Guild Wars 2

Aedrion.6483:

Myron.6732:

Terror necros can be a tough fight for any condi build but engies especially because we have limited CC and condi cleanse.

Necros don’t have the most mobility or defense against CC. As en engi you have tons of mobility and CC.

Did you just make a 180 in a single comment?

On topic, there are no real counters to Lich Form 7K crits, you can hide or nuke them and hope they die first, that’s it. The condi spammers with MM are just very hard to beat because hitpoints are so wonderfully balanced.

CC is your best weapon, since they don’t have vigoror stability.

There is one counter to Lich form, a Mace/Shield Warrior with Missile Deflection. Either they waste time in their form by not attacking, or if you time it right you hit them for 10K+ in reflects. It’s a REALLY limited counter, but it does work.

I would buy a Bastion voice pack so fast.

I don’t think it needs to be a stun breaker, but it does need to be instant cast. I actually don’t think it’s worthless, it just only works with a very specific playstyle. It synergies well with Frenzy and allows you to run a glassy DPS build in the middle of a team fight and not die. It can also make up for having less cleanse because even conditions will heal you.

The base heal could afford to be a tab stronger as well, but not by much. It should still be less than Mending since it has a chance of giving a ton of HP back.

I am referring to TPvP, and for good reason. ANet has said multiple times that the do not want to split skills/traits more than what is absolutely necessary. Knowing that it would make sense to balance around the most competitive format in the game. There are so many random variables in WvW, especially when considering gear and buffs, that balancing around it would have a dramatic effect on PvP. Winning matchups in WvW will probably always come down more to coordination, numbers, and good commanders more often than class balance. As for PvE, I honestly haven’t played it in months outside of guild missions but I have done map completion and all dungeons and while there may be an optimal way to do things, balancing around it would also not make sense because what’s wrong with PvE is that certain playstyles are not that useful due to the design of it. There’s also nothing stopping you from playing “sub-optimally” in PvE with friends while in PvP running a weak build will hurt your team.

It’s not subjective. While a single player may value the balance of one game type over another, from a dev standpoint they seem to know that having fun in PvP is very much dependent on class balance. In the other two modes you can run basically whatever you want without negatively affecting your allies, but it’s different in PvP. there’s also ANet’s “Esports” aspirations to take into account, if they want that to take off then PvP balance is the obvious choice to make balancing decisions on.

One thing I am thankful for is that unlike many games some Devs seem to actually be good at their own game. I played with 3 of them the other day and it was a slaughter. The other team didn’t appear to be bad it was just that they worked to well together they just lost every team fight.

Balance isn’t quantifiable, but you can certainly feel when something is wrong. Right now the only “imbalanced” thing in this game is some design decisions.

While I can beat these types of Thieves with Skullcracker (bring the fight to where they used Infi Strike) It CAN be very hard to see where the evade animation ends depending on the race. Some look like they are winding down but are still actually evading and it can seriously throw you off.

I also agree with what Frenk that compared to other Thief builds out there it is REALLY easy. It also got both an indirect nerf and buff with the changes to Lyssa runes. The boon stealing was much less threatening when you could hide your stability and might behind boons you don’t care about losing. Sure, the Thief can’t get that huge advantage from those runes anymore now either but I would still call it a buff overall in that regard.

He’s also right about duel servers, I quit going to them because around 3/4ths the server would be Thieves. They are a really boring class to duel and tend to drag things out unnecessarily.

I’ve got a couple.

1. I was running my glass cannon Bull’s + Frenzy + 100b build for fun and got accused of speed hacking.

2. I faced a well-organized team of an Ele that was basically all Meteor Shower and Ice Barrage, a Terrormancer, S/D Thief, your typical Bomb Engi, and a Bunker Guard.
It was hell

3. I’ve been referred to as a Hambow Warrior on multiple occasions while running Skullcracker.

4. I’ve been told Healing Signet is OP and the only reason I won while using Defiant Stance.

Carighan.6758:

BurrTheKing.8571:

Yes, crying about things that aren’t going to change is pointless. Really competitive people are always going use the best tactics in order to win. Now that we live in the days where if you have a overly strong mechanic in your game you can change it. That makes it fine to debate about game mechanics these days because they can be changed While some of the points made hold up today, many concepts are outdated.

True, but you’re assuming they can be fixed, not only changed.
Changing them is easy. WoW has been doing that for over 10 years, now. They’re happily changing balance, left and right and centre.

As far as “fixing” balance goes, well, subjective. Plenty players leave the game’s PvP in frustration, citing that the balance is “worse than ever” or “still just as bad, after X years”. Others quit PvE Raiding, citing the constant need to change character because “blizzard doesn’t know balance”.
Others, me included, actually quit the game a while ago out of boredom over how balanced it has become (as this required reducing the effective number of classes, one of the few universal truths of RPG balancing).

And it’s impossible to get all these opinions to align far enough to even begin with “fixing” balance.

I would say the only class in this game that is seriously lacking is Ranger. All it really has going for it is Spirits and a few tanky condi builds that are only strong for dueling. Mesmer doesn’t see a lot of play but it’s also one buff away from being an unbeatable god. People say that Warrior is OP but the strength of builds like Hambow (a lot of builds actually) come from the fact that the capture points are too darn small. To go the opposite extreme, Hambow on Graveyard isn’t that big a deal because avoiding the Hammer AoE is easy when you have room to move around. Same applies for Engis and certain Necro builds: they’re only good due to map design.

Nobody expects perfection, but if they can at least give each class a role I’ll be satisfied when it comes to balance. What I believe the real problem is boils down to the design of conquest itself.

Something has really bothered me about that article that I have seen posted time and time again. If I’m not mistaken it was written in the time before patching your game was possible. Before, the only way to fix or change something in a released game was through an expansion pack. These days, if you release an imperfect but otherwise good product that actually has a solid number of players, you can try to fix those imperfections.

Yes, crying about things that aren’t going to change is pointless. Really competitive people are always going use the best tactics in order to win. Now that we live in the days where if you have a overly strong mechanic in your game you can change it. That makes it fine to debate about game mechanics these days because they can be changed While some of the points made hold up today, many concepts are outdated.

Hey there! Glad to see you’re enjoying the build!

If you want to try a more DPS focused version I’ve been using this as of late. I use it in both PvP and WvW. I play with a Meditation Guard so we have it set up that once I stun he spikes and used his GS pull right as the stun is about to end. Not many builds can withstand that.

What I like about it is that against certain glass builds like S/D Thief and Staff Ele it can 100-0 them if you catch them unawares. I used to think Rampage was a silly elite but with Unsuspecting Foe If you go 4-5-2-3 all the hardest hitting attacks will crit. In 2v1s it can quickly dispatch one enemy if you don’t miss any attacks (if you activate the elite then wait until just before it activates to start Berserker Stance it helps).

I did encounter its hard-counter last night though, Chill/Fear Necros. That being said if that became popular you could just swap to the traits you have in the first build and throw on Mel runes. That build is seriously frustrating but I think I know how to beat it now. They always go for the boon strip as soon as you pop stability so if you go roll, roll, Whirlwind chances are they’ll miss the strip. Half the annoyance comes from it being designed to do the same role as this build but it’s ranged fear.

I actually like that they made Skull Crack harder to land, because it’s harder for people to complain about it. Double Melee is also manly as hell. You could probably go mostly Soldiers gear with it considering Unsuspecting Foe would still give you good crit chance when they’re stunned. I’d drop Rampage for the Signet though so you have that Fury up-time.

dancingmonkey.4902:

Personally, my issue with this, is that the devs posted balancing philosophy specifically state that hampering conditions are intended to be the warriors weakness.

How many times do you have to be told that it’s that after that design philosophy was posted they obviously changed their mind. If they hadn’t they wouldn’t have made Cleansing Ire, Dogged March, and changed Berserker Stance. The came to a conclusion that it isn’t fair to have a class be made totally worthless vs a specific playstyle. To top is off, Warrior still wasn’t viable until HS was buffed. The description seemed more like a “State of the class” more than anything.

Idk how anyone can complain about Warriors these days when I can jump on my Engi and feel like a force of nature…a force of nature that does nothing but do a fixed rotation regardless of what the enemy is doing most of the time. I used to enjoy the class but now I just feel dirty using it.

From the perspective of a Mace Warrior, I hate this trait. So often I’ll stun the Thief, this will proc and I’ll down them. They’ll then shadow step and immediately use the downed state stealth. Since I lack any AoE I have to run around seeing if I get lucky and connect. They often times have enough time to actually heal up because of this or I have to spend more time that what should be necessary to finish them.

It’s a rare situation for most other classes but you REALLY should be revealed once you’re downed. I would be totally fine with it being changed though since that’s one less minor annoyance out of the way.

Xbon.9086:

BurrTheKing.8571:

Some games have a timer in spawn so that you can’t sit in it for extended periods. Perhaps have something similar, if you sit in spawn for X amount of time you are kicked from the game and get dishonor. It’s not a perfect system because they could just leave spawn but in addition to a report for leeching option it would be helpful.

If that happens there could be a /surrender option that the team that just lost a player can use that give the other team a win but doesn’t give them a loss. Nothing is more annoying than having to fight a losing battle because you don’t want to get dishonor.

system is already in play; is it not? If you sit in spawn for 2 minutes or so, you’re kicked to main menu, and if you don’t return to game before match ends, you are dishonored.

Many intentional leechers will just tap the movement key every now and again while in spawn. Something like this would force them to at least leave spawn which means they can be killed, which means they go back to spawn again. It would make leeching fairly annoying to do as a result.

Some games have a timer in spawn so that you can’t sit in it for extended periods. Perhaps have something similar, if you sit in spawn for X amount of time you are kicked from the game and get dishonor. It’s not a perfect system because they could just leave spawn but in addition to a report for leeching option it would be helpful.

If that happens there could be a /surrender option that the team that just lost a player can use that give the other team a win but doesn’t give them a loss. Nothing is more annoying than having to fight a losing battle because you don’t want to get dishonor.

Dahkeus.8243:

MajorX.3259:

Hey guy better delete the point is creat a flag for tag, look world of warcraft the bg arathis this systeme is balenced with a better gameplay.

sorry for my english

look https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sriBYxVzEng

The problem with this design is that it would make certain classes super powerful. For example, a guardian could drop Sanctuary and/or use Shield of Wrath to make it next to impossible for anyone to keep them from capping.

Not to mention cloning another game’s PvP 1 for 1 would just make people think ANet is lazy and doesn’t care about PvP.

cheese.4739:

BurrTheKing.8571:

Skyhammer went way too far when it comes to gimmicks but the mentality of having the map change combat isn’t wrong.

This is very true – ignoring the terrible secondary mechanic, the instant death, the bugs, and the dodgy camera around all the capture points… the map is really interesting and would probably be fun to play on.
There’s lots of cover, it’s more dangerous to chase foes (who can hide round one of many corners), and the height differences/jump pads require a lot more positional awareness.

Currently the only places that otherwise act like this are the points on Niflhel (with cover at the side points and the bluffs at midpoint) and the center of Kyhlo (that stops players without teleports/leaps from quickly getting to the capture area). The rest of our points are really quite bland, with the odd bit of high ground but nothing particularly exciting about it.

If they changed the map so there there was no “fall to your death” situations even the secondary objective wouldn’t be that bad. The vertical aspect is cool and even the 3 force-fields around the home points would be to if fall through them just meant you had to jump back out like that lower area in-between points.

Romek.4201:

Caedmon.6798:

Hambow on 1 doesn’t even make sense…most builds are atleast able to counter them,the same thing cannot be said about some of the other builds you have posted in the poll or atleast way harder to deal with then the average hambow.This poll is just broken as it is now,it just doesnt make much sense to me tbh.

the broken part is how bunkerish they are and still deal alot dmg

this has to be fixed – remove the trait with higher dmg vs stunned targets and hambow is fine

The ONLY thing that makes Hambow good is the design of SPvP.

Small point + a AoE stun that is the size of said point = good

Hammer outside of a tiny capture point is really easy to beat, the second they pull out hammer you know what’s coming. Two evades and a block/blind/stun break means they won’t be able to do the full combo for another 25 seconds (Backbreaker’s CD with the trait). Pin Down has a really obvious animation, Combustive Shot pulses less, and Arching Arrow deals much less damage.

The same concept applies to many builds, they’re only strong because you’re forced to fight on this tiny little circle that the AoE is the same size as if not larger. Make the points bigger in addition to changes to the capture system and these builds would just be good but not OP. We’re talking about this on this thread.

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

Darek.1836:

BurrTheKing.8571:

If there’s 1 Guardian from Red and a Warrior and Engi from blue in mid then blue should be able to decap the point at a reduced speed.

I don’t see why this doesn’t reinforce bunker meta, where you can just send 5 indestroyable bunkers and decap points slowly but surely

if 5 of them zerg one point then they will lose out on the other 2 points.

Correct. In theory it would place even greater emphasis on team coordination and figuring out how many players to dedicate to each point. Zerging would be a guaranteed cap but if the other team is smart they’ll just go wherever the zerg isn’t. It would also mean you could see a group of 2 attack a point with a bunker and while the bunker can delay the cap it can’t outright deny it. The meta might not change dramatically but the flow would and it would make fights feel much more tactical.

GW2 is a simple game, but encouraging strategy outside of “tanky with a lot of AoE” would make it much more interesting.

For months and months we’ve have an overwhelming majority of posts talking about X or Y class/spec being OP. In my opinion the problem has less to do with class balance and more to do with the design of PvP.

Look at all the most popular builds in use currently: Spirit Rangers, Hambow, Decap Engi, MM, AoE Ele, any sort of AoE, Bunkers. All of these builds take advantage of small capture points and the ability to deny the capture of 2 or more players for a prolonged period of time.

Nerfing any of these builds seems to me to be simply treating the symptoms rather than curing the cause. Take any of the builds listed out of that tiny little circle and suddenly they aren’t much of a threat. A Hammer or a constant stream of knockbacks are a lot less dangerous when you can simply get out of the way without having to worry about losing the point.

If capture points made better use of the surrounding environment and weren’t so darn tiny AoE would be significantly less powerful. “Oh they’re placing a ton of bombs, well I’ll just dodge over here then.” The current capture points are also really dull. Why are there no graves in the graveyard? Why can’t we fight INSIDE a manor and a windmill? Skyhammer went way too far when it comes to gimmicks but the mentality of having the map change combat isn’t wrong.

Of course, with larger capture points there would have to be changes to how capturing works as well because it would just encourage more bunkers. To solve that the team with the most players on point would have to be able to take the point. If there’s 1 Guardian from Red and a Warrior and Engi from blue in mid then blue should be able to decap the point at a reduced speed. This is how most games that have capture points like Battlefield do things. I’m not sure if it would be better to allow Blue to also capture at a slower speed or just to decap.

Systems like this would not only change the meta without having to actually change the classes but it would also make things feel much less chaotic. From a streaming standpoint it would also hopefully make things more interesting to watch because you could actually see all the fantastic animations that are in the game instead of a bunch of red circles on another circle. Something also NEEDS to be done about Asura because no race should give an advantage in a game that is trying to be competitive. Either they need to be sized up or a player-side option to see them as a different race.

I don’t think conquest is a bad game mode, I just don’t think it was executed very well in GW2. You could even expand the game mode to have some long Team Fortress 2 style maps where you have a tug of war with capture points. I’m not claiming to be any sort of authority on game design, but all of my suggestions have come from other successful games that have a similar game mode.

Arkvan.3561:

The only reason I roll LB is because every now and then I just won’t be able to get to grips with an enemy. It’s just mainly laziness on my side though. I don’t find the damage worthwhile but every now and then you just HAVE to have ranged abilities.

It’s less about the range and more about how the burst is the most reliable way to ensure CI works. With other weapons sets missing your burst could be a death sentence.

Since there’s interest in Skullcracker I’ll post my builds here:

Version 1

Version 2

The build actually really benefited from the Runes of Strength change. Mighty Defence went from “ehhh” to “yes.” Some things I’m messing around with is swapping Spiked Armor for Sundering Mace and in Version 2 Short Temper can also be good at times but if they have no blocks it’s worthless. Vs Guardians though you’ll be hitting them hard with Destruction of the Empowered and when they block you’ll get more might.

Minion Masters.

I play Skullcracker which sustains itself by keeping your opponent from attacking you while you deal damage. A MM screws that up by having hardly any real damage themselves and just let their AI do all the work. Killing the AI screws you up as well because they make an AoE.

People call Warrior passive which must make MM brain-dead.

Warlord.9074:

BurrTheKing.8571:

Warlord.9074:

Ya I see what your saying. Welp maybe if CI wasn’t our only “viable” option. I say specifically viable. Since there are other options but they are not viable.

That really is the core issue. I thnk if mending cooldown was reduced to like 15 seconds that could open up builds without CI. I doubt thats going to happen.

We almost have to take 15 in defense no matter what since adrenal healing is a big part of our sustain. I guess thats the other part of the core issue is your forced to pump points in defensive tree if you want to be viable. Which leaves not enough points left over to have build diversity. Or there are just simply clearly better traits than others, and many over valued traits that cost a lot but are basically worthless.

You’re right about Mending, if it was worth using you could take less in Defense and take Restorative Strength in Power and have basically a full heal, I’ll add it to the list.

The other thing we could hope for is if healing signet was given a better active it could be like the ele heal that removes conditions when it pulses when u activate it. I doubt that will happen too.

I think HS is always going be be a “passive” heal. Make the active too strong and it’s OP, too weak and it’ll never be used.

Hmmm…that pulsing thing is a cool idea though. Maybe if Mending gave you a pulse of healing for every condi removed. Problem with that though is if you have only 3 condis and 1 is a soft CC Resto Strength would remove and you’d be out of a pulse.

That sort of delayed healing would be really cool mechanically though.

Warlord.9074:

Ya I see what your saying. Welp maybe if CI wasn’t our only “viable” option. I say specifically viable. Since there are other options but they are not viable.

That really is the core issue. I thnk if mending cooldown was reduced to like 15 seconds that could open up builds without CI. I doubt thats going to happen.

We almost have to take 15 in defense no matter what since adrenal healing is a big part of our sustain. I guess thats the other part of the core issue is your forced to pump points in defensive tree if you want to be viable. Which leaves not enough points left over to have build diversity. Or there are just simply clearly better traits than others, and many over valued traits that cost a lot but are basically worthless.

You’re right about Mending, if it was worth using you could take less in Defense and take Restorative Strength in Power and have basically a full heal, I’ll add it to the list.

I’ve always believed that ranged weapons were the most dull weapons in this game. Both Longbow and Rifle are essentially “TAB + #.” I’d much prefer the ability to actually aim all of my shots but it’s highly unlikely that the aiming system is going to be totally overhauled any time soo…ever.

This makes it all the more unfortunate that Warriors are all but forced into using LB right now. Not taking one means you have a high probability of being blinded/blocked/evaded/whatever while trying to land a burst skill that you need to avoid having those 15+ stacks of bleed eat you alive. My favorite loadout has always been Skullcracker and while it’s good mano y mano in a hectic mid point fight there’s going to be a lot of condis and you need that cleanse. I can take Signet of Stamina in addition to Zerker Stance and CI but then that means getting rid of Bull’s Charge, an important skill when sing Mace seeing as Skull Crack is easy to see coming.

The point I’m trying to make is that I would like to see changes that allow Warriors to not take a Longbow. Two of the most promising options are:

1: Changing the GS burst into something that always triggers CI similar to Combustive Shot on LB. I suggested a ranged cone attack that is similar to Illusionary Wave without the Knockback. Another good one I saw recently was a sort of AoE ground smash.

2: Brawler’s Recovery has the right idea but is totally worthless in its current form. Even if it were to be buffed if it only effects blind it really wouldn’t be worth using when you would have to give up Burst Mastery or Heightened Focus. What would be worthwhile is burst attacks being unblindable and unblockable. The name would probably need changing because there’s no recovery involved (Brawler’s Ferocity?).

*3: Make Mending a more worthwhile heal. If it was worth using it would practically be a cleanse if taken with Restorative Strength. Either the healing needs to be increased, the CD reduced, or it needs to heal more when you have condis on you like Consume Conditions. (Thanks to Warlord for pointing this out)

Tom Gore.4035:

Hey nothing as fun as a mighty warrior killing himself going down some stairs!

“Chaaaaarrr!Ow!Ow!Ow!Ow!Ow!Aaaaaargh!” silence

Best part in falling damage is of course it kills you outright. No downstate for breaking your ankle in the stairs!

Let’s just say we lost the Tranquility that match.

Might and Runes of Strength are both fine as is. they are the only thing keeping power relevant and are counterable. Without them, there would be little reason not to just reroll condi (although I still say certain condi specs are stronger than most power builds). Might can be stripped and stolen, conditions can be cleansed but are also much easier to apply, especially with the sigil and rune changes. Condis also scale off of just one stat and ignore armor.

There will probably always be a dominate rune set for a particular play style so nerfing it accomplishes nothing.

CntrlAltDefeat.1465:

Old school beta weekend warrior revisited.

I play a similar build as a roamer. It can deal good damage, and it can take out a weak target in one rotation..however, when it misses it misses real bad and can be hard to recover because of blade trail/rush/bulls rush/whirlwind attack all being somewhat sketchy if there is any terrain whatsoever. A-net addressed these lingering greatsword problems when they nerfed hammer. Then nerfed axe. Then nerfed hammer again. Then nerfed longbow and then nerfed longbow again. I felt the quality control on greatsword after so much work had been put into it now made it reliable.

Axe also got an indirect buff with the change to Sigil of Intelligence. Not to mention Runes of Strength gets its damage close to what it used to be. One thing to note though, don’t use Rush going down the stairs on Temple because that can cause you to kill yourself from funky fall damage. Up works just fine and most other downward angles do as well.

Brigg.6189:

Yeah, the weakness of axe/GS BC has always been that you can’t bait stun breaks yourself. These days considering there’s so many hambows, it could actually work alright since they can bait for you.

It’s a fun build, I’m not completely sold on all your choices, but it can work with the right teamcomp and playstyle.

The thing I’d probably be most worried about is getting trained by thieves. That’s kind of the downfall of most zerk classes these days.

That risk is why I got rid of Healing Signet. Defiant Stance will take you from 25% health to 100% in just a few Heart Seekers. It doesn’t matter how fast your reaction time is, you’re going to end up healing the Warrior a lot. This build is actually really strong vs Thieves since just a few attacks will take them down. One Whirlwind Attack is half their health. You just have to make sure you take the fight to where they used Infiltrator’s Strike if they’re running S/D.

If I’m in a 1v1 I’ll probably start off in axe and use Shield Bash to see if I can bait anything out and most do because they expect a Evis to follow. If they don’t break then I do use Evis. As someone who hates fighting Thieves this is probably the best build I’ve run for them.

Cogbyrn.7283:

@Burr: You are splitting hairs in an almost insane way.

Berserker Stance: Conditions cannot be applied to you. If you are arguing that the condition makes contact THEN the stance removes it, so it isn’t immunity, then I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe take a break from the forums.

It’s not splitting hairs. Having the ability to still hit the player gives you the capability to do things that true invulnerability skills don’t allow. You can still gain adrenaline and life force on someone using Endure Pain. You can apply conditions that are on hit or on crit. You can use control skills. In return you can attack while it’s active. Calling it “invulnerability” or “immunity” makes it sound as if you should just not bother attacking while the stances are up which isn’t necessarily the case.

Zerker Stance is certainly different. There’s not any benefit to using condition-only attacks while it’s up. It’s still not invul/immune as far as the game mechanics are concerned. It doesn’t matter in this case. but yah this one is a bit more splitting hairs but I’ve had to deal with several people saying it’s “bugged” because they have +duration and condis still don’t get through.

zapv.8051:

BurrTheKing.8571:

Endure pain does NOT make you immune to direct damage, it reduces all direct damage to 0. On-crit effects can still happen because the attack still lands.

AKA immunity to direct damage, 0 damage equals nothing equals immunity

Berserker Stance does NOT make you immune to conditions, it reduces the duration of conditions to nothing. They only changed the definition because people didn’t seem to get that adding + duration does not make something last for 110% +, it’s still 100%.

AKA immunity to condition damage, 0 duration equals nothing equals immunity.

Balanced Stance gives you a strippable boon that keeps you from being knocked down. It’s a stance in name only so that traits affect it. It’s fine as is, it’s just a signet with no passive. Unless ANet wants to totally redesign stances by giving them shorter CDs and duration and have the overwrite each other they’re going to stay as-is.

AKA immunity to hard CC except under special conditions.

No, all wrong. You totally ignored the fact that the mechanic of invulnerability/immunity in this game keeps attacks from even touching the target. They become a ghost basically and nothing can affect them. It makes them untouchable by direct damage, conditions, and control skills at the same time from one skill. Stances allow your attacks to still connect with the one using them. if you have runes/traits/sigils that proc something on hit or on crit it can still occur, unlike vs invul/immune. it is an important distinction to make but it’s inconvenient to some because it doesn’t agree with their rhetoric.

Ta Da! Even the wiki doesn’t consider Endure Pain to be a real invulnerability skill.

I still don’t understand the problem with CI. Most critics of Warrior complain that the class is too passive yet at the same time we see posts saying that the most active form of condi removal in the game is OP. There seems to be no pleasing either side.

Eloquence.5207:

12th letter
Second number
16th letter

checks forum post history

Nope, totally not a Thief main here folks.

At least other Thief mains can at least post SOME sort of argument as to why it isn’t broken. Meanwhile all you do is make attacks on player’s skill, players who you have probably never seen play before.

Can we PLEASE stop using the word “immunity” because no stance provides that. Immunity in this game is where attacks cannot actually make contact with the player.

Endure pain does NOT make you immune to direct damage, it reduces all direct damage to 0. On-crit effects can still happen because the attack still lands.

Berserker Stance does NOT make you immune to conditions, it reduces the duration of conditions to nothing. They only changed the definition because people didn’t seem to get that adding + duration does not make something last for 110% +, it’s still 100%.

Balanced Stance gives you a strippable boon that keeps you from being knocked down. It’s a stance in name only so that traits affect it. It’s fine as is, it’s just a signet with no passive. Unless ANet wants to totally redesign stances by giving them shorter CDs and duration and have the overwrite each other they’re going to stay as-is.

Stop comparing stances to things like Mist Form, Elixir S, Distortion, whatever because they are totally different mechanically. Those skills stop ANYTHING from even connecting with the player, while stances allow the attack to connect but reduces the effect to nothing.

Cygnus.6903:

Such hate. I like what you built. Even if it’s just for good ol’ times.

The hate only makes my axe stronger!

MWAHAHAHAHAHA!

Flissy.4093:

BurrTheKing.8571:

Flissy.4093:

A bunker that won’t counter your long CD combo with stability/invuln? Please.

Your lacking stability and even a stun break (last stand doesn’t count, a 20 point investment on a 90 second CD you can’t even control). Using Berserker Stance for Adrenaline is a horrendous idea, given that most bunkers are condi at this point, they will just outlive your burst with stability/stunbreak/invuln, then tear you a new one while your stance is on CD.

Defiant stance is pathetic, btw, it will only help you against bads that you could have beat without using a single utility/heal anyway.

Just going to say that tonight I was pretty much MVP for every match I played…except 1 where it was 4v5 and everyone kinda gave up. Decap Engis were pretty kitten vulnerable to it because they have no invuln or stun breaks often times so if you pace it right they never get to heal.

MvP means nothing. Points doesn’t mean you were the best. I could defend a point for the whole map and it never gets decapped, but get no more than 10 points in a map.

Decap engie is a weird one. Sure, they probably don’t have a stun break, but if you’re Brush is dodged you’re kittened too as they fling you about like a hooker.

ProxyDamage.9826:

This kind of build was left in 2012 for a reason.

I wasn’t talking points. I’m talking captures, saves, that kind of thing. My guild mate would run hammer, go attack mid bunker and make him use his stability and the like, then I come in from just capping another point and kill him in 4 seconds. Spirit Rangers don’t like it much either, since going stealth after the Bull’s does nothing since you don’t need the target anyways. Just wait for the heal when they get up and Shield Bash it.

Landing Bull’s is only hard for me at certain times and that’s purely due to my crap isp. Just wait for a dodge and time it so you land on them as soon as it ends. That’s all you gotta do for anything in this game. And even if you DO miss the Bull’s just go to axe, Evis, and use your autoattack for the next 5 seconds and you’ll still hit for most of their health and force them to do nothing but play defensivly. The sustain after the burst is actually fine due to how much Vigor you stacked. So long as you did over half you have enough sustain to finish them. Defiant Stance is basically the same thing as a condi clear, get condi spiked? Wait a few seconds then pop it and with Restorative Strength all the soft CC is gone and everything else heals you.

I still value a spike build like this over a Thief because a Warrior doesn’t stealth and has enough sustain after the burst to stay on point.

Neko.9021:

Lol, it’s the Bull’s Charge, Frenzy, Hundred Blades combo. Fun stuff.

But now with twice the sustain it had at launch!

Flissy.4093:

A bunker that won’t counter your long CD combo with stability/invuln? Please.

Your lacking stability and even a stun break (last stand doesn’t count, a 20 point investment on a 90 second CD you can’t even control). Using Berserker Stance for Adrenaline is a horrendous idea, given that most bunkers are condi at this point, they will just outlive your burst with stability/stunbreak/invuln, then tear you a new one while your stance is on CD.

Defiant stance is pathetic, btw, it will only help you against bads that you could have beat without using a single utility/heal anyway.

Just going to say that tonight I was pretty much MVP for every match I played…except 1 where it was 4v5 and everyone kinda gave up. Decap Engis were pretty kitten vulnerable to it because they have no invuln or stun breaks often times so if you pace it right they never get to heal.

Tom Gore.4035:

August 2012 called and wants it’s “op” tactic back.

But yeah, with the new influx of “PvP” players in the field, there are bound to be many who still fall to the good ol’ Bull Rush + Frenzy + 100b combo.

Me, I slot a stun breaker.

My team slots control and boon stripping.

Also, the idea is similar to launch but half the things in this build were drastically different then.

Warlord.9074:

You know I may give your build a shot just becasue its different. The 1st build that I’ve seen using traited stances for vigor in a long time. I may swap out the battle sigl for the other sigil of conditional removal. I forget what its called so I have generosity on one and the other on the other one. Purity.

Yah that will certainly help with conditions in a longer fight but tbh if the fight lasts much longer than those 8 seconds from Zerker Stance it probably won’t make a difference. Of course with proper uses of all the evades you get from the Vigor you have, the Evade on Whirlwind Attack, and Shield Stance you can still stay in the fight. You’re basically a Thief but deal more damage in the short term but without the ability to stealth away if you mess up.

Carpboy.7145:

GS/axe and GS/hammer also are great at 1vX. Just not so much vs thieves

You can win a 1vX with Axe, so long as you hit hard enough to down one of the Thieves fast enough with a well-timed Evis.. If it’s 2 Thieves you’re probably screwed no matter what class you’re playing.

Warlord.9074:

ya, I played warrior so long I just make up names for stuff lol. Like GS cool down reduce. I call it that instead of forceful GS sometimes since I have a bad memory.

I know that feeling. I keep build editor open now because I spend so much time “debating” angry Thieves (if you look most of them are) that will try to discredit you for the most petty slip-ups and I want to make sure what I say is as correct as possible. Of course, I consistently say Berserker’s Stance or Zerker’s Stancewhen it’s actually just Berserker and Zerker.

I’ve started ignoring certain players, some will totally ignore the meat of your posts and pick at anything that can distract from your point.

Warlord.9074:

I was hoping to see a slotted signet of str. For somereason I was thinking of unblockable CCs and evas idk why.

I’m assuming you mean Signet of Might? While it would be nice it’s not worth taking over Bull’s Charge. You need it as an initiator because chances are the enemy isn’t going to be polite enough to stand in your 100b. There’s also no getting rid of Frenzy or Zerker Stance because you’ll be either be left vulnerable to fear/blind or you’ll attack too slowly to deal the damage you need to kill a bunker.

I’ve been using Short Temper instead of Restorative Strength because if they do block chances are they just gave you 25 stacks of might and your Evis and follow up attacks are going to hit like a truck.

Amir.1570:

I don’t understand the godkitten point of “initiating” with the bulls charge HB combo.

It’s better to use it as a finisher when they don’t have anymore stun breaks to be honest. But w/e, this build’s still out-dated crap I guess.

How else do you land 100b? With Zerker Stance you’ll have max adrenaline and will therefor be dealing 15% more damage. Using Evis first drains your adrenaline and as a result any followup attacks will hit for less. I messed around with the rotation and this appears to be the most damaging and more importantly consistent.

The build is no longer outdated because we’re seeing more and more bunker comps. The way to counter that is decap engi and high burst in a short period of time. This burst is so fast that by the time the person has time to react they’ve lost most of their health even if they are a bunker. Have the decap Engi bait out the stun break/stability and the Guard will be totally helpless to do anything and they’ll never get to pop their heal/elite.

(I am copy/pasting this from another thread because I not only wrote a lot more than I thought I did, but I’ve seen more and more interest in Axe + GS builds so I though I would make it its own post)

All I run now is Axe/GS these days. My version of the build is still highly experimental so I’m messing around with it a lot.

I call it, The Bunker Buster

You’ll notice some really strange decisions right off the bat. Most noticeable is the lack of Balanced Stance and the use of Frenzy, Last Stand, and Defiant Stance. The whole build is centered around doing one big burst every minute or so. The combo is just like at launch but slightly different:

Start off in Berserker Stance -> Bull’s Charge -> 100b -> then depending on the situation you either Whirlwind attack or or swap to Axe/Shield AS THEY ARE STANDING UP -> followed by Eviscerate

It’s supposed to be used on a target with is either light on stun breaks or ideally on a target that isn’t focused on you. It’s called the Bunker Buster because if you are coordinated it’s possible to very quicky dispatch a Bunker Guardian or tough targets like MMs and Engis. If I’m going mid I always take the long way and show up to the party a bit late, then pick my victim and annihilate them in a few short seconds. Some don’t survive past 100b and you can swap targets and use the 100% crit chance Evis on someone coming to revive them. The use of Defiant Stance is going to all depend on the situation. Sometimes I just use it just as I do the burst because you’ll be immune to conditions, Last Stand will hopefully cover CC, and you’ll be healing for more because of Frenzy. There’s also plenty of damaging dodge rolls to be had with all the Vigor and Sigil of Energy.

Now for the glaring weaknesses. No CI, no Balanced Stance. After your burst is done you should probably high-tail it out of there unless the battle was won. Go support someone else or rush to an open node. Your speed is your sustain. Sigil of Generosity is nice for some light condi mitigation when Zerker Stance is down, but never, EVER fight a condi user without your combo being ready. Don’t open up with it, see if you can bait out dodges and maybe a stun breaker/Stability with Shield Bash. Another potential weakness, lags effect on Bull’s Charge. Sometimes the skill will totally miss or send you flying past while still knocking them down. That’s typically when you Whirlwind Attack back and go for the Evis then bug out. When it works though, it’s totally devastating. I have poor internet so it affects me more than most. You also have only 8 second of Stability every 90 seconds. I couldn’t find any better way to deal with this. if you want to spike you NEED Frenzy and you NEED Zerker Stance and you NEED Bull’s Charge. Remove any of those and the spike doesn’t work in many situations. With good teamwork though, your Guardian can give you some when you go in and problem solved. Defiant Stance really needs to be an instant cast though, it’s so reliant on timing and that 1/4th second can totally screw you over, but it can also make you unkillable while in the middle of a hectic fight over mid because the second they see you healing they stop attacking but almost always too late.

Basically, you go in, kill one or more targets, then move on and make yourself useful somewhere else. I’ve actually won 2v1s because if you quickly down one target then cleave with 100b while their teammate tries to revive you can actually outdamage the revive long enough to down them as well.

Traits I’m still messing around with include the Adept Strength trait, Dogged March vs Shield Master (is more frequent Shield Stances worth losing reduced soft cc duration and regen?), and DotE vs Sharpened Axes (is adren on crit, thus getting you back to 15% more damage faster worth giving up the extra dmg on bunker Guardians?).

All I run now is Axe/GS these days. My version of the build is still highly experimental so I’m messing around with it a lot.

I call it, The Bunker Buster

You’ll notice some really strange decisions right off the bat. Most noticeable is the lack of Balanced Stance and the use of Frenzy, Last Stand, and Defiant Stance. The whole build is centered around doing one big burst every minute or so. The combo is just like at launch but slightly different: Start off in Berserker Stance → Bull’s Charge → 100b → then depending on the situation you either Whirlwind attack or or swap to Axe/Shield AS THEY ARE STANDING UP → and use Eviscerate. It’s supposed to be used on a target with is either light on stun breaks or ideally on a target that isn’t focused on you. If I’m going mid I always take the long way and show up to the party a bit late, then pick my victim and annihilate them in a few short seconds. Some don’t survive past 100b and you can swap targets and use the 100% crit chance Evis on someone coming to revive them. The use of Defiant Stance is going to all depend on the situation. Sometimes I just use it just as I do the burst because you’ll be immune to conditions, Last Stand will hopefully cover CC, and you’ll be healing for more because of Frenzy. There’s also plenty of damaging dodge rolls to be had with all the Vigor and Sigil of Energy.

Now for the glaring weaknesses. No CI, no Balanced Stance. After your burst is done you should probably high-tail it out of there unless the battle was won. Go support someone else or rush to an open node. Your speed is your sustain. Sigil of Generosity is nice for some light condi mitigation when Zerker Stance is down, but never, EVER fight a condi user without your combo being ready. Don’t open up with it, see if you can bait out dodges and maybe a stun breaker/Stability with Shield Bash. Another potential weakness, lags effect on Bull’s Charge. Sometimes the skill will totally miss or send you flying past while still knocking them down. That’s typically when you Whirlwind Attack back and go for the Evis then bug out. When it works though, it’s totally devastating. I have poor internet so it affects me more than most. You also have only 8 second of Stability every 90 seconds. I couldn’t find any better way to deal with this. if you want to spike you NEED Frenzy and you NEED Zerker Stance and you NEED Bull’s Charge. Remove any of those and the spike doesn’t work in many situations. With good teamwork though, your Guardian can give you some when you go in and problem solved. Defiant Stance really needs to be an instant cast though, it’s so reliant on timing and that 1/4th second can totally screw you over, but it can also make you unkillable while in the middle of a hectic fight over mid because the second they see you healing they stop attacking but almost always too late.

Basically, you go in, kill one or more targets, then move on and make yourself useful somewhere else. I’ve actually won 2v1s because if you quickly down one target then cleave with 100b while their teammate tries to revive you can actually outdamage the revive long enough to down them as well.

When it comes to Brawler’s Recovery I would rather have something that gives an effect that is useful against more than just a small number of builds. While blinds are annoying it’s not something a Warrior can’t beat. In sticking with the traits’ theme I would make there be only 2 seconds of blind resistance (of course still cleansing a blind of swap), maybe even just one, and make swapping weapons a stun breaker on an ICD. As for how long of an ICD I’m not sure, 9-10 seems short but it IS a GM trait and it’s very possible to be controlled right after switching. I like the idea of a anti-blind trait that you have to give up a strong trait for, but like I said if there’s no blind users around it’s totally worthless. I don’t like a theoretical 100% immunity because while I hate blind spam a change like this would cause nothing but a waterfall of tears from d/p Thieves and we’re still dealing with their constant smear campaigns.

CI has been and still is perfectly fine as is. It is the one of the most active forms of condition removal in the game. It requires either the use of a Bow or landing a burst skill where other classes are just “Remove/Transfer X number of conditions every X seconds.” For a class that is constantly called passive that seems pretty active to me. It’s also still VERY easy to overwhelm a Warrior with conditions when Zerker Stance is down. I don’t like playing condi Warrior but man does it look more and more attractive every day and it does eat other Warriors whole.

What Warriors really need is for the other healing skills to be made more attractive. Healing Surge punishes you for using your class mechanic, Mending Heals for an insignificant amount, and Defiant Stance has a cast time. I actually kind of like Defiant Stance because it actually lets me use glassy builds because if I get condi spiked or focused by a Thief I just activate it and that damage gets healed so I don’t NEED CI if I kill them fast enough. It also works really well with Frenzy because the stance heals you for all damage that would be delt and Frenzy increases the amount of damage you take. Where it can screw you over is that it has a cast time and the whole point of it is using it while under pressure. It’s also not affected by Stance-Related traits. I’m not sure if it would be OP for Sure-Footed to increase it to 4 seconds but if you think about it, the Warrior will probably NOT have a trait like Defy Pain and probably just avoid Endure Pain as well because it’s too risky because it being active at the same time would reduce your healing to 0, so that may balance it out. I think this heal has the most potential.

Solori.6025:

Inscrutable.8347:

Actually condis were snapped over the knee of the strongest support comp against them that I’ve ever seen

wait wait…
I’m sorry I dont understand you..are you saying a condi comp lost?!

It almost seems like everyone was anticipating condis and made really resilient bunker builds so half the teams ended up coming to the dance wearing the same dress. That or like in the EU tourney nobody wanted to mess around with their comp too much. I’m sure there’s still some as-of-yet undiscovered super OP combination that we’ll have to deal with for the next 6 months.

tichorum.2415:

infantrydiv.1620:

Phaeton.9582:

Empathetic Fighter.2065:

It’s not OP, just very easy to play.

infantrydiv.1620:

vincecontix.1264:

Yes its a viable build for wars but its not really over the top. Other classes can bring just as much to the table and strength runes are available to all classes.

No, strength runes are not ‘available’ to other classes since they don’t have firefields and blast finishers on a 7 second cooldown.

Elementalists have waaaaay more than soldiers axe, which is a better build IMO.

Elementalists also have to rotate properly, and dont have complete immunity to damage periodically.

Yes they do. Focus 5 with earth. Mist form.

I think hammer is too strong right now with how long the CC is. Warriors don’t have 3000 toughness and if focused correctly can be torn apart, especially by conditions. Conditions after beserker stance is the death of a warrior that is just loaded up by them.

Also to note, Warrior has ZERO pure immunity skills like Mist Form and Elixir S. They has Stances that reduce the damage or duration of a specific source to 0. You can still use control skills and conditions on someone using Endure Pain, you can still use direct damage and control when Berserker’s Stance is up. Immunity skills do not allow you to be even HIT by anything. If they use multiple stances at once then they are going to be really vulnerable when they end.

It’s annoying to see people saying things about a class that are just flat out WRONG and Warrior gets this more than most. I think Hammer is fine. You can only do a full rotation once every 25-30 seconds due to Backbreaker. You avoid the combo ONCE and you have enough time to mount a good counter attack. You KNOW the combo is coming and it has a really obvious rotation. It can be more difficult to see coming in team fights but that applies to pretty much everything. I actually like Soldier Axe/LB more now because it’s tougher, still hits hard, and all of Axe’s attacks are combo finishers which lets you apply more burning. Not to mention one well-timed Eviscerate means dead Thief where as any moderately competent one can avoid hammer.

NevirSayDie.6235:

Lopez.7369:

BurrTheKing.8571:

I think many of you are looking at this from the wrong angle. It’s not the Warrior, or any one class/spec, that that is to blame. What’s wrong with PvP is that we have tiny little capture points and the fact that one tanky player can totally deny the cap of 2 or more players.

This design means that AoE and tanky builds are going to be prevalent. Hambow wouldn’t be that great if the capture point wasn’t so small. The same goes for condi necros and engis. If the points were larger the builds would still be good, but avoidable without leaving the point. I’m also not a fan of one player being able to deny the cap of 2+. It should definitely slow the progress by a large amount but it being able to stall indefinitely is not a mechanic I’m a fan of.

The playerbase seems to be pretty satisfied with where Warrior is at now. Beating on Hammer or Bow any more would just make them worthless.

That is completely inaccurate. The comp is even stronger in Legacy because it’s practically impossible to take a large point away from a full bunker team.

And considering necromancers and engineers didn’t make it to the finals, I’m not sure we should be discussing nerfing AOE or conditions right now.

Yes, larger points seem to benefit tanky comps more than anything. Even if the rules for contesting a point were changed so that one player couldn’t maintain control of a point vs. two players, that wouldn’t change. Rotation would just get even more important.

The whole “PvP is about standing in little circles” thing has been completely overblown for almost two years now. PvP is about winning fights and controlling the map. If you don’t win fights, you always lose. If you win fights by clumping together/zerging, but have no control over the map, you usually lose.

Winning those fights becomes a lot easier when you have the ability to use AoEs that cover the whole point that basically say “either leave the point or lose it.” It’s not that hard to do and it does make certain builds much more powerful than they actually are. Earthshaker is really easy to avoid in an open area, but less so on a tiny little point. The small points are also REALLY bad from a spectators PoV as well. It means you just see a crap-ton of particle effects in one spot, in addition to tiny little rat-men that have harder to read animations.

Controlling the map is much easier when one player can delay the cap from 2 or more players for a significant amount of time. I also see no issue with rotations being more important because then it makes teamwork OP rather than “X class OP.”

ANet has made a lot of mistakes with PvP. They didn’t put much focus on it when it was the main thing in GW1 for the longest time. They tried to force Esports, which has never worked out. All you can do is make a solid game and hope people want to play competitively. No big Esports game that I can think of came to be because of the developers, the scene came from the players THEN the devs encouraged it. There’s also STILL no mention of GvG in a game who’s predecessor was pretty much built from the group up for. GW1 had Random Arenas, Team Arenas, Hall of Heroes, GvG, Alliance Battles, Jade Quarry, Fort Aspenwood…you get the idea. Sure, they didn’t all exist at launch but what was there was much more solid in design than what we currently have.

Romek.4201:

no – bigger nodes make it only easier for bunkers and wannabe bunkers jsut running in circles forever

only thing to nerf bunkers would be to tick the cap for the team with more players on node
so when a bunker wanna bunker it forever just bring 2 ppl and decap

but dont know when this would be fun

Didn’t I basically say in my post I think the cap should be going to the side with the most players on the mode a la Battlefield? In fact most capture point game modes do things with way. The ones that do things like GW2 typically have a low time to kill so they get away with it.

EDIT: On another note, it doesn’t make sense to be discussing balance based on this tourney. A very, very small number of players compete on that level. What’s most important when it comes to balancing is what the majority of players who play SoloQ and TPvP experience. The meta in those situations is totally different than what we saw in the ToL. This might be for many reasons such as not wanting to mess around with a new composition so close to a tourney, or maybe nobody wanted to switch classes and play Engi. I mention Engi because I encounter 2 of them in organized TPvP way more often then I encounter double War. The most nightmareish comp I encountered was 1 Condi Engi, 1 Fear Spam Necro, 1 knock back rifle Engi, 1 S/D Thief, and a Bunker Guard. They pretty much sapped your will to play because it was so frustrating to fight. The condis lock you down while the Thief consantly evades and picks away at targets while the rifle Engi uses their Supply drop on another point and repeatedly pushes whoever is there. I’m sure it’s beatable but after the first few minutes several players just lost the will to try.

I’ll take diminishing returns on control skills if we also get a cap on how much hp/s you can lose to conditions at a time. At least then you would be discouraged from running more than 1 condition based spec in a comp, similar to GW1. With that + larger nodes and no anti-capping PvP might be more interesting to watch.