Guild Wars 2

Ravens of the Veil: http:\\rotv.guildportal.com

We are a guild that’s been in existence since 2001 and since the launch of GW2 (we started in DAoC on Percival/Hibernia). We reside on the Sanctum of Rall server.

On any given night, we currently can field about two (plus) full groups during Eastern US prime time. We are primarily adults. What do I mean by that? Well, we have lives outside of game. We generally expect members to have a mature attitude and to behave as a generally sane member of our online community.

We are looking for laid back adults who enjoy the whole game. We have all guild events unlocked and have regular event nights, including our extremely popular Drunk PvP Friday. Our schedule is as follows:

Sunday: Guild Missions (Bounty, Rush, Challenge)

Monday: WvW

Tuesday: New Content (every other Tuesday, otherwise a down night)

Wednesday: Guild Missions (Bounty, Puzzle, Trek)

Thursday: … you’re on your own

Friday: Drunken sPvP (where you can trash talk your guildies over TS)

Saturday: … you’re on your own

We have a core group of very competent men and women who enjoy playing GW2, even one year after release. Our WvW tactics revolve around 10-20 man strike groups and tend not to run with the zerg. Most of us have multiple level 80s and lots of game experience. We are helpful, but don’t like dragging around dead weight. We are looking for people of a like mind, who want a good community of fun people to hang with.

Contact any member in game for more information (I’m Yurtil, Hastur Ryleh, or Fuzzy Glitter) or you can visit our web site or even PM me here for more info.

Okay, I’m toying with a similar idea and would like to hear opinions on the following…

Instead of the 10, 0, 30, 30, 0 build, I’m running 20, 0, 25, 25, 0

I’m giving up the health regen and bombs that heal allies for reserve mines and short fuse (and a bit more power). Would love to hear opinions.

Also, what do people think of the A.E.D heal? I’ll be testing it tonight during our Friday, Drunk sPvP night with our guild, but it looks okay on paper.

Also, by having at least 25 in Alchemy, shouldn’t you equip Elixir C to get the boon benefit (this build needs all the dmg you can milk out of it)?

For sPvP, I use 4 nightmare runes and 2 earth runes. As for the Amulet/Jewel combo, I’m a little less clear… any suggestions? I’m currently using Rabid with Settler’s jewel.

Thanks in advance for any comments.

Sirendor.1394:

I agree, but it’s hardly possible, except if you do it purely for fun.

On Vabbi we have a small guild going (~5 guys in WvW at all times) and FoW (other sIn this instance we won, we got loot, and we had a great time. Sure, rewards weren’t anything compared to 60 people zergs farming eachother, but the fun we had doing this… no blob can ever have that.

and this proves that skill >> numbers…

to a point, but smart players will avoid the zerg.

The key points made here (and, yes, Samhayn, you did fix WvW in your post above) is that the current system is essentially broken.

Therefore, what makes WvW fun for me?

- objective based group play where the outcome is different every time you try it
- matching your group’s skill versus the skills of like minded opponents
- a competitive outcome that has ramifications in the greater context of the game

HOWEVER, the server limitations and the capacity of large groups to game the reward system through ‘zerging’ objectives, diminishes the viability of WvW for smaller groups who want a challenge (there is no challenge for small groups on dead servers) but don’t want to game the system through zerging.

That’s where things have to change. We need larger maps to decrease the impact of the zerg and have incentives that reward skill (base the reward on group size if possible).

gennyt.3428:

WvWvW is about a show of force so numbers will win out at the end of the day so it won’t ever, ever be about skill.

Not at all true. I can take 10 people into a zone and by judiciously picking targets and avoiding the zerg, we will take points more efficiently than larger groups.

gennyt.3428:

If Anet wants to cull farming they need to really stop implementing bullkitten vertical progression via ascended gear and stat boosts hidden behind ranks and probably think about revisiting structure defense against the ever increasing strength and availability of siege weapons.

The key here is that WvW is linked to your PvE toon and not your sPvP toon. If you want WvW to be seamless and associated with PvE zones, then the rewards and ranks need to come from kills and a progressive zone control, where your rewards increase based on the more area you control.

gennyt.3428:

Also, zergs aren’t stupid per se they just provide a sheltered and forgiving way to play, because someone is in the blob doesn’t automatically mean they are a terrible player.

No, zerglings are not terrible players per se, they just are not using their abilities to be anything other than a rampaging cudgel. If you have bigger zones, with points that need to be held in order to get more ‘points’ the bigger your area grows, then you encourage strategy over rapid objective turnover.

For instance, if we own our spawn point and you capture vale, then briar, you would get ‘points’ for capturing those points and then ‘points’ for holding those points and more when you add Bay to the mix. You make it progressive and give incentive to have an actual battle plan, where you actually have to defend spots and run supply, rather than just a constant exchange of points with no meaning other than who racks up the most points overall.

Reading this forum and trying to have a reasoned discussion (not possible in any forum of this type) about some of the issues uncovered by this season of WvW achievements, I feel that the big issue isn’t the lag or the long queue lines, it’s giving incentive to a farming mentality and not giving incentive to skill.

This really is the issue that isn’t being addressed. I’m from SoR and haven’t had substantive issues with queues or lag since we’ve been on that server… until last week’s patch dropped. Now everyone is yelling about insane queues and unbearable skill lag.

Those are not the issues, they are the symptoms of a bigger, long standing issue: WvW incentives are based on a PvE system and not a PvP system

These incentives all revolve around PvE concepts – Farming – and farming does not require skill. We all want epic WvW where anyone who wants to participate can. Zergs are stupid and only exist to maximize farming objectives. Create a system that rewards skill and diminishes returns on the blunt force of the zerg.

Taldren.7523:

Chris.3290:

Quit complaining about queues. I’m on SoS and we only queue two maps in prime-time.

If you guys had put two and two together, and realized that if 80% of all the WvW guilds were stacking in Tier 1; that there was going to be queues.

We’ve been telling people this since the season was announced and you still went to T1 for easier wins, and this is the price you pay.

Stop complaining, only a small handful of those in T1 were on those servers since start (folks like GSCH, Choo, HzH) and I feel sorry for them, but they chose to remain there and this is the price.

Hey genius … we transferred to a tier 6 server named Sanctum of Rall which then became a T1 server. We already started over once, asking us again is just pure BS.

There is a key point that is missing here. Up until last weekend, the queues on SoR have been tolerable and the lag has been bearable. The small guild that I’m a part of (with Taldren and Samhayn above), has never had an issue before this weekend with queue times, and we are currently on SoR, one of the three servers perpetually at the top of the heap, slugging it out week after week. Those weeks when we don’t face JQ and BG, we roll with a score that’s 3x over the next server.

The answer is in some way server population, but that is not the real solution. Spreading out population among all servers does nothing to solve a fundamental flaw in this system… The fact (and it was referenced earlier when someone said that it’s okay because we all have lag) that zerg versus zerg just isn’t fun and requires NO skill.

This ‘season’ does nothing to promote skill and everything to promote farming. The lag issue is just the result of ANet not considering the ramifications of adding a farming system to a limited WvW pvp zone.

styx.7294:

@ Hastur

I don’t understand why you play on a tier 1 server by necessity when that is where people yell at you for disrupting karma trains.

5-10 people guild can be ninjas, special forces and make a difference in the low tiers. Where you make noise and how much people you draw to lift pressure off somewehre makes a big difference.

My guild runs 5-10 (mostly 5) and gets lots of love from our server and sometimes from other servers we fight.

We started on JQ, but at launch the queue times were so long and based on the same reasoning expressed here, we moved to Erradon Terrace. Yes, we had no more queue times and yes, it was easy for us to take objectives, but the competition was a joke. Therefore, we moved again to Sanctum of Rall (a tier 2 server at the time) and proceeded to move into tier 1, where we now sit with a continual match-up with JQ and BG.

The key point is that you shouldn’t have to go to a low pop server to play small group WvW. That gets boring real fast. We should be in bigger, more dynamic battlegrounds where all groups can make a difference if they are good at battleground strategy and the zerg still could exist for what it was (i.e., I don’t think that anyone on JQ can fight in a group under 10).

I would like to chime in on what Taldren said and add a little context. For those that don’t know, Taldren is a seasoned veteran of MMOs and has had a lot of experience working with game developers. He’s a smart individual and someone people here should listen to.

I do agree very much with the feedback given by the OP. We do play on a T1 server, not by choice, but by necessity. WvW has been broken for some time and this new season, where PvE type achievements are incentivizing greater participation, just exacerbates the issues.

WvW is an exercise in ‘Zerg Mentality’. The zerg, or Karma Train as it’s known, exists to essentially to perpetuate a leveling mechanic and not as any real test of strategy or ability. That is what Taldren is getting at when he talks about a roaming small band perspective. Taldren and I were brought up where our band of 5-10 people could truly make a difference on the battlefield. We were the ninjas, the marines, the special forces. On any given night, we can take a band of Ravens (our guild from back in the DaoC days) and change the face of battle. Now we get yelled at for messing up the karma train rotation.

WvW is just a loot/karma pinata at this point. The changes to the middle of the battlefields have helped, but hasn’t addressed the BIG issue. The BIG issue is that the maps are SMALL. The current WvW battlefields should be at least twice the size of what they are now. The technology should be tweaked to allow for more into the zones (given that the zone size is increased) and there should be incentive for small raiders and the zerg should be de-emphasized. (Taldren and others have probably posted this before)

As far as this current league situation goes, it is a mess. Sanctum of Rall, Jade Quarry, and Blackgate will slug it out for the top slot and it will remain a zerg-fest. The lag and queue times are horrendous and eventually will turn people off to the WvW experience.

http://www.gw2armor.com/

The above link gives you a site where you can view all of the armor choices for all of the races, all of the sexes, and all of the classes in the game.

The key points with respect to armor for Asura are:

- There is relatively little distinction between the sexes in terms of armor skin.
- Many of the armor skins (with the exception of some order armor and cultural armor) look poorly scaled to the Asura form. When in doubt, it looks like they just simply wrapped a piece of textured cloth around them and called it a day.
- Many individual pieces have rendering problems mentioned in this and other threads.

With respect to weapons, it is evident that the Tier 2 Cultural weapon set for the Asura and the Sylvari are switched. If you look at the Tier 2 Sylvari weapon set, they are Asuran Glyphed weapons. They should be switched, but since I have multiple characters of multiple races, I’ve already rectified the situation and would hate to have to re-skin them, so if they are changed, I would hope that existing weapons in the population would not automatically re-skin.

Asuran weapons and armor are a problem. I would hope that ANet would address this aesthetic for a truly wonderful and dynamic race.

http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/601173_10151393650469485_646088260_n.jpg

Above is my Asuran Necromancer, Yurtil. She is awesome, but the only really nice armor for her is the Asuran Cultural armor. The rest of the light armor on an Asuran looks like they rolled a couple of times in a bolt of cloth. Aside from the fact that we are forced into a child’s onesie when we take our clothes off (as apposed to the Sylvari’s genital leaves), the armor skins for the Asura are the weakest in the game.

Additionally, some of the weapon skins just don’t scale well. Note the scepter below:
http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/644341_10151393650464485_1913365110_n.jpg

Thanks. Would like to hear the communities thoughts on this.