Guild Wars 2

Bring every single equipable weapon into a dungeon run, especially one that you or your party do not know well yet. Most weapons have some utility that may have a niche use that may save your party!

I was running Fractals 30+ with a non-heavy party the other day. We unfortunately got grawl but got to the final boss. After wiping a few times, I noticed both the Elementalists were using Staff, so I asked if they could switch to using Swirling Winds, since it’s very useful when the adds spawn to keep excessive damage off of your group. To my utter shock, neither of them actually knew what that was. One of them said the skill didn’t exist, and the other confused it with Tornado.

I ended up having to explain to them that the skill was a projectile-nullification skill in slot 4 of Air Attunement Focus. And then they had to dig through their inventories for Foci/Scepters.

We ended up, not surprisingly, giving up after a few more attempts, but we did do a helluva lot better than we did without Swirling Winds. The point I’m saying here is that most weapons put into the game have one or two skills that would make it a ton easier for your party, and it’s always best to keep an open mind about what might be good in certain situations vs others. I usually bring every single weapon for my profession and swap frequently between fights just because certain weapons are more efficient. Don’t just get stuck in a comfortable weapon set and never swap out.

You never know when that Focus is going to come in use.

Then lollygag after the skill duration is over, because you don’t have enough AoE to kill them. Errm, just kite them while blasting with staff.
Still, your point about knowing your class’ ins-and-outs is valid.

It’s amazing how many Elementalists have no idea what Swirling Winds is. It’s such a ridiculously good skill. May not have the reflect of Feedback, but the radius is stupidly big and it’s a lot safer and easier to use. Use it, stand in it, boom, you’re safe from any projectiles.

It especially confuses me when an Elementalist doesn’t carry multiple weapons. I mean seriously, Staff/Dagger/Dagger/Scepter/Focus. Same with Thieves, Dagger/Dagger/Pistol/Pistol/Sword/Shortbow. Engi is just Rifle/Pistol/Pistol/Shield (and hell, that’s what kits are there for too). That’s all they’ve got, there’s no excuse not to have one of each, just for the utility of each for just in case you’re having trouble with something. And it’s not like the clusterkitten of weapons my Warrior lugs around. If you’re having trouble with any of the dungeon content, and you aren’t carrying around multiple weapons, even just random level whites for the utility heavy ones, you’ve only got yourself to blame.

Guardians Spirit Shield anyone?

I think I have seen so far 2 Guardians that use this skill.

But its like a half minute shield against pretty much anything with a 60 sec cooldown afterwards. Perfect for absorbing most bad attacks from mobs.

Also hardly anyone utilizies Staff correct. Line of Warding is very strong to keep those trash groups in ascalon from insta gibbing everyone.

Untraited it is 20 seconds, 30 seconds traited. Wall of Reflection + Spirit Shield + SoA + 2nd Wall of reflection = lol for dungeons with lots of ranged stuff.

People who can’t figure this out by themselves shouldn’t progress or atleast not too fast. Sorry if it’s harsh, but this stuff is just common sense. When fractals just got released I had to explain these things to a lot of people, but after awhile only those who actually thought for themselves remained. Seems like more people got to this level now without properly playing their class, because I had a similar experience now that I started playing again after a break.

I don’t think I would have made it to high level fractals so fast when it just got released without abusing Wall of Reflection, Shield of the Avenger, proper block timing and atleast 3 or 4 weapon sets.

Eldiora.5836:

Guardians Spirit Shield anyone?

I think I have seen so far 2 Guardians that use this skill.

But its like a half minute shield against pretty much anything with a 60 sec cooldown afterwards. Perfect for absorbing most bad attacks from mobs.

Also hardly anyone utilizies Staff correct. Line of Warding is very strong to keep those trash groups in ascalon from insta gibbing everyone.

Not that convinced with staff tbh. I’d rather have mace/shield or scepter/shield combined with hammer or gs. I usually take Sanctuary if I need something like that (never really needed more than one of those) because the rest staff offers is rather meager compared to gs control and blind or hammer cc.

I’ve used staff a lot in normal dungeons but rarely in fractals.

This is why I don’t believe in single weapon builds. If you have to depend on a weapon to win, you are not a good enough player IMO. Weapons have lots of uses and may come in handy in very different situations. I always carry one of each possible equipable weapon for each character. This is specially important on eles who cannot change weapons during combat.

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

Not if your soloing.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

If your an ele in wvw with a focus unless your taking a keep your slow. So slow in fact not only will you not be able to chase any one down but despite your defense your too slow to run away. In WvW switching sets on an ele is a big decision. If the Zerg finds you and your in focus to put is quite frank your screwed. http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Swirling_Winds 6 seconds of projectile nullification is not enough to justify the weapon by itself.

No one skill in any ele build will every justify the set. There are too many synergies that go on. Instead of arguing that one skill makes the weapon set look at focus over all.

Focus- Where its equal or better than dagger in the off hand-

1. Has better active defense than dagger off hand. (Especially against projectiles.)

2. Has the same number of blast finishers* (2 however they are on a shorter cd than Dagger but with less access of fire fields this is debatable)

3. Has a longer lasting fire field (but access to only 1)

4. Has more Condition Removal (personal)

5. Has access invulnerability

6. Has the same access to auras* (1 and 1 with leap with dagger in main hand)

7. Has better range

-Where its weaker-

1. Has less healing./ Group healing

2. Has more limited access to fire fields (and subsequently because of cool downs less access to auras with dagger in the main hand)

3. Has less mobility / gap closers* (you also get access to swiftness through http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Updraft)

4. Has less crowd control* (3 vs 3 actually but due to the limited radius focus skills and blowouts and knockdowns being more hard cc its goes to dagger)

5. Has weaker AoE over all.

6. Has less group condition removal.

Over all carry a weapon on ele for 6 seconds of projectile defense is an utter waist. However if your fully utilizing focus this wont matter. Over all due to cc mobility and group healing dagger is the better support weapon.

And one last note. No you don’t need to carry every weapon as it is a bit silly with builds built around specific weapons. There is nothing wrong with bring flexible but expecting every one to carry every weapon all the time is beyond foolish.

Completely forgetting about gear and traits is a bad idea. The key to beating any run is knowledge and always will be. The weapon set you use is more a matter of preference and skill. As there are many players who will be able to do things in melee or at range you personally cant who can survive situations with the tools in hand without ever switching.

Remember that.

The only thing most parties will ask you is to have at least one ranged weapon (and that’s only for peace of mind) besides that it is up to you but the utility maybe exceedingly limited.

Edit:
TL;DR

Didn’t realize it would end up some what of a wall but to sum it up this isn’t a pro tip. The main reason most people don’t switch sets is that individual skills usually don’t balance out the over all loss of utility when switching weapons. One skill will rarely make up the utility you just lost leaving your build, traits, and stats. While it may seem like a pro move in many cases it is a foolish one.

The best tip anyone can give you is learn the runs before hand and get better with the set your using now. In all likelihood like myself you haven’t actually mastered every possible way you can use it.

Mesmers! Staff for Rata Sum fractal endboss, keep them together and cast chaos storm —> easy ownage. Also use Sceptre + Sword for Grawl boss

Ele is usually responsible for aoe’ing the lava grubs. I guess it boils down to party composition. Just look at the skill set for focus. You’ll be sacrificing your aoe and other utilities for one skill. Unless your party can kill the grubs before their next burst, you only prolong the fight.

omgwtflolbbl.7142:

It’s amazing how many Elementalists have no idea what Swirling Winds is. It’s such a ridiculously good skill. May not have the reflect of Feedback, but the radius is stupidly big and it’s a lot safer and easier to use. Use it, stand in it, boom, you’re safe from any projectiles.

It especially confuses me when an Elementalist doesn’t carry multiple weapons. I mean seriously, Staff/Dagger/Dagger/Scepter/Focus. Same with Thieves, Dagger/Dagger/Pistol/Pistol/Sword/Shortbow. Engi is just Rifle/Pistol/Pistol/Shield (and hell, that’s what kits are there for too). That’s all they’ve got, there’s no excuse not to have one of each, just for the utility of each for just in case you’re having trouble with something. And it’s not like the clusterkitten of weapons my Warrior lugs around. If you’re having trouble with any of the dungeon content, and you aren’t carrying around multiple weapons, even just random level whites for the utility heavy ones, you’ve only got yourself to blame.

Uh, you just named all the weapons for a thief. Me personally, I run sword/dagger main with shortbow offhand. But I always keep two pistols on my for fractals like the dredge mining suit because it’s safer to unload on him from range and the single target dmg of duel pistols is greater then that of the short bow.

The problem with learning and leveling on an ele is that a new weapon can be anywhere from 8 to 12 to 20 new skills to learn, including their synergy with other weapons and the combos and attunement swapping that comes with it. It’s not like throwing a sword on a warrior and learning 3 new skills, kitten . Ele is a complex class, also factor in the need to respec completely, and possibly regear, if you’re going to seriously use the weapon. I was playing an ele since launch and didn’t get a focus until 3 weeks ago at the wvw request to block treb shots because I was mostly staff or d/d, depending on the situation, and still learning to play in both of those roles. The op is right, we should all learn all of our weapons, but picking up a new weapon for an ele is a challenging ordeal.

TheGuy.3568:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Swirling_Winds 6 seconds of projectile nullification is not enough to justify the weapon by itself.

From The Wiki Page You Linked

This spell can be used to nullify catapult and trebuchet projectiles

IIRC it’s also the only skill that can do this.

DaveGan.8065:

TheGuy.3568:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Swirling_Winds 6 seconds of projectile nullification is not enough to justify the weapon by itself.

From The Wiki Page You Linked

This spell can be used to nullify catapult and trebuchet projectiles

IIRC it’s also the only skill that can do this.

So I post this huge pros and cons list and that’s all you see. Your insight is amazing. The best defense is to move out of the circle. Like I said before 6 seconds is not enough to justify the weapon alone but I guess you missed that part even though you managed to quote it.

Yes because you have to have the weapon equipped 100% of the time, the possibility of you using another weapon and having a focus in inventory to block projectiles is completely illogical.

If you’re in WvW as an ele and you don’t have a focus either equipped or in your inventory, you are wrong.

TheGuy.3568:

DaveGan.8065:

TheGuy.3568:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Swirling_Winds 6 seconds of projectile nullification is not enough to justify the weapon by itself.

From The Wiki Page You Linked

This spell can be used to nullify catapult and trebuchet projectiles

IIRC it’s also the only skill that can do this.

So I post this huge pros and cons list and that’s all you see. Your insight is amazing. The best defense is to move out of the circle. Like I said before 6 seconds is not enough to justify the weapon alone but I guess you missed that part even though you managed to quote it.

The trebuchet blocking isn’t for you. It’s for your keep/tower.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

TheGuy.3568:

DaveGan.8065:

TheGuy.3568:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Swirling_Winds 6 seconds of projectile nullification is not enough to justify the weapon by itself.

From The Wiki Page You Linked

This spell can be used to nullify catapult and trebuchet projectiles

IIRC it’s also the only skill that can do this.

So I post this huge pros and cons list and that’s all you see. Your insight is amazing. The best defense is to move out of the circle. Like I said before 6 seconds is not enough to justify the weapon alone but I guess you missed that part even though you managed to quote it.

The trebuchet blocking isn’t for you. It’s for your keep/tower.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Yes because you have to have the weapon equipped 100% of the time, the possibility of you using another weapon and having a focus in inventory to block projectiles is completely illogical.

If you’re in WvW as an ele and you don’t have a focus either equipped or in your inventory, you are wrong.

Answer both of you in one go. True you can block some but how many attacks is it really? 1 maybe 2. If your taking a keep due to our speed were more useful running supplies and other duties. Let me say it a gain its 6 seconds. It doesn’t mean as much as you think. Now play with focus all you like it has its ups, many in fact, but don’t act like its a requirement for WvW. With it a equipped a player like me sees you as a sitting duck no more no less.

The way your thinking is too limited. I actually take the time to do my homework and figure out the downfalls of using weapon sets in pvp. That “your wrong” if you don’t have a focus crap doesn’t cut it as you give up a lot to use a focus. If you don’t realize that its your won problem. The focus might be useful but it is by no means necessary.

guardians not using their shield/reflection skills is what trips me out the most

Guardians running around with GS only using no utility skills for Support, never using their F1-F3, no reflects. It simply makes me rage sometimes.

I absolutely agree with this. When I run dungeons with my ele, I usually use d/d but have staff in my inventory just in case. Same thing with my ranger, since our bows sometimes don’t hit objects (burrows, statues, etc.), I carry a GS with me and switch to that if I have to.

If eles don’t block treb shots in WvW, you must be in a low tier server. Dungeon wise, I have every weapon, but I rarely, rarely ever change to niche weapons.

TheGuy.3568:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

TheGuy.3568:

DaveGan.8065:

TheGuy.3568:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

I would hope they don’t play WvW. If you’re an ele in WvW and you don’t have a focus in your inventory for swirling winds, you’re wrong.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Swirling_Winds 6 seconds of projectile nullification is not enough to justify the weapon by itself.

From The Wiki Page You Linked

This spell can be used to nullify catapult and trebuchet projectiles

IIRC it’s also the only skill that can do this.

So I post this huge pros and cons list and that’s all you see. Your insight is amazing. The best defense is to move out of the circle. Like I said before 6 seconds is not enough to justify the weapon alone but I guess you missed that part even though you managed to quote it.

The trebuchet blocking isn’t for you. It’s for your keep/tower.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Yes because you have to have the weapon equipped 100% of the time, the possibility of you using another weapon and having a focus in inventory to block projectiles is completely illogical.

If you’re in WvW as an ele and you don’t have a focus either equipped or in your inventory, you are wrong.

Answer both of you in one go. True you can block some but how many attacks is it really? 1 maybe 2. If your taking a keep due to our speed were more useful running supplies and other duties. Let me say it a gain its 6 seconds. It doesn’t mean as much as you think. Now play with focus all you like it has its ups, many in fact, but don’t act like its a requirement for WvW. With it a equipped a player like me sees you as a sitting duck no more no less.

The way your thinking is too limited. I actually take the time to do my homework and figure out the downfalls of using weapon sets in pvp. That “your wrong” if you don’t have a focus crap doesn’t cut it as you give up a lot to use a focus. If you don’t realize that its your won problem. The focus might be useful but it is by no means necessary.

2-3 eles with coordination can completely cancel out a trebuchet. The focus is 100% mandatory for an ele in WvW, if you’re not carrying a focus in WvW, then you’re bad at WvW.

@OP – I believe that this cannot be stressed enough. I just encountered a group on the Grawl Fractal at 31 where nobody else bothered to switch to a weapon with an immobilize/cripple, and we wiped on the first half with everybody uselessly chasing down the veteran shaman.

Squally.4963:

Uh, you just named all the weapons for a thief.

That was the point. Some classes have so few weapons overall that there’s really no excuse not to have one of each. Sure, you may not exactly enjoy using pistols on your thief, but if you ever see your party having trouble with mob pulls in dungeons, then bam, easymode mob pulls with perm aoe blindness, even if you’re using some random level 2 white pistol. I’m not saying to have 7 of every weapon, or even one of every weapon, but a lot of weapons have nice little utilities that can make life a lot easier in certain situations even if not traited for, and in dungeons where you have the liberty of engaging at will there really isn’t a reason to not have those options.

I’d personally rather have those 3 eles equip staves and burn down the trebuchet. It’s pretty rare I see one set up where I cannot hit it with meteor storm, and it’s usually in a bad enough spot I can hit it with lava font and eruption, too.

Asking people to sit around using an ability that earns them neither karma nor badges (nor xp) is silly, especially if it makes no forward progress.

ATMAvatar.5749:

I’d personally rather have those 3 eles equip staves and burn down the trebuchet. It’s pretty rare I see one set up where I cannot hit it with meteor storm, and it’s usually in a bad enough spot I can hit it with lava font and eruption, too.

Asking people to sit around using an ability that earns them neither karma nor badges (nor xp) is silly, especially if it makes no forward progress.

Because 3 eles can totally burn down that trebuchet on the enemy keep’s inner wall…
Or on the enemy tower’s top platform…
Or on the high cliff only accessible from within an enemy-controlled fort…

Or, well, any other place you will find a decently-placed treb.

Yea, who the hell are you playing against that puts trebs in an area that can be hit by meteor storm?

Love how some theifs get to fractal level 30, even 40+ without knowing they can make the whole team invis for ~14 seconds ? Good in dredge for the gate and asura fractal for skipping some of the harpies.
Told a few theifs about this and they were completely sure I was talking kitten. Skill doesn’t exist and such a thing is impossible. I was actually proper shocked at the stupidity of some players. It gets me so angry, how the kitten have they got to 30+ ? or even level 80 ? They are exactly the ones who get carried to high levels, the ones that die every 3 seconds with their braindead glasscannon builds yet still manage to get the rewards that they didn’t deserve.

blahhh…I prefer doing 40 and 38 dailies instead of 10 and 20+ because players are simply more skillful and intelligent (I guess…) and a level 38 run is 9/10 times faster than a 10-20 run. Great stuff.

omgwtflolbbl.7142:

Squally.4963:

Uh, you just named all the weapons for a thief.

That was the point. Some classes have so few weapons overall that there’s really no excuse not to have one of each. Sure, you may not exactly enjoy using pistols on your thief, but if you ever see your party having trouble with mob pulls in dungeons, then bam, easymode mob pulls with perm aoe blindness, even if you’re using some random level 2 white pistol. I’m not saying to have 7 of every weapon, or even one of every weapon, but a lot of weapons have nice little utilities that can make life a lot easier in certain situations even if not traited for, and in dungeons where you have the liberty of engaging at will there really isn’t a reason to not have those options.

Oh I agree with you, just pointing out that you named all of the thief weapons

I always have equipped a sword/dagger and shortbow. Then I always carry two pistols and another dagger in my bag.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Yea, who the hell are you playing against that puts trebs in an area that can be hit by meteor storm?

I’m more curious to know which world you’re on where you can count on people to spend their time and resources to deflect treb fire for zero reward. I’m lucky if I can get someone to help build anything, let alone give up any badges/honor on a defense that also doesn’t achieve anything more than buy time. About the only thing I can count on is a group of people following around a commander on the field.

I’m pretty sure you see Ele’s blocking Treb shots in Tier 4 at bare minimum (and I assume every server higher than that). I know I have been on both sides of that against Darkhaven and Northern Shiverpeaks (I’m Dragonbrand)

Maestro.5376:

I was running Fractals 30+ with a non-heavy party the other day. We unfortunately got grawl but got to the final boss. After wiping a few times, I noticed both the Elementalists were using Staff, so I asked if they could switch to using Swirling Winds, since it’s very useful when the adds spawn to keep excessive damage of of your group. To my utter shock, neither of them actually knew what that was. One of them said the skill didn’t exist, and the other confused it with Tornado.

I ended up having to explain to them that the skill was a projectile-nullification skill in slot 4 of Air Attunement Focus. And then they had to dig through their inventories for Foci/Scepters.

You do realise that eles have 60 weapon skills(+25 more from conjures). A mesmer has 24(just to compare). Do you seriously expect anybody to know every single name? If you gave me that name, I’d probably blink a few times while counting all air skills to figure out which one of them is swirly enough to have that name(since I’m, like, 80% sure it’s not a utility). If you were to say “that projective-nullification skill”, I’d instantly think of focus air4. Point being, I find this part of your post very…high horsey. It’s like you were trying to embarrass those players and show how “smart” you are. And the funny part is, you still failed to complete it even though they got the weapons thus no progress was made that day….

As for the actual topic…people choose their weapon sets for a reason. I’m a staff ele. I can play it blindfolded and perform pretty good. If I need adjustments, I can easily get those through traits/unitlities. If I switch to another weapon, I become less efficient. Simply because I lack practice with it(and enjoyment thus the no practice thing). It’s not a “win” kind of advice, imo. You are sacrificing a player who knows exactly what s/he is doing for 1 skill. And those who can work all weapons equally good…well, they already have and use all those weapons making your pro tip redundant.

Aphix.9846:

Love how some theifs get to fractal level 30, even 40+ without knowing they can make the whole team invis for ~14 seconds ? Good in dredge for the gate and asura fractal for skipping some of the harpies.
Told a few theifs about this and they were completely sure I was talking kitten. Skill doesn’t exist and such a thing is impossible. I was actually proper shocked at the stupidity of some players. It gets me so angry, how the kitten have they got to 30+ ? or even level 80 ? They are exactly the ones who get carried to high levels, the ones that die every 3 seconds with their braindead glasscannon builds yet still manage to get the rewards that they didn’t deserve.

blahhh…I prefer doing 40 and 38 dailies instead of 10 and 20+ because players are simply more skillful and intelligent (I guess…) and a level 38 run is 9/10 times faster than a 10-20 run. Great stuff.

Haha, I had this happen to me. I actually got flamed when I told them. My main is a thief and I was playing my guardian. They told me that it lasted max 10s, even the thief in the group was doubting me untill they checked it. (Think it’s 14s when traited?)

While I agree with some of the sentiment that players should be prepared and know their class, I have to strongly disagree with the heart of this post.

Some weapons do absolutely nothing, and in a lot of cases are a detriment to a particular players build. Take for example, you have a warrior who is specced for greatsword. If he brings with him, everything that he can equip – it becomes pointless. That sword, warhorn, and mace are going to do him no good in any situation.

The intracacies of each class for certain builds is the same. Some weapons regardless of having a few useful skills turn out to be rather pitiful without the right traits or stats. And given that no one sound build is hands down leagues above another sound build, the whole elitism of running the wrong build, or min/maxing the wrong stats goes out the window. The argument then falls into the land of “don’t play how you want to play, play how I think you should play”.

evo.8640:

That sword, warhorn, and mace are going to do him no good in any situation.

The warhorn is party speed/vigor and area weakness. Weakness and vigor may not be as key, but there are plenty of times where party speed boost comes in handy (helps even more that it removes slowing conditions too).

Maces is always good for removing defiant stacks quickly (F1, 3, and 5).

Sword I can’t think of a use for off the top of my head, but just the fact that two of the three weapons you listed definitely have their niche uses in potentially unusual group/build compositions is an indication that people are undervaluing having more weapons in inventory.

DaveGan.8065:

evo.8640:

That sword, warhorn, and mace are going to do him no good in any situation.

The warhorn is party speed/vigor and area weakness. Weakness and vigor may not be as key, but there are plenty of times where party speed boost comes in handy (helps even more that it removes slowing conditions too).

Maces is always good for removing defiant stacks quickly (F1, 3, and 5).

Sword I can’t think of a use for off the top of my head, but just the fact that two of the three weapons you listed definitely have their niche uses in potentially unusual group/build compositions is an indication that people are undervaluing having more weapons in inventory.

In semi-high to high level fractals, vigor is your bestest friend.

TWMagimay.9057:

You do realise that eles have 60 weapon skills(+25 more from conjures). A mesmer has 24(just to compare). Do you seriously expect anybody to know every single name? If you gave me that name, I’d probably blink a few times while counting all air skills to figure out which one of them is swirly enough to have that name(since I’m, like, 80% sure it’s not a utility). If you were to say “that projective-nullification skill”, I’d instantly think of focus air4. Point being, I find this part of your post very…high horsey. It’s like you were trying to embarrass those players and show how “smart” you are. And the funny part is, you still failed to complete it even though they got the weapons thus no progress was made that day….

As for the actual topic…people choose their weapon sets for a reason. I’m a staff ele. I can play it blindfolded and perform pretty good. If I need adjustments, I can easily get those through traits/unitlities. If I switch to another weapon, I become less efficient. Simply because I lack practice with it(and enjoyment thus the no practice thing). It’s not a “win” kind of advice, imo. You are sacrificing a player who knows exactly what s/he is doing for 1 skill. And those who can work all weapons equally good…well, they already have and use all those weapons making your pro tip redundant.

And each class in GW1 had 100+ skills to keep track of, PER CLASS out of TWO CLASSES PER CHARACTER. What’s your point?

Increasing the number of things you have to recall by a trivial number, ESPECIALLY since all the skills and their names can be accessed from your Hero window, is NOT AN EXCUSE for not knowing your class. ESPECIALLY in a 30+ Fractals run, which should, without any doubt, be composed of players that know their profession.

If I truly were trying to embarrass those players, I’d put their names up. Another point goes out the window. And so what if we failed to complete it? We still got further than we did without it. Anything left can be chalked up to bad party chemistry.

And honestly, as soon as you started advocating single weapon use, your argument pretty much invalidated itself. Arenanet even STATED that during the course of a dungeon it would be natural to assume different roles even for a specific profession. And don’t you just THINK for a moment that sometimes, requesting that someone bring a certain skill isn’t for the purpose of improving their individual performance but for IMPROVING THE PERFORMANCE OF THE PARTY AS A WHOLE, which is the purpose of running a dungeon IN A PARTY?

Swirling Winds is easily a skill that can boost party survivability as a whole in that fight. I’m pretty good at dodging the Agony Arrows from the Grawl Boss as well as dealing with the adds, but when I see that others aren’t, I want to try to devise solutions to keep us from having dead party members for most of the fight.

Your argument that just because you are the most comfortable with the staff that it is the only weapon you should NEED in a fight is not only selfish but will ultimately become detrimental to whichever party you’re in (by the way, you can’t AoE reflect/nullify projectiles with traits and utilities unless you already happen to have 30 in water so you can share Magnetic Aura, and by then you’re already doing suboptimal damage). Continued wipes dictate changes in strategy to suit the skill level and strengths of each party member. That’s how a party works, that’s how it becomes a cohesive whole instead of 5 people that happen to be playing alongside each other.

But you’re always welcome to stick to a staff if I ever find you in my party. I always enjoy another stationary channeling body as a meat shield to hide behind from projectiles. Love the way they work in this game.

DaveGan.8065:

evo.8640:

That sword, warhorn, and mace are going to do him no good in any situation.

The warhorn is party speed/vigor and area weakness. Weakness and vigor may not be as key, but there are plenty of times where party speed boost comes in handy (helps even more that it removes slowing conditions too).

Maces is always good for removing defiant stacks quickly (F1, 3, and 5).

Sword I can’t think of a use for off the top of my head, but just the fact that two of the three weapons you listed definitely have their niche uses in potentially unusual group/build compositions is an indication that people are undervaluing having more weapons in inventory.

You can quickly remove stacks of defiant just as fast with a rifle. And the rifle has far better up-time, far better damage. As well as providing a huge buffer to survivability with the merit of being at range. And since defiant removal doesn’t even take a trailer hitch attachment to player survivability, the choice is clear.

The warhorn is incredibly niche and still puts a warrior at detriment of near uselessness simply having it equipped, as most people will generally have a trait that adds this effect innately. A group has never said, “boy that vigor buff was the saving grace that made that encounter any less difficult than it already was.” Sure, most boss fights you can run out of combat and swap to better weapon loadouts, but that’s just all the extra amount of downtime that person is doing anything useful other than regen’ing health.

There are definitely weapons/skills that are useful, but the examples you pointed out carry far more cons than pros. That’s not necessarily a problem with people undervaluing or underestimating potential, it has everything to do with a lot of weapons/skills are simply lackluster and the unique snowflakes do everything they can stand out. Generally striving in vain attempts to make something that’s “meh” into something that seems cool, edgy, different, and in their mind: useful.

I suspect when Fractal levels are opened up to the masses, you’ll come to see this extrapolate with the overflow of people who shouldn’t be in fractals 20+ no matter what build/gear they have. The player is not necessarily at fault. There are poor mechanics and poor abilities. White knights generally refuse to cast any objective opinions though.

I also do have all the weapons. But I think my focus just takes up space and I only use it for like 1 or 2 things. Thing is if there is a guard/war or Mesmer then there is not really a reason to use focus…cuz ele def capabilities are pretty horrible (aside from can trips).
Thing is if I have to use focus then I would have to change quite a number of traits from water/arcane to earth/air. Fire is almost useless (arcane passive signet is probably better than those 2 focus skill) and water is not that great on a focus either.
But maybe it is time to dust off my focus and use it.

And this is the lesson why u don’t want a non-heavy pug party. Play with friends.

I agree with this tip completely. I often play with a ranger friend and would give her a hard time for not carrying around a melee weapon. Some enemies reflect projectiles, such as the jade colossus creatures in the Jade Maw fight in fractals. If you are ranger that means you are only dealing pet damage, and not even that if you are using ranged pets.

There is a big difference between people who just pick a build/weapon set and use that for EVERYTHING in the game without ever sawpping weapons(and major traits, utility skills) and people who do.

As a warrior I’m constantly swapping things around to suit the situation. This game differs from GW1 int that you can swap things around alot outside of combat, and you are hurting your performance and the performance of your group by not taking advantage of that.

If you don’t want to because it’s too diffiuclt to remember to switch back, or you are too slow to do so, well…nobody ever said being good was easy.

evo.8640:

DaveGan.8065:

evo.8640:

That sword, warhorn, and mace are going to do him no good in any situation.

The warhorn is party speed/vigor and area weakness. Weakness and vigor may not be as key, but there are plenty of times where party speed boost comes in handy (helps even more that it removes slowing conditions too).

Maces is always good for removing defiant stacks quickly (F1, 3, and 5).

Sword I can’t think of a use for off the top of my head, but just the fact that two of the three weapons you listed definitely have their niche uses in potentially unusual group/build compositions is an indication that people are undervaluing having more weapons in inventory.

You can quickly remove stacks of defiant just as fast with a rifle. And the rifle has far better up-time, far better damage. As well as providing a huge buffer to survivability with the merit of being at range. And since defiant removal doesn’t even take a trailer hitch attachment to player survivability, the choice is clear.

The warhorn is incredibly niche and still puts a warrior at detriment of near uselessness simply having it equipped, as most people will generally have a trait that adds this effect innately. A group has never said, “boy that vigor buff was the saving grace that made that encounter any less difficult than it already was.” Sure, most boss fights you can run out of combat and swap to better weapon loadouts, but that’s just all the extra amount of downtime that person is doing anything useful other than regen’ing health.

There are definitely weapons/skills that are useful, but the examples you pointed out carry far more cons than pros. That’s not necessarily a problem with people undervaluing or underestimating potential, it has everything to do with a lot of weapons/skills are simply lackluster and the unique snowflakes do everything they can stand out. Generally striving in vain attempts to make something that’s “meh” into something that seems cool, edgy, different, and in their mind: useful.

I suspect when Fractal levels are opened up to the masses, you’ll come to see this extrapolate with the overflow of people who shouldn’t be in fractals 20+ no matter what build/gear they have. The player is not necessarily at fault. There are poor mechanics and poor abilities. White knights generally refuse to cast any objective opinions though.

Actually, dual-mace has 3 defiance-strip abilities while rifle only has 1. Facts straight? Facts straight.

Regarding Vigor….that’s ALL my party members ask me for when I ask whether I should bring Vigor-on-shatter if the current fight doesn’t necessitate one of the other Adept Inspiration Majors.

So…yeah.

evo.8640:

wall of text

(warning: another wall of text here)

Um, no. Rifle has one CC skill with the same recharge as mace 3. And unlike mace 5, it happens to be melee range. Also the damage coefficients on the rifle are pretty horrid except on kill shot and volley. If your party is lacking CC at the dredge powersuit, mace/mace and mace/shield will run circles around your rifle. Combine that with lack of comboing potential (projectile finishers are terrible), and I honestly see the rifle as a selfish weapon mostly used by players who are bad at dodging/blocking and/or have little idea of aggro mechanics. (Yes I’d have one in inventory, but really would only use it in a wvw zergfest sniping situation)

Warhorn is meant to move people between combat mostly. One prominent example that comes to mind is the spider cave in TA (did I mention that they cripple, or that mesmers have terrible access to swiftness and condition removal?). Weakness/vigor are also incredibly useful if your party does not have a good source of protection. The argument that your party doesn’t praise everything you do is absurd. Just because they don’t notice the extra dodging they get, or where they might have been from, does not mean it did not help with the battle. Not enough damage on your 2nd weaponset? Then l2dodge, lose the overkill toughness (emerald/sapphire trinkets) that steals aggro from your guardian, get on the opposite side of the boss as said guardian, and mash 1/2/3 on that greatsword. The utility will be there when you need it.

Everyone else has the exact same access to weapons and skills as people at fractals 20+ right now (except for the RNG exotic cavalier gear). If they’re incapable of making it to 20, it’s every bit a l2play issue (with the exception of disconnects). Biggest things I see are eles/mesmers/guardians not pulling out swirling winds/feedback/wall/shield of the avenger in parts of the grawl/asura fractals.

Progress-blocking mechanics aside (cliffside I’m looking at you), everything else can be overcome (or made a lot easier) by people swapping weapons and utilities midway. Just because you or others don’t notice it does not mean it doesn’t exist or isn’t helpful (vital).

Stridix.4260:

I also do have all the weapons. But I think my focus just takes up space and I only use it for like 1 or 2 things.

Those 1 or 2 things may be the difference between your party giving up and disbanding or continuing through the dungeon. I’d say 1 inventory space is worth that.

Maestro.5376:

And each class in GW1 had 100+ skills to keep track of, PER CLASS out of TWO CLASSES PER CHARACTER. What’s your point?

That we are not playing GW1. Yours?

Increasing the number of things you have to recall by a trivial number, ESPECIALLY since all the skills and their names can be accessed from your Hero window, is NOT AN EXCUSE for not knowing your class. ESPECIALLY in a 30+ Fractals run, which should, without any doubt, be composed of players that know their profession.

Oh, so if I learn the names of all skills, I automatically know my class? Because I memorized some names? Yeah, truly exceptional.

If I truly were trying to embarrass those players, I’d put their names up. Another point goes out the window. And so what if we failed to complete it? We still got further than we did without it. Anything left can be chalked up to bad party chemistry.

Because, obviously, I meant the topic, not the way you talked to them in the party. No, wait, that makes no sense.

And honestly, as soon as you started advocating single weapon use, your argument pretty much invalidated itself. Arenanet even STATED that during the course of a dungeon it would be natural to assume different roles even for a specific profession. And don’t you just THINK for a moment that sometimes, requesting that someone bring a certain skill isn’t for the purpose of improving their individual performance but for IMPROVING THE PERFORMANCE OF THE PARTY AS A WHOLE, which is the purpose of running a dungeon IN A PARTY?

Which means that you can never complete that fractal unless you bring…3 elementalists? Cause with all you rleet skills, you still failed. As far as I remember, they said you can build your cha any way you want and complete dungeons with any combination. But then again, you are the one failing fotm thus I must really suck, right?

Swirling Winds is easily a skill that can boost party survivability as a whole in that fight. I’m pretty good at dodging the Agony Arrows from the Grawl Boss as well as dealing with the adds, but when I see that others aren’t, I want to try to devise solutions to keep us from having dead party members for most of the fight.

Which is no reason to get on your high horse.

Your argument that just because you are the most comfortable with the staff that it is the only weapon you should NEED in a fight is not only selfish but will ultimately become detrimental to whichever party you’re in (by the way, you can’t AoE reflect/nullify projectiles with traits and utilities unless you already happen to have 30 in water so you can share Magnetic Aura, and by then you’re already doing suboptimal damage). Continued wipes dictate changes in strategy to suit the skill level and strengths of each party member. That’s how a party works, that’s how it becomes a cohesive whole instead of 5 people that happen to be playing alongside each other.

So, tell me, how did that work out for you? That’s right, it didn’t.

But you’re always welcome to stick to a staff if I ever find you in my party. I always enjoy another stationary channeling body as a meat shield to hide behind from projectiles. Love the way they work in this game.

Nah, dun worry, we ever end up in the same party, I won;t stick around. I have this issue with know-it-all-wanna-be-pro-giving-orders-to-everybody players. You so awesome, go solo it. So nobody can screw it up for you^^ Wish you the best of luck.

Maestro.5376:

Actually, dual-mace has 3 defiance-strip abilities while rifle only has 1. Facts straight? Facts straight.

Regarding Vigor….that’s ALL my party members ask me for when I ask whether I should bring Vigor-on-shatter if the current fight doesn’t necessitate one of the other Adept Inspiration Majors.

So…yeah.

Because no other class has defiance stripping abilities, right? lol
Because clearly, you are making ALL of the difference? How arrogant. Or rather, no one else should carry their weight. How selfless.

And all at the same time, pointless with a cohesive group. Which still even happens with pug 30+.

@DaveGan

So what you’re saying is “they shouldn’t play how they want to play, they should play how I think they should play”.

Again, rifle can take off the stacks just the same. And as I said before, because you didn’t catch it apparently: defiance takes a back seat to players survivability. It’s not a l2roll issue, if you don’t need to roll in the first place with one method over the other.

Equally, just because you or a few people might find some buffs useful in situations that don’t even call for them doesn’t make them truly useful.

In the end, if the content gets completed by a group it doesn’t matter how they accomplished it, but the heart of this thread is not about being open to other choices, rather it’s condescending masked with false intent to help players become better.

@TWmagimay:

There is a clear difference between giving advice and suggesting what people SHOULD DO and bossing them around, breathing down their necks just so the run goes smoother. I always throw suggestions at pugs whenever I run with them as to what they can do to improve their situation. If you are too stubborn to “be a better player”, then I’m not having fun carrying you. I dont care about people who suck but want to get better, but I’m not going to put up with people who aren’t willing to carry their own or at least learn to.

This thread does exactly what the topic says, providing a pro tip that one should carry ALL AVAILABLE weapons on their character. I have 7 level 80’s and I carry every weaponset on all of those characters. I don’t memorize all their names, but I do understand 90-95% of how most of those skills work.

Games are meant to be fun. Fun for me is helping people get better, finishing content fast and smooth. Whats not fun for me is carrying stubborn, ignorant, conceited, self centered, spoiled, bratty players who cant even carry their own weight.

If you’re going to suck, at least be willing to get better not pout about how “awesome you are” and that if you cant do it, it means the developers failed to deliver.

TWMagimay.9057:

That we are not playing GW1. Yours?

Point being that a high number of memorization elements does not excuse not knowing your class…

Oh, so if I learn the names of all skills, I automatically know my class? Because I memorized some names? Yeah, truly exceptional.

Because converses are totally always true, totally…

Because, obviously, I meant the topic, not the way you talked to them in the party. No, wait, that makes no sense.

Because, obviously, you were there when I asked them to equip Swirling Winds…Because obviously, you know how I talked to them…

Which means that you can never complete that fractal unless you bring…3 elementalists? Cause with all you rleet skills, you still failed. As far as I remember, they said you can build your cha any way you want and complete dungeons with any combination. But then again, you are the one failing fotm thus I must really suck, right?

Because obviously changing the strategy of my specific party composition to better suit our combat strategy means that OUR STRATEGY IS THE ONLY WAY TO COMPLETE THIS DUNGEON AND NOONE ELSE IS FREE TO DO IT IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER…

They also said you can have any party composition you want, they did NOT say to complete any dungeon you could have any builds in that composition that you wanted…

Also, I’ve been completing Fractals successfully since Day1, so…right, there goes another point.

Which is no reason to get on your high horse.

I wasn’t aware I was either at a greater elevation or that they had enabled mounts in the game.

So, tell me, how did that work out for you? That’s right, it didn’t.

Snarkiness does nothing except earn you the lack of respect.

Nah, dun worry, we ever end up in the same party, I won;t stick around. I have this issue with know-it-all-wanna-be-pro-giving-orders-to-everybody players. You so awesome, go solo it. So nobody can screw it up for you^^ Wish you the best of luck.

I love how you just continually make assumptions about how I treated a party when in reality, you weren’t there, and you have no idea how many failed attempts occurred before the suggestion was made, or how there was no mention of the competency of any of the party members, or how we were all polite and courteous to each other, or the fact that I never gave orders, only suggestions.

But that’s alright, you can think what you want. Have fun with that.