Guild Wars 2

Nerfs are in order. Thief and warrior are actually balanced, for the most part. Buffing them to bring them more in line with this ridiculous bunker meta is pointless, since that would do nothing to change the state of stale PvP.

Personally I like it but it has been toned down too much, it needs to be more distinguishable that you 1. Have an aura and 2. It is in fact chaos armour.

Right now most of the auras look very similar with a small differentiation at the feet which is not easy to see. Yes they needed toning down but this is too much as you can’t reliably see what auras are present.

The dev already said he would make a post on the official forums as well, and that he picked reddit first because he is more comfortable with reddit’s format. Also, he stated he was doing this because he wanted to, not because he was told to. Looks like OP just beat him to the forums.

Let’s not jump down devs’ throats when they’re actually communicating with us.

Novamatrix.2569:

You people obviously dont know how to play your class correctly, always thinking about the end boss and dps…. Did ya know, you can swap your traits & skills at any time when youre not in combat – to meet the needs of the situation??? In fact, if you’re not doing this, youre not taking advantage of the full potential of your class!!!
NOTE::: PVE does not mean THE BOSS FIGHT!!!!

Let me explain this to you!!!
*Shield #5 – tides of time — HAS NO LIMIT to the amount of mobs it can hit, it has the potential to interrupt any mob it comes into contact with, TWICE
*Mistrust – applies 2 stacks of confusion AOE!!! for every time it interrupts, NO COOL DOWN!

• This means, it has a Max potential of (#of mobs hit * 4) stacks of confusion.

This combined with other traits will give a super high damage output upon interrupts (im not going into my full build)

Or you could just build for damage and 1shot all the interruptable trash with pretty much any skill regardless. The point is that on fights that actually have any degree of challenge to them, that type of setup will be less than useless.

Edit: As an aside, claiming that other folks “obviously have no idea how to play their class correctly” is usually a pretty good marker that some quality introspection time should be taken.

Many of the old traits and utilities are absolutely terrible and need to be updated before the pvp season takes off. All classes suffer from this problem, but since my main is currently a warrior, I’ll use it as an example.

The trait thick skin in the defense line is one of the worst offenders. It gives 120 toughness while above 90% health. This is around a 1-2% reduction the first time you are hit… it might as well give you nothing.

As far as utilities go, the “On My Mark” shout is an obvious outlier. Literally all it does is apply 10 stacks of vulnerability to a single target, and it has a 30s cooldown. Like what?

For the sake of build diversity and balance, please work on this anet.

I am glad that Trahearne is gone. I will be happier still if it becomes clear that he was killed off, not as a knee-jerk reaction to being disliked by some portion of the player base, but rather because Anet is committing to better character writing going forward and have realized that this particular character carried too much baggage to be salvaged.

I do not blame Trahearne for stealing credit for anything as I am unaware of an instance in which he did so. I do consider him to be a poorly conceived and terribly implemented character on almost every level. He actively detracted from the experience of the story for me and so I am glad to see him go.

For those who liked Trahearne, my condolences. Hopefully characters introduced in the future will appeal to you while also being better written, or at least less obnoxiously written, for others.

Endless Trahearn gathering tool. Says some of his boring speeches during gathering.

“We do this together”
“This is my wild hunt”
“Commander, to me”
“I am no soldier”
“Mordemoth calls to me”
“This plant looks like my cousin”

etc.

I’d buy it, especially if when you gathered you had a chance at “ruined plant parts” as a memento to Trahearn.

Odokuro.5049:

I was glad that we got to end Trehearne…

Soon as he enters YOUR personal story he takes it completely over, and you become his mascot errand boy, running around doing it all, and he takes credit for it…

And making us “Commander” of the Pact? Right, more like Participation Award of the Pact….

None of what you just said is true. At no point during “your” personal story are you working for yourself, except maybe the 20-30 missions.

At no point does Trehearne take any credit for anything you do. At every point does Trehearne and EVERYONE ELSE praise you for how much you’ve done.

I always found the claims that Trahearne was some kind of “Kormir 2.0” immature and largely unfounded. During the Zaithan story, his character suffered from a couple of badly written lines, and sub-par voice acting. The biggest problem might have been the fact that a lot of other characters tell us about “that one time back then when he totally saved my kitten ”, etc., but we don’t get to see the rather bookish Trahearne do such things while we are with him.

The important thing – at least to me – however is that he does threat us (= the player character) with respect, he gives us plenty of credit for the things we do for the pact (while Trahearne is stuck doing strategy stuff – do players really envy him for doing all that organizing stuff instead of being out in the field?), he seeks our council, lets us hear his thoughts, and in general treats us like a friend!

Compare that to, for example, Caithe, who betrayed us, stole from us, and does even take a second and try to explain her motives to us – after all the things we did for her during the Zaithan story, like rescuing her from Faolin, reuniting her “worst soap opera cast in tyrian history”-type of guild, and taking down an Elder Dragon! I’d rather having Trahearne at my side than her any day.

I can’t say was surprised to see Trahearne die at the end of HoT ( I predicted Trahearne, Zoija, and Eir dying. 2/3 I guess…). The moment you see him in that vine pod, you know he’s not coming back out. But I do wish they would have given Trahearne a little bit more agency – he opens the “portal” to the mordrem dream for us, allowing us to strike at Mordremoth’s weak spot; decent enough storytelling. Now imagine after we defeated Mordremoth Trahearne would have told us, he couldn’t be separated from the vines anymore BECAUSE he did that dream portal thing. That would have turned his actions from a were plot device into an actual willing sacrifice, and, in my opinion, a stronger (and more worthy) death.

What I really dislike is how there is no epilogue whatsoever – and no, those few lines your comrades say to you after you are put back into the map don’t count, and the cinematic, while pretty, is a classical sequel hook, not an epilogue. I would have expected a ceremony to commemorate all the pact soldiers that died fighting the mordrem, including the pact marshal. He earned that much during the Zaithan story alone. And I would have also like to see a more personal epilogue between the player character and the companions, checking in with Taimi, Logan/Zoija, etc. And bringing back Caladbolg to the Grove. When I saw that item after the mission I was sure I would be going to bring it “home” to honor my dead friend. Turns out it’s just a souvenir from when you finally we allowed to shank that stupid salad who always stole the spotlight from you. It’s very disappointing.

People didn’t as much hate Trahearne for taking the credit, as much for being lifeless, useless and with a terrible, terrible voice acting. It was one of the worst characters I’ve met in video games.

Funny thing is that he never took credit, he always gave it to you. Always was saying we would have come nowhere without you.

All I see is OP complaining about good customer service.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

With the upcoming Raids and so on do you think the Meta/Optimum gear will stay Zerker/Assassin’s

That’s the catch, we don’t know what Raids are. I saw a remark from those who beta tested them that each encounter would have it’s own “meta”. I’m going to assume that simply means some encounters will have hard-counters to specific damage applications, ie having insanely high toughness or being immune to conditions.

If gear is such important investment for you, wait till Raids are actually out. It’s too soon decide on “meta” for raids and best we can currently do is speculate, and basing your investment on speculations as we know is risky business.

Inspiration with Restorative Mantras, Mantra of Recovery+Pain is another good glasscannon sustain setup. Run MH sword in at least one weapon set and abuse Blurred Frenzy to dps while you evade, use MoR while CC’d, using BF or when afflicted with conditions when your main cleanse is on cooldown. Spam MoP against melee-unfriendly enemies and when you need to retreat a bit and heal.

Generally speaking Healing Power is worthless, Vitality doesn’t help much in PvE as conditions are rarely a threat, and Toughness draws additional aggro which can actually get you killed quicker. Classes like Warrior or Necro can get decent use out of defensive stats, but most of our “survival” skills don’t scale with gear at all. If played well zerker gives a greater increase to killing speed than its sacrifice in durability.

I do love how it’s always ‘fixed a bug that caused this skill to be useful’. They don’t even have the strength of character to come out and say they’re nerfing it.

Synosius.9876:

Silverkey.2078:

Synosius.9876:

mesmer […] are OP now with out a doubt.

It didn’t take long… 1h30 and someone says mesmer is OP…

why is it so hard to admit? feeling self conscious that maybe skill is less of a factor?

we should embrace our superiority!

OP = Overpowered = Too powerful = it should not be this powerful = it is a bad thing that it is this powerful = it should be nerfed.
That is what you are saying when you call it OP, by definition.

That’s a secondary part of the problem, many people like you are trying to say “yeah, it’s the best” but instead saying “it’s too powerful”.
Being at the top of the heap =/= overpowered. In the case of mesmer, for example, being the best duelist class (arguably) is balanced out by the lack of viability in larger combat. Bringing a mesmer instead of another DD ele means shifting team power from team fights into solo roaming. It can be a legitimate move (a couple teams have tried it in tourneys), but it’s a strategic move, and a risk. That’s the balance.

Given the above, calling it “overpowered” is a disservice to the class, and is frankly not true.

Wolfs Shadow.7234:

Why?

Because he has unlocked them and wants to be a special snowflake.

redcomyn.4651:

Its not just other classes that asks for nerfs. Quite a few mesmers constantly ask for nerfs. To these people, the mesmer is never nerfed enough. I don’t understand that, but that is the way it is.

Surprisingly, good players of any class want a balanced game.

That includes nerf to their own class, if warranted.

Doam.8305:

The other classes had there F skills thrown out the window and replaced or at the very least altered however the chrono is an addition without change.

In what way did the Druid F* skills get changed? How about Warrior when not activating the Berserk? The Scrapper sure changed up the F* skills, did it not? The Daredevil changed theirs right? Tempest, those surely changed the Attunements beyond giving them additional effects through Overload which can be activated 5 seconds after swapping, oh.. wait. Herald totally changes up the Revenant, am I right?—it’s not as if you mainly just gain access to Glint.

Yeah.. Reaper and Dragonhunter changes stuff the most, and it’s not massive differences. Dragonhunter Virtues are basically the same as Guardian with their Passives, though arguably better on their Active abilities. Yes, we get a new shatter. Other elite specializations gets new things too with their profession mechanics.

I don’t hate Trahearne as much as the voice acting, gawd! what an uninspired and uncharismatic bore!!!

There are actually a few instant stuns in the game, Engineer Overcharged Shot, Turret destruction trait, Magnetic Inversion, Elementalist Updraft, Necromancer Doom, Fear of Death and Reaper’s protection traits, Thief Sleight of Hand trait, main hand sword stealth attack, Mesmer Mirror of Anguish trait, what you listed and anything from stealth practically.

I thought we had that covered by throwing ourselves to our death in every imaginable deadly endeavor. Adventurers are wildly suicidal by nature.

Then the transporter grid/Asuran “waypoints” just spew out the next facsimile of the long dead hero and off we march again to our next demise.

I’ll throw my two cents in with many others. The reason Chonomancer seems better than base mesmer is because so many things we’ve been asking for as base mesmers were given to chronomancers. In my opinion, Illusionary Reversion and Chronophantasma should be in the Illusions trait line as they make shatters more bearable. Mesmers shouldn’t have to pay for using their class skills. Time Marches On should be in Inspiration so every mesmer, elite spec or not, will has access to it. If they make those changes, I don’t think Chronomancer would be seen as an upgrade anymore.

As for me, of my 6 mesmers, possibly 2 of them will become chronomancers. My main will because the shield and wells provide a lot of aoe. I might rework my bleed condi one into a slow/interrupt build, should we get runes that prolong slow. My confusion condi and bunker will stay base as their builds work better with the default traitlines.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Xyonon.3987:

You can make sound every idea bad if you act like this …

They could buff it to 2 sec + 1 sec per illusion and give the distortion share trait 2 sec too.

I personally don’t think that distortion is in urge need of a buff, altough it wouldn’t be op and it would increase the usage of the distortion share trait, since 1 sec is reaaaally short.

They would be careless to touch the shatter. 4 seconds is already 1 second over most invulnerability in the game. Not only this but why on earth would you want to uncontrollably make it so you can’t control a capture point for half of its decapture time when you shatter with no clones out.

Running the inspiration trait at all is considered a bad idea. Your upgrade would forcibly decap the point by 50% whenever you distort in pvp. Don’t exacerbate the situation where it is. Mesmers who distort when they have the inspiration line will already forcibly decapture the point by 25%

I assume this was nor your intent. But any buffing of either is immensely rude to mesmers in spvp.

Personally I’d make protected phantasms the minor, then buff inspiring distortion and make it the major. Inspiration is a fantastic line for a lot of reasons, but if you happen to need distortion while on a point, it’s good for a guaranteed 25%-50% decap depending on location.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Ross Biddle.2367:

Daniel Handler.4816:

He gripes but he uses it.

No. No you do not -_-u

He admits the inherent flaws. Even sheds tears over them. And still uses it.

If he wants to use it, ok, cool, I don’t really care. Yet we’re discussing the semantics of competence.

BTW, quoting names doesn’t necessarily amount to anything, though your propensity to do it is notable. I get you want to dismiss the point because I’ve contradicted two “names” (Helseth/Supcutie), but I dismissed Helseths opinions on “Scepter AA clone spam becoming the new Mesmer meta” in the same fashion. I.e. on principled grounds.

So yeah, names, cool.

The point to all this was, you faulted Alpha for not running it (for a second time as your post stated), yet there’s profoundly strong reasons for him not to take DD and profoundly strong reasons to just take Phant Fury instead.

Oh and ahh, I’ve also noticed you seem to interchange between WvW and PvP builds (the build linked was a WvW setup btw). You made some comment before about upping Phant crit chance from 70% to 90% which, while more plausable in WvW, isnt the case in any PvP meta build. You’re talking assassin trinket + accuracy sigil, or a mes/pack rune (instead of vamp). Some combination of “non-meta” anyway, in an argument you’re making under the guise of “meta”.

I’m really not you just aren’t thinking straight.

The dueling tree gives perms fury as minor. Phantasmal fury runes augments in addition to this.

So a 20% increase for you and your phants + phantasmal fury = 40%

I dismiss the trait in alpha’s build because the phantasm they use do not multi hit.

It is a shatter build, one extra bleed every 8 seconds is inconsequential. Increasing the crit rate of the phants for whatever power damage they have is miniscule when you are talking about the difference between 70% and 90%

The minor trait in dueling tree gives “perma fury” to the mesmer. Phantasms take their precision from the mesmers base stats. Unless that has changed. So Fury on the Mesmer does not stack with fury on the phantasm.

The only good argument you make against Phant Fury is that his phantasms are single hit in a condi build, but this is no reason to take a bad trait choice. Especially not in WvW where being locked out of stealth is a death sentence. Furthermore, even in a condi build, a couple k damage from an iWarlock is nothing to be waved away. It’s worth the crit chance once all other options have been reviewed.

Embolism.8106:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Your point is like going off a life saving medicine because you don’t like the side effects.

If not using Desperate Decoy means certain death and if one of the side effects wasn’t death, sure.

Yes but the pros will always avoid death when playing russian roulette, because, you know, they’re the pros -_-u

AlphatheWhite.9351:

Show me the math.

Math can tell only so much. Granted, the more variables your math accounts for the clearer picture you will get but almost always it’s still just not enough. There are enough serious flaws with going condi that Power build is the only realistic option left…. for now.

With HoT, my bet it on ascended power gear. Your condi gear can be left exotic simply because power benefits from ascended better than condi would – asc weapon strength (5% more dmg) applies only to direct dmg and has no effect on condi dmg. By leaving your condi gear exotic, you now can easily craft both Rabid and Sinister and keep them in your inv and use depending on your mood.

As far as ascended, I’d craft Berserkers. With the ranger coming closer and closer to the meta there will be a much higher chance you’ll run with one which means you will be getting Spotter buff much more often, and Spotter as we know more or less nullifies Assassins gear purpose by kicking you past 100% crit, as well as the 30% crit bonus vs. slowed targets which also will screw your assassins gear.