Guild Wars 2

I am a returning player. Used to run hammer/gs and focused on earthshatter, and burst with 1k sword ability. Is that still a thing? I’m a little lost with the changed screen for traits.

Eh, sorry Jeknar.6184. I said I just came back to the game after a hiatus.

From some of the comments on here, I guess the real issue is that WvW is treated as a large objective based competition, rather than an open world rvr area. When there is a scoring system in place it becomes less about combat and testing yourself against other players, and more about doing everything you can to win the game.

Not saying that there is anything wrong with that, but I think I just realized that its not what I am looking for, and not what I keep hoping it is.

Fun is the right answer. WvW is a lot about objectives, but its also fun to fight people. Laying an ambush and engaging enemies means nothing when they can just run away. Or you can chase them for 10 minutes until they find a keep or a zerg makes you run away.

The whole point of this topic was that extreme mobility is fine in the combat system, but being able to escape with the same mobility makes the “player vs player” more into “players capturing objectives, and sometimes having incidental combat with other players. But don’t worry, you can always run away if you want.” There is very limited investment into engaging an enemy, which makes non objective fights very dis-interesting and “cheap”.

True, I can’t. But I also believe that if you get in an even fight and lose 2 guys, it shouldn’t be as easy as it is to escape.

Even in your situation you can fight 10v5, kill a few, and then the rest will bounce.

Came back after a hiatus and only 1 hour into WvW’ing (roaming) I still find myself frustrated with what I think is the only thing that holds this game back.

WvW is all about escaping fights. There are rarely any equal # fights (closely #‘d at least) that doesn’t involve kiting and one side running away. Even 1v4 fights involve 4 guys trying desperately to slow down that warrior or thief who is just flying away. In the end, its just too annoying to kill anything when one side wants to leave.

Its a result of the combat style, and doesn’t effect fighting over objectives. But i find it as the sole reason why I don’t want to log in. Anyone else hate this?

SkyShroud.2865:

I shall answer TS question with a question. Why the people prefer to roam in WvW and not do pvp?

Zerg has been there since many many many MMOs. How effective is a zerg is subjective to how the game is designed. It is not uncommon to see hundreds of players diving through choke points to break into kingdom or castle in other games. It is not uncommon to see hundreds of players getting wiped by a few destructive AOEs but they continue to try breaking the choke point anyway.

For guild wars 2, zerging is very effective and the game is designed so. Can TS enlighten me on how to take down a sieged keep without zerg?

A solid question, and as a Roamer I’ll answer.

I prefer WvW because of the random nature of the fights vs. what Spvp offers. I like that there is a larger map that I can have fights on. I prefer using the gear that I took time to aquire, plus I feel like I am using MY character, not a pvp placeholder. I like how not everyone I fight is equally equipped or balanced for small man fights. I like how I can roam and a fight can go from 1v1, to 1v5, to 5v5, and escalate higher. I like how I can help siege and defend siege, and can assist zergs from sides.

While I “hate” zergers because they ruin some of my good fights and cause me to run away a lot, the reality is that without them the population wouldn’t be sustainable and wvw would suck. The ugly truth is that zergs make WvW in any game work, they give mediocre or less intense players a way to win fights and be involved, while letting people who want more of a challenge play around the edges. If everyone was to 5 man, you would have good fights but it wouldn’t feel like a chaotic war, just a predictable bro-fest that everyone would quit.

Keep zerging zergers. But maybe take pity on those small groups that you see and don’t chase them across the zone.

Ostra.3927:

A pure PvE player can get Ascended trinkets, weapons, and soon to be armor MUCH faster then a pure WvW player.

So those that PvE to get the items, can then jump into WvW and be better geared then someone who has dedicated themselves to the gamemode?? Not equal which is fine… but BETTER?

This is just stupid. Devon probably doesnt get a choice in this… but even he has got to know how stupid this idea is. It forced real RvR players away from WoW and it has forced MOST real WvW players away from GW2 already. We are left with the people that love the GW2 game sticking it out while getting punched in the nose repeatedly by the devs.

You’ve got a lot of wrong things in that post.
A pure pve player will be able to get ascended weapons faster, but by definition he will not have the desire to wvw, so thats irrelevant. If he decides to, he will have a small advantage in gear, and a large disadvantage of lack of experience, knowledge, and practice time. You should not be rewarded for being dedicated to only playing one part of the game. The reward should be the experience of playing your favorite part of the game.

Also, RvR players didn’t leave WoW because of the gear grind, they left it because it was a pve game and only had 2 realms.

@Vena
Love the last one.

Part of the joy of open world pvp is that you have to invest in your character to be in the top. That makes pve bearable, since you know that you are experiencing it and furthering your character’s ability to pvp. If you remove the link between wvw and pve, I would no longer have a reason to pve, which is inherently bad. I now have nothing to do in game if I get bored of WvW (like this week, where I am in Japan and can only play at odd hours. Dragonbrand owns everything when I’m on, and there is NOTHING to do in WvW) and will likely log off or be disenchanted with the game quicker.

Please anet, don’t separate WvW from pve. As an old school gamer this system has worked previously and works now, and it should not be changed. I want to invest in my character and see returns, even if that means I have to plan gear aquisitions and step into the rest of the game world to get it. If I wanted perfectly fair, I would play something that is not an MMO.

Yes.

This gives a GREAT way for small groups to effect WvW.
-You will split up zergs to cap the points
-it isn’t effected by 100 people standing on one
-it’s unique wvw gameplay including terrain elements-
-it promotes intelligent play via knockbacks, stability, etc…
-the stat increase isn’t gamebreaking for zergs vs zergs.

The most important part: stomping getting points = smaller gameplay and not just aoe everything down. This is the first thing that has been implemented that makes KILLING players effect the WvW score. It is a great addition.

Let me say that again: KILLING PLAYERS HELPS YOUR WORLD.

No.

Ascended gear is a good way to keep the progression of your character going. I want my character to be my character, not seperate between wvw, pve, and pvp. Creating more separation via scaling down gear just makes me feel more disconnected to the world. The stat separation of ascended vs exotic is not large enough to warrant it not taking part in wvw.

For me its been almost the same as Ecto. I salvaged ~10 exotics and have 13 dark matter. I’m probably on the lucky side, but I figured I would post to let people know that there is a lucky side.

Also I have gotten 3 Dark Matter from two different exotics, so that can happen.

So [Hot] is kind of funny on Emhry Bay. And by funny I mean embarrassing, and bad.

Anyone know this engineer? I want to ask him a couple questions about his build

[Bush] been having some really good small man fights with a few groups out there this weekend. Thank you to everyone who engaged us.

I want to give a shout out to a Necro in [hot] who runs solo. Not sure what his name is, but I want to know how you figured out how to screen drag in this game. As soon as a fight goes sour, you start lagging around and skipping. Should be a fun fraps if I find you again out there.

[BUSH] had some good fights with that group from [BS] and I think there was a [Zero] in there as well. After you embarrassed us in the first fight of the night I’m glad you gave us the chance to find you again and redeem ourselves.

Always fun with [AoN] too, but our 5 isn’t quite enough to beat you yet. Were working on it though, hopefully we’ll still be matched up by the time we figure something out.

I had an enjoyable time seeing [AoN] last night. Racta and Shinty’s group is making a comeback under the [Bush] tag, we’re currently building up a 5man group that we plan to roam with. Would love to set up some 5v5’s in a couple weeks if you guys are dtf.

Are the guys that played WAR still in the guild? Narian’s kitten kitten still running things?

This post is spot on. I ran the same two builds (same first, a little different second) and I thought I was the best player in the game roaming WvWvW with the regen build. Then I realized it was just the build and I slap 1-5 without thought and still win most of the time.

My guild is setting up a Warrior, Guardian, Ele, and Necro group to try out. It’s only 4, but we only have 4 that play now so we’ll do what we do.

I like the idea of the downed state but it has its faults.

They should kill two birds with one stone and implement a new weapon that enables the weilder to rally and rez. Making him into a medic. Then remove rally from everyone so that if you want to be a dedicated healer, you are a dedicated rallier.
You would still be able to rally yourself when downed, if people leave you alone for ~1 minute, you deserve to be back in the fight.

Makes it harder to rally people and still keeps the spirit of the downed state. It also wouldn’t create “Group looking for healer” because any class can swap the rally weapon out of combat and become the dedicated healer when needed.

It’s a troll post. Bad one too. One of those rangers who instead of trying the changes just kittenes about it.

I like how he contradicts himself too. The pet is running around chasing people being useless, but also giving away his position while stealthed by standing next to him.

Bad post all around.

@cimon
That’s precisely what I mean. Some guilds just want to kill enemies and participate in smaller scale fights. But still be part of the realm and contribute. Right now WvWvW doesn’t allow us too, its either cap points or zerg around to defeat the enemy zergs.

We want to help the realm, but we also want to fight players and not just the extremes, zergs or stragglers. And we don’t want to have to play with objectives and risk a huge zerg chasing us just to draw people out to fight.

Its extremely useful. I’ll list a few uses I’ve used so far:

ANYTIME: Offensively to put vuln on (and get another crit when they fix that). Stealth stomp. Stealth rez. Break target and let your pet dps while you relocate.

LARGE SCALE FIGHT: Escaping the notice of a pack of players (use at low health or when they target you). Escaping from that thief which just loves to stealth fight in a chaotic melee. Creeping up on a enemy on the outskirts of the fight. Getting through a chokepoint. If you get separated from your group and you need to quickly get back to them.

SMALL SCALE FIGHT: Break targetting. Use when enemies are training on you. When enemy is about to use big combo. Start the fight with it so they don’t know which direction you are coming from. Use to close the distance.

Just a few WvW uses that I’ve in a few hours playing with it. Biggest issue is to break myself of the habit of using #3 as an opener. That will come in time.

Topic started in WvWvW forum.
The main jist is that there should be instanced pvp maps between the three realms that count towards your realms WvWvW score. Improving small scale involvement in WvWvW and fostering realm pride for people who don’t like zerging keeps or killing stragglers/supply lines every time they want to help their realm.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Scenarios-which-count-towards-score/first#post2484839

Why isn’t their some sort of instanced pvp maps that count towards your realms WvWvW score?

The pvp game is fun, and it keeps everything very balanced, but there is a disconnect between your character and you when pvping. I think being able to use your full character in the pvp maps with a group you can queue against your matchups realms would be a great idea to boost smaller guilds input into WvWvW. If the results of these matches could help your realms WvW score, maybe a fourth income wheel dependent on % of matches won. You could limit the # of matches available at one time (just like a WvW map) so that it doesn’t detract the population from WvWvW.

I believe it would be a great way to foster more realm pride for people who enjoy small scale fights, as well as a way to involve smaller guilds into the WvWvW scene. It would also be a great way for guilds from opposing realms to fight each other and have it mean something, without having to coordinate and switch to pvp.

Just like every open world pvp game before this, GvG is best when formulated by the players. If you take roamers and Guilds running around looking for fights out of the WvWvW maps, you are left with giant zergs steamrolling keeps and each other. You would barely ever see anyone moving around the map outside of the zerg and WvWvW would end up being brutally boring for a large population of players.

Instead, they should focus on making it so there is more room to roam in the WvWvW maps, make changes to split up huge zergs, and make changes where killing players actually helps the realms score. Even add a “scenarios” where Guilds can fight other realms guilds in pvp maps but the winning realm helps the WvWvW score.

My group and I want to help the realm, but we don’t want to run around taking objectives and camping zerg straggler routes and supply lines. Let us help the realm by winning GvG pvp matches and roaming and killing players.

I have realm pride too, I just can’t stand skill lag when we have 150 people on the screen, and fighting doors.
Made a topic on this: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Scenarios-which-count-towards-score/first#post2484839

I’d rather have the extended vulnerability on my long range shots rather than rapid fires.

Also I like how people say long bow burst is gone, and then in the same post mention that rapid fire takes too long to channel to be considered burst. Wut?

I agree that Eagle Eye is hard to live without. I like piercing arrows in big fights and zerging, but its situational if your soloing or picking at the edges. Spotter is always useful but never exceptional.
I think remorseless will be great once they fix the auto-crit. Especially for people who are power based, but aren’t using heavy crit chance/damage. It will give you a nice way to use hunters shot and get an offensive boost out of it.

Stacking it from dwayna’s, shouts, Oakheart salve from wildness survival line, and natures bounty from nature magic line.

Also I use healing spring instead of trolls which stacks more regen. During battle all the things stack and end up giving me perma regen.

Thanks for the similar builds guys.

I like the marksmen line, but I definitely see the benefit to staying with all the healing and perks in BM. I’m halfway to getting my cleric suit and I’ll try out both and see which suits me better.

Remorseless + Opening strikes + 25 points in marksmen gives you 100% crit on opening strikes.

@Daze
Thats the thing. We now have to make some choices when speccing. It’s a pretty new thing to rangers and I’m excited for it.

It’s not like they took away the vulnerability. They just gave you an actual reason to press rapid fire. Troll post?

Alright, new ranger patch!
This is my new thoughts on WVW solo play.
I used to run a longbow build because that is how I wanted to play my ranger. The spec was http://www.gw2build.com/builds/simulator.php#1.6.9.3.0.15.0.0.0.0.131.137.139.145.151.10.8.31.380.385.387.394.400.0.411.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.30.25.15.0.0

But it never had enough survivability.

So I switched to the “RRR” spec and have been having a lot of fun being a tanky regen ranger with condition damage.

Well now these changes are just too good to longbow to pass up. I’m thinking of switching to a cleric based build so I have some of the healing, and some of the new longbow stuff.
http://www.gw2build.com/builds/simulator.php#1.6.9.3.0.21.0.0.0.0.133.141.139.145.151.1.1.26.380.385.387.0.0.0.407.413.416.423.0.0.0.0.0.30.0.30.10.0

Longbow and sword/horn.
I’ve got the goodies from marksmen and longbow, and the power to back it up. Then I have fury from horn, pet and runes of rage to go with it.

Defensively I have the regens, blast heal from the horn, and toughness. Plus the sword evades/escapes. With a little condition removal on the side.

Do you think it will work? Or will it just be mediocre damage and mediocre survivability? I’ve got to go out and get the clerics stuff (just spent 40 laurels on apothecary ascended jewelry like 2 days ago…) but I’m hoping it plays fun.

@kichwas
It’s only good for a few builds. Condition builds and soloing builds don’t have as much use for it. And it’s definitely not mandatory, because crit chance is easy to get. The difference between 40% crit and 50% crit isn’t that good, especially when you factor in how easy it is to get fury

The RRR build definitely still works. You feel the dps nerf to the pets though, or at least I feel like I wasn’t doing as much dps yesterday.

I was thinking of using the runes of the grove as cheap replacements for forge so I can try out this new spec over the RRR.

This is why you don’t make dumb threads like this. The devs find a way to make a post without answering any of our actual questions.

On a side note: Love the game, love my ranger, keep up the good work gents.

As a condition/bunker build I was using axe/torch and shortbow. It was a nice combo and probably not as powerful as axe/dagger and sword/torch. It still worked pretty well, and let me hold a bow for fluff reasons. The range nerf will probably make me end up getting a sword and dagger to replace the shortbow since its now just a subpar condition weapon, rather than a trade off.

While not a huge deal, it still stinks for people who like using a bow for image reasons. Or I’ll just suck it up and keep using the short bow.

It’s very noticeable. In WvWvW I switch from axe to SB when an enemy dodges or leaps a good distance away. That way I can hit them with a cripple or stun and catch up. Now I find myself swapping weapons and still out of range.

It’s a learning curve, but it does stink. Especially since the LB doesn’t have any conditions so its unusable in those builds.

Interesting build. I just finished my RRR suit right before the leaked changes, so I’m a little annoyed because I was enjoying it a lot. The passive heal ticks were really awesome.

Your condition alternate in the OP, it drops the passive heals and instead adds more protections to the mix instead. Also in the exchange, you get a spammable regen and swiftness. I am understanding that all correctly? And since you have a way to get swiftness up near always, is signet of the hunt worthless? I am guessing so, but that means I have to be pressing guard every 15s while running around, so no more eating and playing…

Same. I’m a returning player (2 months) as well

I love the class, and I think we are close to being balanced. We have upsides, we have downsides, but with a few bug fixes we’d be close to perfect.

Sadly beating thieves 1v1 doesn’t shut them up. They just blame it on something stupid and keep saying they same things to other rangers.

Well a lot of people making blanket statements about how easy it is to dodge certain LB attacks and how LB #1 doesn’t hit hard.
In mixed gear WvW, my #1 is critting for 2.5k. Against glass cannons I’m getting 3.5k. At max range, thats a ton of damage. Your also looking at 6k damage from rapid fire.

Any player with a brain can dodge? How about when they get wolf feared? Or dog knocked down? Or after you use #4? Hound root? Then use one of your 3 quicknesses and rapid fire. 3/4ths of the rapid fire will hit in any of the situations above.
If YOU have a brain, you can time your quickness rapid fires until after they have used their dodges trying to avoid the #1 shots.

Play with the whole class guys.

Also, @ Dakheus, hunters shot is great in WvWvW.

Disclaimer: I play WvWvW. Thats all I do, so this is based on that.

Very hard to kill a good thief. If they thief is a chain stealther, it should be almost impossible for him to kill you as well.

Either way the thief is specced, they can usually get away any time they want. The trick is that they WANT you to follow them, cause then they get their cooldowns and strat ready and own you quickly. DONT play into their game. Chase at a safe distance and prepare to kite at a moments notice or DONT chase at all. Forcing a thief to run away from a fight HE chose is a win in my book. If he wants to stop being a kitten and actually fight to the death, well he’s welcome to come back.

In general for thieves I attempt to get a rapid fire off anytime they are likely to stealth. A quickness rapid fire is better because if they don’t think to roll right away, they take too much damage to recover from. That brings me to the key to fighting high damage thieves. DO DAMAGE. They lack defenses, so bring them down quickly and efficiently and you will be alright. Also use 2 dogs, the CC they bring is imperative for killing them. Knockdowns give you a second+ of them not being able to dodge or stealth. Longbow knockback also does a knockdown for you.

When you go down, don’t give up. The wolf howl is great at stopping a stomp, as is getting lucky with any of the dogs knockdown. Using the pet CC and #2, you can keep yourself up long enough to rez with the pet and if the thiefs not quick you can bandage and petrez yourself back up, i’ve done it. Also while stopping the stomp dont forget to throw dirt. If you down the thief while you are downed you have a 90% chance of beating his kitten as long as your pet rez doesn’t bug out.

Lastly: when they stealth house, i rush in and frost trap plus swing my sword around. you’ll hit him a couple times. My newest move is to actually run in an use #5 with offhand axe. It will hit most of the area, so they might panic and move out of it if his health was too low, which it usually is because they save the house for trouble.

Don’t despair when you die to thieves. Their play style is to pick the best situation you can and if it gets hairy, to escape. Experience is your friend so learn from every thief death until you start killing them more than they kill you.

Judging by the increase in rangers playing in WvWvW, I would venture to say that the past fixes have been good to us. Any further balance must be made with careful precision to prevent us from becoming monsters.

@bambula,

Don’t spread lies. I use LB and win many 1v1s, small fights, and 5v5s.
In fact I’ve never lost to a shortbow ranger 1v1 either.

@Casey, i meant LB for soloing. LB for small group fights. LB for zerg fights. not soling zergs.

In wvwvw theory, you will get one shot at an approaching enemy. In wvwvw REALITY you get lots of long range shots because of kiting, distractions, not 1v1 situations, etc.

Don’t put arguments in a vacuum. A lot of the times, enemies don’t have the luxury to make sure they are close range to you, because of other circumstances going on. When put in practice, it is generally pretty easy to get mid-range and long-range shots off at targets. This is especially true when dealing with players who run away.

For WVWVW go long bow, its way better than a short bow. Soloing, small groups and zergs included.

You just can’t beat the burst on long range shot in addition to vulnerability and the extra range.

Hey, I want to give a shout out to the Emory Bay thief that I had an epic fight with this morning around 11am EST. You’ve got a legendary dagger i think.

I had you down when those yaks killed my bud and that got you up. Then we ran around for fools for like 20 minutes until you finally got me.

Just wanted to say great fight. Most instense thing i’ve been in awhile. Great use of headshot, it got me so frustrated I snapped my headset in half when I died. I wanted to win that one pretty badly heh.

This is phinz, big norn ranger with the floppy hat btw

Its just a tooltip bug. We are receiving 25% but the tooltip says 10%.