Guild Wars 2

With the latest installment of the skill bar changes, I am voicing my concern for the future of pvp in GW2.

I fear that low risk, high reward builds are a bit disenheartening, and while most of us complain about P/D thieves or turret engis, anet isn’t doing much to make higher risk, high reward builds more viable than their low risk high reward counterparts.

The biggest offender I see in for the future is PU mesmer. Right now, it is regarded as the most toxic build in the game, and anet is buffing it with torment on autoattacks. Thankfully, its overreliance on stealth will still cripple it in higher level spvp, but we didn’t need this build to gain more condition output.

The adrenaline changes will likely make more warriors thanever cling to their longbow for condition clearing, as cleansing ire procs will be less reliable with other weapons, and the longbow apparently has the best adrenaline generation of any warrior weapon (correct me if I’m wrong about that).

P/D Thief is in a similar position to the PU mesmer, and now many could run venom share instead of maxing out trickery or shadow arts to provide group damage benefits with their buffs.

D/D elementalist is another low risk high reward build, albeit with a higher skill cap than most of the others, and I’m glad that it won’t be facing any major changes, although staff ele, a more complex build may be less viable without meteornado. Turret engineer seems to face a minor nerf, and other than that will remain a somewhat braindead build.

Finally, spirit ranger, a build said to be cheesy for spamming 1 while being in a perpetual state of evasion and protection. With the new axe, their mightstacking potential with a celestial amulet and appropriate runes, or a more condition focused build, will beanother low risk high reward build. I am more okay with rangers getting crazy might stacking, because D/D eles pretty much ousted spirit rangers out of the meta, and now with might, they’ll be able to compete for that team support role more, albeit with lower mobility. And with axe being so great in that patch, the issues of autoattack spamming with shortbow will likely disappear.

And then theres the necro and guardian, and we don’t know entierely what they will get, but I’d be kind of sad to see buffs to minions or spirit weapons made viable.

The builds a tend to run in pvp right now are glass S/F ele, glassish power necro, and some hybrid/condition ranger with traps or spirits. S/F ele is very high risk, high reward, while powernecro is barely even viable and simple at that, while the type of ranger builds I play will be extremely buffed by the new axe, while I don’t think the longbow changes would entice me enough to make a high risk high reward ranger build.. since it barely works compared to thieves, mesmers, guardians, or eles with that mindset.

What are your thoughts on the future meta, given that most of these changes effect underused skills and traits, many of which will remain underused, or simply encourage low risk-high reward builds to flourish?

I doubt SWs will be buffed to matter, they don’t have very good build paths to do much, and the lack of an elite SW is massive. Minions are unlikely to be truly buffed as well, plus literally every MM I’ve ever run into even in the highest tiers of soloQ was absolute garbage and ran Blood Fiend, so I don’t think you have to worry about good MMs in PvP unless I decide to play more. At most MM will be indirectly buffed via weapon/trait changes, but even then the unreliability of the skills themselves and their clunkiness make them undesirable except for fun.

So, wouldn’t worry about those.

Yeah, thats a relief Bhawb, so I shouldn’t worry about those two classes getting turned into passive-spam=win.

Anyway, here’s what helseth has to say about the mesmer changes.

http://www.twitch.tv/thelordhelseth/c/4964980

As you can see, this change should NOT happen, in order to have a healthy metagame. The maim the disillusioned buff was more than enough!

P/D thief complaints, i won’t comment on that, but i’ll stop you right there on the venom share change. if we had 2, maybe 3 venoms that could apply decent condi damage, you’d have a point. but at most, the party members will get 50 damage per tick from a single venom.

not just that, but P/D practically relies on a short CD steal, so it would at least put 20 points into trickery.

the only thing that venom share buffed was skale venom on a build that already requires 6/x/6/x/x dumped entirely on venom traits instead of survivability or damage traits, and the investment is so heavy that you have to sacrifice utilities to make room for venoms.

TL;DR: the venom share change only sounds like an important buff to people that never played a venom share thief.

BrunoBRS.5178:

P/D thief complaints, i won’t comment on that, but i’ll stop you right there on the venom share change. if we had 2, maybe 3 venoms that could apply decent condi damage, you’d have a point. but at most, the party members will get 50 damage per tick from a single venom.

not just that, but P/D practically relies on a short CD steal, so it would at least put 20 points into trickery.

the only thing that venom share buffed was skale venom on a build that already requires 6/x/6/x/x dumped entirely on venom traits instead of survivability or damage traits, and the investment is so heavy that you have to sacrifice utilities to make room for venoms.

TL;DR: the venom share change only sounds like an important buff to people that never played a venom share thief.

Yeah I really haven’t played it, but it just sounds like a low risk, high reward build, at least for certain situations.. but not as bad as mesmer by far.

Thief, Mesmer and Necro are made to be crazy good duelling professions. Its build into their class mechanics. You either nerf them into oblivion or they will be superior to other professions in 1v1.

Thief stealth/dodge spam will always give them an advantage in 1v1 but sucks in teamfights.

Mesmer clone spam will always give them an advantage in 1v1 but sucks in teamfights.

Necro death shroud will always give them an advantage in 1v1 but sucks in teamfights.

As much as I hate to fight PU Mesmers, P/D Thieves and Terrormancers myself they are all useless if you play as a team. I dont say its not easy mode but in the end its a team game and those specs cant compete in that mode.

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

nearlight.3064:

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

No it isn’t. Only on Mesmers is that true because the clone system lets them up to quadruple their condition output. If the clones aren’t applying it, then it can be balanced on an auto.

Heck, even if it was on almost any other weapon, it wouldn’t be so bad, but Scepter clone generation is quite fast.

Your concerns about Mesmer PU are laughable. /ignore thread and move on.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Your concerns about Mesmer PU are laughable. /ignore thread and move on.

If Helseth has concerns about Mesmers being buffed, I will pretty much blindly believe him.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

nearlight.3064:

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

No it isn’t. Only on Mesmers is that true because the clone system lets them up to quadruple their condition output. If the clones aren’t applying it, then it can be balanced on an auto.

Heck, even if it was on almost any other weapon, it wouldn’t be so bad, but Scepter clone generation is quite fast.

Well yeah, to clarify I meant mesmer autoattack, since their autoattack effects are balanced to be relatively weak to compensate for clones. Staff autos never became too bad because of their RNG, but because scepter autos will stack torment every time instead of a chance to stack a weaker condition, it’s a bit insane. Even the iElasticity buff, for staff clones in addition to torment casting clones will make it so mesmers won’t even need PU to kill things quickly.

I’m just frustrated that Anet is encouraging passive and brain dead builds, and I’m worried about this for the mesmer because it is literally the cheesiest build there is, and now it will be able to kill things much faster if anet doesn’t make the torment on cast apply to the mesmer only or some other sort of nerf.

I am glad though that they buffed maim the disillusioned, as it encourages condition builds that rely on active play.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Your concerns about Mesmer PU are laughable. /ignore thread and move on.

This thread is about far more than PU mesmer. It’s about anet encouraging cheesier builds for pvp instead of opening new high risk, high reward builds that require skill to play well. You can see that many of the changes for a several professions are having low risk, high reward builds being buffed in someway. Mesmer is just the straw that broke my camel’s QQ back.

nearlight,
you are wrong about warrior ’s long bow having best adrenaline generation.

warrior weapons with :
- fast attack speed
- easy to land attacks
- fast easy to connect cleaving attacks
- fast easy to land aoe attacks

will generate adrenaline fast.

main hand sword, axe have decent adrenal generating speed
off hand axe 5 have the best adrenaline generating speed provided that the warrior is not interrupted by control effects during the 3 seconds spin.

long bow, have slow default attack, can be very easily side step strafed to avoid the dual arrows from connecting, this is not fast adrenaline generating at all.

long bow 2 activates fast, but only hits 3 times if fired at melee range. 6 seconds recharge.

long bow 3 is a small radius slow projectile speed aoe, usually only connects if fired at close range or on immobilized opponents. 10 seconds recharge

long bow 4 is a quick firing single target blind aoe on connect, 15 seconds recharge.

long bow 5 is a semi quick firing single target piercing shot. 25 seconds recharge.

also, before the long bow f1 damage was nerfed, the long bow f1 does not replenish the adrenaline on its own, it is a ridiculous fiasco fabricated by vocal minority warrior haters but unfortunately the clueless people in charge listened to the minority.

so, no. the long bow does not have best adrenaline generating speed.

sword, axe, greatsword would be better.
combined with constantly swapping weapons to gain 5 adrenaline.

I tried pu and it’s meh then i went back to my CI and standard shatter for reasons.
PU with scepter still dont have aoe condition pressure like engi and necro means less damage potential and easy to deal with when the meta is guard/ele/war for tpvp.
Adding torment doesnt help pu mesmer that much ,they are already strong for 1v1, also clone death is more a defensive trait (I doubt u even really used it).

The builds a tend to run in pvp right now are glass S/F ele, glassish power necro

about this im pretty sure everyone who has some brain and played pvp a lot will tell you glassish power necro and s/f ele aren’t highest skillful play ,they are not even your words “high risk” at all. what they truly are is one trick pony —--almost one shot u in secs and for rest time they are struggling to stay alive (yeah this is hard while u could have more teammate help after your burst someone down ) that’s how they are played. They don’t have much trouble to land damage at all unlike CI or shatter mesmer(unless aoe is hard to land to point lol).

Wake up and stop crying about P/d thief and pu mesmer ,at least for pvp

Nobody is crying about p/d thief or pu mesmer for pvp but the direction that anet is going, if they succeed in making these builds fit the meta then expect a dead pvp (if it isn’t dead already).

nearlight.3064:

With the latest installment of the skill bar changes, I am voicing my concern for the future of pvp in GW2.

I fear that low risk, high reward builds are a bit disenheartening, and while most of us complain about P/D thieves or turret engis, anet isn’t doing much to make higher risk, high reward builds more viable than their low risk high reward counterparts.

The biggest offender I see in for the future is PU mesmer. Right now, it is regarded as the most toxic build in the game, and anet is buffing it with torment on autoattacks. Thankfully, its overreliance on stealth will still cripple it in higher level spvp, but we didn’t need this build to gain more condition output.

The adrenaline changes will likely make more warriors thanever cling to their longbow for condition clearing, as cleansing ire procs will be less reliable with other weapons, and the longbow apparently has the best adrenaline generation of any warrior weapon (correct me if I’m wrong about that).

P/D Thief is in a similar position to the PU mesmer, and now many could run venom share instead of maxing out trickery or shadow arts to provide group damage benefits with their buffs.

D/D elementalist is another low risk high reward build, albeit with a higher skill cap than most of the others, and I’m glad that it won’t be facing any major changes, although staff ele, a more complex build may be less viable without meteornado. Turret engineer seems to face a minor nerf, and other than that will remain a somewhat braindead build.

Finally, spirit ranger, a build said to be cheesy for spamming 1 while being in a perpetual state of evasion and protection. With the new axe, their mightstacking potential with a celestial amulet and appropriate runes, or a more condition focused build, will beanother low risk high reward build. I am more okay with rangers getting crazy might stacking, because D/D eles pretty much ousted spirit rangers out of the meta, and now with might, they’ll be able to compete for that team support role more, albeit with lower mobility. And with axe being so great in that patch, the issues of autoattack spamming with shortbow will likely disappear.

And then theres the necro and guardian, and we don’t know entierely what they will get, but I’d be kind of sad to see buffs to minions or spirit weapons made viable.

The builds a tend to run in pvp right now are glass S/F ele, glassish power necro, and some hybrid/condition ranger with traps or spirits. S/F ele is very high risk, high reward, while powernecro is barely even viable and simple at that, while the type of ranger builds I play will be extremely buffed by the new axe, while I don’t think the longbow changes would entice me enough to make a high risk high reward ranger build.. since it barely works compared to thieves, mesmers, guardians, or eles with that mindset.

What are your thoughts on the future meta, given that most of these changes effect underused skills and traits, many of which will remain underused, or simply encourage low risk-high reward builds to flourish?

honestly? every time i see a warrior with a heal signet i get irritated. nothing says ’i’m trying to beat you with skill’ like a passive full heal. that and a warrior with four signets is effective nothing running four signets should be effective. it’s like you’ve pinpointed the noob when you find a four signet anything, yet warrior is rewarded highly for it(endurance regen, insane hp regen, damage reduction, condi clears) I get that warriors are basically the intro class for every MMO, but wow, tone it down a bit Anet.

Lifestealer.4910:

Nobody is crying about p/d thief or pu mesmer for pvp but the direction that anet is going, if they succeed in making these builds fit the meta then expect a dead pvp (if it isn’t dead already).

Then please cry for old power block first thanks for help .
Also cry for something which have happened and wont happen to mesmer ?whats the point ?
Shouldn’t we cry for d/d ele , staff bunker ele ,celestial amulet , most war builds ,half necro builds ,half ranger builds and s/d thief first ?
They are basically your wrong direction and in meta (well beside necro build ).
Whats wrong with mesmer build which isnt and wont be meta ?

musu.9205:

Lifestealer.4910:

Nobody is crying about p/d thief or pu mesmer for pvp but the direction that anet is going, if they succeed in making these builds fit the meta then expect a dead pvp (if it isn’t dead already).

Then please cry for old power block first thanks for help .
Also cry for something which have happened and wont happen to mesmer ?whats the point ?
Shouldn’t we cry for d/d ele , staff bunker ele ,celestial amulet , most war builds ,half necro builds ,half ranger builds and s/d thief first ?
They are basically your wrong direction and in meta (well beside necro build ).
Whats wrong with mesmer build which isnt and wont be meta ?

Nobody is going to deny that d/d ele or s/d thief is also bad for meta but lets be real, even those builds require way more effort to play than a passive condi mesmer, also s/d thief is getting a big nerf for good reason.

You don’t trade one cancer for another.

Cancer? They just gave condi mesmer a reason to stay out stealth more often. About certain thief and mesmer being called cheesy or cancer lol those classes are build for 1v1 it’s intended that you feel that way lol fight in team and their influence decreases since the game is not about 1v1 . D/D ele too countered by condi necro,decent power shatter mesmer,S/D thief….

The game need more builds being used not less so many traits,skills,gear and stats not used because we are required to burst power or condi. I feel like it might change in the future however….hopefully.

The thing with pu condi mesmer is there is no risk to that spec at all. Just spam your skills off CD and your good. At lest with PD thief’s you can block, blind, evade, cloak and dagger which kittens em up bad.

musu.9205:

I tried pu and it’s meh then i went back to my CI and standard shatter for reasons.
PU with scepter still dont have aoe condition pressure like engi and necro means less damage potential and easy to deal with when the meta is guard/ele/war for tpvp.
Adding torment doesnt help pu mesmer that much ,they are already strong for 1v1, also clone death is more a defensive trait (I doubt u even really used it).

The builds a tend to run in pvp right now are glass S/F ele, glassish power necro

about this im pretty sure everyone who has some brain and played pvp a lot will tell you glassish power necro and s/f ele aren’t highest skillful play ,they are not even your words “high risk” at all. what they truly are is one trick pony —--almost one shot u in secs and for rest time they are struggling to stay alive (yeah this is hard while u could have more teammate help after your burst someone down ) that’s how they are played. They don’t have much trouble to land damage at all unlike CI or shatter mesmer(unless aoe is hard to land to point lol).

Wake up and stop crying about P/d thief and pu mesmer ,at least for pvp

If S/F ele doesn’t require skill, and careful management of cooldowns and skills, than I don’t know what does. Power necro, yeah that’s several times simpler. But you can’t deny that those builds are high risk high reward, and that gives me more satisfaction than all the cheese builds I mentioned here for one reason or another.

So once again, this post isn’t specifically about one class, but rather the direction anet is overall going towards with much of its changes.

nearlight.3064:

musu.9205:

I tried pu and it’s meh then i went back to my CI and standard shatter for reasons.
PU with scepter still dont have aoe condition pressure like engi and necro means less damage potential and easy to deal with when the meta is guard/ele/war for tpvp.
Adding torment doesnt help pu mesmer that much ,they are already strong for 1v1, also clone death is more a defensive trait (I doubt u even really used it).

The builds a tend to run in pvp right now are glass S/F ele, glassish power necro

about this im pretty sure everyone who has some brain and played pvp a lot will tell you glassish power necro and s/f ele aren’t highest skillful play ,they are not even your words “high risk” at all. what they truly are is one trick pony —--almost one shot u in secs and for rest time they are struggling to stay alive (yeah this is hard while u could have more teammate help after your burst someone down ) that’s how they are played. They don’t have much trouble to land damage at all unlike CI or shatter mesmer(unless aoe is hard to land to point lol).

Wake up and stop crying about P/d thief and pu mesmer ,at least for pvp

If S/F ele doesn’t require skill, and careful management of cooldowns and skills, than I don’t know what does. Power necro, yeah that’s several times simpler. But you can’t deny that those builds are high risk high reward, and that gives me more satisfaction than all the cheese builds I mentioned here for one reason or another.

So once again, this post isn’t specifically about one class, but rather the direction anet is overall going towards with much of its changes.

Dunno about you but on my 5k crit 100% crit chance in DS power necro I have to play alot less carefully and can juggle cooldowns way more randomly than on my full blown condimancer.

Mayama.1854:

nearlight.3064:

musu.9205:

I tried pu and it’s meh then i went back to my CI and standard shatter for reasons.
PU with scepter still dont have aoe condition pressure like engi and necro means less damage potential and easy to deal with when the meta is guard/ele/war for tpvp.
Adding torment doesnt help pu mesmer that much ,they are already strong for 1v1, also clone death is more a defensive trait (I doubt u even really used it).

The builds a tend to run in pvp right now are glass S/F ele, glassish power necro

about this im pretty sure everyone who has some brain and played pvp a lot will tell you glassish power necro and s/f ele aren’t highest skillful play ,they are not even your words “high risk” at all. what they truly are is one trick pony —--almost one shot u in secs and for rest time they are struggling to stay alive (yeah this is hard while u could have more teammate help after your burst someone down ) that’s how they are played. They don’t have much trouble to land damage at all unlike CI or shatter mesmer(unless aoe is hard to land to point lol).

Wake up and stop crying about P/d thief and pu mesmer ,at least for pvp

If S/F ele doesn’t require skill, and careful management of cooldowns and skills, than I don’t know what does. Power necro, yeah that’s several times simpler. But you can’t deny that those builds are high risk high reward, and that gives me more satisfaction than all the cheese builds I mentioned here for one reason or another.

So once again, this post isn’t specifically about one class, but rather the direction anet is overall going towards with much of its changes.

Dunno about you but on my 5k crit 100% crit chance in DS power necro I have to play alot less carefully and can juggle cooldowns way more randomly than on my full blown condimancer.

Okay we’re getting offtopic, and people are starting to flame me, which makes me want to stop posting on these forums. Anyway yeah, power necro is easy to play, but there are certainly easier to play necro specs like minions, and whatnot.

Whatever, I’m just trying to explain how anet is encouraging people to use simpler builds that are afar too forgiving of mistakes to bad players.

In my opinion, I’d say that the builds requiring the most skill to play are S/D ele, glass staff ele, D/D thief, shatter mesmer, and engi build with 2+ kits. I don’t know guardians or warriors enough to comment on them.

So would you guys prefer more opportunities for high risk high reward builds, or would you prefer being spoon fed builds that are way too easy to play by anet?

nearlight.3064:

BrunoBRS.5178:

P/D thief complaints, i won’t comment on that, but i’ll stop you right there on the venom share change. if we had 2, maybe 3 venoms that could apply decent condi damage, you’d have a point. but at most, the party members will get 50 damage per tick from a single venom.

not just that, but P/D practically relies on a short CD steal, so it would at least put 20 points into trickery.

the only thing that venom share buffed was skale venom on a build that already requires 6/x/6/x/x dumped entirely on venom traits instead of survivability or damage traits, and the investment is so heavy that you have to sacrifice utilities to make room for venoms.

TL;DR: the venom share change only sounds like an important buff to people that never played a venom share thief.

Yeah I really haven’t played it, but it just sounds like a low risk, high reward build, at least for certain situations.. but not as bad as mesmer by far.

venom share is the opposite of low risk, high reward. it’s extremely high risk (you give up any survivability to dump all trait points and utility slots into venoms, because otherwise it’s a waste of trait points and venoms are too weak without 12 points into them), and the reward remains really bad. as in, the only situation venoms would win a team fight are situations where you’d already win anyway, and would win faster if the thief player could do any damage and mitigate incoming attacks.

venoms are inexcusably bad alone, sub par after traiting all your points into them. this “buff” didn’t change that.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

nearlight.3064:

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

No it isn’t. Only on Mesmers is that true because the clone system lets them up to quadruple their condition output. If the clones aren’t applying it, then it can be balanced on an auto.

Heck, even if it was on almost any other weapon, it wouldn’t be so bad, but Scepter clone generation is quite fast.

Have you actually played a Mesmer even once? Are you posting from planet Mars?

shimmerless.4560:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

nearlight.3064:

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

No it isn’t. Only on Mesmers is that true because the clone system lets them up to quadruple their condition output. If the clones aren’t applying it, then it can be balanced on an auto.

Heck, even if it was on almost any other weapon, it wouldn’t be so bad, but Scepter clone generation is quite fast.

Have you actually played a Mesmer even once? Are you posting from planet Mars?

Yeah, I do play my Mesmer rather frequently and I use Scepter on my shatter build because it generates clones much more rapidly than any other weapon.

nearlight.3064:

In my opinion, I’d say that the builds requiring the most skill to play are S/D ele, glass staff ele, D/D thief, shatter mesmer, and engi build with 2+ kits. I don’t know guardians or warriors enough to comment on them.

Did i just read d/d thief ,glass staff ele and 2 kits engi build are requiring most skill to play ? in pve u meant ?

first skillful build tier : d/p thief (not those perma stealth troll, note skill#3 always makes great combo unlike other thief weapons ,it is not evade evade and evade),shatter mesmer ,CI mesmer (something that u have to actually take time to build your dps source and take risk to use . shatter have to melee to get full damage potential , CI have to interrupt foes to get might stack ). Few engi builds do require much skill to play well but all condi engi build are medium risk and we all know how the old SD build works before nerf.

Also note these are team pvp builds and require more awareness of map to rotate properly .(decap for thief ,portal for mesmer )
And now you got ideas what the actual skillful builds are. Die easily alone =/= more skill to play.

I do think anet should nerf pu trait tho and about scepter i’m waiting actual test in game (problem is anet really took too long to make meaningful balance change )

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

shimmerless.4560:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

nearlight.3064:

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

No it isn’t. Only on Mesmers is that true because the clone system lets them up to quadruple their condition output. If the clones aren’t applying it, then it can be balanced on an auto.

Heck, even if it was on almost any other weapon, it wouldn’t be so bad, but Scepter clone generation is quite fast.

Have you actually played a Mesmer even once? Are you posting from planet Mars?

Yeah, I do play my Mesmer rather frequently and I use Scepter on my shatter build because it generates clones much more rapidly than any other weapon.

scepter has a low AA speed also barely hit things which is why it needs buff to begin with. Low AA speed is same to scepter clone too .
The thing is we dont have chance to test this yet but problem is anet did balance patch slowly(thanks living story group ) and never reacted to balance issue fast(free signet for war has been used in TOL and no words from anet ,no fix in a month)

PU Mesmers are certainly a concern, and even Karl recognized that at the ready up’s chat.

However, it’s worth noting that anet’s latest buffs to pet skills (usually recognized as low risk/ high reward skills) have been done through active skills instead of passive skills. Glyph of Elementals will now become stronger by becoming more active, and spirit weapons will get buffed with improved actives.

Yeah only glass canons are not low risk high reward..pffbtt...stop drowning in those debates. I’m hoping this is about pve because no build created cannot be countered meaning not 1v1 balance. What is low risk against some is high risk against others that’s what you guys cannot simply understand YOU ARE AVOIDING THE DIVERSITY.

Your beliefs are illusions.

Well then, by the logic and opinions of people in this thread, there might as well be no builds that require significant skill to play.

nearlight.3064:

Well then, by the logic and opinions of people in this thread, there might as well be no builds that require significant skill to play.

I explained to you why d/p thief require more skill than d/d ,and why shatter/CI mesmer is highest tier of skill play .
what you said is first making wrong opinions about power necro and s/f burst ele . Then throwing more glass cannon builds without any thoughts on them to us to prove you know what are the skillful builds . But sadly you proved that you know nothing about how those builds work.

Are we clear before you are just making up others opinions?

musu.9205:

nearlight.3064:

Well then, by the logic and opinions of people in this thread, there might as well be no builds that require significant skill to play.

I explained to you why d/p thief require more skill than d/d ,and why shatter/CI mesmer is highest tier of skill play .
what you said is first making wrong opinions about power necro and s/f burst ele . Then throwing more glass cannon builds without any thoughts on them to us to prove you know what are the skillful builds . But sadly you proved that you know nothing about how those builds work.

Are we clear before you are just making up others opinions?

You forgot the only unviable power class -> Ranger. Any person who run a power ranger build need more skill than any of the listed class you mentionned. I don’t talk about the sniper that stay on high ground and #1 all day. I talk about the one that try to decap things or protect a point.

It’s the hardest spec atm because:
1- You have no burst, which means -> you vulnerable to burst and tank usually outheal you. So you basicly you are an attrition zerker class which is REALLY bad.
2- Most unforgiving gameplay from all glass. You more likely to loose any encounter if you miss a defensive skill (such as LB #3-#4).
3- Most timing reliant class. You need those key evades to survive.

Power ranger build are atm are high risk/low reward. It may change next patch!

Klonko.8341:

musu.9205:

nearlight.3064:

Well then, by the logic and opinions of people in this thread, there might as well be no builds that require significant skill to play.

I explained to you why d/p thief require more skill than d/d ,and why shatter/CI mesmer is highest tier of skill play .
what you said is first making wrong opinions about power necro and s/f burst ele . Then throwing more glass cannon builds without any thoughts on them to us to prove you know what are the skillful builds . But sadly you proved that you know nothing about how those builds work.

Are we clear before you are just making up others opinions?

You forgot the only unviable power class -> Ranger. Any person who run a power ranger build need more skill than any of the listed class you mentionned. I don’t talk about the sniper that stay on high ground and #1 all day. I talk about the one that try to decap things or protect a point.

It’s the hardest spec atm because:
1- You have no burst, which means -> you vulnerable to burst and tank usually outheal you. So you basicly you are an attrition zerker class which is REALLY bad.
2- Most unforgiving gameplay from all glass. You more likely to loose any encounter if you miss a defensive skill (such as LB #3-#4).
3- Most timing reliant class. You need those key evades to survive.

Power ranger build are atm are high risk/low reward. It may change next patch!

Are you going to mention the high risk/no reward builds as well like zerker trap thief or zerker signet guard?

Sagat.3285:

Are you going to mention the high risk/no reward builds as well like zerker trap thief or zerker signet guard?

Why? Are you having trouble reading the thread tittle? Please do not derail the thread. If you wish to discuss builds that are problematic in that context, make a thread for it or use one of the multitude of them that already exist, to express your opinion. Thank you.

Klonko.8341:

musu.9205:

nearlight.3064:

Well then, by the logic and opinions of people in this thread, there might as well be no builds that require significant skill to play.

I explained to you why d/p thief require more skill than d/d ,and why shatter/CI mesmer is highest tier of skill play .
what you said is first making wrong opinions about power necro and s/f burst ele . Then throwing more glass cannon builds without any thoughts on them to us to prove you know what are the skillful builds . But sadly you proved that you know nothing about how those builds work.

Are we clear before you are just making up others opinions?

You forgot the only unviable power class -> Ranger. Any person who run a power ranger build need more skill than any of the listed class you mentionned. I don’t talk about the sniper that stay on high ground and #1 all day. I talk about the one that try to decap things or protect a point.

It’s the hardest spec atm because:
1- You have no burst, which means -> you vulnerable to burst and tank usually outheal you. So you basicly you are an attrition zerker class which is REALLY bad.
2- Most unforgiving gameplay from all glass. You more likely to loose any encounter if you miss a defensive skill (such as LB #3-#4).
3- Most timing reliant class. You need those key evades to survive.

Power ranger build are atm are high risk/low reward. It may change next patch!

not viable =/= more skill required

also no matter what build rangers are running , highest skillful builds tier has nothing to do with them .Just check their damage skills and defensive skills. Tell me how hard it could be to use them ?Ranger requires more skill than necro , war and maybe guard .
power ranger = poor man’s glass staff ele .

Beside those said fact , there is a easy way to judge why a build requires more skill than others:
Watch the actually tournament matches ,compare those players with starters and bad players and tell the difference by the usage of the certain skills from same build .
How many skills a build could offer to clearly tell there are better usage ?
Do those better usage require more thought and active play ?

coglin.1867:

Sagat.3285:

Are you going to mention the high risk/no reward builds as well like zerker trap thief or zerker signet guard?

Why? Are you having trouble reading the thread tittle? Please do not derail the thread. If you wish to discuss builds that are problematic in that context, make a thread for it or use one of the multitude of them that already exist, to express your opinion. Thank you.

since topic is about anet is creating more low risk /high reward build so there is something to do with definition of risk/reward.

And clearly op has little knowledge about what the high risk/high reward build
are.if anet follow his opinions then even they not rewarding cheese/ bunker /condi build they will reward gambling builds(those one track pony just because they share “honor” with being class cannon )

musu.9205:

And clearly op has little knowledge about what the high risk/high reward build
are.

I do agree with this completely. The problem is that everyone thinks there opinion of high risk/high reward is cannon. Apparently the concept of subjective opinion is a foreign concept to so many here. Some of those folks need to play a elementalist or multi kit engineer against actual skilled players, before suggesting they are not complicated or high risk to play.

I do play condi kit engi and ele actually, my point those two set up can be rewarding but are not all it doesn’t have to be zerker stats. Complicated get’s easy over time that’s not high risk and I go arcana on my ele because I like having all skills as soon as possible. High risk and complicated are not the same lol.

If I’m lost please enlighten me sir share us your high reward/high risk specs that are not zerker related.

Sagat.3285:

I do play condi kit engi and ele actually, my point those two set up can be rewarding but are not all it doesn’t have to be zerker stats. Complicated get’s easy over time that’s not high risk and I go arcana on my ele because I like having all skills as soon as possible. High risk and complicated are not the same lol.

If I’m lost please enlighten me sir share us your high reward/high risk specs that are not zerker related.

Apparently you missed it earlier. I cannot enlighten you on anything, because apparently we disagree. The problem appears to be that you think your opinion of high risk/high reward is cannon. Apparently the concept of subjective opinion is a foreign concept to you my friend.

coglin.1867:

Sagat.3285:

I do play condi kit engi and ele actually, my point those two set up can be rewarding but are not all it doesn’t have to be zerker stats. Complicated get’s easy over time that’s not high risk and I go arcana on my ele because I like having all skills as soon as possible. High risk and complicated are not the same lol.

If I’m lost please enlighten me sir share us your high reward/high risk specs that are not zerker related.

Apparently you missed it earlier. I cannot enlighten you on anything, because apparently we disagree. The problem appears to be that you think your opinion of high risk/high reward is cannon. Apparently the concept of subjective opinion is a foreign concept to you my friend.

I asked zerker sir not cannon sir but let’s leave at then sir let’s agree to disagree sir.

Edit: *non-zerker

musu.9205:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

shimmerless.4560:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

nearlight.3064:

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

No it isn’t. Only on Mesmers is that true because the clone system lets them up to quadruple their condition output. If the clones aren’t applying it, then it can be balanced on an auto.

Heck, even if it was on almost any other weapon, it wouldn’t be so bad, but Scepter clone generation is quite fast.

Have you actually played a Mesmer even once? Are you posting from planet Mars?

Yeah, I do play my Mesmer rather frequently and I use Scepter on my shatter build because it generates clones much more rapidly than any other weapon.

scepter has a low AA speed also barely hit things which is why it needs buff to begin with. Low AA speed is same to scepter clone too .
The thing is we dont have chance to test this yet but problem is anet did balance patch slowly(thanks living story group ) and never reacted to balance issue fast(free signet for war has been used in TOL and no words from anet ,no fix in a month)

Low AA speed, but a cycle of the auto is still faster than any clone generation cooldown. The projectiles home, so hitting is not as big an issue as you make it out to be.

Don’t get me wrong, the scepter AA needs a buff, but Torment on Ether Bolt is not what it needs. Ether Blast is fine getting Torment.

this game has been barreling towards boring low risk combat for a while now. one way or another builds that abuse imbalances have constantly risen atop the changing meta update after update, eclipsing the previous trainwreck of a build that holds the title of most broken.

anet seems happy with pushing low-risk gameplay onto everyone and making it the norm, and the tournament of legends has repeatedly shown just how badly this is mutilating gameplay.

honestly don’t have much hope for this game to put it bluntly.

Finally, this thread is back on track after everyone and their mother decided to flame me for suggesting that their favorite cheese build requires no skill to play.

And Musu. You’re bringing out very negative thoughts within me. If you honestly think that fresh air eles or staff eles or whatever, are a one trick pony, then you didn’t watch the ToL finals today.

I see your point that D/P thief requires more skill to play than D/D. I merely said that D/D requires more skill because of the relative uslessness of things like death blossom or dagger 4 compared to the interrupt, on demand stealth, and on demand gap close, and oodles of damage mitigation through blind that the build has. It certainly requires more thought than D/D, I see that, but in my noob thief mind, I always found that using CnD was harder than pressing 5, and 2 without needing a target. Oh well, I guess I just dislike people who hang on every word to invalidate my opinions, especially the OVERALL OPINION OF THIS THREAD.

I play S/F ele. I play power necro. I play condition necro. I played cheesy kitten spirit ranger. I know how they work, and I’m not going to let someone like you come here on my thread and tell me I don’t know kitten about the builds I live and breathe.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

musu.9205:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

shimmerless.4560:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

nearlight.3064:

Well yeah that is true. It’s just for mesmers, helseth suggests that they won’t even need PU, since torment spam will let them faceroll through everything. It’s too strong of a condition to just slap on an autoattack.

No it isn’t. Only on Mesmers is that true because the clone system lets them up to quadruple their condition output. If the clones aren’t applying it, then it can be balanced on an auto.

Heck, even if it was on almost any other weapon, it wouldn’t be so bad, but Scepter clone generation is quite fast.

Have you actually played a Mesmer even once? Are you posting from planet Mars?

Yeah, I do play my Mesmer rather frequently and I use Scepter on my shatter build because it generates clones much more rapidly than any other weapon.

scepter has a low AA speed also barely hit things which is why it needs buff to begin with. Low AA speed is same to scepter clone too .
The thing is we dont have chance to test this yet but problem is anet did balance patch slowly(thanks living story group ) and never reacted to balance issue fast(free signet for war has been used in TOL and no words from anet ,no fix in a month)

Low AA speed, but a cycle of the auto is still faster than any clone generation cooldown. The projectiles home, so hitting is not as big an issue as you make it out to be.

Don’t get me wrong, the scepter AA needs a buff, but Torment on Ether Bolt is not what it needs. Ether Blast is fine getting Torment.

I agree with this but if only ether blast gets buffed ,scepter will stay useless .So i think we need something else beside a damage condition on scepter (even i think it wont make pu condi spec op in actual tpvp).But something different from staff , maybe chill/cripple.

The builds a tend to run in pvp right now are glass S/F ele, glassish power necro

about this im pretty sure everyone who has some brain and played pvp a lot will tell you glassish power necro and s/f ele aren’t highest skillful play ,they are not even your words “high risk” at all. what they truly are is one trick pony —--almost one shot u in secs and for rest time they are struggling to stay alive (yeah this is hard while u could have more teammate help after your burst someone down ) that’s how they are played. They don’t have much trouble to land damage at all unlike CI or shatter mesmer(unless aoe is hard to land to point lol).

[/quote]

Going to have to agree with this.
Burst builds are arguably less interesting/require less (or maybe just different) skills than bruiser type builds which require the patient and consistent landing of skills in order to be effective.
Its in the eye of the beholder.

musu.9205:

nearlight.3064:

In my opinion, I’d say that the builds requiring the most skill to play are S/D ele, glass staff ele, D/D thief, shatter mesmer, and engi build with 2+ kits. I don’t know guardians or warriors enough to comment on them.

Did i just read d/d thief ,glass staff ele and 2 kits engi build are requiring most skill to play ? in pve u meant ?

first skillful build tier : d/p thief (not those perma stealth troll, note skill#3 always makes great combo unlike other thief weapons ,it is not evade evade and evade)

Empty laughter

nearlight.3064:

Finally, this thread is back on track after everyone and their mother decided to flame me for suggesting that their favorite cheese build requires no skill to play.

And Musu. You’re bringing out very negative thoughts within me. If you honestly think that fresh air eles or staff eles or whatever, are a one trick pony, then you didn’t watch the ToL finals today.

I see your point that D/P thief requires more skill to play than D/D. I merely said that D/D requires more skill because of the relative uslessness of things like death blossom or dagger 4 compared to the interrupt, on demand stealth, and on demand gap close, and oodles of damage mitigation through blind that the build has. It certainly requires more thought than D/D, I see that, but in my noob thief mind, I always found that using CnD was harder than pressing 5, and 2 without needing a target. Oh well, I guess I just dislike people who hang on every word to invalidate my opinions, especially the OVERALL OPINION OF THIS THREAD.

I play S/F ele. I play power necro. I play condition necro. I played cheesy kitten spirit ranger. I know how they work, and I’m not going to let someone like you come here on my thread and tell me I don’t know kitten about the builds I live and breathe.

First of all, on one flamed you for what you thought. People disagree with your opinions on what the skillful builds are .

Secondly , did i say s/d is one track pony ever?

About comparing with d/p thief with d/d , let me use some words i said here again :

Watch the actually tournament matches ,compare those players with starters and bad players and tell the difference by the usage of the certain skills from same build .
How many skills a build could offer to clearly tell there are better usage ?
Do those better usage require more thought and active play ?

CnD is harder to land itself but from time to time , d/p thief requires more initiative management and offer more space for a good player to promote .More useless skills offer nothing to promote .
But this time at least you explained how you thought of those builds .This is how we discuss stuff . Inb4 you were just throwing builds to us and saying thats skillful ,and once someone disagree with you ,you try another builds again.

No offense really.

You should specify wich mode are you talking about:

PvE ele is HIGH risk, high reward at moment:
I.E. ANYONE can melee lupi on a warrior, not so many can melee lupi on an ele.
That is because Warrior is extremely forgiving, being able to facetank a couple of strong hits, and healing back without even pressing a button

Ele gets oneshot by so many Attacks in pve that is extremely difficult to play unless the content itself is extremely easy.
Tell me how often do you see a FGS in high level fractals.
The issue is obviously the content, but nerf is Always the lazy way anet chooses.

WWW:

Thieves and torpedo warriors are OP and will be almost untouched.
DD celestial ele is trash… You need to be able to engage/disengage and strong defense mechanic at will to be good at roaming.
Ele has none of that. anyone saying the opposite should prove it, and i can prove i can escape them even with a mesmer.

Healing is just half effective due to the increased damage and condition spam comparing to PvP, but this is a concept too hard to grasp for some

In Zerg WWW ele is either a waterbot (low risk/0 reward) or if dps is extremely difficult to play for not even a strong reward. (read unwanted and considered unviable)
But will be nerfed so will be high risk/low reward.

InPvP DD celestial seems strong due to reduced stats, no food exc.
But obviously the need of the few is more important of the needs of the many because of esports TM

Mayama.1854:

Thief, Mesmer and Necro are made to be crazy good duelling professions. Its build into their class mechanics. You either nerf them into oblivion or they will be superior to other professions in 1v1.

Thief stealth/dodge spam will always give them an advantage in 1v1 but sucks in teamfights.

Mesmer clone spam will always give them an advantage in 1v1 but sucks in teamfights.

Necro death shroud will always give them an advantage in 1v1 but sucks in teamfights.

As much as I hate to fight PU Mesmers, P/D Thieves and Terrormancers myself they are all useless if you play as a team. I dont say its not easy mode but in the end its a team game and those specs cant compete in that mode.

^..hotjoin hero favourites is all they will ever be.