Guild Wars 2

Andy.9137:

lunyboy.8672:

Andy.9137:

lunyboy.8672:

Christos de Soufre.3802:

…I don’t know how many ticks Barrage hits for, but if you’re running any amount of Vitality, it shouldn’t be enough to kill you. Especially if you’ve got Regen and/or Protection up. And again, use your heal. If you’re actually dying to your own Barrage, then it’s because you’re standing in enemy AoE/in the way of their charge as well. Not just because of Retal.

Edit: As for the “it’s the same deal as Confusion pre-nerf” argument, Retaliation can’t be stacked and epidemic’d and it can’t cause several thousand damage per action whether single-target or AoE.

Wrong, wrong and wrong.

Protection doesn’t mitigate any type of damage except DIRECT damage.

Retaliation is duration stacked, up to a possible minute by blast finishing and/or leap finishing light combo fields. In other words, Guardian + Thief (SB) = infinite retaliation. Good thing there aren’t that many Thieves or Guardians in WvW…

Stacking a whole minute is ridiculous, the duration can only be stacked 5 times. I just tested it with a thief and with 5 blasts we got 10 seconds of retaliation. Maybe with enough boon duration we could get a few seconds more.

Can it be reapplied every 10 seconds? Because if there are only 5 stacks, and leap finishers grant 5 seconds per, then that is 25 seconds at a time…

So, closer to half a minute at a time, and then reapplied every 5 seconds as the effects of each application wear off. I stand corrected, it is only infinite retaliation, not infinity x 2.

Leap finishers grant retaliation to ONE person….

Yes, as someone with a leap finisher, I know this…

Lets just be completely clear about this:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Retaliation

all available sources of retaliation, notice the big showing for guards, mesmers and necros; it is easy to see where a few guards in a 15-20 person zerg could keep retaliation up pretty easily.

Save yourselves, Stand your ground, and Symbol or Wrath on rotations should do nicely when you aren’t blast finishing light fields.

Hey, I get it. It’s a big source of damage for you, and makes you even more OP and unkillable in a big glob o’ invaders, but it is disproportionately powerful and fundamentally destructive to a few of the lower tier professions… I am not talking about just button mashers. How am I supposed to do any damage to a zerg, when all of my anti-zerg skills are more likely to kill me before I down anyone in the group at all?

Especially when there is perpetual retaliation? I mean, if it were me facing a bunch of Warriors, no worries. They don’t have the access to it that some others, and they don’t share any of it that I know of.

So while you are busy trying to poke holes in my argument, you aren’t dealing with the fact that it is a bit over powered. Confusion I was fine with, I have condition removal, and I know how to wait out a few seconds of confusion if it is unavailable.

lollasaurus.1457:

Your using longbow, that’s your problem right there.

So it is one of em broken which one long bow or retaliation.

lunyboy.8672:

Andy.9137:

lunyboy.8672:

Andy.9137:

lunyboy.8672:

Christos de Soufre.3802:

…I don’t know how many ticks Barrage hits for, but if you’re running any amount of Vitality, it shouldn’t be enough to kill you. Especially if you’ve got Regen and/or Protection up. And again, use your heal. If you’re actually dying to your own Barrage, then it’s because you’re standing in enemy AoE/in the way of their charge as well. Not just because of Retal.

Edit: As for the “it’s the same deal as Confusion pre-nerf” argument, Retaliation can’t be stacked and epidemic’d and it can’t cause several thousand damage per action whether single-target or AoE.

Wrong, wrong and wrong.

Protection doesn’t mitigate any type of damage except DIRECT damage.

Retaliation is duration stacked, up to a possible minute by blast finishing and/or leap finishing light combo fields. In other words, Guardian + Thief (SB) = infinite retaliation. Good thing there aren’t that many Thieves or Guardians in WvW…

Stacking a whole minute is ridiculous, the duration can only be stacked 5 times. I just tested it with a thief and with 5 blasts we got 10 seconds of retaliation. Maybe with enough boon duration we could get a few seconds more.

Can it be reapplied every 10 seconds? Because if there are only 5 stacks, and leap finishers grant 5 seconds per, then that is 25 seconds at a time…

So, closer to half a minute at a time, and then reapplied every 5 seconds as the effects of each application wear off. I stand corrected, it is only infinite retaliation, not infinity x 2.

Leap finishers grant retaliation to ONE person….

Yes, as someone with a leap finisher, I know this…

Lets just be completely clear about this:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Retaliation

all available sources of retaliation, notice the big showing for guards, mesmers and necros; it is easy to see where a few guards in a 15-20 person zerg could keep retaliation up pretty easily.

Save yourselves, Stand your ground, and Symbol or Wrath on rotations should do nicely when you aren’t blast finishing light fields.

Hey, I get it. It’s a big source of damage for you, and makes you even more OP and unkillable in a big glob o’ invaders, but it is disproportionately powerful and fundamentally destructive to a few of the lower tier professions… I am not talking about just button mashers. How am I supposed to do any damage to a zerg, when all of my anti-zerg skills are more likely to kill me before I down anyone in the group at all?

Especially when there is perpetual retaliation? I mean, if it were me facing a bunch of Warriors, no worries. They don’t have the access to it that some others, and they don’t share any of it that I know of.

So while you are busy trying to poke holes in my argument, you aren’t dealing with the fact that it is a bit over powered. Confusion I was fine with, I have condition removal, and I know how to wait out a few seconds of confusion if it is unavailable.

What I was poking a hole in is that no single person can leap from a light field 5 times for 25 seconds of retaliation. I think the problem people keep going over is zergs stacking it (and it’s not that much anyway).

Guardians don’t have a lot of damage unless you go that way and sacrifice what guardians are renowned for, which is staying power. We don’t have a lot of ranged capability and retaliation really helps. What people here are suggesting would nerf guardian quite a lot which is not the problem. People can run from us and avoid dying altogether, some people like to attack us until retaliation kills them and that does not make it overpowered. Guardians are meant to hold areas.

Kvitoq.9154:

As a mesmer I try to ensure I have chaos armor on me at all times. When an enemy hits me with chaos armor on they can get 1 stack of confusion. If they have retaliation and continue to hit me the retaliation from the confusion ticks hits me like a truck.

How does this force me to play better?

I like the idea of retaliation but the execution is just bad.

Just tested this in sPvP and it seems I was wrong, retaliation does not tick from confusion ticks.

The weird thing is I swear I often have the problem in WvW that I see an enemy is using retaliation, I stop attacking and I keep getting hit with a lot of retaliation hits for the next second or 5. Maybe retaliation damage is delayed or something when the server is under load?

Anyway, sry for the confusion caused by my misinformation!

As much as retaliation and confusion are different, it encourages a lack of action, which isn’t fun. Forget that for a second that it “adds depth” or whatever else you may think it adds. Look he has retaliation. kitten it all I can do is wait it out. Is that fun? Nope. If you gave every class a way to more regularly deal with it other than don’t do anything and twiddle your thumbs, it wouldn’t be so irritating. Yes certain classes can deal with it, but most can’t reliably deal with it, or can’t do anything about it at all other than not do anything.

To me and I’m sure to a lot of other players it isn’t about how to properly deal with it, but about how it detracts from the fun in the game for us. Confusion annoyed me far more than retaliation, but they are both still lame mechanics to deal with.

How could someone wants a passive 100% uptime buff that punishes people dealing damage while doing NOTHING in return? I know some people like running 30 guards/wars but guys, is that any fun?

EFWinters.5421:

Terrahero.9358:

EFWinters.5421:

So…

• You know using Barrage will basically kill you if you fire it into a zerg.
• You still use Barrage, and promptly dies.

Sorry but I think this is working exactly as intended. Bad players die good players prevail.

Because facerubbing a gate, instagibbing people that AoE you due to Retal is the pinacle of skill. Amiright?

I never claimed it was the pinnacle of skill. But it sure as hell shows a lot more skill than AoE’ing that zerg even though you have died because of it thousands of times already.

Wait. You actually think that a zerg just facerubbing against a gate, semi-akitten or just completely afk, is more skillfull then throwing AoE?

Stacking Retaliation takes no thought whatsoever, it just happens because of how many combofinishers are going on in a zerg and how many Light-fields are just getting kitten all over the place by Guardians.

It litteraly takes no choice, sacrifice, or even a single sentient moment to do. Its a side-effect, an afterthought, to what you’re doing anyway. Its a great deal more difficult to NOT stack retal in a zerg.

It’s kind of funny how people don’t seem to understand how broken retaliation is right now in wvw (in the maps where it hasn’ t been nerfed yet)

Simply put, if you haven’t noticed what a ridiculous amount of damage retal does, it’s because you’re not really contributing to the fight.

You’re probably doing l33t single target dps against that one guy in the 40 vs 40 fight. Then yeah, you won’t notice retal.

Terrahero.9358:

EFWinters.5421:

Terrahero.9358:

EFWinters.5421:

So…

• You know using Barrage will basically kill you if you fire it into a zerg.
• You still use Barrage, and promptly dies.

Sorry but I think this is working exactly as intended. Bad players die good players prevail.

Because facerubbing a gate, instagibbing people that AoE you due to Retal is the pinacle of skill. Amiright?

I never claimed it was the pinnacle of skill. But it sure as hell shows a lot more skill than AoE’ing that zerg even though you have died because of it thousands of times already.

Wait. You actually think that a zerg just facerubbing against a gate, semi-akitten or just completely afk, is more skillfull then throwing AoE?

Stacking Retaliation takes no thought whatsoever, it just happens because of how many combofinishers are going on in a zerg and how many Light-fields are just getting kitten all over the place by Guardians.

It litteraly takes no choice, sacrifice, or even a single sentient moment to do. Its a side-effect, an afterthought, to what you’re doing anyway. Its a great deal more difficult to NOT stack retal in a zerg.

You are just completely missing the point aren’t you?

• You know that pressing button A will result in an electric shock.
• You have the option of pressing or not pressing button A.
• You press button A. And again. And again. And again.

Does this seem reasonable to you?

Would you consider changing weapon sets? Even with the retal reduction bow rangers are rofl for guardians.

Gab Superstar.4059:

You are just completely missing the point aren’t you?

• You know that pressing button A will result in an electric shock.
• You have the option of pressing or not pressing button A.
• You press button A. And again. And again. And again.

Does this seem reasonable to you?

You sound like you’re trying to argue in favor of Retaliation, but you’re actually arguing against it.

Gab Superstar.4059:

You are just completely missing the point aren’t you?

• You know that pressing button A will result in an electric shock.
• You have the option of pressing or not pressing button A.
• You press button A. And again. And again. And again.

Does this seem reasonable to you?

Not really, no. However, if potentially far greater electric shocks are a certainty to be administered anyway, and there’s a chance that with pressing Button A you’ll stop them, then we might have a scenario vaguely similar to retal in wvw.

If a zerg has retaliation up 100% of the time, then the choice you would choose is “run away”, yes?

Gab Superstar.4059:

Terrahero.9358:

EFWinters.5421:

Terrahero.9358:

EFWinters.5421:

So…

• You know using Barrage will basically kill you if you fire it into a zerg.
• You still use Barrage, and promptly dies.

Sorry but I think this is working exactly as intended. Bad players die good players prevail.

Because facerubbing a gate, instagibbing people that AoE you due to Retal is the pinacle of skill. Amiright?

I never claimed it was the pinnacle of skill. But it sure as hell shows a lot more skill than AoE’ing that zerg even though you have died because of it thousands of times already.

Wait. You actually think that a zerg just facerubbing against a gate, semi-akitten or just completely afk, is more skillfull then throwing AoE?

Stacking Retaliation takes no thought whatsoever, it just happens because of how many combofinishers are going on in a zerg and how many Light-fields are just getting kitten all over the place by Guardians.

It litteraly takes no choice, sacrifice, or even a single sentient moment to do. Its a side-effect, an afterthought, to what you’re doing anyway. Its a great deal more difficult to NOT stack retal in a zerg.

You are just completely missing the point aren’t you?

• You know that pressing button A will result in an electric shock.
• You have the option of pressing or not pressing button A.
• You press button A. And again. And again. And again.

Does this seem reasonable to you?

In a game where i need to use button A to defeat my enemy.
The people i am attacking dont have to do anything for me to get a shock. So my choices are split between

1) Dont do anything, at all.
2) Kill myself.

Either way, i am not contributing to the fight because of a no-brain boon. So NO its not reasonable at all.

It’s interesting that most of those defending retaliation fall into some distinct categories- namely those that solo (so they don’t see the problem), and those that play thief or guardian.

The solution is simple: as the receiver of the damage, you can only receive one tick of retaliation per second. That still means one guardian can be doing retaliation damage on 20 targets a second without raising a finger whilst taking no damage themselves..which seems to be the argument guardians use to justify telling people not to use aoe’s against multiple targets- don’t use your aoe’s, they cause so much damage, and yet what exactly does your no brainer skill do?

Sounds like guardians want to have their cake and eat it at the moment.

All it needs is a cap for the amount per second any player can receive from it – at the moment it is potentially one of the most powerful skills in the game and you don’t even have to be near the other players for them to be damaged by you.

I have it! The solution is this:

Retaliation damage should also trigger Retaliation.

Sound good?!

Infinite loop! Sounds awesome.

xiv.7136:

It’s kind of funny how people don’t seem to understand how broken retaliation is right now in wvw (in the maps where it hasn’ t been nerfed yet)

Simply put, if you haven’t noticed what a ridiculous amount of damage retal does, it’s because you’re not really contributing to the fight.

You’re probably doing l33t single target dps against that one guy in the 40 vs 40 fight. Then yeah, you won’t notice retal.

Actually, XIV, far from it. I’m a ranger – almost 23K HP, 1546 Toughness, 2610 Armor, and use Longbow and GS primarily. I use barrage as much as possilbe, AOEing in zergs regularly with it. I average 45 – 60 kills per hour. (I believe that’s pretty decent. Lvl 78 Major with 23,328 WvW kills atm that I’ve contributed to.) And I play on EB and the BLs.

I use healing spring, signet of stone and food to deal with damage. And, no, retaliation is not a big deal for me.

A guardian is a pin cushion just like anybody else – in a zerg or otherwise! ;-)

Moonlight Wish – GoM

Sunflowers.1729:

Don’t compare Retaliation to Confusion – even though the two are similar they aren’t the same.

Both have consequences if the enemy attacks, however confusion is much more powerful:
-Works when the enemy attacks anyone, so they can’t just target someone without retaliation and carry on attacking
-Triggers on anything, including heals, stun breaks, some dodge rolls.etc
-Confusion is stackable
-Confusion doesn’t trigger multiple times for something like Barrage (although it does for Tornado/Dagger Storm, I think)

In other words, confusion punishes you for doing anything, but retaliation only punishes you for attacking someone.

While I do think the concept of retaliation is badly implemented (it should hit really hard, but have low duration), it’s hardly the same as confusion.

Edit: I keep missing words out

^Whatever this guy said
QFT

Terrahero.9358:

In a game where i need to use button A to defeat my enemy.
The people i am attacking dont have to do anything for me to get a shock. So my choices are split between

1) Dont do anything, at all.
2) Kill myself.

Either way, i am not contributing to the fight because of a no-brain boon. So NO its not reasonable at all.

You don’t need button A to defeat your enemy. You can use button B, button C, maybe even button D. I am not arguing in favor of anything, because this is not a thread for it. I am telling the OP how to deal with retaliation. The solution here is to not use Barrage.

Victory.2879:

It’s interesting that most of those defending retaliation fall into some distinct categories- namely those that solo (so they don’t see the problem), and those that play thief or guardian.

I am playing all professions in WvW at level 80 across multiple accounts. Believe me when I say I am not biased in any way. In fact, if you look through my posts you will see me be very vocal about nerfing confusion even though I run a full on Glamour mesmer myself (I still do, it’s still powerful).

Olvendred.3027:

If a zerg has retaliation up 100% of the time, then the choice you would choose is “run away”, yes?

I find that unlikely, but okay let’s pretend that happens. In that situation then yes, it might very well be in your best interest to run away, stringing the enemies out so they lose formation and don’t have time to stack retal instead of continuing the chase.

You are all talking like I am defending retaliation here, which I am not. I really don’t care whether or not it gets nerfed. But this thread is not a thread where you can whine and complain about it. This is a thread where the OP asked how to deal with retaliation. I simply gave my view on the matter.

Gab Superstar.4059:

You don’t need button A to defeat your enemy. You can use button B, button C, maybe even button D. I am not arguing in favor of anything, because this is not a thread for it. I am telling the OP how to deal with retaliation. The solution here is to not use Barrage.

Button B, C, D and all through the godkitten alphabet are all aoe aswell.

I play an Engineer, lets recap my weapon choices.

-Rifle: There is 1 ability that is single target damage, but its a CC. The damage abilities are exclusively AoE

-Pistol: Exclusively AoE. And one ability is multi-hit.

-Grenades: Exclusively AoE

-Bombs: Besides the fact its melee range, so goodluck defending a tower/keep with this. Its exclusively AoE

-Flamethrower: Exclusively AoE AND multi-hit.

-Toolkit: Besides being melee, goodluck with the whole tower thing. It has 1 single-target hit ability. And the other damage ability is a cleave, so, AoE.

-Elixirgun: Ability 1 is single-target and ranged. hallelujah! To bad it deals kitten poor damage. The other damage abilities, all AoE aswell.

And Engineer isnt alone in this. I’d easily wager a guess that most abilities in GW2 have an AoE or multi-hit component to them.

Watch how the clowns (clown not specifically aimed at the person i quoted) will now claim its more reasonable to just reroll another profession instead of fixing Retaliation.

Victory.2879:

It’s interesting that most of those defending retaliation fall into some distinct categories- namely those that solo (so they don’t see the problem), and those that play thief or guardian.

The solution is simple: as the receiver of the damage, you can only receive one tick of retaliation per second. That still means one guardian can be doing retaliation damage on 20 targets a second without raising a finger whilst taking no damage themselves..which seems to be the argument guardians use to justify telling people not to use aoe’s against multiple targets- don’t use your aoe’s, they cause so much damage, and yet what exactly does your no brainer skill do?

Sounds like guardians want to have their cake and eat it at the moment.

All it needs is a cap for the amount per second any player can receive from it – at the moment it is potentially one of the most powerful skills in the game and you don’t even have to be near the other players for them to be damaged by you.

ICD is no solution.

When the guardian throws up Reflect and you see the shiny shield wall glowing in the air in front of you please continue to attempt to shoot the guardian standing on the opposite side of it, because at this point the reflective shield will be performing it’s intended function, it’s not broken because you chose to keep shooting. Retaliation’s purpose is similarly the same to discourage you from continuing to attack or make you at least weigh the risk against continuing your assault. Don’t want to die from retaliation don’t attack when it’s up send the pet into die or just pause and set a trap and let them come to you. Personally I liked Retaliation before the nerf, but I’ve had to adapt since. Nerfing never was and never will be the key to keeping players happy I believe since someone always get shafted, better to buff the remainder. They busted my retaliation once already I respectfully request you leave it alone.

Krypto.2069:

xiv.7136:

It’s kind of funny how people don’t seem to understand how broken retaliation is right now in wvw (in the maps where it hasn’ t been nerfed yet)

Simply put, if you haven’t noticed what a ridiculous amount of damage retal does, it’s because you’re not really contributing to the fight.

You’re probably doing l33t single target dps against that one guy in the 40 vs 40 fight. Then yeah, you won’t notice retal.

Actually, XIV, far from it. I’m a ranger – almost 23K HP, 1546 Toughness, 2610 Armor, and use Longbow and GS primarily. I use barrage as much as possilbe, AOEing in zergs regularly with it. I average 45 – 60 kills per hour. (I believe that’s pretty decent. Lvl 78 Major with 23,328 WvW kills atm that I’ve contributed to.) And I play on EB and the BLs.

I use healing spring, signet of stone and food to deal with damage. And, no, retaliation is not a big deal for me.

A guardian is a pin cushion just like anybody else – in a zerg or otherwise! ;-)

Moonlight Wish – GoM

Well done on your pro dolyak kills

You don’t understand how the game works

I’ll let the cat out of the bag for the hell of it

ball up, 25 stacks of might, light fields, blast finishers

it’s pretty much broken OP, and there’s no counter to it

Halfwitte.6578:

When the guardian throws up Reflect and you see the shiny shield wall glowing in the air in front of you please continue to attempt to shoot the guardian standing on the opposite side of it, because at this point the reflective shield will be performing it’s intended function, it’s not broken because you chose to keep shooting. Retaliation’s purpose is similarly the same to discourage you from continuing to attack or make you at least weigh the risk against continuing your assault. Don’t want to die from retaliation don’t attack when it’s up send the pet into die or just pause and set a trap and let them come to you. Personally I liked Retaliation before the nerf, but I’ve had to adapt since. Nerfing never was and never will be the key to keeping players happy I believe since someone always get shafted, better to buff the remainder. They busted my retaliation once already I respectfully request you leave it alone.

Nah it needs to be changed, for reasons the engineer has pointed out above. When it’s got a near 100% up time for whatever reason, it needs to go. Granted it doesn’t bother me, but for many others, that’s a different story.

You can’t have an ability that nullifies whole classes across the board. If you believe they should, then I suppose you wouldn’t mind if say engineers had an ability called “Retribution” that took all the damage people would have taken from Retaliation but reflected all of it back to the Guardian.

Would you like that? Would you have a problem with it if Anet created an ability like that?

If we just take a look at things at 3 paths:
1 take decision
2 opposite decision on 1
3 do nothing
How is possible Arenanet always takes wrong one decision?
ps “Retaliation” is one of this decisions

I’ve played a guardian and only a guardian since headstart. I spent time learning all the combo finishers, and spec to keep retal up on myself and the 1-4 other guys I play with as much as possible. I don’t zerg. I think the dmg in EB is good, and once it goes to the BLs things should be pretty balanced.

One of my weps is greatsword, and I often take 10k dmg from retal with greatsword whirls when I jump into a group that has a guardian. I used to use a staff and take 1500dmg each swing. I think the only class that can reasonably complain about retal is engineer, but at the same time engineer is one of the most survivable classes out there with multiple weapon kits to choose from, much like an ele.

Maybe this is all just a zerg problem. Maybe you guys should stop playing in giant unorganized blobs.

I think warrior can run to fast. Nerf them.
I think thief can stealth for to long. Nerf them.
I think Mesmer can cast to many clones. Nerf them.
I think Ranger’s pet is to anoying. Nerf them.
I think Asuras are too small, Nerf them.
Norn are to big
Human are to human nerf them.
Please Anet make the game so I am a god.
Stop crying and get better.

Let me pull out a post from the Ranger forums I made a while ago…

RyuDragnier.9476:

The formula for retaliation seems solid as of right now at first glance to most, until you see one thing in open combat. As of right now the formula for it is the following, with the power based on whatever gave the person retaliation.

198.45 + (0.075 * Power)

While the flaw isn’t immediate, the following should tell you where the flaw lies. Last night I wakittenting a guardian who had retaliation on. I was taking 394 damage with each hit when the hits I were dishing to said guardian with a longbow were only 280 damage.

Anybody else see the problem here? It’s that the retaliation damage can OUTDO the damage you’re inflicting to the opponent, and stays at that amount regardless of whether or not you burst them down or not. This is the main problem with retaliation, that it’s not a set percentage of damage YOU do, making it somewhat overpowered against players who have low attack, and underpowered against those with high attack.

I say make it so that you’re taking anywhere from 25% to 50% of the damage you dealt to them back at you (I’m leaning towards 33%). This can be considered a nerf and a buff to it at the same time. Condition users like myself need not worry about shooting ourselves down by getting hit with more than we’re hitting for, while at the same time making it a worry for somebody who is a glass cannon, like a thief, who pulls off a 8-9K damage burst.

Rob.7624:

Sunflowers.1729:

Don’t compare Retaliation to Confusion – even though the two are similar they aren’t the same.

Both have consequences if the enemy attacks, however confusion is much more powerful:
-Works when the enemy attacks anyone, so they can’t just target someone without retaliation and carry on attacking
-Triggers on anything, including heals, stun breaks, some dodge rolls.etc
-Confusion is stackable
-Confusion doesn’t trigger multiple times for something like Barrage (although it does for Tornado/Dagger Storm, I think)

In other words, confusion punishes you for doing anything, but retaliation only punishes you for attacking someone.

While I do think the concept of retaliation is badly implemented (it should hit really hard, but have low duration), it’s hardly the same as confusion.

Edit: I keep missing words out

^Whatever this guy said
QFT

BUT that being said it takes more than 1 confusion to do the same amount of damage as retaliation :P Just stating it to be clear, though you are right. I don’t see what the huge deal with people against retal is…once they fix it so that it’s properly nerfed in the BL’s it won’t be an issue I think. Confusion was a decent counter to retal..if they spring a bunch of retal on you, you AoE confusion and both sides can’t do it, but with the confusion getting nerfed but not the retal, it makes retal seem much more powerful. I’m not sure how ANET derped it up, but they some how did (I swear they would mess up a PB&J somehow…). My only issue with retal is that it counts reflected attacks the same way as direct.

S i t u a t i o n a l A w a r e n e s s

Handin.4032:

Drakh.3128:

Better yet, try being a confusion mesmer. I hit them for 65 with confusion then get hit back for 375 from retaliation. Yeah, that’s fair…..

But remember, the only way to counter confusion is to not attack, and the only way to truly counter retaliation is…oh wait…

Yeah, I do find it personally hilarious to see people supporting retaliation with things like “get more vit”, etc…but when confusion was on the chopping block, people were proclaiming the only thing that you could do is not attack, and therefore it must be nerfed. Confusion and retaliation, in my eyes, are the same type of idea..except one is a boon you put on yourself, and the other is condition you put on others.. I guess the only difference is you can stack the conditions, but I’ve seen people with near constant retaliation, or spreading it to entire zergs. I’ve been killed by a feedback from retaliation because someone in the raid will spread retaliation the moment it hits. It’s a great strategy though (though I don’t think reflects should be affected by retaliation, because I’m technically not “attacking” the person..they’re attacking themselves)

Thats cause confusion could easily do 2k+ per action. retaliation is fine. You can cancel your barrage. plus retal is really only good vs certain actions, as opposed to confusion being good vs everything

Can any of you legitimately defend how many times retaliation triggers on channel skills, multi-hit skills, and multi-projectile skills? “Use something else” certainly isn’t viable for all professions, as shown by the engineer post somewhere above. As it is, a group with retaliation can spike a player on the walls down with retaliation without ever targeting them, or even knowing they were there.

Here is the real answer:

(1) If you identify that the enemy has Retaliation, you are not supposed to use certain fast-hitting AoE skills (2) at that moment. Either (3) remove it, or (4) don’t attack.

Breaking down this answer:

1. Identifying the enemy has Retaliation is very difficult in a zerg. What exactly is reasonable? Are you supposed to target every player on the enemy team? The visual effect of Retaliation is too subtle to identify it properly in a large zerg. You should simply assume it’s going to be there on an organized zerg.
2. Retaliation in WvW follows the same ruleset as in PvE. Thus, sPvP limitations on Boons (-5% Boon Duration on Rune of the Water, Rune of the Monk) are not in effect. Furthermore, with consumables it further boosts the uptime of this Boon. Finally, with how large scale groups are in WvW, the uptime of Retaliation can be nigh indefinite.
3. Boon Removal vs. Boon Application is lopsided for reasons stated in (2). Boon Removal consists of stationary medium-sized AoE (240-300), while Boon Application typically involves Shouts which have twice the radii (600-900). Even if the stars align and you are able to land enough Null Fields, Well of Corruption, etc., the recharge rate of AoE Boon application exceeds that of removal.
4. Not attacking is the only response. Because (1) you must assume it’s there because it’s hard to identify if it is or isn’t, (2) and that it’s often up (3) while being difficult to remove, you must (4) use builds which do not punish you for hitting someone with Retaliation in the first place.

Kyuzo.4675:

…..so a guy goes to the Doctor and says “Doc, it hurts when i do this” and the Doctor says “Stop doing that”……

Don’t barrage zergs since they will often have many players with retaliation up. Sorry but its that simple. There are many other things you could be doing instead of using the one skill from one weapon used in one scenario that gives you too much damage.

LOL, this is why we can’t have nice things.

Just don’t use your AOE on a group. Makes sense.

Excellent summary and answer by Nokaru.7831. I voted it.

To put it short: keeping up retaliation in a zerg is easy and currently it is overpowered in such situations, hurting certain builds very hard (e.g. grenadier engineer, flamethrower engineer, barrage ranger). Boon removal is not the answer.

I don’t understand why retaliation still does full damage in Borderlands. I used it once again today to kill opponents using light combo fields. Even after reducing retaliation to same level as in Eternal Battlegrounds and spvp/tpvp, it would still be too powerful, but why full damage on borderlands?

Relation is fine in 1-vs-1, but becomes overpowered in big fights when multiple opponents all have retaliation.

I wanna Aoe, no matter what, to get a badge somehow should be the topic’s title in the end
Thread closed.

I think the easiest fix would be give nearly every class a reliable boon removal. Too many classes can be over the top because of boons anyway. Retaliation supporters could still scream their l2p garbage and those that hate it can reliably deal with it.

As a flamethrower Engineer I hit the sharp end of Retaliation quite often. If I start seeing it coming in from my attacks, I suck it up for a bit and then back off and heal. If I get downed by Retaliation it really is because I’m not paying attention. There are plenty of options for me to damage/inconvenience people without kicking off Retaliation but honestly I hardly ever have to resort to them because, I hardly ever see truly long-term Retaliation … and I wouldn’t be so disrespectful to the servers I’ve faced as to suggest that they don’t have the skill to do it.

Incidentally I’m mostly in the Borderlands.

Refer to the post I made above as to why Retaliation is currently OP.

Lyndis.2584:

I am a ranger.

I use a longbow. (Which is terrible enough as it is.)

I used barrage.

I see that there are many guys, who solo spam aoe skills each time they see any group of ppl – 1 vs 20..
That’s ok, but next time try to do it with your mates using teambuilds (not many required). Dont think that you would get any problems.

Don’t know what anyone else said but the solution is you stop attacking. Same as confusion. Easiest solution ever.

Retaliation was already nerfed and doesn’t need another.

I have a p/d thief and each sneak attack is retal x 5. Sometimes you just have to stop attacking that target and be smart about your AoEs that trigger retaliation.

Zephyrus.9680:

Don’t know what anyone else said but the solution is you stop attacking. Same as confusion. Easiest solution ever.

Retaliation was already nerfed and doesn’t need another.

I have a p/d thief and each sneak attack is retal x 5. Sometimes you just have to stop attacking that target and be smart about your AoEs that trigger retaliation.

no because then people would have to think and not attack without consequence.

People should be able to use a skill and receive some consequence as a result of that use. But wouldn’t you agree that if the consequence was greater than the initial attack, it could be considered unbalanced?

Chaba.5410:

People should be able to use a skill and receive some consequence as a result of that use. But wouldn’t you agree that if the consequence was greater than the initial attack, it could be considered unbalanced?

I think they should lower the number of sources you can receive retaliation damage from, but nerfing the damage and duration AGAIN is not the answer.

Which is why they need to make it a set % of the damage dealt to the opponent by an attack (not condition). Why should I be taking 394 damage from retaliation when I’m only doing 232 damage to the enemy?

RyuDragnier.9476:

Which is why they need to make it a set % of the damage dealt to the opponent by an attack (not condition). Why should I be taking 394 damage from retaliation when I’m only doing 232 damage to the enemy?

Because then warriors and thieves hitting for 10k would complain.

Zephyrus.9680:

Don’t know what anyone else said but the solution is you stop attacking. Same as confusion. Easiest solution ever.

Retaliation was already nerfed and doesn’t need another.

I have a p/d thief and each sneak attack is retal x 5. Sometimes you just have to stop attacking that target and be smart about your AoEs that trigger retaliation.

kitten that is one fine solution.. why didn’t I think of that. In WvW tonight.. I’ll just do that..

I’ll encounter a zerg..

and just….

stand there…

brilliant….

….

….

K everyone on T2, look for a ranger just hanging out in the back somewhere doing nothing, free lootz!!

GJ with hyperbole. If you’re too laggy or just don’t have the awareness to cancel your AoE attack that’kittenting 5 targets, don’t zerg.

if anyone actually listened to the less than intelligent posters in this thread, every zerg fight would consist of two zergs running at each other, hitting tab until a target without retaliation popped up, and then trying to single target that person down.

Retal makes most engi builds useless in large scale fights.

Engi aoe: Grenade kit, Flamethrower, Bomb Kit

Grenade kit + Flamethrower get annihilated by retal.
Bomb Kit a little better, but requires u to be in melee range and Heavy armor classes are much better than that. (Not tanky enough, and lacks disengage, if made tanky enough, bombs become useless)