Guild Wars 2

I definitely favor the mortar if: 1) I am not using a turret build; or 2) I have not gotten the scrapper skills and traits completed yet. Does anyone use the elite elixir?

I like Boot’s Bad Build: One Man Army build, although I have modified it.

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?vdAQFASncoC1ahFpCmcBEqil7iie1j9cHcBjwAQsg6hQE-T1BBABAcBA+4BAYkyv80BIhSQw3f/BH1fIFQgTtA-w

I use Runes of the Traveller to get the +25% Movement Speed, but basically it is a FT/Juggernaut build.

The problem with all of these builds is that they are what you use AFTER you get the full Scrapper trait line. It will take you quite some time to get the full Scrapper traits so you need a non-Scrapper build.

So if you like FT/Juggernaut, then you work from there. You obviously have Firearms to get Juggernaut. For the Master I would choose No Scope. FT hits a lot so your chances of getting a critical increase, as long as you stay up close. That procs Fury, which further increases you chances of getting criticals.

Criticals proc bleeding (Firearms Minor Adept trait), which lasts longer (Minor GrandMaster), which further increases criticals (Minor Master). So now your build should focus on criticals and bleeding. For your Major Adept either Heavy Armor Exploit or High Caliber seems like the ticket, depending upon what you want. Note that the former procs on criticals while the latter procs on range, which increases the chance of procing No Scope.

Inventions are really centered around healing. If you like to go solo, this is probably a line to take. Of the traits, I almost always take Bunker Down, simply because criticals will proc it, giving you healing (move forward) or inflicting more damage (move backwards drawing them into the mines). If you take Inventions, this means you can take Mecha Legs and get perma +25% Movement Speed, always a good thing for those long runs.

So that leave Explosives, Alchemy, and Tools, at least until you get Scrapper. If you focus is on FT, then Explosives is unlikely to be a choice. I personally prefer to round out the skills with Elixirs, so Alchemy is a much better bet. Projection Injection and HGH would be my Adept Major and GrandMaster Major choices with either Backpack Generator or Self-Regulating Defenses as my Master Major. The former gives me regeneration, which procs Energy Amplifier, while the latter helps you escape defeat (although less so in solo open world PvE).

I am a rifle person and because FT has little condition on it, it goes better than pistol/pistol, which is oriented more for a condition build. Forget hammer until you have a full scrapper build. If you choose rifle then you don’t need Elixir Gun for range, but you might consider it because you have invested in HGH.

I use Elixir H when solo. Turrets are too finicky in open world. I like Elixir U for quickness. It helps you burn down the enemy faster. If not taking Elixir Gun I usually take Elixir B, although admittedly usually waste it for swiftness.

I always took Mortar before Scrapper, unless specifically playing a Turret build.

Akira.5746:

The idea is to grab the essentials for Grenade Kit and Applied Force while still maintaining the minimum necessary defenses from traits. Elixir B, Super Elixir and Acid Bomb are our common sources of Might; in addition, 60% of all crits, Toss B, our stun break and both elites also offer Might for AP access.

Pros:
-has grenades
-doesn’t have FT
-70% Boon Duration without Leadership runes, Commander/exotic equipment or Platinum Doubloons
-high Protection uptime from your heal and runes
-passive 50% Quickness uptime on grenades and in Rampage form
-reliable 15+ Might with Prot, Fury, Retal, Swiftness after popping elixirs (Might maintained with food)

Cons:
-awful condition cleansing with no answer to corruption
-propensity to spam elixirs for 10 Might/Quickness

Questions:
-Is this build reasonably viable or is it just a gimmick?
-If so, what are the better ways to build a Grenade Scrapper?
-Are there any utility swaps I should consider to make the build more stable?

Thanks much to all that read and reply.

I used the Boot’s Bad Builds “One Man Army” build and started modifying from there. Now I get that you don’t want to use FT and Juggernaut (which is what his build is), although I don’t understand the rationale, but that is okay. I could not afford the Runes of Leadership either, mostly because I cannot get the recipe (darn Dragon’s Stand meta events!) and started with Platinum Doubloons. What I found was a problem with the build was speed between combats. Although Boot’s was right that you will stack 45+ seconds of Swiftness after a big combat, that still is not great for WvW or open world PvE (my main venues).

If speed out of combat is an issue with you, Runes of Traveler give you 15% Boon Duration (5% less than your runes), but gives you permanent +25% Movement Speed. You can offset the loss of Boon Duration by putting in 2-3 Platinum Doubloons in your trinkets. This solved the issues I was seeing with Boot’s build.

Not sure why you are against putting in PDs though.

I used Bootcamp for SWTOR and it was not fun. As the game’s content grew, the need for more disk space grew with it. Bootcamp by itself does not allow you to expand the Windows partition; it is a process of backup, wipe the partition, expand the partition, and restore the data. Not fun. (Either that or buy software that can update the Windows partition.) Loading another full-blown OS on you system is not ideal either. That said, Windows under bootcamp ran pretty nicely.

That is a good one!

No, actually I do not want the game to play itself, but the developer blog stated it clearly (IIRC) that they want objectives to count for more. They have also indicated that they want people to group up more. Making it harder to solo objectives will do that.

Personally, I think this will make the map slightly more static, depending upon your server’s non-prime activity. Whether this is good or not will probably depend upon your mode in WvW (i.e. blog, zerg, havoc, or solo).

I think the biggest issue is that the dev blog – if I understood it correctly – uses the wrong language. They say upgrades are “automatic”; what they mean is “requires no manual intervention by players” rather than “guaranteed”. They say “requires no supply”, but that implies the dolyaks have less of a role. I think if they had used better terms there would be less resistance to change or tweak.

I look forward to seeing how it all plays out, despite the fact that I am one of the players that ran around on off-hours upgrading objectives in an attempt to make it harder for solos and small groups to quickly flip the objectives. That automation is what I used to do (and sadly, spend coin on).

Yaks that downgrade objectives and deplete supplies?!? How does that make sense? Is it a klepto yak?

If you solo cap a camp you deny supply to the enemy for making siege both in the camp and in the objectives it serves, grant it to your side, and you gain objective points for your side. How is that not providing impact? Is it less (because upgrades no longer require supply)? Yes.

I am interested in seeing how this all plays out, as they are essentially messing with the “economic system” of WvW by altering the value of its “currency” (supply). Much like real world economists and government officials I think they will find that just because they have their hands on the levers it does not mean they understand all of the consequences.

I say let it play out and see what happens before they start tweaking. It may be a disaster, but the larger the disaster the more likely they are to quickly fix it. (Notice the post-patch patches we have been having of late.)

Edit: by the way, although they have taken supply out of the equation for upgrades, they have not taken out the fact that dolyak arrivals reduce the time remaining to upgrade. So think of it as dolyaks carrying two currencies: upgrade supplies and siege building supplies.

Thanks for the tip and the response.

My character was stuck in a pose with his left arm raised, right arm lowered. I never noticed it leaving that pose. (Stayin’ alive, stayin’ alive…)

I could never map the scroll wheel of my mouse to zoom in and out. My character was stuck in one view level unless I used [Fn][Up Arrow] or [Fn][Down Arrow]. The keybind mapping did not recognize me using the scroll wheel and the Razer’s keybind mapping does not allow mapping [Fn][Up Arrow] or [Fn][Down Arrow].

Other than that, no other issue detected with the Mac client. That said I was not able to get on when there were a lot of characters on. This will usually cause the Mac client to crash, after about an hour’s play. (Same with World bosses.)

Number of finisher moves that contributed to War score would really be nice (although separating our sentry, dolyak, and finishers points would be better). Lot of discussion going on (elsewhere) about the true value of bloodlust in winning.

I realize you are being serious, and I am being serious when I ask: do any of your characters eat meat or dairy consumables? How far do you carry it?

What time zone are you in? I have two other players that would love to run dungeons, but we cannot get another two people consistently. Two of us are in PST and one is a vampire in EST.

Our guild is EOSM and we have a Teamspeak server. Plus, we can get a guild channel on the FC TS server.

I have found that map running – ignore the hearts – is one of the faster ways in PvE. Everything is relatively fast except for the hearts, and doing a few events as you pass them will give you extra XP and the occasional heart. However, you are not going to be allowed into Lion’s Arch until level 35, so that cuts down on the tactic to run all of the 1-15 areas and capitols before moving on to the higher level areas.

Why are people saying run EotM? Did I miss a message that said EotM is not WvW and therefore you can get in before level 60? If so, that would be great, but I have a character that levels in EotM and it seems like you still need to go into PvE in order to get enough skill points.

Ideas like Tomes won’t fly as they are account bound so you are not going to get them from your paid account and as has been pointed out, you don’t get login rewards.

Crafting is definitely possible, as you can send gold from your other account. But if this is your only account, this is not a viable method. You going to get some XP, but not level to 60 that way.

Thanks. That really helps.

Through experimentation I found out that if I capture and hold the ruins on Borderlands map “A” and the ruins on that same map are retaken and held it removes your bloodlust. But if you get bloodlust on map “A” and no one does take it back, how long is the bloodlust supposed to last?

Also, is there any way to tell which borderlands map is providing you the bloodlust?

Thanks in advance.

Thanks Jethro for that response, especially about the problems with FC and other lower tier servers. What you are saying is what we are seeing. I am west coast so I stay on a little later, but we could roll a guild zerg around, capture a lot of stuff, but by next morning it would have all turned back if we were T7. (Not so in T8, indicating they have as little a night crew as we have.)

I remember the first WvW meeting I attended on the FC TS and the issue of the week was that we need people to sign up for holding down the fort during non-prime hours, otherwise we would never rank up. Seems like they were right.

Thanks for the reply. That leads to follow-on questions, largely about what some of what you said meant.

• “Queuing on the deep end”? Is that another way of saying that the queue is at worst 50 players deep when trying to get on EB?

• What is considered “the militia”? Are these the havoc squads, ninja teams, and solos running around, i.e. 1-2 small parties of 5 (or less)? The third answer (“roaming parties are rare nowadays”) seems to imply it means something else.

• Are “blue commanders” Siegerazer and Siegecrusher? Or is that something else? I was not counting them, only players.

• What is a border spreadsheet. We do have a gigantic TS server for FC, with lots of channels. Usually there is only one person (the zerg commander) speaking on it, however.

Yeah, I bought ikitten0 when it was on sale last. I did not have the foresight to buy two copies, which is what is holding me back from doing it now.

Thanks again for the response.

I am currently on the FC server and we have bobbed between tiers 6 (once), 7, and now currently 8 in WvW. When I started GW2 I neither knew which server to join and why (so I randomly joined one that was open), nor thought I would like WvW.

My sessions with WvW fall into two categories: completing WvW dailies with two other guys and zerging with my guild. I do EotM every so often, devoting one character solely to WvW (and mostly EotM), but I pretty much do WvW with my level 80 engineer or level 80 warrior.

I never have any problem getting into WvW. In fact for a long time I did not know that EotM was designed as an overflow server for when you “queue” to get into WvW. The worst week for roaming in small groups was when we recently rose to tier 6 … for one week. (All right, all right, stop laughing.) That was also our worst week for zerging with the guild. But at tiers 7 and 8 it is easy to run and get your dailies and often never even see an enemy player. The only time I see an enemy zerg is when I am in the guild zerg myself. (Zergs seem like zerg magnets.)

So, I know what being at the bottom of the WvW heap looks and feels like. What does it look and feel like at tiers 1-2, 3-4, and 5-6? Specifically:

• Do you frequently have to queue and wait in order to get into Borderland or EB? What are typical wait times?

• I suspect that the higher tiers want WvW players to join in the WvW-oriented guilds and participate in a more organized fashion and don’t take to solos and small group roamers out there doing there own thing. I suspect the higher you go, the more intense it is, sort of like how serious raiding hard content in other MMOs. Is that impression correct?

• Is everything scaled up, i.e. the size of the groups, or is it that there are just more groups?

• Are there more commanders active simultaneously? (We infrequently have two commanders on the map at one time and rarely have three or more. I have seem more commanders in a single instance of Tequatl than I have in one WvW map in our tier.)

• Do you use tools better than Teamspeak? Something that allows players to easily switch channels during gameplay so teams can have separate channels, but cross-channel communication can occur rapidly and easily? (If so, what is it?)

I have been thinking about creating a second account – if it is not against the TOS, that is – and I figured I would try a different server for that account. But not having any idea what a higher tier server is like week after week, I am still as clueless as when I started as to which tier of server would be best for what I would like to do, which is be part of an organized effort more sophisticated than “stack on me” and “start pushing now”. (No offense meant to my current guild, which is far more serious about WvW than my previous one.)

Thanks in advance for any insight you can provide me.

Don’t you get five, plus one for HoT pre-purchase, and one to use during the beta?

So I noticed in the gem store there is a “Living World Season 2 Complete Package” and my first question is: how do I know if this was (or was not) included when I bought the deluxe package? Is there any way to tell, in-game, whether I have the content?

It says the package includes:

• Gates of Maguuma
• Entanglement
• The Dragon’s Reach (Parts 1 and 2)
• Echos of the Past
• Tangled Paths
• Seeds of Truth
• Point of No Return

Considering that it is 1280 gems, I want to make sure I do not have it already.

Is this all content for level 80s?

Thanks in advance for your replies.

By the way, when at group (dynamic) events, like killing the bosses, be sure and group up with four other people as it will help ensure that you get the gold for the event.