Guild Wars 2

Danikat.8537:

Having said all that the end chests from the puzzles already do have a small chance to drop rare skins. They can drop any piece of equipment that’s available as a drop, including named exotics and precursors.

Well, a chance of about 10^-10 (conservative estimate) is hardly worth mentioning.

Those masteries sound pretty reasonable. I support their deployment to the game.

Walhalla.5473:

Don’t forget that mastering and killing a Raid Boss are two different Things but I agree. The next Bosses should be much harder and require more Effort to take them down. Like for the World first Teams, wiping for a few hundred Times before getting it done.

True. With “master[ing]”, I actually meant “killing (no matter how messy)”, so that was imprecise.

Dadnir.5038:

(enjoying wipe is masochism! yes it is!) <> (Sometime you must understand that the journey is what’s important, not what lie at the end of the road).

Love the contradiction within one sentence. What’s the point of a boss that just rolls over to hand out his loot? The best bosses have always been those which were complex and required the raid weeks to months before we mastered them.

And by the way, don’t bother with breather and underwater weapons. The only fractal where you use them is just level 7x, so you’ll comfortably reach the AR threshold when your normal gear is ready for the other T4 fractals.

Obtena.7952:

Really? Do you care to explain why? Let me start: Here is why I think it’s true:

Primarily, because raids were too easy with excessive boon durations and sharing.
Secondly, because the compositions were biased too much against unfavoured classes

So basically, if Anet is advertising an inclusive and challenging raiding environment, everything that got nerfed moves them in that direction.

Nothing has changed about “excessive boon durations and sharing”. There’s only one thing that actually changed: they added revs to the list of unfavoured classes, while diversity overall took a dive.

Obtena.7952:

Anet does understand how their changes affect how players ‘solve’ raids … that’s why they make those changes.

Now that’s something I seriously doubt when I think of the consequences the last round of balancing had.

Morty.4721:

I do plan to try sword+focus later, though.

Try it. At least in open world, most standard mobs melt from sword #2 and one AA chain. Due to the blind from #2, they don’t even have the chance to hit back. With radiance traits, F1 adds another blind and recharges with every mob you kill, allowing you to mow through mobs without any break in between.

Mobs with break bars are the only real weakness of such a build. Blinds don’t work and it lacks the hard CC abilities to break the bar efficiently.

Rednik.3809:

All they had to do is just not pushing raids at expense of everyone else.

Your insistence on that nonsensical claim is almost impressive. But it’s getting old, so you should try something else. Stuff like Earth is flat, for example …

Thanks for the reminder. I’ve seen this species far to rarely and don’t have my own one

maddoctor.2738:

Yes that’s another thing to consider we don’t want them to go the Chrono route but instead be like Druid.

I mean although Chrono is needed in Raids and is an excellent addition to any team, who takes a non-Chrono Mesmer in a Raid? Of course it’s not only Chrono but really most Elite specs are like that.

On the other hand, Druid was a good elite spec for Diversity, it provides a new unique role for Rangers, while the non-Druid Ranger is still viable as a condition damage dealer.

I think all classes except ranger and thief currently are pidgeonholed into their elites. But then, we only have one elite spec per class. We’ll hopefully see more diversity once the second elite becomes available, but that will require some careful consideration. If all offensive group support of a class is put into one elite, it will probably force everyone into that one. That cannot be the aim.

maddoctor.2738:

There is a choice between reducing the amount of unique buffs, or adding more similar unique buffs to other professions, both are acceptable solutions to me, and both can help with diversity. The first would require messing up with existing skills, the second can be added through their next elite specializations without upsetting the current skills. That’s why I prefer the second option, but the first option can be great too.

If we went that way, not all of the stuff should be put into the next elite specs. That would just mean that engi, guard, necro, thief and ele just get pidgeonholed into those specs. I’d really prefer to put those things somewhere into the vanilla trait lines.

A valid concern. No matter what you do, I think that it would be a herculean task to get class balance right, given its current, rather dire state. Giving each class a desirable (i.e. offensive), unique group buff in combination with a general increase of the buff limit might also help a lot. With regard to this stuff, I always like to think of Wildstar. They have six absolutely unique classes, each one brings a few unique group buffs, and apart from a few major fails they’ve done a pretty admirable job at keeping the balance. At least I’ve never seen some massive stacking there, even when the race for proper world firsts was still open.

Rising Dusk.2408:

CptAurellian.9537:

The nerf to Bloomy afterwards was unnecessary.

No, it was a very good change. Now the invulnerable phases have durations dictated by how fast you kill the adds, which is vastly superior to just sitting around for 2 minutes waiting for it to be over.

You’re right about his invuln phase. But then there were the nerfs to attack frequency and some other things, which I was talking about.

Ooops.8694:

Problem is, there are no roles in this game by design.

You’re missing the point. There may be no overly relevant roles in the very classic sense (tank with fat armor, healer who’s the only one keeping everyone alive, etc), but we still have all the different support roles, which are unique and limited to a few classes. Combined with the current target limit of the buff systems, that leads to all diversity problems.

maddoctor is on the right track when he wants to open all those roles. For that, we’d need to give all unique buffs to at least two classes. For example, give revs something that is equivalent to (and mutually exclusive with) warrior banners and suddenly you have the choice which class to take. Give eles something comparable to GotL/spotter on their heal skills and tempest healers are a thing. And so on.

Of course, some proper balance would be required to make such a system work. With the current balance, we’d just see which alternative has more DPS, e.g. mesmers would get screwed over if someone else had quickness and alacrity. I don’t know whether such a bold step would ever be feasible. Given ANet’s balance history, I doubt it. Maybe raising the buff cap to 10 targets would be the easier fix to PvE.

Someday? As long as class balance is as bad as it is now, that day won’t come.

Joxer.6024:

“When developers balance an entire game mode almost exclusively around the meta, this is the situation that results – where math, rather than flavor, fun and build diversity, rule the day.”

Now that’s something I wasn’t aware and shines a whole new light on things. Thanks for that and yea, sadly if that’s the case then it wont be changing any time soon.

It’s pretty obvious that the content of the quote is utter nonsense.

Apart from that, it’s what Tex already wrote: There will always be a meta that many pugs want to enforce for dumb reasons. We saw that in dungeons, we saw/see it in fractals, why should raids be any different.

Indeed, the system is broken. But it’s not the raids themselves, but rather classes and buff mechanisms. If a few unique classes offer massively powerful buffs no one else can provide (mesmer – quickness + alacrity; warrior – banners + EA; druid – gotl + spotter), while the buff limit is 5 characters, then the current situation shouldn’t surprise anyone. Class balance in GW2 is, by far, the worst of any MMO I’ve played (except WoW classic, but they learned pretty quickly after that period) and no changes to the content itself would be able to fix that.

Was even more fun when they first changed it. The nerf to Bloomy afterwards was unnecessary.

Interesting, but the old voice still was better

In PvE, both classes excel in group content (mesmer even more than guard), but in my experience, mesmer is a pain when you’re solo while guard still cuts quickly through everything. For sPvP and PvD, erm WvW, I can’t really offer any profound insights.

Jorvych.3064:

I mean, we’re experienced raiders and fractal folk. we know are classes, our builds, we know the mechanics and all that good jazz. but it has been a freakin’ chore if not a disgusting venture to try to complete our fractals.

If the second part is true, the first obviously isn’t. T4 fractals can still be easily completed with about 90% of pugs (even if they’re mediocre), so an organised party should have no issues.

zealex.9410:

Social is fine you can simply stop moving and dps at max aa range if you are using some meta food like seaweed salad just move back and forth facing the boss so you dont hit your allies or if you can stay ranged do that

‘sigh’ Now go and preach that to all those randumbs out there.

Social is just awful because most people seem to think they need to be bouncing balls on speed.

I tend to agree, an internal CD on afflicted would likely be a good idea. Currently, it has a pretty disproportionate impact, depending on which fractal you’re in.

Just that going for >100% doesn’t sound very probable. What was the conversion on gear? 15 points of concentration is 1% duration? Then those 1500 stat points would be a fair trade-off.

I think maddoctor aims at something else. Take leadership runes, for example: They provide 30% boon duration in a stat budget that should be roughly 225 in other stats. 225 concentration give just 15% boon duration, meaning that the runes are 100% over their real budget. Converting every bonus to concentration would fix all those budget problems and, in addition, probably help towards a solution of the boon meta problem.

I think you may be talking about two different things with regard to “raid community”.

Baseline? Maybe in certain environments. I know that none of my guard, mesmer, ele and my colleagues’ necro spam it. In the environment where it might actually matter, Ori already named the biggest offenders.

Rauderi.8706:

The only time where I really find this to be a problem is when a high damage normal enemy sudden spawns as a veteran+ (especially Elite/Champ) without any modification to their damage output. Mordrem Snipers/Stalkers are probably some of the worst offenders, and in large enough event groups, they spawn at level 83 and at veteran+.
The balancing point is supposed to be their relatively small HP pool, which doesn’t happen as their difficulty scales up.

Ah, mordrem snipers. Nothing better than a bunch of them spawning as elite/champion in a DS zerg and randomly oneshotting people. Mob scaling in HoT is hilariously bad.

I don’t raid (yet), but do you honestly expect anything to change? I still remember times when the dungeon lfg demanded x achievement points, although that was even more pointless than those LI things.

Heibi.4251:

There will always be exceptions to the norm. Some peeps are just that good. But the mechanics of some bosses don’t allow things like 3-manning. Try 3-manning Vale Guardian.

You fail.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Trio-Vale-Guardian-Snow-Crows-SC/first#post6356961

Blasting fire/water fields in unorganised groups? Don’ think that’s relevant. For such groups, hammer is a decent choice because of the permanent protection it pumps out and the strong CC abilities. Since they killed boon thieves, light fields aren’t an issue anymore.

For runes, I recommend the good, old, boring scholar. At least for instances, but everyone can yolo through open world anyway.

Finally, to healing and condi removal. Among the healing skills, the trap is extremely strong. 8600 healing + blind + daze + 10 sec regeneration on a 24 sec CD (if you take the trap trait in the DH line) isn’t matched easily by anything else. Shelter is an alternative, but then you’ll need to know very well when to use it. For conditions, you have F2 (removes 2) and you can take smite conditions as utility. That’s usually enough unless you’re standing in front of the wall in ascalon fractal with the afflicted instability.

Greatsword is kind of ok for open world, but in instanced content it usually lacks both damage and utility compared to the alternatives sword+x or hammer. A few fights like the asura in uncategorized or the kitty golems in chaos are the exception, where the pull from #5 comes handy. Unless you have a mesmer with focus, who does the job better. Longbow is just poor, scepter beats it in almost every relevant aspect.

With regard to the runes, I hardly see the point in pack ones. Looks like a half-baked attempts between getting some mobility for open world and doing something useful in instances. Decide what you want and then do it right.

Finally, for the traits, the valor line offers rather little for PvE. Any of the other three, especially radiance and honor, would be more effective. In my experience, sticking relatively close to the raid meta and then changing utility skills and weapons as needed is most beneficial.

Maybe Zhaitan isn’t dead at all. He just moved to the forums to create all of these undead threads.

Redfeather.6401:

Yes it is bad.

One time I was drinking milk, and looking up runes on the wiki. I came across Rune of the Golemancer and read, in detail, the wiki page. It made me choke up my milk and pass out.

I’m lying about that scenario. But yes, many kittenty runes/sigils still in the game.

Hey, golemancer runes are great! Three or four years ago, I used them for a while when I got my first CoE berserker set and they were a blast. I’ve never, ever seen a better troll than that lovely golem. All mobs grouped up nicely somewhere? BAM! Whirlwind knockback! That was hilarious.

Darcwolf.6817:

Let me guess, every person saying L2p or get better are probably all necros. Conditions are absolutely insane now. I can throw every condition removal I have out there, I still drop in a few seconds UNLESS you have a druid. I doubt many of you remember when the game launched it was supposed to be play as you want and no more tank/healer/dps. Seems ever since HoT anet has gone against every promise they made about this.

Sorry, I don’t even have a necro on my account. Your rant sounds as if you need to git gud. Tanks still don’t exist in fractals (because one crucial thing about being a tank is missing) and while a healer certainly makes a lot of stuff easier, you can do everything without one without encountering any big obstacles.

As to the old, dumb “play what you want”, it’s still there. You can do fractals on your full shaman spirit weapons guardian. Go for T1 and you’re fine, unless your group decides that they don’t want to carry dead weight. Just don’t expect every nonsense to work in the very few parts of the game that are actually supposed to be challenging.

IndigoSundown.5419:

Fwiw, I’ve seen bosses in other games’ raids who also did unavoidable raid-wide damage as part of the encounter mechanics.

Though that’s usually something totally different from what the OP describes.

Heibi.4251:

Yes, raids should have been designed that any compliment of toons could have done it if they played it right. I should be able to take my best character in instead of niche meta designed toon. More would raid if the raids weren’t so elite-istic. I’ve raided some and had a few successes, but they aren’t enjoyable enough to invest all my efforts into spending 1000s of gold to get exactly the armor, weapons and trinkets. I’m still disappointed in the design of the raids. They’re just too exclusive.

And then all the stuff like 1h Matthias kills, 3-manning encounters and I dont know what else (certainly a lot) has been done. Those raids can’t be overly demanding if such stuff is possible.

Pretty sure the change interval is 5 seconds or more on 88.

Zephyra.4709:

This. So much this. 100% agreed here in terms of SPLIT THE BALANCE BETWEEN GAME MODES for the love of all that is holy.

Indeed, that balance split is absolutely necessary (and has been for ages). I’m tired of WvW- or PvP-related stuff kittening up PvE balance, just as other people will feel the other way.

Xstein.2187:

I suppose there may also be the option to bring a dragon hunter with 100% boon duration instead of a second chrono, using feel my wrath to cut out the down time.

Why would you want to do that, though? Sacrificing a ton of damage from the DH for nothing but a tiny bit of quickness uptime does not sound glorious.

I can hardly imagine a damage buff for mesmers that lifts them to proper levels, but we’ll see.

BeaT.3541:

Anyway, ArenaNet at GW2 launch
“Our professions aren’t dedicated healers, DPS, or tanks because frankly, we built a combat system that just doesn’t allow it.”

ArenaNet after 4 years
We made new content that it’s too hard, so we need a healer, so we made the holy trinity.

As if the pre-HoT system wasn’t absolutely primitive. Addition of some healing (tanking still does not exist for most of PvE) was a good call.

BadSanta.6527:

yeha it has been buff but yet how often do you see gurdian wildeing mace at any mode ??

The main problem is probably the lack of working bunker builds in PvP. For (instanced) PvE and PvD … erm WvW, the general philosophy of the weapon hardly works as a supportive melee weapon.

Oh yeah, a better loot stick

No doubt many mechanics put melee players rather at a disadvantage, but imho the new instabilities are the smallest problem among them.

There’s still more than enough space to stay within boonsharing range when social and toxic are active. Likewise, 4 or 5 melees around a small hitbox target aren’t a big issue. It’s just highly annoying when there are some people in a group who think they are need to be a bouncing ball on speed.

Multiple threads are no argument. There will always be some whiners, probably even if you’d just have to look at the boss to make it die and hand out the loot.

Pregnantman.8259:

Torch is for groups that are already good. In such groups you dont have to worry about CC, survivability and all the other stuff that actually matters. This may be the case in T4.

At least in EU T4 pugs, it certainly isn’t. But I loved the last sentence of your post – great summary of the torch.

Takoyakii.2146:

“What have you done "

Make fractals a lot more fun to play :> .

Indeed. For the OP, I think three letters are sufficient: l2p.