Guild Wars 2

To be blunt, I dislike the underwater combat. I’d really, really, really want to like it, I’ve even forced myself into water DEs just see if it wouldn’t grow on me, but no. If anything it’s pushing me away, which is a real shame. Underwater graphics are amazing, but the combat feels finicky, it’s dull, and I can’t help but feel insanely weak compare to the feeling I get above water.

So, last time I tried it I really scrutinized the entire session, trying to see what it is that made me dislike it so. And that made me think what I’d like to see that would change that.

1. Movement. I feel don’t know why, but down there I feel so very sluggish and not in control of the situation. Sure that might add a certain level of realism, but it just detracts from fighting, and with enemies coming at you from all sides.

2. Skills. There are some skills that you can’t carry with you underwater, which is fine, it makes sense. Though it made me wonder why the opposite isn’t also true. Why aren’t there any underwater specific utilities? If underwater combat is a strong feature, then perhaps a few skills focused in this area might be useful.

3. Fighting. Another reason I realized I felt weak was while fighting, it felt as if I just didn’t make a real impact. Above water some most of the time it feels to me that my weapon attacks carried some oomph, but underwater I don’t feel that. Maybe the skills can be update to have more impact. Something else I dislike is the fact that enemies pack you not only from the sides, but from above and below as well, now there are so few skills to really deal with that. A rapid jab will sometimes not even hit a target right under me. I think skills should interact more with the vertical plane, and have more aoe or cone effects in different directions.

Well, these are my gripes. I’m sure you might have a completely different perspective on this. So what bothers you, and how will you change it? Maybe you love the water combat, which is good, but if there;s anything you’d lack to add onto it, what would that be?

Are your underwater weapons of the same rarity as your land weapons?

I think the main problem people have with underwater is the additional dimension of depth they have to deal with. It makes mobs harder to group up and aoe, so control skills become very important in underwater combat.

Personally I enjoy the underwater combat. The way it works is similar to how JPs work. The better you are at navigating JPs, the more familiar you will find underwater combat (navigation and stuff, probably much easier to use a wasd + mouse keybind to do)

The main gripe I have really is the underwater skills. Yes it makes sense that certain skills can’t be used, but then it should just be morphed into a form that allows it to be.

I have a ranger specced to maximise trap utility, but it becomes useless underwater for instance.

Rangers own underwater combat after our wonderful Nov update buff ….

I enjoy underwater on my ranger, not as much on my guardian. Guardians share the spear with rangers, but the skills are entirely different and under-powered compared to the ranger’s set. The trident is ‘meh’ ..

I always use underwater travel when available for more direct map travel. Also, I use underwater travel most of the time in Orr to avoid the never-ending land spawns and always loads of normal and rich ore nodes down there ..

EDIT: Just wanted to add that cos I do more underwater travel than most players, I always keep my aqua breather and weapons at the proper level. At 80 both my ranger and guardian have full exotic underwater weapons …

I too would like to ask what weapon and class you are using underwater because I have noticed playing accross 4 different classes now that some weps/classes are just a heck of a lot better.

To Bri, I found underwater combat on my Ranger VERY fun/good even before this patch you speak of which I’m not even sure what that patch was lol. For Rangers I def suggest using spear underwater with a jellyfush. Why? Spear attacks are (aoe for lack of a better word) and it puts you real close to your jellyfish whish is great since he will heal you often as well as blind the enemy (I think he does or is that one of the spear skills I am confusing here, not played my ranger for some time :P).

@ Paulytnz

In the Nov update I referred to (patch notes are on the wiki..), there was an unexpected buff to some of the ranger underwater weapon skills, cannot remember exactly what now…

I was being a bit sarcastic cos, rangers were promised a big update in Nov by the devs, and got this instead of what we wanted or expected …

Yes, jellyfish is the underwater pet to have, I use this and an armor fish … The spear is great for ‘melee’ and the spinning aoe-type attack when surrounded by mobs. However, I like the harpoon for ranged attack. Both are very nice underwater weapons.. Now if only our land-side weapons were as effective …

I like underwater combat on my elementalist. Plenty of skills to choose from.

On my thief, I hate it. I only have two weapon choices, and only poisons (whom I suspect may be bugged underwater) and sigils are available. It’s boring. Weapon set one: spam 1 and 3. Weapon set 2: First use skill 4 to get close, then spam 5 and 2. Apply poisons when recharged.

And that for 80 levels and more. Yawn.

I mainly play with my guardian. My breather is masterwork, which I bought at Orr, and my spear is exotic.

The 1st attack is a projectile, it’s pretty slow and soft.
The 2nd skill does a good jab, but I’ve found that if the enemy is just above or below you, the attack will miss, so it kinda works on a flat plane and doesn’t quite register the 3D environment.
The 3rd attack is aoe, but the cooldown is quite long so when you’re swarmed it can’t really be relied upon to save your neck.
The 4th skill is a retreat that creates a wall of blades, which is useful, but the blades rarely damage foes all that much.
The 5th skill pulls a foe and burns the target. One would think it’s gold in conjunction with skill 4, but isn’t all that reliable for good damage.

My main problem is when I’m swarmed. Though I love skill 2, it frustrates more than anything. You need to position your target perfectly, or else you’ll see more misses than numbers. I used the trident more while leveling until I switched to spear, so I’m considering giving it a go if I can pick up a decent one.

As for my alts. My engineer is killer underwater due to grenades being brilliant. I love the spread of damage, and consistent battering it delivers. Although, this is mostly due to grenades being great all round.
I haven’t used my elementalist underwater a lot, so I’m not sure which attunements work best. I used fire and earth a bit, but remember both feeling a bit underwhelming.

Underwater combat in some professions is much worse than in others. An engineer underwater, using a grenade kit (which is directly targetable instead of ground target while underwater) is pure win. My warrior does well underwater too, particularly with a spear.

On my mesmer, however, I’m not thrilled with underwater combat and don’t enjoy it nearly as much.

Vayne.8563:

Underwater combat in some professions is much worse than in others. An engineer underwater, using a grenade kit (which is directly targetable instead of ground target while underwater) is pure win. My warrior does well underwater too, particularly with a spear.

On my mesmer, however, I’m not thrilled with underwater combat and don’t enjoy it nearly as much.

I have found the mesmer uw combat to be the best of them all-seeing as they have the most powerful phantasm on their spear,and illusions work great underwater.
Elementalist however is pure torture-0dmg no cond removal 2 of our 4 autoattacks are only for melee and the other 2 are so weak they aren’t worth casting .

There should at least be a way to have a different trait setup for underwater.

As it stands now, you trait for one build, and your entire skill line could be unusable underwater (Physical for Warriors, Consecrations for Guardians), gimping you severely.

Underwater combat is pretty ‘ok’ for me. Though it takes some getting used to, and it can be quite a lot more dangerous then on land obviously.

Biggest factors for me that hurt me in underwater combat was 1) it breaks rune sets if your aqua breather doesn’t have a rune, if you use max 6 slot bonus. 2) underwater gear tends to seriously be out of level if you don’t make sure to keep it up. Can only get aqua breathers from karma vendors that I know of. And that there is nothing better then masterwork for level 80.

Most attacks for a lot of classes are AoE, which while helpful can also be dangerous. I find it pretty fun though. Mostly on my Ele. While I hated it at first, it got a lot better once we got whirlwind elite. I really like Rangers underwater combat too, Engi isn’t bad either with Speargun.

Warrior.

Hate, hate, HATE !

it’s not interesting, not tactical, not fun. Skills are okay though, I just don’t like fighting underwater. And mobility is bad.

Azjenco.9425:

I mainly play with my guardian. My breather is masterwork, which I bought at Orr, and my spear is exotic.

The 1st attack is a projectile, it’s pretty slow and soft.
The 2nd skill does a good jab, but I’ve found that if the enemy is just above or below you, the attack will miss, so it kinda works on a flat plane and doesn’t quite register the 3D environment.
The 3rd attack is aoe, but the cooldown is quite long so when you’re swarmed it can’t really be relied upon to save your neck.
The 4th skill is a retreat that creates a wall of blades, which is useful, but the blades rarely damage foes all that much.
The 5th skill pulls a foe and burns the target. One would think it’s gold in conjunction with skill 4, but isn’t all that reliable for good damage.

My main problem is when I’m swarmed. Though I love skill 2, it frustrates more than anything. You need to position your target perfectly, or else you’ll see more misses than numbers. I used the trident more while leveling until I switched to spear, so I’m considering giving it a go if I can pick up a decent one.

As for my alts. My engineer is killer underwater due to grenades being brilliant. I love the spread of damage, and consistent battering it delivers. Although, this is mostly due to grenades being great all round.
I haven’t used my elementalist underwater a lot, so I’m not sure which attunements work best. I used fire and earth a bit, but remember both feeling a bit underwhelming.

Aha I see I see. My main is Engi and I agree they are great for underwater, I used to roll with grenades myself but now prefer the harpoon gun because it just plain kills things faster. Get in the enemies face with it and the number 2 skill really does massive damage 3 times.

Now with regards to your Guardian I too am playing my Guardian now and do prefer spear underwater. you are right you have to be on an even level with your foe or I find just a little bit above them. I hardly ever use the 4th skill as that runs the risk of causing the enemy to flee and go invuln and heal – never good. When you get outnumbered I would just suggest spamming your f1 skills and use the ONLY elite we have under water (which is crap I know but better than nothing) and if this still does not save you run for cover and try again if need be. As for the trident, I only find it useful when taking on bosses/champs with other people. Good Luck!

PS what the heck is up with a lot of engi skills being USELESS under water? Yes I am speaking of dwayna healing f-key, elixir gun heal skill and many other elixirs, they just can’t be aimed and fly past anywhere you need them to be!

Katreyn.4218:

Underwater combat is pretty ‘ok’ for me. Though it takes some getting used to, and it can be quite a lot more dangerous then on land obviously.

Biggest factors for me that hurt me in underwater combat was 1) it breaks rune sets if your aqua breather doesn’t have a rune, if you use max 6 slot bonus. 2) underwater gear tends to seriously be out of level if you don’t make sure to keep it up. Can only get aqua breathers from karma vendors that I know of. And that there is nothing better then masterwork for level 80.

Most attacks for a lot of classes are AoE, which while helpful can also be dangerous. I find it pretty fun though. Mostly on my Ele. While I hated it at first, it got a lot better once we got whirlwind elite. I really like Rangers underwater combat too, Engi isn’t bad either with Speargun.

Actually with regards to the rune sets with the testing that I have done you get the bonus of ALL your normal runes and anything on the breather is classed as a bonus so think of it that way. I could be wrong but I was playing with gear one day testing things and I’m sure that’s how I saw it….

I don’t like underwater combat, I never have in any game.

I do like that they’ve tried to make it different with different skills, weapons, etc.

Where are we supposed to get to aqua breathers? On the entire TP, lvl 1-80 for all rarities, there is 1. One. For lvl 20.

Hopefully not Orr. That place is awful. The WP are always contested. You can never buy anything from the karma vendors because of it.

Yeah, tell me it’s all soloable to open the karma vendors. I’ve tried. There is never anyone there to help.

Sorry to go OT, I just don’t like Orr. Actually I do, it’s all creepy and fun to explore. But that’s all you can do is run around. You can’t ever go anywhere you want because of the WP’s!

More aqua breathers, or accessibility would be nice. I still wouldn’t like underwater combat, but it would help.

I really like it. I have taken all but Warrior, Mesmer and Ranger underwater so far and I enjoy them all. I like the change of pace, though it still remains active it feels very different. I am yet to really explore deep underwater, but so far I have enjoyed every encounter of it.

I used to like underwater combat, but I’m finding at the higher levels the characters I am fighting are far more powerful than I am. I’m a level 80 Norn Ranger and I have a level 80 water cannon — I just played a level 47 quest — NOT a group event and I was down there chipping away for over an hour and 20 minutes, meanwhile getting ravaged by so many minions that can shoot farther and at more angles than I can, so I can’t even collect my loot. It’s just not worth it any more. How is it possible that I’m getting blasted from an angle that I can’t shoot from, I have to get to a level plane of some sort yet the minions can cause damage. Not to mention that I’m out of range yet taking huge damage from rocks being thrown not form cannons or turrets by enemies. I was so over matched that I almost gave up — not at all like me, I love a good challenge, normally. The inability to shoot from most reasonable angles needs to be adjusted IMO and I also find my targeting sucks too, double click, double click, double click and I can’t lock the target in, and auto targeting only works sporadically and it seems far worse in some venues more than others. Just my two cents — In fact, I killed a champion/veteran shark, by myself, that was supposed to be a group event way easier and in 1/5th the time of the individual quest on the same level.

EXACT WEAPON LEVEL 80 WATER CANNON OF FORCE (sigil of force) RARE.
Instance that I just played with great frustration — Blood Tide Coast, destroy psyllium generators and free quaggan prisoners. The generators took about 50 hits to destroy as well.

Am I missing something, other than the targets? lol

My only prior MMO experiences are Ultima Online, Everquest, Dark Ages of Camelot, and World of Warcraft. However, I can tell you with certainty, that of the games that have swimming/underwater combat, Guild Wars 2 is 1000 times better than the closest competition. At least A.net made an attempt to make being underwater less absurd (and slow).

ChaK.3254:

Warrior.

Hate, hate, HATE !

it’s not interesting, not tactical, not fun. Skills are okay though, I just don’t like fighting underwater. And mobility is bad.

Underwater combat is really boring, no matter what class (opinion) but I prefer the warrior underwater combat over anything else. You think warrior sucks? Try thief, I rather throw up coat-hangers.

Love ranger and mesmer underwater, guardian works better for me the more mobs there are. Love my ele but the skills they get underwater are bad, basically only use fire and air, seems a waste. Don’t really like spear on any of them. 3D thinking is required to get placement and mob locations so it is quite different than land combat. Necro I can’t seem to get the hang of underwater.