Guild Wars 2

Mystogan.4157:

a ranger ambushed me

Mystogan.4157:

I used my invis to get the jump on him

Which is it? Because when you go into stealth in the middle of a fight for a few seconds, you’re not actually “getting the jump on” anybody.

I run around with Infiltrator’s Signet and Signet of Shadows all the time, including dungeons. The 25% speed boost is very useful. And they have really good active effects, on relatively low cooldowns.

STRanger.5120:

I think that the Runes of the Divinity are much more reliable in the terms of the Damage than sholar (10% dmg when HP > 90% kinda sux in PvE).

There’s also Ruby Orbs. Same +% crit damage, more Power and Precision at the expense of the defensive stats. Moreover, they’re like 30 times cheaper on the TP.

I also don’t like Scholar for WvW or PvE. Or for SPvP other than the one-shot burst combo build, I suppose. “Don’t get hit at all or your damage will suffer” is pretty annoying, especially in bigger fights.

What kinds of thing are you thinking of when you say “assassin”?

I like Aureate Daggers and the Krytan Shortbow. They’re both super-cheap skins, but I find beauty in their understated-for-a-video-game simplicity.

Makeshift is another good dagger skin, if you want something that looks like a short stabby knife.

xyger.7349:

Yah, while thief could probably exceed a warrior going for the highest DPS, warrior will always be able to take on more foes.

Other way around, for me. The hard stuff in this game is more about active defense than Vitality and Toughness, and thieves have good active defense.

For instance, sometimes when I get bored in WvW I go solo-cap that quaggan weather thingy in the middle of the lake, with the big pile of krait in it; I’m not sure I could do the same with a warrior. (But I’m personally not a very good warrior.)

…

Mudkip,

I’ll try to get you a more concrete example. Maybe just some timestamped screenshots of play (I can’t really do FRAPS on my setup). Seems like it would be a better overall data point than just me saying things.

I mean, presumably some of the enemies in structured also have comparatively reduced stats.

But crit damage is absurd when you pump it up as high as you can.

Basically, this was my experience while leveling:
See some mobs. Corral them together. Black Powder then autoattack… 5-1-1-1 5-1-1-1 5-1-1-1 5-1-1-1 5-1-1— they’re dead.
At 80, with exotics, in Orr, it’s more like this:
Same deal. 5-1-1-1 5-1-1-1 1 they’re dead.

Very noticeable difference. So noticeable that the first time I put on 80 exotic gear, I felt like a ninjariffic murdergod compared to my old self.

Now, can a PvE warrior specced for DPS do better? I’m honestly not sure. My suspicion is probably, but I suspect he’d have a harder time burning through big groups without getting smushed.

The catch is finding the right stuff to — evasion, blinding, &c. — to stay alive while you get those hits in. Sword/Pistol makes this pretty trivial. Some others make you work for it more.

IIRC, Dagger/Dagger has that Death Blossom evade thingy that works nicely with condition damage, but I haven’t tried it enough to really have a sense of its damage potential.

I think thieves’ SPvP stats are actually a bit underwhelming. Because the Zerk/Zerk amulet doesn’t stack up stats as nicely as wearing 14 individual pieces of Zerk gear. IIRC, it’s a damage difference of around 25% (nowadays there are also differences in some of the skills, like C&D).

I have on armor set for PvE and WvW: full zerk. Works great. Most mobs die in two passes through my autoattack chain. My clusterbombs hit like a truck, too — 4k-6k isn’t bad for a ranged area attack. (Arguably it’s not a “full” glass-cannon build since I don’t like Deadly Arts nearly as much as other thieves do. Mug and the extra Power would be nice, but I prefer to jack up my crits, dodging, and initiative regen. But, well, definitely focused on damage output.)

You mention ogres… What level are you? Straight damage-based builds don’t really work well until you’ve got access to triple-stat gear, and aren’t actually great until you’ve got exotics.

Sword/Pistol just rolls over PvE, though. At most you’ll need an anti-range skill like Smoke Screen or Dagger Storm for some fights.

Sword/Dagger is a trickier beast. I mostly WvW with it. It can work alright in PvE as well, but I feel like it really needs traits (for initiative management and blinding) and gear (for the damage boost) to succeed. Compared to S/P, your defense relies on timing rather than positioning, and you’re more likely to run out of resources during a protracted fight.

Why?

In WvW and SPvP, this would alternate between useless and super-annoying.

In PvE, you already have so many alternatives for bypassing enemies. Why do you need it?

EgonVenkman.1907:

Unless you want a legendary.

You also need Badges of Honor for a legendary. So…?

lynspottery.6529:

I have an aversion to wading through 10 baddies just to find I am faced with their ghosts just a step later and they have added a wicked grab and root ability never seen before.

This is definitely a real issue. Orr punishes slower defensive builds… perhaps a bit too much?

My recommendation — for you, for anyone else having a hard time, and for anyone who just wants it to be more fun or to be done faster — is to group up for map completion. All you need is one or two other players (with a full group of 5 it tends to turn into herding cats a bit too readily).

smug.3895:

Is this how most thieves feel?

The only time I actually get annoyed is when people launch or pull things inappropriately, if it turns what’s generally a stable battle into an unstable one.

I see people do it to downed opponents in WvW about two nights a week. Maybe this is some rare warriors misunderstanding what ‘stomp’ means?

Try Frostgorge Sound.

digiowl.9620:

The main issue with moving around Orr are the amount of mobs with long aggro and equally long pull CC. Sure, you can dodge. But that just means that the third pull rather than the first pull gets you.

So kill them and move on instead of trying to run past them. It doesn’t take that long to kill all the guys along the path of your daily Orichalchum jog.

There are a few little pockets that are really hard to explore solo — places where the mob density is really high and there is some particularly nasty temple effect — but 90% of Orr can be done solo with relative ease. If you’re having trouble just moving around at all, it may be a good sign you need to explore new tactics or refine your build.

I don’t think any server’s PvE activity is really based on WvW performance. Those bonuses are worth something but nobody actively sits around waiting for WvW numbers to go up before doing a dungeon.

Tarnished Coast, as the “unofficial RP server,” supposedly has a lot of people who are diehard PvE-only players (I guess because they want nice skins for “roleplaying”?). It’s kind of a weird stereotype because TC also has a pretty consistent WvW following, though. Seems like speculation for the most part.

TC was doing a pretty good job with Orr over the last two weeks (keeping temples open and such), as far as I could tell. So, our PvE landscape certainly isn’t desolate.

Skills like Unload, Pistol Whip, and Hundred Blades show a running total of the damage dealt, not the damage per each hit. So that last big number on Unload is how much you got for the whole volley.

Shortbow is totally a real ranged weapon. More real than P/P, really. It’s just also good up close.

Same.4687:

If you run power/prec/crit dam and you don’t have Mug you are cheating yourself out of free damage. There is no other skill that will be as useful as Mug is with those stats.

It does less for Sword/Dagger because the build isn’t all about spike compression. I’ve seen SPvP videos that make good use of Mug in S/D, but often they hold Steal back for a final little finishing burst rather than leading with it (Infiltrator’s Strike instead, to set up an escape path if anything goes wrong).

In WvW, Mug’s cooldown leaves me cold. I benefit from faster Initiative gain and 4-second stealth far more often than I would benefit from the once-every-45-seconds mini-burst.

@Snoring Sleepwalker.9073: Indie-gaming high-five!

To reiterate for people skimming:

Things you can do if you really want a refund:

• Ask Anet for a refund using their refund page.
• Ask Anet for a gems refund using their refund page.

Things you shouldn’t do if you want a refund:

• Put a chargeback on your credit card.

Same.4687:

Because a 5k Mug isn’t worthwhile?

I don’t really like it as much in WvW.

I mostly mean putting 30/25 points in DA to get the Power and traits, though. 10 points for Mug is often a reasonable investment.

Power/Precision/CritDamage. They multiply together, they don’t conflict with other players, and MOAR DAMAGE is always relevant.

I don’t take the Power trait line, though, because I think the actual abilities in it aren’t really worthwhile.

Dacromir.6207:

Alrighty… what armor?

Nope, no match at all.

Here’s my current look: Whispers hood, “Conquest” coat (PvP name; this skin from a Malchor’s Leap karma vendor), Sylvari shoulders, Vigil leggings, Hall of Monuments shoes, some mid-level glove skin. Good view of a Krytan bow in that picture, too.

I just got my personal story unbugged a few days ago, though, so I can finally go pick up the Commando coat I’ve always wanted.

Dacromir.6207:

Does that have the same model as the Steady dagger? If so, that’s what I’m using too!

Yes! OMG we’re totally twins.

I agree about Krytan skins. The sword is one of the few sword skins that doesn’t seem a little bit too big on my thief. The shortbow is beautiful in an understated way.

The one Krytan thing I really don’t like is the dagger; I use Aureate instead.

Radeonkid.2843:

Anyone can name out all good looking shortbow?

It’s a matter of taste. Play with them in the PvP Locker?

John Lucier.5486:

CAPS CAPS CAPS

Are you a lawyer? No? Then don’t do a chargeback over a situation as ambiguous as this. Because inappropriate chargebacks are bad news. Just ask Anet for a refund, like everyone else who wants their money back is doing. They will give it to you.

John Lucier.5486:

If you purchased your game before 6 months ago, make sure to contact your card company and charge back EVERYTHING you spent on the game. I know my bank and card issuer cover me longer then 6mo

Chargebacks aren’t refunds. Chargebacks, generally, are for incorrect billing or total failure to provide a service. If some company’s glitchy storefront double-charges me for a web order, I get a chargeback. If I paid for a product and the company closes up shop before they can deliver it to me, I get a chargeback.

IANAL, but there’s no way that “ascended gear ruined the game after I played it for 3 months” qualifies for a chargeback.

There’s an Anet refund page that will give you a refund, though.

EndlessDreamer.6780:

If You do not accept the provisions of this agreement, You may request a refund for the Software, if you were required to pay for it and if it was purchased from NCsoft, within thirty (30) days of either the date on Your receipt or the date You created a Game Account, whichever is earlier.

This is the “if you do not accept the provisions of this agreement” refund. It’s a standard thing in click-wrap EULAs. Because you often can’t see the EULA until after you’ve already bought the software, you see, but it’s possible that you won’t accept the license agreement; so this clause tells you that if you don’t like the license, don’t install it and just go get a refund on the application.

The refunds folks are applying for are different. They’re not just the legal boilerplate on all software.

I generally think some of the folks getting refunds after 2-3 months are abusing the system a bit. In your case, though, get a refund on the gems. Because I’m betting a lot of that spending was “This is the right direction, please keep it up!” money. And, well, they obviously didn’t get the hint (from your personal perspective).

Southern Lord.7254:

No, but every single RPG, video game or table-top, has had stats and progression. It is not defined by this, but it is a part of what the genre entails.

“Every single RPG?” That hasn’t been true in the tabletop world for years now. Probably well over a decade.

Nate Gray.9241:

How are people like you not embarrassed for repeating a completely ridiculous phrase like ‘kitten’ just because someone else did it first? The magnitude of the lemming mentality among gamers these days is astonishing.

There’s no new fad. It’s just the forum’s automatic censoring software. Nobody’s actually using the word “kitten” all the time; that’s just what you see when folks curse.

Columba.9730:

99 to 1 against. lol

Well, I’m trying not to read too much into it, given that there’s probably a significant self-selection problem in terms of who reads these topics in the first place.

But with such a stark difference (20-to-1 at the moment, effectively), I’m comfortable speculating that at least a plurality of players don’t really like the new gear.

UnderdogSMO.9428:

((for instance We don’t have Tanks, we have Bunkers.))

This is a poor example, because it’s just terminology.

Vardahoth.6984:

I’m trying to decide on warrior, ranger, theif, or elementalist.

Warrior is a solid PvP class if you like hitting people, and they do respectably in PvE. The gameplay tends to lean towards knockdown-burst-done, though. Warriors are good for overall damage output, and are fairly durable, but lack some of the cooler active defense stuff that other classes — like thieves and guardians — get.

Thief is a great class if you like big bursts and being really slippery. The class suffers from some pretty repetitive gameplay in PvE (95% of the time, the optimal strategy is to auto-attack while recasting Black Powder every once in a while) and WvW (spamming Clusterbomb in ranged fights; I actually enjoy this a lot, though). I think of thieves as the best “glass cannon” class because of their unparalleled ability to disengage from combat. Also, for PvP, you may enjoy the fact that dagger thieves have the most time-compressed burst in the game.

Elementalist is a bit of a “challenge yourself” class. You can be very effective, but you have to juggle more buff durations and skill cooldowns than pretty much everybody else.

I really don’t like rangers at the moment. They do have some nice long-range attacks, but they often feel like a bit of a liability in PvP. (I’m a bit biased, maybe, since I play thief. But the ranger’s class abilities all seem designed to make them easy kills for me.)

Tulisin.6945:

The main problem with the OP’s philosophy is he keeps talking about “vitality and toughness” for defense, when the majority of thief defense comes from not getting hit.

Exactly.

Trying to stack defensive stats is almost always a losing proposition, if you’re trading away offense to get them. So you take less damage per hit, but the monsters will hit you more before you kill them.

A thief’s best resources are initiative and endurance. Both can be used to just straight-up avoid damage, but they’ll run out if you try to turn everything into a battle of attrition. Don’t try to tank things; kill them while you still have the resources for active defense.

Genesis.5169:

it was a single player rpg with co-op options

You’ve posted this several times already.

Calling GW1 a “single-player RPG” is, like, 10,000 times more wrong than calling it an MMOG.

You need to run difficulty level 10+ to get the ascended rings.

Infusions have real stats in addition to agony resistance.

The new back slots and infusions use those ever-so-popular “… and 250 t6 mats” style recipes.

Nothing about this setup is “casual-friendly.”

What pays the bills? People buying vanity costumes, or random chests because they like gambling.

This is just speculation, but I figure that, with the way the gem store is set up, my impression is that “hardcore grinders” are less likely to spend real money for gems, because they can just spend in-game gold for gems. The person who’ll throw down 10 actual dollars for a cool Halloween costume is someone who doesn’t routinely farm up 10 gold.

Sadly, I can’t change the title.

I had a better one initially but the 45-character limit really messed it up. And then I kinda had a brainfart and picked this one.

I really like Krytan. It’s super-cheap but has a really nice kinda wave effect to it.

If you want something more metal, with sharp bits and glowy lightning, try the CoE dungeon or Mystic Crescent skins (they are red and blue, respectively).

In full Zerk gear with Shortbow and Sword/Pistol, I can go into Orr or Frostgorge sound, pull eight guys, and kill them all without ever going under 50% hp. It’s all about using the right damage mitigation stuff.

Leveling with S/P was boring as heck, but Black-Powdering stuff doesn’t feel nearly as repetitive when you only need a few hits to kill things.

I think it’s misleading to call grinding dungeons to get max gear “endgame” to begin with. You’re not actually at the “end” until you’ve completed that. What do you do then, in WoW or whatever? Chase achievements, keep doing the same raids you’ve “finished” just for fun or extra money, try to pick up character bling like fancy mounts, and other self-directed stuff like that.

Also, to nitpick…

magabury.5792:

Raids require much more coordination, and are best done with a guild. Raiding brings a guild together, and requires them to work as a team to get stuff done.

Now you’re complaining about how the “endgame” stuff is implemented. That’s not actually “Where is the endgame?” It’s “This endgame is unappealing.” Based on my experience in GW1, though, your complaint about coordination is a level-design and mechanics issue and group size has fairly little to do with it.

magabury.5792:

PvP is the same as dungeons, no reason except to look cool as you kill people.

I don’t think you understand the point of PvP. Like, at all. PvP with unbalanced stats, the way many MMOGs have done it, is absolutely degenerate. It’s not sensible competition in the slightest.

If you’re going to ask a rhetorical question, don’t label it a Q&A.

Turtlemilk.1064:

ArenaNet said something about making the ascended gear available through WvW. They just haven’t implemented it yet.

It’s likely to take them months to get around to it, though.

Also, the current WvW token system is kinda busted: it’s far more effective for a WvWer to get exotic gear is actually to just craft/buy exotics using WvW gold rewards instead. So just adding stuff you can buy for, like, 1000 Badges of Honor wouldn’t necessarily make acquiring the ascended items that much less frustrating.

What are the typical features of MMOG “endgame”?

• Dungeons / raids — there are definitely dungeons
• Grinding achievements — check, although the interface should probably emphasize them more, I think
• Getting prestige gear — Legendary stuff definitely qualifies
• PvPing with your high-level character — World vs. World

Basically the only standard activity that’s conspicuously absent is raids, and that’s because GW2 opted to do small-party dungeons instead of large-party dungeons. There’s nothing inherent about 40-man raids that makes them more “endgame”-y than 5-man dungeon parties.

Wilky.7521:

The ‘end game’ starts at lvl 1.

Enh, it starts at level 80. Or 60, at least level. Because the part where you’re stumbling through the game without access to traits you need to make a bunch of builds work is sort of an extended tutorial.

I changed the link, because oops there was an option missing. Sorry, folks. Done with that now. :/

Rancor Chiron.6178:

So far, no change.

Ooops. Replaced it with one that includes that option.

There’s been a lot of discussion about Ascended gear, “vertical progression,” and the like. But it’s tricky to separate numbers from just, you know, post volume.

So, let’s try this? A poll!
How has the introduction of Ascended gear affected you?

This just a bare-bones opinion poll, for the purposes of the community’s self-understanding. Please don’t treat the results like a referendum or a petition.

I made a new thread for this because I think just leaving it in the super-long thread is going to unfairly skew it too negative.

TehMesmor.5602:

Do you think 14% more stats will make you a God Slayer who can own a mob of players in WvW without even loosing 5% HP?

I think 14% more hp or damage or armor will sometimes be the difference in close fights. Which are some of the more interesting fights to have, you know?

The question raised about how much this thread actually reflects community opinion is a good one. So, let’s try…

An unscientific poll!
How has the introduction of Ascended gear affected you?

The results aren’t likely to be very accurate, but at least we’ll have more of a “one person, one vote” situation than everyone posting to a big thread.

(Note: This just a bare-bones opinion poll. Please don’t treat the results like a petition.)

(EDIT: Ooops, messed it up the first time. Updated!)