Guild Wars 2

Not a bad idea

1) I finished in the top 3 twice. Once first place and the other 2nd place. – Among 4 races.

2) My first race (where I finished first and got credit toward the achievement), I started late. The race had been going, though only for around a minute and majority of us had joined at around the same time.

In my first race I started late, 2nd and 3rd race I had waited there for it to reset and begin again, and the 4th race I’d left and gone back in via the Sanctum Sprint person in Labyrinthine to see if I needed to speak to them every time since I was getting no credit after my 1st race which counted toward the achievement.

3) Nothing that would have caused any problems. No bugs or glitches in any of the races.

I do hope that we don’t need to come in 1st place for it to count toward the achievement. Coming in 1st is difficult on its own, so coming in 1st ten times would be too much. People would need to do double or triple the races (at least) before likely coming in 1st ten times. Top 3 is hard enough as it is, especially for people with slower computers.

I finished within 3rd twice, and only 1/10. Also, I don’t think they should make it so that you have to place in 1st-3rd place. Considering that it allows you to join after so many have started already (and are halfway through), it puts players at a total disadvantage because there is truly no way for them to catch up. It should just be 10 races in total, not dependent on where you place.

I guess it would also be important to note that when Defiance only stacks 3 times (for example), it’s generally not a concern for groups as every third person is likely removing it within seconds of it being applied. It’s definitely a huge difference to one that gains 30+ stacks and takes 5 or more minutes to remove Defiance completely.

However, it’s a good rule of thumb (even if Defiance isn’t truly an issue) to practice with those Defiance stacks. Meaning that even if it is removed within seconds, this is a good time to practice and learn when to use CC (or even learn the Defiance icons and train themselves to keep an eye on them during events). It might not be an issue for most events or champs, but in a way, that teaches people to ignore Defiance because it really isn’t an issue there. However, ignoring Defiance on certain bosses like Taidha or Megadestroyer can really hurt the event (as my server has seen by the consistent failures of Taidha and Megadestroyer, lol).

cranked.3812:

I agree with Mystic. Nice write up, but I don’t think I have ever been at a world event that didn’t succeed other than teq but that wasn’t because of defiance.

Hehehe. Teq is truly in a category of his own! I’m still waiting to succeed in a Tequatl event :P

Glad to hear that Mystic! ^.^

While my server is listed as Very-High, we generally lack the huge groups in events where players can easily remove Defiance. I have been in groups where it’s just about removed right as it’s applied, and in that case, it wouldn’t make a huge difference.

Lately, however, my server has been failing many events (mainly Taidha and Megadestroyer) and the one thing that both events have in common when they fail- Max stacks of Defiance. I’ve been in similarly sized groups who succeed in record time and the one thing that is different → Nobody stacks Defiance. Lol.

(Since I had to break up my post, it’s continued here )

Look at those Weakness and Vulnerability conditions-

Weakness – regeneration decreased by 50%; 50% of all attacks are glancing blows (50% damage- which means you take 50% less damage when struck by that champion!) Stacks duration.

Vulnerability – increases damage the target takes by 1% for each stack, up to a maximum of 25 times. <- This means that while Vulnerability is stacked at 25, the target takes 25% MORE damage from attacks! That’s a LOT!

When Defiance is on a Champion, these two wonderful conditions that we can stack on that Champion is greatly diminished. This means it takes more time to kill them, it’s harder to kill them, and it makes it EASIER for them to kill US.

Another reason for me taking the time to type this out is for a link to share with others. We all need to be aware of our skills and debuffs (or buffs) that stack on enemies. I’ve gone through several meta events where I’ve tried to coach people through Defiance (which isn’t easy when facing down someone like Taidha!). I’ve also had many many people whisper me after an event has failed (due to Defiance) to ask about what Defiance is, what it does, how one applies and removes it. Well, truly, it would be much easier to have something concrete to link them to rather than spam their tiny map chat with an explanation on something so in-depth.

If anyone has any advice or would like to add anything to this, feel free! If I have missed something or made a mistake, please feel free to correct me (I am only human, after all ^.^).

I do hope that this will help new (and old) players when it comes to that horrid Defiance! Some things in the game should not be ignored.

Hello everyone!

Lately, with all the new players coming into this wonderful game, I wanted to touch a little on the issue of Defiance on champions.

Most champs (with the exception of the Svanir Shaman at Maw) have a Defiance debuff on them. It’s located under their health bar where the condition icons show. When the Defiance is not active, it’s greyed out. However, when it is Active, it shows as a bright yellow with a number in it. This number reflects the amount of stacks that the champion has and can vary from as little as 3, all the way up past 30.

Now, some people might say that you don’t need to worry about Defiance in large groups because you can generally get those stacks off rather quickly, but I would argue differently.

With certain meta-events, like the Hydra Queen (Taidha in Bloodtide Coast) or Megadestroyer (in Mount Maelstom), we are given much less time than the rest and these events are generally much more time consuming. In such events, stacked Defiance can certainly make a full zerg NOT succeed at the event, even if you’re looking at 20-30 players working on it. Why? Simple- The events scale. More players means it scales higher. It would be silly if more players meant that Defiance didn’t matter because than what would be the point of the Defiance?

To back up a little bit, I want to explain Defiance. Defiance (as stated above) is a debuff on certain champions. When a champion has Defiance stacked, they gain an effect called Unshakeable. With this active, Blind is 10% less effective while Weakness and Vulnerability last 50% less time. In addition to this, they become immune to crowd-control effects.

However! While they are immune to crowd-control effects, this is the only thing that will remove those stacks.

Crowd-Control abilities that will remove (and also apply) Defiance includes any skills that will knock-back, daze, stun, pull, fear, and knockdown.

When Defiance is stacked on a Champion, it is important to nearly spam your CC (crowd-control) abilities to get those stacks off. Once those stacks are completely off, it is important to never use one of those skills as it will bring Defiance back to full stacks. If a Champion like Taidha or Megadestroyer have no stacks of Defiance, a well organized group can easily bring them down in the allotted time with very little difficulty because let’s face it, Weakness and Vulnerability can make all the difference in the world! I have personally seen many events fail simply due to Defiance.

I also know that it’s hard not to simply spam all your skills when you’re fighting a world boss, but doing so can be a very negative thing (unless you’re fighting someone like Svanir Shaman in Maw who does not stack Defiance).

This truly makes players need to understand their skills and what they do. When I first started playing, I knew no better. I used every skill once it came off of cooldown! However, when I really started to learn and notice those horrible stacks of Defiance, it made me need to learn my skills and know what each of them does -before- using them. For example, my main character is a Shortbow Ranger. I know that her #5 skill (Concussion Shot) is a stun. Therefore, when there is no Defiance stacked on the enemy, I simply do not use my #5 skill.. at all. That skill is completely ignored by me unless Defiance is somehow reapplied to the champion.

Now that I’ve touched on what Defiance is as well as how one applies and removes it, I wanted to give a few example of skills that are considered CC (crowd-control).

Shortbow Ranger- #5 (Concussion Shot) is a daze/stun.
Longbow Ranger- #4 (Point Blank Shot) is a knock-back.
Greatsword Mesmer- #5 (Illusionary Wave) is a knock-back.
Dagger Elementalist- #3 Earth (Magnetic Leap) is a pull.
Greatsword Guardian- #5 (Binding Blade) is also a pull when the skill is activated again.
Hammer Warrior- #5 (Backbreaker) is a knockdown.

This list is very short as there are far too many to list. Just remember, any skills (or even utility skill) that dazes, fears, knocks back, knocks down, launches, pulls, and stuns, will have an impact on Defiance. When there is 0 Defiance, refrain from using any of those skills and when Defiance is stacked, use them as often as you can. Just remember to be aware of those Defiance Stacks! It is usually a safe bet to stop using any CC abilities when Defiance is around 3 stacks if you’re in a larger group. Why? Because generally there will be someone who does use a CC skill.

Someone might be wondering.. “Why is she going through all of this?”.. Well, as I stated above, Defiance can definitely make teams lose events. We might look at it and think it makes no difference, but it really does!

Still not working. I’d be done with Fractured right now if it was, lol. Just ran 8 fractals and neither set counted toward the daily fractal achievement

Behellagh.1468:

Brother Grimm.5176:

Players that kill Champs out of rotation are certainly NOT breaking any rules (but if they know there is a train running in the area, it is rather rude and selfish)

It appears in this case as in many others that those running in the train are the ones being rude and selfish because they think all the champs in their train are theirs and theirs alone.

Exactly! About a week ago, a few of my guildmates and I were on the champ train, but due to a bad computer, one of my guildies could not get to majority of the waypoints in time before the champ died. Because of this, we skipped two of the waypoints and went to select champs that we could be sure she would have time to load for. In the process of this, someone killed Drake out of order and the entire group jumped on me and mine over it because we were not there for some of the champs. Not only were we insulted in map chat (and in whisper), but the train continued to accuse us, threaten us, and tried to ‘force’ us to go to all of the champs by hounding us with questions as to why we weren’t at troll.

^This kind of behavior makes me shake my head in disappointment. Often times, it is as if these ‘trains’ think that they own the map that the chain belongs to. That if people who do their own thing is against the rules because we are not following their own. If anyone crosses those rules, the train gets downright nasty, almost to the point of abusive.

Thank you for all of the responses, especially from Gaile! What I saw in FG was simply appalling. While I agree with you, Brother Grimm, threatening players who don’t play the way that a group wants to play is rude and selfish in itself. When players threaten others with reports enough that those players leave the map or stop playing because they know no better and are in fear of getting in trouble isn’t right one bit. Even used as a scare-tactic is not appropriate, at least in my opinion.

Oh I never reported anyone. Submitting useless tickets for such nonsense is ridiculous and a waste of time, hence why I came to the forums for my question I’d just hate to see people being banned or getting in trouble from having an entire guild report them for playing the game, lol. I can’t believe how much of a hissy fit people throw if someone kills Drake before Wurm. Not to mention, as you said, wasting Support’s time by going through dozens of false reports due to it.

The reporting wouldn’t be 1 person spam reporting, but a group of 15-20 people reporting one or two individuals for killing a flippin’ champion ‘out of order’, lol. I’m sure the report would be lied on, because playing the game isn’t against the rules.

alwaysbluffme.6890:

If they usually spam report ppl for who knows what reasons they can be banned

A couple of us were just curious because we didn’t know what would happen if this huge group all got together to report a person (or people) for some random accusation, lol.

Oops! I did not know that! I’ll see if I can do that now if I can edit my post. Thank you!

I have a simple question about something. I was on the Frostgorge Champ train earlier and someone (or a group) was killing the Drake. It was apparently ‘out of train order’, when this entire farming group (all one guild who is actually from another server) all threatened to report that person. Why? Because they were playing the game. Even though I wasn’t getting the Drake either, it kind of infuriated me that a group as large as that (at least 15 people) were all threatening to report that person (or people).

Has this game seriously come down to this? Are people seriously spam reporting people for playing a game that they paid for? Would they seriously be punished for playing the game like THEY want to play it?

In my eyes, this is purely ridiculous. Yea, so I miss getting Drake too.. But come on! Show me a rule that says we have to follow certain player-implemented-trains.

My question to the GW support team is this: Can that person (or people) seriously get banned for that?

As I’d gotten a whisper from someone else on the map regarding this, I figured ‘what better way to get them an answer than to check on the forums!’

I’ve attached a screenshot of one of the threats made on map chat

(If I do not have the right forum venue, please direct me to the appropriate one!)

I’ve been having this problem for about a week now and it makes it impossible to play the game. Shortly before it crashes, everything in game freezes, yet I can still move around (just not attack or do anything else). Majority of the time, when I reload, I am dead because apparently the game was still going while nothing was actually happening on my screen. It’s becoming really unbearable. Several of my guild members are also having this problem and have been for at least a week. These crashes usually happen every 15-30 minutes. I KNOW it’s not my firewall or my Antivirus because I’ve been playing since release without a single problem, as have they. I can also run every other game without a problem, including League of Legends. This is the ONLY game that’s giving me problems. Though, just to be sure I ruled those out, I did take all the steps to check my firewall and antivirus software, and everything is as it should be. ArenaNet.. Please fix this problem. Obviously this is a server issue or majority of us would not be having this problem while having no problems with any other games. This isn’t an isolated problem with only a few people.. There are dozens upon dozens of us having this problem.

There’s one major flaw that I think hurts everyone in the new dungeon setup, especially for Twilight Arbor.

Removing the ability to use WP’s while the team is still in combat is alright, however, I think other things should change due to this.

For example, the first Worm that you face before choosing a path. Once DPS on the worm stops, he fully regens and the rest of the worms respawn. If an entire team wipes, he regens nearly immediately. This quickly turns this portion of the dungeon into a chore. Having to repeat this step over and over and over is a deterrent to this dungeon. If constant DPS is needed so that the Worm does not regen, the inability to use a wp while one player is still trying to keep him from regening is cruel and turns a fun experience into a horrible and frustrating one.

If we cannot use Waypoints unless the entire team is dead or out of combat, you really should look into changing the Worm. Make it so that he doesn’t regen his health when an entire team wipes (or the dps stops). Or at least put a time limit on the time he regens from the time the dps stops.