Guild Wars 2

Imbune.5497:

So what would happen is you’d have the people who stay safely in the back ranks doing more damage then those in the thick of things…doesn’t sound too balanced now does it? It works with other mmo’s because of the trinity-squishies do big damage because the tanks allow them to go pew pew in peace

Why can’t this work in GW2 if tanks are self-sufficient enough to not need healers?

Snubber.4967:

This is a pretty big issue that I feel like isn’t really being addressed. It really bothers me because I enjoy playing a lot of professions that don’t perform too well in dungeons. Which is a huge bummer because dungeons and other pve things are my favorite parts of gw2 but if you don’t choose to play a warrior, guardian, or ranger (and maybe thief) you’re permanently stuck with the fact that you won’t be as effective or as survivable as other professions.

I really enjoy playing elementalist but they are extremely squishy. I would be fine with this if they did huge dps but they don’t! I feel like the squishier professions should do the most damage whilst the heavy armor professions should do less, so the game would be more balanced. But, warriors end up getting the most dps and armor, which is why it seems like 1 out of 4 characters are warriors (maybe even more). So hopefully a-net starts addressing some of these things. What do you guys think?

Okay.

Snubber.4967:

if you don’t choose to play a warrior, guardian, or ranger (and maybe thief) you’re permanently stuck with the fact that you won’t be as effective or as survivable as other professions.

Er…

Snubber.4967:

ranger

wat

The bigger point here is valid, and you shouldn’t devalue balance simply because it isn’t achievable. I think the problem with attacking it this way, though, is twofold.

First, if you gave, for instance, Elementalists the most DPS because they have the least armor, everyone would roll Elementalist because it has the most DPS. Second, squishiness and survivability aren’t inextricably linked, and are mostly subjective concepts anyway. My Elementalist might have 8k~ less base HP than my Necromancer and is therefore squishier, but I feel Elementalist—between vigor, heals and invulnerable moves—is far more survivable. My Ranger and Engineer might have the same base HP and armor values, but I feel far safer on Engineer because of its heals, blocks and blinds (and, again, vigor uptime).

So, wat do? I feel like a lot of people on the forums agree that one of the major dungeon balance problems is dungeon design: with reworking dungeon encounters and using new encounter design philosophies, things like heals, CC and tankiness might be more beneficial.
One thing that always gets me in particular is the stacking technique. It’s almost the ultimate crowd control in itself, and I don’t know how one would fix that without a significant rework of various game mechanics. However, stacking is also deemed mandatory by many melees since breaking formation and, say, going off at 1,500 range with Ranger Longbow or Engie ’nades, neither supports your group with boons nor allows you access to the boons they produce. Do you think making range more desirable in dungeons would be a step in the right direction for balance, perhaps by increasing the radius of abilities such as shouts and banners?

If given the option, I would also vote for the Great and Powerful Woz.

Unfortunately this doesn’t seem likely so probably Gnashblade between the two. Who better to govern a den of pirates than a legitimate businessman? Also he’s fluffy.

If this is all working as intended, I think the cats who thought this up might need to have a sit down with Dark Souls to reconsider fairness in game design. If the AI breezes a certain way, he can be mathematically impossible to kill even if you never make one tactical mistake.

Hey, just recently hit Lv.80 on my Engineer, got the Dark Asuran Shield from Sorrow’s Embrace thinking to put a different skin over it, but much to my surprise it actually looks pretty darned good. I find it fits my Engineer’s look quite nicely. I’d also look into Guardian of the Six, and anything involving Charr or the Flame Legion.

(Edited for wrong link, whoops)

See this thread about these problems. Sorry, new players.

bloodletting wolf.2837:

1. Lions arch usually has banners up at peak times and it’s worth the silver to jump there to get the buff.
2. Keep food buffs up.
3. If you camp the boss events don’t just stand there waiting – farm until it starts.
4. Kite as many mobs as you can handle into a blob then aoe them.
5. Use speed buffs to get you to the next mob quickly – the quicker you travel the more money you make.
6. Don’t just farm one area or for one thing – stay ahead of the DR.

These are my general rules when I actively farm, hope it helps.

You are a wise wolf. If you want money, do all of this. (About the DR, I never farm long enough to feel the effects of it.)

I don’t really care for the whole CoF P1 farming culture (a topic in many other threads that should stay there), so I farm Frostgorge Sound for T6 mats and Corrupted Lodestones. I make similar money to my guildies who farm CoF P1; it’s much less on a bad day, much more on a good day. You can bypass the issues one may have with CoF , with the only caveat being that magic find gear is requisite. While good money solo, it really comes into its own with random farming neighbors, or especially a friend/guildmate or two.

I tried my hand at the mystic forge once, made about 20g in a day only to lose it all and more over the next two days. 3: I would not recommend it either.

Meta-boss hopping has never really been that great for me, to be honest. When I’m in Frostgorge and I see Claw of Jormag up, I usually go for it, but I end up spending quite a lot of time off farming for what’s often just one rare. Two T6s alone in that time would have covered that (this ignores both CoJ chest exotics and Corrupted Lodestones, for equity’s sake). As for less time-consuming meta events, time spent waiting on windows and money spent WPing all over the map tends to gnaw at the profitability of it. I usually only do this when I explicitly require ectoplasm, but even at that farming the money to buy them usually goes faster for me.

tl;dr: I don’t like CoF, I’m indifferent to world bosses, and I like Frostgorge very much.

I’ve posted in similar threads, but I’ve had these issues since the latest patch as well.

Running meditations? Sweet.

Yeah, I posted in the bug forum about this. Fire Focus #4 and Water Scepter #2 get interrupted by the auto-attack, but are still able to be used out of combat, with auto-attack turned off, or with your back turned to the enemy you’re engaged to.

Didn’t hear about the DT one, that sucks o.o

I’ve also found this bug. Flamewall put to interrupt cooldown when attempting to cast while engaged, always towards the end of the cast, always quickly followed by an auto-attack. If you turn auto-attack off, turn around while casting Flamewall, or use it before engaging a fight, the ability works fine. Otherwise, as I suspect, the auto-attacks will interrupt it every time.

Tested on Lv.80 Sylvari Elementalist in Heart of the Mists against Target Golems and profession bots (the “Guardian,” “Engineer” etc) and Practice Dummies in Lion’s Arch. Same results with Dagger/Focus as Scepter/Focus.

JoshuaRAWR.4653:

My Reaction after seeing the thread title and instantly knowing what the OP was going to say.

I bet you can guess what my reaction was when I clicked that link.

What a singularly inappropriate moment you’ve chosen to assert your pedantery.

I’m personally kind of indifferent to the AC changes. I like the novelty of the new fights, and it overall feels more interesting and immersive, but the hard-hitting, instant-kill nature of attacks like Kholer’s spin (weaker, right?), and the King/Rumblus’ shouts made me get better at dodging. I feel like there’s less incentive or opportunity to learn good technique in AC now, which was where many people got their start in explore modes to the best of my knowledge. I know I did.

What I’m not indifferent about is the framerate drops. 40-60 FPS everywhere else, including big Orr events, then 7-10 FPS whenever masses gravelings show up (P1 burrows encounter, Howling King, second P3 burrows encounter, Grast walking backwards and attacking a bunch of breeders). This wasn’t the case before, so I’m assuming this is to do with the patch. The rest of my PUG suffered this as well.

Error code 7:11:3:189:101 after…

Zorainda.3495:

When I try to reconnect, the loading screen changes between Lion’s Arch and the area I was before teleporting. As if the game can’t decide where to send me..

…that. One time it loaded me in Heart of the Mists in the Asura Gate to Lion’s Arch, zoned me into Lion’s Arch, then disconnected.

I think a lot of what could be perceived as a new profession treads too close to other, existing professions, and could be instead implemented as new weapon style. I’m by no means opposed to new professions, but the current roster will likely be a big factor in how they’re implemented.

The Dark Knight archetype could instead be implemented through a new Necromancer Sword or GS; the Duelist archetype is already present with an arcane twist in Mesmer; the Druid archetype could fit with Staff Rangers, and that’s halfway there as it is. While I feel a Bard profession would fit in well here, it might even be too close to banner/shout/warhorn Warriors. There are workarounds; xiv’s Chanter would bring the music while having a separate identity, for instance.

I think the Golemancer idea that’s been tossed around here a bit is one of the best ones. As said before, it’s in the lore, and it would have a unique mechanic that could be utilized in interesting ways. FFXI’s Puppetmaster class, for example, had a personal, adorable automaton that you named, upgraded and customized to different roles. This customization went so far as to completely change its appearance for the more sweeping changes of physical vs. magic or ranged, or even a balanced build. It would be neat to see something similar implemented, be it through a pet management menu like Rangers, or through utility skills, as per Conncept’s suggestion.

I’m not entirely sure the game needs a third Soldier profession, as it currently stands. While I’m sure this is not the case in PvP, in PvE the high population of Warriors and Guardians seems to offset the lack of a third Soldier, making heavy armor just as common a sight as light and medium armor. That might change if one were to add, say, a fourth Light profession in Golemancer and a fourth Medium profession in Bard/Minstrel/Chanter/Troubadour/etc. I have yet to personally see or create a suggestion for a heavily armored archetype that would not, in my opinion, step on the toes of any current professions.

tl;dr: Golemancer’s a great idea, Bard’s a good idea but tricky to implement properly, new archetypes are possible with new weapons instead of new professions, there’s a lot of heavy armor out there already, and I have no new ideas of my own to bring so I comment on other people’s ideas.

I would pick Mesmer because I like swords but don’t like being restricted by even what would be considered medium armor, let alone heavy. Oh what, they have magic too? Yeah that’s cool.

Conncept.7638:

Frequently see a guy in Orr on my server named “Whywontmynamefi”

I though it was especially funny when I realized he had four more characters to work with. :P

I have a big Sylvari Warrior named The Unbagable Mulch, who goes shirtless and always carries around a pile of growth potions. PUNY FAUNA! MULCH IS STRONGEST THERE IS!

I’ve seen you around, and the guy you reference. Love those names.

1- Human Female Necromancer
2- Sylvari Male Elementalist
3- Asura Male Ranger
4- Charr Female Thief

Honorable mentions:

Charr Male Guardian (80, but inactive and likely staying that way)
Human Male Mesmer (only mid level, but climbing as my next project to 80)

Also:

Low level Norn Female Engineer
Mid level Asura Female Warrior

Thank you for making this thread. I love stuff like this.

Saw a guy yesterday, Charr Engineer named “An Asuran Mesmer”. lol’d irl

If you need to learn to dodge, remember that you’re invincible through your dodge animation; dodge pre-emptively. If a wurm is about to slam its face on the ground, dodge before it lands, not as it lands.

My favorite place to practice dodging was the Giant event at Nageling Waypoint in Diessa Plateau. AC Explore is a great place to get better at it, too, as deSade suggested.

In my experience, if I swung my sword five times, if I hit a single target, Spider Venom would proc five times, and if I hit three targets, Spider Venom would proc five times per target, adding up to 15 procs between them all. Now, if I swing my sword five times on a single target, Spider Venom procs five times, and if I swing my sword five times on three targets, Spider Venom hits the first target only twice, one additional target twice, and the remaining target only once: a total of five procs either way.

Can anyone confirm if I was receiving the benefit of a recent bug? Was this an older, unaddressed bug? Or was this simply a nerf to AoE venom builds?

Edit: Basilisk Venom never worked like this and is totally unaffected; I’m only talking about the utility ones.

I’m an inexperienced thief, leveling to 80 on a venom build this whole time. I see this as a tremendous nerf to venoms.

Before, if I used Spider Venom without the added hit trait, it applied over five attacks. If an attack hit on multiple targets, it applied the effect (life steal included) to each target hit, so with shortbow or sword, this meant Spider Venom could proc 15 times.

Now, venoms apply per hit; whether I cleave 3 targets twice, hit one target with pistol 5 times, or fire two shots from my shortbow that bounce between two targets, my Spider Venom is only ever gonna proc 5 times.

tl;dr, my venom effectiveness was reduced by 66%.

And here I was expecting the AoE nerf to happen to my Elementalist.

New to the thread, not gonna read all 1,000,000 pages, but I just realized something.

This arc (be it this update or the next iteration), with changing priorities and a swarm of refugees, is going to mean the end of Meatoberfest. Are they going to risk the Cattlepult as well? /._.\ Say it ain’t so, ANet.

I’ve been doing HotW paths 1 and 2 on two characters a day, always after the daily reset, for a little while now. For the first couple of days I was getting 60 tokens per path, per character, but the day before yesterday I only got 30 tokens on my final run, and yesterday I got 30 tokens on my final two runs. It took roughly the same amount of time, always the same time of day. I’m not seeing any particular rhyme or reason to these diminishing returns and can’t find any information beyond this thread. Anyone know more about this? Before this, I thought it was either 60 tokens, or 20 (or less).

mrstealth.6701:

For ele, the dagger offhand skills are some of the most powerful AoE abilities. Excluding highly conditional +damage traits (hp under 33%/knocked down), Churning Earth tops the list hitting light armor (test golem in the Mists) for around 7.4k. Next highest on the D/D set is Fire Grab at 4.5k (with +10% fire attune and 5% damage to burning foes traits). A few more skills are able to hit 2.2-2.5k, which is still well under Backstab/Killshot damage with all 5 targets totaled.

I suppose that’s not including when said Kill Shot pierces to hit 5 targets, huh.

Only suggestion I have is on your heal rotation, you can use Eruption > Geyser > EA, then Healing Rain > Eruption > EA for three blast finishers and an EA heal-roll. Admittedly, the downside of this is that you’re stuck throwing ice spikes or applying chill for a few seconds while your Earth Attunement recharge comes back, but it’s an option for making the most out of your group-heal cooldowns.

Edit: another suggestion!

If you find yourself at close range, you can switch to Earth Attunement in the middle of Burning Retreat and quickly make an Eruption in your combo field for a blast finisher. Best used, in my opinion, with your back to your target so you can roll through them.

Fun with Eruption! Yay.

DungeonDaughter.7391:

Wow you guys sure are being smartkittenseses. Obviously that was a typo. He meant the pantry attacks where you shoot out crackers and spices and coffee beans and tea leaves. Give the guy a break.

PvE Staff Elementalist here with no reason to post other than to say I lol’d profusely. GG

Just rebuilt my PvE Elementalist for a staff damage spec right before the news, but it’s okay because I’m going to be able to do wicked damage and stack mad weakness with my Earth auto-attack, right guys?

If the point of this was to nerf, say, Meteor Shower and Frost Bow 4 on zergs in WvW and large targets (Nightmare Tree, Graveling Burrows) in PvE, I’d understand it. But from my limited exposure to the subject, it’s not sounding like this is going to be the case.

Good thing I can fall back on my Epidemic Necroma… oh no

^this guy
I’d probably run jewels or seals myself if it weren’t for all the boon duration (in fact, I did before I got my exotics). 2x Superior Monk, 2x Superior Water, 2x Major Monk makes me a happy plant.

When I play S/D, I need to be up close for EA, Earthquake and Churning Earth blast finishers anyway, so I’m usually close enough to get the might off that blast finish.

Also for the record, S/F can stack just as much might on lower cooldowns with Firewall, Dragon’s Tooth, Pheonix, Comet, Evasive Arcana and Magnetic Wave, but I’m sure it goes without saying that the might obtained from such a combo would be relatively useless to you.

Edit: I’ll admit, I was crushed when that update happened. I was gone when it and the EA nerf hit, so coming back to it filled me with anguish. Once I finally got back onto my Elementalist after a lot of alts and soul searching, though, I found surprisingly little had changed.

A lot of people will tell you healing power is terrible for Elementalists and I can’t personally disprove them. If healing is your primary concern, Scepter and Staff are both probably better choices than dagger mainhand. However, if you’re doing an Aura Share build (which is what it looks like from here), then you probably needn’t even concern yourself with healing power, and you should continue D/D.

Still, the thread’s up, so let’s talk about heals. Staff gives you the iconic Healing Rain and Geyser, combined with blast finishers in your water fields for tons of AoE healing. Scepter’s Water Trident has a better heal to cooldown ratio than Dagger’s Cone of Cold, and you don’t even need to channel it; this isn’t even to mention its range which can lead to more surgical placement of heals. Using Scepter also allows you to offhand Dagger for the wonderful Cleansing Wave.

Either way, if you really wanna heal, I’d say Evasive Arcana is a must-have. Having Cleansing Wave on Water Attunement rolls with only a 10s internal cooldown is amazing, and for staff you can utilize the blast finisher on Earth’s Evasive Arcana for more Water field blasting awesomeness.

Regardless what you choose, I hope this helps.

Resouled.5614:

^ for d/d that is. You can fit in dragon tooth with s/d

^ and Pheonix :P If you wanna stack might, and that’s your primary concern, S/D is probably the way to go.

Jlpeaks.8702:

What does everyone think about the idea of having mixed armor types ? I’ve been toying with the idea of going 1/2 carrion and 1/2 knights as a general all purpose PvE build (dungeons and solo explore).

I run mixed types for my heal/defense set, being Magi on the armor and Cleric’s everywhere else, and it works pretty well for me. I assume it would work well for damage too, but for me it would probably boil down to a sort of compromise glass cannon (for instance, 50% Berserker’s, 50% Valkyries), or adding condition damage to an otherwise direct glass cannon (50% Rampager’s, 50% Berserker’s). I might end up having to run 50% Carrion and 50% Rabid on my Necromancer for awhile, but that’s off topic.

50% Carrion, 50% Knight’s could be pretty interesting. You’d have a hefty boosts to condition damage and toughness, and a modest crit rate (boosted by 5 into Arcana and/or Auramancy?) balanced by solid power with just a sprinkling of VIT. What weapon set and traits would you use with such a stat layout? If Knight’s precision interests you, I’d imagine you likely have some into air?

For me, mixing armor sets is a bit too much to think about as I’m trying to contemplate how to build my Elementalist for damage. I’ve been having more fun and doing better with staff in the situations I use it, so a Carrion+Staff build is growing on me a lot, especially since D/D Auramancy is so ‘flavor of the month’. Maybe I should wait ’til after the patch to see if they increase the burn duration on Flame Blast or lower the cooldown on Eruption or make Lava Font last longer or some other roflstompshenanigans.

My dungeon experience is limited so far to only AC Explore and all story modes, as I’m only just starting to focus on one character, being Elementalist. My build is S/D 0/20/0/20/30, and I stack healing power on my gear between Cleric’s and Magus sets.

It’s true that you can’t simply heal; I spend very little time on Water Attunement despite my heavy investment into healing power. Still, I find the burst heals between switching to Water and using Cleansing Wave, Water Trident and Evasive Arcana allows people who might otherwise be backing off to continue a full assault. More importantly, perhaps, healing power allows me to quickly negate any damage I might have taken, lending to a sort of bunker playstyle. By itself I recognize that’s not enough, but between the AoE burst of Scepter’s Fire and Dagger’s Earth, and the might I give to my party (between 9 and 15 stacks every 20 seconds) I feel I lend to my runs.

Food for thought from a heal spec.

Hey everyone! Great responses so far, and I really appreciate all the advice! I hadn’t even given Valkyrie’s a glance before, thanks Leo G. Just keep it on topic; this thread isn’t about healing power. It’s about building your gear for damage! Q(;`A`)9 manly damage
(And perhaps not killing yourself while you do it? not so manly)

My current setup is S/D with situational use of /F and Staff. While that will likely change once my conversion to damage is complete, it needn’t necessarily. I guess the topic of this thread could be focused to…

What gear sets do you think are the best for each weapon combination?

Carrion seems a good choice for Staff (thanks Ferny!). Agreed?

I assume most of the discussion so far has been in the context of D/D use, is that the case? What do you all think about gear for S/D; would you gear it differently than D/D, generally speaking?

Zaviel.1245:

I’ll start off saying that healing power in general is over-rated, it scales badly and isn’t too useful to begin with.

Noted. Not what I wanted to talk about. Maybe PM me if you wanna talk about it some time?

Zaviel.1245:

For damage gear you need some form of defense, glass cannon is a very bad choice. Depending on your build I suggest Power/Prec/Tough, Power/Vital/Tough, or Power/Vital/Cond.

I’m really interested in your suggestion for PVT when its only damage stat is power. Is this because the power stat is so much higher than on PVC or PPT?

Hi, Elementalist forum!

I’m a Lv.80 Elementalist, about to finish off my collection of healing power gear. Since that’s almost finished, I’m going to start working on my damage gear. Problem is, I can’t decide on which set to use. I’ve done testing with D/D and Staff on golems with Berserker’s, Rampager’s, Rabid, Carrion and Knight’s, but I can’t get a feel for what’s right for me. Does Berserker’s do more than Rampager’s? Is a glass cannon setup even viable? Is condition damage worth taking past 200-500, making Rabid and Carrion stand out over Knight’s?

I realize the optimal set might change depending on whether you’re a D/D auramancer or a blasting Staff setup, or something entirely different. This isn’t really about whether D/D’s better than Staff, or if Scepter’s burst is great for damage/support hybrid, or the minutiae of how traits factor in. All I’m interested in is a discussion weighing gear sets against each other.

tl;dr, what are some of your opinions on damage-oriented gear sets for dungeons and PvE?

Pendragon.8735:

Here’s the problem with the Necro form of attrition, its not sustainable. And it needs to be IF the profession is designed not to get mobility to escape, nor great ways to keep opponents in the fight.

Right now by comparison the Ele bunker has sustainable attrition, meaning he does not have a huge health pool or toughness, at least by default, but he endlessly reinvigorates himself throughout a fight.

Imagine an Ele bunker like a sink half full of water with the plug open, but the faucet running. The water runs down the drain, but gets filled back up equally (or almost as equally) as it is running down by the water coming in. This lets you last a loooong time in a fight.

Now the Necromancer is more like a sink full of water with the plug open as well, but the faucet off. He has more water to begin with (regular health + LF) but once it starts draining (when a fight begins) his lifespan is finite, it drains to a zero point with little refill – while other attrition builds (including thief and guardian ones), can refill during the fight, either by direct healing / cleansing or escaping or stealthing to stop taking the damage.

The Necro would function properly as an attrition class if either Life Force could be built fast enough in battle to use our heal many times over, or if health stealing abilities were good enough to negate at least some respectable portion of the life we lose in a long fight. But life draining skills and traits are utterly gimp, a drop of water in that sink against burst damage, and Life Force has too few skills that give it or buff it. And to even invest in those skills means you have sacrificed a great amount of offense (either stronger conditions, longer fears) or sacrificed the defensive traits that make us survivable in the first place (meaning slower draining Life Force, a bigger pool, things like stability, improved wells, etc).

The Necro can be attrition in damage, or to some lesser extent, survivability, but he can not be great at attrition in both, and he can never be great in mobility or locking down an opponent close to him. Other professions simply have far less tradeoffs to make, even in the same playstyle, and they get to have multiple strengths in these categories, while we must choose but one, and in fact are almost limited to one, offensive attrition via conditions.

+1 Internets on this post. Necro was my first 80, Elementalist was my second; this pretty much encapsulates the biggest observation I made comparing them (with my builds and playstyles).

+1

Didn’t even like it on Minion builds.

Now I’m not only unable to perform most Leader options, such as change ranks and edit the message of the day (the permission in ranks is unchecked and greyed out for the latter), but I can’t represent my guild or any other guild on two of my characters. This effectively locks me out of one of my favorite characters.

Server: Yak’s Bend.
Guild: Of Tides And Quaggans [Coo]

I created this guild yesterday, and while I’m able to represent freely and edit rank properties, I’m unable to change the ranks of my members, nor am I able to edit the Message of the Day.