Guild Wars 2

pdavis.8031:

Sorel.4870:

Ithilwen.1529:

VOIP is known to be easily monitored by a third party. A certain free VOIP provider that rhymes with snipe is infamous for the practice of allowing governments to listen in. I have some personal experience with this issue and the former Thai government.

The technology is untrustworthy and is known to be monitored by third parties. I definitely would not like to see it in game on principal.

Well, no one would force you to use it. I personally would have no problem with the Thai government knowing I suck at the game.

I can somewhat agree with that sentiment, but its the principle of the matter. Governments have no business monitoring its citizens. But thats a completly different discussion that really shouldn’t be had here.

In any case, security is a concern. If such things can easily be monitored, how much information can one obtain for malicious purposes? Of course when using the internet in general security is always a concern. Although I am confident enough in my own personal computer protection, and Anets efforts to protect their game, it shouldn’t be a major deciding factor, but certainly needs to be addressed by Anet if considering such a thing.

I think your arguments against in-game VOIP are valid but easily obviated by a simple global disable option in the options menu (and probably have it disabled by default). Also, I think your arguments advocating for use of third party solutions is misguided due to underestimation of the laziness of your common gamer. I for one, would not want to go out of my way to download third party VOIP apps to do in-game comms with random people that I play with – maybe because I’m a somewhat casual solo player. But as a somewhat casual solo player I think it would greatly improve my experience to have the option to enabled in-game VOIP by simply going to the Options menu and turning it on. The other problem with 3rd party is that there are more than one so you might have to download and install several and still not be on the same one as the rest of your team.

I honestly just think the pros way outweigh the cons so…

+1 for in-game VOIP!

I’ve been having that issue on and off lately – it’s server lag. Playing on my thief it’s really a gamebreaker when you try to use shadowstep and then hit it again because it seems like it didn’t work the first time – only to find out it was lag and you actually just shadowstepped away and then immediately right back into the thick of things – doesn’t typically end well

I main thief – I think the argument against OP that since there is “no cooldown on thief weapon skills this is working as designed and /thread” is simply a strawman argument. The point OP is making is that mesmer have a GM trait that does not work effectively against a class because of the way the trait and thief class mechanics are designed. I think it’s a valid complaint and I would argue that the trait (and chill) should have some kind of impact on initiative (trait eats some, chill slows generation of).

Justin ODell.9517:

I really like this idea, passing it along to the team.

Isn’t it important for pre-game strategizing to see your enemies team composition? I feel like preventing class switching is actually the better solution. However, I didn’t even know that this was a penalty so I think the game should at a minimum warn you if you attempt to log out/switch characters while in a match that you will get penalized for it.

I turn off friendly name plates in pvp so it’s clearer to me who is the bad guy because it’s difficult to distinguish. Also, damage you take is in a red color which can also be challenging for colorblind people – game could really use a color blind option that changes colors of things like these.

I know this is not technically a bug but I did not see a more appropriate forum to post in (suggestions is in “Archive” and last post 3 month ago)

A new build is not likely going to solve all your problems – playing against other players is always going to require some time put in for practice to get a feel for how the game works in that environment. So just expect to get beat up quite a bit for a while until you start getting used to things and then you will start to improve. Build is important, but this is much more important at least in my opinion.

I think someone needs to start a pool to pick next weeks “OP build of the week”. Choices cannot be previous builds (decap engi last week, pw thief this week). Maybe if ANet can get on board so we can have prizes like “forum ban tickets” so the winner can dole out bans to the forum QQer’s they find most annoying. I know I would have a very hard time deciding :P

JinDaVikk.7291:

Big bomb is so ez to dodge, block, blind, invuln, evade etc.

DUuuudee… make a big norn/char character and wear a big coat – stand on top of BOB so they can’t see it – problem solved!

Yasha.5963:

Luxorflip.5243:

can i get some details please

I think Cynz summed it up well

I agree Cynz summed it up well – but one additional note is that sleight of hand was buffed which made the 10/30/0/0/30 build (typically d/p but I think it works for s/p too) a popular meta build due to the team fight utility of interrupts through stability.

Qaelyn.7612:

Leadfoot.9071:

Look at some of the responses to dev posts – can you really blame them?

Doesn’t that kind of suggest that they are avoiding this issue for whatever reason?

That would be one way of looking at it but not necessarily the case. Looking at it in a more positive/optimistic light you could say that they might be doing some in depth analysis, looking at real data, and trying to come to a conclusion with a solid plan for improvement prior to making any statements on the forum that are likely to enrage people one way or the other – considering this issue in particular is such a hot button issue.

Qaelyn.7612:

Well, it doesn’t have to be discarded. It just needs to be adjusted so there’s more playing against other players and less against the map.

Even something simple like doubling the CD on the hammer would help. That’s a very easy change. It needs more than that, but it would be a start.

Meanwhile I’ve been here 4 months and have never seen an Arenanet employee even discuss this issue.

Look at some of the responses to dev posts – can you really blame them? If I were them I’d be pretty kitten skittish about posting on the forums – especially regarding such a hot topic. I’m not trying to come across like some dev fanboy or anything – I agree with a lot of the criticism, I just think things would be a lot better if we all took a breath and showed each other some respect – I’m aware that’s a tall order lol

Cynz.9437:

Leadfoot.9071:

Cynz.9437:

the truth is…anet is too proud of their “creation” so they will never change or remove that map from rotation because it would be just admiting that they didn’t do their job properly

so here we are, getting forced to play on incredibly imbalanced map that favors engis by huge margin; the fact that majority of players hate this map and don’t wanna be forced into class/build they don’t enjoy just shows how much devs care about our opnion or players for that matter

i started to play gw2 because they advertised how much they care about pvp etc., reality looks so different

ahhh, back out to lunch with them again? Next time can you put in a good word for me? Thinking I’d like to maybe get a shot at developing for them.

if you checked pvp forums lately, you could see post by dev with the link of vid about how they made skyhammer….they ARE proud of this map

Of course they are proud… they are game developers and they developed something that some percentage of the community enjoys playing – regardless of whether that percentage is the majority it’s still an accomplishment.

You pretend like you know what they are thinking and that they are so ridiculously vain/stubborn that they would not consider changing or maybe even removing the map due to popular demand which I think is totally ridiculous and just… lol.

I believe they are probably looking at REAL data, not forum banter, and trying to ascertain how the community really feels about it, like any half competent software engineering team would do – sure the forum qq is part of the equation but you have to be open to the possibility that it’s not necessarily representative of the community as a whole.

Cynz.9437:

the truth is…anet is too proud of their “creation” so they will never change or remove that map from rotation because it would be just admiting that they didn’t do their job properly

so here we are, getting forced to play on incredibly imbalanced map that favors engis by huge margin; the fact that majority of players hate this map and don’t wanna be forced into class/build they don’t enjoy just shows how much devs care about our opnion or players for that matter

i started to play gw2 because they advertised how much they care about pvp etc., reality looks so different

ahhh, back out to lunch with them again? Next time can you put in a good word for me? Thinking I’d like to maybe get a shot at developing for them.

Qaelyn.7612:

Well that one event was anecdotal, but I consistently see fewer players on Skyhammer maps than others.

That’s still anecdotal… what you see is a small sample and does not constitute factual evidence… there also may be some confirmation bias involved. I respect your opinion and all and don’t even necessarily disagree with you – but I do not think what you are saying counts as factual evidence about the popularity of the map. It would be interesting to see ANets data on the matter… pump it into lavastorm and do some analysis.

@Qaelyn http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anecdotal_evidence

Not even necessarily disagreeing with the larger point but… just sayin…

You guys have different opinions – some people are willing to create a build/class for this particular map – there is no arguing that the map is imbalanced in that certain class/builds have huge advantage over others. Whether you are willing to build for it or not seems to be at least one of the main contention points… although you have high level players like Ostrich, who DO build for it and excel, but still hate the map. I also take the forum polls on the map with a grain of salt because I think there is a certain demographic that frequents the forum which might not actually represent the whole (statistically it can’t be very far off but it might be far off enough to bias the results). I really think it’s not as bad of a map as people make it out to be but that’s my opinion and due to my willingness to take up a character slot for a toon that is especially suited for the map – I think it’s a fair argument that this should NOT be necessary. I don’t think the map should be totally removed, but for teamq/soloq i think it should be possible to opt out of it. I could see that maybe someone wants to put together a gimmicky team SPECIFICALLY for this map – and to see teams that are built that way play against each other might be very amusing.

I would hope thats a bug – sounds very unreasonable. However, clones/phantasms reacquiring a target after they stealthed automatically is also BS and unreasonable. This is certainly not the way to fix it though…

Arganthium.5638:

SallyStitches.4096:

Which would you say is best for solo queue; d/p or s/p?

Probably S/P. Virtually everybody runs D/P.

Actually seems to me like S/P has been steadily gaining in popularity in soloq lately. I think they are both decent for soloq – you trade a bit of burst from the d/p set for some extra survivability options in the s/p set.

NevirSayDie.6235:

It’s generally not a solid strategy to “bunker” your home point in solo queue anyway. Especially as a thief. In a solo queue, thief is the perfect choice to quickly cap home at the start and then either decap far (if empty) or join teamfight (if far is being bunkered).

If far is empty, your team gains an advantage. If far has someone twiddling their thumbs on it, your team gains a huge advantage. The only way to be at a disadvantage is to sit on your close point.

I’m assuming you’re using shortbow for mobility. If not, I tip my hat to you for running a very non-meta build. But seriously, don’t waste your time bunkering when your build excels at moving.

In soloq it seems to me that people push far at the start so frequently that having thief take home point is a bad move?

Also, how do you guys feel about thief going straight for initial boss steal on forest in soloq?

Incurafy.6329:

I love it when people with zero knowledge of programming/software engineering make statements about how easy something is to code, lol.

wat r u taking aboot dude… look:

[code]
if games_is_ready tehn
make_a_suound
[/code]

see??? two lines nub

/sarcasm

The game has mechanics for securing and preventing stomps – some players are better equipped to do this than others – I think that’s fine since it’s a team game.

Using stealth to counter a stomp is a skillful move that introduces more strategy/tactics into the game and I don’t think the “realism” argument you are making is a sufficient reason to change that – there are tons of things in the game that are not realistic per se – it’s just a game after all… Also, cleaving/aoe damage and knockbacks are good counters to stealthing downed players. Yeah, a mesmer may not have these tools like other classes do but again – it’s a team game.

NevirSayDie.6235:

mini.6018:

Most condition attacks in this game are ranged and spammable while power dps is mainly based on melee range and 130 point blank.Also conditions are not mitigated by weakness,armor,or protection,can be easily covered for not being removed and a few of them even counter direct use of skills or movement.

Okay I thought you were talking about a warrior build but that’s cool. I still don’t really understand what you mean.

My original interpretation of what he was saying was that if you are kiting your (already applied) conditions are still ticking doing damage as opposed to power attacks that only damage on application and therefore cannot do damage while just kiting… but now i’m not so sure…

Keybinding engi is a bit tougher due to the four toolbet skills. I have a razer naga and have 5-9 mapped to the thumb buttons. I have the toolbelt skills mapped to E, Q, Shift-E, Shift-Q respectively and elite mapped to C. I have left alt bound to dodge (double tap movement key for dodge is a habit to avoid). Obviously, the mouse helps a LOT!

I have been using withdraw with D/P for the reasons hihey said (low cd instant + evade). However, in doing so I feel the need to also take lyssa runes for the extra condi clear which reduces dmg by a bit…

ahuba.6430:

Josh Davis.6015:

Thanks for the heads-up.

Has anyone else noticed strange queue/roster behavior the last few days? If so, please try to record the error code and any other relevant information and reply here with what you have.

yep everytime i finish a team queue game (havent tried solo queue) i get a “roster not found” error message

I was getting this the other day after soloq matches as well – i don’t think it happened every single time but often.

Viking Jorun.5413:

I stay alive without stealth better than most thieves do with it, Burnfall. I also have 4 stun breaks (shadowstep is 2, fyi). I don’t think you play thief. Please stop.

You play S/P right? I think that evades and ports are much better for survivability than stealth – I personally prefer D/P but take Withdraw over HiS because of the low cooldown and evade. People complain about stealth and evades on thief but are typically people who have not played them and don’t realize how difficult it is to survive as a thief (compared to a lot of other classes/builds) – one mistake your kittened. I would argue that SB#3 is a bit too spammy and could use some kind of small tweak like an aftercast like Jumper suggested…

Actually you said:

Only time anet played a thief (at least from what i recall) was new fractal preview…

It’s a common trend I see on the forums of people saying “devs don’t care about x”, “devs don’t play their own game”, “devs do this”, “devs do that” – as if you really know what they are thinking or doing. It’s just ridiculous hyperbole and I find it annoying so I’m just busting your balls about it.

Ohhh I see, you’re saying that the devs don’t play thieves because if they did you would have seen them? I guess you must play a LOT and have MANY accounts so you can play on multiple screens? Or maybe the devs have a rule that when they play the must find where Cynz is playing and be sure to play nearby. Very interesting…

Cynz.9437:

there is no dev playing thief as far as i know

i can confirm (saw it myself) they play mesmer, warrior, ele and engi…idk about other classes

Next time you go have lunch with them or whatever it is you do with them that allows you to know exactly what they do in the game, can you ask them when they plan to add new game modes? kthx!

Like people have said, thief evades are their only real survivability mechanism.. without it they are dead very fast. Stealth is not a valid argument because they still take damage in stealth and it’s not that hard to hit them. That being said, I sort of agree with Jumper’s suggestion to add an aftercast to SB#3 because I do think that SB#3 evade is a bit over the top. You cannot just nerf thief evades without giving them something else to survive.

Also, people tend to give balance suggestions with the implication that all classes should be able to beat all classes – I disagree because it’s a team game and I think it’s OK for certain classes to do well against other certain classes.

Lastly, Deimos comment is pretty ridiculous, maybe trolling – they balance the game as best they can for everyone and a person who gets high rank in soloq’s opinion is just as valid as that of a casual 10 percenter…

DaliIndica.9041:

Think of those super champ body builders, they lift things so much, their bodies become all mutated, and they win a medal or a ford focus. Thats champs winning at this life.

lol ford focus… “i pick things up and i put them down!”

Guard.6751:

Any notice or acknowledgement on this issue from A.net? Lag seems to progressively gets worse for many of us at night still (EST).
:(

I’m having problems from EST as well – suggest you use the diag utility (gw2.exe -diag) and paste your pingpath results into the “lag” sticky in this forum. What ISP are you using?

I’ve been having problems for a few weeks now – located in Boston mostly play week nights after 8PM EST and experience 1 second or more skill delay and rubberbanding. I only pvp. Here’s a pingpath capture from the diag utility:

================ = Tracing network paths ================

• pathping -w 500 -q 25 -4 64.25.39.1 <--*

Tracing route to 64.25.39.1 over a maximum of 30 hops

0 —-————————————
1 —-———————————-
2 te-0-1-0-2-sur01.westroxbury.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.87.152.81]
3 be-20-ar01.needham.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.85.106.21]
4 he-2-10-0-0-cr01.newyork.ny.ibone.comcast.net [68.86.94.17]
5 ae12.edge1.NewYork2.level3.net [4.68.127.1]
6 vlan51.ebr1.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.138.222]
7 4.69.132.89
8 ae-92-92.csw4.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.134.158]
9 * ae-91-91.ebr1.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.134.141]
10 * * *
Computing statistics for 56 seconds…
Source to Here This Node/Link
Hop RTT Lost/Sent = Pct Lost/Sent = Pct Address
0 —-————————————————————————————-
0/ 25 = 0% |
1 11ms 0/ 25 = 0% 0/ 25 = 0% —-————————-
0/ 25 = 0% |
2 12ms 0/ 25 = 0% 0/ 25 = 0% te-0-1-0-2-sur01.westroxbury.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.87.152.81]
1/ 25 = 4% |
3 14ms 1/ 25 = 4% 0/ 25 = 0% be-20-ar01.needham.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.85.106.21]
0/ 25 = 0% |
4 39ms 2/ 25 = 8% 1/ 25 = 4% he-2-10-0-0-cr01.newyork.ny.ibone.comcast.net [68.86.94.17]
0/ 25 = 0% |
5 —- 25/ 25 =100% 24/ 25 = 96% ae12.edge1.NewYork2.level3.net [4.68.127.1]
0/ 25 = 0% |
6 20ms 1/ 25 = 4% 0/ 25 = 0% vlan51.ebr1.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.138.222]
2/ 25 = 8% |
7 47ms 3/ 25 = 12% 0/ 25 = 0% 4.69.132.89
1/ 25 = 4% |
8 51ms 4/ 25 = 16% 0/ 25 = 0% ae-92-92.csw4.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.134.158]
21/ 25 = 84% |
9 —- 25/ 25 =100% 0/ 25 = 0% ae-91-91.ebr1.Washington1.Level3.net [4.69.134.141]

Trace complete.

Looks like it times out in the comcast level3 routers on this test? Windows resmon showed my ping to gw2 servers to be around 300ms.

Appreciate if someone could help me troubleshoot – is this an ISP issue? Anet issue? Modem issue?

Thanks.

NevirSayDie.6235:

I recommend elixir gun highly— <<<snip>>> The leap is great, of course you get a stunbreak and regen, heal, condition removal…

The condi removal doesn’t work on yourself right? Only on allies in the cone it sprays? I remember messing around with an engi bunker build a while ago and was disappointed when I found that skill was not removing conditions from me… but I always see posts like this that seem to imply it does…

Getting stealth frequently probably means he had either dagger off-hand and was using dagger #5 cloak and dagger which means he would need to be in melee range to strike you to get stealth. Or he could have been using D/P and using pistol #5 to put black powder down on ground and then dagger #2 to heartseeker out of it which gains stealth via combo – this would be pretty obvious.

I agree with previous poster that he was most likely using Shadow Arts trait line and Withdraw heal which rolls backward evading while healing.

If you are saying “NO GRIND” and “no imbalanced stats” then I’m not sure I understand what you are asking for or how it is different than what we have today. Are you talking about being able to use armor skins from PVE in PVP but without any stat advantages from the PVE gear over the normal PVP gear?

I think what most people are objecting to is making it so that grinding can lead to gear that is statistically better than gear someone who doesn’t grind has access to – giving them an advantage (this includes spending gold to get statistically better gear because gaining gold depends on the amount of “grinding” as well).

Nymru.2045:

my suggestion is not replacing the system, but running a pilot with gear NEXT to the current system, just to try out how it goes.

The concept of a pilot is to try something and if it goes well then make it permanent which implies replacing the existing pvp with your concept including gear grinding. A LOT of people bought this game (myself included) because they wanted MMO style PVP without the gear grind. That’s why people are roundly rejecting the entire principal of your idea. It’s not gonna happen…

Blacknasty.3641:

As an ex-wow pvp’r and as mentioned earlier…GW2 is a totally different experience.

Simple things that I found exciting: Dodging. A level playing field ( ie – lack of gear grinding ) The ability to hop immediately in pvp. Testing out builds, professions, stat combos very easily in the heart of the mists. Each profession is very unique, and unlike wow traits can be built with a wide array of diversity. I enjoy the maps much better with better use of LoS and terrain elevations. Also, I think the core mechanics of game play are faster than WoW imho.

As far as top ranked, high-tier play…I would suggest getting your feet wet in hot join 5v5 for a little. Get used to your build and profession, then work your way into Solo Queue where you can work on your rating. Eventually, hopefully you will meet some folks and Team Queue where, in my mind, the top level of play exists.

One side note, when it comes to Solo Queue, you can change your profession at any time. ( Preferably at the begging of a match ) You’ll see people on your team who will say “Oh great, we have 3 theives and 2 eles…going against all heavies…great this is a loss” Instead of giving up, change it up. Play a guardian or warrior to help out. ( basically, try to become proficient at a dps role, bunker role, support role, etc…eventually, i would suggest learning and playing all the professions to help your counter play)

Be warned: Hot join 8v8 is a bit of a kitten show. You won’t be ranked, so don’t worry about win / loss. Learn the maps, professions, and their counters. And also, the forums is mainly for the 1% ers. And by 1%, I mean the most poisoned, hate filled, kitteners and moaners.

Anyway, good luck and enjoy.

Another good post from this guy – I think it sums it up pretty well.

Coming from WoW I’m sure the OP realizes there are always a lot of negative nancy’s in threads like this so just take posts (like that of gareth) with a grain of salt. I’m not a high tier player like yourself but I think the game is very fun and has a lot of promise (I really like that you can jump into pvp on a level playing field with everybody without having to grind for hours just to not get 1shot. I also love the combat system and class mechanic approach) – that said, it definitely does have some frustrating issues that we all hope the dev team are going to do a good job of taking care of in the near term.

Yeah watching Ostricheggs stream – same thing going on for him and his team.

I got home and logged in just to see what the lag was like – it wasn’t too bad. I went and ran the diag tool again and saw the same packet loss as before:

5 —- 25/ 25 =100% 24/ 25 = 96% ae12.edge1.NewYork2.level3.net [4.68.127.1]
16 —- 25/ 25 =100% 17/ 25 = 68% 64.25.32.26

The first one was definitely the same as when I ran the test when I was experiencing the lag – pretty sure the 2nd one as well but I don’t remember and I didn’t save it. So, I think the packet loss informatino is probably due to what I said before – those routers just ignore ICMP packets for performance/spam-prevention reasons and therefore it doesn’t mean anything.

I do notice though, the pings at some of the routers are lower than I remember them when I ran the test when the lag was bad – I’ll have to run the test again when it gets bad again (probably later tonight).

EDIT: After some research I’m pretty sure that is not the issue – was getting the same thing during a period where the game was OK – this is just the routers being configured to ignore ICMP packets.

Guard.6751:

I had the same problem over the past few days. I’m in EST. Too laggy at night I couldn’t play. The game server list even lags to load. I wasn’t sure at first if it was ISP or Anet but, seems like others are having the same issue…

Yeah, looking at the PVP server browser is a good indication – for me if it takes more than a half second to load the list then I know the game will be unplayable in the sense that I cannot be effective due to frequent skill lag and rubberbanding. I just exit the game at that point…

I’m using Comcast by the way – in the tech support forums I think there were people complaining from multiple ISPs but I’m not too sure if ISPs share routers along the way and therefore I do not think we can definitively say that this is an Arena Net problem or not.

Yeah for a week or so I’ve been experiencing the same thing – skill delay of ~1s at times and it does seem to be worse in the evening (Boston area). I used the -diag utility and posted my results in the tech support forum but it’s unclear to me whether the packet loss it shows is normal or not (some routers are configured to ignore a percentage of ICMP requests over a particular time interval). If the packet loss it shows is the problem then it looks like it’s more likely to do with the network infrastructure my ISP uses than an Arena Net problem but ti’s really hard to say….

YtseJam.9784:

I’m on the east coast too, since yesterday I’ve also noticed the huge spikes, on some maps, but not others. I also did some combined traceroutes/pings and i noticed I was dropping 25% packets on a NewYork hop and a Dallas hop. I think these might be ISP issues or that kitten Trolling DDOS still running somewhere…

6 —- 25/ 25 =100% 25/ 25 =100% ae12.edge1.NewYork2.level3.net [4.68.127.1]

I’m in Boston and getting like a 1 second delay on using skills that make the game pretty much unplayable (I play spvp only). Using the diag tool I see the same thing as this guy with the NY edge1 level3 hop dropping packets:

Tracing route to p4-23-c0-ncdc-pub.plaync.net [206.127.158.1]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
4 be-22-sur01.westroxbury.ma.boston.comcast.net [69.139.220.37]
5 be-20-ar01.needham.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.85.106.21]
6 he-2-5-0-0-cr01.newyork.ny.ibone.comcast.net [68.86.94.201]
7 ae12.edge1.NewYork2.level3.net [4.68.127.1]
8 vlan51.ebr1.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.138.222]
9 * * ae-4-4.ebr1.NewYork1.Level3.net [4.69.141.17]
10 ae-44-44.ebr2.London1.Level3.net [4.69.137.77]
11 ae-23-23.ebr2.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.148.194]
12 * * ae-92-92.csw4.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.140.30]
13 ae-4-90.edge6.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.154.202]
14 195.16.161.58
15 206-127-157-86.plaync.com [206.127.157.86]
16 * p4-23-c0-ncdc-pub.plaync.net [206.127.158.1]

Computing statistics for 100 seconds…
Source to Here This Node/Link
Hop RTT Lost/Sent = Pct Lost/Sent = Pct Address
3 11ms 1/ 25 = 4% 0/ 25 = 0% 68.87.152.85
0/ 25 = 0% |
4 13ms 1/ 25 = 4% 0/ 25 = 0% be-22-sur01.westroxbury.ma.boston.comcast.net [69.139.220.37]
0/ 25 = 0% |
5 14ms 1/ 25 = 4% 0/ 25 = 0% be-20-ar01.needham.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.85.106.21]
0/ 25 = 0% |
6 40ms 2/ 25 = 8% 1/ 25 = 4% he-2-5-0-0-cr01.newyork.ny.ibone.comcast.net [68.86.94.201]
0/ 25 = 0% |
7 —- 25/ 25 =100% 24/ 25 = 96% ae12.edge1.NewYork2.level3.net [4.68.127.1]
0/ 25 = 0% |
8 25ms 1/ 25 = 4% 0/ 25 = 0% vlan51.ebr1.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.138.222]
1/ 25 = 4% |
9 23ms 2/ 25 = 8% 0/ 25 = 0% ae-4-4.ebr1.NewYork1.Level3.net [4.69.141.17]
3/ 25 = 12% |
10 92ms 5/ 25 = 20% 0/ 25 = 0% ae-44-44.ebr2.London1.Level3.net [4.69.137.77]
0/ 25 = 0% |
11 109ms 6/ 25 = 24% 1/ 25 = 4% ae-23-23.ebr2.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.148.194]
0/ 25 = 0% |
12 100ms 5/ 25 = 20% 0/ 25 = 0% ae-92-92.csw4.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.140.30]
1/ 25 = 4% |
13 101ms 6/ 25 = 24% 0/ 25 = 0% ae-4-90.edge6.Frankfurt1.Level3.net [4.69.154.202]
1/ 25 = 4% |
14 128ms 7/ 25 = 28% 0/ 25 = 0% 195.16.161.58
0/ 25 = 0% |
15 —- 25/ 25 =100% 18/ 25 = 72% 206-127-157-86.plaync.com [206.127.157.86]
0/ 25 = 0% |
16 129ms 7/ 25 = 28% 0/ 25 = 0% p4-23-c0-ncdc-pub.plaync.net [206.127.158.1]

Trace complete.
Section completed in 162.65 seconds

It looks like ISP or internet backkittenelated and not GW2 related but maybe the GW2 team can escalate it somehow I dunno….

Interceptor.2653:

Travlane.5948:

dagger auto attack is similar to sword but a tiny bit faster. i guess dagger is sustained too.

Dagger has Backstab, which is about as bursty as you get, since you have other hard-hitting things to combine it with.

Nobody is running around plowing targets with Tactical Strike.

Shadow shot hits pretty kitten hard too – pretty close to the last hit of S/P and sword auto? Dagger is definitely more bursty but lacks the mobility of sword #2 which to me means that D/P is a bit riskier with higher rewards while sword builds put out better sustained damage with a little bit less through better mobility/escape mechanisms.

I think it’s because thieves are harder to play effectively which is why people in this thread were previously mentioning how many not-so-great thieves there are out there… Caed and Magic Toker are extremely good thieves (arguably the best) so that’s an exception.

Agree that thieves should be last option for stomps due to how squishy but also think Dahkeus has a point that sometimes the situation is such that you really need to get that stomp and nobody else is currently capable of doing it in which case Shadowstep stomp is a really good option – should be last resort though. It’s a good tool to have in your mind for those emergency situations.

Qaelyn.7612:

Sure, there’s a tendency for people who are unhappy to post on forums more than ones who are happy. But many of the same complaints get repeated over and over again because they are valid complaints that do not get addressed.

Complaining may not fix anything but shooting the messenger or sweeping stuff under the rug doesn’t either. And frankly, it’s getting to the point where it’s more enjoyable to debate PvP than to play it.

I’m just pointing out that in general it’s a slippery slope to start blaming teammates and stuff like that and that it doesn’t do any good because all you are doing is getting yourself worked up over things that are beyond your control – I do it too and ralize that it’s stupid but it’s a very easy thing to fall into.

On the other hand, I totally sympathize especially regarding Spirit Watch and the tendency for people to overvalue running the orb and completely ignore the capture points. I feel like that map in particular is tough for soloq becuase it seems to me to require a more coordinated strategy that you have a hard time getting in that environment.

Qaelyn.7612:

Heizero.9183:

“I lose over and over again because my team is awful and my matchups are awful, there’s no possible way my own gameplay could be improved and I would never even think about looking at my own effectiveness on a team because i know I am better then all of them.”

- The code of the QQ

“I jump into threads and make snarky remarks about other posters because I think I’m so clever that I need to try to belittle others, there’s no possible way that the OP was making a different point that I didn’t really read carefully and understand correctly and I would never even think about whether my post adds anything constructive to the thread because I know better than everyone else here”.

- The code of thoughtless forum warriors

I never said that the problems were entirely with other players and not with me. But very often it is. My skill becomes irrelevant when my team is outmatched by the other team, and especially when they do stupid things (like ignoring capture points).

He’s right though, there is a trend where people immediately look for things to blame for doing poorly in soloq including blaming teammates, matchups, game balance, etc. Doesn’t necessarily mean that that is what you are doing but coming on the forums complaining about this stuff is, in my opinion, a knee jerk reaction with a very slippery slope. It’s very easy to vent and blame factors beyond your control but it gets you no where and has a viral quality in that other people feel validated in complaining in the same way which then results in a miserable community. The game and it’s community would be a lot more enjoyable if we were all better at focusing on the things we CAN control such as our contribution to the game and less on factors beyond our control.

You should also keep an eye out for some of the top thiefs live streaming their gameplay on twitch – you can watch them play whole games beginning to end in soloq and teamq:

http://www.twitch.tv/narcarsis (more commonly known as Caed – D/P trickery – NA)
http://www.twitch.tv/magictoker (S/P trickery (lately) – NA)
http://www.twitch.tv/sizer2654 (S/D Acro – EU)

Those are arguably the best spvp thiefs in the game and you can certainly learn a lot by watching how they play.

There are others as well but those are the ones that I’m following on twitch and have their URLs handy to share

ens.9854:

Jakkson.4076:

30 in CS is a waste IMO in TPVP…you get more out of putting pts in the acrobatics line…compensate with gear and runes and you wont miss the crit chance and dmg loss much…and you will be much better at tsaying alive and slippery…you want to max out your boon efficiency you get from the trickery line and initiative management is key…

Better overall for you and your team…

Don’t listen to this guy, Dee Jay hit on the the two main builds, those should be your starting point. I disagree that s/d is easier though, it is very easy and effective to burst people from out of sight/range using d/p before they can do anything. In general the burstier builds are easier because fights should end quicker and you don’t have to worry about accruing value slowly for a long time.

Both builds have quirks/techniques that are probably better to be shown than explained… Just drop in a 1v1 server I’m sure some1 will help you.

Edit: sword pistol is fine, even excellent in some situations, but it just feels awful when somebody has a build that countered it (stability, blind, block, daze or stun when hit, protection when disabled…. Etc etc)

I don’t think the difference in difficulty between the two is very significant actually, they are just a lot different. D/P is high risk reward due to the relative lack of escape/avoid abilities paired with spike burst damage whereas S/D is good at avoiding damage but requires more skill to know when to stop evading and do damage without risking your squishy kitten .