Guild Wars 2

I personally think underwater combat is a very neat aspect of Guild Wars 2. However, it needs to be greatly improved and there are a lot of problems with it. I have recently heard a rumor that it is going to be phased out and I really hope not, because I think many of the underwater areas are well done and intriguing.

Reasons to keep underwater combat:
1. There is a lot of content underwater and in areas only accessible by swimming (islands). If underwater combat were removed, the underwater areas would become very boring, because there would be very little to do there. And removing swimming altogether would make these areas inaccessible.
2. Underwater combat is an improvement over only land combat in Guild Wars 1.

Things wrong with underwater combat:
1. About half of the skills and even some traits don’t work underwater.
2. Very few weapons to choose from for underwater combat.
3. Getting a good quality breather (above masterwork) is very difficult to say the least. And even the masterwork level 80 breather only has one type of stats (no variety to choose from).

Reasons why players probably don’t like underwater combat:
1. Players feel weaker underwater than on land. This is because of the lower quality breathers, the fact that they are limited to certain skills that may not work well with their build, and the fact that some of their traits suddenly don’t work when they go underwater (or merely become pointless because the skills they reference are not usable underwater).
2. Players feel constrained by a smaller variety of good builds for underwater combat. This is because of the lack of usable skills and traits for underwater combat and the fact that each class only has one or two weapons for underwater combat.

Suggestions for fixing underwater combat:
1. Add more breathers of all qualities (common, fine, masterwork, rare, and exotic [and make them as easily accessible as any other kind of equipment]; make ascended breathers accessible to people other than fractal enthusiasts).
2. Make more skills available for underwater combat and maybe even add a few for underwater combat only.
3. Add more weapons for use in underwater combat (including one-hand and off-hand weapons).
4. Incorporate underwater combat more into traits.

+1 for more underwater combat

Not every trait should work under water, nor should every skill, there is the reverse and this definitely needs work.

The same for weapons, a great sword, just won’t work the same under water. You spend a fraction of the time underwater, it only needs a fraction of the weapons. The real flavor should come from skills.

There are lev 80 karma breathers exotic
There are ascended breather recipes on tp for a few copper, and the mats are not bad considering the waste on a breather. (Note these are the ones that drop in such excess from fractals we basically vendor trash them in the tp for a copper or two.)

I don’t aim to speak for other players, but its not a matter of feeling week, its a matter of weak AI and underwater enemies. It’s quite the opposite, because all I have to do is swim in a circle spamming 1 on just about any weapon and I will kill everything with out getting hit. There are few exceptions to this.

Now for the over all theme, I would love to see underwater redone and improved, but I won’t hold my breath.

I agree that not every weapon should work underwater, such as the hammer, mace, pistol, rifle, etc. However, there are a few that might be able to work underwater, such as the dagger, scepter, focus, etc. And there might be possibilities for new weapon types that are exclusively for use underwater.

I was not aware the ascended recipes are available on the trading post, which does make that part not so bad. However, according to the wiki, the only exotic breathers are only obtainable via Wintersday Gifts. As for rare breathers, the only rare breathers are the Benthic ones (only available with Soldier’s stats), which are currently available for a few gold each on the trading post. The only level 80 karma breathers are fine and masterwork, available from Gavbeorn, in Orr (and only come with one set of stats [which is different for each armor weight]).

Nothing can save underwater combat since you can not dodge there.

FogLeg.9354:

Nothing can save underwater combat since you can not dodge there.

Yeah you can, there’s just no special animation for it (you just swim more quickly in the direction of the dodge).

FogLeg.9354:

Nothing can save underwater combat since you can not dodge there.

Funny, I seem to be able to dodge underwater. The character moves and if I time it properly I get the Evade proc.

I for one love the underwater combat aspect to this game however just as you said there is very little variation in builds/equipment to use underwater and I just feel weaker so honestly I avoid it when I can..hopefully they can come up with a way to make it better because I really do think its a great thing, It just needs some TLC.

Hi, I think water scences are actually nice, but just not focused atm. In the future, how about adding a new feature called submerge. Just like gliding in the air, submerge allows you to fight on the ocean floor just like on the lands and use the 3 water weapons with new different skills when fighting on ocean floor. So you can switch between 2 modes while underwater. Add new traits/trait line if necessary for more fun. Instead of making new maps, rework on the water scene machenics and add new mini games like sea treasure hunting sort of things.

There can even be a live story. For example, Taimi went look for rare materials to make a more robost scruffy so that it won’t break next time it serves as a wire… She went to the caribbean sea and had gone missing. Few months later some little asura general leads an army of cute quaggans attacking vigil outposts who looks familiar… Boss has to investigate what happened and there you go Rise of Asura (ROAR) one of your future expansion (if there is more) invloving sea dragon XD. I am just thinking out loud.

Underwater combat needs to be seen to. Either Anet needs to completely give up on it and remove it, or finally get around to fixing it. A ton of skills aren’t available underwater, some for no sensible reason, some because Anet couldn’t be bothered to code in a proper way to target them in water. I cringe every time fractal dailies contain Aquatic Ruins, please Anet, remove it or fix it. Don’t leave it in as it is.

I’d honestly rather the devs leave uw combat alone vs removing it completely. It’s not like uw combat is bad, it just has glaring issues. I mean the American judicial system had issues and loop holes but I’d rather it exist flawed than just anarchy.

Asking for more weapons might be a stretch but definitely push to have more of the utilities opened or uw variants.

PS: I think the main thing wrong with uw combat is that the devs may be ignoring it

yeah underwater combat sucks… tho idk how exactly it could be fixed, i do like the idea of being to fight on the actual ocean floor, since one of the things that sucks is movement. but it being seen to in general would b nice.

If we ever get to Bubbles I imagine underwater will be a big deal so they should fix it now instead of waiting.

Feel like bobbing into this slightly necroed thread to advise you can make ascended aquabreathers since the end of last year (IIRC). Recipes cost next to nothing from the BLTC if you don’t feel like opening lots of fractal boxes.

I love the full 3d aspect of underwater combat. It’s essentially flying and aerial combat.

I enjoy the depth that underwater combat brings to the game so I really hope they do not remove it. Yes, it is a bit overlooked, but it has excellent potential. I like that you get different weapons for that situation. It also provides a “reason” for your character being able to stay underwater for so long (breathers). instead of just magically being able to breathe down there forever.

I was bummed when they took out that pvp map with the underwater capture point…

A separate trait line for underwater combat. Doesn’t have to be 3×3×3 necessarily, but enough to add more variety whilst in the depths. Take current traits for spearguns/spears/tridents away from the current trait lines, and put them in the underwater combat line instead, for example.

penelopehannibal.8947:

A separate trait line for underwater combat. Doesn’t have to be 3×3×3 necessarily, but enough to add more variety whilst in the depths. Take current traits for spearguns/spears/tridents away from the current trait lines, and put them in the underwater combat line instead, for example.

This is an idea with merit. I think working in something like this.

Water combat means water is accessible. In some games you can’t enter water because there is nothing in it, so they don’t have to map it properly out. The end effect: Invisible walls at shores and every place with water. And invisible walls are bad.

I really think the aquatic stuff in GW2 is cool. Diving into it and be attacked by various underwater foes is cool. Or seeing a Quaggan once in a while.

But I find underwater combat very confusing. Everything feels dizzy and trippy. When I fire my weapons on land I have a real impact. Visually, audio-wise and I know how to react. Underwater however, I feel like my torpedos (coming from a harpoon gun…) are simply vanishing. They travel slow and the only thing I can really notice is the damage numbers.

Believe it or not, but I have ONE weapon underwater: It’s my wrench. I whack fish all day long despite I have like 8 other skills I could use, but the wrench is the only “weapon” I know I am doing something to the enemy. Also, the attacks underwater seem to have vey huge hitboxes. In my 11 months here, I have so far never been drowning (downed state) underwater, so something’s wrong with ALL the combat, balance and stuff.

What would be nice is to have limited air (very slowly decreasing though), slower movement (at least the Asuran swim animation looks hilarious and 500% too fast), more animations like an actual diving emote and in general more bombastic fights. It is very underwhelming combat-wise but awesome to have this feature in the game.

Underwater combat needs a dedicated expansion, not a quick fix. I hope we’ll get an underwater themed expansion one day, and with Steve, there’s good reason to go down that route.

Sarie.1630:

Underwater combat needs a dedicated expansion, not a quick fix. I hope we’ll get an underwater themed expansion one day, and with Steve, there’s good reason to go down that route.

While I still enjoy underwater combat, I totally agree but that’s probably going to take a few years, maybe even cantha? (jade sea stuff!)
underwater mastery even has a ring to it, riding currents etc…

I’d also like to see the return of underwater pvp for unranked but that’s probably not going to happen

I like underwater combat too.
I’m ok with the limited and specialized underwater weapons,but the traits and utilities are a big problem.
Just an example,if I have DH trait line enabled,my traps don’t work underwater and all trap related traits are non applicable.
And the same goes for almost all the classes and a lot of their traits and utilities.

Either give us a separate window for our underwater traits build,of make all traits and utilities useable and useful for underwater combat.

I like the idea of underwater combat, but definitely agree it needs some polishing. Whether it ever will be depends on the devs’ priorities; UW combat works as intended, so it isn’t “broken”, I guess, but I would like to have more options. And frankly, too many skills are land-only.

As for the suggestion of a limited air supply—hmm…I don’t think that’ll ever happen as it would place another limit and require a fix to something that isn’t “broken”. Would make things “challenging” but would also make people dislike UW combat even more.

Yeah I really have no problem with UW combat, I hope they don’t phase it out. Seems to be very polished mechanically and visually. Didn’t know there was a real problem here. I get why people like fighting on land more, but this game does water combat well.

“Fixing” is just not enough of it to express exactly what needs to be done with this game content.

“Complete reworking and rebalancing Underwater Combat” fits it better.

Underwater Combat is until today the absolute most neglected part of the whole game, it has never ever seen anything at all in all those years until todax to improve anythign of the gameplay mechanics or balance of skills ect.

Instead ANet went the lazy way and removed absolutely mostly everything that had something to do with underwater combat out of WvW.
When Skill Balance Patches were made, the Underwater Skills never got any attention to get balanced, they all are still at the Development State of 2012!!

There is still half of all Skills among all classes not useable underwater, with certain classes gettign seriously PUNISHED HARD for fighting underwater, while others are not so much limited there in their basic gameplay!!

Underwater Combat is basicalyl the feature, that ANet should have kept completely out of the game from begin on best and should have implemented first into the game when they would have brought out the xpansion that is 100% focused on that feature and implements this feature together with lots of underwater maps/content and makign the water passages of the existing maps then first accessible to be explored so that we would have had then for those maps that have lakes, rivers and seas ect. then some new stuff to explore together weith the story and battle aroudn the Deep Sea Elder Dragon and its minions

Thats how I do see it by now after all those years… Underwater Combat in its current form is nothing but a huge wasted potential – ressources that should have been spent better elsewhere into maybe a longer personal story for the main game, or into some more skills for all classes as they all are currently still missing skills so that they have for all skill categories also under Utilities, Heals and Elite Skills a fitting skill for each category

Or thery could have used the ressouces better on something else, that was announced to be there on release date and still inst’ there until today, like Polymok and many missing Home Town “Adventures/Minigames” that should have been a reason for players to keep on revisiting these towns every now and then, stuff like the removed Bar Brawls for example whose achievements were already once in the game, but not the mini game >.>

This are all prime examples for how well certain thigns got thought through here for this game, only worser is that all these thigns seem to have been put already silently forever on ice without a word about these things anymore, in hope, we may forget these things “somewhen” maybe…

But as long as I play this game, I will keep reminding Anet on these things …

+++++ for under water combat. Some of my characters seem squishy under water and could use more fighting options, like new weapons and weapon skills. We have so many options on land, but too few in the water.

Deedrick.4372:

I don’t aim to speak for other players, but its not a matter of feeling week, its a matter of weak AI and underwater enemies. It’s quite the opposite, because all I have to do is swim in a circle spamming 1 on just about any weapon and I will kill everything with out getting hit. There are few exceptions to this.

I have the opposite experience. When I am underwater, I get attacked from all sides. I can kill something in front of me, but if I get into melee range, I aggro something else. I can kill a dozen or more enemies, swimming from one to another, but I can’t get out of combat. Even worse, I can’t dodge because I can’t see what’s attacking me or where it is attacking from. (Of course, it’s only fair to mention that I don’t use a mouse because of wrist issues, and it’s much harder to look around and find out where the attack is coming from without a mouse.)

Some things not mentioned:

•Camera clipping with surface

•No frame of reference for judging distance

•75% of deep water exploration ends up being fighting monsters in an “empty room”

Something probably mentioned:

•Projectile weapons become hyper effective compared to melee ones because of the 360° 1200 range attacks that require minimal movement and there is ZERO natural cover. Without cover, it is also hard to stack mobs around a corner to cleave with the melee weapons negating that should-be-advantage.

Each of these problems can be addressed by moving pve foes from the top half of lakes to the bottom and adding more features/objectives to the lake bottoms.

Yes, I agree that some changes/polishes need to be made to underwater combat. It really does add another element to the game, which is good.

Also, I wish that there could be more than just ONE piece of music that would play underwater. It gets very old. We get different music in different zones, why not underwater as well?

Justine.6351:

Some things not mentioned:
•No frame of reference for judging distance

I did mention it. That’s why I use my wrench underwater. The hitboxes underwater are somewhat either wide or just broken. When something’s spazzing out 5m away from me and I get hit I know I am in one of these huge hitboxes. When I fire a torpedo and I can’t even tell when it’s going to hit something there is something wrong. Over the surface everything is clearly visible and working well. And the hitboxes are really much closer.

Moyayuki.3619:

Also, I wish that there could be more than just ONE piece of music that would play underwater. It gets very old. We get different music in different zones, why not underwater as well?

That’s true, but just in case, let me point out you can create your own soundtracks specifically for underwater.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Customized_soundtrack

Sir Mad.1092:

Moyayuki.3619:

Also, I wish that there could be more than just ONE piece of music that would play underwater. It gets very old. We get different music in different zones, why not underwater as well?

That’s true, but just in case, let me point out you can create your own soundtracks specifically for underwater.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Customized_soundtrack

So we can use music from our iTunes? That would be really awesome. There is one track from the Final Fantasy X soundtrack that I have that I would love to have playing in GW2. =)

You can use any music on your computer, yeah (some formats may not play though because of the lack of codecs – just reencode the track if that happens).

The only issue with underwater tracks is they only play if you’re underwater when the previous track ends, not as soon as you jump in a river.

For now, I want mainly 4 things to improve underwater combat.

1. ALL healing, utility, elite and profession skills should work underwater. If the skill is ground-targeted, it’ll simply lock on target when underwater instead. If it summons a creature or a turret or anything like that, the creature will either still work underwater, or have an underwater counterpart, and transform into its counterpart when entering or leaving water. Traps would create nets like those nets krait use. The nets would be visible to the enemy, but visible to allies as if they had Stealth.
2. Swim down needs to be bound to a key by default.
3. Breathers should stop being gear. They should be mere skins. While underwater, the helm stats would still be used, but the appearance of the breather would be used. The recipes from fractals would be replaced by recipes for new Breather skins made out of existing skins. For example, the Soldier recipes would produce items that unlock Sorrow’s Embrace armor helmet skins as breather skins instead ascended Soldier breathers. Other recipes for breathers like those bough with karma, and other breathers found as rewards as drops, bought with karma or during festivals would also be replaced by skins, using as many already existing skins as possible that could look like breathers, like the Gas Mask skin.
4. The traits selected underwater may need to be saved separately and switch when entering and leaving water, unless all weapons and skills are also allowed underwater, or all weapon traits affect also an underwater weapon.

I think the more productive solution would be to drain a lot of the water from the game and convert the newly dry areas to land content.

When did they last include underwater weapons in BL Chests? It’s been a long time. Underwater combat and zones are dead to them and they have proven it with their actions.

MithranArkanere.8957:

For now, I want mainly 4 things to improve underwater combat.

1. ALL healing, utility, elite and profession skills should work underwater. If the skill is ground-targeted, it’ll simply lock on target when underwater instead. If it summons a creature or a turret or anything like that, the creature will either still work underwater, or have an underwater counterpart, and transform into its counterpart when entering or leaving water. Traps would create nets like those nets krait use. The nets would be visible to the enemy, but visible to allies as if they had Stealth.
2. Swim down needs to be bound to a key by default.
3. Breathers should stop being gear. They should be mere skins. While underwater, the helm stats would still be used, but the appearance of the breather would be used. The recipes from fractals would be replaced by recipes for new Breather skins made out of existing skins. For example, the Soldier recipes would produce items that unlock Sorrow’s Embrace armor helmet skins as breather skins instead ascended Soldier breathers. Other recipes for breathers like those bough with karma, and other breathers found as rewards as drops, bought with karma or during festivals would also be replaced by skins, using as many already existing skins as possible that could look like breathers, like the Gas Mask skin.
4. The traits selected underwater may need to be saved separately and switch when entering and leaving water, unless all weapons and skills are also allowed underwater, or all weapon traits affect also an underwater weapon.

#1: Yes. Yes. Yes!!
#2: You actually can go thru the options and map a key to make your character swim down. You go down w/o changing direction. I would list it, but it’s nearly midnight and the game wants to update. If I can think about it, I’ll come back and list where it is tomorrow or something.
#3: I’ve never really liked having to use a separate helm and mask either.
#4: That might also be a good idea.

Glad you posted this.

Yeah. I know you can bid the key. But not many people do.

It needs to be bond by default, and when entering underwater in starting areas with low level characters a movement tooltip with the keys should appear, so people not checking options can see it.

Underwater combat without swim down is HORRID. To go down, you have to actually look down and swim downwards, while with swim down you can freely move in all directions while keeping an eye on the target.

Underwater combat is likely to be overhauled in a future expansion revolving around the underwater dragon “Bubbles.” In theory, I’m guessing Bubbles will be one of the last dragons to be fought.

So I wouldn’t hold your breath ;D

But be rest assured that I believe A-net will eventually get to it.

MithranArkanere.8957:

Yeah. I know you can bid the key. But not many people do.

It needs to be bond by default, and when entering underwater in starting areas with low level characters a movement tooltip with the keys should appear, so people not checking options can see it.

Underwater combat without swim down is HORRID. To go down, you have to actually look down and swim downwards, while with swim down you can freely move in all directions while keeping an eye on the target.

To swim down, I click both clickers on the mouse at once and move the mouse backwards, which makes me go downward. But yes, it does limit what else I could be doing/takes my visual attention elsewhere.

I bound “swim down” to x in my first week playing the game. The one thing I don’t like about it is that it feels slower than pointing the camera down and moving forwards.

Adding my +1 to this.

I was pretty content with GW2’s underwater experience. I’m sad the devs backed away from it instead of committing to updates to fix the gaps. And poor Revenant…

ekarat.1085:

I bound “swim down” to x in my first week playing the game. The one thing I don’t like about it is that it feels slower than pointing the camera down and moving forwards.

This. I have swim down and swim up separately bound and maneuvering in water is rather easy now.

i have to +1 the separate underwater build… WvW and PvP and PvE all have independent build templates, so should underwater combat (it already has separate skill bar, why not traits, too?)

The game lacked flying and mounts which was completely fine and it was fine because when GW2 launched it offered up something different and rather unique.

That being underwater combat and many people were initially sold on this game for that one aspect alone. However instead of balancing it they removed the water from PvP Lobby and the the entire map, instead of adding new underwater weapons including BL ticket weaps they stopped working on them all together.

Legendary weapons may have stopped now but the legendary underwater weapons were canned way earlier than the rest. We have a so called expansion with only a few underwater caves that lack combat for the most part.

We got an extra weapon for a paid expansion but I don’t think anyone truly expects to get the third missing water weapon for their class.

Anet has had from launch until now to polish one if it’s main and unique draws to pull people into this game and instead they have disowned it as well as many other things all in the name of esports.

So yes I like underwater and yes it was a part of my decision process to get this very game. However I just can’t see Anet spending time on it Bubbles the magical water dragon or not. It’s a major en-devour and so little has been done to expand other easier aspects of this game.

Press Escape key. Select “Options”. Then “Control Options” (the mouse icon on the left side of the Options menu). “Swim Down” is in the first panel “Movement”. (I believe it is blank by default.)

Doam.8305:

The game lacked flying and mounts which was completely fine and it was fine because when GW2 launched it offered up something different and rather unique.

That being underwater combat and many people were initially sold on this game for that one aspect alone. However instead of balancing it they removed the water from PvP Lobby and the the entire map, instead of adding new underwater weapons including BL ticket weaps they stopped working on them all together.

Legendary weapons may have stopped now but the legendary underwater weapons were canned way earlier than the rest. We have a so called expansion with only a few underwater caves that lack combat for the most part.

We got an extra weapon for a paid expansion but I don’t think anyone truly expects to get the third missing water weapon for their class.

Anet has had from launch until now to polish one if it’s main and unique draws to pull people into this game and instead they have disowned it as well as many other things all in the name of esports.

So yes I like underwater and yes it was a part of my decision process to get this very game. However I just can’t see Anet spending time on it Bubbles the magical water dragon or not. It’s a major en-devour and so little has been done to expand other easier aspects of this game.

I, too, thought the underwater stuff was interesting. Then they redid things so you couldn’t even go underwater for combat until you’d gained several levels. I’ve never understood that (or why allowing you to open your weapons the old way was changed). I was used to starting underwater combat at low level. Gone are the days, I guess. But to be fair, it doesn’t take an extreme amount of time/levels to get UW combat now, I just still prefer the old way.