Guild Wars 2

In melee (or groups with lots of legendaries), I have a lot of trouble seeing bosses and being able to tell what direction they are facing, or when they do their attack telegraphing. This is especially bad on small bosses (Mossman, etc).

Is there any secret to being able to tell who a boss is targeting or what direction they are facing? I have turned a lot of my settings to low, and it helps, but there’s still just too much noise sometimes.

It’s frustrating because I’m trying to play melee (as I should be), but I can’t dodge or position if I don’t know what the boss is doing or which direction he’s facing because of all the effects (or Norn warriors/guards near me).

How do the people who are really good at GW2 do this? Is it timing? Are there secret graphical settings? Or do you just learn to recognize what’s going on in the flashy-models-clipping-through-each-other-tiny-boss-weapons-huge-player-weapons-chaos?

I feel like I still die more than I ought to as a melee, and feel like I’ve hit a bit of a plateau because I can’t parse what’s going on.

For facing…we watch the enemy. Seriously facing is the easiest thing in the game to keep track of, because it involves only looking at the screen.

When to dodge varies with each enemy. Some windups are absolutely huge (Lupicus’ ballerina impression), others not as much (devourerer knockdowns/fears).

Turn off post-processing. Removes bloom around particles and thus makes it slightly easier to see wtf on earth is going down there.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

For facing…we watch the enemy. Seriously facing is the easiest thing in the game to keep track of, because it involves only looking at the screen.

When to dodge varies with each enemy. Some windups are absolutely huge (Lupicus’ ballerina impression), others not as much (devourerer knockdowns/fears).

Right- the issue is that facing sometimes gets lost in the effect/model soup that is melee. I always play with the camera out as far as possible, and that helps, but on tiny bosses (not Lupi) it can be almost impossible to see facing. For me anyways.

Turn off post-processing. Having that bloom go away will help immensely when it comes to being able to see clearly.

A friend of mine was having trouble with jumping puzzles, and navigating in general. even just following me when I would say ‘run this way, jump!’, they had no idea which direction I went even though I was right in front of them moments before. It got to the point where I asked how zoomed out they were, because I just couldn’t understand why they couldn’t see my character from that location. they had no idea what I was talking about. I knew what was going on :P asked how big their character was on their screen – maybe 50%. yup. told them to scroll down on their mouse. no mouse wheel. had to look up the key for zoom out (default is page up / page down). that opened a whole new world for them.
most boss fights even allow you to zoom out further than you otherwise can. most world bosses do this, jade maw, lupi, pretty much anything taller than your screen.

Too many graphics is a problem for everyone sometimes. However, when it’s a problem, it’s also not a problem if you don’t see it. If there are enough people that you can’t see the telegraph, then there are also more than enough people to trivialize it when they do attack. I mostly just stay out of red circles.
most bosses have cleaving attacks (hit everything), so the exact target isn’t always important (except for range). just look for which direction they are facing if you can, and stay out of red circles on the ground.

Thanks for all the advice!

Particle effects have been completely ignored for years. It is an issue for everyone, not just new players like yourself.

2 years and I still can’t see what the hell is going on.