Guild Wars 2

nagr.1593:

Usually zerk stats for all classes. I think assassins is something like 0-1% better than zerk at best, so just go with power/precision/ferocity with power as main stat. Now that I’m comfortable with Ele I can go full zerk, but I know some like to add some toughness/vitality because its very squishy otherwise. try something like knights (power/precision/toughness) if you are starting out.

Doesn’t that pretty much illustrate how broken things are? The current state of power/brute force >>> everything is pretty bad.

Always easy to tell what the current metas are — just see what gear/runes cost the most on the TP

tl;dr: Anet mechanics cause direct conflict with ranger mechanics.

Ranged is an important aspect of any tactical situation. Melee has it’s place, as does ranged and support (even without the “trinity”, we’re talking just pure tactical layout). Right now, range suffers in contrast with melee, and ranger’s get the brunt end of it. Their class design is a selfish one (on purpose) with little thought to the groups-are-everything mentality currently existing in game (truth be told; I don’t care. I roll solo 90% of the time w/ ranger).

I don’t mind melee rangers, but I tend not to want to play them often. I dislike having to play a specific loadout just to get in a group. If I want a lazy faceroll with a big shiny blade, I switch over to warrior. The pet mechanics do lend itself to reduced situational awareness as someone levels (dodge, etc) but there isn’t really anyway around that. Hell, with self-healing shout warriors back in the day…I don’t think I ever dodged from 1-80 pve LOL.

I want my machinegun-esque shortbow back and some sort of area procs for ranged that would actually help folks. Bearbow…not so much. Never was a fan (well, unless we count the closed beta weekends hehe).

I don’t see an issue in the conversion of gems <—> gold. Both options satisfy either party. EVE has been doing this forever, you can buy PLEX with currency in game, or buy a PLEX w/ RMT and convert it into ISK. It’s a win win.

I’ve converted gems into gold, and vice versa. I don’t understand the hate for supporting an IP you like… o.O

lunyboy.8672:

Forestnator.6298:

You can easily hit 15 stacks of might with bombs or grenades and with some effort even 20-25 stacks. What is again the point? FT still sucks.

^This. It’s useful as a utility kit, especially in pvp for area denial, but that’s about it.

Meh, to each their own. If I want to be forced into a specific build, I’d play the plethora of other cookie cutter MMO’s.

So I returned after a very long absence, dusted off the 40 engineer and took him to 74 as of this morning…using mostly FT. I like it, I use it.

What is interesting to me is that, completely untraited, a heavy golem in the mist drops with bomb#1 in the same amount of time as FT#1. Bomb hits harder on paper, but their times still evened out over and over again. Even traited to favor the FT (juggernaut, etc) is still came out the same. I thought #1 bomb would outshine the FT1 much more than it is (?!). The other abilities are debatable – like anything else, situation dictates the tool.

Sucks that they’ve capped the number of FT targets to 3… I don’t remember that from closed beta, but it’s been a long time heh. I guess the reasoning there is that it’s got nearly 3x the range as the bombs. Still think it should be capped at the cone dispersal rather than max # of hits at any moment…but whatever

On the topic of “good vs. bad” — GW2 has devolved into the same number hungry meta as other MMO’s. To make matters worse, being the pay model that it is attracts rather unsavory elements/attitudes that are unfit for service in even the most menial of jobs. If you find yourself surrounded by people trying to tell you to play a specific way or a specific build, you’re among the toxic. Just go off and do your own thing, enjoy the beauty and don’t be afraid to try out different things.

I love my shield. I’ve yet to die solo at 53, zero down time, and I am used to the rotation.

Face pull mobs into a nice little ball w/ longbow. Drop fire. Swap to shield setup, and bash. AoE flame shield applied. Continue smacking mobs while they burn in the center as well as contact with shield. If you want, the trait to add might on block is fun when you have 7 things beating on you at once (my max was 25 stacks applied in one block session hehee). While the stacks only last 7sec untraited, with current traits they last around 12s, with the block on a 24sec CD.

I don’t feel swords aren’t useful in PVE. When I first started out, dual blades w/ cond/precision along with the arms tree ment you’re criting kitten near every swing. Throw on a few runes of earth and you’ve got yourself a never-ending bleed machine. The fun part is (as alway) swings hit multi-target, so you could block+apply, then use burst, then continue to just auto attack a group of mobs until the combined pressure brings them down.

I’ve since switched over to sword/shield with heavy survival. I didn’t hang up condition completely as I still apply bleeds, but I vew them as extra damage rather than a main source. Even though on paper the axe should pump out more dmg single/3-mob group, for some reason sword still brings them down a tad faster for me. I don’t dislike the GS, but it seems a bit to…common I guess. Hammer is fun as hell but a bit on the slow side (which coming from a sword n’ board, that means a lot) from what I’ve experienced thus far.

Granted, toon is only like 53 atm, but it’s going to be my 4th 80 on this acct. Overall been very happy with the Warrior.

So just to throw in on this — while dual shields sounds odd on paper, it has been used in history. A shield is both an offensive and defensive weapon. Since the Phalanx was described – the round shield was used highly offensivly when in 1:1 combat – stikes to the head (like a high hook strike) as well as direct bash/upper bash style hits. Now most think of shields as the bulky blocking walls – but technically anything that can be used to block/deflect was classified as shield. Targe’s were rather small but highly useful.

….annnnnnyway, in order for a dual shield to work on paper, the shields would have to be of a design where the two combined form a direct “wall” in front of the player, but seporated would be more like 2’ wide spars on the foreams of the character. Strikes as such would be similar to throwing punches, except the shield tips would extend about 1’ past the knucles. Think of it like how a baton is wielded – just wider and flat in design. You could totally make a highly defensive build out of such a character and still make it reasonable in terms of the physics of offense.

…don’t think anyone has tried it yet either in a game right?