Guild Wars 2

Hey there. I’ve been playing for about 2 months now, but I’m still pretty new to PVP. Based on what I’ve seen so far, I had a few questions that I was hoping the community could help me with. My PVP experience is very consistent. I run around, I fight people, sometimes they kill me, sometimes I kill them. Fun is had by all. Most of the time, that is. Sometimes however, I run into a mezer in which case I’m killed 100% of the time, or sometimes I run into “that guy”. He’s generally a warrior or guardian. He takes no damage from anything I do, instantly heals every condition I put on him, and in the extremely unlikely event I do a small amount of damage, he heals it instantly. He always has 5 or more boons up, and he’s faster then me. Eventual, he gets board of laughing at my attempts to harm so he hits me with one attack that roots and stuns me will doing 20K+ damage.

The first question is about mezers – Should I just be playing one? It’s very clear that they are the most popular class BY FAR in PVP, with most 5 on 5 games I play having 4 to 6 mezers in them. They seem pretty much unstoppable.

The second question is … what’s going on with “that guy”? Is there some trigger I should be looking for? Am I unknowingly doing something wrong that giving him this complete immunity? Is there a way to counter it?

Any help would be great!

It would be nice to know, which class you are playing and what build/traits you are using. Because if you set things right you have allrdy half the work done. Second thing is experience with your own class (how good you play, when activating which skill etc.) and third you need to know some common builds (bs-thief, shatter-mesmer, 100b warrior etc.) and learn some class-mechanics from other proffessions. This prevent being surprised by combos and skills you don’t know.

Thanks for the reply man, and for the great advice.

I understand that getting better at PVP by reading, playing, and experiencing more will make be better at PVP. So I think that’s some great advice, but it’s only half of what I’m asking.

Me problem isn’t that I constantly up against things that I don’t understand or I can’t beat; from the experience I do have and what I’ve read online, most of the time when I attack someone I can size up what is happening and react, and like I said, I win some and I lose some, pretty much 50/50. So I guess I would say I’m just fine at PVP, but nothing special. What I’m saying is that it seems like although I can deal and react to 7 classes and win sometimes, there is one class that I simply can not win against ever. Same with builds, there are 100s of builds I’ve encounter and killed except 2 or 3, which seem completely unstoppable.

The question I’m asking is … do I just not understand some non-obvious point (I tried to do research before coming here and have read a lot about builds and the like so that why I say non-obvious) or is that just how PVP in GW2 works … there are a few completely OP builds and if I’m not playing one, I should be.

There are some “OP” builds, let’s call them “viable”. for example: One of them is the 0/X/X/30/30 ele! But it would be really helpfull for me if you could be concrete, on which classes you have problems or how you died and which class you play on your own.

Mesmers are a pain if you are new – don’t let the clones run at you and explode, use AOE to kill the clones, spot the real mesmer by looking for him backpedaling/dodging/or has a lot of boons on him (clones do/have none of those). “That guy” sounds like either a bunker (impossible to kill a good one by yourself) or a 100b warrior (roots with very predictable bulls charge and then uses “one hundred blades” on you to do a ton of dmg).

Like Emphatic Fighter said, a lot of it is learning what the other classes do so you can spot them and then have the experience to know how to counter them (or ignore them).

Also, all professions/builds have pros and cons and they all have a set of other professions/builds that are simply very good at winning against you. No such thing as a single build good against everything (except maybe a d/d ele)

As you’re improving as a player I like to think the first step is understanding your own class well, and being able to execute a strategy to win. The second step is recognizing and understanding what the strats are for other class, and learning their weaknesses. That seems like where you’re at right now.

Here’s a few tips, but I’d recommend you watch some videos/streams of good people playing the class (or even better, try it yourself):

Mesmer:
-Anticipate the shatters when they get 3 clones up, try to mitigate it with defensive abilities or dodges.
-Blurred frenzy is a strong channeled sword attack with invulnerability, on short CD (~8s?). Try not to stand in it, don’t waste your strong damage attacks during it.
-Common defensive CDs are a short duration stealth and teleport. Typically I try to put out enough pressure on mes to force these CDs, but save my strongest burst for after.

Warrior – 90% of warriors will run Bulls Charge + Frenzy + 100 blades. It’s a KD, followed by double attack speed for huge damage on long cd. You have to, have to, have to save a defensive CD/stun break for bull’s charge (or dodge it if you can). As long as you can do this, you should be able to kite around the war. Cripples and chills are practically a hard counter.

Guardian:
Several defensive CDs, great healing. Best counter is lots of condition damage. If that’s not your build, you may need friends. Another class where you need to work through the defensive CDs, then go for the kill.

Thanks a ton for the great feedback. I’m sure it will really help.