Guild Wars 2

Super Bullet Point Mode:

Soulbeast: Only viable if playing core ranger loadout with ability to merge on occasion. New weapon and utilities are a joke as of right now.
Weaver: Might be really good, but learning curve that incorporates the need to unlearn 4+ years of muscle memory might kill the spec.
Renegade: I have no idea why anyone would play this spec over glint.
Scourge: Will be a beast on tight PvP maps. Until boons get stripped. Still can be a force with barrier.
Yolosmith: Textbook definition of what a glass cannon is to be honest.
Mirage: Whole premise is build around PvP. See no reason to run it in PvE since its basically core Mesmer for the most part, but more complicated.
Deadeye: Another one that will take getting used to, but in the right hands will be devastating and can find a place in all game modes.
Firebrand: Pointless when compared to core Guardian or DH. Just too slow and bleh. I guess play for variety and if you want to give out lots of aegis. Until its stripped.
Spellbreaker: Hope you weren’t planning on popping boons near them. Or using a skill. Or not using a skill.

Yeah, see most of the new stuff is balanced around or meant to have more impact on PvP. Ultimately it won’t seem to matter a bit what you run in PvE this time around. Unless Anet has a whole mess of easily fooled NPC enemies with tons of boons on them in PvE of PoF.

See, what I think it really happening (and this is totally my personal read of the situation) is there was an influx of new players boosting to play the new HoT content with absolutely no idea how the combat really ran and went to the areas of the game that were made specifically for people who have been playing multiple classes for a few years now. Maybe they played some of the core game story content before jumping in to HoT and LS stuff, but they certainly didn’t know the ins and outs of combat like vet players and then tried to solo the newer stuff and paid a high price for it.

I just can’t see someone who is a vet player of GW2, who has played the core game content (maps, stories, dungeons, etc) and then going into HoT and being surprised by much of anything, and certainly not from any of the LWS stuff that came out. I really hate the “L2P” argument because it seems so dismissive, but honestly this is an instance of people needing to slow down a touch and learn the mechanics of their chosen class(es) and trying out the story step once or twice to learn how the bosses might work. Is it hard to solo stuff sometimes? Sure, since it is an MMO. Its definitely not impossible and should not be tweaked downward.

Before I flipped to reaper, my vampiric necro made insane use of the warhorn for combating large groups of enemies in tight quarters. That thing basically kept her alive when getting swarmed. The interrupt is also very good.

I love it the way it is.

IMO, core builds are still very much viable when compared to the HoT specs (and i even put some of my toons BACK to their core set ups after playing for a while with their HoT spec.

The only class I don’t think (and this is personal preference) that is true is with the necro/reaper. I personally feel that Reaper outclasses core necro and I get WAY more out of it, but that is just my opinion from my play on both of my reapers. Its not that core necro isn’t still fun to play, I just think reaper edges out my core necro builds. Others might feel differently depending on how they play.

Oh yeah, everyone loves a Narc/Vice cop. And even more people love the idea of how to “police the police”. It already goes over so well in society as it stands. /sarcasm

Seriously, though this is the dumbest thing I’ve seen suggested. Anet already has this/does this with their employees to some degree.

Played a game for 6 month, left and now came back after 4+ years and you want a rundown of how things have changed from your limited perception?

They’ve changed a lot as well have not changed too much.

No one here can enumerate all the changes for you. and if you load up you’ll have to play more than 6 months and drop some gems on the store to get content that you missed out on had you been actively playing if you that much of a PvE player.

Had some fun (when they initially buffed LB for ranger) running with other rangers and machine gunning people down in full zerk.

We were all “stacked” when buffing up then gleefully sniped people.

Also, when i run my ranger with LB in a zerg I’m constantly looking to be the sheep dog, either picking off the tail of the other zerg or rabbiting to draw players in and out of the other zerg as need to be. Use greatsword in the second slot for mobility and in your face damage as needed.

Most importantly, expect to be killed quite a bit as you don’t have the defense of the clump and be a good scout for the zerg.

Absconditus.6804:

What in the flying.. In what world aren’t condition bursts about as telegraphed as any physical bursts. When did you ever experience a condition-build compete with the ludicrous damage dealt by let’s say a Thief doing the good old Mug > Cloak and Dagger > Backstab > Heartseeker combo over the span of about a second, maybe three? Sure, you can mitigate it through quick reaction and anticipation, but that freaking goes for condition applications too. You can dodge the application of a condition, it needs to bloody hit you. You can evade the application. You can block the application of a condition. You can invulnerability block the application. (Unless there’s Unblockable effects in play of course.) A whole lot of burst application comes from fields too, specific locations that you can avoid or at least get out of before they start to properly hurt.

When I am facing a Power-based build, my mitigation are dodges, evade skills, blocks, invulnerability, mobility skills to re-position myself with and get health back, healing skills, cleanses, Protection and then some. There is practically no difference when it comes to facing Condition-based builds. You use dodges, evade skills, blocks, invulnerability, mobility skills to re-position yourself with and get health back, healing skills, cleanses, Resistance (which trumps Protection with it negating the damage completely) and then some. When I am out of the majority of my mitigation against a Power-based build, I’m certainly getting hit with more physical damage right after to finish me off.

…

In WvW actually. There was no standing against a necro condi/epidemic bomb and there is no telegraph for that. One second you are standing and the next you’re dead. You were lucky if you had a half second to react to it. And I’m talking this could take out whole groups of people. even in smaller group scenarios, coming up on a condi necro and condi ranger or thief means you’re dead. Full stop.

I primarily have female toons because they look better than the male ones. An no I don’t mean look better in the they “zomg so hawt” way, but in the “male characters in this game look like garbage most of the time” way. I like the armors, animations etc way more on the female toons more. I have maybe 4 male out of the 20 I have.

Also like the female voice acting more and if I am going to have to listen to them talk, I’d rather enjoy it than not.

I really don’t know what the hang up is.

Ferelwing.8463:

I do the dailies all of the time, my kids not so much (lots clipped for space saving)

This is something that should be addressed but the way to address it should NOT be a pointless redoable heart AND identifying gear.

OK, sorry, there is more here that is definitely not HoT related. Your kids are teens, playing an MMO, but don’t want to be bothered with playing the game content to get rewards, but would rather get boosted to 80 then try high level content, but not the “grindy” kind, and then complain when they have no loot/money???

Setting aside all the other stuff you mentioned since all new characters can wp to all starter areas right out of the gates and never have to go through LA, and forgetting that simply fighting random mobs will still drop enough loot to earn even a modest income when trying to run to events that I’d assume maybe matter to your teens, I have to ask:

What is the point of them playing this game at all? Honestly want to know why they are bothering to play the game if they don’t want to do things in the game.

Its like they want to start a game of Trivial Pursuit with their token already filled with the pie pieces and answering the final question for the win. And to that end, why are you tping to them to res them??? Holy enabling Batman. I just don’t get the point at all to them even loading up the game.

I hate the idea of paying for identifying loot, but this is literally the least of your and your kids’ problems.

Absconditus.6804:

Bear.3689:

Absconditus.6804:

I vote we also complain about physical bursts of damage as well.

Go make your own thread about this.

Why would I? It’s as ridiculous as making topics about Condition Damage bursts. They both exist, the fact that they are bursts means they can be avoided.

Wrong. A well timed dodge, block, invuln etc can mitigate a physical burst that is telegraphed UNLESS some other factor flags that hit as unblockable, but even then most can be evaded in those cases provided you still have enough dodges left in you.

Condi burst on the other hand is a non-telegraphed massive stack of damage types that both cover each other and tick off LARGE damage at such a fast rate that you can insta die to it before you could ever try to hit your cleanse after the fact. Furthermore if you somehow managed to eat enough of the damage and live to hit the cleanse and got maybe half of them cleared, you’re probably down you’re condi cleanse and will certainly get hit with more condi damage right after to finish you off. And this is all provided you even had a clue that you were about to be condi-burst.

Fact is condi damage should never be “burst” damage.

Jack Redline.5379:

1st Raptor doesn’t jump up at all only forward. Imo it should jump parabolicaly since if you want to get through jump and there is even smallest obstacle in your way you can’t since it will block you.
Also i think mounts need more jump 4 maybe. I noticed they consume endurance on it so maybe splitting it in 4 would help, after all it is animal that lived there whole its life so it should have better endurance than common person.

2nd Deadeye
I only focused on this class since i play main thief.
I will be straight i didn’t like idea of rifle thief from the very begining but i can’t helo it now so whatever i will do somehow.
Anyway DE is very weak. Does a lot dmg yes but is very vulnerable. Since we loose 3 jumps from DD and we become stative after #5 it is very easy to kill us from behind or by shadowstep. I know price for camping is high but we should be able to avoid it somehow if we notice in time.
Marking target is very bad it should be automaticly set after you attack target. Also Withdraw and Roll for Initiative should automaticly remove crouch. It is very distractive to use skill and then focus on standing up.
RANGE.
OMG when i saw it i was like What? Range is very very small. If you are sniper that can’t move from his spot you need to be sure you can hit fly on mile away. 1500 is not enough should be 2500 or 3000 in crouch because that is realistic distance you would want to put between you and your target if you were sniper.
Ranger has range 1200 on longbow so he can literary attack us from spot where he is.
Point of camping is that enemy is in range and you are not otherwise it is gunfight in a bar which makes whole Dead eye pointless since we could do gunfights with p/p AND even do more dmg. I checked it personaly since i could not believe it and it is possible to kill your target faster with p/p than with rifle AND you even have better survavibility due to 3 DD jumps.
The last one is i was really dissapointed when i saw that those contracts were only a new currency. really guys i thought, I believed we will literary recieve msg where will be like “I heard you are assassin for hire here is your target.” and the harder the target would be the higher would be the price. (Something like dark brotherhood from Skyrim) but this was really sad for me.

Thanks for reading this i hope i helped.

Keep on good job guys i love this game x)

PS: I know it is maybe a bit late for it but could third attack on Impact strike get combo finisher blast. Please thief doesn’t have enough finishers. Thx.

They have a bunny mount for the vertical leaping. Raptor is only supposed to jump forward well.

As for your Deadeye stuff…

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, but no.

Seriously. No. There is no shortage of deadeye vids on youtube right now that show both how deadly AND survivable deadeye is if you play it well. What next? Give them a base 30K vitality just in case they get hit with conditions and an auto dodge that triggers when attacked while crouching? Maybe an instantly activated invuln that lasts for 10 seconds when they first crouch? Those suggestions are just as absurd as what you ask for the class.

My Attack Will Kill.7816:

Serenity.6135:

Missed it because you decided to change the time…

i agree. just a small post on the forums saying the time changed not even anything on the launcher or ingame or whatever. very bad communication like always

rather the official forum than twitter or buried on some post on reddit.

Was able to get on for about an hour or so.

The only two things that I came across while in there:

Mount:

It felt “laggy” compared to the first time I was on the mount a few weeks ago. Seemed like the response time was off and all in all it felt “heavier”. Not sure if this was due to lag or if you all changed something with the raptor.

Also seemed to get “stuck” more often at the top of ramps.

Activating the get on mount key was also hit and miss at times.

Class – Soulbeast:

Only problem I ran into was that when I merged I would sometimes not get the merge skills and then I had to hit the unmerge key a few times before it registered and separated me from my pet. It happened 3 different times.

Agree, but will never happen. Like ever.

The problem with the condi meta as it stands now isn’t a condi-attrition build set up, its that there exists a condi-burst setup. With burst, there is no defense. Don’t come to me with all that “bring a cleanse” nonsense. There is no reaction to a condi-burst in this game nor is there enough cleanse that can be brought to mitigate how quickly the condi burst can be reapplied. Granted its “easier” to handle in say, PvP, but in WvW its just broken and the main reason I refuse to run it on any of my toons. Sure I’d probably win more fights but I don’t like exploiting that kind of stuff in a game. I tested the ghost thief set up for all of five minutes (before it was nerfed) and felt genuinely bad while running it.

Now, yes, some changes were made to stem the “epidemic” that was condi burst in WvW, and we are even getting new and interesting ways with the new PoF elites to both give out and deal with condi, but then they also made one class capable of pooching that with one elite… coughspellbreakerwindscough.

Ultimately though, if you’re in a PvP match or a WvW one you pretty much have to run with someone that can do the things you can’t in your build to have the best chance of survival.

Terra.9506:

I’m working on The Shining Blade and I hate PVP however WvW for gift of battle isn’t so bad since it take me 3 day to get it which alot faster than I expect… all i did just follow zerg and press 1 while drinking ice cold cola…

compare to 77 mystic clover it ask for…. and since I’m not the rich 250 Amalgamated Gemstone is something that scare me the most. XD

Best thing to do for malgies is park a toon that has access to Verdant Brink (but whom you don’t run around with much) at matriarch and log in to punch her in the nose once a day. Tedious, yes, but it’ll mean you’re buying less when the time comes.

For crying out loud…look…just stop.

When I was first trying to get map complete in this game WvW maps were required to get that, and since world complete was necessary to get things for a legendary I was “forced” to do WvW. This was also way before reward tracks. Amazingly, I actually found i liked it after trying it for some time. Was I good at it in the beginning? Nope. Am I good at it now? Sure a bit. Do I have nights where I just get rolled? Oh yeah. But at the end of the day its way more exciting when you get into some good fights than facerolling idiot NPC mobs on most PvE maps.

As others have stated, you can escort dolyaks and maybe fight a few skirmishes (and probably earn a few dailies) while doing the gift of battle reward track (which gives you other things which you’ll need anyway: clovers I’m looking at you) and you can even do the track multiple times for more of those mats and more gifts of battle. Or try for some armor after. Or really anything for very little effort and time per week.

Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497:

Why run it when most people are at work for the NA?

Because Anet employees are also at work and need the data from the stress tests and as she stated, its a bit unfair to also expect them to work odd hours just to perform a test that people who are available during the day can help with.

Alin.2468:

No, thank you, I shall not participate. I am just a client, not an employee.

Well, since its usually CLIENTS who perform stress tests of software being delivered by a company, your comment makes zero sense. That’s ok though. One less person might make this one easier on my connection and I’ll be in town for this one.

I’ll try to jump on and see what, if anything, breaks.

No. I’m only barely OK with the current mounts being required and really don’t like the idea of most of them not even being lore friendly creatures (especially that bunny thing).

Just…no.

Metas change. Roaming is a joke thanks to condi burst and no one actually roaming like they used to. Adapt or move on basically.

Obviously you’ve chosen the latter.

Things will change even more drastically when PoF drops, so yeah, get out now before you start raging about Deadeyes and Spellbreakers.

Its like this:

There is no hard trinity, but there are still ROLES to play.

So you can have a team comp of pretty much any class combo (assuming all players are very good at playing what they know) and each can choose a kind of role to play (whether that roll be DPS power or condi, support through buffs heals, AoE control, etc.) After that, if they work as a team, they can more of less hold their own all while playing more or less the way they like.

Now sure some classes excel more at the DPS thing or the healing/support thing. I’m not looking for a thief to pump out heals for instance, but they can either be a big damage dealer or condi monkey or venom share support. And my warrior can either be a kind of tank to eat damage or even a healer support. Its that flexibility that really allows GW2 to shine when others stagnate.

Also, and I know this sounds silly, watch vids on youtube pertaining to your class. Get a feel for how those classes are being played competitively. Then dedicate some time to playing the classes you feel are killing you more often. Sometimes getting more familiar with enemy skill rotations is more valuable than gear.

Would love to help, but heading out of town this afternoon. I’ll let some of my buds know though in case they want to jump in to help.

Its not the armor.

Its a bit of power creep from the HoT elite specs and more that you just haven’t been playing as much as them. They are used to fighting others and therefore just have a higher skill level.

Most people are using exotics or ascended or a mix of the two. Still just comes down to skill though. I was once rolled by a dude in yellows that simply outplayed me and I’ve rolled people that were all flash but had no idea how to swing their sword. It happens.

Also, Soulbeast in particular:

Dagger – Horrible weapon. Hits like a wet noodle compared to existing condi damage spec and is pointless.
Stances – Also not better choices than core skills.

Verdict: I can run my power ranger setup with an occasional merge with smokescale, but basically run my current set up with slightly more nuking potential from a quick pet merge and knowing how things roll here that damage is going to be nerfed immediately. In short, the spec is pointless next to both core ranger and druid at this time. It brings almost nothing to the table.

Feanor.2358:

PookieDaWombat.6209:

Honestly, adding more/proper boons to enemies aren’t going to make them “zomg the insta death” to lower level players. In fact it might make them consider their choice of skills a little more, or traits, etc that allow for boon strip and condi cleanse, etc. OP does have a point that once you reach a certain level, the mobs do become a little easy to faceroll without much thought to gear or even personal skill. Sure it could take a while but most times when doing a map open or something, or even a HP in core tyria I find myself literally running in a circle around an enemy with my 1 set to auto while I drink my coffee. I only ever use the other skills if I want to practice a combo or something like that, but usually its just a kiting game.

There’s a problem with that. The game already has places where you need to think about your build. Instanced content, pvp modes, specific achievements. Open world serves as a kind of sandbox, which allows you to “play your way”. This is even true for HoT zones. All they require you to do is step away from the red circles or lines. Sometimes it might help you if you can break out of immob, but even without it you can generally play with anything you want. I don’t think that should change, tbh.

See, and there lies the rub. I’ve seen no shortage of DPS meter threads lately where someone inevitably brings up player skill levels. I’m all for play your way, but i should not be able to run a literal circle around a mob in a level 70-80 zone with letting my auto attack kill them. Sure I can kill them faster, but the point here is I don’t HAVE to. Might hit my heal on occasion if they manage to land a hit. Might hit a daze on them or a knockback if they get too close, but that does nothing for me as a player. I’m sorry, but what you simply say as “get out of the red circle” is over simplifying the fights in HoT maps. You have to do way more than that to survive there and there are a lot of players coming from core Tyria maps that have developed very bad habits, don’t do many instanced things because their skill level is too low and they get kicked by meter users and then go to a HoT map and get wrecked by pocket raptors and a few mordrem guards.

I’m not saying ramp up the enemies in QD, but if you’re in frostgorge or fireheart or even blazeridge, you should be more concerned about knowing your skills and build options and not just rolling over anything with some hodge podge of gear that makes no sense together while smashing 1 on your keyboard. It might even make trying to get level appropriate gear more more rewarding for the players as they level as opposed to “oh, this one has numbers that are a little bigger than what i’m wearing right now so sure I’ll wear it because ultimately it doesn’t matter”.

Actually my suggestion is give us something else to do with those level boost scrolls if we don’t plan on having another toon on our account.

Honestly, adding more/proper boons to enemies aren’t going to make them “zomg the insta death” to lower level players. In fact it might make them consider their choice of skills a little more, or traits, etc that allow for boon strip and condi cleanse, etc. OP does have a point that once you reach a certain level, the mobs do become a little easy to faceroll without much thought to gear or even personal skill. Sure it could take a while but most times when doing a map open or something, or even a HP in core tyria I find myself literally running in a circle around an enemy with my 1 set to auto while I drink my coffee. I only ever use the other skills if I want to practice a combo or something like that, but usually its just a kiting game.

Also, I saw someone say above about barrier needing to be affected by Spellbreaker elite. I swear to all things holy Anet that you better not ever make that a thing.

That one elite literally shuts down MOST of the other classes/elites and their core features/functions in a large area for WAY too long as it is. Barrier is the ONLY thing that might offer some small buffer to big hits while caught in that bubble. If you make that change you will frankly kill any kind of group play more than you already have and I say that as someone who went out into WvW specifically to troll people with that elite.

bigchunk.5190:

Xenon.4537:

So you’re basically saying Anet is a bunch of racist bigots because of the name of some armor…

Not at all actually. Arena Net has shown a good effort to represent a multicultural world celebrating many different human and non-human races. They also make good development decisions for making a great game which is why I play.

While I still think it’s a poor choice to name a stat set “Minstrel’s”, it’s probably an oversight on their part, and I don’t really fault them for doing so since the other definition of Minstrel is benign. Some forum replies to this thread have explained very well that we can’t assume the most offensive definition of a word which I can kind of agree with to some extent. I just can’t bring myself to equip Minstrel’s as healing gear on my black character solely because of the name and the racial history of the word in America. You have to admit, it would be a little strange to do so if you understand the other definitions of the word.

No actually I don’t have to admit that because it wouldn’t be true. And I am very familiar with the definitions of the word and how its been used here.

I seriously have doubts that you are not a troll at this point.

It can’t be explained any clearer. The only meaning of the term as it pertains to the game and the armor is that of the bard. That’s it. Full stop.

There used to be a cleaning product and turn of phrase that included what is also known to be a common slur for those of my ethnicity. Not once in my life when someone said the term did i think they were trying to be racist or even insensitive because i knew the context in which it was being said.

DeanBB.4268:

I still don’t get housing. Anet will make it instanced, so who would ever see your little pink house?

technically guild halls are instanced, as are current home instance, but you can bring people into those. Soooo…

Barring that (although I do like the idea of a small place I can hang with just a few friends with some basic storage stuff and maybe a node of our choice from our large “home” instance, I think smaller more accessible guild halls for smaller guilds that for whatever reasons cannot muster the people to get or outfit the larger halls would be nice.

Since the second weekend post isn’t up yet (or at least since I couldn’t find it) here goes:

Soulbeast: Feels very fiddly (this is going to be a theme, be warmed) and ultimately feels like I can do more as a core ranger (at least could have until you nerfed them). And the few things they did well I see you guys taking that away with the quickness so yeah.

Firebrand: OMG those boons! Its crazy how many boons they can just hand out. Good thing there isn’t anyway to get all those boons suddenly and instantly stripped and no way to apply more boons for a god awful long time. I mean, that’d be silly. Right?

Spellbreaker: Oh, so you like your boons? Not in my house. Oh and your projectiles. Yup, and your ability to use your skills. Nothing wrong here. /sarcasm

Deadeye: Don’t look, don’t look, don’t look – BAM oh you thought you had health. Nope, me and one skill took care of that. Managed to dodge it? OK, I’ll just plink at you and keep going stealth until I can hit you for over 10K again. On my one skill.
That is unless you’re a Spellbreaker.

Yolosmith: BLARGGBLPPTTHHH, damage for everyone. Sure I might die soon after, but everyone is going with me. Eeeeeeveryone. Basically just a walking nuke with mommy issues.

Scourge: Another way for Necro to pass around condition damage? Where do I sign up??? Oh, and barrier, the only thing Spellbreakers can’t strip.

Weaver: Imagine getting in your car and someone made it so your gas pedal was now your brake and your brake was now youre gas pedal and then flipped your blinkers. That’s weaver. Familiar, but not.

Reneyawns: So boring I have nothing witty to say.

Mirage: Took me forever to get the feel for this class’ new mechanic and I’m just…wow. Basically only worthwhile to camp scepter, make clones, dodge and hit one. Maybe shatter occasionally. Basically mesmer with a cool skill that you need twitch reflexes to even hit half the time.

Basically you gave some classes some very cool boon creation and sharing skills which will mean nothing if there are two spellbreakers coordinating their elites against you, which means one class can neuter most of the others group effectiveness in PvP/WvW scenarios, all while you have holosmith going ham on anything that moves, and if you manage to somehow both escape its onslaught and the spellbreaker stun locking you, you have to hope you’ve noticed the orange beam of doom and have enough dodge left in you to time the big hit from the stealthing death monkey with the rifle behind you. I’m sure Renegade and Mirage will be out there doing something useful, maybe.

I honestly hated everything about how it played when testing it. Really glad i don’t main a mez. Core and Chrono felt much better overall. Most of the skills on the axe as well as the new utilities are just, meh.

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

Adenin.5973:

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

I don’t actually know what you are saying here.

Does your beastmode aura visually change when you merge with another pet? Is it red, blue, whatever?
No.

The devs thought that visual representation of what pet you merged with does not matter. And now there are suddenly people that tell us that we can’t have a petswap in beastmode because people need to know what pet you’ve equipped, which they didn’t knew before either.

Ah, right, got you now. Agree completely. 100%.

In fact they talked about it taking a lot of development time to get it looking right, which makes me think they don’t intend on it being a tell, just to look good.

If Soulbeast can swap pets while in Beastmode I want to be able to enter Photon Forge with Holosmith without the visual tells.

You see how that could be a problem? It’s a good thing you guys don’t have any actual say in balance beyond slinging your shxt at walls and calling it art.

There already IS a visual tell for Soulbeast merge.

Hawken.7932:

Adenin.5973:

Miellyn.6847:

How many times does it need to be repeated? You are not supposed to stay permanent in beastmode.
It is not a petless ranger. Get over it.

Look this is what you’re saying:
-Beastmode is a complete dmg loss, unless you use an F skill in it.
This means: NEVER go into beastmode, unless you want to immediately use an F skill.
This means: 90% of the time, play vanilla core Ranger, with an additional annoying mechanic that makes the pet AI now even more clueless and useless when spawned/despawned .

Imo that is just bad game design.

This is absolutely incorrect. It makes me think that you haven’t even tried playing it. The damage – particularly burst damage – in beastmode is completely INSANE. It so good in fact that I just don’t see how it can last too long without getting nerfed.

Here’s the thing: to get that burst i need to build out in a very particular way, and then hit a very specific set of skills just to up might enough to hit with a skill that can be blocked.

On the other hand i can go holosmith and basically have a seizure while headbutting my keyboard and splarg insane AoE damage and have no real clue how I did it.

Leo Schrodingers Cat.2497:

Kaizoku.1298:

Needs to have increased initiative cost based on your malice. It’s too strong, 12k damage and also spammable.

Someone got kittened down.

Anyways 20k damage is baby talk. I’ve hit 43k

PookieDaWombat.6209:

Its fun seeing a DE try to hit a spellbreaker right when they pop their AoE denial then chase them down after that skill 4 (did it a few times), BUT I also tagged a few people with the skill 4 on DE in WvW who were engaged in a fight with others. I think its more of a mindset change that needs to happen with those that play DE.

More patience and setting up ambushes than active play that thieves have been so used to. even just 2 DE tagging up on someone can be enough of a vex at range.

I think you’re able to use the utility “Shadow Step” while you are channeling number 4. If you can, you can invade their “No no zone” and tag them with number 4 to finish them off. And shadow step out again.

Yes, but when timed with a reflecting shield block its like the days I’d reflect the warrior rifle burst back at them. Good times.

Granted unless some other major changes happen this will be the only weekend I play these classes because i don’t see myself buying the expansion at this time.

Well the hate comes from them basically SPLARGING damage around in a obscene AoE cluster-f. I’m looking forward to running around with a mass stealthing mez or thief with a few other holosmiths so we can hate bomb people for funsies before they nerf that damage.

Adenin.5973:

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

I don’t actually know what you are saying here.

Does your beastmode aura visually change when you merge with another pet? Is it red, blue, whatever?
No.

The devs thought that visual representation of what pet you merged with does not matter. And now there are suddenly people that tell us that we can’t have a petswap in beastmode because people need to know what pet you’ve equipped, which they didn’t knew before either.

Not to mention the fact tht if I’m fighting a sb in WvW or PvP, I’m not trying to remember what every pet/pet class can do. I’m just gonna remember that its a soulbeast when they are glowing green and hit them with as much condition damage as possible.

Old thief mentality was all about very active, and up-close play. Honestly have to think and act like a sniper. Not sure how well that will translate for Anet style combat, but there you have it.

Its fun seeing a DE try to hit a spellbreaker right when they pop their AoE denial then chase them down after that skill 4 (did it a few times), BUT I also tagged a few people with the skill 4 on DE in WvW who were engaged in a fight with others. I think its more of a mindset change that needs to happen with those that play DE.

More patience and setting up ambushes than active play that thieves have been so used to. even just 2 DE tagging up on someone can be enough of a vex at range.

yup. Nerf incoming. bleh, Anet is insane.

I’m really sorry you guys. I don’t main a ranger, but my wife does, and i was really hoping that once we got our hands on Soulbeast that it was going to be better than this. :/

I don’t know why Anet seems to hate ya’ll ranger mains. I really don’t. I’m kinda hoping the other elites get a serious nerf to some of their damage right now because its frankly insane.

If they actually made this (and dear gods I hope they never do), it would end up being a ranger elite spec, will be built around “team support”, and will end up sucking worse at it than all the other classes, their pets will be given new “howl” skills to help in their “songs” and their DPS will be lowered even more.

While i understand that this is not the “official” feedback thread, can we get some acknowledgment that someone from Anet is reading this thread and hopefully taking what is being said here into consideration?

IndigoSundown.5419:

PookieDaWombat.6209:

The problem isn’t that the meta is condi, per se. The difference is that even when the meta was zerk, there was a way to counter play it.

Condi on the other hand doesn’t have a real counter play. If you get condi bombed, then you’re just dead. Full stop. Its why roaming in WvW is a joke most of the time and why the only meta these days is who out conditions the other, and its only going to get worse with the new elite specs.

There’s nothing wrong with condi attrition builds. There are counters to those in the form of cleanses, and sustain. If people don’t want to spec for that, it’s their own fault. What is counter-intuitive is condi burst, which in addition to being an oxymoron, is a lot harder to deal with than attrition.

No one is running a condi-attrition build and even if they were, there is not enough condi removal for all classes to properly counter that amount of pressure without completely making a build soley around that. Condi in this game is simply broken and what I said still stands. Its all about who out condies the other person first.

The problem isn’t that the meta is condi, per se. The difference is that even when the meta was zerk, there was a way to counter play it.

Condi on the other hand doesn’t have a real counter play. If you get condi bombed, then you’re just dead. Full stop. Its why roaming in WvW is a joke most of the time and why the only meta these days is who out conditions the other, and its only going to get worse with the new elite specs.

IDENTIFICATION OF GEAR:
Remove it or allow us to just open bags and see whats in there. The cost currently makes players operate at a loss. There is no ROI. Please see the other 2342 posts about this for more info.