Guild Wars 2

DeceiverX.8361:

Einlanzer.1627:

Leviathan.9850:

Engi Flamethrower kit. Such a sad weapon when it could be good.

Also, Warrior Longbow – even though it’s effective situationally, the #1 skill is pathetic (it needs a dramatic reduction to its aftercast), which makes it really clunky and feeble in general usage.

To be fair, some of the skills on longbow are particularly strong for the warrior, and the skill in its entirety SHOULD feel clunky seeing as you’re a heavy using a longbow trying to shoot more arrows than rangers and thieves while also lighting them ablaze. :\

It still does more damage than ranger longbow, though. Consequently, ranger longbow/non-pet power/precision builds need more attention to begin with.

Minus the burst I think most of the skill were just rip-off from GW1 rangers markmanship skills. So….

Why haven’t they merged all these threads yet?

I think that the traps suffer similarly to most of the ranger’s utility options the require larger point investments to approach what should have been ‘out of the box’ functionality.

It probably does need looking at as it is a hard counter to one profession.

Off topic slightly how does it interact with guardian spirit weapons/ranger spirits/etcs?

@Razor stop trying to use skill level as an insult and if you can get your way about there being skill level requirements for forum posting I would counter with any use of the words skill, bads and casuals in a insulting or inflammatory way should equally limit where and how often individuals can post. So how about we keep discussion open and friendly? If we can’t keep your Skirtt to yourself.

Zero Day.2594:

Nerf everything but the warrior guys.
It’s the only prof that’s balanced and is not OP at all.

Somewhere there is a video of profession discuss where the generally idea of buffs to everything else would be a nerf to warrior, I can hope it was sarcasm, but the forums general vibe makes me think it is kind of the view that many would take.

I doubt we can see the pet removed from ranger, and while they other weapons on ranger exist we will see changes that are not entirely for the better, if short bow/longbow become to widely see (or longbow gets Warr/Nercoed [defined as over-tune to rapidly in haste to make a option seen/viable for an event (i.e Pax,) then basically painting the devs in a corner of when/how to adjust it to level where it is used but not totally dominate)} then suddenly ranger is backt to, or at a worst place.

@Orca: Currently the archer only playstyle can only be at a disadvantage as one this game/its vocal community are focus on melee superiority and preaching risk vs reward (stacking near instanced melee kill are ok somehow and I didn’t see the risk). The game design is partly to blame as the limit on the range of boons (probably to deal with the spvp map basic design) and the increased effectiveness of most blast combo pushes for the continued stack formation we see.

Ranger is a profession with many archetypes we have the archer, the beastmaster, the druid (nature magic/spirit) the guerrilla. It would be nice to know what Anet wanted and it partially seem that ranger is the product of the early cutting room floor when Archer (as a profession) and Warden got the axe.

Not sure if that was the best way of handling it prehap creating a thread that was for fostering discuss, not arguments would have been a start. Or you could have broke it down profession by profession and split the viewing a bit, nothing seems to stop anyone from doing so as we have seen from these new Sub-forum. Skritt they don’t even seem to merge as often as they once did.

We are playing a fantasy genre mmorpg and you have concerns for realism, please just get out now as realism isn’t going to be a part of the design.

Kyon.9735:

It’s pretty rare to see D/D eles in pvp too and Boon Duration Runes are somewhat ignored because they have lower duration than in PvE/WvW.

From what I’ve been reading and from the impression I got from the Ready Up the above quote needs a bit of editing. “It’s pretty rare to see eles in pvp…”

Maybe is it a better question to ask why are there fewer D/D elementalist in PvE/WvW. I can only guess that in WvW staff is the superior tool for the perception of the content. As for PvE I have not at clue there I do not play elementalist for anything other that getting alts of different armor weights/race right now working on a human elementalist for that purpose.

Kyon.9735:

People can argue how much boon duration Eles need. Some will say 45%, some will say 60%. And as far as I know the only build that’s usually locked to Boon Duration is D/D. Of course, Anet is not stopping eles from using 6/6 rune sets.

If you’re gonna call an ele “nerf”, it might be because of Crit Damage nerf. Eles have no decent condition builds so they’re forced to use Power builds. It’s gonna be a lot harder now to kill bunker condis given that they were hard to kill even before the crit damage nerf. But hey, every power builds of every class gets “nerfed” too.

Unless this is all focused on WvW engagement then I think the overall ‘crit damage nerf’ is being exaggerated as I understood it the numbers for s/tpvp are to remain unchanged by the advent of Ferocity (why it couldn’t have just stayed prowess is beyond me).

Maybe it is just habit at this point, but I can not help, but think somehow ranger is going to come out of this entire process, in overall worst position than the profession started. At best it’s Aquaman v2. and at worst I can’t really think of too much worst for the overall profession.

As Sharp stated in the Profession Balance Sub-forum sticky:
“Be mindful of scope. It takes design, development and testing time in order to make a new feature or revise an old one. Keep scope/work/time/resources in mind when you make your suggestions.

Be mindful of context. Power creep is something we’re trying to avoid. Sometimes a profession may not receive as many increases as other classes. A lot of times, this is because that class is already performing very well in the current state of the game. So keep the overall context/state of the game in mind when giving feedback."

I think that there will not be enough time/effort put into the changes the ranger needs, which will lead to more band-aid fixes. Secondly rangers seem to doing well in the s/tpvp environment with all the ‘hard-wired’ problems inherent with the profession. I can only image the havoc on the current game when the profession is functioning as a fully integrated (no more weird interaction with the security checks/pets separated from the universal NPC based behavior) and the general call for the reduction of ranger overall effect as fixing the problems plaguing ranger comes to be view as power creep.

That being said I almost been motivated to look through some ideas I had over the past year and consider revising them for posting. Maybe none of us (myself included) can not help, but feel that ‘maybe this time’.

They only said the bulk of the bonuses, until we see the changes we can not assume to know how the developers are using the word ‘bulk’. For all we know they may very well be a rune set that taken in total is superior to the cherry picked 2/2/2 setup we are currently seeing, or it will just be another set of changes that we, the player base, will have to adapt to.

All and all I think most vigor is on the chopping block right now as the previous patch touched on engineer, ranger, and thief. So we see the remaining profession not yet effected by this change in overall philosophy (not necromancer’s as there vigor uptime is basically a non-issue, nor warrior as they are either feeling untouchable, or too focused on trying to stay over-tuned) trying to be kept out of the change.

I am not saying that the decision not to change change in Deceptive Evasion is or is not a good idea it just starts additional issues, one it does presents the perception that ‘the mesmers whined enough and Anet caved’ and perception has become very important in the overall design of the game (as Anet will weaken one option to make another be perceived as better). Another issue (related to the above mentioned) is it can create further problems as there have been changes not well received that the players have had to learn to deal with, without being able to put any input into the implementation (i.e reveal duration in pvp, most of ranger’s changes, but not limited to those just some of the recent ones).

That all being said the best of luck to the mesmer players (while I do have one I do not play it much).

Not say whether or not it ‘should’ be this way, but from what the evidence is pointing towards.

Could you elaborate more on how it isn’t a problem? I would like to understand your point of view.

One reason I see it as a problem is the basic target limits creates a stacking is the solution in PvE and WvW, while the builds that have aways to increase the targets on the field are among the most complain about in s/tpvp. That all being in place by designing the engine around the 5v5 Conquest oriented game mode.

Mbelch.9028:

Our class mechanic isn’t extra skills like your tool belt… Our class mechanic is a weapon swap.

Logically, if weapon swaps ARENT supposed to be affected (see all classes) then neither should Ele! Even if they are “one in the same,” like you said, we don’t get extra effects like stealth and such off the attunement mechanic.

If once we used our swap, for example to fire, that fire swap turned into a usable skill like “Hurl fire spike” then I would be okay with the double cooldown hit.

But for the moment, eles are hit doubly hard.

Look at it like this. Not only is our weapon swapping kittened, but our abnormally long cooldowns are also kittened by this.

And we only have those abnormally long cooldowns BECAUSE of the way we get extra skills. So you’re basically saying kitten ele in two directions, when really we should only be kittened in one direction — the same one each class is; skills.

While it may your weapon swap, the additional skills add by design might just balanced around that interaction with chill. Or look at it as cost of doing business like ranger pets being unresponsive or warrior getting the best tools with no/few penalties/trade-offs.

Carighan.6758:

I wanted to post this rather lengthy reply, and then you already posted it, Blood Red Arachnid. :P

The goal is to make PvE enemies behave smarter, and more like you’d expect from a PvP player. Focusing on weak targets, dodging out of AEs, dodging in general, interrupts, such things.

This still won’t fix some of the more glaring/pressing issue of the balance centered around the Conquest game mode and the difference between it and other game mode objectives.

Why bother at this point as there would still be grandfathered in commander that have their tags?

Some of the issue plaguing a lot of the content of guild wars 2 is honestly the use of scaling and how content has supposedly designed for any level <80 is by and by only for well/capped geared scaled down 80.

I for one would not be surprised to see one by one the dungeon explorable mode shift to level 80 only.

And it is to just dungeons, does anyone have a Teq video of a group of characters in the area’s natural level range taking him down? I for one do not think it would be possible.

IF i recall correctly at one time the eagle and hawk shared a F2 cool down just like the any other re skinned pet

Might as well ask anet to have Scarlet flood all of Tyria/the Mist.

Harper.4173:

phaeris.7604:

Really, want to play that game?

Aoe stun frequency warrior > all

Best mobility in game warrior > all

Highest health + highest armour warrior > all

Highest single target damage at range warrior > all

Highest invulnerability uptime warrior > all

See…i can do this all day.

You may as well type : Class who is called an Elementalist : Elementalist > All.

Warriors don’t have invulnerability. Try again.
Warriors have good mobility – true.

High armor and health – you need those because no soft damage mitigation.

And if highest single target range damage means Killshot then allow me to laugh.

Please get your facts correct before posting:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Endure_Pain
Skill text Take no damage from attacks. You are still susceptible to conditions and crowd control effects.
The no damage is in fact Invulnerability:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Invulnerability.

So…anything else you’d like to share with the group?

I think that the core of the issue here is that for some reason clone replacement (i.e. creating a clone while 3 illusions are present) is counting as a clone death. Has it been stated that this is working as intended or is it a case of the programming being not being separated between a death from damage, being replaced and a being remove at target’s death.

pza.8024:

new meta = new equipment required = keeps people farming stuff & goldsink = increases value of gold = increases value of gems = more temptation for customers to buy gems for real money.

the point is, they could achieve a better customer satisfaction by simply fixing their stuff.

@OP: All i see is “QQ, dey nurfd my stuffz, nao i cnnt pwn with that exploit i found in that forum nemore”.

Too much tin hat there bub, as they confirmed for PvE that berserker would be the best damage set, and I doubt most profession deviate from whatever set they run currently in WvW and as for PvP a new gear set is just a few clicks away.

It seems that is would be a good time to have a general discussion about the nature of the weapons skills in Guild Wars 2.

General guidelines: No suggestion on improvement, just view of the strength and or weakness of specialized (power or condi) weapons or hybrid weapon.

Secondary question: Should control, be a separate weapon category?

I think we’ve hijacked Barabajaga’s thread and for that I apologize.

I do not think Main hand ax switching to a melee weapon would be a good idea. I think with the reduction of range on shortbow, main hand ax suffers in its original role as a skirmishing middle range weapon.

I think we can stop designing new class mechanics for the ranger that do not involve the pet as Anet has been very clear on the decision that ranger is to be the ‘pet class’ for guild wars 2.

Here we go. I think this might be one of those “Release the Kraken” moments.

Not trying to be disruptive here, but stealth in and of itself is not a thief mechanic, steal is the class mechanic, initiative is a mechanic, sneak attack (which don’t care how you became stealthed) are a class mechanic. Just had to get that out, carry on.

Weakness: Not enough of the surface of tyria is water.

Well maybe we can see some of that Whack-a-mole design they say that they don’t do>

oZii.2864:

I don’t know tbh I personally don’t think vigor uptime on guardian and Mesmer is a problem I have both classes along with my main which is ele. I think this is a s/tPvP focused nerf brought about probably by people claiming there is to much random dodges or people aren’t dodging skillfully. That is the only way I think this came up.

PvP is to blame for most ‘balance’ changes anymore, think about the profession that were adjusted first on the vigor focused patches, Engineer, Ranger, and Thief. The later two known for being evasive. So leaving any profession with better evasive options than the ‘Adventurer’ subgroup is just asking for trouble especially after the whole ‘Make warrior feel like warrior’ skrit for not adjusting Healing Signet anymore than the -8%.

Let’s just be honest with ourselves the Developers designed the entire game to work around the sPvP system of maps with 5v5 being the ideal situation. PbAoE buffs, target limits, and most of the mechanics all make sense in that environment, however then they proceeded to use that same design (with band-aid fixed siege for WvW) and you see where the problems originate. Slightly off topic it also shows glaringly in the current annoyance the general PvP community hold towards spirit ranger and minion master necromancer.

There is also the problem of it is taking the Developer’s almost two years to get to the shaving phase, as they have been in the past prone to “knee-jerk” reaction to balance, so in this shift we are seeing quite a bit of whack-a-dredge.

So the concept of simile is lost on you. In changing the base up-time of vigor mostly across the board while leaving one or two untouched bring the question on how is that balanced and what was the point of the statement of bring down total vigor across the board other than a PR move to make the players of the profession adjusted first feel that the profession of choice was just being targeted.

So what your saying is warrior would be balanced if it hit about twice as hard a the ranger’s bear’s in PvE/WvW and only about 1 1/3 as hard in PvP.

It still comes across as a bit double standard though making the statement that they do not want permanent vigor up-time and begin work to lower vigor up-time across many profession, but do not touch a couple of professions in that over all change.

It would be like when they changed quickness, except deciding that it wouldn’t effect one of the quickness granting skills.

Slightly off-topic is the passive of Signet of Stamina on the chopping block as well?

Even if they are balancing around a fictional mean, we will continue to see changes (nerfs or buffs) just for the sack of changing the spvp meta once it become too stale, a profession isn’t being used as much as the developers would like, or change the perception of the options on a skill/weapon/trait.

Picturing the standard NERFbuffNERF sandwich that Anet has been prone to do to the ranger profession, I for one am starting to run out of imagination to what these could be.

1). Ranger
2). Elementalist
3). Engineer

Still waiting for those “amazing” things they talked about in the stream. Maybe that word does not mean the same thing to me as it does the developers.

Hypothetically if they did revert the cool down change would you except it range being effected by cripple and chill?

Swagg.9236:

Balancing the game around PvP is better for everyone because it leads to more PvP-like PvE encounters. If everything is balanced around PvP encounters, then PvE encounters and bosses would have to mimic players so as not to be too overtuned or brain-dead easy.

Ok I was going to just watch this thread slowly fade out, but you do understand that the primary mode of balance that spvp is going for is conquest right? And in turning more of the game into that would be “overtuned or brain-dead” in a different direction.

Unfortunately for players that primarily play only in PvE the company mostly balances around Conquest mode sPvP.

Ranger pet in there current state really have no place in a game with an active defense system (as the developers have stated before they have no intention of giving the Ranger a command to make the pet dodge). Look at the mechanics they have put out lately for PvE the handful of jump to avoid a ground effect as an alternative to dodge to avoid the attack. I am not saying that the entire game needs to redesigned to work with ranger pets, but it would be nice if they would at least consider making the pet immune to future effect in which there is no defense except leave it dead or hope with does happen again before the swap penalty is over.

With the announcement of the First season leagues for WvW we all saw a sudden drop in the performance in quite a few servers resulting in what should have been a Silver rank server dominating the Bronze ranking and the previously lowest server in Gold ranking doing the same in Silver. Is this consider smart play or “match” fixing?

It seems that the current game is based around a maxium 5 targets for (most aoe) skills. However WvW as place for massive group battle that target limitation creates a basic safety in exceeding that target limit. Is this being examined as groups are also able to exceed the increased target capacity of siege weaponary?

They should probably work on fixing the Stronger Bowstring trait before doing any adjustments to the auto-attacks rate of fire.

So after this last patch the game seem very laggy and after chatting with other in the maps I am not the only one experiencing this. For me it is at its worst in Diessa the giant is nearly impossible during the spikes that can last all the way through two of his attack routines.

In watching (or reading the transcripts) of discussions on balance and design there is a lot of focus on Passive effects in comparison to active effect and often a passive effect of one Profession is labeled a problem, but similar effects on a different profession seem to be intended and not a problem.

To get to the question what is the criteria of passive effect to flag it for a problem?

The current stance seems often based on the idea of counterplay, but that does not really explain why some passive manage to be on the chopping block while others remained untouched.

Why should they even bother with feedback on the Ranger changes (or any changes for that matter) they will do what they are going to do to Ranger and then the Ranger community will look at it, find the stealth nerfs, enjoy (for a couple of days) unintended buff(s), and generally adapt to what has happened.

1. No
2. Signet of the Hunt and Hilt Bash are both the same buff. so no stacking.