Guild Wars 2

Group comp?

Guardian (me)
2x Thief
2x Ranger
Group collaborated from gw2lfg on top of that

Bloomhunger
Uncategorized
Grawl

Yeah we wiped once on legendary shaman, but we revised our strat and worked it out.
(and we got the chest, too)

This is basically to address the issues of “you need X comp for Y”

I’ve never had a group comp I couldn’t manage with… yet..

Ummm…. not to downplay your argument, but given that the greatest issue in FOTM is the reliance on projectile reflect / null; Wouldn’t you being a guardian completely invalidate your argument that you don’t need X comp for Y.

Kirbyprime.2645:

Ummm…. not to downplay your argument, but given that the greatest issue in FOTM is the reliance on projectile reflect / null; Wouldn’t you being a guardian completely invalidate your argument that you don’t need X comp for Y.

Three of the most useful areas of fractals for a guardian are ones listed too. I don’t get the argument either. Theives are useful in a bunch of the fractals too which I guess he doesn’t realize either. Wait until you get to 40s and you will see being able to dodge is more important than your class, but having some professions with block/absorb projectiles that can dodge makes things easier.

Perfect fractal group compostion: One or more guadian/mesmer/ele/theif with reflect/absorb projectile skills that can dodge + any other professions that can dodge = win. That is pretty much the composition of every random fractal group you will get except the dodge part varies.

Replace you the guardian with a necro/engineer/warrior, and color me impressed. Theif makes the grawl boss eaiser as well because of the smoke wall and SR resses. It isn’t so much an issue of required classes (though going with out a guardian is semi suicidal on most fractals), but those classes which make the run smooth, and don’t impact the team DPS. Like Mesmer/Guardian.

You could do fractal 38 with 5 engineers, it would just take forever, and your margin of error would be much much smaller.

Maybe you forgot, OP, but Thieves are stellar for their smokescreen projectile block, particularly in the areas you mentioned. You had not two (the normal), but three projectile stopping members of your team; that’s a stellar composition for FotM 40+ if everyone is a good player.

Try this dungeon with only Warriors, Rangers, Necromancers, and Engineers and no Mesmers, Guardians, Thieves, or Elementalists. You’ll see just how painful certain team compositions can be, regardless of player skill.

At the same time as I did have two thieves (which many deem desired due to smokescreen, one of them did use it as I recall) I still had two players on the “worst profession” in the game.

Also only having 1 heavy is not really desirable by most groups. However it was still a pretty smooth run.

Not having a Guardian would make it more difficult, but not nearly impossible. The difference is people need to play at a better level without that group support. For example, having a well/plague necro makes grub phases trivial through aoe blinds and dots.

Projectile reflect in regards to the fractals we had:
Bloomhunger: I don’t use any projectile reflect since this fight only requires you to dodge AoE circles, and if you can’t manage that then you deserve the agony (I melee him and do just fine)

Uncategorized: Reflects work wonders for getting past harpies, but besides that the rest of the fractal is trivial anyway. Tom is kitten easy, and the last boss shoots three slow moving electric balls that are easily dodged by anyone with decent vision.

Grawl: Projectile reflect only beneficial on legendary imbued (I dont use it on the grawl boss) However, reflect isnt neccessary if individuals know how to dodge flaming arrows (turn your sound up, SO easy to dodge every one) and have a team mechanic to help with grubs (reflect is a big help, but so is AoE blind, slows, daggerstorm, etc)

I think it’s more of a Learn2Play issue.
I also don’t think EVERY group comp can work, and thats fine. But most will, as long as people are good.

If this is just another “all professions are viable in all content” thread then I probably won’t pursue this discussion further, but I will say the following. The reality is that all dungeon content in this game is mechanically very easy and being a good player counts for way more than playing a good class.

Rangers aren’t “bad”, they’re just not “as good”. That’s the real argument anyone ever makes when they say they’d prefer to not bring a Ranger. My guild can beat any PvE content in this game using any class composition without difficulty because the content is easy, but that doesn’t mean that certain classes aren’t inferior to others when they are. You must be mindful of the logical fallacy that’s easy to fall prey to there.

If 1 person does something, it means everyone can! By your logic, you should be a nuclear scientist or the president of the united states, “just” because someone else did it, who was a underdog? ……Right

I get it, and in a sense you’re right, assuming they’re both of equal skill level. A warrior at the meta will always do more damage than a ranger, and a Guardian will dish out superior support compared to an Engi.

However, it’s still doable – and evekittenome of the hardest points in the game. Too many people drop everything and give up because they don’t think X comp can do it. It’s more about how good you and your party is IMO.

JJBigs.8456:

If 1 person does something, it means everyone can! By your logic, you should be a nuclear scientist or the president of the united states, “just” because someone else did it, who was a underdog? ……Right

No, it’s more like I got invited into a fotm 38 group with this comp, manned up, played like a boss, and finished it with one wipe. And it didn’t take us that long either.

And yeah, I should be both a nuclear scientist and the president. If someone else can do these things, I think I’m more than capable.

Tell this to the group that wouldn’t invite me because I wasn’t…

“a heavy” -_-

I agree with you though, player > profession every time.

obal.3218:

Kirbyprime.2645:

Ummm…. not to downplay your argument, but given that the greatest issue in FOTM is the reliance on projectile reflect / null; Wouldn’t you being a guardian completely invalidate your argument that you don’t need X comp for Y.

Three of the most useful areas of fractals for a guardian are ones listed too. I don’t get the argument either. Theives are useful in a bunch of the fractals too which I guess he doesn’t realize either. Wait until you get to 40s and you will see being able to dodge is more important than your class, but having some professions with block/absorb projectiles that can dodge makes things easier.

Perfect fractal group compostion: One or more guadian/mesmer/ele/theif with reflect/absorb projectile skills that can dodge + any other professions that can dodge = win. That is pretty much the composition of every random fractal group you will get except the dodge part varies.

Thieves have projectile destruction as well, in addition to dagger storm…

Mesmer/guardian/ele/thief/warrior are your good fractal classes. Eles just need to get our of their crappy staff phase — dagger dagger or dagger/focus is supremely better for burst aoe, cc, and utility. Everything staff does, dagger/x can do immediately and with more mobility.

OP, you group will have some trouble if you got Cliffside/Snowblind/Ascalonian/Underwater.

I run lv48 fractals with my Guardian and Thief, IMO thief is not a unwelcome class for fractals, a support thief is great addition to any team.

The only bad PvE classes are necros and rangers. The rest can get by pretty well, although the engineer is just overshadowed in utility and everyone else is overshadowed by the warrior for speed runs.

The only class I dread seeing in a pug is ranger. Every other class generally pulls their weight for the most part.

Poor rangers. So funny. I regularly run FotMs 28-30 with 2 rangers in my grp. Indeed we do have a guardian and a warrior and we always have to pug a 5th as we can’t seem to find a regular to fill that last spot. We don’t really mind what class the pug is because in our minds we’d prefer the player to be comfortable and knowledgeable of the class he is playing.

And we don’t really have a problem with any fractals. Having 2x entangle rangers is very useful, allows us to leisurely kill the ele adds on grawl shaman, allows us to recover from a silly pull on dredge too. Pet revive allows us to …. w8 a minute we seem to do a lot of silly things!

But seriously, what ppl seem to be missing here is that they will get to improve their overall playing style by playing and surviving with all the classes, especially the ‘unwanted’ ones. Of course this is irrelevant if all you want is to speed through.

But yeah, personally I don’t care what the class is that comes as long as the person pushing the buttons is able to play properly Also, getting the Longbow Fractal skin when you’re a guardian seems to really irritate the rangers and warriors more, lmao!!

Zenith.7301:

The only bad PvE classes are necros and rangers. The rest can get by pretty well, although the engineer is just overshadowed in utility and everyone else is overshadowed by the warrior for speed runs.

Disagree about necros, they provide great DoT Dps and offensive support on mobs.

A pro epidemic necro can significantly speed up a fractal run.

Yeni.3507:

Zenith.7301:

The only bad PvE classes are necros and rangers. The rest can get by pretty well, although the engineer is just overshadowed in utility and everyone else is overshadowed by the warrior for speed runs.

Disagree about necros, they provide great DoT Dps and offensive support on mobs.

A pro epidemic necro can significantly speed up a fractal run.

That, plus, permablind with their elite can really help out a crappy pull situation/grawl grub situation

If reflects is what it’s all about why don’t we at least love rangers for their whirling defense?

Doctor Orderly MD PhD DDS.7625:

If reflects is what it’s all about why don’t we at least love rangers for their whirling defense?

We do when they use it, even though it’s not nearly as good as skills like Feedback and Wall of Reflection and Smokescreen. More often than not, though, bad players playing Rangers simply spam Shortbow for hours on end.

Rising Dusk.2408:

Doctor Orderly MD PhD DDS.7625:

If reflects is what it’s all about why don’t we at least love rangers for their whirling defense?

We do when they use it, even though it’s not nearly as good as skills like Feedback and Wall of Reflection and Smokescreen. More often than not, though, bad players playing Rangers simply spam Shortbow for hours on end.

Seriously, this. I just made a ranger who’s really low leveled, and upon trying whirling defenses I can already tell this is an amazing skill to have on a secondary weapon set swap.

The worst thing is, I have never seen a ranger use this ability in PvE content. Not on lupi, not in fractals, literally never.

Sad

Zenith.7301:

obal.3218:

Kirbyprime.2645:

Ummm…. not to downplay your argument, but given that the greatest issue in FOTM is the reliance on projectile reflect / null; Wouldn’t you being a guardian completely invalidate your argument that you don’t need X comp for Y.

Three of the most useful areas of fractals for a guardian are ones listed too. I don’t get the argument either. Theives are useful in a bunch of the fractals too which I guess he doesn’t realize either. Wait until you get to 40s and you will see being able to dodge is more important than your class, but having some professions with block/absorb projectiles that can dodge makes things easier.

Perfect fractal group compostion: One or more guadian/mesmer/ele/theif with reflect/absorb projectile skills that can dodge + any other professions that can dodge = win. That is pretty much the composition of every random fractal group you will get except the dodge part varies.

Thieves have projectile destruction as well, in addition to dagger storm…

Mesmer/guardian/ele/thief/warrior are your good fractal classes. Eles just need to get our of their crappy staff phase — dagger dagger or dagger/focus is supremely better for burst aoe, cc, and utility. Everything staff does, dagger/x can do immediately and with more mobility.

ele are good for survivability and stuff….but they are a burden on mossman, volcanic veterans, uncategorized second boss (venom room).

Going full glass cannon is too risky, while going balanced (even sligtly toward GC) they have risible damage….

Best weapons are D/D, S/F

But lets see those 3 parts.
On veterans, no matter what you don t deal enough damage.

On mossman you cannot use D/D due to being oneshot (eles D/D skills are long enough to make you incapable of evading some Attacks), nor S/F and staff because most of your Attacks will just “miss”.

on Uncategorized you again lack dps (well considering how broken warriors are that may not be a problem….i saw post patch 1 warrior taking this boss out at 1st Crystal -.- and then Killing a maw tentacle in 3 seconds …. really? they didn t tell me how he did but i saw this at 38 with my eyes and was O_O).

Best party is still 2 guardians (1tank/support 1 dps/balanced) and 3 DPS warriors…sad but true….that is the sad truth.

George Steel.1804:

Seriously, this. I just made a ranger who’s really low leveled, and upon trying whirling defenses I can already tell this is an amazing skill to have on a secondary weapon set swap.

The worst thing is, I have never seen a ranger use this ability in PvE content. Not on lupi, not in fractals, literally never.

Sad

I have seen one use effectively at dredge fractal when opening the gate. The problem is that you are rooted and open for damage from AOEs not covered by your whirling defense in other cases.