Guild Wars 2

Anyone speculating that druids will get new pets?

• Nature spirits- ANet probably made utility Nature spirits stationary to differentiate Druid’s Nature spirit vs the utility.
• Spirit pets- Pets but transparent.
• Oakhearts- Because they’re cool.
• Sylvari pets- Just because…

Speaking of spirit pets, Ranger’s F5 skill could be Pet spirit form. It would give them a spirit form that gave them a way better F2 skill. Or morph the druid and pet together to make a transformation like the WoW series.

runeblade.7514:

Anyone speculating that druids will get new pets?

• Nature spirits- ANet probably made utility Nature spirits stationary to differentiate Druid’s Nature spirit and the utility.
• Spirit pets- Pets but transparent.
• Oakhearts- Because they’re cool.
• Sylvari pets- Just because…

Speaking of spirit pets, Ranger’s F5 skill could be Pet spirit form. It would give them a spirit form that gave them a way better F2 skill. Or morph the druid and pet together to make a transformation like the WoW series.

I didn’t really like WoW much from the gameplay point of view.

But if I wanted anything for druid to get – that would definitely be “Nature’s Grasp”.
“Your XYZ ability steals some portion of the enemy magic, removing 2 boons.”

If we are talking about thematic or cosmetic things, I’d want a spiky wall of thorns launching all enemies back. I can see it happen >)

I hope Druids don’t get a transformation. The way Anet does transformations range from novelty to borderline useless.

Wondrouswall.7169:

I hope Druids don’t get a transformation. The way Anet does transformations range from novelty to borderline useless.

This x100.

I hope that druids can transform into dragon like in Neverwinter nights

Maybe the ability to kill 1 mob every 10 minutes with root n rot
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Kappa

Transformations would be the #1 thing i’d want, however i don’t see that as likely. I think we’ll get our own form of Consecrations. AKA area skills that benefit allies.

Durzlla.6295:

Transformations would be the #1 thing i’d want, however i don’t see that as likely. I think we’ll get our own form of Consecrations. AKA area skills that benefit allies.

Yup, I’m thinking so too mate. Consecrations could also affect foes in the same area. They could fulfill both support and CC in the same skill. Say, slow to foes and swiftness to allies in the area, or might to allies and weakness to foes, or stability to allies and cripple to foes. Etc.

Probably more utility than anything. If it’s a huge amount of healing and buffs, I might be interested. If they get more pets out at the same time? I’m sold.

Yeah, something like an AoE Hunter’s Call would be sick too. I’m thinking that the vines attack we see on the video is something along the lines of Zealot’s Embrace but I’m also hoping the animation is just that and it sends out the AoE immobile to the target foes area.

Global teleportation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=TPOu8cLyKhA

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

Yeah, something like an AoE Hunter’s Call would be sick too. I’m thinking that the vines attack we see on the video is something along the lines of Zealot’s Embrace but I’m also hoping the animation is just that and it sends out the AoE immobile to the target foes area.

WH (with regen) will probably be mandatory for a support staff build. The problem is that we don’t have a good main one-handed weapon to fit this role and i don’t see a better group support heal than HS. Enough heal i think, i’d rather like to see something else.

If the staff itself have good AoE and CC, i don’t know if we will recieve team support utilities that much ( i mean, am afraid it could happen). In the vid the staff throw something pretty fast (we don’t know what’s the result) and the vines are probably an addition effect, following the projectile (the cast time is nearly2 s).

Consecration could be nice (but those are utilities with high CD).

sorrychief.2563:

Global teleportation.

Cantrip, Meditation or Manipulation offer a teleport and could also fit the new spec.

In my opinion druids must have 2 things : MOBILITY and DEFENCE
If the staff doesn’ t give mobility..for me..it will be nearly useless in wvw and i will never use it.

borya.2964:

…WH (with regen) will probably be mandatory for a support staff build. The problem is that we don’t have a good main one-handed weapon to fit this role and i don’t see a better group support heal than HS. Enough heal i think, i’d rather like to see something else…

I don’t think I’ll use WH with staff, it is hardly mandatory.
What I will be using is Beastmaster’s Bond, MoC, Remorseless, Resounding Timbre, 2HT, ZS with the other as 3 Druid traits. GS/Staff, “HaO”, LR, “Sic Em”, “Protect Me”, “RaO”, Trooper or Defender Runes. Lots of damage, sustain and still perma regen/swiftness on everyone.

I suppose if you wanted to go full support, you would go quite different, but not a lot of places call for full support.

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

borya.2964:

…WH (with regen) will probably be mandatory for a support staff build. The problem is that we don’t have a good main one-handed weapon to fit this role and i don’t see a better group support heal than HS. Enough heal i think, i’d rather like to see something else…

I don’t think I’ll use WH with staff, it is hardly mandatory.
What I will be using is Beastmaster’s Bond, MoC, Remorseless, Resounding Timbre, 2HT, ZS with the other as 3 Druid traits. GS/Staff, “HaO”, LR, “Sic Em”, “Protect Me”, “RaO”, Trooper or Defender Runes. Lots of damage, sustain and still perma regen/swiftness on everyone.

I suppose if you wanted to go full support, you would go quite different, but not a lot of places call for full support.

I said “support” staff build. Your build is much more selfish (i don’t even see why you would use a staff), i already bring perma swiftness and regen in my party with Guard, but it’s not what i call support. Someone want more heal utilities, i just said that we have enough heal support with HS and WH (with now regen), so in a heal/CC/ boons perspective, i’d like something else. I won’t focus on damage, i’ll keep my ranger for that. I want to try something that ranger could not do before.

Going by Ranger in the announcement trailer, I’m not too excited.

I see a skill that probably roots the Ranger for 3 seconds as the skill charges up. Afterwards I see a slow moving vine move slowly towards its target. It’ll probably get interupted 50% of the time and miss the other 50%.

I’m still curious however, especially to see if the trait line will be any good if you don’t use a staff.

As for the new F5 shortcut. They will probably move Guard/Avoid Combat or the Stow button to it because “Rangers have been asking for this for a long time”.

Yes, well if the staff is a support weapon, then just having it would make you a support build. That’s why I want some damage too, otherwise it’s not contributing a great deal. And that build I described is hardly selfish heh, BB, RT with shouts and troopers runes? Plus the staff/druid traits assuming they are CC/Support.

You are right though, we do have enough healing support already so the staff better not be healing, that would be garbage. If it is CC and party boons/support, it will be great.

Maybe druid change natural spirits to become spirit armor or aura, now spirit command skills trigger near ranger. Nature’s Vengeance would trigger when ranger go downed dont know if elite spirit is then too op. But if they make spirit command like spirit weapons were before, destroyed after one command skill use.

one question guys : If the druid specialization isn’ t great…will you buy the expansion?

Darkness.9732:

one question guys : If the druid specialization isn’ t great…will you buy the expansion?

every elite spec needs to be great other wise people wont buy it. Look at Chronomancer, huge game changing features, expect the same for every elite spec.

threw this idea out in another topic a few days ago:

Bountiful Harvest: roots your pet to the ground (pet can’t move or attack). Pet will now pulse (radius=500) every 10 seconds, this adds 1 stack of might (5s), fury (5s), and protection (5s)(targets =5). 90s CD. pet will remain this way until druid is X distance, pet dies, or F5 is hit again. Master trait to reduce pulse time to 8 seconds.

While pet is rooted, it can have a different F2 ability that could provide another boon like regen, or add a condition to enemies. This would also keep the pet out of your way for a while if you want it to just sit somewhere (up until you get X distance away that is).

EDIT: ill probably get HoT regardless of how the Druid spec is

Seeing how Mesmer got a new skill type … I imagine Druid will get a new skill type as well that is currently unavailable to non-Druid Rangers.

The currently available skill types in-game are listed here

• https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Skill#Skill_types

My guesses for Druid are:

• Consecrations — apply an area effect that aids allies or punishes enemies.
• Wards — areas across the ground that prevent enemies or projectiles from crossing them.
• Cantrips — magical tricks, sorcery, and charms which activate on an instant.

Maybe one of the other Elemental skill types, but they seemed a bit too “arcane” for a Druid thematically.

A staff. Definitely a staff.

Ragnar.1546:

A staff. Definitely a staff.

gasp Are you from the future? ;-)

Well since we’re throwing darts at this point.

No transform please, there’s pretty much none of them in the game worth using. Possibly make F5 similar to an Engy kit where you swap to and from it at will, that’s about the only “transform” I could see being useful.

F5 could be the “sacrifice pet for a boost to your stats” that I would love in zerg situations. I doubt it though and it wouldn’t really fit that you’d have to take druid to do it.

Concecrations would be great, but that kinda steps directly on Guard toes.

F5 could be a version of a warrior burst skill but utility/healing only.

F5 could be a pet transform turning your pet into a “Dire” form of whatever it is for a set time.

Vine wall warding line on staff, make it so.

Staff should be a melee weapon, we have plenty of ranged options. Make sure you give it skills to survive the melee as well. Perhaps an aoe heal at the end of its cleaving AA chain, projectile/regular block, some form of mobility, etc.

Staff with a mix of AoE and support. The Thief stolen skill “Healing Seed” could be good, another water field with a nice animation.

Knox.8462:

Staff with a mix of AoE and support. The Thief stolen skill “Healing Seed” could be good, another water field with a nice animation.

You mean the healing spring that we have had ever since I can remember?
We already have the best water field uptime thanks to this.
It already does everything the Healing Seed does, but better. Not to mention you can get Healing Seeds from a vendor.

That is a horrible idea.

I only want a bonus blast finisher. Other things – I’ll wait to be surprised.

Did anyone notice the fact that in the HoT trailer, when the Druid channels his vine attack thingy, the Alpine Wolf does not attack until the channel is over? Usually, if you use a skill, the pet will immediately attack, yes?

Hope:

• F5 instantly fully heals and/or revives pet – shares cooldown with pet swap (Using it to revive: 60s cooldown. Using it to heal: 20s cooldown.). Basically allows you to keep the same pet instead of swapping it out. Counts as a pet swap for traits.
• Plated Bohemoth new pet (instead of some shoulder item)
• druid trait with 25% movement speed so it doesn’t tie down a utility skill or rune set.
• druid trait that makes spirits invincible.

Tragic Positive.9356:

Knox.8462:

Staff with a mix of AoE and support. The Thief stolen skill “Healing Seed” could be good, another water field with a nice animation.

You mean the healing spring that we have had ever since I can remember?
We already have the best water field uptime thanks to this.
It already does everything the Healing Seed does, but better. Not to mention you can get Healing Seeds from a vendor.

That is a horrible idea.

I only want a bonus blast finisher. Other things – I’ll wait to be surprised.

Good things come in twos, just ask the Staff Ele with its two water fields.

It doesn’t have to be an exact copy, I just like the animation and the idea of an additional water field.

I believe the elite is…

Chop Suey
CD: 180 sec
Radius: 1200

Slam your elemental stick of doom into fresh soil; feeling the power of last nights dinner shatter a thousand pieces of chop sticks creating random elemental effects and apply 25 stacks of bleeding and toilet torment.

I would love to see transformations if they are actually done well. A lot of the specialisations seem to be throwbacks to guild wars 1, and if we look at the guild wars 1 druids (which actually are very much involved with the maguma jungle in GW1, so it fits) you can see the final sentence of the article is “Druids actually shed their physical bodies to become one with nature. The Druids now exist as spirits, appearing similar to Oakhearts.”

this makes me think that some sort of transformation, whether it be tied to the already existing spirits or not, is going to be involved

Has a Norn Ranger

I srsly hope Druid doesn’t get transformations… I have a couple of useless elites that are pretty pathetic

Oh

i bet we are getting Nature Renewal Spirit, we are defenatly getting some dope spirit

For the staf, think World of Warcraft balance druid and resto shaman

“Wrath” has skill 1 for staff
“Entagling Roots” has we can see from the video
Some huge Water Field on 4 or 5 (see Mesmer Staff/Elementalist Staff)

I think that melee skills for the druid staff would be pretty cool, but I honestly don’t think it will happen…

My first guess is that it will be related to the pets, though I don’t see how it could work unless the skills will be buffs or commands, which would simply be too lame for me to believe anet would do it… Unless maybe we could get different spells depending on the family of the pet that we have at the moment, which would be similar to the elementalist switching elements, that could be pretty cool.

So, I think that condition damage spells could make sense… Maybe debuffs, or roots or something like that… They will change how traps work, they will need some time before working, maybe they will use the staff with quicker and better versions of the traps effects, but again, that sounds a little bit “lazy”, IMO…

One thing that occurred to me yesterday is that maybe we will get turrets? I am very new to this game, so I don’t know if there is any race or class that can set those “plant turrets” that we see on caledon forest, but maybe that could be the druid skill… They could fit the druid’s nature theme…

runeblade.7514

Or morph the druid and pet together to make a transformation like the WoW series.

Hey that was my idea!

:D

They have said in the stream that the Druid will be built around using a staff.

Chokolata.1870:

They have said in the stream that the Druid will be built around using a staff.

^^True story.

Ragnar.1546:

Chokolata.1870:

They have said in the stream that the Druid will be built around using a staff.

^^True story.

Lol can’t argue with that ^^

But how would that staff work?

Now that I thought on what I posted I actually think that spells changing accordingly to the pets we have at the moment sounds good. And it would fit both having pets and using the staff…

Elendur.9342:

I think that melee skills for the druid staff would be pretty cool, but I honestly don’t think it will happen…

My first guess is that it will be related to the pets, though I don’t see how it could work unless the skills will be buffs or commands, which would simply be too lame for me to believe anet would do it… Unless maybe we could get different spells depending on the family of the pet that we have at the moment, which would be similar to the elementalist switching elements, that could be pretty cool.

So, I think that condition damage spells could make sense… Maybe debuffs, or roots or something like that… They will change how traps work, they will need some time before working, maybe they will use the staff with quicker and better versions of the traps effects, but again, that sounds a little bit “lazy”, IMO…

One thing that occurred to me yesterday is that maybe we will get turrets? I am very new to this game, so I don’t know if there is any race or class that can set those “plant turrets” that we see on caledon forest, but maybe that could be the druid skill… They could fit the druid’s nature theme…

Sylvari have a utility skill and racial elite that make the plant turrets. They’re pretty weak and the elite is only used for the invulnerability it gives while you summon them.

Aerathnor.8305:

Elendur.9342:

I think that melee skills for the druid staff would be pretty cool, but I honestly don’t think it will happen…

My first guess is that it will be related to the pets, though I don’t see how it could work unless the skills will be buffs or commands, which would simply be too lame for me to believe anet would do it… Unless maybe we could get different spells depending on the family of the pet that we have at the moment, which would be similar to the elementalist switching elements, that could be pretty cool.

So, I think that condition damage spells could make sense… Maybe debuffs, or roots or something like that… They will change how traps work, they will need some time before working, maybe they will use the staff with quicker and better versions of the traps effects, but again, that sounds a little bit “lazy”, IMO…

One thing that occurred to me yesterday is that maybe we will get turrets? I am very new to this game, so I don’t know if there is any race or class that can set those “plant turrets” that we see on caledon forest, but maybe that could be the druid skill… They could fit the druid’s nature theme…

Sylvari have a utility skill and racial elite that make the plant turrets. They’re pretty weak and the elite is only used for the invulnerability it gives while you summon them.

I didn’t knew that, I didn’t play much with my Sylvari, thanks for the info ^^
So, that pretty much shots down one of my guesses ^^

Elendur.9342:

Ragnar.1546:

Chokolata.1870:

They have said in the stream that the Druid will be built around using a staff.

^^True story.

Lol can’t argue with that ^^

But how would that staff work?

Now that I thought on what I posted I actually think that spells changing accordingly to the pets we have at the moment sounds good. And it would fit both having pets and using the staff…

1: Leaf Blower – blows leaves at your victim with a violent gust.
2: Power Mulch – kick up a fuss when your foe tramples on your flowers – knock him down with the power of mulch
3: Splinters – stun foe and rub your staff against the grain on their skin. Inflicts bleeding.
4: Roots of doom – let loose spiraling roots of poison oak and nettles irritating your enemy. Does no damage. (the one we saw in the vid)
5: One with the trees – smear your face in mud, leaves and grass while hiding behind your staff you go invisible.

Elendur.9342:

I didn’t knew that, I didn’t play much with my Sylvari, thanks for the info ^^
So, that pretty much shots down one of my guesses ^^

I may give them a try on my ranger when HoT comes out depending on the skills the staff gives. I’m dreaming of a Frontline shout build using the staff as a support weapon (if it has support skills that is) and the seed turret elite as a way to survive a nasty burst. Probably a GS or S/Wh for my alternate.

All of it is just dreaming until we know more though.

I bet druid will utilise that new resistance boon a lot.
Other than that, immobilizes most certainly (since that’s what vines to in this game apparently).

I don’t recall them saying “Druid was built around using the staff”. I believe they said that the Ranger Staff was implemented before the Druid was implemented so the Druid was implemented with the Staff in mind … as opposed to the Mesmer Chronomancer which was implemented before its weapon (the shield) so was implemented without the shield in mind.

Considering we’re missing Stability Training and Intimidation Training, we might see those moved to the new traitline somehow. However, the cripple might have simply been replaced with the weakness of Writing Strike.

I’m guessing either meditations, mantras, cantrips, or elixers

Wondrouswall.7169:

I hope Druids don’t get a transformation. The way Anet does transformations range from novelty to borderline useless.

Engineer kits is pretty much transformation without the cosmetic change.

If Druids get transformation while using Utility skills, it will be as useful as kits.

That’s a good point runeblade. I hadn’t thought about it like that. That could be quite interesting.

I’m still somewhat doubtful that we’ll get that though unless part of being Druid is that we get locked into one weaponset like engineers as that is part of the trade-off they make for having access to kits.

That being said … they do also have toolbelt skills … so who knows. Fun to think about