Guild Wars 2

Animosity.5968:

So I’ve played since launch and lately I cant even log in because the game is so boring to me. I PvE, mostly dungeon or fotm and this zerker meta is literally killing the game. Just recently a old gw2 member named Nemesis uploaded a video on this subject and he hit alot of points that I’ve noticed and even more than I didn’t notice. (GJ nemesis!)

So this meta is all about DPS, Corner stacking, Glitching and exploiting.. Some evidence…

-The meta is DPS because its all Zerker gear (out of the 23 stat prefix’s, guess anet just wanted to make different stat gear for giggles)

-Corner stacking doesn’t need evidence, everyone has done it but it’s common in MMO’s and isn’t a problem unless it’s mixed with the other 3 parts of the meta.

-Glitching is a serious problem but people do it and it’s literally accepted as part of the meta. A few examples are CM attacking people through walls, CM climbing wall by Frost in P1 to take 0 damage, CM P2 running the boss between 2 plateau’s to become completely stuck, etc. I only mentioned CM but there’s glitching in every dungeon, just youtube “gw2 Glitch (whatever dungeon)” and you’ll be met with video proof.

- Exploiting is just stupid and yet people still do it to Lupi with reflecting his attacks to down him in seconds. Obviously this isn’t challenging content for a boss in a dungeon yet now it’s accepted as ok? wtf man. There are more but I draw a fine line between glitching and exploiting so i’ll let you choose.

So as nemesis states in his video “Gw2 abondonded the holy trinity to become…just dps?” It’s literally gotten to a point where people are stating that certain classes are sub par and should not be taken for optimal dps. How is this better? I for one think it’s literally ludicious and now with HoT coming I’m sending the Dev’s a message…" You have the opportunity to fix what has been left to grow into such a big problem. The ball’s in your court, Please stay true to your word to make this MMO the be all end all MMO"

Just so you know (Nemesis says this as well), 3.5 million copies of the game has been sold since launch but only 443k views on the expansion reveal video. These number’s are fairly alarming as the majority of players still interested in the game would of watched the video already. New or returning players will be greeted by looking up videos of corner stacking, glitching, all dps numbers and most likely turn away from the game as it’s bad advertising.

What does everyone else think about gw2 current state? Is all this ok?

Link to Nemesis video as it’s very informative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=js5ltIBr73s

You are correct! I completely agree with everything you say. If i were to post evidence of everything you say: it would take more than 100+ pages because i do have them.

My only questions to Arena net: You have too many evidence of everything that is happening in the game (3 Years+ beta testing), how many evidences do you need and want to give your players a challenge and fun game? To enforce Hard-Work, Effort, Risk-Reward? To take serious action anything that is against it and to make serious change for the game in a positive way?

Dawnbreaker.6215:

maddoctor.2738:

Then I’m asking again, if you know the reasons why this is the “optimal” thing, what exactly are you contesting? Out of 23 gear stats, one is more optimal/efficient than the others (not for all professions though) how shocking news, out of all sets players found out which one is more efficient than the others! All builds and party compositions can’t be equal for all pieces of content.

I’m contesting the existence of the 22 others, and because you still haven’t understood it, you earn another copy/paste:

Why not replace all PvE gear with a single set that provides enough HP for noobs to learn and enough damage for veterans to speedrun, with some conditions included, while keeping WvW gear choices a matter of their own?

Also let’s make it clear that almost all noobs these days learn to play while using a zerk gear set. Your point that other gear sets need to be there for them to learn is completely and utterly invalid. You can just learn to play in easy dungeons and do Arah later.

I answered it ages ago, you haven’t read it yet so here is another copy paste:

And I already answered your bolded question:

Not one for sure, but certainly not 23. There are quite a few good gear sets and with some of the upcoming HOT changes in how conditions work and how certain traits give extra critical chance, perhaps Precision won’t be as important and Condition damage will be more viable. Less and better sets is better than an overflow of sets that most see no use at all.
As for more defensive gear (Tough/Vitality/Healing), I already answered that too. You can already do content in full Cleric or Nomad without even dodging, just using auto attacks. How is this “buff” on those gear sets going to work exactly, do you want those afkers to do the runs as fast as a zerker party?

Never said anything about learning. Different professions need different gear and HoT will mix things up a lot until the community identifies the best choice (s) for all of them. Mesmers are better with Assassin’s for example than Berserker

Those “noobs” learning in Berserker are either in groups with experienced players that can even do the dungeon solo, in order to teach them (or carry them), or are getting kicked on their first death. Hardly a learning experience.

Since you identify why 1 (or better 3-4 based on build) gear set(s) is (are) better than the others (because of speed and efficiency as you yourself say) what is there to contest? If they alter what gear sets do and how much they affect any build in the end players will always figure out the best for each profession.

It’s not a Berserker Elementalist, Guardian, Warrior and Thief but Berserker Elementalist, Knight Guardian, Soldier Warrior and Assassin Thief. That’s an amazing difference there

Dawnbreaker.6215:

maddoctor.2738:

Wall of boring zerk meta fanboyism

Then why are we not removing gear stats from PvE? What the kitten is the point of having a CHOICE in PvE at all, if like you say you can do everything in zerker?

Gear isn’t removed from PvE because it is a time sink that keeps players playing. Simple as that.

It takes forever to gear up a character as a casual player and that’s exactly what they want – to keep you playing.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

I’m contesting the existence of the 22 others, and because you still haven’t understood it, you earn another copy/paste:

Why not replace all PvE gear with a single set that provides enough HP for noobs to learn and enough damage for veterans to speedrun, with some conditions included, while keeping WvW gear choices a matter of their own?

Also let’s make it clear that almost all noobs these days learn to play while using a zerk gear set. Your point that other gear sets need to be there for them to learn is completely and utterly invalid. You can just learn to play in easy dungeons and do Arah later.

The other sets are there as a resource… Say the designers want to create encounters with ticking AoE damage or mobs resistant to physical attacks. Giving a choice is good, the issue is current encounter design is poor and support comes from CC, Blind, Block and Reflect so that healing isn’t needed and faster killing allows those temp methods of avoiding damage to keep the party up. Zerker gear is the most efficient in the game we play atm so thats why everyone plays it..

BUT in the future designers might want to make things that cannot be done by Zerker easily so the other stats become more useful choices. They should be obviously kept in game.

Your mad desire to kill off zerker is so blinkered you aren’t thinking…

I understand your point, OP. However this is a fault of the players, not just game design.

There will ALWAYS be players that look to find the fastest/most efficient method of doing content no matter the sacrifice in fun (look at how fast chest farm arose from silverwastes), that is not something any form of design principles can fix

Why not replace all PvE gear with a single set that provides enough HP for noobs to learn and enough damage for veterans to speedrun, with some conditions included, while keeping WvW gear choices a matter of their own?

In a F2P game with a real money store the goal of the developer is to keep players in contact with the game as often and as much as possible.
Why? It increases the likelihood that they’ll spend some money on the game.
To that end having different types of gear that you have to craft build is one of many “time sinks” used to keep you playing well beyond the point where you would have normally gone and done something else by having you work towards a goal.

Why do you think ascended gear is time gated? Just one of the reasons is stated above – to make sure you keep building that gear every day instead of finishing it all at once.

This is one of the game’s major time sinks apart from legendary weapons so it makes sense to keep it in the game and keep people working at it.

That’s precisely why you have gear in the game and why it hasn’t been completely removed.

Harper.4173:

Dawnbreaker.6215:

maddoctor.2738:

Wall of boring zerk meta fanboyism

Then why are we not removing gear stats from PvE? What the kitten is the point of having a CHOICE in PvE at all, if like you say you can do everything in zerker?

Gear isn’t removed from PvE because it is a time sink that keeps players playing. Simple as that.

It takes forever to gear up a character as a casual player and that’s exactly what they want – to keep you playing.

Gear CHOICES. Not gear general. Another example of you pretending not to understand the topic just to drag on the conversation.

Why not replace all PvE gear with a single set that provides enough HP for noobs to learn and enough damage for veterans to speedrun, with some conditions included, while keeping WvW gear choices a matter of their own?

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Why not replace ALL PvE gear with a single set that provides enough HP for noobs to learn and enough damage for veterans to speedrun, with some conditions included, while keeping WvW gear choices a matter of their own?
This means REPLACE all gear. You know English? Remove zerk, remove nomads, remove the choices FROM PVE. Keep one all-in-one set similar to a combination of valkyrie and rampagers so that everyone is happy, noobs can learn, veterans can speedrun. What is your problem with that?

Why not replace all gear with one set? Well that’s a different question.

The reason is that with multiple types of encounters and multiple facets of the game one gear set may not be optimal for the entire game.

You might want to do your dungeons in full zerk but WvW zerging might require you put on PvT or Knight’s.
There’s no clear PvE / PvP distinction here – they are interested in keeping you in the game regardless of the content you approach. Thus there’s no clear difference between WvW and PvE gear.

So – the answer is easy – to keep people investing more time in gathering more gear. Again the time sink I wrote about above.
More gear types means more things people will work towards.

Do these gear types have to be viable? Somewhat.
Do they have to be optimal? Not really – as long as they’re there some guy is going to build it. For any reason – it doesn’t matter – it is giving you more chances at keeping people in the game.

Even if he’s building the wrong gear ( the absolutely worst type of gear you can imagine) that he’ll never use efficiently he’s still playing the game, driving the economy ( by buying and selling mats) and ultimately that’s what you want.

You want to have as much busywork in the game as possible to keep the players playing. Gear is just one facet.

Harper.4173:

Don’t bother trying to prove me wrong – we both know you can’t – just please stop posting the same stuff – it’s just tiresome to read.

I can prove you wrong and I have.

The difficulty is not proving you wrong.

The difficulty is getting you to acknowledge that you are wrong, and that, we both know that I can’t do that, due to your nature.

You can take a horse to water, but you can’t make a horse drink.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Harper.4173:

Don’t bother trying to prove me wrong – we both know you can’t – just please stop posting the same stuff – it’s just tiresome to read.

I can prove you wrong and I have.

The difficulty is not proving you wrong.

The difficulty is getting you to acknowledge that you are wrong, and that, we both know that I can’t do that, due to your nature.

You can take a horse to water, but you can’t make a horse drink.

Read above.

Harper.4173:

Dawnbreaker.6215:

Why not replace ALL PvE gear with a single set that provides enough HP for noobs to learn and enough damage for veterans to speedrun, with some conditions included, while keeping WvW gear choices a matter of their own?
This means REPLACE all gear. You know English? Remove zerk, remove nomads, remove the choices FROM PVE. Keep one all-in-one set similar to a combination of valkyrie and rampagers so that everyone is happy, noobs can learn, veterans can speedrun. What is your problem with that?

Why not replace all gear with one set? Well that’s a different question.

The reason is that with multiple types of encounters and multiple facets of the game one gear set may not be optimal for the entire game.

You might want to do your dungeons in full zerk but WvW zerging might require you put on PvT or Knight’s.
There’s no clear PvE / PvP distinction here – they are interested in keeping you in the game regardless of the content you approach. Thus there’s no clear difference between WvW and PvE gear.

So – the answer is easy – to keep people investing more time in gathering more gear. Again the time sink I wrote about above.
More gear types means more things people will work towards.

Do these gear types have to be viable? Somewhat.
Do they have to be optimal? Not really – as long as they’re there some guy is going to build it. For any reason – it doesn’t matter – it is giving you more chances at keeping people in the game.

Even if he’s building the wrong gear ( the absolutely worst type of gear you can imagine) that he’ll never use efficiently he’s still playing the game, driving the economy ( by buying and selling mats) and ultimately that’s what you want.

You want to have as much busywork in the game as possible to keep the players playing. Gear is just one facet.

Apply the PvP gear system to WvW, problem solved.

Also, there are so many time sinks in this game that converging all gear into one multi-purpose set would hardly make people play less. I don’t think many people actually invest time making ascended cleric’s gear when they can just buy exotic which has nearly the same stats.

No – it isn’t problem solved.

The current PvE gear system we have now – with WvW mixed in keeps people grinding and that’s exactly what the developers want – if you change it you take away a significant amount of grind from the game.

You want to keep your time sinks in the game not take them out.
There are never enough time sinks.

You would be surprised how many people make various types of gear. I know because I sell them the insignias on the TP.

People already grind for a full zerk ascended set and then buy everything else in exotic if they need. It would change nothing.
They could just make ascended gear harder to get and that would work too.

Ravenmoon.5318:

The only thing that Gw2 did right is showing the world that majority of MMO players are baddies. And they need their trinity because they can’t take care for themselves.

Right… the same way that GW2 showed that most chess grandmasters are baddies who are dependent on their turn based combat.

GW2 is a different game than other MMOs. Trinity games are balanced around the DPS / Tank / Healer set up. Players can’t take care of themselves because the game is designed so that they are not to be able to.

GW2 has different design goals in mind. However, before you assume everything is working the way the developers intended, ask yourself why, if the zerker meta is correct, that there were over 40 billion different ways to combine gear at launch. Seems like a big waste of time to me.

That’s not to say that the zerker meta is bad, but just to say that it’s extremely arrogant, given the evidence, to assume that the zerker meta was intended.

rapthorne.7345:

I understand your point, OP. However this is a fault of the players, not just game design.

There will ALWAYS be players that look to find the fastest/most efficient method of doing content no matter the sacrifice in fun (look at how fast chest farm arose from silverwastes), that is not something any form of design principles can fix

read:

" There is a difference between a good game that is difficult and a game that is disguised to be a good difficult game under cheap armor ".

http://www.noobfeed.com/features/414/false-difficulty-in-video-games

TooBz.3065:

That’s not to say that the zerker meta is bad, but just to say that it’s extremely arrogant, given the evidence, to assume that the zerker meta was intended.

Most content is supposed to be doable by any combination, and it is, so most gear types are viable and allows you to finish most content. However, players always find the best way to finish content as fast as possible and with as much efficiency as possible, that’s true for most games. In an action game with lots of active defenses, that negate 100% of the damage, having as much group damage as possible is a desired effect.

Was the zerker meta intended? Probably not, but they should’ve expected it. However, ask yourself if the alternative is much better. For example imagine having Knight Warriors, Cleric Guardians, Carrion Necromancers and Celestial Elementalists as their “optimal” sets. Would that be better?

I don’t think the zerker meta is a problem that can be solved as long as players want the most efficient/fast way to do content. But, the more recent “LF Warrior, Elementalist, Thief, Guardian” LFG posts are becoming more frequent and more annoying. In the end, making more stat combos “meta” is much much lower priority than making ENTIRE professions more viable. And that is a much better “meta” discussion to have than the “zerker meta”

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/guild-wars-2-has-no-healers-or-tanks

“There are no dedicated healers that do full healing. Every profession has some form of support to a greater or lesser extent, but none of them enough that they aren’t also fighters,” Peters told PC Gamer.

Jon Peters’ quote is enough to show that the idea a “dedicated support character” was never intended. All characters are intended to be “fighters” who bring “more or less support” which is exactly the system we have in PvE right now.

Dawnbreaker.6215:

People already grind for a full zerk ascended set and then buy everything else in exotic if they need. It would change nothing.
They could just make ascended gear harder to get and that would work too.

People grind for full zerk and then grind more for full PvT and full Knights’ and whatnot because people make use of this edge in WvW. It does make a difference being in full ascended vs full exotic in WvW.

There’s a delicate balance between “harder to get” – it doesn’t work like you want it to.
If you make something “harder to get” you might get to a point where people consider it too hard to even start.

The trick is to make it accessible enough for the player to start but hard enough for him to have a lot of time invested into this.

The best way to do it is through a repeatable process that has certain points where the player is rewarded.

If crafting 3 sets of armor had a difficulty of X and crafting one set of armor had the same difficulty people would prefer the 3 sets variant. Why?
Because it offers satisfaction before the process is complete and also allows for more versatility. It’s the same effort but being more spread out and getting more rewards in-between motivates people to keep going.

DarkSyze.8627:

rapthorne.7345:

I understand your point, OP. However this is a fault of the players, not just game design.

There will ALWAYS be players that look to find the fastest/most efficient method of doing content no matter the sacrifice in fun (look at how fast chest farm arose from silverwastes), that is not something any form of design principles can fix

read:

" There is a difference between a good game that is difficult and a game that is disguised to be a good difficult game under cheap armor ".

http://www.noobfeed.com/features/414/false-difficulty-in-video-games

Sadly I would read your article but it doesn’t open for me. The link doesn’t work. Just keeps loading forever.

Still – I can hint at what you mean from your quote but will raise you this argument.

It doesn’t matter if it’s real difficulty or false difficulty as long as it keeps players in the game.
As long as players stay in the game the game has a population and makes money off its players through the gem store and off its new comers through its populated world.

It doesn’t matter if the game is well designed or not as long as it sells and if it does sell then the game is successful.

Look at Call of Duty – a franchise CONSTANTLY bashed, hated and criticized for any and all reasons?
Does it matter? No.
In 2014 – Call of Duty Advanced Warfare was the best selling game out of all of them. And it is considered a bad and “weak” CoD by the community.

As long as a game sells and sells well it means there’s a paying market that wants that game for what it is. Regardless of how many theoretical game designers fill the forums with ideas and suggestions about why the game is bad and what it should do to change.

To Harper: link with quotes

“False Difficulty In Video Games”

“There is a difference between a good game that is difficult and a game that is disguised to be a good difficult game under cheap armor”.

By Artemis, Posted 23 Jan 2015

“Difficulty in video games is a complicated thing to talk about, because every person has their own definition of what it difficult and what is not. Something that you find hard in a game might not be something your friend finds difficult and vice versa. Even if something people find universally difficult, you will always find that small group of people that just breezed through it like it didn’t matter at all”.

“Nowadays, difficulty in games seems to be an added “bonus” to gamers, since the general consensus is that games are being made too easy nowadays. However, there seems to be a misunderstanding as to what real difficulty is and what bad game design is”.

“For example: the Castlevania games from the NES era. These games, while difficult, used their game design to teach the player when they should attack and when they should back off. Nearly all of the player’s mistakes weren’t the fault of the game but the fault of the player themselves. The Mega Man games did something similar, using their game design to teach the players about the difficulty rather than just not telling them anything”.

“If you look at a game like Jekyll and Hyde though, it almost doesn’t tell a gamer anything through design or even text boxes. The difference is that, no matter what, the game sets you up for failure, and you’d have to spend more time with it than you have to spend time with something like Mega Man. Not because of good game design or difficulty, because you can’t find out how to conquer the thing”.

“Back in those days however, this is somewhat forgivable because games were just starting to gain a following and there was no real standard on how to make your games frustratingly hard but “fun”.

“Nowadays though, a sort of standard has been set, with books about game design being written and those young gamers from the early days of gaming have grown as well, along with their tastes. People have expressed what they like and dislike, and with developers trying to cater to both the hardcore demographic and the new gamer crowd that’s been seemingly coming out of the woodwork”.

“Developers now have the difficult job of trying to appease everyone and to make a game that is strictly difficult and nothing else might result in less overall sales, which from a business standpoint isn’t a good thing”.

“This is why a lot of games that have been difficult in the past or a little unforgiving, like the Fire Emblem Series, have added the “casual mode” difficulty in Awakening, in order to appeal to newer players, which managed to successfully save their franchise”.

“They also managed to put in Nightmare difficulty for the veterans of the game, simultaneously pleasing both newbies to the series and those who had been playing it for years. This gave the series a perfect balance of difficulty, even with the so-called “casualfication” of the series as a whole”.

“There are of course niche games like Roguelikes, survival games and others that are always an exercise in patience when it comes to playing them. These are the sort of games like Neo Scavenger, that use the game mechanics itself and simple logic on what one needs to survive. It’s a difficult game, but with every game over you realize your mistakes and you learn from them”.

“A game that doesn’t do this, is Dark Souls 2. While its predecessors Demon’s Souls and Dark Souls have a reputation for being difficult but fair, but this one on the other hand has an issue with its hit boxes. If you roll out of the way, your hit box doesn’t always come with you, causing you to be struck just when you thought you magnificently dodged a move”.

“While some can say it “forces you to adapt to its own brand of difficulty” it really shows the fact that the game designers just designed the game badly in order to give you a false sense of difficulty. It is an achievement to beat Dark Souls 2, yes, but that isn’t from the game’s difficulty by good game design, it’s because of how broken the game actually is”.

I just want to mention that over the weekend I played a handful of dungeon paths with players in non zerker armor to see just how terrible this plight of zerker meta is.

I did just fine. I also got a Crucible of Eternity story dungeon run, was able to help train a novice thief, met some silly people and got a couple of Friendlist + for the experience. We took a little longer, but the session was much more enjoyable than speedruns.

I saw one “Zerker only” group. Even though I run zerker, I didnt pick it.

I think I’ll put together a data set about exactly how easy it is to find people who dont care about armor when running dungeons. Because that’s literally the only place this complaint applies to.

“The problem with difficulty in games is that people are starting to not recognize the difference between a game that’s actually difficult, and a game that’s broken and one of the only reasons they keep losing is because of bad game design or a glitch”.

“People have become so “used” to their idea of what an easy game that they are willing to praise anything that they perceive as difficult, even if that means that the game is broken by design. They want to test their mettle against games so much because they have something to prove when they beat a game even if that game functionally doesn’t work as well as it should”.

“They get a false sense of achievement from something that should have been difficult in a way that worked, rather than a way where you had to adapt to a terrible system. Difficulty in games is fine, but there is a difference between what is truly difficult and what is just an exercise in futility”.

Over the years games that are genuinely difficult at the start of the game are getting harder and harder to find and now hardcore gamers are desperate to prove themselves. It is like a trial by fire for them, even if the fire they are trying to escape is in a furnace with a window that it just big enough for them to fit through".

" They see any difficulty as good difficulty and will get angry at anyone who says otherwise, because the other person should just “Get Good” in order to destroy something that they are essentially crippled against. There is a difference between a good game that is difficult and a game that is disguised to be a good difficult game under cheap armor. It’s just a matter of tearing off the armor to see the good or bad game inside".

DarkSyze.8627:

rapthorne.7345:

I understand your point, OP. However this is a fault of the players, not just game design.

There will ALWAYS be players that look to find the fastest/most efficient method of doing content no matter the sacrifice in fun (look at how fast chest farm arose from silverwastes), that is not something any form of design principles can fix

read:

" There is a difference between a good game that is difficult and a game that is disguised to be a good difficult game under cheap armor ".

http://www.noobfeed.com/features/414/false-difficulty-in-video-games

I’m missing what this article has to do with the preferred playstyle of players killing the game. Elaborate?

Azure The Heartless.3261:

I just want to mention that over the weekend I played a handful of dungeon paths with players in non zerker armor to see just how terrible this plight of zerker meta is.

I did just fine. I also got a Crucible of Eternity story dungeon run, was able to help train a novice thief, met some silly people and got a couple of Friendlist + for the experience. We took a little longer, but the session was much more enjoyable than speedruns.

I saw one “Zerker only” group. Even though I run zerker, I didnt pick it.

I think I’ll put together a data set about exactly how easy it is to find people who dont care about armor when running dungeons. Because that’s literally the only place this complaint applies to.

Really good point. I also avoid zerker only groups and I don’t remember ever having trouble getting a dungeon run together. Although it has been a while….

I think those anti-meta threads have made Special Snow Flakes more ambitious lately. I’m so so so SO sick of people that waste other peoples time with no shame getting carried by people that try to maximaze they’re builds to provide both DPS and team utility.

I had some really bad fractal runs lately. To give an example of this abomination of “Snow Flakes”, and I’m not even talking about the gear now, how can you come in a lvl 50 fractal as a guard without reflects, camping staff as well as your virtues and MEDITATIONS! Or scepter camping eles with no conjures, or D/D eles or Rangers that don’t have the decency to give a spotter for the PS warri and the party, when he doesn’t even need to do anything than just provide a passive bonus. I’m so disgusted about those players, and I’m talking about players with lots of AP’s and several legendaries so you can’t say they are new to the game.

Most of the time it’s really not about the gear. It’s the selfish nature of people that makes me start to think some of them do this on purpose just to grief other players and waste they’re time.

I sincerely would take a power necro any day (and i really don’t have problems against good necros in fractals) before any of these useless kittens.

I hope to never meet those people again and I REALLY HOPE ANET makes an INSPECT GEAR and BUILD option, a DPS meter and more DPS checks on bosses similar to Simin.

I really want a fast way of selecting my party without the need of arguing in party chat. People will still make LFG req and will kick people. Why NOT make the whole process cleaner and faster?

Thank you DarkSyze – I’ve read through all of it but really don’t see how it relates to our problem.
The only connection I can make has been addressed in my post above. What are your thoughts?

creepmatic.9435:

I’m talking about players with lots of AP’s and several legendaries so you can’t say they are new to the game.

They are not new but AP and legendaries are not skill based rewards. Game is not pushing players to be better too so 9000k AP guy with all legendaries in the game and absolutely no experience is pretty common sight.

Offtopic:
Can someone check if ctrl+c is working here? I can’t copy anything on this forum for some reason.

creepmatic.9435:

[Stuff]

While I still think there should be some difficulty presented to people looking to tailor LFG that the current system provides, I agree with part of this.

People seem to be missing the fact that “playing how you want” does not automatically include “to the benefit of others.”

Selfish builds exist, but they do not help in dungeons. The whole problem that this “zerker meta waaah” stems from is backlash against players that have not realized the above disconnect between “playing how you want” and “playing to the benefit of others”, join an instance where the latter is top priority, get kicked for not adhering to it, then somehow reason that they should not have been kicked because the game allows them to “play how they want.”

It’s kind of painfully simple when you look at it objectively. All of the threads, the posts, the complaints…. If you are playing a game and someone elses time is invested, do what is beneficial to both of you instead of just thinking about yourself.

And, as an additional note, supporting someone who does not need the support when you could be assisting in a task where help is needed is just as fruitless as not doing anything.

Animosity.5968:

So I’ve played since launch and lately I cant even log in because the game is so boring to me. I PvE, mostly dungeon or fotm and this zerker meta is literally killing the game. Just recently a old gw2 member named Nemesis uploaded a video on this subject and he hit alot of points that I’ve noticed and even more than I didn’t notice. (GJ nemesis!)

So this meta is all about DPS, Corner stacking, Glitching and exploiting.. Some evidence…

-The meta is DPS because its all Zerker gear (out of the 23 stat prefix’s, guess anet just wanted to make different stat gear for giggles)

-Corner stacking doesn’t need evidence, everyone has done it but it’s common in MMO’s and isn’t a problem unless it’s mixed with the other 3 parts of the meta.

-Glitching is a serious problem but people do it and it’s literally accepted as part of the meta. A few examples are CM attacking people through walls, CM climbing wall by Frost in P1 to take 0 damage, CM P2 running the boss between 2 plateau’s to become completely stuck, etc. I only mentioned CM but there’s glitching in every dungeon, just youtube “gw2 Glitch (whatever dungeon)” and you’ll be met with video proof.

- Exploiting is just stupid and yet people still do it to Lupi with reflecting his attacks to down him in seconds. Obviously this isn’t challenging content for a boss in a dungeon yet now it’s accepted as ok? wtf man. There are more but I draw a fine line between glitching and exploiting so i’ll let you choose.

So as nemesis states in his video “Gw2 abondonded the holy trinity to become…just dps?” It’s literally gotten to a point where people are stating that certain classes are sub par and should not be taken for optimal dps. How is this better? I for one think it’s literally ludicious and now with HoT coming I’m sending the Dev’s a message…" You have the opportunity to fix what has been left to grow into such a big problem. The ball’s in your court, Please stay true to your word to make this MMO the be all end all MMO"

Just so you know (Nemesis says this as well), 3.5 million copies of the game has been sold since launch but only 443k views on the expansion reveal video. These number’s are fairly alarming as the majority of players still interested in the game would of watched the video already. New or returning players will be greeted by looking up videos of corner stacking, glitching, all dps numbers and most likely turn away from the game as it’s bad advertising.

What does everyone else think about gw2 current state? Is all this ok?

Link to Nemesis video as it’s very informative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=js5ltIBr73s

Zerker is the meta because it is the best way to do it. If they broke Zerker the next best thing would be meta. That is how metas work. You can’t fix it because it isn’t broken.

Stacking is done in almost every MMO in existence.

Glitching? You can’t kill anything through walls in CM any longer, only the lowest DPS NON-ZERKER teams need to climb up to kill Frost because a high dps team will burn him down before it matters.

Exploit? How is using reflects, a game mechanic designed to reflect projectiles, on Lupi’s reflects to kill him an exploit? That is probably the single most desperate complaint I’ve ever read.

DPS isn’t the meta, ever single meta build has something that they bring to the party. It is the reason classes like Necro aren’t part of the meta. A power necro can dish out a ton of damage, but overall they are a selfish class that doesn’t bring anything to the party. Guardians bring aegis, reflects, blinds, etc. Warriors bring might and banners. Elementalists bring might, ice bows, etc. Mesmers bring boon stripping, reflects, etc. Thieves bring stealth, high dps, and blinds.

There are no problems with the zerker meta. There are only problems with people who don’t want to run the zerker meta getting mad at people who do as if they have some right to tell zerker wearers what to wear.

creepmatic.9435:

I think those anti-meta threads have made Special Snow Flakes more ambitious lately. I’m so so so SO sick of people that waste other peoples time with no shame getting carried by people that try to maximaze they’re builds to provide both DPS and team utility.

I’m so sick of people complaining that their dungeon runs take 30 seconds longer. Also, if you put the correct terms in the LFG you should have a problem. May I suggest “ZERKER ONLY, I’m a really kitten about this” or “L33T RUN, MOAR DPS” which says the same thing.

I had some really bad fractal runs lately. To give an example of this abomination of “Snow Flakes”, and I’m not even talking about the gear now, how can you come in a lvl 50 fractal as a guard without reflects, camping staff as well as your virtues and MEDITATIONS! Or scepter camping eles with no conjures, or D/D eles or Rangers that don’t have the decency to give a spotter for the PS warri and the party, when he doesn’t even need to do anything than just provide a passive bonus. I’m so disgusted about those players, and I’m talking about players with lots of AP’s and several legendaries so you can’t say they are new to the game.

What class do you play? If you have trouble with guards, roll one yourself. Be self-sufficient. Stop asking for the other guards to carry you.

Most of the time it’s really not about the gear. It’s the selfish nature of people that makes me start to think some of them do this on purpose just to grief other players and waste they’re time.

I sincerely would take a power necro any day (and i really don’t have problems against good necros in fractals) before any of these useless kittens.

I hope to never meet those people again and I REALLY HOPE ANET makes an INSPECT GEAR and BUILD option, a DPS meter and more DPS checks on bosses similar to Simin.

How you a build / gear check help with guards camping their virtues? Also, if they are trying to troll you, they can just but the build you want them to run and then change it after the check.

I really want a fast way of selecting my party without the need of arguing in party chat. People will still make LFG req and will kick people. Why NOT make the whole process cleaner and faster?

I have nothing to say about this. Best of luck to you.

Azure The Heartless.3261:

People seem to be missing the fact that “playing how you want” does not automatically include “to the benefit of others.”

Selfish builds exist, but they do not help in dungeons. The whole problem that this “zerker meta waaah” stems from is backlash against players that have not realized the above disconnect between “playing how you want” and “playing to the benefit of others”, join an instance where the latter is top priority, get kicked for not adhering to it, then somehow reason that they should not have been kicked because the game allows them to “play how they want.”

It’s kind of painfully simple when you look at it objectively. All of the threads, the posts, the complaints…. If you are playing a game and someone elses time is invested, do what is beneficial to both of you instead of just thinking about yourself.

This is an eloquent way of saying selfish builds are bad.

The vocal PHIW crowd is the most selfish because they seem to want to nerf the team based, unselfish builds so they are as inefficient as their selfish builds. Or they just don’t care about the lack of synergy they bring to a team, again selfish.

I also find it amusing that people who want the trinity are so vocal about build diversity when every mmo I have played with a hard trinity had 1 build for each classes job and the gear required for it.

Harper.4173:

Thank you DarkSyze – I’ve read through all of it but really don’t see how it relates to our problem.
The only connection I can make has been addressed in my post above. What are your thoughts?

I agree with you and it make sense. Like i always read from other players posts also " As long Arena net make sales, they do not need us "

Oh Well!

Why even continue to waste my other time writing in the forum than? I already spending very little time with the game: it make more sense to not waste any of my time at all.

(I picture Arena net laughing at us players who use our time to report problems: the joke was always us players: no serious solution, no serious anything-the evidence are everywhere: Same laughing 3 years+ ago, same laughing now )

" There is no humiliation more abusive than being taken advantage of "

TooBz.3065:

I’m so sick of people complaining that their dungeon runs take 30 seconds longer. Also, if you put the correct terms in the LFG you should have a problem. May I suggest “ZERKER ONLY, I’m a really kitten about this” or “L33T RUN, MOAR DPS” which says the same thing.

I wasn’t talking about dungeons in the first place. And wearing “ZERKER” gear does not make people bring useful group utilities…

TooBz.3065:

What class do you play? If you have trouble with guards, roll one yourself. Be self-sufficient. Stop asking for the other guards to carry you.

I main guard, and can also play ele and warrior in fractals. So if I play ele, and i’m the single ele in the group, by your suggestion I should drop the ele just so I can do the job that the guardian isn’t doing, so you say I should drop the only ele in the party to actually carry the bad guardian? Is that what you call self-sufficient? I don’t even..

TooBz.3065:

How you a build / gear check help with guards camping their virtues? Also, if they are trying to troll you, they can just but the build you want them to run and then change it after the check.

Because I could gear/build check anytime in the instance. And if LFG req is not respected then here comes the kick. But I see that you are more interested in how to you could trick the gear check than supporting the idea of people you spend the time with in an instance (especially lvl 50 fractals) to actually bring usefull group utilities. It sickens me how Anet shields the scrubs, and don’t actually make things to improve skillful play.

Also you seem to think that I don’t make my own lfg’s. But how many times did I caught players linking a set of zerker armor then looking at them struggle to kill a single trash mob, it’s quite hilarious. Plus it’s easy to see for signs when Guardians VoJ don’t blind or don’t provide vuln, or ele’s fire fields don’t provide fury. Anyways you made my point. Thanks!

creepmatic.9435:

I think those anti-meta threads have made Special Snow Flakes more ambitious lately. I’m so so so SO sick of people that waste other peoples time with no shame getting carried by people that try to maximaze they’re builds to provide both DPS and team utility.

So are you doing 20 minutes fractal50 pug run?

else I dont’ see it matters.

Why do people even care about meta that much. Almost every pug fractal50 run is 40-50 minutes regardless of class composition or if someone put some defense gear or traits.

laokoko.7403:

creepmatic.9435:

I think those anti-meta threads have made Special Snow Flakes more ambitious lately. I’m so so so SO sick of people that waste other peoples time with no shame getting carried by people that try to maximaze they’re builds to provide both DPS and team utility.

So are you doing 20 minutes fractal50 pug run?

else I dont’ see it matters.

Why do people even care about meta that much. Almost every pug fractal50 run is 40-50 minutes regardless of class composition or if someone put some defense gear or traits.

How does asking for a guardian to use his virtues and bring projectile defense equates to “doing 20 min fractal50 pug run”?

And again, I didn’t even talked about berserker gear. My point was that PHIW people don’t even bring useful group utilities. Please try to do a lvl 50 Volcanic Fractal without projectile defense, or blinds for the adds at the imbued shaman, then come and tell me about your smooth 50 min pug run.

I guess some people will try to find the most ridiculous reasons only to make they’re selfish playstyle viable. I keep repeating that is not the gear i’m complaining about, yet I still get replies about Zerker this Zerker that WHEN I was actually talking about USEFULL group utilities.

creepmatic.9435:

I guess some people will try to find the most ridiculous reasons only to make they’re selfish playstyle viable. I keep repeating that is not the gear i’m complaining about, yet I still get replies about Zerker this Zerker that WHEN I was actually talking about USEFULL group utilities.

well, I think you are exaggerating a little bit. For fractal 50, once in a blue moon I actually find group that is terrible enough I bother to complain.

I’m sure 95% of the guardian bring reflect for fotm50.

And sometimes people just dont’ know why people use build the way they do. I use staff/GS for legendary imbued shaman on my guardian. Some people laugh at me for using staff, when guardian duoing the encounter use staff too.

laokoko.7403:

creepmatic.9435:

I guess some people will try to find the most ridiculous reasons only to make they’re selfish playstyle viable. I keep repeating that is not the gear i’m complaining about, yet I still get replies about Zerker this Zerker that WHEN I was actually talking about USEFULL group utilities.

well, I think you are exaggerating a little bit. For fractal 50, once in a blue moon I actually find group that is terrible enough I bother to complain.

I’m sure 95% of the guardian bring reflect for fotm50.

And sometimes people just dont’ know why people use build the way they do. I use staff/GS for legendary imbued shaman on my guardian. Some people laugh at me for using staff, when guardian duoing the encounter use staff too.

I’m pretty sure that 99.9% of people, even ones that got carried, will have gotten enough skill to at least know why they’d need Reflect for FotM 50. ~.~

But yeah, people have no clue at all about builds. We pretty much have two metas as it stands: the meta, and “the meta.” A vast number of people fall under the latter, where they grab the “most powerful” build, and never do anything at all to change it. Purging Flames isn’t a requirement for literally every dungeon? Better not grab it under any circumstance. Tome of Wrath gives a DPS increase? Better always take it because this game only has DPS! People just do whatever it is as written, or even not as written when it gives a perceived DPS boost (I’ve had that as reasoning for not bringing WoR, as it would’ve taken over their Bane Signet slot ~.~).

And yeah, I’d bet people will laugh at you for running Staff, as it’s not meta (in Dungeons… that aren’t TA…). Luckily, I’ve never once been kicked/laughed at for pulling my random crap out. Generally, people don’t get aggressive at you when you have a pretty clear skill advantage over them (and the times when I’m actually playing with skilled people, I don’t do silly stuffs). I switch over to a healing build for the Imbued Shaman fight when PUGing, for instance (It’s pretty good for knocking off the shield, surprisingly. Especially in PUG situations where the average skill level can be a bit lacking.).

laokoko.7403:

creepmatic.9435:

I guess some people will try to find the most ridiculous reasons only to make they’re selfish playstyle viable. I keep repeating that is not the gear i’m complaining about, yet I still get replies about Zerker this Zerker that WHEN I was actually talking about USEFULL group utilities.

well, I think you are exaggerating a little bit. For fractal 50, once in a blue moon I actually find group that is terrible enough I bother to complain.

I’m sure 95% of the guardian bring reflect for fotm50.

And sometimes people just dont’ know why people use build the way they do. I use staff/GS for legendary imbued shaman on my guardian. Some people laugh at me for using staff, when guardian duoing the encounter use staff too.

Well yes and no. True high level fractal groups usually tend to go smoother than say groups in their 10s or 20s. The difference between a smooth 45 minute pug, a normal 1 hour pug and a bad 1 hour 30 minute group is mostly not even down to only team composition but player skill.

I’ve had groups that were idealy setup go terrible and groups with not optimal classes like ranger or necro run smooth as butter. I run Mesmer and Guardian in fractals 40+ and I can tell if that other guardian or mesmer have their class down or not. I’m not even talking about fancy stuff wich sometimes is just icying on the cake (and the moments where I go “wow, that was a cool move, haven’t thought of that” have become quite seldom). I’m talking basic core things that should be a given.

Guardian has 3 utility slots. At least 1 of those can be wall of reflection. It’s probably the 1 utility you never need to switch out in fractals. Slap on a Shield of the Avenger and Retreat and you have your go-to starter spec. Know when to use “Stand your Ground” and “Hallowed Ground” and the Harpy fractal should have no one falling down and stacking buffs prefight is more efficient. These are things I consider the bare minimum as far as knowing your class goes at fractal 40+. And if you are not using them, you’ve gotten carried most of the way.

Now a decent guardian might slot in a Greatsword for Arch Diviner and during his stuned phase pull the top 3 enemys together into a wall of reflection so they can get burst down (Mesmer does the same with focus pull. while at it, focus pull and knowing how to use it should be a given). It small things mostly that make the life of the group easier without most people noticing what you’ve done.

And this is not even touching on the subject of switching traits or weapons inbetween fights.

So yes, usually groups perform decently. That is mostly due to 1-2 players picking up the slack for the rest that play “okay”. That’s why a good Elementalist or Guardian are currently the 2 classes with the most impact. Because you can negate enough damage to cover for sloppy dodge or evasion mechanics of your group members.

no, meta and exploits are killing DUNGEONS

and btw i dungeon and i just kick any1 from the party who offers the meta, i am a meta free zone, i hate that stuff and i put it right in the party description

DarkSyze.8627:

You are correct! I completely agree with everything you say. If i were to post evidence of everything you say: it would take more than 100+ pages because i do have them.

Oh go ahead. Post a half page’s worth of this “evidence,” if you’ve got any. Don’t bother with reflection on Lupi, we’ve all seen that and it’s not an exploit. Also, don’t bother with forum complaints, we’ve seen those, too. It would be genuinely helpful if you had math. If you’re trying to prove something about game-play, that’s where you have to go. Have you got math?

DarkSyze.8627:

My only questions to Arena net: You have too many evidence of everything that is happening in the game (3 Years+ beta testing), how many evidences do you need and want to give your players a challenge and fun game? To enforce Hard-Work, Effort, Risk-Reward? To take serious action anything that is against it and to make serious change for the game in a positive way?

Anet has and is continuing to change the game. Critical damage cap took a fairly substantial hit, resulting in a loss in overall DPS that affects glass parties more than any other group. They reduced the effect of might stacks. They did this because of … wait for it … math. So, you got any math?

ANet is also trying to make harder content, promising stuff that’s harder than we’ve seen in HoT. We’ll see. I expect a host of posts early on claiming the content is “too hard” and “needs nerf” followed later by claims that it’s too easy. Will they “fix” dungeons to meet your expectations? Not likely.

every thought nemesis has about why the zerker meta is bad is silly. hes a noob when it comes to dungeon running. its too bad hes gonna convince some people not to play with his videos. a real cryin shame.

statements like “melee builds were never intended to have 100% dps uptime” are just completely ridiculous.

This whole thread is ridiculous. All anet needs to do is make it harder to kill foes than just having high damage output and a player hitting 1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1

Everything else is just trolls feeding each other.

The problem is all other stats are ignored when doing dungeons and other events. Toughness has a viability to it in WvW and PvP as taking damage may be unavoidable. Healing power needs to be buffed as it has little or no viability in its current state.

It’s a problem of enemies who kill you in 1 hit, ignore everything, and will only die when they take enough standard damage.

Screw convention. Play how you want. When I see people stacking up, I just do my own thing, unless I just feel like mindlessly nuking to get some quick cash. It’s more fun to me to play the game as it was intended. Play a glass cannon ele, that’ll get you out of a corner in a hurry, as you will get squished if you don’t sit in water and get carried. As far as reflecting on Lupi, that’s a feature, not an exploit. If you want to fight him without reflects, you are not alone and shouldn’t have trouble finding people who feel the same way. If you’re PUGging, just avoid “EXP” “Zerk” and “red Run” as those are usually the meta groups. GW2 has an awesome community. Be part of that and guide low-levels/first timers through, they normally want to experience the content as intended.

CornBread.3268:

Screw convention. Play how you want. When I see people stacking up, I just do my own thing, unless I just feel like mindlessly nuking to get some quick cash. It’s more fun to me to play the game as it was intended. Play a glass cannon ele, that’ll get you out of a corner in a hurry, as you will get squished if you don’t sit in water and get carried. As far as reflecting on Lupi, that’s a feature, not an exploit. If you want to fight him without reflects, you are not alone and shouldn’t have trouble finding people who feel the same way. If you’re PUGging, just avoid “EXP” “Zerk” and “red Run” as those are usually the meta groups. GW2 has an awesome community. Be part of that and guide low-levels/first timers through, they normally want to experience the content as intended.

Actually Eles stack in corners just as well as every other class. I’ve never seen a good Ele switch to water during combat. Switching to it post combat to clear some condis, sure. But never during a fight. Fire, Fire, Fire, its all a good staff Ele needs.

Your point about Lupi is spot on though. And also yes, if you don’t want to play the meta nobody is forcing you. Just don’t join meta lfg parties and then get upset when you get kicked for not playing the meta.

Harper.4173:

It doesn’t matter if it’s real difficulty or false difficulty as long as it keeps players in the game.

Of course it does, because not everyone is taken in and/or is happy with the situation.

So, it will significantly reduce potential sales/continued sales if some, or most, of the players can see the truth.

Even if a game appears to be selling well, despite some people seeing its “difficulty” is due to its flawed design (rather than true, well designed, difficulty), that just means the same game would sell even better if that wasn’t the case.