armor, with Ascended Zerker weapons and trinkets, my Guardian was a little easier, Burn guard with zerker armor, and a mix of zerker and Soilders trinkets, all exotic gear. My third time thought with my full zerker ranger in full exotic, bar her longbow that is ascended and HoT is easy mode.

From my experience of hot ranged players have an easier time in open world and story mode than melee classes.

BloodyNine.7504:

Supernaut.2684:

WoW did a lot of things wrong, but one thing they did right, IMO, was to provide a clear and reasonable path for gear progression.

Yup, the bottom line is that if the gear is required for content then you should be able to get it through content. I don’t want it given to me for free. If I need ascended armor for doing higher level fractals, then doing lower level ones should be able to eventually gear me up. That was I can work my way up.

If ascended weapons are needed for raids then high level dungeons, and or other high end content should drop those as well. You can gear yourself up through playing content to work to harder content. Grinding/buying gold and crafting the armor/weapons should be a shortcut. Not the only way to get there.

None of that would matter at all if the content didn’t require those items. But it does.

you can get them Via drops, granted they are few and far between. but they do drops.

If you think about it power creep can communicate: “You’re actually going to need these stats or abilities sometime. Better get used to it.” We could already beat the much easier content without it, this would further widen the gap making gathering that much faster and more convenient. HoT may not be as hard as their reputation like you stated but there are times when you have be careful. In Tangled Depths for example there’s a spot with abunch of grunts, a couple of mounted mordrem, some snipers, and a veteran smoke scale off to the side. I know to shadowstep behind a sniper, burst him down, switch to shortbow, let the bouncing arrow and exploding ponies bleed out some extra damage, go back to sword/dagger for more daze stunning, take out the juggernauts, then the grunts. It’s that ledge near the steps you need to get up where you glide to a helicopter blade, jump off to the cliff, climb up the ramp, get the vista, then dive (seriously do it! The free mastery point was a pleasant surprise) only to be chewed up by piranhas.

Exploring that part of TD was actually fun so I don’t understand why people hate the map. Yes getting the meta to succeed requires great organization, familiarity, and skill, but there’s more to the map than just that one meta and besides, those who mastered the content need some open world stuff too. Some content needs to chew up intermediates and even goods but not quite greats and spit them out.

Ghedoriah.4290:

Sinister
Primary 1: 439
Secondary 1: 315
Secondary 2: 315

Total: 1069

Viper
Primary 1: 376
Primary 2: 376
Secondary 1: 207
Secondary 2: 207

Total: 1166

Have there been power creep, Yes. Is Viper one of the reasons.. not really

Why not?

The condition duration food was nerfed, so we lost 20% duration, this = 300 expertise. So we lost 300 stat points (from food buff). That Viper is 100 points more then Sinister do therefore not explain any power creep. Since old Sinister (with food) > viper (with food).

The new traits/weapons (and alacrity) on the other hand..

Just my 2c. The ascended requirement wouldn’t have been so bad if there was an actual viable way to earn them outside of sinking gold into them. WoW may have been filled with elitist snobs due to the nature of in-game progression, but what they did perfectly was gear progression (at least back in Burning Crusade). It was quest reward gear>dungeon gear>heroic dungeon gear>entry level raid gear>tier set gear found in harder raids. But what do we have in GW2? We’re forced into sinking gold into crafting professions to make the best gear that can be attained. We can’t even pay someone to do the crafting for us, we’re forced to learn a crafting profession, level it, then spend even more money to craft what we need (if we want the best possible gear). It’s like traveling from one point to another, but all roads eventually lead to the same expensive toll gate.

But even with all that said, I’ve pretty much resigned to the fact that there’s no way around it…so here I am, spending my weekends trying to farm the mats and gold necessary to make:

2 swords
1 hammer
1 mace
1 axe
1 shield

At this rate, I’m probably gonna get my ascened weapons by xmas 2016.

beefjus.9347:

At this rate, I’m probably gonna get my ascened weapons by xmas 2016.

By which time you’ll have to stat-swap it for something else. Enjoy the “no gear treadmill” or “no power creep”. Coz Viper’s is totally not much better than Sinister’s. And there’s totally not gonna be some better stat combination in the future to make your current one less useful.

Juclesia Elcritian.8410:

beefjus.9347:

At this rate, I’m probably gonna get my ascened weapons by xmas 2016.

By which time you’ll have to stat-swap it for something else. Enjoy the “no gear treadmill” or “no power creep”. Coz Viper’s is totally not much better than Sinister’s. And there’s totally not gonna be some better stat combination in the future to make your current one less useful.

Yeah, the funny thing is, ANet has a tiered gear treadmill now.

But instead of resetting the grind on an update and putting everyone on the same level, ANet just raises the gear score on their ascended items (like from sinister to viper) to hide the fact, that ascended items having different values.

So there is no new level and no new rarity but we clearly have a power creep going on.

Beast Sos.1457:

Juclesia Elcritian.8410:

Except newer ascended combinations such as viper are much better than older combinations like sinister. Which is still a creep.

I had a engi in my party solo the red guard because he was in full asc viper. Thats min of 40K ticks on his burns…Thats some serious power creep.

Min (minimum?) of 40k burn tick? Lolol maybe he was using a hack or something you should report him. I’ve played all kinds of condi with full ascended and have nvr seen a 30k burn single tick let alone a 40k tick minimum. That would be like 35 to 40 stacks of burn at maybe more than max condi dmg at 25 might and vuln. Even if he spammed all his burn skills as an engi at one shot assuming no cast time or button pressing time he still wouldn’t be able to get that amount of burn stacks. Come on lol 40k burn tick bahaha that’s funny.

Zach.2618:

Beast Sos.1457:

Juclesia Elcritian.8410:

Except newer ascended combinations such as viper are much better than older combinations like sinister. Which is still a creep.

I had a engi in my party solo the red guard because he was in full asc viper. Thats min of 40K ticks on his burns…Thats some serious power creep.

Min (minimum?) of 40k burn tick? Lolol maybe he was using a hack or something you should report him. I’ve played all kinds of condi with full ascended and have nvr seen a 30k burn single tick let alone a 40k tick minimum. That would be like 35 to 40 stacks of burn at maybe more than max condi dmg at 25 might and vuln. Even if he spammed all his burn skills as an engi at one shot assuming no cast time or button pressing time he still wouldn’t be able to get that amount of burn stacks. Come on lol 40k burn tick bahaha that’s funny.

Well maybe that engi who did 40k burns was sPvP player. They are much better than PvE players.

As someone who has cleared vale guardian every week I want to say that he can easily be done in exotics, I am in ascended but you always have over a minute left on the timer for vale. If you are having trouble finding the money to craft ascended, cap out your magnetite shards on vale guardian every week and you can get a full set for about 100g, which is so so much better than the like 900g+ I spent on weapons+armor

Once you get a full set you’ll be ready to try gorseval, because the stat difference between ascended and exotics in gorseval actually does make a difference

I think Power creep only ‘works’ when it allows greater access to ‘hardcore’ content over time by being tied to Character level cap increases and/or easy to obtain varied ways of getting starter Raid gear.

Over time in wow you forgoe being an early adopter of a new Raid when the price to entry is higher, knowing you can still do it a few months later when Heroic gear reward levels are increased or the level cap increases.

Here you have ONE way of getting ascended with increased mats, only the first boss can be done in Exotics and of course there will be no opportunity to do the raid later because – no increase of access to entry level gear.

Ive just heard people raiding the last 3 weeks may not even have had an Ascended drop yet so you cant even farm the first Boss to kit yourself out. Sorry but WoW Raid Bosses always had a loot table of the highest gear in the game – none of the sup par Exotic kitten…

So the Raids will remain inaccessible to far to many people because Power creep really is happening but with no mechanisms to make it easier over time to get into Raids.

Add in the ‘other’ stealth ilevel with the new 4 stat sets and it doesn’t look good – I certainly cant see me being able to Raid.

Ascended is way too expensive now (and I mean a set of weapons and armors), trinkets are easy to get, but still that’s almost 500g depending on classes for an efficient choice of weapons, and the double for an armor set, that’s too much for new players…

Kaiyanwan.8521:

Juclesia Elcritian.8410:

beefjus.9347:

At this rate, I’m probably gonna get my ascened weapons by xmas 2016.

By which time you’ll have to stat-swap it for something else. Enjoy the “no gear treadmill” or “no power creep”. Coz Viper’s is totally not much better than Sinister’s. And there’s totally not gonna be some better stat combination in the future to make your current one less useful.

Yeah, the funny thing is, ANet has a tiered gear treadmill now.

But instead of resetting the grind on an update and putting everyone on the same level, ANet just raises the gear score on their ascended items (like from sinister to viper) to hide the fact, that ascended items having different values.

So there is no new level and no new rarity but we clearly have a power creep going on.

Your entire point becomes quite pointless when viewed under the possility of being able to cheaply change the stats from one ascended stat combination to another doesn’t it though?

Here, read up: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ascended_equipment

Especially the part aboutchanging the attribute prefixes.

Also, as was mentioned, the main power creep comes from the vastly more powerful traitlones and elite specialisations and changes to boons.

Quickness alone being a boon now changes everything dramatically. But yeah, who cares about facts anyway.

Wahaha.7938:

Good players are more likely to have ascended armor. The correlation goes the other way around. I have found this correlation to be very noticeable.

Also someone with ascended armor is more likely to have good sigils, food.

Buying gems on the gemstore does not make someone a good player. And frankly there’s not really any other way to earn the gold needed to get Ascended Armor.

Kichwas.7152:

Wahaha.7938:

Good players are more likely to have ascended armor. The correlation goes the other way around. I have found this correlation to be very noticeable.

Also someone with ascended armor is more likely to have good sigils, food.

Buying gems on the gemstore does not make someone a good player. And frankly there’s not really any other way to earn the gold needed to get Ascended Armor.

I’m pretty sure running around and chopping trees/mining nodes/converting karma isn’t buying from gemstore, as is running fractals or just playing the game. Just because you don’t get much raw gold doesn’t mean you don’t get much gold hidden in materials.

I still agree that overall, ascended gear prices are too high currently though.

While needing ascendeds to be able to complete raids may not be true it is unfortunately becoming so for people that try to PUG to do it. For example earlier I was looking on LFG and saw a post saying “LF Engineer VG” since I have a condi engi (on which i have gotten VG to <5%) I join up and entered the instance then they asked me to link my gear (I have all but 3 pieces ascended Sinister/Rampager and 98% burn and bleed duration) so I do, and within 10 seconds I am kicked. Annoyed i look for the guy on LFG again and whisper him to ask why i was kicked. he claimed that whenever anyone is looking for an engineer for raids it is implied that they will only accept a fully ascended Viper engineer. First I point out that I already have 98% on the main 2 damaging conditions i apply and the duration caps at 100% so it would be stupid for me to get Viper then tell him that groups that want full ascended are supposed to put it in the LFG description, so of course he decides to insult my intelligence.
I realize that most people aren’t this horrendously rude and stupid but since raids came out I have noticed that they are growing in number

DirewolfX.5861:

Now those prices above assume you’re buying everything off the Auction House (and using your own daily Deldrimor/Spiritwood cooldowns). Part of the problem right now is that wood prices have spiked since the start of the expansion (example: http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/19722).

That’s kind of proving his point since the auction house prices are related to people trying to get better gear quickly to do the raid – or more specifically, to be invited to a raid group.

Cloth prices and black diamonds are also no joke either. Not that the diamonds really matter considering the very unfun and only option to obtain them is relying on RNGesus.

I’ve got 3 characters with weapons & accessoiries and 1 piece away of the power set for one of them. The Viper set is still at 0/6 although I’m slowly collecting black diamonds I’m also running out of empyrial fragments.

At first ascended gear was introduced as a shiny bonus that has a tiny stat increase which isn’t needed for anything really. Now I think if this were still true and the discussion would revolve around the second raid wing it would be an entirely different one.
The issure here is the rather awkward situation of a piece of content requiring pink gear (no matter if because of design or group leaders) while at the same time all content has been designed and balanced in a way that makes said content the easiest and second most relyable source of the very same gear. Basicly raids are there so you can a) get your legendary armor and b) gear your alts.
But as it stands your main character has to first complete pretty much all meaningful progression and then go raid. Whoever had that stroke of genius I do not know but afaik this is unprecedented in any western MMO – for a reason I might add.

Death Stroke.9875:

While needing ascendeds to be able to complete raids may not be true it is unfortunately becoming so for people that try to PUG to do it. For example earlier I was looking on LFG and saw a post saying “LF Engineer VG” since I have a condi engi (on which i have gotten VG to <5%) I join up and entered the instance then they asked me to link my gear (I have all but 3 pieces ascended Sinister/Rampager and 98% burn and bleed duration) so I do, and within 10 seconds I am kicked. Annoyed i look for the guy on LFG again and whisper him to ask why i was kicked. he claimed that whenever anyone is looking for an engineer for raids it is implied that they will only accept a fully ascended Viper engineer. First I point out that I already have 98% on the main 2 damaging conditions i apply and the duration caps at 100% so it would be stupid for me to get Viper then tell him that groups that want full ascended are supposed to put it in the LFG description, so of course he decides to insult my intelligence.
I realize that most people aren’t this horrendously rude and stupid but since raids came out I have noticed that they are growing in number

Look at it this way: judging by the competence of the groups selection abilities, you just got spared 2 hours of wiping to Vale Guardian.

You should thank who ever kicked you for sparing you such a noob pug.

Kichwas.7152:

Wahaha.7938:

Good players are more likely to have ascended armor. The correlation goes the other way around. I have found this correlation to be very noticeable.

Also someone with ascended armor is more likely to have good sigils, food.

Buying gems on the gemstore does not make someone a good player. And frankly there’s not really any other way to earn the gold needed to get Ascended Armor

I said “good players are more likely to have ascended armor”.
I did not say “getting ascended armor will make someone a good player”.

It’s more like “dedicated players are likely to have ascended armor/gear”, and it is clearly showing. Currently people who have completed the raids have at least 1 set of ascended gear, and those people are now at the stage where they can literally farm the entire first wing of the raid. And then there are people who can’t even beat the Vale Guardian and yet won’t even try to adapt to the change in meta.

If you really do want to complete raid, get quality food/utility, meet the standard, and then attempt it. Raid is not dungeon or fractal, difficulty is pretty good, and it is your responsibility to either meet the standard of people who want to raid or to create your own squad/lfg/guild for raid. Strategies and guides are now available, there are videos and guilds constantly being updated, so there is no excuse for not clearing the raid.

TheFamster.7806:

It’s more like “dedicated players are likely to have ascended armor/gear”, and it is clearly showing. Currently people who have completed the raids have at least 1 set of ascended gear, and those people are now at the stage where they can literally farm the entire first wing of the raid. And then there are people who can’t even beat the Vale Guardian and yet won’t even try to adapt to the change in meta.

If you really do want to complete raid, get quality food/utility, meet the standard, and then attempt it. Raid is not dungeon or fractal, difficulty is pretty good, and it is your responsibility to either meet the standard of people who want to raid or to create your own squad/lfg/guild for raid. Strategies and guides are now available, there are videos and guilds constantly being updated, so there is no excuse for not clearing the raid.

Problem just is that dude who made these raids probably doesn’t have any idea how gw2 combat works. Now you dps dps dps. You don’t even need to take any defense traits.

Junkpile.7439:

TheFamster.7806:

It’s more like “dedicated players are likely to have ascended armor/gear”, and it is clearly showing. Currently people who have completed the raids have at least 1 set of ascended gear, and those people are now at the stage where they can literally farm the entire first wing of the raid. And then there are people who can’t even beat the Vale Guardian and yet won’t even try to adapt to the change in meta.

If you really do want to complete raid, get quality food/utility, meet the standard, and then attempt it. Raid is not dungeon or fractal, difficulty is pretty good, and it is your responsibility to either meet the standard of people who want to raid or to create your own squad/lfg/guild for raid. Strategies and guides are now available, there are videos and guilds constantly being updated, so there is no excuse for not clearing the raid.

Problem just is that dude who made these raids probably doesn’t have any idea how gw2 combat works. Now you dps dps dps. You don’t even need to take any defense traits.

umm you have dedicated healer and a tank. Also now raid punishes players even more by adding 1 shot mechanics and timers that force people to do proper rotation, wear proper gear, use proper traits, and actually dodge in order to beat the boss. If you are stuck on VG you won’t see it, but later on if you have someone who cannot dodge or think fast, that person will be dropped from raid regardless of gear, consumable, class, or anything because you cannot complete the raid with that one person.

Alright, alright, I get your point, but don’t forget: Raids are MEANT to be lategame content for people who have ascended gear. You wanted lategame hard content? Here it is, stop complaining.

This is always the problem with raids in any game,
What you thought raids won’t breed elitism ???Lmao

Enasalin.2871:

Alright, alright, I get your point, but don’t forget: Raids are MEANT to be lategame content for people who have ascended gear. You wanted lategame hard content? Here it is, stop complaining.

Raids are not the end game content in this patch -_-
The endgame content for this patch was the story path+ DS meta event

I feel like Anet is trying to combine 2 different game types. Their “No Trifecta” game type and WoW/Other MMOs Healer/Tank/Dps type. An yes, the gear thing is really irritating. Maybe add Ascended armor/weapons as buyable rewards in Fractals for Pristine Relics? Would cut out the complaining about gear grinding and such. Still gotta work for it, but it’s not an impossible feeling slog.

Edit: I do like the Raid content, though not the timers, but it is a nice challenge and my guild and I have fun with it, even if we’ve never taken out the first boss. lol

Why are people even bothering with raids if they can’t get ascended gear in the first place? What is the goal for someone in raids who can’t be bothered enough to save up for ascended let alone any legendary armor components (yes we don’t know these yet but in sure it will be very expensive, much more so than ascended).

If they are too hard or challenging then move onto something else. If you are serious about them then work on something else while getting the gold / working through the time gate to get the ascended. Right?

Because some folks want the challenge to be the content, not the grind. Hell, half the battle is the grind to ascended gear.

I am fine that ascended is recommended for raids. But the prices are insane at the moment. There is something broken with the whole ascended crafting and that’s resources needed from low level areas. And those are getting more and more expensive.

You can farm and level or whatever for weeks and months in the new areas and run have almost zero low level mats do to the fact that they won’t drop there. This is a kittenty system, really. I get extremely mad every time I want to craft new ascended stuff only to see I have a kittenload of elder wood but zero or next to zero green wood.

Again, ascended gear is just recommended, not required. Get trinkets which almost cost nothing and maybe weapons and you’ll be fine. Then get your ascended armor from raids themselves.
Ascended crafting prices are kittened up not due to needing low level mats, but due to the fact ANet decided to take every material in the game and make it necessary in ridiculous amounts for new items, guild expansion etc. – while not giving us any new ways to get those mats, of course.

JVJD.4912:

This is always the problem with raids in any game,
What you thought raids won’t breed elitism ???Lmao

Well, competitive PVP also breeds elitism, and they did that before they did Raids…

Ascended must neccessary for raid. I dont understant everybody is crying we are casual, we dont have money, content is soo hard etc. In despite of not make a gold farm , i can earn 200-300 gold every week. If people search internet they can find effective gold farm guide and they will farm 500-600 gold every week and will buy asc gear and weapons. Content is not soo hard only need progress, patience and group coordination.

girginov.3528:

Ascended must neccessary for raid. I dont understant everybody is crying we are casual, we dont have money, content is soo hard etc. In despite of not make a gold farm , i can earn 200-300 gold every week. If people search internet they can find effective gold farm guide and they will farm 500-600 gold every week and will buy asc gear and weapons. Content is not soo hard only need progress, patience and group coordination.

Problem is that whole point of raids is just try to make players poor. Let’s see what kind of silly stat combination they bring for next wing. I think that viper was too cheap to make so they need to bring something more expensive. They could have made hard content where condi users could have use rabid or dire, but no they made content where you just need to dps, dodge and have viper gear.

Anyone who can’t get past Vale Guardian in full exotic gear is just bad and should shut the kitten up.
Sabetha is a bit harder, yet, still doable in exotics.
Gorseval is the only boss requiring ascended, since its a pretty big DPS check.
1 boss out of 3 requiring ascended gear DOES NOT MEAN YOU NEED ASCENDED FOR THE RAID. Okay. You got 2 other encounters. Chances are, you’ll get
ascended pieces off boss 1 and 3 anyway.
Raids aren’t entirely a gear check(just said 66% of the raid isn’t one), it’s just that people try to justify their lack of skill as a gear check.

I understant but if members want to make a progress, firstly everybody must play maximazed build and gear. I dont remember clearly, how much cost to change asc gear’s stat but that is not exceed 50 gold to change full gear and weapon stat change.

girginov.3528:

I understant but if members want to make a progress, firstly everybody must play maximazed build and gear. I dont remember clearly, how much cost to change asc gear’s stat but that is not exceed 50 gold to change full gear and weapon stat change.

And when you go do some real hard content where you actually might take some dmg you change stats, runes and sigils back again?

Junkpile.7439:

girginov.3528:

I understant but if members want to make a progress, firstly everybody must play maximazed build and gear. I dont remember clearly, how much cost to change asc gear’s stat but that is not exceed 50 gold to change full gear and weapon stat change.

And when you go do some real hard content where you actually might take some dmg you change stats, runes and sigils back again?

Hard content where is that

Full weapon gear stat change max 50 gold
Sigil change max 50 gold.
Rune change max 80 gold ( str rune 12 gold max at ah )

Totally 180 gold. And new content will be come min 6 month. IF i save 1 gold everydays, I can collect enough money to change stat.

honestly, you don’t need ascended armour for raids so far

RobLnd.1074:

honestly, you don’t need ascended armour for raids so far

Apparently you don’t need it according to a fair few people.

However you do need it to get into a raid party.

Somebody will be along shortly to tell us something different.

(Tin hat on).

Solid Gold.9310:

RobLnd.1074:

honestly, you don’t need ascended armour for raids so far

Apparently you don’t need it according to a fair few people.

However you do need it to get into a raid party.

Somebody will be along shortly to tell us something different.

(Tin hat on).

https://twitter.com/All_Caulle/status/649239988282875907

Apparently someone doesn’t even meet the recommendation that the game designer put out for but wants to play with dedicated people. Also based on the attitude and inability to follow a simple guideline, there’s no need for him/her to even raid as a simplest raid mechanic such as “dodging” will definitely be a challenge. At this point it doesn’t matter if you have ascended gear or not, you will most likely not be accepted into any raid guild anyway.

Junkpile.7439:

Problem is that whole point of raids is just try to make players poor. Let’s see what kind of silly stat combination they bring for next wing. I think that viper was too cheap to make so they need to bring something more expensive. They could have made hard content where condi users could have use rabid or dire, but no they made content where you just need to dps, dodge and have viper gear.

I don’t think that was the motivation.

• There are more points to raids than just promoting gear choices. Let’s start with a desire to attract new blood to the game that has passed before because there are no raids. Let’s continue with the desire to cater to those who wanted instanced group content that belonging to a guild mattered for. Let’s also look at the desire to cater to a desire for challenge and a return to GW endgame elite instances.
• Raids were designed to shake up the “everyone wears the same gear” meta, not to promote a new single gear meta. Glass gear, whether Condi or Direct, was always going to be a part of the hard content meta, the goal was for variety in role that extended into gear. Raids do that, at least so far.
• Absent Viper, the go-to stat for Condi DPS would have been either Sinister or Rampager. However, players have been demanding more stat sets. One of those demands was for a set that featured Condi duration ever since stats were removed from traits.
• ANet has attempted to kill two (or more) birds with one stone since the game launched.
• Meta decisions are driven by players interacting with the content. Content design can influence the meta, but it cannot determine it.

Raizen.7981:

Anyone who can’t get past Vale Guardian in full exotic gear is just bad and should shut the kitten up.
Sabetha is a bit harder, yet, still doable in exotics.
Gorseval is the only boss requiring ascended, since its a pretty big DPS check.
1 boss out of 3 requiring ascended gear DOES NOT MEAN YOU NEED ASCENDED FOR THE RAID. Okay. You got 2 other encounters. Chances are, you’ll get
ascended pieces off boss 1 and 3 anyway.
Raids aren’t entirely a gear check(just said 66% of the raid isn’t one), it’s just that people try to justify their lack of skill as a gear check.

Gors doesn’t require ascended either. lol

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Gors doesn’t require ascended either. lol

Confirmed.

girginov.3528:

I understant but if members want to make a progress, firstly everybody must play maximazed build and gear. I dont remember clearly, how much cost to change asc gear’s stat but that is not exceed 50 gold to change full gear and weapon stat change.

Per piece maybe!! … it’s quite expensive to be honest, at least for some like me that didn’t make it to the dungeon speed runs.. T_T

Exotrax.4207:

ugrakarma.9416:

i have full ascedend, but dont like overzealous game modes, so im avoiding raids til someday i see on LFG something like “all welcome”.

well said !!!

Unfortunately will not come to pass as the group as a whole must suffice various “hard-gates” that the encounter asks for which include:

condition damage
boon strip
breakbar
overall damage

Not really elitism when its just more of “if you don’t have it, you can’t even deal damage to the boss”. Outside of that of course there are many absurd requests like only excepting condition engineers specifically geared in vipers armor when all condition damage specific builds across all professions(yes, including the rev) are more than capable of sufficing VG, or druids specifically geared in zealots, or better yet only excepting a vipers burnzerker warrior for gorseval.

“all welcome” has taken a different form in a sense that is:

“need condition damage”
“need a tank”
“need a healer”
“need dps”

In a sense that a group has asked that this role be fulfilled regardless of profession given. As more “restricting” and “overzealous” raids are, I have seen more build diversity in raids than the entire since launch that I’ve done dungeons in this game.

Raids have justified toughness as a respected toolset that controls aggro rather than some “offensive defensive training wheels slider”. It has allowed people who really wanted to play a healing power build, actually play a healing power build and be respected in that light. Overall there is more respect for understanding these toolsets that I personally feel deserves commendation.

IllegalChocolate.6938:

In a sense that a group has asked that this role be fulfilled regardless of profession given. As more “restricting” and “overzealous” raids are, I have seen more build diversity in raids than the entire since launch that I’ve done dungeons in this game.

True. The amount of different build that we see working in raid is astonishing. Of course stupid people will still exist. People that are usually behind in the new and can only accept something if it’s on metabattle. The kind of people that used to kick condi warrior of their squad 2-3 weeks ago and are kicking Condi Reaper right now.

Hey guys,

I just want to chime in that getting ascended gear is not hard. We already have several collections that awards ascended weapons (Specialization Collection) and ascended armor boxes (Leystone armor, Luminescence armor, Ambrite Weapons). If you play PvP daily, it is a very decent source of random ascended boxes – just pop them on Monday during Greater Call of the Mist buff. Chances are you get a box every 15-20 containers. Now if you are into raid, keep it in mind that the ascended weapon/armor drop rate from the boss chest is fairly high, about 15% – meaning 1 or 2 per raid squad would get an ascended piece for every boss. If you are unlucky, continue to farm practice the encounter to cap the shards and you will be able to pick up an ascended box of your choice after 2-3 weeks. With careful planning, I have got 3 ascended pieces bought with magnetic shards. In the end, if you save any spare change from crafting ascended gears, spend it on proper food please. That means condi duration on condi classes, boon duration on boon keeping classes, and slaying potion on power classes at the bare minimum.

Nothing ticks me off more than some dudes laced with ascended gears and several legendary weapon skins skimp on quality food, play like kittens and worst, take their sweet time to waste other people’s food time.