Guild Wars 2

I’d just like to have dungeons feel like dungeons, and not stacking on every corner to afk auto attack everything dead. If there was a trinity system, maybe it’d be better, since as it stands PvE is basically “Wear zerker, stack and kill everything.” It gets really dull.

Kit.3986:

I’d just like to have dungeons feel like dungeons, and not stacking on every corner to afk auto attack everything dead. If there was a trinity system, maybe it’d be better, since as it stands PvE is basically “Wear zerker, stack and kill everything.” It gets really dull.

You know, you don’t have to do dungeons like that….

Why don’t you fight the mobs and bosses without stacking? Oh wait, would that be too difficult?

It’s like everyone that complains about stacking is complaining about how dull and boring dungeons are because of it, yet if they were to try it without stacking, suddenly its too hard and takes too long and no one wants to. So which do you want, difficult content or easy content?

Why don’t you people quit taking the easiest possible path to completion. Then maybe dungeons wouldn’t be so dull…

Wanna make dungeons interesting? STOP STACKING IN CORNERS. If you continue to just stack, then you can’t complain about it being dull because there are other options.

I think the real issue is that nobody feels like they are having much of a meaningful impact on their group. It used to feel good as tank saving the group when a DPS carelessly pulled an extra group of mobs. Now all I do is stand in a corner and press ‘2’.

Draknar.5748:

You know, you don’t have to do dungeons like that….

Why don’t you fight the mobs and bosses without stacking? Oh wait, would that be too difficult?

It’s like everyone that complains about stacking is complaining about how dull and boring dungeons are because of it, yet if they were to try it without stacking, suddenly its too hard and takes too long and no one wants to. So which do you want, difficult content or easy content?

Why don’t you people quit taking the easiest possible path to completion. Then maybe dungeons wouldn’t be so dull…

Wanna make dungeons interesting? STOP STACKING IN CORNERS. If you continue to just stack, then you can’t complain about it being dull because there are other options.

Good point! I do AC without stacking and it’s a blast. Really recommended for anyone bored with the game.

Hawke.9013:

Crossaber.8934:

It is called “Holy Trinity” for a reason, you need to worship her and follow her rules tight to works. It is a MMO religion, a faith.

To make it work, by the cost of freedom. Freedom to build your class, freedom to create better combat mechanics.

I am not a believer, and GW2 is not a religion, so NO, this game is a minority out there for non-believer, are you suggesting to kitten away our freedom with your believe?

Cross

No, there is freedom in the trinity. You can specialize your dps as in condi/crit whatever you like. If anything theres less freedom with out it, as you have to take into account that you’re going to get hit, so you need toughness, that takes out of your damage, you have to heal yourself and others, so that takes out of other things you might want to build yourself into.

You have an opinion, but its wrong. Allow us to diversify ourselves within the trinity, rather than making everyone a tank/dps/healer.

Soujnds Like the Double-Speak of 1984. “Feel free to explore your freedom, as Long as you wear the chains of the Holy Trinity” I mean wtf?

I Play a mesmer in berzerker gear. I also play a Mesmer in Carrion gear. The gear I wear id up to me. The way i play is also up to me. I do not see this embracing of The Holy Trinity as leading to any type of freedom. Even your example shows it… be a rogue, and you are free to choose between being a Criticals DPS, or a Conditions DPS, or maybe a Power build DPS… um… freedom as long as you embrace The Holy Trinity role your class has to be relegated to?

I have seen elementalists tank. I have seen elementalists heal. I have seen elementalists..even..umm wow, they can also do DPS.

Maybe the Trinity exists within the game as concepts for those that do not even try to look outside the box. But there are other game play styles for those that do look outside it.

And even for those that do not, and want to follow One of the Trinity paths…. ie. Tanking Rogue, Healing elementalist…crowd control Ranger… etc…. the Freedom even if they limit themselves to the trinity roles, comes from being able…. to carry out that role, with whatever class they wish. Will there always be Optimal combos? will there always be Optimal builds? of course there will. But Gw2 doesn’t demand an Optimal Build to play…. it seems some players demand it though…of themselves, and unfortunately…of everyone else.

So yes… in my opinion The Holy Trinity is a religion, and many worship it…. as for me..Thank The Six I am an atheist.

PS. How can someone else’s opinion be wrong? you can argue about whether facts are right or wrong. An opinion is a personal belief or observation, it is PERSONAL. Therefore you may agree or disagree with it, you cannot say it is WRONG. That you try to say his opinion is wrong, just shows you don’t Understand the difference between fact… and opinion.

Mireles Lore.5942:

I don’t understand the mentality of people wanting to turn this game into another WoW clone.

If GW2 is “so bad” and “WoW’s endgame is very much so superior to GW2’s”, what are you even doing here? Play WoW or the numerous WoW clones. Its like not liking a orange for not being more like apple… If you want an apple, dont eat an orange.

This game was specifically advertised to deliver something other than the WoW clone box “have nothing new for months and years on end” expansions. Believe it or not there are a majority of players that do not come to these forums that may enjoy GW2 for it has promised to deliver, something different then the close minded reskined holy trinity.

There are plenty of holy trinity games out there for you. Not so many games that can offer the experience GW2 offers for many players. Say no to WoW cloning.

THIS

Lunchbox.6970:

I know that a VERY small percentage of the people who play GW2 actually read the forums and then a very small percentage of those people actually post on the forums. With that said, it seems the majority of the people who do post on the forums have nothing good to say about the game…. SO WHY ARE THEY PLAYING IT?!? Go find a different game to play if you don’t like this one and stop being toxic and unhelpful on these forums! If ANet isn’t living up to your expectations, then leave, nobody will miss you, including ANet.

Well first of all, I would if I could. In a heartbeat. Drop this game like a bad habit and go play FEZ. FEZ however shut down, all versions of it now, so I don’t have the option to go back.

Second of all constructive criticism =/= bashing on the game. I do enjoy GW2, not as much as I enjoyed FEZ, but I would have left long ago if there wasnt anything I enjoyed. Even those people who complain about the game all the time that are still here, there’s something they enjoy too. They just want the game to be better, and more in line with what they want. How is anet supposed to know that unless we tell them. Maybe anet decides that our constructive criticism isnt for them or whatever, but we atleast told them what we thought which is the important part.

I know the forums don’t represent the majority of the playerbase (as evidenced by the kiel vote which only myself and like 2 other people on the forums voted for kiel). And sometimes people don’t know what they really want, as evidenced by Scarlet trolling us at the end, Braham not caring, and people on the forums getting upset that Scarlet didn’t tell us her plan after that. They seem to forget they’re the ones that told anet to drop the Scarlet story as soon as possible.

The important thing for anet to remember in the future is, people dont necessarily want dragons, they say they do but that’s not what they’re after. They’re after a compelling story. Even if they wont admit it since most of the bad parts of the PS shine brighter in their mind than the good parts, it had a lot of good parts. Both pre and post orders. The PS represents better storytelling to them and it had a dragon. Scarlet even wore me down after awhile. While I didn’t write her off at her first appearance as most people did, eventually she got a little ridiculous for me (It was the toxic alliance, I couldn’t see the krait outright working with anybody willingly). Just don’t forget about us, the people that loved those little sort of filler updates in there. SAB, BOT4W and the holidays.

Algreg.3629:

Kaiyanwan.8521:

Algreg.3629:

every week the same thing. I think I am done arguing, so allow me to adopt the general disrespectful answer: Go play WoW.

Many people I met on my journey through GW2 actually returned to WoW.

Now tell me please how this will help this game exactly? Losing players is probably the last thing ANet wants.

battling the King on his own turf sure would help, eh?

I agree here. It seems that WoW players cannot shake the arrogant idea that Only WoW players exist. And if WoW players leave, a game must fail. " The WoW players returned to WoW, the game will fail now!!! get the WoW players back…turn this into WoW."

See a Lot of WoW players do not realize some of us played MMO’s before WoW was released. Some of us know that a game doesn’t have to be a WoW clone to be successful. But for many WoW players this is heresy…after all.." WoW was the first MMO" … right? lol…

To the OP: This is not WoW, this will never be WoW, if you want to play a game Like WoW, go back to WoW, it does the whole.." MMO Lite" thing better than anyone else. I remember EverQuest. The first one…THAT was an MMO. But for players Like you… everything that made THAT game awesome would make you scream." This is nothing like WoW, the WoW players will leave…then the game will fail!!!"

tl:dr… Say no to The Holy Kittening Trinity.

I have a problem not calling the OP names for starting this tired-kitten thread.

Should GW2 allows for all sorts of build types including healers… sure why not.

The whole point was that Trinity should not be REQUIRED.

Here’s an honest question (seriously, not joking): is it possible to actually play a “holy trinity” in this game? I mean, warrior full toughness/vitality specs, elementalist full dps specs, and guardian full healing specs.

Would that not work?

So guys, after watching the stream I can concur that we, healers at heart, are getting a lot of love. Exciting!

SonOfJacob.7396:

Here’s an honest question (seriously, not joking): is it possible to actually play a “holy trinity” in this game? I mean, warrior full toughness/vitality specs, elementalist full dps specs, and guardian full healing specs.

Would that not work?

You can do better than that! You can get tanks+healers+dps with one character.

http://youtu.be/b2VhmwLwvrM

lol…I’ve actually seen that one already believe it or not. I just mean, if people WANT to play holy trinity, can’t they just DO it?

Or is this more of a problem with the zerker damage output versus playing a holy trinity and the lack therein?

SonOfJacob.7396:

Here’s an honest question (seriously, not joking): is it possible to actually play a “holy trinity” in this game? I mean, warrior full toughness/vitality specs, elementalist full dps specs, and guardian full healing specs.

Would that not work?

Most fight mechanics where a group is organized as such fly in the face of it, not the least of which are the 1 shot mechanics.
I wonder if the OP is the same hawke I ran with when the game launched, he left to go back to wow and rift not long after a really bad experience in Twilight Arbor where I announced that this game is not a trinity at all, and should be played more so with the fluidity of FPS games in mind than some ridged pull structure… have fun tanking 4 doggie pounces at once followed by bite attacks for 1/4+ of your health on the very first pull of TA exp

Sure, but a warrior with the HS, full Sentinel armor/trinkets, mango pies, and Superior Runes of the Dolyak should be able to do just what you are saying. I’ll have to try that in TA as you suggest.

SonOfJacob.7396:

lol…I’ve actually seen that one already believe it or not. I just mean, if people WANT to play holy trinity, can’t they just DO it?

Or is this more of a problem with the zerker damage output versus playing a holy trinity and the lack therein?

If this was GW1, you would actually have a true option to trinity, kilroy stonekin, or anything in between… There an ele could do the true tank, and a warrior could smash things real good and it was 100% about the 8 skills (and related attributes) you chose to bring along.

In GW2 they have defined every class rather narrowly by “style” more so than “tank/heal/dps” and what i mean by that is generally that mesmer = phantams, warrior = melee, ele = aoe, ranger = pet…etc. While there are build options to avoid a little of this, it also means you in GW2 are slaved to the limitations of your class’s range of skills chosen for your gimmick. Full on dps is better given the way the overall game is built, and they have tried a few things via living story to break it up some, but it isn’t easy to overcome the fact that the mechanic available to all classes is the #1 defense bar none, and that killing the bad guy more quickly is the best way to stop the need to have to dodge.
Yes, some classes can “tank” better than others, some can dps/heal better, but there isn’t enough of any of it really to create a proper “trinity” group… Other than Trahearne’s unity clap-trap of course

If the GW2 combat goes the way of the holy trinity, I will never run a single dungeon ever again.

I love the combat in this game because I can be anything and do anything in the dungeon that I want to do and I’m not limited to one role on any profession. I love that I can take my warrior or guardian and put on some different gear and be a tank or dps or a support character (or a combination of both). And if I want to, I can change what I want to be even on the fly by switching my weapons or skills and adapt to every situation in a dungeon.

I picked up the FF14 remake (that uses the holy trinity) last Septermber-October, gave it a shot and, in my opinion, the dungeons were incredibly BORING. Played an arcanist and guess what I got to do the entire time? Stay at the back, click on my party members, and press a skill every once in a while when their HP was low. Walked out of a red circle every once in a while even! Exciting stuff. And when we got a bad tank that didn’t know what to do— guess what, we wiped because an idiot couldn’t do their job. I love that in GW2 that a fight never hinges on one player doing something wrong or right – heck, if the entire party wipes, I love that a single skilled player can solo the boss and save the day.

If you want to play the game the holy trinity way, just find a guild that likes it too and then get a tanky warrior or guard, a healer ele, and a thief for DPS and have at it. But don’t demand that GW2 conform to your demands just because every kitten MMO does it. There’s a reason why I’m here playing GW2 and there’s clearly a reason why you shouldn’t be. So go away and leave this game alone.

TL;DR: You can take your holy trinity and shove it somewhere unpleasant. I hate it and I love GW2 combat BECAUSE there’s no holy trinity.

SonOfJacob.7396:

Sure, but a warrior with the HS, full Sentinel armor/trinkets, mango pies, and Superior Runes of the Dolyak should be able to do just what you are saying. I’ll have to try that in TA as you suggest.

Good luck to ya

You can invul the spike damage, but the sustained from elite mobs can be realy harsh. And remember, TA was just one experience, to be true, you would need it to stand up to arah trash

Inimicus.7162:

In GW2 they have defined every class rather narrowly by “style” more so than “tank/heal/dps” and what i mean by that is generally that mesmer = phantams, warrior = melee, ele = aoe, ranger = pet…etc. While there are build options to avoid a little of this, it also means you in GW2 are slaved to the limitations of your class’s range of skills chosen for your gimmick…Yes, some classes can “tank” better than others, some can dps/heal better, but there isn’t enough of any of it really to create a proper “trinity” group… Other than Trahearne’s unity clap-trap of course

I particularly appreciated the last part of this. But, the first part just seems how I would want to pick my profession anyway though (ie, if I want to melee, yeah, warrior makes sense; ele being aoe too; etc). I think what you’re getting at is to really have a viable holy trinity, toughness and healing would have to be more pronounced/effective rather than just the damage being done.

Inimicus.7162:

Good luck to ya

You can invul the spike damage, but the sustained from elite mobs can be realy harsh. And remember, TA was just one experience, to be true, you would need it to stand up to arah trash

Yeah…Arah…didn’t think about that. You still don’t think it could be done with a full on heal/support Guardian? He can put up walls to stop the mobs…

Inimicus.7162:

Good luck to ya

You can invul the spike damage, but the sustained from elite mobs can be realy harsh. And remember, TA was just one experience, to be true, you would need it to stand up to arah trash

You don’t need luck, just skill. Those 5 extremely skillful players showed it. Arah trash? How about the boss of Arah?

http://youtu.be/b2VhmwLwvrM

I think the one thing the trinity brought out was different pacing to match player preferences. Right now, GW2 is very twitchy, ditchy, and *itchy. I’d like slower more tanky healing to match my preferred pacing.

For example, my Norn Warrior has to be tankier and have “Death from Above” slotted at all times. Why?…. because I love the feel of stomping around. It makes my character feel right to me. Though obviously people would complain it’s blah…blah…blah not optimized. Though for me the play style feels right. If it changes and I cannot have my play style, I’ll leave the game. So instead of trying to force players into a “Zomg, fast paced, twitchy, blah blah blah, adrenaline, yay me” game style, they should consider whom the paying customer truly is.

DeWolfe.2174:

I think the one thing the trinity brought out was different pacing to match player preferences. Right now, GW2 is very twitchy, ditchy, and *itchy. I’d like slower more tanky healing to match my preferred pacing.

For example, my Norn Warrior has to be tankier and have “Death from Above” slotted at all times. Why?…. because I love the feel of stomping around. It makes my character feel right to me. Though obviously people would complain it’s blah…blah…blah not optimized. Though for me the play style feels right. If it changes and I cannot have my play style, I’ll leave the game. So instead of trying to force players into a “Zomg, fast paced, twitchy, blah blah blah, adrenaline, yay me” game style, they should consider whom the paying customer truly is.

But this just sounds like you aren’t in a guild that is fun and let’s people do it their way and works with them. It’s like, the play style can be whatever you want, you just need to find a guild that functions that way. I’m on TC and I know of a BUNCH of guilds that are legit like that.

No trinity is like one thing that GW2 is doing right.

haviz.1340:

Inimicus.7162:

Good luck to ya

You can invul the spike damage, but the sustained from elite mobs can be realy harsh. And remember, TA was just one experience, to be true, you would need it to stand up to arah trash

You don’t need luck, just skill. Those 5 extremely skillful players showed it. Arah trash? How about the boss of Arah?

http://youtu.be/b2VhmwLwvrM

Lupi is easy mode compared to the trash in there

Inimicus.7162:

Lupi is easy mode compared to the trash in there

I tried and it doesn’t matter cause you’re immortal anyway.

Besides, you can skip trash, lupi not.

SonOfJacob.7396:

DeWolfe.2174:

I think the one thing the trinity brought out was different pacing to match player preferences. Right now, GW2 is very twitchy, ditchy, and *itchy. I’d like slower more tanky healing to match my preferred pacing.

For example, my Norn Warrior has to be tankier and have “Death from Above” slotted at all times. Why?…. because I love the feel of stomping around. It makes my character feel right to me. Though obviously people would complain it’s blah…blah…blah not optimized. Though for me the play style feels right. If it changes and I cannot have my play style, I’ll leave the game. So instead of trying to force players into a “Zomg, fast paced, twitchy, blah blah blah, adrenaline, yay me” game style, they should consider whom the paying customer truly is.

But this just sounds like you aren’t in a guild that is fun and let’s people do it their way and works with them. It’s like, the play style can be whatever you want, you just need to find a guild that functions that way. I’m on TC and I know of a BUNCH of guilds that are legit like that.

Well, the thing is, most other MMOs already cater to that style of play, and frankly, its quite unclear who the ‘paying costumer’ these days are. Action-MMOs have become quite a thing in recent years, and that’s all about the fast-paced twitchy gameplay.

SonOfJacob.7396:

Inimicus.7162:

In GW2 they have defined every class rather narrowly by “style” more so than “tank/heal/dps” and what i mean by that is generally that mesmer = phantams, warrior = melee, ele = aoe, ranger = pet…etc. While there are build options to avoid a little of this, it also means you in GW2 are slaved to the limitations of your class’s range of skills chosen for your gimmick…Yes, some classes can “tank” better than others, some can dps/heal better, but there isn’t enough of any of it really to create a proper “trinity” group… Other than Trahearne’s unity clap-trap of course

I particularly appreciated the last part of this. But, the first part just seems how I would want to pick my profession anyway though (ie, if I want to melee, yeah, warrior makes sense; ele being aoe too; etc). I think what you’re getting at is to really have a viable holy trinity, toughness and healing would have to be more pronounced/effective rather than just the damage being done.

Yes that’s basically what i was getting at, the survival/healing isn’t there in large enough durations/amounts to make it possible game-wide imo.

One thing to consider also, even a 100% maxed out uber dps’er isn’t going to bring as much extra damage to table as can also be brought along by whoever is giving up dps to make those supports/heals viable in the durations needed to really make it happen. Then there are also aggro mechanics and some boss behaviors, and a few other considerations that make the building of a trinity team less and less viable.

Where they made the goof imo is that toughness, vitality and healing are not able to make up for what’s accomplished by killing something as fast as possible. I like the lack of a required trinity but: Ancient toughness and hokie heals are no match for a good zerker build on your character kid.

Inimicus.7162:

I like the lack of a required trinity but: Ancient toughness and hokie heals are no match for a good zerker build on your character kid.

+1,000,000,000 LOL

DeWolfe.2174:

I think the one thing the trinity brought out was different pacing to match player preferences. Right now, GW2 is very twitchy, ditchy, and *itchy. I’d like slower more tanky healing to match my preferred pacing.

For example, my Norn Warrior has to be tankier and have “Death from Above” slotted at all times. Why?…. because I love the feel of stomping around. It makes my character feel right to me. Though obviously people would complain it’s blah…blah…blah not optimized. Though for me the play style feels right. If it changes and I cannot have my play style, I’ll leave the game. So instead of trying to force players into a “Zomg, fast paced, twitchy, blah blah blah, adrenaline, yay me” game style, they should consider whom the paying customer truly is.

We’re all paying customers. You just happen to be a customer who either did not research the game you bought, or who did but didn’t care that what you read contradicted what you want. Either way, I’m having a hard time feeling you’ve got grounds to complain.

That said, you can feel “tanky” in this game in persistent world PvE, in WvW, in PvP — and in dungeons, as long as you’re willing to do them with people who don’t care about optimization. In fact, in trinity games, your “tanky” feeling is a sham propped up by your pocket healer. In GW2, you are responsible for your own survival.

So, let’s see, the only things you cannot do while stomping around and feeling tanky are: getting into dedicated, organized, coordinated groups, and being accepted in every pug group. Sounds to me like you want it all to go your way, which is decidedly unrealistic in any MMO.

Hawke.9013:

Keitaro Dragonheart.9047:

I especially loathe healing classes. Playing whack-a-mole with red bars is boring, and allows bad players to stay bad instead of learn and adapt. The lack of a dedicated healing class and thus the trinity, makes the game far more interesting. Sure, the combat is not perfect, but it is far superior to the boring, 2-dimensional, and completely flat combat systems of World of Warcraft, and all games like it.

You’ve obviously never played a healer at endgame. It’s arguably one of the hardest of the three. The combat in WoW is much more fluid and moving than this, it is clunky to move, and ineffective.

A-Net wants everyone to work together, but personally I’d rather spend my three measly utility skills on saving my hide, (since I have to worry about that as theres no tanks or healers) than to waste one slot on others.

/thread

Guess we know who doesn’t like teamwork folks. Had so many times when my reflect saved group from wiping. Only reason most whine is cause we lack more dungeons IMO.

WAY TL:DR…
On the OP.
I’ve been playing MMOs for a very long time, I’m old K Shakes cane at kids on lawn
I’ve done, EQ, EQ2, WOW, SWG, SWOTR, RIFT, and a whole bunch of ones half the people here probably never heard of because they are bad P2W ports from Korea and China. The trinity works for those style games. Mainly because that is how the game is designed, Half the games I’ve played guess what you have a class, no builds just a class. Bam you play that role. WOW, SWOTOR, Rift yeah you can customize… But not really. You customize to A build that fits the Trinity.

I play primarily solo, Because I can grab an hour here or there. SWOTOR a couple classes are either Tanks or DPS. Well I had mine a Hybrid, Worked great, except in a group setting, I could out argo the tanks, and out damage the DPS. My guild loved me running the dungeons, Because I Protected the healer. If something started in on the healer Bam I would start agroing, and save them. Any other groups Hated me, because I would steal agro from the tank without using agro specific skills, or If I was the tank, I was too squishy for the healers to keep up. And of course alot of these non guild groups would then flame me, kick me and then block me. Because I was playing a great build for me everywhere but with them.

At least in GW2 I have never been flamed for a build not being, Just so. I’ve been flamed for not doing something right. Which hey it happens, but never for//valley// OMG your build needs to be just like this Becky…//endvalley//

This is why I play a game that does not support the Trinity….

Dalanor.5387:

Tatsuo.1478:

I have to agree with OP. I actually find GW2 combat much more boring than in mmo with holy trinity, especially in PvE. Now everyone has one role and its dps. So what that we have evasion, it does not add that much.
And tactics? Give me a break. Stand at one hell of a big boss mob and spam all your skills, evade some attacks, so awesome..

Remember Colin Johanson joke about other mmos? “I swong a sword?..” Well that is a joke on GW2 now

Well to be honest, removing holy trinity didn’t change anything, it just made everything more zergish. So no, there was no innovation here.

Because spammig 4 skills in a “rotation” and side step from an obvius danger zone is soooooooo exciting.

Actually yes. And thats the kicker, because if such combat is more exciting than what is in GW2, it just tells how much GW2 combat sucks (at least for me).

Draknar.5748:

Kit.3986:

I’d just like to have dungeons feel like dungeons, and not stacking on every corner to afk auto attack everything dead. If there was a trinity system, maybe it’d be better, since as it stands PvE is basically “Wear zerker, stack and kill everything.” It gets really dull.

You know, you don’t have to do dungeons like that….

Why don’t you fight the mobs and bosses without stacking? Oh wait, would that be too difficult?

It’s like everyone that complains about stacking is complaining about how dull and boring dungeons are because of it, yet if they were to try it without stacking, suddenly its too hard and takes too long and no one wants to. So which do you want, difficult content or easy content?

Why don’t you people quit taking the easiest possible path to completion. Then maybe dungeons wouldn’t be so dull…

Wanna make dungeons interesting? STOP STACKING IN CORNERS. If you continue to just stack, then you can’t complain about it being dull because there are other options.

You think that you REALLY can make millions of player stop using game glitches to speedclear simply telling them to not do?

Stampede.5308:

Draknar.5748:

Kit.3986:

I’d just like to have dungeons feel like dungeons, and not stacking on every corner to afk auto attack everything dead. If there was a trinity system, maybe it’d be better, since as it stands PvE is basically “Wear zerker, stack and kill everything.” It gets really dull.

You know, you don’t have to do dungeons like that….

Why don’t you fight the mobs and bosses without stacking? Oh wait, would that be too difficult?

It’s like everyone that complains about stacking is complaining about how dull and boring dungeons are because of it, yet if they were to try it without stacking, suddenly its too hard and takes too long and no one wants to. So which do you want, difficult content or easy content?

Why don’t you people quit taking the easiest possible path to completion. Then maybe dungeons wouldn’t be so dull…

Wanna make dungeons interesting? STOP STACKING IN CORNERS. If you continue to just stack, then you can’t complain about it being dull because there are other options.

You think that you REALLY can make millions of player stop using game glitches to speedclear simply telling them to not do?

Stacking in corners is how the non-zerker players are going to get it done though!

I really do quite enjoy dungeon stacking, stealthing and every other conceivable art of the metagame because it makes builds viable. But their lack of place in the endgame is quite disturbing. People shouldn’t need a handful of tricks to make a ranger with longbow actually useful.* It should be possible naturally with useful skills, traits and gears.

*I know that there are some instances where longbow with ranger has actually been somewhat beneficial, such as Lupi’s first stage or Tribune Burntclaw. It just seems like more often than not, melee DPS is unconditionally better than support or range. Luckily the upcoming patch may help remedy some of the tension with free trait changes. Would be nice to be able to swap out longbow/greatsword roaming build for swordhorn on a dime.

It is quite interesting to see how uneducated the community is. ‘’The concept failed, there is no innovation’’. Since when was innovation measured with the end-results and from where did you learn that experiements always have to succeed?

People will get bored whatever the model is, whatever the content that gets introduced and whatever the company does. This is a fact proven in the hundreds of MMOs we have gotten so far, the community will never be happy and if you are actually awaiting a game to give you the same joy as your fantasy, you will die without happiness my dear, hopefully the after-life, if there is, will offer you the perfect world you want to be part of.

The content is zerg-ish because you don’t know how to play it. Pve is boring? try to play alone and try builds to have fun instead of going with the most op build because you are forced to. Pvp is boring? probably becasue you can’t play and await others to carry you. WvW is boring? because you just follow the zerg and decide not to organize a party through skype or team-speak that can totally destroy big-zergy-groups out there.

You have to enjoy the game as it is instead of wasting your free-time crying because if you think the holy trinity is that amazing of a combat experience, un-install GW2 and go play WoW instead of wasting your and our team reading useless rubbish about the main mechanics of the game.

People have to start enjoying games the way they are, because there will never be a combat that will statisfy you for years and there will never be a boss that will surprise you everytime. The game was much harder via release and the dungeons were godly, still people complained and Anet nerfed everything. Now people want to stack everything up so they can have a challenge and use the mechanics of the combat system more. Anet changes and we get the casuals again complaining about hard it is. To be continued.

nGumball.1283:

It is quite interesting to see how uneducated the community is. ‘’The concep failed, there is no innovation’’. Since when was innovation measured with the end-results and from where did you learn that experiements always have to succeed?

Adding to this, can you truly say something has failed before the full potential of the system has been realised?

“Holy Trinity Is Called “Holy” For A Reason"
Que, normal religious thinking and dogma. . . small minded, limited, narrow, anything other is Wrong and hated, Etc etc.
On buying this game everyone knew there where no “Holy Trinity” so why keep bringing it up? There are enough other games that still use that game play framework go there to get your fix and to full full your quasi religious fever over a game maniac that was originally introduced to force a required role and cooperation in MMO games that had very limited scope and actual game play possible because of limited computer / network resources. This is no longer the problem and games (MMO) are now much more free to explore other game play options that could not exist previously.
Being hostel to new game maniacs is asinine and small minded. (as you ALWAYS have ample alternatives). Let it grow or fail on its own merits and not by your preconceived prejudice as that helps no one and only stifles new development.
GW2 is a casual game that allows people to play and progress in a wide range of ways and does not force play styles. This is HIGHLY valued by Most of players and is the basis for most to be playing this game! Players do not have to play with the one “perfect” build or be forced into a role (no matter how loud the min-maxers crow).
Again if you do not value the basic tenets and basis of how this MMO was constructed (none of which where hidden or secret) You are not required to play the game. But even more to the point stop trying to make the game into something it is NOT, and in that case I would say please just go away and leave us to this game which we appreciate the way it is.

Glad this game is not gw1

TheDaiBish.9735:

nGumball.1283:

It is quite interesting to see how uneducated the community is. ‘’The concep failed, there is no innovation’’. Since when was innovation measured with the end-results and from where did you learn that experiements always have to succeed?

Adding to this, can you truly say something has failed before the full potential of the system has been realised?

The kind of problem here is that I can see a lot of people not seeing any chance of this potential being ever realised.

The trinity is bad. I absolutely despise it and I think GW2 made a good decision in getting rid of it. But it does seem a bit halfway sometimes.

Things like Defiance still being there and rendering the use of any CC pointless, fixed weapon skills and slow implementation of much-needed new traits and skills to diversify builds can really make it seem like the dev team has no idea what they’re doing.

Often it just seems like the dev team has this whack-a-mole style of experimentation, where they can be creative and innovative, but just implements whatever idea that comes into their head in the morning, without really any long-term structure or goal.

For example, it’s unrelated to the trinity but Majory and Kasmeer being a lesbian couple is ….. creative (?) but just doesn’t fit into the genre of the game… at all. And judging by how every thread that mentioned it was closed for inappropriateness, they didn’t really seem to know what they’re doing.

Dungeoning in this game has been some of the worst / most unfun I’ve ever seen in any MMO… and the “every man for himself” aspect is part of the reason.

You don’t need a holy trinity to make dungeons fun — in City of Heroes, some of the most fun (and successful) groups I’ve been in didn’t have a tank or a healer. What they had were multiple buffers/debuffers/controllers that could deal with any combat situation from locking down zergs of weak mobs to handling strong bosses as well as enemy buffers/debuffers/controllers. On my defender I could nuke, I could support (healing was a tiny part of ‘support’ btw, sometimes omitted altogether), I could control… it worked great. If content was too easy for a group, just crank up the difficulty and have at it! Compared to that, my gw2 staff elementalist is supposed to have zero points in arcana, sit in fire attunement and press 2/5 on cooldown while pretending I’m playing an action game by using an invulnerability move based on metaknowledge of boss behaviors and/or muscle memory.

GW2 is far from the first mmo to try and break the mold of the trinity. AoC and Champions Online both boasted twitchy ‘skill-based’ action combat — and dungeoning was really, really unenjoyable in both games. TSW too, though it works slightly better there; there are so few buttons it’s easier to pretend I’m playing an action game (albeit one with considerable latency — how fun could it be to play Dark Souls with a 400ms delay on everything, for example?).

Zaphir.7210:

Dungeoning in this game has been some of the worst / most unfun I’ve ever seen in any MMO… and the “every man for himself” aspect is part of the reason.

You don’t need a holy trinity to make dungeons fun — in City of Heroes, some of the most fun (and successful) groups I’ve been in didn’t have a tank or a healer. What they had were multiple buffers/debuffers/controllers that could deal with any combat situation from locking down zergs of weak mobs to handling strong bosses as well as enemy buffers/debuffers/controllers. On my defender I could nuke, I could support (healing was a tiny part of ‘support’ btw, sometimes omitted altogether), I could control… it worked great. If content was too easy for a group, just crank up the difficulty and have at it! Compared to that, my gw2 staff elementalist is supposed to have zero points in arcana, sit in fire attunement and press 2/5 on cooldown while pretending I’m playing an action game by using an invulnerability move based on metaknowledge of boss behaviors and/or muscle memory.

GW2 is far from the first mmo to try and break the mold of the trinity. AoC and Champions Online both boasted twitchy ‘skill-based’ action combat — and dungeoning was really, really unenjoyable in both games. TSW too, though it works slightly better there; there are so few buttons it’s easier to pretend I’m playing an action game (albeit one with considerable latency — how fun could it be to play Dark Souls with a 400ms delay on everything, for example?).

TSW’s dungeons worked on a very hard trinity. I don’t really see how its like Dark Souls at all though, most of the fights are very scripted, there’s a few encounters that had ‘freeform’ mechanics which didn’t have any particular fixed strategy in mind for them, but that’s still nothing like Dark Souls.

You seem to really dislike a game based on what you call ‘twich reflex’. Personally I don’t mind it as it makes fights feel more real. Against a real enemy, you won’t exactly know what’s he going to do all the time, do you?

Xae Isareth.1364:

Zaphir.7210:

Dungeoning in this game has been some of the worst / most unfun I’ve ever seen in any MMO… and the “every man for himself” aspect is part of the reason.

You don’t need a holy trinity to make dungeons fun — in City of Heroes, some of the most fun (and successful) groups I’ve been in didn’t have a tank or a healer. What they had were multiple buffers/debuffers/controllers that could deal with any combat situation from locking down zergs of weak mobs to handling strong bosses as well as enemy buffers/debuffers/controllers. On my defender I could nuke, I could support (healing was a tiny part of ‘support’ btw, sometimes omitted altogether), I could control… it worked great. If content was too easy for a group, just crank up the difficulty and have at it! Compared to that, my gw2 staff elementalist is supposed to have zero points in arcana, sit in fire attunement and press 2/5 on cooldown while pretending I’m playing an action game by using an invulnerability move based on metaknowledge of boss behaviors and/or muscle memory.

GW2 is far from the first mmo to try and break the mold of the trinity. AoC and Champions Online both boasted twitchy ‘skill-based’ action combat — and dungeoning was really, really unenjoyable in both games. TSW too, though it works slightly better there; there are so few buttons it’s easier to pretend I’m playing an action game (albeit one with considerable latency — how fun could it be to play Dark Souls with a 400ms delay on everything, for example?).

TSW’s dungeons worked on a very hard trinity. I don’t really see how its like Dark Souls at all though, most of the fights are very scripted, there’s a few encounters that had ‘freeform’ mechanics which didn’t have any particular fixed strategy in mind for them, but that’s still nothing like Dark Souls.

You seem to really dislike a game based on what you call ‘twich reflex’. Personally I don’t mind it as it makes fights feel more real. Against a real enemy, you won’t exactly know what’s he going to do all the time, do you?

Yea, I wasn’t clear enough in that last paragraph. I just used DS as an example of a ‘good’ action game, is all… as opposed to dungeoning in GW2, where at no point do I feel that I’m part of a group doing interesting content and making the most of my class abilities (as I did in WOW and COH), I’m just one guy among 5 doing an optimal 3-button dps rotation on the bad guy, and “pretending I’m playing an action game by using an invulnerability move based on metaknowledge of boss behaviors and/or muscle memory” to prevent OHKOs. It’s sad because in open-world content (or wvw) I have a lot more fun with my staff elementalist and the twenty-something buttons I have at my disposal. Maybe I’m missing something, though I’ve played through every explorable dungeon at least once (except arah, never tried that one).

re TSW, I know that it used a trinity model, I was just following up on the ‘MMO with twitchy combat’ angle, could’ve used vindictus or something as a better example but I haven’t actually played it. I guess I could’ve just said “MMOs with twitchy combat are pretty bad when it comes to dungeoning”.

And no, twitch doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with how predictable an enemy’s moves are. My favorite WOW bosses were the ones with no aggro table and ‘pvp-like’ randomized abilities with no clear patterns (Delrissa, tier0.5 BRD fight, Faction Champions), and there was no twitch involved anywhere. Incidentally, those encounters worked just fine with the trinity, too.

edit: I was hoping GW2 would have such fun bosses as the WOW ‘pvp-esque fights’ I mentioned above, but nope… the only really interesting encounters that I remember from all these dungeons were the Iron Forgeman in SE story mode and the “illusionary party” boss fight at the end of TA story mode (and since release, I’ll give a nod to the two berserkers as well as both encounters in the Aetherblade Retreat… and really, that’s a letdown even compared to what I’ve seen in GW1’s mission content. Maybe it just means this isn’t the game for me, though.

Tatsuo.1478:

Dalanor.5387:

Tatsuo.1478:

I have to agree with OP. I actually find GW2 combat much more boring than in mmo with holy trinity, especially in PvE. Now everyone has one role and its dps. So what that we have evasion, it does not add that much.
And tactics? Give me a break. Stand at one hell of a big boss mob and spam all your skills, evade some attacks, so awesome..

Remember Colin Johanson joke about other mmos? “I swong a sword?..” Well that is a joke on GW2 now

Well to be honest, removing holy trinity didn’t change anything, it just made everything more zergish. So no, there was no innovation here.

Because spammig 4 skills in a “rotation” and side step from an obvius danger zone is soooooooo exciting.

Actually yes. And thats the kicker, because if such combat is more exciting than what is in GW2, it just tells how much GW2 combat sucks (at least for me).

Then what do you do here and don’t go back to WoW?
Here is what WoW was: 432 and spam your “auto” until cd is up or as a healer click click click every few seconds or as a tank spam [threat generating skill], if something went wrong, press Taunt. Yay, such an amazing experience. :/
In GW2, you should equip the right weapons, the right utilities (since you have a limited skillbar here, unlike other games), switch food buffs if necessary, stack might and fury, position yourself etc
And the whole flow and combat speed is different. Here you need to move away from danger and dodge the attacks, meanwhile in WoW the obvius tell takes seconds (or DBM warns you) and you just casually walk away like you don’t give a duck.
Oh well, it’s just a matter of taste, but if you bored, move on.

Zaphir.7210:

Dungeoning in this game has been some of the worst / most unfun I’ve ever seen in any MMO… and the “every man for himself” aspect is part of the reason.

You don’t need a holy trinity to make dungeons fun — in City of Heroes, some of the most fun (and successful) groups I’ve been in didn’t have a tank or a healer. What they had were multiple buffers/debuffers/controllers that could deal with any combat situation from locking down zergs of weak mobs to handling strong bosses as well as enemy buffers/debuffers/controllers. On my defender I could nuke, I could support (healing was a tiny part of ‘support’ btw, sometimes omitted altogether), I could control… it worked great. If content was too easy for a group, just crank up the difficulty and have at it! Compared to that, my gw2 staff elementalist is supposed to have zero points in arcana, sit in fire attunement and press 2/5 on cooldown while pretending I’m playing an action game by using an invulnerability move based on metaknowledge of boss behaviors and/or muscle memory.

GW2 is far from the first mmo to try and break the mold of the trinity. AoC and Champions Online both boasted twitchy ‘skill-based’ action combat — and dungeoning was really, really unenjoyable in both games. TSW too, though it works slightly better there; there are so few buttons it’s easier to pretend I’m playing an action game (albeit one with considerable latency — how fun could it be to play Dark Souls with a 400ms delay on everything, for example?).

Nice post!

It’s both sad and funny that good old CoH was leagues beyond our current modern “aaa” game of the year. Unfortunately, because it was not your traditional sword and board fantasy dragon game, it didn’t get the respect it deserved. When I compare profession and combat between both games, gw2 has no soul. There has been more effort into the art and graphics, npcs and the economy as opposed to the most important elements.

Xae Isareth.1364:

TheDaiBish.9735:

Adding to this, can you truly say something has failed before the full potential of the system has been realised?

The kind of problem here is that I can see a lot of people not seeing any chance of this potential being ever realised.

The trinity is bad. I absolutely despise it and I think GW2 made a good decision in getting rid of it. But it does seem a bit halfway sometimes.

Things like Defiance still being there and rendering the use of any CC pointless, fixed weapon skills and slow implementation of much-needed new traits and skills to diversify builds can really make it seem like the dev team has no idea what they’re doing.

Often it just seems like the dev team has this whack-a-mole style of experimentation, where they can be creative and innovative, but just implements whatever idea that comes into their head in the morning, without really any long-term structure or goal.

I get what you mean.

In terms of new traits and skills, however, I’d say it’s largely pointless to introduce these without also introduce content that makes use of them. Otherwise we’re still going to be stuck with the Zerker meta we have now.

Xae Isareth.1364:

For example, it’s unrelated to the trinity but Majory and Kasmeer being a lesbian couple is ….. creative (?) but just doesn’t fit into the genre of the game… at all. And judging by how every thread that mentioned it was closed for inappropriateness, they didn’t really seem to know what they’re doing.

I didn’t actually get to play most of the end (was laid up with a kittened arm), but I’m not sure what you mean about a lesbian couple not fitting in with the genre.

ozma.3498:

I think the real issue is that nobody feels like they are having much of a meaningful impact on their group. It used to feel good as tank saving the group when a DPS carelessly pulled an extra group of mobs. Now all I do is stand in a corner and press ‘2’.

If you don’t run the meta, and you don’t run through mobs and you don’t stack in a corner, you have plenty of influence on your groups.

I actually envy people to enjoy stacking and taking down things fast, because I hate it. It makes a mockery of dungeons. I don’t enjoy it and I don’t care that it’s faster. It’s a waste of my time because I’m not having fun. I’m not feeling heroic, and that’s one of the reasons I play fantasy RPG games.

Playing a non zerker profession and drawing fights out longer (minutes as opposed to seconds) makes the game harder and more interesting.

Admittedly I get loot slower. But I have more fun. And I definitely feel like I’m making a difference in groups that run like I do.

Zaphir.7210:

Yea, I wasn’t clear enough in that last paragraph. I just used DS as an example of a ‘good’ action game, is all… as opposed to dungeoning in GW2, where at no point do I feel that I’m part of a group doing interesting content and making the most of my class abilities (as I did in WOW and COH), I’m just one guy among 5 doing an optimal 3-button dps rotation on the bad guy, and “pretending I’m playing an action game by using an invulnerability move based on metaknowledge of boss behaviors and/or muscle memory” to prevent OHKOs. It’s sad because in open-world content (or wvw) I have a lot more fun with my staff elementalist and the twenty-something buttons I have at my disposal. Maybe I’m missing something, though I’ve played through every explorable dungeon at least once (except arah, never tried that one).

re TSW, I know that it used a trinity model, I was just following up on the ‘MMO with twitchy combat’ angle, could’ve used vindictus or something as a better example but I haven’t actually played it. I guess I could’ve just said “MMOs with twitchy combat are pretty bad when it comes to dungeoning”.

And no, twitch doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with how predictable an enemy’s moves are. My favorite WOW bosses were the ones with no aggro table and ‘pvp-like’ randomized abilities with no clear patterns (Delrissa, tier0.5 BRD fight, Faction Champions), and there was no twitch involved anywhere. Incidentally, those encounters worked just fine with the trinity, too.

edit: I was hoping GW2 would have such fun bosses as the WOW ‘pvp-esque fights’ I mentioned above, but nope… the only really interesting encounters that I remember from all these dungeons were the Iron Forgeman in SE story mode and the “illusionary party” boss fight at the end of TA story mode (and since release, I’ll give a nod to the two berserkers as well as both encounters in the Aetherblade Retreat… and really, that’s a letdown even compared to what I’ve seen in GW1’s mission content. Maybe it just means this isn’t the game for me, though.

I don’t really get the same impression as you. Even in say, CoF P1, where I can be blindfolded and still win, I feel like Im contributing in one way or the other uniquely to the party. Whether it be timing Aegis and protection right such that we can just attack the boss non-stop, portalling my team across the rolling fireballs, or just doing my (although somewhat easy) job of holding out in the braziers.

Then in stuff like a level 49 Grawl fractal, I can honestly say without boasting that my team would’ve been screwed without me. Trying to do that fight without a Guardian/Mesmer is a one way ticket to hair loss. The other classes as well, they all contribute in one way or the other, maybe apart from rangers, but that’s a different argument.

Again, I don’t really see what’s wrong with having twitch mechanics. Comparing say, Smash Bros to WoW, I can’t really say which is the better game, they’re good in different ways.

I think the core ideas of GW2 is fine as they are, just that they need to be a bit less messy (ie, the Dredge kind of frustrating messy), and more direction.

Maybe it just isn’t the game for you and our tastes are different.

I actually think TSW has some of the best dungeon content in any MMO I’ve played because some of them balances fair and hard so very well, and because they aren’t so scripted they have a lot of replayability because its incredibly fun to find different ways to tackle them (I have to explain what I’m doing to a lot of groups in BiS gear because the way I tank them is often different to what they normally see).

As for Vindictus, managing to solo some of the harder bosses on the hardest difficulty is incredibly satisfying, and I still look at the solos people do on that game and think its a work of art

This can’t be serious. “There will always be a need for a tank”?

No. There will always be a need for dodging. That’s what this game is. No need to absorb damage when you can prevent taking it in the first place.

Just going to say, a lack of dps, tank, healer can work.
It isn’t the idea that works it is just guild wars 2 doesn’t implement their pve encounters very well and support as it is is pathetic while control cannot be used at all due to low reliability, uptime, AOE and ofcourse defiant stacks.

Don’t blame the ideal because it had bad implementation.

Ideally the combat scenarios needed to be based more around teamwork and phases. Skills need to be more impactful but be less spamable.

The biggest issue on a design level without going into things is this, DPS can be constant, support is weak and infrequent and control is artificially hampered and REALLY infrequent.

Also not having stuff like healing power scale while resing people is dumb.

I main a Zerkerguardian that focuses on perosnal damage mitigation, wall of reflect, party shout cleansing, stability/protection/regen giving so I am certainly not an advocate of “tanking” or lazy play.