Guild Wars 2

When they flirt, I’m reminded of Amazing Spider-Man 2…

Hopefully one of the two dies to turn the other into an actually cool character. Or, ya know, they at least get better VAs.. I’d suggest someone like Kari Wahlgren for Jory as she has the voice that sells the kind of character they tried to make Jory at the beginning, such as Princess Ashe from FFXII. Kas would really benefit from someone like Laura Bailey.

Calys, that’s different. Arthur Conan Doyle did it because he HATED writing Sherlock Holmes and wanted a way to end it. Also, in effectively every adaptation with a Moriarty he’s shown somewhere near the beginning as a perfect counterpart to the detective and usually a very well written one at that.

:P You’re reading too much into that phrase.

Also, being a Priory member has given me the wonderful look at the toys they have. So Priory ex Machina sounds good too.. >_> it’s like every single thing people need comes from one of those two sources, save for relatively small problems like your gap.

Aww… I was hoping it’d be Faren.

Jaken.6801:

- Priory Sylvari using air magic to fly over a giant gap
- multiple illusions by Kasmeer

Just encountered the first one a few hours ago as I FINALLY did PS (just so I could level through it and skip Orr). In reality, it kinda makes sense.. Elementalists ARE pretty much the Avatar. She also creates a spark path to show you the way to her, which would be a really simple trick for Eles IMO.

The second.. I can only assume we can’t do that much like Necros can’t have an army of undead like in GW1. It’d be WAY too hard to balance around. We CAN theoretically do it, but the mechanics won’t let us.

Sylvari Thieves don’t stealth. They just stand really still and everyone mistakes them for scenery.

How is Logan like the typical Guardian?

Always neglects the Snaff.

Omar Aschi Popp.7496:

There’s a wizard hat?
Finally some fantasy in this steamkitten game.

..did no one tell you about the Witch’kitten either?

:P I use Asura ex Machina because of CinemaSins. If a character SOMEHOW suddenly can solve the problem, “[Character’s Name] ex Machina.”

^ pretty much this. You’d have people picking and choosing the “best traits” and putting them over onto one character. While I do find myself angered over a lot of useless traits (grandmaster..), I’d rather them just add more to the game than deal with such BS. Plus it’d be a NIGHTMARE to balance.

I prefer this to the classic “Asura ex Machina”.

Because when a problem needs solving, who better to pull an invention that does JUST THE THING out of nowhere?

Only lag I get is my own from having terrible internets. CURSE YOU TERRIBLE INTERNETS!

Vexander.9850:

Kasmeer will take Lyssa’s place as the Goddess of Illusions.

…It’s Kormir all over again..

OH MY GOD THEIR NAMES EVEN RHYME.

I can see it now..

PC: “We’ve defeated the dragon, woo! Thanks Lyssa, sorry you had to use your godhood powers to defeat it.”
Lyssa: “It’s no problem. But look, Mordremoth’s energy has coalesced. Such raw power would cause destruction unless someone weilds it and ascends..”
PC: “Taimi, you’re almost dead from your disease.. you should take it. Plus how cool would it be to have an Asu-”
Kasmeer: “I SHALL SACRIFICE MYSELF TO SAVE US ALL!”
Marjory: “Nuuuuuuuuuuu! BUT I NEEDS MY PRINCESS!”
Kasmeer: “We’ll both share it!”
both jump in
PC: /facepalms
Lyssa /facepalms
Taimi /facepalms
Taimi has died

Well Vayne, DDO is as close to DnD as an MMO has gotten. Leveling to 30 (if it’s an epic campaign. 20 if it’s not) takes almost a year in a campaign mainly because you only play once a week. They actually kept the system the PnP game has, but the problem is that it doesn’t work that well in an MMO Setting..

For instance, the starting zone has you go through a very large area (think the size of Queensdale and DR put together) doing quest after quest until you FINALLY go into a massive mountain area that can be very confusing and watch a dragon freeze a Mindflayer. The whole line takes a few hours to do.

DnD the board game? That would equate to about 2 sessions of 4 hours IF you’re lucky. That’s not including player banter, investigation breaks, ragestorms that come when the Lawful Stupid Paladin murders the thief because “HE’S EVIL!”.. To compensate for this, usually whatever quest or undertaking you complete during your time there, you gain either a level or a good chunk of one (usually 1/3 or 3/5 for a harder one..) and that’s not counting enemy XP and DM XP (the latter is a homebrew creation where DMs reward player ingenuity in a situation..) So, if I were to do a campaign that included that starting area, the players would leave it at around level 6. The DDO players who leave? Level 3… 4 if they farmed EVERYTHING. The real pain comes from you getting barely ANY XP from quests at all. That starting area has about 20 something quests IIRC.. that’s insanity.

Suppose I should leave a note here: Quests in DnD are more than “Kill X amount of enemy Y.” A dungeon here in GW2? That’s a single one.

One.

Think about that.

Djinn… you mean Asura ex Machina.

WELL.. here was my question when I came back..

Apparently that system was scrapped for whatever reason and instead you now get your first trait at level 30 and a new trait every 6 levels.

This wouldn’t be that bad if they didn’t also gate back the different tiers of traits behind both PvE events AND levels… >_> I was dumbstruck when I saw I couldn’t get Duelist 15 at level 42..

Righto.. lemme explain this since DDO gave a kittenized version of Reincarnation from DnD.

Reincarnation was not given as an idea to “advance your character even more once you’ve hit 20 (or 30 if you’re epic campaign)”. It was there because many players expressed a deep hate that they had to roll an entirely new character when going through a dungeon module that was known for being a meat grinder (Meat grinder modules usually are known for being brutal and murdering EVERY character that sets foot.. Big ones include Dungeonland and the infamous Tomb of Horrors). SO they effectively put out a book that detailed reincarnation. Your character would, if they had permanently died and not had their soul stolen or taken to the void, be able to have their spirit put into another character you roll. Doing this would cause the new character to have slightly more gold (like.. an extra dice roll), get a +1 (some homebrews gave you up to 3 depending on what level the dead character was) to a single ability score and if the DM was REALLY nice, you could start with an extra feat.

Problem. Reincarnation was seen as a cop-out maneuver that many bad players decided to abuse, at least in my area. You’d have them killing their characters off about halfway in and have a significant advantage over the party/encounter thanks to reincarnation. (+1 CAN lead to this, believe me it sucks).

Now, say a similar system is put in place. You can reincarnate and each character gains +1 to every stat for every level. So 80 would equal 80 in every stat.. that just might be a threshold where it could give a VERY significant advantage in PvE or WvW.. suddenly you have a splitting where all who want the META which is now a reincarnated character with Berzerkers are gating everyone out. The system becomes more of a scumbag system than META already is, and that’s just from a small difference!

Where’s “That’s the Guild Wars 2 That You Play” when you need it..?

..what is with all this hate towards OH Sword? Seriously, pair it with MH Scepter and you have a pretty awesome set up that punishes people who do nothing but spam their big attack skills the second they see you.

I’m starting to get the gist of what many of you guys aren’t liking about Mesmer in terms of PvP. It’s not a solo monster that brings death everywhere and doesn’t drop (like Warriors or MAYBE an Engi/Guardian.) It’s a class that is best used to bolster the abilities of other classes and set up attacks for them. Magic Bullet is great when you have an AoE spammer on your side as it stops enemies just long enough to get a good few pulses out (even longer with condi duration talented..). Time Warp, while on a long cooldown, can lead to a swift end of whatever on earth is giving everyone trouble as long as they know to use finishers. Everyone, just as in dungeons, doesn’t wanna be “that support dude” but rather “That killer dude!”.

Of course, I might be completely wrong on that but it’s just my observations.

Countess Anise, man. Just make them as awesome as Anise…

…Spelling kitten taking over.. must.. warn.. that it’s spelled “Defense”

Right. Because we only get kitteny over JoryKas and no other NPC/couple in the game.

Except, ya know.. Trahearne, Kormir, Logan Thackery, Sieran, Scarlet Briar, Rytlock, and Braham… and probably many more that I don’t know of yet.

Have you not at all been reading any of the posts before yours, Chase? We’ve praised Caithe, who was the first confirmed lesbian in this game, because she was less broken up over the fact her mate technically dumped her and more about the fact she has to fight Faolin now since she’s a member of the Nightmare Court.

If Jory was a man, I’d want to kick him in the nads too just to get his head out of the clouds and make him start focusing on the task at hand instead of getting all gushy gushy with his lover. Then I’d punch Kas in the face for egging him into it. And ya know what? A punch to Logan just because he’s Logan.

Characters can be flirty from time to time, but they can’t make it their main staple. See Countess Anise of the Shining Blade for an example of how to do it RIGHT.

I wasn’t too impressed when I played it. Really, the only character that caught my interest was the scientist dude (forget his name) you meet as an Illuminati in the HQ. It was such a disappointment to have your first real (not counting the skippable tutorial area) zone be full of zombies. Really? The most cliche’d and overused horror monster? I don’t want to sound so whiny, but I was expecting shoggoths and “The Thing” and creatures that would put Devil May Cry (original) to shame. I mean the zombies are created by a Cthulu-esque beast.. but that encounter comes so late into the zone that it pretty much feels like a cop out. >_> Even VtM: Bloodlines grabbed my attention faster…

I agree they haven’t been up to par with the writing but the example you gave wasn’t really better IMO. If I could pick their style, I’d go for some of the classic DnD CRPGs like the Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights series which could own the cliches in their own way but also throw you off when it came to certain events.. not to mention the way they showed a certain character’s descent into evil in NWN’s Original Campaign was beautiful and actually made you feel for them as opposed to Briar’s shoehorn of “OH BY THE WAY, I’M TRAGIC!”

I have just one question for you guys.

Would you want to see more Jory/Kas or more Trahearne? I hate both equally, but.. I can’t tell which one is the lesser of the two evils.

Way to go, Buzz Killington.

Least GW2 doesn’t start you off fighting ladybugs and delivering pies…

I have been a little irked by the lack of clarity of what some ability’s summoned illusions do. So I do agree that they should add this tidbit of information, at least underneath the ability’s tooltip.

Example:

Phantasmal Swordsman
Creates an Illusion that attacks your foe.

underneath it

Illusionary Swordsman
Leaps to target then returns to original position.

Im Mudbone.1437:

lordkrall.7241:

Omar Aschi Popp.7496:

“Kormir”

Yah okay, good one you guys. Next thing you’ll be telling me is that we lost the Guild Wars.

Well Kormir IS a god, and before her it was Abaddon. There have always been Six Gods.

And funny that you should mention the Guild Wars, because humans actually DID lose the Guild Wars (which were human-only btw) due to the Charr invasions.

Some people just don’t know the GW lore. There ARE 6 gods.

Yep. Balthazar, Grenth, Lyssa, Melandru, Dwayna and Oswald are the 6 gods.

What kind of food will Ascalonians refuse to buy?

Dragon Brand.

Jurica.1742:

Swag Captain.5318:

Hmm.. true true.. kitten ed if they do, kitten ed if they don’t. Although my main concern is still MH Pistols (I want it so bad ._.), a buff to the class that’s beneficial without being broken is what’s most important. Leveling a mesmer is a huge nightmare compared to the other classes mainly because of the low Self-Damage Output and having little to no control over your illusions and where they are/when they attack. It wouldn’t be so bad if each one had an autoattack they used before their big hit coolsdown (Phantasmal Duelist, for example, would unload upon spawning, just shoot for low-ish damage after, then unload after 6 seconds.) and if you could give simple orders like “On me!” (Stops attacking and follows), “RUSH EM!” (Melee run in and attack, ranged stops where they are and attacks), and “Disperse!” (Each goes to how they act now). I’d gladly take this over the Shatter mechanic.

To clarify, this idea is a heavily simplified version of the Mastermind from CoH which is what I view the Mesmer as.

This just shows how extremely new to mesmer you are, that you don’t have a clue about the class. Did you even hit 80 yet?

I don’t see how that’s a bad view. I personally do not like the Shatter mechanic mainly because a fair majority of times (for me) the illusions will die before the shatter I need (Diversion) is off cooldown (we’re assuming this is in a situation I need it, such as vets/champs or a group of enemies more than 5). This is usually due to them not being able to move out of the way of large, easily telegraphed attacks and that they just stand there while waiting for their ability to recharge. I play a very defensive style that punishes aggressiveness and therein do not constantly spawn clones. Some people might call it stupid, I call it a different approach.

And no, I’ve just hit 35 since I’ve been running around gathering mostly plus doing the LS and finally getting map completion on my Warrior main.

the thing that throws me off is the 34K health his warrior has. I wear Soldiers and stack Soldier crests and I can’t even get past 23K… what the hell?

Hmm.. true true.. kitten ed if they do, kitten ed if they don’t. Although my main concern is still MH Pistols (I want it so bad ._.), a buff to the class that’s beneficial without being broken is what’s most important. Leveling a mesmer is a huge nightmare compared to the other classes mainly because of the low Self-Damage Output and having little to no control over your illusions and where they are/when they attack. It wouldn’t be so bad if each one had an autoattack they used before their big hit coolsdown (Phantasmal Duelist, for example, would unload upon spawning, just shoot for low-ish damage after, then unload after 6 seconds.) and if you could give simple orders like “On me!” (Stops attacking and follows), “RUSH EM!” (Melee run in and attack, ranged stops where they are and attacks), and “Disperse!” (Each goes to how they act now). I’d gladly take this over the Shatter mechanic.

To clarify, this idea is a heavily simplified version of the Mastermind from CoH which is what I view the Mesmer as.

Darnis.4056:

I demand Illusionary leap’s Clone be promoted to a higher HP due to how badly we just got kittened by arenanet :/

I second this. IMO, since we rely on Illusions for a vast majority of damage, I propose they raise the health significantly (Maybe 3/5 of the player’s for most and double that for Phantasmal Defender)

That’s how the Mage has been acting for me. If it spawns at all. Duelist is bugged but only when targeting anything that isn’t an enemy that can fight back. It also seems to take a second or two to start up its attack from time to time, but that might be lag on my end.

Wait. You think Phantasmal Warden is less useful than Phantasmal Mage? I’m really going to have to disagree with you there.

ASP.8093:

Fay.2357:

… and mesmer is no longer good at doing anything in the game other than roaming as a condie build.

Hyperbole!

Swag Captain.5318:

Exploiting is using mechanics that do not work the way they were intended and can give the player a potentially significant edge over those who do not use it/cannot use it.

This is GW2. Lots and lots of things don’t really work as intended. I’m not sure how iLeap being a bad version of Infiltrator’s Strike was really an “exploit,” though.

At the end of the day, they took a flaky skill with poorly-documented functionality and made it terrible. It’s still flaky. Why, it’s actually flakier now, since you’re way more likely to hit Swap and go nowhere.

This is true. I’ve actually been using it to quickly swap targets before whatever I’m fighting goes down and sometimes the clone doesn’t even spawn, or worse nothing happen. Happened before the fix and seems to be happening more often after it so here’s hoping they get on that soon.

It was exploitable because the Swap skill specifically states “Swap places with your Clone. Immobilize nearby foes.” If you have no clone (specifically one spawned by the initial Illusionary Leap skill) you can’t swap places with one. The fact that people were still able to after the clone was destroyed means this was a bug and therein could be exploited if utilized in certain ways, such as Blinking away from your immobile foes.

Exploiting is using mechanics that do not work the way they were intended and can give the player a potentially significant edge over those who do not use it/cannot use it. This can also apply to using mechanics which do work in ways they were not intended to be used which, once again, give a significant edge over those who do not/cannot. Classic examples of former include the infamous Bottomless Box glitch from Dark Souls and the Power Island from Ultima 1 which gave you a weapon that was better than the one you were holding and could be used infinitely, resulting in a very low level character being able to steamroll most things. The latter include the BubbleHearthing Paladin from World Of Warcraft and the Slots-Pause cheat in Final Fantasy VI.

In no way did I say I’m a top player. BUT this isn’t my first rodeo and as with all MMOs, there are eternal truths.

You’ve just witnessed one of the big ones: If it is Exploitable, They Will Fix It Sooner or Later.

Also, as for the other comments.. I don’t PvP here mainly because I’m not a fan of rushdown tactics and can’t really do the fast-paced style it’s presented here. Last game I was reaaaally into the PvP scene was Shadowbane (mainly because you were forced to be). That might be a big part of it and I do understand how frustrating it is for you guys to lose a go-to skill, but you just need to learn to adapt.

Little unnecessary changes do irk me, do not get me wrong. But almost a decade of dealing with them has pretty much built up a lack of caring in the end. :P Sorry.

I feel like I’m the only one who doesn’t really care about this bug fix. Started leveling my Mesmer last week, discovered the bug and was like “Huh. That’s weird.” and went about my day. Granted, it made the RP build I was going for easier (Disappearing Fencer. Uses stealths and teleports to enhance a gentleman duelist.) but the inevitable fixing of one ability didn’t break that. So I can’t pop in, immobilize, and Blink away to summon the PDuelist. Doesn’t mean I have to scrap the entire concept, just gotta work around that.

So far, all I’ve seen is overreacting over the smallest little change. I’m pretty sure within a week or two, everyone who’s yelling they’re quitting the game will find either a new meta for mesmer or a new class that’s “SUPAH UBER BESTEST”. If you truly love your class, you’d stick with it through the good and bad times and not cry fowl when there’s a change you don’t like.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Swag Captain.5318:

inhearth.2038:

These “balance” devs or whatever are the WORST that I’ve ever seen in any MMO.

Clearly you’ve never played Champions Online.

I loved champions! You offend me! (I played about as casually as casual gets on champs tho)

The iLeap bug is nothing (AND IT WAS A BUG!) compared to the Imbue bug Champs had since the Celestial set was released 2009. Imbue causes the next ability to be an instant crit, and ranking increases the severity of the crit. For 3 years, ranking it did not increase crit severity as it was supposed to and then when they DID Fix it, you had another bug which made it beyond OP… Suddenly, Healing did not consume Imbue. So you could heal yourself infinitely before using a high damage attack..

ANet may not be the best, but they’ll always be better than Cryptic when it comes to fixes.

Celestial Warrior? Isn’t that called a Paladin?

Grok Krog.9581:

You’re doing less damage with flurry (as far as I know, maybe unless you’re running full condition gear) than you are with the auto-attack. Also Off-hand Axe 5 is a massive damage loss compared to the Axe auto-attack.

Hundred blades is good but would never go with Sword if you’re focusing on bleeds. Better off with Longbow.

However, in the open world. You’re pretty much free to use whatever you want. In dungeons though, you don’t really want to use conditions or a shield.

Out of all the Shield classes, I’d say Engineer is the best. While you’d be using a kit 90% of the time, there is a blast finisher and some nice stuns on the Engineer Shield, making it the most useful in my opinion

:P I suppose I should preface every post I make with a build with “This player does builds most might consider unorthodox. He values concept and fun over functionality. Be warned.”

Here’s a working that’s more damaging than my current build, but loses a good bit of survivability (doesn’t get as many regen procs)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQNAR8ejMd0FalHOewJaAgAxYjAnncKjy2pB-TBSAwAF8EAJVeoUJGP1fqoEEgLC/9XLNCs0FAA-e

Warrior with Shield is the way to go, especially if you pair it with a sword. What I like to do is interrupt/stun with shield bash then release Flurry (if adrenaline is full) for a massive amount of damage, even more if you talent so that every crit is an extra bleed effect (Stacking with the bleeds the burst puts on). Helped me a LOT in Arah.

This is even better when paired with another setup that has a huge amount of damage on a single ability like GS with 100Blades or OH Axe with Whirling Axe. Since neither one are Burst abilities, you can hit them at full adrenaline then swap to SwordnBoard and let Flurry off. Usually Vets are all that is left standing, and even then they are down a lot of health (a lot more if your weapons are Zerkers save for the shield.. I always do Soldier’s or Knight’s shield)

Here’s Nick, my Mesmer. Used the Aristocrat’s Chest and Legs and Caudecus’s Manor shoes to create this look. So don’t fret, Light Armor Users, you can look noble too!

Although I can’t tell if I made him look too skinny or if it’s the armor that gives that look..

Righto. So took all of this in consideration and ran Arah story (Nope, never did that part of the personal story!) in whatever gear I had (WOO VIGIL!) with a PUG. It pretty much ran like Argon said, I was surviving a good bunch of damage unless I got careless or didn’t dodge the easily telegraphed big ones and rezzed most of the time I wasn’t fighting. First power core was a massive wipe, but we all got the rhythm down and (mostly) did well. Till the airship. That swarm of constantly respawning undead was like going through a Gary Gygax mod… holy hell. Pretty sure we were supposed to be backed up by NPCs, but until they actually got inside the ship and started attacking randoms we were on our own. Finally made it out with me rezzing who I could, 100Blades any groups, then Flurry to kill em, and shooting the dragons. Took a while, but it worked. Zhaitan himself was a cakewalk.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJEQNAR8ejMd0FalHOewJiAggCXtbsBCgjpQGorNA-ThSAwAJVeQ5CA8TNAlKxGpEknqPA8U4veapRhluCGmhAA-e

What I used. Though Signet was swapped for the standard in the Mouth of Zhaitan fight and stayed that way until we actually killed that kitten dragon.

After an Arah run, I found out you need ranged for the 3rd power core. Can’t get close to the eyestalks without being massacred and can’t hit the giant flying thing with any melee weapon (flies away). Lucky me, I don’t carry ranged because RP!

XD I’m sorry. All Gold. Been playing too much WoW lately. And I figured Healing Signet would have either been really really good or replaced by Healing Surge.

Signet of Rage still miles better than Juggernaut or the Standard?

Nice.

From what I remember (been a while.) I had Healing Signet, Endure Pain, Dolyak Signet, and For Great Justice. Going to assume that’s not exactly good anymore?

Also, Deep Strike. Did they fix it where it doens’t give massive amounts of crit anymore?