Guild Wars 2

Asrat.2645:

You know…a 50% winrate means the matchmaker does exactly what its supposed to do: removing the element of randomness)
If it tried to make you win we would just have s2 again, including MMrhell
The only alternative is complete RNG. In that case you would have a 50% winrate (theoretically) and wins and losses clustered.
But it would also mean unfair treatment to an unlucky minority of players.
We will eventually have to decide what we want.
Fair treatment or equal treatment of every player.
Both is not possible.

Untrue, 50% =/= matchmaking is doing what it is suppose to do. Matchmaking is suppose to give you quality competitive matches where games are close and you have an equal chance of losing/winning (50%). However, I think most complaints are that 50% mean you blow the other team one match and you get blown out the next match. Hence 50% win/lost rate.

Question should be: How bad the other team is? If you get matched against a lot of bad teams then sure you’ll get far. Otherwise not far

Sun Lian.4075:

Coulter.2315:

Sun Lian.4075:

Fermi.2409:

Sun Lian.4075:

I think players really need to get real and lower down the elitist meta bs.

This just happened to me. I’m assigned tank in spirit vale, someone else joins, switches character to apparently a better tank even though I know I was good enough and then I’m forced and expected to switch gears or characters.. really?

It sounds like the new tank was a friend or someone the leader knew, who they trust to tank more then you since they’re a known quantity. Asking you to switch characters isn’t super unreasonable in this case…

Sun Lian.4075:

We don’t all nolife this game, we don’t all have time or even want to gear up extra roles just to please other people, or just for that 1 minute less time needed for completing something.

You don’t have to “nolife” to have a second character geared for DPS. A set of Berserker exotics+weapons+jewels is like 50-60g and will work just fine. Less if you get gear or weapons from dungeon/WvW tokens.

Sun Lian.4075:

On top of that, I think there are only more raids failing because of this, since people just say that their condi or tank or whatever role, while they’re not fully. And nobody can even check it unless they ask to link gears but I rarely see that happen.

Sun Lian.4075:

Conclusion is it definitely doesn’t make the game more fun, or easier.

The “elitist meta bs” of what, people asking the people joining their raid to bring classes that will contribute what is needed for the group’s success? That definitely makes the raids easier and more fun because you won’t spend hours failing because people are running bad specs.

But that’s the problem, raids do take hours and still failing because not everyone can live up to the expectations of this meta, but they still join because they want to and just lie about their build, and I don’t blame them. Cause the whole thing is toxic as hell.

Have you considered its “toxic as hell” because of all these liars you are endorsing?

No liars means no failed expectations means no toxicity.

Yeah of course that has to do with it, but that’s what you’re gonna get with the way people are excluded now because of the meta. It basically feeds itself.

So if someone runs PTV build on a profession and he/she gets excluded because the team doesn’t need that or that build/profession isn’t bring much to the table for the group he/she is with. How is that the meta’s/raid community’s fault? o.O

Option 1 (Playing Non Meta):
Random 1 – Would like to play how I want. Play PTV Warrior with Regen banners to tank.
Team – Ask Random to switch profession and/or build to suit the team more like PS Warrior
Random 1 – Refuses to switch or change
Team – Tells Random that they need a PS Warrior and proceeds to kick
Random 1 – Go on forums to complain how toxic the raid community is

Option 2 (Playing Meta):
Random 1 – Would like to play how I want. Play PTV Warrior with Regen banners to tank.
Team – Ask Random to switch profession and/or build to suit the team more like PS Warrior
Random 1 – Changes to PS Warrior to accommodate the team to ensure successful raid completion

Explain to me how Option 1 is even a valid response for raids since it is a team effort and requires coordination. There will always be a time when someone has to sacrifice and refusing to change it seems like said individual is unwilling to be a team player which is against everything raids intend to be.

Sun Lian.4075:

What I’m trying to point out is, there is not just one class or one playstyle for every role. I can tank fine as reaper for example, but because other people are so stubborn with the meta thing, I’m just excluded most of the time.

And that’s bs, I should be able to play what I want, not what other people want me to play all the time.

I’m not gonna spend weeks leveling other chars and gearing them in order to perfectly fit in the meta and to please other people for every raid, I don’t even have enough char slots for that.
What kind of ridiculous expectation is that, and it’s only gonna get worse with new content.

And here is the issue:

“Playing how you want” . This is raids, it demands specific things which means you don’t get to play how/what you want. The intent is for you to do whatever is needed for your team to be successful in raids. If that means switching a build and/or profession. So be it. I don’t get how the expectation for hard content like raids to not be this? Considering you have 9 other teammates.

About the meta, think about it this way. People want druids to take the healing role in their groups. You can be like I don’t want to please people and play healing guardian. And you can say that you are healing your team just fine. However, the truth is that a druid in that role would bring much more to the table. On top of that the guardian would be much more useful in a different role with a different build.

If this sounds ridiculous then maybe raids aren’t for this person.

I’m sure someone will point out that a non meta comp worked for x guild group. This is true however, these individuals play at a much higher skill level than the average GW2 player you will find in an LFG PuG. This is why LFGs require ascended gear among other things because you really don’t know the skill of the PuGs you are picking up. And the thing you can control is the gear he/she has which will give your group a margin of error to work with when you are clearing raids.

ArenaNet should just have a long season and balance things out constantly within that season just to make PvP better. And so that people that want to play say warrior in pvp don’t have to like wait till after season to maybe have their profession viable again.

Locuz.2651:

Carrying is mostly related to decision making / timing etc. Things that are impossible to capture in stats alone.

Nailed it

Tyriark.7825:

Alice Of The Twist.1230:

Back in GW1, there was a function that I and many others made frequent use of in PvP and GvG. This function was a chat command that set a flag for voluntarily losing the round or exiting a PvE instance.

The command was /resign.

I did a number of runs today and lost virtually all of them due to a player or, in one case, two players that simply gave up at the very beginning of the round due to something they saw and deemed an instantaneous losing situation. I would like a /resign function because:

1. It will allow players to express themselves (at the very least).
2. It would give Anet a countable measure of how often a particular player just gives up, which can be factored into MMR or somesuch thing
3. It would enable players to end an inevitably losing round without suffering needless pummeling from the winning team.

A slight modification I might make to the way it was in GW1 is that in GW1, the entire team had to /resign to end the round. It is my belief that there are many players that will never, ever, /resign. As such, I believe a 3/5 vote to /resign is reasonable.

I definitely recall that this has been suggested before, and I’m sure it will be again, I simply wanted to express the idea again in my own semi-coherent fashion.

Couldn’t agree with you more.

Right now the pvp feels like it tends to snowball after the first crucial fights in a match, and as the match goes on its harder and harder to keep up if you’re already losing let alone make a comeback.

Agree 10/10.

The issue is that most pvp players don’t know how to adapt. Like if you lose mid fight initially it doesn’t mean to bang your head and go for mid all game because they have a better 4v4 comp against you. Play sides. On top of that if you are on staggered respawn you shouldn’t just go straight into a bad fight and die again.

It doesn’t snowball but people allow it to snowball due to bad play and a complete lack of understanding of basic pvp mechanics

Nerf chill it shouldn’t do as much as it should compared to everything else in the game

cakeonroof.7385:

Aeryn.9813:

Most Common Mistakes Made by SoloQers

Queuing on weekends :/

You make it sound like weekends are a bad time to queue. The increase in player population is a very positive thing. Queuing on weekends should be promoted not avoided.

Not true, if you get players who don’t work as a team (or don’t communicate) that is a negative not a positive. Numbers don’t mean everything. I rather have less but higher quality players

ArenaNet needs to revert these changes and just stick with what worked before in terms of rewards. They need to make this their #1 priority since they guild halls need these guild missions for upgrades and half of them aren’t functioning properly.

Ok I Did It.2854:

Same problems with Hearts and Minds, first time rift was in the air, 2nd time no one could interact with it, and we couldn’t fly, invisible wall blocking us, the instance is broken.

Yeah same thing happen to me. No point in doing this story if Anet can’t fix this bug. They might as well make it static rift points, not sure why did they didn’t do that. It has been like over a week and no fix :/

Spirigo.2897:

Well it is sad but at the same time you have to admit that dungeon content in this game was kind of a joke. I mean they took no effort, could be glitched through/solod andgave an absolutely ridiculous amount of gold, enough to cause massive inflation.

Whatevs, not fussed.

Honestly I never liked dungeons, open world content is much more fun.

So are fractals and with the HoT expansion it is even easier now. On top of that fractals don’t even take any effort, even more so that HoT is out.

A bunch of things in the game can be glitched and people have used that for gains beyond dungeons, not sure what your point is unless you are saying stacking = glitch. Also, a person who solos are dungeon is putting more effort in learning the mechanics and maximizing what they do so they should be rewarded for it.

Dungeon rewards aren’t the problem since they nerf the rewards to discourage people doing dungeons (see official post on the main site).

Open world content is not fun and has no challenges on top of the fact that it can be frustrating since you are paired up with people who won’t listen/won’t work as a team. I rather have more group content (dungeons, fractals, raids) where I a pair up with people I know I can work together with to succeed.

Fuji.6284:

They’ve explained it multiple times already. Dungeons were generating too much raw gold, which caused an excessive amount of gold flowing into the economy over time. Bottom line is that it’s harmful to the economy.

Except that is not the official statement:

“As the game progressed, we shifted focus from dungeons to fractals and raids, and we firmly believe that fractals and raids are the content that we want to continue to support….The shift in rewards is a direct representation of our focus on raids and fractals and our commitment to make them the best they can be.”

With that how are the post-HoT fractals and raids?

Currently, no raids yet. Fractal rewards are questionable and still no new fractals. The only thing that changed is just decreasing rewards and forcing people to do certain things to get money if they want to progress in their goals.

Fire Shield bug existed pre-patch as well. So it hasn’t been fixed for a long time

They are putting a new trait system and they are going to build on top of it to add more choices. It has only been out for a little bit. And some of the old traits that got combined were simply bad or didn’t work well. So combining them together is a plus.

Velimere.7685:

Pazu.8320:

All the celes are running earth, but I agree that fire has great potential. I actually ran the exact build you linked with cele amulet and it was quite effective. Haven’t had time to play with it much, but the trait spread is strong.

I’ve only ran into Diamond Skin cheese in hot-join. In queued matches, I only run into other FWA D/D Celementalists and occasional S/F builds.

Fire line is bugged right now so that is why people are using it more as a dmg spec than anything else.

Not that good since it is a global ICD instead of per target. If all you did was 1v1 then I guess it wouldn’t matter but that isn’t the case most of the time

Too early to rank due to the bugs on different traits for different professions

into the mists updated theirs

For PVP it depends on your role and team composition. I find that for D/D, water + arcane is a must. Now as for the third specialization you can choose between air or earth. They offer different things (offensively and defensively) so in terms of what your role is and what your team needs you would have to go into one or the other.

Depends on the size of the fights and group composition. I find that Stop, Drop, and Roll wouldn’t be that good if you have a group you are running with that has on-demand condition removal for you. The Frost Aura trait is pretty good if you run the Earth line as well with the auras grant you Protection so every 20 seconds you will have that.

Cele + Hoelbrak

Rentapest.6503:

When 9out10 games is lose to unbalanced matchups, then yes, I also cannot be bothered to stand there getting ganked repeatedly.

Every game, I try, if it’s a loss or unbalanced, I give up. I’m not there to be a free kill, I join because I stupidly think PvP is ‘balanced’ and find out the hard way it’s not and end up afk’ing bored because you cannot exit.

This is the problem, it shouldn’t be encouraged to go afk just because you feel it is “unbalanced” might as well not queue to be honest. I understand if it is 4v5 and you are missing one person.

Under your logic is it ok if I just look at the enemy team and after losing 1 team fight go afk because I deem it as a “loss” or their comp is apparently OP?

Congrats to Ti, great job!!

Teon.5168:

CuRtoKy.8576:

.

By the same logic what they are doing is forcing other people to play how they want..

That statement makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

How, exactly, do you “force” people to “play how they want”? That is completely contradictory.

To clarify the people who play how they want are making other people play in specific ways. For example, if the people who play how the want (doesn’t want to win, go far all day, playing specific subpar builds, etc). And I want to win this match. That means I can’t play how I want and I’m forced to play around individuals who play however they want to play. This may mean I have to swap professions to balance out the team.

The problem if someone doesn’t care and plays how they want. Why should they be allowed to do that when it affects if someone wants to win. Isn’t the scoring for arenas designed around going to 500 first and winning? Why should someone who wants to win and play in that way be forced to run a pre made team? Why shouldn’t someone who doesn’t want to play to win and just wants to mess around be forced to run a pre made team as well under the same logic? Why is it acceptable for people who just want to mess around, playing not to win, playing how you want to queue solo with 4 other strangers and ruin their experience?

There is nothing in pvp that encourages teamwork unless you are pre made so a solo queue wouldn’t change much. The same problems occur it is just that you won’t face a pre made. There needs to be a lobby system so that you can talk and see your teammates (maybe switch professions for team comp.). And there needs to be significant punishments for abusive behavior and behavior that does not help the team.

It is 2015 and this is still a topic to debate about o.o

Teon.5168:

I have to agree with Rednik…..you’re wanting others to play the way you think team pvp should be played. The way around that, is to field a full team. I know, easier said than done……but if you only field a partial team, and then expect the other players that fill out your team to have the same seriousness or mindset about pvp as you do, I can guarantee you’ll be disappointed/frustrated at least 80% of the time.

With that being said, you still can’t expect people to play the game the way you think is best. Might be the best way to you, but that doesn’t mean it works for other players. Doesn’t matter if there is a ladder system or not……everyone paid the same initial price for the game, so they can all play it any way they want. (within the tos, of course)

Not much you can do about that, except to gnash your teeth…..or field an entire team that agrees with your way of playing team pvp. /shrug

By the same logic what they are doing is forcing other people to play how they want. If they are too many roamers either you roam and lose matches (accept that) or you have to play another way just to make up for what your team is lacking.

There should be a middle ground but both sides continuously go for the extremes. If you want to win you must have a team versus play how I want/games are meant to be fun/similar logic.

SobeSoul.6910:

CuRtoKy.8576:

that baby stealing dingo.7216:

CuRtoKy.8576:

that baby stealing dingo.7216:

The amount of whining is so high that I long ago started turning off map chat, team chat, etc. before joining any sPvP match. My god, do people whine.

Good news is that sPvP is a pleasant (if only occasional) diversion when everyone’s been muted

But the community is laughably ungracious compared to what I’ve experienced in WvW and general PvE.

Untrue, everyone is expected to play as a team. I just came from a game where you were on my team who literally did nothing to help out the team even when asked.

Telling someone to be a team player = whining is quite surprising to me. And that really is the problem. Might as well play a solo game instead of an MMO tbh if you mute chat and refused to work with your team.

Lol thanks for stalking me and proving my point?

I block my own teammates from experience: I’ve been insulted, had orders barked at me, and god knows what else. And this is on practice and unranked arenas. I don’t even play ranked.

And now they follow me onto the forums and tell me not to play sPvP.

I hope you’re paying attention to these threads, Anet, because this is why PvE players avoid PvP.

How is this stalking? I saw the thread then I post? It seems like you have an issue with other people. In fact no where in my statement did I say not play sPvP.

I’m saying the most frustrating thing for people is the simple fact that people don’t listen and play as a team. Most reasonable people can tolerate new players but the fact that you disable all forms of communication really proves what is wrong with people queuing up in PvP. The attitude that it is ok or even acceptable to play against your team and to not work together to achieve a win. If you rather not play as a team in a team based game why play anything in GW2 like WvW, PvP, or Dungeons, Tequ, etc. They all require you to play with other people as a team on some level.

This is the real problem and you have proved it. I never knew it was whining to tell your teammates to stay mid point because 2 of them will come soon. I guess the standard is now that if you tell people how to play together then it is whining. Interesting

I have 60%+ winrate and turn my chat off. You are wrong about needing to communicate. If know the game mode well enough most stuff should be intuitive. Sadly, a lot of players haven’t developed the intuition.

I disagree, communication is needed for high level of play in pvp. Think about the tournaments and such. With that said if you are queuing it isn’t as important. However, we shouldn’t encourage others to take the same approach. The person I was speaking of wouldn’t communicate in my game (the person had chat off). And at one point when we won a team fight and the person was the only one on mid point standing on it. The person walked off the point while their team was trying to tell them to stay and cap it.

It sucks for newer players since this is what my friend who is completely new at pvp encounters all the time. I didn’t believe it but when I queued with him on an alt this is what I see.

Honestly, you could probably win a bunch of matches at low MMR with turret engi and never communicate lol

Even if you like fighting there is no point to fighting elite mobs. There are no interesting mechanics to them and they just have a lot of hp and take time. I rather just speed through it.

There are no direct relationships between skipping mobs and getting a precursor. It is simply RNG.

that baby stealing dingo.7216:

CuRtoKy.8576:

that baby stealing dingo.7216:

The amount of whining is so high that I long ago started turning off map chat, team chat, etc. before joining any sPvP match. My god, do people whine.

Good news is that sPvP is a pleasant (if only occasional) diversion when everyone’s been muted

But the community is laughably ungracious compared to what I’ve experienced in WvW and general PvE.

Untrue, everyone is expected to play as a team. I just came from a game where you were on my team who literally did nothing to help out the team even when asked.

Telling someone to be a team player = whining is quite surprising to me. And that really is the problem. Might as well play a solo game instead of an MMO tbh if you mute chat and refused to work with your team.

Lol thanks for stalking me and proving my point?

I block my own teammates from experience: I’ve been insulted, had orders barked at me, and god knows what else. And this is on practice and unranked arenas. I don’t even play ranked.

And now they follow me onto the forums and tell me not to play sPvP.

I hope you’re paying attention to these threads, Anet, because this is why PvE players avoid PvP.

How is this stalking? I saw the thread then I post? It seems like you have an issue with other people. In fact no where in my statement did I say not play sPvP.

I’m saying the most frustrating thing for people is the simple fact that people don’t listen and play as a team. Most reasonable people can tolerate new players but the fact that you disable all forms of communication really proves what is wrong with people queuing up in PvP. The attitude that it is ok or even acceptable to play against your team and to not work together to achieve a win. If you rather not play as a team in a team based game why play anything in GW2 like WvW, PvP, or Dungeons, Tequ, etc. They all require you to play with other people as a team on some level.

This is the real problem and you have proved it. I never knew it was whining to tell your teammates to stay mid point because 2 of them will come soon. I guess the standard is now that if you tell people how to play together then it is whining. Interesting

that baby stealing dingo.7216:

The amount of whining is so high that I long ago started turning off map chat, team chat, etc. before joining any sPvP match. My god, do people whine.

Good news is that sPvP is a pleasant (if only occasional) diversion when everyone’s been muted

But the community is laughably ungracious compared to what I’ve experienced in WvW and general PvE.

Untrue, everyone is expected to play as a team. I just came from a game where you were on my team who literally did nothing to help out the team even when asked.

Telling someone to be a team player = whining is quite surprising to me. And that really is the problem. Might as well play a solo game instead of an MMO tbh if you mute chat and refused to work with your team.

Tao.5096:

Elitist.8701:

Why would you not play meta builds? Have fun being mediocre forever I guess.

Implying that Meta makes everyone good? :v

But the reverse isn’t good anyways. People with less experience shouldn’t kitten themselves when their skill level isn’t there. Running something that they made up on their own or some odd build isn’t going to help them. Might as well play something that is proven to work and build up skill.

If you don’t know how to play a profession or pvp you should use a meta build. Trying to be “unique” or “creative” using your own build when you have no idea how your profession works in pvp is just bad. And I see people trying to do this. Sure you can beat someone with non-meta but that doesn’t mean it is good. Maybe the other person is just bad even with meta build.

Why not have professions but instead of having win with x profession have win with any profession 2x or 3×. That way if someone plays main they win 2 or 3 times with that same profession for dailies.

I don’t mind new people playing pvp but it is bad if they run like some bad random build (non meta) thinking it is good.

Rule #9000: Run a non meta build when you don’t even know how to pvp to begin with. Auto win

ocirne.7915:

IndigoSundown.5419:

People have decided that no matter whether someone is providing support (defense or offense) or CC, if they are using berserker gear they’re a DPS. The idea that gear = role is too deeply ingrained in the MMO consciousness.

I think people are just emphasizing the fact that speccing for max dps / berserkers is the only sane option there is.

And it does make sense to an extent that gear = role because it makes the biggest difference in your build. Traits are all +5% bonuses, utilities can be swapped out at any time to suit the encounters, and we can’t change anything about our profession / weapon abilities.

Yeah but the point is just because you are spec in berserker it doesn’t mean you are only filling the dps role. You can have dps but provide high support. In fact some of the builds using berserker for PvE actually provide the highest level of defensive and support utilities.

The Game Slayer.7632:

LightningBlaze.4913:

Modify the scepter shatterstone, dagger lightning touch, focus firewall and fire shield skills. Reduce overall effectiveness of all bunker builds. There’s nothing more forgiving than these builds. It is like saying “it doesn’t matter how much you outplay me and how many mistakes i make in our 1v1, I can always heal myself backup.”.

P.S: Where is it announced we are getting a balance patch soon?

Really? They’ve nerfed bunker ele, and then reverted some of those changes, and now you want them to nerf bunker ele again?

He plays full dps ele and has hated anything bunker since the end of time. Saying that about bunker is saying the same thing to full glass dps where if they somehow manage to get the jump on you (like wvw gank) and unload every skill in the game and 100%→0 you that is somehow skillful play? Stop trying to funnel Ele into one play style and let players decide if they want more dps or bunker. Like if you are complaining about bunker look at guardians in wvw :/

Mitch.4781:

Anybody could have seen everything there was to see in Dry Top within a few hours. Add in the fact that IF you wanted to bother with the achievements you had to go through the story twice yet you cannot skip it. Anet, let me be clear when I say this “Achievements are NOT CONTENT”!

Imagine they had started season 2 with at leats 3 new FULL maps and a new Dungeon with 3 paths and then said that’s your lot for at least 3 months? Wouldn’t that have been better and more exciting? This drip drip tap feed of "content " is absolutely NO different from LS1 and It’s like they are not listening.

I loved this game…but unless I see PROPER DEEP content then yeh..I’m done and I know for a fact I’m not alone.

What is deep content? It isn’t some standard definition. You may think 10 new maps + 3 new dungeons but for me if it is another southsun 2.0 map then it wouldn’t be deep content. I rather have 1 map plus story behind it.

3 full maps + a dungeon for 3 months is silly. People would be bored and complaining after. Honestly, the 2 week release will probably outpace this hypothetical 3 month content release you are proposing. If you don’t like episodic content then just log in and wait 1-2 months and play it. It is like TV if you can’t stand just watching one episode and having to wait to see what happens next then wait for it to be released all together and watch it.

S2 is different from S1. S1 story was temporary where if you didn’t do the story within the two week time period you wouldn’t be able to do it again. S2 you can repeat it even after the 2 week period before the next update. So in fact it is different which I don’t know why you can’t see that it is

DonQuack.9025:

2 hits yes 1 hit not that I can recall.

Or perhaps people mean 1 skill ko then hell yes atleast on my zerker ele.

Nightmares about the birds from hotw story mode
Horn
dodge
Horn
dodge
Horn
kittenUUUUUU

But the dude said less damage doesn’t apply for people wearing tanky gear since there are 1hko mechanics against even tanky people like full PTV + traits. Which honestly is untrue.

maha.7902:

1hko mechanics like what? there’s hardly any in this game.

I’m always curious why people say there are 1hko mechanics in GW2 dungeons when like I don’t know of any if you are running like full tank gear + traits :/ . Guess people are playing like a different game or something

Time Glitch.2460:

maha.7902:

Time Glitch.2460:

I am so kitten sick of stacking.

It effectively ruins all the dungeon content in the game. No more fighting the boss as it was designed. Nope, gotta all sit in a weird corner watching my cooldowns go off. Oh, and this time it decided to magically not work, so we have to go try it again.

I know all you professional dungeon runners are in love with the idea of cheesing down content to get it done faster, but for all of us that actually enjoy fighting bosses and doing PvE content, stacking is killing our love for this game.

I just have to wonder why ANet lets this kind of thing go. Why are they just enabling their playerbase to just cheat their way through dungeons? Doesn’t that go against everything game designers and developers are supposed to stand for?

I don’t know. I’m just so kitten sick of cheesing my way through every bit of content in this game.

“Magically not work” he says.

Sounds like someone who has no idea why people stack.

I’ve stacked perfectly multiple times in a row and sometimes it just doesn’t work. That’s probably the worst part. If it worked 100% every time I’d understand but basically people are gambling on the system breaking and sometimes that doesn’t happen and the boss creams you because, guess what, you’re all just standing in one spot.

You know, like what’s supposed to happen.

Dodge? I mean the boss only kills you if you stand there and use no active defense.

Trevor Boyer.6524:

stachekiller.2591:

I actually don’t think this encourages elitism. I think it helps people new to dungeons be forced to learn some mechanics. I went with two casual groups yesterday and cleared the spider queen in about the same time as before with no wipes because we went in together to clear the gargoyles and then people actually saw the spider queen AOE on the ground and dodged out of it. I think this has the potential to make players better overall by forcing them to learn a core mechanic. “Elitists” might try to stick to the old way of doing it and FGS the thing in that corner, but to the credit of the PUGs I played with they adapted quickly and successfully. Once enough people run through it I doubt the elitist mindset your guildie had above will really resonate.

It does nothing BUT encourage elitism
Remember that elitism is not about player skill/experience or wisdom
Elitism is about what you’re wearing, if you can afford it and if you’re using meta

It does nothing BUT encourage elitism
Now in PUGs, you won’t be accepted unless you are using a perfect serk meta in AC
Because people want to complete the dungeon run in 15 minutes, not 45 minutes
No one has time, nor would they want, to dance around The Spider Queen
For 20 to 30 minutes, while wearing Cleric’s gear, before killing it
Especially when considering the grind required to build ascended gear

And again, this is supposed to be the introduction dungeon
The first dungeon in the game, able to be completed with level 35 characters

That isn’t even elitism o.o what

Don’t like berserker? Don’t like stacking? Don’t want to LoS? Only want to Range? Well make your own LFG I don’t see what the problem is.

Dual.8953:

@CuRtoKy.8576: I’m gonna have to call you out on your statement of LoSing. True the Devs made it possible to herd nearly every mob in the game into tight locations, which is why players use it in almost every encounter in the game. However, the word “intended” carries a lot more weight then you seem to realize. Do you really think that one day during development the Devs had a meeting where they decided, “You know, we’ve made all sorts of movement skills in this game, leaps, dashes, launches. I don’t know what we were thinking by making all these. Psha. Let’s make the Apex of skill in PvE be standing in corners, trying to remain as immobile as possible. Who cares if renders; blowouts, cripples, pushes, immobilize, fear and chill, useless and possibly detrimental”
I’m not saying don’t LoS, or Stack or Zerk. If you find a way to beat the hardest boss in the game in 3 seconds with a simple reflect, go ahead and do it. There’s teamwork in it, and there’s play. Not so much for spectacle, but w/e. Go ahead and use it till you can’t anymore.
What I’m saying is I see the word “intended” thrown around a lot in these threads and I don’t think that it’s an appropriate use of the word. Intended suggests it was their primary aim, as if they want all players to aspire to it. Imo, a better word would be “sanctioned”, or “allowed”, but “intended” doesn’t sit well with me.

PvE isn’t the only thing that matters. LoS as a mechanic exist across all game play and is used quite often in WvW and PvP. Now if the concern is LoS in PvE then you can simply just remove all forms of LoS in PvE if you really want to.

Your example doesn’t work because the Devs created the game for all game types and LoS is a strategy that is employed. Now if they feel that is bad like I said then they can simply just remove any form of LoS in PvE and just make it an open field fight. If that doesn’t happen then of course some form of LoS is ok. Even for recent stuff there are still LoS spots (the new fractal, TA Aetherblade Path). They had the opportunity but there is still LoS.

HHR LostProphet.4801:

That still doesn’t discard the fact that one reflect made this boss very easy and to no threat at all.

But the question is does this change anything? Answer is not really since good coordinated groups can still stack as before. You just punish the same players that wanted this change.

HHR LostProphet.4801:

Aren’t they allowed to undo things they’ve done? How should they broke Alphard’s kegs in the first place? The kegs aren’t reused anywhere else, so they had to change that intentionally.

I never said they can’t undo. I’m saying people made that argument for Alphard. So for AC spider queen, people are making the argument that ArenaNet did it to stop stack, exploit, zerk, or whatever they think this change does. Now if ArenaNet changed it back to how it was before then everyone making the argument this was intended to stop stack and such were wrong. In the same light of how people talk about the Alphard change. These changes are undocumented so nobody knows what is or is not intended (on top of ArenaNet not saying anything about it). So at best you can only say if this change is good or bad and why. But that isn’t what you are doing, you are saying that x was changed because of y and ArenaNet intended to do this because of a,b,c reasons. That flow of logic doesn’t make sense.

HHR LostProphet.4801:

CuRtoKy.8576:

No because the changes are undocumented. What you are saying is just an assumption of why this change occurred. For all I know it could be a bug or unintended (e.g. Alphard change)

And the CoF P1 change? Did they just accidentally added a door at the ritual event? Or did they try to hide something behind it? Or did they just want to stop the players resetting the aggro?

Alphard was just one boss (and most likely done intentionally), whereas the reflect changes affect multiple bosses of different types.

Point is nobody knows so why is anyone trying to say ArenaNet intended X when it isn’t documented. Logically you can only assume why something was done. Even then people have different ideas why something was done. On top of the bias too.

You can still reset CoF p1 anyhow, nothing changed.

As for TA spider boss. You can fight it without reflect stacked and you do just fine. Just have to dodge tbh.

If Alphard was intentional why was it changed back? It was changed where the bomb explodes instantly for months then recently changed back. See we will never know

HHR LostProphet.4801:

maha.7902:

How do you know how the fight was meant to be designed?

I say that the bosses were not meant to be fighted by just stacking in front of them, putting down one reflect and kill them without them being able to hit you. The recent changes proved me right, didn’t they?

No because the changes are undocumented. What you are saying is just an assumption of why this change occurred. For all I know it could be a bug or unintended (e.g. Alphard change)

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Look. Anet is just doing what the loud forum majority wanted. When people said “dungeons suck because spider queen” they listened. And when we dungeon forum regulars told them this very change was not a solution they called us dumb elitists. Just like the bloodstone dust nerf. You asked. They delivered.

Yup which shows the people who wanted this change didn’t really understand how dungeons work or the implications of the change.

Shiren.9532:

CuRtoKy.8576:

At this rate they might as well remove reflects from the game because obviously they don’t like it and are just making more things unreflectable.

You’re crazy. Reflects are still one of the most powerful mechanics in the game.

Anyone who was being fair knew that reflects were incredibly broken when used against boss mobs. The Lupicus videos showed this – a single skill was, in a few seconds, doing more damage to the boss than the entire rotations from the four other party members during the fight. Reflects were stupidly broken mechanics when they reflect powerful monster attacks that do full damage that was never intended to be given to players.

Not only were reflects one of the most powerful DPS options given to players, they were also incredibly powerful defensive options. Malrona was an incredibly easy fight with chained reflects. Without them, her poison shot required you to pay attention, but with reflects she was a complete snooze and much faster. Some boss attacks simply shouldn’t be able to be reflected if you don’t want to turn dungeons into cheese content (which even with these changes they still are).

Even if there wasn’t a single boss attack in the game that you couldn’t reflect, the mechanic is incredibly valuable in content where trash mobs have powerful or annoying projectiles. The harpy fractal is a glorious play ground for a reflect mesmer, and a lot of CM paths are also very good places to bring reflects. Not only is the mechanic incredibly valuable as a defensive option, it also does quite good DPS against a lot of attacks.

Honestly, GW2 has reached a point where content has become stale and unintended game mechanics (FGS’ Fiery Rush, LoS AI exploits, reflecting boss attacks etc) have resulted in a very low skill cap and very high efficiency for content that has the potential to be more engaging than it is. As players we should encourage and support efforts to make content more complex and engaging, rewarding players for accessing more of their tool box or simply doing more than standing behind a wall auto attacking.

I don’t want to spend hours in dungeons because of giant health bars, but I don’t think the old/current meta of reflects, LoS and FGS abuse are what we should aim for when it comes to shorter dungeon runs.

Wait what?!?! I never said reflects aren’t strong. Just saying with these type of changes you might as well remove reflects and redo things but it is confusing to newer players. Vet players will know the differences anyhow between what is reflectable and what isn’t.

No such things as mob AI exploit :/ . People too often throw the term exploit without knowing what it means. PvE will always be scripted so you will always know what mobs are going to do. Saying it is an exploit is like saying knowing Lupi’s skill rotations is an exploit.

LoS is intended if it wasn’t then ArenaNet should just make boss encounters in like a large open field.

Honestly, the idea of low skill cap just comes from players you meet in PuGs that have no intention of playing well or better. These changes do nothing since I just did the exact same thing I did before the patch just fine. The only difference is maybe an extra dodge.