Guild Wars 2

Okay… that might sound like a rant… but it’s really not.

I was some days ago in WvW on a power based CI lockdown build. Had my fair share of losses and wins. Then I came across another Mesmer. Judging from his food I could see he was a condition based Mesmer. Well so far so good. “If he is shatter, I can shut him down.”, was my thinking. I engaged him. And the first he did was using torch stealth… “Okay, I thought, most likely PU”. A clone and phantasm popped up. So I dodged a possible shatter, just in case. But there was no shatter. After he reappeared he had a bunch of boons on him (so my PU suspicion was confirmed)… but he also reappeared far – and I mean out of 1200 range far – away. I was like: “really, you gonna play it like that?”. Well this went on for a while, clones and phantasms popped, I could avoid much of the damage and stayed away from any illusion to avoid clone death hits. But I also didn’t manage to interrupt him and put some serious burst on him.

The fight went on for some time. I got him to around 30-40% health without being in too much trouble but he went further and further away and to continue to reach him, I needed to close in on his illusions. I did so… and almost died. Not having any condi cleanse put in much trouble… I managed to get away though and survive with like 50 HP…

We then had several similar engagements. He constantly was running away, not even really attacking himself and do the AI do its thing. In the end I realized, I could have made different choices in the fights… but I decided to let it be.

I had fought plenty of PU condi mesmers before. And they all seemed to fight similarly. But they at least fought. This guy was really just running away and let the AI fight for him. That took the Mesmer play to a new level of… well… AI exploitation. I’m not really sure, what I wanna say here. I was a bit annoyed of the way he fought and suddenly understood all the complaints against PU condi builds, if they are played like that. I guess I just had to let it out… I find this kind of fighting a bit… well honorless. On the other hand, WvW is war… and in war there are no rules and probably also no honor, if that brings you the win…

On the other hand, if my GF gets back into GW2, I would recommend her that build and play style myself. She, not being the most serious and dedicated player, would certainly have much better chances surviving in WvW with it… Well… from this perspective things do look a bit different… bah, whatever, never mind me

for one prismatic understanding is already nerfed by adding all those boons on it, secondly debilitating dissipation had also received a nerf by removing stacks of bleed and reducing the duration i believe. Lastly a mesmer running no condi cleanse when the meta is well mostly condi everything or hybrid is something that you shouldn’t be complaining about. You cant expect one build to beat everything out there you will face things that you can beat…like in this case condi heavy classes

You missunderstand me. I am not complaining about the condition build itself. I have beaten plenty of condition only users (including PU condie) without a single cleanse with shatter and lockdown builds (cleansing conditions is totally overrated, especially as a Mesmers. Mesmers can easily [painfully easy, I don’t care about conditions any more besides thief condi builds] avoid being hit). I am more questioning the way this guy used the build…

While I hate this type of ‘fighting’ style as much as you, I also realise that no player has an obligation to fight how you see is suitable!

The best thing you could have none, is walk away from it, it’s what I do, no fun in chasing a player who wants to play like this!

Just my input!

Clearly this guy has studies Sun Tzu, and you have not :p

Honestly, you got outplayed. The fact you’re here posting shows you’ve suffered a huge moral defeat. You engaged, you were forced to retreat, you’ve been utterly frustrated. He knew his approach going into it and you played right into him. He was in control the entire time, and you didn’t find a suitable counter to achieve your own goal.

Take this as a learning experience. Draw from this enemy and look to your future fights.

Interesting how you actually killed yourself chasing a PU mesmer, I wish more people tried to chase me on my PU mesmer instead of strolling away from me all the time :p

@Ross Biddle.2367:
-deleted due to stupidity on my part^^-
I don’t think he studied Sun Tzu. His build excels in… well letting the AI do the work while running away. That’s what he did and I thought I can outmaneuver him, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t morally defeated though. I expected such an outcome as likely. I simply decided to share my experience, and what I think of his tactics/fighting style. That’s what a forum is for, is it not? Sharing experiences and opinions.

@Alex.9268:
I didn’t kill myself I almost did, but I didn’t. But that is stated in the first post already.

TyPin.9860:

@Ross Biddle.2367:
-deleted due to stupidity on my part^^-
I don’t think he studied Sun Tzu. His build excels in… well letting the AI do the work while running away. That’s what he did and I thought I can outmaneuver him, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t morally defeated though. I expected such an outcome as likely. I simply decided to share my experience, and what I think of his tactics/fighting style. That’s what a forum is for, is it not? Sharing experiences and opinions.

@Alex.9268:
I didn’t kill myself I almost did, but I didn’t. But that is stated in the first post already.

Ok so you arent morally defeated and you’re just here sharing an experience.

I highlighted the story you’re telling yourself, the mental stronghold that has you bound up.

The fact is that Mesmers are a casting class, that summon clones to apply conditions or for shattering, and summon phantasms either for some utility or to deal high, raw damage. How a player chooses to apply those means is up to them, the point being that within the confines of the game it totally supports this guys manner of play. This guy didn’t cheat, he wasn’t “honorless” as you’ve dubbed it. He played smart, he played well, he played to win. He utilized all the tools at his disposal with the intention of controlling and ultimately winning the fight. That’s brilliance. If you want to call him/it names to make yourself feel better, that’s up to you. You’d be better bypassing that and getting on playing the actual game that’s right in front of you.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Clearly this guy has studies Sun Tzu, and you have not :p
…
You engaged, you were forced to retreat, you’ve been utterly frustrated. He knew his approach going into it and you played right into him. He was in control the entire time, and you didn’t find a suitable counter to achieve your own goal.

To be fair, it sounds like the other mesmer was the one that was constantly retreating, so I’m not sure he was doing any “outplaying.”

To the OP, there are a number of players who run very easy-to-use, survival-oriented builds and play extremely conservatively. As a general rule, their entire playstyle/build is set up so that they don’t die unless they get ganked or completely kitten . The flip side is that they generally can’t accomplish anything besides troll you because their damage is low. When you fight them in the open field with no objectives or goals in mind besides to kill them, you’re playing into their one and only strength.

My advice would be to ignore those players in casual roaming fights, and instead focus on taking some objective to help your team. People running those builds generally won’t be able to stop you from killing a yak or capping a supply camp because their builds rely on constantly running away and resetting the fight (and more often than not, the players running those builds are awful skill-wise). Once you’ve accomplished your objective, then move on and continue to ignore him. Now it’s the other guy who ends up being useless.

Alternatively, you can roam with a small team. Those survival-based builds are also extremely selfish, and their efficacy is limited in teamfights.

I have to agree with Ross on this – sure it’s cheesy, but it’s within the “rules” of the game and I’d say they were playing smart. Blame the balance team if you like, for allowing use of builds like that, but I wouldn’t blame the players for making use of what is available.

It’s not a great build if they are unable to secure any kills with it, but they certainly allowed themselves to survive and prevented you from killing them.

Honourless can be applied if it was an organised duel (ie in OS), but when it comes to open world roaming, anything goes tbh.

For the record, I’m not condoning that sort of playstyle – personally I couldn’t bring myself to play in such a cheesy way – but I accept that it’s there as an option and I won’t hold it against anyone who chooses to take advantage of it.

There is no honorable fighting or honorless fighting.
Every player finds a playstyle that matches best with their skill and/or their character(RL). There definetly are playstyles that are easier to play or less risky for the same profit
The thing is that some builds are more fun to play against and builds that are no fun to play against but that’s always a personal opinion. I personally really hate playing PU but think it is challenging to play against it. It’s simple why I hate playing it. It’s like a passive play. You press a few buttons and wait until your enemy is down. If I should suggest your GF a playstyle or a build I would tell her to keep distance from PU builds for two good reasons:

1. It is no fun at all to play a PU mesmer
2. you don’t really become a better player if you don’t need to risk anything to win.

I’d suggest a shatterspec! Vashury, a real skilled mesmer here on the forums, told me how to become good as a shatter mesmer: Try to find 2 or more enemies. Engage them so they try to kill you. Do not attack back, just try to survive as long as possible! If you know how to survive then you don’t need anything else.

That’s not an honorless fight. You’re actually lucky to find a 1v1 fight (even against that playstyle) rather than running into a “havoc” group. They’ll fight you 1vX and feel proud about it, that’s a real honorless fight.

Well… I find this kind of play style still honorless. Valid as it may be, clever as it may be. It still lets the AI do the main work. I didn’t say he was cheating, I didn’t say it was unfair, I didn’t say nerf it. Of course it is a valid tactic, as is maneuvering so that you outnumber your opponent all the time or leading your opponent into siege fortified traps and such things. I used the word “exploit” in the first post, but I didn’t mean that he violated game rules. It was a bad choice of words.

@Ross:
I really just wanted to share my experience. Maybe you are hold up in a mental stronghold yourself. Because not everyone talking about his experiences and opinions demands changes or judgment. Read my initial post again and rethink what I wrote. You may understand, that I actually don’t take myself seriously.

TyPin.9860:

Well… I find this kind of play style still honorless. Valid as it may be, clever as it may be. It still lets the AI do the main work.

So….if this type of playstyle is honorless, what type of playstyle is honor-full? Standing toe to toe trading autoattacks? I’d recommend you go play a warrior if that’s your sort of thing.

Maybe the guy was just scouting and therefore didn’t have any interest in fighting you? People have different goals and motives in WvW, so you’re often going to come up against things that don’t match your standards of fun.

Also, running around allowing illusions to do the brunt of the work seems like quite a good counter to a Mesmer packing some daze mantra charges.

Fay.2357:

TyPin.9860:

Well… I find this kind of play style still honorless. Valid as it may be, clever as it may be. It still lets the AI do the main work.

So….if this type of playstyle is honorless, what type of playstyle is honor-full? Standing toe to toe trading autoattacks? I’d recommend you go play a warrior if that’s your sort of thing.

I wonder, which mindset lies behind this warrior comment^^ I think I have to explain more, because I feel ppl project an opinion in my words that actually doesn’t lie behind them.

Firstly GW2 is a game. Main thing is fun and entertainment imho. So when I talk about honor, I am not talking about serious real life Japanese Samurai style honor. And any form of honor is far from mandatory. When I talk about honorable play style, I am talking about skill, tactics and reaction based play style. Where split second decisions matter, where you have to make risk/reward decisions and that actually challenges a player to improve himself.

So no, trading auto attacks is not what I find honorable…

@Simonoly.4352:
It is quite possible that he didn’t wanna fight. The fight occurred west of the SE tower in BL. But he wasn’t running. He was watching me standing in front of the wall and I decided in the moment to engage him. The tower was his server’s. He was not retreating towards the tower. He actually moved away from it. So I am quite confident he was baiting me to continue fighting and suiciding into his clones^^

But it is true. Interrupting doesn’t help much against PU condi unless timed very well. However it is hard to interrupt what you can’t see^^

TyPin.9860:

Firstly GW2 is a game. Main thing is fun and entertainment imho.

Absolutely correct! That’s my opinion too.

When I talk about honorable p lay style,I am talking about skill, tactics and reaction based play style. Where split second decisions matter, where you have to make risk/reward decisions and that actually challenges a player to improve himself.

Your definition of Honor is kinda weird. It’s like I said before, there is no honorable or honorless playstlye in a game there are fun styles and styles that are less fun to play against but that is not what honor is!
PU definetly is one of the strongest builds for 1onX | X>1 situations and maybe some would call PU-players “try-harder” or something but still it is their playstyle and if you think that playstyle is no fun to play against just don’t fight them. PU is not a build that bursts you down in a single second. (also PU is a mesmer build… you can just walk away [We’re too slow qq!])

~ Me Games Ma

Hahaha. I fought against the same Mesmer yesterday! Constantly running away was his fighting style. After 20! Minutes i killed him. ( I am Running Phantasm glas cannon. )
This guy is a joke. He enganges you, then runs away. Every time.

@Me Games Ma.8426:
My complaint is not against the PU build. I fought plenty PU mesmers (won and lost), who actually fought and didn’t circle you at max possible range. My complaint was against his way of using the build…

my definition of honor may be weird^^ But that’s why I explained it :P

TyPin.9860:

@Me Games Ma.8426:
My complaint is not against the PU build. I fought plenty PU mesmers (won and lost), who actually fought and didn’t circle you at max possible range. My complaint was against his way of using the build…

my definition of honor may be weird^^ But that’s why I explained it :P

Yes, you complained against his playstyle. I say: “Don’t fight him if you dislike his style.”

Yep, and that’s what I did in the end… as I have said^^

If it kills the other party while minimizing risk to myself, what’s bad about it?
I call it “smart”, you call it not fighting. There’s some high level social commentary in there, I suppose.

Carighan.6758:

If it kills the other party while minimizing risk to myself, what’s bad about it?
I call it “smart”, you call it not fighting. There’s some high level social commentary in there, I suppose.

Reminds me of the asura :P They let golems fight their battles.

TyPin.9860:

Yep, and that’s what I did in the end… as I have said^^

And you did the absolute best thing to express your opinion on that style of fighting. Speaking purely devil’s advocate, the more people do that, the less fights these other roamers can engage in, which may lead to thought on changing their style.

I have to agree that not many people I know enjoy fighting someone like this. A PU condition mesmer is a great example. Most just ignore them and guess what, the PU mesmer or hit/run type player probably won’t get the benefit of fighting other players as much as if they used a different build or play style.

I’m not dissing any of these builds or styles, but given the way you feel about this, employing that tactic will be much more of a weapon than engaging them to fight.

Me Games Ma.8426:

Carighan.6758:

If it kills the other party while minimizing risk to myself, what’s bad about it?
I call it “smart”, you call it not fighting. There’s some high level social commentary in there, I suppose.

Reminds me of the asura :P They let golems fight their battles.

Reminds me of Enter the Dragon – “the art of fighting, without fighting”.

no diff. than the warriors who run away when they have lost to get out of combat regen then come back or perma stealth thieves or rangers who jump in water when they are about to lose 1 v 1….

TyPin.9860:

This guy was really just running away and let the AI fight for him. That took the Mesmer play to a new level of… well… AI exploitation.

Ever encountered the good old Beastmaster rangers? They do the same: Buff the pet and let it do all the work, meanwhile pew pew away.. ;-)
No exploitation at all, working by design.. And, you have to admit it, his tactic did work..

In wvw the objective is to stay alive at any cost. This is why we se so many d/p stealth thieves, GS warriors, GS rangers, people with runes of the trapper, etc. All those builds designed to run away as soon as you see you are in risk of losing.

Meh. Just ignore these guys. The only times I care for them is when they engaged with another player and I can help. Discouraging these people from harassing others with cheese builds is my type of grieving (and i’m not above /laugh-spamming in that case).

Tribio.8531:

TyPin.9860:

This guy was really just running away and let the AI fight for him. That took the Mesmer play to a new level of… well… AI exploitation.

Ever encountered the good old Beastmaster rangers? They do the same: Buff the pet and let it do all the work, meanwhile pew pew away.. ;-)
No exploitation at all, working by design.. And, you have to admit it, his tactic did work..

I already said I don’t mean by exploitation a violation of game rules or smth. in this direction. It was a poor choice of words. I know that AI play was intended by Anet. But that is not the point.

TBH I think you’re also missing the point, that this build you fought excels at remaining in a fight. There’s no gap closing, they can’t burst you down instantly, they rely on you hanging around long enough for you to kill urself. If you want to complain about it being honor-less, turn tail and walk away lmao.

True, as often when people complained about Blackwater builds, I have to wonder how someone loses against one. Not winning is one thing (the builds are durable, hard to keep a hold off, and you damage yourself when you attack them). But losing? They cannot stop you, cannot pressure you, nothing.

A build which is entirely based on exploiting people’s mad desire for “zomg duel”. It’s awesome.

Some ppl seem to miss the point. Again, I don’t attribute the play style to the build. PU builds can be played more offensively and can be used actually to fight. You will see, if you ever meet this guy. It was ridiculous (even compared to the many other PU Mesmers I fought). He wasn’t retreating into safety. He simply stayed at max range and taunting you to attack. While this might be smart, a thing I never disagreed with, I find it a very cheap way of fighting.

Btw. ppl seem to be under the impression I lost to this guy. I did not. We had several fights and I just ended the fights, when I wanted to and ultimately gave up on trying to get him.

TyPin.9860:

Btw. ppl seem to be under the impression I lost to this guy. I did not. We had several fights and I just ended the fights, when I wanted to and ultimately gave up on trying to get him.

So..? Why did you fight him several times anyways? You describe it as if it was no fun at all so I don’t get why you engaged him more than once. Did you see a challenge in this guy or did you just rage to kill him? What was your reason for fighting more often. Obviously you now complain about his playstyle over and over. I don’t get what you wanna hear… Some people already agreed that this playstyle is bull****. Some said it is ok since it’s “war” you may use everything.
Is this thread meant to be a discussion or is it meant to find ppl who support you in your opinion?

Of course I want only support coming to this forum. This is a realistic expectation, isn’t it?^^

The reason why I come back to my actual intention is that some ppl seem to missatribute my words to the build, not the actual play style. That’s all. A simple correction

Why did I fight him several times? Because I like a challenge. But I thought that became self explanatory at this point.

Yeah but I still don’t really see the downside to playing like this. It clearly works, plus it doesn’t really lose anything for it. It’s ofc trivially easy to shut down by bringing a second attacker, but few players do that, they seem to be stuck in this “must duel” mentality.

It feels good to win 1v1 duels. I had this mentality for like a year after the game was released. It took me a while to understand that the games wasn’t even balanced around 1v1 situations, especially in WvW.

But you are right. If a player enjoys this kind of play style, there is no actual down side except that you are barely able to stop anyone in their path. But that is an issue for Mesmers anyway. But as I have said, I would even recommend this kind of play style to players, who aren’t that dedicated into training their solo play skills. I think that is even the point of this kind of playing. To give the not so skilled players a tool to work with and enjoy the game too.

It becomes funny, when players, who use such play style, challenge you to duels, claiming they were the better players. But hey, there is something for everyone in GW2 I guess :P

I think the main issue here is that you’ve come into this discussion with the pre-developed opinion of ‘honorable fighting is the way I like to play, and anything else is dishonorable’. Everyone else is coming in and pointing out how absurd that is.

‘Honor’ is obviously an abstract concept that means something different to everyone. That being said, trying to base complaints and discussion off an impressively blinkered view of honor is going to earn you a good bit of ridicule, as you may have noticed from this thread.

The Problem is, that guy wasn’t fighting. He attacks and runs away. Every time. Sometimes he stayed a few secconds. Then: Stealth – blink – byebye – oh let me try again – attack – Stealth – byebye.

And no, honor isn’t an abstract concept that means something different to everyone. Honor is Honor.

@Fay:
That is actually not the case. Neither my position (the “?” in the title actually has a function^^) , nor the position of “everyone” (as you say it), that responded. I also do not feel ridiculed at all. No idea where you get this from…

There are disagreements on how to interpret this defensive AI reliant fighting style, granted. But where have I claimed my definition of honor to be the only right one? Where did anyone say, that how this guy played was actually honorable? They said it was clever, it was strategic/tactical, it was smart and that I got outmaneuvered. But, unless I missed it, no one said this guy fights honorably. If at all the general idea seems to be that it actually doesn’t matter for it is only a computer game. A position I very well understand and with what I do agree with.

Do not project a position into my words or the words of the responders (whose responses were very diverse in fact). I am not the general QQer and I was actually interested in the ppl’s opinion on this. Even though my expression on this may not have been the best :P

@MandJ:
Actually honor is in most cases a social concept connected with norms and expectations. One can also have personal honor, that might even differ from how their peers define it. But honor is not just honor. It is a bit more complex

It depends a lot on what you want out of a game’s combat, too.

I think one reason why I don’t enjoy 1v1 (beyond the fact that it’s clearly not intended by the game’s mechanics) is that it feels needlessly “stupid” to play that way. There’s millions of players near me, why waste time and risk death if players killed isn’t the metric which judges success in WvW or sPvP?

On the other hand, I enjoy outsmarting enemies. My GF and me noticed that people love to gank Mesmers if they notice me not carrying a staff/scepter. But they’ll always try to 1v1 me, especially Thieves. Now, despite not appearing to be I use a somewhat tanky kit and my GF is a condi thief. She hides nearby and closes in stealthed, I act as bait. 1v1 players die even if they try to run away between my Phantasms and her DoTs. Winning before the fight even started is what I enjoy.

My greatest moment so far was auto-killing Ruby Weapon in FF7 via a mimic+counter chain multi-casting an HP and MP draining Knights of the Round. I could genuinely get up and do something else and still won, it was amazing.

Hehe. That is really interesting. I am very different than you. I usually seek out stronger targets. Either I have a build, that is weak against my target or I fight outnumbered. For example I sometimes go hunting thieves with a IP power shatter build. Not impossible to win, but the odds are against me in this case^^ Of course my success is often moderate, as I try to bind as many enemies in one place as possible. Theoretically I prevent them from doing anything else for the time but if that has any impact on the result is hard or even impossible to measure.

If I win against some1, when the odds were in my favor from the very start, I don’t feel satisfied having won the fight. I tend to get into impossible battles. Baiting zergs and 5+ groups to follow me, hoping to be able to separate one or two targets and kill them. But mostly I get rolled by the zerg, if they decide to follow me through half the map. But then they didn’t do anything else either^^

This is but not what I call honorable, if someone wants to come back to this. This kind of fighting is more suicidal and megalomaniac^^