Guild Wars 2

Ah, and another inconvenience item that drops multiple times daily and is incredibly annoying to deal with, especially since like 95-99% of those who get it play on lvl 80 characters:

Writ of Experience

And along with it, Tomes of Knowledge.

Also, agreeing with Xalugami up there: Indigo Mushrooms as well as Bauxite Ore and other precursor collection node-drops should go into material storage. They do not sell with trash – I would’ve never started these collections had I known they would spam and clog my inventory on all characters

Blaeys.3102:

As far as things to cut, I would question the need for space for stuff you buy from Miyani (eldritch scroll, philosopher stones, etc). Given that those items are only used in the mystic forge, having them purchasable right next to the forge makes them easy enough to get to as is.

Please don’t listen to this guy. The portable Forge is an easily affordable item and we have shared inventory slots already. Having to go to Miyani for these minor items has always been a major annoyance for me, and hoarding all of them in the bank, even maxed out, is not enjoyable.

Also, agreed with Lumber cores, Pruning Shears, Giant Mushroom Spore, Badges of Tribute and the like.

I would prefer some level of clipping, definitely.

Floating looks a lot, a lot worse.

Also, I appreciate it that you’re asking for feedback (I hoped you would) instead of just leaving everything as is.

I hate the sounds, they’re very annoying, but I understand people have crafted them for that reason, so:

• The idea of your designer sounds okayish – if it’s rare enough, it’s tolerable – but still rare distinct sounds for no apparent reason can become distracting in challenging content.

• Alternatively, these sounds can play only for the wielder (client-side), and not to other players.

• Or these two ideas can be combined: always on for the wielder, but a very rare chance for other players.

Gaile Gray.6029:

For Mesmer, we’re looking at making Signet of Inspiration’s boon sharing functionality a bit more controlled, giving each shared boon a fixed duration.

Chronomancers are already the most desired class in the LFGs. Now all raid comps will require two of the class that people do not like to play, and people will have to wait for groups even longer, while other classes (like revenant) will be moved out of the team comp.

If it’s affecting WvW, then only nerf it in WvW?

We’ve already had Well of Precognition purged and alacrity cut to a limping state.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Base values for the Celestial Avatar heals will be reduced, while the healing power contribution will be enhanced significantly.

Then please look into a HEALING/power/precision stat set, so that we do not waste stats running Magi. But I guess if it will come, it will come in the next expansion when people have already made their Magi sets, and people will have to stat swap and change runes and sigils again.

Adding to my previous comment on the map style: maybe adding more colour to it could liven it up? The coliseum definitely reminds of the ANet logo which is bright red. How about painting the respective halves of the inner map decorations in bright red and bright blue, or at least giving them accents?

Since this looks like the thread for feedback, here’s my 4 copper:

1. The map is ugly and screams 90s. For some, visuals are not important in PvP; for others, they are. Look at these depthless low-poly boxes and texture clipping right in front of the base and 2D sprites that even move like a gif animation. The greenishly-brown colour tint makes it look like one of those games on older PCs too.

I absolutely loved Capricorn and always picked it, but this map – even if it tried to bring back the 90s nostalgia, for me it failed as it just looks utterly disappointing on the visual front. At the very minimum, it needs proper normal maps for the wooden boxes; and probably a change of scale on those wooden textures (I wouldn’t mind replacing all the wood with stone though) and maybe some torches, broken planks here and there, signs of battle. The outer parts are actually okay (apart from the crowd), but you rarely see them during the match compared to the ugly low-poly boxes insight.

2. Small caps and large LoSless zones are not fun. I understand this is a feature, but I doubt I will enjoy even on other classes. Your experience? Time will tell, I guess…

3. The cheering crowd is annoying. Though good in promo material, it is another level of background noise. I wouldn’t like to turn down my preferred settings because of one map, but I might have to.

4. Secondary mechanics. Too early to comment on their power for me, but mostly, it was confusing. From the notes, it felt like the whole party got the buff; then why only one person is marked with an icon? We’ll sort it out, I guess, but first impression is first impression.

It never looked as it was intended to work that way, and I would never use a skin that works that way. +1 for fix.

I know that WvW still has vanilla guardian as frontline meta, but I used to play it a lot, and wanted to jump into the new Borderlands with something different – like a ranged DH. The most efficient use of guardian’s skills seem to be in melee, so is there actually a viable build that uses longbow in WvW?

Gaile Gray.6029:

To avoid issues, we will continue to limit the number of decorations that may be placed close to one another in a specific allotment of space to 20 decorations within a radius of 500… But even with that protection in place, some players could experience performance issues.

I find this explanation weird. If this is the reason not to increase the limit, then why is HoT stuffed with all those high-textured plants and monsters that appear through a thousand of combat particle effects? The players with low specs are not a reason to downgrade the whole paid expansion, but for guild halls where you never hit as low FPS as at Frozen Maw since no one ever is fighting, it is.

Unfortunately, the increase of the amount limit won’t help much without an increase pf the location limit. I know I’ve easily hit the limit even with huge SAB walls and floors in my JP. No matter the increase, we still won’t be able to make an "office " or an “altar”, and the amount of walking a person is willing to do with how many areas are poorly accessible also doesn’t help extra in terms of extra decoration.

Tyler Bearce.3427:

Personally, I voted ‘Yes’ to this, as did the rest of my team. So we are also disappointed with the result. But that was an accepted risk when we decided to poll the community about WvW development rather than just following our own vision.

“Our vision was to have rotating BLs.”

“70% instead of 75% voted for rotating BLs.”

“Sigh, let’s follow what the community wants and give those 30% something that we don’t see as good ourselves.”

Huh?

Minx.7521:

eNeRgOo.5463:

THIS GAME IS NOT ABOUT LEGENDARIES kitten .
Wake up. Content is more important than shooting mobs with flowers, kittenes or other weird things. You have lots of legendaries, other ones can wait. Living Story vol 3 Please! :*
Malyck! :* Rata Novus :*

It’s more about what we were promised. We were promised new legendaries and basically now it’s not going to happen. This is a TRUST issue and a LYING issue and a BUSINESS ETHICS issue.

Indeed. At this point, it wouldn’t really matter if they delayed one or the other (though yes indeed, legendaries feel like the lesser of two evils); the issue is that they are delaying the promised stuff people paid for again.

And yes, in this light having a lot of people to work on the next xpac before they could even deliver what they promised in this one looks like… well, the whole thread shows how it looks.

Mike O Brien.4613:

In the upcoming Spring 2016 Quarterly Update, we’ll launch the new legendary short bow, Chuka and Champawat.

Just imagine how much happier (correction – less angry) the people would’ve been if it was a GREATSWORD or a SWORD – a thing that more than 1, not really popular class will use…

Talk about planning and priorities.

“Elements” is a symmetrical Conquest map with equal distance to all points for both teams and a Keeper/Portal secondary mechanic.

Album of the mock-up: http://imgur.com/a/nmc2L
(hastily created in UT3 Editor with stock stuff to show the basic idea, so not that pretty)

Layout

The side points (Ice Domain and Fire Domain) are elevated and cannot be easily accessed from the middle point (Water Domain) which is a shallow pond, and terrain is adjusted to disable blinking up from it, so you have to walk around the mountain to get there. A side point can also be accessed from another side point by walking across narrow walkways, but that comes at a risk since it makes you an easy target for ranged players.

Falling damage will not instantly kill you but will cause you to lose some health, so falling while in combat is even more risky since it can put you directly into Defeated. The side points have some space to fight on and walls to stick to but there is still some room for knocking your enemy out to the middle point area.

An Air Keep and an Earth Keep are positioned closer to the team starting points and are used for the secondary mechanic. Inside each is an underground hall with the Air Keeper or the Earth Keeper, respectively, who are friendly to their team and hostile to the enemy, and initially invulnerable (have the “balance” buff).

Secondary Mechanic

1) When a team captures mid, a portal accessible only to this team opens in the keep of the team (Air Keep for Blue, Earth Keep for Red). It leads to the top of the keep, from where a player can access the side points by walking across the narrow walkways, risking being killed or knocked down to the ground.

2) When a team controls both side points (Ice and Fire), the respective Keeper loses “balance” and becomes vulnerable to the enemy team. Killing the keeper causes a landslide or a tornado that decaps both side points and knocks back all players that were on points, as well as opens a portal to the top of the keep for the enemy team (replacing the mid-cap based portal, for a certain time until the Keeper respawns).

That’s basically it. Thoughts/suggestions?

crosspost on reddit

WatcherJason.2678:

Kicker.8203:

• Removing bunker amulets is a dream come true! Great job.

Give it week 1 of Season 2 and it will be “This is no fun… I just die in 2 seconds constantly to this <insert burst spec here>, wish I could build more defensive”

It will work the new WvW way. Spawn, run, die. Respawn, run again, die. Respawn, run some more, die.

The one who runs faster wins more, #sigilOfSpeedMeta2016 (:

A similar thread popped up on reddit today: https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/40s2ww/ds_massive_bug_screwing_everyone_over_in_the/

Video from /u/ObeliskT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOujkG91nUE

I still see a problem in the daily profession win achievements. People have played classes they do not know to get the rewards for a long time; but when there’s a PvP league with achievements, they’ll combine both types in one go – play ranked and on classes they do not know.

My suggestion is: change the profession win dailies to a daily profession win in unranked, or a daily win on any profession in ranked, like this:

• Win an unranked match as Elementalist or Mesmer, or win a ranked match as any class.
• Win an unranked match as Guardian or Ranger, or win 2 ranked matches as any class.

This will effectively work with the current non-exclusive achievement system and allow 2 achievements for both options.

Gaile Gray.6029:

I checked with QA and they still are investigating this issue. It’s difficult to ascertain which elements are causing it to happen, but it’s under research. I’m sorry that we’re unable to give any sort of timeframe for a fix but wanted you to know the status.

Thanks for letting us know! Even a simple acknowledgment matters.

I sent a bug report after it happened, but that’s what I remember happening (I hope I didn’t mess anything up):

• During a standard burn phase (head and body) Mordy’s HP was slowly going down as intended, until the bar got empty, at which point his mesh simply disappeared, but the event carried on for some time. I do not remember the state of the defiance bar at this moment and whether we could do any damage at DPS spots – I think not.

• After this, some defence event popped up. Most people waited for the win cutscene to play.

• After this, Mordy’s head and body burn phase started again. Mordy was still not present, the icons on the minimap showed up (screenshot). I do not know if he had DPS spots active or not.

• Not sure if there was or was not a defence event up after it; judging by the other screenshot – there was not, Mordy consumed all energy and we lost.

This is still an issue. The Mordy gets his HP to zero, but the fight goes on and the event fails. Pictures.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Mesmer

• Echo of Memory: Block duration reduced from 2.25 to 1.5

I am once again saddened that PvP needs affect the 95% of my game experience, which is PvE.

Looks like I’m not the only one wondering about it:

Remove PvP League Icon

PVP Divison Symbol on ALT hold

This new pvp rank beside your name is dumb

Nerf the “Violets, not violence”. Nerf the “Get some water from the dolyaks, and put out those fires!” audio spam.

Or those shouts. The new ones are totally narm, overly complex, situational, like something a child would consider “epic” after he sees a superhero cartoon. When repeated 1000 times while you play a shout build in a new multiple hour HoT map, that sounds just awful.

I am disheartened at both the continuing visual nerfing despite the evident unhappiness in the community and the total lack of communication on this issue.

I have always thought that skill effects and animations were not good enough in this game compared to magical flashy Korean grinders, and the nerf to fireball, mesmer wells and now even auras is beyond my understanding. The game looks outdated enough on high-resolution screens already because of the ancient engine — why make it look even worse?

My favourite awesome purple wells, the epic fireball and the magical auras got nerfed with the excuse of “reducing visual noise”. So what is the point of having this completely irrevenant information clutter my screen in PvE?

Map completion, mastery level number (3-digit, going over 100), “I bought HoT” icon, and now the PvP League marker. The names are overloaded with information both in world and in target mode, where the multiple icons are not even aligned and look like a total mess…

The PvP icon should not be displayed in PvE. To make people play PvE, one fixes matchmaking, splits PvE and PvP balance and makes new non-PvE maps, and not pushes more e-Sports information into our screens.

Carighan.6758:

But… I know some people are much more utilitarian, but shouldn’t your guild be people you want to play with and get to know?

And how are you supposed to find these like-minded people in the first place? Kappa.

piza.9310:

Most of the time if you try to join a smaller raiding guild which is actually really good you have to go to their website or something and apply. How do you get to know which website they have? try the name or go to the forums and ask them, the place you wanted to leave remember?

→

Lishtenbird.2814:

at some point, a Guild Recruitment Board should be unlocked for guilds so that they can input custom recruitment information (website application form, age restrictions etc.).

Yes, I know there’s a forum section and there’s a subreddit for recruiting (inb4 “wait, there’s a subreddit for recruiting?!”), but firstly, they should not be outside of the game, and secondly, they feel like such a mess that every time I try to use them I just say “whatever” and close them.

Since ANet insists that raids should not be puggable (and thus does not add an LFG section for it), I believe they should also make it easier for people to find all types of guilds in the game itself (and not only those that bother to spam mapchat with advertisements in popular maps at a certain period of time).

Ideally, I see that as a tab in the Guild panel (an NPC in LA would also be nice) where you can filter all existing guilds (on your EU/NA region) by multiple criteria (exclusively and non-exclusively):

• game mode(s): [] Open-world PvE [] Organised PvE [] Raids [] Fractals [] Dungeons [] sPvP [] WvW [] Guild missions [] communication/roleplaying

• preferred game experience: [] newcomers [] experienced [] hardcore

• roster size: [small/medium/large] (or [number range])

• activity: [low/medium/high] (there should be some algorithm that checks representation, participation, guild chat, guild missions and upgrades etc.)

• major activity time: [time range] (either based on activity above or manually set)

• guild hall: [Awesome Precipice/Gilded Hole/none]

• guild level: [number range]

• representation requirement: [full/during guild activity/no requirements]

• server: [dropdown list] (for WvW purposes)

• voice communication: [available/unavailable]

• language: [dropdown list]

All these parameters (apart from some objective and automatic ones – like size, level, activity) should be ideally settable by guild leaders; at some point, a Guild Recruitment Board should be unlocked for guilds so that they can input custom recruitment information (website application form, age restrictions etc.).

The guild should also have a mailbox for join requests, as well as an option to opt-out from being listed in the Guild Browser (for small friend-only guilds).

Finally, there’s a monetary incentive: even a part of these features, if implemented, will do a lot to improve the average player engagement and – surprise! – the amount of money he is willing to spend on the game he cares about.

Oh… Glad I was not the only one… Posted this just a while ago on reddit:

Honestly, when I sum up my overall ratings of Zhaitan and Mordremoth fights, it’s a tie. Why? Because Zhaitan was (more or less, as much as a video game can deliver) a scary epic dragon and the “fight” was epic; the mechanics and my contribution – eh, not so much.

But when I look at Mordremoth, all I see is an overfed jungle potato; despite the nice fight mechanics and amazing atmosphere and those sylvari racial moments, I just couldn’t take this fight seriously because of his looks, which reminded me of some small, chubby, chibi-style pokemons and not epic dragons at all.

Yes, I understand it is an “avatar” and “everything” was Mordremoth (maybe at least having it named “Avatar of…” and not “Mordremoth” could help?) But seriously, what was the problem? We had epic cutscenes with awesome vine dragon-like creatures and tall Mordrem Guards, we had Shadow of the Salad; if Mordy is “everything”, it could even be a vined shapeshifter growing from the platform (as in the trailer); the Avatar of The Pale Tree is slender and not “funny” – so what was the reason we got some Chinese money frog/humanoid drake/high-poly pokemon for the final boss?

I can live with the fact that we killed Mordremoth – even though I do hope it was not a “rushed story” but just the “beginning” of the true fight with Mordremoth who let us think we defeated it – but those looks… I just cannot take the whole story even remotely seriously, even with it being just a video game and all.

I do hope they redesign the looks of this boss… Just make it more slender, fix the proportions – and even this should work. The way it is now… eeewh.

Gaile Gray.6029:

That would be a totally different subject,

Will the total absence of upgrades to Mighty, Precise etc. fine infusions at the vendor be the same subject though?

Thanks.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Where are the +7 ones and how much do they cost? Do they come in an omni variety?

The problem is that there is none.

Nokaru.7831:

If it’s +5 / +7 then sure, but not +7 / +7.

Honestly, I don’t care either way, as long as they’re not a waste anymore. +7 / +7 will be definitely more… aesthetically pleasing.

Cirian.8917:

I’m not actually sure if I want them to be upgradable as the specialist +7 simple infusions would have a reason to be slotted. The current choice is actually a choice: +5 to a stat or another +2 AR. Maybe this is more interesting.

Are you serious? They were supposed to be Best-in-Slot and that’s why they cost an arm and a leg, instead of a couple relics.

It’s like, you know, “ascended weapons are required for raids; please go trash your legendaries now because they do not have some artificial +2 stat that lets you play in raids”.

Sublimatio.6981:

Do we even know if there is a recipe for them?

…apparently not, at least not in the Mystic Forge. The extracted infusion does not show up in the MF window…

Ok then. ANet, please add the +7 Mighty, Precise, Malign etc. infusion upgrade recipe to either the vendor or to the Mystic Forge.

Has anyone found a recipe for upgrading the fine quality Mighty, Precise, Malign agony infusions (the ones that give +5 stat and +5 agony and cost a lot to make)? Feels like a waste with those +7 ones.

Reminder: these are not the new “Versatile” infusions that you get from the new vendor.

I am honestly surprised it is classified as a bug.

- veterans here have done core open world PvE so many times they most likely never want to do it again
- dungeon and FoTM (the somewhat challenging stuff) XP has been nerfed
- HoT only progresses HoT masteries
- everyone loved running Labyrinth not only for loot, but for experience last year

It makes so much sense to think “oh look, we’re launching Tyria masteries and Labyrinth at the same time, everyone gonna boost them there, let’s check if it works!” that when I saw it didn’t work, I naturally assumed it was intended.

But since it is a bug, may I suggest adding several large chunks of experience in a new Halloween achievement for everyone who has finished the meta event and goes on doing the Lab? Or it can be a collection from some account-bound drops or something.

As a player with 15 characters (a double for almost every class), I find the current situation disappointing and frustrating. Solutions:

1. Halve the SP cost (to 200). If one has full map completion, that means he’s played enough to master a new spec. Really, after 3 years the last thing one wants is to play his old class instead of a new one.

1.1. Move decorative reward to end of line. I can live without the new pretty exo shield, thanks. Really, that’s how this game always worked: functionality from day one, cosmetics – after a variable grind.

2. Make each class elite spec unlock account-bound. My main is a mesmer and I finish all LS on it; I also made a mesmer themed for a chronomancer; do you really expect I will enjoy grinding the same 400 points in the same content just to have characters with different skins? No thanks; I should better think of asking for the char slot refund for all my duplicates in that case.

Onlysaneman.9612:

In addition, I’ll have to repeat this for every single alt I decide to roll if I ever want to use their new specializations.

My 14-character altoholic can relate. Please make them account-bound after first unlock!

I am an altoholic and have several characters of the same class but with different looks. Obviously, I am not keen on grinding extra 400 points on the same class for each class multiple times; it says nothing about ‘mastering’ a spec, it’s just an anti-alt grind wall.

So my suggestion is: once finished for the first time, the elite spec should either be free to train on other character, or cost just as much as the base specs.

Question (while it’s about the old camera, it feels like the best place to ask at the moment):

Is it possible to get a keybind for toggling autotargeting on and off? It will be especially useful when switching between classes that have a lot of movement skills (and attack without a target), and those that require a target for most skills; or even when doing different things on a single class.

Nol.2976:

Today it happend 2 times again that i dc’d in the middle of the event and after getting my 10 stacks back, i got no reward at all.

AFAIK you have to join another map instance after a DC to get rewards.

I found my WvW mixed ~PVT set with trooper runes on guardian to be more fun to run in SW than the pure damage zerk build. Don’t know about HoT, but that extra utility and HP really did make a difference in SW, so…

I think this topic is worth mentioning again since we’re getting a lot more new skills with the specializations and their behaviour is often can be determined only by using each skill in multiple scenarios and then memorizing, which is very unintuitive. Adding the following two tooltips will especially help newer players and altoholics:

Interrupted on movement / Requires root
or whatever makes more sense – channeling this skill will get interrupted if you move.

• Meteor Shower requires root.
• Static Field does not.
• Blurred Frenzy requires root.
• Whirling Wrath does not.

Scope
in degrees or front/front+side/full.

• Gust can be cast on any target around you (in LoS).
• Magic Bullet fails if your target is behind you.
• Illusionary Berserker can be cast on any target around you (in LoS). This is not a “bug”, no need to “fix” this, ANet!
• Illusionary Wave works in a cone in front of you.

Crosspost on reddit.

Daerian.6523:

Yea, totally. Except that historically mace or one handed warhammer is main close range weapon of every friggin knight (well, some used axes instead), while two handed hammers were rarely used (and when similar weapons were used, it was by the infantry). You have that exactly backwards.
And no, swords were not primary weapon used for killing. They were more status symbol.

I’m not saying anything about history, you know. It’s about fantasy. Ogre, ugly troll? Cudgel. Something humanoid, advanced and powerful? Large swords (or hammer) — stuff that has a definite shape and has to be crafted. At least that’s the image I have.

Sthenith.5196:

So mace is bulky and hammer is not ? 0.0

Hammer is not, it is a dynamic powerful weapon of a definite shape. A mace is a boulder on a stick to smash things with

Sthenith.5196:

Beside that, you can choose the way you play, no need to follow the ‘meta’ to the letter.

I know I do not have to; I want to go as close as possible to meta to be helpful, while maintaining the maximum of fun.

While I like to be efficient in dungeons and fractals, I also like my characters to wear pretty skins and to be consistent from the RP perspective. Mace is bulky, ugly, barbaric and turns a guardian into some dumb tanky Hulk; torch is like… well, it’s a stick on fire.

Prior to the specializations patch, I used to have Sword+Focus on swap and found it really fluent; but currently I see that the meta is mace, torch and only occasionally scepter and focus. So how bad are now PvE builds that use, say, GS/Sword+Focus or even GS+Hammer?

Setz.9675:

and xxx colour for 91-100, for prestige purpose ofcourse.

Not sure if GW2 is ready for NSFW colors, even if it’s “for prestige purpose”

That said, I doubt the colors will be numerous. I’m totally not a fun of full golden skins and expect the worst here: golden reskins only.

doddbox.8153:

Your glorified noob filter plan would take a lot of extra development time when there is simpler options that use less resources and have an equal or greater affect, i.e. implement a tiered title or some other simple visual way of exalting veteran and experienced Fractal players.

Reworking Mai, Molten Duo, Swamp, Maw to be separate soloable instances is not only relatively fast, but also provides unique fun content for many people even if it is a rehashed version of a group encounter.

doddbox.8153:

Your idea isn’t bad but it’s wasteful and only addresses a fraction of the problems.

It solves the problem of people not knowing anything better than spamming 1-2-3-4-5 and is very benifical in the long run: as soon as all the playerbase knows the mechanics, you can start building more fun bosses in which the boredom of the HP pool is not the only “challenge”.

The title thing, on the other hand, does little outside of encouraging formal elitism.

perry.9645:

people should need to do at least 8/10 scales to level up past 10 levels

Eh? You always have to do 10 scales to go 10 levels up. The problem is that it’s terribly easy to get carried without learning anything.

butch.8136:

Meh that’s just a temporary/artificial bandaid for something you can’t prevent. People will have guides up and running after a week and they’ll get through it like that. Just like the gauntlet.

You’re underthinking it. I am totally okay with people using guides for it. For example, I had next to no experience with elementalists but then I watched a guide on farming Hammerfell and learned about the awesome blind and block possibilities on them.

At some point I even suggested making the Gauntlet bosses a permanent training ground with nice unique skins and achievements so that players have fun content that they’re encouraged to do because it’s both unique, rewarding and teaching.

Purple Miku.7032:

I would be very happy if they released this, not only because it would at least help with filtering out leeches/clueless players that ruin runs easily, but it also sounds like it would be fun. ^^

I know right? I am not someone who has the time and commitment to learn to solo 5-man encounters (and get the same loot for it), but I would find it fun to have more Gauntlet-like solo bosses defeating which could feel like a valid, game-approved accomplishment.

doddbox.8153:

They made a perfectly functional kick button. There is no reason why they should spent time implementing new content because people don’t know how to properly use existing features in the game.

“Just let everyone enter any university they like hiding how good they are, waste everyone’s time and kick them outside later – instead of putting entrance exams to gate those out straight away.”

“Just let everyone get any job they like hiding how good they are, waste everyone’s time and kick them outside later – instead of putting a CV and an interview to gate those out straight away.”

Now that we’re revamping Fractals, how about adding solo instances each 10 levels to filter out clueless players who piggybacked to 50?

I’ve met way too many clueless players at level 50 (PvP condi warrior anyone?) than there should be, and I’m afraid that this new system will let such players advance and infest higher levels without actually requiring them to get better, eventually poisoning the fun for all those players who actually want challenging content (but do not always have a full premade party) and want to play with like-minded individuals.

So how about this: each 10 levels, you get a personal instance you have to clear yourself (no party members allowed) and if you do, you unlock the next personal reward level tier (11-20, 21-30…). So unless you clear that instance, you cannot get your personal reward level higher than this threshold and do not get higher level rewards.

The bosses can be somewhat similar to the Queen’s Gantlet bosses, or be toned-downed versions of boss fractals. That way, people will be encouraged to look into their builds, learn the encounters and eventually get better if they actually want better loot than pressing [F] in the Silverwastes.

crosspost on reddit

Yes, watching it in case it needs a nerf to match the current straightforward, streamlined approach to mesmer.

skcamow.3527:

HM nerf aside, the background mantra recharge thing really hurts. In Anet’s eyes it was a bug from the inception of the 6/23 patch. They don’t look at how it improved the QoL of mantras, they just saw it as a bug on their big list needing fixed so they fixed it.

I’m sure the “Mesmer OP” rants of late made sure it got prioritized higher. It’s unfortunate.

Reminds me of…

How does one know if a bug destroys the game or even if a legitimate tactic destroys it? The rule of thumb is to assume it doesn’t and keep playing, because 99% of the time, as good as the tactic may be, there will either be a way to counter it or other even better tactics. Prematurely banning something is the scrub’s way. It prevents the scrub from ever discovering the counter to the Valle CC or the diamond trick. It also creates artificial rules that alter the game, when it’s entirely possible that the game was just fine the way it was. It also usually leads to an avalanche of bans in order to be consistent with the first. When players think they have found a game-breaking tactic, I advise them to go win some tournaments with it. If they can prove that the game really is reduced to just that tactic, then perhaps a ban is warranted. It’s extremely rare that a player is ever able to prove this though. In fact, I don’t even have any examples of it.

A note to game developers: fix your bugs after release if you have the opportunity to do so. But beware that players enjoy the feeling of wielding “unfair” tactics, and taking that away from them can be a mistake if the “unfair” tactic isn’t powerful enough to single-handedly win tournaments.

IMO the only benefit of having Mirror Blade bounce 4 times was in PvE where you have to tag mobs (and that is what mesmer is awful at and needs a buff [even outside chronomancer spec]). But hey, it’s E-SPORTS so I guess that extra random boon bounce was really breaking the PvP balance!

Erron.5327:

In an amazing world ANet would read this thread and reconsider the changes to Harmonious Mantras damage modifier and the cooldown.
This is really a bummer to us crazy mesmers who ran mantras.

In an amazing world ANet would put a pure DPS PvE trait in a tier where an absolutely integral, option-excluding PvP trait exists (which apparently Deceptive Evasion was not?).