Guild Wars 2

Ok so I love playing WvW and have from the beginning.

So this is what has happened twice now where a commander (and this in Not new commanders) comes to a map and started asking people to join the squad and then after a while when they have a decent sized squad they started kicking Rangers and Thiefs from the squad. I PM them to ask what’s going on and the one response I go was you are a Ranger and the other one did not bother to respond.

That is messed up!

JessieAngel.6254:

Ok so I love playing WvW and have from the beginning.

So this is what has happened twice now where a commander (and this in Not new commanders) comes to a map and started asking people to join the squad and then after a while when they have a decent sized squad they started kicking Rangers and Thiefs from the squad. I PM them to ask what’s going on and the one response I go was you are a Ranger and the other one did not bother to respond.

That is messed up!

I can understand thiefs a bit, they are mostly roaming classes and shouldn’t be with tags but I have no idea for rangers those can be great healers if they are speck to druid and if its because you where trait-ed then shame on him for at least not asking if you could

Learn who to support as a commander and who not to.

If they are arbitrarily kicking people out of squads, follow a commander that doesn’t.

Soon, the more inclusive commander will get the following, while the other guy will be scratching his head wondering why he’s alone.

Otherwise, get your own tag and tag up and create the environment you want on map.

You have choices. So does the commander on map. If you don’t like it, then create your own.

When the squad is full it is should be filled with guards, warriors, revs, necros and front line eles. These all benefit from each other.

It doesn’t make sense for a thief or ranger to be in a squad, as they shouldn’t run with the melees. If you are in a full squad you take the spot of another front liner who should be in a group.
You as thief or ranger don’t get any benefits from beeing in a squad.

Rangers and thieves aren’t really good classes to bring for Zerging. (theyr’e great for roaming though. You should try it!) If you were to bring a power rev to a PvE raid, you’d be laughed out of the squad, unless the squad decided they wanted to kitten themselves by accepting you.

In WvW, zerg compositions have a set meta, with subsets in that meta. Guardians, support eles, condition necros, and revenants are high valued classes. Guardians provide stab, protections, and moderate damage. Support eles provide cc, consistent healing, and great condi clear. Damage eles (usually a hybrid build these days) provide great damage potential. Necros strip boons and deal great condition damage. Revenants provide resistance.

In comparison to all those useful classes, why would I want a thief? Thieves have little defense against bombs that will always at least clip you, since no commander and no person dodges perfectly. Thieves have no team support and deal very little multi-target damage at range. They’re there to flank zerglings that get too far from tag, not fight with the zerg.

Ranger is considered the “beginner” class. The majority of people new to mmos or new to guild wars will generally pick a warrior, ele, or ranger, as those are class archetypes shared among mmos. A ranger druid has to be good at healing and have a set build specifically tailored to surviving at close range to work in a zerg, and most rangers do not have that.

So why kick you from squad? If you are playing a “less useful” class, most commanders don’t want to waste their stab composition on trying to give you boons when you’re probably going to be the first to die, even with stab.

Is it prejudiced? Yeah. Will you have to work hard to prove yourself? Yeah. Can you fix the problem? Yeah.

Your solutions

• Join a WvW guild and tailor your ranger/thief build to fit in with their needs
• Swap classes

I bet those toxic commanders are from vabbi
Kicking rangers , thieves and dragon hunters from squad

You don’t need to join a squad. Just follow if you want. They can’t stop you from doing that.

Crescendo fort is the only person here who actually answered the question correctly. In short those are not wvw classes, you’re a detriment to the team.

I get thief but druid..really? Have you seen how much healing one can put out? If the melee train melts it’s game over

It’s something i usually do on my own to be fair. I usually play a marauder chrono in zergs which is quite effective if played properly but at the same time a more useful class could take its place and utilize the boons provided by the guards/revs.

So what i do is i join squad (most comms dont usually kick mesmers) and if that squad is nearly full i leave it to make space for another guard/rev/necro or whetever works. The com doesnt have to kick me cause i grasp the situation and how my less efficient build isnt as good as the top tier meta builds.

Summary: It’s fine to play an off meta build as long as you grasp the situation and how much u can contribute. If as a ranger/druid u are taking a slot from a more contributing class then i would kick u as well. Sucks but a “deadly squad is a happy squad”, and everyone should agree on this and stop being salty about it.

JessieAngel.6254:

Ok so I love playing WvW and have from the beginning.

So this is what has happened twice now where a commander (and this in Not new commanders) comes to a map and started asking people to join the squad and then after a while when they have a decent sized squad they started kicking Rangers and Thiefs from the squad. I PM them to ask what’s going on and the one response I go was you are a Ranger and the other one did not bother to respond.

That is messed up!

I never join a squad (thief) – I’m always paired with the rangers and get no boons anyway and thanks to the messed up meta I have to stay away far from the melee groups in most cases anyway.
Problem here is that squad size is limited to below the map cap.
What you can do is to ask if a second commander following the original one can tag up and join on them (our people did that yesterday) – at least you can form groups.

On the one hand: Yeah it sucks and I don’t agree when someone is kicked without a reason or note “woopsie we need the space, sorry”, on the other hand it’s understandable as Ranger and Thieves aren’t boon sharing.

another example here of how its difficult to earn rank in wvw. If you play a certain class, commanders won’t even invite you to zerg, another example of how wvw rank is best earned in eotm. This shows that rank is not associated with wvw prestige at all.

• Rangers have no burst damage or reliable cc in zerg fights
• Ranger pets get epid and kill their allied
• support/healer? Theres no boonshare, why would you play it over other classes?

Napo.1230:

I get thief but druid..really? Have you seen how much healing one can put out? If the melee train melts it’s game over

Have you seen how many poison fields a thief can spam and with that destroy the healing of the enemies?

For full disclosure I play power (zerker) ranger with my guild. I can see why pug drivers kick rangers and thieves. If you are playing a power zerk class like a power ranger or a pick thief the reason you get kicked is simply because you should be self sufficient. I will actually volunteer my spot if the squad is full simply because a). I won’t always be on tag. I SHOULDN’T always be on tag. My job is to get to the backline and harass them and finish downs, snipe or hassle drivers and interfere with resets. b.) I am (or should be) self sufficient. As mentioned I am primarily a pick class in my role. That means I will squirrel off a fair bit, thus I don’t provide or receive boons from being in a party. I will bring my own might, own condi clear, super speed, stealth, etc. It also means I don’t provide much support to a party. I’m not near them. So yeah, squads don’t really benefit that much from me. I also don’t get that much from them. As long as you know how to kite and reset, can reasonably read an enemy zerg’s movements and are in some sort of voice coms so you know what your driver is doing not being in a squad is no big deal.

There is a level of bias against rangers for some players, that’s just the result of Anet allowing the ranger to be so bad for years. (A warrior could literally passively out heal ranger damage) Not much you can do about it. Just do your job, get your bags and be happy.

My daredevil got kicked out of a 30 man squad the other day… I asked why and they said I don’t need to be part of the group… I’m thinking ok… what about my stab, healing, etc? I’d understand if it were a full squad but THIRTY people?!? Stupid…

Look at the party composition of this squad, notice anything about druids, thieves and warriors? – #notwanted – which is gross, anet should balance this, or make it so commanders cant kick

lol, I don’t even try to join a squad when I’m on my Ranger. When I do get invited the first thing I say is.. “Hey I’m a Ranger, you sure you want me cause I’m happy to do my own thing”… if they say come on in I do.. if not then I really don’t care.

As noted above, Ranger is a good roaming class. Yes healer if spec’d that way but I’m not a healer, my two Rangers are built for either power or condi and that’s it. I can get as many, or more, pips by roaming/havoc as I can in a zerg so unless I feel like running my guard I really stay away from them.

The folks above are right, zergs need group support and unless Ranger is spec’d for that then it’s best roaming. As for thiefs… well… my momma said if you can’t say something nice…. :P

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

another example here of how its difficult to earn rank in wvw. If you play a certain class, commanders won’t even invite you to zerg, another example of how wvw rank is best earned in eotm. This shows that rank is not associated with wvw prestige at all.

What does being in a squad have to do with earning ranks? You don’t earn more wxp when you’re in the squad.

Lol and that’s the problem all blob mentality lol

Had a awesome commander the other night you know what he did with his rangers and Thiefs he gave them shared participation and had the thiefs and rangers hold the keeps,camps and towers while the zerg did there thing.

So dont give me that excuse.
WvW does not = blob

Rhiannon.1726:

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

another example here of how its difficult to earn rank in wvw. If you play a certain class, commanders won’t even invite you to zerg, another example of how wvw rank is best earned in eotm. This shows that rank is not associated with wvw prestige at all.

What does being in a squad have to do with earning ranks? You don’t earn more wxp when you’re in the squad.

On the “earning wxp note”:

Well, that depends on what you’re doing. If you are fairly new then you don’t really understand how to go out and get wxp. You can’t get it by just being there. New people joining a zerg will at least get an idea of what is going on after a while and get wxp in the meantime. If you understand WvW then joining a zerg really is optional if all you’re looking for is rank xp. That’s easy to get … well most of the time.. wp mastery is often engaged while roaming..

Balthazzarr.1349:

Rhiannon.1726:

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

another example here of how its difficult to earn rank in wvw. If you play a certain class, commanders won’t even invite you to zerg, another example of how wvw rank is best earned in eotm. This shows that rank is not associated with wvw prestige at all.

What does being in a squad have to do with earning ranks? You don’t earn more wxp when you’re in the squad.

On the “earning wxp note”:

Well, that depends on what you’re doing. If you are fairly new then you don’t really understand how to go out and get wxp. You can’t get it by just being there. New people joining a zerg will at least get an idea of what is going on after a while and get wxp in the meantime. If you understand WvW then joining a zerg really is optional if all you’re looking for is rank xp. That’s easy to get … well most of the time.. wp mastery is often engaged while roaming..

You can join the zerg without beeing in the squad.

i play thief in zerging all the time i never once been kick from a raid because i play thief.

Since retiring my Guard/Rev’s i play ranger virtually 100% of the time and i’ve prolly been kicked once or twice at most however when the squad is filling up I will usually consider leaving if any guards, warriors, revs, necros and eles are needing a spot. Their input to the zerg is generally more important than mine.

I’d be kittened at getting kicked from a 20 man squad tho, but i know the odd commander who has a no ranger/thief mentality so I just switch border and find one who isn’t a total bellend

Nothing wrong with having a 2nd tag for ranged tho.

@Rhiannon… exactly!

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

Look at the party composition of this squad, notice anything about druids, thieves and warriors? – #notwanted – which is gross, anet should balance this, or make it so commanders cant kick

Don’t see anything wrong with that pic, its a full squad and rangers would not bring anything better to the table that those classes can do

Decado.9304:

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

Look at the party composition of this squad, notice anything about druids, thieves and warriors? – #notwanted – which is gross, anet should balance this, or make it so commanders cant kick

Don’t see anything wrong with that pic, its a full squad and rangers would not bring anything better to the table that those classes can do

There is a druid and a thief (ETA and also 2 warriors).
So I guess the professional complainer wasn’t serious.

Jana.6831:

Decado.9304:

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

Look at the party composition of this squad, notice anything about druids, thieves and warriors? – #notwanted – which is gross, anet should balance this, or make it so commanders cant kick

Don’t see anything wrong with that pic, its a full squad and rangers would not bring anything better to the table that those classes can do

There is a druid and a thief (ETA and also 2 warriors).
So I guess the professional complainer wasn’t serious.

the commander kicked from the party of thieves and war’s and vanilla classes that joined when he got full.

Rhiannon.1726:

Balthazzarr.1349:

Rhiannon.1726:

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

another example here of how its difficult to earn rank in wvw. If you play a certain class, commanders won’t even invite you to zerg, another example of how wvw rank is best earned in eotm. This shows that rank is not associated with wvw prestige at all.

What does being in a squad have to do with earning ranks? You don’t earn more wxp when you’re in the squad.

On the “earning wxp note”:

Well, that depends on what you’re doing. If you are fairly new then you don’t really understand how to go out and get wxp. You can’t get it by just being there. New people joining a zerg will at least get an idea of what is going on after a while and get wxp in the meantime. If you understand WvW then joining a zerg really is optional if all you’re looking for is rank xp. That’s easy to get … well most of the time.. wp mastery is often engaged while roaming..

You can join the zerg without beeing in the squad.

only you’ll get a lot less credit for kills, which means way less wxp

You get even less wxp when your zerg dies over and over again because of bad group management.

Just join the caster squad or if there isn’t a caster squad join other thieves to make a focus party.

If the squad is full, then it sometimes is necessary. Some things are just more important.

However, it is somewhat annoying for commanders to insist everyone join them, and then spam invites. If that’s the case , well….

Personally, I move them to the bottom squad so they can pick targets at least. But usually the squad doesn’t get full in our cases though sometimes scrappers and druids can be used when all other priorities are filled. No idea what to do with thieves.

It goes like this for priority:
These must be in optimal parties, no compromises
1.) Guardians (Base)— Duh. Guardians are the most important part of any zerg.
2.) Necros — Also a duh, as Necros are your damage base but have poor anti-cc abilities. Keeping your necros alive to deal as much damage as they can is paramount.
3.) Revs — Same as necros, and resistance. Revs are highly flexible and can have damage and healing variants, so they can adapt as needed. However, their lack of good stability means they have to be babysitted very heavily and the loss of a few may mean a wipe.

Would be good if you got them into a good party. These do thankless jobs while everyone above only notices when things go wrong.
4.) Eles — Healing/sustain. Very important but a little more expendable,. Much like Revs, they can fulfill a lot of roles but need a lot of babysitting. Less than Revs though.
5.) Mesmers — Utility/Boon share. But your generic veilbot doesn’t need that much frontline protection. Helps though. Generally indispensable but you don’t need that many.
5.5.) Warrior/Zerker — CC and Banners. Generally are self-survivable enough, though preferred to frontline party if possible. Unfortunately their role has been diminished by Revs but like Mesmers provide indispensible utility.

Misc. Generally considered too niche for most situations; not that people could understand what situation means. Most average players aren’t going to be able to take advantage it either, so this is a case why things are meta for a reason. Often arises situations where they become useless, especially in narrow passages or fights within structures.
As you see there is not much space for the remaining.
6 . Druid/Scrapper— Superspeed/stealth/Condi clear— Unfortunately redundant with Rev/Ele. Can substitute if one of the above is missing. Generally self-survivable enough to not need frontline party.

The situation is a bit more complex than some may think. Zerg fights often rely on damage dealt from mid-range as you generally push through and encircle the enemy, not just jump in their faces and 111111 because that makes you convenient target practice for anyone that knows how to ground target. It’s the best way to cleave down lows and downs that are weakened from epidemics and other kinds of burst damage.

Both suffer from not having reliable ways of cleaving at this distance, eg. guardian staff may be weak, but the 600 range cleave can help wear things down, where say a scrapper using a hammer is completely useless unless point blank sans thunderclap, and druid ranged weapons are very weak to projectile hate. Trying to fight further away means you’re further away from boon range, and more easily trained down. On the other hand Revs are great here as from a little bit behind they are free to launch their CoRs for massive unreflectable damage/cc.

7.) Thieves— Stealth, Venom Share, Pick. Generally, Not going to be frontline.

Particularly adept thieves, druids, or scrappers will use stealth to break target and stop people from being focused. It is rather difficult to do and the sheer amount of cleave and AOE is a hazard. But sometimes you have no other choice and people often panic and spam 1 anyways, ruining the stealth.

I can’t see a use to these at all.
8.) Base ranger and Engineers. Might join thieves as gank.

I don’t want to convince people of anything, but I definitely want them to understand why things are the way their are. I do play every class, but reality ensues, and can’t ignore facts. Even when given squad control, I don’t place myself in a frontline party if I’m using a medium class, for example.

You just have to understand that the people that run the squad want to have the best chance of winning fights as bad wipes will empty out the map pretty fast People will cut you leeway if you’re a familiar face, but as a random, caution is rightfully advised.

Though OTOH, given the relatively low skill level of pug on pug action, especially these days, there is also reason to chill out as well. You can run a lot of silly stuff and faceroll through anyways. But if stuff gets harsher, please keep all of the above in mind.

wut? Since when did wvsw conform to a raid meta? You getting kicked for not running full ascended too? heh

If you don’t like it make ur own group or folllow them around anyways…..they can’t stop you, discord usually open to all as well so who cares….just pretend to be some1 else lol.

To be fair, rangers and theirs are trash in WvW in squad lol I usually kick rangers and theirs too

This has been prevalent for a long time and its for a good reason. Rangers are often not specced properly for squad play and so they should not benefit from the boons. If you are a ranger running a frontline heal druid spec, pm the raid leader and they may let you in, otherwise you have two choices, join a pve player pug squad, or change toons.

As for thieves, when the patch hit, we left the thieves in our squad but put them all in one group. every single encounter, there was 5 out of the 6 down, and unfortunately it wasnt the same person living every time. THe class isn’t built for zerg play in any useful form. People are too bunker and there is too much condis being spammed all around for you to properly pick people off. Your best bet is to roam and be that person people rage about, or to switch toons

Napo.1230:

I get thief but druid..really? Have you seen how much healing one can put out? If the melee train melts it’s game over

There is a difference between healing druid and ranger.

I have rarely run into this when playing wvw. However, when I do, I just mark them down as a commander not to follow.

That being said, the commander tag has the right to kick or keep any classes they might like/not like in their squad. /shrug

Thieves and non-druid rangers don’t need to be in the squad. Just follow around the outskirts picking people off, it’s not an insult, it’s just your role.

If you’re a zerg druid, let the commander know and he can put you in an appropriate party.

You dont even need to be in a squad to participate….. I never join a squad, unless they invite me on their own terms. Other than that I just look for the tag on the map and follow them around as if I were a part of their squad

SarahGobbi.2319:

You dont even need to be in a squad to participate….. I never join a squad, unless they invite me on their own terms. Other than that I just look for the tag on the map and follow them around as if I were a part of their squad

The point of the squad is mostly to make sure the boons are being distributed correctly. If you’re not playing frontline, it’s not a big deal to not be in it, especially if you’re in TS.

Fluffball.8307:

SarahGobbi.2319:

You dont even need to be in a squad to participate….. I never join a squad, unless they invite me on their own terms. Other than that I just look for the tag on the map and follow them around as if I were a part of their squad

The point of the squad is mostly to make sure the boons are being distributed correctly. If you’re not playing frontline, it’s not a big deal to not be in it, especially if you’re in TS.

Of course, but Im just trying to prevent OP from saying " I cant be in a squad, so screw WvW"

As a ranger I sometimes roam with the group and sometimes I’m off doing my own thing, (scouting, taking side objectives, popping white swords, that sort of thing). Commanders often give me shared participation since I’m off doing my own thing. Works out well. I generally don’t try to play a healing druid in wvw ‘cause Rangers don’t have the tools to sustain against the conditions a melee ball generally has to deal with. At that point they (or their pet) are just asking to be epi bait.

Looks like the tags you deal with are simply kittens. #JoinFortAspenwoodToday.

~ Kovu

The only thing thieves are good in a zerg is stomping downed players and com focus.

Most groups dont like com focus.
And most thieves cant be bothered with the stomping, allowing those players to be ressed.
Thieves and roamers dont bring anything to a squad, so why should coms add them?

If you want to join a squad then play a class which will be of benefit to the squad.

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

Look at the party composition of this squad, notice anything about druids, thieves and warriors? – #notwanted – which is gross, anet should balance this, or make it so commanders cant kick

Its things like this that make wvw’ers have to come on forums and explain why anet shouldnt take concept ideas about wvw from pve’ers.

I’m so used to kicking commanders who try to invite me that I haven’t noticed this problem.

JessieAngel.6254:

Lol and that’s the problem all blob mentality lol

Had a awesome commander the other night you know what he did with his rangers and Thiefs he gave them shared participation and had the thiefs and rangers hold the keeps,camps and towers while the zerg did there thing.

So dont give me that excuse.
WvW does not = blob

That is only if the thieves and rangers followed the instructions, many don’t. It is a universal truth, not everyone read chats, not everyone gonna do what you want them to do, not everyone gonna say yes just because you say please.

This is indeed a prejudice but this prejudiced is so happen built up by the numerous predecessor examples. Commanders are still people, eventually they got tired of telling everyone the same thing over and over again every single day., especially when the words fall on death ears and having to undergo losing battles. Commanders are not paid to please other players.

Jumpin Lumpix.6108:

Look at the party composition of this squad, notice anything about druids, thieves and warriors? – #notwanted – which is gross, anet should balance this, or make it so commanders cant kick

Tell that to pve raiders too, don’t kick people.

DevilishLyx.2340:

The only thing thieves are good in a zerg is stomping downed players and com focus.

Most groups dont like com focus.
And most thieves cant be bothered with the stomping, allowing those players to be ressed.
Thieves and roamers dont bring anything to a squad, so why should coms add them?

If you want to join a squad then play a class which will be of benefit to the squad.

Lets face it, the only professions wanted in a zerg are Necros and Guardians.
Who did that? Right anet and you are following their ‘instructions’.
I am doing quite a bit as a thief in a zerg but in the current meta and since HoT it’s becoming harder and harder. No one uses combos anymore, so my combo finishers are mostly wasted. Again, not my fault, it’s anets/HoTs.
At one point all of us will be guardians bashing our heads in and then the game is truly at the point where it doesn’t need any balance anymore – problem solved.

As a teef WvW main (coming from Pewpew Druid main) I understand why. Some commanders want a “tried and true” composite team but without getting all squad members in TS/Discord, its usually for naught. From what I have gathered over the last couple years, a lot of commanders are elitist due to knowing that a lot of people do not know how to play these classes in a zerg train.

I personally haven’t been kicked, on the contrary, when a commander invites me, I make sure I state im a DD and ask if the commander can target any special people he wants me to hunt down…otherwise I look for the sideline/backline enemies and start with them (starting with necro’s). One time (when I was actually in TS with the commander) he wanted to look for the driver of an enemy zerg. I happened to notice who it was (support DH), deleted him and stealthed away closer to my group. Someone noticed and praised me for such. Their group backed off to regroup now their leader was on their back not giving boons/reflects etc.

I rarely join squads due to the horror stories of other servers’s commanders, but if they are hunting an enemy zerg, ill def tag along

JessieAngel.6254:

Ok so I love playing WvW and have from the beginning.

So this is what has happened twice now where a commander (and this in Not new commanders) comes to a map and started asking people to join the squad and then after a while when they have a decent sized squad they started kicking Rangers and Thiefs from the squad. I PM them to ask what’s going on and the one response I go was you are a Ranger and the other one did not bother to respond.

That is messed up!

No offense but you stated “from the beginning” which from my understanding means at least a year or more experience under the belt and any regular/dedicated WvWer would know every class has a role and their place, especially when it comes to generic meta squads. I’m under the assumption the commander (PUG zerg) kicked you from a “decent sized squad” to make room for a class that will greater benefit the group as a whole; support, boons, heals + sustain etc…

These classes/builds are as follows for PARTIES within a squad:

1. Guard (commander)
2. AH Guard (stab 2)
3. Mallyx Rev/Healbot Rev etc
4. Aurashare Tempest/healbot etc
5. Necro (traditional wells, condi, boon corrupts)
6. Mesmer (veils, portals, boonshare)

I would argue Warrior could be in there especially for Battle Standard Elite skill but they are quite uncommon/considered oldschool and/or used in organised GvG.

Then you have Thieves, Rangers and Engineers which are great at 1v1, SMALL scale fights, great gank squads/commander focus yet that kind of focus is frowned upon.

Venomshare Thief could be a thing but once again due to pirate ship meta it was extremely frowned upon/cheesy. Healer Druid was/is a thing in some ORGANISED guild fights and power Engineer is all that I know of for frontline hammer offense. You don’t see them and commanders don’t often welcome these classes because others fit the role better.

Want a healer? Tempest/Ventari rev is more reliable. AoE DPS? Hammer Rev/Necro/Guardian. Ranger’s LB #5 is literally nothing compared to a DH’s babygates which at least provide crowd control.

Until ANet makes new elite specs or revitalizes some old skills to cater towards group/support role play in WvW Thieves/Rangers/Engineers will more often than not be kicked from squads when nearing full to make room for other classes who simply do the job ten fold better.

Hope this makes sense.

^ do note guys that thief has one of most active way to remove resistance in the game.