Guild Wars 2

I think exotic gear should be able to get infusion slots. You don’t even need ascended to do raids.

Or maybe better, have a way to add multiple infusion slots to 1 ascended item by doing fractals (only pure ar, not other stats). The infusion slot upgrade should be balanced so you can’t just put 150 +1s on the same item. You’d still need to buy multiple +8s and +9s, but it’s possible to affordably put them all on the same item.

My only strong opinion is if it only takes a dev a couple of quick hours to add a “story mode” button and nerf the hp, damage, and mechanics of each boss, then disable the weekly rewards, then I don’t mind it.

It might actually be fun to solo raid bosses.

But if adding story mode means that new raid wings will come out less often or be lower quality then hell no.

the conditions that the console applies don’t do any damage, so it counts from your first hit

All of wing 4 and some older bosses already have easy and hard mode (challenge motes or achievements). They could make an easier story mode with no rewards, but I think most of us would prefer to get wing 5 instead of a story mode for the previous 4 wings.

Easier fights also tend to make the story less significant so it would take away from the story.

It’s fairly easy to get into raids. All you need is to join a guild that does raids weekly and copy a few meta builds that you like. Might not even need a guild if you catch on quickly. This is not like some other games where you have to have been doing it from the start to have a chance.

My asuras take no kitten from human clown gods. I like it

Make a condi ranger.
It’s very competitive with tempest (unless you’re a really good tryhard with tempest) in all bosses except KC. The rotation is much easier, just swapping between shortbow and torch to take advantage of quick draw. You also have immobs and the option to take spirits or spotter if your squad has no druid.

Only about half the balance comes from the class design. The other half comes from the design of each PvE encounter. If they make bosses which require things like 1500 range, stealth, extremely high mobility, perma blocks, or completely prevent melee dps or stacking then it will shake things up nicely.

Also, the current mirror comp meta is not there only because of balance, or lack of it. It is there because it’s simple, and easy to fill groups. It’s faster to find a team as a ps warrior if they need 2 of them. So the goal is allow multiple builds to effectively fill the same role, but I don’t think this will happen until many more specializations come out.

But I agree that role of chrono, druid, and ps should be split better with other classes.
They have to find a way to make ALL unique buffs 10 target, so that it’s a waste to bring more than one, and also make these roles unable to do descent healing or dps while providing the buffs.

Some suggestions:

Warrior:
-Make empower allies affect 10 targets
-Make the ps trait affect 10 or 7 people, but have an internal cooldown to prevent one warrior from giving more than 10-12 might.

-This will allow one warrior to bring all warrior buffs, while allowing others like a rev, dh, or dps warrior to bring the additional 15 might.

Druid:
-All spirits should be 10 targets so that only one of them is needed.
-Change traits, or the way those buffs scale so that you can’t be the top healer while having spirits. Possibly move those buffs to another elite specialization.

-The goal is again, to make only one of the druids mandatory, while allowing a heal only druid, or dps only ranger, and also encouraging other healer roles.

Chrono:
-I think the signet of inspiration, and maybe the tempest “heat sync” should be moved to another class, or another mesmer elite spec, then make it affect 7 allies. I think a “boon spread” role is worthy of it’s own alite specialization.

Also make alacrity sources apply to 10 targets
-Have a trait that forces chronos to if their well of action gives quickness, or alacrity. then replace the alacrity function of the well of recall with something else. Maybe slow or taunt?
-Add a traits which causes reflected or phantasm projectiles give a small amount of quickness, and increase the max quickness stacks.

-The goal is to split chrono into 2 or 3 different roles: alacrity tank, or quickness condi dps. but without requiring 2 of the same.

Tempest:
-Remove the cooldown on meteor shower, but nerf fire staff autoattacks. It’s very unintuitive for new players who should obviously assume that every meteor that hits does damage.

Fill the gaps:
- Buff the low end builds, like power reaper and hammer scrapper in PvE.

Auto attacks:
- Many auto attacks need to be nerfed, like angi bomb 1, ele fire staff auto, dh hammer auto, rev auto, possibly warrior sword auto’s bleed, possibly some necro autos. It is seriously disappointing to find out that auto attacks do higher dps than other damage focused skills.

Combo finishers:
- I think combo fields need to be reworked, similar to conditions in HOT. A finisher should be able to trigger multiple combo fields, as long as they are of different types.
- Then of course balance them as not cause crazy power creep
- Currently, in a 5 or 10 man group it’s too chaotic to pay attention to which combo field will be activated. Instead we should be able to simply focus on combo field uptime and finishing them. It would be a big rework, but it is very not GW2 like to constantly override other players’ combo fields…

I don’t see anything wrong with 2 dh’s. They are a good class for fractals

Join 1 or 2 guilds that do raid training and have static teams to clear them weekly. My 2 guilds [YAK] and [Fuzzy] work pretty well for that, and there are many more.

I’d be surprised if this type of item can be so flexible, especially since there would have to be a way to control which buffs activate when you use a mistlock singularity.

Maybe they can make a way to split the omnipotion back into 3

Does anyone know the exact amount of hp each of the 3 nightmare fractal bosses have in challenge mode(not the normal 100)?

Just curious

The focus in fractals(and pretty much any other content except training golems) shouldn’t be on getting perfect dps buffs. 99% of the time having more dodges is better.

you won’t fail a fractal because you didn’t have that buff 100% of the time.

looks like another potentially good outfit I’ll never get because the female version has a buttcape…

But it’s ok, most of my characters are asura

repping is still an important part of guilds in an internal or UI way. It decides which guild hall you go to, which guild’s stuff show up on the guild panel, to which guild’s storage an item goes (like the solid ocean fragments), and it also helps a bit with chat (you only have to type /g instead of /g1)

There will always have to be a way to swap between your guilds and I don’t see how it can get any simpler than repping.

plz?

Maybe the other races too? if it’s not too much trouble making them

Also wouldn’t it make sense for the jade maw fractal to drop fragments of the solid ocean?

Anet made the right decision in not allowing memory readers and not adding ingame dps meters.

If Anet add dps meters, it shows that they have failed to create interesting bosses that are more than just a dps golem with a few extra mechanics.

“Think about it for a second, why are raids not accessible for new players?”
There are many reasons. dps meters would only kinda sometimes indirectly fix one of these reasons

“The only gauge of knowing what you’re doing is how many Legendary Insights you have, Kill proofs, achievement points and so on.”
How would you ping your dps as soon as you join the squad? Even if you could, dps shows your skill against the training golem, not against that particular boss. So dps meters will not replace insights and kill proofs in any way.

People who complain about raids not being accessible seem to forget that guilds exist. It is not hard to find a guild that will train you and get you your first clears. After that you can join a public lfg guild that uses ranks instead of LI to show experience.

I’ve been in many good pugs who don’t ask to ping anything. It’s not hard to tell if a player is bad without a dps meter, and having one would’t instantly make them better.

it took me about 2 weeks to get 5000 for my last potion. I think i was getting 400-500 per day.

I was doing 7 dailies (3 t4s, 3 recommended, lvl 100 challenge) I was using at least one large speed potion for the challenge last boss, but it’s worth it since that fractal gives like 140 relics.

The only problem is that now i’m a bit burned out of fractals lol

DrummerX.8549:

Why is an add that runs around the map one shoting anyone that doesn’t wear toughness gear while a Boss takes 3-4 hits to down anyone.

I’m guessing you are talking about the ice wolves in the thaumanova fractal. I think lethal non boss things like that make them more fun. otherwise they would just be another boring trash mob that you focus pull and aoe down.

Lets compare them to a boss:
1. The wolves die much faster
2. Bosses are generally designed to require the full attention of your team
3. Can be cc’d or avoided
4. If you die to them, it’s less of a setback than if you die at the boss
5. Bosses normally have many more mechanics than one instakill move.
6. Many bosses also have high damage or instakill mechanics

Damage is only one of many factors and it’s justified in this case.

I think more “trash” mobs should have high importance mechanics. The uncategorized harpies are another good example.

imo bloomhunger is one of the best bosses in the game, but I wouldn’t say it’s harder than raids.

In general when designing a game, I’d try to make it less focused on passive numbers, and more on active abilities, usually referred to as utilities. for example blink, reflect, rise(necro) are utilities, while global boons like fury and quickness are too number focused.

gw2 has quite a few fun utilities across all classes, but they are just not as good as all the buffs like spotter, 25 might, fury, quickness, banners and so on. Your effectiveness in a fight should be more like pvp, where it matters what you do, and not what your stats are.

The duration of boons and buffs should be reduced. It should be impossible to keep any of them on 100% of the time. Instead, they should be used as part of a combo. basilisk venom is a good example: it increases the cc of your team only when you need it.

Many of the traits that give a dps increase should be replaced with something more class specific. Making a build shouldn’t be about how many +10 damage traits you can find, but more about which traits will be more useful. Damage buffs do nothing to make blocks, invis, blinks, pulls, or range any better.

A big part of build diversity comes from the pve encounter mechanics:
For example, what if there was a boss which moves around the room very fast, while stopping for a very short time at predictable spots(if the vg arena was 3x larger and vg moved 2x faster). With some good balance, you can have long range builds which can keep the boss in range most of the time while doing steady dps. You would also have high mobility builds which are able to keep up and do steady dps. There would also be high burst dps builds, who wait for the boss to stop moving to drop all their damage. In the end each of the 3 types does the same damage, but with very different playstiles. But in the current game the meta would be all ranged builds stacking in the center where they can stack every buff in the game with 100% uptime, because passive buffs are too strong.

summary:
classes and bosses should be designed so that your dps on the training golem has nothing to do with how effective you are in the rest of the game. After that, it should be balanced so that different builds do the same task in different ways, but with the same success.

So do you think they should stop making raids or is there a way to make hard team content without causing these problems?

Seems like it either has to be easy enough for every build to work, which gets boring(open world)
Or there has to be hard endgame stuff that naturally create strict meta and trinity

Maybe there is another option which requires amazing balance, class design, and content design. But I think Anet is doing pretty well there so far.

Maybe the hardest content in the game should not be something where you organize teams based on builds. So if you have a bad build then only you suffer. aka make open world harder.

everyone who complains about not being able to join raids seems to forget all about guilds. There are many guilds that do scheduled training and loot raids, which is very accessible.

I also I see many lfg groups that don’t check insights or gear, but you’ll be less likely to actually get a kill.

I can see it being stressful if you try to organize and lead a full pug group, then someone always leaves after each failed attempt.
But you can just join a group and do your stuff and it’s not stressful at all.

Keep in mind I don’t pvp much, and i have not thought about it as much as Anet should if they were to make it.

==*New mesmer spec: Twins:*==
The main concept of this specialization is that there are two of you: your character, and your “mirror twin” illusion. a twin is a step up from a phantasm. Chrono deals with time, Mirage deals with space.

==*new weapon: Warhorn (main hand or offhand, not sure)*==
i havn’t thought about it too much, but it might offer a healer build. could also be cc focused.
It would have a melee range phantasm that heals allies while doing some soft cc’s to the target(depending on balance)

=*the mirror twin:*==
-may or may not take one of the 3 illusion slots (depends on balance)
-exact same stats and weapons as you. if you swap weapons, your twin swaps too.
-always uses autoattack.
-attacks your target, and does not die when its target dies.
-the trait that creates the shatter effect on your character works on it (so up to 5 shatters total)
-it generally copies your actions, but not wasd movements. if you jump – it jumps; if you dodge – it dodges; if you get downed – it gets downed, however since you don’t directly share hp, if you rally, it rallies with it’s old hp.

==*the f5 skill (2 part skill, like tempest attunements):*==
-part 1: long cd, create your mirror twin
-imo it doesn’t have to be a shatter, but if it must be, then it will sacrifice all your illusions to create the twin. The twin will only be at full strength if you shatter 3.
-part 2: mid-short cd(depends on balance), swap to your mirror twin (similiar to swapping to sword 2).

==*swapping to your twin:*==
-your twin has independent weapon cooldowns.
-since the AI only uses autoattcks, you effectively refresh your weapon cooldowns(but not utilities)
-may also refresh shatters, depending on balance.

==*New utility set: tricks (similar to thief)*==
-I haven’t thought about specifics too much. but they will be designed to interact with your twin.
-“chain link” create a chain link between you and your twin. enemies or allies that touch the chain are affected in some way.
- “mirror” create a mirror wall at the mid point between you and you twin. it reflects projectiles and possibly buffs allied projectiles.
- “trade” copy all boons and conditions to your twin
- “copy” causes your twin to cast the next utility you cast, possibly twice if the next skill you use is mimic(depends how confusing it gets).
- another possible utility “lonely”: orders your twin to not move for 60 seconds, as long as you are within 5000 range.
- elite “portal” your twin creates a portal entrance. reactivate to create portal exit at your location.
- heal skill “shoot me” heal for some amount; you and your twin fire healing shards both towards and away from each other.

==*Some traits*==
Maybe a trait that gives nearly perma swiftness in some situations(depends on balance)
3 condi traits, to bring condi dps mesmer into the pve meta(depends on pvp balance)
some other traits that synergize with the twin and warhorn.

==*What this will bring to the game:*==
-dps mesmer spec. 2x the current AA dps + halfed cooldowns. This may require a general nerf to autoattacks.
-it offers more dps without having to buff the
-better shatter builds. with up to 5 shatters(3 illusions + yourself and your twin) and with two sets of independent shatter cooldowns. it may be op in pvp, not sure.
-possible healing spec if balanced correctly.

==*gameplay: *==
-the idea was to make mesmer more focused on positioning, and less on buffs and boons.
-try to keep your twin on the opposite side of your target and your team.
-swapping to the twin can be used either for mobility or for resetting weapon cooldowns.

how about make buffs affect 7 targets. so 2 of each is a waste and not everyone has 100% everything

I use trapper and nightmare runes too with sigils of bursting and malice. It gets me 100% chill and bleed, but 81.4% poison. if I use toxic crystals i get 91.4% poison.

I think thorn runes rely on the #6 to stack at least twice in order to give you more condi damage than nightmare runes, but that seems too situational for me.

I can simply swap sigil of bursting for sigil of venom to get 100% bleed, chill, poison with toxic crystals. But I wanted to be able to use cheep food for non raids content while still having 100% bleeds.

this is my cheep fractal and non tryhard raids build:
http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNArYWjM0Q3NWdDO3AHOWKGMpPQIoDEFAGAJg4eYRMJC-ThSAQBhUZw6WYIanAAAcEAwmSPvsPQEV/xmKBDo+Ap9IAIFgiitA-e

Swap sigil of malice for venom and use toxic crystals for 100% poison.

I wasn’t playing at the time of the patch, but if i understand right it’s still good. instead of chill doing damage, now it applies bleed stacks which means you can stack with other necros.
The bleed stacks will last longer than the chill, but if you really want to have something chilled 100% then it’s still possible.

how is it possible that you could not find a build guide?
http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Reaper_-_Viper_Horror

it’s one of the most common builds

I might be the only one to disagree with this. Most if not all of these changes look like buffs to ele. The changes may seem like a good idea now and add more build variety, but if they balance classes by simply buffing underused things then eventually there will be noticeable power creep.

If you buff something, you gotta nerf something else.

Players unknowingly tend to agree with buffs more then with nerfs, so the dev’s should take this as feedback, but not as something they should do exactly.

In PvE if you want to have both blood magic and death magic traits as well as curses. Also i don’t think the chill damage stacks with other players.

For example in raids you might want the extra minions and condi transfers as well as the shroud 4 rezing trait and healing from blood magic.