Guild Wars 2

This has to be looked at, especially in PvE, melee characters really get hurt, most boss fights in dungeons are about staying ranged unless you’re a Guardian and some even punish Guardians, this comes from a Warrior with toughness on every item, 20k HP and 3000 armor just for the sake of being able to survive melee and yet, I’m still forced to stay ranged because:

1. Kiting is so strong in PvE
2.Some bosses deal enormous damage but just get kited
3.Easier to dodge
4.Less damage from AoE

In short, PvE says go ranged.

Yep, pretty much! I play a Guardian and can melee most things fine, and the dps is higher in most cases. But even still it’s not always worth the tradeoff, especially on bosses. Much better to do way lower dps with a staff but have more chance of avoiding attacks and staying up.

Aww yee.

Kiting = Auto-Win in PVE.

Too Easy hommie! ._.

Red circle attacks shouldn’t be able to kill you from one mistake. They don’t in action games without RPG elements even on the highest difficulty settings with no health power-ups.

Getting rid of Defiant could also go a long way too. Your average group isn’t likely to have the co-ordination to permanently stun/KD chain a boss anyways, between the huge CDs and tiny durations on them. Even if an organized group can, shouldn’t teamwork be rewarded?

All you need to be able to melee successfully in a dungeon is a good support guardian. There is a huge difference in gameplay when you have that in your group.

My normal dungeon group includes such things as a Mace/shield/greatsword guardian, a Greatsword/hammer warrior, and a melee mesmer.

Melee is higher risk, and most people don’t seem to be able to turn it into reward, but for quite a few fights, melee actually has a significant advantage if the melee players know how to dodge the boss’ attacks.

A melee mesmer against Kholer with ANY form of durability can easily take him on. Twilight Arbor first boss is actually much easier with melee as the volatile blooms or whatever the flower landmines are don’t spawn next to the boss or his minions, and it baits out their pathetic melee attack instead of their ranged spam. Fractals, I’ve actually seen melee do the Volcano fractal without going down (I swear, our greatsword warrior is an absolute monster when it comes to dodging).

the damage/AoE gained from being melee, and properly clustering enemies up for the melee is far beyond anything ranged can do. It’s less safe, but many of the dungeon fights have overwhelming numbers that are best thinned out quickly.

AnemoneMeer.7182:

My normal dungeon group includes such things as a Mace/shield/greatsword guardian, a Greatsword/hammer warrior, and a melee mesmer.

Melee is higher risk, and most people don’t seem to be able to turn it into reward, but for quite a few fights, melee actually has a significant advantage if the melee players know how to dodge the boss’ attacks.

A melee mesmer against Kholer with ANY form of durability can easily take him on. Twilight Arbor first boss is actually much easier with melee as the volatile blooms or whatever the flower landmines are don’t spawn next to the boss or his minions, and it baits out their pathetic melee attack instead of their ranged spam. Fractals, I’ve actually seen melee do the Volcano fractal without going down (I swear, our greatsword warrior is an absolute monster when it comes to dodging).

the damage/AoE gained from being melee, and properly clustering enemies up for the melee is far beyond anything ranged can do. It’s less safe, but many of the dungeon fights have overwhelming numbers that are best thinned out quickly.

I’m probably gonna get mesmers nerfed for telling ppl this… but al wel.

For a mesmer, I suggest running Blurred Inscriptions while having a sword + focus / staff combo. You need fast fingers but if you do it quick, you can almost get out of anything.

When your Mesmer is taking tons of damage, either:
- Phase retreat immediantly.
- Opening a signet so you gain 1 sec invincibility (have two signets on hand)
- Use Blurred Frenzy (sword skill 2) for 2 sec invincibility.

Make a ton of clones to divert agro from all your teamates and yourself (Deceptive Evasion is useful; it creates a clone every time you dodge ~ clones are weak but good for one mob hit).

If you use this build along with a fully toughness/procession gear, I promise you that you’ll tank 99% of the stuffs in lvl 80 dungeons with ease (assuming you chain everything efficiently, which if it’s difficult at first – practice a few times and it will become relatively easy when it becomes just reactionary).

EDIT: Other useful skills that helps tanking as a Mesmer :

- Phase retreating through any “glowing thing” (ie. feedback, chaos storm, etc.) and most likely it’ll proc a Chaos Armor (-33% damage).
- Have CD traits for Sword & Staff so you can constantly swap between the two in fights (the basic tactic in terms of positioning is a bit nosiating… but you’re basically phase retreating & illusion leaping -> then swapping, 24-7).

Balsco.3682:

This has to be looked at, especially in PvE, melee characters really get hurt, most boss fights in dungeons are about staying ranged unless you’re a Guardian and some even punish Guardians, this comes from a Warrior with toughness on every item, 20k HP and 3000 armor just for the sake of being able to survive melee and yet, I’m still forced to stay ranged because:

1. Kiting is so strong in PvE
2.Some bosses deal enormous damage but just get kited
3.Easier to dodge
4.Less damage from AoE

In short, PvE says go ranged.

You think that’s bad try playing a low level Ele solo, its not fun at all…

So no guardian in party = no melee?
And thus guardian became the most wanted class for dungeons.

So much for being able to do perfectly any dungeon with a party composed of any class because “oh, no holy trinity” eh?

FluffyDoe.7539:

AnemoneMeer.7182:

My normal dungeon group includes such things as a Mace/shield/greatsword guardian, a Greatsword/hammer warrior, and a melee mesmer.

Melee is higher risk, and most people don’t seem to be able to turn it into reward, but for quite a few fights, melee actually has a significant advantage if the melee players know how to dodge the boss’ attacks.

A melee mesmer against Kholer with ANY form of durability can easily take him on. Twilight Arbor first boss is actually much easier with melee as the volatile blooms or whatever the flower landmines are don’t spawn next to the boss or his minions, and it baits out their pathetic melee attack instead of their ranged spam. Fractals, I’ve actually seen melee do the Volcano fractal without going down (I swear, our greatsword warrior is an absolute monster when it comes to dodging).

the damage/AoE gained from being melee, and properly clustering enemies up for the melee is far beyond anything ranged can do. It’s less safe, but many of the dungeon fights have overwhelming numbers that are best thinned out quickly.

I’m probably gonna get mesmers nerfed for telling ppl this… but al wel.

For a mesmer, I suggest running Blurred Inscriptions while having a sword + focus / staff combo. You need fast fingers but if you do it quick, you can almost get out of anything.

When your Mesmer is taking tons of damage, either:
- Phase retreat immediantly.
- Opening a signet so you gain 1 sec invincibility (have two signets on hand)
- Use Blurred Frenzy (sword skill 2) for 2 sec invincibility.

Make a ton of clones to divert agro from all your teamates and yourself (Deceptive Evasion is useful; it creates a clone every time you dodge ~ clones are weak but good for one mob hit).

If you use this build along with a fully toughness/procession gear, I promise you that you’ll tank 99% of the stuffs in lvl 80 dungeons with ease (assuming you chain everything efficiently, which if it’s difficult at first – practice a few times and it will become relatively easy when it becomes just reactionary).

EDIT: Other useful skills that helps tanking as a Mesmer :

- Phase retreating through any “glowing thing” (ie. feedback, chaos storm, etc.) and most likely it’ll proc a Chaos Armor (-33% damage).
- Have CD traits for Sword & Staff so you can constantly swap between the two in fights (the basic tactic in terms of positioning is a bit nosiating… but you’re basically phase retreating & illusion leaping -> then swapping, 24-7).

I run sword/sword for melee, alongside a greatsword for buff stripping AoE (atop null field, you can generally keep most buff powered bosses completely without their power). For Kholer, you basically just sit on him, and use Illusionary riposte and Blurred frenzy’s priority over riposte to catch his grappling hook, then power through his entire spin, avoiding every hit. Then as long as you have some durability, and are using phantasms/clones/dodges remotely properly, you can easily stay alive alone forever.

Mesmer tanking is a large part of what I do honestly.

Nontheless, the more important part is that warriors/guardians can do melee very well too without being healed if you know how to do it, and when to do it.

Having a Guardian gives you a larger margin of error, but isn’t required at all. I’ve run in several groups where I’m the only melee player on my Warrior without much issue. You just need to get a little more creative with whatever support the rest of your party brings to the table.

As others have said, mesmer can melee extremely well due to the number of block/invulnerability skills they have.

Blurred inscriptions + Signet of Illusions + Sword + Sword = x6 blocks, x3-9 dazes, ~18-26s distortion/minute

Ryuujin.8236:

As others have said, mesmer can melee extremely well due to the number of block/invulnerability skills they have.

Blurred inscriptions + Signet of Illusions + Sword + Sword = x6 blocks, x3-9 dazes, ~20s distortion/minute

Shhhhhhh. It’s more like 10 seconds (….don’t tell Anet :X)

Funny enough. Doing Ascalon Catacombs frequently gets you nothing but warriors and guardians that want to go.

It’s actually an amazing group as long as everyone knows how to use their skills, how to dodge, and communicate if someone hasn’t done the path yet or if they are going to skip stuff.

So sad and so true. They definitely need to fix how melee works in dungeons. I almost always end up switching to my ranged weapon on boss fights as a Warrior because it is simply much more efficient. Even if I do less damage, the fact that I stay alive far longer outweighs any additional damage I would do for as long as I can stay alive while meleeing a boss.

There are definitely some specs/weapon combos that make it more viable than others, but the fact remains that compared to other options, it is far less effective to melee in boss fights. It is so obviously broken that there really is no rational argument for it. That you should have to limit yourself so much spec wise in order to be remotely effective doing this in comparison with other options, combined with the minimal advantage(if) of doing so makes no sense whatsoever as a working implementation.

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/70080-guardian-effective-dps-tests/

This is not exactly what i’d call a minimal advantage. I don’t know what they can really do about it though – I don’t think the Anet is going to go review every encounter and remove or nerf things like the Charr Fractal boss’s fiery greatsword whirling blade.

Cancrizans.8527:

So sad and so true. They definitely need to fix how melee works in dungeons. I almost always end up switching to my ranged weapon on boss fights as a Warrior because it is simply much more efficient. Even if I do less damage, the fact that I stay alive far longer outweighs any additional damage I would do for as long as I can stay alive while meleeing a boss.

There are definitely some specs/weapon combos that make it more viable than others, but the fact remains that compared to other options, it is far less effective to melee in boss fights. It is so obviously broken that there really is no rational argument for it. That you should have to limit yourself so much spec wise in order to be remotely effective doing this in comparison with other options, combined with the minimal advantage(if) of doing so makes no sense whatsoever as a working implementation.

If they “fixed” it, there wouldd be no point in being ranged. Melee has a massive damage advantage to go with the additional risk. Good melee, as a direct result, tend to kill things much faster while staying up. Guardian greatsword pulls a group in and spins while a warrior pulls 100 blades into hammer stun, and by the end of that stun, normally the dungeon mobs are reduced to small chunklets.

Just a small list of immediate bosses that come to mind who are outright weak to melee.

Howling king/rumbler AC end bosses. Melee can dodge forward and completely avoid his instant kill attack. Ranged can’t.

Kholer. AC boss. Melee can dodge roll backwards and get the evade on his instant kill grapple and get out of range with very little in the way of timing. Otherwise can’t even do reasonable damage.

Twilight arbor exp first boss. Boss melee attack is worthless. Boss ranged attack is death when mixed with landmines. Landmines don’t spawn in melee range of boss.

And many of the various pulls also favor it for the natural AoE letting you kill multiple targets for the price of one.

You know what? I feel better the more melee I see in my party.

Shifu.4321:

You know what? I feel better the more melee I see in my party.

of course you do,

they die so you dont have to.

Malvagite.3254:

Shifu.4321:

You know what? I feel better the more melee I see in my party.

of course you do,

they die so you dont have to.

As a warrior who mostly uses two melee weapon sets, I am offended.

Being with other melee characters just eases my life a lot, I get their buffs, they get my shouts, they share tanking duties with me, etc.

Plus runs are so much faster most of the time.

Melee has a higher risk, but the increased damage compensates that.

It isn’t that bad, it just has a much higher skill ceiling. And it makes sense. Who brings a sword into a gunfight? Somebody very, VERY skilled with a sword.

Hermes.7014:

So no guardian in party = no melee?
And thus guardian became the most wanted class for dungeons.

So much for being able to do perfectly any dungeon with a party composed of any class because “oh, no holy trinity” eh?

Bomb Engineer spec’d for heals has a lot to offer too, people just aren’t in the know because there are more bad guardians out there than good engineers.

(It’s still too easy for melee to take a beating though).

The reason why a lot of squishes kite is because if we take one hit we’re dead. Ran a fractal as a necro. Not the squishiest one by far (have a damage specked elementalist with daggers, maxed out on fire. My build while good for massive damage has problems – I only have 12 000 health and because of the dagger range I need to be relatively close to my target, that produces dodge galore), was kitting a boss in my shadow form, got careless, got hit once and got taken from my death shroud to lying on the ground in one hit. Really your armor reduces the damage you take and you can survive much longer than squishies (had one warrior in the group, he ended up resurrecting us all at one point), while dungeons indeed favor rangers, you’re far better off in WvW and PvP than most races because you can tank.