Guild Wars 2

Get the Berserker set and then pay out for the runes. If you’re totally broke, go for something like Privateer or Ogre runes until you can afford to upgrade.

Also, is your IGN your… serial number?!

sirloin.9145:

omm rifel bersek is the strongest build to have 1v1 (war) when u got a might signet, so ye ull get hate. But u like the trait + that you get taunt, headbutt + cc on weapons + thougness on brake stun and 2,5k heal, adrenal helth, quickness etc. How can you like this? And u can land all above in 1 sek. And add, the cds are short for it… I rather see nerfs then accept it, i think there is a big % that agrees.

I don’t use either build, I’m offering suggestions to deal with your problem of long boring fights. I’m not personally afraid of dueling gunflame builds either, because I just build and play accordingly.

As for how you deal with the headbutt combo, you kite. If you get caught in the taunt, use a stunbreak or condi clear (e.g. brawler’s recovery) to break free before the headbutt lands. It’s not that hard to interrupt the chain, especially if your opponent blindly rolls through that rotation every time.

But hey, it’s just my two cents. I guarantee you’ll get greater results by adapting your build and play style than you will posting here and hoping Anet nerfs as a result.

sirloin.9145:

Choppy.4183:

So don’t use that build? You could go range and kite, and not use stuns to deny the heal….

Rifel in duels get so much hate, and not that fun to play anymore. Rousing Resilience… plz Q_Q.

There’s no justification for hate over warrior rifle, especially in a warrior-warrior duel.

Otherwise, I’m not sure what to tell you… you’ve got to build for the battle. If you’re getting crazy long fights from due to melee stun breaks, either don’t use stuns, agree with the opponent to not play that build/use that trait, or just accept it as is.

So don’t use that build? You could go range and kite, and not use stuns to deny the heal….

I like it just fine. It combines well with Reckless Dodge and it generally works well with high endurance regenerating, dodge-happy play styles.

(Note: I don’t play pve, so constant dodging is critical for survival)

I’m honestly among the least qualified regarding large scale wvw fights (I’m 85% exclusive roaming, plus another 14.9% havoc), but I recommend using your resistance on the first push of any group you know that does this.

If your group is organized, have your commander beef up your resistance boon sharing and your group condi clears. I imagine it takes fewer resources to negate a condi bomb in a large fight than it does for them to drop one.

And they’re corrupting your resistance? Have your group change up accordingly. In big fights, it’s often less about what you can do individually.

I can’t imagine only you’re getting melted by this…. If you are, then take a look at how you’re managing resistance and condi clears.

Aeolus.3615:

Yeah i hate to use rush -.-, but i hate GS overall, prefer axe/shield.
Still it is to much, way to much for the warrior capabilities atm, warriors need a good trade off for the good things they have, not removing it entirelly but reducing and fixing rush.

Increase WA CD by 5 seconds 10(traited),15(untraited), and change rush by giving 8seconds speed boon and 2 seconds quickness.

I still maintain that warrior is pretty middle of the pack in terms of mobility, especially if you’re just relying on the gs for mobility. Honestly, I just don’t see the case for reducing it further.

I can see justification for a shave or two to Berserker, but not to mobility. Warrior just isn’t the “endless run-away spec” that it used to be.

(Also, 2s of quickness to Rush would be wasted since warrior movement skills can’t be affected by quickness/slow either and Rush has a 2s channel)

ddoi.9264:

Final thrust should be buffed to finish downed foes.

Oh man, I’d never leave the sword if they did that! Then again, I really dislike the unequal distribution of death blows in this game. So maybe I’d give up the sword out of guilt… </ambivalence>

Aeolus.3615:

GS is more used to run away than actually fight, warior is in a very good position, with the durability runes, and some sturdy builds that packs good damage, why do they need suchs skills ?

When i figh warrrior they spend more time running with GS than actually figthing.. then switch to axe/shield, when burn both set skills, swap weapon to GS and run again… its idiotic.

Guardian to be sturdy , sacrifices alot of damage and the mobility, warrior has no trade offs, they have stability pulse, decent damage on sturdy builds, high HP, mobility on GS, resistance… they need to trade off something.

Imo Warrior is the only class that needs the GS nike spec cutted off.

Not so much. gs5 isn’t used that much as an attack because it’s still buggy and better saved for movement. But it can still be used as a decent (large) gap closer and to escape, and gs3 (the other movement skill) is used extensively to attack, evade, and escape.

But in the comment you replied to, I was only pointing out that Anet has cut mobility before (and I said that in direct response to Rink’s comment that warrior’s mobility hasn’t been cut).

Every warrior movement skill (including both skills on the gs) took a big nerf from a mobility point of view when speed buffs stopped affecting them. gs5 moves the warrior 1200 in 2s, but in the old days the warrior moved 1600 in the same amount of time due to swiftness. In other words, warrior mobility used to be 33% better when swiftness was in effect.

Signet of Stone, by my read. Unblockable should only defeat blocks and reflects, and the signet doesn’t do either.

Rink.6108:

Since I don’t think Arenanet will address it (otherwise they would have adapted GS-warrior a long time ago)

Warrior mobility took a huge hit about a year and a half ago when they made speed buffs no longer affect movement skills. It cut the distance of every warrior skill (gs included) by 33% (if under swiftness) or 25% (if just Warrior Sprint).

So there’s definitely at least one example of Anet nerfing a class’ mobility.

I primarily run a power gs/s+sh while roaming, and have for just over a year or so. The gs is obviously the damage set… the sword’s primary purpose is additional mobility, followed by setup and the occasional big hit.

I’d love to see a direct damage boost to the sword auto, and some work on the “freeze” that sometimes happens after a Flurry setup, but it’s honestly not a priority for the class or game.

I have no idea about the condi value of the sword and if that needs a buff… I mean, core warrior condi is anemic as hell, and Berserker condi is more powered by burning, so I guess that means it probably needs a buff.

Mobility is the main reason (by far) that I’m not just running an axe with the shield. It’s a big help in combat and to escape combat. It also let’s me make leaps that almost nobody else can when using elevation and weapon swap. As a fairly dedicated roamer, this just barely makes it worthwhile over taking another weapon.

The Flurry setup for a 100b (or any other spike) is ok, but not that great. Warriors and thieves largely ignore immob, but it’s sometimes enough to land a big hit on them (like a Final Thrust). Other classes can often pop an invuln, teleport, or condi clear that takes care of it. Still, it’s not nothing.

Jeknar.6184:

You need that bull’s charge man… GS 3 > 5 > BC and the only thing that will likely catch up with you will be another high mobility toon like thief or druid. That’s the experience on my warrior so far at least. And I run Longbow, so I don’t have another set of running like sword+warhorn.

Haha, yeah, that’s the one piece I don’t run. Just not worth it overall imo, but it does add to the hustle. But I do run sword, and I suspect you don’t. Sword brings more hustle than Bull’s Charge.

Jeknar.6184:

A warrior do have that and a warrior can still wear nike shoes.

It’s rare that I disagree with two of your posts in one day, but man, the days of nike warriors being a thing is long gone.

I normally run a build that has more hustle than the vast majority of warriors out there, and I’m still middle of the pack in terms of builds with escape/pursue potential. It’s been that way for more than a year.

My ability to escape is based as much on proper positioning and effective use of terrain.

Jeknar.6184:

Solo roaming was dead way before HoT.

Ahem… you know that it’s still done, and can be done successfully.

Which class do you play?

Unfortunately, I don’t think it can be helped. The benefits of the 0.5s fix clearly outweigh the costs, but those costs are a drag for those just trying to use the affected skills in a way that wouldn’t have been broken.

I think (could be wrong) that Anet had few options, and that the reason they went the way they did (the 0.5s limit) is related to why bow doesn’t work the same way with traits like Cleansing Ire and Berserker’s Power. It’s an issue related to how ground targeted skills work.

It’s not devastating enough? It’s practically an “I win” button in a lot of encounters already.

I’d immediately tag up, eschew these options, and call my squad the Rebel Alliance. It would be open to anyone able to remember they’re playing a video game….

Roaming is more fun than doing something else? I know that’s not as poetic as you were hoping for, but it’s just how it is for me.

PS: The one and only precursor drop I did get (Chaos Gun) was indeed from a thief, back when I was still green and afraid of their sneaky, ganky ways (back when p/d condi was a death sentence for warriors).

Fernshade.9016:

Your moral victory has no power here Choppy! If my armor doesn’t break then it means I didn’t die! Which means they didn’t win! Which means I win!!!!

That means the outnumbered buff grants immortality! Guess that explains how I’m still kicking after 10k+ deaths!

As mentioned, quitting because you think they “don’t deserve the kill” actually gives them more than they’d get otherwise.

I personally interpret it as a rage quit, which is hilarious in a video game. You still often give up a bag (depending how you do it), but it’s almost always too low value to care if you don’t, and the player knows they got the kill anyway… and so do you.

I like when I kill someone in an outnumbered fight and his friends stop to siege bury him. Has happened a few times.

I don’t personally care if someone does it to me. I’ll occasionally pm them to complain if they used low quality siege after I’ve put up a good fight, but all in good fun.

Johje Holan.4607:

Why would you be in support of bad matches? If an obvious mismatch is in existence, Anet should act quickly to rectify that.

I’m not. But which server in its place wouldn’t also be a mismatch? If Yaks isn’t stuck behind a wall, then each week their chance of rolling a better match improves.

CD wasn’t tweaked just because of bad matchups, but more because it was impossible for glicko to balance enough to account for that (due to what they started with and what they could pull from the other servers in T4).

Is that the case with Yaks, or are they just dominating? If the latter and Yaks isn’t in a glicko trap, then it should be left alone.

Man, I run full zerk base warrior… what are you talking about “meta bunker”? I also don’t normally run axe, and I occasionally run longbow.

You have to build to the problems you face. If you don’t want to run the defense line or stability, fine. But then Berserker Stance isn’t why you’re having problems nor will going back to 4s of how Berserker Stance used to work solve them.

Also, you don’t need the defense line to make the stance work. It’s objectively better than the old version out of the box, if you play it properly.

Activating healing signet as soon as your first stance pulse of resistance is removed is clearly NOT playing properly.

Forgive my ignorance, but wouldn’t a first place server running away with a match under the new system just show that it has the best overall coverage, and it’s opponents had been relying on shorter periods of massive population imbalance (e.g. night capping)?

In other words, isn’t that exactly what the new system is supposed to do?

It’s mostly been said, but I dropped hammer after HoT because of the proliferation of stability/stunbreaks and much higher ranged pressure, rather than any gutting to the weapon itself.

You could probably make a go of it, and I still use it for duels from time to time. But the loss of reliable stun lock and lack of ranged defense (block, mobility, etc) make it ill suited for roaming these days, imo. At least when compared to the alternatives.

Cygnus.6903:

Hoaxintelligence.4628:

mike put.6892:

Hoaxintelligence.4628:

mike put.6892:

Hoaxintelligence.4628:

mike put.6892: ‘’reckless dodge will remove blinds for you’’

How do you remove blinds with reckless dodge :o ?

Strength traitline makes it so the dodge does unblockable 2-3k damage on dodges.
Use that to dodge on your enemies and remove the blind if you have it on.

So Reckless Dodge can cleanse condi now ? Sins when ?

It procs damage that cleans the blind.

Wow i didnt knew, I thought reckless dodge only do unblockable damage after you dodged. I never knew about the blind cleansing.

Are there more condis that can be cleansed by reckless dodge? Or only blinds?

I am pooping myself here.

I think he’s saying Reckless Dodge counts as an attack, and blind clears after preventing one attack. So, if you’re blinded before your big burst, dodge into the enemy, blind clears after negating Reckless Dodge, and you’re good to go with your burst without the blind to stop it.

I don’t know how to determine if someone is “the best”, but I do know that even excellent players get killed all the time, even by lesser skilled players. Edited videos tend to project an aura of invincibility just by their nature, and nobody is going to be able to live up to that.

I appreciate the quality of the Cake videos, and the tips some of them give to other players. They’re evidently skilled, even if it is impossible to know if they’re “the best”.

I agree with the diagnosis of the build you were up against (almost certainly a mace+shield build and probably a bow). But I disagree with the recommendation on how to fight him.

There’s a good chance he was running a trait (Rousing Resilience) that gives him +1000 toughness and 2500 health every time he breaks a stun. Thus, if he has this trait, you shouldn’t bait out the stunbreaks but rather stop stunning.

His mace set has no range, and know that he’s delivering a massive condi spike plus gaining a ton of healing over 15s if he manages to hit you with the burst. So keep him at range as much as possible, especially when he’s on this set. Keeping him loaded with condis is a good, especially movement impairing condis, or just range spike him as much as possible. If using projectiles, watch out for reflect.

If he’s using a bow as a second weapon, know that he’s still more dangerous up close than he is from range. That said, he’ll be able to get his health benefit (Adrenal Health) even if he can’t hit you with the bow’s burst (just a feature of the bow). Still, keeping him at range will limit his damage output by a lot because the bow’s aoe is slow moving, and most of the damage (condi and power) is fairly easy to avoid at range.

If you find that he’s dumping your condis like a boss, then he’s almost certainly running Cleansing Ire instead of Rousing Resilience. That means you’re free to try and stun him without risk of healing him in the process, but he’ll probably be able to shake most of them off.

Cleansing Ire will make it much harder to down him with condis, but the tactic is largely the same. Keep him at range and on bow, avoid the aoe and damage from distance. Learn what the animation for Combustive Shot and Scorched Earth look like… if you can interrupt it (i.e. doesn’t have stability up) or reflect it, you’re going to really impact his sustain.

EDIT: In terms of how you and your friend could have approached it differently, your friend could have switched to rifle/greatsword and packed Signet of Might. Use rifle on the opponent, activating the Signet to be unblockable during the burst. If the opponent chased your berserker friend, he should switch to gs, Whirlwind through the opponent, and then use gs5 to gain a bunch of distance.

Meanwhile, you do what mesmer’s do, whether power or condi. Keep range as much as you can, use your ports, invulns, evades, blocks, and stealth when he gets close to keep him from doing much to you. Get some distance between you, and keep on trucking.

If you and your friend are nowhere near each other, kite when he’s close to you, unload when he’s not, he’ll be dead in the water. He WILL be able to get Adrenal Health going by bursting one of your clones with his mace, but he’ll still be boned.

In fairness, he might just be misdiagnosing the problem as CntrlAltDefeat noted.

Even with RR though, perhaps he’s putting a cc on a Berserker, who then uses Headbutt to break it (for 2500 health) and then Savage Instinct to break the self-stun (for another 2500).

It’s a big heal, especially when piled onto other warrior heals/invulns. But it can be managed by changing up game play, and it pales in comparison to the sustain of the class he (apparently) mains.

RyuDragnier.9476:

What I’m saying is that WvW should not be balanced around small scale. That’s sPvP’s territory. Though what Invictorum said hits the nail on the head too, just corrupt/strip their boons, and they’re dead in the water. Before you can say not everybody can do that, there’s the Superior Sigil of Nullification (60% chance on crit to strip a boon) and the Superior Sigil of Absorption (steal a boon when interrupting).

Where did you get this notion that wvw shouldn’t get balanced at the small scale? Do you think the PU nerf, or the history of nerfs to thieves, was due to their massively OP contribution to zerg vs zerg combat?

Besides, that’s no sort of argument. And, seriously, a 60% chance to strip one boon every 10s? Lol… why would you even post if that’s all you’ve got?

Erzian.5218:

Glass druid is simply a bad revenant/daredevil/chronomancer/scrapper. There is no reason to play one except your love for the class, because there are plenty of better buildsavailable. Arguing that it beats a core class (or other bad builds for that matter) is silly, because the requirement for a build to be good, is being able to compete with multiple of best builds, not being favored vs a single good build or many bad builds.
E.g. Core ranger wins 100:0 vs core necro, but core necro is still a much better build over all, because it doesn’t get completely annihilated by the other 8 of 9 classes.

You think my argument is that it’s good because it beats core warrior?

I’ve actually spoken to the people I fought, they know their class well, and they’ve had remarkable success with it against all classes. You can find videos on YouTube showing how well they can perform, and the builds themselves look very solid

Have you actually played one? If so, what defeated you?

RyuDragnier.9476:

Do you know the normal setup for zergs nowadays? A frontline full of classes with CC and chasing moves, a backline full of classes that can remove or corrupt boons. NO Druid is escaping, they’ll be locked down like everything else that crosses the group’s path.

So… you’re saying bunker druid is fine as is because a zerg can take one out? You might want to think this one through. o_O

Jim Hunter.6821:

If you hadn’t noticed I tend to use the names for the base profession and the elite specs interchangeably. If you read closely you would have noticed this line, “Now if you are talking about fighting a bunker druid you need to run a comparable berserker build”.

Complaining that a vanilla glass build has to fight an uphill battle against a HoT bunker build has no place in this discussion. That isn’t a druid problem, that’s a HoT power creep problem.

I only brought up the dps druid because someone who apparently plays a druid thought bunker was the only viable option.

apharma’s right though. The lb/staff dps druid simply has to use its superior access to stealth (plus hard/soft cc, blind, and mobility) to keep the base warrior at a distance. Celestial Shadow alone, for example, has a lower cooldown, and lasts as long as, shield stance.

This prevents landing the burst (and Adrenal Health) unless the warrior uses it on the pet, which they should do but carries its own issues. Even then though, it doesn’t matter because the warrior will spend so much time in transit the dps won’t be comparable. A competent druid will win that match every time.

The gs/staff version is probably more lethal, but it requires a higher level of skill than the bow version. Hits like a truck and is fun to play against. I suppose that’s a big reason why I’m totally fine being hard countered by a dps druid.

The bunker build the OP is talking about isn’t like that. It’s a total bore to play against, doesn’t require any skill to be useful, and soaks up a disproportionate amount of resources to put down. My success ratio against these sorts of druids is actually much higher than against the dps druids, though that’s more because practically only skilled players appear to be running the dps version.

That’s my issue with it, and it sounds like a lot of people running a lot of different builds on different classes feel the same. All the classes should be balanced against risk:reward as much as possible, and the bunker druid seems skewed in that regard. It happens to every class now and again.

Jim Hunter.6821:

No counter!? Equip a shield, run the defense traitline. You now have blocks, reflects, a kitten ton of sustain, and passive "save your kitten traits. And as a warrior you have plenty of gap closers and damage, you can pretty much brush up against a glass druid and ruin his day.

No, that doesn’t remotely cut it. Have you played the build before? It’s far stronger than you give it credit for.

Erzian.5218:

Glassy druid builds, on the other hand, are generally part of the weaker builds.

Wait, what? Glassier druid builds are extremely powerful in the hands of a skilled player. To the point that I’ve pretty much resigned myself to accepting I have no counter for them as a vanilla warrior in small scale wvw (and I’m ok with that, I don’t think they should be nerfed).

Seriously, if you play druid and assumed going glassy is weak, you should have a second look at that. Staff/gs and staff/lb can be extremely effective if played right.

Cerby, I think you need to adjust your playstyle here.

Before I get into that, know that I’m running straight vanilla warrior, and the only thing I might have over you in terms of condi mitigation is Brawler’s Recovery (which you should definitely slot if you can and haven’t).

Yes, condi-based boon strippers can be tricky, but I’m mostly beating them senseless, and typically only run into trouble when there’s a second player who can further steal boons, provide support to the necro, or do high damage power damage that I can’t ignore while Berserker Stance expires.

As for your tactics, you should absolutely not activate Healing Signet if someone steals your resistance as soon as you activate Berserker Stance. Just soldier through it knowing Berserker Stance will throw resistance back on you in 3s.

Activating HS might give you 1-2s of resistance sooner, but does nothing else except deny you a huge amount of healing (and your Hail Mary resistance when Berserker Stance runs out) for the next 20s.

Second, if you’re running a low boon build, change that. Balanced Stance pulses two boons on you, which is something you could bring into your build, or you could use runes and food to keep your boon diversity up.

Third, make sure you’re landing your bursts to keep Adrenal Health going at all time. If you haven’t used Healing Signet, that’s a lot of health regen that can’t be interrupted that will get you closer to being able to use your stance again.

Fourth, you have way more mobility than a necro (and often condi chronos), so use it. If you’ve gone through Berserker Stance and you haven’t made a dent in your opponent, keep your distance until it comes back. If you’re loaded with condis, pop your stability and Healing Signet, use Shield Stance while moving away, then use your run skills as soon Shield Stance is over.

Here’s what the old Berserker Stance will give you – nothing. Anyone who can counterplay Berserker Stance now will be able to kite you for the original 8s of Berserker Stance, nevermind the 4s you’re proposing.

Also, to be clear, the current version of Berserker Stance doesn’t give you 9s of resistance. It pulses resistance every 3s during that time, which gives you 12s of uptime. With food, runes, trait, etc. you can jack that up way higher.

RyuDragnier.9476:

Because Anet rarely buffs Rangers, and their “buffs” are usually lackluster and included with an unnecessary nerf elsewhere.

That’s beside the point, and somewhat similar to other classes as well. It’s no reason to not favour buffing aspects that are too weak and nerfing aspects that are too strong.

Balthazzarr.1349:

This all really cracks me up. Ranger/Druid … About the most rejected class by zergs but at least good for roaming apparently and you want nerfs…

Why wouldn’t you favour buffs to improve their value in zergs while supporting specific nerfs that deal with the specific issue identified as a problem in small scale wvw?

Swagger.1459:

Maybe you can pick up some tips from this thief player…

That’s not particularly relevant to the subject being discussed.

The thief in the video you linked is highly skilled, pulling off crazy amounts of damage by squeezing every last drop out of what his class has to offer.

The issue raised by the OP (and most of the posters) has nothing to do with high level players, it’s what the class affords players with even low to mediocre skill in a particular aspect of the game.

DeceiverX.8361:

Any proposals on how to shave down the effectiveness of this build without affecting much else? Anyone asking for nerfs to the core of the druid or ranger must not be aware of how the class functions without this build, but this build is certainly an issue when it comes to raw effectiveness.

Like PU condi mesmer, D/D condi daredevil/ghost trapper, and the cele bunker, the sustain BM/NM Druid is OP at one thing, but is so strong in that aspect that it isn’t fun or even particularly fair to play against, and in many people’s eyes, not even fun to play because of it.

So what’s the cut to be for how to properly bring the build into line with the rest of the game’s small-scale performance without affecting other builds?

This sums up how I feel about it too. I don’t see a need to nerf the core of ranger/druid, and I actually like druid for the most part, especially in the hands of someone really skilled with it.

As an outsider, I’d proposed earlier in the thread that pet stats be tied to player gear choices to some degree. It makes sense to me, but I admit I’m not qualified to know if that’s actually an appropriate solution.

Alternative ideas (again, as an outsider), include increasing the cooldown on Celestial Form, tweaking Celestial shadow (removing superspeed, adding an ICD of 15s or more, etc), tweaking Ancestral Grace (increase the cd, decrease the speed or distance travelled, etc), reduce the heal output on Druid skills, or bring the smokescale/bristleback more inline with the other pets (though iirc they just buffed some of the other pets, so maybe Anet’s thinking the other pets are underpowered, not sure).

Seems to me that none of the above breaks the druid, but might mitigate some of the problem. To be clear, I’m not proposing that all of those be applied to the druid, only that there seems to be room to take a scalpel to this instead of a sledgehammer.

Funny how these things come back in cycles. I remember proposing something like this (making the “weapon traits” nonspecific to weapons) a long time ago. I’m sure others did it before me too.

No real objections to what you’ve proposed (no point quibbling over specifics), but there’s not much to discuss until Anet gives an indication that they’re interested in reopening the trait system.

Caedmon.6798:

So they’re just pretending headbutt not to be a physical skill ;p

Well yeah, that’s because it’s totally different! I mean, it’s clearly a rage skill because you have to be angry to use it.

Just the other day I was dueling on a bl that had maybe four from one server and six from another, and it was just me from our side until a buddy showed up to watch.

That’s ten enemies on a bl not taking our stuff for an hour for the paltry investment of one (and eventually two) roamers. Pretty good deal for our side, I’d say.

What sort of extra contribution do you think one or two extra people in a blob makes? Bet it’s not as high as keeping 10 enemies out of commission for over an hour….

Physical is a skill type, like signets, stances, and shouts. The trait description is referring to the skill type.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Physical

ArchonWing.9480:

False dichotomy here.

Have you ever considered that those people might just be taking a break from running around? A lot of people encounter each other roaming and it’s just more convenient to meet up at a predetermined spot rather than just run around aimlessly hoping to get lucky.

Try giving this a read: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Play_

It can be useful to hone various skills which can be applied in more practical situations, aka getting better.

In a game that promotes zerging everything, I suppose people that seek some degree of self improvement in a game where the bar can be set quite low are quite the bane of its existence.

Totally agree. I’ve found dueling to be tremendously helpful from a small-scale skills point of view, and from the perspective of adding more variety to the game mode.

I find it helps small-scale wvw rather than ruins it, and I think it would be easy for someone to ask similar question of, “do small-scale/havoc squads ruin large scale scene” with just as much justification. In that case, hypothetically, someone could be concerned that five or six havoc groups plus roamers could have made a mid-sized tagged-up group, which is obviously better (sarcasm).

Tom.6478:

I guess I’m talking about duels.

Today I was just trying to do dailies and was killing a guard. Two people came up and started fighting. Well I fought back.

I’m not very good so I thought I would die.

Amazingly, I got one person in a down state. But I noticed the other person was not doing anything.

I finished the one person and was not sure what to do next…so I attacked…..lol I quickly died.

I guess what I’m thinking… either both or one wanted to challenge me in a fair fight or not.

Anyhow how do I know how I should react in a situation like this?

It’s not uncommon for me (and people I sometimes run with) to even the odds a bit in the scenario you described. So, for example, one of us might stop fighting you’re not in a 1v2. Or, another common scenario, we notice you’re probably just getting dailies, or a new player, or something, and most of us decide to let you carry on but one person takes the, “better dead than red” attitude.

In terms of protocol, there is none really. If it was the first scenario, the person who held back may decide to spike you since you actually spiked the other guy (given they let you off). On the other hand, I’d totally let a buddy get spiked, and may even cheer the spiker, in the second scenario.

Dueling. You definitely weren’t in a duel based on what you described. But others seem to be talking about stumbling across other peoples’ duels for some reason. In that case, do what you want, but know that most duelers understand that getting inadvertently interrupted is bound to happen. Keep an eye on map chat to see if your ally is saying it’s a duel, or if there’s been any /bow emotes. If there are spectators, it’s a duel, etc.

If you attack, watch the behaviour. Is the person you’re attacking fighting back or kiting you? Is your ally still fighting the guy you’re attacking? Those are important indicators.

Finally, I’d say most people won’t spike you if you interrupted their duel and they downed you unless you were given plenty of warning and just kept going (or they think you interrupted deliberately).

I think the biggest objection people have is how forgiving a tankier druid is. Tonnes of sustain, and more damage than most classes could put out if they ran that tanky.

People probably wouldn’t mind so much, except it leads to (a) really bad players being hard carried by their build in a fight that’s above their pay grade, and/or (b) super boring fights.

That said, I love when I come across well played dps-oriented druids. They wreck just about anything I can throw against them in a 1v1 (as a warrior main), and I’ve got no problem with that.