Guild Wars 2

Stuns. Let’s face it this is what makes thieves and warriors such powerhouses. Which is fine in a sense, you can counter them. Except how often do you actually have a full endurance bar and a stun breaker ready in a group fight? I mean it usually requires it all just to counter one of them. And that’s not even mentioning the situational awareness that’s required of you.

Amulets. Just a quick point but it kinda annoys me how limited I am in how I can choose my stats. Want precision, toughness and vitality? Nope you can’t have that.

Class stats. Not really a sPvP only thing but.. Why do some classes get so much higher health than others?

Random battles. Kinda a minor point but it bothers me how poorly balanced random battles can be sometimes. And that’s not really considering how skilled people are. Like for example how one side can get all the thieves. Good luck trying to survive with 4 thieves hitting you. Also there’s no proper queue for randoms so you get fights where one side has more guys than the other.

the more squishy you are the more attention you have to pay when you use stunbreaks, dodges and utility. if you are tanky to soak burst damage you can play safer.

nope. the game has very very few stuns that last very little.
and everyone has some kind of stunbreaker.
so ur not making sense.

Stuns and breaking stuns are what makes the game so dynamic. This isn’t a game where you just stand still and hit buttons until one of you dies. You need to time your CCs and save your evades. If you’re using two dodges and a stun breaker to break one single stun then you are most certainly overreacting. If I see a warrior frenzy (yellow lines swirl around him for a moment) I know he’s going to bull’s charge me. I wait for the bull’s charge, and when he starts to use his 100 blades I’ll Phase Retreat or blink away. I’m not trying to insert that I’m somehow way better than you, but I’m saying that it’s probably a good idea to use your escapes judiciously. You don’t need to dodge every stun. A lot of them last for a very short amount of time, and honestly you probably only need to break the stun if it’s followed with a high damaging ability. Sometimes warriors will just toss out a bola that immobilizes for 4 seconds, but if I don’t see them follow up with anything, I’ll just chill out. Take a step back and try to think if you really need to waste your stun breaker, because stun breakers have longer cooldowns than the stuns. This is as intended, which supports the idea that you do not need to break every stun. Just use your skills wisely.

Your statement about amulets reminds me of the older arguments about weapons, and how your skills are “chosen for you” by your weapons. Yes, this results in fewer possible skill combination (as compared to GW1) but there are more viable ones. Every single build is strong in a baseline sort of way. In the same sense, every amulet is strong, and none of them suck. If there is an amulet that isn’t in the game, it’s either because it would suck, or it would be too strong compared to the other ones.

Class stats are balanced in ways beyond obvious numbers. So for example, Warriors get more base HP than Guardians because Guardians have much MUCH better healing. I will agree that I wish some of the clothies had higher base power (Necro and Ele come to mind) because they don’t seem to balance out the way that Warrior and Guardian do in terms of HP. Now that being said, I’m glad there are differences because it makes things more dynamic. I think some classes should have less armor and less HP but more power naturally, because that’s what their archetype is.

Random battles are fine the way they are. Here’s why I think this: there is virtually no queue as there might be when you’re waiting for players to join. I mean, random sPvP is meant for practicing and having fun and getting glory, nothing more. It’s so easy to do tPvP that it’s apparent (to me at least) that that’s the real organized “serious” stuff, not just basic sPvP. Also, yes you might join a game where one side has more than the other, but the auto balance system will kick in, and while I find this frustrating sometimes as well, I really think sPvP is just for fun and practice, not serious winning. You can still get tons of points if you lose.

But you’re talking about it like it’s a duel situation. Where you’re fighting 1 guy and you know he’s coming. This rarely happens in a real game. This is something that most people seem to get wrong when they discuss balance in this game.

There’s actually fewer builds to pick because you have to make your character kinda tanky to survive. Not to mention that most builds follow the same patterns with only slight variations to their abilities. The amulets are a problem because you have very little actual choice in which ones you can take if you want to make your character viable.

The difference in class stats is a problem because all it does is make one class stronger than the other. It also gives some classes a bigger leeway in how they can setup their character.

Not really gonna go into randoms because they are just a minor frustration. Only thing I will say is that if you want to practice you should quickjoin a tournament instead of going randoms.

i run a build on my thief that has no stunbreaker, i have to be very careful when it comes to said stuns.

this doesnt mean i think stuns are OP.

a thief for example, best one i can think of is a S/P thief. he doesnt have a lot of stuns, his PW is a stun, then he probably has devourer for a immobilize. maybe even basilisk venom for a short stone form (tho rarely)

PW stun lasts about .25 seconds if i remember right. the only way its killing you is if he pairs it with haste.

also i hate how people act like just cuz its a team game they cant be bothered to look at more then one person on there screen, learn the animations and gain some group awareness. if you fighting a thief and a ranger and you see a warrior with a sword coming hes 9 times out of 10 gonna bull rush and HB yourkitten get ready to dodge, if you didnt notice him coming, thats your fualt for not paying attention.

This can be said about every MMORPG PvP. Don’t let those things bother you, just do the best with what you have. And keep at it, you’ll be happy you did.