Guild Wars 2

SirV.7245:

How do you fight a perma stealth thief that basically backstabs -> invis -> pistol -> invis rinse and repeat? By the time I try to cast anything he is already invis.

i fought a thief like that last night. the problem is that if you dont have the right build, weapons, and utils it’ll be extremely tough. I won because I used focus sword mainly, and staff if i really needed to get out of a situation.

The breakdown was if thief showed up for backstab, i would use staff to put down chaos storm right on top of me then phase retreat out (which gives me chaos armor in the combo field). switch to sword focus and then wait for his next move. if he did heartseeker spam then i just use blurred frenzy, mirrored images, mindwrack, diversion, then ileap to keep him in place and prevent him from going into stealth (i have IP traited). if he used unload (pistol spam) then i drop temporal curtain with the focus and reflect projectiles (this is traited). I will drop iWarden right after to try and get extra dmg and if he goes stealth iwarden does some aoe so it’s safe for me to stand on top of it. At the end of the day they’ll probably just stealth and run away like the kittens they are if you play more defensive. If you use conditions then mirror images into blurred frenzy with cry of frustration shatter will melt him if he continues his attack. decoy is a must against these skill-less kittens

I don’t know why ANet created a class that requires zero skill to play – and justified it by saying “aoes hurt them”. AOEs are also the most easily avoided things during stealth… since there’s this giant red circle you can steer away from – assuming the person dropping the aoe even knows where to put it since the kitten thief can be anywhere. And even if he gets hit by an aoe, it doesnt bring them out of stealth and is never nearly enough to deal a finishing blow. But mesmers are OP so lets continue to nerf them.

ps. if you have clones out it helps to stand still and look like them (sheath your weapon if they do) this way he’ll have a hard time knowing who’s who – and then when your clones get LOS on it and move thats when you go in and try to do as much dmg as possible. Shattering on time is key to defeating these spineless kittens. I’m sure you understand my distaste for thieves -_-

When picking runes in particular you have to look at two things:

1. The primary stats you want out of it (for example toughness or strength)
2. What you get when you put all 6 of the same together (is it something you can benefit from? IE runes of lyssa give you all the buffs for 5 seconds and remove all conditions on use on elite skill)

To answer those, it comes down to play style and what you want most out of it. For example, in WvW mesmers are always trying to catch up to others and are the slowest running class in the game. So what I did was traited my focus to recharge faster and using 6 different rune combinations I increased boon duration by 50% so now whenever i use my temporal curtain to gain a speed buff I get that buff for 50% longer – which means by the time it cools down my speed will just run out in time and i can drop it again. For me it was the sake of mobility and that’s why I took that route. It also helps maintain might and fury for a little while longer.

In regard to sigils, that’s mainly based on build. There are sigils that proc effects when you crit – so if you have a high crit chance it’s great to add extra bleeds or aoe attacks etc. you have to research the runes and sigils (goto wiki.guildwars2.com) and see what fits your style of play most. Also, the extra toughness/strength/vit you get through runes are not particularly significant (where as precision, condition dmg and duration, along with boon stats have a fair impact on gameplay) and I personally don’t believe they contribute meaningfully to any build.

So you wanna basically pick the rune(s) that best fit the overall benefit you want from them. Glass cannons come purely off armor/jewels and traits and very little impact comes from the runes themselves. So don’t expect to have zerker gear with 30/30/0/0/10 (or any variation of that without contributing to toughness/vit) and expect that runes of the dolyak will make up for the loss in toughness lol

I suggest doing the dungeons first for a few days until you see what it is you’re really lacking and then decide.

Let us know how it goes =)

Hammerguard.9834:

Greatsword: The phantasm is the only good damage that comes out of this weapon. Everything else including skill 1- at all ranges – does pathetic damage.

Staff: Decent damage but too defensive. Skill 2 forces player to port away and skill 1 projectile speed is too slow.

Scepter: Skill 1 attack rate is too slow and weak. Skill 2 and 3 are good. No AoE on this thing making it horrible for PvE.

Sword: Forces player to get up close to do any damage. Skill 2 is too slow and the range is pathetic.

Sword off-hand: It’s just crap…

Torch: Skill 4 is good, skill 5 is trash.

Pistol: Decent damage to single target…

Focus: Skill 4 is only good for PvP and skill 5 is only good for PvE. It’s a horrible weapon. I feel the only reason people use it is for the swiftness because that’s the only mobility mesmers have besides blink. Mesmers who don’t want to use focus – I don’t blame them – are forced to get rune of the centaur.

I think mesmers need some serious changes to their weapons.

While this is mostly true, the only changes we’ll get (and the only ones we’ve gotten) are nerfs. So if you think iDuelist is decent dmg to single target, go on the QQ threads for every other profession about how we need this MONSTER nerfed.

The way I see it, blurred frenzy is all blur and no frenzy. It takes way too long to execute the skill, and sometimes the skill doesnt even execute unless you mash it a few times, and it’s so slow to finish that by the time you iLeap in and get started, half way through your frenzy the immobolize wears off.

Though I have to say, the focus is amazing for WvW and you just have to learn how to use it effectively

kerona.3465:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

A charr Mes.. uh…

Furballs?

Charr mesmers and thieves are just… strange. I can never take them seriously

Rskippy.3620:

Ross Biddle.2367:

Either go glamours, or go shatters with your sceptre staff.

Why not do both? a 20/0/0/20/30 build utilizes glamours to the best of their potential by making them blind and in turn cause confusion in multiple ways

I don’t know if this has been fixed yet, but there was a bug before (around halloween time) when i tried a similar build. The glamour would cause blind, but it wouldn’t proc confusion through blindness which is why i stayed away from that kind of build. Can someone verify if this is working now?

grimmson.9154:

Alchemist.3692:

…
The calcuation is simple – if you take condition dmg at 2600 (which one of the mesmers in my guild has without the sigil of corruption or signet but it does include food + crystal) …

could you tell us how he reaches that condition damage? or is that with a ~15 stack of might?

I haven’t asked him, but playing around a little i can hit +1100 condition dmg (the base changes based on the condition being applied) with the following build, plus 5% condition taken from toughness, plus tuning crystals and rare veggie pizza (70 dmg and 40% duration), carrion/tribal staff which is another +179 and rabid armor should get us to that mark or at least very close to it.
http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mcmc9wGG0x9k8070V7kGW70V7ow170m

when i go on tonight I’ll ask him if he’s on what his build is

Dhampyr.2104:

Alchemist.3692:

snip

Thanks for clarifying – just didn’t want folks reading the post and walking away with “zomg 8k with 6 stacks!” and starting a new qq thread on confusion. Appreciate it!

lol but that would be epic… either way as a class that’s been nerfed since launch (and probably during beta) i don’t think there’s much else left to take away. tbh using a mesmer requires a fair amount of technical skill – so you’re either really good or you’re not. I’ve rarely seen any inbetweens. What there should be a QQ thread about is a perma stealth thief running away after having his kitten handed to him!

Dhampyr.2104:

Alchemist.3692:

I have only 800-900 condition dmg but when i stack with my shatters im doing 2k ticks with my dps in the mix as well. It’s very powerful. If traited and built properly you can hit up to 8k ticks (using foods and sigils) but you’d need 6+ stacks for that.

Great post – please be careful with inaccurate info tho. There is no way anyone is getting 8k ticks with anything close to 6 stacks of confusion. Even Kylia (referenced above and probably one of the most proficient confusion mesmers I’ve seen) doesn’t break 7k ticks with 17 stacks of confusion.

Only reason I bring this up is because there are already calls for confusion to be nerfed – no need to add fuel to that fire with inaccurate info. ;-)

The calcuation is simple – if you take condition dmg at 2600 (which one of the mesmers in my guild has without the sigil of corruption or signet but it does include food + crystal) then your damage per stack is 130 + (0.15*2600) = 520; take that x the 17 stacks you mentioned (which i have no idea how someone can get 17 stacks of confusion and you’ve hit the 8k mark – granted at the difficulty of putting on 17 stacks). If we say max sigil and signet plus 3 stacks of might (which is a joke for mesmers because we can keep them up easily) we get 130 + [0.15(2600+250+100+105)] = 588 x the 17 stacks you mentioned is 9996 and at 6 stacks it’s 3528, and at 9 it’s 5292. Here we are also assuming the weapon set is made for condition dmg as primary stats and rune of undead for the extra condition and 5% off the toughness (I haven’t asked, but it would seem logical lol).

ANet is well aware of how powerful confusion is which is why it’s only half the dmg in spvp. Granted it’s not easy to hit 8k and requires a lot of practice and timing to make sure you stack properly – but it’s not impossible… if you trait correctly you can be doing 3.5-4.5 easily. Beyond 5 is very difficult, but it’s not fair to call it inaccurate.

To be clear I said up to 8k dmg and 6 plus stacks. I never said 6 stacks will give you 8k, that’s just ridiculous.

I think IP (if you mean illusionary persona) is extremely useful. even if you dont get in melee range most of the people you face will want to (i.e thieves warriors guardians d/d eles) you’ll have a lot of flexibility with that trait imo and you’ll find that even if you are a condition build you will shatter often so the shredding rate bonus is great to if you invest in that trait line.

another thing to keep in mind is that your shatters are aoe so when up against more than one enemy it really, really stands out. You can easily take 3-4 opponents if you manage your shatters properly – I have been successful against a max of 8 so far but that depends on their individual and group level skills.

While using the blind confusion combo is nice, you’ll only get one stack of confusion unless you’re shattering or they just keep running in and out of your glamour fields. It’s really not worth it numbers wise because 1 stack only does about 300 dmg depending on how your build is setup but even if you push it to the extreme of 500 dmg, confusion is devastating in stacks.

I have only 800-900 condition dmg but when i stack with my shatters im doing 2k ticks with my dps in the mix as well. It’s very powerful. If traited and built properly you can hit up to 8k ticks (using foods and sigils) but you’d need 6+ stacks for that.

imho not only are you getting more condition dmg from investing there but you’ve got a backup (diversion and distortion) in case ppl get too close for comfort. not to mention diversion is excellent when you’re going for a stomp

Olonnais.4307:

Hi! I’ve just finished my first serious video and I’d like to share it with you guys.

Hope you enjoy it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJnNHjCNJwM

Great video! I’m curious what are your stats for attack armor condition and crit chance?

kodesh.2851:

Try them out in the heart of the mists first. I really like Runes of Lyssa, but just run orbs in pve b/c they’re so cheap.

What do you mean run orbs in pve? Is there some other way to get some of these ridiculously priced runes?

Przemek.3289:

Ok, but while using absolutely non-condition items i feel that so many conditions form staff and clones are ‘wasted’ and could actually deal more damage if there were some condition damage on items

The problem with condition stacks are that most professions can remove them easily, and if you aren’t pure condition spec’d you’re not outputting enough damage since most professions again are spec’d for vit and toughness since their base power is higher than mesmer they don’t typically invest much (minus the glass canon noobs).

unfortunately we have to usually pick one or the other, or it becomes a complicated build.

I use zerker armor, with toughness and condition trinkets to balance it out a little because I did want my confusion stacks to do damage right away before they figure out they have it. I don’t have as much power as i did with my full zerker build but huge survivability opportunities to completely confuse the enemy as they try and figure out what build im running so they can adjust their strategies.

The way I do it is that I use conditions mainly as a distraction or something to add a little bit of pressure. Confusion is great because most ppl don’t even notice it’s on till it’s too late. They’re usually spec’d for bleeds burns and poison so they know its a battle against time and the more they can attack you the better chances they have of downing a mesmer and then clearing conditions then stomp. But with confusion they dont usually realize right away so it does a fair amount of damage even at only 800 condition dmg. In that time of panic you can usually get off an ileap into the blurred frenzy and shatter combo.

keep in mind, while staff can chew someone down at close range with the additional bounce trait, you are also at risk to take big damage. Being a staff primary you should be going for condition build and not shatter.

you should post some videos of your fights with your current setup and get feedback on it. Also, get the cheap level 78 masterwork of the same armor (similar stats) so you can see the difference in gameplay which is the goal. You wont get the exact same damage numbers, but it’ll give you something to benchmark against when you make your final decision

Currently im at 2800 atk 2100 armor around 900 condition and 18.5k hp. I run zerkers armor two toughness rings, zerker amulet, and two condition earings.

Traits are 0/20/0/20/30, I mainly run sword focus with staff for defensive plays

Saturn.6591:

So yeah, I’m making this topic because I just got my kitten handed to me multiple times in a row; in the obsidian sanctum jumping puzzle. This thief even won 2vs1 2 times in a row.

Basically, he would attack out of stealth and apply poison on me when attacking. I managed to apply 6 stacks of confusion on him a few times, but that didn’t bother him much, as he’d just go into stealth again and instantly remove it (cure conditons in stealth). He was always stealthed for most of the fight; I daresay he wasn’t visible for more than 1-2 seconds at once, even though that’s technically impossible because the revealed debuff is supposed to last 3 seconds. I simply could almost never target him, and if I did and actually managed to at least give him some confusion, he would just stealth anyway and remove it. I mean okay, I’m not fully exo-equipped yet, but still… he also didn’t do insane amounts of damage, “just” 1,5 – 3k every time he attacked. But together with being poisoned a lot (for some reason the poison actually did a bit of dmg as well), I couldn’t heal fast enough to make up for his dmg. I also couldn’t damage him, because 1. I couldn’t really attack him as he was almost perma-stealthed and 2. if I could get confusion on him, he removed it instantly without even trying.

So yeah, is there any way to counter this as a condition mesmer? I’m running with a mix of carrion and rabid gear; using staff and sword/torch for when I’m alone (thus, also in jumping puzzles) and staff and sword/focus while in bigger groups.

I always thought condition necros are the hardest to fight as a condition mesmer, but today I’ve learned that thiefs can be even worse.

Use your staff, chaos armor and chaos storm should be your friend. If you dont have fast cast ground targeting on then clicking and moving your mouse will def not keep you up to the thief’s pace. Use your chaos armor first, once it’s on cool down drop your chaos storm on your self.. before chaos storm runs out do a phase retreat and you’ll get chaos armor again (keep in mind it doesnt stack duration it just resets the counter to 5 seconds if you already have CA on) and if he’s hitting you at that time he’s hurting him self… if you have illusions traited to shatter on yourself you can do f3 when he shows up then pull out clones and shatter (aoe damage is extremely powerful against thieves, they are specifically made to take more aoe damage than other classes while invis).

I would also recommend you use a focus instead of torch.. while the stealth is great the phantasm is useless… with a focus you can power your iwarden and just stand right on top of him. That phantasm will rip him to shreds if he comes near you. Also stacking retaliation with chaos armor is incredibly powerful because he’ll just kill himself if he continues attacking you.

You could also use pistol to stun and iduelist. If the thief goes to take out the duelist then it’s your chance to attack him, if he doesn’t then that will be a big mistake. Even without traits and a power build it can easily do 5K damage. Use staff mainly and you should be fine.

Bottom line: You gotta aoe, and keep attacking while strafing even when you can’t see him. Condition build is tough if you’re relying on confusion, but using burn and bleed from staff will hurt him fast, and as soon as he goes invis if you drop a chaos storm on the spot he was you’ll stack more conditions and his stealth wont be able to remove it because it only works while going in to stealth, not while you’re in it. Remember to phase retreat and drop iwarlock as it’ll stick around even when he stealths.

If the real issue is him going into perma stealth, /laugh stealth and blink your way out of there. It’ll kitten him off that he couldn’t do anything to someone invisible laughing at him

Oh yeah, re: posion Sigil of geneoristy will give it back to him, null field can wipe it off, and arcane thievery will send it to him and take his buffs. as a condition mes you HAVE to have at least one of those since it makes fighting condition necros a lot easier

Thieves have that shortbow thing which shadow step/teleport whatever it is – them anywhere… doesnt matter what the terrain is and so on. Blink USED to be that way – but like every other mesmer skill it’s been “adjusted”

Nurse.1085:

I’m new to Mesmer, I’m still leveling her but I want to “main” her as my WvW character.

I really enjoy the Staff weapon, but I’m getting the feeling it’s more of a “secondary” weapon rather than a “Main” one. I could be wrong.

Are there any builds or anything that’d center around Staff? I don’t mind being a “Support” type character, since my 3 out of 4 of my 80s are spec’d for Support. I also don’t care for big numbers or straight Power builds.

If I were to go for a Confusion build, any tips on that? I heard Scep/Torch was bad, but it seems like the most “obvious” Confusion set up.

TLDR; To Staff or not to Staff? Builds for Confusion/Condi Dmg?

Staff is probably the safest weapon to go with since it has a lot of defensive capabilities along with giving you might and fury. I don’t run a condition build, but I almost always have a staff. If i’m defending a tower i’ll run staff and GS but if I’m running around i’ll usually do staff sword/focus or sword/pistol.

I find the issue with using a greatsword is that while iBerserker does a lot of damage, it goes done easy and has a long cool down. Also, the GS’s main damage comes at range, so if someone moves in too close – you’re pretty much useless. With a staff though and the trait in illusions which gives you the extra bounce.. it’s almost suicide to be so close to a mesmer with a staff cuz you can stack bleed and cause burning, then also get fury and might, phase retreat out, switch to your sword/whatever you have, iLeap, swap in blurred frenzy and shatter at the same time. It’ll melt your opponent

Red Falcon.8257:

Never play defensively just roflstomp them and keep yourself in their face all the times.

Not sure what would be exactly OP in this class.
If I was a necro I would run a power build and just permachill+roflstomp them, maybe with a nice daze and a couple fears in between.
Or as a conditionmancer I would just stack 3k/second DoTs and CC them while avoiding/kiting the clones.

Rofl this guy has never played a skilled mesmer. If you get in all CC and he/she’s got retaliation up all it takes is a blurred frenzy, into clone shatter, switch to staff chaos storm, phrase retreate stun shatter and that mesmer is roflstomping you now while your hundred blades took out half your hp. Also, leaving a phantasm around without taking it out first is an extremely stupid thing to do. They deal about 5k-10k every 4-7s depending on how they’re traited – leave them unchecked and the mesmer will kite your kitten around while they destroy you.

Then when you stack conditions he’ll use arcane thievery steal your boons give you the debuffs and roflstomp you again. Maybe even add a sigil to pass off the conditions back to you when thievery is on cd, or use null field or many other ways to remove conditions.

Don’t give bad advice to people who are already doing terribly against such a complex profession. It takes a lot more skill to use than a thief or warrior so the general assumption fighting a mesmer should be that this person had a lot of technical knowledge or else they’ll get their kitten handed to them.

The class is not OP in the least bit. We require ridiculous level of LOS now for 90% of our attacks; iLeap is a fail; no matter how much toughness we build, we’re the weakest profession in terms of handling dps and also have the lowest vitality.

On the other hand there are a ton of things that make this a spectacular class, but it isn’t for the weary. It takes time to learn and understand how things work together and if you screw up the timing it can be devastating – unlike a thief who’ll just cloak for 30 seconds and run away if they screwed up in a fight.

The toughest opponent for mesmers are d/d eles and necros based on a profession perspective. At the end of the day it’s the actual skill of the opponent that matters above everything else.

Anyone else have difficulty hitting ppl on towers/keeps with the GS and phantasms? The staff is ridiculous and i’ve never actually landed a hit. Most attacks come up as obstructed, so I’m virtually useless during a tower siege. Every now and then I can get of an iBerserker if I’m really careful but the amount of required LOS to land our hits now is pretty bad. I don’t see any other profession having this much trouble hitting people on towers. Esp not the people who use bows and rifles at least. I don’t think any necros have had any problems either with this, so it seems like a mesmer specific issue

Snoxx.7943:

(actually, I think The Prestige should be a double-activation skill, where you could press the key a second time to trigger the unstealth effect at will)

I agree totally. It’s ridiculous that we can’t control when we come in and out of stealth – meanwhile other professions have complete control over their phases – such as thieves stealth, ele mist form, etc

iLeap fails have yet to be addressed, and i’m still finding issues with that LOS change they made on Phantasms. You need almost perfect LOS to cast them. If there’s a slope of any kind it just fails. It’s sad that despite the many, many issues this profession has – ANet continues the nerfing process without any good reason (or maybe it’s just the onslaught of eles and thieves everywhere whining about how we’re so OP).

SemmlerTh.2685:

Hey guys,

I just came back from failing again at Lupi in Arah exp. As you cannot use illusions until phase 2, you have to switch to other weapons. So I decided to go with Great sword and Sword/Focus, in preparation to phase 2.

But in Phase too, I feel like I am actually a Problem for the group. I dont do much damage without illusions. And the Greatsword doesnt make more damage than about 400 per Hit. All my other skills, sword/focus and all utility skills are just equiped, for surviging.

There is The Blink, the signet of illusions, and the Mantra of Concentration, because you’ll die if you can’t get away from him. And because of some idiotic reason, I allways have the aggro, until I am completely dead. So all I do, is a few hits, until I have to shatter illusions to survive, or blink arround, and not to forget, dodge those 12k per second insane fields.

and all this, for 100-400 damage every 5 seconds? If Group members try to rez me, this is actually bad for them, because they risk their life, because it doesnt make any diference, if the mesmer is alive, or not. His damage is not worth mentioning anyway.

Id really like to make bifrost, but at this point, it seems absolutely impossible to kill Lupi. How do you play against him?

Mesmer is probably one of the best classes against GL.

Phase 1 there are two options:
1. If your party wants to do melee then use sword/pistol since iduelist stacks a lot of dmg (you can even do sword/sword). This is important that EVERYONE do this because if even one person goes ranged then he’ll send out locusts and grubs. Up close all he does is swing his arms around and kicks. I prefer this method

2. Do the ranged method by keeping up 3 iduelists at all times and switching to staff to stack some conditions and buffs. Alternatively if your dps is high enough leave iDuelists out to do your bidding while you run around on grub duty using your sword skills such as ileap to keep it locked in place while you blurred frenzy his kitten down.

Phase 2:
everyone melee! I cannot stress this enough. It’s incredibly more difficult especially with the new rez rush restrictions to range this guy. When you are all close and tight, anytime he does that bs aoe attack with those green bolts pop a feedback bubble and watch you do over 40k damage instantly! Also, tell the people you are running with to drop things like wall of reflection etc if by chance he does that move again before your feedback cools down. Also when he does that attack where he uses his hands and bombards you with bullets feedback will also reflect that right back! Just watch out for the ShadowWalk he does and count to 1 after he lands and then dodge to avoid his attack – everything else should be easy and you should be able to see it coming. Also being close together anytime you drop phantasms (depending on the build) you can buff your allies, and others can aoe heal – while using combo fields to stack up buffs and debuffs become a lot easier!

Phase 3 is soft tingz.

My guild members and I clear him in about 15 mins depending on the group’s build.

Good luck, lemme know if you have any questions.

Any idea when the name change feature for characters will be up? It’s in the TP already but I haven’t heard yet when we’ll actually be able to access it.

Oh, and i find blurred frenzy takes longer than what the tool tip says…. it takes about 1 second to cast and pull off, it should be a lot faster. And the 25th skill point in dueling for illusions causing confusion on death. That only applies to clones as of wintersday patch. For some reason the phantasms dont do that anymore -_-

We really got screwed

Blink does not break stun/immobilize anymore http://youtu.be/1D_Qhz9TNXs
also, decoy SOMETIMES breaks stun.. not always.

The additional bounce trait in the illusions line also does not apply to clones for some reason when it should.

If someone is up a flight of stairs, and your attacks are hitting – summoning iBerserker is usually obstructed unless camera is panned all the way up – which is troublesome keeping up with those annoying thieves

This wasn’t asked during the AMA but I’m sure a lot of people are curious about it. Linsey mentioned a “scavenger-hunt” type of method for getting precursors. Can someone maybe elaborate on it, and perhaps give a timeline on when it might be expected?

The biggest concern I have is that while RNG is a ridiculous concept altogether, hunting for a specific enemy in hopes of an RNG drop (such as the rumors of getting precursors from Jormag) is only moving sideways and not forward. I (and I’m sure many others) don’t mind challenges in to getting the precursors (just like how getting the gifts are challenges and not an RNG fest) but if it’s just going to be another ridiculous gamble – then just leave them as it is.

Could we maybe also get a comment on the amount of RNG involved in the acquisition of precursors?

neoxide.7320:

swiftpaw.6397:

neoxide.7320:

I spent 350g on my precursor last week, would suck if they became freebies next update.

They’re a little rarer than most would like but their price is due to the high demand for legendaries. If they nerf precursors it would really be a slap in the face to anyone who worked to get a precursor the hard way when compared to those who sat and cried until it was made easier.

It’s a slap in the face to me that you got your precursor at 350 but I have to pay 400 now and possibly even higher in a month’s time. imo they need to add an NPC that just sells it outright at 350.

That’s called supply and demand as I said in my last post. You can’t expect time to lower prices alone, and you can’t expect to get the same priced precursor as the guy before you. Demand is still high for precursors and when supply of them decreases, price increases.

I wouldn’t care if the price of precursors dropped naturally over time as the demand dropped, however, I do have a problem with ANET artificially adjusting precursors to make them “more available” without compensating those of us who obtained one when it was “less available”.

In other words, give me my 350g back and I will gladly re-obtain Dawn the easier way.

You have no idea if this is “easier” or not. You might end up without a Dawn – permanently.

Shadow Blade.1324:

im currently ok with the current method of obtaining pre-cursors for the following reasons

4. you can actually get precursors without spending any gold at all, just chuck weapons bought for karma or dungeon tokens into the forge and repeat as needed.

Clearly you aren’t up to speed with the various patches made to fix that. That’s how people got the precursors to begin with – and it was an exploit. They never intended to have that happen. So as of a long time ago – that method no longer works. You need to gold farm and get lucky on drops and toss things into the forge. That is the ONLY method (refer to Linsey’s post about getting precursors). Everything else has been addressed and adjusted.

I think you people are missing the point. It’s not going to be any less difficult to acquire a legendary – so stop crying. It’s just taking out the luck factor which a two year old could do to get one.

If you’re concerned you don’t have the skill required to get one – then you just aren’t legendary, and that’s how it’s supposed to be. It’s unfortunate that clowns can RNG a precursor and suddenly claim they’re legendary.

I bet the same people whining about this change, are the same ones who bail on a dungeon because they died a few times and just cant figure it out.

Anyone seen this staff? http://www.gw2db.com/items/68519-final-rest (type in the chat link to see the preview.. it’s kitten). I’ve read that it’s a supposed drop from a “large” boss, though so far I haven’t seen it at all at any bosses, nor is it on the TP.

Curious if anyone has found it, and if they can share how they went about it. It’d be great if a Dev could drop us a hint as to where we can start looking for it (aside from the “large boss” comment that was made about this in a another post).

P.S. I can only assume “Large Boss” would mean dragons? But then again I’d consider everything a large boss when I’m using my asura -_-

I was just going through this with my guild leader as well. We have people who guild hop, and basically just join a guild to avoid pugs, and if the primary guild they’re in doesn’t have anyone, they just switch and represent a different one and try to find people to run with them.

I’m not sure if this has been mentioned yet or not, but there’s some inconsistency regarding the battle system.

While I understand why it would be senseless to be able to not face our enemies (lets say the enemy was standing behind us) and be able to land an attack – at the same time, I don’t see why this doesn’t apply to the enemies we fight (in PVE).

It’s particularly annoying when that enemy is using a knockdown ability which leaves you down for a while, and even worse when there’s more than one and they stack that ability on you (particularly risen brutes, ettins, scavengers, tamini tramplers) and unless you use something like “Shake it off” which only the warrior has, it’s a guaranteed armor break + having to respawn. It kind of defies the purpose of being about to run around your opponent and get to their side or back (where most systems of battle actually reward you for being able to do that). Before anyone goes saying “that’s what the dodge button is for”, it basically just makes the mechanics of the game lazy if all I do is stand there and attack while waiting for one of those knockdown attacks and then dodge – not mention what happens when you run out of endurance?

I suggest, if we are unable to do that sort of thing (since there was a patch that fixed that with the elementalist a while back) then perhaps those we fight shouldn’t be able to do it either. It gets very annoying and just makes the battle system look so cheap, despite being as robust as it is.

It’s usually a lot of fun fighting in GW2 but these instances (especially in dungeons) just ruin the experience. And before anyone says “that’s challenging” – it really isn’t. There are far more challenging fights which require actual skill and don’t come off as annoying. Especially if this isn’t a boss or high level enemy doing that attack.