Guild Wars 2

ANet provides the tools. The community provides the demand.

In my honest opinion, you’re unlikely to change ANet’s development as much as you’d hope, and you’re unlikely to change the community’s mindset at all.

Your Best bet is to gather like minded people around yourself and play the way you want to play with them. If you wanna spec for Healing or spec to “tank”, then it’s best to gather a group of friends who share your goals and want you to heal or “tank” for them. This scenario is a win-win for everyone around. Sometimes makes me wonder why people dislike this solution.

They’re currently adding flames to the country armor set.

Mortifer.2946:

Yesterday I saw some guild recruitment where it was claimed that they look for experienced dungeon/fractal runners. I consider myself such player, yet I was not accepted, because I’ve built my guardian on soldier stats and condi removing runes/traits which is very useful for the whole party, yet it lack some DPS so I was told GL BB

It is their perogative – as it is their guild – who they’d like to invite. They wanted to play with players of likeminded attitudes. To be honest, they probably did themselves as well as you a favor.

It is merely your ego that’s got you fired up because you feel someone’s taken a potshot at your “experienced” status. My suggestion is to let it go. It really is no skin off your nose if you failed to get into that guild.

However. I do have a question for you. If you Do feel that you’re quite experienced at Dungeons/Fractals, then you’d be able to do feats that most people would consider “experienced” only, yes? Like solo Lupicus in Arah. Or run full melee 49/50 fractals. Okay, now do it all in zerk gear. If you truly know how a fight works, then you ought to be able to do it in zerk gear, yes? Because if you know how each attack works, you’d be able to nullify the damage with just the perfect dodge or block. Anyone can stand in one spot and get hit while wearing tanky gear. Not everyone can complete a fight with nary a scratch on them.

Mortifer.2946:

Those zerkers are just dumb. Sorry, but they do.

Are you the quintessential PVT “tank” guardian? Because with grammar like this…

Mortifer.2946:

The most fun is when I see them play open world and some champ insta-down them. Most of them don’t even try to dodge. Thousand Blades rulezzzz, I guess.

I have a dirty secret. I rarely join “zerker only, must be meta” Arah runs. I PUG Arah, and there are times when the dice roll and you get that bowbear ranger, or the PVT or Cleric staffguard. I always make sure to be friendly. I have yet to be kicked from a PUG Arah.

The most fun is when I see Lupicus absolutely destroy them because they’ve never challenged themselves to learn their class or the fight. Most of them don’t even know when to dodge, because dodging’s never been that important to them. I do my due diligence and attempt a res if they’re right at lupi’s feet. But usually I’m soloing lupi before phase 2 ends. That is the most fun.

Earlier today I received a whisper from someone who said they were interested in joining my guild and had found my advert posted in the Guild Recruitment section. He wanted to join and do wvw, however, he said, he was on Tc with 3 level 80s and didn’t want to delete them. Long story short, he asked if my guild would be willing to help him transfer from Tc to my server by donating 43 gold. I politely declined for obvious reasons, but still offered that he submit an application and save up to transfer over if he really disliked Tarnished Coast. Temporarily placing him on flist, I noticed his AP was just barely over 200.

This is just a friendly message to my fellow players and Guild Leaders/Officers to please watch yourselves.

Thank you, ANet, for finally addressing this hot-button topic. I know it’s been on the minds of many players how unfair this situation is, and I’m glad you’re finally delivering a justly deserved nerf. Don’t let naysayers deter you.

Seriously, it boggles the mind how long these people have dominated the scene. Some people may say, “This is an undeserved nerf!” Or they may say, “We’ll keep going, nerf or not!” But you, ANet, say, “Nay, the nerfing’s just begun!”

After all, abusing the mechanics of the game this way… it’s practically – dare I say it? – an exploit. And oh how they exploit. Can you imagine how new players feel when they come across these elitists? Oh! The shouting, the gnashing of teeth. Saying what to kill and what not to kill? What ever happened to playing how you want? Yes, these exploiters have had their heyday. And now it’s time to move on. So thank you, ANet, for bringing this welcome change and a fresh breath of balance.

Now we can get back to playing the game as intended. For fun. Just how I know you want it to be played, ANet. Killing everything in our path and not just leapfrogging from one prizebag of HPs to the next. Thank you for fixing these Champ Train exploits.

yayuuu.9420:

Stacking in one picture (pro paint skillz)

I feel like the problem with making a “PUG-proof” build is that the universe can always make a puggier PUG.

Seabreeze.8437:

NOOOO!

Don’t do it! It belongs in a museum!

So do you, Dr. Jones!

I don’t cringe at the word amongst, whilst used properly.

I do cringe at:

“Your welcome”
“Wheres you’re grammar”
“Its over their”

And countless other internet-speak phrases.

Leo.8792:

Go on and gang up and attack the person who dares to voice his own opinion that does not fit with the masses of people. Shoot down my distant ideals of a game where people actually play and not mindlessly walk through rolling their faces on the keyboard.

I find it interesting that you say that people are ganging up and attacking you. You are the one to start with the inflammatory accusations.
“Stacking is for players who can’t handle the game and think it’s too hard” I do believe you said.

Leo.8792:

How do you know how much content is in something if all you do is skim the top of what is actually there.

The people of this subforum have run these dungeons countless times and explored a myriad of tactics. They probably have more in-depth knowledge of the run than you do.

Leo.8792:

it is clearly an exploit when players outright make bosses unable to use abilities and attacks.

If stacking to prevent Spider Queen from AoEing you is an exploit, then using Ranged attacks to prevent monsters from meleeing you is an exploit.

Leo.8792:

This is an MMO and MMO’s take time to get through

Certainly. But does that mean that the longer you take to get through a dungeon, the better the experience? If you took 4 hours to do CoF P1 instead of 7 minutes, did you have a better experience? It doesn’t mean that your experience was better at all.

One thing that you CAN do with games is improve your ability to play it. And an easy metric to measure your increase in skill is to cut the time in which you complete a dungeon run.

But seriously, why make this thread? ANet has never addressed stacking as an exploit. It’s wiser to live and let live. Make parties that are no stack/no skip and enjoy your game your way. Let other people enjoy their game their way.

I feel somewhat evil. I am enjoying the fact that as people cry about their dual legendaries and wardrobe, all I can think of is how people in the fractal reset thread said, “just wait until this happens to you.” And it kind of reminds me of something I’d wanted to paraphrase but never had the opportunity to…

This forum is afraid of me… I have seen its true face. The GD forum is an extended gutter and the gutter is full of blood and when the drains finally scab over, all the casuals will drown. The accumulated filth of their anti-zerker rhetoric will foam up about their waists and all the bowbear and staff guardians will look up and show “Save us!” … and I’ll look down and whisper “No.”

I should probably take a break from the forums for a bit.

Allow me to attempt a translation:

I refused to use battle standard at Giganticus Lupicus. My reason is simple, I wouldn’t get the boons from it because I’d be waiting to use it on a pug that got downed. Plus, there’s the danger of someone kiting Lupicus away from my banner and thusly losing the benefits of having the banner down. Instead, I’d rather use my Signet or Rage and have the boons on me right away. I even had a pug just leave before the fight because of my refusal to switch SoR to BS.

Totally offtopic, but dun report meh! I just feel more comfy posting for my fellow dungeon subforumers than the general discussion. >.>;

http://youtu.be/TPDQS61189w

My guild playing QuagganBALL.

tl;dr: Just a different way to view the casual/elite issue. Are you a romantic or a pragmatist? Mostly just me soapboxing.

This is actually a topic about mentalities that people hold. The popular view on people’s mentalities is the “casual vs. elite.” I kinda wanted to toss this idea out here and see what people think.

The idea of Superheroes vs. SWAT was sparked in my mind when talking with one of my guildies about clearing dungeons. He is one of the people who likes to kill everything in the dungeon. In a Guild run (the only kind he does) we usually agree before running whether it’s going to be a “kill everything run” or a “speed run”. When I asked him why he likes killing everything, he said, “When I go into a bad guy’s lair, I’m going in there to defeat all of the bad guys.”

First, I’d like to premise this by saying I’m not criticizing either group of people I’m about to describe. Also, I’d like to say that it’s not 2 distinct camps, but a spectrum that people can possess varying degrees of one side or the other.

I’d like to suggest that there are people who play this game to be “Superheroes”. After all, our characters can do really amazing things. Leap dozens of yards, teleport, cure poison by yelling at it, raise the dead. These people hold a romantic’s notion of the incredible abilities of their characters, and build their characters to help reinforce their ideals.

I feel like the romantic’s notion of a fight/dungeon crawl is to kick in the door, rush in and engage the bad guys on their home turf. Think comic books where the hero smashes through the window, the robbers shoot bullets but those bounce off the hero’s chest. People build “tank” and “support” characters because they believe they can do better in a fight protecting the soft squishy people. LOSing is an exploit because the game is meant to be played a certain way and LOSing violates that preconceived notion.

I’d like to suggest that there are people who play this game to be “SWAT”. Practicality, efficiency, maximizing gains, minimizing losses. When a SWAT team is required to clear a dangerous situation, they approach it with pragmatism, research and training. In real life, your teammates’ lives are on the line, in game, it’s your time and patience that is the price to pay.

I feel like the pragmatist’s notion of a fight/dungeon crawl is to approach each encounter from every aspect and select which one is the best for the situation as far as time/effort/cost/profit. Sometimes this even means choosing Not to engage a certain encounter. For a SWAT officer, a bad situation would be to have to go toe-to-toe with an equally armed enemy. You give yourself the advantage by taking cover in a fight.

Personally, I don’t have a problem with being either a Romanticist or a Pragmatist, or any part of the spectrum in-between. I do feel that trying to understand why clashes occur, why some people dislike a tactic while others think it’s acceptable is important. I also feel that it’s important for people to play with people whose playstyles align most closely with theirs because then they’ll be a lot happier. And of course assuming that you can’t (you need to PUG some people to fill out a group), having open communication to see where everyone stands so you can all agree on a group position when running a dungeon will minimize conflict as well.

I can’t wait for the funky transition period where some people will be using the in game tool and some people will be using the website and some people will be posting on both. Who knows what exciting new things you guys will get to complain about?

Hi all,

This thread’s more or less done, but I just wanted to add a post directed towards those of my own server, SBI. First, I’m very proud to be a member of SBI – I’ve been on here since BWE3. I’ve avoided the sheer caustic toxicity of this thread, but I decided to post because one of my guildies encouraged me, and I wanted to give this message.

This post is about respect in the long term. Some of you guys have been on here since we were T1 butting heads with JQ and BG and HoD. Back then, Stormbluff used to be called Steelbluff. We loved to scrap and we still do – being out there this week I saw a lot of people fight their hearts out. This fight we got a couple of good punches to the chin. It’s our job to grin at those punches and hit back just as hard. Because we’re Steelbluff.

You know what people called JQ back then? JQQ, because they were always the first to QQ about some perceived double teaming and such. Now, I’m not here say whether YB and EB was or wasn’t. (I was in the Lord’s room on Thanksgiving with Bannok when we held it for like 3 ticks with no doors – EBay on one side, YB on the other.) I’m just saying that back then, nobody respected JQQ.

Why is respect important? You know the kid who cries easily gets beat up the most on the schoolyard. In WvW, all 3 servers are bullies trying to bully each other. Show a little QQ and you get focused by the other 2. Similarly, show a little too much bluster and you also become a target. If you want to lessen the chance of future 2v1s, fight with honor. If someone from our server actually did go to another server as a saboteur and got caught doing so, it’s only natural the response we received.

I’m gonna go back to being quiet now. Because I believe that Stormbluff Isle has the ability to “Speak softly, but carry a big stick.” I’d rather that these words on the forums not define what SBI is, but our actions.

See you all on the battlefield.

What kind of sigils did you order for your breadsticks and what runes do you have baked into the crust of the pizza?

Chesty LaRue.
Busty St. Claire.
Hooty McBoob.

People who call their teammates by their profession instead of their names.

“Hey mesmer, can I get a portal?” or “Hey guardian, go pull those mobs.” or whatever.

I hate that. -_-#

You really showed those lvl 2 spider hatchlings a thing.

notebene.3190:

They’re replacing human females with inanimate harvesting trees, and you can role play with people who stop and chop. You have to buy charges to restock your supply of wood.

Hmmm. Human Females giving wood. I’m sure there’s a joke in there, but I can’t see it.

Don’t rebound into an internet relationship. No good can come of this.

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Btw Lilith, I heard you’re the gw2 fashion expert, is that true?

She once redressed Agent Spire with the push of a button. Or maybe it was a flip of a lever.

She was voted “Most Fashionable Asura,” even while running the Ascalon Fractal.

Detha’s never called her Fashion stupid.

Her fashion’s made Koptev shout, “Yesyesyes!”

Lilith is The Most Fashionable Expert in the dungeon forums.

All I can think of right now is Malchor shouting, “DWAYNAAAAA~!”

guardian.6489:

Hey guys I have this crazy idea. What if there was some sort of…. box that the fractal weapons dropped in, where you got to pick which weapon you actually wanted. Just thinking out loud here. :P

But this box you speak of might be put in a very high level of Fractal… Say… 51+.

Oh and just in case people think that might be too easy to achieve, they might reset people’s fractal levels to Really make them earn it.

Never forget.

Lilith. You’re a good person.

I’ll miss seeing you around and about.

Nemesis.8593:

The reward is usually as meaningful as the struggle/journey to obtain that reward… Ever heard the saying “the harder the battle, the sweeter the victory” ?

If you put it like that… why would you even want to spend any time in a dungeon, just have a starting vendor with all best gear in the game…

But to swing to the other end of the spectrum as illogically as you’ve swung your way: why not do all dungeons in white gear with 0 traits spent and dodge unbound? Your struggle would be most epic thus, your “victory” would be most sweet.

I myself also consider myself a fairly casual player. (Work 2 jobs, play for ~3ish hours five nights a week, give or take)

However, I feel that your requests are somewhat misguided.

CHIPS.6018:

I already finished Arah paths 1 to 3. I farmed enough in Arah for the Arah armor. But I refuse to touch path 4 because everyone in my guild said it was brutal time wise. I do not have 4+ hours to burn on this, with the risk of failing and not getting anything.

You have the word of your guild members as a gospel that you are adhering to and trying to push an agenda on these forums based off of that. It’s not even your own personal experience.

A casual player could very well complete path 4 in under 2 hours given some practice so they become familiar with the run. It’s somewhat unfortunate that you are denying yourself the opportunity to find out because of your refusal to try it out.

Perhaps you fail the first time. Maybe it takes more than your 2 hours. Is that time wasted? Only if you believe it so. But you could instead take the stance that you learned something from your experience, and the next time you could go in, armed with that knowledge, and get further, and further until you actually accomplish the path in under 2 hours.

Perhaps as an aside, how about some evidence from others that Have finished path 4?
How many people have finished Path 4 in over 4 hours?
Under 4 hours?
Under 2 hours?

Next patch notes: Archdiviner’s difficulty appropriately increased to match new rewards from this fractal.

Mortifer.2946:

I usually run with pugs, and my build is something what keeps everyone alive even if someone lacks the skill. I keep explaining the tactics to everyone and my runs are very smooth, without downed or dead players. I don’t run arah too much because it is long and I need my guild group for it. Yet, I have no problems with lupicus.

I and many other player who happen to use Berserker gear take the time to explain strategies when doing certain dungeon runs. Though I’ve always been very cautious about this, as many people can potentially take it as “that person is super bossy”. If anything, I’ll usually ask if anyone is new or wants the tactics explained, or I’ll even ask, “how would you guys like to do this fight?”

But I would like to make an honest suggestion. If you feel you’re a really experienced player, go and PUG Arah. I do know of a charr guardian in PVT that takes newbies through Arah here in NA, so it’s certainly possible to carry people through it. If you’re taking newbies through Arah, don’t think that your PVT will save them every single second through, and especially not on Lupi.

Mortifer.2946:

IYes I don’t like you, zerkers. Because it was you, the players who destroyed the sense of cooperation in this game, not Anet. You spoilt the game system and overcome everything by doing 10000000000000000 dmg in 1 sec and learnt to dodge 2 or three times before you kill the boss.
When I started playing this game on launch, it was about helping each other, about diversity, about tactics.

Now it is about you.

No. The blame lies with each and every single person who fails to live and let live, regardless of gear type worn. For every person who has failed to write an adequate lfg comment, for every person who has failed to respect another person’s lfg comment and joined regardless of the requirement.

“Pass down your set of Zojja’s gear when you decide to go for a more balanced build.”
- Plotting against us. I knew it.

Zelu.1692:

If you do dungeons for in-game rewards and not for funzies, the current (poor) dungeon design encourages you to stack and/or LoS bosses and to skip mobs. As most people run dungeons for the tokens and gold, they want to get through it as fast as possible.

There’s a misconception here. You think that fun is mutually exclusive from fast. This is not true. Some people have fun when they beat record times. (Personal or public.) Additionally, some people actually have Fun when they have a smooth run where everyone stays alive and the mobs all die quickly.

Zelu.1692:

Those who think they are good players for doing speed clears in Zerk gear fool themselves. I bet they’d have no chance in a proper tact-based PVE instance (thinking a proper Raid or dungeons like in TSW NM mode or WoW).

Another misconception. Many people here do what they do because they’re pragmatic and are usually good at what they do.

Personally for myself, I didn’t play TSW or WoW, I came from FFXI. I played main tank or main healer for my dynamis guild depending on what was needed. The choice to use zerk gear merely states “I’m willing to focus on dealing the most amount of damage and rely on player skill and tactics to mitigate damage.” I think Nikaido mentioned this when he said – and I’m paraphrasing here, “Traits and utilities determine the playstyle, your gear simply determines where you are on the spectrum of how much damage you’re comfortable receiving and dealing.”

Zelu.1692:

For those players who enjoy a bit of RP and doing instances slow and fun for the lore and beautiful aesthetics of GW2 at least can go to [PASS] or LFG for similarly-minded people. Not a bad thing and nothing to make fun of.

Zel

So long as people live and let live. The problem is that you can see the snide jabs that people make about players that skip/stack or run the meta. If a person goes and does this, then it shouldn’t be a surprise that the flames would escalate.

So before you say “don’t make fun of people who don’t stack/skip” stop and reread your posts and reword anything that smacks of talking down to others or saying that they’re unskilled. If you want respect, give it first.

Ah yes. Fond memories of playing FFXI. One of my friends mained ranger, possibly the most expensive job to play there. Shooting money at the enemy to kill it. Having to craft stacks and stacks of ammo before going out adventuring. “Sorry guys, down to my last stack of ammo, gonna call it in 15.” “Oh kitten it, missed the skillchain cause I didn’t equip more ammo.”

I’m a no for ammo.

Ebay, most likely…

If they make more Charr plushies, I’d be really happy. If they made baby quaggan plushies, I’d be estatic. If they made Dolyak Plushies, I’d be wondering why the aren’t taking my money right now.

Sariel V.7024:

Let’s say there are some fields that kids like to play on, and Marty wants to play Soccer (football for those of you outside the US). The sign outside the fields says that you can play whatever you want, and so Marty goes over to the Varsity Soccer team playing soccer and says he wants to join the game. The kids tell him that they don’t want to play soccer with someone below their skill level, because it embarrasses them to have to do so. There are some other kids a few fields over playing soccer, but instead of going and playing with them, he keeps arguing with the varsity kids. “I want to play soccer with people who are experienced!” he tells the other children, but the other children ignore him and go back to their game of soccer. Marty tries to play soccer on the same field as the varsity kids and manages a few plays before getting hurt. The children kick him off of the field they’re playing on, and go back to their game. Instead of going and playing soccer with the other children who are still playing soccer, he goes to the parents, and tells them how the other children are bullying him and excluding him. The parents scold their children for excluding poor Marty. Marty still isn’t satisfied, and demands that the parents make their children play soccer with him. What do you think the parents are going to do?

Changes things a little.

So why is Marty wearing Hockey equipment?

Edit: Oh right. PHIW.

They’re killing the 14/14/14/14/14 build. What ever happened to I play how I want…?

Asking for a no stacking solution to be coded in by ANet would be as ridiculous as asking ANet to remove staff and mace from guardians and longbow and shortbow from rangers.

trunks.5249:

what i have learned from this excellent experience is that stacking is for the people that are not skilled and skipping is for the lazy

This is also the wrong lesson to learn. Many of the people who are able to do lvl 50 fractals, or solo various bosses or even whole fractal levels stack and skip. And they are definitely some of the most skilled players ing GW2.

Chaotic Storm.2815:

I’m personal not a regular in alot of dungeons so it always kitten es me off when suddenly everyone makes a bolt for it without a word and then gets mad at me because I didn’t know and kicks me. I say make all mobs unpassible and if people have an issue with it all I got for you is "go join the champion trains if your only there for the money.

Hello! As a non regular, perhaps it would be a good idea to state that you don’t know exactly where the skips are before the run starts. So long as you didn’t join a run that specifically stated Speedrun, chances are good that you’ll have someone willing to let you know when/where the skips are.

Best of luck!

(Top to Bottom, Left to Right)
Genevieve Talbot, Ara, Amber Angelsong, Makenna, Nevehna
A composite of Arah and Twilight Arbor
A verdant renewal comes to Orr. Even the lifeless ground of Arah may be touched by the gentle beauty of Nature.

Arah P3 just outside of Ascendant’s Bounty Waypoint, and TA Story right at the entrance.

At the end of your 14 hour stint, how badly did you have to go pee?

MastaNeenja.1537:

I think we are ready for 51 31 and up

I suppose most people are recovered enough for another reset.

gosferano.8614:

Maybe at least ANet could change match up system, so that any server couldnt be same color two weeks in a row, or something like that.

They did change it up. Your color should change much more frequently. Patience, and you’ll get it done.

Alternatively, you could jump into WvW more and help your server out. I’m sure every little bit helps.

Happy Valentine’s Day, all! I hope it’s a day that you can enjoy in the company of loved ones.

Just for fun, I thought it might be cool to have a brief thread to highlight all of the lovely and/or romantic spots in this land of Tyria.

Please show off your screenshots here!

Beryl.1493:

I think I could see myself subtly nudging some metal circles and rectangular paper towards ArenaNet’s direction on the same day as a Mad Memoires reintroduction, if you know what I mean.

Handcuffs and restraining orders?

So instead of teaching a person to play zerker properly, you’d rather laugh when they die?

Heck, even just a friendly suggestion to someone to check out the dungeon forums and up their game.

By definition, Optimal means “the best or most favorable outcome” and implies a singular. This is something that isn’t directly controllable by ANet. They can give us tools to work with, but in the end it’s the players that make the decision on what they view as Optimal for their specific situation.

So before you start demanding that more things become optimal, perhaps you should consider what your criteria is first, as well as the criteria of other players.

Now, as you attempt to start making more builds “optimal” consider what that really means. Choices that players make mean less. If it takes a group of players specced for DPS 6 minutes to clear a dungeon, and a group of players specced to tank 6 minutes to clear the same dungeon, and a group of players who barely know how to press 1 on their keyboard 6 minutes to clear the same dungeon, how do the choices that the players make become meaningful?

I’d take a Guild Airship and/or a Guild Submarine while we’re at it.