Guild Wars 2

DiogoSilva.7089:

Lordrosicky.5813:

I mean we can argue all day about whether it will be good or not. But the bottom line is, good or not, it is just more lame cheese. Single traits which hard counter entire specs AND are passive? Really? Not great.

To be honest, the hard counter is only very temporary, and demands hard work from the ele player to keep the hp that high. For that reason, the new diamond skin is less of a hard counter and less passive than what it might seem at the first glance.

I’d say we should test it first before fully judging it. It’s hard to predict how cheesy it might or might not be at the moment, in my opinion, but something tells me it requires more active input than what you think.

Ele doesnt need buffing.

I agree with this. However, eles don’t need nerfing for their barely viable builds, neither, do they? And I’m not talking about their most popular instant-burst cheese, but just a typical d/d build. In the upcomming changes, eles are going to get some buffs in weak areas, which is cool, and they are going to get some nerfs to compensate for it, which is fair, but d/d builds seem to suffer a bit too much, considering they aren’t that strong nor cheesy. For that reason, I think Anet should consider compensating the indirect nerfs done to d/d by doing some slight buffs exclusive to those builds.

Yeh well. Sometimes for the good of the game your favourite build has to go on some down time. They must nerf all the lame kitten to save this game. This will probably make eles decent to be honest. If it doesnt then more nerfs can come later to make them better. When s/d thief is pretty much responsible for eles not being very common AND this build is getting nerfed then surely ele will be in a way better position.

I forgot one thing:

Please fix illusionary leap!
It is so annoying when the clone just gets stuck somewhere.

Maybe another good idea would be to increase the Stability gained from Mantra of Concentration / Power Break at ~3(,5) Sekonds.
This would basicly allow a Mantra Mesmer to use the Stability gained from Powerbreak to recharge another Mantra.

Lordrosicky.5813:

Empathetic Fighter.2065:

I’m dissapointed you didn’t change anything about the healing-signet. We know warrior need defense in order to be a melee. However, Healing-Signet creates a very passive and cheesy play. It’s boring to see bad warriors are able to perform that well, just because they have an utility in their slot with such a high impact and which doesn’t require no skill in order to succeed.

You should really start to focus and reduce the passive play to bring up the fun-factor of this game. It is not fun to play against Minion-Mancers, CC-Warriors or Spirit-Rangers. All people hate these cheesy builds . . .

Presumably healing signet will be slightly nerfed prior to the 10th december patch

Missed the info. Thanks for it!

The Necromancer changes are a bit worrying, full feedback here: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Dec-10th-Balance-Preview/page/17#post3138558

I think the biggest vigor culprits are actually guardians. Vigorous precision needs a serious nerf. Permanent vigor on the guard is ridiculous

Lordrosicky.5813:

Avead.5760:

^ exactly..losing protection or vigor and evasive arcana sustain will not be a good trade off for just freeing up 20 points that you can dump in earth for a cheesy trait that might not work at all

Ele doesnt need buffing. If necro, s/d thief and spirit ranger get worse then ele will be good again. Nerfs not buffs. That is what they have to do. If you dont agree then fine. But anet finally agree with those, like me, who want nerfs and not just more buffs from clueless forum QQers

Where did i say i wanted ele to get buffed..nosir..no buffs
But..! For all 30 in arcana builds( the current suboptimal kitten that nobody takes into their team but are the best around) the changes are a big nerf.And honestly diamond skin appart from cheese seems pretty crappy too most of the time..1.3k damage ?? thats half a sec sitting in splash aoe in a teamfight or 1 auto of a power class.

Lordrosicky.5813:

Presumably healing signet will be slightly nerfed prior to the 10th december patch

Just out of curiosity, how do you know this?

Why are warrior tactics minors still absolute garbage…cmon now <.<

JonathanSharp.7094:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

/grumble

Confounding Suggestions.. Ugh. I’d rather the stun. The daze duration synergizes beautifully with Runes of the Mesmer (which also needs a buff)

All of the changes are kind of awesome, but Confounding Suggestions barely merited Grandmaster as it is. What makes it so good is that the 50% stun chance makes it MUCH easier to chance down fleeing opponents as well as escape crappy situations. Increasing daze duration takes that away, but gives us the potential (w/Mesmer runes) for a near 2-second daze, making the DazeMantra -> OH SwordDaze -> DazeMantra combo into a beastly 6-second daze… assuming they don’t just run away from you.

I’d much rather them make the 25-point in Domination grant a 20% daze duration increase. The Confounding change is still barely grandmaster-worthy IMO, if its an addition to the stun chance, then it becomes freakin’ glorious and totally worth the 30 points.

Thanks for the feedback. We had the same discussion internally on that one. Back in alpha/beta, there were lockdown Mesmer builds that COULD keep someone down for 6-7 seconds…and it was brutal.

We’re afraid to go back to that, but as you can tell with these changes, we do want to augment the current Mesmer’s efficacy in regard to shutdown. It can just be scary if we go too high with it…..so we’ll think this one over some more.

The problem that occurred however is instead of a mesmer keeping one person locked down for 6-7s we ran into warriors that could keep entire points locked down for 3+seconds and single person locked down for much much longer…..

If you want mesmer to be a “control” class… Don’t make warrior better at it than we are.

There are definitely some good changes in the preview, but the one thing I find a tad disconcerting is that there is so much focus on Traits when a number of problems surround the actual skills and balancing should start there.

One of the biggest issues I’ve noticed since launch is that some weapons across professions have autoattacks that are weaker than they should be and end up crippling the whole set (in every game mode really) since most rely on the autoattack to supply the baseline DPS.

There are a number of examples, but the most egregious ones are probably:

Thief/Engineer Pistol
Guardian/Mesmer Scepter
Warrior Longbow (recently fixed only on Ranger).
Thief Shortbow (fixed near launch on Ranger)

The autoattacks on all of these weapons feel sluggish for their damage specs, which seems to be the result of poorly tuned aftercasts, and it makes them feel feeble when trying to use them outside of specialized situations where you can exploit other skills within the set.

It’s a particularly big problem for the Thief (why there are so many P/P complaints) due to the Initiative system – it’s very important for the autoattack to be the ‘primary’ damage skill while the other skills are more utilitarian. Currently, that’s not how P/P works – Unload is the primary damage skill and it keeps you in a state of perpetual resource starvation and crippled mobility. Pistol Mastery was buffed a while back to help fix the damage problem on P/P, but it was a poor fix because it made the trait overpowered and disproportionately benefited Unload over Vital Shot when it should have been the opposite. Please do another review pass on that.

I see all the changes in the ele traits to be an overall nerf to the currently barely viable builds existing (D/D eles in particular, heavy water and arcana builds) and an opportunity to create more gimmicky, cheesy, however still useless builds via the other trait lines. lol

Quick question. Will the game ever see changes to the core gamesystems? Changing the way traits, sigils, etc. work?

Is the game ever gonna evolve from the passiveness it is now to the active/skill-based game we all want it to be?

Overall, this is the best list of changes I have seen in any update from an ‘you get it’ point of view. So that is very encouraging. Not to say there aren’t things to nitpick over. But still, reasonably solid list.

I also thinks its great that you are using the community resource prior to releasing. Maybe there is something here that will wildly effect the game in a way not forseen and someone can head that possibility off.

Larynx.2453:

silvermember.8941:

… Does it make sense for a class that has higher hp, more toughness, 5 second weapon [swap] to have more mobility than a class that has 3/5 its HP? …

… Elementalists have 20 weapon skills, yet a warrior only has 10 …

/em dumbfounded
Correction sir. The Ele can equip 40 skills if you count conjure, and can spread those skills to one other player with each conjure cast. The warrior could be the other one to pick up the conjured weapon. Also, if you count the skill of the Elementals, then an Ele can equip 30 active skills + 20 passive skills (pets). Maybe the Ele should be confined to a lounge chair with all those choices, or a straight jacket for showing up to play.

mistsim.2748:

I think the biggest vigor culprits are actually guardians. Vigorous precision needs a serious nerf. Permanent vigor on the guard is ridiculous

I can understand what you mean, however that would significantly nerf guardians. They have no means to escape or reset fights efficiently. Vigorous Precision is what helps them with survival.

First impression: Awesome!

Excited for these changes, but I do not think it will make a very big difference in the overall pvp experience.

what dps guardian needs is something related to swiftness/cripple/stun in his actual build(10.30.30.0.0)
he is useless with his greatsword if your teleport is in CD, you cannot even autoattack with it.
there is also a problem with his main dps: scepter autoattack, even if it is now faster it still gets obstructed, but the most important problem is that when you fight against ranger – necro with pets, that autoattack hits those pets intead of the enemy character so it is useless

It seems like there are too many changes just because of one build, Hambow. It usually looks something like this – although I focus more on might stacking than the standard version.

Reducing the damage of Earthshaker seems like a crude way to go about it. What makes it have the potential to hit as hard as it does comes from the fact that the stun is applied before the damage. After the stun, the damage gets increased from the trait Merciless Hammer as well as getting the extra crit chance from UF. It also gains a damage increase from Burst Mastery which is why it’s getting nerfed as well.

But what if you just had the damage apply before the stun? Then it would not only have a much lesser chance to crit, it would also not gain the damage increase from MH.You could do the same to Skull Crack as well. Also, why not reduce the bonus damage gained from MH instead of nerfing Burst Mastery? Nerfing Burst Mastery just due to one skill doesn’t seem fair to other burst skills. In addition, rather than moving Unsuspecting Foe why not simply reduce the +crit chance instead? Making it around 25%-30% would make it useful, but not lead to skills like Earthshaker and Skull Crack almost always criting.

I get that you want the damage output to be reduced, but you are hitting it from so many angles it may start to hit just as low as a Guardian with Hammer. What good is a Warrior that has less sustain than a Guardian but has only slightly more CC and the same damage output? With the proposed changes you are nerfing the damage of the Hambow build in four areas: critical hit chance, ES damage, Staggering Blow damage, and Burst Mastery damage. If CC Warrior just becomes a slightly inferior version of Guardian, people probably won’t be as willing to run one. I for one have a lot of fun using Hammer in it’s current form, but I fear hitting it in so many areas will make it not worth taking over other weapons.

Summary of suggestions:
- Reducing the +crit chance from Unsuspecting Foe to 25%-30%
- Reduce the bonus damage from Merciless Hammer rather than nerfing Burst Mastery
- Have the damage from Earthshaker and Skull Crack be applied before the stun so that they crit less often.

These changes do not majorly effect any other weapon besides hammer, and lowers the DPS just enough so that it isn’t as strong as it is now – but still has enough that it is worth bringing.

Maybe they could make Mantra more like Ranger Spirits xD

Working like this:
Casttime ~1s
When you cast the Mantra, you receive for 10-X seconds the “Mantra Buff” which allows you to use the Mantraskills (Power Break etc.) as often as you want BUT there is a Cooldown after every use.

When the time is over, the Mantraskill goes on Cooldown.

This would integrate Mantras much more into the combat, instead of “chrage → fight → charge again”.

Ele – The change in attunement CD might open things up a bit more. Seems to be the most dramatic change of the bunch.

Engi – Like the speedy kits change. Better healing on bomb kit seems like it could make the amount of healing problematic, but we’ll see. Engis already healed for an awful lot.

Guard – Meh. Nice buffs, but I don’t see anything world changing. DPS will be marginally stronger though.

Mesmer – Ugh. I-Celerity didn’t need to go back down. A less clutter dependent Mesmer would have been my preference. They can get away with Mantras easier now, so at least there is more diversity.

Necro – Nice shave on bleeds. I don’t see the other changes really bringing anything new into viability. You probably just wind up with more Terror Necros going to double Geomancy sigils for a bit more burst.

Ranger – Like the Spirit shave, bout time. Zerker LB/GS will be more dangerous now.

Thief – D/P finally got Smiter’s Boon-ed. S/x will be markedly less effective with a cast on #2 return. The initiative changes will take some playing with to really feel, but I am guessing that this opens up a bit more diversity.

Warrior – Wow. Ham/Bow got destroyed. Still gonna be a bunch of Warriors though due to HS and other sustain tools going unchanged.

All-in all not too bad at a glance. Best changes are to Necro IMO. Looks just about right. Worst change is to Mesmer (again IMO). Really just wish Phantasms would disappear and Mesmers would get actual skill based damage output.

First off, thanks so much for giving us a preview of your thoughts. Definitely appreciate the open communication. As for feedback —

Elementalist
Very happy with the decision to lower the base cooldown of attunement recharge. A rework of the arcana tree and its benefits has been needed for a long time. It will be interesting to see which builds can rise up out of that. That being said…
— Fire II / Burning Fire — I would love to see this become an active trait, rather than a passive one. Having some condi clear access in Fire is a great idea but making it passive defeats the purpose.
— Air XI / Tempest Defense — Waiting to see this in action before I can pass any judgment, should be a big change
— Diamond Skin — I personally like this trait; it’s not nearly as passive as everyone is suggesting. Power damage coming from condi builds should still easily pass the 90% threshold and will allow the ele to have some weird interplay w/ condi builds. Main concern I can think of at the moment is this trait coupled with Ether Renewal
— Water I / V — please reconsider moving water V. It is not really strong enough for a master tier trait and will give eles very few trait options for condi clear
— Arcana V / VI — similar as previous feedback. Moving both is overkill and will seriously damage current builds. Elemental Attunement is basically baseline for Eles at this point; frankly, it should be. Making it less accessible will not be so great for the class.
— Blasting Staff — Solid change.

Engineer
— Incendiary Powder — Slight nerf to straight grenade builds but was definitely too much for a 10 point investment.
— Accelerant Packed Turrets — inb4 really kittening annoying engi builds
— Speedy Kits — Probably the biggest nerf for engis in the patch. Can’t disagree with less vigor uptime in general, but worried about the implications of certain classes having big hits against others with little vigor

Thief
Overall the initiative gain reduction will probably be good for the longevity of the game. It’ll force thieves to time their skills better and not be able to be absurdly relentless. Again one of those changes I’d like to see in action before speaking either way.
— Shadow Return — this skill is certainly a culprit for a strong build but adding a cast time is going to have negative long term effects for thief sword builds — fear a thief with their stunbreak down after they use Infiltrator’s Strike = gg
— Infusion of Shadow — Sorry Cruuk

Warrior
— Unsuspecting Foe — Thank god.
The rest of the changes look generally good — happy with the shaving here.

Thanks again for giving us a preview and for considering our responses! Very ready for this meta to be shaken up.

ImProVocateur.5189:

Larynx.2453:

silvermember.8941:

… Does it make sense for a class that has higher hp, more toughness, 5 second weapon [swap] to have more mobility than a class that has 3/5 its HP? …

… Elementalists have 20 weapon skills, yet a warrior only has 10 …

/em dumbfounded
Correction sir. The Ele can equip 40 skills if you count conjure, and can spread those skills to one other player with each conjure cast. The warrior could be the other one to pick up the conjured weapon. Also, if you count the skill of the Elementals, then an Ele can equip 30 active skills + 20 passive skills (pets). Maybe the Ele should be confined to a lounge chair with all those choices, or a straight jacket for showing up to play.

Maybe you should practice reading comprehension too.

First set of changes in a long time that seem to be in the right direction. ANet doing a better job of rebuilding confidence in the PvP community.

That being said, it was long overdue. Reversing the damage/negativity of ~6 months will be an uphill battle.

A trait like Diamond Skin is poorly designed… A cooler trait idea might be an Earth GM trait that reads

Immune to burning while attuned to fire
Immune to blind while attuned to air
Immune to chill while attuned to water
Immune to bleed while attuned to earth

This would promote active play: say you’re been chased by a shortbow 1 spamming spirit ranger? switch to earth and negate a huge chunk of his damage. It also would promote active play by opponents and it would be definitely worthy of a GM trait

Krafty.9758:

Thedenofsin.7340:

ensoriki.5789:

All you have to do is drop 10% of health, why are people tripping?

If Necromancers had a trait that made them immune to direct damage until you dealt condition damage equal to 10% of their hp, you wouldn’t complain?

Apples n Oranges….. Necros have a higher health pool than elementalists, so 10% damage needed against a necro is more of a big deal than an ele needing 10% damage done to itself. And lets not forget about DS for the necro.

Max ele health pool is ~20k. Max necro is around 28k. That’s only an 800hp difference. If you like, make the necro version threshold 93% of hp. Then it’s the same. Death Shroud does not regen hp. Elementalists get all kinds of heals and regen.

About Warriors…

I don’t liked Long Bow changes, this forces LB users to go condition builds due to buff in burning damage and Nerf in raw damage.
1 pulse every 3 seconds destroy the aoe effect, because after dodge 1 pulse, the foe will have more 2 or 2,5 seconds safe if the field. Was an insane nerf! Thieves, Rangers, Mesmers, Necros and Guardians just will dance over combustive area
Not forgetting the unnecessary base damage Nerf in Staggering Blow and Earthshaker, the simple fact of remove 10 points of Defense or Discipline for spend in Arms is a huge nerf in damage, sustain and recharge rate. Unsuspecting Foe could affect disabled foes instead only stunned (this allow this trait to synergy with physical skills, juggernaut, rifle, mace, banner, etc… Increase build diversity)
Now we will not be able to react to these classes without AoE CC, damage or/and conditions

I agree with build diversification

Defense: Good and long time needed tweak in Armored Attack and Spiked Armor But we still depending of defense tree to have some sustain
Merciless Hammer and Surrendering Mace need be mixed as one single trait, because isn’t possible use Mace/Sheld + Hammer without sacrifice Cleansing Ire and one of Grandmaster Traits. the new trait need increase Hammer and Mace damage in 10% against disabled foes, and decrease skill recharge of both in 20%.
Rabid warriors may become more popular. I fear that next QQ about warriors may be about conditions and passive heal.
Strength: I think burst skill could synergy better with Building Momentum (not need to hit the foe for trigger. Cleansing Ire could work in the same way). Stick and Move could increase damage in 10%, 25trait points for 3% extra damage looks underpowered and not attractive
Arms: WvW warriors get buff with Rifle + GS or Rifle + Sword/???, this will be good for build diversification. But this tree need synergy better with other weapons, due be important for power and condition builds. I think two simple things could make this tree fine, attractive, and agree better with warrior theme:
Critical Burst - Move to major adept tier.
Furious Speed - Move to minor minor master tier. Need increase movement, action and skill speed in 10% (as they says, warrior rules in “speed”, etc… Movement this need stack with quickness movement speed boosters).
Blademaster could be sent to Discipline Major Master and mixed with Sharpened Axe, because isn’t possible use GS + Mh Sword without sacrifice one of Grandmaster traits.
Tactics: Leg Specialist need immobilize for 2s instead 1s, or in last case need have CD decreased from 5s to 3s.
Burning Arrows need be sent to Major Adept and mixed with Stronger Bowstring, because isn’t possible use LB and Warhorn without sacrifice one of two Grandmaster traits.
Discipline: Thrill of the Kill is completely useless. I think this trait could be more attractive if gain health on kill (need scale well with heal power).
Versatile Power could grant 3 stacks of might instead 1
Burst Mastery: I don’t liked of Nerf in this trait because affects all weapons, even that needing buff. Now Axe, Sword, Hammer and Greatsword f1 will become completely weak and useless in terms os raw damage

For now it’s all. Gl to Anet.

Jetwing.

— Shadow Return — this skill is certainly a culprit for a strong build but adding a cast time is going to have negative long term effects for thief sword builds — fear a thief with their stunbreak down after they use Infiltrator’s Strike = gg

Lol shadow return never did anything against fear ever since they removed the stunbreak. You still keep on running even after you port back.

Excalibur.9748:

— Shadow Return — this skill is certainly a culprit for a strong build but adding a cast time is going to have negative long term effects for thief sword builds — fear a thief with their stunbreak down after they use Infiltrator’s Strike = gg

Lol shadow return never did anything against fear ever since they removed the stunbreak. You still keep on running even after you port back.

Not true.

Fear is a condition, and it has also a very high priority.

Shadw return cleansed fear if it didn’t proc burning with a dhuumfire crit. Same for signet of agility.

But it’s not the point: instant shadow return allowed the thief to teleport away from necros-engie condi spam after a stun/wars stunlocks, now it won’t be possible anymore.

basically you’l be dead after the first stunbreak. If this is the case than there’s no point in bringing sword over a dagger ( since dagger deals more damage).

Sad part is that dagger is not capable to handle common meta builds ( reason why most D/P lovers quit the game, also due to D/P being one of the highest skill cap sets in the whole game).

thief won’t be viable after this patch.

Aza.2105:

mistsim.2748:

I think the biggest vigor culprits are actually guardians. Vigorous precision needs a serious nerf. Permanent vigor on the guard is ridiculous

I can understand what you mean, however that would significantly nerf guardians. They have no means to escape or reset fights efficiently. Vigorous Precision is what helps them with survival.

Elementalists need it even more…

infantrydiv.1620:

A trait like Diamond Skin is poorly designed… A cooler trait idea might be an Earth GM trait that reads

Immune to burning while attuned to fire
Immune to blind while attuned to air
Immune to chill while attuned to water
Immune to bleed while attuned to earth

This would promote active play: say you’re been chased by a shortbow 1 spamming spirit ranger? switch to earth and negate a huge chunk of his damage. It also would promote active play by opponents and it would be definitely worthy of a GM trait

Sounds OP, but daaamnit, it would be AMAZING! =O

Mrbig.8019:

thief won’t be viable after this patch.

Perhaps an overreaction. The increase to initiative regen is a huge deal. It extends the thief ability to stay in combat for longer durations which means that some builds that were just too initiative intensive will suddenly be playable. Overall though I do think that the changes to thief will dramatically change the way that it gets played. D/P will be even more burst or bust than it was previously and S/D will probably give way to S/P. We’ll see how it comes out. D/D might actually become the “best” with this set of changes though. Really hard to say the impact until you see how the initiative changes play because it is such a profession defining mechanic.

will the hammer nerfs be for pvp and pve?

As an ele-only player, I’m not happy with the changes announced. I like that you guys are trying to remove dependancy on arcana traits but I also believe you’re going the wrong way. Evasive arcana is by far the best trait any ele can take for spvp and it’s still there, as a grandmaster trait. So, not going 30 in arcana would mean losing a LOT for the player even if the passive arcana bonuses get shaved. To sum it all up, I like the way you guys were thinking but I believe this will not realise what you intended. It will only destroy D/D completely, it will mostly leave S/D fresh air untouched, it will destroy S/D valks (cuz of the water traits) and it will introduce a clingy condi/bunkerish ele which will most probably suck kitten . The dependancy on arcana will remain, 2 builds will be gone and maybe 1 will be introduced.

infantrydiv.1620:

A trait like Diamond Skin is poorly designed… A cooler trait idea might be an Earth GM trait that reads

Immune to burning while attuned to fire
Immune to blind while attuned to air
Immune to chill while attuned to water
Immune to bleed while attuned to earth

This would promote active play: say you’re been chased by a shortbow 1 spamming spirit ranger? switch to earth and negate a huge chunk of his damage. It also would promote active play by opponents and it would be definitely worthy of a GM trait

That sounds so awesome.

Myrmidian Eudoros.4671:

Mrbig.8019:

thief won’t be viable after this patch.

Perhaps an overreaction. The increase to initiative regen is a huge deal. It extends the thief ability to stay in combat for longer durations which means that some builds that were just too initiative intensive will suddenly be playable. Overall though I do think that the changes to thief will dramatically change the way that it gets played. D/P will be even more burst or bust than it was previously and S/D will probably give way to S/P. We’ll see how it comes out. D/D might actually become the “best” with this set of changes though. Really hard to say the impact until you see how the initiative changes play because it is such a profession defining mechanic.

You might have been right about extended time in combat if not for the changes to our vigor. I argue would after the change to LS it looked like more thiefs were already shifting to Sp but with added cast time to IS Sp will be hit just as hard kitten. Most thiefs in tpvp didnt really spec to heaving into SA anyway so even after changes I still believe Dp with be the thiefs strongest and most complete set. Overall this patch will create less diversity by destroying two thief sets( sd and sp).

Also I have started noticing and increase in mesmers(mostly with GS) which imo counters s/x thief spec pretty well. Being about to juke around doesn’t help much since it doesn’t drop target. I would say in the current state Mesmers already have a slight advantage over thiefs and it will be worse after patch.

DPS guardians needing buffs has been pretty debatable for a while now, but can i just suggest that ANET stops power creeping us and focuses on more important things? I main a dps guard, and i have for quite a while, so im not against all these free damage increases, like the fury from last patch, and traits like the 5% sword damage trait becoming 10% in the december patch, but i think many would agree with me when i say that powercreeping DPS guardian builds is a terrible idea. The burst we have is amazing, regardless of how reliant on cooldowns it may be, but the problem I see is that no matter how much damage a DPS guardian has, or how much survivability they can have, it still feels like they have no purpose in any composition other than to just kill people when our CDs are up. Increasing our damage output here and there wont really give us a purpose. I have a long list of ideas that one day id like to send over to ANET, but as the forums lately have even more enraged QQ than normally, i think posting them would only get shot down pretty fast by everyone whos ever been globalled by a guardian, making them forever convinced that theyre “OP” or something.

P.S. if one more guardian sends me a 30 zeal build and says its amazing, and i dont know what im talking about, i may very well rip my hair out.

stobes.9254:

DPS guardians needing buffs has been pretty debatable for a while now, but can i just suggest that ANET stops power creeping us and focuses on more important things? I main a dps guard, and i have for quite a while, so im not against all these free damage increases, like the fury from last patch, and traits like the 5% sword damage trait becoming 10% in the december patch, but i think many would agree with me when i say that powercreeping DPS guardian builds is a terrible idea. The burst we have is amazing, regardless of how reliant on cooldowns it may be, but the problem I see is that no matter how much damage a DPS guardian has, or how much survivability they can have, it still feels like they have no purpose in any composition other than to just kill people when our CDs are up. Increasing our damage output here and there wont really give us a purpose. I have a long list of ideas that one day id like to send over to ANET, but as the forums lately have even more enraged QQ than normally, i think posting them would only get shot down pretty fast by everyone whos ever been globalled by a guardian, making them forever convinced that theyre “OP” or something.

P.S. if one more guardian sends me a 30 zeal build and says its amazing, and i dont know what im talking about, i may very well rip my hair out.

Well said my friend

Phadde.7362:

infantrydiv.1620:

A trait like Diamond Skin is poorly designed… A cooler trait idea might be an Earth GM trait that reads

Immune to burning while attuned to fire
Immune to blind while attuned to air
Immune to chill while attuned to water
Immune to bleed while attuned to earth

This would promote active play: say you’re been chased by a shortbow 1 spamming spirit ranger? switch to earth and negate a huge chunk of his damage. It also would promote active play by opponents and it would be definitely worthy of a GM trait

Sounds OP, but daaamnit, it would be AMAZING! =O

Ele has an extremely small HP pool that can really be decimated by burning/bleeding unlike classes like warrior/necro. I don’t think this would be overpowered if it was placed as a GM trait in the earth line (even though I don’t know much about eles). And remember, as soon as they switched attunements they could once again be hit with the conditions. Most high level tournament eles switch attunements frequently so it would be a way of adding a new level of skill to damage/soft cc prevention

Thank you for this thread, and listening to us, allowing our feedback to be heard this way is very refreshing.

I play a Ranger, I’m not very good with numbers, but I can tell you how the class feels for me in wvw .

1.I feel like the Longbow is very underpowered, and requires a lot more traits than other weapons to become viable compared to other weapons, I understand that it’s a slippery slope considering it’s range, however the marksmanship trait line needs some slimming down, 1500 range should be an aspect of the weapon, not a trait.

2. Spirits are very weak, don’t feel intuitive to activate and use. They go down very quickly in wvw, and it feels like those skills are taking up space, rather than giving a viable playstyle.

3. The “does more damage at x range” mechanic on the longbow is weird, if there’s a reason for it’s existence I’d love to hear it.

4. I’d like to play more with the sword, but find it too annoying to take it off auto attack and spam my 1 key so I can move.

5. Is there any plans for axe/axe to get better? I love the playstyle, but the damage is very weak.

6. I like pets, but they have a hard time hitting enemies, especially cone attacks. I’d love to see cone attacks just become aoe circles, the drakes breath is way to hard to get lined up.

That’s all that I can say bothers me with my class, I hope this style of engagement continue with the players, this really is a great game.

infantrydiv.1620:

Phadde.7362:

infantrydiv.1620:

A trait like Diamond Skin is poorly designed… A cooler trait idea might be an Earth GM trait that reads

Immune to burning while attuned to fire
Immune to blind while attuned to air
Immune to chill while attuned to water
Immune to bleed while attuned to earth

This would promote active play: say you’re been chased by a shortbow 1 spamming spirit ranger? switch to earth and negate a huge chunk of his damage. It also would promote active play by opponents and it would be definitely worthy of a GM trait

Sounds OP, but daaamnit, it would be AMAZING! =O

Ele has an extremely small HP pool that can really be decimated by burning/bleeding unlike classes like warrior/necro. I don’t think this would be overpowered if it was placed as a GM trait in the earth line (even though I don’t know much about eles). And remember, as soon as they switched attunements they could once again be hit with the conditions. Most high level tournament eles switch attunements frequently so it would be a way of adding a new level of skill to damage/soft cc prevention

This is a great suggestion, but I would stay away from the primary damaging condis and instead say:

Fire: Chill
Air: Weakness
Earth: Cripple
Water: Poison (although maybe even burning, as just sitting in water isn’t really viable, and this doesn’t cleanse them).

Empathetic Fighter.2065:

I’m dissapointed you didn’t change anything about the healing-signet. We know warrior need defense in order to be a melee. However, Healing-Signet creates a very passive and cheesy play. It’s boring to see bad warriors are able to perform that well, just because they have an utility in their slot with such a high impact and which doesn’t require no skill in order to succeed.

You should really start to focus and reduce the passive play to bring up the fun-factor of this game. It is not fun to play against Minion-Mancers, CC-Warriors or Spirit-Rangers. All people hate these cheesy builds . . .

You´re not serious, are you? The problem is not HS. Wars problem is only ONE (Hambow) Build. Warrior is in a good position, far apart from beeing op. The real problem in this game are STILL the insane conditions and minions.

mistsim.2748:

I think the biggest vigor culprits are actually guardians. Vigorous precision needs a serious nerf. Permanent vigor on the guard is ridiculous

No that’s Engineer.

At least Guardian’s need to get a crit for Vigor, Engineer can have permanent Vigor and Swiftness just by kit swapping. In and out of combat.
Plus being able to throw Grenades and condi spam behind you while running away >.<

infantrydiv.1620:

A trait like Diamond Skin is poorly designed… A cooler trait idea might be an Earth GM trait that reads

Immune to burning while attuned to fire
Immune to blind while attuned to air
Immune to chill while attuned to water
Immune to bleed while attuned to earth

This would promote active play: say you’re been chased by a shortbow 1 spamming spirit ranger? switch to earth and negate a huge chunk of his damage. It also would promote active play by opponents and it would be definitely worthy of a GM trait

This is a really good suggestion.

BakiSaN.9281:

As an ele-only player, I’m not happy with the changes announced. I like that you guys are trying to remove dependancy on arcana traits but I also believe you’re going the wrong way. Evasive arcana is by far the best trait any ele can take for spvp and it’s still there, as a grandmaster trait. So, not going 30 in arcana would mean losing a LOT for the player even if the passive arcana bonuses get shaved. To sum it all up, I like the way you guys were thinking but I believe this will not realise what you intended. It will only destroy D/D completely, it will mostly leave S/D fresh air untouched, it will destroy S/D valks (cuz of the water traits) and it will introduce a clingy condi/bunkerish ele which will most probably suck kitten . The dependancy on arcana will remain, 2 builds will be gone and maybe 1 will be introduced.

Think you’re exaggerating. Evasive Arcana is indeed amazing, but it does not mean that every build would benefit from taking it. I think they did it the right way, but I would love to see some more interesting GM traits elsewhere.

BakiSaN.9281:

As an ele-only player, I’m not happy with the changes announced. I like that you guys are trying to remove dependancy on arcana traits but I also believe you’re going the wrong way. Evasive arcana is by far the best trait any ele can take for spvp and it’s still there, as a grandmaster trait. So, not going 30 in arcana would mean losing a LOT for the player even if the passive arcana bonuses get shaved. To sum it all up, I like the way you guys were thinking but I believe this will not realise what you intended. It will only destroy D/D completely, it will mostly leave S/D fresh air untouched, it will destroy S/D valks (cuz of the water traits) and it will introduce a clingy condi/bunkerish ele which will most probably suck kitten . The dependancy on arcana will remain, 2 builds will be gone and maybe 1 will be introduced.

Think you’re exaggerating. Evasive Arcana is indeed amazing, but it does not mean that every build would benefit from taking it. I think they did it the right way, but I would love to see some more interesting GM traits elsewhere.

… Actually, replace interesting with amazing.

As I already mentioned in the necromancer forum, for necros this is a completely pointless skill change. It doesn’t address any of the actual issues with the class, and kind of dances around the real problems that we all know of. This is nothing but creative number juggling, with really small numbers. The changes to Weakening Shroud probably hurt the class far worse than the balance team realizes, and it only further weakens the class in PVE (specifically in regards to burst survival, which was already destroyed with the changes to Death Shroud a few nerfs back).

The necromancer needs a PVE balance patch, not a PVP balance patch.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

The necromancer needs a PVE balance patch, not a PVP balance patch.

these es Structured PvP forum if you want to cry about pve go to pve forum necromancer need a nerf for pvp and atm i’m playing necro.

Sheslat.6750:

these es Structured PvP forum if you want to cry about pve go to pve forum necromancer need a nerf for pvp and atm i’m playing necro.

Yeah, no. Any PvP change to the necro IS a PVE change to the necro. So this is the correct forum to point that out. Also, your argument does not address the fact that there are some much bigger issues with the class that are still being neglected. This balance patch does not address any of those big issues.

As a player who plays ONLY necromancer, this upcoming balance patch is just a colossal waste of time. And I can hardly imagine any other necros agreeing that this is good for the class. I’m not saying the class is okay as it is. Far from it. But these are not the aspects of the necro that the balance team should be focusing on. We all know what the real issues are. The necromancer forum is full of hundreds of topics on those issues.

Please, stop moving minor numbers around, and solve the real issues.

• Necros need more mobility. The balance team disagrees, but they do need it. And you can’t keep dancing around this problem. Especially if you keep weakening the class further, and weakening their defenses.
• Necros need burst survival, both in pvp, wvw and pve. The old change to DS already hurt the necro’s burst survival potential, and the change to Weakening Shroud ruins our burst survival even further. This balance patch is doing exactly the opposite of what we need.
• The condition cap needs to be addressed. Hot issue number one, and we all know it.