Guild Wars 2

How will a damage meter affect casuals? The people who want one already don’t play with bad players unless they feel like carrying someone, in which case chances are they won’t start kittening and moaning about DPS meters anyway. Casuals can and will continue to form their own safe spaces.

But criticism is undeniably the most important type of feedback there is, most people know when their performance was adequate and do not need to be told it was unless it was absolutely exceptional but are quick to shift the blame when it isn’t. Being able to tell someone to step their game up in raids if you see that they are far below for example the 7k DPS threshold required for the first wing’s boss is nothing but positive.

Just a DPS meter would be paltry though. They have the tools for it as evidenced by the PvP scoreboard so give us split damage and condi damage meters, boons applied, outgoing and self applied healing, boons removed etc.

This is 100% intentional. It used to be a window that you could dismiss and ignore, the result was that 4/5 of all match calls failed and put you back in queue. This is better, trust me.

Oslaf Beinir.5842:

I agree with the OP, it is not about gold but principle the game started with which they have time and again ignored.

IMHO The gold sink is pvp is just plain dumb and un-fun and thus should be taken out.

From a market perspective there has to be a gold sink in content in which you can earn liquid gold. PvP on launch was completely separated from the main game and had no rewards that affected the economy. Disregarding gem rewards from paids, which were promptly removed while gems were getting less cheap, 15 gems wasn’t much in the days when 80 silver was enough to get you 800 gems.

Anyway, with reward tracks giving materials and loot as well as match rewards PvP is now a source of income, though a bad one it still needs a gold sink by default. So it has a minor one in unlockable Amulets, Runes, Sigils and Tracks. Fun is not a factor, the well-being of the economy is and it is better to err on the side of caution.

Vavume.8065:

Have fun paying for your unlocks then guys, you are giving them the green flag to continue doing it, good luck with that.

What we want couldn’t matter less to John Smith.

15g is pocket change though. Even if you literally do no content other than PvP you’ll get 15g by winning a mere 45~ matches anyway.

Nah man. The Chrono wells are pretty balanced, apart from Well of Action because Slow is worse than kitten.

Dunno, never tested the set without.

Since the HoT release I no longer believe making Life Blast the same as Plague Blast would be OP. I think all 5 skills on base Death Shroud need to be looked over and have some appropriate minor increases in power and/or beneficial changes to make it comparable to Reaper Shroud. It just doesn’t hold up anymore.

I hated every second of getting those bandit crests for sinister though. So much that I fled SW and simply grinded the SW reward track instead which was slow as hell.

But muh damage.

I’d totally get Viper gear if I didn’t have to do open world content to get it.

Bluewizard.2694:

Aktium.9506:

What if they made it so Master of Corruption also transferred 2 conditions on corruption skill use? So when you hit a corruption skill you are properly awarded and don’t get the awful negative effect and when you miss you’re stuck with a bunch of conds on you.

Or simply when you use a corruption skill you inflict the self-inflicted conditions on nearby foes as well.

I know the self- applied condi’s are a problem for quite some people, although I believe this is actually quite useful in certain situations as you can transfer these conditions allowing you to deal more damage.

Transfers are less plentiful than corruptions. You can’t just blow a transfer every time you use a corruption. If we’re expected to do that then the self applied corruptions need to be increased substantially so you actually gain some mileage out of using a transfer to combat self-inflicted conditions. Most of the time those transfers are needed to save your own skin when you get bombed by conds in a teamfight or some such.

Skoigoth.9238:

@Aktium, if you don’t mind sharing, what does your set-up look like apart from the Sinister gear (traits, runes, sigils)? Given the comparatively low Bleed ticks, I’m assuming you are running a build focused on Shroud/Dhuumfire, maybe without Curses, yes?

Nah. I ran curses/sr/reaper with berzerker runes I just slapped a sigil of smoldering and bursting on my staff as well. I thought about going for flame legion/balth but the 5% increased damage on both power and condi should be worth more than and extra tick or two of burning if I did my math right. I’m still not entirely sure whether malice is better than smoldering for this tho and i cant be bothered to calc it. Anyway, either I’m worse than I thought at theorycrafting or condi reaper is awful.

Full Asc Sinister Condi Reaper was a massive disappointment in PvE. 5k Burns, 1.1k Chills, 2.3k Poisons, 1.5k Bleeds was the highest I’ve gotten so far. I think I’m better off sticking with zerker even if mobs have Husk-tier toughness. RS1 needs like one offensive filler cond or something because you ain’t getting any bleeds except from the trait and staff/scepter and that’s awful. Whenever my RS emptied and a boss wasn’t dead and I ended up in Staff or Scepter/Dagger I could hear my sweet dps running away screaming and dying in a corner.

What if they made it so Master of Corruption also transferred 2 conditions on corruption skill use? So when you hit a corruption skill you are properly awarded and don’t get the awful negative effect and when you miss you’re stuck with a bunch of conds on you.

Or simply when you use a corruption skill you inflict the self-inflicted conditions on nearby foes as well.

Bhawb.7408:

I think its just fine in Curses even with the change, since it would have quite a bit of synergy with basically every single trait.

I just now realized Parasitic Contagion isn’t in Spite anymore. Then it should be fine to change it without having to relocate it.

Bhawb.7408:

PC is probably best changed to not require damage dealt, but just be on applying conditions (like an opposite of Altruistic Healing), or on tick of conditions, regardless of damage dealt. This would also open it up for non-condition damage builds.

I’d say to remodel it after the current Blighter’s Boon except with conditions instead of boons. And considering all the vuln application you can get from Spite there’s a lot of synergy. Maybe too much even, so it would have to be moved to another line. A merge with Corrupter’s Fervor in Death Magic could make the entire line a lot more attractive.

Minx.7521:

Schlange.4308:

LvL 83 now, still not a single Ascended Itemdrop

NICE

To lvl 96 now. Today finishing to 100. So far no ascended chest drop, only 4 rings, and 1 fractal weapon skin. (so basically 5 drops).

NOICE.

The only noteworthy thing I got from doing all the levels from 51-100 was an Exo wep worth 7g.

Sublimatio.6981:

Aktium.9506:

The gold fractal weapons definitely need more of a glow. And trails like the normal fractal weapons except gold coloured. It just ain’t acceptable for my weapon to be less incandescent than myself.

trust me it’s acceptable

I can see the details on the skin. That means it doesn’t have enough particle effects and it needs to be brighter and more dazzling. I’m thinking rainbow coloured flame effects maybe.

The gold fractal weapons definitely need more of a glow. And trails like the normal fractal weapons except gold coloured. It just ain’t acceptable for my weapon to be less incandescent than myself.

Jeanpatty.8940:

wait, theres actually a death breakdown in game? how do you access this?

The little circle thingy

Cogbyrn.7283:

I’m just trying to understand why you’re spamming autos on an advertised slow weapon.

Most skills have a situational use, sometimes all that is left to get another player down before they manage to disengage and heal up is a tiny sliver and to get him there you put more or less everything you have on cooldown. Sometimes you just need some quick LF before others show up to the fight so you don’t die instantly. And there’s no need to use an actual dodge to avoid GS auto, you only need to sidestep or backpedal and it will miss.

I’m trying to understand why you aren’t using autos. Do you just sit in the back staring intently at the enemy until your team mates get them low enough that you can soar in like a little fairy and do a Gravedigger on them? Autos are meant to be a reliable source of pressure, either condi based or power based. As of right now they’re anything but. Anet advertised the skill being slow because it put Chill on the enemy but man, But since I started playing Reaper in the BWEs I’ve never gone “I really wanna put some Chill on that guy, I better use GS 1 on him”.

That said I really do like GS. But I feel like I would be better off just running dagger. As good as Nightfall is, a single skill on a 25s cooldown can’t viably carry the entire set.

I think the auto is one of the skills that needs a minor PvP/PvE split. For PvP it definitely needs a range increase or an attack speed increase. It simply doesn’t hit. Even in Reaper duels no one is hitting the other with GS apart from a stray swing here and there.

But buffing the auto for PvE means dagger loses its place completely. So that’s not ideal. I really wish Anet would stop being afraid of splitting skills. So many problems would be solved by split skills.

I run GS just for Nightfall. It’s such a nice skill. I could probably count the times I actually hit someone with Gravedigger that wasn’t already downed or trying to get another downed guy up on my hands. Doesn’t matter much though, I let RS do all the work anyway. My one complaint is still Grasping Darkness. I just can’t grasp how the kitten thing works, the pulling thingy spawns in the weirdest of places and sometimes inside walls and structures and gets stuck a bunch. It’s a shame really because it’s so close to being an amazing skill.

silvermember.8941:

Nemesis.8593:

Actually… i think i’ll keep some information to myself for a while…

Why not make it a permanent thing?

Decimate and Dhuum for PvE.

DP and CV for PvP.

Xae Isareth.1364:

Aktium.9506:

Bhawb.7408:

Aktium.9506:

I don’t think anyone takes Speed of Shadows

Really hard to justify the trait overall because of its competition, but yeah that’s why its taken.

I take it on Reaper. Unyielding Blast ain’t worth the slot on Reaper unless you’re the sort of plebeian who uses Decimate Defenses and I don’t use Staff so Soul Marks does diddly.

Just to be clear, you’re talking about PvP/WvW right?

Well yes. Mostly. I slot it for a handful of fractal encounters.

Bhawb.7408:

Aktium.9506:

I don’t think anyone takes Speed of Shadows

Really hard to justify the trait overall because of its competition, but yeah that’s why its taken.

I take it on Reaper. Unyielding Blast ain’t worth the slot on Reaper unless you’re the sort of plebeian who uses Decimate Defenses and I don’t use Staff so Soul Marks does diddly.

I enjoyed grinding 26 800 500~ experience in a day. It felt good to be rid of all those useless EXP boosters I’ve had lying around for years. Even if I got a headache doing so.

I don’t think anyone takes Speed of Shadows for the movement speed boost. It’s main thing is the Shroud recharge decrease.

Zaoda.1653:

The one in Auric Bason I think, the champion that rolls over (can’t remember the name, maybe it’s a stonehead creature?) and needs like 10-20 people to take down, should be called ‘ok who let Godzilla out’

I did that one with a random dragonhunter who came along while I was soloing it.

When I looked through the new runes these were the only ones that piqued my interest. So I put them on and I haven’t taken them off since.

Tim.6450:

I’m pretty sure that they are blockable. They are not migitated by armor though but atm they do around 40 damage/hit so to reach 1K damage with a single trait you need around 25 hits so it’s vey negligable.

Leeching effects do bypass invincibility effects like Endure Pain/Defiant Stance/Signet of Stone/Renew Focus/Obsidian Flesh. I think they bypass blocks as well, I’m not sure actually. Someone should test it, I can’t be bothered.

A set of zerker armor would serve you well for both modes.

Dhampyr.2813:

stuff

Vydahr.4285:

more stuff

I don’t even remotely think OP’s post is any good nor do I support it. But we literally had a trait called unholy martyr.

Besides, don’t forget that Necromancer Wants To Get Hit Because We Have Double The Healthpool™

Raz.1632:

they’re not really the martyr type.

Uh-huh.

Exedore.6320:

Aktium.9506:

Because it’s the very reason Anet themselves gave when they were asked as to why they changed the old stat system of Amulet + Jewel to just Amulet.

The only reason I saw given was that Amulet+Jewel was “too hard for new players to understand”.

They did change the system after vanilla BWE1 to reduce complexity. That beta build had 4 items (amulet, 2 rings, 2 accessories). IMO, 3 items would be enough.

I’m sure they said it also made it easier for the dev team to balance things. 99.9% sure of it.

Orangensaft.7139:

anyone who says they shouldnt come back is just incredibly egoist and short sightened

these skins just need to come back for the same requirements which they had before

—> rank 30+ for tribal armor
for example a reward track for tribal armor that unlocks at PvP lvl 30 that can only be completed with real queued arena games

this would be the perfect solution in my opinion

because:
it still has the rank 30 requirement
it needs real matches to be completed (no hotjoin rank farm arena players can get it)

so it keep its value and everyone can be happy

but pls anet dont forget to add really ALL old PvP skins
not just Tribal set!
Destroyer Scythe for example
or Primitive Pike are skins i really would like to see back in the game

Rank 30 in the old system took longer to get to then Rank 80 in the current. You got so much less rank points back then its not even funny.

Exedore.6320:

Why does this fallacy keep getting parroted around the forums? More stat customization doesn’t create a balancing nightmare at all. It actually gives developers more freedom in balancing.

Because it’s the very reason Anet themselves gave when they were asked as to why they changed the old stat system of Amulet + Jewel to just Amulet.

Josh Davis.6015:

As a note (and to address concerns), we won’t be adding dire stats or perplexity runes to sPvP.

Come on. You know you want to.

Cogbyrn.7283:

Has anyone else run into the “Blocked” pop-up when spamming marks into a WvW zerg with Soul Marks traited? I am going to keep an eye on it, but I could have sworn I saw it a few different times.

Hitting someone with an unblockable attack and proccing a blockable effect in the process is most likely what you’re experiencing.

Josh Davis.6015:

Hmmm, new amulets. Aside from zealots, anything else you folks think would be interesting?

Nomad and Dire.

Velimere.7685:

I’m pretty sure the developers have already accounted for this with their assumingly intentional power creep which I’ve embraced wholeheartedly having spent many hours during every BWE with the majority of the Elite Specializations. Basically, your traditional Celestial Dagger/Dagger Elementalist won’t be anything special when Heart of Thorns hit.

I’m very excited to see how the meta will shift!

I’m putting my money on Scrapper replacing Ele in the post-HoT meta.
If Scrapper and Chrono don’t end up being Meta²-tier I’ll be incredibly surprised.

Caine.8204:

You claim to want to run 5 shouts but also use plague signet? you cant have both

Plague Sending, lad. I care none for your argument, but 5 shouts and Plague Signet is definitely possible due to Plague Sending.

I want a legendary dagger that isn’t a filthy charr blowtorch.

gavyne.6847:

Not exactly accurate. YAAW’s 8 second weakness is pretty big deal for any builds that do not roll Curses. I rather enjoyed roaming in WvW with YAAW acting as stun breaker, weakness application, and instant might stacking which sets you up for a nice spike.

Weakening Shroud has better uptime on weakness and CPC is arguable better long duration weakness even if the self-weakness is worse than hitler and pol pot combined. A single long duration weakness stack is likely to just get cleansed before it does any good. The might is just superfluous. Now, if we could stack might to 50 I’d say it was a good skill. I would personally like to see the shout revamped. Quickness or something else we aren’t already good at getting would be nice.

gavyne.6847:

I don’t consider the other options superior, I consider them different and all viable. But YAAW is very viable to take as an utility slot. And like I said, especially so if you don’t run Curses.

Well, at least it’s not Suffer. I’ll give you that. I’m quite pleased with Reaper as a whole. My only complaints about it are some QoL stuff with Death’s Charge and Grasping Darkness. But shouts are incredibly lacklustre in comparison to the rest of the package. Trooper runes are not a valid reason as to why they should be as insubstantial as they are.

Cogbyrn.7283:

He was addressing the OP, who specifically mentioned PvE. Others have mentioned they found use for Shouts in PvP specifically.

I used them extensively during the BWE. YAAW does nothing because you’ll get maxed might by rolling your face across the keyboard when specced into Reaper anyways, the stunbreak would be nice but Spectral Walk/Armor are simply better stunbreak skills regardless of build. NCSY looked awesome on paper but the only time it ever felt useful in practice was against Engi due to frequent Gear Shield shenanigans and the odd shoutbow Warr with shield. Suffer is just a worse Plague signet. Rise had some niche utility but it’s basically a minions skill parading as a shout. It would be tons better if it was just a minion skill.

Cogbyrn.7283:

Discussion has popped up here and there around using some Shouts in Raiding for tanking purposes,

Cleave will make short work of Rise minions. You could have a whole party of Droods spamming heals and one AoE will still wreck them because they can’t dodge.

Cogbyrn.7283:

and when roaming, unless you only ever fight duels and refuse to hop into even small scale engagements around camps/etc., I can see Shouts being used there as well.

I don’t mind small fights in the area of 2v2-4v4, but not in a million years will I trust my servermates. They do more harm than good simply by being awful 9/10 times. So I do actively tend to stay away from them. It never ends well for me when I try to help.

Cogbyrn.7283:

Or maybe they don’t suit your style. Does that mean they don’t have their place?

Apart from Rise, I don’t see how they can fit any style.

Tobias.8632:

You really think the fact that they’re not worth taking over wells in a power build for PvE is a problem?

Spectral skills and corruptions and signets also aren’t worth taking over wells in a power build for PvE, but those skills all have their places, just like shouts do.

I found shouts to be largely useless in PvP, PvE, Raids and roaming. So that leaves zerg fights?

As much as I personally dislike condi, I think terror and Fear in general needs to be expanded on in the future.

Like, some rad new traits with interesting effects. For example:
Tonic Immobility
Foes are stunned when Fear ends.

Mass Panic
When you inflict Fear, foes near the affected target are Feared.

Liewec.2896:

cakeonroof.7385:

Willing to swap BOTH skyhammer and spirit watch for a single raid on the capricorn

capricorn actually had everything bad for PVP in it,
1. a cannon
2. NPCs
3. it went one step further and threw in mandatory water combat.

Anet need to learn to make simple maps,
theres a reason Forest and Foefire are picked by 7 out of 8 players every game,
no gimmicky fall damage, no cannons, the NPCs are merely objectives to cap.
just a bunch of capture points, simple.

Capricorn was tons better than the failed lumps of fecal matter that is Skyhammer/Spirit Watch/Courtyard.

The reason for Capricorns removal remains the most lame thing Anet has ever done as well. I will never get over how they simply couldn’t be bothered to balance underwater combat and just straight up removed all instances of it in PvP.

You can never have enough damage, lad.

Besides, at the time my reasoning for it was that there wasn’t a proper offensive condi elite nor a well that did CC.