Guild Wars 2

EgonVenkman.1907:

This whole argument is a result of the Cult of Min/Max. It has been the curse of RPG games all the way back to pen and paper.

I’m not sure which side you are on. The side that min/max their dps or the side that min/max their magic find.

Sleel.8365:

colesy.8490:

If you are using gear that buffs your own stats without helping the team (toughness and vitality as examples) then you are being selfish. How hard is that to understand?

Yeah, cause not being glass and going down all the time is so not helping anything. Pretty tired of picking up zerkers off the ground all the time cause they can’t deal with a fart wafting in their direction.

Two things to point out :

1. It’s actually quite easy to survive full glass, you’re overestimating how much an effect no toughness/vit has.

2. Zerkers will normally drop when they go in to unoptimised groups. It’s what happens when I try to melee a boss in a pug and everyone’s decided to camp at range.

It’sactually quite funny how often I’ve been the last one alive in a group even when they’re running “tank” gear, and simply by dodging I was able to sit there with a full health bar the whole time doing just fine.

As a person who pugs arah all the time, I’d rather pug with pvt that doesn’t die than a zerk that always dies, but once again, a zerk that doesn’t die is better than a pvt that doesn’t die. in other words
I’d rather have a pvt pug over a zerk noob pug, but a zerk pro is better than a pvt pro.

I’m quite sick of people wearing anything less than berserker.

Truth is if everyone is wearing berserker, you can brute force the boss and kill it before it kill anyone.

If it is a hard fight, you’re going to be 1 shot anyway by boss’s big attack. So there’s no point wearing defense gear, you just have to learn to play.

laokoko.7403:

I’m quite sick of people wearing anything less than berserker.

If that becomes the only way to get a group, including the whole “stop being a Ranger” thing I get told very often . . . I’ll very quickly drop this game and go back to something more fun.

It’s okay you like to play that way, but there’s almost nothing for me to join in on now. If that turns into “actually nothing”, then I don’t see a point.

“Anything that you do that doesn’t benefit me is selfish”
Playing the “wrong” class is probably selfish too.

I’m sorry guys. I’m just not is l33t as you guys that can dodge all damage. I guess having defensive skills on my bar that give protection is also an abomination since I shouldn’t need to reduce your damage, as you won’t take any anyways.

Of course, mf was removed because the current implementation was horrible. Though they could be chided to fix it, I guess it’s easier to take the easier way out.

ArchonWing.9480:

“Anything that you do that doesn’t benefit me is selfish”
Playing the “wrong” class is probably selfish too.

Of course, mf was removed because the current implementation was horrible. Though they could be chided to fix it, I guess it’s easier to take the easier way out.

When it pleases the vocal players crying for it to go away? Yes. It’s much easier to just rip it out and say “screw it”.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

laokoko.7403:

I’m quite sick of people wearing anything less than berserker.

If that becomes the only way to get a group, including the whole “stop being a Ranger” thing I get told very often . . . I’ll very quickly drop this game and go back to something more fun.

It’s okay you like to play that way, but there’s almost nothing for me to join in on now. If that turns into “actually nothing”, then I don’t see a point.

Oh get real. People exaggerate too much.

I never been kick just because I play a ranger. And as far as I can tell, almost all the post on GWLFG dont’ require you to be berserker.

Most of the time, I’m just happy I find a group.

They really should just get rid of all other armor options and any class besides warrior.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

laokoko.7403:

I’m quite sick of people wearing anything less than berserker.

If that becomes the only way to get a group, including the whole “stop being a Ranger” thing I get told very often . . . I’ll very quickly drop this game and go back to something more fun.

It’s okay you like to play that way, but there’s almost nothing for me to join in on now. If that turns into “actually nothing”, then I don’t see a point.

Don’t worry, it never will. Play with like minded people and just work on improving yourself.

I love a good full berserker party, but simple fact is that someone in knight/zerk or zerk/valk or anything like that can still work fine for the group. Focus on getting your own DPS up and relying on the crutch of defense as little as possible, and ignore people that are all Zerk or Die. Almost all of use started off with PVT at some point.

ArchonWing.9480:

“Anything that you do that doesn’t benefit me is selfish”
Playing the “wrong” class is probably selfish too.

I’m sorry guys. I’m just not is l33t as you guys that can dodge all damage. I guess having defensive skills on my bar that give protection is also an abomination since I shouldn’t need to reduce your damage, as you won’t take any anyways.

Of course, mf was removed because the current implementation was horrible. Though they could be chided to fix it, I guess it’s easier to take the easier way out.

Practically every class can be strong in dungeons besides necros (utility-wise, dps is fine) and apparently engineers. Someone posted some pretty big damage numbers recently though, so I dunno, probably warrants testing like Brazil did with his ranger.

And stop overreacting, you don’t have to be l33t to watch for a clearly choreographed attack and then dodge, if you fail to dodge you’re either lazy, bad or in the case of most zerkers you screwed up your timing. And defensive skills are fine as long as they’re appropriate to the situation, for example hold the line on guardian is always solid, and “defensive” skills like feedback and wall of reflection are great too.

Meh, I never did understand people who want to rush through content. Everything is not a competition….

Oh well, play as you will….

laokoko.7403:

Oh get real. People exaggerate too much.

No. I’m not, I never got to do the Aetherblade Retreat because Rangers’ pets were too much of a liability. (Exact words.) I don’t do Fractals because I got tired of arguing about why I needed to roll a Warrior instead. Seven out of ten of the other attempts to get into a group weren’t interested as they wanted experienced people only.

I also got kicked because I have one piece of MF gear and that was just because I liked the item (Vekk’s Solidified Aether Circuit).

So I mostly do dungeons with the guild, which is roughly once every couple weeks But PUGs just aren’t interested in me for dozens of reasons. Being a Ranger just is the one which is said the most to me.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

laokoko.7403:

Oh get real. People exaggerate too much.

No. I’m not, I never got to do the Aetherblade Retreat because Rangers’ pets were too much of a liability. (Exact words.) I don’t do Fractals because I got tired of arguing about why I needed to roll a Warrior instead. Seven out of ten of the other attempts to get into a group weren’t interested as they wanted experienced people only.

I also got kicked because I have one piece of MF gear and that was just because I liked the item (Vekk’s Solidified Aether Circuit).

So I mostly do dungeons with the guild, which is roughly once every couple weeks But PUGs just aren’t interested in me for dozens of reasons. Being a Ranger just is the one which is said the most to me.

I’m purely guessing. But you got kick out of a group once and you get over sensitive and stop doing dungeon.

I get there are people anti ranger. But if you meant to tell me you see them all the time I’m quite skeptical.

Not to mention I think ranger is one of the better class for atherblade retreat.

laokoko.7403:

Truth is if everyone is wearing berserker, you can brute force the boss and kill it before it kill anyone.

And you do realize this is bad game design… right?

…just checking (not going to bother correcting your broken english either)

The problem isn’t zerk gear, the problem is that :

- all content success is determined by the speed at which you can deplete an HP bar
- all gear is capable of doing all content
- some gear is 10 times more survivable while another gear set kills 10 times faster

There’s no way to make a balanced PvE game out of all those rules together. But if ANet removed all but zerk gear in PvE, they could start doing some real balancing.

stof.9341:

The problem isn’t zerk gear, the problem is that :

- all content success is determined by the speed at which you can deplete an HP bar
- all gear is capable of doing all content
- some gear is 10 times more survivable while another gear set kills 10 times faster

There’s no way to make a balanced PvE game out of all those rules together. But if ANet removed all but zerk gear in PvE, they could start doing some real balancing.

Basically. The Zerker or GTFO mentality that’s been going around is simple hyperbole from both sides of the argument. The issue it meant to highlight was that the game favored hyperoffense through zerker stats, but it doesn’t ensure that that everyone is competent enough use zerkers gear or even tanky gear in some cases.

laokoko.7403:

I’m purely guessing. But you got kick out of a group once and you get over sensitive and stop doing dungeon.

I get there are people anti ranger. But if you meant to tell me you see them all the time I’m quite skeptical.

Not to mention I think ranger is one of the better class for atherblade retreat.

I got kicked once. I’ve been told “no thanks, don’t need a ranger” many more times, which is preferable to me than being kicked. (Note, the kick was because I wasn’t wiping with the rest of the party and they wanted to quickly restart.)

I really think Ranger is underrated . . . but it doesn’t matter what I think if I can’t get a group without sifting through a ton of “no thanks”. Though considering most games which have Rangers have had the same problem with the class . . . I should wise up and roll a Cleric on EQNext or whatever is after this.

People are getting kitten because the word “selfish” is getting thrown around. But its not necessarily a bad thing. I paid my own cash money for this game and i will play it any kitten way i feel like it. If i want to go full zerk with offensive traits and go do cof in 1minute, then i will do that. If i want to go cleric and dodge roll heals on cooldown, then i will join a different kind of team for that. It seems like people are getting kitten not because of gear or other people’s mentality, its lack of groups. Cof has groups for zerk and anything else. I dont see why anyone would have problems in cof runs because the LFG posts usually specifically say zerk-or-gtfo or LF anything. I give everyone enough common sense to be wearing zerk gear when trying to join zerk groups or not be ZERK4LIFE when join an anything group where its probably some chill ppls playing. The problem is everywhere else. Some ranger in PVT armor at 3am in morning wants to do (insert dungeon here) and all he sees is LF dps or heavy or whatever and hes like oh ok ill do only dmg stuff and then dude is upset because they kick him. Dude probably arguing that hes the best ranger in the entire game and his dmg will be greater than a baddie zerk warr and it could very well be true. But it does not matter. There is no measure here for skill level unless theyve played with you before. But there is a measure of how much dps you can do using your gear. And in this game, its pretty obvious that a dps is OPTIMAL gear. What people are not understanding is that all those zerk only people are not PROZERK exactly, they are PRO EFFICIENCY. If for example a dungeon came out where a boss did unavoidable 20k dmg shockwaves, then the same zerk gear only people will first get 20001 hp, then rest all DPS. In closing, if you are joining groups where people rag on you for your equipment choice, then you need to find some new friends. Because obviously, you are looking for groups in the wrong place.

Lokki.1092:

IndigoSundown.5419:

Leo G.4501:

Late to the debate but…

…the real prognosis for this issue isn’t to shout about how the zerkers namecalling people that don’t go full DPS but to alter the content!

Would it be better to alter the way damage is calculated? The dichotomy between berserker and other specs exists because of near 100% crit chance coupled with 100%+ crit damage. That’s approaching as much as 2.5 times the damage non offensive stat combinations are likely to generate. Glass cannons are not 2.5 times as likely to die as defensive or support builds. The supporters of the berserker mindset tell us that dodge and other mitigations are enough to take no damage. That means that the risk of running all-out damage is quite low.

BINGO

The risk is not only low, but becomes non existent when you get into higher tier content (like 40+ fractals) The 30k Warrior is just as dead as the 12k Ele if they are hit by many of the boss mechanics.

The problem is there is we don’t need to be defensive to beat the content at all. since they got rid of the trinity and everyone is their own tank and healer they cant make it so that you need an effective health of 40k+ to beat an encounter because some classes cant get to that while a warrior can easily. But at the same time it cant be a 20k- Effective health because classes like necro or guardian would lol at that without even trying. They made (perhaps not intentionally) the game revolve around DPS.

I wondered about the discrepancy in health, until I realized that I was looking at combat from a PvE perspective. When you look at it from a PvP perspective, it makes more sense. It also seems to me that the risk/reward for berserker is much more balanced in PvP. It’s unfortunate that PvP and PvE combat have so little in common.

As to changing the way damage is calculated… I don’t think ANet will do it. They’re married to PvP being the determining factor in game balance. They’d also probably have to split damage calculation into PvP/PvE modes.

I blame this whole thread on Anet bad mechanics, if Anet had made all classes and builds viable these threads wouldn’t exist.

Dante.1508:

I blame this whole thread on Anet bad mechanics, if Anet had made all classes and builds viable these threads wouldn’t exist.

So you’re saying you need specific classes to complete content? That some content is unavailable to some classes?

I don’t disagree that builds need to be brought up to scratch, but there’s a difference between ‘being optimal’ and ‘not viable at all’.

laokoko.7403:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

laokoko.7403:

I’m quite sick of people wearing anything less than berserker.

If that becomes the only way to get a group, including the whole “stop being a Ranger” thing I get told very often . . . I’ll very quickly drop this game and go back to something more fun.

It’s okay you like to play that way, but there’s almost nothing for me to join in on now. If that turns into “actually nothing”, then I don’t see a point.

Oh get real. People exaggerate too much.

I never been kick just because I play a ranger. And as far as I can tell, almost all the post on GWLFG dont’ require you to be berserker.

Most of the time, I’m just happy I find a group.

On the contrary I often saw this.

Who know what will happen now that the runners will split more between dungeons.

As a guardian I feel there is a place and time for everything.

There is a moment to go zerker (speedruns) there are moments to go tank (hard pathes).

Erick Alastor.3917:

laokoko.7403:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

laokoko.7403:

I’m quite sick of people wearing anything less than berserker.

If that becomes the only way to get a group, including the whole “stop being a Ranger” thing I get told very often . . . I’ll very quickly drop this game and go back to something more fun.

It’s okay you like to play that way, but there’s almost nothing for me to join in on now. If that turns into “actually nothing”, then I don’t see a point.

Oh get real. People exaggerate too much.

I never been kick just because I play a ranger. And as far as I can tell, almost all the post on GWLFG dont’ require you to be berserker.

Most of the time, I’m just happy I find a group.

On the contrary I often saw this.

Who know what will happen now that the runners will split more between dungeons.

Sir, CoF 1 isnt a real challenge is everyone should have a zerker gear for that.
If they dont, all it takes is a few runs till they do.

colesy.8490:

ArchonWing.9480:

“Anything that you do that doesn’t benefit me is selfish”
Playing the “wrong” class is probably selfish too.

I’m sorry guys. I’m just not is l33t as you guys that can dodge all damage. I guess having defensive skills on my bar that give protection is also an abomination since I shouldn’t need to reduce your damage, as you won’t take any anyways.

Of course, mf was removed because the current implementation was horrible. Though they could be chided to fix it, I guess it’s easier to take the easier way out.

Practically every class can be strong in dungeons besides necros (utility-wise, dps is fine) and apparently engineers. Someone posted some pretty big damage numbers recently though, so I dunno, probably warrants testing like Brazil did with his ranger.

And stop overreacting, you don’t have to be l33t to watch for a clearly choreographed attack and then dodge, if you fail to dodge you’re either lazy, bad or in the case of most zerkers you screwed up your timing. And defensive skills are fine as long as they’re appropriate to the situation, for example hold the line on guardian is always solid, and “defensive” skills like feedback and wall of reflection are great too.

My point is that more stuff works then whatever the fotm is, though it’s so easy to simplify it to berserker > all for every single class and build that exists.

The other thing is that “you’re not supposed to get hit” is also a oversimplification in a vacuum. If that were true, all defensive skills would be pointless. There should be no reason to mitigate your “perfect” ally because -33% of 0 is no reduction. So the only justification for defense utility would be things like stability. Shall we just run all dps skills too?

I also bring this up due to latency, as with any game that has to require online play that occasionally things will not always be perfect. Even if your connection is in good condition, there’s no guarantee it’ll be true on the other end. Yes, it’s not really the game to require that kind of split second reaction, but I never see it being brought up.

And this leads to a number of slippery slopes, such as then shouldn’t people be using only damage food too?

No, the real problem is that running MF gear or something like cleric’s or soldiers is bad because the benefits do not outweigh the cost. You are gimping your contribution to the party by sacrificing damage for dubious value. In the case of MF, you sacrifice it for 0 value to leech off your team, so it’s obviously the worst, since people are doing it deliberately instead of being misled through good intentions. All forms of support, utility, and holding down enemies so they don’t attack your party members have little or nothing to do with stacking more toughness or vitality. Considering you brought up guardians quite a bit, then it should be noted that they can do all that wearing berserker gear or no gear at all.

In any case, the MF gear can be construed as selfish— everything else, well is debatable even if behind flismy reasoning.

Somehow I missed this 200+ post kittenstorm before I went to bed last night

Reihert.1509:

Erick Alastor.3917:

laokoko.7403:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

laokoko.7403:

I’m quite sick of people wearing anything less than berserker.

If that becomes the only way to get a group, including the whole “stop being a Ranger” thing I get told very often . . . I’ll very quickly drop this game and go back to something more fun.

It’s okay you like to play that way, but there’s almost nothing for me to join in on now. If that turns into “actually nothing”, then I don’t see a point.

Oh get real. People exaggerate too much.

I never been kick just because I play a ranger. And as far as I can tell, almost all the post on GWLFG dont’ require you to be berserker.

Most of the time, I’m just happy I find a group.

On the contrary I often saw this.

Who know what will happen now that the runners will split more between dungeons.

Sir, CoF 1 isnt a real challenge is everyone should have a zerker gear for that.
If they dont, all it takes is a few runs till they do.

I never thought that it is, just saying that people require that kind of equipment often.
And if they do it for an easy content, giving that atm dps is better in a lot of PvE situations, they will likely continue this trend :S
If you build your character to bear the damage income, he is (maybe) “a bit” better than the average character in survivability.
If you build you characters to maximize his damage output he will boost it “a lot” AND this will result in taking down enemies faster, so indirectly he will benefit even of a better survivability.

Anything less than the best is a felony.

-A totally legit guy

I get the feeling most of this thread devolved into arguing with a particular troll, so now I’ll do the adult thing and analyze everything in a manner that shows how useful everything is.

I do feel partly responsible for this, since many months ago I made a thread detailing the inefficiency of investing in stats other than offense. This is largely because offense contributes to group survivability in a way that defense doesn’t: dead enemies do no damage, so if you kill an enemy twice as fast, you’ll take half the damage. Though you could argue that defense lets you take more hits and thus use more dangerous tactics to do more damage, in the end this is inferior to simply sustaining an offense, since it means you eat up your defensive advantage to accomplish a burst that many players were outputting as their standard offense to begin with. Often times, it is better to just revive the downed players who are zerkers, because if they’re outputting twice the damage, then the only time they lose out is if they are downed more time total than they are up.

So my motto for PVE has always been to build for as much offense as you could. The key phrase here being “as you could”. The fact is, not everyone is as good as everyone else, not everyone has the same tools available to them on the class they play, and not everyone necessarily enjoys a high stakes all-or-nothing brawl. There are some parts of the game that are really hard to do with a pure offensive build, due to how some enemies don’t load all of their damage into sparse attacks.

For example, I’ve been running HotW explorable mode with my Zerker thief for awhile. Path 1’s final boss has sparsely placed attacks that do high damage, and what I like to do is use Sword/Dagger #3 to avoid all of his attacks and steal his boons over and over again. This, however, is crazy, since he can kill me in 2 hits even with the permanent protection boon. Should the server lag, should I lag, or if the skill is gated behind the auto attack’s long aftercast, I would go down. This makes meleeing the boss incredibly risky, to the point that I’ve never seen anyone else do this. Ever. Frankly, I don’t expect anyone to try this, either. In contrast, path 3 has that big werewolf smack in the middle of the dungeon, and little Jacob there makes mincemeat out of my thief. He has a bunch of fast attacks that do medium to light damage against normal builds, but kills my zerker thief in 3 to 4 hits or so, which comes really fast. On my necromancer, who has a lot of bulk, that stupid werewolf isn’t a problem, so I can stay in the fray. But on my thief, I have to snipe with the shortbow or risk being torn to shreds.

Anyway, there are many advantages to being a durable build that aren’t just personal survivability. What a lot of players will do create a faux-trinity system, and load up their guardian with PVT gear, a bunch of defensive abilities, and then take point with every dungeon encounter. While that guardian is absorbing all of the enemy hits, as well as blinding enemies and giving AoE protection, the other DPSers can run in from behind and attack with full abandon. Every attack that lands against a player with high toughness does less damage than against a zerker, and players with high vitality can take more hits as a whole, so a single durability stacked player can diminish the offense of an entire enemy group. In areas where there is a lot of ambient damage around (coughgrawlfractal), zerker builds die too easily to maintain an offense, and become a liability to the group as a whole. Healing power and healing builds themselves are a direct boon to the survivability of other players. The higher the HP of the group, the less the group has to withdraw from the fray, and the more damage they can do.

You can see the that there is a diminished return for players with high durability. Having 1 player with high durability or high healing is enough to substantially improve the survivability. Having 5 of them… not so much. But outside of extremes we have builds that mix gear together. A bit of PVT, a bit of zerker, and then you can give yourself just enough survivability to take the hit, but still have a substantial amount damage. This is the preferred way to build, since hybridized builds don’t rely on other teammates to survive, and don’t become redundant when paired with each other. However, building like this requires more thought than just going for a full set, and that is a lot of players to process, apparently.

I think the biggest problem is more about how players play than how they build. The slow prevalence of berserker builds didn’t come from superior skill or mathematical proofs, but out of better tactics. People discovered that by gathering together they could share boons, share the aggro equally amongst each other, all the while maintaining the highest offense possible. They discovered that, by actively engaging bosses at close range, when someone needs to pull off to heal, the boss doesn’t chase them anymore. Doing this allowed players to build more and more for offense.

The hardest time I ever had in my HotW marathon was on a power necro. Knight armor, zerker everything else; a hybrid in essence. I played through the dungeon as I always did, and I swear I downed every 5 seconds. It was odd, because I’d done this path on a power necro build a half dozen times before and I never had this problem. The issue was, as I eventually learned, that all of my teammates did nothing but stand very far back and auto attack at range. They didn’t use utilities or multiple weapon skills or even weapon swap. Just stand back, and auto attack. Because of this, I would end up drawing all of the aggro of enemies, and also maintain permanent aggro on the boss because even when I turned tail and ran, my teammates weren’t doing enough damage to draw aggro away, so the boss would chase me down and kill me. I couldn’t “not” take aggro, because until I ran forward they would just hang back doing nothing until their complaints of how “this sucked” eventually became worse than the sting of having to die.

It isn’t the first time I’ve seen it happened. Once I refused to run forward, and the team disbanded on the spot. It didn’t matter what build they had, since they couldn’t play at all. Their tactics involve letting competent players die, and then dying themselves because even with defensive stats they couldn’t defend themselves.

I think this might be why it is so many people run PVT gear. If you hang back and let people fight for you, dying one by one, then it seems like PVT gear wouldn’t be enough. The fact is, a player has to pull their weight no matter what gear they wear, because nothing can compensate for bad gear

Great post Blood Red Arachnid, I’ll call you spidey from now on.

I agree with your point, specially been someone that changes from defensive to offensive builds based on instance and party set up.

However, most content is this game is designed in a way that you dont need tatic at all. Some push back/invul here and there, but mostly, it is just what you mentioned: Band together and kick the crap out of the mob.

Aetherblade Retreat, for example, going full support while others went zerker (or mostly zerker) was a great experience.

Not only allowed me to control trash waves (through walls, aoe pulls, buffs) and letting those dpsers burn them down with less concerns about their surroundings, but made the final boss a walk in a park.

We need more content like that. And I’m sure they will add it. Content that requires people to watch and use proper skills, not just gather up and beat the crap out of a boss.

Berserker gear in dungeons seems like a variation of the Prisoner’s Dilemma to me. If one person runs it, but the rest of the group doesn’t, that person is very likely to get killed before the fight ends because the boss outlasts their burst avoidance, but they’ll still speed up the fight enough it gets cleared. If nobody runs berserker, the boss takes so long to kill that inexperienced groups will get attrition’d out before they clear its health bar. If everybody runs berserker and has some skill, the boss dies before the greater survivability questions become relevant.

That’s my understanding of how it plays out in dungeons anyways. Confirm / Deny?

This thread proves again why GW2 needs heroes and henchman; and yet some people still wonder why so many refuse to do any content that requires a group?

No one needs to suffer the glass … cannon fodder kiddos and similar fauna.

Forced grouping?

No, thanks.

Bring the tools to do any instance solo.

I’m very impressed by the OP’s sleight of hand here. I very much agree that other stat combinations besides one offered by zerk gear is viable and agree that it’s overboard to call other combinations selfish unless that group specifically asked for it or it’s agreed upon before the run.

However, the real topic and defense is MF gear. I strongly disagree that MF gear is not at all selfish. MF gear is selfish in nature because it contributes absolutely nothing to the group and removes huge chunk of stats that actually affect a dungeon run (from my understanding, MF takes the primary stat slot). By definition, MF gear is selfish. Which is fine, actually.

It’s true that Anet did put MF into the game and players have the right to use them. However, let’s not bother with the rationalizing and taking the high ground on using MF gear. If you’re using MF gear, then just be honest about it. Man up and admit that you’re bringing less to the group in pure terms of mathematics. Skill is relative, but I’m not convinced that a highly skilled player would defend MF gear in any way except in that it gives sole benefit to the user in terms of loot. Now can you still perform well enough with MF gear if you’re skilled? Of course. But assuming all things are fair, your output in terms of contribution will be less.

If someone in the party is using MF gear, the other members of that party now have to do more than their fair share of the work. That’s all fine with a group that all wears MF group, or if you’re casually playing with a group of friends who are in this together. But to join a random group and expect to be carried through by non-MF users absolutely is selfish. Only way to get around that is by simply being honest from the get-go and to admit that you’re going to be using MF gear.

I would be completely fine with that. If not, then I would be the one to leave as you did your part and I can now make an informed decision.

Softspoken.2410:

Berserker gear in dungeons seems like a variation of the Prisoner’s Dilemma to me. If one person runs it, but the rest of the group doesn’t, that person is very likely to get killed before the fight ends because the boss outlasts their burst avoidance, but they’ll still speed up the fight enough it gets cleared. If nobody runs berserker, the boss takes so long to kill that inexperienced groups will get attrition’d out before they clear its health bar. If everybody runs berserker and has some skill, the boss dies before the greater survivability questions become relevant.

That’s my understanding of how it plays out in dungeons anyways. Confirm / Deny?

Yea pretty much, except I’m not a prisoner so it won’t affect me.

The thing is if someone runs full tank he shouldn’t complain about glass guys getting down because he is the one making it harder for them.

I really don’t understand OP’s argument.

MF is most definitely selfish. I don’t think I even need to argue that point, nor will I bother since it’s being removed as a stat.

While everything else is viable, it’s without a doubt sub optimal. Conditions are broken in group PvE content, please don’t use it there. Using conditions instead is similar to just saying hey, I want to do a fraction of the damage as anyone else. You are not helping the party at all, I wouldn’t call it selfish, but it is stupid.

Healing power is useless. You are essentially making fights take longer in order to give your healing a negligible boost that doesn’t actually assist anyone. This is a very bad stat that just makes everything slower and more difficult for everyone. The longer a fight lasts, the more damage everyone takes, the more chances people will go down.

Vitality/toughness is definitely useful to players at a lower skill level. I’m not too bothered by people that need a little survivability if you play. Go a little into this if you need to whatever, but gradually throw on some zerker instead and you will perform better, and fights will be faster and easier.

I don’t see how anyone can be against improving and doing a better job. I would say it’s just lazy more than selfish. Choosing to hold everyone down, making things take longer… it’s just the respectful thing to do to play to the best of your ability.

Well, if I can’t play to the best of my ability, or am not always at my best, it would be respectful not to play with others at all then, isn’t that so?

Dog.1472:

I don’t see how anyone can be against improving and doing a better job. I would say it’s just lazy more than selfish. Choosing to hold everyone down, making things take longer… it’s just the respectful thing to do to play to the best of your ability.

I don’t play this game for you or anyone else. That means that I will choose whatever stats and playstyle I want, and I will not ask your opinion about it.

If you can’t respect my desire to play how I want, you have no business in my groups. That doesn’t make me selfish, it makes you selfish.

You are not being respectful when you sacrifice your individuality to avoid “holding everyone down”.

AntiGw.9367:

Dog.1472:

I don’t see how anyone can be against improving and doing a better job. I would say it’s just lazy more than selfish. Choosing to hold everyone down, making things take longer… it’s just the respectful thing to do to play to the best of your ability.

I don’t play this game for you or anyone else. That means that I will choose whatever stats and playstyle I want, and I will not ask your opinion about it.

If you can’t respect my desire to play how I want, you have no business in my groups. That doesn’t make me selfish, it makes you selfish.

You are not being respectful when you sacrifice your individuality to avoid “holding everyone down”.

Pretty sure that demanding that you get to play your way is considerably more selfish than wanting what is in the best interest of the entire group, which is clearing content as fast as possible.

Dog.1472:

Pretty sure that demanding that you get to play your way is considerably more selfish than wanting what is in the best interest of the entire group, which is clearing content as fast as possible.

No, playing the game with other people so that everyone gets to play his way is not selfish.

Demanding that everyone plays the way you want “for the group” is selfish.

And that mindframe is what causes runs that last for hours instead of minutes and the entire party repeatedly wipes instead of wins.

Do you enjoy it when runs are frustratingly slow and painful? I have a feeling there’s a couple people who don’t, therefore you are not playing in a way that everyone enjoys and are indeed being selfish.

Seras.5702:

Poor analogy. You’re assuming that taking longer in a dungeon is inherently un-fun. You’re too goal oriented; something the OP and others have pointed out is the problem. Instead, you should be enjoying the ride.

I don’t believe the “Zerker is the only way to win” thing… but telling people the “correct” way to have fun doesn’t seem to be very helpful. You can’t tell Zerk’s that they’re bad for not letting you play the way you want… and then tell people they aren’t having fun the right way.

I only don’t like it when people who run zerker builds confuse “optimal” or “most efficient” with good and bad players.

If you want to run zerk only, that’s totally fine. If you want to run dungeons with other people who only run zerk builds, that’s also fine. You have fun that way, and that’s more than ok by me.

I have no disagreement that the way GW2 is set up, zerk builds are by far the most efficient.

However, I lose patience when for some people, NOT running zerker builds seems to necessitate the conclusion that you are a bad player or simply, as one person has said, “not good enough”. This just simply isn’t true, and is elitism akittens highest form.

Dog.1472:

And that mindframe is what causes runs that last for hours instead of minutes and the entire party repeatedly wipes instead of wins.

Do you enjoy it when runs are frustratingly slow and painful? I have a feeling there’s a couple people who don’t, therefore you are not playing in a way that everyone enjoys and are indeed being selfish.

I don’t like to say enjoy it, but it’s one of the finest memories of my GW1 days – the Eight-Hour Urgoz’s Warren raid. Fun times, and it totally by all rights should have been the worst night of my time there AND broken up the alliance. Instead we just decided we had to come back in a week or two and try again.

Weird, isn’t it?

Some people like playing the game in the most efficient way possible.
Some people find fun in just enjoying the experience.
Some people like to run/experiment what build whatever they like.
Some people just doesn’t care.
Etc.
It’s all subjective and there is no unique right way to play the game.

Just play with the people who fits your play style or the ones that doesn’t care. But, it is easier said that done.

Oh man. Sometimes I leave WvW and maybe try running a dungeon, Sometimes I think I might even finish my personal story. Then I run into this. Do you know how hard it is to find 4 people willing to accept someone who is very forthright about not already knowing the dungeons in this game? It doesn’t matter that I can play the game well, and throughly understand its mechanics. If you’re going to be asking for pointers on every boss, you’re useless. It’s kind of funny how toxicly competitive the part of the game designed to be the least competitive is. Yeah, I wanna run in my PVT gear, and yeah, I wanna try something new once in a while. So I guess, yeah, by the PvE community’s rigorous standards, I am greedy. Sorry!

Klawlyt.6507:

Oh man. Sometimes I leave WvW and maybe try running a dungeon, Sometimes I think I might even finish my personal story. Then I run into this. Do you know how hard it is to find 4 people willing to accept someone who is very forthright about not already knowing the dungeons in this game? It doesn’t matter that I can play the game well, and throughly understand its mechanics. If you’re going to be asking for pointers on every boss, you’re useless. It’s kind of funny how toxicly competitive the part of the game designed to be the least competitive is. Yeah, I wanna run in my PVT gear, and yeah, I wanna try something new once in a while. So I guess, yeah, by the PvE community’s rigorous standards, I am greedy. Sorry!

And so what? Many MMOs have specific gear for PvP different from the one for PvE anyway. It’s not something new :p

True, but it’s hard to take pve snobs seriously.

@stof. I know you’re just jabbing, so don’t take this as hostile, but that’s exactly why I’m not currently playing many mmo’s.

@archon I agree, but I don’t really know how to honestly express that without sounding like a pvp snob.