Guild Wars 2

Invite please :>

A nice way to do it would be to reset the recharge of certain utility skills (like Improv) at a set health %, or even add a contextual button to push when they proc.

That way you can actually control when you want to use it.

Reaper Alim.4176:

You don’t play GW2’s sPvP for the competition. You plays GW2’s sPvP for the PvE rewards.

Try your best; and if things outside your control are factors in the loss of the game, shrug and decide whether you still want to play another match. If you don’t, take a break. Don’t burn yourself out.

I don’t know, some of us seem to be afraid to ask for more. If you don’t where do those actually good changes in PvP come from? (This is where we go down the full-of-assumption-but-it’s-true they don’t really care about us route.)

It’s not like if we say too much they might take away the texture from PvP legendaries… oh skritt am i giving them ideas

Personally, I think our own appearances matter much more to us than others (duh), and it’s how we think we’re perceived that brings about the bigger part of (internal) validation.

I don’t really care what you wear unless it looks like something I can use for reference. Otherwise, I’m happy you’re happy. The keywords are forgettable strangers.

You can immediately go to character selection screen and back, it’s only (only) a 30 second respawn. Ignore the dishonor warning, it only triggers if you pick another character.

Edit: I was mistaken.

Crinn.7864:

2.5 players

Does that mean as long as we never grow up we can have pre-made teams of 5 containing nothing but man-childs?

That would be the dream, if you can use #3 as an on-demand evade that poisons and allows you to move while swinging. Do note that it’s a “better” (debatable term if you have Wilderness Survival’s super-powered Protection-on-dodge-with-healing) dodge roll since you can use it while immobilized.

For #2 it would also be nice to have evade frames towards the front portion or just tighten up the animation (the stabbing), more time to leap (adjust positioning so you can leap into fields).

There was a post I wrote on the current S/W meta build explaining why it’s used in PvP.

I do remember how bad Sword was in 2012 though, that lock on the Kick got me killed more than once.

Warhorn 5 interacts with Staff water field (Area Healing), and gives an unblockable buff to pet, which you can use with Electric Wyvern to interrupt blocks (press F1 before F2 to re-align the charge), or just swap to Smokescale for a burst. [Traited Warhorn 5 also gives Regen to earn Celestial Avatar’s Astral Force.]

Warhorn 4 allows you to apply Poison at range in this set, when you pick the trait Refined Toxins in Wilderness Survival. Great trait, and as Frosty mentions, the poison is a lot of your pressure.

Sword 3 is a free dodge you can use while immoblized, the Poison is a bonus.

Sword 2 can be combined with Staff #3 Ancestral Grace for burst mobility. Bind “About Face”, and press that before Sword 2 to let the backward evade go forward; then manually turn your camera around/press About Face again to face forward and complete the 2nd leap. [You can also click your LMB to clear target and lock camera before About Face so that it turns your character but not the camera. Press Sword 2, then hold RMB to turn the character forward again to complete the 2nd leap.]

Sword auto can be combined with Warhorn 4 to chip away at people. You have a lot of Fury and your pet does too. You passively proc Poison and make people waste CDs trying to clear it for heals (or they don’t). Pay attention and dodge with Sword 3 or roll when enemy uses important skills, you are great at stalling 1v1s and 1v2s.

Smokescale F2 interacts with Sword 2 leap finish and Warhorn 5 blast finish, so you can stealth, heal up, re-position and keep trolling. Have an eye on your lizard dog so you know where to leap to after you pop F2.

While LB can just plain decap someone by rooting them off-point, S/W is better at keeping a node capped and surviving on point; and Druid can now do that easily with how good Wilderness Survival has become (WS/NM synergy).

Not saying it can’t be better but Sword is extremely useful if you’re playing Mender bunker (Jroh build). Just now in ranked (at 1468 rating, nothing special) I was playing with a Warrior (he’s being whittled down; why Warrior tho) on mid point, out of dodges and a DH was charging up LB #2. A quick glance at the skill bar tells me I have Sword #3 ready. I evaded LB #2 + JI + Test of Faith with it, switched to staff and evaded his LB #3, and I was in position to stomp the Warrior (Staff #5) when a teammate came to +1 me. Great day, didn’t screw up my dodges (not like I’m in danger with how much sustain this build has).

If it’s so undecided we can extend the poll or pick out the top 5 names to narrow it down further. Make “Lich Slap” first and test reactions maybe, guilding is so ez in GW2 we don’t have to treat it like a grave, final decision that decides the fate of Azeroth Tyria.

Having 1 more vote on the leading option doesn’t make it significant unless you’re calculating with abnormally wide confidence intervals to make it fit or something (like those evil science research papers). I don’t think there’s a rush to make the guild, it’s not existed for 5 years it can wait a little longer.

Edit: You’re pretty brave for putting the idea out there though, and honestly it doesn’t hurt to give the chosen name a try. Just throwing out irresponsible suggestions like a well-trained backseat driver.

A Sage ammy Mesmer is a duelist with mobility in Portal. You want to push advantageous 1v1’s and win them, put a Portal down at far and make backcaps to screw with enemy rotations. They also have utility in a corrdinated team using Moa and giving invuln while rezzing. Your Shield 4 is important. Shatter constantly to pressure, keep in mind your clone respawn traits.

Matchup is important, for example you should know that Power DH is hard to fight with a Sage setup. Games are ever-changing, this is not PvE where you can predict perfectly. You have to be actively making decisions. For example if you try to push far but there’s a bunker sitting there (classic mid-low tier rotations), leave him there and get a free 4v5 elsewhere. You got 1 stomped on the mid fight and you can see the fight being lost, can you push far early and get a decap? If not, can you put down a Portal, leave and backcap later? Did a class you have favourable matchup with push in, and are you sure you can win the 1v1?

If you can’t learn anything from a loss, that’s considered a “true” loss. Don’t be afraid to ask what to do in certain situations, and bit by bit you can extrapolate these methods and have better mentality dealing with difficult decisions. There’s only so much you can infer on your own, ask on the forums and ask other players, this is an interactive, online game.

Stop pointing out the mistakes in other people, you can’t change those (fools don’t learn, is why I’m trying to change yours). Don’t wallow in self-pity, this cold world is devoid of people who want to hold your hand. It’s too early to be giving up on improving yourself.

If you want to get better, plop into a duelling server or find a friend who’s clearly better than you and duel. Best way to make everything instinctive and get your burst down. Failing that, play a class that requires less mechanical skill to do ok (a ways from the skill ceiling tho), like Necro, Ranger. Then when you have a friend who wants to carrry you, you can try to duo queue.

In the opening if their Necro is poorly positioned your team will likely focus him first because he’s ez with barely any Life Force at the start. If you fail to peel for him and he gets stomped + rezzer eats cleave that’s like one of the worst possible scenarios you can face.

Anyone worth his salt will try to avoid being hit by the mega slow Shroud combo, or know to engage only if you have the CDs to get out.

Who did you get held down by and beat senseless then? Can you describe the usual situation concerning particular classes?

If you’re like me and fail to dodge on bad days (only the bad days), bring more stunbreaks, use your Wurm on Necro, and memorize all the jump puzzles you can use. I always try to corrupt Might into Weakness against Power builds.

Great to see you’re having fun. If you want to get into PvP and be ready for common situations, I would suggest going over and trying out all of the current “meta” builds, so you have an idea of how the matchups go (matchup is fairly important).

Learning from videos of top players using the builds is never a bad thing, saves you a lot of time figuring out what works.

Balasar.9137:

In the beginning I have been placed in the Gold 1 bracket and now, somehow, I went so low as to Silver 1

were not my fault as a player. Contrary, every match I managed to get at least one top stat, from kills to revives to offense.

In every match that I am a combatant and lost, I have seen everything from lack of direction, structure and a modicum of strategy, which means that I am either in the wrong bracket OR I am matched up with the wrong kind of competitors.

I still got one or two top stats, but to no avail. A loss is a loss. The score in these matches varies wildly from 500 to 100 and something or 500 to 70 something, so on and so forth

watched Youtube videos of Tournament plays, listened to Tournament champions and overall I believe I have been a good student and something stuck to me.

your matching up system not only works poorly, but it does not work at all.

a toxic community, bad competitive players with no strategy whatsoever

Video by Crinn detailing how to handle Ranked.

Look, if you lose 2 matches in a row, stop and take a break. Losing and continuously queuing makes you upset and affects your performance, and you make bad decisions. You should also queue dodge if you keep running into the same minefield of supposedly bad players.

These lose streaks shouldn’t be created in the first place. The most I’ve had was 4 losses in a row and I can feel the tilt in me by the 3rd game; I felt completely silly because there’s no point in PvP if you don’t have a cool head, you’re not winning/learning and you’re not having fun.

Balasar.9137:

With that Mesmer I get Top Kills at least once in three matches, mate. I know what I am doing.

Top stats mean jack skritt most of the time, a mechanically correct Thief that successfully +1s whole game and escapes before prolonged fights might not even get a single top stat, but he has one of the highest carry potential in the game. It’s been a few years and I really haven’t seen “I got top stats steefu” in a long time.

It’s always about the build isn’t it? Sage amulet Mesmer with Sword/Shield + Staff is setup the way it is because every weapon in the meta build has a function. Do you understand the utility Sword brings? If you run Power Shatter, are you aware of how well it performs compared to other specs (read: not great)? Context is important.

Balasar.9137:

Then mister Wisdom impart with me the wisdom you so ostensibly display and tell me what Mesmer build should I try. Make yourself useful.

I suppose you also learned to be passive-aggressive from our Youtube content creators?

You have to be aware of how good you are compared to other people. Saying you’re good in an isolated environment gives no significant value. Being unable to gauge your ability relative to others is how you get disappointed.

Before you critique other people, examine what you can do better in your games. After that, evaluate your team but be aware you can be biased and harsh instead of objective in your analysis, because you want to take the blame off yourself.

Juidodin.5829:

dont let you tell anything else, like from hot boy and stuff.. they just dont want people to mention how corrupt that system is, because they probably are exploiting it for them self. also im sure the amount of bots is raising.. either that or gw2 has some brain decaying effects.

Sure, everything’s everybody else’s fault. If they win they cheat if I win it’s cuz I’m gud. Ranked is pretty evil yeah, I’m not sure why if you hate it so much you keep coming back to it. Using Balasar’s example, doing it for a backpack that signifies the things you hate is just silly to me.

The rating system isn’t an auto-win track. You’re facing living breathing players, and each game has the potential for a different outcome. For every loss you get they worked for it and won. There is no “I deserve” in here.

It’s really simple. If I’m always around 1400-1500 and I fail to climb into Plat 2, and my win-rate is always around 50%, it means that’s where I am relative to other players. It means I do not have the ability to climb further at the moment and I belong here in Gold as long as I don’t fix my issues. If I don’t even recognize what issues I have, then I have a much longer way to go.

How far do you guys want to go to weasel out of a loss?

potatocity.6470:

seriously thou is this true?

Revenant is the newest class added in the Heart of Thorns expansion. I must have subconsciously filtered it out because I suppose anyone trying out the game would only have access to Core.

Yes, the Revenant class with its elite specialization Herald can use a Shield; the Sword/Shield + Staff combo using Power Shiro/Glint is a potent roamer that can greatly affect game outcome if you play well and win fights that matter. Sword/Axe is also very much viable though.

Power Rev: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlAQNAsemn3guNSuQ7JRboVlsP0rS4IaWJ4EdskFNFqtABIC2DMhPkdMnpNA-TpxHQBK7QAowjAw1KDMu9HAwJA4bPAAA

Frostball has a video detailing how to use a Sword/Axe build. He made it to legendary (while being nacked) using it so he might have a point or two.

LUST.7241:

Don’t forget a lot of the toxicity simply gets exaggerated. People see one salty player over and over, but then assumes every player is that way.

Then there’s the problem of ignorance, some players just refuse to work around their team and rather just spend the entire game typing instead of reworking their own strategy. This, more often than not, is the real reason people don’t win as much as they could.

Yes, it’s really more like you get 1 human wonder in 15-20 or so games, who spends the whole game typing and insulting teammates. If we keep calm whilst losing and try different strategies, there is definitely room to make a comeback, and those are some of the best games.

Cooperation is such a wonderful thing; if these toxic episodes are as frequent as claimed, mankind would have been extinguished over small, violent squabbles when we lived in caves. As it turns out, I think it’s just the present gamer population that’s too sensitive.

“Lich Slap” is pretty great, compact and has bite. Reminds of how meme Lich was with scaling Fire and Air Sigils.

Edit: though if you want a generally accepted, Necro-y name, this probably goes out the window.

Kuya.6495:

I think the problem with the kind of people who post on this forum is a problem of expectations. You expected anet to balance elite specs a certain way and get outraged when they don’t meet your expectations. But you never seem to question whether your expectations are realistic or ultimately desireable in the long term. I think we should all practice more self criticism and study whether our desires and expectations are really practical and whether they match the designer’s vision for what an elite spec should be.

Instead though, on this forum in particular, we seem to act like we’re ordering at McDonald’s.

The player culture consists of expectations of one-way progression and instant gratification, so any balance fixes that bring about a loss in some way won’t be well-received. But that’s natural, and a given.

Balance changes are a feature of long-standing games, it keeps the game fresh. We may have suggested minor tweaks to “perfect” the meta, and it might indeed become so; but everyone will leave if the game becomes stale. So the question might not be what to change, but how to not upset your playerbase too much so we keep throwing gems at the Black Lion Trading Company.

To emphasize again, imbalance might very well be intentional.

It’s more the patch changes that are getting the hate, but Spellbreaker was rather powerful in the beta (intentionally made so). Might be the thing to get Warrior back in the game.

Warrior had its glory in Core and HoT, the nerfs are merely a setback!

Edit: I don’t know if OP will re-read this, but just want to give some more information regarding builds and other things.

Dragonhunter (DH) is geared aggressively usually, and has great spike in the form of push and pulls that manipulate your target into and out of Test of Faith. Ping squishes with your Longbow autos while you gauge situations. DH defenses are bursty and CD reliant (small heals, clears, blocks, invuln, leaps), so keep track of how many outs you have, or else you might run out and plain die.

Warrior with the Berzerker specialization used to be a great duelist, but its sustain was nerfed and CD timers were increased to the point where it has great difficulty taking care of daily life. The theme was supposed to be a melee combatant with the impactful “Burst” adrenaline mechanic. Land your F1s and you get sustained healing, condition cleanses, and pressure your opponent at the same time. The posted GS/LB Core spec is a great start to Warrior, since LB’s F1 can be dropped on the ground and triggers your sustain without having to hit a target (though it takes quite a bit of skill to master this setup).

WvW and custom server duelists are a separate group, and though in WvW items and traits are different, there are players with great mechanical skill which can be great to learn from. Conquest sPvP teaches you how to play around the nodes with builds designed for this particular mode, but 1v1 duels as well as open-field combat call for different strategies and setups. WvW roaming videos are more popular since WvW is arguably a more accessible game mode with better variety.

I’ve linked some pure sPvP-based channels, but GW2 doesn’t end there, not at all. In fact players occasionally post roaming videos in the class subforums and there’s always some new techniques you can learn and try out.

In which modes though? PvE/PvP/WvW?

Yes, GS is all about that Maul burst, with some surprising mobility and defence built in, though you really want to milk it with Marksmanship traits like Remorseless. Sword autos do higher sustained damage.

They aren’t actually bad maps.

Colosseum is a bit eh, it’s a wide open map. They fixed the side nodes so it’s alright.

Capricorn “4th node” mechanic is pretty nice, we actually had a comeback recently with a final +75 point cap, when the enemy was a bunker comp that just won’t leave mid. Lots of side node play in this one.

drcraig.9403:

your mom

Forum PvP is a source of great joy.

I consider myself an average player (1400-1500 rating usually).

Weapon themselves have unique skills and the usefulness of different weapons change with the patch. Sometimes it’s not just the weapon but paired with traits as well.

These are my opinions, anyone is welcome to stop me from misleading OP.

Currently if you’re trying to run Sword/Shield it works paired with a Longbow on the Dragonhunter (Guardian specialization). Otherwise if you lack the HoT expansion and play Core, Guardian is best played as Meditation with Scepter/Focus + Greatsword.

DH: Post by Naru.

Core Meditation: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vVAQNArdRlsAhuhY5QwaIwPEHxD1dfjhcInivYMWDgGoeB-TpxHQBA4BAMwDBQ/2f4alBS4JA4bHBAA

Sword/Shield + Rifle Killshot Warrior also works, but the Sword/Shield set doesn’t really bring you damage, it’s just there to provide mobility and block when you need to go defensive after a burst. Sword main-hand is not the best weapon in PvP for a Warrior in both Power and Condi setups, so you might try Mace/Shield + Longbow for Condi instead, or Axe/Shield + Greatsword for Power.

Core Warrior (LB/GS): http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vJAQJARTjMdQVIW2BehAnIGICK9Lm+tAPhXYEsAICGAA-TpxHQBJ8QAoi9HAwRAYgPAAlUG4bXAAA

I can understand you want to stick to certain aesthetics, but since skills are tied to weapon type you’d have to run with what works best if you want a baseline to your performance. Note that Warrior isn’t doing well at this moment due to significant nerfs, but Core Warrior can be fun.

Time-to-kill is fairly short in GW2, and survivability can be extended significantly if you avoid (dodge/block/evade/invuln/stealth/positioning/movement) damage. A lot of the defensive stat amulets have been taken out, so even bunker builds won’t be able to bathe in focus fire.

sPVP is only “Conquest” based, which means you are fighting for the possession of 3 nodes. Nodes tick every 2 seconds and accumulate up to 500. Don’t chase kills way off point, fight for nodes and think about capping, decapping, rotations. In general if you think you’re about to lose a point, back off and push another node (e.g. far instead of mid node). Stay alive, don’t feed, don’t die on point unless that wins you the game in the last few seconds.

Team composition is important, because some classes are squishy and built for +1’ing fights, while some have viable builds that let them stand on node to keep it capped or neutral, and others may be duelists.

I suggest you watch Sindrener for rotational knowledge, top Thief play, and useful critique. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXQEmr_-XvMRSIKJg4MDMIA

Frosty (Ranger): https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCgTXdbRMe3e7rK11U4h7YA

Helseth (Mesmer): https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLordHelseth

Crinn (Necro): https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCImCs2deTjCz1LQgPleI-Pg

I limit myself to watching these, in no particular order, because of time constraints, but there are many many other good channels to learn from (that I must have missed), especially some WvW players and duelists.

I approve of OP, very balanced.

We should also make it completely exclusive to just Scourge, the amount of sodium and the resulting heart attacks will cripple a nation.

1) 25 Condition Damage
2) +5% Condition Duration
3) +50 Condition Damage
4) +15% Condition Duration
5) +100 Condition Damage
6) +125 Vitality; Cause fear for 2 seconds when you apply torment (Cooldown: 45 seconds).

But wait isn’t that just Rune of the Nightmare in a controllable form? Shhhhh.

Maybe just make it a mini Lightning Reflex.

Giving it longer evade frames + increased roll distance would also work.

I would think Sword/Dagger or Sword/Warhorn a better fit for your Core Ranger than Shortbow, but you’re already braver than I am since I just hide behind Druid.

One of the things I would recommend is Options > Show All Enemy Names, you want to keep track of players at all times.

This subforum has some great Rangers around, so I’m sure you’ll get useful comments if you keep posting gameplay!

@Gotejjeken: I might sound like I’m eating my words, but I do think new ideas and suggestions, as well as the very occasional dissent regarding class balance, is good for the game because it tells the devs what we’re not having enough fun in.

At the same time, I don’t think only being happy when the class fits your fantasy is a good mindset, because 90% of your game time might be spent obsessed with “how it should have been” and sap your enthusiasm. We should see a class for what it is, even when we’re hoping for what it isn’t. Just be practical.

All things in balance, play down your expectations and you’ll have fun.

Ranked and Unranked both count as “rated” matches so if you just want to fish for a daily win you can queue Unranked with a premade. It’s a mad world out there.

Ranked has pips for the reward boxes, and although not always, the matches tend to be more balanced with similarly skilled players, and thus some would prefer it and find it fun.

I would say above 400’s or even the ones about 350 could have gone either way.

When it goes past mid-game, any significant play like a 1v2 on neutral node, some kind of godly animal steal, reverse-downed-mind game mid-wipe (?) can completely turn the outcome around. One of the things I’m still learning to do is to back off a mid-fight you know you can’t win (team comp issues) and look to push other nodes (likely far).

5-10% of games will be nail-biting to the finish, so don’t give up until the very end. You never know what might happen (you lose most likely).

Attaching screen of game, fresh today (Gold 3). We were actually behind 350-440 or something, but we held on and got 2 backcaps, there was a 1v2 somewhere, kept mid neutral, then someone got a steal on Chieftain. To be honest it’s very likely they got too complacent towards the end and practically gave us the win with bad rotations.

+1 for [Dead] tag :>

Scholars of Mortality [Doom]? Necros give off that studious vibe. You know, while stabbing things with a GS.

Other trash ideas:

Path to Lichdom
Treatise On The (Un)Living
Phylactery Research Team
Children of Bria (we need to learn her secret to wearing heavy armor)
All My Friends Unite [FGLM]
The Deathless Will March (so edgy 5 stacks of bleeds)
Panic Double Tap [FIFI] (fastest way to meet Death)
Have You Seen My Closet [Skel]
The Murder Scrolls
We Do Voodoo
We Require More L F

Kovu.7560:

Ranger has a lower learning curve, but also a lower ceiling.

It’s the safer option, but still very mobile and versatile. You trade damage for quite a bit of survivability.

Thieves have the potential to be godly, but you have to play sharp.

GW2 has one of the lowest opportunity costs of re-rolling a new character/class so it’s not as if we are stuck with Ranger.

I’ve just been going back to other games and the Ranger in GW2 has the most options by far. Being able to switch to support, have proper Melee weapons, super easy pet management…

I think we’re projecting too much of what we want into the class instead of playing it as how it is now. Patches will push some aspects of the class to the forefront but that’s just the ebb and flow of it. I’d be quite bored if they didn’t switch it up for us once in a while.

It’s had its dark days in core, but even before this patch in PvP I would rate it a 7/10 and now as some top players like Frosty would put it, 9/10. It has fantastic sustain, burst heals, mobility, stealth, cleanses, and the only department it lacks in is damage, but it’s actually not all bad with a pet and some traits. Longbow is a control/burst weapon and sees much use in WvW and PvP, it’s a great weapon if you play to its strengths.

In PvE sure you can play Condi, but when I run with friends and they don’t mind it I pull out my Berserker gear.

The problem is we love ourselves too much and don’t love the class enough. Maybe change your thinking from how it doesn’t work for you, to how you can make it work?

I was barely plat last season, and climbing into gold 3 from gold 2 slowly this time. (I blame work, can only squeeze out 2-3 games a day.)

Of course my opponents and I aren’t anything to write home about, but with WS/NM you can completely tank through situations (well, with a few good dodges) where you would have been downed immediately.

I also blame OP for selling Warhorn so hard, I find it increasingly difficult to put it down now.

@voltaicbore: don’t be afraid to try Ranger out in ranked, it’s definitely more powerful than last season with its improved sustain. When you decide what weapon to use (LB or S/D or S/W etc) you should think about your and their team compositions.

If you have a team with no Ele/Ranger/Engi then usually Menders + Water, S/W & Staff is best, since your team won’t be winning mid unless enemy team is worse. You’ll be stalling every 1v2, winning 2v2s, and looking for every chance after a teamfight stomp/wipe to push far. You have the mobility to do it and I doubt anything can actually kill you 1v1 in a reasonable amount of time (better players?) if all your CDs are up. Power Thief most likely can +1 you, just have to pay attention.

If there are supports on your team and not too much projectile hate on the enemy team, LB/Staff Menders can be great, just make sure you use LB to decap when the time is right.

The problem with Rangers is how popular they are in queue at the moment, so if there’s another one I usually suppose they’re Menders (when you assume, you make an ass out of u and me) and I switch to Marauder/Berzerker ammy + Ranger runes (nobody expects the Power Ranger). If nothing goes wrong (like a good D/P Thief who notices, as is usually the case…) the first half of the game will consist of you plugging people with 7-8k Rapid Fires. You’re also pretty good at disposing of Condi Thieves when you run Survival utilities.

I’m not quite sure if the unblockable effect on SotH is worth it though.

Levetty.1279:

The implication was that SoTP is terrible and basically the same as having no stab.

Buy the new expansion for Dolyak Stance, at special offer prices! Oh do it through my link tho you can feed me that way I stream and I have 3 gnomes in my garden to feed. My pet rock also died recently we were such good friends.

If you’re looking to use SotP you can try to pre-cast before someone on team/enemy goes down so you can rez/stomp immediately. You can also stealth up or LoS so you don’t get interrupted mid-cast. I should use it for offense more in some situations though (or just get kind of good in general).

Sometimes you can bait a Guardian down #2 if you start stomping, cancel it, use CA #5, cancel for stability, then exit CA for stealth and stomp.

I think you’d have 3 stunbreaks from SoR, QZ and F5? When I’m fooling around on Power Ranger I sometimes take LR instead of SoR.

Pterikdactyl.7630:

the retargetting tip someone mentioned

This was the original tip by Wondrouswall, and I hope to see more people (including myself) get bowled over by the Electric Wyvern!

I will not settle for less than 5 charges on Spike Trap.

Swagger.1459:

Dagger 5- Port-O-Potty- Create a “nature” portal and port to target. 300 radius. 5 target AoE “nature” damage explosion. 1,200 range port. EDIT- This is a ground target skill that can be used on walls and cliffs just like some thief and mesmer skills.

5- Port back to original spot.

…Perfection

When the intro for Ranger says “rely on the power of nature” then one day you find out they do exactly as said on the tin, in a literal sense, it makes you very, very slightly uncomfortable.

Okay, I wrote to explain S/W but I got logged out and everything was vain. Rewriting.

Warhorn 5 interacts with Staff water field (Area Healing), and gives an unblockable buff to pet, which you can use with Electric Wyvern to interrupt blocks (press F1 before F2 to re-align the charge), or just swap to Smokescale for a burst. [Traited Warhorn 5 also gives Regen to earn Celestial Avatar’s Astral Force.]

Warhorn 4 allows you to apply Poison at range in this set, when you pick the trait Refined Toxins in Wilderness Survival. Great trait, and as Frosty mentions, the poison is a lot of your pressure.

Sword 3 is a free dodge you can use while immoblized, the Poison is a bonus.

Sword 2 can be combined with Staff #3 Ancestral Grace for burst mobility. Bind “About Face”, and press that before Sword 2 to let the backward evade go forward; then manually turn your camera around/press About Face again to face forward and complete the 2nd leap. [You can also click your LMB to clear target and lock camera before About Face so that it turns your character but not the camera. Press Sword 2, then hold RMB to turn the character forward again to complete the 2nd leap.]

Sword auto can be combined with Warhorn 4 to chip away at people. You have a lot of Fury and your pet does too. You passively proc Poison and make people waste CDs trying to clear it for heals (or they don’t). Pay attention and dodge with Sword 3 or roll when enemy uses important skills, you are great at stalling 1v1s and 1v2s.

Smokescale F2 interacts with Sword 2 leap finish and Warhorn 5 blast finish, so you can stealth, heal up, re-position and keep trolling. Have an eye on your lizard dog so you know where to leap to after you pop F2.

While LB can just plain decap someone by rooting them off-point, S/W is better at keeping a node capped and surviving on point; and Druid can now do that easily with how good Wilderness Survival has become (WS/NM synergy).

GS is a mobility/burst weapon best used with Power amulets, BM line for quickness and Moment of Clarity + Remorseless in the MM traitline. While it does have evade on auto it isn’t on-demand. The Maul burst with Hilt Bash isn’t all that impressive if you are running Menders. It’s not a bad weapon at all, it’s just best used in a GS/LB setup (you can even run a Tiger).

Maybe not in all modes at first, just implement this for WvW where the fact that Longbow just lightly caresses a few people completely breaks the weapon for any reasonable use.

Indeed, so far we only have the Glorious PvP Chest, maybe the gem-bought BLTC Viper Chest, and Ascended armor that doesn’t have a long piece of leather hiding everything below the waist.

You can only make so many different trenchcoats, and yes, some are pretty cool, but I think after 5 years the Adventurer classes got maybe, perhaps, slightly tired of them.

Did you just assume someone’s gender??

This is going to become an even bigger debate when Rangers meld with pets, there are so many options they can choose to identify with.

Nice video, despite its flaws getting kills on it is hype!

Ranked matches people tend to throw less, and when you win you make other people lose rating which stokes the fire of competition in some of us. Rage chat is also hilarious. Losing teaches you humility and patience.

The most important reason is the pip reward system, it’s where all my gold and transmutation charges come from. I simply don’t understand how I can spend 90 charges over 2 days, so I constantly have to come back to play. Must be a bug or something?

Unranked quality sways wildly and people will give up halfway through since there’s no rating to drop and no consequence to badmouthing. There are also guild teams looking for easy wins farming puggers while in voice chat, so unless you like thug life way too much you shouldn’t be here unless off-season.

If OP is enjoying his time in the rage-forum-post-inducing Unranked, why stop him?

Yeah and another forum post says Power Ranger has too much cleanse…

How about you guys meet up and have a beer?

Edit: kitten, beat me to it. Is this why I always eat Eviscerates?

LughLongArm.5460:

Season 8 you will see tons of core rangers going LB/GS- MM/WS/BM, It’s very effective and it’s superior to the druid builds in terms offensive roles.

Having the WS/BM synergy and going full Survival definitely helps if the Season turns out to be Condi heavy. With MM you also get to have insane boon uptime and maybe Remorseless if you can handle that.

We know Power Ranger does have its niche in wide open maps and can do their thing if there are squishies for them to Rapid Fire into, but the question is how does it hold up against the usual fare, because projectile hate is still rampant.

Substance E.4852:

Xtinct.7031:

Substance E.4852:

>Ranger with sustain
>Glass Cannon

Pick one.

Exacccctly bro,

You’ve greatly missed the point.

He’s full glass + cleanses and you beat him with Power Thief, what more would you want? What people have been pointing out is that Power Survival Ranger has no sustain and completely relies on fighting a Condi build with the cleanses, or plain kiting everything else.

Power Ranger is also prone to getting spiked in Troll Unguent and dying unless he pops Signet of Stone or is able to create distance/pressure.

If he’s specced for Survival (cleanses) and you don’t want him to have enough cleanses, what’s that supposed to even mean? What you’re suggesting is similar to saying you want to remove the evade frames from D/D Condi Daredevil because you can’t hit them.

If he switches to Shouts on Power Ranger it then fights your Power Thief better.

Helly.2597:

The ability to use all the shade skills while stunned is very useful since you can create space via the fear or sustain through desert shroud barrier.

I immediately thought of this, but it’s not truly relevant: Ice Barrier vs Green Rogue

What I’m worried about is getting spiked too hard while in CC, because Barrier decays rather fast and generation can be limited as the fight goes on.

How would you compare traditional boon corruption to the boon rip + torment?

For a dedicated PvPer the suggestions seem surprisingly on the moderate side. I would welcome these reasonable changes since they directly impact our PvP performance. I feel that even with your suggested tweaks, Soulbeast is still going to be comparatively… plain, modest… in function compared to other specializations like Holo, Firebrand, Scourge, and Spellbreaker.

This really has to do with the pet type division restricting the choices on our mostly underpowered pets, and Beastmode skills themselves not worth the double lockout mechanic on pet swap and pet meld. Indeed we should try to first fix reliable pets like Smokescale to establish options that work.

Right now Soulbeast is just a clunky all in, full burst option for Ranger. It has increased stats, the Maul effect, and Sic ‘Em + (any skill) damage spike going for it, and some team-value-wise underwhelming but potentially great pet-class abilities in Beastmode, but the way we achieve the damage spikes doesn’t feel like an intended effect. I didn’t know GW2 was a hidden-combo sort of game like BDO?

I was dueling a friend on his Spellbreaker and he noted that Power Druid gave him a lot more trouble than Power Soulbeast, because you can juke better on Druid and the root is a great setup for bursts. On Soulbeast (Power; LB/GS) you can’t shake off a GS+D/D Spellbreaker.

Indeed Dolyak may be the only worthwhile stance to take; Bear Stance can’t really beat out TU + Lesser MT in terms of versatility, or even our bread and butter “WHaO!”, plus its heal amount makes it weak against anything outside of a condi bomb (and people will wait to interrupt you).

I think the F5 mechanic is clunky, but perhaps I just need to get good.

While Holosmith has a smooth transition into Photon Forge (lulburst) and always-available utilities that interact with the F-bar mechanic…

Soulbeast has to manage pet swap and beastmode separately and it’s extremely clunky. Not to mention most of the melded skills don’t have any meaningful impact, with the Beast abilities having awkward animation locks or extremely long CDs.

We might need a smoother mechanic. Don’t want to fight my UI while I’m fighting people already.

Off topic, is Condi the only way to go for Soulbeast?

Most likely I haven’t figured out how to boonstack/use pet traits like the spec suggest yet, maybe that’s the new way to play Ranger.

^ Ranger has more personal safety and even less buttons to worry about.

Soldiers is really boring though, I would suggest a Zerker/Knight’s mix so she can experience the crits on Rifle and feel powerful. GS is also very unwieldy since you have to move a lot with it to stay safe.

I would use Axe/Shield since all she needs to do when surrounded is go into Shield Stance and run away, and Axe can clear out mobs pretty quickly. If she spams her stances and F1, she can keep Adrenal Health running and keep her topped off.

Switch things out if she wants Crack Shot, without Warrior’s Sprint on your melee set you might need Warhorn for the swiftness.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vJAQNAU3ejMdQXIWFC2dAnIG+BKNN6+yAjhcoFsFIAaAA-ThSDABD8AAARHwBXBAe2f4F1fS4gAAg5P40MEkyPVVCSIgYjBA-e

Prophet.1584:

Soulbeast mode, for lack of a better term, doesn’t look like its something that is intended to be camped. What I mean is you may start a fight with your pet out and dps’ing, swap to SB to use skills and swap back out or maintain it for an attack chain. The same way we swap weapons might be the better way to look at how to use this. SB provides more play options, not to just sit in it, similar to what weaver will be for ele.

I’d rather focus on what the e-spec brings us now, balance updates would probably take a backseat to ironing out bugs/more LS episodes after release.

One of the things I’m thinking of is how you can reposition pets due to the use of Beastmode, since people do like to kite out and LoS your pet’s distinctly average AI. You can also force a stow while pet swap is on CD to prevent them from dying to focus fire.

It might seem trivial, but being able to hard reset pets on a potential 10 second CD means I can probably increase pet uptime on my target, instead of them running up stairs across half the map/want me to take it to a vet in 70% of the fight. In half the situations the pet isn’t where you want it to be e.g. when you want to peel/combo with Beastly Warden, or when you’re on jump puzzle maneuver #927 and leave your pet to path away into the distance.

Since we now have some pet-skill evades and endure pain on demand if we build for it (I hope it can work, we have clarion bond v2 now), Rangers have more ways to evade and CC than ever (unblock on beastmode), we just need to be managing and weaving beastmode into the usual things we are already doing.