Guild Wars 2

@Panhauramix.2784

We may get the videos from PAX. We’ll see.

I’ve made the point before in other threads – the problem with the whining on the forums that we see, with lack of proof to back it up is because of the difficulty in getting the proof.

If we had tools to replay matches, see what skills were used and where mistakes were made, it would cut down on the whining and subsequent CJ.

Without the ability to analyze performance, or what happened in the heat of battle, the players come away with a sense that the other side had an unfair advantage.

Look at the evolution of the meta over the last little while. Necro’s got two additional conditions so players tried it out. They found that very few people were building to counter conditions so it wrecked them across the board – forums blow up. Then people started building to counter conditions with stunlock warriors that can move fast, hit reasonably hard and can avoid initial condition pressure long enough to kill first. They then realised that build actually works really well against almost all classes and builds.

I digress, but the point stands, if we had more tools to analyze battles, meta would shift quicker, balance changes would take effect faster meaning less time in the limbo of a meta players seem to dislike.

Totally agrre on the lack of real data. Combat log is missing lots of info, and Death log in PvP is not a good tool.

For example: On some fights that lasted for 3+ min, Terror was showing for 9k im my Death log, Bleeding for 22k. Yet what really killed me in that long fight over a point was a backstab for 4-5k at a moment where I couldn’t prevent/dodge it. Yet this backstab hit was so small compared to others DoTs for that long fight, that it wasn’t even shown in the Death log, or completely at the bottom. Lots of players looking at this would say that Bleeds or Terror killed them, not the last burst. Yet they could have regen enough or healed in between DoT to survive longer.

It hurts badly, and quite hard to screw up with a scepter.

hackks.3687:

Then you discovered that Engi’s are building to hard counter condis and more specifically Necros. I’m sure you saw more than a couple Warriors rocking Mace/Shield and Berserkers Stance since that’s virtually a 100% hard counter to Necros as well.

Thank you though for doing everyone a favor of playing some PvP and reporting back that Necro’s OPness is in fact not an L2P issue on the community’s part because as you clearly discovered people are in fact building deliberately to counter conditions and Necros and not simply holding on to their old builds. If multiple classes are deliberately building to counter a particular class and a particular form of damage, I don’t know what else there is to convince people that Necros are in fact OP… that is, until they run into one of the various hard counters.

The PvP meta is just borked right now. It’s not all Necros fault, but they were an instigating factor in it’s development, and as such some toning down on some aspects of its builds are in order. And just to be clear, I’m not looking to nerf Necros in to the ground, in fact it’s really nice to play him on the regular again. What I’m really looking for is PvP to be balanced and enjoyable. Currently it is the furthest thing from both.

P.S. it’s rather flattering you went so far as to look up the leader board rankings of not only me but other posters in this thread. Kind of scary, stalker-ish but still somewhat flattering. Next time just ask politely and I’ll tell you that my highest rank was top 200 when queuing regularly with a team, lowest rank was 50% after an epic losing streak yolo-queing for a weekend. Nobody cares about the leader boards though while balance is so fubar’d.

ok enough, time to get your story straight….

is the meta borked?

or are people able to make builds to counter the so called OP necro?

you dont even know what the point youre trying to make is while you fling buzz words like meta around to try and garner some credibility.

nemesis stalkerish???? lol

get a handle on things buddy, no one here wants to date you.

He went searching for some evidence you might know what youre talking about since it wasn’t what he experienced. Unfortunately it made you look bad.

But at the same time… like i said and described scenarios, i’m a lot of the time faced with “nothing i can do” scenarios because the target is SIMPLY IMMUNE to everything i have (either by stealth or perma block perma dodge or just plain old immunity) and after that they leave combat with no way for me to stop them. I truly only win when i survive their immunities and 6 seconds stuns while being 1 shot and they still didn’t leave combat… it should have been clear by then that i am more skilled then them… since when i do a chain fear + damage they die but i never do it first… i always must survive their initial damage, i play on their terms always… And they do have the option of always leaving, i never do…
Yet i am called OP noob when they die…

I just wanted to note this post.
it is exactly what necros do. wait .. wait some more.. wait.. hope not to die.. then if we are still alive attack and hope we can keep our opponent into combat.

btw : out of combat mechanic is terrible for necros (mostly only on necros)

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

VydoLL.8714:

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

so a spec is a class now?

it’s funny how people get stupid when they are angry…

VydoLL.8714:

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

How many more times must i post the screenshot where a thief hits a 22000 backstab hit ?… Have you seen the elementalists 1 shot burst combo, check it on youtube…

Don’t talk to a necromancers about faceroll class…

PS: Moa

Dredlord.8076:

VydoLL.8714:

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

so a spec is a class now?

it’s funny how people get stupid when they are angry…

yes, its become a class when you see only this spec played…
haters gonna hate, dude !

Nemesis.8593:

VydoLL.8714:

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

How many more times must i post the screenshot where a thief hits a 22000 backstab hit ?… Have you seen the elementalists 1 shot burst combo, check it on youtube…

Don’t talk to a necromancers about faceroll class…

PS: Moa

try a shief before talking about faceroll.

current conditions spec is so brainless, that’s a fact. Any noob in PvP can play it and win.
To follow your example, some practice is needed to play a burst combo as an elem or a thief,

And yes, i’m quite interested to see your 22k bs video in sPVP, unless it was made 10 months ago….

VydoLL.8714:

Nemesis.8593:

VydoLL.8714:

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

How many more times must i post the screenshot where a thief hits a 22000 backstab hit ?… Have you seen the elementalists 1 shot burst combo, check it on youtube…

Don’t talk to a necromancers about faceroll class…

PS: Moa

try a shief before talking about faceroll.

current conditions spec is so brainless, that’s a fact. Any noob in PvP can play it and win.
To follow your example, some practice is needed to play a burst combo as an elem or a thief,

And yes, i’m quite interested to see your 22k bs video in sPVP, unless it was made 10 months ago….

Well since it’s so easy… what are you waiting for, hop on your necromancer and break top 100 on the leaderboards. Go go go !… before we get nerfed…

i dont play a class because it’s OP. I play a class for its gameplay.
i’ll be quite happy when cnd necro will be nerf, something legit !

VydoLL.8714:

Dredlord.8076:

VydoLL.8714:

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

so a spec is a class now?

it’s funny how people get stupid when they are angry…

yes, its become a class when you see only this spec played…
haters gonna hate, dude !

well…..don’t be such a hater then, dude?

I see more variety in necros now than I ever have.

VydoLL.8714:

i dont play a class because it’s OP. I play a class for its gameplay.
i’ll be quite happy when cnd necro will be nerf, something legit !

Im sorry but you cannot say thakittens not only a hypocritical thing to say (since in the end gameplay is what matters, since if the noob necro cannot position his wall to stop the cc warrior with medicore skill, the necro dies), but also a very very stupid thing. Personally im not a fan of pvp, but i do know that in order Thief, Guardian, Mesmer, Thief, Ele, Ranger, Guardian were the top dog in pvp, and if you could look at pvp match history you would clearly see that those were the professions i used when i wanted some random killing fun and won most of it *kitten no open world duels*; You have to be plain stupid not to play the strongest thing (or its counter) around in a player vs player game if you like winning. Thus just that line made all your points invalid. Also use any form of cc, please for the love of god learn how easy it is to ping pong a necro (and technically seen a ranger and a thief if you catch those out of evade/stealth/in range).

*yes i know its a very much kittenbag thing to say but it is true and nonsense just bothers me, if the enemy has a nuke in war you dont fight back with the threat of throwing cupcakes at them

It’s not, in reality nearly all other condition builds are underpowered and people ignorantly think that should remain the norm.

My guild mate thinks necros are OP. His reasons are:

1. He mains a thief and necros are what he dies to, because his stealth is not as much of a get out of jail card against conditions.

2. When he plays a necro in solo Q or hot join, he can rack up high point totals due to tagging everybody before they die.

Never mind that tagging everybody is actually bad due to how the downed system works. Never mind that he has no defense and drops like a rock when focused on his necromancer. Never mind that his high point totals depend on his team winning with the others on the team doing the heavy lifting.

I think condi necros are a little bit OP atm. Mostly because of Terror + Master of Terror.
Before the big balance patch I thought that terror necro was borderline OP, but after all the goodies from the patch I think necros were pushed a bit over the top.

And I do play necro. Or atleast used to.

Many of the necro’s conditions can be unblockable, on a short cooldown, and chained with a lot of single target CC. This is why, imo, the current condi necro is too powerful. Because the counters to all of these things are on far longer cooldowns less skill is required.

My definition of OP = build/class that requires less “skill” to play/use yet achieves the same or better results the majority of the time. See the influx of new necro’s? Yup, its not cause just now EVERYONE decided they look cool.

(edit) My entire comment is for WvW. No idea if its legit for sPvP at all.

Like Forty Seven Ninjas.6982:

My definition of OP = build/class that requires less "skill" to play/use yet achieves the same or better results the majority of the time. See the influx of new necro’s? Yup, its not cause just now EVERYONE decided they look cool.

(edit) My entire comment is for WvW. No idea if its legit for sPvP at all.

That is bad counterplay *cough stability not letting fear do damage*, not op, something being overpowered is plain numerical strengh being disproportional to the resource cost required for it to be used (e.g. 100b is op in pve, not in pvp because you need other reliable ways to make the target stick in the damage).

There are many forms of OP and definitions I don’t think anyone knows what it means anymore.

OP = Good as in a compliment not negative at all and not gamebreaking just Good. Example “My OP build” buzzword for views not really OP but has a OP part to it the burst rotation is kind of op.

Kind of OP = I don’t even know what this is besides someone being noncommittal in their argument so they can leave the door open to back out.

Ugh its so dumb seeing OP just slung around you can’t tell if the person really believes something is OP, if its just difficult to deal with, if its just OP as in good or what.

“I fought this ranger build it was kind of OP” What does that even mean ’Kind of OP"?

/rant

Like Forty Seven Ninjas.6982:

Many of the necro’s conditions can be unblockable, on a short cooldown, and chained with a lot of single target CC. This is why, imo, the current condi necro is too powerful. Because the counters to all of these things are on far longer cooldowns less skill is required.

Thing is, the OP build at the moment doesn’t use those unblockable conditions (which only comes from traited marks as a cost of 20 points in Death Magic) and even a full rotation of staff skills won’t kill you.

Like I said before before, lack of knowledge of what the class can do leads to comments about a 30/30/30/30/30 necro who can 1-shot people with instant unblockable moves.

As a side note, I do more WvW than PvP, I consider myself a pretty good player and while we’re good door keepers and zerg-lovers, in small groups as a necro I’ve gotta pull my weight in gold just to be able to survive a couple more adds or a zerg. As any other classes, I can normally get out of jail for free, no sweat.

oZii.2864:

There are many forms of OP and definitions I don’t think anyone knows what it means anymore.

OP = Good as in a compliment not negative at all and not gamebreaking just Good. Example “My OP build” buzzword for views not really OP but has a OP part to it the burst rotation is kind of op.

Kind of OP = I don’t even know what this is besides someone being noncommittal in their argument so they can leave the door open to back out.

Ugh its so dumb seeing OP just slung around you can’t tell if the person really believes something is OP, if its just difficult to deal with, if its just OP as in good or what.

“I fought this ranger build it was kind of OP” What does that even mean ’Kind of OP"?

/rant

No there is one form of op, from the original P&P D&D days, if a cleric could do a 3d10 heal as a rank 3 divine spell 6 times pre rest, that is bloody op.

VydoLL.8714:

Current condition necro spec = faceroll class.

I object! Condi Necro needs tons of support. You are crediting a Necro for the win when other professions are necessary to leverage the condition build. Without support, a Necromancer is still fish bait so, is it fair to credit a win to one profession when the others are tuned and played to support it? Who is doing spike damage, boons, and mobility control? It is like saying a glass cannon Ele won because it was OP when 4 other players protected it.

Edit: Go play an Engineer if you think condi Necro is too L33t

I watched ESL today Ill keep watching the rest of the matches but spirit ranger is what is hot from what I see. I saw 1 necro but 4 spirit rangers in the matches I watched today. Looks like stun warrior and spirit ranger comps make it difficult for Necro to be op like people claim. Spirit ranger with awesome cleanses, warrior with its immune + cc = dead necro’s.

Have to watch the rest of the matches to get a bigger picture though.

That’s assuming you’re using a warrior with a ton of CC, anyway. Against anything else it’s just lolconditionspam. Blow every cooldown and Fear to win; totally brainless “strategy” which can be repeated over and over in a very short amount of time. They need to tone back down the condition stacking; after that last big patch it’s just way too much to be balanced. If they must do it, at least raise the skill ceiling higher than this button mashing BS we have now.

Sil.4560:

That’s assuming you’re using a warrior with a ton of CC, anyway. Against anything else it’s just lolconditionspam. Blow every cooldown and Fear to win; totally brainless "strategy" which can be repeated over and over in a very short amount of time. They need to tone back down the condition stacking; after that last big patch it’s just way too much to be balanced. If they must do it, at least raise the skill ceiling higher than this button mashing BS we have now.

Yes paper tell me more about how scissors is op and faceroll. *cough stability/guardian/war/ranger/ele are rock*

Sil.4560:

That’s assuming you’re using a warrior with a ton of CC, anyway. Against anything else it’s just lolconditionspam. Blow every cooldown and Fear to win; totally brainless “strategy” which can be repeated over and over in a very short amount of time. They need to tone back down the condition stacking; after that last big patch it’s just way too much to be balanced. If they must do it, at least raise the skill ceiling higher than this button mashing BS we have now.

When did you get a necro? Is the warrior forum boring right now? You run condi warrior now anyway at least the was last that I knew you ran. Your never going to beat a necro. A necro should very rarely lose to a condition build if they have a off hand dagger and a staff just because of a transfer.

Its ok that you need cc as a warrior to beat a necro that is the counter as andele put it. That is rock just like when you fight a guardian you must account for their boons if your not looking at a guardians buff bar then your doing it wrong.

Blow every cooldown is a bit of a stretch but as soon as you see a necro go into ds you should have your finger on the beserker stance button. Everything else is filler against a warrior if you see staff dodge or avoid marks. Your in close its going to be scepter AA and probably DG the pain is all in DS. Corrupt boon is the counter to your stability but if you have your stab up and in zerker stance it just clears the boons then its on a 40 sec cd.

I don’t know how you can complain about necros as a warrior though. Just because you engage doesn’t mean you have to stay. Running condi warrior is asking to die anyway because the necro can just give it all back to you so deathly swarm dodge and putrid mark dodge is important. You can’t win every fight with every build. If a CC heavy warrior is the warrior build to counter a condi necro and a condi warrior is not I really don’t see why that is a problem.

I know you like sword and warhorn but it’s just 2 exposed against a necro and you waste dps time using the warhorn skills to wipe condi’s you could always jump in force the necro to deplete its Death shroud the reengage on your own terms which is a necro with not alot of LF.

P.S. There was a team that ran 3 warrior 2 CC mace warriors and 1 was Condi w/LB they fought Super Squad the vid is on Bleu’s channel and they held up pretty well with the 3 warrior 2 spirit ranger setup losing the first match winning the second then they switched to 2 warriors 2 ranger 1 guardian for the last match.

oZii.2864:

When did you get a necro? Is the warrior forum boring right now?

According to /age, my necro is 318 days old. If you were trying to mock me on that front, perhaps you might rethink that.

You run condi warrior now anyway at least the was last that I knew you ran. Your never going to beat a necro. A necro should very rarely lose to a condition build if they have a off hand dagger and a staff just because of a transfer.

&

Yes paper tell me more about how scissors is op and faceroll. cough stability/guardian/war/ranger/ele are rock

Rock/paper/scissors is a poor game balancing strategy with so many possible variables. Balance in a game promoting skill above all else would see as many methods for varying builds defeating one another as is possible. Of course, as we know, build diversity in this game is a joke and what I just mentioned would require some actual thought and effort which doesn’t seem to be top priority for this game’s continued content.

Andele, your post utterly lacked in substance but I felt I should respond at least once since you made a reply to me. If your next post is more of the same, don’t bother.

Anyway, “your (sic) never going to beat a necro” is in direct contradiction with:

You can win every fight with every build.

I think that basically dismantles whatever snarky argument you’re attempting to make at me. You can’t even remain consistent within a single post, why should I waste my time?

Also, let it be known:

I know you like sword and warhorn but it’s just 2 exposed against a necro and you waste dps time using the warhorn skills to wipe condi’s you could always jump in force the necro to deplete its Death shroud the reengage on your own terms which is a necro with not alot of LF.

You apparently don’t know how I play at all if you think I’ve been wearing a warhorn anytime recently. I disengage and re-engage at will and none of that requires a warhorn. I don’t need to fight unimaginative game balance directly when I can just lure the player to an inescapable death and /laugh at the fact that they were too stupid not to see it. Are you quite finished or are you going to continue prattling on about how you think I play?

That was a typo it’s suppose to be “You can’t win every fight with every build”. I don’t know exactly how you play but I know you like to use warhorn and sword. Maybe you use something different. I hardly see you on necro and more on warrior. Age of a character doesn’t mean you play it alot. My elementalist is older than my mesmer since I created it first but my mesmer, thief, and warrior have way more play time than my elementalist.

So you made a post about how you felt condi’s where imbalanced and to easy using the example of “blow all your cooldowns and fear to win”.

I provided what knowledge I have of what I have seen you run on your warrior and our talks of your builds and then provided what last I known you to run “You run condi warrior now at least that I knew you ran” You didn’t rebut that in your post but instead of addressing what I posted directly on condi warrior/warhorn vs a condi necro (which was the majority of my post) you pick my post apart as if it was a personal attack which it wasn’t.

You always take discussions to personal as if someone not totally agreeing with you was a personal attack.

If I say something along the lines of last I’ve known you to run that is not saying I know exactly what you run and leaves the door open for you to correct me. All you said basically is blah blah if you think you know me you don’t know me.

You would rather argue off topic and defend yourself personally then about your statement that it’s imbalanced and a necro blows every cd and fears to win and that you need heavy cc.

If “Rock-paper-scissors” balancing is so bad, then why does it exist (and get used) everywhere?

It’s because it works. It’s rarely as simple as “rock-paper-scissors”, but it’s the same thought process. If, for example, Rock wasn’t beaten by paper, then what would everyone choose? That is the definition of OP.

Condi necros are very strong against condition builds of other classes to the point of being almost unbeatable. However, they are also extremely vulnerable to CC. Fresh Air eles are unmatched for burst ability, but if they don’t kill their target (as usually is the case with bunkers), they are screwed. A CC Warrior will smack around a condi necro easily, but they will have a difficult time against a Rampage as One ranger.

oZii.2864:

You would rather argue off topic and defend yourself personally then about your statement that it’s imbalanced and a necro blows every cd and fears to win and that you need heavy cc.

There’s nothing to argue. The only thing you posted in response was a contrary opinion and that you think a rock/paper/scissors design is good while I find it to be poor design, along with some ways you personally think that you should fight a necro (none of which actually address the glaring imbalance). No actual points were made, just “it’s okay that the game is like this”, completely disregarding the idea that design of this sort minimizes the need for individual skill and instead uses R/P/S as a crutch against certain opponents.

I also find it hilarious that your post implies there is already adequate balance when we receive fixes every month to address the fact that this is far from true.

And yes, I’m going to respond in an unfriendly way when you lead your post with “When did you get a necro? Is the warrior forum boring right now?” You want to snark me, don’t expect a warm reply.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

If “Rock-paper-scissors” balancing is so bad, then why does it exist (and get used) everywhere?

If racism is so bad, then why does it exist (and get used) everywhere? Your logic is crap. Seriously, if you can’t come up with anything better than “if it is so, it must be good” – and can’t understand why such a statement is logically unsound – don’t even bother replying to me further.

It’s because it works. It’s rarely as simple as “rock-paper-scissors”, but it’s the same thought process. If, for example, Rock wasn’t beaten by paper, then what would everyone choose? That is the definition of OP.

It only works in a very simplistic and unimaginative way. Hammering a nail with my face also “works” but it doesn’t make it the most amazing means of accomplishing what I need. The trinity in MMOs also “works” but it’s stale as all hell and about as unimaginative as R/P/S.

A game with so many variables could easily have a much more complex interaction of builds but instead they choose this lazy approach by refusing to add only a fraction of the amount of skills and traits (and so build diversity) necessary. From what I understand, GW1 craps all over this game in terms of that and this game was supposed to be an improvement on that system.

Condi necros are very strong against condition builds of other classes to the point of being almost unbeatable. However, they are also extremely vulnerable to CC. Fresh Air eles are unmatched for burst ability, but if they don’t kill their target (as usually is the case with bunkers), they are screwed. A CC Warrior will smack around a condi necro easily, but they will have a difficult time against a Rampage as One ranger.

So instead of giving each class and build varying tools to ensure that every opponent that every player faces has to rely more on personal skill for victory, they opt to make it more build dependent. I’ve run into certain builds on my warrior that literally have trouble even hurting me. That’s just silly and brings me no satisfaction in a fight. This is my complaint on the matter. I prefer a deeper mental combat system which emphasizes personal skill more over the same garbage we’ve been seeing for years but it seems GW2’s playerbase ultimately doesn’t like change.

I’ll be chipping in my 2 cents of thoughts:

First, people are not really prepared for conditions. Most enemies you meet up until you really play WvW and PvP stack some conditions, but not many. You mainly get direct damage, which is stopped by toughness, protection and retaliation. From that you wont learn how much condition punishment your build can take.

Second, condition cleanse on most classes (not necromancer) is kind of bad. Most skills remove 1-3 conditions at most and have a somewhat high cooldown. If you go for OHD and staff, you already have 2 cleanses, which remove 3 conditions each. Other classes don’t have that luxury.

Third, many people think that direct damage is the optimal way to grind on someone. Again, direct damage can be reduced by boons and armor. Conditions completely ignore thoughness protection and retaliation. While a build with much retaliation will kill someone with high power / crit damage rather fast, a necromancer will not be impressed at all.

Fourth, many conditions are hard to judge. Yes, you see that you have 25 stacks bleeding but they all tick by themselves for like 120 damage per second. Now do the math, I can’t really do it in my head, so I just grabbed a calculator. 3000dps. That is what you get. And you don’t clearly see 3000 tick away on you, like with confusion, where you get one big “2k DAMAGE” sign thrown at you the moment you use a skill. Necromancers don’t have confusion. Mostly we work with poison, fear and bleeding. Fear is rather obvious if you spec into terror. 1.5k damage per tick is obviously not good. But people are not prepared for it. You can chain (if you get someone with stability and can corrupt it) 3 fears. If each one ticks for 1.5k damage twice, that is a whopping 9k damage burst. And most people are not prepared for it. Many don’t have anything equipped to get out of a stun lock (aka. fear lock), but one stun breaker. And they use it rather poorly. The first fear hits, most people break it and instantly chew on the other (or other two) fears you can dish out. Condition handling is on most people I have met, rather poor. There are not many classes who can chain up to 3-4 locks and grind away on you the same time.

Packing CC of their own, like many warriors do now, helps. And that is also why I went for foot in the grave. CC is completely underrated, since not many classes have great CC at all. But necromancer do, with their insane fear locks.

Just my thoughts.

With the sort of condition meta as it is now and the ridiculous duration you can achieve with food/runes/traits, I wouldn’t be surprised if in the future we see a mechanic which reduces condition damage itself outside of the very limited cleanses that a lot of classes get.

So Sil, what you want is for every build to have great variety, yet all be stopped by exactly the same things. is this right? because that’s what I’m getting from your posts. You want variety, but not if it involves counters.

Now THAT is brainless, since it makes builds not even matter. Just grab a couple weapons, grab any old utilities/elite, and you will do fine? Is that what you want?

Instead of harping on how the game should be more about “personal skill”, how about you get it into your head that counter-builds are a part of that personal skill. Mastery of the game doesn’t stop at timings, you know. If you are having issues against condi necros as a condi warrior, perhaps your own skill isn’t as great as you think (hint: it involves not being a condi warrior to take on condi necros).

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

So Sil, what you want is for every build to have great variety, yet all be stopped by exactly the same things. is this right? because that’s what I’m getting from your posts. You want variety, but not if it involves counters.

Now THAT is brainless, since it makes builds not even matter. Just grab a couple weapons, grab any old utilities/elite, and you will do fine? Is that what you want?

Not at all, what I’d like is for each build to have such diversity in possible playstyles that it can counter counters and be met in kind. That is, each build would have at least some tools with which to combat the most logical counter to make for the sort of skillful fight that R/P/S seeks to undermine.

Characters in GW2 as it stands are limited to 1 or maybe two builds per weapon set at best. This is horribly limited and I sincerely hope the game evolves beyond that. Were we given a much larger variety of skills and traits (and maybe more skill slots), we might be able to begin using them in such a way that goes beyond the typical R/P/S setup and actually see some more interesting fights. We can at least aim for more than three angles by which to approach combat.

Instead of harping on how the game should be more about “personal skill”, how about you get it into your head that counter-builds are a part of that personal skill.

By nature counter-builds are not a part of personal skill because they actively seek to defy it by virtue of the build itself replacing necessary skill to defeat another player. Within the limitations of the game, assuming two average people, one person holding their hands out as scissors and the other rock, neither player is inherently any more skilled than would be a person trying to guess heads or tails on a flipped coin.

The choice is made and within GW2 I cannot figuratively break the other person’s wrist and claim myself the victor at R/P/S; I cannot redefine my build any time out of combat to display skill in the form of build counter knowledge, because that isn’t how the game works. We are fixated with our choices and given the limited options of play, that is what we sit with in terms of individual play no matter what other people present us with.

Mastery of the game doesn’t stop at timings, you know. If you are having issues against condi necros as a condi warrior, perhaps your own skill isn’t as great as you think (hint: it involves not being a condi warrior to take on condi necros).

To reiterate, this is not a matter of personal skill, it is a matter of build limitations and diversity by your own admittance. If the build itself is a counter, how on earth do you expect personal skill to be the determining factor to overcome such a thing when your entire argument is that the builds themselves need to directly counter other builds for exactly that reason? Rock beats scissors, so again then, it is a matter of skill to choose either rock or scissors? What happens when paper enters the mix? I’ll tell you what – everything you’re trying to say falls apart.

Choosing one of three options is not skill, it is a necessary choice any given player must make simply by entering combat. The usage of those options’ specifics is skill and when, by nature, those specifics seek to narrow the amount of possibilities in the way they are used by virtue of simplistic game design, we are left with fewer opportunities to utilize personal skill and more reliance on the system itself (i.e. relying on condition necros having an innate advantage over condition builds of other classes in lieu of actual play skill).

My warrior setup being nigh untouchable by some of the players I’ve encountered is not a matter of my “skill of choice”, as your argument seems to imply, but rather an unfortunate state of game mechanics that has started me with an advantage in a number of scenarios. The M+Sh/GS meta isn’t even a threat but I do not attribute this to those other players only lacking in skill. “Use another build” is not personal skill, it’s an unfortunate limitation of the combat system.

Your entire stance on this matter is laughably inconsistent as is the way you have chosen to present it. If you want to trade petty remarks regarding personal skill, here’s one you should consider: How are intellectually bankrupt people like you allowed to keep on living? It’s saddening. Should I start making wild assumptions about your playing skill as you have chosen to do out of ignorance of my argument? Or is that just another sad “L2P” fallback because you don’t actually have one of your own that is logically consistent?

You’re wasting my time with this drivel and quite honestly I doubt you have a thing to say that I would find even remotely unexpected, interesting, or useful.

You want to counter your counter? Out-play them. The current Mace/Shield/GS warrior build was made popular because it is practically a hard-counter to the 30/20/0/0/20 necro build (and works pretty well against almost everything else too). So how does a condi necro beat it? By outplaying them. Kiting that build is the way to bring it down as their only real gap-closers are on the CC-less Greatsword. Yes, a condi necro takes far longer to kill them than a power necro (which in turn is practically a hard counter to said warrior build), but it can be done. Likewise, how does a condi-warrior beat a condi-necro? Slot some CC (Bull’s Charge works well) and save it for their heal, then dodge the transfers. Fears should be countered with either Fear Me (the necro has no stability) or a stunbreak (which you should have on your bar anyway). The constant poison from the necro will neuter Healing Signet, but you still have more innate sustain than he does. It will be a long fight, but condi vs condi always is.

Alternatively, sPvP is a team game. Have someone else that is more suited to dealing with thatproblem enemy do it. Teamwork is also a part of your skillset.

Identifying what builds exist and how to counter them (as many as possible, preferably) is very much a skill issue. Now, if you get into a match only to find yourself faced with your own build’s counters, then you also need to know how to play around their advantage and exploit the weaknesses of those builds as much as possible.

It seems what you are asking is for every possible build to have a method of pushing a button to beat their counter, at which point, why does having a counter matter? Everything is meant to have strengths and weaknesses in a game. It’s called an opportunity cost. If you decided to build yourself with tons of condition cleanses, then condition builds will have a tough time with you. The price you pay is that power-based builds will chew you up.

TLDR: You can’t have everything, not even in games. Get over it.

Oh, and stay classy

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

You want to counter your counter? Out-play them. The current Mace/Shield/GS warrior build was made popular because it is practically a hard-counter to the 30/20/0/0/20 necro build (and works pretty well against almost everything else too). So how does a condi necro beat it? By outplaying them. Kiting that build is the way to bring it down as their only real gap-closers are on the CC-less Greatsword. Yes, a condi necro takes far longer to kill them than a power necro (which in turn is practically a hard counter to said warrior build), but it can be done.

This is in direct contradiction with your closing statement of your previous post:

“(hint: it involves not being a condi warrior to take on condi necros).”

So can you address this contradiction? Go on, let’s see it. Unlike a number of other people who have likely had to endure the sad display of your debating on these forums, I’m not going to let your every mistake slip by. I’m going to point it out, and you can either address it directly or be made a fool of for it, as you deserve.

Beyond that, I’ve also addressed this argument with my statements above (because it was hilariously predictable), but it seems it did not take in a previous edit due to length restrictions: The difference in skill for beating a counter must be at least X units and, following, this cannot occur at the highest levels of play due to a (low) skill ceiling preventing that gap from existing (this is an inherent flaw with R/P/S). You also contradict yourself in that you believe that certain builds need hard counter one another and as such this exists independently of personal skill.

Likewise, how does a condi-warrior beat a condi-necro? Slot some CC (Bull’s Charge works well) and save it for their heal, then dodge the transfers. Fears should be countered with either Fear Me (the necro has no stability) or a stunbreak (which you should have on your bar anyway). The constant poison from the necro will neuter Healing Signet, but you still have more innate sustain than he does. It will be a long fight, but condi vs condi always is.

Your argument does not take into consideration a level of Death Shroud to soak conditions nor does it account for the number of cleanses a necromancer has which they can simply have access to easily by dodging a very visible and predictable Bull’s Charge (which is on a very long CD timer, certainly more than the one that exists when someone interrupts their own heal).

Moreover, again, you’ve directly contradicted yourself in saying that a condition warrior should not even try to fight a condition necro, and yet here you are giving crackpot solutions to dealing with the build. Make up your mind – as you stand now your posts are laughable.

Alternatively, sPvP is a team game. Have someone else that is more suited to dealing with that Warrior do it. Teamwork is also a part of your skillset.

Saw this coming from a mile away. This is merely evading the argument of a 1v1 scenario. One cannot argue that the game must be a team game as people can and do duel quite frequently whether Anet ultimately expected it or not.

Identifying what builds exist and how to counter them (as many as possible, preferably) is very much a skill issue.

Incorrect, it is a mere knowledge issue in a game which lacks in substance as far as actual knowledge is concerned. Also, from my previous post:

“…I cannot redefine my build any time out of combat to display skill in the form of build counter knowledge”

Now, if you get into a match only to find yourself faced with your own build’s counters, then you also need to know how to play around their advantage and exploit the weaknesses of those builds as much as possible.

Moreover, your comment “as many as possible” precludes that not all builds are able to be countered in some way, which stands as exactly the sort of problem I have brought up in the first place. Your wishy washy “exploit the weaknesses of those builds as much as possible” offers no concrete means for guaranteed victory either and so you’ve failed even there.

It seems what you are asking is for every possible build to have a method of pushing a button to beat their counter, at which point, why does having a counter matter?

Once again, you’ve completely failed to understand my post (which is unsurprising giving your apparent lack of mental prowess). I’m not going to bother explaining it further. You can go back, read, and try to think a little more critically for next time.

Everything is meant to have strengths and weaknesses in a game. It’s called an opportunity cost. If you decided to build yourself with tons of condition cleanses, then condition builds will have a tough time with you. The price you pay is that power-based builds will chew you up.

And this is the unfortunate limitation that this game places upon us in terms of system vs. skill. The original concern of a number of members in this very thread is that necromancers simply apply conditions too quickly in a brainless faceroll means of play, which is very much correct in the current meta (I’d agree that the skill ceiling is too low for a number of classes, for that matter). The class, innately, brings a number of means to transfer and turn conditions into their benefit no matter how they choose to actually spec. There is no opportunity cost in that short of not just playing a different class altogether.

TLDR: You can’t have everything, not even in games. Get over it.

Even this comment is in contradiction with your posts on how to deal with direct counters to builds. Either you can or you can’t. Why not stop contradicting yourself?

Oh, and stay classy

Try harder. Wishful thinking, but maybe come up with something worth reading next time. For a start, you could stop the conflicting statements in your posts. You can’t even make a consistent or logically sound argument. But then I knew that you had nothing worth saying when I saw the “it exists, therefore it’s good” stand-in.

Not exactly contradicting myself. You made a comment that you should be able to counter your counter. I just said how it would be possible to do so in two specific circumstances, one of which you seem to be taking personally.

Even at the highest level of play, you can still out-play your opponent. It happens all the time. Ever seen one of the tourney matches of LoL where the support comes out on top in a 1v3? They happen more often than you think, even though the counter to a support is, well, anyone with damage.

Every build has methods of dealing with every other build, though that method may be suboptimal for your intended role. This may mean taking out one of your favorite utility skills and using something more suitable in its place. It could be swapping a weapon to one that isn’t optimal for your build, but has what you need (such as a shield on a glass cannon warrior/engineer). Maybe it’s just swapping a trait. Regardless, every build has the option to use one of those answers. These are already in the game.

If you overspecialize, you will get countered. If you get countered, change something up to prevent it from happening again.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Not exactly contradicting myself. You made a comment that you should be able to counter your counter. I just said how it would be possible to do so in two specific circumstances, one of which you seem to be taking personally.

Oh, but you did contradict yourself. You deliberately said that I should not be playing a condition warrior against a condition necro and then later start listing ways to combat it. So make up your mind. As it stands your examples are whimsical garbage which does not refute the fact that things cannot be changed mid-combat.

Even at the highest level of play, you can still out-play your opponent. It happens all the time. Ever seen one of the tourney matches of LoL where the support comes out on top in a 1v3? They happen more often than you think, even though the counter to a support is, well, anyone with damage.

By definitely, top is top. Peak is peak. Two people of ultimately equal skill with distinctly different specific options gives one side an advantage and expecting it to be overcome 100% of the time is unrealistic and ultimately unbalanced.

Can a necro kill my build? No. I can leave anytime I want. But this does not address the issue of standing and fighting for objectives in a 1v1 scenario.

Every build has methods of dealing with every other build, though that method may be suboptimal for your intended role. This may mean taking out one of your favorite utility skills and using something more suitable in its place. It could be swapping a weapon to one that isn’t optimal for your build, but has what you need (such as a shield on a glass cannon warrior/engineer). Maybe it’s just swapping a trait. Regardless, every build has the option to use one of those answers. These are already in the game.

This game needs far more options in utilities and traits for that comment to be anything even resembling reality. You can’t respec any of those while already in combat anyway and in many scenarios won’t know what you’re fighting until you’re locked in.

If you overspecialize, you will get countered. If you get countered, change something up to prevent it from happening again.

Then you get countered by another counter. “Happening again” does not address a here and now scenario. You don’t get as many chances as you want. Congratulations, you’ve failed to counter my argument. Probably because you’re completely wrong and incompetent.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go make some more money.

EDIT: Because my final post in this thread was deleted and some silly little man saw fit to reply to that, I’ll leave this here in lieu of wrecking the rest of your so-called arguments below:

- You use dying in your first argument. I’ve no interest in failure.
- You can’t change anything about a build mid-combat, as I’ve said before; further your posts still do nothing to justify R/P/S as actually permitting individual skill to always overcome limited game design.
- You did explicitly contradict yourself; your intent was obvious in the prior post and your recoil from such an obvious mistake is even more obvious – I just wanted to press you on it because that’s what you deserve. You’re not fooling anyone with half a brain.
- Yes, you still are missing my point, and that is not my fault. I don’t have the time or patience to explain things to people like you and quite honestly trying to help ignorance on the internet is a lost cause to begin with.

Have fun posting some sad little message to try and salvage what remains of your shattered argument. I’m bored of this altercation.

step 1. Die in PvP match to your counter.
step 2. Swap utilities/healing/elite/major traits (you can do these)
step 3. Go back out and fight.

Funny thing about Conquest PvP, one kill doesn’t mean much. If you’re at the end of a match and you haven’t figured out how to counter your opponents, then frankly, it’s your own problem. You don’t have unlimited chances, but you do get more than one.

I did say that you should not fight a condi necro with a condi warrior. It will always be a bad idea to take on a condi necro with a condi build of any other profession, but that’s what necros are supposed to be. Using a condi build against a condi necro is kind of like challenging Poseidon to a fight when you’re on a rowboat in the ocean; you’re fighting on his terms, which is never good for you. However, since you went on about countering your counter, I suggested a possible course of action to do so (hint: remember your Longbow skills too). You will still likely lose, but that’s the nature of counters.

Now, if I am missing your point still, perhaps you should step back, think for a moment, then post it clearly and concisely. Honestly, if you had put even a quarter of the effort into making your point clear as you have attempting to insult me, I’m sure the conversation would be much further along and possibly productive.

Been watching the gw2 twitch channel in the background at work and on down times on my phone for the last week or 2 http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2pvptv (They run continuous streams of players from top level teams), and the question of the state of the necro inevitably comes up quite often. Every single streamer so far, including the ones who play necro, have stated that necros are OP right now. Every. Single. One.

If the current best players in the game all agree on that necro is currently over the top, it MUST be a “L2P” issue. Obviously.

And has nothing to do with them having to change how they play to account for the fact that conditions are now a part of the meta. I’ve been watching the stream too, and they all talk about how great necro sustain is while putting out TONS OF DAMAGE! When I mention the only sustain we have is high hp, no evades outside of dodge, no block, no invulnerability, very few stun breaks… That the current stunlock warrior can cheese through 90% of classes including condition based necro…

Seriously, take away a necros support and they are easy to kill before the conditions start rolling, or just walk at a brisk pace away and reset the fight.

I’’d just like to point out – not one of the streamers mains a necro.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

It seems what you are asking is for every possible build to have a method of pushing a button to beat their counter, at which point, why does having a counter matter?

Sil lives in a weird reductive world where all characters should have an answer to all other characters attacks. This will apparently lead to a utopia where we have the greatest possible variety in builds and fights will only be determined by “personal skill”.

And this game will be called “Pong”.

Would Necros be opposed to dhummfire becoming torment on application of fear or Fear on application of torment? With terror being restored to its old damage? That way you wouldnt need precision to proc your grandmaster trait in in a tree that has no precision.

Marlafox.8715:

Would Necros be opposed to dhummfire becoming torment on application of fear or Fear on application of torment? With terror being restored to its old damage? That way you wouldnt need precision to proc your grandmaster trait in in a tree that has no precision.

I wouldnt mind the trait just moved to curses line and staying the same or changed. I don’t think withering precision or lingering curses is GM worthy lingering only affects 2 skills.

Sil.4560:

With the sort of condition meta as it is now and the ridiculous duration you can achieve with food/runes/traits, I wouldn’t be surprised if in the future we see a mechanic which reduces condition damage itself outside of the very limited cleanses that a lot of classes get.

oh you mean a mechanic like oh I dunno……..other types of food/runes/traits that reduce condition damage?

I’m pretty sure they thought of that…

If you look hard enough you may even find evidence of it in game.

transtemporal.2158:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

It seems what you are asking is for every possible build to have a method of pushing a button to beat their counter, at which point, why does having a counter matter?

Sil lives in a weird reductive world where all characters should have an answer to all other characters attacks. This will apparently lead to a utopia where we have the greatest possible variety in builds and fights will only be determined by “personal skill”.

And this game will be called “Pong”.

Impression I got was that he wants to play Gen 1 Pokemon and use only psychic types, since their only weakness wasn’t a threat (bug type moves, which were all ridiculously weak) and the supposed “counter” for them actually wasn’t (since Ghost was not very effective, had no resistance to psychic, and all were also poison types, so they were weak to psychic anyway).

Azzer.8137:

My warrior has a win ration of problably 80/20 where the 80 is wins for me, and the ones i lose is often because i get picked off when on low health, the weakness for necros in general is CC, knockdown, interrupts, daze, condtion removal and stabilty, see how many counters there are?.

1: stab when entering ds counters CC knckdown, interrupt, daze
2: corrupt boon
3: ???
4: profit

Am i the only one destroying every m/s GS warrior?

take your 30 out of power and put it into Deathshroud/crit dmg.
stop using dhummfire, its horrobile