Guild Wars 2

I see it even in timed solo speedruns, indicating that people think it’s perfectly ok. It seems the community accepts this tactic?

What are your thoughts on this? Please speak in a theoretical manner: do not say that you use this technique yourself… just in case.

Well she bugs just by running out of range. So its kind of hard not to do it in a solo.

Thought she only bugged when you broke the bone wall? And you very much can just face tank her, super easy with thief, very doable with Engi with some more heavy build modifications.

To me it is surely an exploit, but I think everyone is ok with it because she’s annoying and people like to solo/duo that path. So making her less annoying is something people can get behind.

It’s perfectly acceptable IMO. All it does it make the boss a bit faster. As for low-man record runs, you’d have to check gw2dungeons solo ruleset for solos and (I think) duos; for trios (I think) and up, it’d just be the regular restricted or unrestricted rulesets used, AFAIK.

You can still easily solo her without doing it. It’s not even really harder, just longer and more tedious.

On a Warrior, for example, you just hide behind the objects when you get low and use your condition clear. Then you stand there and regen life, being aware of her teleport order and moving if she’s going to teleport somewhere that will hit you (or just not going totally afk and reactively moving… whatever). When you’re back at nearly full life, go out and engage her, and watch where you stand and where you might get knocked back to.

On a PW thief solo, you could just save your F1 for when she teleports. Don’t stand in obviously stupid places.

Et cetera.

Or, you could range her and make it even easier, albeit at the cost of making it even slower still.

Literally, it’s the exact same thing. Just longer (a lot longer for some classes) and much more tedious because she moves and lots of pots ignite.

So how does this bugging actually work? If it happens very easily then there is no point disallowing it.

That “exact same thing” argument could be used for bugging lots of bosses. The way I see it, more stuff there is going on, more chances to show some skilled gameplay.

Jerus.4350:

Thought she only bugged when you broke the bone wall?

Pretty much the same thing.

The bug is done by running out of range towards the bonewall. Once you reach a certain point the bone wall collapses and resets the fight (she reverts to start position). After the fight is reset. Belka will no longer teleport when you next engage. As far as im aware once you have caused this by accident or intentionally there is no way to unbug her other than restarting the instance.

Thing to note is it doesnt actually disable anything other than her teleport. She still kicks, throws the orb, reflects and fire arrows.

Wethospu.6437:

So how does this bugging actually work? If it happens very easily then there is no point disallowing it.

That “exact same thing” argument could be used for bugging lots of bosses. The way I see it, more stuff there is going on, more chances to show some skilled gameplay.

You run past the bone wall that’s near the ‘entrance’ to her area. When it breaks, she becomes locked at her first teleport spot and all the pots reset. You will go out of combat as you run back in (if not suffering from burning). You can repeat this to get out of combat and regenerate health during the fight, without Belka’s health resetting.

It’s very easy to not bug her. Bugging is a deliberate choice.

I have zero problem with this tactic.

It bugs very easily. You just break the bone wall. If I had to guess Wethospu, her teleport timer is probably supposed to pause when she loses aggro. So when you run back and break the bone wall to get OoC and heal up, she’s supposed to assume she has no targets and stop teleporting. Then for whatever reason it doesn’t start again.

The more you move around in that fight, the better chance for her projectile to bug and randomly explode on you with no tell, killing you instantly. I’ve had this happen enough times to be 100% okay with people stopping her teleport just to avoid it. It still happens even when she is rooted but it seems less frenquent.
Here’s an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhuJ_Z4gQXY

spoj.9672:

Jerus.4350:

Thought she only bugged when you broke the bone wall?

Pretty much the same thing.

The bug is done by running out of range towards the bonewall. Once you reach a certain point the bone wall collapses and resets the fight (she reverts to start position). After the fight is reset. Belka will no longer teleport when you next engage. As far as im aware once you have caused this by accident or intentionally there is no way to unbug her other than restarting the instance.

Thing to note is it doesnt actually disable anything other than her teleport. She still kicks, throws the orb, reflects and fire arrows.

There is a timer on it, something like 5 mins maybe? … flamethrower + afk…

I don’t have a problem with it.

Every time you run out of combat and run back in, you’re wasting time you could be doing damage. I think it’s perfectly reasonable to allow it because you’re still encouraged to avoid running out as much as possible anyways.

spoj.9672:

After the fight is reset. Belka will no longer teleport when you next engage.

She will still teleport after the reset, but it’s rather random when / if happens. But, you just repeat the bone wall glitch and she resets again.

I refused to use this trick for the first few times I soloed her, just because I wanted to be able to do it “fo’ reel”. But at this point, I don’t mind glitching her. Her blue ball glitches have kittened me over enough times, I don’t mind having a little payback :P

I suppose the bigger question is: Does ArenaNet care? They’ll never chime in on this conversation, but this bug has been common knowledge for at least a year and a half. Draw your own conclusions

dlonie.6547:

spoj.9672:

After the fight is reset. Belka will no longer teleport when you next engage.

She will still teleport after the reset, but it’s rather random when / if happens. But, you just repeat the bone wall glitch and she resets again.

It’s not random actually.

If you go beyond the bone wall and don’t go within her range quickly enough she’ll disengage combat herself and you can look for visual cues to tell when it happens. She will change from combat stance to just idle animations for an asura. If that happens she’ll begin as if she just spawned and will teleport around the room. To prevent it from happening you need to run back after retreating behind the bone wall quickly.

She also will begin to teleport around the room if you remain out of her line of sight (behind wooden structures etc) for more than 30 seconds I believe. I think that was implemented in case of someone safespotting.

So if I understood correctly:

1) It’s easy to not bug her

2) Bugging disables flamepots which makes positioning and sustain less important

3) Bugging disables teleporting which makes gap closing, positioning and movement less important

4) Bugging removes the chance of getting insta-orbed if you close the gap carelessly

The way I see it is that “having to move around” is not a very good reason to allow bugging. So how big thing that insta-orbing is? If you realize that you may get insta-orbed can’t you counter it somehow? Or does good time depend too much on RNG?

Thanks Miku — I was hoping someone would dispute the “randomness” of that. Always nice to learn something new

Odd thing about that is that she won’t fully reset (her HP stays put), so it’s a strange sort of OOC.

Wethospu.6437:

So if I understood correctly:

1) It’s easy to not bug her

2) Bugging disables flamepots which makes positioning and sustain less important

3) Bugging disables teleporting which makes gap closing, positioning and movement less important

4) Bugging removes the chance of getting insta-orbed if you close the gap carelessly

---

The way I see it is that “having to move around” is not a very good reason to allow bugging. So how big thing that insta-orbing is? If you realize that you may get insta-orbed can’t you counter it somehow? Or does good time depend too much on RNG?

A good time does depend on some RNG but not much of it. It’s just her knockback attack – she sometimes doesn’t do it right off cooldown and if you’re in close range you cannot reactively dodge it – only preemptively.

Because of that, if you anticipate her to use her knockback (from my experience it’s almost always after between 6-9 fire arrow attacks or whatever they’re called), you waste potential time to strike/evade. Besides this RNG there is nothing else aside from your own damage numbers.

As for bugging you’re right about all of those.

Wethospu.6437:

So if I understood correctly:

1) It’s easy to not bug her

Correct — don’t run back out of the arena and she won’t glitch.

2) Bugging disables flamepots which makes positioning and sustain less important

Yes — and that’s not to be taken lightly. Those flame pots hurt like hell on a zerk thief, etc. Getting knocked back into one due to bad positioning is pretty much gg. Glitching her will reset them, easing a ton of pressure.

3) Bugging disables teleporting which makes gap closing, positioning and movement less important

Yep. Though as you note, gap closing is problematic with her. If you do it while she’s casting the orb via teleport/etc, it’ll proc at her feet, leading to instawipe.

4) Bugging removes the chance of getting insta-orbed if you close the gap carelessly

Yes.

The way I see it is that “having to move around” is not a very good reason to allow bugging. So how big thing that insta-orbing is? If you realize that you may get insta-orbed can’t you counter it somehow? Or does good time depend too much on RNG?

IMO, it’s an exploit that shouldn’t be allowed in restricted runs. The instaorb can be countered by carefully closing gaps by just running, or waiting until the orb is already out before closing via shadowsteps/leaps.

For a full party, getting a fast time isn’t a good reason to do this — you waste time by running out of the arena to trigger the glitch, and it should be possible to burn her down before she teleports, or maybe after a single teleport. Solo runs would probably see a significant speedup, but it’s definitely an “unrestricted” sort of thing.

And if you pull bad RNG and get orbed while closing a gap during a record attempt, she’s the first boss. Rinse’n’repeat at that point isn’t a big deal.

Just my $.02.

Wethospu.6437:

So if I understood correctly:

1) It’s easy to not bug her

2) Bugging disables flamepots which makes positioning and sustain less important

3) Bugging disables teleporting which makes gap closing, positioning and movement less important

4) Bugging removes the chance of getting insta-orbed if you close the gap carelessly

---

The way I see it is that “having to move around” is not a very good reason to allow bugging. So how big thing that insta-orbing is? If you realize that you may get insta-orbed can’t you counter it somehow? Or does good time depend too much on RNG?

It doesn’t disable flamepot, its only reset them. Over time, more and more flamepot light up, when you bug her they all reset and you probably kill her before you notice flamepot appearing near you if you are in a group. But when you solo it, they can be an issue by the end. A good position will help you not getting kick inside one of them. Or you can bug her several time during the fight to keep flamepot to a minimum throughout all the fight.

The insta-orbed can be a pain, especially when you are solo. Randomly you have to reset the fight and run back just because you were unlucky. It can be really frustrating, especially when you are near the end of the fight. Sometime the orb give pretty much zero warning, sometime you get knockback by her and insta-orb right after. No realy counter unless you have a break stun ready. Again, not a big deal if you are in a group, but in solo you already need your utility for other reasons you can’t really have a break stun just in case she freak out.

Purple Miku.7032:

It’s just her knockback attack – she sometimes doesn’t do it right off cooldown and if you’re in close range you cannot reactively dodge it – only preemptively.

Because of that, if you anticipate her to use her knockback (from my experience it’s almost always after between 6-9 fire arrow attacks or whatever they’re called), you waste potential time to strike/evade. Besides this RNG there is nothing else aside from your own damage numbers.

It’s a DPS loss, but I like to bring stability to her when I can for that knockback. On warrior especially, it’s nice quality of life improvement to be able to get off a full HB without getting interrupted in a casual solo.

Jerus.4350:

very doable with Engi with some more heavy build modifications.

Or just let a turret tank it (from crate)

I just leave the group immediately if somebody tries to do this, because they’ll likely want to WoRsploit Lupi too.

Anyway, I think this can be fixed by ANet fixing the position of that bone wall. based on the size, it looks like it should be closer to Belka, near the post where the risen reset when you hide behind it. The other bosses with bone walls have the walls where you can’t just run around it to break it.

What do you mean insta-orb? I’ve always been able to see her launch her orb. Sometimes it goes up so high that you might’ve forgotten about it by time it lands on you though. But I’ve never had it just randomly and instantly pop right on me.

And I also view this as an exploit that shouldn’t be allowed. Some want to pass it off as just disabling her teleport, but by doing that it allows easy positioning to avoid being knocked into the barrels – a major part of the fight.

Rainmaker.7594:

I just leave the group immediately if somebody tries to do this, because they’ll likely want to WoRsploit Lupi too.

Anyway, I think this can be fixed by ANet fixing the position of that bone wall. based on the size, it looks like it should be closer to Belka, near the post where the risen reset when you hide behind it. The other bosses with bone walls have the walls where you can’t just run around it to break it.

What do you mean insta-orb? I’ve always been able to see her launch her orb. Sometimes it goes up so high that you might’ve forgotten about it by time it lands on you though. But I’ve never had it just randomly and instantly pop right on me.

And I also view this as an exploit that shouldn’t be allowed. Some want to pass it off as just disabling her teleport, but by doing that it allows easy positioning to avoid being knocked into the barrels – a major part of the fight.

Projectiles target where they predict players will be at the time of the impact. Careless players very frequently get knocked back, and rush back to Belka. The game estimates that they will be at Belka by the time the projectile would land, and thus you get a projectile that instantly explodes and kills them and anyone else standing at Belka.

Of course, sometimes (rarely) even if you’re close enough that she shouldn’t use the orb, she uses it and it instantly kills you, or similar (rare) assorted bugs with the orb that don’t make any sense at all.

Rainmaker.7594:

What do you mean insta-orb? I’ve always been able to see her launch her orb. Sometimes it goes up so high that you might’ve forgotten about it by time it lands on you though. But I’ve never had it just randomly and instantly pop right on me.

If you teleport to her (shadowstep, steal, guard sword 2, etc) right as she launches it, you’ll never see it — you’ll just down. Consider how useful teleports are should be in that fight, it’s a pretty annoying problem.

Paired with the fact that it’s a range-only attack that is typically used right after she teleports (and you want to teleport to follow her), it’s really irritating.

Best bet is to bait it out of her before using a gap closer. Once the AoE is out, you’re safe.

Well, sort of safe. There’s also:

- The AoE just tells you who was targeted. The Big Blue Ball of Bullkitten doesn’t actually travel to the AoE if the targeted player is moving.
- The orb’s trajectory itself doesn’t even tell you squat about where it will hit. I’ve watched it come down on the opposite side of the arena, only to be mysteriously instadowned by it.

Wethospu.6437:

So how big thing that insta-orbing is? If you realize that you may get insta-orbed can’t you counter it somehow? Or does good time depend too much on RNG?

You have to be more cautious then you want to be in a speed run to guarantee not getting hit, but you can work around the bugged visual tell. when I fight her I just assume the orb is invisible and use other cues. You can guess fairly well by your position when she fired the shot about how long the orb will take to hit the ground to time your dodge. If you get out of melee range at any point, make sure she is in the middle of a fan of fire animation or has already shot an orb before you gap-close to avoid being orbed right on top of her.

This is not me arguing that it should be disallowed, just my assessment of the encounter.

spoj.9672:

As far as im aware once you have caused this by accident or intentionally there is no way to unbug her other than restarting the instance.

I think its enough to wait far enough untill she resets, or simply die.
Not sure thouhg.

It’d be nice to maybe get a firm ruling on this, as I’m sure there are people out there who are planning to work on / are working on arah p2 current meta records, and there’s a substantial time difference between both methods.

Someone post a public vote thread. Calling a meeting for a single encounter is a bit much.

I have disallowed it for now so you can’t bug her. If someone strongly feels something else we can vote about it.

In all honesty I can’t think of a single person who’d bother doing Arah P2 solos if it’s disallowed.

My opinion is that it’s a complete waste of time otherwise :x

If you really want your opinion count I suggest avoiding ridiculous hyperboles. But I will check out the encounter later today for solo rule set.

Also I’m bit curious, would you guys really stop running the path if Anet fixed the bug?

Ok, so I tested the encounter quite a bit. I was able to kill her 5 times plus lots of testing on warrior without any surprises. Few pointers:

• You can get out of combat without bugging her or making her teleport to start
• Orb has a clear animation so you can for example interrupt Rush or not teleport when she is about to shoot
• Orb visuals are bugged but what else would you dodge?
• Knockback has no tell so avoiding it is pretty random
• With proper positioning you can avoid getting knocked to pots

I seriously wish I could understand your reasoning. It would make this all much simpler. The way I see it that not bugging her opens room for tactics and skill and bugging her makes it just a robotic dps rotation.

Yes, there is some rng involved but so is in all encounters. Sure, you may get insta-orbed in some really unlucky case but it’s the first fight anyway.

Poll: http://strawpoll.me/3710626

It’s not really a hyperbole. I honestly don’t know of a single person that would ever care about doing an Arah p2 solo record other than maybe Goku and Quin. A hyperbole is an exaggerated claim.

Solo records/runs in the past always included it and her teleporting around the room doesn’t really add anything to the encounter other than making it take much, much, much longer because the boss does nothing but the exact same attacks.

I understand what you want is to be consistent and not include something that’s obviously unintended but I’m just thinking realistically because barely anybody even does solo record runs… have already spoken with a handful of people about it and nobody that I’ve spoken to is interested in not preventing the teleporting.

You can do what you please really but don’t shoot the messenger lol

why even have rule sets for records if you’re going to bug out a boss anyway? If exploits like that are allowed, might as well just have the same timing rule, get rid of any other rule, and slap an unrestricted label on it.

Wethospu.6437:

Also I’m bit curious, would you guys really stop running the path if Anet fixed the bug?

I missed this part of your post last time.

I might do it on the rare occasion if they were to fix it but I can’t see myself caring to compete anymore provided it happens. I recall Goku telling me he’d stop running it if this rule is implemented, or he’d run it without caring about/following the rule. One or the other.

Tom Yzf.5872:

why even have rule sets for records if you’re going to bug out a boss anyway?

Why even have rule sets for such a small aspect of the speed-running community in the first place, especially when it’s only ever 1-2 people competing in paths or 1 person trying to achieve personal goals they set for themselves. I don’t think the GWSCR seal of approval means much to most people who solo.

Goku is one of the only players that actively posts solo records. And he has told me he prefers the unrestricted ruleset. Honestly solo records are a very small part of the community. I dont believe its a good idea to reduce the size even further. Most people who solo do whatever they can to progress and just do it for fun. They dont care about consumable use or minor exploits. They dont even care about proper attempts at records (atleast not with the current rules). But if we have too many rules then those players cant even submit their casual smooth solos as records. In fact the rules right now prevent a lot of submissions. I wasnt at the meeting but it seems it was mostly non solo’ers who voted on it.

Depending on the necro specialisation in HoT i have considered actually doing some necro solos. But i certainly wont be hindering an already weak class just to fit overly restrictive rules. My personal enjoyment for the solo is more important. To put this into perspective. If i was going to do a dungeon solo on necro right now i would most likely use the exec axe for skips despite it being against the rules. Using that item would still provide necro absolutely no advantage over another class but it would close the gap between them. Not using it just makes the gap huge. I have no desire to post a slower record when there is no competition. Also for something like TA FW on a necro its almost impossible to kill the knight with another aggroed mob with burst. Its so rng based that i would be forced to abuse flux matrix consumables if i was doing it in a record.

Also i doubt we would see any major complaints if we allowed the belka bug. Most people probably wouldnt even understand whats being done or notice it.

The main challenge of Belka is outsustaining her 100% burning uptime while keeping good dps. Adding chasing her around and hoping the orb doesn’t bug just drags out the fight and drags out your practice sessions when she does bug and instakill you. It just makes the fight slower without actually adding anything of value. And Miku is right, we’re not going to bother submitting p2 records to gw2dungeons if this strategy is banned. Goku is the only person who has submitted any solo records. I’m not going to submit a solo without bugging Belka if Goku uploads a faster solo on his youtube channel with stationary Belka. There just wouldn’t be any point. I say this as one of maybe 2-3 people actually spending time practicing solo records of this path.

I really don’t think this strategy is an exploit in any way. In another thread Wethospu you said, “I would say boss must be able to use his offensive attacks. Does that sound fair?” Belka can use all of her offensive attacks while she is stationary. I don’t see any reason to make special rules for her. It’s not like the targetted wall on Lupi or the reflector gun on Wahlen where you can kill the boss instantly. I really don’t see any reason to ban this strategy. Like I said, it just makes the fight slower without adding anything of interest or value.

I don’t really mind allowing bugs but I strongly oppose dumping down encounters because of l2p issues. Sure, it may feel annoying when she moves around and you can’t do a robotic max dps rotation with full dps spec and may have to think about other elements like sustain, mobility, positioning and even tactics. Also you might have a chance to show skill and creativity.

Some people talk about bugging orbs. I have yet to see any evidence of an orb which couldn’t have been avoided. Sure those may exist but that’s then very rare.

Yes, we can allow it because that’s what solo players want. But I have to warn that rules may move back and forth because a reason like that is very unstable.

Quin Marino.6384:

—
I really don’t think this strategy is an exploit in any way. In another thread Wethospu you said, “I would say boss must be able to use his offensive attacks. Does that sound fair?” Belka can use all of her offensive attacks while she is stationary. I don’t see any reason to make special rules for her. It’s not like the targetted wall on Lupi or the reflector gun on Wahlen where you can kill the boss instantly. I really don’t see any reason to ban this strategy. Like I said, it just makes the fight slower without adding anything of interest or value.

Are you serious? So moving to certain location after the fight has started which causes half of the mechanics to disappear is a perfectly legit strategy?

Quin Marino.6384:

In another thread Wethospu you said, “I would say boss must be able to use his offensive attacks. Does that sound fair?” Belka can use all of her offensive attacks while she is stationary.

It does reset the barrels, taking significant pressure out of the fight and removing one of her passive offenses. Combining following her around + having OMG FIRE EVERYWHERE does add up to a significant challenge — and removing that by using what’s obviously a bug…seems clear to me that this should be an “unrestricted-only” technique.

But I’ll never submit a solo record, so I really don’t care. Just sharing my thoughts. I agree with the view “why bother splitting the rulesets at all if this is allowed?”

Wethospu.6437:

Some people talk about bugging orbs. I have yet to see any evidence of an orb which couldn’t have been avoided. Sure those may exist but that’s then very rare.

Feel free to chalk all of my comments on orbs up to l2p. I can barely see her tells, much less distinguish/react to them :P I just go by the AoE’s appearance to avoid orbs, and sometimes it hits before the circle appears when you teleport. Doesn’t mean a better player couldn’t learn the tells

Theres a separate ruleset for solo. And its mostly restricted. Except you can use certain consumables. Most solo’ers wont submit records because of that. Learn to play issues dont even come into it. If the only people that do solos dont submit because they dont like the rules then its a problem with the rules.

We can’t make a rule set for every individual player. It would be really easy if there was a single rule set everyone agreed on. Unfortunately that’s not the case.

dlonie.6547:

Wethospu.6437:

Some people talk about bugging orbs. I have yet to see any evidence of an orb which couldn’t have been avoided. Sure those may exist but that’s then very rare.

Feel free to chalk all of my comments on orbs up to l2p. I can barely see her tells, much less distinguish/react to them :P I just go by the AoE’s appearance to avoid orbs, and sometimes it hits before the circle appears when you teleport. Doesn’t mean a better player couldn’t learn the tells

Ye, orb is quite shady with its weird hit box. On my attempts I also got hit once in a while but all were my mistakes.

I’ve already voiced my opinion, but I’ll write it down here as well.

I feel as though the belka bug is completely harmless. Obviously the guys soloing this path are able to deal with soloing belka legitimately, it is just an unnecessary time sink to have to deal with RNG and teleports.

Furthermore, I 100% agree with what Purple Miku has stated above. If the people who are doing these records do not agree with the idea of banning the belka bug, who are we to tell them differently? Sure, this is unintended, and by all means if anet wants to fix it, I’d be happy to encourage them. Until then there’s no point in us arguing over something that wasn’t worth debating or discussing to begin with. This wasn’t a question on the old GWSCR site and shouldn’t be here. We’re intervening on something that we should stay out of until it becomes an ACTUAL problem.

Don’t fix what isn’t broken.

As for the vote called on this thread, I feel like this thread was not the best place to create a strawpoll on. We should create a seperate thread and create the vote there. I’m not quite sure that everyone who should be seeing this strawpoll has, or will due to the fact that its in the middle of an already established thread.

This post was written on my mobile, so excuse any grammatical/spelling issues.

Further note to the strawpoll:

Im trusting that everyone is honoring the system but you are able to vote more than once for the strawpoll. This means that random click happy users within the forum are able to spam vote one section to “troll”.

I dont feel as though this is an accurate system to gauge the communities interests.

Nah, it wasn’t a serious straw poll. Just there to gauge the interest of both sides. Because ppl like me who are too lazy to give an opinion here.

Ok, I allowed bugging her on solo to please solo players. But I still think that it would have been better if rules were based on factual reasons.

It’s easy to reproduce her orb bug: if you stand far away from her and strafe left to right very quickly, her orbs will show as going to either the left or right in a way that it’s clear there’s no chance they’ll hit you. But if you do this long enough (I did it twice and both times within 5 orbs), you’ll get hit anyway.

No soloer is going to range her like this, but you from this you know theres a big bug here that’s not just the AOE circle showing the wrong position.

Yes, but that’s not really relevant.

Wethospu.6437:

Yes, but that’s not really relevant.

It means there is a bug that’s not entirely random. So if you don’t bug her out to be stationary, you’re possibly at risk from it (depends on exactly what causes this bug) when she teleports.

Then you dodge.

Wethospu.6437:

Then you dodge.

You could, but having to dodge an invisible ball whose location you don’t know precisely is somewhat lame. Fix it Anet! (LOL)