Guild Wars 2

dancingmonkey.4902:

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

BurrTheKing.8571:

coglin.1867:

Juba.8406:

dancingmonkey.4902:

Don’t be greedy. lets take this beyond just the warrior profession.

just fix the freaking thing.

I’m greedy now ? for asking simply that my skills actually hits, instead of facepalming ?

A little bit, yeah. Perhaps we could go with fixing all the skills and not just the ones you favor. So yeah, you kind of are greedy the Second your reply was anything short of “good iedea, we really need all of them fixed equally”…….

I think the point is that Warriors are a melee class and when your gap closers don’t work properly you’re more and more inclined to bring a LB. This patch would have oppened some more options for double melee sets but not when Bull’s Charge doesn’t hit the vast majority of the time. There’s no substitute for that skill in particular. On my Engi I don’t HAVE to take Rocket Boots and the like. They should all be fixed, but the ones that are hurting the classes the most should be prioritized.

Thank-you for stating it so diplomatically. After 12 pvp matches using bulls’ rush, shield bash and rush (mace/shield-greatsword) The success rate of all the movements has become noticeably unreliable. At first if you used them in relatively short proximity to how far they could travel they connected often (80%) But currently it seems the skill insists on making its full movement distance before activating the strike. It made running duel melee sets ungainly to use and frustrating.

There is no such thing s a melee profession. As well, your excuse to claim your main profession, should take priority in bug fixes is the opposite of saying anything diplomatically.

Well, let’s look at it this way. Longbow isn’t really a “ranged” weapon because it’s strongest at close-mid range. The rifle is the only real weapon that encourages you to stay at range, and it’s not that great of a weapon. The other five weapon are melee range. Guardian’s have teleports so when I play one it doesn’t pose as much as a problem because teleports are more reliable.

Unreliable gap closers make double melee sets almost unusable. I think lag is a big factor but they broke them on their side as well. If I use a gap closer on a target that isn’t evading or blocking I should ALWAYS HIT. It should not be a roll of the dice. They should be fixed on all classes but Warrior depends on them way more than any other class. I can not take Rocket Boots and still be viable (it doesn’t fail that often for me anyways), my Ranger has a 1500 range bow if Swoop acts up, and Leap of Faith has a cone so it actually hits reliably.

So yes, if ANet has to pick what leap skills to focus on first, Warriors should get it first. If they worked we wouldn’t be forced to use LB on EVERY. STINKIN’. BUILD.

bigmonto.4215:

IMO shout-heal is better than all pure condi builds. Since you got 30% boon duration as part of the build, the might stack is always between 10 to 20 stacks (around 2k condi damage) you are of course still very much unkillable.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQNAscTnMdQlHWKIeeAnIGoKoQu4Bgye4GSfCddKA-TFTAABYoEEkDBAFmgMSVFF1HAwJAwMlZh8AAQVtCOOCAjp0on9HIFgiSjA-w

Additionally you can try full celetrial hybrid.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQNAscTnMdQlHWKIeeAnIGoKowu4BgueI9J01pAA-TVSAABgcIAiUJ4pq/AwJAIkHAQaK/6Z/BC1HwxRAgUAKKNC-w

80% fury uptime, with 10 to 20 stack of might = 2.2k power with 1700 condi with the same tankiness.

Something I’ve been debating. With the adrenaline changes do you think it might be better to sacrifice the power from Armored Attack and take Inspiring Shots so that you have better burst uptime? It’s a hard choice to make.

mPascoal.4258:

DrDivine.5378:

Penguin.7906:

mPascoal.4258:

DrDivine.5378:

Penguin.7906:

hambow:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQJASTjMdUGaXIWhQHagqgC9iHAPg6eoxzhUbAA-TpRHwAFeAABOCAAOEACuAAk2f4YZAA

GSbow:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQJARTjMdUGaXIWhwJaAmgCZnPBHT7AQ9T85LBA-TpRHwAFeAABOCAAOEACuAAk2f4YZAA

Macebow:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQNApcTjMdUGahHWhwJaghgC9KUCxgxA4nVGGxOA-TpRHwAFeAAc2fIwRAAwhAQwJA4YZAA

Axebow (barely viable):
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQNAncTjMdUGaXIWhwJaghgC9rXCxgpAQdYE7dBA-TpBHwAAeAACOCABOEADOBAl2fAZZAA

edit:
SwordHybrid:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fJAQNAscTjMdUGaXIWhwJagqgC9iHANg6eoxj9UbAA-TpRHwAFeAABOCAAOEACOBAk2f4YZAA

Would you say that axebow (celestial axe) is not really a viable competitive build anymore? Or is it viable and just harder to play now?

Still viable, but since Eviscerate is so hard to land and the build is heavy realiant on that skill, it makes a bit less viable than Hambow. But if well played it will work fine still

I would say Sword/Sword does same job only better.

Can you explain? I’m kinda curious to try sword/sword

Well is can work better because Final Thrust hits as hard as Eviscerate when target is below 50% and Sword has more condi presure than Axe/Sword with more CC to and a Burst that set ups Final Thrust if you want

I still dream with GS

Don’t forget mobility as well which is what axe lacks. That being said, if you can consistently land your Evis then the power DPS is probably higher. It just depends on what you want to do. Take Leg Specialist and you can bring a good amount of control as well.

EDIT: Been thinking about it and what do you guys think about running a build like this and have them be someone that rotates between home and mid providing support where needed.

I’m not really sure it’s viable though due to the lack of stability. If you built your team around it though like having your standard Bunker Guardian, this, and a Celestial Dagger Ele you could then add in two damage dealers of your choice and have a significant amount of sustain. I’ll see if I can get that comp together later and see if it works.

Right now, all that really needs to be done is giving classes more options, which involves buffing more weak stuff like they did this patch. What is causing imbalance isn’t any build so much as Might Duration runes. If those go back to where they used to be balance would be pretty darn good for a MMO.

I feel like this is one of those rare moments when I don’t have to defend what I said because others knew what I was getting at and said exactly what I would have. Every patch proves that I was right to say that some won’t be satisfied until Warrior is a free kill like pre patch Power Ranger.

One more thing to add. If Bull’s Charge worked properly Mace might actually be viable because it’s a good setup for it. You can land Skull Crack without it but having a skill that makes it more reliable is what makes it viable.

Some of the suggestions are OK. The missile reflect on the Axe skills would add some needed utility. Not so sure about the knock back on Dual Strike but it certainly does need SOMETHING. The physical skills could also need some work. However, the only way I would ever consider taking the Physical Training trait is if it affected the Rampage skills.

Furious Reaction seems like it would be stupidly OP in PvE/WvW and even in some PvP situations. The 2 boon traits are just clones of already existing traits that Engi has. I would prefer something more…unique. Not sure what exactly but I’ll think about it.

Doon.2364:

Good suggestions Burr.

Thank you.

coglin.1867:

Juba.8406:

dancingmonkey.4902:

Don’t be greedy. lets take this beyond just the warrior profession.

just fix the freaking thing.

I’m greedy now ? for asking simply that my skills actually hits, instead of facepalming ?

A little bit, yeah. Perhaps we could go with fixing all the skills and not just the ones you favor. So yeah, you kind of are greedy the Second your reply was anything short of “good iedea, we really need all of them fixed equally”…….

I think the point is that Warriors are a melee class and when your gap closers don’t work properly you’re more and more inclined to bring a LB. This patch would have oppened some more options for double melee sets but not when Bull’s Charge doesn’t hit the vast majority of the time. There’s no substitute for that skill in particular. On my Engi I don’t HAVE to take Rocket Boots and the like. They should all be fixed, but the ones that are hurting the classes the most should be prioritized.

Sebrent.3625:

If you had mace just boon strip like Mesmer Sword … I’d be all over that.

Don’t see it happening since their solution was +3% damage per boon on target (meh), but hey, one can dream.

I’m still curious about a Mace build that focuses on keeping weakness on your target while also having good condition removal for itself. Weakness to reduce enemy direct damage while cleanses to reduce enemy condition damage. Then wear them down.

Haven’t gotten around to testing that idea out yet :-/

You could try something like this I suppose. Having 15% extra damage when they’re weaknened could be somewhat useful now that the AA actually works.

EDIT: If you want to try something silly you could do something like this (it’s probably awful).

The time I could see Swd/Shld being superior to GS is if you run 0/0/6/2/6 and take Leg Specialist. It works with both weapons and the cripple/immob can be used to set up Final Thrust or Backbreaker.

You also can’t underestimate how much sustain a block gives you. It can be harder to escape, but personally I’d rather go out in a blaze of glory anyways. Flurry is also great for Eles you downed near a portal so they can’t slip away.

Sebrent.3625:

If that was done, I’d definitely love Mace + Shield.

MH with a block & CC plus OH with a block & CC ? Yes, please!

What’s nice is that due to the Adrenaline and Skull Crack changes it’s difficult enough to hit that it justifies the powerful effect. It forces a real choice between the AoE/Ease of use that is Hammer and the strong single target CC/Stab stripping of Mace. Atm Mace is USEABLE but not worth taking over all that AoE.

Mace as a weapon has often been viewed as being inferior to Hammer. This is understandable, Mace’s burst is only single target and it is very slow and obvious. In addition, you almost never see anyone using Mace taking the Mastery Trait Sundering Mace. It’s slightly more useful now that the 3rd attack in the chain actually connects but it still isn’t worth taking over Cleansing Ire or going 6 points in to take both. With the weapon’s focus on a single target Skull Crack could use some special effect to make it more attractive in PvP/WvW. I believe that effect should be the ability to strip Stability on a high icd. As for how High of an icd would have to be tested. I would imagine it would have to be around 45 seconds to a minute.

This would give the weapon a specific role. Other boon stripping specs can’t specifically target Stability and it would make it able to save teammates that are about to be stomped.

Another benefit of the Mace is a low CD block that when traited can reflect projectiles. This means you also bring a shield most of the time for the setup stun and the block. The problem here is that you almost never see Shield Master used because of it. I feel that Reflect Missiles and Shield Master should be one trait. If it is seen that having both +90 Toughness and Reflect in addition to the CD reduction is too strong I don’t think most players would mind losing the toughness, it’s not like it helps much in the first place.

Bullet point list for connivence:

• Sundering Mace gains the ability to strip Stability
• High ICD (45-1min?)
• Merge Shield Master and Reflect Missiles
• If needed drop the +toughness

Aberrant.6749:

TheDevice.2751:

Frenk.5917:

TheDevice.2751:

Khenzy.9348:

As long as Engineers are as weak as they are against conditions, they wont be as OP as you claim them to be.

Elixer C
Toss Elixer C
Cleansing Burst
Drop Andtidote
Tosss Elixer R
Fumigate
Cleaning Formula 409
Transmute
Automated Response

What?

Do you even play engi? Fumigate doesn’t even remove conditions on the user. Did you just linked random skills?

I’d totally love to write a long and exhaustive post on how little you know about engineer (I’m not being rude, it’s just the plain truth) but it would take too much of my time and expert players already know what I would have written.

@Eurantien: yep, you listed the things engineers are good at, but you are ignoring the things engineers suck at. Like removing conditions, and breaking stuns, or gaining stability.

Everytime is the same old story: people making biased assumptions on everything. I don’t know why I’m even posting on the forums, I should just stop and give up on hoping people to show some form of objectivity.

the guy before you already mentioned fumigate and lets hear how much you can come up with that will show exactly how little i know. I’d like to see the lengthy post man

Oh wait.. it just ended at fumigate didn’kitten

Engineers are also the most finely tailored class in the game. They get so much attention its disgusting. It’s like vomitable. They are constantly being touched-up while other classes suffer real problems. Eventually, there will be absolutely nothing an engineer can think of complaining about. The issues engi’s bring up are like little snobby rich kids screaming that their chocolate cake didn’t have sprinkles on it.

I mean honestly, conditions? That’s your major issue? And apparently you can’t run certain clears because they’re just “too difficult” to use. Not only are there clears built in to your class but I already said that runes and sigils are available for condition defense. Yet thats not good enough.

There is having access to them, and then also having reasonable access to them without destroying your build/role in a group. Eng is very vulnerable to cc and conds and were designed that way. If you try to be stronger against conds you wind up giving up too much and are weaker overall.

I would suggest that you go play an eng in pvp for a while to understand the basics of a class before coming onto the forums and talking about it.

P.S. Cleansing burst and antidote are mutually exclusive while they both technically exist, you can’t take both.

You know what’s funny? I said pretty much the same thing you did, and they just didn’t answer. He’ll jump to w/e they feel is the weakest argument and pound on it and ignore the meat of the point the other person made. I wonder if they are in politics…

I’m fine with being a little weak to conditions, but they overnerfed the one trait that was supposed to allow you to win vs condi classes. I want build weaknesses, not class weaknesses. Before this patch Warrior was a good example of this. Right now though the changes seem to have hurt perviously viable builds.

Even taking 409 isn’t all that amazing against conditions, it just doesn’t die instantly to them.

dancingmonkey.4902:

BurrTheKing.8571:

They all need to be fixed, but I think Warrior needs Bull’s Charged fixed more than the others. I use Rocket Boots and the frequency of failure is much lower than what BC has. It not working all but invalidates the use of a GS. I’m not going to use Bolas, it’s equally as finicky and it’s also easy to cleanse and the target can still attack back.

Nope. Not since the last update. I have been playing ranger, engineer, and warrior all a fairly equal amount of time since 9/9, and rocket boots actually root you or put you back in the same location as you started, but cost you 2s or so of you time, and actually cause you to lose ground, about 200% more then I have with Bull’s Charge….

Swoop seems better to me, but that may be just my perception because of the ranger as a whole right now.

BurrTheKing.8571:

Right now it’s totally worthless. I can’t even hit a stationary target a few feet away. You go past them and by the time you about face they’ll be back on their feet. All the leaps were unreliable before but this patch really screwed them up bad.

That is very literally more value and functionality then you will get out of rocket boots. I was in EB for 8ish hours last night on my warrior, and it was working pretty well for me. It does make one curious though, as to what conditions occur that cause you to “pass through” or miss?

Kharr.5746:

This problem generalizes to the majority of movement skills, including blinks/teleports. It

Teleport/blink/shadow step skills fail just as often now, as do pulls (magnet, spectral grasp, scorpion wire). Since the patch, I’ve had blink skills fail more often than succeed (70-80% fail in pvp)

Absolutely agree. I have totally and completely stopped using any pull skill on any profession. Once a skills fail rate is larger then its success rate, it completely destroys all hope with the skill at all.

I think what causes it to happen is lag. For me, Rocket Boots at worst forces me to let go of the movement keys for a split second so I can move. When it comes to Bull’s it was never really reliable except for when Skullcracker was in its heyday, it would connect around 8/10 times. Idk what they changed but after those initial group of nerfs its functionality has just gotten continuously worse.

Even Earthshaker has issues with just a tiny bit of lag. I’ll rubberband around and by the time I’m sure where I am the stun has worn off. My internet isn’t great but I can function in most online games. For some reason GW2 is just the most lag-unfriendly game I have ever played. On WvW reset night it took over a minute for me to find out what happened. My guild in TS will inform me I died and I didn’t see it happen on screen till a minute and a half later. What’s worse is that everything else around me was real time. I could move around but my attacks were slow. I just suddenly start taking damage and die.

dancingmonkey.4902:

Don’t be greedy. lets take this beyond just the warrior profession. Rocket boots, Swoop, RTL, spectral walk, they have have issues based on the same problem. Try the other professions. If you think you got it bad, try using rocket boots. They will very literally lauch you, then half way through the animation, send you 180 degrees back to your original position or 90 degrees left or right…………Hang up on a blade of grass as the other skills will, and whats worse it it will root you in position, defeating its purpose.

They all need to be fixed, but I think Warrior needs Bull’s Charged fixed more than the others. I use Rocket Boots and the frequency of failure is much lower than what BC has. It not working all but invalidates the use of a GS. I’m not going to use Bolas, it’s equally as finicky and it’s also easy to cleanse and the target can still attack back.

Right now it’s totally worthless. I can’t even hit a stationary target a few feet away. You go past them and by the time you about face they’ll be back on their feet. All the leaps were unreliable before but this patch really screwed them up bad.

If I use a targeted leap and the target is in range and not evading, using stability, blocking, or any other action to disrupt it, I should hit 100% of the time. It would be more interesting if BC was a straight line ground targeted skill shot and it knocked down the first person it hits and stops you. Maybe make it cleave due to the increased difficulty.

Sagat.3285:

mrauls.6519:

Sebrent.3625:

If you’re having trouble against celestial builds, it’s likely because you’re having trouble against builds that are quite boon heavy.

Build to strip (or corrupt) boons and you’ll see these builds become much weaker.

I’ve tried that by adding in sigil of nullification to my sword, and by going 10 points into radiance for the boon stripping by burn application (10 second CD). It didn’t make a difference. Most classes have many ways to continue to apply might, regen, and even protection. If I was another profession maybe it would be easier to remove boons. I am a guardian

Exactly not all classes have access to quick boon refresh(spec). Who are you fighting and what build are you using?

I think it’s hard to deny that builds such as Dagger Ele, Axe + Sword/LB Warrior, and 2-3kit Engis all benefit greatly from having Celestial and they gain more from it than any other gear set. They all have access to both power and condition damage, and have multiple ways to heal/regen health outside of their main heal. I never feel weak with the set. If my foe is running any sort of specialist build I now I’ll have enough of w/e they’re weak against and gain an advantage. Ele in particular has the ability to stack Might without having to interact with the enemy whereas the Warrior at least has to be gaining adrenaline to make the most of it. Multi-Kit Engis gain the least but the set is still never a bad option. In some cases pure condi might be better but for general play you’re probably better off with Celestial than Rabid.

This was possible with the old Celestial gear but the buffs + Might Stacking runes/sigils made it even better. I do agree with others that the Might Stacking should be nerfed before Celestial to see how it affects it before making other changes.

dancingmonkey.4902:

gartz.7013:

I’ve seen posts from this person under ArrDee and Ellsee? and i just would like the story behindd the number 1 engi NA

He is a solid playing engineer.

He absolutely is dishonest in claiming to be the first engineer in NA to 80.

He is often on the leader boards here, but is also generally ranked below some of the other posters here that he argues with or calls bad players who disagree with him.

He has multiple accounts because he has a bad habit of making personal attacks and insulting players with profanity. I would guess he aquired other account to use when he gets enough infractions to have one on suspension for a week or two.

He states his opinion as fact.

He claims anyone who uses the inventions line is a bad person’

He tries to give the best advice he can, probably with the best intentions to help players. He is so close minded to certain aspects, that his advice is limiting, and he often appears very much against thinking outside the box.

This is my direct answers to the OP. Everything in bold, is provable fact, and everything else is my personal opinion based on my experience.

I kind of want a write up of me now, considering how often we go back and forth at each other. Although recently we’ve agreed more than we’ve disagreed. We also tend to remain civil.

I haven’t had time to read every post here so it might have been answered to/stated already but I just want to add my views.

The most important thing to me when it comes to balances is more frequency. Having balance changes every 6 months is just NOT ok and it is probably my number one issue with the game atm. One of my favorite parts of games like these is being able to mess with all of the changes and theorycrafting new builds. In GW1 you would be able to do this fairly frequently but I’ve only been able to do it a few times in GW2. There’s a ton of cool potential builds but at the end of the day they aren’t viable due to one reason or another.

Maybe something like target profession changes every 1-2 months so the balance team can focus on just one class, see how the changes affect the meta, then make small tweaks next class with more changes to another.

If there’s a specific reason why we get balance changes to frequently I would be interested to hear it. Is it a resource issue or just what the balance team wants?

Rather than using it for Might you can also use it with Healing Turret for some extra healing. Easier to pull off and still useful. The real problem is Napalms shape, I’d rather it just be a circle or a thicker rectangle with less length.

I get what they’re trying to do with their identity but personally I just find the quirks more obnoxious and I find it hard to take someone who writes like that seriously. The claim of the first R80 also confuses me because last I remember there was no R80 until the Glory change. Technically the second the update hit anyone that had enough XP to become R80 hit it simultaneously. Also, the claim of them being the most friendly person rings pretty hollow to me when I’ve seen them both here and in the HotM saying some really negative things towards people and covering it up with niceties. If someone thinks I’m a moron/wrong I’d rather they say it straight out then covring up under a veil of politeness.

I know a ton of people disagree with my views (I’m only human) but I’d rather they identify me for those views and not a few catchphrases. But hey, w/e works I guess. This post is kind of pointless but I guess but oh well.

I never said good Necros go power. Honestly power is easier to play than condi imo on necro. I never said Engis are afraid of just ONE of their builds, even power (you confused me here, even with the nerf Power Necro still hits hard) and MMs have enough conditions to be a threat even without a ton of stat points thrown behind them. Engis also generally hate Hambow or any CC build. While beatable in an open area avoiding a full Hammer combo while on point is just 1 mistake from being chained to death (no stability and all). 3 kit or 2 kit with Elixir S (rocket boots in WvW ) is the meta you generally see, it’s what the people here are generally complaining about. That is the spec that is weakest to conditions.

No one (reasonable) said that Engis have NO removal, it’s just that the removal is focused in the same area. Elixirs are great, but in PvP they may not be the most useful thing to run over a 3 kit build. That brings much more to a team fight. Nobody I know runes AR because it isn’t good anymore.

I also said that we often choose to use Elixir B over C because C/R is ONLY useful against conditions and taking it means DRAMATICALLY reducing your DPS which is what an HGH Elixir build is used for in most cases. Another issue in PvP for S is while it’s good for not dying you can’t contest a point for the time it’s active, which is a huge negative if you’re alone.

So yes, there are condi removal options, but you seem to be ignoring how subpar they are. Taking 3 total Elixirs + 409 is still only 6 removal, not that great and involves using Stability/Stealth when you may not want to. There’s having removal and then there’s having effective removal, big difference.

I’m going to agree with some of you that it would certainly be wise to nerf Might stacking FIRST and THEN seeing how that effects Celestial. If it falls in line, great. If it doesn’t then it needs to have another look taken at it.

I still maintain that certain builds are going to receive a major boost because you get decent damage on both your power and condition attacks. I would need to test it more but I think on Warrior Sword/Sword + LB with Celestial might actually be better than Axe because you gain mobility and all those bleed stacks but you also still have a heavy hitting Final Thrust for power damage. If you can keep those bleeds up I feel like they would outstrip the damage from the axe AA.

As for Eles, you often have good access to conditions no matter what you run and Celestial lets you take more advantage of that. While on a training dummy you may not see the advantage but when fighting a class that is either really resilient to physical or condi damage t really helps to have damage coming from multiple sources. Same applies to Warrior and Engi. The extra sustain is also a HUGE factor. War, Ele, and Engi all have access to multiple types of passive regen or burst healing from something that isn’t just their heal and getting a few more stats behind that is always good if it comes at the cost of just a tiny bit of DPS. The builds don’t tend to kill fast but in PvP/WvW they can wear down multiple foes. Once one goes down the other player almost always tries to revive which is when I just drop all my big attacks for free and even if they do revive them now they’re both in pain.

A.E.D requires trating into it for it to have a decent CD…actually going down to 32 seconds from 40 is still not that great. Even then, it’s a heal that removes all damaging conditions only if you take lethal damge and it also has that high CD. I can’t even see me traiting into gadget reduction on my build that uses 2 of them. I don’t even USE A.E.D because of how clunky it is to use. It’s a cool idea but not a huge help.

Also no, I know Necro is weak to CC. I also know that a good Necro can Fear lock a CC player and corrupt their Stability when they try to get out of it. It’s a weakness they can overcome by being good. Did you also know that Engis most feared opponent is Necro? If you aren’t running Elixirs chances are you WILL lose if the Necro is even remotely good. Even when running Elixirs one screw up and your dead, especially if they do into the fight with Life Force. Did you also know that Engis have little access to stability as well? Once again the only skill that has that is Toss Elixir B. It’s also NOT a stun break/instant cast so you have to anticipate the CC for it to be effective is is generally only used to counteract the self knockback of Overcharged Shot. It also only lasts 4 and 3/4 seconds on around a 30 second CD. You picked a really bad counterargument there. Not that I’m denying it’s not an issue. Necro needs help in some areas but they should NEVER be complaining about Engis.

Carighan.6758:

Interesting, just a short while ago there were tears all over the forum because the Ferocity-change would make the already weak and underused celestial-gear even more useless, despite the 5/8 buff.

What changed? Just might-stacking + the new runes?

I think in general it’s quite ok if Celestial is statistically the best gear because it is unfocused. Of course it has to increase overall power by more than other gear sets because well that’s the only thing it does. But the might-stacking on top of it is meh, yeah.

I really wish boons (and conditions) were much stronger, but also much more rare.
Say Might should probably just increase your outgoing damage by 15% per stack, but even 1 stack should be something you’d be very hard pressed to keep up, much less multiple. Even in group situations.

In return for the loss in ferocity it got buffed in every other stat. This ended up making it just the best option for any sort of hybrid build. The gear used to make you mediocre and everything but now you’re just good at everything. You would think a 6% buff wouldn’t be that big of a change but it was, especially since like I said before any loss is mitigated by stacking might.

I don’t think we’ll see any overhaul to the boon system at this point in the game. There’s too many skills that would have to be changed.

110% agree. I was rather excited to bring a GS build but doing so all but requires Bull’s Charge as a setup for 100b. There are other ways but they are subpar. It’s really annoying because if it did hit reliably then I could see GS + Axe with 0/4/4/0/6 using the new Brawler’s Recovery and taking Frenzy for an old school Bull’s + 100b + Evis being pretty kitten strong. However when you only connect 1 out of 10 times or when you do connect you fly past or they randomly teleport a few feet over (not from anything they did) it’s impossible to tell.

TheDevice.2751:

Khenzy.9348:

As long as Engineers are as weak as they are against conditions, they wont be as OP as you claim them to be.

Elixer C
Toss Elixer C
Cleansing Burst
Drop Andtidote
Tosss Elixer R
Fumigate
Cleaning Formula 409
Transmute
Automated Response

What?

Taking an Elixir that is focused on cleansing conditions and not taking an offensive or defensive one such as Elixir B or S means you won’t be likely to be killing anything or being much use to anyone. Also of note, most of the condi removal you listed it only on* ONE TYPE OF BUILD*: Elixirs.

Med kit is OK but most of the time you want to quickly remove damaging conditions. With Drop Antidote you have to swap to the kit and then drop it. This means you’re spending a ton of time not damaging the enemy when you could take Healing Turret and only slightly disrupt your damage.

Automated Response was nerfed so hard it’s not really worth using unless you want to bring -condi duration runes and maybe a sigil dealing with removal as well. Even then it’s not a good trait anymore for the most part.

Fumigate is only on allies…so you’re making yourself look silly now. Try reading the skill/playing the class before posting something.

Your average Engi build depends on Healing Turret for removal or 409 and the cleanse on EG. Even with 409 you won’t generally bring 3 Utility Elixirs, at most you’ll have 3 utils and the heal. THis means that you have at most 6 condi removal. All these skills have relatively high CD and not only that but do you really wanna blow your Stability/Stealth just to remove ONE condi?

Now, it is possible for a high damage HGH Elixir build to burst down a condi build before being overwhelmed, but that is ONE type of build on the entire class. Even when Auto Resp was good it was only so on decap/tanky builds for the most part. You wouldn’t be able to go that far into that type of tree and expect to deal much damage.

Your post oozes ignorance, please do some research before posting things like this.

I wanted to title this “Might Stacking/Cele is still the Cause of Imbalance” but that’s too long apparently.

As of now I feel like none of the classes stand out as being overly overpowered. There are still bugs to squash and underused traits/utilities/weapons need to be brought up to snuff, but overall I feel like the majority of classes are at least some what useable in every game mode.

However, some builds give the illusion of being OP due to gear. When Might duration runes such as Strength, Hoelbrak, and Pirate got buffed it became possible for builds that are both tough and have the ability to hit hard. This wasn’t really a huge problem before with these runes because the duration increase wasn’t that significant. Now, even without many ways for your build itself to stack might you can still get a healthy amount by just having one of the runes above and a Sigil of Battle. If you do have the ability to stack might like with Warrior’s Longbow, Guardian with a Staff, or by being several Ele Specs things can very quickly get out of hand.

The other half of the problem is Celestial Gear. If your build has a variety of attacks that deal both power and condition damage then things become even more ridiculous. In PvP Celestial Gear gets a ton more stat points than other gear. Now, if your build is focused on one type of damage that doesn’t really help, but Engis and Eles in particular gain much from it.

I’m all for hybrid builds, I think they’re generally cool no matter what game they’re in. Generally these builds can do several things in a mediocre fashion and you win by pushing whatever your enemy is weak against. Right now though with the combination of Celestial and Might Stacking you may not be the best at dealing direct power or using conditions, but you will be good at both rather than mediocre. In some cases you’ll also be able to heal up your team and act as support as well.

If the changes to Might runes were reversed it would only be possible for Soldier, Cavalier, Knights, what have you builds to have a tiny bit of a damage boost by say, landing a Bull’s Charge + 100b with Forceful Greatsword or by using Empower, but after a few seconds that boost is gone.

Celestial did need something to make up with the Ferocity change, but why they didn’t just give it more Ferocity I have no idea.

I used to be OK with the concept of these changes because I thought “people will just have to bring more boon removal” but that doesn’t seem to be panning out. Not enough people bring these types of specs and few can strip boons frequently. Several classes have no ability to strip boons whatsoever. Most would rather just abuse it themselves and who can blame them? It’s good.

This has been brought up multiple times but recently I see more “X class is OP” or “X build is OP” and it’s often one of the builds I mentioned in this post.

EDIT: Grammar and clarity.

EDIT 2: I agree with the posters that said that the Celestial gear might be fine if Might stacking gets reduced. So If I was to have control over balancing I would definitely only touch the Might stacking at first and then see what that does to Celestial.

Engi is certainly not OP considering that any sort of condition spec can roll over the majority of their builds. Even well used CC specs are effective against rabid/celestial Engis due to the lack of stability. Sure, they often gain protection while being controlled but if you do it frequently enough there’s not a huge amount they can do.

What I don’t argue with is how imbalanced Celestial gear is. I can’t even bring myself to use it because so long as you have a variety of attacks it’ll just be better than any purist option like Zerker or Rabid. Builds like 3 Kit Engi, Dagger Eles, and Axebow Warriors are fairly well balanced if you use any non-celestial gear. The extra sustain it gives while not sacrificing much damage is absurd. Might stacking runes are also to blame even post nerf. It was never the bonus damage it was the duration that was the issue.

The actual class balance in the game now feels pretty good, but now gear is a huge problem.

I only occasionally play my Ranger, but the amount of QQ is almost on pre-nerf Warrior levels. Actually, it might be greater. The only class I can think of that has limited ways to deal with LB Rangers would be Necro due to their low mobility. Warriors have plenty of gap closers, Guards have teleports, Thieves have…a lot of stuff, Engi has blocks/stealth/Rocket Boots, other Rangers have the same range, Mes has stealth/teleport, Ele can have reflects/blocks/gap closers. There’s also a thing know as Line of Sight that reduces the Ranger’s damage to 0, the best thing is that everyone can use it!

It’s the same issue as when Warriors became viable, players were unwilling to change up their build to deal with the changes. One thing I do miss though is ranger’s focus on interrupts in GW1. Landing that Broadhead Arrow or any of the other interrupt skills felt so satisfying. Moment of Clarity seems to be an attempt to encourage that but when there’s only a few interrupt skills it feels less like the old days.

Instead of an ICD, they could also just make picking up banners not count as a weapon swap.

That being said, it it even that huge of a deal? If you’re just picking up and dropping your banner, you aren’t doing damage, so it’s a trade off. Not to mention, if you take both banners and BR and want your banner to actually be worth using that means 6 trait points in both Discipline and Tactics line. This means that chances are your DPS would be really low and you would still have less sustain than a guard/ele.

There’s 2 versions I’m favoring atm.

Version 1: All DPS with lowish sustain

Version 2: More sustain and condi mitigation

I feel like there’s a place for DPS Engis in PvP now which is great.

Once this is fixed the kit will be a fantastic power weapon. Please fix ASAP.

I don’t really have an issue with this. I feel like several things in the game require more subtle visual representation to limit how much you have to look at the opponents’ health bar. Another big one is Stability. If there was a small circle at their feet with the icon for the boon inside of it, it would be helpful when facing classes like Guards and Eles that can have a whole line of boons. The devs have stated before that they don’t want us staring at the bar too much so making things like reveal and stab more immediately apparent is fine with me.

So an update.

After testing a bunch of different builds I gotta say I’m really, really put out. While they CAN work fine in WvW, when it comes to PvP nothing has really changed. I’m fed up with LB and Hammer. They’ve both become boring and feel like a crutch. However, you also aren’t rewarded for running anything more challenging. I like using GS, it’s a weapon that forces you to play around its weaknesses for it to pay off.

The changes to Brawler’s Recovery aren’t bad but still don’t change a whole lot. The only thing I could see it being good for is allowing you to drop Berserker Stance for something else. Maybe something like this or this. I really, really want to be able to use Skullcracker…but honestly the build has several builds that just 100% counter it. I feel like the Sundering Mace trait would need to allow Skull Crack to strip (AKA go through) Stability (on a fairly lengthy icd) before it would ever be a weapon people would want to use again.

I’m really disappointed. Rifle can be fun but still isn’t something you would ever you seriously and the Mace AA buff was nice but doesn’t make it viable. They did NOTHING to nudge people away from Hambow or Axebow in PvP. Even in WvW you’ll still probably want to still run Hammer/Sword + Horn especially with the Signet of Rage nerf. My enthusiasm for the class I’ve put the most time into is pretty much gone.

dancingmonkey.4902:

Sykper.6583:

By design and numbers, Healing Surge is a horrid, counter-intuitive heal that might seem appealing when measured against other lower health professions. It does nothing to keep the Warrior alive though.

My numbers disagree with you. Would you mind breaking it down for me?

Sykper.6583:

Mending simply needs a bump of about 5-10% before I start considering it, as that condition clear will likely be even more needed with how Adrenaline and Cleansing Ire function after the patch.

It removes 3 conditions and heals comparatively to other professions heals on similar cool downs. Although the cast time is a bit much.

Sykper.6583:

It is not that Warriors are spoiled on Healing Signet, we just do not have a good alternative that fills the other healing roles we can run. Anyone running Healing Surge is shooting themselves in the foot, and those dedicated enough to run Mending might be going hellish out of their way into Healing Power / Regeneration that they might see conditions as the biggest threat.

Yes, warriors are spoiled on healing signet. Nothing you say will convince most players otherwise, and for good reason. The only reason anyone is “shooting themselves in the foot” with healing surge is because of the spoiling of signet. it has great heal potential, it simply requires more situational and battle awareness.

• What numbers? It’s undeniable that Warrior is a class based around the use of their adrenaline, not sitting on it for when you need a heal. Now, you’re even less likely to be on full adren when you need the heal. It’s too much of a risk, especially for that CD.

• The heal is comparable to other professions yes, but guess what? Warrior lacks mechanics/boons that other classes have that justify that level of healing. No Protection, no Aegis, no 100% vulnerability, only has blocks on mace/shield, no stealth, need I go on? Warriors have to face tank more damage, so it makes sense that they’re heals would be more potent.

Warriors don’t necessarily WANT to use Healing Signet, but the alternatives are terrible.

Sebrent.3625:

Looks like there is something to test then, eh fellas? :-)

On the topic of canceling skills … which method do you guys use?
– stow weapon
– esc (hotkeyed to something more reachable)

I have my game set up like a FPS. my attack skills are still 15 but my utilities are Q-E-R-Shift-G. I keep Stow as X and it’s what I tend to use.

Phoenix.5047:

It has always been 3 seconds, on both burst and normal skills. Same as the interrupt CD (non-Power block).

Last I remembered no. If you in any way canceled a burst skill it went on a 7-10 second CD. I feel like I would have noticed this before if it wasn’t the case since I’ve messed around with rifle so much and you frequently would be forced to break the animation fairly often.

MarauderShields.6830:

BurrTheKing.8571:

So something I have noticed with more difficult to land burst skills such as Skull Crack and Kill Shot, if you sheath, dodge, swap weapons, or in any way cancel the skill it does not go on the old CD. I’ve been landing Kill Shot by repeatedly canceling it until they are out of countermeasures then going for the kill (shot). It’s a godsend for Mace as well. Think you aren’t going to hit? Cancel and try again if a few seconds.

For players that have actually used intentional canceling in the past this won’t be a hard tactic to pick up. I’m seeing several interesting new play styles forming in my head already. I hope that this was an intended change and that it remains. It is something that good players will make use of while bad ones will simply continuously waste their adrenaline.

You could always do this, but now that Burst skills share the same CD after self-interrupts as other skills it’s much more practical.

Isn’t this really old? I use weapon stow on important skills all the time to prevent a miss.

You would get a 10sec CD, now it’s around 3 for bursts.

Cygnus.6903:

Well, with practice everything becomes better of course.

Thing is, with both your builds, how do you build up adrenaline? Especially with the skullcrack, this will be way too slow. In the end, you have to use a burst skill, what then?

I see BR more of an addition to Cleansing Ire in case of going up against heavy condi, then a replacement.

With the Rifle build, you use Volly so frequently you’d be surprised how fast it add up. Don’t forget how many times WWattack can hit as well. I also tend to start the fight off with Berserker Stance to get the early lead and then press the advantage.

With Skullcracker you can use Counterblow as a way to gain after Zerker Stance, especially vs ranged enemies. Let’s also not forget that you’re going to be swapping almost on CD to keep condis off which is also giving adren. It’s not as good as having CI in long fights, but both of these builds are designed to not let it get that far.

So far they seem to be working alright. There’s simply no way to move traits around and not compromise damage (Skull Crack + 100 hits a lot less without both Forceful GS and Unsuspecting Foe) or condi removal, which is a problem in both PvP and WvW if you don’t at least somewhat plan for it.

People are seriously scared of Kill Shot though, you don’t leave them much choice, use your countermeasures or eat what could be a massive hit (helped along by Sigil of Intel) and the GS dmg nerf didn’t hit Skullcracker tooooooo badly since that last hit still hits as hard as ever.

They aren’t forgiving builds that’s for sure, but I think some will appreciate that. I know I do.

EDIT: has anyone else noticed that it feels like in WvW the SPLIT SECOND you stop attacking something you get out of combat. Some would consider that an advantage but it’s actually a massive pain when playing a sharpshooter.

I’m OK with these changes because it just means that Skullcracker becomes more useful because of our low CD reflect when set up correctly. I enjoy watching them hit themselves for 6k.

Cygnus.6903:

The hard part is timing it within half a second. You have to go from initiating, to realising you will miss, to sheathing in 0,5 seconds for most burst skills.

It’s certainly not easy, but it was something I already did with some skills already. It’s not hard with Kill Shot though, considering that cast time. I’ve noticed though that it can actually be a major help. It makes people panic and blow all of their dodges/blocks/blinds/whatever, which was time you wouldn’t be doing damage anyways but now you’ve forced them all out at once and left them wide open.

It’s a cool mechanic and makes the other nerfs potentially worthwhile. This is what I’ve been messing with.

With proper use of your Bull’s/Rifle Butt in addition to your runes and the updated Brawler’s Recovery you can generally stave off condis long enough to kill them before they kill you. I’m wondering if it might be better to take 2 points from Strength to get Forceful GS in Arms. It’s a question of whether the CD reduction + might is more important or the extra damage which is applied to KS. I think Brawler’s Recovery is a must, especially with so many Warriors running around with LB. with this setup you can cleanse the Immob with a movement skill and then swap to get rid of those bleeds.

Skullcracker will probably look like this now, it’s not like Cleansing Ire was that great on it to begin with but there wasn’t much choice before.

Many changes this patch were…questionable. However this new CD reduction on burst skills was a smart one. I think that not only was the skill floor raised a bit, the ceiling rose as well.

So something I have noticed with more difficult to land burst skills such as Skull Crack and Kill Shot, if you sheath, dodge, swap weapons, or in any way cancel the skill it does not go on the old CD. I’ve been landing Kill Shot by repeatedly canceling it until they are out of countermeasures then going for the kill (shot). It’s a godsend for Mace as well. Think you aren’t going to hit? Cancel and try again if a few seconds.

For players that have actually used intentional canceling in the past this won’t be a hard tactic to pick up. I’m seeing several interesting new play styles forming in my head already. I hope that this was an intended change and that it remains. It is something that good players will make use of while bad ones will simply continuously waste their adrenaline.

You could always do this, but now that Burst skills share the same CD after self-interrupts as other skills it’s much more practical.

I posted the other day some suggested changes to how stances work. It would for the most part solve this problem since the ACTUAL problem is the trait Defy Pain PLUS Endure Pain. Just having EP is not that big of a deal. What is is having a trait that auto pops when you need it most. I dislike ALL traits like that. I don’t normally get on the “hurr hurr passive r bad” but that is serriously the most forgiving thing in the game. In a close fight it’s the one thing that will allow some Warriors to survive.

AnonMD.7263:

BurrTheKing.8571:

AnonMD.7263:

words

more words

some other words

Worse. Even though with the trait is could almost be a full cleanse, it doesn’t heal enough for that CD for it to be useable.

AnonMD.7263:

Lemme just…

AnonMD.7263:

AnonMD.7263:

Can we talk about the new Brawler’s Recovery? Kitten seems cash, yo.

And also, have you guys heard that there’s gonna be some sigil that removes condis on weapon swap? That’s also pretty awesome sounding.

So nobody wants to talk about these tidbits, eh? Lets look at that list of builds that warriors have a good bit of difficulty with…

EvilSardine.9635:

Condi and power thief
Condi and power mesmer
Condi engineer
Condi Necro
Condi Ranger
DPS/Meditation Guardian
D/D Ele

Alright, so you’ve got issues with condis. Got it.

First Step: Stop using Healing Signet.

Second Step: Use Healing Surge, as it hits several birds with one stone if you’ve got Cleansing Ire still.

Third Step: Take Signet of Rage

Fourth Step: Grab Brawler’s Recovery and that new sigil I mentioned on both weapons.

With this, you build up to a burst quickly, pop it, swap weapons, heal if wanted, burst again, build a little adrenaline, change once the sigil is off cd then rinse repeat, adding in whatever weapons or utilities you want.

tldr; Warriors are condi rubber, you’re the training dummy. What you throw on them bounces off and look here comes another burst.

That sums up my feelings. Necros did get nerfed. Condi’s got nerfed.

Did you really just advocate using HEALING SURGE!? This change to adrenaline made it a totally worthless heal that is more of a liability than an asset. If you don’t get the T3 heal you just blew a 30sec CD on a tiny amount of health. It is not risk/reward, it is all risk with very little reward. Before you say “you still get adrenaline” let me counter with what other non-warriors have said “it’s not that hard to gain adrenaline.” There’s no skill to using Healing Surge, it’s just a bad heal.

I also assume you’re advocating sitting on Signet of Rage for the adren gain? Guess what, 100% of nothing is still not a lot. If it was 200-300% then maybe, but right now the gain is still not worth what the skill lost.

I can agree with Brawler’s Recovery, it’s a good change and it’ll make some of my previously just-for-fun builds a bit more viable. What’s better is that I won’t need to bring a bow for condi removal.

Good Warriors will adjust to these changes and still kill you. Which means chances are Thieves (it’s almost always Thieves) will continue to complain.

Warlord.9074:

silentnight warrior.2714:

dancingmonkey.4902:

Harper.4173:

dancingmonkey.4902:

Harper.4173:

Also GS is not a PvP weapon, nor was it Op.

Strange, I just used it in PvP. You are confused.

No one said it was OP. I stated it in a manner to answer his question. adding another 50% to the arcing slice damage would be OP. It is reasonably strong now, does more over all damage, and increased the chance to proc CI by hitting more foes. Making an AoE cleave added a very large amount to the skills damage potential.

Because sPvP is exactly the place where you’ll be using that awesome 5-man cleave.

The fact that you used GS in PvP does not make it a PvP weapon and any good player will know that.

When you hit the point that you can tell folks that, please do. What is your PvP rank by the way? Did your team progress further then mine did in the last NA ToL?

I didn´t watch the last ToL.

Honest question here:

How many warriors played there with gs?
Those who played were able to win?

Pretty sure I thought that not one single top team had a warrior could be wrong. Warrior no longer viable/needed.

Even then, the fact remains that before the change to Brawler’s Recovery you wouldn’t use GS over a LB because you needed that cleanse. The best builds were always and might still be Hambow and Axe/swd + LB. I’m not sure BR will be enough to not take CI but we’ll see. I’m hoping it was a bit of a buff to Skullcracker since CI was never a huge help there anyways.

Well, while it does make it much more punishing there are multiple ways to make use of it semi-reliably.

• If you activate it as soon as you knock down with Bull’s Charge, you will connect as soon as they stand up.

• Bolas leaves more room for error but has a low CD and if taken with a sword/gs and Leg Specialist it can be stacked to decent effect. Good for also landing 100b. On that note, I though Bolas was supposed to be made faster in this patch, or was that just my imagination?

• The aforementioned “Fear Me” combo.

THis patch was certainly a nerf overall. Idk why they didn’t revert the nerf to 100b and WW attack if they toned down the buff to Arcing Slice. The nerf to WW attack in particular is particularly harsh because if you hit 3 times on average you’re dealing 15% less than you used to. Last I looked the dmg on both of those skill weren’t that imbalanced. I bring this up because I think the build that has been brought up the most is any damage based 6/x/x/x/6 setup because you can keep condis at bay with the changes to Brawler’s Recovery. Now if we cold just get Mending, Healing Surge, or Defiant Stance up to viability we could take Restorative Strength. I’ll have to mess around with it but we MIGHT even be able to bring Frenzy and help Kill Shot out a bit. I think we’ll still probably need Zerker Stance though.

Wow, this thread moves so fast this was on the front page for all of 3 mins. If that.

I am currently going to college for a communications degree and while I can’t claim to be any sort of expert I feel that ANets biggest issue right now is less about the lack of communication and more about how their message is delivered.

The Feature Patch News Posts

The most recent example would be the news posts that have been leading up to the feature patch. There’s a good number of these posts, but most of the contain only a small amount of information. This gives the impression that the feature patch isn’t all that big. If these posts had started closer to the release date and where larger in size, it would have made the patch seem much more impressive. Of course, there’s a risk of putting in too much info but most of the core player base would be more than willing to put forth the time.

In addition to this, some of the posts are poorly named. For example “September 2014 Feature Pack: Improvements Galore” hints that it’s going to be a lengthy list of changes. What you find when you read it however are a few short paragraphs. While they contain some good changes the use of the word “Galore” had many on forums/reddit saying “That’s it?” If this had been a part of another post or was titled something more conservative like “Upcoming Quality of Life Improvements” users would have probably reacted more positively.

Devs on the Forums

We’ve had a decent number of devs responding to users on the forum. This is great to see and most of them give well written responses that garner positive reactions. n the other hand, some make statements that either confuse, annoy, or at worse don’t really tell us anything. Most of us understand that you don’t want to hint at something that may never come to pass, that has burned many games in the past. But when we get non-answers that have the intent of saying “We hear you” it tends to do more harm than good. I’ve said this in the past but I think it would be good if the devs had the ability to mark a thread as “read” without having to actually respond. Perhaps it could look like a grey/black version of the red icon we have now.

It might be a good idea to have someone else read your posts before you submit them if you don’t already. I really like seeing a dev ask for more clarification on something but other posts do more harm than good.

Interviews with other Websites

It’s always nice to see ANet devs taking time out to talk with fan sites and the like, but once again we often get non-answers or information we already know. Sometimes this is the fault of the interviewer more than anything. They ask questions they know or SHOULD know will never get a response. As a player I would only bother reading an interview if I knew something I didn’t know before was being revealed there, or at least hinted. These sites can be a great tool for hyping up an upcoming press release, heck it could even happen on the same day but you could use the interview to gain momentum.

Again, I am not an expert in the field. However as a player I see some of these things and wonder just why some things were done they way they were. I enjoy this game and want it to grow but miscommunication or poorly done communication is something I feel has been an obstacle towards that goal.

My least favorite part about the downed state is how classes that need to connect with an attack to deny a non-stability(and on all but Guard, stealth) stomp (Warrior, Ranger, Engi, Guard, Necro) are much easier to stomp than those with the ability to stealth/teleport/move (Ele, Mes, Thief). The ability to more frequently deny the stomp is way more powerful than something that can be easily countered by popping a Blind/Stealth/Aegis/Stability.

If all downed states were dependent on connecting with something to deny the stomp that would be fine, but they aren’t. Also, why are there some that have the ability to interrupt multiple enemies but Warrior, Necro, and Engi can only stop one with their 2 skill? The inequality there doesn’t make sense. Rangers can use their pets to interrupt a group of targets twice with fear on their pets and the 2 skill. If it’s only one stomper then they could even do it 3 times if the pet has a knock down (of course Rangers are still pretty weak atm so it’s not like it makes them OP).

I don’t expect perfect equality but some consistency would be appreciated. The 2 skill should always be some kind of interrupt and either all be AoE or all single target. I like the mechanic but it’s another case of a good idea that was poorly implemented.