Guild Wars 2

You can still do this. Go to your settings and keybinds. You can bind the pvp menu to a key so that you can change builds/traits in servers.

Today’s matchmaking has been awful. I’ve had multiple 4v5s / afks and I’ve been paired with people who clearly cannot play at all. Examples include getting triple capped while my team was 2v4 defending lord. I don’t actually understand why today has been so bad but it feels unbearable.

Anti.9156:

why are there even leaderboards?

eepeeeen

Wintersnight.3061:

I"m not sure it is fair to say that baddies can just show up and win 50% of their games.

I’m not here to derail the topic but this can in fact happen due to the point based system. People with lower MMR that are averagely skilled will gain points for winning and go up the leader board but they often dodge premade groups and when they do fight them they’ll often still gain a point if they lose. It’s a complicated mess and I wouldn’t know how to fix it but anyone could show up and win 50%.

Well when I play with teams or superpugs or whatever we often go to practice/unranked first to you know…practice. In case we have something wrong with our comp or whatever we test it out first.

What is your build? Shatter mesmer with staff/gs will always beat an engie off point and will definitely give a good kicking to an engie on a point.

Ryn.6459:

Unfortunatly, we dont have pve youtubers engis…
PvP and Wvw wise ,we have few but good players.
At home I will post the ones I like.

Nike from DnT has made many engineer pve videos.

Mesmer is not weak, in fact it has been buffed several times recently. However it cannot compete with the current celestial meta in team fights. Mesmer can still work, but you need to be very coordinated with your team to do so, as it now takes a bit of work to remove a celestial ele and occasionally an engie which is a lot to handle when you have a thief on you at the same time.

Archon.6480:

I am more interested in how to squeeze out 200 points against a skilled premade team. They almost always seem to wipe pug and keep it under 80 points. It’s a guaranteed -1 point each time your MMR gets high enough to have you slotted for death.

You have to counter rotate while they hammer the rest of your team. If they’re good enough to go for a 3capstrat then nine times out of 10 you can get yourself points by counter capping. Problem is 200 is hard to get versus a good team. My team came up against a pug and we triple capped them and continued to beat them 5v5 at their close. It was a sad affair really…

It’s unfortunate because I won 15 games and lost 2, but at the same time I’m kinda just happy that it’s back online.

Strengths
I’m a fantastic kiter and I generally maintain a good position. I am always spinning my camera and I always phase retreat about in fights, forward and backwards. I am great at shatter and sporadic combos.

Weaknesses
I am still a bit of a failure when it comes to duelling other good mesmers. I am always told I don’t speak out enough in team speak during tournaments. I still panic a lot also, if a good thief jumps on me and I’m not near any team mates to peel I’ll often panic and my lack of communication will turn me into a stomp fodder.

insanemaniac.2456:

Benjamin.8237:

it is unbearable to do so unless I can have a win more than I lose.

this is funny and horrifying

Tell me about it hahahah.

uberkingkong.8041:

Sorry if you just want to play for fun and not be ranked.

No I want to play ranked, but at the moment it is unbearable to do so unless I can have a win more than I lose. Pre december 2nd patch the leaderboards were pretty bad, but I was still consistently moving about in them because I felt I played well and during the week leading up to december 16th I played with my team and fluctated around the 200 position. Right now though ranked is a bit wobbly so I’ll wait a bit then try and fix my mmr or something by playing with teams.

uberkingkong.8041:

Benjamin.8237:

I agree with this, unfortunately. I don’t like 5 man roflstomping people but since the new patch solo queuing has forced me up against super pugs and premades while I was paired with new players. I don’t even understand how that happens at the moment and I’ve only played a few games so I’ll give it some more time but I’m likely to only queue as a team again and get stupidly high win ratios. It still seems to swing hugely both ways but we’ll see.

Really?

I just que’d solo not too long ago, another good game.

You have any screenshots to share with community of those super pugs going against new players?

I know a lot of people so I can tell if they new players or veterans.

I haven’t got any games against a premade yet, maybe I’m just on a lucky streak right now. Some people do like to exaggerate when they explain there things, that’s why you need proof to back up your claim. Easy to show proof, all you do is hit printscreen button and BAM!

This is my game from 10 mins ago. Pretty legit game, we up they up we up and we win. That deviation of the score is pretty good too, less than 50.

I could provide proof with a screenshot but I haven’t got any at the moment. I’m currently not playing ranked at the moment as my losses exceeded my wins and I’m not happy if it’s not 60% win rate so I’m going to wait until I get 5 players. But I’m not new.

I agree with this, unfortunately. I don’t like 5 man roflstomping people but since the new patch solo queuing has forced me up against super pugs and premades while I was paired with new players. I don’t even understand how that happens at the moment and I’ve only played a few games so I’ll give it some more time but I’m likely to only queue as a team again and get stupidly high win ratios. It still seems to swing hugely both ways but we’ll see.

I wouldn’t mind something like this again.

But they’re unranked. Unranked is the new hotjoin. You get nothing from it lb wise, so why worry about new players using it? It’s more of a matchmaking problem than the fact that it’s unranked.

Knighthonor.4061:

I am excited about getting new pets and skills in the expansion pack.

Tell me I’m not missing something…right?

Staff works well for doing dungeon solos. Generally if you use power amulets most things work as well, but you won’t be helping your team do things quickly and they may kick you.

Go phantasm while you learn.

All my mesmers have different looks but this one is rocking the classy battle mage look.

The point is that there isn’t enough top players so the top brackets will have stupidly long queue times and people will tank their mmr to queue quicker and still smash people.

GhOst.4019:

Benjamin.8237:

Chase.8415:

Because all it does is cause more problems, people will expect exclusive finishers and all it does is basically undo what they fixed months ago where it would take years to get a certain finisher.

But we need an endgame pvp reward and hopefully they achieve that with the new seasons. There should be a finisher/title or something that you can only get if you’re the top 5% of PvP population or something.

End game PvP reward… Win WTS for the Benjamin’s. This isn’t Call of Doody, we don’t want prestige. As stated, it will bring in more QQ for better finishers and crap like that.

I guess I didn’t articulate that well, I don’t want prestige, I think that’s a bad idea, but I do want unique rewards for the best players.

It all depends on which game mode and what level you want to achieve at. Is mesmer ‘viable’ in general, yes it is very much so ‘viable’.

Chase.8415:

Because all it does is cause more problems, people will expect exclusive finishers and all it does is basically undo what they fixed months ago where it would take years to get a certain finisher.

But we need an endgame pvp reward and hopefully they achieve that with the new seasons. There should be a finisher/title or something that you can only get if you’re the top 5% of PvP population or something.

Curunen.8729:

SlimChance.6593:

F5 – Shatter Phantasm based on Shatter Hex
Shatter Only Phantasm at its current location, doing damage and add a unique effect. 30sec cd
…

This is brilliant, I really like it.

+1

This is like arguing against a brick wall. It has been proven that CP = more damage, but whatever.

Clownmug.8357:

Benjamin.8237:

No you’re wrong. It is increased critical hit chance. Not damage.

Critical hits produce critical damage…

No it increases the chance to critical hit. In berserker gear you already crit a lot so an added chance to crit isn’t as good as a trait that will give a flat damage increase.

Clownmug.8357:

Benjamin.8237:

Don’t use precise whack. It’s a wasted trait. Take compounding power because it directly affects mind wracks damage as well as your other damage.

3 clones with CP means first MW hit will do +9% dmg, second +6% and third +3%.

I don’t think precise wrack is a wasted trait. Increased chance of critical damage (up to +125%) seems better than +9% damage in my opinion.

No you’re wrong. It is increased critical hit chance. Not damage.

Don’t use precise whack. It’s a wasted trait. Take compounding power because it directly affects mind wracks damage as well as your other damage.

3 clones with CP means first MW hit will do +9% dmg, second +6% and third +3%.

DeathReign.7821:

Ramp Up
30s CD

Your next shatter within 20 seconds deals 1.5/2/3 times the normal effect (based on how many clones shattered).

Mind Wrack deals more damage.
Confusing Cry deals more damage and stacks more confusion stacks.
Diversion has increased daze duration.
Distortion has increased distortion duration.

Could you imagine that. 3 x mindwrack damage. We would 1 shot any class in the game hahaha

Courtyard shatter builds are still very efficient, but I usually swap my staff for sword / pistol for more burst. Portal will get swapped for null field too. I then moa a target and get my team to burst him down.

Stacking Mesmers on this map isn’t a good idea though as you can get rolled over easily. On this map you mostly want support/aoe classes. I find it easiest to win with Warr / Engie / Ele / Ele / Mesmer.

Frost.5017:

The OP has missed the real issue with match making in GW2: lack of pvp population.

In the first week since the patch went live 16,000 unique EU accounts and 8000 unique NA accounts played PvP. That may be small compared to pve, but it is not a small pool.

You want to play competitive PvP but don’t want to get matched up with competitive players?

Because Mesmer is in a good place right now if you’re an average player with an uncoordinated team…

You guys keep mentioning how it wont be fun for casuals…well tell em to gut gud

Double queue has happened to me. Mid match and me and my duo buddy got a queue pop up again and forced us into a new game.

dead.1098:

Ok thanks for that

Flamethrower can be played in PvP and while it isn’t the most effective build in tournaments it is still very fun and you can hold your own against most opponents. I’d recommend you use it in a Flame/Elixir Gun build with celestial gear and grenades/toolkit.

The Snake over skull for poison makes a lot of sense though! Nice vid too.

Archaon.9524:

you know that ranked and unranked are pretty much the same since ladders are frozen right?

Ladders are but your MMR isn’t, so winning a ton of ranked now will push you up when the ladders arrive.

I hate mixing. I play this game to win (and to have fun) and I don’t appreciate it when I have people of a much lower skill level making silly mistakes. I don’t have the time to teach them often enough so I want to be paired with people who have a similar mechanical and rotational skill as myself. I don’t want to get put with top 10 players either because I want to have a balanced match, but I don’t want people with only 100 games.

Essence Snow.3194:

Are you NA or EU?

EU

Essence Snow.3194:

I’m in ranked queue for going on 30mins…….this is not worth playing.

Must be a bug, I keep getting insta pops with players roughly around my skill level. Occasionally get a new player but whatever.

SaintSnow.6593:

Doesn’t matter since everyone uses basic models in ranked ques so you’re just going to look like a human to everyone anyways. Play what you think looks best.

Wait people use basic models? I don’t know 1 person on my fl who uses basic models and most of the streamers I watch don’t use them either. They’re ugly and the Asuran tells aren’t even that hard to see if you pay attention.

I’ve only really found the same experience in ranked. I don’t know about unranked but why would a team queue there?

The poor guy needs a team, so bump! He’s pretty good also

At the moment it is because the leaderboards / ladders haven’t been turned on yet (december 16th?) and there is also a huge influx of PvE players trying their hand at PvP. This creates the impression that you’re doing worse where in reality you’re not. There are entire handfuls of players I never knew PvPed pre patch but they did, they just weren’t any good at it so I wasn’t paired with them. The PvE players also factor in, but because of the new matchmaking and leaderboards it will take a while for them to even out.

I played one match where I was the pug and the other 4 players were a guild. We were up against full pugs. The 4 ran around the map as a bus collecting personal score while I tried to rotate, and they blamed our loss on the fact that the other team had 2 thieves “cos thief is op”.

Piggy Malone.9501:

I am not going to go onto the type of bullying as this isn’t the time or place. People making huge assumptions here. It is one group who do this whenever they see a team from our guild. When they have played each other, our team will beat theirs 9 out of 10. They don’t like that so it starts. We ignore them and they dont like that and it starts again. The question was posed as a guild member walked away and others in the team didn’t. I just wanted a steer on this. Thank god I don’t pvp looking at most of these replies

Then you need a thicker skin! That’s competition, people will get salty and smack talk other teams. I know a lot of people do it, I know myself that when I come up against two particular guilds I will talk a ton of smack and focus the players I know, it’s competition and it’s all good fun. Especially when you win.

How can anything someone says online personally affect you? They can’t do anything to you but throw words at you. I guess over time I’ve gotten used to it but what’s the point in getting upset when you can get a thicker skin.

It won’t be in the season ladders. But the map is broken, so I don’t see how people like it. All it takes is 1 person to die at the beginning to snowball an entire match.