Guild Wars 2

michelada.2947:

i have 355 hps with my guardian, it would be kinda silly to have the full spec just at the beggining of the expansion, i’m assuming it will be 400 or probably 300

Doubtful, in my opinion. The reason you have so many more than you currently need is likely because they lowered the amount required to unlock a HoT elite spec. When HoT launched you needed, I believe, a whopping 400 HPs to fully unlock it. They reduced it due to the amount of complaints received about it.

Archaeopteryx.7409:

Yargesh.4965:

1. no
2. yes
3 Depends on you.

When you say ‘Depends on you’, what does that mean? You’re way too vague lmao

For instance, will people in WvW be using a hybrid between Scourge and Reaper? You need to remember I haven’t played since [pretty much] vanilla GW2, so I’m not aware of all the changes made to builds. -- Can people use both the Reaper and Scourge trait lines, or is it limited to only one?

I don’t think you understand. It is not possible to use two elite specs at the same time, so hybrids are literally impossible. This was an intentional design choice by Anet.

MrForz.1953:

I have my share of okay looking rifles for whatever my Thief will become at this point.

However, my engi still could use some shotguns. The Ogre blaster is getting old now.

I think the Privateer Rifle might be a nice option if you’re looking for a more short barrel type shotgun look.

I switched from ranger to thief because I was bored of ez mode longbow in open world pve, but didn’t want to go for condi. Loving it so far, especially once I finally got Daredevil fully unlocled and practiced with the staff a bit.

I NEED THIS FOR MY THIEF.

Please, Anet.

There will always be some trolls and tryhards around, no matter what multiplayer game you play. However, I will say that GW2 has probably the most friendly and helpful community I have ever seen for an online game. My gf tried out the game a few weeks ago and was completely weirded out by how helpful and friendly random strangers are in this game, because she’s used to the toxicity and selfishness that runs rampant in other games like MOBAs and other MMO’s.

Bio Flame.4276:

Will mounts trully keep you playing more? Were they really necessary?

The main idea behind mounts is that they remove the need to compromise your build to include movement speed increases to get around faster. No more need to take swiftness utilities or weapons. No more need to take a movement speed signet or trait.

I’ve only really tested…

Soulbeast: 3/10 – It has some fun synergies like Sic ‘Em and Maul while in Beastmode, but that doesn’t make up for its current shortcomings. The dagger, in its current state, is going to be the worst weapon of the class by far and will never be touched by anyone even remotely half serious about doing decent damage. It scales horribly with both power and condi, and its longer cast times on the AA and #2, when compared to main hand daggers on other classes and elite specs, make it feel incredibly sluggish. The skills are also pretty bland, with #2 in particular just feeling a boring trash skill with no interesting functionality to make it worth using. Finally, its traits and utilities are (also) generally very boring and uninspired (when compared to other elite specs). I believe them when they say the whole pet melding mechanic took a lot of technical work to implement effectively and make core traits and skills work with Beastmode, but that doesn’t mean they should’ve slacked on the rest; because that’s what it feels like they did.

A lot of games nowadays include a “Story Mode” difficulty type because they’re designed for people who don’t actually want to play the game, but are there for an interactive, cinematic experience… or something. I guess those types of “gamers” exist now, but I don’t know if an action MMORPG like GW2 needs it. I don’t think the story content is particularly challenging as long as you have a basic grip of the mechanics and run a decent build/gear setup. If you die too easily, a setup that is a bit sturdier might be a solution. Sure, it won’t win you fights quite as fast, but that’s better than not winning them at all, right?

I’d say buy a key code from an associated retailer. It’s how I got my gf HoT recently.

Metavahn.7293:

Rangers give themselves a name, and that name is selfish loner, never do i see rangers supporting the team in pve or pvp, usually they are the first to run ahead and KS the mobs in a event before slower classes can get a tag in

Even if rangers were good for pve i wouldnt take one because i know the type of kid that would play a ranger knowing the state they are in…just a clueless kid who wants easy street

Did a big bad ranger take your precursor drop or something?

Seriously though, the moment people start throwing around buzz words like “kid” and make negative, baseless assumptions about the players who play the class, is the moment they’re not worth taking seriously anymore. Stay salty.

That’s nothing new and was a lot worse pre-HoT than it is now.

Tommy will always be the best ranger.

I’m sorry, but how would that even work on classes that already have more than two F skills? On top of that, forcing your class mechanic onto other players sounds like absolutely bad design. But even if it was something like a bundle that others can “pick up,” the first argument still stands.

I’d rather have Anet work on improving the existing pet mechanics instead, to be honest.

Edit: okay, you added stuff.

Merging with pet: been a lot of discussion on this already in regards to soulbeast. General consensus is that it’s wasted time and people are not fond of the idea of it basically being a WoW shaman. We don’t need to copy WoW.

Pet charge up + stat increase: BM traitline already does the latter. Don’t know what the point of a new ski would be when there’s existing ones that suck or are still bugged (Anet, fix plz).

Pet invis: already have a pet that does that. Would invalidate that pet if all pets could do it.

Pet portals: how would that work?

Pet aoe heal: sylv hound gives regen on its howl, I believe. And isn’t there a trait that heals nearby allies on swap?

Trade positions with pet: been suggested as part of the soulbeast’s beastmode merge mechanic, where you shadowstep to the pet’s location when merging. Currently, it only does it the other way around, so it would add some interesting gameplay opportunities.

Danikat.8537:

Wait, what? Legendary wyvern mount? What am I missing here?

Just watch the stream on mounts they did this week. They showed some stuff from testing that was cut or they just did for fun, which includes turning a legendary wyvern into a mount. It’s not going to make it info the game, of course, but it was fun to see.

Yeah, noticed this, as well. I’m thinking it’s likely mounting is considered a type of transformation ability, so it cancels out other transformations like Beastmode when used.

Probably smokescale and rock gazelle (if it’s not nerfed too much).

Unholy Pillager.3791:

Kreed.2768:

Anela.3867:

I agree. I love my long bow and since we are Rangers, you would think that would be the main focus.

Ranger =/= ranged.

The term ranger doesn’t mean someone who focuses on the use of ranged weapons, so that’s not a valid enough reason to think the class should be focused around bows.

The official description, official art, and implementation of the profession in GW1 were all heavily focused on archery.

That wasn’t the point I was trying to make. I was just pointing out that the term ranger itself has nothing to do with ranged weaponry/fighting and that it was thus a poor argument to back up the notion that the class should have a greater focus on it. Don’t get me wrong though, I’m all for buffs to our ranged weapon options as much as the next ranger. Been running longbow since they gave it some buffs like RF being a machinegun intead of just 10 AA’s with a vuln stack at normal speed. God, that was terrible before the change…

Anela.3867:

I agree. I love my long bow and since we are Rangers, you would think that would be the main focus.

Ranger =/= ranged.

The term ranger doesn’t mean someone who focuses on the use of ranged weapons, so that’s not a valid enough reason to think the class should be focused around bows.

I, personally, wouldn’t have found it logical if Rev was locked behind one specific expansion (HoT). And they’re not exactly “handing out” the Rev, since you still have to buy an expansion to unlock it.

You guys ‘member when Rapid Fire wasn’t the machine gun type skill it is now?

BadSanta.6527:

soul beast need new dagger animation and not the thief one

Recycling of animations is nothing new. They did it in HoT too. I’m more concerned about the fact that the Soulbeast’s dagger AA is slower than that of the thief AND Spellbreaker, even though the damage scaling seems undertuned for both power and condition. On top of that, it just feels… clunky to have such a slow AA chain.

Kreed.2768:

Soulbeast

• Traits seems lackluster, especially the Grandmasters and even more so when compared to other e-specs. They should tie into Beastmode and each encourage a different type of playstyle. See Scourge and Holosmith’s Grandmaster traits as examples of how it was done right.

To add a little more about how to make the Soulbeast’s grandmasters a bit more unique and tied into the elite specialization’s mechanic, here are some quickly brainstormed possibilities:

• Make one GM trait reduce or remove the cooldown that normally applies when leaving Soulbeast form. This is for the players who like to dip in and out of the Soulbeast and quickly rotate through all the abilities available, without wanting to put the pet at too much risk just because they want to swap over to the other pet and meld with them instead.
• Make one GM apply Fury, a couple stacks of Might and Quickness when entering or exiting Beastmode. This is for the players who want to rotate in and out of Beastmode at tactical moments (burst spikes).
• Make one GM double the stat bonus applied when melding with a pet. However, make it a buff a la Grace of the Land that stacks five times over ten seconds. This would be for the players who want to camp Beastmode.

Just some random suggestions that might or might not be balanced, but I wanted to give an idea of what I thought some more GM’s that tie in with the elite spec’s mechanic could look like.

Edit: replaced Stability with Quickness to the GM that gives boons, since it makes more sense, given that it provides more synergy with other traits in the Soulbeast line.

Soulbeast

• Dagger skill animations/casttimes are too long, making the weapon feel too sluggish and not fluid, especially compared to dagger on thief and spellbreaker.
• Dagger damage seems incredibly low, both for power and condi, considering the fact it puts you in melee range and the weapon doesn’t have an evade on any of its skills.
• Traits seems lackluster, especially the Grandmasters and even more so when compared to other e-specs. They should tie into Beastmode and each encourage a different type of playstyle. See Scourge and Holosmith’s Grandmaster traits as examples of how it was done right.

Mounts.
A non-Druid Ranger elite spec. :P
Crystal Desert.
New armor sets and weapons.

A shortbow with massive range makes little sense, aesthetic-wise. I’d rather they replace the shotgun skills if they think it’s unhealthy. I’ve never really found them practical or fun to begin with, to be honest.

I’m also finding it to be leaning towards power, which was quite a surprise.

AEFA.9035:

Speaking of the Gazzelle, this pet is OP as kitten eventually it will be nerf to kitten. Just hit a warrior with this thing F2 pet skill at 12k not sure if I was dreaming or what. And good to know Potent Ally works while on Beastmode definitely opening up some Power build with this, just wondering does it proc twice for might? cause I noticed as well that while in beastmode or Dagger 2 skill double strikes.

As far as I can tell it procs only once per cooldown interval (1s), so no double might stacks for us, unfortunately. Natural Healing also applies to us while in Beastmode, I’ve found out, so that also needs to go on the pile for Beastmode tooltip adjustments.

Vavume.8065:

Kreed.2768:

You’re in the wrong profession sub-section for this one.

Nah I’m in the right section, perhaps you have not realized that stealth skills are not only for thieves, mesmers also now have them, so why not ranger longbow? it makes perfect sense since we can stealth via longbow, why any ranger would be against this truly baffles me.

Uh, no, mesmers do not have Stealth Attacks. What you are thinking of is the Ambush skills they gain when they use their Mirage Cloak, which is not a stealth, but the invulnerability blur that replaces their dodge roll.

You’re in the wrong profession sub-section for this one.

DuckDuckBOOM.4097:

Has anyone tested if Oppressive Superiority is by % or by raw numbers? I would if I was able to log in but can’t.

It says 10%.

At first, I didn’t like the Soulbeast as I began hitting some golems in the PvP lobby. The dagger is incredibly clunky as it is right now. It just feels… slow. As suggested by others, some reduced cast times might be the solution here. Other than that, if it’s supposed to be a condi weapon, it’s disappointing me terribly so far in that regard. It needs to be buffed.

Then I moved on to trying power, after reading what some of you were saying. Boy, is it a lot of fun! As I began digging around in the trait-lines, I noted how much work was actually done to adjust them to work with Beastmode. Well done for that. One thing I’ve found that I’d like to note though: Potent Ally works with Beastmode, thus allowing you to self-stack might on crits, but the tooltip has not been adjusted to mention this.

Some of the stuff you can do with a Soul Beast power build is pretty nuts though. Sic ‘Em + Maul, for example. Also, my rock gazelle managed to score a 7.8k crit with its charge on a golem (with BM equipped). That’s going to hurt unsuspecting squishes a lot.

bearshaman.3421:

I have the same question as you, HA. And I think that the answer (at least for now) is versatility seems to be the point. It’s a “what you make of it” spec. The pets you choose will have a lot of impact on what you can do, the dagger is available for a condi spec, but you can use whatever, and the stances offer another type of utility skill. But it does appear to lack any obvious role, and maybe that’s the point?

That may very well be the idea, yes. In my opinion Ranger was always supposed to pick their pets based on the situation, creating flexibility. Unfortunately it ultimately turned out differently due to the nature of various modes, making only a small amount of pets actually useful. The Soulbeast could be seen as the spiritual successor of that original idea of offering flexibility.

In any case, I, for one, am looking forward to having some more CC available, especially vs all those breakbars that mobs have nowadays.

A year ago I would have probably said no to the idea of adding mounts to Guild Wars 2. But here is a plus point to getting mounts in Guild Wars 2: we’ll no longer be forced to waste a slot on a signet or utility skill for swiftness, forced to take a trait, or even an entire rune set, just to get around the map faster or keep up to the group or squad. Anet also implemented the mounts in ways that make them more than just glorified speed boosters. Each mount has its own unique aspects tthat set apart from the others and gives it more value than just picking whichever one you think looks best.

A snake per would’ve been dope. I mean, we already have a couple snake themed skills, so a giant snake pet to go with it would have been cool.

As far as I can tell, especially with the latest patch, is that Anet wants to make each Elite Spec their own sort of niche that complements the core class or give it new options the core class lacks. This why some of the gen 1 elite specs got nerfed in certain regards, so that they’re no longer straight up upgrades to the core class (see Tempest, for example). It’s kind of bad it took this long to get there, but at least we’re there now and PoF looks to add more elite specs that give new options to classes, rather than being a straight up upgrade again.

Oh nice. Been looking for a nice GS that isn’t weird-looking or super bulky. Cheers!

Tried the demo. Got the mount. Ran around. Had some fun.

I didn’t play too much though, as it is only a demo. The thing is that you’re likely to get bored when playing a demo, since any progress you make is literally meaningless, and that might, in turn, negatively influence your opinion of the product before actually getting to play the full version.

ZeftheWicked.3076:

Rangers, Revenants are pretty happy if you ask me.
Necromancers are also happy. To burn some tiers under a-net’s hq that is

I play both Ranger and Rev mainly and I am extremely happy with what the new elite specs bring for each, as they are exactly what the classes needed and many have wanted. As some people have said, this expack is looking to be a crowd pleaser and I totally agree.

NotOneToRidicule.2340:

I recently started running Rev in WvW because my elementalist build finally felt significantly diminished from all the nerfs. I decided on a condi Rev build since it appears to offer group support with Glint and fairly good dps with Mallyx. So far, after learning the rotations, I’m starting to really enjoy it for front-line. I was surprised after hearing such awful things about the class. Did the latest balance patch enhance this class or hurt it? It seems that the condi damage on my current build out dps’s my condi necro – which either says something about my necro build or that rev is getting an undeserved bad reputation because of previous nerfs. What does everyone think?

As far as I could tell, the patch was pretty much buffs across the board, mainly to traits and legends that were underperforming, such as Jalis. I’m holding off on making any condi gear for my own Rev until the expansion is out and I can slot Renegade. I kind of want that shortbow as second condi weapon before I commit to a condi build.

xarallei.4279:

I’m disappointed we didn’t get any energy regen in the traits. The renegade abilities have insane energy costs. >_<

Then it would be better to reduce energy costs on abilities, instead of introducing a trait that would very likely end up becoming “mandatory,” which cripples build diversity.

jcbroe.4329:

They want the game to sacrifice it’s identity so that they can play a ripoff WoW shrugs

Was getting that impression, yeah. I’d rather not GW2 become a WoW clone of any kind.

Caeledh.5437:

I saw the traits in the wiki just now.

And so died the hope that shapeshifting might be one of the unrevealed ones.

That’s two for two in disappointing elite specs for ranger.

Considering how many different pets we already have and will get in the future, shapeshifting would have been too huge an undertaking to achieve visually. And why are some people so hung up on the whole shapeshifting thing anyway? I’m honestly curious here.

Sweet. I saw the Soulbeast’s were datamined, so came over to the Rev section to see if Renegade was also mined. Nice!

Seeing plenty of synergy with the core ranger in this, like the fury and protection tallents. It’s certainly a step up from the druid in that regard. Looking forward to spending some hours on build crafting next preview weekend!

Hexalot.8194:

Kreed.2768:

Elite specs are next preview weekend, not this one, unfortunately. And not everyone has gotten to see theirs. Soulbeast, for example, also hasn’t gotten much attention from the peeps who were in the press/partner preview. We know the minor adapt and the grandmasters, but nothing of the rest in-between.

“Not this one” ?

Are you saying that the Renegade elite spec will not be among those playable next week ?

Source ?

No, I’m saying it’s not playable in the current preview weekend that’s going on as I’m writing this – none of the new elite specs are. We’ll be able to play them in the next one, which is, as you say, next week.

Elite specs are next preview weekend, not this one, unfortunately. And not everyone has gotten to see theirs. Soulbeast, for example, also hasn’t gotten much attention from the peeps who were in the press/partner preview. We know the minor adapt and the grandmasters, but nothing of the rest in-between.

Durzlla.6295:

contrary to popular belief, merging with your pet isn’t meant to be a flat out upgrade, there’s supposed to be give and take.

Yeah, I think they learned their lesson after the Tempest.

I play pretty much only LB ranger. Viable for what, though?

dchsknight.3042:

as some one who is about to make a rev… I have noticed, I do not see alot of them. I see gobs of Warriors, and guardians but almost not revs. I like that and that is why I want to play one. but that also means lots of more room to look bad.

I recently returned to the game, but from what I gathered, the class was in a bad place before the recent patch, so that might be why. Personally, I went from Rev back to Ranger because the glint/shiro build had gotten boring to play, but didn’t feel condi rev was gonna be a thing for me without a second condi weapon/legend. The new elite spec might change this for me.