Guild Wars 2

In this thread we post WvW protips to help out our fellow gw2 players and share knowledge. This will hopefully result fewer WvW facepalm moments and a more fun for everyone.

Please keep your tips short and in the following format for maximum effect : )

Protip: *protip goes here*

I’ll get us started

Protip: gate defense catapult can be placed on a supply depot roof to hit both the gate and also over the gate maximizing the defensive potential of the catapult

So pro it needed to be posted twice?

Ok. No repair costs: change to town clothes before dying.
Don’t think you’ll ever get a 1v1 fight, bads will be bads.
Running from a group of people when you are short 1 or 2 makes you an easy target. If you stay and fight and actually coordinate (even with randoms) you’re going to crush them. Most people who WvW expect no competition/opposition in small group run-ins or even 1v1s and almost always rely on people running away in order to just sit there and bash on them as they run.

Protip: Be specific when communicating with your team. “We are being attacked by around 30 HoD’s at Durios, they have 2 catas and our gate is at 50%. We only have 10 people defending” is much more helpful than simply saying “HoD is attacking us at Durios”

Protip: The grub is worthless.

Protip – Toughness or Vitality are far undervalued.

Don’t take supply from StoneMist…

Protip: learn compass points for quick communication.

e.g 30 HoD hitting NW gate of E keep, 10 heading to NE supply.

Each map has different names for the towers, keeps and supply. Seeing as the borderlands maps are laid out the same, learning the compass points for these locations is often easier.

@samfisher – would like to extend that..

protip: never take supply from a keep/ tower unless repairing / building siege to defend THAT tower/ keep.

Protip : never be the one to have 0 supply in your pocket. If you have used it to build siege on a keep’s outer gate, try to get more as your gonna need it for the inner.

Protip : No one will ever say “we have too much siege!” We know it costs money but even the cheapest arrow cart can turn fail into win, try to always have some form of siege in your back pack.

Protip : banging on a gate without siege is doing it wrong.

• The first structural upgrade for supply camps may well be the most important upgrade in the game. Being able to ship twice as much supply per dolyak to your associated keep/tower means upgrades will be built that much faster.

• Borderlands keeps, ranked in order of difficulty to capture (most to least, assuming local control): Hills, Garrison, Bay. This has direct implications on which maps you should aim to capture/hold orbs.

• The +5 supply carry bonus is a level 2 Art of War buff that costs 200 influence and takes 16 hours to research. There’s no reason you shouldn’t have it active on your most important supply camps at least 75% of the time.

• You have to activate “build” a second time to use the 5 extra supply.

• You can start researching a guild buff again as soon as you activate it.

• Trebs built at the edge of the cliffs at Garrison (for the purpose of hitting Bay) can be quickly destroyed by a ballista at the foot of the cliffs.

• Large groups of players moving towards a location will almost always kill sentries. Checking your map for disappeared sentries is crucial to doing well on your home borderlands.

• Mesmers. Portals. Portal chains. ’nuff said.

• One of the tier 4 guild buffs grants 10% extra health. Ten. Percent. More. Health.

• A keep with a waypoint that’s under attack can still be teleported to for about one second between the current defend event finishing and the next one starting.

And of course…

• If force isn’t working, you aren’t using enough of it.

wanna bump this thread because its a good one

protips:

flank flank flank.
dont claim a keep unless you have a really good guild buff. (+vita/supply)
dont follow kitten commanders. (ie: Brewha)
kill cannons/oils/stuff on the walls before laying down your rams.

Protip: Keep scouts on the enemy zerg, and people watching the map.

Never know when they’re building a golem army.

Protip: If you have the manpower, fight just outside the walls to utilise your keep/tower/castle’s defenses while stopping the enemy team from pushing up easily aoeing them down.

Defensive area denial abilities such as Wall of Reflection are brilliant for this. Just know to get back inside if you’re overwhelmed.

Protip: if someone puts +5 supply on a supply camp, USE IT.

Few things more depressing than running through a supply camp with 250/250 supply and the +5 carry upgrade while people yell in map chat “Who has supply?”

Protip: Siege does not trigger orange swords, so if you want to stealth cap, don’t use auto-attack

(On a similar note, if you want to stealthcap, don’t take all the camps and sentries in a direct line to the point you want to cap. it’s a dead giveaway. literally.)

Protip: It only takes 3 pearls to get a gold medal on Quaggan weather nodes.

If there are other allies nearby (and you aren’t in danger of losing it to another team), let them get theirs in before fully capturing the node so the most people can get rewards.

Protip: use the back/side door

If you have any influence in directing your server’s zerg, don’t direct them to the front gates of a keep. Not only will there be more siege built at the front gates, but all the siege at the inner keep will be positioned to point at the front entrance. Not only do most defenders forget about alternate entrances, but many of them don’t even know it’s there and can’t even find it when their guild leaders are yelling in mapchat. Whenever you capture a keep, find all its entrances and exits and consider whether the one -you- use is as well defended as the one you expect the enemy to use.

Protip: Quaggans are great distractions

If you want to attack the Garrison, don’t capture the North Quaggans. Capture the East/West. The swords that show up when guards attack the keep/supply depot will be enough to divert a few reinforcements to the false alarm and may buy you the extra time you need.

Protip: party up, even when you don’t have matching objectives

The main advantage Commanders have over us laypeople is the little blue arrow over their head that lets you know where you can find a group of teammates. For those of us who aren’t commanders, we can do the same thing for teammates by using parties. When you’re partied with 4 people, you can always look at the map and see 4 blue dots where you know there will be allies. You can watch their health bars to have an extra set of eyes to alert for oncoming attacks.

Lastly, the morale bonus of seeing those blue dots scattered throughout the map cannot be overstated. Thanks to culling problems, it’s easy to feel alone in WvW, but if while sitting at the vale you can see a blue dot over by the hills, by the cliff, by the bay, and by the quaggans, you get a renewed sense of hope that y’know what? Our team isn’t so small after all. Look at how far we reach. Look at the places we can go, the opportunities available. Let’s go out there and kick some butt.

Protip – Toughness or Vitality are far overvalued.

Karicus.8356:

Protip: learn compass points for quick communication.

e.g 30 HoD hitting NW gate of E keep, 10 heading to NE supply.

Each map has different names for the towers, keeps and supply. Seeing as the borderlands maps are laid out the same, learning the compass points for these locations is often easier.

Oh dear god this.

Also, use top and bottom supply for the north and southmost ones instead of labeling them N supply after having several incidents of “but which N supply.” Other than that it is simple, you have an E and W keep, and only one Garrison, directions are different on EB, but this will save 75% of the people out there schlepping around in the borderlands.

Protip: Toast rules

1. Don’t look at the scoreboard, it’s only there for the clowns and badies. Look at your kill/death ratio and if you end the evening with less than 10 deaths but with more than 200 kills you’re actually the winner.

2. Towers and forts are there for the clowns and badies who care about the scoreboard. You can easily recognize them as they always move around in groups of 20+, 30+. Be a pro, stay away from them. Far away.

3. Red is dead. Clowns and badies make alliances, pros just kill every red, no matter where the reds are coming from.

4. No loot for banging on tower doors or fort doors. Plenty of loot for killing clowns, badies and camp vets.

5. Pros are happy when the other big server has everything, full green map e.g. while being the blue ones. Pros are happy with night capping, when it’s the other server doing it. The less you have, the less you have to defend and the more you can choose to take back. Take back camps, not towers or keeps as they are for the clowns and badies.

6. Pros do have a family, social life, a job and enjoy beer, alcohol and french fries. Pros play during Prime-time. People playing more than pros are no-lifers. Never mix up both groups.

7. Pros run into the fight, no matter the odds against them. Clowns and badies evaluate the sitution and turn back if the odds are against them. Pros run into the fight and that’s it.

8. You easily recognize Pro’s doing PVE. They are the ones pulling everything in one go, not matter what they pull, and destroy everything in that one-shott pull. Sometimes it goes wrong of course but none is perfect, even not the pros.

9. Pros never lose and never let others win. Beating pros as clowns or badies is just an illusion.

10. Pros don’t care if their server is 600 000 points behind Wednesday evening. They will be there to kick some clowns and badies butts as usual.

Have fun all, it’s only a game.

Protip: if you play WvW, join a guild. Guilds are the ones that do successful keep ovetakes, successful orb steals and at least my guild does, successful golem marches. Nothing is more fun than being a part of the golem siege capturing 3 keeps in 2hours.

Protip: Don’t get lured into the other world’s base, you will die. Legendary defenders kick your kitten

[ Yeah i realise most of you know this, but i still see it happening every now and then ;p ]

Protip: Communicate, always. Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing alwas report enemy sightings. Location, number, server, direction of travel. It gives everyone better battlefield awareness from commanders down to scouting groups, yakslapping teams and POI taggers.

Protip: Thank the plebs using their supply to build YOUR siege weapon, they’re not only loosing out on easy kills and badges but also have to go running back to fetch some more.

Protip: Catapult shooting your enemy’s own tower door getting you down? Simply place your ram with the green placement circle just touching the door, then relax as it smashes the door to splinters unAoEd.

Protip: You can be in as many guilds as you want at one time.
Protip: You can fire a catpult behind a door between the door and the arch above the door to hit other ranges.
Protip:Higher elevation shoots farther
Protip: There are 3 exits out of spawn
Protip: a well placed arrow cart makes you far more than 6 silver in lootbags.
Protip:The person who places a siege weapon can take it over at any time.
Protip: matches are won and lost via supply

Hux.8739:

Protip: matches are won and lost via supply

This is so true. Oh, you’ve let your opponent fully upgrade the keep and stock 1700 supply. Yeah, you’ll totally take that one over in 15 minutes. Even when not on the offensive you need to harrass your enemies supplies.

Protip: Enemy keep fully upgraded and stocked with 1700 supply? Laugh at their feeble attempt to defend as you walk up to their keep with 10 Omega Siege Golems. Note, this requires friends with deep pockets.

Protip: The fight is not over once your tower gate/wall has been breached. 1-2 arrow carts firing + aoe spells at the opening in your wall/gate can decimate/hold off an entire zerg.

Diethro.7608:

Protip: Enemy keep fully upgraded and stocked with 1700 supply? Laugh at their feeble attempt to defend as you walk up to their keep with 10 Omega Siege Golems. Note, this requires friends with deep pockets.

Couple of well placed ballistas will cost you 10g. Yeah, you’ll get to inner most likely, but anyone worth a kitten will have that better defended than outer.

There are MUCH cheaper means of getting to the inner. Like Trebbing from a defendable location.

Bumping! This needs more updates and additions – super duper helpful.

• Always have a stunbreaker on your utility bar, if possible a teleport. Nothing
  is more funny than watching a 100b warrior pop his frenzied faceroller into thin
  air. Well, maybe a guardian doing his ballet dance far away from anything he can
  damage.

• Always bring at least one decent condition removal to battle.

I.e.: Its a utility bar. Try having something useful in it. Damage isnt everything.
You cant deal damage if you are dead.

• Been said before but needs some elaboration imo: Flanking even when done
  with only 3 people can make whole zergs falter. Even better if you are mesmer.
  Nothing scares people more than the “we are surrounded”-feeling. Which leads
  to >Always try to hit the squishy backliners first. While killing that heroic tank
  in the frontline may seem to be demoralising the enemy, killing some people in
  the backline who use him as a distraction to nuke your forces is way more
  useful. Dont worry, there will be lots of people focussing the tank.