Guild Wars 2

For starters, i would like to state that i aggree with the concept of using
the tank-dps-healer system. Its an mmorpg game,
people like to have roles, thats why they play, to fulfill their role
and do their best to surpass the others in any way. Its a game.

The way the dungeons are now in this game is not fun! All the dying,
the reviving,the waypoint zerging,
the boss one-hit KO you if u are in the wrong place,
sometimes with only 1sec to react,
and with that ridiculus thin red line to avoid
when all other spell effects are going on.
I just DONT enjoy it… Its a mess..

But i will not whine. I know your answer.
“GO play another game”, or “its all about dodging”
or " all can do any role "
or all the reasons you state above in your posts…
And ok i agree, this is the game,
but do you know why i am writing this?
Cause this game is absolutely perfect in all the other aspects.
I LOVE it!! It could be the perfect one.. and yet it lacks in dungeons…
I just dont want to die and get revived all the time…
at first i hated it.. to tell you the truth i coped with it afterwards,
i found it challenging… but only cause i am a pve fun.
. i dont like the boss going zerging around to everyone
and kill u in one sec and then someone revives you…
ITS NOT EPIC!!
ITS NOT EPIC TO KEEP THROWING
BOULDERS ALL THE TIME SO YOU CAN BEAT THE BOSS…
REALLY..

ok, there are some fun bosses where the tactics favor
these new mechanics, but imagine haveing a huge
dragon zerging around with no reason
just to get dodged by an elementalist…

anyway i have some suggestions…
people who actually like this system,
please dont reply, i know your answers…

1.TURN THE SYSTEM TO “TANK-HEALER-DPS”
noone will listen to that so :

2. give to some classes some aggro skills,
or at least taunt skills and
build the aggro system from the beggining

3. u must make the game so we can see the target’s target
and what it is casting!!
so its more doable to dodge or to position yourself..
so give us target’s target frame and cast bar so we know
who the boss is going after and what is it casting.

4.replace this thin red line from traps,
with something more noticeable

5.CAN we please see our target’s health????

6.damage meter… everyone likes to measure their skills

These are my suggestions and i believe that
with these fixes the system of GW2 will be working
perfectly and noone will be whining about that…
haters gonna hate but its my opinion to make
this game more fun, cause

GUILD WARS 2 RULE

Ravenblade.7685:

Gutrot.9437:

2. So why not allow me to spec a tank with some aggro tools, and let those who want to spec as a DPS to go glass cannon
3. People with same language or guild can still run the instances and rolldodge their hearts content, I don’t want to take that away.

I don’t see how such a system could exist parallely with one rewarding an ancient mindset. People will always choose and prefer what they are used to. Since that would become a dominating mindset it will become outright obligatory. So the other one goes extinct and in doing so it will defeat one design purpose of the game.

Well, there are several people that defend the current role free gameplay, claiming that they enjoy the challenge. It’d be pretty funny if they would voluntary change to holy trinity if game would permit.
What I’m after here is, that why not let both groups get their wish. It would only be a small change, adding a bit of utility to here and there.

Are we all supposed to play the same type of game for ever and ever ?

Learn the game (not L2P, don’t tax me of trolling/flaming ), know your mates abilities and combine yourselves for great power : a.k.a Combos.

The most difficult part of this is to forget your old knowledges, and re-learn …
Thinking out of the box is not so difficult in itself, just try instead of being totally opposed to the idea.

lucretor.3084:

anyway i have some suggestions…

1.TURN THE SYSTEM TO “TANK-HEALER-DPS”
noone will listen to that so

Because not every solution to a problem lies with turning the perceived cause into a purpose. The true and not yet widely perceived cause seems to be a combination of lack of will to adapt, certainly overtuned content and unrewarding/stringent dungeon rules. If you fix 66% of the causes and leave the rest to the players then certainly you’ll have a way to get along with the system.

Nobody is certainly saying the current system is flawless and the embodiment of perfection but in my opinion and experience as well sometimes an approach requires several iterations to get there. Thus turning your back before not having tried an improvement at all is either:

- because you were reluctant to accept the new approach anyway and preferred the traditional approach and thus happily see things not working and as proof for old being better.
But: Even the traditional systems started out faulty once and people had to adapt to that as well!

or:
- the new system is doomed to fail regardless whatever you are trying. You’d have to be very experienced with system design and almost omniscient to actually state so with absolute certainty.

alternatively:
- you simply don’t want a change ever and thing of the genre having a hidden manifesto because of being dominated so long by a game using a system you are used thus concluding it must be the only working one. Which may not actually the case because simply noone ever has seriously tried that on equally large scale.

2. give to some classes some aggro skills,
or at least taunt skills and
build the aggro system from the beggining

Well, no. But not a strict ‘no’. More like snap-aggro with a long cooldown and fast decay of it might work.

3. u must make the game so we can see the target’s target
and what it is casting!!

5.CAN we please see our target’s health????

Yes. Agreed here. It would also help to get better insight into some mechanics without trial and error even outside dungeons. But I wouldn’t say “you must”. It does sound a bit commanding.

6.damage meter… everyone likes to measure their skills

I don’t think this would be wise because the system is not very static.
There are boons and combos – sometimes random and even stacking – which may skew the results easily it would also again lead to a very dreaded and warped mindset which led to an unhealthy amount of controversies in a certain game. Let’s not open that can of worms here.

Gutrot.9437:

Ravenblade.7685:

Gutrot.9437:

2. So why not allow me to spec a tank with some aggro tools, and let those who want to spec as a DPS to go glass cannon
3. People with same language or guild can still run the instances and rolldodge their hearts content, I don’t want to take that away.

I don’t see how such a system could exist parallely with one rewarding an ancient mindset. People will always choose and prefer what they are used to. Since that would become a dominating mindset it will become outright obligatory. So the other one goes extinct and in doing so it will defeat one design purpose of the game.

Well, there are several people that defend the current role free gameplay, claiming that they enjoy the challenge. It’d be pretty funny if they would voluntary change to holy trinity if game would permit.
What I’m after here is, that why not let both groups get their wish. It would only be a small change, adding a bit of utility to here and there.

I know but it’s not black and white here:
There are people who actually have adapted, some which have troubles to but are willing to, some which are undecided, some which prefer the old ones. If you actually implemented a dualistic system then there is a decent chance that many people will swing over either because it’s easier to switch than to adapt or due to peer pressure.

In the end this would also imply that the game would have to use two rails. From a technological and technical aspect that’s a lot of overhead we are looking at and in the end difficult to service properly.
That’s why I can’t realistically see a parallel existence. Game designers usually tend to make a clear cut whenever they have to tweak the system core of their game. I am not saying they couldn’t do it but the question is in the end whether it’s worth the efforts and that’s usually down to demographic breakdowns of demands – something us players don’t have access to but like to speculate (incl. myself) often about.

I never got to do AC yet as it was too bugged initially but I have done CM, TA and SE now. (level 68 currently)

CM was great I thought. The balance there was good and the instance didn’t take too long.

TA, well, I agree with the other poster that it’s a pain in the rear end…on various levels. There is a point where challenge becomes tedious. The last boss we couldn’t actually manage but it took hours to get there.

SE was ok, but rather long and it did bug the first time. The before-last boss was killed but the game didn’t realise it was dead so didn’t open the next gate. The second time it worked and the end boss was a pain but easier in the end.

What I am saying is that the difficulty within a single instance is most balanced in CM and not at all balanced in the other two I played. It does require tactics but the difference in difficulty between some bosses within the same instance is completely out there.

Gutrot.9437:

Ravenblade.7685:

Gutrot.9437:

2. So why not allow me to spec a tank with some aggro tools, and let those who want to spec as a DPS to go glass cannon
3. People with same language or guild can still run the instances and rolldodge their hearts content, I don’t want to take that away.

I don’t see how such a system could exist parallely with one rewarding an ancient mindset. People will always choose and prefer what they are used to. Since that would become a dominating mindset it will become outright obligatory. So the other one goes extinct and in doing so it will defeat one design purpose of the game.

Well, there are several people that defend the current role free gameplay, claiming that they enjoy the challenge. It’d be pretty funny if they would voluntary change to holy trinity if game would permit.
What I’m after here is, that why not let both groups get their wish. It would only be a small change, adding a bit of utility to here and there.

I play GW2 exclusively because I can be a melee beastmaster that combos with his pet, a melee wizard thief, a fregile but extremely mobile melee mage.

The problem here isn’t in the design but in the numbers that represent it. Namely damage beeing too high and DPS build being too good in PvE, PvP and in WvW if ranged.

lucretor.3084:

3. u must make the game so we can see the target’s target
and what it is casting!!
so its more doable to dodge or to position yourself..
so give us target’s target frame and cast bar so we know
who the boss is going after and what is it casting.

+1
This is exactly what PvE missing. That would really improves all player’s skills, tactic, dodge movement and stuff.

Some people seem to think like this:
“ANet said the holy trinity is gone, so why doesn’t it work when everyone traits the way they please and just randomly hit the number keys?”

With this point of view, what’s the whole point of traits, stats and skills?

I had the luck to end up in a clan which KNOWS how to play this and we have absolutely no problem running through ascalon with 4 or even 3 players. An with this combination:

-Defensive soldier: guardian. Traited virtues and health with laughable bad DPS I grant healing and protection boons while applying wards, consecrations and other light rings to control terrain. My attacks are more about interrupting and freezing than dealing damage. Keep an eye on conditions too.
-Offensive soldier: warrior. He has powerful attacks and not so tanky as me but grants attack boons and applies vulnerabilities and as a soldier fights alongside with me. Since he can shoot too, he’s the one luring crowds before I put a ward to split.
-Defensive ranged: engineer. Sets up the turrets and huge healing rings on the back. Area controls and revives the most.
-Offensive ranged: ranger. Goes pewpewpew from distance dealing huge damage. Goes melee in the back to get enemies off engineer.

Whenever us soldier are in trouble we can dodge our retreat to engineer and get healed there. And bolts going through my light rings cure conditions from the back.

So am I the tank? No. Is there tanking? Yes.
Is there ‘the’ healer? No. Is there healing? Yes.
Is there ‘the’ DPS? No. Is there DPS dealing? Yes.

While the dedicated classes of the trinity are gone, you still need a BALANCED team which covers the aspects of boons, conditions and damage.

You just won’t beat the ascalonian catacombs if you grab random players with random skills and random traits and just stay inside the poison rings while rolling your face over the keyboard.

Before entering the dungeon, we carefully choose our traited skills, gear and weaponry. I use entirely different skills and weapons when I go around gathering materials and questing. I don’t even CONSIDER going into the dungeon with the greatsword I normally flail around. And I haven’t even decided what to use when going WvW.

The problem is, there’s utilities lacking that are badly needed if AN actually wants people to do dungeons the way they’ve designed them. Everyone is crying about how every one else is dps and aren’t building their builds more uniformly. Well no kitten Sherlock. The vast majority of your time spent is killing trash. The most effective way to do this is to build high burst dps builds because trash is generally weak so if you kill it fast, you don’t take much in damage. If you do happen to come across a tougher than average mob, it’s typically not anything you can’t kill with some other players. So naturally people are just gong to build dps builds, whether you want them to or not. For the player to do otherwise would be counter-productive to his level grind. Likewise, it’s just not worth paying to respec every time you want to run a dungeon either. It may only cost a silver or 2, but silver right now is a lot of money. Maybe in a year or 2 when the realms settle down and the economies are set up in full swing it might not be too bad, but as for now, I’m not spending even 1 silver just to respec because I’ve got a quest to go do something in this particular dungeon. Oh, and as far as stats are concerned, all the gear running around out there is attack power, precision and effect damage gear, so naturally everyone is going to build high damage specs and AN obviously planned for them to do this, or else they wouldn’t have put all that gear out there. What there isn’t a lot of out there, at least in the lower levels, is a lot of vitality and toughness gear.

If you want people to run your dungeons and to build flexible builds, then you need to give them easy ways to maintain their flexibility. Give them the option to build multiple specs and to be able to change between them with the click of a button, like you can with weapons, and you’ll see more people playing support roles in dungeons. There were reasons Blizzard did some of the things they did, and it all wasn’t just because that’s how they wanted to design their game. It took them a little while to figure it out, but once they did, they realized, if you want people to be flexible, then you need to give them the abilities to be flexible. I remember the days when it cost 50 gold +spells/talents every time you wanted to respec to do dungeons in WoW. The dual spec came about simply because people were tired of paying to respec their toon multiple times a week. As soon as they came out with the dual spec feature, you started seeing a lot more support classes being played, especially while leveling.

What I find the most ironic in all of this, AN wanted to do away with the trinity because it made it hard to find groups, especially tanks and healers. Every plate wearer wants to be a tank, but very few could pull it off very well. It takes a certain type of player to tell the group they’re gonna pull the entire room and tank it, and then do it. Do it well, and do it well repeatedly. But tanks weren’t necessarily as hard to find as healers. Tanks LOVED their jobs, but not too many healers were very fond of healing. Yet, out of this whole breaking of the group trinity thing that AN is shooting for, I find it funny how the one support group that makes the dungeon runs easier if your lucky enough to have one, is a player that’s willing to be a full on support/healer.

watter.5170:

Its not so much tanks are not needed, but someone to take agro is.

I play my thief with 15 points in acrobatics so dodging returns some endurance, as well as gaining vigor (endurance regen) with heals. Combining both of these, I’m the guy who goes in head first, pulls agro of a group, and then lives through it while rest of gorup dps them down 1 by 1. I dodge, I heal, I kite. I don’t tank.

I just survive.

hint: pistol offhand = aoe blind for 4 sec, quite helpful for my role.

My necro is broke and you just made me wanna try the thief

In regards to dungeons I suggest that you read the combat section of the Guild Wars 2 Wiki in particular the section on Control and Support.

A sturdy player won’t be able to take much of a beating either, they have to dodge and get away from damage as well, just that he can take more hits before going down.

For one, I’d like to say I’m glad ANet did away with dedicated classes. I went through Ascalonian Catacombs with a Thief, two Elementalists, a Ranger, and myself being a Thief as well and we had no problems. Just synchronize you major traits and equipment and talk some strategy if you can and that’s it. So, you don’t need a “tank” for a dungeon. Heck, you don’t even need someone to absorb damage.

Mandrax.7342:

What we need is a way to build multiple specs and a fast and easy way to switch to that build. If we had that option I think dungeons would be far smoother because many would create specific builds that are more suited to the style of play.

The problem is that many people are just shoving everything in their main damage traits thinking that killing faster is better. That’s probably fine for general leveling, but for dungeons you need more utility, more support, more defensive abilities/stats.

I rerolled from my Thief to a Necro because of that problem.

It’s impossible for a solo play Thief to run a dungeon and i honestly dont want to reset my Traits every time i think about doing one, just to reset them back afterwards, not even thinking about the costs of porting + reset every time.

As Necro, and with pretty much every other class, i can at least make builds that are viable in every situation.

But playing a Venom Aura Thief when roaming around alone would just be silly, while being the only real useful build in dungeons for that profession.

I wish they would let us reset traits at no cost at all time (out of combat), just like we can switch out skills/weapons.
It’s just a silly small gold sink that does more damage than good.

I think it’s already been said a few times – but you absolutely do not NEED a tank or healer – i would even call someone claiming to tank a bold-faced lie. No matter how defensive you go, mobs are going to hurt.

What you do need to do – is make sure everyone in the party is fully aware they need to be responsible for keeping themselves alive through healing and condition removal. Then you need to make sure at least some of the party members have some means of control – fear, stun, cripple, daze, knockdown, etc.

Kiting & Control is the name of the game.

Last boss fight of Twilight Arbor was ROLLING me and my friends last night, repeatedly. Switched up our skills sets a bit – i equipped my bolas for an immobilize on one of the melee bosses, along with my fear when they got close to other people, then used my rifle spec’d for piercing attacks so I could use it’s movement slow to help kite them while the other bosses were killed.

Used that along with having a few people equip their elite skills that summon allies – fight became a breeze.

Thing I’ve noticed in dungeons here – they’re all different, and it just comes down to knowing what skills are needed in which fights.

Also. Boulders.

lucretor.3084:

6.damage meter… everyone likes to measure their skills

Other people have answered your suggestions very well and essentially, you need to know how to adapt to the gameplay. But I highlighted number 6 in your list to say this:

NOOOOO!!!!! Never, ever, please GOD NO DAMAGE METER!!! It single-handedly ruined WoW and created hundreds of thousands of elitists in the community and ruined it (amongst many other things). Keep that AWAY from GW2!!

K, done.

Gutrot.9437:

saurus.8290:

1. you would sit in town for 2 hours for healer (almost everyone want to play awesome DPS)
2. some classes are better than others in specific roles
3. its not luck, ppl need to learn to dodge and ress others not only DPS all the time

1. Nope, I’d like to click the LFG tool, get a group, and be teleported to the dungeon
2. So why not allow me to spec a tank with some aggro tools, and let those who want to spec as a DPS to go glass cannon
3. People with same language or guild can still run the instances and rolldodge their hearts content, I don’t want to take that away.

1. And everybody else has a queue, right?
2. No, that’s a totally different game. Remember where you are?
3. Split the population so part of them are pretending to play another game? Why? Just go play the other game.

this game was not designed to need dedicated tanks or healers for any of its “team” content

if you and your “team” are unable to complete the “team” content in the game it is because of one of two factors (or possibly both)

1) you (or your team mates) are not dodging enough and are not moving out if the “stuff on the ground” enough

2) you (or your team mates) are not supporting each other enough via the “combo” system or using your support abilities enough

that’s it – once you master those things as a “team” you will be able to do any “team” content in the game

have fun

(yes i know that some of the “team” content can be done by just tossing your characters at the content and waypointing until the content dies, but what I suggested will also kill the content =P)

We ran Ascalon with 2 Rangers, 2 Ele’s and a Mesmer. Died quite a bit until we started really working together. Rangers sharing heals for the Ele’s who worked at doing as much dmg as possible. Everyone using root and mud to slow down the mobs.. ranger buffing their pets. Dodging, moving, evading etc..oh..also, the rangers changed their weapons to be able to switch from longbow to shortbow instead of melee…cause a ranger melee-ing with an ascalon captain is useless, lol.

But we had stop, talk and change attributes for each boss as needed. Was pretty eye opening coming from a game before where agro control and dedicated heals were just taken for granted.

Great fun, btw…figuring all that stuff out.

I like it.

Didn’t know about the boulder thing though…so thats handy. Will use next time.

Raf

Gutrot.9437:

What I’m after here is, that why not let both groups get their wish. It would only be a small change, adding a bit of utility to here and there.

Just to be clear, you’re saying that allowing for an option for holy trinity or no holy trinity when entering a dungeon would be a ‘small change’?

You realize that every game mechanic would require a full re-haul for that, right? That’s very far from a ‘small change.’

It definitely makes dungeon a hella lot harder, but in a way I like that I get wiped from a dungeon. So far I’ve only completed AC, and failed one run of TA and one other I forgot. I like the challenge dungeons bring.

But you’re right I feel like without someone to soak the damage it just feels like playing the revive game over and over.

I ran with 3 Els and 2 Rangers last night, we did fine with no “tank,” in fact very fast runs.

If you stand still when the attacks come, you’ll be revive, no matter what armor you wear.

If you want to play Rift, play Rift. It works great and is a fun game.
But if you try to play Rift (or WoW or etc) in GW2, you’re doing it wrong and will be frustrated. Not cuz the game doesn’t work or isn’t fun, but cuz you’re playing it wrong.

I have two toons I play more, a 39 thief and a 36 warrior. What I’ve seem is that there are too many ppl spec’ed as damage. When I changed my warrior for shield + mace/hammer and focused in interrupts, stuns, knockbacks and dazes doing AC explore was much easier. Basically, we need to focus target, keep him disabled as much as possible and buff the party a lot.
Imo the group need more control and support and less damage, there is no rage timer (I haven’t seem at least). I think any combination of classes can do this only changing some skills and weapon.

You are going to end up with people that all spec into durability skills/traits/traits lines.

You can only dodge twice in most cases before you are a sitting duck for that next attack.

anet never actually removed the trinity, they just toned down how they can be used.
for example tanking and healing is still alive and well for running dungeons, guardian/warriors can easily chain mitigation skills such as blind and block with dodging and vigor to evade 95% of the damage they would normally take, thieves can also do something similar with straight evasion builds. agro control isnt really that big of an issue, kiting and a dodge roll is all it usually takes to get that mob/boss off you.

as far as healing goes, things are a bit unbalanced imo. so far my support specced staff/mace/shield guard can throw out way more mitigation and healing buffs then can be achieved by other classes easily. im putting up 15 stacks of might, healing for thousands, keeping retaliation up nearly 75% of the time, weaken debuffing, and dare i say tomb of courage. then theres the anti CC you can run with stand your ground and hold the line.

bottom line the utility of guards for pve dungeon running is pretty extreme and can be labeled as a healer support setup even though this goes against the so called trinity. anet can keep talking about trinitys and this and that not being necessary, tell that to my aoe full heal bra. this experience is from running AC, CM, SE, and CoF. you want a sup guard it makes dungeons easier.

@OP

Anet is talking about dedicated roles of tanking, dpsing and healing confined to a single player more than the terms tank healer and dps being gone.

Each player is a his own Tank, Healer and Dps.

The trinity refers to the group composition of 3 people you could not live without in an instance.

In summary, yes you still need a tank (you have 5 in your group) you also need healers and dps, you also have 5 of those if you get me.

To me tanking is defined by dealing with the aggro of the target that is attacking you. If that means take some hits, then cool. It could mean dodging or kiting something as well. Generally you give what you can to the situation and back out, then someone else needs to pick up the slack and continue rotating through group members.

Doing High level Explorable modes (some of which seem crazily overtuned atm) without any form of dedicated support or someone who can put themselves in the line of fire just isn’t going to work out overly well.

Not all over the Expl. Modes are a joke like CoF is.

The Trinity is gone insofar as a dedicated healer is concerned or a dedicated tank is concerned, but you still need to fill roles accordingly.

Some of the members should focus of debuffs, buffs, as well as doing DMG, and others should be DMG oriented, while still being able to support themselves.

Glass cannon builds will not work in the higher end PvE content, and without a suite of buffs/debuffs you are going to be hard-pressed to make it through some of the more difficult pulls in an instance.

Dodging of course is a universal constant in the PvE scene and avoidance is kind in this game, but my guild has found that some support is definitely neccesary. I don’t support by healing predominantly, but keeping large groups of mobs stacked with vulnerability, blindness, or slow is very powerful.

And then the AoE starts coming having a 600 HP/s heal on the ground that creates a field of condition removal ain’t too shabby either.

If the intention was to spec 5 glass cannons and do runs there would be no healing/toughness gear in the game.

There is healing gear, there is gear built to allow players to soak some hits.

There is also aggro mechanics that you can learn to exploit. Trying to revive a downed player will almost always draw aggro. Good thing they gave Healers +toughness on their gear… It’s all intentional guys.

It isn’t WoW-esque Healing/Tanking, but its still there, nuanced in its own way, I personally find it very liberating and have a great time on my support necro.

Sounds like a whole lot of learn to play to me.

Support warrior here – Rolling mace/ sheild & axe/horn. Stacked Vitality toughness and healing.

I love it as well – lots of fun.

There will always be roles. Many classeses can fill different rolls in different ways.

That does NOT MEAN you don’t need a TANK. That just means your tank could be almost anybody with skill from almost any class.

Notice the group in the OP wasn’t waiting for a Guardian, but a TANK.

Now, ANet made a huge mistake in how they described what they created. It’s not the end of the Trinity, IT’S A CLASSLESS TRINITY.

Trying to portray it as “Any group can get together, all just DPS away and you’ll solve every dungeon with ease!” might have been going a bit too far. It’s more like, “If your group sits down and thinks about it, gears up, makes a plan, sticks with the plan and adapts to the situation, you might be able to do almost any dungeon without having to drag another character out.”

Eskali.1380:

Sounds like a whole lot of learn to play to me.

Not saying that this is the OP at all but I personally have seen a lot of people very accustomed to only visiting instances that were on Farm in WoW. Where it was safe to enter and just kind of button mash and get free loot. The learning curve is STEEP for those type of players.

The Guildies that paved the way to putting an instance on farm are the ones doing well in this game. They were faced with big challenges and paid the price for it wiping night after night in WoW and paying large repair bills, sucking down all their pots etc etc. First time Ragnaros went down anyone? Some of us worked LONG and HARD for that.

These dungeons remind me of that – they are difficult, but not so bad that you are stuck for weeks on content. It still seems like people can clear a dungeon the night they start it or soon after.

hex.3218:

There will always be roles. Many classeses can fill different rolls in different ways.

That does NOT MEAN you don’t need a TANK. That just means your tank could be almost anybody with skill from almost any class.

Notice the group in the OP wasn’t waiting for a Guardian, but a TANK.

Now, ANet made a huge mistake in how they described what they created. It’s not the end of the Trinity, IT’S A CLASSLESS TRINITY.

Trying to portray it as “Any group can get together, all just DPS away and you’ll solve every dungeon with ease!” might have been going a bit too far. It’s more like, “If your group sits down and thinks about it, gears up, makes a plan, sticks with the plan and adapts to the situation, you might be able to do almost any dungeon without having to drag another character out.”

Not to mention the ability to change out major traits without a respec, change utilities and being able to change weapons around to totally change your role between pulls. It is very user friendly to tweak a given group.

When I ran CM, we did it with 5 players, however 3 were elementalists, 1 was a ranger and the last was level 22. The 22, being an engineer, volunteered to throw buffs and healing springs into the area, and this worked amazingly well, we completed the dungeon in about an hour and a half.

As for AC, we had 5 people, 2 elementalists, 1 guardian, 1 ranger and a thief. This group was entirely new, none of us had met and none of us said a word during the dungeon – but we knew how to do it. We used the ‘ctrl-click target’ tool to the extreme to take out each enemy, we had our ranger use healing spring and the guardian and thief got as close as they could and took the aggro from melee enemies, while ranged enemies were continuously condition damaged which stopped them from becoming a huge threat. Even the lovers were really easy (I don’t know what everyone complains about).

I don’t know about the later dungeons (doing TA tonight), but for the first two at least, there is no need for huge amounts of communication (besides the targeting of enemies) in order to beat a dungeon. As long as everyone knows THEIR character well, they are pretty easy to beat. It doesn’t matter if everyone is a glass cannon as long as they know that they’ll have to dodge out the way of ranged attacks, try and keep the aggro on them at a minimum while doing the highest damage output. Moving cleverly so that the enemy is slowed or walks into your attack. Even something as simple as circling the enemy helps to keep your health bar high – because when I see some people fight they just stand there and its no wonder they have a trouble with dungeons because you CAN’T just stand there. You need to think about what you are doing, every move. You don’t need to rebalance your traits every single dungeon – it may need doing ONCE if you went all out DPS and now realise that you need a balance of traits, but as soon as you have this balance you just need to learn your traits, your utilities and your character in order to maximise your contribution while in a dungeon.

I really didn’t want to write a wall, so TL;DR: Balance your trait points, learn your weapon, learn your utilities and dungeons are as easy as dungeons get.

You don’t need “tanks” at all for Ascalon Catacombs. The most important things are crowd control, and for the Lovers specifically, stuff that can pull enemies (like Scorpion Wire for thieves and Spectral Grasp for Necromancers) in order to separate them.

That said, protip on that fight is to basically dedicate two people to throwing boulders at one of the two (I suggest the dude) while the other three people fight the chick until she’s dead. Then it’s just a matter of everyone killing him (and if you want a laugh, have everyone grab boulders and you can knock-down lock him until he’s dead).

TL;DR: The Lovers require pull abilities or the liberal application of boulders. Everything else in AC is perfectly doable without any “tank”, and trying to “tank” in the first place is ill-advised.

ChairGraveyard.2967:

You don’t need “tanks” at all for Ascalon Catacombs. The most important things are crowd control, and for the Lovers specifically, stuff that can pull enemies (like Scorpion Wire for thieves and Spectral Grasp for Necromancers) in order to separate them.

That said, protip on that fight is to basically dedicate two people to throwing boulders at one of the two (I suggest the dude) while the other three people fight the chick until she’s dead. Then it’s just a matter of everyone killing him (and if you want a laugh, have everyone grab boulders and you can knock-down lock him until he’s dead).

TL;DR: The Lovers require pull abilities or the liberal application of boulders. Everything else in AC is perfectly doable without any “tank”, and trying to “tank” in the first place is ill-advised.

Protip: Have everyone in your party attack the chick while the heavy armor person (usually warrior) attacks the guy. The warrior then runs circles around the small pillars that are in the area, thus obstructing the guy’s attacks… most of them. This worked for us. No need for boulders although it might help. Also, make sure the warrior has some knockdown abilities as well as a two-handed hammer (knock down skills).

Ultio.8015:

Ok, so I have been watching videos and reading stuff from ANet for a long time as GW2 was being developed. One of the ideas I liked best was that they were trying to get away from the so called “holy trinity” of MMO’s (ie. tank, healer, dps). So I’m leveling away, enjoying my ranger, my guardian, etc, and then I hit the level where I can enter Ascalonian Catacombs. I have now had 4 groups in which the group was dedicated to getting through the instance, they were patient, they were planning stuff out ahead of time, they were communicating, and they all were willing to stay through wipes and wipes and wipes and wipes and….

So I ask my guild, what is going on? And I get the response “well the tank needs to do… whatever.” So, what? Did ANet move away from the idea that we weren’t supposed to require a tank? Several times on their site, even to this day, after they’ve changed the site so much, they still talk about how it shouldn’t matter who’s present in the battlefield, that everyone should be able to contribute and with good communication and planning, be able to win an encounter.

So if I get into a group where no one is able to switch to “tank gear” and “tank spec” (because ANet has been busy assuring people its not needed) how on earth are we supposed to beat some of these encounters? If tanks are required, then fine, tanks are required for this game. But don’t go telling people that you don’t want dedicated tanks and then build encounters where you have to have them!

I just spent the last 3 hours working with this group, who for all their passion, could not get past Vassar and Ralena. And this is the 4th time I’ve spent about that much time to only have everyone finally give up. Am I just stupid for assuming that ANet meant exactly what they said?

I think you need to think outside the box more. Those two are “the lovers”, right? I cannot possibly think how a tank would greatly contribute to the mechanic of this battle. But that people may have suggested that the lack of a “tank” in your party had been your problem displays the underlying issue. As long as someone will think along the lines and in the categories of other games, they will neither enjoy GW2 fully nor improve in any way. The reaction to your problems with the lovers should be “what are we doing wrong”, “what alternate strategies could we try to apply” – but you stick to the knowledge based on other games and automatically conclude, well, sure we cannot do it, we have no tanks.

Yes the instances are very tough, is this better than being able to rush through it in 5 mins over and over again? probably for some people. Seems that other games have gotten people lazy and frightened of a death or two.

The main problems I can see is already been stated, we have no quick way of changing builds for instances, they obviously require a different set up and having to run to the trainer for a respect everytime you want to do an instance or go back to leveling isn’t ideal.

What would people think of a system like pvp?
we get a lobby to go into with portals to all the instances, from this lobby we can set up our toons for whatever level we are for whatever instance, this, like pvp would be a seperate skill set, we can also meet up with players and parties in this lobby making group finding easier.

The other thing is waypoints, think there should be one or two more, it gets annoying having to run back from the start constantly.

Gutrot.9437:

Ravenblade.7685:

Gutrot.9437:

2. So why not allow me to spec a tank with some aggro tools, and let those who want to spec as a DPS to go glass cannon
3. People with same language or guild can still run the instances and rolldodge their hearts content, I don’t want to take that away.

I don’t see how such a system could exist parallely with one rewarding an ancient mindset. People will always choose and prefer what they are used to. Since that would become a dominating mindset it will become outright obligatory. So the other one goes extinct and in doing so it will defeat one design purpose of the game.

Well, there are several people that defend the current role free gameplay, claiming that they enjoy the challenge. It’d be pretty funny if they would voluntary change to holy trinity if game would permit.
What I’m after here is, that why not let both groups get their wish. It would only be a small change, adding a bit of utility to here and there.

The role free gameplay also means that most if not all PUGs go in with a DPS set up with 0 CC, some don’t even come in with any combo fields skills at their disposal. They dont switch weapons to apply debuffs, they dont switch weapons when their skills are obviously on CD, and when we wipe, it is never their fault.

They dont have any kiting set up to immobilize or cripple the boss, I’ve seen elementalist (staff user) who never even use the stun field from Air attunement or the ward line from Earth attunement to CC bosses, and u need to beg them to literally cast their rain of healing. Even then, you need to tell the rest to “quickly COMBO UP you dumb piece of kitten” just so that you can proc a heal combo. Its a pain in thekitten when these people don’t even know the most basic and rudimentary combo procs off what.

I’ve also seen warriors who go in dual axe wielding when mace and shield would have saved us from dozens of wipe, and it pisses me off because as a Guardian we don’t have such a great CC setup as a warrior does, as a mace and shield + hammer user, I can only ward, immobilize, knockback on long CDs. As a warrior, mace+shield gives you stun on your burst, stun with shield, daze with mace, and hammer gives you knockdown, knockback and stun… It seriouslykitten me off to see them not using hammers/ mace and shield just because its not cool…

Anyway the statement that you can play anyway you want is completely false for dungeons, everyone needs to have utility skills set up to full support to be able to play through easily. Weapon skills needs to have at least one or two CC to disrupt boss from dangerous casting. To me traits are of secondary importance, they only serve to enhance your choice of skillsets. If you go in as a tgh + vit traits as a guardian, its obvious you heal much better, you can apply buffs more often. But all this means no kitten if you are using power + crit signets, or using DPS oriented utility skills that provides 0 support to your team.

All in all, arenanet needs to either help to clarify the wrong mindset that all the dungeons newbies have on how to run dungeons or some veterans to step up and write a starter guide explaining all the wrong things that should not be done if you want to run a dungeon. As of now, running with a PUG will have very little chance of success since almost everyone is going glass cannon, and cooperation is non-existant. The slightest suggestion to change their skillsets results in people beingkitten off because they are so convinced that “they can play any way they want” and I am tired of that.

ChairGraveyard.2967:

You don’t need “tanks” at all for Ascalon Catacombs. The most important things are crowd control, and for the Lovers specifically, stuff that can pull enemies (like Scorpion Wire for thieves and Spectral Grasp for Necromancers) in order to separate them.

That said, protip on that fight is to basically dedicate two people to throwing boulders at one of the two (I suggest the dude) while the other three people fight the chick until she’s dead. Then it’s just a matter of everyone killing him (and if you want a laugh, have everyone grab boulders and you can knock-down lock him until he’s dead).

TL;DR: The Lovers require pull abilities or the liberal application of boulders. Everything else in AC is perfectly doable without any “tank”, and trying to “tank” in the first place is ill-advised.

You dont need tanks, but you do need melee people who can disrupt especially for the kholer fight. He’s a joke with a warrior and a guardian that can just disrupt or absorb his pulls. He’s a nightmare if everyone is playing ranged, and every man is for himself. So essentially, you can tank it, though the essential word is you can “control” it.

The whole AC is much more doable if you have a few melees because the AI of some of the bosses completely change as long as there is one character in melee range of the boss. It makes fights more manageable instead of it being a mess with everyone running around.

This topic is very interesting. From the outside looking in, a analyzing current player feedback it appears the optimal setup for dungeons is requiring a tank or dedicated healer. Now this could be because people are having a hard time accepting the non trinity “design” but I tend to think it might be more then just that simple.

Although Anet has touted the No Trinity trope since the inception of GW2 I’m not sure they were able to Optimize the non trinity gameplay.

If the dungeons are inherently “easier” with a tank and or “dedicated healer” then you can bet that Mmo players will choose the most efficient way to run the dungeon. Which inherently creates a slippery slope of the player base mentality returning to “trinity” style of play. It’s what we know and if it is more effecients it’s what we will do.

Now is that a problem? I would say so considering the game is marketed as eliminating the trinity, yet that might not be the case at all. I know it can be done without the trinity but like I said ATM that seems sub optimal, whereas I would argue it should be more effecient without a trinity, considering like I said, it’s what makes the game “different”!

That’s just my opinion, maybe Anet views it backwards to that. Whereas they think that giving the ability to run a non traditional setup is what they want but very much still like the idea of the Trinity. There blogs would indicate otherwise tbh.

I would also like to point out, dungeons were created not to be just pugged! They have said time and time again they are for groups of organized and even “vented up” people. Which makes them much harder to just run in a pug. I don’t think that’s something I personally care for tbh. I would prefer the story mode to be easy to pug and easy to complete, making it much more accessible just like everything else in the game. But I’m not saying that has to be changed its just my personal preference .

So Im okay with the fact that I will not be running dungeons because of my lack of a guild and whatnot. No big deal, but others like me just have to accept that fact. You can’t just pug and roll face in GW2. Which I think is where a lot if the frustration is stemming from.

Irishbrewed.6537:

This topic is very interesting. From the outside looking in, a analyzing current player feedback it appears the optimal setup for dungeons is requiring a tank or dedicated healer. Now this could be because people are having a hard time accepting the non trinity “design” but I tend to think it might be more then just that simple.

Although Anet has touted the No Trinity trope since the inception of GW2 I’m not sure they were able to Optimize the non trinity gameplay.

If the dungeons are inherently “easier” with a tank and or “dedicated healer” then you can bet that Mmo players will choose the most efficient way to run the dungeon. Which inherently creates a slippery slope of the player base mentality returning to “trinity” style of play. It’s what we know and if it is more effecients it’s what we will do.

Now is that a problem? I would say so considering the game is marketed as eliminating the trinity, yet that might not be the case at all. I know it can be done without the trinity but like I said ATM that seems sub optimal, whereas I would argue it should be more effecient without a trinity, considering like I said, it’s what makes the game “different”!

That’s just my opinion, maybe Anet views it backwards to that. Whereas they think that giving the ability to run a non traditional setup is what they want but very much still like the idea of the Trinity. There blogs would indicate otherwise tbh.

no, because this is not the standard player feedback. There are hordes of players who have no problems with the new play style, dungeons and the whole game are beaten by pugs and guild teams alike with ease. They just do not come to the forum and insist having the game turn into another game they know. Luckily, at this stage the advocators of the GW2 system still feel like countering this vocal minority, hopefully it stays this way or anet has someone on the team who has a professional communications background and understands that dissatisfied people voice their opinion a lot more and louder than satisfied ones.

thread +1

I haven’t tried a dungeon yet, but I’ve been reading what I can find on these forums. I’m not looking for a walk-through, but the advice gleaned from various viewpoints is nice.

I really like not needing the trinity. I didn’t find the requirement fun at all and eventually stopped running dungeons in WoW.

I would like a few buttons for different specs: not even for traits, but for loading different skills. There are so many skills that I find it time-consuming to select them.

Well playing with Sorrow’s Embrace for the last two days, I also learned something.
ANet’s promise of not requiring traditional roles to do dungeons did not translate over into reality.
Day one was us getting wiped over and over. And we were all playing the builds we have been using in PVE and Wv3 up to that point.
So in the end, we did not complete the dungeon.

Day two we all speced ourselves to play specific roles. My Engineer was the conditioner cleanser/healer. Our Guardian played a tank role and etc…

In the end, we fared much much better, and our survivability was higher. And we did complete the dungeon in story mode.

I don’t think it’s sad or an issue to have to make these minor changes to your trait build to accommodate a nightly run in a dungeon.

It gave us a chance to try out some new features for our characters, and also I learned my Engineer can take a beating as a healer. :-P

Ravenblade.7685:

Gutrot.9437:

2. So why not allow me to spec a tank with some aggro tools, and let those who want to spec as a DPS to go glass cannon
3. People with same language or guild can still run the instances and rolldodge their hearts content, I don’t want to take that away.

I don’t see how such a system could exist parallely with one rewarding an ancient mindset. People will always choose and prefer what they are used to. Since that would become a dominating mindset it will become outright obligatory. So the other one goes extinct and in doing so it will defeat one design purpose of the game.

This is sound reasoning and makes perfect sense, however we are now speaking with the “don’t stop me from doing it my way” “Don’t blame me if my way is better and everyone wants to do it” crowd, no amount of human nature leaning towards the familiar and/or taking the path of least resistance will convince them otherwise.

Wayfinder.8452:

I play as a Support Ranger in dungeons and I usually end up with 3-4 dps chars on the team that charge in like there is no tmrw and die in 2-3-4 boss major hits. I can manage to keep them alive or ressurect them well enough so they can go crazy all the way till the end, but I do agree that instagibbing and damage over all should be reduced a bit.

On the other side of the coin… Thoughness and tanky builds should receive considerable buffs as this stat and builds are heavily overshadowed by DPS (glass cannons) in PvE, WvW and PvP. They are only decent in dungeons and that is as far as they go.

The way they built GW2 is around that.

Extreme toughness build in sPvP reduces overall damage by 50%

Extreme DPS build aka glass cannon aka full berseker raises your dps way 2x

Am not tanking in consideration skill of the player, play style and builds weakness/strong points.

Its just Raw stats

In pve and WvWvW this gap is alot bigger, i belive a full valkyre/berseker player can reach 100% critical damage bonus wich is not the way to go (i like some toughness, not much, just 300/400 toughness to take a big hit and live to tell the story)

It’s fine as it is, just needs a few balance tweaks to the numbers, the system is lots of fun when you actually play properly. It’s supposed to be hard.

Algreg.3629:

Irishbrewed.6537:

This topic is very interesting. From the outside looking in, a analyzing current player feedback it appears the optimal setup for dungeons is requiring a tank or dedicated healer. Now this could be because people are having a hard time accepting the non trinity “design” but I tend to think it might be more then just that simple.

Although Anet has touted the No Trinity trope since the inception of GW2 I’m not sure they were able to Optimize the non trinity gameplay.

If the dungeons are inherently “easier” with a tank and or “dedicated healer” then you can bet that Mmo players will choose the most efficient way to run the dungeon. Which inherently creates a slippery slope of the player base mentality returning to “trinity” style of play. It’s what we know and if it is more effecients it’s what we will do.

Now is that a problem? I would say so considering the game is marketed as eliminating the trinity, yet that might not be the case at all. I know it can be done without the trinity but like I said ATM that seems sub optimal, whereas I would argue it should be more effecient without a trinity, considering like I said, it’s what makes the game “different”!

That’s just my opinion, maybe Anet views it backwards to that. Whereas they think that giving the ability to run a non traditional setup is what they want but very much still like the idea of the Trinity. There blogs would indicate otherwise tbh.

no, because this is not the standard player feedback. There are hordes of players who have no problems with the new play style, dungeons and the whole game are beaten by pugs and guild teams alike with ease. They just do not come to the forum and insist having the game turn into another game they know. Luckily, at this stage the advocators of the GW2 system still feel like countering this vocal minority, hopefully it stays this way or anet has someone on the team who has a professional communications background and understands that dissatisfied people voice their opinion a lot more and louder than satisfied ones.

Yeah u might be right, the outcry might just be the vocal minority, which is often the case. That being said I hope more players embrace the trinity less design and more ppl like yourself become just as vocal so we can get away from the LF TANK bit. My assumptions were made on just what I’ve read and see in game. I personally do not plan on running dungeons because I thought Anet was clear that they are a organized effort and I don’t play enough to really organize for anything. I think if as you say is the case then as the game matures we will see a shift away from the trinity mentality, naturally.

Ultio.8015:

So I ask my guild, what is going on? And I get the response “well the tank needs to do… whatever.”

I just spent the last 3 hours working with this group, who for all their passion, could not get past Vassar and Ralena. And this is the 4th time I’ve spent about that much time to only have everyone finally give up. Am I just stupid for assuming that ANet meant exactly what they said?

I’m not sure. The first time we did AC, we did it fast and simple. No talks of healer, DPS, or tanks. Someone shouted LFG, we formed a PUG, entered, and blast our way inside. I even got a very good Ascalonian Hat which I only replaced after I reached 70, but I’m still keeping it because the hat skin is really good.

So I can only say that the PUG you have still need to adjust and adapt with the game. I think the reason why you guys were having problems is because you still cling, unconsciously, to the Holy Trinity. Your reaction, analysis, tactics, still rely unconsciously, in having a tanker, a healer, and a DPS.

In the PUGs that I join with, we don’t. Some PUGs, the leader reminds everyone to forget the Holy Trinity or we’ll experience endless wipes.

In a Holy Trinity format, you rely on someone else to do tanking, DPS, and healing. In GW2, you should be aware of your healing and tanking and DPS without forgetting about your team.

I don’t know how best to explain it, it is normal to me and others because we just happen to be from a generation of gamers that doesn’t have a Holy Trinity to begin with – so we’re used to it, we know what to do, we know how to handle it, how to react, when to react.

It’s challenging for the Holy Trinity generation of gamers, the only suggestion really is to forget about it, as-in forget it, literally. It’s all about keeping yourself alive and synchronizing with your team.

Think about how the fight would be IRL, or say recall LoTR movies. Did they rely on each other as tanks, DPS, and healers? Nope. Do the wars of old, medieval, feudal times relied on tanks, DPS, and healers? Nope.

Each individual thinks for himself, his survival, his own strategy, his style without forgetting about his allies. Haven’t you wondered how they were able minimize friendly-fire in the ancient days when they don’t wear “marks” to identify themselves?

It’s the same thing here. Though we don’t have friendly-fire, but the concept is the same. Think for yourself without forgetting your allies. You are your own DPS. You are your own healer. You are your own tanker. But never forget your allies. Do they need a heal? Drop a heal. Do they need a rez? Rez when you can (don’t attempt to rez when the enemy is damaging you). Do you need to tank for them? Switch to it.

Remember how in the real world, people go back-to-back with each other when in a pinch? Do that in GW2 dungeons. In the real-world, you don’t go tell your ally “you tank, I’ll do the DPS”. What you do is you both do tank and DPS. Give and take. Give and take. Give and take.

Then GW2’s dungeons will be easy.

So if you want to do dungeons – then forget about the Holy Trinity, delete it from your vocabulary. The words “tank”, “DPS”, and “healer” does not exist in your brain ever. That’s the best suggestion I can give you. As long as you cling to it, consciously or unconsciously, you will never be able to react properly. Because that’s what matters – your reaction.

Oh btw, if you guys haven’t tried, you can pull mobs. Try to find a good puller too (And it doesn’t have to be a ranger.) It’s rare to see pullers in GW2 because everybody wants to “CHARRGEEEEE!” but pulling is still as useful as before. (I’m for hire btw… 10g per pull, haha, just kidding.)

Hope that helps.