Guild Wars 2

“Unyielding Blast – Life Blast pierces and causes vulnerability”

I don’t know about you guys but i find the ‘Pierce’ mechanic to be very clunky and unrewarding most of the time. Mobs have to be either in a line or directly next to each other or very close behind each other and you gotta target the furthest mob away to get the projectile to travel the longest and blah!!

Point is, pierce is annoying and clunky to setup. Do you think the trait would be more fun and rewarding if it was changed to splash damage instead of pierce. For those who don’t know, splash means to also damage mobs around your target in a set radius.

That way, instead of a cleave, the Power Necromancer would now have an ensured way to damage multiple grouped enemies, and wouldn’t need to keep asking ArenaNet for a cleave weapon.

It may also make Necros a more attractive class in PvE, with their ability to apply constant AoE vulnerability and damage in Death Shroud. If you think it would do too much damage, the secondary targets could get hit for less (like Howling Blast in WoW) while still applying vulnerability.

Tobby

That actually sounds nice.

Ele staff Fire #1 dose that… Our staff & trait’ed DS, seems to have got the line them up.

It’s actually nice when your dps’ing down a totem + boss, or crystal + boss.

Nope, piercing overall does way more (and even reliable) damage in pve than explosion damage (pbaoe on impact of projectile) based on mob movement and fight layouts, some of the best examples being objects that you can hit between 3 to 5 times with a piercing shot, but only once with something like a engie pistol auto attack.
Also if i may add, scaled bosses like abominations cannot be withing range of eachother to do splash on most such skills unless the mobs are manipulated into choke points and sometimes the mobs (oakhearts/icebrood equivalents being prime example) is plain too big with weird hitbox position to ever be able to splash, even if you bring it close to another mob.

What would be cool is if they merged Reapers Might into Unyielding/reverse.

What if the range didn’t work the same as Ele Staff #1 (which i find a very poor splash anyway). What if it was increased to a point where it made sense.

Tobbygnome.6793:

What if the range didn’t work the same as Ele Staff #1 (which i find a very poor splash anyway). What if it was increased to a point where it made sense.

Take a deep breath, thats good, now…
Say with me, CoF P1 Cleave clears.

Andele.1306:

Nope, piercing overall does way more (and even reliable) damage in pve than explosion damage (pbaoe on impact of projectile) based on mob movement and fight layouts, some of the best examples being objects that you can hit between 3 to 5 times with a piercing shot, but only once with something like a engie pistol auto attack.
Also if i may add, scaled bosses like abominations cannot be withing range of eachother to do splash on most such skills unless the mobs are manipulated into choke points and sometimes the mobs (oakhearts/icebrood equivalents being prime example) is plain too big with weird hitbox position to ever be able to splash, even if you bring it close to another mob.

What would be cool is if they merged Reapers Might into Unyielding/reverse.

Yeah, most of this is nonsense. Way more reliable ? splash isnt effective if mob is huge ?
Andele pls.

Pelopidas.2140:

Yeah, most of this is nonsense. Way more reliable ? splash isnt effective if mob is huge ?
Andele pls.

So hording mobs into a position where you can aoe them all with around a 120~180 aoe hit is stronger than a 1200 line ? Mobs that got upscaled have different elevation and hitboxes than normal mobs so yes, a lot of the stronger encounters will nullify the aoe effect. Not to mention that something like Hip Shot can hit structures and bosses like Claw of Jormag 3 times, a aoe hit only once.

no thanks I will keep my pierce.

I can understand how a keyboard turner might have more trouble with it though.

I’m not a keyboard turner :P i just wanted to discuss it but seems all you guys want to do is insult each other, so nvm.

Pelopidas.2140:

Yeah, most of this is nonsense. Way more reliable ? splash isnt effective if mob is huge ?
Andele pls.

One does not simply say Andele doesn’t know what he’s talking about in PvE.

On a more serious note, keep it pierce. Unless you made it a really big cleave, you are almost always better off with piercing.

It’s actually quite rewarding targeting the furthest enemy, lining all of them up and blasting them to oblivion. In PvE or PvP. It may be a bit more difficult to pull off than some AoE explosion thingie, but it’s all about practice and placement.

Keep pierce. If you want, for example, hit a mesmer behind his clone, I want to hit a mesmer, not waste “splash” on npc.

Fair enuf, that reminds me, did Anet say if any of our new weapons will have cleave or splash on them.

To my knowledge the only thing that has been released about weapons is that they are looking into giving us access to every weapon, as well as every class. Nothing about specifics are out yet, that I have seen. I would be very surprised though if we got greatsword/hammer without AoE to back it, so at the very least we can anticipate a few cleaving weapons.

splash dmg on my power necro would be so op.

Pierce AND splash. Like an Engineer pistol autoattack with a Master trait Coating Bullets… But then, pistol autoattack hits like a wet wish

This is by far one of my most wanted changes at the moment. The pierce is just way too situational. A splash would do wonders for our PvE viability and help us out in WvWvW too while having a minimal effect on SPvP balance. Yes, yes and yes!

This is of course assuming that the splash would be substantial which knowing Anet’s track record of balancing our class might be a bit too hopeful.

Little confused about the whole “pierce” mechanic in this game.

Do I have to target the furthest enemy to have max pierce or if I target the nearest enemy will it pierce for the whole 1200 range?

Bhawb.7408:

Pelopidas.2140:

Yeah, most of this is nonsense. Way more reliable ? splash isnt effective if mob is huge ?
Andele pls.

One does not simply say Andele doesn’t know what he’s talking about in PvE.

On a more serious note, keep it pierce. Unless you made it a really big cleave, you are almost always better off with piercing.

He only knows about casual pve. Cant really call him an expert when he claims LoSing is an exploit and running full beserker is cheesing.

Glenn.3417:

Little confused about the whole “pierce” mechanic in this game.

Do I have to target the furthest enemy to have max pierce or if I target the nearest enemy will it pierce for the whole 1200 range?

No matter who you target, it’ll go for 1200 range. However, I find it very difficult to line up shots that fire through a primary target into a secondary one behind it. Some height disparities between players / mobs can also lead to shots firing into the air or ground as well, especially if you and your target are quite near each other. So the way I personally take advantage is like this:

Aireroth.7596:

It’s actually quite rewarding targeting the furthest enemy, lining all of them up and blasting them to oblivion. In PvE or PvP. It may be a bit more difficult to pull off than some AoE explosion thingie, but it’s all about practice and placement.

Always target the more distant enemy, then move such that other ones are standing between the two of you. This also reduces the vertical angle of shots, so more of them fire along the ground and through enemy hitboxes, rather than off into the air or ground.

Splash damage would be awesome, even if it didn’t add vuln to the splash damage it would still give the Necro the much needed cleave damage.

+1 for WvW!

spoj.9672:

He only knows about casual pve. Cant really call him an expert when he claims LoSing is an exploit and running full beserker is cheesing.

When you can do all PvE content outside fractals naked, there really isn’t anything but casual PvE.

Bhawb.7408:

spoj.9672:

He only knows about casual pve. Cant really call him an expert when he claims LoSing is an exploit and running full beserker is cheesing.

When you can do all PvE content outside fractals naked, there really isn’t anything but casual PvE.

That might be true. But I wouldnt call speedrunning casual. I know andele is against it because he seems to think speedrunners do nothing but exploit. Which is just ignorant.

I’ve done speed running, and I’ve never been in a group that didn’t exploit when there was one available to speed things up. Your definitions of what “exploiting” is might differ, but they abuse the mechanics of a dungeon in such a way as to skip every single bit of “unnecessary” content, unnecessary defined as anything that is not required to be done to finish the dungeon in the fastest speed possible.

Is it casual? No, but that is taking casual content and making it “hardcore” simply by trying to finish it as fast as possible. You can speed run Pokemon, that does not make Pokemon a hardcore game; you’re simply turning a casual game into a challenge by setting harsh limits on your gameplay.

Skipping trash isnt exploiting. The devs said its perfectly acceptible. The only dungeon and path my group even remotely “cheeses” on is CM path 2. You can cleave some bandits through the walls without getting hit by the turrets. Doesnt really improve time much though, its just less annoying.

Everything else we do completely legit and just skip unnecessary trash. The difference between speedrunning and fast experienced groups is team composition and dps builds, using organised tactics and meleeing everything. We all have multiple alts so we can swap around what we play without being forced to play sub optimal classes.

I think your definition of speed running is different to mine.

pierce is fine please don’t even suggest this kind of things they just might do it

jalmari.3906:

pierce is fine please don’t even suggest this kind of things they just might do it

Quoted for truth

It’s actually a fear of mine that Anet reads some of the strange and random suggestions on these forums, snaps their fingers and goes ‘why that’s a brilliant idea, let’s do it’ despite that fact that a vast majority of players shuts the suggestion down.

Call it ‘balance on a whim’ if you will.

That said Pierce > Splash

As someone mentioned above, one of the things that makes pierce superior is that fact that you can target whatever you want in the middle of a hoard and still know you can hit it without something else body blocking it.

spoj.9672:

Skipping trash isnt exploiting. The devs said its perfectly acceptible. The only dungeon and path my group even remotely “cheeses” on is CM path 2. You can cleave some bandits through the walls without getting hit by the turrets. Doesnt really improve time much though, its just less annoying.

Everything else we do completely legit and just skip unnecessary trash. The difference between speedrunning and fast experienced groups is team composition and dps builds, using organised tactics and meleeing everything. We all have multiple alts so we can swap around what we play without being forced to play sub optimal classes.

I think your definition of speed running is different to mine.

By old WoW dungeon exploit definition (kinda first mmo where you could skip trash mobs): If a option exists by a class in game or specific action to be used in a uninteded way (in GW2 it would be stuff like porting trough walls, aggro drops and re chains to get mobs stuck away from objectives, etc) allowing to skip more than 33% of a dungeon is exploitation (since then/BWL you got pretty much either always mobs that you couldnt skip or that are worth more to kill).

jalmari.3906:

pierce is fine please don’t even suggest this kind of things they just might do it

I’m sorryyyyyyyyyy for making a discussion about my class, i didn’t realize i had such power over Anet, won’t happen again o/

If it makes u feel any better i stopped caring about this idea about 15 hours ago.

Andele.1306:

spoj.9672:

Skipping trash isnt exploiting. The devs said its perfectly acceptible. The only dungeon and path my group even remotely “cheeses” on is CM path 2. You can cleave some bandits through the walls without getting hit by the turrets. Doesnt really improve time much though, its just less annoying.

Everything else we do completely legit and just skip unnecessary trash. The difference between speedrunning and fast experienced groups is team composition and dps builds, using organised tactics and meleeing everything. We all have multiple alts so we can swap around what we play without being forced to play sub optimal classes.

I think your definition of speed running is different to mine.

By old WoW dungeon exploit definition (kinda first mmo where you could skip trash mobs): If a option exists by a class in game or specific action to be used in a uninteded way (in GW2 it would be stuff like porting trough walls, aggro drops and re chains to get mobs stuck away from objectives, etc) allowing to skip more than 33% of a dungeon is exploitation (since then/BWL you got pretty much either always mobs that you couldnt skip or that are worth more to kill).

Speedrunners dont port through walls. Aggro could easily be made to never drop in dungeons if the devs wanted it. They increased the leash range a few patches back but they dont want it infinite because its silly and being forced to kill trash with poor loot drops which are easily avoided is pointless. In some cases it takes more skill to skip than to kill. I dont know of any situations where we stop mobs from reaching important objectives (there arent any complicated mechanics like that anyway). If your referring to LoSing to pull trash and group them up. People do that in loads of games, i believe they even do it in WoW. Its a valid tactic, for a bad group with poor dps it can go very badly (dredge fractal).

And gw2 isnt WoW so even if skipping is regarded as exploiting in that game. It isnt in gw2. The devs were asked about this ages ago and they say its a valid tactic, hence why they havent prevented it. They just made it harder by changing aggro in stealth and increasing leash ranges.

spoj.9672:

Speedrunners dont port through walls.
Tell that to 1/5 speedrun videos of Arah, CM and what you used to do in CoF.

Aggro could easily be made to never drop in dungeons if the devs wanted it. They increased the leash range a few patches back but they dont want it infinite because its silly and being forced to kill trash with poor loot drops which are easily avoided is pointless.
Trash mobs have a point, to keep you in a combat situation/your apm up without having to actually think a lot and get some additional crafting items, also infinite aggro would be a problem for first timers so its sadly not a option.

In some cases it takes more skill to skip than to kill.
You mean never because you can drop stealth.

I dont know of any situations where we stop mobs from reaching important objectives (there arent any complicated mechanics like that anyway).
CoF again and Arah if you do the Grenth Wraith trick, also what you do in the Blue man fractal

If your referring to LoSing to pull trash and group them up. People do that in loads of games, i believe they even do it in WoW. Its a valid tactic, for a bad group with poor dps it can go very badly (dredge fractal).
LoS is valid if the mob can at least use basic attacks but stops special ones

And gw2 isnt WoW so even if skipping is regarded as exploiting in that game. It isnt in gw2. The devs were asked about this ages ago and they say its a valid tactic, hence why they havent prevented it. They just made it harder by changing aggro in stealth and increasing leash ranges.
Want it or not WoW is the father/mother game of the current generation MMOs, it uses rules its previous generation – everquest – used and it used the rules of generations before it – MUDs – with improvements for the enjoyment of the playerbase.
Saying skipping in gw2 shouldnt be seen as exploitation if under its set criteria is like saying oh just because slavery was bad in Colonial American standards doesnt mean slavery would be bad in the United States. Ok the slavery is obviously worse, but in both cases you are doing stuff that shouldnt even be thought off in the first place

My comments in bold.

GW2 isnt a traditional MMO. Ill say it again. The devs fully support skipping. Just because you think its wrong doesnt mean it is.

Back on topic. How about instead of directly replacing pierce trait with splash, add another trait to change it. Isn’t that what traits were supposed to do? Change the base mechanics of our skills to customize your playstyle according to the encounter and/or situation at hand?

If you really want to go all out on LifeBlasts, then you can trait for both pierce AND splash. Maybe that would be too much? Who knows. But I like the idea of having the option to change how LifeBlast works.

spoj.9672:

GW2 isnt a traditional MMO

In what way? That quests arent solo? They werent back in the days of text based mmorpgs. It was just easier to do it for reward systems for the 3d games
Its combat style? please so many games came out before it with a better and more action based combat system and failed.
Its lore? The one different devs and world builders are kitten ing up and is the last 1% paid attention to in the living “story”, hell the entire section about the zephyrities could have been a awesome transformation dungeon searching for the location of glints grain of sand/portal into her cave/realm, nope just text on site.
Now how is GW2 different from any mmorpg out there except in minior (but very enjoyable) quality of play/illusions of quest models?
GW2 is for MMORPGs what WiiU is for consoles, with the difference that the gap for next gen wont be a few months, but looking at previous leaps in MMO design around 2-3 years. Seriously ask anyone who know a bit of gaming history and they will all tell you its the same old but rolled up in a much more efficient/enjoyable way. Stuff like skipping flame giants in MC wasnt there because of MMO evolution, it was because WoW didnt have the engine resources to make it not a option in 3d unlike in text based scenarios.

Also tell me where devs said skipping mobs is encouraged, please, because if a actual dev (not forum mod) said so i wanna ask him to what school he/she went because it would then make no sense to add them if you said skipping is a good method to run the dungeon.

I feel like im talking to a brick wall. I dont have a source for where it was said. But i remember it being discussed on the dungeon forums. Early on someone asked someone from anet and they sait its perfectly fine. If people want to skip, they can. If it was considered exploiting, dont you think Anet would of done more to stop it by now?

There are different ways to complete content in many games. Just because WoW and other games want you to do nothing but kill everything doesnt mean its the same for gw2. Mindlessly killing everything in your path is boring and stupid. Skipping past trash to save time is just avoiding unnecessary combat to save time and complete the content in a different way. In no place in a dungeon does it say you have to kill these optional mobs to progress. Your only objective is to get to the next main objective. How you do that is up to the team you are playing with. Consider it stealthing past guards to infiltrate and assassinate the boss. Or running past them and losing them because they cant keep up.

This idea of multiple ways to complete content is taught to us in the personal story. We choose between vigil, whispers and priory. The vigil missions generally involve storming the place with brute force (which is how you want to us to play for the whole dungeon). Whispers missions involve infiltration, stealth and subterfuge. Priory involves tactics and intelligent planning. Surely we can use these methods in the very game they are displayed in….

@spoj.9672

To sum this up: I cannot face history so ill just go off topic – a-net is slow and kinda lazy in polishing up things since they have to do things on set timestamps, as proven by the fact that most necro bugs stick around for 4+ months since discovery.

Im against fun power fantasies and rollplaying and want to get loot with the least bit of effort. Also dungeons aint there to deafeat and weaken a foe in lore, they are there for us to be tactical squads that walk trough hallways with nice painings and click a lot at the same thing at the end till its no longer on screen, its not like the inquest creations or risen priests could hurt anyone – in lore.

The idea of having different types of combat was introduced but never looked upon because the devs were too lazy to make a balance between control support and damage, but instead i chose not to do either of these and just jump for the rewards.

lazor wall status online, anyone approaching will take 15k damage, will be dazed for 2 seconds, doesnt apply to trolls that turn immune to damage because of provided empowerment no matter what the personal opinion is

One note on the actual topic, the idea to make another trait for the slapsh would be cool, like said Reapers Might, that is meh not interesting as a trait.

I have no idea what you just said.