Guild Wars 2

I find it odd none of the top threads have touched on this (especially with many posts on the need for more active combat and things of that nature) but I find the underwater combat to be very lacking, nay dreadful. That’s not to say it’s not dynamic, doable, or cool, but there is a severe drop in dps once you hit the waves. The nature of most weapon skills underwater revolve around conditions and movement rather than damage like their land counterparts, which makes even single mobs difficult.

Not only that, but a huge array of utility skills and elites can’t be used underwater, ergo many builds don’t exist once you put your head under. For example, as a thief, most skills are area effects, teleports, and stealths; once you’re under the water, really your only options are signets that increase stats slightly and allow a shadowstep or blind to a single target. This reduces survivability and stealth abilities (which is the primary way a thief dishes out damage and exhibits combat control). This is not an isolated case; elementalists are also a good example of this (and all are free to post there thoughts of every other class).

Fire attunement is supposed to bring burning and big damage, but underwater, only one move burns and only 3 deal substantial damage, which siginificantly hinders dps. Water brings healing and support, but underwater only 2 moves heal (one for a very meager amount, the other only gives regen) while the bomb and wall skills hint at water attunement as being the “glass cannon” underwater rather than fire. Lightning and earth have similar problems as the previous 2 as far as lack of damage options worth considering in return for lots of long cool down condition moves and movement of sorts. Though you could argue that that one would have to utilize all 4 attunements to procure good dps, does this not go against the purpose of trait lines as a means to specialize yourself into a certain role?

If this weren’t enough, the multi-dimensional nature of the environment has proved more of a hinderance than a blessing. On land, you know what is around you and when you can engage a 1 v 1 or 2 v 1 safely or escape on low health, etc. In water, it is difficult to be fully aware of mobs that can exist all around you, especially when lots of classes have moves that cause displacement (move your toon around). Charging, pulling, dodging away, teleporting can be a death sentence instead of an escape or initiate because in the 3-D combat environment, more enemies exist around you per cubic area compared to on land since mobs technically exist on a 2-D plane on land (birds don’t rain down on you out of no where and mobs don’t emerge from underground from some obscure range of hostility).

This coupled with the loss of true damage and survivability make underwater fights a headache to say the least. I’d love for some player feedback to know I’m not crazy but I do feel that these complaints are well thought out and consistently experienced in-game. To test whether this is true, compare the ease that you solo (or duo) a veteran mob on land then take it to the water. Note how many enemies surround you, how many times you HAVE to heal or dodge or avoid damage/blow a big cool down. A good test run is the Ship of Sorrows explorer achievement in Straits of Devastation. You fight 1 v 2 fights quite often on the ship and many mobs are around you.

Anyways, please comment and share your likes/dislikes with water combat and let me know if I’m crazy or on to something.

I would whole-heartedly agree with everything you said; and i’de also add that the loss of damage coulped with the fact that everything has the same health on land as in water just makes already dull silver/champion/boss fights simply unbearable.
http://youtu.be/CdQmQ2HqAGU?t=4m6s
This video is of one of the top dungeon guilds (if not THE top guild) doing AC, from the perspective of the guy that created a Ranger build that rivals Warrior DPS. As you can see when they jump into the water, his lvl 80 theif doesn’t even have the 2 ability on his spear unlocked, which I think says alot about under water combat.

Used to be decently fun, despite having 0 utility skills, no elite and lack of stealth under water as Thief. Then they nerfed the only thing that made it not 100% horrible. Now I don’t enjoy the water as much anymore.

I love the combat itself but the randomly lost skills/utilities (the only weapons you can’t use underwater should be the gunpowder using ones) really make me a sad asura.

Never had a problem with the difficulty though, the underwater abilities seem more damaging across the board in my experience – but completely destroying your build (well necromancers T_T) is unacceptable, either give us a different trait spec for underwater, or give us the skills/utils.

Some of the omissions don’t even make sense, like, I can use my elixir gun 5 underwater, though It requires me to manually aim it at a solid object – which is awesome as I need to be very aware of my surroundings and possible impact points.

I’d be fine with that for all other GTAoEs

I think its great, and have to disagree about the lowered DPS when fighting underwater. I’ve always thought its greater, with Anet making it so since the combat can be more difficult with the extra dimension. Its easy gliding through the water slaughtering everything with any class. My guildies would have to agree with the OP, however.

I do have to say that GW2’s underwater combat is very reminiscent of DAoC’s. I really enjoyed that too and had no issues though friends of mine avoided it like the plague.

It is interesting that this hasn’t been a bigger topic in the Discussion forum.

Indeed, the entire skillset more or less changes when underwater rendering your land build non-existent. Which, I think is a good thing in and of itself.

However, the skills one receives in place, need to be exciting and fulfilling—most of them are not.

Also, maneuverability is sluggish and frustrating.

P.S. I regularly use the water to escape or gain advantage to defeat enemies in WvW, as most players don’t have decent underwater equipment. Also, as a Ranger the pets seem to prove more troublesome and dangerous to enemies.

Underwater exploration is great. Underwater combat? Not so much. Between the severely limited skill selection and the bad hit detection, combat just isn’t as enjoyable underwater as it is on land.

I love the underwater combat and landscapes. One of the things that made me fall in love with this game when I first started was how beautiful it was under there. I would travel all around just to check them out.

You are right though on some classes needing to be retouched for underwater combat to make it a bit more fun. My necro for example is hard as hell to get his DS charged back up underwater. On the other hand I have no problems with engineer underwater.

if you are a mesmer and ele under water you rule the oceans like aquaman wishes he could.
if you’re a thief underwater then whats wrong with you?

Underwater combat is all about CC. When I was in Team Legacy before they left GW2, we made it a staple to utilize underwater combat and required everyone in the guild to have full underwater exotic gear, even going out of our way to run the event every once in a while to gain access to Gavebeorn’s breathers. No enemy would follow us into the water and at many points, we were farming them. It’s all about coordination. When you have an entire 25-man organized zerg of the same guild diving the the bottom of the lake around Bay and coordinating attacks in order (guardian spikes, ele cages, mesmer pulls), it’s pretty scary. We never lost a GvG fight underwater and it’s because we spent weeks on end theorycrafting the best possible ways to use it to our advantage while the rest of the game preferred land combat any day. Those were also some of my best experiences with the Team.

Aside from that, you have a third dimension to worry about. You can’t think of underwater combat as two-dimensional like the rest of the combat in the game with the added Z-axis, and using that to your advantage will confuse your enemies more than a top tier mesmer. Your attacks will hit depending on the angle of your camera, so if you’re above them and aim down, you’ll hit from above. Same with from below. Positioning is a key part in determining the outcome of an underwater fight, and while there may not be too many blocks or conditions underwater, there are two things you can count on: direct damage and CC. Every class has both in multiple forms of some type on each weapon underwater. That’s the underwater meta.

It really depends on the class. For my warrior and ranger, with a spear and all my signets intact? It’s fantastic. For my ele, with half my skills culled, including my good glyphs, only one elite, and only one weapon option with terrible skills? It’s not so great.

Instead of skills being completely unavailable underwater, these skills should simply have an underwater version. Please give me one good reason why I shouldn’t be able to summon my elementals underwater, or a glyph of storms centered on my target. I don’t mind the change in combat, but I really don’t like having my skills taken away.

Doggie.3184:

Used to be decently fun, despite having 0 utility skills, no elite and lack of stealth under water as Thief. Then they nerfed the only thing that made it not 100% horrible. Now I don’t enjoy the water as much anymore.

My thief underwater feels like a completely different character. And by different, I mean useless.

Tamaki Revolution.3548:

Doggie.3184:

Used to be decently fun, despite having 0 utility skills, no elite and lack of stealth under water as Thief. Then they nerfed the only thing that made it not 100% horrible. Now I don’t enjoy the water as much anymore.

My thief underwater feels like a completely different character. And by different, I mean useless.

Hehe. Cry about your lack of stealth some more. Your tears feed my pets.

In all honesty, I run a condition thief which is far more useless than a burst thief underwater. Burst thieves have Shadowed Assault which is a spammable evade while attacking. I don’t see how not-OP that is.

Can I pick something between great and suicidal? I love the idea of water combat that the game presents us with, and was absolutely stoked for it prelaunch. In practice, it does feel like your abilities are a bit diminished under water, and I gotta wonder why some things are wholesale blocked. I main a thief, and as noted, we seem to be on the short end of the aqua-stick, though. Doesn’t the magical, teleporting, more-members-on-demand Thieves’ Guild have water breathers? I would love to sea water combat tweaked a bit more, but I know there are probably a lot higher priorities for ANet atm.

Its great but without a single place in the whole game where its actually fun and challenging so /justwait

Viking Jorun.5413:

Tamaki Revolution.3548:

Doggie.3184:

Used to be decently fun, despite having 0 utility skills, no elite and lack of stealth under water as Thief. Then they nerfed the only thing that made it not 100% horrible. Now I don’t enjoy the water as much anymore.

My thief underwater feels like a completely different character. And by different, I mean useless.

Hehe. Cry about your lack of stealth some more. Your tears feed my pets.

In all honesty, I run a condition thief which is far more useless than a burst thief underwater. Burst thieves have Shadowed Assault which is a spammable evade while attacking. I don’t see how not-OP that is.

Eh, talking about PvE here guy. I’m also a condition thief, so not sure where you’re going with this. I just hate losing all my utilities and elites.

Also 30 into SA pretty much means nothing, and no caltrops on dodge underwater XD

Underwater Combat needs to be reworked. Meelefights seem to be pointless because you miss most of the time and ranged combat feels spammy. I like the way the ranger works underwater, you really want to switch between meele and ranged because both weaponsets provide really useful and strong skills. I can’t stay that about other professions.

Rangers and Mesmers are fun underwater. I may be biased on the ranger part, mainly because I love my shark. Not a big fan of Guardians underwater (feels like it takes too long to kill most things), Necros are fine, and I enjoy Engi’s turrets underwater unlike above water.

I’d agree that ranged feels very spammy.

Tamaki Revolution.3548:

Rangers and Mesmers are fun underwater. I may be biased on the ranger part, mainly because I love my shark. Not a big fan of Guardians underwater (feels like it takes too long to kill most things), Necros are fine, and I enjoy Engi’s turrets underwater unlike above water.

Yeah I don’t like Guardians at all underwater – no Damage, not many useful combos.

I still don’t understand why we deal less damage underwater and why there are no finishing moves underwater.

I like underwater combat, but then I have a ranger for that with full lvl 80 exotic weapons and superior sigils. I also have 2 lvl 80 breathers slotted with a 7th rune so I maintain my 6th rune bonus depending on which armour set I am using.

The reason many don’t like under combat is because they do not bother, or are too cheap, to run level appropriate underwater kit.

As for utility skills, so certain ones are not available – big deal. Rangers loose all traps and anything ground-target related. This does not make rangers useless underwater. No matter what class you play, if your build is that dependent on these unavailable skills, then that is a problem with your build, not the combat.

Yup, it might take a play style adjustment to play in a completely different environment, who would have thought?? But this should not be a problem for all you so-called ‘pro’ hot-shot players, yes??

Surely this depends on the profession and weapon choice.

My engineer and ranger are as good underwater as they are on land. My necro, I’m not quite as happy with.

working as intended.

some professions are meant to be powerful while under water.

Elite aside, my build translates perfectly underwater. It doesn’t mean I’m pleased with the restrictions. Granted, some make sense mechanic-wise, and some make sense immersion-wise, it just bugs me that some things, like engi turrets had all new assets for underwater, but thieves’ guild npcs can’t just use the pre-existing swimming human animation. Not that I use traps as a thief, but if engi’s get special aqua turrets, why don’t thieves and rangers get aqua traps for example? Or look at grenade kit (sorry to keep hammering at engis). The whole skill bar fundamentally changes its function underwater. Why not that level of attention on everything to make it work. Necros lose their elite minion just for going underwater.

And which of us are the pro hot-shot players exactly? Maybe the Team Legacy dude, but I’m pretty sure he was doing the opposite of complaining.

I’m not a fan of underwater combat.

You have poor manoeuvrability, all your powers change but you have to be under water to get it set up (and you’d better hope you remembered to get it all set up before meeting that boss). You can’t tell where the surface is so you can inadvertently poke your head up out of the water then you lose ALL your skills. Things under water seem to aggro at enormous distances and seem to be telepathically linked to each other. Damage output under water varies considerably depending on what class you’re playing…more so than it does for ground combat. Mobs move into melee range instantaneously and you just can’t get away from them.

I go under water only when I absolutely have to…

I personally think its great.

Some of the weaponsets need better balance tweaking, and as brought up earlier, more utility skills need to be usable.

However, in general water combat in this game is pretty well done.

Many of the terrestrial combat strategies also work underwater, which I think is a nice touch.

Dagraan.2854:

if you are a mesmer and ele under water you rule the oceans like aquaman wishes he could.
if you’re a thief underwater then whats wrong with you?

This is one of the most powerful classes underwater.

The main thing I don’t understand about underwater combat is the downed mechanic. Swim to the surface? Um, why? And chasing people around who are downed and yet still swimming is as frustrating as trying to survive yourself.

It’s a neat idea and I love the graphics underwater but since I don’t practice much it ends up being an irritating mini game I can’t quite get the hang of.

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

working as intended.

some professions are meant to be powerful while under water.

Probably. Mesmer trident skills bleed things to death fast and it’s fun to watch a thief run away without stealth, not that I ever see too many thieves underwater.

My favorite play is to aggro a bunch of kraits and drag them on to some poor sap trying to build a quaggie node, then I stealth away.

bri.2359:

I like underwater combat, but then I have a ranger for that with full lvl 80 exotic weapons and superior sigils. I also have 2 lvl 80 breathers slotted with a 7th rune so I maintain my 6th rune bonus depending on which armour set I am using.

The reason many don’t like under combat is because they do not bother, or are too cheap, to run level appropriate underwater kit.

As for utility skills, so certain ones are not available – big deal. Rangers loose all traps and anything ground-target related. This does not make rangers useless underwater. No matter what class you play, if your build is that dependent on these unavailable skills, then that is a problem with your build, not the combat.

Yup, it might take a play style adjustment to play in a completely different environment, who would have thought?? But this should not be a problem for all you so-called ‘pro’ hot-shot players, yes??

Pretty sure all of us are in exotics, and not complaining about underwater combat while wearing whites. I also get the feeling you mean thieves losing stealth is build reliant, when it’s a basic concept for the entire class, so lose the attitude. Who said they were a pro hot shot player (lol), weird guy.

underwater combat is incomplete

I like playing underwater although some of my characters are not so polished for that type of combat. My biggest gripe is the bug in which if a mob knocks you into shallow water and downs you, there are no skills (downed or otherwise) to use. That is a situation where you must simply wait to die.
I think with some polish on the professions that are very weak underwater and possibly a separate, save-able build for this type of combat, it could become more popular.

I kinda feel like the whole separate underwater mechanic is unnecessary, especially that it requires a different set of weapons. I don’t think it even warrants its own legendary versions since we very rarely do combat there. I would’ve liked it better if they just allowed us to use our weapon sets on both land and water.

Dagraan.2854:

if you are a mesmer and ele under water you rule the oceans like aquaman wishes he could.
if you’re a thief underwater then whats wrong with you?

Thieves used to good only as PVE evade tanks underwater.

Now that thieves underwater abilities have been nerfed to the ground. They just plain suck.

For me water combat is worst part. You will lose all your skills, which makes your character somehow unique, your DPS lower, and it’s hell hard to navigate in 3D environment. I just not understand why it’s important to remove every single utility skill while you underwater. I mean i understand why: you need to implement something, but you don’t have time and resources to make it equal to surface combat. But i don’t understand why to put so many missions under water, where some classes really become twice as least powerful as they’re on surface.

I don’t think it is great or suicidal, it just isn’t executed in a real fun way. I think there is real potential here, but it needs developed and for somebody to take a good hard look at it. I’d love for a primarily underwater map to be created, but not in its current state.

Well, water combat is does nto come up much, and it feels simplified. Underwater enemies are generally weaker though. It could be improved, but it could also have been way worse than it is. I just wish skills would let you know they do or dont work underwater. Always a pain trying to pick a skill for the elite slot for my characters.

It’s annoying to have and carefully put together build, utilizing various traits & weapons & skills, only to have all of that become useless as soon as my head goes underwater. As an Engineer that frequently uses FT builds, it’s quite a hinderance to lose my primary weapon when underwater. And having to switch to something else means that it will be weaker than it would be on land if traited for.

At the least, we need a separate underwater trait system. And the loss of certain utility skills needs to be looked into. I understand that a flamethrower wouldn’t operate underwater. It then needs to be changed to another type of kit that works in the same way that benefits from the same traits. For instance, FT becomes a hot acid gun or a volcanic rock launcher.

Being able to have completely unique 1-0 skills underwater is cool, but needs to be reworked so-as not to be so limiting for certain builds that it’s weak or, as indicated by the thread title, suicidal.

I love underwater combat and wish their was more of it in game. They routinely ignore this aspect of the game and an update or expansion underwater would be great! Enough JPs, do a little underwater also.

Though, there a lot of valid points and concerns brought up in this thread. A total revamp of the system in probably not practicle.

And I have never heard of an Engie complaining about UW combat! Engies are one of the best classes to play underwater. While we may be lackluster above ground, we excel below the surface.

Yeah, I would have to agree that engies are good underwater. Fighting krait with an elixir gun seems much more fun than on land with flamethrower. In WvW, combat is a bit different, but still decent.

Water combat is ok but there needs to be more play on the 3d where you can go up or down with a one touch button.
At the same time there is a prospective problem human judges how big and fast things are base off other things in the environment so if your in open water every thing looks small and as if they are moving slow. So we need water with more things in it to swim though and over etc.. i think that would add a lot more to “feeling” of underwater combat.

I never said Engis underwater were bad. Just used that as an example since it’s my main. To create and trait a FT build and then go underwater and realize your main weapon no longer exists is annoying. If you’re running ’nades on land, underwater is sick good. My point is that underwater forces a new weapon and restricts your utilities. Which means often times your well thought out build becomes a shadow of itself underwater.

My favorite thing about ele under water is the speed of the auto attacks is so insanely high that the signet heal can keep you alive in full glass very easily. I especially loved the most recent buff to air#1&2, its so easy to hit for a few thousand per second but you have to be up close which can be tricky. I do hate that most of the earth and fire skills are useless and that water 5 is very hit or miss in terms of effectiveness.

They need to add exotic breathers with the 500 crafting or by some new karma vendors though, I hate adding superior runes to masterwork gear and that there is only one stat type at 80, not to mention lack of skins. It makes it feel unfinished, but i’m hopeful.

Underwater is terribly unbalanced.

It needs more weapon sets and utility skills that actually WORK underwater.

Underwater combat as a whole needs work. Its got a decent foundation but lacks a lot of polish.

Its clear that not even the devs care about it that much at this point. Many of the underwater weapons (spears excluded) are just copying the Staff / Rifle skins, there have been hardly any new underwater weapons / skins introduced to the point where I was actually shocked when I looked at the Aetherblade skins and saw underwater weapons, decent rebreathers are ridiculous to get (karma merchants ONLY? No crafting or TP? Really? And no exotics?), the ever-annoying bugs underwater don’t seem to get much attention especially the bug where enemies will just end combat randomly and heal, utilities (and traits) work differently or not at all, weaponsets are a lot more unbalanced…

Underwater content is kind of in a weird place, because right now its a joke to many people. It needs to get worked on, but if they put a lot of effort into polishing it up people will just complain thakittens a waste and no one cares about underwater content anyway (I remember a lot of complaints like that when they added combo fields / finishers to underwater weaponsets last Fall). But if they don’t work on it, it’ll continue to be overlooked and thought of as pointless.

I find water combat great, and super-easy once you get the hang of what precisely your weapons do and the right swapping and combos for them. Water combat for me is part of the icing on the cake of a superb game overall.

There’s a reason why the Water map in Spvp got removed from the tournament rotation.

I avoid underwater at all costs. I never do underwater tasks because it’s so annoying. They need to buff damage asap

I have every class and i find my ele u/water is the worst. She just pecks at the enemy and i avoid the underwater with her. Thief is a probably 2nd worst but in general, i find the u/water combat ok, but yea, my ele sucks. If i have to do aquatic killer for the daily it takes her twice as long to complete it.

Best u/water? My ranger with harpoon gun and my engi with elixir gun.