Showing Posts For AVHero.7382:
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Engineer downed state is crap….yeah Elementalist sucks, but that’s mainly because mist form adds up your downed penalty. Engineers have 1) an autoattack like everyone else; 2) an ability that PULLS the enemy to them; 3) an ability that blows up around them, knocking back any enemies around them; 4) self heal. Against melee mobs, their 2 is useless, and they have to resort to hoping their 3 comes up in time for them to knock back their enemy so they have a reprieve to heal before its on them interrupting the heal again. Against ranged they can pull the enemy towards them (which interrupts their attack for a second), and is then stuck in the same boat as before. The problem is when they knock the enemy back, the enemy can keep attacking from that range. The kit would be better if the heal didn’t go on a 10 year cooldown after being interrupted. But, since it does, it isn’t very good at all, as you at any time only have about 2 seconds to heal before its interrupted by your attacker.
Mist form at least gives you an opportunity to hide behind a wall to heal up, or get someone else around you time to grab threat so you can heal, or even get you into water so you can chill on the surface to heal (if applicable).
Not saying ele’s downed state is great, but it is definitely better than engi’s.
Power Rangers? Jedi? Captain Planet? Really? Nobody feels like the Avatar?! Seriously?! Making rocks pop out the ground at your enemies? Launching fire at them? Manipulating water? If only air was air and not lightning…
My elementalist is like, 19, so you can take this or leave it if you like, but like Aiglos said, I find the most success with water, and I stay in it almost exclusively underwater. The 1 is mediocre, but the 2 is a huge burst of damage if you detonate it right. You have to launch it, and then rehit the key to make it explode. Otherwise it does mediocre damage as well. The 3 is really good if you can close the gap. Simply drop the wall, and then detonate it immediately the same way you do the 2. This one requires you to be close to them as the wall drops on you instead of shooting like a projectile, but it also does a large amount of damage. Water 4 gives you regen where you are sitting, and sinks any enemies in melee range. It is nice for some heal support, but not much else. Water 5 dashes forward (which you can use to close the gap if you like), and does damage and heals. It is extremely finnicky about positioning for the damage dealing aspect, but if you manage to get it right, it basically 1 shots any normal mobs.
I maxed out all the other elements, but rarely use them, so I cannot say how to use them effectively underwater. Whereas on land I am all about stance dancing, I stick to water while submerged.
The uniqueness of each Phantasm is what they do other than “spam damage” Different phantasms apply damage differently, or they have additional effects. Berserker applies cripple. Warlock increases damage based on conditions applied. Swordsman delivers one large blow. Duelist delivers a bunch of smaller blows (good for bleed stacking). Mage grants retaliation and delivers confusion (when working right).
I understand you are trying to make it so that if we go Phantasm our shatters won’t be useless, but aside from giving us something other than shatters, I am not really sure this is the appropriate way of going about doing it. Shatter builds utilize phantasms too (albeit in a different way than phantasm builds do), so it would essentially further “lock” these two builds as two distinct builds, rather than allow players to mix and match. Depending on the situation, I shatter some, and sometimes I stack 3 phantasms. More often than not I have 1 or 2 phantasms and rotating clones that I “kill” via additional clone creation (by dodging or using a clone ability) to apply a few debuffs to my target. I would not be able to do this with your setup.
You feel that phantasm builds lock us out of our shatters. To a degree, you’re right; You don’t want to shatter 3 phantasms. But in this vein, you would lock shatter builds out of their phantasms. It just seems as a way to completely separate the builds rather than allow Mesmers to mix and match depending on the situation (I shatter my phantasms when finishing off a mob that is almost dead).
EDIT: TL;DR, I can see where the shatters might need a bit of a rework, as they basically require you to trait to use them effectively, which is a problem most other classes don’t have, but I think having two bars in this sense is probably not a good way to go about it.
(edited by AVHero.7382)
No….just….no.
While I think our F1-F4 might be able to use some rework, this is simply too much. It would not only make it infinitely more complicated than it is now, but it would potentially kitten us. With the long cooldowns on Phantasms, we would be forced to slowly stack up Phantasms while having 0 clones out. If we summon a Phantasm and they die, then we would be either forced to wait for the cooldown, or to go into “clone mode” (as an aside, how do we switch between these two forms? And what would happen when we use a clone ability while in “Phantasm mode,” since they oftentimes have additional effects?). It just seems incredibly nuanced, complicated, and not really effective.
I feel you have good intentions, but I really don’t see how this can be implemented effectively.
Wait until you do explore mode of the dungeons. Much more difficult. Also, a repair cost is not “no price.” It is, rather, a very concrete price. And if the boss has a mechanic that clears your whole party, then what? It resets. I know story mode dungeons can seem very hack and slash at times, but it gets better (or worse, depending on your perspective).
Also, I asked what class you were because there is one class that always discusses how world combat is super easy: the guardian. I could have predicted it, but I didn’t want to flat out call you out for playing one of the sturdier classes and complaining about not dying.
I am curious as to what level you are, what profession you are playing, and what dungeons you’ve run. There are areas where “unchallenging combat” is an unfair assessment. Not all combat is challenging, but not all combat is unchallenging. There are plenty of instances where I have been overwhelmed trying to take out a small group of baddies.
Additionally, dungeons require more strategic combat than simply “hack and slash.” Some of this requires reflexes, moreso than other MMOs due to the dodge mechanic being implemented. In some of these dungeons having certain skills makes your party’s job significantly easier.
As far as having access to all your skills early, I can’t argue much against that. Being able to have a full skill bar at level 30 is cool, but also makes 31-80 a bit less exciting. There are some awesome traits to look forward to getting, but gaining a passive isn’t as exciting as getting a new toy to play with.
End game argument is driven into the ground. Not even going to go there.
Those are my thoughts.
Vanilla WoW? That was what, around 7 years ago? Games have come a long way since then when launching. This game was under development for a very long time, there’s no excuses for the poor amount of content on offer
I dislike jumping down people’s throats, but your assertion that there is a “poor” amount of content is ridiculous. Just because there isn’t a gear grind that players can views as a “reward” does not mean there isn’t content. As far as PvE content goes? There are 8 dungeons, each with a story mode, and an explorable mode with multiple paths per dungeon. That is more dungeon variety than any other MMO I can think of upon release. There is obvious progression with these dungeons as they require you to be certain levels, and they restrict you to those levels. This simulates different gear levels without allowing an individual to “beat out” the content simply by outleveling it. It is a challenge every time.
The map is a substantial size that is by no means “poor.” Each of these zones has a lot of frequently occurring events that users can take part in; more than any other MMO I can think of on release. While these may be repetitive after the first few times, it is still a huge variety of content that is interesting to participate in.
There is more I could name, but I am currently at work and went from having nothing to work on to having 5 projects at once, but I felt the need to address this a bit. There is a LOT of content out for the released version of the game. Stat grinders just feel less of a desire to repeat the content for a reward that amounts to nothing statistically. There is a lot of content (although a healthy chunk is bugged, which takes away from it to an extent, but that’s what happens when you don’t have a true extended beta); it is just not formatted in a way that MMO frequenters can follow linearly and mindlessly, with obvious rewards.
I just can’t believe people on this thread really want to make the argument that the Gw2 cosmetic grind model is different from the WoW gear grind model.
They are the same. It is not innovative.
It is different in one significant way; it does not impact your character’s effectiveness in a given scenario. In WoW, you HAVE TO grind gear to participate in raids, and then raid gear to participate in better raids, until you reach “Best in Slot.” You cannot ding 80, grab a starter set of gear, and run end-game content (this is slightly untrue at the moment, because Pandaria just came out, so end-game content is starter content, but you get what I mean). Getting the “Best” gear statistically in WoW is a HUGE grind. Getting the statistically best gear in GW is not. After you have the best stats, you are free to choose what you want to grind, whereas in WoW you have the ladder set out for you; grind this raid, then this one, then this one, etc. The freedom of choice is what makes it different.
Also, tokens that are redeemed for what you want. WoW has this in a sense with the tokens that drop from dungeons and raids, but they only by you a limited number of pieces. You still have to run dungeons and hope for a drop to get your Best in Slot. Guild Wars 2 diminishes the luck element severely.
So how much “fun” do you expect to have with your character who fundamentally stays the same for the entire time you play the game?
First of all, I’m playing more casual than others, so while I am 80, I have yet to acquire an exotic. I am still just enjoying the zones as I complete them.
However, I can’t say how much fun I will have at 80 once I get my max gear. I may not at all. In Guild Wars 1 it was the same. They were bragging rights and aesthetic grinds. What did I do? I had a max level PvE character of every profession, and I would play whatever I felt in the mood to play. I imagine this game will be similar. The thing is, the trip from 1 to 80 will take me longer than my one day grinds from 1 to 20, so I will be required to play longer to achieve just that goal. Which I am okay with. When I tire of my Mesmer, I go play another character. Since there is no emphasis on improving one character’s stats, I don’t feel restricted to that one character; I can play whatever I want.
I was simply addressing the grinding issue in my previous post, and how ANet DID change it. It won’t be for everyone. But there are other ways to have fun in this game. When I get bored of the game, I’ll stop playing it. Did that with Guild Wars 1. Since it is Buy to Play, I can come back whenever I want. That’s my prerogative.
I just can’t believe people on this thread really want to make the argument that the Gw2 cosmetic grind model is different from the WoW gear grind model.
They are the same. It is not innovative.
It is different in one significant way; it does not impact your character’s effectiveness in a given scenario. In WoW, you HAVE TO grind gear to participate in raids, and then raid gear to participate in better raids, until you reach “Best in Slot.” You cannot ding 80, grab a starter set of gear, and run end-game content (this is slightly untrue at the moment, because Pandaria just came out, so end-game content is starter content, but you get what I mean). Getting the “Best” gear statistically in WoW is a HUGE grind. Getting the statistically best gear in GW is not. After you have the best stats, you are free to choose what you want to grind, whereas in WoW you have the ladder set out for you; grind this raid, then this one, then this one, etc. The freedom of choice is what makes it different.
Also, tokens that are redeemed for what you want. WoW has this in a sense with the tokens that drop from dungeons and raids, but they only by you a limited number of pieces. You still have to run dungeons and hope for a drop to get your Best in Slot. Guild Wars 2 diminishes the luck element severely.
As much flaming as this OP is getting, I kinda see his point. There is a large (LARGE) step between getting full exotics and getting a legendary item. You can farm/grind for gear and be done in about a week. Or you can farm/grind for legendary in be done in 3 months. There’s no middle ground.
Although I do also understand everybody else that has a problem with the OP. This game is a lot more about skill than getting lucky or who can grind for 10-12 hours a day. I think GW2 has a lot more people, like me, who can only play 1 to 2 hours a day. We don’t feel like we are at a disadvantage because our skill and awareness is a lot more important than how long we can grind a dungeon.
Thanks. The problem I see is that people equate sympathizing with me to instantly transforming this game into World of Warcraft. Sorry guys, but admitting you’d like ways to get better stats (or more vanity gear options) doesn’t mean you want the blizzard whip on your back.
Now that you’ve made it clear you hate good gear (weirdos), let’s focus on vanity stuff. Why is there such a huge leap between stuff that looks good and stuff that looks plain? Why is it that an 80 blue staff looks about as good as an 80 exotic crafted and as good as an 80 exotic for 50G on the trading post? Why does the legendary precursor look plain as well? You took away the stat grind for gear but replaced it with almost nothing. What am I supposed to do in between now and legendary? Oh, that’s right, GRIND with no reward.
This is where these arguments are unraveling.
In my wall of text post above you must have missed me addressing the weapon argument that you keep making. You seem to want to buy your aesthetics with your gold, rather than with effort. You realize all the dungeons have weapons that you can purchase with tokens? A lot of these weapons have pretty awesome particle effects. In fact, one of ArenaNet’s problems is that they don’t allow you to view particle effects in “preview” mode. Rather, you have to actually equip the weapon to see it (try previewing a fiery dragon sword; you’ll see what I mean). The ghastly weapons from AC have an ethereal, blue spirit like effect that sort of looks like an icy enchant in WoW, or blue flames. These weapons don’t require near as much of a grind as the legendary, and can be considered an “in-between” step between crafted and legendary.
Honestly, I cannot begin to see a reason why ArenaNet would implement this. They have built the game on the premise that they do not have a grind for stats system; rather, it is a grind for aesthetics. I understand what you are saying when you liked seeing the marginal improvements on your gear as you aspired to acquire Best in Slots for your class; however, the stats served the same purpose in that game as aesthetics do in this game.
The amount of effort put in to grind a set of dungeon gear is visual rather than statistical, which may leave some players feeling empty. However, I would argue this is a better system than the gear grind. In a gear grind, you could spend months trying to acquire the “drop” you needed from the boss you needed it from. Even then, if you managed to see the drop, you still had to RNG against other players for the piece (unless you were in a group or guild that passed out loot based on a point system). Either way, there would be some people who grinded (ground?) for months on end and would not acquire the piece they needed. On the other end, there would be others who seemed to be blessed by the gods themselves, as one run through might net them 4 or 5 pieces of gear. In Guild Wars 2, the grind is based partially on skill (ability to clear dungeons, with more efficient runs netting rewards quicker than less efficient methods), but mostly on time and dedication (frequent running of the dungeon over and over, with measurable progress via how many tokens the player has acquired, or how many pieces of their set they have purchased).
The primary difference for you, though, is that you like seeing your numbers go up, rather than seeing your character look a bit snazzier. That is simply how you enjoy playing your MMOs. However, ArenaNet did not want their game to require a grind for stats; rather, they wanted players to be able to choose what they want to grind. After all, what was the point of getting best in slot gear? Bragging rights. You looked and felt awesome, and it was evident in your appearance. I have not had a chance to look at dungeon armor yet, but you seem to not be impressed by the upgrade from one look to another. It may simply not be your thing. However, the ultimate goal is the same: bragging rights. The gear was an obvious representation of progression, effort, and dedication. The progression is visual instead of statistical, but it is still progression. For those who may not care for PvE grinding, there is also WvW to do for a more community-driven PvP, or of course sPvP and tPvP for those really into testing their ability to best their fellow Tyrians in a structured battle on an even playing field. There are grinds associated with PvP as well, although again, they are aesthetic and “bragging rights” more than anything.
On another note, there are also weapons that you can acquire with dungeon tokens from what I understand. These aesthetics do serve as an “in-between” step between a basic 80 exotic and a legendary. Some of them do have pretty cool skins as well. If you have not seen them, I would suggest checking them out.
Why not?
You are asking the wrong question, my friend.
I wouldn’t even mind having the focus on a second weapon set to go with my Sword/Pistol or Sword/Sword. The problem with that is I am stuck with the Scepter, and I have a hard time justifying using the Scepter when just using a GS or a Staff seems infinitely better.
I recently switched my build to have a traited Focus (the CDR/Reflect as well as Phantasmal Haste for Warden), but in terms of PvE content, I liked having 3 Phantasms up at once doing damage, and I feel this is not feasible with Warden. I also probably just need more practice and experience with using Warden, as I am not entirely sure how his reflect works, how his spawning works, and under what situations he will move. But I find myself dropping him, and if he’s lucky, he gets off one whirling combo before the enemy moves out of his range, unless I stand there and tank it for him. After they move, I just detonate him with the other clones I might have up. I guess this would put me in more of a support-y role than damage role compared to stacking bleeds and damage with Duelists? It might just be I need to go to a lower level zone and practice utilizing my Warden as well as the wall (and how the dislocation on it works; it always seems to throw them forever away).
Let me start by saying I absolutely love the game and I am completely impressed by not only the game that ANet has put out for us, but also by the support they have been providing since the headstart to make sure the game is running as smoothly as possible.
Onto my Mesmer!
I made my Mesmer first, as all the information I saw on them looked awesome, and what little of the BWE I played was fun. Now, I’m not having a problem with the class mechanics (although there are some bugs that need to be addressed, which I am sure ANet is working on). My problem is right now I am level 70 and I feel like I am having a crisis deciding on a build.
My problem is I want to be able to do WvW and PvE (including dungeons) with the same build. I have been looking on the forums and reading discussion on builds, and I have been trying a few out. I ran Sword/Pistol+Staff for the longest time, but as it started getting boring, I started mixing it up.
After reading how Phantasmal Warden was, I switched my traits around to focus on a Phantasm build with Sword/Focus+Staff, and shatters. The problem is, while I can see how the Phantasmal Warden is amazing, I HATE that it barely moves (which makes total sense, because with Phantasmal Haste if he readily followed his target he would be ridiculously OP). I don’t like feeling like I have to stand still so that my Warden can keep flailing his axes at my target: I actually enjoyed kiting and I feel Warden prevents me from doing that. Additionally, I thoroughly enjoyed having a bunch of Duelists up with my pistol and just watching them all shoot their guns like mad at boss targets in PvE and my enemies in WvW as I kited.
I know the game is constructed in a way to make it so we don’t feel like we’re pigeonholed into running certain builds, but I keep hearing how, especially in dungeons, not running Warden is borderline idiotic simply due to how powerful it is.
I really enjoy Sword/Sword, and Sword/Pistol, as well as the Staff, and I have been meaning to give the GS a fair shot (only played with it a little bit), because I enjoy its animations. Can I be a Mesmer and not run a focus offhand and be successful? I understand I might have to switch to it on occasion, but I hate having to “main” it? I guess I am just seeking some general tips on this, possibly some builds, and mainly words of encouragement. I’ve been showing my Engineer more love than my Mesmer, and I would like to focus on my Mesmer more.
It’s easy to find groups now because the game is brand spanking new.
6 months down the road, when people farmed up the particular sets they wanted and hardly anyone wants to run the particular instance you want to, the system in place is going to make achieving most armor sets incredibly difficult.
This will be my second and probably last response, because you seem eager to find fault with the system regardless, and making valid points will be countered or ignored.
There will be new players. There will be old players with alts who want to set on their alt. The game isn’t going to die in 6 months. There will be people around. I assure you you will not be the only person playing the game in 6 months (if you are still playing, because let’s face it, you sound like a quitter already, no offense).
Like my edit said in my previous post that you might have missed, this game sets it up for you so that the grinds are purely aesthetic, rather than statistically beneficial (aside from legendary weapons, but that is a marginal increase anyway), so you are allowed to pursue whatever grinds you choose. Other MMOs allow for aesthetic grinds, but also impose a gear grind that is mandatory in order to experience later end-game content. In this game you can experience all content with max gear fairly easily. If you want to enjoy the game beyond that experience, you get to choose how you want to. This is an awesome system.
You also had to grind reputation with factions to get their armor sets in Eye of the North. While again, there were different ways to go about it, it involved running something over and over, whether it was speed-booking, or vanquishing, etc. Either way, it still had the monotony of “grinding” to gather the resources necessary to craft the armor.
The complaint here is that you only have one method of getting a specific set, rather than simply farming money and “buying” the set, which was feasible in Guild Wars 1.
This is NOT a bad thing. If you think about it, almost every other MMO ever requires you to farm an instance or a raid over and over for a CHANCE at getting the piece of gear you want. After that, you had to combat other players that might want that same piece of gear for it after the first RNG was nice enough to reward it to your team.
While you might not find running the same dungeon over and over again favorable for one specific set of gear, know that every successful completion shows progress towards your goal that you can see, rather than a chance to just see what you want. Additionally, you aren’t locked out for a week or anything like most raid schedules on MMOs (that I am aware of), so you can run it whenever and however many times you want.
Additionally, take comfort in the fact that anyone else that wants this set has to do the exact same thing, so it will be easier to find groups for these dungeons than it was in Guild Wars 1.
Also, I imagine being “forced” (if you want to view it that way) to do one thing in order to acquire the specific set you want will result in a more satisfying sense of accomplishment, as everyone who sees you sporting your new gear will know exactly what you had to go through to acquire it, rather than people being allowed to believe you ran easy and mindless gold farms for it, or came across a pile of gold via a birthday minipet or something. It shows exactly the accomplishment you achieved.
EDIT: Additionally, after completing the campaigns in Guild Wars 1, there was little to do in PvE except for extensive grinds (whether it was gold runs to buy the gear or otherwise). While this may not look appealing to some, it allowed for players to achieve exactly what they hoped to achieve in the game, rather than forcing players to run raids and such to achieve an advantage over their fellow players. The “prestige” grind in this MMO (which, let’s face it: every MMO’s max level grind is for bragging rights) is purely cosmetic, which allows you to pick and choose which grinds you want to participate in. That is AWESOME.
(edited by AVHero.7382)
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