Guild Wars 2

I recently tried using the burnbow rousing resilience one which isn’t that bad, my issue with it is it’s surprisingly heavily countered by power warrior. I’m excited to pick up my warrior again this patch, I just haven’t found a build that wows me yet in terms of practicality.

Someone wanna update a guy who took a month break? xD

I’ll be first to say I love Guild Wars 2, it has a lot of great things going for it, which is why I want it to get better. With the release of HoT I actually thought it would extend me and my friends interest in the game, but something didn’t feel right. I kept asking myself why I feel a little meh about the game right now, maybe I burned myself out temporarily, but here’s a few things I sort of see that took a slight step backwards from when I first started:

PVP diversity: Granted the old way of using traits made for some broken builds (looking at you turret engi), part of the fun for me pvp was seeing different or strange builds in both matches and dueling that worked. Warrior is a prime example for me, I remember back then I would see full signet warriors, gs warriors, tanky banner warriors, etc. mesmers there was phantasm, condition, power shatter, lockdown, guardians had AH and medi for two different roles. Really look around at the players now, everyones running the same thing or a slight variation of it.

WVW: Took a pretty big hit to the point where I had to leave IoJ to Maguuma because the server just flat out died due to bad matchmaking. New maps actually hurt the game mode as everyone is funneled into EB most of the time as the map just isn’t practical.

Stronghold: A brand new game mode for PVP, it has potential and I have fun with it, so why doesn’t Anet have faith in it? Not is there no competitive play in this game mode (no builds on metabattle) it was just a flat out forgotten game mode that could’ve gotten maybe a few new maps like conquest, something to highlight it or give it some love. We NEVER hear about stronghold.

Those are my thoughts so far at least, I want to see this game get better because it has a lot to offer, I just feel like there were some bumps in the road along the way. But who knows, similar to a video on Woodenpotatoes, maybe under a new head things might get better similar to Diablo.

Shadow.1345:

I seriously hate thieves and I mained one when I started playing. It’s still listed as my favorite class on the pvp panel but most of the thief players annoy the hell out of me. Pretty much everyone knows thieves and warriors are pretty much trash tier. Sure there are a few good thief players that can play the class well but overall the class is just outdone by Revenant. The difference between warrior players and thief players is that the warrior players know their class is trash. Thieves on the other hand act like you insulted their family honor for daring to ask them to change when you have more than one or if you say their class is trash they start going on about how you have no idea of what you are talking about and the class is so OP. Then they go on to die over and over again, meanwhile blaming the team for their deaths. Seriously, learn to play another class or stop being so kitten ed stubborn about the class being trash in most player’s hands. /endrant

I hate getting thieves and warriors on my team, thief may not be tier 1, but a really good thief can be a great asset. I had a thief help me go on a 8 win streak and got me my legendary wings which was awesome. That being said, here are the bad things about thief and they’re pretty apparent

-They can’t 1v1 very well, even against a warrior they surprisingly struggle, playing them as the +1er is almost a must

-For every good thief, there are 10 bad ones. A good thief knows the limitations of the class, but were over saturated with a bunch of yolo thieves who think they can carry teams when they’re outclassed instead of just playing their strengths.

This is why thieves annoy me, it’s not an easy class to play right, especially not right now, your chances of getting a good one are usually pretty slim.

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

congrats!

what profession / build you used btw ?

eh you’re a fellow warrior player right ?

i think i remember your warrior buff requests topics in the forum.

Thank you! I know I’m a little late to replying to this irl stuff lol

Out of all the working builds, I love chrono the best right now. My three mains tend to be warrior/mesmer/ele, chrono feels excellent this meta and is a lot of fun.

I like warrior for the cc and gunflame is pretty fun too. Warrior as a whole needs a lot of work though haha

I finished The Ascension a few days ago, kinda took my time this season due to work and art stuff but I made it, having been through season 1 and 2 I wanted to give my experience.

Season 2 may have it’s problems, I still don’t like warrior is not getting used, people still are having to take elite specs, etc. but as far as how it’s run, it’s a big improvement to me. The pip system was way more forgiving and easy to understand this time around, my biggest issue with season 1 is sometimes I would lose 2-3 pips in one game and have no idea why, same goes for winning two pips.

The issues I have right now are more about certain classes not being used at all, elite specs, lack of diversity in builds (remember how cool it was when someone would be running a weird build and it kinda worked in dueling rooms or even pvp sometimes?) I miss that, some players got pretty creative and it paid off. But as far as the pip system goes and how much you get punished for other players, it was a step in the right direction, I could actually solo que my way through most of it which is something I could not say for season 1. I was surprised that most of my ruby pips came from my in solo que. Getting to legendary a second time did not really motivate me much (primordial legend sounds way cooler than exalted legend lol) but it’s cool they don’t force you to get to legendary twice in order to get the back piece.

Azure.8670:

I do think warrior is one of the better 1vq classes honestly but that’s about it. 1v1 means nuttin

Some positives I can say about warrior right now, the rifle is awesome (mostly gunflame but the extra dodge is nice), the cc is good and you can actually do decent damage.

The issue is, well, everything else. Warrior, despite having high vitality, cannot take hits, play defensively and the “good” builds lack mobility. Like I said before, I can’t expect every class to be meta, but this is really, really bad to the point of being unplayable and this is two major patches in.

Warrior suffers the most when it comes to balancing between all game modes, as it is actually quite decent in PVE, but it’s at the cost of being pure garbage in pvp. Before there were instances where it was fine between both, but being shoehorned into taking entire traitlines straight up butchered the class’s potential.

YinsenDK.1840:

I couldnt agree more. My main charachter has been warrior since the launch of GW 1. And I have always liked the directness of the class. I have been playing a lot of pvp and i really feel a major disadvantage when choosing my warrior, and i have been trying af ton of different approaches. I have no idea what to do other than give up and start on my necro or engineer, they seem to be plowing through the pvp.

I encourage you all to do the same, this class does not work on a technical scale in any tier except against itself, submit a report. There’s no reason to take one anymore, no special snowflake builds, this class sucks and everyone knows it. I still get asked to switch sometimes, but the fact that people ask me to switch to a necro or ele shows how people are aware bringing a warrior holds the team back.

This has been talked about into oblivion, but I’m bringing it up again. I don’t expect all classes to be meta, but similar thief, guardian or mesmer, I expect them to be at least playable, this is not the case here. This is about the third meta in a row where warrior is not just bad, it’s a joke to be even taken into competitive. HoT came out in October, it’s march now and Zero berserkers in tournaments, zero berserker builds on metabattle, that’s the entire history.

I submitted warrior has a bug to support because the class is broken, it does not work. Warrior used to be a fast heavy hitter and you can kinda see that role had to be split with revenant. However, while revenant got good traits and skills to compensate for it’s weaknesses, warrior cannot sustain, lacks mobility, lacks team support. Berserker stance, the one that that gave us a jail free card from necro, was nerfed. Yeah the rifle buff was nice, but none of the core issues were addressed.

Make warrior playable, make it to where we at least see something in the “good” or “great” category on metabattle.

I love this game, I don’t expect every class to be meta, but I expect them to be at least usable. It’s been almost a year now, I think warrior now classifies as a bug/technical issue because it is not working as intended. I bought the expansion and that actually made the class worse originally.

Zero berserkers in torunaments, zero berserkers on metabattle in conquest, getting asked to switch in ranked because everyone knows the class sucks on a technical scale. Berserker came out in October, this is March, enough is enough. Thief got a decent fix and now we have to sit out another season because issues were not addressed.

My usual choice of a heavy class is warrior, and while I can at least get stuff done with him, I feel like learning revenant would end up more useful to my team. My issue is that I’m just meh with revenant.

I’m not terrible and know some of the combos, but I can never seem to finish people off and once I get bombed by condis via mesmer or necro, it’s tough. Is there a detailed video or perhaps a player here that could help me improve my skills on revenant? I feel like I would like the class, it just doesnt put in the work right now compared to my warrior.

I don’t care if I sound like a broken record lol, this is ridiculous. Mesmer and thief aren’t meta, but hey, at least they have “great” builds. HoT came out in October, it’s almost march and not a single kittening berserker has been played competitively or even has had a build on metabattle in pvp since it’s creation.

Even now with these cc builds and power builds, people aren’t even using burning, one of the main selling points. They’re choosing bleeding and confusion. The sustain was not addressed, for being the “noob friendly” class it sure can’t get anything done.

The damage is decent, but what does it matter when pretty much everything can out sustain you while doing a similar job and having superior mobility? There is no defending this,

Is there a good build that uses both of these together? Idk if it would be good, but I feel like it could work

Sorry but seriously the expansion came out in October, this February and not a SINGLE berserker build on any tier list

If there are no berserkers being played this is ridiculous lol

I don’t even care, rifle is great as a power and condi weapon. I’ve gotten called out for it like you have, from people playing things like druid, reaper, tempest, etc. like you’re telling me I’m cheap/cheesy when you’re playing that kitten? lol get real

While this patch they can at least do something, I’m disappointed. People have made suggestions into oblivion, even Tarcis went as far as to say stances should become F skills, pretty much all the core issues were ignored.

What they did with rifle was great, I want more of that. Damage can be decent, but it still comes down theres just better options. Revenant is warrior 2.0, it does almost everything you’d want warrior to do and more. All the warrior players are still having to take the SAME traits and stances leaving very little room for improvement. Stances have become such a staple they should be F skills as they’re required to have even remotely any survivability.

Warrior could’ve had once niche, using berserkers stance to counter reapers as being immune to condis for that long is a great skill, but no, they made it a boon and gave reapers even more boon corrupts so it’s barely usable.

DeceiverX.8361:

Ele will never be properly balanced so long as it’s built around the principle of being “decent” at everything.

Either you excel or you suck in PvP. It’s why longbow ranger used to be bad before they buffed it massively (designed/discussed in a video with the ranger designer as kind of a “sustained” ranged damage option with some utility). It’s why hambow and cele ele and bunker mes and scrapper dominate(d); they have the raw numbers to back up being “too good” at something, and that something is pretty much entirely sustain.

Ele’s dependence on boons and swapping attunements for meaningful benefits are keeping its build path options very limited and very imbalanced. Fire/Air are pretty terrible lines because what they bring to the table will never be as good as water/earth/arcane/tempest, and the majority of the damage gained and synergy in dealing damage comes from weapon skills and stacking boons, rather than stacking trait effects to allow deeper specialization with some “extra” kind of back-up utility found in other attunements.

Other classes (mostly) need to specialize heavily in traits and select their weapons very carefully, making sacrifices somewhere along the lines to get the synergy they need in performing what the build is intended to do, making them have definitive and innate weaknesses per build. The ele’s coverage of effects inhibits this kind of build creation and subsequently makes the class overly-difficult to balance.

The removal of the celestial amulet was a big step forward to reducing the elementalist out of the “master of all” issue it had, but a lack of synergy within their offensive options and boon-dependence within certain trait lines keeps them from being able to deviate from the sustain-oriented path.

I agree, the idea was to put ele in a more offensive role, but the fact that the meta ele (tempest) is still going back to support aurashare kinda shows how much the profession relies on certain stats to be good due to low vitality. I was kinda expecting some sort of variant of fresh air this patch but it’s still not getting used that much.

Still, I’d rather have ele have one good build than nothing at all.

Agemnon.4608:

You’ll still need lots of deliberate practice and experience to catch up to his skill level. Even then his build and your particular psychology might not mesh. Reaper may be in fashion but the playstyle as a whole doesn’t gel with my psychology preferring a faster, more flexible class.

You may think you wanna copy his build but discover you really don’t since it works for him but might not work for you.

I agree, usually I play something along the lines of a menders build, the reason I bring this up is although I am not on the same skill level, he mentioned in the stream it was more functional than “power shatter” so it kinda peaked my interest.

I actually don’t know how the build works, I’m guessing with pistol offhand it’s mistrust?

Artyport.2084:

I love the Mesmer.. In theory
But in practice I have always felt something was missing.
Phantasms are really boring and offer a inactive play style. I actually complained about this in beta.
There is nothing fun about summoning a creature that sits there a attracts every three seconds
I think they need a rework in making them feel more dynamic and useful

Does anyone like them?

My personal opinion is that they should no longer be tied to an enemy. They should be summons that change the reality of the battlefield

Example: phantasmal nightmare- summon nightmare in a targeted area foes attacking in this field are damage and gain 1s of bleeding for each attack

Phantasmal warden- summon an illusionary warden allies attacking in this field are healed for each attack

Phantasmal beserker- summon a berserker at targeted area that does damage every x seconds and burns foes

All of them can still be attacked to offer counterplay
It would also be neat if they weren’t just clones of yourself. But fun illusions

Ghostly image for nightmare
Butterfly for warden
Beast for berserker

What do you think? Are you currently having fun with phantasms?

I would really like to see “Phantasm builds” be a thing, not really in the sense of running away and letting your clones do the work, but actively using illusions as a way of offense/defense.

I’ve been seeing a lot of condi chronos lately, and after watching Helseth’s latest stream he was using something like with staff/s p, mer. amulet with rune of the nightmare.

Whats this build thats been going out? Kinda curious to try it and see if it’s good lol

UPDATE: Sorry I kinda vanished for a few days, I have been updated ankitten ow aware of the cleric amulet aura build which is actually decent, the healing is actually really good and makes for a decent support.

My issue is that this cleric/menders build is exactly what they were trying to AVOID, they said before they wanted to make ele more offensive rather than defensive like the past cele eles and tempests. When people are still crawling back to defensive support builds instead of something like fresh air marauder being viable, it shows that ele is still flawed in that it can’t be “offensive” without healing power, vitality and toughness.

I’ve actually been having a blast with the cleric support build, but it also goes against what the original plan was. Offensive ele is still a gimmick, but at least it makes for a decent healer and I’d rather have that than nothing. I think tempest now is actually even more tanky than before despite the low health pool.

At first I disagreed, but the more I think about it, pre june patch last year had more versatility.

Think of warrior for example, before the big trait line change last year, we saw hambow, shoutbow, signet warriors, banner tank warriors, gs warriors, even though they all used the healing signet, there was more variations I saw in pvp.

I can’t say this is true for all professions, ranger was sidelined for so long and am glad they’re getting played now, but ranger was also the only profession not in tier 1 for awhile. Now I feel like it can only home about 4 professions reliably for high tier play. Don’t even get me started on stacking revenants lol

I’ve criticized warrior before for becoming a gimmick profession, and while that is true, they are at least playable and can provide a lot of stuns. Not great, but no terrible.

Honestly, I can’t think of anything ele is good at right now, they have the vitality of a guardian, but remove the reliable damage, toughness and blocks and we are left with a profession that has very poor base stats with little options of survivability.

In dueling rooms they can be ok, but in an actual match the moment you get focused you will feel that lower vitality and toughness. I’m all for removing the celestial amulet and glad it’s gone, but that thing was their life support. They needed the base stats because they had to be ok at everything to compensate for low health and toughness and was not given anything new to transition to the fresh air side.

If they really want to steer away from ele being the jack of all trades, give them more health/toughness/healing power idk something to bump it up, what they have now is just not enough. Try to see how long you last with 1888 toughness against marauder Thief/DH/Scrapper/Herald

Alekt.5803:

Smokescale is not balanced either.

As annoying as druids are, I feel like the new pets doing decent damage is acceptable. The pets are one of the core mechanics of a ranger, before druid they were mostly for knock downs and stuff via wolf and let’s be honest, those pets were never reliable when it comes to killing which was another problem for ranger. It feels like a ranger should, a pet and player working together.

That being said, my issue with them is their versatility. The shoutbow build in particular benefits greatly from the removal of tanky amulets, longbow by itself hits very hard especially for having no ferocity. Bristleback does insane damage on the F skill. Comebine that with condi clears, good healing, access to stealth and you have probably one of the most adaptable professions in the current metagame.

Reapers are really good too, but they do have glaring flaws (kiting reaper shroud for example), druid feels like it can handle 1v1s and overall more situations.

“This meta is completely different from the last one!”

No, people are still taking the same druid, scrapper, herald, reaper, only two you took out was tempest and chrono. Minus the decrease in defensive play, it is literally the same but with less options.

But hey, at least people die. Scrapper I don’t ever recall being bad or given a break out of the meta whether it’s scrapper or engi, only for a few weeks during the warrior rampage stuff last year in june but they sure jumped on that fast.

While warrior is at least playable now, it is still outclassed, were still taking the same traitlines, the same stances, the healing skills are still terrible.

Nobody is going to take a berserker/warrior over a reaper for condi damage or thief/rev for power. If berserker gets 0 play again this season this is flat out kittening ridiculous. You made thief better, but want to keep warrior the same, terrific.

Deniara Devious.3948:

chronometria.3708:

Deniara Devious.3948:

,,,snip

Suggested nerfs:

Forceful greatsword trait does way too much for a master trait, in fact it is better than most GM traits in this game. Remove the +10 % damage buff.

Gunflame needs it damage toned down.

This puzzles me – surely crippling the two things warriors are doing well at is ….a bad idea….in a discussion about the complete absence of warriors in Spvp?

If you read my complete post, you noticed that I was suggested just these 2 nerfs to warrior and much more buffs. I am also for toning down other professions e.g. I think scrapper hammer needs toning down, some ranger pets should do less damage (druid damage output alone is fine) and necromancer should have a bit less chill application. The power creep has went too far in this game.

I think everybody agrees that warrior has access to a wicked burst and has solid DPS (can be specced for both direct damage, condition or hybrid). The biggest problem is the lack of sustain. Even if you take a very defensive amulet and all the possible defensive traits and skills you can cram into one build, your sustain is still going to be subpar, while your damage output has suffered immensely. Warriors should be the man, but they are too fragile.

I know that many players enjoy one shotting opponents from far. I am not asking to nerf rifle into gutter, just to tone down the damage of gun flame, which is just too high (-25 % to -30 % should be fine). Forceful greatsword trait is simply too good, giving might stacking, cooldown reduction and flat +10 % damage increase with gs + spear in one master trait is too much. The current state pushes warriors too much into using these two weapons, while combinations like mace/warhorn and axe/warhorn etc. are basically non existent (this should be a good hint, which needs buffing).

I think the original vision of the warrior was a mainly melee oriented fighter, which can stick to combat for a long time. Instead warriors are mainly just 1-trick ponies, kiting and trying to long range snipe with rifle or 100 blades opponents to death or CC chain with hammer or mace or shield, but mostly hit and run.

I agree, I’ve mentioned numerous times that there are better options, but warrior’s damage output has seen improvement, it’s at least playable. The issue is that they still can’t take a hit and the healing skills are still useless. People are using the same stances, same healing signet, the cds are too high and the healing is just not enough because after the cd is up on something like mending or to the limit, the cds between that and the stances do not sync well at all.

Berserker/warrior is garbage, it’s definitely better than last patch, it’s at least usable, but there is no reason to take a power warrior over a power druid/DH/thief, there is no reason to take a condi warrior over a necro.

Warrior/berserker will probably not get played again this season because there are better options. I’m saying this because I like warrior, it’s one of my favorite classes, but there are just better options competitively.

“This patch is so much different now, people are taking completely different stuff and now professions are still viable!”

People are still taking the same herald, scrapper, druid and necro they did last patch. Warrior/berserker is STILL GARBAGE because all the suggestions were completely ignored.

Chrono and tempest were pretty OP and needed to be balanced, but so did these other specs. Why is it that these professions still get to keep the same role they did last patch? It would be cool if maybe chronos or tempest got a new role, but they didn’t. They fixed thief rather well, it feels like a thief now, warrior completely got the shaft. If you’re still going to let scrappers run around with the same tankiness, druids run around with the same healing and damage, DH with the same damage and control, and necro having solid damage overall, then fix it. I have three mains, it was mesmer and warrior but picked up ele awhile back to adapt to the meta. Seeing the same scrappers and necros is just as boring, but hey, at least people die.

I have this crazy idea, perhaps they could listen to the hundreds of great suggestions made before (Tarcis even brought up making stances to F skills) that was were completely ignored.

If warrior/berserker is sitting out another season I swear to god lol

Silv.9207:

Yesterday I was killed “easy” by a warrior. He simply bursted me down with the Rifle. 9k of F1 while in Berserker, every 4 seconds.
Counting all the other skills and the GS if needed a melee damage, his damage was really insane.
I don’t know the warrior build but I was with my Necro in Mercenary (560 toughness) and he simply hitted me for 9k (500-700 damage more or less, frequently more) all the time.

The warrior is really hard to play why actually is a berserker machine that can burst down a enemy but have to be quickly.

Actually, in this new meta, is Ok and can work really good with different builds.

warrior can be decent in duels, but when it comes to the best option for a role, it is outclassed. Will a competitive team really bring a condi warrior over reaper? Will it bring a zerker rifle warrior over a thief or paladin druid? Not really.

While I can say it is an improvement over the last patch (it’s at least usable now), it’s still going to live in the revenant’s shadow as that go to heavy damage dealer.

warrior has been a gimmick class and is about to sit out another season for the same revs, scrappers and druids. I’m tired of this, warrior has sucked for a year now, why can’t a warrior take a hit?

Nobody’s going to use Condi war over reaper, nobody is going to use gunflame over thief. This profession could be sent as a bug report because its broken, it doesn’t work. You fixed thief, do the same for this heaping pile of garbage of a class.

Silverkey.2078:

It’s been a week now since the patch. So what do you feel is our best build right now, and how viable is it in the current meta?

---

I have been trying a few things myself, among others:

• chrono shatter (dom-duel-chrono)
• core shatter (dom-duel-X)
• mistrust (duel-ill-chrono)
• crusader interrupt (dom-chaos-chrono)
• chronobunker (chaos-insp-chrono)

and I feel like chronobunker is still our best. Chrono and core shatter feel like subpar version of thieves. Mistrust build could do very good damage, but were too glassy and simply outclassed by condi reaper. Crusader interrupt dies too easily to reaper to be the “bruiser” I intended. Only chronobunker seems to hold its grounds.

Note that my analysis is very likely biased because of the very bad unranked team compositions. I often played alongside 4 DPS/roamers, usually at least 1 or 2 thieves, so playing a node-holder and team fight support spec was the best way to “rebalance” the comp. At the end, even in a more thief-rich and DPS-centric meta, the team that can win team fights has an edge.

I’ve found a few builds I like, I’m going to get a lot of hate for this probably but double ranged shatter (power mesmer) has almost always been outclassed which is why I never liked it to begin with.

When they weren’t relying on +1ing, they were thief bait. People can say “condition and bunker builds are so cheap blah blah blah” but when power shatter always loses to both of them I don’t care about what takes “uber skillz” I care about what gets the best results. How many zerker mesmers I’ve seen lose a point because they can’t hold against condi or tankier mesmers.

Leave the +1ing zerker stabbing to thieves, mesmers have unique qualities and inflicting confusion and doing interrupts sound way more mesmer-like than swinging a greatsword, bursting and then leaving.

Warlord.9074:

Warriors are worst off now than before.

The buffs warriors received did relatively nothing to help them sustain in a burst meta or any meta.

Hard counters such as thief and necros revived buffs to further give them advantage to warriors. Druids are unkillable, and so are Revs and DH. At skilled level.

ANET is so far behind the times that they think giving warriors a little more passive healing would help when other professions were a joke last time warriors had decent healing and shouts the gave them even more healing than we have now.

I made a similar thread, while warriors have decent condi damage and good power, most of the problems with the class were NOT addressed. I was all excited and then I realized, I’m still taking the same stances, same traitlines because warrior just cannot take a hit.

Going full gunflame is awesome, it hits hard just keep your distance, however that is also another issue. Why is it a necro is able to fight on point close quarters with somebody, and yet a warrior, a profession that is for, we… WAR, is the one in the background sniping and is super squishy?

Warrior is definitely better than previous patch, but it still feels half baked. Warriors could’ve been a decent counter to necro since zerker stance gives them a lot of free time, but they turned that into a boon so that was thrown at the window lol

The issue remains that if you want to survive for a normal period of time, prepare to take the usual stances, traitlines, etc. Warrior shouldn’t be a gimmick class, the condis are actually pretty good, but necro also does condis and beats warrior and most other classes 1v1. Rifle is good, fun weapon.

I actually think one of the biggest mistakes was making berserkers stance a boon this patch. Burnzerker actually did good against reaper as the stance provided a good counter to most of their damage for a limited amount of time (not like diamond skin). Now that it can be corrupt, it is not nearly as useful and that’s a shame because with the newly added condi damage and power, warrior could’ve been that still good counter to keep necro in check.

I put this in quotations because there is some good, the conditions are actually quite improved this time and I applaud Anet for that, mace is awesome, rifle is awesome, burning is awesome.

However, a lot of issues were ignored. At the end of the day, I’m still taking mostly stances and the same traitlines because the recovery of warrior is ok at best. A few people told me that necro was designed to be the best 1v1er, but I can’t help but feel that warriors should have that title, they’re warriors…. lol

There are good things and improvements about warrior this time around, it’s playable at least. I do feel that it’s going to become predictable again though as people begin to understand the meta more and more.

I heard theres a good build using dhuumfire and chill or whatever but haven’t really found any definitive builds yet for pvp, which one seems to work the best so far?

Ok so I don’t know if this would be overpowered or not, but regarding alacrity since it seems to be a popular subject, but what if it was split like this:

Wells grant alacrity to allies when they end: You set down a well, it does 66% to yourself, but 33% for allies. Something like this might be interesting

I also want to add I feel like alacrity does need to be looked into, it’s the main mechanic of chronomancer and I feel it’s underwhelming, if not forgettable. Maybe to balance it out, when wells apply alacrity, it does 66% to yourself, but 33% to outgoing allies?

Gaile Gray.6029:

Every week I prepare a forum report for management. For while many of us read the forums every day, a once-a-week report is helpful to the various teams as a sort of overview of what’s happened recently and as they consider what might be a focus in the future.

I’d like to ask for some help with this week’s report, because the January 26th build was huge, and it had a lot of components that touched on nearly every part of the game. Because it did, feedback could appear in any of our sub-forums instead of in an overview thread.

So could you share (or re-share) your top reactions to the build in this thread? If you’re posted elsewhere and simply want to repost in this thread, that’s fine. But if you’ve posted a long set of comments and could give the Cliff Notes here — maybe a one-liner for each of your top several thoughts? — that would be marvelous!

I’m asking for your appraisal of the quarterly build: likes, dislikes, etc. I’d like to not veer off into debates about what wasn’t included, or suggestions about what should be coming, but a snapshot, or “This was the dinner, what’s your restaurant review of the meal?”

Thanks so much to those of you who choose to post!

I feel like the patch is ALMOST there, and I mean that in a good way. My berserker feels like a berserker with the mace/sh and sw/t and can hit quite hard, not the best at 1v1s but at least does damage. My chrono is actually decent too, not too OP, but not bad, I would like to see a little bit more versatility in mesmer builds as the scepter trait is ina spot where you have to give up crucial condi traits, these grandmasters are fighting each other like mistrust, DE, malicious sorcery and the blind confusion one.

Necro is very strong, druid is still good, not sure about guardian, I feel like ele needs acces to more healing power to sustain with it’s lackluster healthpool, as I really want to play fresh air effectively. Thief is awesome, can’t say much about rev but I hear it’s inbetween.

Warrior has definately improved in the damage department so I applaud the staff for making condi so much fun! My issue unfortunately lies in the traitlines and the healing skills, I still feel shoehorned into def (but do take strength and berserker now with decent results so its better), the healing skills are what really hurts warrior for me.

There’s been so many times where I’ve taken mending, to the limit, etc. and it was just easily interrupted, to the limit has great healing in itself though. Healing signet is meh, it’s decent, mending is ok but the cast time kinda hurts it too, always get interrupted. Blood reckoning is pretty awful, it sounds good on paper but the initial heal is too low, I’m usually healing because I’m about to die, 3k and less doesn’t cut it and can’t land a hit if I’m weak. I find warrior is at it’s worst when the healing skill is down, they’re very open. They are also struggling against necros, but I think most classes are. Still taking endure pain and berserker stance, which was a good counter to necro but now that its a boon its negated by boon corrupt.

To sum it all up for me :
-Druid, necro and thief are very strong
-Warrior and ele need some help on healing and variety, shoehorned traits and utilities
-mesmer needs more variety in builds

I just came back and am slowly learning all the new changes, been playing a warrior and I feel the ones that give me the most trouble are necros and druids. I can do damage to them, but once reaper shroud is up it can turn the fight pretty fast.

What would you say is the best way to combat a necro on mesmer/warrior?

The V.8759:

Yamato.8932:

The V.8759:

Thanks for the feedback all! Quoting multiple posts annoying and takes long, so I’ll just do it like this:

• @Yamato.8932: I honestly didn’t think about PvE. I think those stats could indeed )

Coming back for another question: weapon-wise, do you think there are any alternatives out there?

I certainly have nothing against the functionality of GS. I agree that it’s probably the best choice for the build. I just find the playstyle really boring! Would hammer perhaps be a suitable alternative, or even mace/axe MH?

Or should I just go to bed?
I should probably go to bed.

I don’t think using axe in both sets in main hand is useful. However I see 2 viable options:

1. Axe / Axe or Warhorn + Mace / Shield (Here your mace shield will be defensive + lotta CC)
2. Sword/axe + Axe/shield

I think the seconds option is best. Offhand axe is in a descent spot now after the update and you can use the fury in the build alot that it offers. You still do not lose mobility because of sword 2 and have a burst skill on sword 3.

I do not think that hammer is viable, however you gotta test that to be sure. Hammer is a slow weapon which doesn’t really work with this build. Next to that it’s berserker burst skill is increadibly weak.
However I don’t like playing hammer so this is all theory. I suggest you just try it

How well would this build do in 1v1s you would say? (trying to contest or dueling rooms)

I know I’m being salty so I apologize ahead of time, but what am I supposed to do with these “buffs”?

-Power shatter is basically dead, didn’t play one much anyway though. For boon removal I’d go to necro who can not noly remove boons, but can corrupt them.

-So maybe go condition? Again, necro has you covered, mistrust and scepter buff sound ok, but then you realize you have to give up crucial things like DE and ineptitude to get them.

-Don’t need to talk about bunkering, it was overpowered, everyone knew it, my issue is that mesmers now have an identity crisis.

Xiahou Mao.9701:

Ithilwen.1529:

Yes, we know we sold the Chronomancer based on Alacrity. We changed our minds after we got your money though and we’re now giving alacrity to Engie and thief.

C’mon, you’re not even trying anymore. At least add in that Alacrity will affect Thief’s initiative regeneration. Put some effort into your whining!

No wonder you’re getting nerfed.

I’m a mesmer main (and warrior) and while I am admittedly sad about the mesmer nerfs because I don’t want them to be useless/thief bait, a change was definitely needed. It might work out who knows, remember when axebow got nerfed hard, then shoutbow dominated the metagame? Or last year when ele got “nerfed” but became one of the strongest builds in the history of the game?

I hate thieves, but they do deserve to be played just as much as other professions, same goes for warrior.

Xiahou Mao.9701:

The stream today is likely going to be focused on the rest of the patch. Going over the Shatterer revamp, gliding in Core Tyria, the Brew of the Month Club, and that sort of thing.

That makes sense, I appreciate it!

Pretty straightforward question, will they be doing another stream similar to last Friday on more changes to classes? Or are they just gonna wait for Tuesday?

It’s not written in stone yet, the devs said they’re open to change and everything is reversible/open for debate. Mesmer can still be good

TheOneWhoSighs.7513:

You do realize that pretty much every non-mesmer player in this game, would literally delete condi mesmer given the chance. Right?

They already deleted PU, after a long time of it being basically the only thing we were good at in WvW.
Now they’re trashing WoP, which was basically a “HOLY CRAP, SAVE THE COMMANDER TAG” button.

A button that was a double edged sword, might I add. Considering it potentially covered water fields.

We aren’t going to get anything to play as Mesmer from ANet.
ChronoShatter will be hard countered thief.
CondiShatter will be outclassed by Necro.
ChronoBunker is literally in the kittening ground. Losing the amulets & alacrity they needed.

PvE wise, mesmer is yet again just a timewarp slave. As alacrity’s effect reduction is absolutely disgusting in PvE, we’ll likely be outclassed by another class for DPS in longer fights.
PvE wise, we need more sustainable DPS, but we’ve asked for that for how kittening long? We’re never getting it.

WvW is lining up to be frontline dominated with some of the guardian changes. And a gank mesmer with gravity well might be worth it, considering the res changes.
But that’s basically all we’ll be. Shatter with a GW. Miss either of those and you’ve lost most of your effectiveness.

Like I said, since all the buffs/changes have not been announced yet, there is still room for them to provide mesmer for some counter play to thief and necro while still maintaining this. We have to be vocal about it, instead of thief bait or mesmer bait, let’s balance both

With the recent announcements on nerfing chrono and buffing thief, we sort of have a bad taste in our mouth from the thief bait days of most metas until midway last year. Thieves needed a buff, and they did say that everything they’ve talked about is completely reversible/open for debate so let’s talk about it.

Mesmer needs to be pushed into it’s own unique role to combat thieves and necros. Power shatter has always been a gimmick (except PU shatter) as popular as it is, being outclassed by thief. Looking at the new amulets, a chrono with more access to condis, inflicting confusion, slow, etc. to manipulate a fight sounds more mesmer-like than stabbing with a gs and leaving, we don’t want thief gameplay here, it will get outclassed.

Nerf to energy sigils means less clones via DE and avoiding bursts, well of precog means more standing in place (aegis feels more guardian esque and gets corrupted by necro), We need an identity in this upcoming meta. For all the things taken away, I want to be able to inflict some extremely nasty condi damage and excel at it, manipulate the field, boonshare, something that will stay relevant. If we had another amulet like vigilant or more traits/stuff to compensate the bunker nerf, boonshare could be a great way to keep support mesmer alive without it being broken. What do you think?

messiah.1908:

so with the new scepter speed buff 20% and the new runes (power,condi, vit, tough)
along side choas armor nerf (weakness instead of blind)
and less other sustain/bunker runes
would you reconsider a comeback to condishatter builds?

illu/chaos/chrono – ci condirupt
illu/dom/chrono – pb condirupt
illu/due/chrono – de/mis condishatter

I hope that with the next announced changes mesmers will get some buffs to compensate for what was already announced, maybe more access to condis and confusion