Guild Wars 2

Hello everyone. Lets start of by me saying that i love my elementalist, and by saying that im refering to how the class plays and nothing else.

But regardless i have found a great many annoyences, many of which are already mentioned here on the forums and many which are not. These annoyences break the game for me in certain ways. For example, you know that feeling when you have set up a perfect combo and is just about to finish it all with the mighties nuke of them all “Fire Grab”? Well, i feel like im missing out on that awesome feeling when it doesnt hit like it should, or even better if the spider mob you are fighting goes around your character and even though you have registered this movement you already made the cast and it will just go off at nothing. I thought my Asura would be smarter then that?

Fire Grab really is the perfect example for my point since it messes itself up in a number of ways all equally annoying. This ability is fairly easy to use, mob in front of you -> put it on fire -> fire away. But there seem to be an excessive, extreme even, amount of situations in the game when this will fail in one way or another. Maybe the mob is moving around you, maybe the mob is a little to far to the right or the mob is higher up then you or further down and the cone itself seems more like a carrot then an actual cone in many situations, considering it does not often hit all the mobs you aimed it at. And in many, many cases this kitten will just miss without apparent reason and thats not fine at all. But the thing which without doubt annoys me the most and really makes me wonder is the first example i used with the spider moving around you. The spider starts out infront of you and it is on fire, so you cast fire grab but in that very moment the spider runs around you so its behind your back and your character just casts it away, hitting nothing and triggering the massive 45 second cooldown. Its not cool, at all.

Atleast to me it seems fair that if my asura is stupid enough to cast at nothing even though i told him specifically what to cast at he should, at the very least, try to make that cooldown a little less severe. Or even better, if the target cant be hit just dont cast it, tell me “i cant hit that kitten man” and do not use the ability at all.

Edit: Ofcourse i do understand that the whole cast when you press the button no matter what is a part of this game but my impression of this what that it would add to freedom and control? IMO when i have a mob targetet my character should use it spells on that target and nothing else, if he cant do that then no spell, simple really.

It’s part of the action combat in this game that you need to learn to aim properly and keep a mob under control and other players are able to dodge your skills, etc. It adds an extra layer of strategy and skill. And the way skills cast allows you to move around as you cast which you are expected to do. This is not your typical tab target game, it’s more action combat than anything else. As soon as you treat it that way and embrace it, you’ll have a lot more fun with it. I personally prefer action combat to tab targeting anyway – it’s makes for more interesting combat. If I could just stand there and press buttons and they’d all hit just because I was targeting the mob, that’d be so boring.

I agree and i am embracing it but in the end some situations no matter how attentive you are and how skilled you are you will miss by a fluke, im not a fan of random chance determining the outcome of a battle.

It’s not really random though if a mob moves as you cast a skill. If you’re casting a skill that has precise aiming requirements and you’re afraid of wasting a cooldown, make sure the mob is CC’d before you cast it. The great thing about action combat is it’s mostly in your hands – you control what happens and how the fight goes. It’s not determined by how high your Hit stat is compared to mob level or anything dumb like that. You don’t have to rely on stats, but instead you can rely on your own skill to hit a mob, dodge a skill, etc.

Leiloni.7951:

It’s part of the action combat in this game that you need to learn to aim properly and keep a mob under control and other players are able to dodge your skills, etc. It adds an extra layer of strategy and skill. And the way skills cast allows you to move around as you cast which you are expected to do. This is not your typical tab target game, it’s more action combat than anything else. As soon as you treat it that way and embrace it, you’ll have a lot more fun with it. I personally prefer action combat to tab targeting anyway – it’s makes for more interesting combat. If I could just stand there and press buttons and they’d all hit just because I was targeting the mob, that’d be so boring.

The main problem on this is that not every class have it this way (especially on hard-hitting abilities). Imagine a Thief trying to aim his Heartseeker at nearly downed opponent in a way Ele has to aim his Fire grab, quite amusing

If you stop moving long enough to cast Fire Grab, your character will automatically turn to face the mob you have tartgeted and cast it. If you have movement keys pressed, that will override that mechanic. It’s the same way melee classes are able to use their skills while mobs are moving around. This won’t swivel your camera btw.

STRanger.5120:

The main problem on this is that not every class have it this way (especially on hard-hitting abilities). Imagine a Thief trying to aim his Heartseeker at nearly downed opponent in a way Ele has to aim his Fire grab, quite amusing

Yea but not every class has a chill, a knockdown, a launch, and a cripple in one weapon set. And that’s only the offhand! Considering you’ll have even more skills depending on what MH you’re using. Thief doesn’t have comparable CC at all and he’s going to have to use Initiative to CC which will mean less Initiative for things like Heartseeker (which has already been nerfed as well as Pistol Whip so clearly ANet didn’t intend for them to do so much damage and be used so often). Besides, a Thief has less in the way of other things as well whereas an Ele has a wider variety of skills.

The weapon skills classes have do make sense if you think about the bigger picture. Complaining about having to aim skills in a game like this just doesn’t make sense. It’s supposed to be that way.

I dunno I’ve played a lot of other games with free targeting systems so this type of thing is natural to me at this point. The OP mentions a mob being a little to far to the right or slightly higher in elevation – the skill missed because you aimed yourself wrong. You’ll get used to being in the right spot. Or spiders moving – part of a game like this is learning a mob’s moves and learning how to counter them. So if you know a mob is going to do that, CC him first. Or there’s some mobs that knock me down and things, they drive me nuts – so you learn to dodge them before they do that, or blind them then hit it, whatever. Just takes practice to adjust your playstyle to a game like this.

I am not complaining of having to aim skills im complaining about skills missing when i have aimed them as best possible.

You dont have to aim Fire Grab, just hit it while the mob is in range, after you stop moving. Your character will face the mob it will hit. The mechanics of the game are far better at aiming that skill than we are. Also far faster. For a player or mob who has run thru us, your character will do an instantaneous 180 degree turn far faster than we can mouse turn.

Battery.5930:

I am not complaining of having to aim skills im complaining about skills missing when i have aimed them as best possible.

If they’re missing, you haven’t aimed them well enough. I almost never miss anything and it’s because I’m always CCing or following or taking advantages of their changes in direction. It’s a dynamic combat system and you have to use it that way. You can’t just run in circles casting abilities like you can in WoW.

And other classes have it just as bad. Anyone who uses ranged weapons will tell you the same thing. That’s part of what makes melee weapons advantageous at close range. But you mentioned heartseeker…part of the whole idea of heartseeker is that you don’t have to aim it. It was designed to be an ability that was special in that way.

well, how about staff /fire/ 3 skill (flame burst?) missing when the auto-attack fireball hits… they have the same range, except fireball is a projectile, while flame burst only requires line of sight…

Forgotten Legend.9281:

well, how about staff /fire/ 3 skill (flame burst?) missing when the auto-attack fireball hits… they have the same range, except fireball is a projectile, while flame burst only requires line of sight…

I’ve never experienced that. How does that even miss? There’s no travel time, it hits the mob/person you’re targeting and create an AoE Flame Burst around them. It doesn’t really require aiming or anything.

I have fire grab missing all the time despite me standing still and letting the character freely rotate and the mob staying well still. I think it misses 5 times more often than the other skills.

The two D/D breath (fire and ice) are a cone too but work flawlessy, I don’t even miss a tick even when I move (I sidestep and circle strafe the mobs)

Leiloni.7951:

Yea but not every class has a chill, a knockdown, a launch, and a cripple in one weapon set. And that’s only the offhand! Considering you’ll have even more skills depending on what MH you’re using. Thief doesn’t have comparable CC at all and he’s going to have to use Initiative to CC which will mean less Initiative for things like Heartseeker (which has already been nerfed as well as Pistol Whip so clearly ANet didn’t intend for them to do so much damage and be used so often). Besides, a Thief has less in the way of other things as well whereas an Ele has a wider variety of skills.

The weapon skills classes have do make sense if you think about the bigger picture. Complaining about having to aim skills in a game like this just doesn’t make sense. It’s supposed to be that way.

I dunno I’ve played a lot of other games with free targeting systems so this type of thing is natural to me at this point. The OP mentions a mob being a little to far to the right or slightly higher in elevation – the skill missed because you aimed yourself wrong. You’ll get used to being in the right spot. Or spiders moving – part of a game like this is learning a mob’s moves and learning how to counter them. So if you know a mob is going to do that, CC him first. Or there’s some mobs that knock me down and things, they drive me nuts – so you learn to dodge them before they do that, or blind them then hit it, whatever. Just takes practice to adjust your playstyle to a game like this.

I´m not complaining this way as you had undestood, I rather think that these fire grab misses are more of a netcode/terrain problem than anything else.
Also, try this:

Stand still with your character and try to turn it only with right-clicking and dragging the mouse. From my experience, this will not turn your character except the situation in which the char is moving (running, strafing, going back), but I think that it will be more comfortable if right-click dragging will turn the character even when standing still (just like in other 3rd person games), because logically, if I want to just look around, I have my left mouse button, right?
This change can also help with aiming skills of this type, but the netcode thing is much more relevant of course.

Elementalist skills constantly miss especially with staff. All you have to do is walk and you can avoid the damage from one in PvP. No dodges needed since case times are so slow and the animation hang times are slow. Unless you play dagger/dagger. Even then the miss rate is pretty high.

Sevati.6724:

Elementalist skills constantly miss especially with staff. All you have to do is walk and you can avoid the damage from one in PvP. No dodges needed since case times are so slow and the animation hang times are slow. Unless you play dagger/dagger. Even then the miss rate is pretty high.

Actually, the excuse to let thieves autohit and spam the same buttons so easily is “because they are in frantic running in melee”.

So, why a D/D elementalist has to stop, stand still (lolthievesdrool!) and then pinpoint a cone ability that of course can’t be spammed?

Thieves are OP and everyone knows it so I don’t think they’re really a good excuse for why our skills need to work the same way.

STRanger.5120:

I´m not complaining this way as you had undestood, I rather think that these fire grab misses are more of a netcode/terrain problem than anything else.

If a skill relies on you aiming then it makes sense terrain would get in the way since it’s looking at physical location of things to determine if it hits or if the target dodged/moved (and it also makes sense that lag would cause problems as well clearly). Annoying perhaps, but not illogical. I don’t know if they intended for the skill to work that way, though so that might be a separate issue like you said.

Sevati.6724:

Elementalist skills constantly miss especially with staff. All you have to do is walk and you can avoid the damage from one in PvP. No dodges needed since case times are so slow and the animation hang times are slow.

Working as intended. Staff isn’t buggy, you just have to play it as if it’s an action combat game and not tab target. Expect that people will try to dodge out of stuff and anticipate, change how you play to adapt. Staff isn’t a solo weapon to start with so you should usually have friends and also have more than one target in front of you. But you can use CC if a person is dodging, you can place an AoE to control where they can dodge (or they’ll just end up dodging into your skill), use Ice combo field for repeated Chill effects on the target, work with your teammates, etc.

But more than anything else, realize that in a game where people can dodge and move out of your skills, you’re going to miss some and that’s just part of combat. It’s not broken, it’s just not WoW.

Maybe I’ve spent too much time in games like TERA, Vindictus, and RaiderZ Alpha/Beta, but the idea of skills missing and mobs moving around is completely normal to me. Without WoW style tab target things just work differently and you learn to get used to it. I find it more fun to be honest, keeps it interesting and engaging. Now if there’s a bug somewhere that would be worth discussing, but so far I don’t see any concrete proof of buggy skills.

I’d like to have the option to have the skill greyed out if your target is out of range of our skill,other than that, missing the target because it’s moving, i’m ok with how it currently is.

Unsteady Ground is a skill that also misses. This is higly terrain related. It also has a slow start so putting it in front of enemies will make it miss. Best bet is to put it a few feet in front of you on completely flat ground.
Personally I feel that Fire Grab’s accuracy is fine as it is, aside from missing because of terrain.

Fire grab has straight up buggy hit detection, it will miss when it really shouldn’t.

In general the ability to fire skills without a target is a good thing for making the game skill based, it gives you more control like being able to hit thieves in stealth, but also allows you to make more mistakes. It gives you the freedom to stack might with fire combos when no one is around or trigger healing from your Signet of Restoration. You can even aim projectiles with mouse look, and sometimes aim breath attacks better with no target than auto targetting.

But Fire Grab is just buggy. Lightning Whip too.