In a zerg fight, I think your best role is as a skirmisher, largely finishing what others have started. So you kill stragglers & reinforcements. Finish downed players after the clash. Kill the one or two lowest who just barely live through the clash.
For WvW zerging I plan to get an owl. A leap, swiftness, and a heal, and no pet to manage – absolutely perfect.
So from 8 skills you could use, you plan on using 3.
Using 37% of your potential is hardly “absolutely perfect”.Don’t get me wrong. Atm I am also only really using one pet, but I don’t think this is a good state we’re in right now.
Under normal circumstances you have 2 skills that you control, not 8. Your pet is a handy DOT with flavor. In a zerg, your pet becomes a maintenance issue just trying to keep it alive.
So yes, 3 crucial WvW skills that fit in every build? I’m happy.
-Jeff
I’m going to pre-order POF precisely because of deadeye. Rifle is not clunky; it’s deliberate, which is perfectly valid trade-off for massive range. It’s also a nifty change of pace, and fits perfectly with the whole sniper motif.
Also, as many have pointed out, people are confusing the new weapon with the new traitline. Feel free to experiment with different weapons.
For WvW zerging I plan to get an owl. A leap, swiftness, and a heal, and no pet to manage – absolutely perfect.
Essentially, pay $30 to continue playing the old game with newer, unbalanced specs. As amusing as that sounds…no thanks, I’ve had my fun.
Thanks, I guess I have “learn to read” syndrome. :-) I was hoping to practice in PvE a bit, as it’s hard to target in WvW.
I’m struggling with the function gyro. I’ve ignored it for a long time, but finally decided to make it work. I re-mapped my F key a long time ago – I assume it’s the key that you interact with.
So I went to blazeridge steps, found some dead charr sentinels, and tried to revive them. It never worked. I got close enough to see the “revive”, then started stepping back bit by bit and trying, and it never worked. I tried double-clicking on the bodies also (one google search brought that up), and it still didn’t work.
What am I missing?
Thanks in advance,
-Jeff
P.S. Yes, I did choose scrapper spec. :-) And I do see it flying around me.
Yes and yes. Is there a video? :-)
Rather than QQ-ing, I’ve been watching videos and practicing things that I see (along with reading and trying builds). It’s really helped me to play “like I was 12” and just practice what I see, so I was hoping to watch a few ambush videos to break down what people did and practice it.
-Jeff
I’m a poor player, I know that. (getting that out of the way).
Are there any videos of a warrior beating a ***good*** thief after being ambushed? I don’t care what the warrior’s build was, and it doesn’t count if the thief simply runs away.
So with that said, any videos of winning after an ambush?
-Jeff
P.S. I’ve honestly been trying, and when I walk into some small fights I’ve actually done well when mentally prepared and so on. But I haven’t the foggiest notion of what to do when I get jumped and I’m already down. Honestly, have the time I’m almost dead before targeting and orienting the camera.
P.P.S. No, I’m not running zerk gear/damage monkey gear all the time. I’ve tried a variety of builds. :-)
I’ve tried using scorpion wire, and it seems like every tiny fold in the ground blocks it. Others are able to pull me off of a keep, even when i have no LOS to them. What’s the trick?
Sorry if this is the wrong place, but is there any way we can get a bit of variety for the male armor. More military looking stuff – like the Ascalon dungeon armor? Maybe something like Byzantine armor, or Arabian, or Persian? It doesn’t need to be head-to-toe armor, just some metal in strategic spots, and leather/cloth in other areas.
And more tunics? Less coats? :-)
-Jeff
I just logged in – it’s 7:50pm EST. JQ has one supply camp on a border, and that’s it.
There’s a period of time around 4pm EST to 9pm EST where JQ has practically no presence.
This is my “follow the zerg” build. Mix valkyrie/soldier/zerker/marauder to your taste. Pick whatever secondary weapon makes you giggle. Most of your life is spent in glint with fury & might active; the fury, in particular, is going to give you a lot of bonuses from traits and your rune of rage. You should be running swiftness outside of combat, but during combat you are being more selective.
I run shiro because it’s the best catch or retreat stance.
I just realized I didn’t say it, but in case it’s not obvious, the hammer is far and away the best zerg weapon. Enjoy it.
-Jeff
Those are just some carefully crafted words on a news website; to my mind, they resemble political spin at best.
If the devs were serious, they would be iterating content, the words would be in these forums, not a news website, they would be responding to WvW forum posts often, and they wouldn’t have done a lot of what they did (too much PvE in WvW).
Anyways, it doesn’t matter; what matters are WvW populations. If the populations rise, then great the Devs have time to introduce more/fix/whatever it is they want to do to achieve a long-term vision. If they shrink, they can say anything or do anything they like and it won’t matter, as people will simply move on to other games.
Make the first place borderland the alpine map, then sit back and watch for a few weeks and compare.
I have an engineer main that I mostly wvw with. For HoT I dusted off my thief because staff seemed cool, and took him to the new PvE zones. Thus far he is underwhelming – I need to be really on my game to get past a lot of the content, and mistakes are scary. I then brought in my engie and was able to bludgeon my way through content, only needing twitch skills when I screwed up by aggroing too much, and that allowed me to handle much more than thief.
I’m going to take a more careful look at my thief, as I do have some thoughts, but right now he seems weak.
Elite Specializations & Hero Point Feedback [Merged]
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: jaif.3518
As far as the new hero points are concerned – I love it. They take work to get to, and they can be challenging which require small groups. I actually like the gate behind some because it’s great motivation to explore more areas and unlock more masteries.
I’m not a fan of PvE, I play this game for WvW. Having said that, I actually like trying to get these hero points, and working with others to kill the champs. It’s fun, though I imagine a few months down the line it will be impossible without a guild group to help you.
HOWEVER, they should have other rewards, not “hero points” which gate my specialization. I want to defeat these things with my specialization.
if you know what the ele is using for weapons and what passives are activating during combat you can easily counter him …
Easily? Countering an ELE is one of the harder things to do, even if you do pick up on all that. Ele’s main strength is the sheer number of tools in his box of tricks.
Nice vid, OP. Gave me a lot to think through.
Each button on the medkit should be a PBAE except the #1 button. E.g. PBAE stab on X cooldown, PBAE condi clear on Y cooldown, etc. None of this ground-targetted stuff; let me equip, spray, do my thing, then move onto the next kit.
It absolutely needs a buff. My thoughts:
1 – same heal, buff the numbers or range.
2 – castable water field
3 – PBAE condi clear
4 – PBAE stability
5 – PBAE stun break and 1s prevention
And guess what? YOU CAN STILL PLAY A RANGER!!
By yourself. If you though bearbow was unwanted before, wait until you get kicked 10x by groups who tell you to get to the back and staff-it-up.
Why cant you do both dps and heal, like being a hyrbid?
Its not like you lost access to other weapons and traits. Even the Staff 1 was pumping out some decent damage.
Have you seen how garbage your damage is with healer runes/sigils/accessories ? If you want to even remotely deal decent damage you dress for success.
I think all of you who are celebrating the new Druid revelation do not seriously main as a ranger.
If i was interested in main healing i seriously doubted i would have made a ranger 3 years ago. I more than likely would have expected my Guardian to be the main heals.
Agreed with all you said. Also want to point out that if they do allow druid to do decent DPS and main heal at the same time then druids will be vastly overpowered.
Maybe that’s what we’ll see, 5 druids crushing all the content.
Color me very dissapointed, first ventari now druid. Trinity or bust!
-Jeff
I have no idea how we can be so far apart; the daredevil spec seemed great to me, and a lot of cool build ideas came to mind.
i do hope they work on staff a bit: its promising, but a bit rough (many have noted specifics, wont tangent here).
Regarding scrapper, i wasnt impressed with gyros, though i reseve judgment until i try them. Hammer seemed quite cool, though.
PvP is the next forum over. That’s the game format where you should look for fair fights.
Your statement about invis+1200 is silly. We’re already snipers. Not being able to see us while we line up a shot is exactly what is happening right now. Everyone has a ranged weapon that could hit us at 1200 and at our current range. You can’t see us now and you are in range to respond in kind. So what about the range and invisibility is an issue?
Because at range 1200 a well-built stealthing thief will never get hit. Nobody could line up AoEs to reveal, nobody could click on us fast enough to use their reveal power. We would be the fishbowl warriors I was saying – everyone is a fish in a bowl, and we reach our hands in with impunity and pull them out.
Even if revealed, at range 1200 it’s no issue to dodge a couple of times and get out. Nobody would ever land a blow.
-Jeff
At least Karl acknowledged that pistols need help. first thing I would do is make them 1200 range, —-—considering we are the only profession in game that has no 1200 range weapon.—— Even with DareDevil we get no 1200. Sure steal is 1200. But who wants to steal into a Boss who has a huge PB aoe and cleave?
Stealth + 1200 = OP
Look, I love pistols and want to see them buffed, but making thieves into snipers is idiotic for the game. A whole bunch of fishbowl warriors looking to see who dips their hand into the bowl to try to get the stupid little GWENs swimming around.
Personally I think the pistol stealth attack needs to be changed to moar damage and cripple, not bleed. That will synergize with the trait.
Ignoring damage, I think we need the following for staff:
First, most important, make staff #4 a knockdown so the staff has an interrupt.
Second, staff #2 needs to target like heartseeker, not be directional.
Third, the AA is clunky, please redo it. My suggestion is not to follow the standard 3-strike pattern, but just have it be a quick poke with a few different animations.
They gave us a decent smorgasborg of runes, but how do you get others (outside of trying pvp)?
Agreed honestly. The current way the game works is basically like this:
Every can do anything. Everything is about YOU. All fights are individual.
Which removes the whole ‘team’ aspect. Everyone does damage. Everyone does support. Everyone heals.
<snip>
Which leads into…
Zerker meta. Why waste time building defense, health, healing, etc. when none of that matters since the whole point of every fight is to never ever be hit. You want pure damage. Always.
In PvP (and WvW) there are many builds and nobody can be everything. What you describe is not a failure of the game, it is a failure of PvE specifically. They need to beef up the AI and make it hard, not beef up the health and make it tedious.
Besides face of elements in dragon stance, is there any other speed skills/traits with revenant? I’m looking but don’t see any.
-Jeff
lol, just went back and tested lyssa, and i’m wrong. That works off of med kit. Really strange system here.
I can confirm. I went to the mists and fought the practice thief. The bandage self is what does it. I also tried runes of lyssa, and that seemed to work off of bandage self as well.
One good thing from this is that a static discharge build would benefit from moving the heal from 6 to the toolbelt. But with med kit nearly useless I’m not sure if that’s enough.
-Jeff
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Med_Kit
Activating or stowing the kit triggers on-heal effects; using the kit’s five skills (or its tool belt skill) does not.
Going by the wiki, it does. I used to use rune of the centaur a long time ago to give swiftness.
-Jeff
Does Med Kit trigger inventions “cleansing synergy” (pbae condi clear) and “heal resonator” (pbae regen)?
I’m not sure where I could test that.
Bonus question: does it trigger “Bowl of Saffron-scented Poultry Soup”
I mostly WvW, and it’s hard to test these things running with the zerg. I seem to be clearing conditions, but I’m so involved in what I’m doing I really can’t be certain.
-Jeff
a) good job – aiming at the big blue pin is job 1 for range. (job 2 is finishing downies). With mortar, you need to aim ahead of the pin somewhat.
b) I always save my mortar 5 (water field) for blue tag as well.
c) necro, guards, engineer, ele.
I don’t care about PvE either – I do it under duress so I can level for WvW. So far all I see for WvW from the expansion is a new class and new specializations. I think we’ll all get access to the new maps, even if we don’t buy the expansion.
The only problem I have with thiefs is the fact that thiefs unique trait is stealth but other classes have stealth which makes thief not as special.
No, steal is unique, not stealth.
I think i figured it out – cloak and dagger stop your auto attack, traps don’t. So you have to deselect, trap, then re-select. Real pain.
I recently made a thief and leveled him quickly to 80. I was trying a P/P build with rune of the trapper, but I’m having a hard time getting the sneak attack to work. I have done P/D, and no problem with cloak and dagger followed by sneak attack, but a lot of the times when I put down a trap my next shot is a regular attack, not a sneak attack.
Is there some rule or trick to this?
-Jeff
Like many players I have a stable of characters. I mostly join the zerg or smaller groups in WvW. In my experience, my glassstaff elelementalist is much more productive for the same number of deaths as my glassbow ranger. Sure, I can be even safer as ranger, but I’ll get fewer kills.
I expect I could do better roaming with the glassBow ranger vs my ele, but I prefer other builds in both classes for roaming. A glass DD Ele should destroy a glassbow ranger 1v1.
(edited by jaif.3518)
It’s the same situation as level 1-20 in Guild Wars 1. They’ve extended 60 more levels in this game for the simple reason in game design called ‘content consumption’.
While I agree with the thrust of your post, I disagree here. In nightfall and factions 1-20 was a pleasant little tutorial. There was tons of PvE after 20. Prophecies wasn’t so bad either, but it did become a bit strained to me.
I did not mind making new characters in guild wars 1. I’ve had to force myself to level up the 4 80s that I have, and I do that mostly through WvW.
Thank you for the information about tomes of knowledge – I may try PvP.
I like WvW. I really, really dislike quests, world events, bosses, and the usual tropes of a theme park. Others differ, and that’s fine, but I’m a bit frustrated that my WvW ability has to be curtailed by PvE.
I really wish they’d just level everyone to 80 in WvW, let them where PvP armor, etc. Players who enjoy PvE could still participate in all their ascended, dungeon-armor glory, so nothing would be lost, other than some easy victories over lower level opponents.
Flamethrower 1 has a 1.5 skill coefficient and takes 2.57 seconds (according to wiki). Grenade has a .33 skill coefficient for each 3 grenades, and takes .85 seconds. Assuming all 3 grenades hit, the grenades will hit 1.995 times harder than the flamethrower. As long as flamethrower’s skill coefficient remains that low, it will never compete with grenades in direct damage. You’d need to nearly double your power through might stacks for flamethrower to beat out grenades (with all 3 hitting).
Speaking solely about WvW, the bolded parts are the absolute key. Grenades rock when they land, and they are great for keeping you at range. But if you want to mix-it up in a keep fight or anywhere close quarters, the flamethrower is a far handier weapon and much more likely to connect. Grenades that fall behind someone do no damage.
Both will tag lots of people in a zerg fight, if that’s your goal. I tend to get more bags with the flamethrower, but I think that’s partly because I’m forced to be more aggressive, and aggressive gameplay leads to bags.
Again, I said in WvW. PvE is a different animal.
Sorry, typing with a 5-year old distracting me. :-)
Want elixer gun? Toss 20 into explosives, and take recharge and range. Want healing bombs? 10 in explosives for radius, then 30 in inventions for elixir-infused bombs. You can also substitute AED for healing turret, and add healing to your equipment until you’re comfortable with your numbers.
For me, the basics were getting speed and protection.
-Jeff
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fcMQFAEnIE17azLUvGJGVgzhUU47LSh+tMA-jUgA1eR0YBA-w
This is what I’ve been using as the core of my build, with PVT equipment all over and superior rune of the earth to get more protection. Put 20 into explosives for bombs, 20 into firearms for flamethrower.
I’m still tweaking it, but with super speed, rocket boots, and 25% base speed you can generally keep up and move around.
Don’t like AED? I’m just testing it right now, feel free to swap out. I think it fits the build, but the 1s activation does make it really hard sometimes.
So, how does an engineer with med kit and rune of centaur (=perma swiftness, esp with med kit 5), rocket boots for a leap, and slick shoes for double speed stack up?
Sums up how we are thought of as Rangers in wvw.
No it doesn’t Zergs are only part of the game. Ask about forming a 2-man havoc group and you’ll get many different answers, with Rangers being part of them.
As for Zergs, backline Rangers can certainly be effective. They may make easy pickings if their not careful, but otherwise they can put out damage and are relatively safe.
In WvW I rarely get killed by mesmers, but I can’t pin them down unless they make mistakes. Of course that varies by their build.
Thieves, otoh, are vastly overpowered. The simple fact of the matter is that a thief in WvW only dies if they want to, assuming reasonable gear and play. Sometimes they attack in the middle of too many people, others fail to reset at the right time. Most of the time, though, they either win, or reset, come back, then win.
-Jeff
I use arcane skills, but otherwise I’m similar in that I go mostly fire damage. Your elementalist has a ton of skills that can be used for escapes, so if you focus on proper positioning and avoid 1 on 1s, you should do well. Also, remember when you are running to cast skills (e.g. earth 4, air 5, others) in front of you and run over them. Your lunging pursuers will appreciate it. :-)
One other thing – when you see the enemy ball-up, learn when to be bold and fly through your AoEs as fast as you can. Those blobs are not the borg – they’re talking on TS, thinking strategy, etc, and if you catch them you can do amazing damage very fast.
Actually, that brings to mind one more thing – just because you are focussed on fire doesn’t mean that you should only do fire. Use the tools that you have.