Guild Wars 2

Totally agree and support the OP.

Guys, Planetside 2 is amazing.

This isn’t about “pulling rank,” it’s about citing plain observation in the 5v5 environment. Hey that’s great that there’s a handful of players on the very best teams carrying the deficiency of the non-cookie cutter build. I’m positive I could look pro running a ranger with 4 other top players too. The point is that the viability of any other than the one or two accepted roles/builds of each class is not as effective as the ones people have min/maxed out. You super neckbeards with 400+ tpvp games are sitting there and honestly saying you’ve seen a wide diversity of comps and builds that are competitive? Really? No, I mean: really? Has anyone dared convention and NOT run a guardian in a premade that doesn’t want to get stomped? Is a 5 ranger comp viable? Is there anybody that doesn’t bring a mes or trebkill ele to Khylo? Anyone running an all 5 dps role comp that consistently wins?

Just because things go fast and there’s lots of pretty lights doesn’t make for a diverse pvp experience. There’s little depth or options available in 5v5 or 8v8 for that matter if you don’t want to die and lose repeatedly.

Does the OP even have like 10 tpvp wins?

Guess what sparky, veterans of 5v5 do all the things you mention in your post. Have you tried any other spec besides the couple of fotm ele builds? Well go on, try one, and you’ll see why people who have much greater pvp experience than you are getting frustrated, and you’ll understand what they mean when they say GW2 lacks diversity. I dare you to experiment with a non-bunker ele spec, and watch how utterly useless you are in both 8v8 and 5v5. You’ll put out laughable burst, while folding like paper to shatter mes or 3 button wonder thief/war. Try your diverse ele build in tpvp, and be a waste of a party slot while trying to take points from an unkillable bunker or get easily ganked by a roaming dps. You don’t need to refute, in my 300+ tpvp games (still not a lot of games compared to some of the hardcore still around playing paid) i’ve seen the “diversity” of GW2, and watched non-cookie cutter builds get destroyed. Tried a couple myself, and got destroyed.

So this is what was promised? Everyone bunker or burst, every team comp nearly identical in 5v5, and every pubstomp build the same in 8v8? I just wished the marketing material was as clear, I wouldn’t of bothered spending the 60 bones.

Teabaker.9524:

Just go something like this (I didn’t really care what to skill, I just wnated to play a broken shatter-mesmer). Start with greatsword…

I had no clue what i’m doing but I still won all 1v1.

So you won some 1v1’s in 8v8 against other clueless players, and that’s proof positive that mes is OP? Wow. How many tourney wins on your fotm gs/sword/pistol build? Zero I bet. Protip: gs is garbage, for garbage players.

Mes is fine. Other classes need a buff. I play mes because I was sick of bunkering with my champion genius engie, and wanted to do rdps. I’d be perfectly happy still playing engie if there was a viable dps spec, but there isn’t for the tpvp meta (other classes have the same issue, pigeon-holed into a single role because any other spec sucks).

And that’s the gag with this game: the meta is what screws everyone into playing 1 or 2 specs for every class, and those 1 or 2 specs perform differently in 8v8 and 5v5. Regardless, it comes down to the same cookie-cutter builds and group comps for either. I can’t pubstomp 8v8 on my bunker engie, but bunkers get complained about anyway, meanwhile 8v8 doesn’t matter yet some scrub thinks that because a class is effective in nub-dominated zerg pvp it should be nerfed. Anet should’ve just had everyone play ranger, and there would be no complaints.

The problem is this game’s depth. The meta is burst vs bunker only, there’s no subtlety or creativity if you want to be effective. Only the skill floor seems to separate choices in classes, thief/war for ez mode 3 button pubstomp, or do the same thing with my staff/scepter/pistol mes with a few more button pushes. Or go bunker for tpvp, which I haven’t bothered for weeks to even find a group, done with “pvp tank” playstyle.

Anet should’ve given every class a viable bunker or burst build if they were going to stick with conquest map-only pvp, but each class only got one or the other. I predict this upcoming patch will give bandaid nerfs to gaurd/thief/mes, and pretty much leave everything else the way it is. Ah well, Planetside 2 releases soon. Sorry this turned into a rant about pvp meta, but GW2 is just another mmo that had great potential in pvp but got ownd by typical corporatist bullkitten.

Hiba is a grumpy Frenchy, with granules in his bikini area.

Oh Cogbyrn, you’re little wordgames are amusing to be sure. You make some snide comment about political brinksmanship, then say something obtuse like “uh, where did I say people were playing D3, I just want facts.” Okay bud. Anyone capable of using Google can get linked to Forbes and read for themselves.

The rest of your post is riddled with the same condescending, pejorative tripe, even citing some kind of inferred IRL resume. What a joke. The point of my statement was to cite gamer demographics, and how values change when it comes to leisure activity. You’ll notice that my statements didn’t include me attempting to prop up some typical consulting gig (“requested by name,” lol). Talk to us about that stuff when you’re good enough to get hired long-term to call strategies instead of being what amounts to essentially a corporate suggestion servant.

The edification you find in these games is fine for you, but I don’t think they’re rocket science. You want to really improve muscle memory? Play golf. It’s about 9001% more difficult than online gaming. Want to improve handling various situations? Try going for a executive mgmt position instead of telling us how awesome you are working for others. There’s about 9001% more situational awareness needed than online gaming. My point is that these leisure activities are amusing shadows of our meatspace existence, and some people want more than just “playing the game.” That’s what lead to the initial innovations I spoke of before.

If people just playing for the sake of playing were truly the majority, then gaming would be the same genres and features as decades ago. Since they aren’t, and franchises like CoD start setting records bigger than opening weekends of Hollywood blockbusters, then I can safely suggest to ANet to start providing the platforms their playerbase is demanding for more “fun.” In this case, rankings and ladders. People want to wave their peen in the air and point to some number on a website proving their existence has worth, and meaning. If they dont have that, they will move on.

Remember your little dodge regarding d3? Well, read that Forbes article. There’s a reason why people seem “to go back to” LoL. The same will happen here if the dev teams don’t get reorganized into triage, fire-alarm mode for sPvP. You guys who just play for playing’s sake do not sustain businesses. Not for a couple decades now. Sorry.

People still playing D3? Interesting, I’d love to hear your source.

I played CS too for a long time, and TF2, and the Battlefield franchise, etc, for years, just for lulz and bloodshed. That’s when I was younger with plenty of time to burn. It’s 2012 now, and young bobf is all growns up with plenty of RL obligations. Current gaming marketing demographics show me in the majority bloc with many other out-of-school professionals. No, I won’t link you sources, you’re (theoretically) an adult and are competent enough to use google yourself. People with a wider life experience are no longer entertained with 8bit super mario, nostalgia aside. People without unlimited time to game want to see a result for the effort.

I don’t miss when games were one-dimensional play. I enjoyeded the innovation to FPS introducing persistence. I enjoyed the evolution of a hobby to a potentially serious esport. I enjoyed the layers of depth, gameplay and interactivity introduced to all genres to keep it fresh and competition fierce.

I certainly won’t miss these “old-school” gamers that think we should revert to a culture and paradigm from the early 90’s, while they shamelessly shill for a developer out of blind brand loyalty.

Not disappointed.

The point of PvP, as any developer will tell you, is to generate revenue.

This is why paid tournies and rented servers took priority over any other meaningful changes.

I see your existentialism, and raise you one objectivist.

Cogbyrn.7283:

I don’t expect people to understand the actual professional business world. I don’t expect people to understand project management paradigms, software engineering practices, or really anything that has to do with anything.

Some of us do, and this blog post is pure sales and marketing, .000001% substance.

Sorry, I’ve exhausted my fun for this game, and got my 60 bucks worth, time to play something else. I hope no one is upset.

What another great bit of marketing, written by a “lifelong PvPer” of course. Edited and approved line by line we were told, as to be a pristine delivery of crucial and sorely need improvements.

Instead, we reviewed features we already knew about, and the author(s) tried to take our breath away with rented servers. Really guy? You claim to be a gamer and give us this by-committee sales tripe? Let me ask you something Jonathan: if you were in fact as genuine as you claim, and were just a normal player on GW2, would YOU be happy learning about the contents of this blog? A few paragraphs of non-specific as possible sales language?

I’m afraid I’m done with this game. Tired of the Burst/Bunker meta that revolves around 7 class/builds only, described in a post your community marketing saw fit to delete because it was a little too accurate. I expect the same treatment of this post, further proving ANet is another insulated developer too sure of themselves in a time where the average shelf life of an MMO is about 90 days.

But please, take your time, release things When It’s Ready™. I’m sure the 10k or so playerbase left will enjoy it greatly, when finally released. The hype about this game becoming a viable esport has pretty much evaporated, but you guys “watch the watchers” so I’m sure you know already but aren’t allowed to articulate as such. Good luck.

“When did they say that there is a deadline for that blog -_-” ?

Stop being so disrespectful, you are not that important. You are one amongst many and for every hater there is out there, 10 lovers of Arenanet stand ready to support Arenanet."

I’m afraid Sprawl is 110% correct. I’ve worked for big companies, and small ones, and the Reality of the situation is always the same: you make a commitment to finish something by xyz date, and if it isn’t done, corrective action is taken. All the while, you have several other projects you made commitments on. THAT is reality. Some things are done by committee and signed off by various depts, other times you are expected to produce mind-blowing, award-winning results all by yourself. The fact that there’s this delay on a blog post, of all things, is disappointing. It speaks to a paranoia that somehow your executive leadership is somehow fearful of misrepresentation and an online reprisal from a bunch of rabid gaming nerds. Well here’s more reality: every other company, big and small, is guilty of the same thing. This leads to one logical conclusion: priorities change, plans change, mmo gaming development timelines change. Everyone who has had a professional job and modicum of maturity will not hold your feet to the fire if just one of your lines of blog text happens to be less than 100% accurate. This “update” is, frankly, empty excuses imo, the kind of thing I would say if I was weeks late on a project and had to answer to someone.

All people want is a written commitment to the improvements in pvp that are sorely needed, and a general timeframe on when we might see those implemented. Dancing around this with some “update” on when we’re getting an update is just more blatant marketing brinksmanship (I’m in marketing, and have developed collateral much to the same effect, so this kind of thing is transparent to me). You’re going to lose players and profits by waiting, regardless if your blog post is pristine or not. Communication, communication of substance, is key here.

I will get hate for this post, I don’t care. This kind of tough love is necessary; people are passionate about the game, myself included, and desire a greater transparency into what we can look forward to. Game development is not a matter of national security, and the corporate veil of secrecy is getting tiresome. Patience will wear thin, and people will move on to other games (your competitors). Holding onto some notion that fanboys will keep your franchise afloat is highly dubious. Please see the massive graveyard of other mmo games for reference. People want to see some confirmation that things are getting fixed, implemented and adjusted. Otherwise, it’s failure and layoffs, and the gaming universe sadly watches another game not reach it’s full potential. This game’s pvp is excellent, much more highly evolved than what currently exists. Don’t waste this potential, please, with corporate processes and paranoia.

OP, get into tPvP. I refer to 8v8 as Nub League. No one is on voice comms, and yes, everyone generally runs around in a big group to farm glory. It’s a purely casual PvP mode, it serves no other purpose really than to facilitate the exact kind of play you describe.

Personally, I don’t find it annoying, I use it for my own purposes, to test builds, or just run around and mash faces.

If you’re looking for skilled play, 8v8 is not what you want to be doing. Find 4 other people on your friends list, and tPvP. THAT’s where the good fights occur.

What saddens me is frankly, the limited, one-dimensional view most players seem to have when it comes to pvp. Engineer is compared to other classes based purely on a single role. “Play class x instead of engie, it does y better.” Engies strength is that the class can adress all roles, on the fly. You will not be able to spam burst like a warrior/thief. You will not be able to spam ai helpers like Mesmer/necro. You will not be able to be an indestrctable bunker like guardian (although shield/pistol/bomb engies come very close). The point of engie is versatility, and having counters to literally ever other class.

The key to successful engie play is execution. This is why they are mostly considered a high skillcap class. There is little room for error. Once competent play is achieved, engies have no counter class; teams must 2v1 you, opening opportinities for your team. This is why most time engies are assigned node guarding roles instead of roaming or node assualt, even though they are certainly capable of doing so.

If your personal playstyle is to maximize a single role, engie may not be the class for you, because they can accomplish and overcome all roles. Their balance in this is not being the “best” at single roles.

There are a variety of ways, as described above. One of the great things about this class is the tremendous versatility.

I personally run a power rifle/bomb/elixir spec. Spammy thief attacks, you lay down Big ol’ bomb, and lulz ensue. Spam moar bombs. Dead and mad thief.

For an actual skilled thief, using a build like mine, you’ll need to anticipate their location while their stealthed, and switch between rifle and bomb abilities. Most will want to close right away, so again Big ol Bomb is key. It’s radius is huge and those dumb enough to not evade will get knockbacked. Anticipating them closing again into melee range, drop a glue bomb, then a smoke bomb. The blind will cause some of that big burst damage to whif, and smoke bomb’s large radius is hard to avoid. From that point, it’s a matter of timing the cd’s from these bombs and your rifle control skills (overcharge and net shot) to either keep the thief at range or negating their high burst. Elixir S is a critical tool in my build, rendering you invulnerable. You can also switch to your bomb kit while shrunk, giving you additional free bomb spam while the thief wastes more burst on an immune target. Jump shot is another important tool for positioning, giving you a couple seconds to get range again.

Your results may vary, as many thieves tend to spam a couple of abilities, but there is a minority getting more crafty with condition builds or are really good about being janky in stealth. For me and my playstyle, the anti-thief strategy is all about bombs.

Engineer is this game’s best kept secret, I have personally discovered. The reason? Their utility gives them a counter to every other class. While the general masses whine about thief/mesmer/guardian, as an engineer you have the tools to beat them all, and every other class for that matter.

There is a catch: it’s true that there’s a high skillcap to engineer. A great deal of twitch ability, spec tuning, gear experimentation, micromanagement, and battlefield awareness is required to make the class truly shine for your particular playstyle. Though, once you achieve your own personal synergy with the class, you step into PvP with supreme confidence against any other class. Spammy thieves and warriors have no chance. Super tank guardians are out-controlled. Mesmers are left confused on how they just lost a 1v1.

As for PvE, just spec into flamethrower and grenades, and have fun killing things extremely quickly. I spend most of my time in the Mists and really cant comment on high-level dungeon crawling with engie, but out in the general PvE landscape, I have little trouble burning things down or exploding them.

If you have the patience and quick fingers, there’s a wealth of potential and depth to the class. My .02.

People sound mad in this thread.

If you don’t want to be humiliated, then Do Better.

Down state is essential to high-level play, giving this game layers of depth similar to our ability to dodge incoming attacks. Even FPS games have this feature (Last Stand anyone?) so facerollers are the only people complaining about this feature.

I DO agree that the classes need adjustment on their downed state abilities, they are not balanced across the board, imo, for some of the utility available.

ITT: thieves calling for guardian nerfs because they cant 222222222222 them with ease.

Truly, these are tears of sympathy I have for the thief class —> !_!

When someone is desperately using all their downed abilities while I have 90% hp and there’s no one else around, of course I’m gonna talk smack.

I like to say “accept death.”

The reactions I get range from the hilarious to the totally butthurt, and because I’m so amused I will continue this behavior.

I hope no one is mad.

Birdy.4816:

This game is suffering from the same problem SWTOR had on release, you hit 80 and the majority of gamers are PvE’rs despite what elitest PvPers that think they are cool because they clock-wise zerg castle gates and grind eachother with cookie cutter builds over and over…. PvE is very important.

The majority of gamers are casuals that partake in both aspects of content, despite what the elite carebears say that think they’re so cool for taking 2-3 hours to clear dungeons of AI-controlled mobs with cookie cutter specs over and over.

Did you know that in addition to WvW, there’s sPvP where I don’t need to raid to have the best gear, I just kit up in the lobby area? I hope no one is upset.

Endgame Re-imagined, lol.

My opinion? It was a brilliant double-think marketing piece, redefining your journey to level 80 as the endgame, then having you do much of the same processes (i.e. grind dungeons) for reward, except that this game allows for the task at 80 or on your way up.

Thankfully, I didn’t buy this game for the PvE. People complaining about “lack of endgame” should queue up and face humans for a change. The realm combat is everything WAR online should’ve been, and if they decide to add sandbox elements like player-owned structures or some kind of guild vs guild, then it will only get more insane. The challenge is different everyday, no grinding here.

Ralcore.9354:

However, the ‘complainers’ simply cry NERF IT, without any consideration for the players who are having no issues completing the content and enjoying it as is. At first I looked at this very objectively; I had a rough time the first time in AC Story (PUG), and I sympathize with those who become frustrated by this. That being said, I kept at it, changed what wasn’t working, found what DID work, and now I can mostly stroll through dungeon content. I’ve also said ANYONE can do this, they just need to put some time and effort into it. To sit here and cry about how its impossible (I’ve seen this word many times in this thread) is absolutely an exercize in futility. It is simply NOT IMPOSSIBLE. People are completing this all over the world, all classes and races, every day, and as we speak. How then is it impossible? Nobody likes to say “its possible, but I can’t do it,” so they cry and winge instead.

You’re missing the point. Story Mode should be STORY MODE. I know, your delicate sensibilities are offended that humans want to be entertained by video games, that we should instead, during our leisure activity, be forced to work for our fun, like in real life. We should put “time and effort” into something that should be effortless i.e. relaxation. We should bleed and sweat for pixels, because that’s what the hardcore do, so, therefore the rest of the casual masses should behave the same.

What a load of elitist nonsense. You can have Exploration for your great video game accomplishments, but for the rest and vast majority of the playerbase that log into this game to yes, just mash buttons and gasp have a good time, there should be an ez mode dungeon option. Yes, I know, we’re all bads because we don’t care that deeply about pixels and super accurate gameplay, and just want to rollface through some content. No doubt, as posted by others before across every MMO forum, we’re all uniformly children that want something for nothing, and someone here will post some meaningless, non-related example on how VIDEO GAMES are an example of the deplorable state of humanity. Oh wait, that happened already.

Pull your head out. It’s a game. There’s an option for your superultrahardmode where raiders can peen about how awesome they are for doing nothing but speccing survivability and pressing buttons in a better order than others, that option should be the explorable modes. I wanted story out of Story mode and all I got was frustration (yes, I managed to actually finish AC with a pug, when the party bugs didn’t turn up).

Consider that most people play video games for fun. Digital leisure activity should NOT be something someone has to “put in time and effort” for, generally. I’m not advocating removing content, or nerfing your superhardmode, but Story Mode should be far more simple than it is currently.

I skimmed through these posts, and all I can say is, I’m sure glad GW2 has a fleshed out, interesting, and mechanics-rich PvP system (imo) because the PvE dungeons are just flat out catered to leethardcorecarebear kids, i.e. garbage.

Pardon me, I know more than a few of these posts have been in the vein of “I want to help, here’s some helpful information,” and helpful information has been posted. But boiled down, I’ve observed that the holy trinity has just been replaced with “spec your toon for super survivability and spam combos instead of WoW-esque tactics.” Gee, I’m blown away by the innovation here.

AC story mode was my first and last dungeon in this game, I will be living in the Mists and WvWvW (at level 80). Dungeons in other MMOs, for me, have been about a simple entertaining leisure experience, filling out the lore and participating in the rich background the game offers. The dynamic events are AWESOME imo, and though the snooty and elitist raiders looking down their long noses at other posters here who are asking for ENTERTAINMENT vs “accomplishment,” may think these events are zerg fests, I am edified and entertained by the experience. I was hoping that Story Mode was the entertainment version of dungeons, for players like myself, and that Exploration was for the pve sadists who can then brag about how elite they are for spending 2-3hrs clearing AI controlled mobs. No, both modes are just aggravating torture fests, offering a joke of a reward for your pain at the end.

I understand that people think mobs with super high hp that hit for 50% (or one-shot) your toon is “challenge,” that’s great. I don’t want it to rain loot, and I dont care, since this game had the good sense to make a completely separate PvP system where there’s no need for me to raid to be competitive. I don’t do PvP 100% of the time, and would like to experience some of the dungeon content, but that’s just flat out not going to happen in this game for me. Yes, it’s been posted, I don’t have to do dungeons, and that’s exactly what will happen. I still feel it’s a shame though, that this content will be essentially wasted on a small portion of the playerbase; the casual person is not in some decade-old raiding guild, thinks or cares that much about their virtual avatar (i.e. doesn’t care to go that deep with spec/gear/pressing buttons in the right order), or cares to log into a voice chat.

GW2 is a VIDEO GAME. Leisure activity. People thinking that all dungeon content must be, by default, some “proving ground” to separate bads from madskillz, need to reassess their priorities when it comes to PLAYING A VIDEO GAME. Story Mode should be about just that, the story. As it stands, it’s just a method to induce anger, and I’d much rather rage at being outplayed vs a human opponent than some unnecessarily difficult PvE content that’s “hard” for the sake of being hard. Story Mode needs to be tuned down, period.