Guild Wars 2

Did not watch the broadcast but got this from dulfy’s tldr off redit

Mesmer portal is giving us problems –giving that tool onto other classes

Seems odd. But I hope it is necros so when I do jumping puzzles with my husband he can portal me up if I fall :P

It could potentially be necros or engineers. I seriously doubt eles will get it…

Im fine with this, no class should be mandatory for spvp (and wvwvw to an extent), I can see people complaining in the future about mesmer losing its “uniqueness”, but balance is balance and this is a step in the right direction, its that or no portal at all.

It is good. Hopefully this will allow Anet to finally do some decent and reasonable balancing.

It should go to thieves….

or maybe not.

Whoever it goes to, I’ll be fine with it if it’s NOT ele or thief haha, the two fastest classes…

Seems fine to me, really wish theyd change our CD back to 60 seconds though

Another PvP whine making them do changes that aren’t needed. That said I hope this goes through so finally people can stop whining and using Portal as an excuse for why Mesmers shouldn’t have obvious sub par/unbalanced areas buffed up to be on par with other classes.

Scrap Moa and put something useful in its place as well.

Though we should get a new skill to match the number of skills to the other classes that will get Portal added.

What do you think… is there the possibility that other professions will get a stronger portal than the mesmer’s portal?

This is beyond stupid. If they do this, I might just retire my mesmer and seeing as it’s the only class I like, might even consider quitting.

They are going the WoW route, instead of balancing, they are homogenizing classes. Everyone will do everything.

There’s already little reason to bring a mesmer along instead of another class.

You have NO idea how much this saddens me.

Navi.7142:

What do you think… is there the possibility that other professions will get a stronger portal than the mesmer’s portal?

I wouldn’t be suprised if they did it…

Also i wouldn’t be suprised if Tw gets nerfed/shared as well..

You heard it here first

Ramiel.4931:

This is beyond stupid. If they do this, I might just retire my mesmer and seeing as it’s the only class I like, might even consider quitting.

They are going the WoW route, instead of balancing, they are homogenizing classes. Everyone will do everything.

There’s already little reason to bring a mesmer along instead of another class.

You have NO idea how much this saddens me.

I was afraid this ignorant reply would come. Please explain your reasons and why you think its a bad idea instead of threatening to quit the game, it makes you look like a little child in a tantrum

Sharing portal. Classes I would like to see get it. Engi/Necro. Different ways of working of course and by god it better not have the same group utility… If a necro gets something along the lines of a thievees shadow step/shadow return that may be cool. Someone mentioned and Engineer portal kit or some form of mass transit like that. Sounds cool but a little too gimmicky to work properly. Warriors they need other buffs to help them out not a mass transit ability. Guardians are meant to be bunkers stay in one place and be unkillable. Eles… Don’t need it because they outmatch thieves in mobility (d/d eles) and thieves have their kitten shadow refuge.

Daximus.8547:

It should go to thieves….

or maybe not.

Besides thief already has a self portal that can give them stealth for 5 seconds and teleport them up to a max range of 10,000.

So if they’re giving portal to other classes does that mean they’re going to give 25% movement speed to mesmer? Or something that can give us some reasonable swiftness uptime? Yeah… don’t think so.

Why have different classes if they’re just going to wind up making them all the same….

Because people will still whine that they can’t do mechanic A, B, or C. But other classes can which is why you pick your classes wisely and learn to play that class.

Exactly, there should be strategy and play style involved in your selection… and also in people selecting the class you play for a role in pvp or whatever. If people want a certain ability then they should play that class or learn to deal with not having it in the class they do play. Each class has a variety of builds and ways to play it. Learn, experiment, get good at what you can do and always strive to be better.

Kazhiel.8194:

Exactly, there should be strategy and play style involved in your selection… and also in people selecting the class you play for a role in pvp or whatever. If people want a certain ability then they should play that class or learn to deal with not having it in the class they do play. Each class has a variety of builds and ways to play it. Learn, experiment, get good at what you can do and always strive to be better.

Well the play style that has been successfully used here was “Forum Whining”

It’s not about choosing your class wisely and implementing a balanced strategy with the classes in your team. It’s about going onto the forums and kitten and moaning for months on end about how X class is so OP and how X class killed you and your ego was hurt and now that class needs a nerf and you need X ability for yourself on your class because that skill shouldn’t be allowed to be controlled by 1 class alone. For instance Mesmer’s get stealth, why can’t we Backstab? or get a surprise attack like thief?

I semi hope that ANet has a sick sense of humor about giving portal to other classes. Like tie it to the Summon Flesh Wurm and have it be some sort of death portal that has to be placed as it does now but when you use the skill any ally within 300 range gets sucked through the portal with you… whether or not they wanted to go.

I wouldn’t mind to see the Portal mechanic being given to other classes. At least people would finally shut up about ‘but you have portal’ as an excuse whenever Mesmers state that their class is not functioning properly (and it is not functioning properly at all).

Necromancer and Engineer would strike me as the most likely candidates. The Necromancer being able to create a Well of Passage and the Engineer a Translocation Conduit or something.

Here you go, everyone already has portal lol: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Experimental_Telportation_Gun

Wise.8025:

I semi hope that ANet has a sick sense of humor about giving portal to other classes. Like tie it to the Summon Flesh Wurm and have it be some sort of death portal that has to be placed as it does now but when you use the skill any ally within 300 range gets sucked through the portal with you… whether or not they wanted to go.

Best. Idea. Ever.

Anet, please make this happen. I would even pay gems for this ability

I like the portal wurm from hell idea.

And the fact that it comes at a cost to the players still makes mesmers a better choice but doesn’t force teams to bring us so maybe ppl will stop whining.

Ramiel.4931:

They are going the WoW route, instead of balancing, they are homogenizing classes. Everyone will do everything.

This is what I fear the most..

Necromancers can teleport and thieves can as well.. why do we need other professions to have the ability? Mesmers are the only ones to mass teleport people at the moment and it should stay so.

Tweaking/overhauling skills and traits to cause more difference between professions > stupid ideas like this one is.

I kind of like being the only class with portal but I would much prefer that they give it to another class aswell, over nerfs or getting rid of it entirely.

Makes WvW so much more interesting

It should stay so why? Because you play mesmer and don’t want to loose the necessity of having one in every spvp team? Stop being selfish.

I would be OK if Engis had it. Or even Rangers, though it doesn’t make sense thematically. Any other class would just be absurd.

I would like to have portal for thief. Portal is not damage skill which can kill players but only can help to your friends for example on jumping puzzles. For example i like jumping puzzles and have no problems with it but i have friends who want archievement but they are not good at it and maybe never finish 50-70% of JP, so i can help them with thief if thief has portal. I think its good idea to give portal to more classes. Thief can have for example shadow gate of somehing like this a there should be limit of transported ppl about 5 for example so its not tool for teleporting whole army on WvW and PvP. You must understand that portal is tool which help your friends and not damage them. Thief was only class who had +25% signet and now this signet speed have almost all classes like necro or elementalist so I think that is fair if thief has too some skill from other class. You took something original from thief so thief can have something original from other classes.

kerona.3465:

I would be OK if Engis had it. Or even Rangers, though it doesn’t make sense thematically. Any other class would just be absurd.

I think that some Shadow gate on thief make sense thematically. This teleport should have all classes and not only some like necro or engineer. If you speak about absurd portal it is engineer portal.

Runcore.5107:

I think that some Shadow gate on thief make sense thematically. This teleport should have all classes and not only some like necro or engineer. If you speak about absurd portal it is engineer portal.

Pocket asura gate is not absurd, and they could add it with race-specific turret meshes too.

I’d love to see the Engineer class being able to set-up mini Asura gates. It’s a class that gets very little love and it really does need that little something else.

I don’t think other classes, especially Thieves, need anything like this.

I think that especially thieves need portal coz their other portal abilities are broken and work only on perfectly straight surface. All portal abilities dont work if you have just a little diferent altitude than your final place where you want port. And btw i said i want it to help my friends port on JP, not for porting armies on WvW (its why i said this limit about 2-5 ppl per portal.

And second think why thief should get portal is that Necromancers, Elementalists and Rangers now has +25% speed signet which was privilege only of thieves and Anet gave it to them so now thieves can have like compensation mesmer portal. Why not.

Basically, the idea is good. However, here is what happened and will continue to happen :
1) Mesmer kept being nerfed due to having portal.
2) Other classes now have portal : mesmers still won’t be buffed, they will keep getting nerfed, but for some other reason (for instance, atm : Time Warp)
3) Other classes that recently aquired portal won’t be nerfed because it wont’ be unique anymore.

Not fair at all.
If it does not happen this way, it’s cool. I’d see it on engineers (to try and encourage players to chose this under used classe, which is a great one) or necro.
It would be absolutely kitten to give it to thieves or warriors though.

I’d like to keep portal as a mesmer option, but give other classes unique, powerful abilities that we cannot do instead. So that they are just as “needed” as a mesmer, but for different things. That way groups have to decide what they want. Of course that goes against Anet’s design that you can always play with any group no matter what you play, but let’s face it, that really only works for PUGs. tPVP and WvW are going to require coordinated strategies and that means bringing the right tools. Just give other classes different “right” tools.

Some examples:

Engineer: Construction Tools (trait): You cap a point and repair structures 50% faster with a tool kit equipped. (Diminishing returns for multiple engineers)

Warrior: They should get the ability to AOE repair armor in the field in WVW (on a massive CD), but it would need another effect useful in sPVP obviously.

Ranger: Pathfinder: OK, this one would be slightly like portal maybe with a delay for travel and a cool effect like the original Death Shroud.

Thief: Sabotage: Lay a trap that slows enemy capping by 50% and does massive DOT to structures while active (not nearly as much as siege but better than other character abilities). Thieves need help in siege, not roaming, or even zerging, abilities.

Necro: C’mon, what necro doesn’t want a self res? Would be awesome in WVW and even great in sPVP.

OK, some of these aren’t great and definitely would need tweaking, but you get the idea.

But if the devs cannot spark their brains to such a degree, my vote goes to giving portal abilities to the necro, engineer, and possibly rangers. Either a death/corpse portal for necros, transporter for engineers, or that pathfinder ability for rangers.

I agree any other class would be absurd. Ele and thief are way too mobile already and it would be OP. Guardians… ehh maybe but they already dominate bunkering and have great group swiftness options if they choose the right build. Warriors I just don’t see how it would fit thematically.

Above all I do not want the class balanced around this one ability that isn’t even useful in 90% of all situations due to nerfs for just that 10%. How unimaginative can they be sometimes?

BTW, to the poster that recommended sucking allies into portal: will NEVER happen. Forcing allies into anything would be a severely abused griefing tool, and Anet clearly recognizes this given how portal works now.

As a Mesmer, I’m actually really happy about this.

There are times when Portal is useful, and I’m okay with that, I use it myself for people at those times.

But there’s also times where people use portal just to skip content and be lazy players.
I’ve never liked helping those people (And usually don’t.)
For example, I don’t run the whole EB Jumping puzzle just to help other people skip it.

I would love other classes to get a Portal-like mechanic so that everyone stops automatically expecting the Mesmer to be a portal kitten just because there’s one present.

Just take my portal and give me a thief’s shadow return.

Better than share portal to other classes is delete portal at all from the game , after that delete mesmer too coz they will be useless !

So now that portal will be homogenized, can Mesmers get a +25% passive movement skill/trait?

This door should swing both ways…

juno.1840:

So now that portal will be homogenized, can Mesmers get a +25% passive movement skill/trait?

This door should swing both ways…

No, mesmers are already too strong because they have por-
Oh, I see what you did there.

Winds.3087:

Runcore.5107:

I think that some Shadow gate on thief make sense thematically. This teleport should have all classes and not only some like necro or engineer. If you speak about absurd portal it is engineer portal.

Pocket asura gate is not absurd, and they could add it with race-specific turret meshes too.

There are even pocket asura gates in the lore already, Destiny’s Edge use one in the second book (I think it was developed by Snaff).

Thief deserve portal? Must be a troll.

+1 to the tradeoff!! if the portal mechanic is given to a class that can maintain perma swiftness, then Mesmers should be given the ability to sustain swiftness 24/7… like, at LEAST make temporal curtain lst through the cooldown… not this extra 3 second bullsheeet from the last patch…..

either that, or change/add a new mantra…. that enables perma swiftness while charged, and can be consumed for 5 sec of cripple…. maybe 25-45sec recharge??? (this may not be the most suitable way to give us perma-swiftness, but i think this idea would fit into our utilities as is… just my $0.02)

I think if any other class should get a portal mechanic it should be Engineer. I could picture them building a sort of Portal device similar to a mini Asura Gate, and the class seems a bit under appreciated anyway.

BUT

For the sake of individuality, at least make another class’s portal a little different. Make it so our portal applies Chaos Armor to whomever warps through it. (Making it useful for not only transportation, but for skirmishes aswell) while making the Engineer portal remove conditions.. or something Or change the range.

If this is definitely going to happen, we should brainstorm ways to individualize cclass portals.

It is a slippery slope when as a balance change you open an ability to more classes. I’m not saying that ‘this’ change alone is bad, but it does place us further down the line of all classes being the same.

GW2 is already a game where to some extent all classes are the same. I would hate to see them go further in that direction.

Seriously, I mean most people I know from a long standing PvP background have already quit this game in droves and then this is supposed to be the new direction?

Nice how one of you even outright insulted a person for being sad that homogenization will remove a class niche he enjoys.. I mean, yeah great community you have considering he probably picked the class for its exclusive abilities! Funny how we do that when certain classes can do UNIQUE things isnt it?

If things continue down this route, you’ll have little reason to have anything in game but a single class. One that you can just customize into whatever you want. I really dont know why that wasnt the original design considering the wide reaction to this experimental lack of a trinity.

Thing with this game, class roles were already semi there. Not literally, but in the back of the minds of both devs and players. Guardian presumed to be the tank, thief the primary dps and so forth. So when people started moaning about too much of this or that in a profession, they couldnt fall back on class roles as an excuse like they did in the past. They have just had to nerf something each week, based upon small scale meta.

The main problem with this simplistic design is that eventually people will uncover a best for purpose, its what humans always do. Without roles locking class definition/ability in place the only end result is either classes who have no differences or a single superior class – who only has that because of an increased efficiency over the others to perform a task.

Take away class identity by all means if you wish, but it will destroy the whole essence of choosing one class over another. People wont have a reason to play different classes.

Dont get me wrong, some of you may feel happy playing the same thing with 8 different skins or ways of doing the same thing. I however prefer individuality to have a purpose :P

Sounds like Engineers could viable get it, as a teleporter you use.

And tbh, I like that. If they give it to more classes they can’t keep chain-nerfing it constantly, they have to think of a proper viable PvE-niche for it then.

If they let thieves go all ninja-like inside keeps and towers I think I’ll just quit wvwing. I can already see numberless kids rushing towers and shouting “omg I’m Ezio Auditore trolol”.
Would be funny tho to see something massive and destroyable like a Warrior’s siege tower, or an engineer’s converted Cattlepult.

Gaiawolf.8261:

I’d like to keep portal as a mesmer option, but give other classes unique, powerful abilities that we cannot do instead. So that they are just as “needed” as a mesmer, but for different things. That way groups have to decide what they want. Of course that goes against Anet’s design that you can always play with any group no matter what you play, but let’s face it, that really only works for PUGs. tPVP and WvW are going to require coordinated strategies and that means bringing the right tools. Just give other classes different “right” tools.

Some examples:

Engineer: Construction Tools (trait): You cap a point and repair structures 50% faster with a tool kit equipped. (Diminishing returns for multiple engineers)

Warrior: They should get the ability to AOE repair armor in the field in WVW (on a massive CD), but it would need another effect useful in sPVP obviously.

Ranger: Pathfinder: OK, this one would be slightly like portal maybe with a delay for travel and a cool effect like the original Death Shroud.

Thief: Sabotage: Lay a trap that slows enemy capping by 50% and does massive DOT to structures while active (not nearly as much as siege but better than other character abilities). Thieves need help in siege, not roaming, or even zerging, abilities.

Necro: C’mon, what necro doesn’t want a self res? Would be awesome in WVW and even great in sPVP.

OK, some of these aren’t great and definitely would need tweaking, but you get the idea.

But if the devs cannot spark their brains to such a degree, my vote goes to giving portal abilities to the necro, engineer, and possibly rangers. Either a death/corpse portal for necros, transporter for engineers, or that pathfinder ability for rangers.

I agree any other class would be absurd. Ele and thief are way too mobile already and it would be OP. Guardians… ehh maybe but they already dominate bunkering and have great group swiftness options if they choose the right build. Warriors I just don’t see how it would fit thematically.

Above all I do not want the class balanced around this one ability that isn’t even useful in 90% of all situations due to nerfs for just that 10%. How unimaginative can they be sometimes?

BTW, to the poster that recommended sucking allies into portal: will NEVER happen. Forcing allies into anything would be a severely abused griefing tool, and Anet clearly recognizes this given how portal works now.

All of your suggestions are abilities that ONLY work in WvW/sPvP while Mesmer portals work in any setting and are still invaluable in WvW/sPvP.

Portals are NOT a class defining mechanic of the Mesmer (that would be Illusions and Shatters) or even a unique skill type (like “Wards” are for Guardians or “Wells” for Necro’s). It’s just a massive form of utility that no other class gets without a legitimate reason, which simply isn’t right.

I can’t wait for another class (Necro/Engi) to get a portal ability.

I sincerely hope Necros and Engis get a portal-like ability (I really want them to have their own flavor) and nobody else. It makes sense for the two of them – not so much any other class. Sure, you can stretch it for your chosen class all you want, but these 2 fit right in with the idea.

I also sincerely hope that we get a +25% run speed signet in exchange. We’re losing the individuality of one of our only mobility options, making the other options potentially better for use of the portal (they can lay down the end faster than we can, in theory). It’s time for us to be able to move.

Finally, I sincerely hope it ends here – but I doubt it will. I’m fairly positive that TW will be the next on the block and the only thing that will be “specific” to the mesmer will be illusions and shattering, which are EASILY countered with a simple dodge.

tl:dr – This mesmer likes the idea of only necros and engis having portal, hopes we get a runspeed increase in exchange, and hopes they don’t continue nerfing us to the ground.

LOL, I have an 80 necro and a engi. Like others have pointed out, my guess is they give the engi or necro a portal instead of fixing the crazy list of broken things they have.

If they give portal to other classes i can finally shelve my mesmer, the only reason i still play him is because my guild doesnt have alot of active mesmers so im on portal duty for WvW or anytime we are doing JPs.

if this goes through i can finally switch to a class that is actually usefull in larger fights, have more than one viable spec and actually be able to hit things on walls without being “obstructed” the only thing i can do during sieges is put down TW and auto attack the door.

The mesmer is an excellent solo/small skirmish class against bads but most skilled players now know how to counter mesmers easily. Our value to a large group (aside from portal) who are defending or taking anything more than a camp is almost nothing, we dont have any decent aoe except zerker which does nothing on walls since we are obstructed by invisible walls and with defense we are just ok, our condition spec is a joke, confusion can absolutly wreck but most co-ordinated groups can easily clense it or turn it against you. rangers, thiefs, necros and almost every class can do it better aswell as removing them. this leaves us with one viable option DD build.

Oh and another reason is we have no reliable swiftness, use focus and get caugh with your pants down if someone jumps you and/ or use a rune set and heal skill that may be on CD if you get jumped or face falling behind runing slow. no thanks.

kerona.3465:

I would be OK if Engis had it. Or even Rangers, though it doesn’t make sense thematically. Any other class would just be absurd.

I hope those two professions don’t get portal, otherwise their whole viability will be based on Portal and get nerfed every update and get their already short stick even shorter. After every update of being nerfed to the ground and if they complain, all they will get is a “But you have portal!” response. No one will care about the glaring problems with the class because they have one or two strong abilities. Sure people right now are thrilled that other classes will get portal, but I wouldn’t wish my worst enemy with it because of A-Net’s habit of balancing through unbalanced skillsets.

Unbalanced skillset: If a character has a move set with a few overly powerful moves, the counterbalance to this may be to have several moves be near-useless. But the existence of bad moves does nothing to reduce the effectiveness of the good ones. A skilled player is likely to exploit the good moves while ignoring the useless ones, often taking away from the variety of the game.

- http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FakeBalance