Guild Wars 2

Whenever you see hoards of people using the same builds in WvW it’s an indication that they are currently OP. I am seeing lots of dragon hunter guardians most of them noobs and others are somewhat good, but usually its the noob guardian that sits on traps and ranges you.

See-Saw balancing

For instance the Chronomancer is probably the best class support in the game but they’re the worst DPS to balance that out.

The Necro is the best at soloing content but is the worst class at support

Warriors are rather middle ground in all modes that their in

The other classes float in between these parameters so I wouldn’t say any class is really OP though it makes balance extremely wonky even broken when you consider the elite powercreep in certain modes. Simply pick a mode and people will tell you what classes excel in that mode.

As for the Guardians your seeing many of them who stayed with HoT abandoned their classes since the DragonHunter doesn’t fit the stalwart wall of holy might and mythos the original guardian portrayed. All the other elites sort of matched up with the theme the core classes represented but the dragonhunter was so far off that it turned many people away. However with the recent leaks comes information about the new elite and there are even additional images compared to other elites with actual combat images. The surge in guardians in the game is a surge not only in people returning to their mains for the new elite but actual hype regarding the new specialization.

We know more about the guardian elite because we’ve seen more of it than the others so it’s only natural it would be hyped up a bit and people making new toons. This would explain why your seeing so many noob guardians as well.

Guardians are probably the number one staple class for wvw with stability, condition cleanse, support boons, healing, so it’s not exactly surprising to see a lot of them, dragonhunter spec also gives them some good options and good range dps to go along with all that.

“most of them noobs and others are somewhat good”
Doesn’t that really apply to all classes?

Guardians are probably most common/popular in WvW zergs because of their strong group support working as a force multiplier for each other. One guardian is weak. But as you get more, they have more boons being passed around each other, more symbols appearing everywhere, more virtues firing off on each other (They can heal and guard each other! ), and all around more power for the whole team of guardians.

McLain’s says it’s anybody but not thief. <cough>

“Whenever you see hoards of people using the same builds in WvW it’s an indication that they are currently OP.” – Hitman

it could mean OP, or just that the class is really liked.

Dragonhunters tend to be slow, but can counter thief & Mesmer pretty well, and are easy to play as, relatively.
they’re also Heavy Class whose Elite sports a ranged weapon, perhaps attracting attention on its own

Though, any class can be good one way or another in WvW (Maybe not Revenant).

I think you are mistaking the categories “popular” and “overpowered”, in your question.

Also, Hitman? You’re currently playing with a thief in WvW, aren’t you?

Arguably condi necro right now. Ever since the change to Deathly Chill, necros have been able to stack ridiculous amounts of bleed in seconds just from hitting their target with shouts, auras, and other aoe.

Previously condi necro was about loading up a target with condi, then landing an epi. Now it’s more about aoe chill+bleed spam and getting 30 stacks on everyone around you from fields + combos.

For roaming, it’s Thief, Warrior, or Condi Mesmer.

Thief has about 5x the mobility of any other class. A good thief can always disengage and run away. Combined with the high burst available to the class, you can kill targets pretty safely, and always have the option to run if things go south.

Warrior has enough invuln/stab/resistance/regen combined with high burst and cc. It’s enough to 1v3 if you are able to finish your targets quickly.

Condi Mesmer is just relentless condi spam that your opponent can’t do much to avoid. If they don’t have tons of condi clear, they’ll probably die. Mesmer also has a lot of invuln and disengage options.

@coro.3176, well for pve reason, Necros needs to perform that way, to make condition build viable to pve…

wait for the next guardian smitting praers specs, transform allies condis in fire to nearby hostiles… ^^

Top tier cheese: Condi Mesmer/Boon Warrior
Mid tier cheese: Staff Druid/Daredevil
Low tier cheese: Condi Reaper/Dragonhunter

Hitman.5829:

Whenever you see hoards of people using the same builds in WvW it’s an indication that they are currently OP. I am seeing lots of dragon hunter guardians most of them noobs and others are somewhat good, but usually its the noob guardian that sits on traps and ranges you.

And what’s so bad about that?

Its difficult to discern what is simply potent and what is actively overpowered.
I think Guardians, Necromancers, Mesmers and Elementalists are the fan favourites for zerging, while Warriors, Thieves, Druids and Mesmers are more potent roamers.

I guess by that shotty logic Mesmers are overpowered while Revs & Engis are underpowered?

~ Kovu

In terms of single class unit, its chrono, there is no room for discussion on that fact. And its due to 1 little tiny utility skill they can possess…I’m sure you can all guess what it is.

For multiple units….necro is doing well but its still balanced.

Guardian > Warrior, engie, necro, rev,
that leaves…ele, mesmer, druid. Druid I would normally go up top but I honestly can’t put something that acts like a minigun in the useless pile regardless of the facts.
I’d say guardian, ele, mesmer would be among the three most OP classes right now.
Guardian are very powerful grouped, they are almost made to function that way. But solo as well guardians have all the tools needed to counter even the most proficient bunker killers….its just hard to do is all.

Chillomancer necro by far.

Necros completely dominate GREN at the moment with a 40%+ presence for having “enough”, anything lower is too few. The chill and bleed spam near zergs is insane and they are just as strong solo. If they know what they are doing and you miss a dodge, you go down 30% hp a second.

Hitman.5829:

Whenever you see hoards of people using the same builds in WvW it’s an indication that they are currently OP. I am seeing lots of dragon hunter guardians most of them noobs and others are somewhat good, but usually its the noob guardian that sits on traps and ranges you.

Been saying it for awhile now. Vanilla Rangers (Often with Ursine pets) needs a good nerf.

In all seriousness the condi necro is probably the most disgusting class atm.

Imo druids and eles healing is anoying, they can do damage at least more than i do with mace shield shout guard.~

@Kilo, i hate druid and eles healings, yeah necros are stupidly op when stacked but they need to be like that due PVE reasons, since they are doing a stupid broken design due pve reasons they canteven balance for pvp.
Anet will add a another stupid gimmick to try to counter necros probably….

Most Op classes:
Roaming:
1. Berserker
2. Daredevils
3. Condi Reapers
4. Condi Chrono
5. Tank Druids

Warriors seem to own the roaming scene currently. Insane amount of passives incorporated into their builds. You can pretty much go autopilot with the meta build and down like 55 people.

roamzero.9486:

Top tier cheese: Condi Mesmer, Boon Warrior
Mid tier cheese: Staff Druid/Daredevil
Low tier cheese: Condi Reaper, Dragonhunter

I would say this right here is most accurate. All of which can be highly difficult to kill while also being an extreme threat even in the hands of an idiot.

RodOfDeath.5247:

Warriors seem to own the roaming scene currently. Insane amount of passives incorporated into their builds. You can pretty much go autopilot with the meta build and down like 55 people.

I don’t feel that they own the scene. I think that title belongs to condition Mesmer and has for a very long time. All the elite spec did was make them twice as hard to kill. 9 times out of 10 if I see a Mesmer, I know they’ll be condition and I know there’s a chance they’ll be condition bunker. The bunker ones are the worst offenders because they’re hard enough to kill as it is without having perma-every boon in the game.

But back to Warrior – I was using an oldschool Cavalier + Arms build for quite a long while. I’ve shared the stats here a number of times because they’re so ludicrous and yet… I recently went full berserker Berserker with the typical GS + Mace/Shield set up and traits (though I’ve been using hammer mostly lately) and it manages to be more effective at everything. I don’t have nearly as much armor, health nor do I have 100% guaranteed burst criticals but I’m still stronger in every way with Berserker than I was with a high stat vanilla Warrior ( click here for said build – also keep in mind that Precision is 50% + during combat). The uptime on Adrenal Health, the ridiculous burst damage + range on most of the skills, Headbutt and Taunt on entering Berserk are all just so much better. I used to not think Berserker was that bad but after playing it… Just wow. The faceroll is so real. Adrenal Health and the massive amounts of damage you can pump out carry so hard. I also think that Defy Pain needs to be reduced to proc’ing at 20% health because I’ve tried not using it and it makes a gigantic difference. If you haven’t tried before and you play Warrior, I urge you to try some fights without that passive safety net and tell me how much of a difference it makes.

Probably warrior because they are basically immune to conditions now. Great job kittenin anet!

Fighting a guild-mate warrior in our arena. I think he has roughly 30 seconds of continuous resistance.

roamzero.9486:

Top tier cheese: Condi Mesmer/Boon Warrior
Mid tier cheese: Staff Druid/Daredevil
Low tier cheese: Condi Reaper/Dragonhunter

I think this is pretty accurate for roaming/small scale, I would move DD to top tier if they have Acro line.

In WvW large scale fights the whole thing is dominated by Guards, Eles, Necros. An argument can be made for not even needing other classes. Maybe Malyx Revs for the pulsing resistance if condi bombing is still the meta.

Ragnarox.9601:

Most Op classes:
Roaming:
1. Berserker
2. Daredevils
3. Condi Reapers
4. Condi Chrono
5. Tank Druids

1. Berserker
2. Condi Reapers
3. Condi Chrono
4. DareDevil
5. Tank Druids

Fixed it for ya. Your welcome

I used to play all the above classes/builds (aside from Tank Druid) and condi reapers now a days have no problem taking outjust about anything, despite of passives. Condi chronos have great condi application mixed with lots of stealth. Daredevils are full DPS and too many passives/condi builds out there that can either negate DPS Damage or have too much toughness/vit to beat through.

Most OP is a bit subjective. Depends on your playstyle. If you look at overall flexibility and usefulness, Ranger and Warrior reigns supreme. Their current balance allows for good sustain, and also useful supportive roles (druid; condi cleansing; shout healing).
Both warrior and Ranger, to my experience, does very well in zerging and roaming at this moment. Both offer good sustain and damage. After returning to the game after a long hiatus, i personally experienced just how annoyingly hard it is to kill a decent druid ranger (i main ranger, and like many others i thought druid was trash for a while)

Necromancer/Reaper, Guardian/Dragonhunter, Ele/Tempest – all good choice, you cannot go wrong per say, but they have their downsides and may not be very good unless specifically built for a role.

Guardians are OP because a hamster could play them effectively and they are basically good/great at every mode of WvW now. Their defensive sustain even on offensive builds is stupid good.

Stealth remains OP. It is easy to stack for long periods and it is attached to classes with high mobility. It is utterly ridiculous in its current form.

Condi Bunker anything is OP in small scale. All the DPS of a power build with none of the draw backs.

coro.3176:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TobRShd-5as

Fighting a guild-mate warrior in our arena. I think he has roughly 30 seconds of continuous resistance.

dont forget 30 sec of 2stack of stability and retaliation. Pretty much immune to everything.
Boon bots with extreme dmg. They should and must be toned down.

Ragnarox.9601:

coro.3176:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TobRShd-5as

Fighting a guild-mate warrior in our arena. I think he has roughly 30 seconds of continuous resistance.

dont forget 30 sec of 2stack of stability and retaliation. Pretty much immune to everything.
Boon bots with extreme dmg. They should and must be toned down.

I play mostly shout warrior, but even with shout and WH and Ire cleansing, you cannot “out-cleanse” any decent condi build… Sure, you wont get knocked over, but you’ll melt against condi users…

If we are looking at the entire game mode from bottom to top it’s hands down Guardian/Dragon Hunter. As someone accurately said they’re a force multiplier for themselves in zergs and form the backbones and entire basis of large scale combat.

Roaming they aren’t too shabby either, yes other builds are better but with a rune that gives 25% movement speed and sword they can do a decent amount of kiting vs their counters. The only classes that have teleports to match JI and symbol of blades in kiting are thief, mesmer and rev, 2 of which the DH has a favourable fight against.

Honourable mention to warrior though as it’s better in smaller scale but not quite as good in large scale as guards.

Prysin.8542:

Ragnarox.9601:

coro.3176:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TobRShd-5as

Fighting a guild-mate warrior in our arena. I think he has roughly 30 seconds of continuous resistance.

dont forget 30 sec of 2stack of stability and retaliation. Pretty much immune to everything.
Boon bots with extreme dmg. They should and must be toned down.

I play mostly shout warrior, but even with shout and WH and Ire cleansing, you cannot “out-cleanse” any decent condi build… Sure, you wont get knocked over, but you’ll melt against condi users…

That’s because you’re not supposed to “out cleanse” them. Just like you’re not supposed to out block/immune physical damage. You avoid the hard hitters and recover from the ones you can survive.

That kind of mentality is exactly the reason so many people think condition builds are OP. Because they think they should be able to cleanse everything and kill them in two shots. Figure out what the biggest threats are and avoid them. Save cleanses for when they’re needed instead of trying to get rid of everything that hits you. You’re not going to go an entire fight without taking a few ticks of condition damage just like you’re not going to go an entire fight evading/blocking every single attack from a power build.

For roaming in my opinion condi mesmer with scepter

1vs1 a skilled thief will always win
However I still think due to volume Condi mesmer are the number 1 spot.
Condi reaper is very close as now they can put so much pressure on you and corrupt anything you give yourself.

Berserker warrior number 1? Really?
I wish I could play it as faceroll as you suggest, 2x endure pain and condi resistance are amazing but don’t last long enough to carry you against a competent player.
If my burst doesn’t hit and doesn’t proc adrenal health it’s not good.
If you kite me I die since I have a few gap closers but do all my work in melee.

Moral of the story don’t let warriors hit you and kite them to death

There is a lot of stuff I don’t like atm but I don’t think there is anything supremely broken right now that pulls ahead of everything else.

If you small scale for 30min you can expect to see,

reaper
druid
berserker
chrono

if you small scale for 60min you can also expect to see,

dragon hunter
daredevil
tempest

if you small scale for several hours you will get some representation of all the classes.

If I had to choose a class to play every night in small scale and only that class forever, it would be reaper. Aoe boon corruption does a lot of work in small scale.

Condi reaper problem is that they can’t land any hits against average or better players. Of course only maybe 2% of roamers are average or better.

Fighting a thief makes me want to drink bleach XD

Junkpile.7439:

Condi reaper problem is that they can’t land any hits against average or better players. Of course only maybe 2% of roamers are average or better.

2% = average?????

K THEN.5162:

Junkpile.7439:

Condi reaper problem is that they can’t land any hits against average or better players. Of course only maybe 2% of roamers are average or better.

2% = average?????

Well i talking mmo players. Not just gw2 players.

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Prysin.8542:

Ragnarox.9601:

coro.3176:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TobRShd-5as

Fighting a guild-mate warrior in our arena. I think he has roughly 30 seconds of continuous resistance.

dont forget 30 sec of 2stack of stability and retaliation. Pretty much immune to everything.
Boon bots with extreme dmg. They should and must be toned down.

I play mostly shout warrior, but even with shout and WH and Ire cleansing, you cannot “out-cleanse” any decent condi build… Sure, you wont get knocked over, but you’ll melt against condi users…

That’s because you’re not supposed to “out cleanse” them. Just like you’re not supposed to out block/immune physical damage. You avoid the hard hitters and recover from the ones you can survive.

That kind of mentality is exactly the reason so many people think condition builds are OP. Because they think they should be able to cleanse everything and kill them in two shots. Figure out what the biggest threats are and avoid them. Save cleanses for when they’re needed instead of trying to get rid of everything that hits you. You’re not going to go an entire fight without taking a few ticks of condition damage just like you’re not going to go an entire fight evading/blocking every single attack from a power build.

Actually, i CAN outcleanse condi bunkers efficiently, on other classes. But i wont bother to list my builds, as every time iv’e done so for the past 3-4 years, it’s been nerfed into the ground 4-6 months later.

I never said, nor implicated, that condi is OP. Being killed by something doesnt make it “OP”. Sadly, it seems you struggle with conditions to such a degree that you find them “OP”. Unfortunately, i cannot and will not help you with that.

But as you can guess, i’ve been playing this game nearly since launch, i am not a “novice”. I know how this game works, almost down to the game engine level.

From the perspective of a roaming thief, condi mes.

You boyz clearly don’t follow the meta!

Chronomancer are slightly cough cough op if handled properly.

Unless something is broken in PVE, Don’t expect Anet to nerf it soon. We need a PVE focused group to run a raid boss using this (same as what happened to perma stealth condi trapper thief)

Resistance uptime and whatever else uptime is for noobs. Permanent Distrotion is the final meta : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqwaNU6kwKI

Prysin.8542:

-snip-

Sadly, it seems you struggle with conditions to such a degree that you find them “OP”. Unfortunately, i cannot and will not help you with that.

But as you can guess, i’ve been playing this game nearly since launch, i am not a “novice”. I know how this game works, almost down to the game engine level.

Lol. I don’t know how you came to the conclusion that I think conditions are OP but it is actually quite the opposite. I may have made a poor assumption about your own opinions as well but the fact remains that you are not supposed to be trying to cleanse everything. Saying that you can do so isn’t hard for me to believe however considering how many builds can maintain such high Resistance uptime or shed conditions like nothing. Which is exactly why I can never wrap my head around how some people think conditions are OP. This is why every time the topic of “nerf conditions” comes up or someone insinuates they are better than power builds I have to assume they’re a) an idiot, b) new to the game, c) all of the above.

I must be the only one licking my chops when I come across a condi reaper as 99% of them highly depend on the game to play for them. I love demoralizing their meta build on my power reaper. Feels oh so good

Find a player who knows how to player condi reaper, now that’s a different story. But in my experience extremely rare.

I find almost everything I use and everything I fight against to generally be overpowered in multiple ways. I struggle to pick out which class is the worst offender because everything is just a mess right now.

Anet, I love you but…..what on an earth is going on?!

Napo.1230:

1vs1 a skilled thief will always win

uhhh only if you count running away a win. In duels, thieves are marginal at best.

Straegen.2938:

Napo.1230:

1vs1 a skilled thief will always win

uhhh only if you count running away a win. In duels, thieves are marginal at best.

thieves are terrible. They STILL get rekt by bearbow power rangers if there is equal player skill. And bearbow power ranger has been around since launch, and it STILL works against thieves… just a testament as to how little has improved for the thief

Prysin.8542:

Straegen.2938:

Napo.1230:

1vs1 a skilled thief will always win

uhhh only if you count running away a win. In duels, thieves are marginal at best.

thieves are terrible. They STILL get rekt by bearbow power rangers if there is equal player skill. And bearbow power ranger has been around since launch, and it STILL works against thieves… just a testament as to how little has improved for the thief

Those are some pretty terrible thieves.

people consider the lowest mobility class in the game as op at roaming. lul.

Erzian.5218:

people consider the lowest mobility class in the game as op at roaming. lul.

they are the same players that get hit by RS5 when they have no other cc on them and defensive cds/interrupts available and then complain about it

Erzian.5218:

people consider the lowest mobility class in the game as op at roaming. lul.

I think that people overrate mobility as a factor while roaming. Does it mean you die less, definitely, but there are two different views for how to determine if a class is op. Some people view mobility and ability to dictate fights through that mobility (along with other class mechanics) as major factors towards something being op. Others (and for disclosure this is how I gauge if something is op) view mobility as less of a factor and instead focus on the ability for a class to win fights that they largely shouldn’t be able to win if they were using another class.

If you subscribe to the first viewpoint, your view of “op” classes probably ranks warrior and thief towards the top. For the second viewpoint it switches to condi necro and condi mesmer.

After roaming on necro for a long time, I think it is safe to consider it op in its current state. There are going to be fights you simply aren’t able to win if the opponents play around you well enough, but there will be times where you would not have been able to win that fight with any other spec or build. When I could run into a group of 5 and if they don’t react in time then 3 or 4 are down in 10 seconds then there is something op about that spec.