Guild Wars 2

story quests seem to be designed for players to die a few times and get a repair bill. however minor, it isn’t fun. am i doing something wrong? I roll whenever i can and heal ASAP but when i’m out of CDs, just a few hits and i’m dead.

if level scaling weren’t in effect i could just grind another level or two (or be my actual level) and this wouldn’t even be an issue.

Have you been updating your armor so that it’s your level? Using your traits correctly so that you have defensive as well as offensive specs? If you’ve pumped all of your points into Power or Arms, then you’re going to have a tough time living. Definitely make sure you have a ranged weapon and use your control skills correctly. Mace and hammer have great control with knockdowns and daze. Time your own skills to interrupt your enemies. Sword as well has a block that you can use.

And use the NPCs to your advantage when they are there. Let them take hits and back off and heal yourself up.

Play smart. If your build can’t melee bash continually then fall back to ranged until your CD’s are done, then run back in.

my guy moves incredibly slow when the dodge is out, if i try to run to range and wait i die.

Move sooner then, if you don’t make it then you left it too late.

This game focuses on skill rather than gear (ie. all endgame exotic gear has the same damage/armor) so it’s about what you do rather than what you’re wearing most of the time.

I solo’ed all Norn Warrior story content and so I know what sort of big zergfest fights you mean. It can be done, you just need to re-adjust the way you tackle it.

sounds like trial and error stupidity, and group events sort of reinforce the idea that people are meant to die so someone else can pick them up.

it plays way too clunky for anyone to honestly argue that encounters are intelligently designed.

Well that’s not how I play my warrior.
I don’t consider it trial and error, I call it reading the situation/circumstances and responding to it. Health going down fast? Just used your last heal skill? Get the hell out of dodge and pop off a few longbow AoE’s then you CD’s and health should be up enough to charge back in.
If you just want to sit there hacking away at stuff then consider pumping vitality and toughness and trait into things that heal you. For instance I have traited so that my shouts also heal for a small amount, this increases the amount of time I can be in melee range significantly.

Agreed with Bluestone. If you are playing your warrior like a tank in other MMO’s, then you aren’t playing him right. You have to be mobile. If you stand still and let a mob hit you, then you’re going to die. You can be mobile without having to dodge. You have to use your skills and traits intelligently. You can’t go in there spamming your auto-attack with 30 points in power and nothing else traited and expect to live. You need to use your weapon swaps to your advantage.

If you do these things and you are still having trouble, then maybe there is a place in the game that is, in fact, too hard. But until you are really being intelligent about the choices you make in battle, you will constantly die.

i tend to get immobilzed/stunned/knocked down while trying to keep mobile, i have no idea how you guys are managing. it sounds like we’re playing different games.

Ok so you have a situation that you come across often, you get immobilised/stunned/knocked down while trying to keep mobile.
Have you considered looking into the Warrior skills and traits to be prepared for that?
You have to dodge or interrupt to avoid the knockdown but you can break stuns and cure immobilisation with the right skills and timing their use well for your escape.

i have 5 skill slots, if i give up one slot for a stun breaker i lose something else that’s good (ie. damage reduction).

i don’t feel very empowered.

From all your responses I am left with one last reply, that Warrior might not be easy enough for you.

i dont know what level you’re at, but you can try getting your hands on some armor with toughness. i usually run with knight’s armor (str/prec/tough), and I have no problems at all with melee (outside of dungeons).
use signet of the dolyak it will give you passive damage reduction and get you out of stun if you use it.

i can handle several mobs of my level with ease (lvl 75-80 area now), it definitely shouldnt be a problem before that.

maybe you’re underleveled for the zone? then do something else and come back when you’re above it.

for dungeons you’ll want to run ranged exclusively or utility builds.

for wvw i can recommend longbow/rifle. its not good 1 vs 1, but they’re pretty good at taking people out at range, while staying relatively safe.

and for huge events you should definitely use some ranged weapon along with your melee. take a few hits and then dodge away to let someone else take damage.

I’m not really sure what else to tell you, other than it takes practice to be good. This isn’t meant to be a mindless spam 1 to win MMO.

Go through the GW2 build reddit and see if you can find a new build that might work for you. You want something that’s balanced on offense (power, precision, and critical damage) and defense (toughness, vitality).

http://www.reddit.com/r/GuildWars2Builds/search?q=warrior&restrict_sr=on

Let me put it this way. If your wrist doesn’t hurt from holding down the right mouse button you’re doing it wrong.

I too had some challenges with my warrior — but I was struggling with the whole tanking or “hack n’ slash” mindset for awhile there and quickly learned to be a little more tactical and patient.

My warrior focuses on bleeds – so I use two swords & a rifle for ranged. While I could dish out damage, I would die just as quickly in melee range without having really good defense (oh ho ho ho, especially in those dungeons). So, I took points out of Power traits and simply put them into Tactics and already saw some improvement in survivability. You’ll just have to really focus on tweaking your character, looking at different builds and see what works best for you.

It’s frustrating, I know — I’ve been smacked around numerous times in personal stories and dungeons, but you’ll get better finding a good balanced build like Jax suggested, and practice. Keep at it! :]

The game is a zergfest, the design encourages it and punishes moving in less than a few group compositions.

:-(

The Dude.6942:

i dont know what level you’re at, but you can try getting your hands on some armor with toughness. i usually run with knight’s armor (str/prec/tough), and I have no problems at all with melee (outside of dungeons).
use signet of the dolyak it will give you passive damage reduction and get you out of stun if you use it.

i can handle several mobs of my level with ease (lvl 75-80 area now), it definitely shouldnt be a problem before that.

maybe you’re underleveled for the zone? then do something else and come back when you’re above it.
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————
for dungeons you’ll want to run ranged exclusively or utility builds.
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————
for wvw i can recommend longbow/rifle. its not good 1 vs 1, but they’re pretty good at taking people out at range, while staying relatively safe.

and for huge events you should definitely use some ranged weapon along with your melee. take a few hits and then dodge away to let someone else take damage.

and this is my problem as a warrior…i want to play a warrior…I would be a RANGEr…if i wanted to use bows or guns…why should it be mandatory to be ranged

It’s not required that you are ranged, but unless you are the best tactical player possible in melee range, or you have the best support people with you, you’re going to die quickly. There’s almost no way for you to stay permanently in melee range in a dungeon and live – you need to have a ranged weapon and swap intelligently between them.

cipher.9240:

it plays way too clunky for anyone to honestly argue that encounters are intelligently designed.

I’d strongly disagree. If people don’t pull their weight and pay attention, even regular enemies are going to slaughter them given the chance. Combat in this game is more about skill and strategy than mindlessly charging at whatever is in sight. Utility tends to be valued more than heavy damage when it comes to larger fights, since it typically increases everyone’s chance of survival.

As a thief I dont like my bow but neither can I stand and trade for long. So I jump in, kill one or two and then run around till my heal and initiative (powers my attacks) is back up. But then I am a faster runner than you.

It depends on what your doing.

In dungeons: You will either have to deal with playing ranged or load up on toughness and vitality at the cost of damage. Trash mobs do insane amounts of damage in this game and have far too much hp to just simply be focused down. Melee is a sever disadvantage when it comes to dungeons because of this and you would probably be better off with a bow or gun, then you might be able to see an enemies attack before it instagibs you.

In pvp: The easiest solution is to play structured, the lower play limit makes it much easier for a melee based character to survive and still be a large threat. In WvW your options are more limited. My suggestion would simply to be to use hit and run tactics while defending (for instance as a greatsword guardian I would leap off a wall and proc my flame virtue and start spinning in the middle of the enemy lines with whirling wrath before running back inside the base while on cd). When attacking be extremely mindful of the AoE indicators (the red circles) and try to stay with the main body of the group with traveling. Charging to the front is the fastest way to get destroyed.

Overall I agree with you, melee in this game feels underpowered when it comes down to it, in dungeons being in close proximity to enemies and dealing even a half decent amount of damage pulls too much aggro, (which is bad considering the trash is more deadly than the bosses) and in pvp we can simply get nuked down too fast by an aoefest. Perhaps it something Anet is looking into.

Tom Gore – Hah! I thought that was just me

To be honest, the easiest way to get through personal story when it’s knocking you about is to bring a friend. Find a random, join a guild, whatever, but another person makes a whole lot of difference! Now, I know you shouldn’t have to bring someone else along, and I think the comments above show that you don’t strictly have to. But it’s the easy solution if getting the dodge/heal/run/weapon switch/etc dance is proving too difficult right now.

Tom Gore.4035:

Let me put it this way. If your wrist doesn’t hurt from holding down the right mouse button you’re doing it wrong.

I went to play another comp game today ( don’t ask why) and I died twice in a row from cooked grenades and I couldn’t figure out why at first… then I had to remember that in this game right mouse click is grenade toss lol..

And as far as playing a warrior goes. I’m 80 all ready but even when I was leveling all I did was keep my weapon up to date honestly. At lvl 55 I found myself still using armor from the teens. Level 17 boots and chest to be exact. But, keeping my weapon up to date (was doing weaponsmithing to ensure it) I just slaughter everything. Even in the story quests. Using a greatsword is super easy imo. Hundred blades, to spin out, to throw weapon, charge back in use burst skill, swap to my back up hammer with seal of hydromancy if anyone is still alive and blow all those cool downs. I don’t do ranged with my warrior, feels wrong lol. Though, the bigger fights in this game are definitely meant to have people dropping to their butts and needing to be gotten back up every once again. But you can keep this to a minimum by staying mobile and using weapon swap to your advantage.

No one needs to die ever if one plays smart utilising all that Anet have made available to a player.

There are usually multiple events happening at the same time.

you could always….you know….run the other way.