Guild Wars 2

If you want an open game world full of flavour that is ripe for exploration, look at something like Skyrim. That is a brilliant example of how you can create a game that rewards exploration, one that isn’t about farming. Free form quests, complete level scaling, the ability to customise your hero to every degree and, most importantly, an incredibly detailed world.

Sadly, you can’t do that in an MMO. The ‘Massively Multiplayer’ means you have to please lots of people, and the best way to do that is target the lowest common denominator. ANet has to keep players in game, spending money in their store to stay afloat as a model. They have to keep people playing, and the way to do that is offer, as people have pointed out, efficient ways to get loot, because that is what the majority wants.

I love GW2, but their ‘manifesto’ was ambitious. Had they made a single player game, GW2 would be a Skyrim, one where you move around wallowing in the lore and flavour. As it isn’t, it’s a farmfest, like every other MMO known to man.

I log in, do my dailies, and log out.

Sometimes I do dungeon runs with guildmates. Mainly CoF because it has a good reward to time ratio.

I would like to see something done about this. A few months ago there was a post saying they were keeping an eye on the situation. Has that eye gone blind? Are the devs simply ignoring the problem or are they working on a solution? We’ve not had any information on the precursor systems in a long time. Something – an acknowledgement that it isn’t working – would be a good start.

I don’t know who decided this ‘feature’ was of benefit to anyone, but frankly, it is atrocious design.

Final boss of CoF 2 – our ranger keeps killing the acolytes despite being told to stop repeatedly. We can’t kill the boss because he is permanently cycling the acolytes. As 4 men we could easily do it and so kick him.

For some bizzare and unintelligable reason this transports the whole party (minus the now removed ranger) from the dungeon.

Thirty minutes wasted. Thanks for that.

What is the purpose of the kick function, if not to remove players that are preventing progress in a dungeon? I would like to see this imbecillic feature removed.

What is worse, while ANet is producing new content (which is buggy, look at P1 and P2 of this event) old content still isn’t working. We’re all losing out, save those few people who have made vast sums of gold with their lucky precursors.

Simple idea: Allow players to buy lodestones for dungeon tokens. I need 150 for my legendary, and the drop rate is stunningly low. With chance already in the precursor, clovers and other materials, I think making the lodestones something concrete would help.

A conversion rate of 10-20 for one lodestone means an amount for a legendary is about that for a full exotic set of gear (1500 being about what one needs). This is over 20 runs – already quite a grind for a ‘grindless’ MMO.

The most fun I have is taking on two/three people at once, and through clever use of cooldowns, managing to win. A good player will be able to give me a solid fight one-on-one (which is also very enjoyable) but most of the time you’re fighting small groups, and taking on a bunch of guild tagged characters and downing them one by one is immensly satisfying.

Everyone’s view on how to play Guardian is different, but there is some general consensus on some things. For dungeons, I think the key point is that you can really take one of two roles; one focused on supporting or one focused on damage. That isn’t to say you can’t do both, but you should prioritise one – whichever you prefer to play.

Builds that use lots of shouts, healing abilities and traits (like altruistic healing) and build for healing power/toughness/vitality are going to bolster allies and mitigate damage very effectively, allowing your party to focus on their damage output and less about staying alive.

Alternatively, going for power/crit damage gear, taking signets and personal damage increases (like +% attacking foes with conditions) will mean your damage is going to be strong, but your allies are going to be having to fend for themselves more.

There are builds (like the altruistic hammer build and other varients) that offer a good mix of the two. Personally, I have a more supporting role that operates at the front line, taking damage and healing it rapidly while pumping out boons and removing conditions. I don’t want to link it because I think much of the fun in this game is finding out builds yourself and testing them.

My advice to you is identify what you want as a guardian, then look to the traits that support that role. So long as your build is coherant and has some thought put into it, you’re going to be an asset to your dungeon group.

You have made a rather large mistake here. You say that signet of resolve is the only real choice for PvE. This is incorrect for this build. You have a trait called ‘might of the protector’ which automatically comes before Altruistic Healing. This gives you one stack of might whenever you block.

Consider Shelter, which gives you an unlimited about of blocking for a few seconds. Time this with a flurry of enemy attacks and you can easily gain many stacks of might. Couple this with the practical invulnerability this gives you, and Shelter quickly becomes the best healing skill in this build.

I think to brush it aside and pick signet of resolve is short sighted.

I second this idea. Give dungeons much better loot. Tokens alone feel grindy; adding some random, themed loot of appropriate level would really brighten people’s days whilst sticking it to the bots.

We used to run path 3 – which we believe to be of good difficulty over all (though the last boss is a little easy). We got into the habit of path 1 using the ‘one person kite a grenadier’ tactic. We avoided path 2 not because it was hard but because it was just too long. The change to path 2 does not affect us – or anyone – because no one wants to spend that much time killing endless dredge for so little reward.

Now, path 1 seems absolutely broken. We were progressing well untill we pulled the boss, so naturally we pulled back and started to kill trash… only it kept comming. See the screenshot for the situation we soon found ourselves in.

Is this what you wanted, ANet? I think we’ll be sticking to the few dungeon paths that work and aren’t ludicrously tuned – and I shan’t mention them for fear of them being similarly ruined.

You say we have no cripples or stuns; this is true but only because of our other abilities. Hammer offers plenty of control. A line immobilise, a blowout for interrupting long cast times or positioning (very good for bosses) and an area lockdown skill entirely unique to our class. Then we have stuff like sanctuary, sheild of absorbtion, binding blade and all our teleports which give us superior area control compared to other proffesions.

Like most classes, stacking Power (Zeal) early on will see you burn through most content. It’s worth noting though that the Zeal line is the weakest of the three main stat lines later game. You’re inherently a very tanky class, so you can be more agressive with your gear and stats, though equally you can do good damage whilst speccing for survivabilty – being able to pull more more often will mean roughly the same amount of kills per minute.

Weapons: don’t pick guadian if you like hovering at range. We thrive on the fight, and while we still need to dodge and move in fights, we’re at our best when toe-to-toe. In order of offensive capabilty to defensive, I would list the mainhand weapons in this order: Greatsword, Hammer, Sword, Mace, Scepter, Staff. I run with Hammer/GS myself with two handed mastery.

I can’t really suggest much for farming, other than stacking MF%.

A few things that came to mind:

1) Revenge of the Fallen: Instead of taking traits that help you when downed, focus on ones that help you from going down in the first place. Fiery Wrath is far superior given that you have Renewed Justice – your foes are going to almost always be burning.

2) Given that you have Renewed Justice (which comes with Justic is Blind) you should take Blind Exposure. I dont think 20% CD reduction on Bane Signet is going to do you any good in PvE. You’re going to end up with lots of vuln. stacks in large AoE fights given your VoJ will be proccing. This doesnt even consider the blind on GS.

3) Personally I wouldn’t use a scepter at all. Your job as guardian is almost always better done at the heart of the fight. With your build you should be able to throw out enough blind to mitigate damage spikes. Capitalise on Two Handed Mastery by taking a hammer for a more defensive and single target focus, or a staff for mobility.

Otherwise, I think it’s ok. Personally I don’t like the Zeal line at all, and would rather go down Valor which is full of goodies. But that’s personal taste.

I’m not sure. I think it is purely for RP or flavour. I’ve not seen it impact my elementalist (at lv 37) yet, so I doubt it has any significant or gameplay influence.

Us Surmians will look forward to seeing a non-German opponent tonight, then.

I do not agree with you, OP. I find Guardian combat to be highly interactive. First let me preface this by saying that the content you are playing with will make the most difference. Fighting standard mobs in the open world will never require much thought or interaction when they can be easily killed, even in large numbers. The true excitement and ‘interactivity’ comes from Champion fights, dungeon encounters and the like.

Basing your argument on skill cooldown doesn’t make sense. If all our skills were spammable, would that make things more interactive? The fact we have cooldowns imposes limitations, and limitations are what generate content. We have to find ways to work around our limitations. The best example is our lack of ranged combat – that means when we go toe-to-toe with a big baddie we have to be tip-top shape. We get plenty of retaliation, protection, block and vigor to keep us alive, and then some of the best healing if we or a teammate messes up. Do not fall into the trap of thinking your skill bar is everything – it isn’t. You’re missing the bigger picture.

You need to think about when you use your new 20s Symbol of Wrath. You need to judge whether you should be using your GS or a hammer for a given encounter. You need to judge what utility skill best serves you and your group, and how it interlocks with their choices. You have such an incredible amount of freedom for each fight, it’s daunting – hence why many stick to one weapon/build.

I suggest going into your next big fight thinking – “How can I improve my game?”. Start boon juggling, start using your endurance bar as a resource to be spent, start playing with your control abilities to mitigate damage and manage the flow of battle. Guardians are all about being at the centre of combat: we command the fight, we’re the leaders, we’re the ones brave enough, with the right tools, to stand up to the toughest enemy and bring it to them.

Personally, I love the Forst bow. Granted, it has limited use, but it is a utility skill. Not everything has to be about DPS. An elementalist should always be shifting attunement, always looking at the situation and how to make your skills work. Frost Bow brings some very good utility to the table.

• #2 is a 100% projectile finisher, meaning that ontop of the stacking vulnerabilty you can get even more conditions/effects out.
• #3 is an AoE chill effect. Chill is a very powerful effect not easily found. It allows for easy kiting and control of mobs.
• #4 is sick AoE damage, not including the confusion. Used all your big AoE nukes in your attunments and waiting for their CD? Just layed down some snaring field like Earth Staff #4 or Water Staff #4? Lay waste to the enemy – super effective in tight spaces.
• #5 a 3 second disable. This sort of CC can really turn the tide of a fight.

Conjure weapons are not intended to ‘replace’ your atunement spells. They are intended to compliment you or fill in your weaknesses. Think about how you can combo them with your other abilities for support, control or damage (the ANet trinity). I assure you, there is a wealth of fun and power in those conjures.

This is the state of the game when I log in in the morning. Through some miracle we still hold the northern half of our Borderlands, but nothing else. Dzagonur is already sporting a 30,000+ lead with all orbs and waypoints in their keeps. I don’t know what the deal with out Borderlands is, maybe we’ve managed to hold some ground, or maybe we just nightcapped it once they all went to bed, but I have a feeling it won’t be long before it’s all solidly green.

As for PvE, well, my guild moved here from a higher pop server (about 20 of us). We were sick of hitting overflow servers in the beginning and wanted to play with each other. Surmia was a medium population server with no language or online following (reddit, for example). Initially it was very good. But, as the guilds started to leave, WvW became what it is and PvE became very quiet indeed. It isn’t terrible though. Every night Orr is reasonable active with groups going the cathedral chains, but other areas are very quiet indeed. Most of the time I feel like I’m playing a single player game inhabited by other single players – hardly the MMO experience ANet set out to provide.

I think they need to lock server transfer to get real data on server populations and then act accordingly. Merge servers, offer incentives for moving to low population, and removing influence penalties, like I suggested, would go a long way to saving Surmia.

What guilds were they, gingertree? Back when we had 24hr matches, we had a big group with the tag [Boon] running around doing much of the legwork. I’ve not seen them about, but then again, I haven’t been in WvW much given the circumstances.

I see some servers advertising for night teams, saying that their lower ranked, shorter queue servers are ideal for a transfer, but with the influence cost being so high, why would any serious guild consider it? All I really want is to enjoy the same close WvW that the top servers enjoy, because at the moment, the world relegated to our bottom bracket steamroles everyweek.

arcdash.4039:

So you want A-Net to force other players on to your server? Even though they can still switch back for free? Actually, how would you keep these players when players can move from server to server once per day for free? Do you just want the servers locked so that people can’t leave? Do you expect A-Net to remove player’s choice of server?

That will not happen.

In all honesty, it’d be much easier to pack up your guild and move to another one, one that has space for everyone.

There are several solutions that have been discussed on this forum, including:

• Swapping the effect of the Orb buffs with the Outnumbered buff
• Locking free server transfers to high population servers while keep low population servers free
• Allowing guild influence to travel over when swapping world, to let guilds move from high queue times to low population without losses.
• Merging low population servers

I do not particularly care how ANet adresses the issue, only that the status quo is misery for those of us at the bottom bracket. With so much attention on the top of the bracket, it’s hard to get our voice heard. We are paying customers like everyone else, and our WvW experience should not be forgotton or considered less important because we are not as successful.

EDIT: 30 minutes on, and all keeps belong to Dzagonur, and will soon be upgraded with waypoints making any form of comeback much harder.

The screenshot says it all. Dzagonur are earning over 500 points. Within the next hour they will own everything. This has been the case, with the opposing German team, for the past three weeks. After the first 2 hours, the map stays the same untill the map resets, resulting in all teams having nothing to do bar the spawn camp.

The problem is that Dzagonur / Drakkar Lake / Whiteside Ridge are all reasonable high population and can assemble for their WvW, regardless of their skill or organisation. FoW and Surmia are the lowest server populations in EU, and as such we simple cannot resist the numbers other servers can field.

This is not exageration. This is not about nightcapping, or orbs, or anything like that. It is as simple as our servers not having the manpower. We have spent 3 weeks skirmishing for supply camps, without any hope of ever taking a keep with the levels of defense and supply the high population servers accrue.

What we need is more people. ANet need to get people into these low population servers to give them a chance. I do not want to witness any more WvW wipeouts that leave us with nothing for entire weeks at a time. This is not what the game is supposed to be.

For the sake of the thousands of players on Surmia, Fow and Dzagonur, save us from another week of futility. Do something to balance the numbers.

These two servers have for the past three weeks been hopelessly outmatched in WvW. Whiteside Ridge, Dzagonur and Drakkar Lake have all shown vastly better organisation and commitment to WvW than these servers. The result is that the score board is almost entirely in their favour, with the other two servers at best holding 25% combined at off-peak times through supply camps and towers.

I enjoyed WvW when it rotated daily, because keeps changed hands often and kept battle rolling. Now, after three weeks of being utterly crushed, I feel that the people of Surmia and FoW no longer even care about WvW. Isn’t this a failing of the system? For the competitive servers, the longer matches provide the chance for epic seiges and long sighted strategy. For the poor matchups, it means a week of misery.

I do not know what the problem with these two servers is. I know they have lower population than average. There is no incentive to WvW now though. Logging on to find one team controls everything is demoralising. I understand that some would take that as an opportunity, but the vast majority of people do not have the coordination or time required to starve out a fully upgraded keep. Then, the alternative is to take supply camps – to supply what? It feels futile for those involved.

There needs to be a review of WvW, so that when one server has clearly won a match, with a score ten times higher than the next, all three are not sentenced to days of boring WvW.

It’s very difficult to answer, because there could be a variety of reasons. Most generally, however, clever use of Virtues is something that all Guardians can do. With the right traits, they have access to blinds, high health regen, condition removal, burst healing, blocking and protection before any skills are even considered.

With a large host of defensive abilites at their diposal, a guardian can really hunker down. Especially 1v1, if using a defensive weapon like a mace, a Guardian can keep their blinds, blocks and dodges rolling to give them an incredibly small window in which damage will be recieved. This is the real power of Guardian that other classes can’t compete with – sheer stayability.

A well presented article, giving voice to the frustrations of many players. Where are the in-game moderators? Where is the bot detection? Where is a single Anet employee saying ‘Yes, we hear you’?

Outrageous all around.

Pikafan.3792:

For starters, Anet has made their stance clear that they are only going to punish legitimate players. Hence, the entire premise of this thread is flawed.

I’ve not seen any evidence or statements from Anet on botting. What they plan to do about this rampant behavior (which is even spreading to levelling areas and WvW) should be clear as crystal. Could you provide a link to this clear stance?

+1

Still the same people botting, and my reports do nothing. It’s spreading though. Why should I bother playing this multiplayer game when there are bots to do it for me?

I’ve been using the Heavy Archon set from the temple of zephyrs chain (Otherwise known as the temple of dwayna chain in Malchor’s Leap). It’s probably the easiest of the karma merchants to spawn after only two escorts and two fights. Each piece is 42k karma, is exotic, and comes with a superior ‘of Dwayna’ rune which buff healing power and grant healing abilities.

The stats are a bit all over th place though. Personally, I like a more generalist approach that focuses on healing, so the medly of stats from this set suits my play style. However, you may want to shop around all the Orrian chains to get a set right for you. All the art is the same and the runes can be changed.

I’d like to report a bug with Ring of Warding; the description does not mention it is a combo field (light) when infact it is.

I found my personal story to be incredibly dull in the post Claw Island sections. The only reason I play the personal story is 1) to get some experience while leveling and then 2) because much of Orr is bugged in terms of DEs.

How many episodes involve defending an outpost from a wave of risen? It’s just tedious and dull. I can do that in my DEs (when they work). I expect my story to be epic, full of flavour and character. Nothing in the later parts is ‘personal’ at all. It’s generic and repetitive.

As I write this, I am in a lv 80 chapter defending yet another town. I can safely tab out and let the NPCs handle the horde of risen that I have spent the last 30 levels slaying myself. From the brilliant early sections where my choices feel relevent and the dialogue is sharp and witty, the end game sections are limp and feel more like filler than anything else.