Guild Wars 2

I only recently started playing sPvP actively. I’m currently really bad so I’m trying to practice a lot in practice mode (custom arenas/hotjoin). Sometimes I do really well, but most of the time I just get completely destroyed in fights. I started paying attention to the finishers of the people who kill me, and I noticed that the vast majority of people who kill me have a high-rank finisher like Dragon or Phoenix. I know there isn’t any matchmaking in practice mode, but as it is named practice mode, I would expect it to be a place where inexperienced players who are new to the GW2 PvP scene can face off to practice and improve instead of being instakilled by seasoned veterans. I only just got to the Deer rank so naturally fighting a Dragon rank player won’t turn out well for me. I’m having some trouble understanding why you would need to practice in practice mode if you already have at least 1000+ sPvP matches played, you’d learn more from fighting people on your own skill level in ranked/unranked games instead of stomping noobs in practice mode, right? I’m not sure how the matchmaking in unranked games are as I have only played one or two of them, but I don’t feel like I can be useful to a team yet and I definitely want to practice some more because of that, but getting steamrolled by Dragon rank players is getting frustrating. Why are so many high-ranked players playing practice mode, and is it acceptable for a noob like me to go into unranked games even though I might ruin games for my team?

Well when I play with teams or superpugs or whatever we often go to practice/unranked first to you know…practice. In case we have something wrong with our comp or whatever we test it out first.

Ego inflation? I can’t think of anything else TBH

Unranked is pretty casual I do not expect to win when I hit that button so I wouldn’t mind you learning the ropes there while you gain some reward track progression

Most go into unranked to practice. Some go into practice. Some high level players go in to get their daily on a class they may have never played. I jump in hotjoins for the dailies myself and yes..you will get spiked by a high lvl player. No, it will not be on a class I know how to play well and that is the reason I go in there. I have never played ranger but needed daily. So I made a ranger and went into hotjoin.

Top two reasons I join practice games:

1) To pvp when you may not have enough time to play a full match.

2) To try out new PvP builds.

Problem is practice mode isn’t meant exclusively for newbies, it was meant for people of all skill levels to practice new builds and classes. If it was meant for only new players, surely there would be a rank limit or cutoff point of some description to stop what is happening now. If you really wanna get down the raw basics, the best this game has for you are those npcs in the pvp lobby (even though they suck and dont really represent their classes very well). After that, your best bet is doing some unranked games.

Because they don’t give a kitten bout leaderboards…if you look at top 100 80% are just random nonames farming matches with horrible win/loss ratios

Old one was bad, but this is totally reterded

i quit game for few months, came back, needed practice…duhh

For the same reason inexperienced players are in ranked; anyone is free to go anywhere.

I have about 1400 games on warrior, 500 on guardian, and 400 on ranger.

For the other classes combined I have…about 40 (with 25 of them on ele). If I’m in practice mode it’s extremely likely I’m doing one of the PvP dailies on one of the classes I don’t play much.

Because even at rank 80 I probably play those classes like a rank 10 headless chicken.

I do practice when I am trying for the class specific daily that I don’t know very well (which, for the record, I don’t like). Hotjoin is just too unpredictable. I like the order of unranked and ranked play.

Usually to practice.

DaveGan.8065:

I have about 1400 games on warrior, 500 on guardian, and 400 on ranger.

For the other classes combined I have…about 40 (with 25 of them on ele). If I’m in practice mode it’s extremely likely I’m doing one of the PvP dailies on one of the classes I don’t play much.

Because even at rank 80 I probably play those classes like a rank 10 headless chicken.

well 2k games is almost nothing btw….expec if it’s total games and not only team tournament ones…hotjoin/custom arena games count 0 as pvp experience, high level players probably just go there because there’s no reason to tryhard atm, ladder rewarding farmers with less than 60% win/loss ratio and top 100 full of nonames…pretty much the opposite of what “competitive” means

• Dailies Profession Win brought me to Hotjoin.
• I can’t queue up to Ranked/Unranked from Hotjoin.
• I don’t feel like leaving the match.

Why are experienced players in practice mode?

I go in to get my daily on other professions that is not my current main pvp character. So Necro is my current PvP profession so when one of the other 7 come up, off to practice I go…

Anyone noticed btw in practice mode it has the same old map selection system, so around 90% of the time you get skyhammer…lol

Archaon.9524:

well 2k games is almost nothing btw….expec if it’s total games and not only team tournament ones…hotjoin/custom arena games count 0 as pvp experience, high level players probably just go there because there’s no reason to tryhard atm, ladder rewarding farmers with less than 60% win/loss ratio and top 100 full of nonames…pretty much the opposite of what “competitive” means

I never said 2k games was extra special It was only used to set a contrast demonstrating why I might be in hotjoin playing like a headless chicken on 5 classees, and I would definitely consider myself on the more casual side of PvP.

As far as the rest of your rambling about the ladder that has little to do with my post and nothing to do with this thread, last I checked I had about a 80% win rate on the new leaderboard. Please leave me out of your agenda against the leaderboard, and go cry about it in a relevant thread.

Zypher, experienced players go in practice mode to, well, practice. I myself am a medium skill player, and I usually go to practice to learn how to duel on a build/profession I don’t know yet. But you’re right: the imbalance in hotjoin prevents you from learning anything. If you want to get better, follow these two simple steps:

1) Find another player who is slightly more experienced than you or on the same level, and duel in an empty server, to learn your skills and know how to behave in a fight. Ask good players playing your profession for tips.

2) Play unranked. With the new matchmaking, the matches are usually balanced, and you will learn the basic rotations.

Naturally, after that, you still will be considered a noob, but you’ll be ready to form a team with a few friends and hop in ranked. Good luck!

I also just tried PvP recently and was surprised at the venom in those matches. My first few had someone whispering me talking trash, a few talking trash in map chat. As I played more, I noticed that my first few matches were abnormal and the rest were relatively quiet and people were just doing their thing.

So my first impression was pretty negative. I don’t mind being spiked by a dragon – that’s gonna happen. I do however find it funny when people call you bad and tell you to l2p noob in the practice matches. What I ended up doing is waiting to see a certain name pop up in the match and then try to get on their team so I can follow them around and be as useless as they accused me of being. I got a guardian to raaaaaage at me – kinda made my day. I just told her that I was observing and learning so that I could be awesome like her one day.

tldr: using it for practice at any rank, I totally get that. Flexing your kitten in the practice matches? Get a life.

I go into practice mode just to warm up my hands a little before queueing. I bet I’m not the only one. Also just because they are a big scawwy dwagon doesn’t mean they are good.

SoloQ is dead, and lots of people do not like being a free meat for tpvp teams.
When current arenas will become as dead as old teamQ (and it will not take long time) maybe anet will find someone competent for position of pvp development team leader.

Doing dailys.

Seeing how well your build can escape a blob of thieves.

Practicing your combos against semi-sentient beings instead of Golems.

Chaith.8256:

Doing dailys.

Seeing how well your build can escape a blob of thieves.

Practicing your combos against semi-sentient beings instead of Golems.

semi-sentient? LOL. One step above practice golems one step below actual people LOL! Just had to quote because I think its hilarious.

Because players who need to be in unranked to practice go ranked and ruin ranked games for experienced soloqer. I stopped playing ranked games because there are way to many players with absolutely no basic skills or knowledge of how to play Spvp. I’m tired of losing ranked games because of new/inexperienced players. If i lose in unraked my account leaderboards wont be hurt in any way. So before you get mad for experienced players playing in the practice arena, get mad at all the inexperienced players that are ruining the ranked arena.