Guild Wars 2

I was curious what it was like to run with CoF “speed groups” as I haven’t done them before. So i put together a lil video… enjoy. I don’t know if it’s generalizing but they seem to be pretty much all like this…

That was really difficult to watch. The elitism at the beginning with the gear made me feel a little queezy inside, but it’s not like I haven’t seen it before. The part that made it difficult for me to watch was seeing how brain dead easy this content is for these groups. Running a glass cannon ranger, guardian or engineer isn’t remotely close to this.

I was genuinely surprised when two people were downed at the end, the boss has more than 10% of his health (this is the final boss of a level 75? dungeon path) and the party keeps DPSing it down because they know they can get a rally – off of a boss at 10% health, with three people. Glass cannons downed right next to it, and the warriors can DPS fast enough that they don’t even die. Great sword DPS needs to be nerfed, it’s way out of line with glass cannon DPS from other classes (although other classes come close). People are getting away with this because their DPS is high enough that they can kill things before attrition gets to them, if the targets lived longer (ie, these glass cannons had DPS in line with other classes and couldn’t just cheese through encounters) we might actually see the need for survivability.

As a side note, I’d like to see a discussion (probably in it’s own thread) on the impact of portal and blink in dungeons. There is a lot of content which was intentionally designed to challenge several members of a group, traps like the water spouts in TA (although it can be turned off, it seems to be intended that you get at least a couple people across to turn them off), or the rolling boulders in this video. In this video we see a mesmer blink across (so no need to play through the encounter as intended, FotM has a similair encounter with the stairs favouring classes with blinks, blocks or invulnerability) and simply portal people to finish the event. I like that classes are being rewarded with valuable contributions to groups from powerful skills, I also like that content is “challenging” people to find creative solutions, I don’t like that it’s creating a kind of “soft trinity” of classes that have “the right” skill for the job, while others are simply ignored.

Every group I’ve done CoF with (and it’s one of the easiest dungeons if you do path 1) has had to play with far more skill and effort than what’s showcased in that video, and it takes us much longer. Sure we aren’t optimised (but that one dude was running major runes, and this is actually a pug team, not a co-ordinated team – even the OP isn’t “experienced” with this style), but wow this looks way too easy.

I must say the speed at which this group does the content is disgusting :o There’s a clear imbalance here that needs fixing.

Hooray, another GS – Axe/Warhorn.

Got nothing else on the video. Business as usual in Fireheart Rise.

Shiren.9532:

That was really difficult to watch. The elitism at the beginning with the gear made me feel a little queezy inside, but it’s not like I haven’t seen it before. The part that made it difficult for me to watch was seeing how brain dead easy this content is for these groups. Running a glass cannon ranger, guardian or engineer isn’t remotely close to this.

I was genuinely surprised when two people were downed at the end, the boss has more than 10% of his health (this is the final boss of a level 75? dungeon path) and the party keeps DPSing it down because they know they can get a rally – off of a boss at 10% health, with three people. Glass cannons downed right next to it, and the warriors can DPS fast enough that they don’t even die. Great sword DPS needs to be nerfed, it’s way out of line with glass cannon DPS from other classes (although other classes come close). People are getting away with this because their DPS is high enough that they can kill things before attrition gets to them, if the targets lived longer (ie, these glass cannons had DPS in line with other classes and couldn’t just cheese through encounters) we might actually see the need for survivability.

As a side note, I’d like to see a discussion (probably in it’s own thread) on the impact of portal and blink in dungeons. There is a lot of content which was intentionally designed to challenge several members of a group, traps like the water spouts in TA (although it can be turned off, it seems to be intended that you get at least a couple people across to turn them off), or the rolling boulders in this video. In this video we see a mesmer blink across (so no need to play through the encounter as intended, FotM has a similair encounter with the stairs favouring classes with blinks, blocks or invulnerability) and simply portal people to finish the event. I like that classes are being rewarded with valuable contributions to groups from powerful skills, I also like that content is “challenging” people to find creative solutions, I don’t like that it’s creating a kind of “soft trinity” of classes that have “the right” skill for the job, while others are simply ignored.

Every group I’ve done CoF with (and it’s one of the easiest dungeons if you do path 1) has had to play with far more skill and effort than what’s showcased in that video, and it takes us much longer. Sure we aren’t optimised (but that one dude was running major runes, and this is actually a pug team, not a co-ordinated team – even the OP isn’t “experienced” with this style), but wow this looks way too easy.

Looks easy.
Pretty much sums up your wall of text.

An ele can solo dungeons, just youtube for it.
Should we nerf eles too ?
Your simplistic view of things makes me shudder, and i don’t think i should comment on it further.

Shiren.9532:

That was really difficult to watch. The elitism at the beginning with the gear made me feel a little queezy inside, but it’s not like I haven’t seen it before. The part that made it difficult for me to watch was seeing how brain dead easy this content is for these groups. Running a glass cannon ranger, guardian or engineer isn’t remotely close to this.

Glass cannon guardian is pretty easy, imho easier than warrior.

I was genuinely surprised when two people were downed at the end, the boss has more than 10% of his health (this is the final boss of a level 75? dungeon path) and the party keeps DPSing it down because they know they can get a rally – off of a boss at 10% health, with three people. Glass cannons downed right next to it, and the warriors can DPS fast enough that they don’t even die. Great sword DPS needs to be nerfed, it’s way out of line with glass cannon DPS from other classes (although other classes come close). People are getting away with this because their DPS is high enough that they can kill things before attrition gets to them, if the targets lived longer (ie, these glass cannons had DPS in line with other classes and couldn’t just cheese through encounters) we might actually see the need for survivability.

I don’t rez people at lupi as glass ele, does it make ele damage op?

As a side note, I’d like to see a discussion (probably in it’s own thread) on the impact of portal and blink in dungeons. There is a lot of content which was intentionally designed to challenge several members of a group, traps like the water spouts in TA (although it can be turned off, it seems to be intended that you get at least a couple people across to turn them off), or the rolling boulders in this video. In this video we see a mesmer blink across (so no need to play through the encounter as intended, FotM has a similair encounter with the stairs favouring classes with blinks, blocks or invulnerability) and simply portal people to finish the event. I like that classes are being rewarded with valuable contributions to groups from powerful skills, I also like that content is “challenging” people to find creative solutions, I don’t like that it’s creating a kind of “soft trinity” of classes that have “the right” skill for the job, while others are simply ignored.

Agree here, mesmer makes a lot of puzzles reduntant

Every group I’ve done CoF with (and it’s one of the easiest dungeons if you do path 1) has had to play with far more skill and effort than what’s showcased in that video, and it takes us much longer. Sure we aren’t optimised (but that one dude was running major runes, and this is actually a pug team, not a co-ordinated team – even the OP isn’t “experienced” with this style), but wow this looks way too easy.

Those people on that vid, take them to coe/arah/fractals with their gear and they will have problems with every boss unless they glitch them. The problem with CoF1 is that you fight 2 silver mobs, 1 champion and 1 legendary. Skill isn’t needed for that.

I still fail to see the necessity for 4 Warriors + 1 Mesmer for these speed runs. Our guild group is 2 Mesmers, 1 Thief (me), 1 Guardian and 1 Necro. Our last run was between 8 and 9 minutes, I think. You can have your precious deeps all you want (and ours is very high, yes) but the key is execution and not just big numbers. For example, I have massive burst available for the gate and Thieves Guild to distract the Hellstorm and do extra DPS. It’s usually down in less than 5 seconds. Before that, at the Acolytes, I wait in stealth on the opposite side (closer to the Flame Callers that you skip) and quickly burst down the two acolytes there. The spawns go by super fast.

Just having 4 big brutes and a fast forward button can only do so much, method-wise. I don’t doubt that they have a much easier time in general, but you can go further.

This topic is highly generalizing, I’m a warrior and I do tend to run in these 4W+M ‘speedrun’ groups and almost always they’re all pretty fun guys and we have some great conversation as we blow through the dungeon in <7 minute runs.

There will always be elitist people, but most of us are just trying to get our legendaries, ascended gear or unique exotics as fast as possible. I mean, we could either run with a regular group and get 4-5 gold an hour or run with a speedrun group and get 7-10 gold an hour. Which would YOU chose?

Balance-wise, it’s more of a problem with the dungeon than anything. Nothing in CoF poses ANY sort of threat, so nothing stops you from just DPSing the hell out of the content. I can guarantee you that such a strategy goes NOT work against bosses like Dredge, Lupi or even that knockback slime king from Arah. Anet has said that they want to revamp most boss fights, let’s see how that turns out. It’s entirely possible that Warrior groups won’t be so optimal anymore when you can’t facegib with Axe/GS.

10 minutes is actually really slow for a speed run >_>

MuffinOrama.7531:

Balance-wise, it’s more of a problem with the dungeon than anything. Nothing in CoF poses ANY sort of threat, so nothing stops you from just DPSing the hell out of the content. I can guarantee you that such a strategy goes NOT work against bosses like Dredge, Lupi or even that knockback slime king from Arah. Anet has said that they want to revamp most boss fights, let’s see how that turns out. It’s entirely possible that Warrior groups won’t be so optimal anymore when you can’t facegib with Axe/GS.

Not really, every dungeon can be done in full berserker. All of the Lupi solo’s are done in full berserker, it would actually be harder to do it in non-berserker.

Pretty much all of my dungeon guides are 1 guard/3 war/1 mes or 2 guard/2 war/1 mes with everyone in full melee and the wars and mesmers in berserker gear with the guardians in a combination of knights/berserker (hitting around 2900 toughness to hold agro off berserker classes). Survivability gear is a crutch for people who aren’t familiar with dungeons, but once you get enough experience it’s quicker/easier to run full dps to clear dungeons quickly when you have the skill/knowledge to either avoid attacks or use skills to negate them.

Strifey.7215:

Pretty much all of my dungeon guides are 1 guard/3 war/1 mes or 2 guard/2 war/1 mes with everyone in full melee and the guards and mesmers in berserker gear with the guardians in a combination of knights/berserker (hitting around 2900 toughness to hold agro off berserker classes). Survivability gear is a crutch for people who aren’t familiar with dungeons, but once you get enough experience it’s quicker/easier to run full dps to clear dungeons quickly when you have the skill/knowledge to either avoid attacks or use skills to negate them.

You meant warriors in full berserker and guardians with knights/berserker with 2900 defense, right?

I laugh when I read how ignorant people are regarding the other classes sometimes.

No full berserker Warrior or Guardian is rolling 2900 defense, not even with 30 into Toughness. If they are, they aren’t full berserker.

If you’re going to talk about them having good deeps and high armor, then that’s a conversation we can have. The fairy tale you’re trying to spin, not so much.

Note: This is not aimed at anyone in this thread. I just need to rant for a bit because I dislike people who will come here to bash elitism.

The elitism argument is stupid and I wish people would stop using it.

here, lets take some hypothetical scenario’s.

Lets say players suddenly started discriminating based on achievement score (lets pretend it was actually worth something regarding player skill)
So a party of 3000+ kicks you, a 2000 player out of their group. This is clearly elitism, and discrimination.

BUT
you have no right to be angry. Because, if you were to then create a group of 2000’s, you’d also be able to do the content. All you have to do is ask yourself 1 question.
Will we finish this content as quickly, easily, or as well as the 3000 group?

If yes, then you have absolutely no problem. Let the 3000’s be elitists and stick to your 2000 party, you’re getting to do everything they do just as well.

If no, then you have absolutely no right to enforce yourself on that group. You are accepting that 2000 players are generally worse than 3000 players, and thus you do not deserve a slot in that group, regardless of your skill. Even if you play at the level of a 4000 player, you cannot prove that without forcing the 3000 group to take you on faith. Which is not fair to them. It’s entitlement.

A similar thing occurs at CoF. The mesmer/warrior parties clear the content faster than almost every other combination (call me crazy but I actually prefer 2 warriors 1 thief 2 mesmer.)
Thus they see no reason to take other classes. And you cannot enforce your will upon 4 other people because you disagree with their behavior.
There’s a similar thing about armor. Especially when a group asks specifically for full DPS, and you show up in soldiers or knights gear and claim it’s fine.

Elitism is designed to allow groups to quickly and safely clear content. It wouldnt exist if it didnt work. And claiming that it’s a bad thing is a self-defeating argument.

Get a guild, get better at the game, and if you really want, prove to the elitists that your build composition works better, then rub it in their faces going nyeh-nyeh-nyeh.

nobody ever asks me to see my gear, nobody asks me to bring certain skills other than to coordinate banners. this whole thing is a nonissue. i don’t see why there needs to be three threads about it.

I’m a bit confused. Firstly, I never do speed runs in CoF or have ever wanted to. Secondly why does this bother people to this extent? Yes warriors faceroll CoF 1 its so easy and the bosses barely move position. There is no penalty for standing on top of these bosses and ultimately watching video’s like this is truly as boring as watching paint dry. However, if someone wants to do these over and over until they go insane and they end up hating the game it doesn’t bother me. I’m too busy running Fractals and Arah to notice

@Zenyatoo

Elitist is an epitaph first, and a description second.
If somebody’s calling somebody that, it might be an evaluation less of how goal-oriented and picky they may be but how much tact and consideration they’re exercising. For example; somebody with social graces would be able to avoid putting themselves in a situation where they have to kick somebody in the first place. A person with a respect for other people wouldn’t so wantonly waste their time when clear and honest communication could have avoided it.

haviz.1340:

Strifey.7215:

Pretty much all of my dungeon guides are 1 guard/3 war/1 mes or 2 guard/2 war/1 mes with everyone in full melee and the guards and mesmers in berserker gear with the guardians in a combination of knights/berserker (hitting around 2900 toughness to hold agro off berserker classes). Survivability gear is a crutch for people who aren’t familiar with dungeons, but once you get enough experience it’s quicker/easier to run full dps to clear dungeons quickly when you have the skill/knowledge to either avoid attacks or use skills to negate them.

You meant warriors in full berserker and guardians with knights/berserker with 2900 defense, right?

yea whoops.

Vox Hollow.2736:

@Zenyatoo

Elitist is an epitaph first, and a description second.
If somebody’s calling somebody that, it might be an evaluation less of how goal-oriented and picky they may be but how much tact and consideration they’re exercising. For example; somebody with social graces would be able to avoid putting themselves in a situation where they have to kick somebody in the first place. A person with a respect for other people wouldn’t so wantonly waste their time when clear and honest communication could have avoided it.

It’s hard to not get in those situations where you have to kick when people are willingly ignorant and/or non-reading.

if you put up on the LFG
“Looking for Full DPS warriors”. You fully expect every person who joins your group to have read that, and comprehended what full DPS as well as warriors means. Any guardian, or ranger, or ele, or ETC gets the boot. And a lot of them will complain and call you elitist. This is not due to a lack of “social grace” on the parties part. They were explicitly clear.

For example if you check the lfg site you see a bunch of posts like these
“LF1M, dps warriors only” <— taken directly from the LFG site when I made this post
I would bet you 2 gold that at least 3 non warriors tried to join that party. Or a warrior wearing non-bezerker gear. These people do not deserve party slots, nor do they get to complain about any form of elitism o.o

MuffinOrama.7531:

There will always be elitist people, but most of us are just trying to get our legendaries, ascended gear or unique exotics as fast as possible. I mean, we could either run with a regular group and get 4-5 gold an hour or run with a speedrun group and get 7-10 gold an hour. Which would YOU chose?

This pretty much sums it up. Many of the speed runners/farmers are normal, friendly players who just want to get some money for stuff they want. They also have their way of enjoying the content and it is fine. There is a ton of threads complaining about speed runs, elitism etc. The solution is always the same: play with like minded people

I don’t expect that when I hear the term DPS.
Condition builds are still Damage focused, just not Burst Damage focused, which is what you seem to be saying they’re really trying to get across in those posts. Even if you personally think it’s redundant, there’s no such thing as being too clear or too up front about your expectations.

If you’re specifically looking for Berserkers gear, I think you’d benefit from saying so.

If it makes you feel any better, I had to play with wording for ages before I could adequately express my desire to group with people who want to limit skipping. As a community we are just not on the same page with our slang.

People who aren’t meeting your clearly stated requirements and joining anyway would be a case where you’d have to kick. Which doesn’t necessarily have to end badly, but even if it does, I tend to think that’s justified in that they’re being awful rude to you too at that point. When I say a person that’s respecting others wouldn’t waste their time, I mean that both ways, for both the GroupMaker and the GroupSeeker. Luckily that sort of thing rarely happens, and you might start having better luck in the regard when you tweak your approach.

/edit: Also, just throwing some advice out there.
If you have a strict requirement on joining your group, start exercising some control over confirmations. Just let your group know you’ll handle letting people in, and engage any interested individuals with a /tell. You’ll be less likely to get a visceral reaction because you’ve put a human face on the process and rejecting people in private tends to remove pride and the bruising thereof from the equation.

The damage you do with the gs, is terrible. lmao.