Guild Wars 2

The druid reveal is basically finished on Twitch and Dulfy has screen grabs of the abilities.

Changes to the meta? Let the QQ commence!

My thought is a druid will be nice in a melee ball going into druid-shroud for support. Also, predict boneheaded druids using that knockback and pushing targets right out of the bomb.

Healing wall looks like a nice addition to Wall of Reflection.

Right now it is basically obligatory to have GWEN classes. No problem at rangers becoming obligatory for meta too.

Sorry, what is a GWEN class?

Guardian Warrior Elemenalist and Necro. The most abundant classes in zergs.

xDudisx.5914:

Right now it is basically obligatory to have GWEN classes. No problem at rangers becoming obligatory for meta too.

The title was meant to say “the thread is obligatory” not that Druids are, but you make a valid point.

Druid looks freagin awesome, just absolutely awesome.

Between Druids, Chronomancers, Hammer Engis, Reapers, Revenants I see LOTS of changes incoming. There will indeed be a lot of QQ, especially from commanders / guilds who are unable or unwilling to adapt.

However I do have 1 very valid concern. Condi specs. As most people here know except maybe the new players, condi specs are largely useless in zerg play and are only used in roaming and SPVP, even PVE other then the top 3 burn specs are pretty much on the low end.

We have been playing power based builds for 3+ years already and only recently started condi after the recent changes. I see this as a flip towards the old instead of the new, to me, the game in general needs more individual active cleansing, but far less aoe cleanse spam in order to balance the small / large scale, but the druid seems to be taking this in a very wrong direction and cause an even further imbalance rather then balance.

Tongku.5326:

Druid looks freagin awesome, just absolutely awesome.

Between Druids, Chronomancers, Hammer Engis, Reapers, Revenants I see LOTS of changes incoming. There will indeed be a lot of QQ, especially from commanders / guilds who are unable or unwilling to adapt.

However I do have 1 very valid concern. Condi specs. As most people here know except maybe the new players, condi specs are largely useless in zerg play and are only used in roaming and SPVP, even PVE other then the top 3 burn specs are pretty much on the low end.

We have been playing power based builds for 3+ years already and only recently started condi after the recent changes. I see this as a flip towards the old instead of the new, to me, the game in general needs more individual active cleansing, but far less aoe cleanse spam in order to balance the small / large scale, but the druid seems to be taking this in a very wrong direction and cause an even further imbalance rather then balance.

Yup, condi regen ranger just took on a whole new meaning. Step aside mesmers, this just became the new king of roaming.

The reason we see power builds favored over condi is because the former leads to fights that are engaging throughout as dodging any attack is useful. The latter relies on making the opponent run out of condi clears, at which point they have little choice but to die. Thus, with condi, the fight is even more blatantly decided by who’s specced what at the outset instead of the decisions that get made in the fight.

It would be a poor idea to promote condi right now. It needs a re-pass so that it doesn’t lead to such binary fights before it can really be spotlighted.

Sviel.7493:

The reason we see power builds favored over condi is because the former leads to fights that are engaging throughout as dodging any attack is useful. The latter relies on making the opponent run out of condi clears, at which point they have little choice but to die. Thus, with condi, the fight is even more blatantly decided by who’s specced what at the outset instead of the decisions that get made in the fight.

It would be a poor idea to promote condi right now. It needs a re-pass so that it doesn’t lead to such binary fights before it can really be spotlighted.

You made some false implications here. You can dodge skills that apply conditions, just as easily as you can dodge skills that apply direct damage. Similarly, you can block as many skills that apply conditions as you can those that do direct damage.

Sviel.7493:

The reason we see power builds favored over condi is because the former leads to fights that are engaging throughout as dodging any attack is useful. The latter relies on making the opponent run out of condi clears, at which point they have little choice but to die. Thus, with condi, the fight is even more blatantly decided by who’s specced what at the outset instead of the decisions that get made in the fight.

It would be a poor idea to promote condi right now. It needs a re-pass so that it doesn’t lead to such binary fights before it can really be spotlighted.

Outpressuring your opponents has been done since betas and is actually still more effective on power builds in large scale groups due to overall average skill lag where conditions completely fail to apply or calculate properly (get 1 tick instead of 3 etc.).

the only nice thing about condi bombs is that they are really effective on restacks / refresh cycles as you can use them to negate all the empowers and / or scatter your opponents so they dont receive full benefits.

Its always been a part of WvW and I dont see that changing. As far as the whole dodging thing goes, the biggest change here was the stability change, not condi change. You know how incredibly fast stab gets stripped now right ? I think that is what you are missing, the ability to have a chance to some sort of active response instead of being insta CCed and insta killed. But your perception is misguided and so your conclusions are flawed. As I said in another thread, if you had just 1 second of unremovable stab, it would allow you to hit your “o kitten !” button if you are quick and good enough, vs unable to do anything whatsoever in the current state. That would promote more action and tactics to great extent. Not condi change.

if you want more active gameplay vs multiple CC fields, you need to rebalance / rework stab, not condis. There is in fact a thread about that on same page as this one. See it.

GWENR

Needs a better ress utility if it’s gunna have a place in zvz.

Should be good in small groups though.

Sororita.3465:

GWENR

No.

I think its gonna be GWEENRR, or often mispronounced to wiener. Guard Warrior Ele Engi Nec Rang Rev. O and I forgot Chrono, but that doesnt fit well in wiener.

Tongku.5326:

Outpressuring your opponents has been done since betas and is actually still more effective on power builds in large scale groups due to overall average skill lag where conditions completely fail to apply or calculate properly (get 1 tick instead of 3 etc.).

the only nice thing about condi bombs is that they are really effective on restacks / refresh cycles as you can use them to negate all the empowers and / or scatter your opponents so they dont receive full benefits.

Its always been a part of WvW and I dont see that changing. As far as the whole dodging thing goes, the biggest change here was the stability change, not condi change. You know how incredibly fast stab gets stripped now right ? I think that is what you are missing, the ability to have a chance to some sort of active response instead of being insta CCed and insta killed. But your perception is misguided and so your conclusions are flawed. As I said in another thread, if you had just 1 second of unremovable stab, it would allow you to hit your “o kitten !” button if you are quick and good enough, vs unable to do anything whatsoever in the current state. That would promote more action and tactics to great extent. Not condi change.

if you want more active gameplay vs multiple CC fields, you need to rebalance / rework stab, not condis. There is in fact a thread about that on same page as this one. See it.

Sorry, I was talking about small scale fights, mostly 1v1. I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, but I didn’t say half the things you pulled out of my statement.

I suppose I should have specified, this being a WvW forum.

im concerned about how rangers who dont spec for druid will be treated by parties and zergs.

…probably like rangers, not wanted.

GWENDR Meta is incomming

Ravezaar.4951:

GWENDR Meta is incomming

Wouldn’t it be GWENDRERC ? Sorry thieves you’re still gank and may or may not be useful in open field.

I’m sure roles will be condensed/replaced so that the meta doesn’t ever exceed 5 characters.

GWENSDHRC – Guardian, Warrior, Elementalist,Necromancer, Scrapper, Druid, Herald, Reaper, Chronomancer

or

Gwensudhurk

Gesundheit.

I think non water field healing will start to show up in wvw but i think its going to be melee aimed casting healing is not as effective due to the need for high mobility of wvw. You do not need to heal back line classes (if your low hp your already kind of out of the fight its not much more to simply run out) where melee need some type of support. I see druid fall more into a melee type support with GS and staff (mind you staff not going to be that great in melee but it will have enofe effects to make it worth to jump into it for a few skill then back into GS as fast as you can). Though i must say its odd that druid got a 1,200 ranged wepon when most of there utility and healing effects are mostly melee ranged.

Sviel.7493:

Tongku.5326:

Outpressuring your opponents has been done since betas and is actually still more effective on power builds in large scale groups due to overall average skill lag where conditions completely fail to apply or calculate properly (get 1 tick instead of 3 etc.).

the only nice thing about condi bombs is that they are really effective on restacks / refresh cycles as you can use them to negate all the empowers and / or scatter your opponents so they dont receive full benefits.

Its always been a part of WvW and I dont see that changing. As far as the whole dodging thing goes, the biggest change here was the stability change, not condi change. You know how incredibly fast stab gets stripped now right ? I think that is what you are missing, the ability to have a chance to some sort of active response instead of being insta CCed and insta killed. But your perception is misguided and so your conclusions are flawed. As I said in another thread, if you had just 1 second of unremovable stab, it would allow you to hit your “o kitten !” button if you are quick and good enough, vs unable to do anything whatsoever in the current state. That would promote more action and tactics to great extent. Not condi change.

if you want more active gameplay vs multiple CC fields, you need to rebalance / rework stab, not condis. There is in fact a thread about that on same page as this one. See it.

Sorry, I was talking about small scale fights, mostly 1v1. I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, but I didn’t say half the things you pulled out of my statement.

I suppose I should have specified, this being a WvW forum.

I’m sorry but this is a team game. If 1 vs 1 balance imbalances group balance as is the current situation, if I had to sacrifice one of them, then I would rather sacrifice 1 vs 1 balance in order to have better team balance, not the other way around. And by team, these things also apply to small scale. Your team comp doesnt have to be a zerg with multiple guards / wars that run multiple team cleanses, heals etc. You can have a team of 3-4 people, where each person has just a single team cleanse or team heal or even just provides regen at a decent rate, which does not negate their offensive abilities or utilities by much, and still get very good average results.

And even for 1 vs 1 what I mentioned still applies, in fact I used it just yesterday on my engi. I was able to outpressure mesmers and thieves both of power and condi variety while in solo situations roughly about half the times just last night. What I noticed from my last night fights, which BTW was predictable, is that I had a high success rate vs anything on glassy side and harder time (got killed) vs anything on the bunker build side (exceptions went to bunker mobility lacking builds which I was able to kite very successfully).

In essence, I only died to hard-counter builds. the same would have applied to small team scale and I had a choice to adjust my build for them, but then I would have become susceptible to the 1st group. Hence to me it seems working.