Guild Wars 2

TwoBit.5903:

There’s moving, but it’s not calculated. Dodging so awkward in that it’s not truly dodging but an invincibility toggle + movement; it feels contrived and often overpowered. Skills are balanced via cooldowns, not animations windups, or timing. Players can move while attack in any direction. Seems like a good thing until you realize that it makes both movement and attack rather spammy. I could go on.

so if you dodged you would want to still be hit? if you dodge, you dodge you can also ’’fake’’ people into dodging with some wind up skills, and what games balance has been based around animation wind ups?

so you would prefer to be rooted and use combat skills in some circumstances? i wouldn’t….that then would be incredible inactive, and you can attack while turned away from someone in most cases, strafing needs to be strafed if you go too 90* you can’t cast (auto atleast) also if you are turned away from someone and press #1 (thief auto dagger based on) then you wont hit anything and you miss everything, if your angled wrong you wont cleave everything and so on…

what is so inactive about that?

i am levelling my second mesmer now, why? because i want to be able to see my sexy gear, Asura’s way too small and have 0 advantage against good players in any pvp setting, just like every other game haha.

and yes multiple builds i don’t think cover it, we literally have around 25-35 floating around some with minor changes that make a few big differences.

for an MMO i think the combat is extreamly active and action packed, dodging abilities is very rewarding thats active enough for me we can move while casting anything and we can fly about the screen and combo with fields……its very active to me for an MMO.

going afk on a boss is simply because the bosses don’t scale properly and don’t have enough 1 shot raid wipe abilities, go to grenth if you go afk there you will die, or balthazaar.

The ranger is not horrible the main gripes are the pet AI (which tbh i don’t mind as i micro manage it well and have it on passive, imho) and they cant contribute the way mesmers and other classes an in WvWvW as they dont have a defining trait / skill / ultility however that said they can area control very well if built for it and entanglement can lock a whole zerg at a gate while you tip oil over them, i dont see enough people using this tact, a mes comes along for the ride to portal you back up the top of the gate too so you don’t die…bleh.

Rangers are not as good as other classes but they are not horrible by a long shot, in Spvp (the mists) they are downright awesome point holders when played as a bunker.

rangers can have burst but you need to work a lot more for it than a thief, mesmer etc.

my recommendation would be a mesmer, but i am a mesmer and i am biased.

wow, a nice answer with an explanation, thanks a bunch, love these forums sometimes, on others all you get is ‘’rar rar your a rar’’

anywho i agree the weapon swap and skills being tied to them is innovative, the way its done hasn’t been implemented in any mmo i have played before and i rather enjoy it, encourages more diversity and choices, hopefully if they do housing it will be done well.

on a side note how did Aions housing turn out if any of you guys/gals played it? the advertisement looked promising with the way the introduced it, i didn’t play it for any longer than a month or so, though, i ask as Anet i’m sure will have access to those systems and codes.

how has weapon swapping got anything to do with GW2 housing?

on topic:

i hope they never add it, personally i think it will end up making people/guilds hiding out in these places and never in the open world, as soon as housing is out (if there planning on it) then the’ll be calls for smiths, trainers of various type, repair shop, TP merchant….before you know it you’ll have an entire town to yourself.

we’ll see but i am against it, of course they might do it decently.

all they need to do is make the clone appear at the target instead of leap, a band-aid quick fix that would work, phantasms never fail to appear, after all (well mine dont :P ) or just have it run along the ground….like the off hand swordsman one.

Welcome!

what i would add to what other people have said is this;

This game is not like other MMOs you may have played the biggest difference that springs to mind is that if you pick a thief you will be playing a thief, based on dodging and reaction times and preparing for fights before they have stated you will be playing this from level 1, likewise with a mesmer you will be learning to play with clones from level 1, warrior/guard you smash things, ele you switch attunements etc.

basically your ele/mes/thief won’t be able to auto-attack stuff and win you will have to utilize abilities and most other mmos i have played have only really gotten the class feel from half way through the levelling process not before, i.e. rogue/mage can just stand face to face and smash buttons, this wont work in GW2.

as for levelling do NOT rush enjoy the ride, you can do fractals (increasing difficulty dungeon everytime your successful in one) from level 1, explore maps and crafting and gathering net a lot of experience so be sure to gather EVERYTHING you can, right click and press ‘’deposit collectable’’ to put them into a storage facility in the bank linked to your whole account.

i have no idea what classes you like to play but guardians and warriors while very popular are extremely boring to me personally, if you want to solo PvE then a ranger with its pet is a solid choice, for groups they are not really sought after though as they don’t bring anything unique to the table.

Lindbur.2537:

Fast and decently high damage = thief

Tradeoff: Horrible at anything more than a 1v1

ha, sorry completely false information if you know what your doing and chain things together you can take on big groups, not as big PvE groups as other classes but still big.

as for PvP or WvWvW then yes you can take on multiple players if you chain and are patient.

personally i would say thief for you or Ele, ele’s are fun but seem rather dull to me after a time and while the thief doesn’t have an abundance of specialist builds a lot depends on the players ability to dodge and react in time.

Good Rangers are fine in groups depending on the players pet management, sure they don’t bring too much group stuff to the table but they can still be pretty darn strong.

generally though i would say mesmer for you;

-Preferably ranged? – Check, some melee if you want to but dont have too, can even use the melee attack to reflect damage with a trait.
-High learning curve – Massive learning curve, very easy to play very difficult to get everything right on and lots of clone micro management and weapon switching.
-Low density – not really low density (as in how many play them?) but good and great ones are very sparce.
-Decent survivability – tons of it, or none of it depends how you spec and how you manage and use your clones, a lot is down to the learning curve.
-Wanted in groups – hell yes, every group, every aspect of the game.

otherwise i would say a thief, now thiefs are squishy but you can build them for a tank/venomshare and chain some nice stuff and bring a ton of group damage, and stealth, however the reason a lot of people frown on thieves in my experience is because they are thinking ’’he’ll always die its another glass canon’’ so you have to set them straight sometimes.

the game is designed so when you select your class your playing the respective class who can then specialize in certain things.

when you level in WoW or any other MMO i have played you start off playing a bare shell of a class that is as boring as dog poo until you ’’unlock’’ abilities.

atleast with these classes you have the core weapon skills from the outset.

its the way the game is designed, you selct a thief you play a thief not something named a thief with ONE melee attack that acts as a tank until the un-nerfed continent.

i.e. a mesmer uses clones so from the outset your going to have to kitten well learn to use them not kill things with a simple purple bolt until lvl 30 while facetanking them.

[mesmer here]

I actually didn’t find it too hard to do, when there all attacking and you have to take the middle (fort or w/e) back with the blue circle just hop on a siege machine on the wall and pound them into dust.

also enduring that part have feedback traited and time warp and you can res everyone in seconds then hop back onto a siege alternatley you can kite them up the ramps, jump off the edge onto the smaller ledge wait till they run to you hop back up on the ramp (can get half way up if you jump from the ledge(s) ) then rince and repeat.

Zhaitans minions in the personal story i believe do have a bigger Health pool though, thats what it felt like to me :P

It is currently working as intended for you i would say wait until the start of the next match if it still isn’t applied then perhaps email support@arenanet.com or w/e it is.

iNaddict.8021:

renss.5764:

sword/dagger has mobility, sustained damage and control where d/p has high burst damage and a bit more stealth.

d/p has burst? what? you mean chain heartseeker?

i think he’s referring to Backstab more than heartseeker chaining as you can chain stealth with black powders combo field, and gain a ton of control as it’s also a blind, its a patient playstyle, not a ‘’mwaaaaahhhaaa dead’’ playstyle. unless i have got mixed up ofcourse.

however once at and below 25% then of course, heartseeker will dish out some damage.

I imagine he means ’’new’’ as new to youtube and new to making thief video’s not a ’’new’’ thief completely otherwise he wouldn’t have bolt, ill give you feedback after lunch, as i’m at work atm

i honestly use more skill combinations in this game than any i have played before (MMO WISE) yes you get 2 weapon sets (bar elementalist & engineer) HOWEVER every class, especially ele and engineer have SO many ways of using there own combo fields it is unreal opening up a brand new set of combinations for different situations.

engineers can have around 29 (+ ? ) ’’skills’’ with kits at any one point, then thinkg of all the combo’s.

WoW had TONS of skills of which 50% were never used and/or just silly and useless ones.

GW2 has fewer skills however all have functions and combinations with everything else, skills are useful and well designed in this game, thats my opinion and i see a MUCH bigger variety of weapons / skill sets and builds than other mmos i have played.

Waste of $10 curently, make it account bound and i think that would be fine, still it is a bit steep for a mining pick.

if it was nerfed? wouldn’t care much, i love it but wouldnt make a difference to me, however if our on dodge gets nerfed then everyones should, so this particular road i think would hurt everyone.

Henrik.7560:

You twonks who think mesmers are an OP easy to play class, you are sadly mistaken. Mesmer is by FAR the hardest class to play..

Play, no pretty easy, to master? sure its difficult.

the mesmers shatters currently are over the top on burst, i play a variation of Osicat’s build and i have to say you can pretty much do exactly what thieves do by exploding your clones, its not difficult to do, to survive sure the games completely different then and you really do have to learn to use clones wisely, even for shatters your right you have to pick or set-up that perfect moment, but i can have a confusion + mind wrack more or less instantly after each other, thats not skill thats ‘’your under my nose cos i want you to be BAMTAGOO, take that’’ and there almost or are dead.

granted its not heartseeker so you cant spam it, however any thief that spams heartseeker has no clue, especially when your above 25% hp, no point and a waste of the thiefs potential.

honestly thieves are not bad at all, i don’t get all the crying good ones who play stealth will be a pain in the but, hell when i play my mesmer Clonestealth build i’m sure that annoys the hell out of people, however learn to counter stealth it is not difficult, dodge, phase, slam, jump(i mean leap:P) anything to get out of the situation.

its the same with mesmers great (good) mesmers will disguise themselves in cones a lot better than the not so good ones but, the fact still remains, were easy to spot and thieves are easy to counter, unless there very good.

i thought GW1’s system was a mess to be honest, each to there own.

i am not on your server but i could guest every now and then and would be more than happy to chat and introduce you to my motley crew.

whereabouts in america by the way? i play later in the evening so probably your afternoon or early/mid evening.

Grenth – organised world boss, people ignore this guy because he takes co-ordination and is a lot more difficult than the others, the Irony is people are starting to complain he’s too difficult – al world bosses should be like him in my opinion except the low level focused zones.

Anet have said they are looking and changing the scaling of boss events as they have admitted they are farmed far too easily with no co-ordination.

—

no Endgame is not traditional like WoW so if you need that carrot on a stick from raiding and the next upgrade then i think you will be VERY dispointed, if your like me and you like creating new looks and getting as far as you can you will love it.

Fractals: unless i have missed it nobody has mentioned this, this form of dungeon get increasingly difficult every time you successfully run it and at some point you will need to get Ascended gear from laurels too, so your ‘’grindy endgame’’ can be this its basically a 5 man raid that everytime you beat you get given more difficult content, these scale to infinity.

this game is not for everyone, the lack of ‘’go here, this is the next big bad boss and here is the new gear’’ turns people off.

personally it turns my digital love on.

now i main a mesmer and have enjoyed every second of it however around level 40 when i got the on dodge trait i became unstoppable, the endless shatter fodder was mind blowingly fun.,

Funnily Enough i had a similar dilemma except instead of ‘’Robin Hood’’ Esque i thought about the green arrow and while i do archery in real life i had a hard time deciding however the rangers pet….arh it just did not feel right both hood and arrow who are basically the same arch-type of character did not fir the ranger by any stretch.

Th thief feels a much better fit, you can play hide and seek ’’strike’’ when the time is right like an archer would and not before and both these characters where extreamly good and slippery in close combat (in movie portrayals / series / comics ) and the thief fits that exactly.

i would go thief, i did go thief, i love thief i DO NOT regret the thief, very rewarding class it feels like to me, a lot of dodging to do though.

10k damage, never seen it or witnessed it.

personally i think thieves are fine, if you catch a thief you can nearly kill them there and then depending on how good the player is two things will happen

1) they will flee
2) they will turn the tables.

now thieves can be countered, just get used to predicting the stealth.

thieves are fine, that video linked, hell i could link you a mesmer one creating much more havoc than that and you can easily find them through clones.

Yishi’s video….not many people will play THAT good, i guarantee it.

on the subject of dailies i have never said to myself ‘’right lets do the daily’’ it just gets done through playing in general i cannot understand why people set out to complete this thing specially, that is just me though.

although i will say i have never really liked or enjoyed raiding so i dont miss or even look for this type of gameplay, WvW is more my thing than anything however i do enjoy the PvE in this game i just wish it was a little more difficult.

after you reach level cap in most other MMOs all you have is battlegrounds or running the same bosses over and over,

wait i see a similarity here! difference is fractals keep getting harder.

the game has ’’engdgame’’ but unlike most theres not a big kitten arrow saying ‘’grind here, run this, do this, make me a coffee, go back to step1 and repeat’’

yes otherwise i would not be playing

its got the most potential for an MMO i have seen in a long time, and i believe it to be going strong and in the right direction, the dev team needs to increase in size though.

it is RNG, so one day it might be a 90% drop rate for you, the next it might be 0.01%, honestly no-one really knows if you want the skins though just continue running them, unfortunately thats the only thing to do.

hmm, i wouldn’t base a choice on not playing something around ‘’its not noob friendly’’ in my experience getting on and playing what you REALLY want no matter how big the task it may seem is to just jump on the horse and get it going.

It’s kind of like saying ‘’i want to practice archery, but as im new ill start with darts’’

1) disregard anything and everything learnt from WoW about what classes do what.

but as a lot have said from your text it seems the guardian might be the best fit, however what is your desired type of gameplay? i am curious as guardian might not fill it, i.e. would you of picked your rogue over your other characters any day? and why?

i cant say i have experienced this but i have not logged in since the maintenance patch i don’t think (downloade done last night?)

the only thing i know about S#1 was covered in the latest podcast, if you stand under a siege weapon while attacking a gate you’ll blow it up, basically.

Mentalblock

seeing as he messes with peoples heads, seemed appropriate.

you want mobility and to be a team asset, well ALL classes can be team players so this to me is irrelevant, the biggest team player(s) i would say with the most team utility would be a guardian, mesmer or ele.

however saying that i would suggest if you want mobility to be a mesmer, ele or thief, all have great team skills now the upside to one specifically the mesmer is they have a ton of viable builds for PvE and PvP/WvW so no one spec ‘’rules all’’ all have pro’s and cons and is easily the most versatile class in the game in respect of trait options.

all three of these classes are not easy, the thief is extremely easy to spam buttons with but difficult to really get the full flow going while ele / mesmer are also the same in some respects.

an ele will do well even if you don’t switch or combo attunements right however there are multiple ways to do this ’’chaining’’ of fields so its not repetitive in my eyes, also have a variety of builds though much more clear cut than say the mesmer.

the mesmer: great all round utility for any given situation, however if you really delve into mechanics and options you will be mind boggled, there quite complicated but can also be very simple, depending on what your using or building it for.

the thief: the most mobile class i have ever played (bar d/d pure speed of the ele but i don’t count that as its a little over the top) you have stealth, rolls, blinks, daze’s etc and if you want you can be the best at picking of stragglers and creating mayhem in the back of the group also, if you go into the Venom Share side of things well….you’ll aid the team to no ends.

basically every class in the game has ups and downs as you know, but my opinion for non-repetitive play would be the mesmer, the build options are pretty endless and new ones surface every other week (tweaks or variations of existing sometimes) you’ll have portals, feedbacks, confusing spreading, great single aswell as multi target…

if you cant decied i would say for mesmers watch some of Flimps, Pyroatheist, Kylia’s, Osicat’s, build videos there very good, there all in the sticky and Osicat explains things extremely well for his ’’shattercat’’ build

for thieves there is a great video with very good commentary on the front page under Yishi, Outnumbered. they might help you decied. i am affraid though i have not watched any ele video’s but ele’s are fun.

guardians are boring, don’t roll a guardian, repetitive and slow (not in the literal sense) in MY opinion, yours may be completely different if you try one though.

the 1 second reveal change was better than what they where planning to do, and thats down to you thieves fighting your corner.

Very impressive play, i have tremendous respect for players of any classes who use the class to such an extent, figure out some tricks etc, impressive.

now we need two more then we need to face you two off against Pyro, Osicat + Kylia (mesmers) would be fun to watch :P

keep it up, i’m doing a thief alt at the moment and this is the style of play i was looking forward too

I main a mesmer too but loving the thief at the moment but as i play a mesmer there condition removal is not very good, you can spec for it to be improved of course but you loose so much, the best way is to pile on conditions and be VERY patient so it might be a long fight but you can do it.

against the shatterburst you mentioned i am guessing your meaning the 7 mirrors? where it looks like an army is pouncing on you?
the pressure there is first from stacking confusion then using mind wrack, if you see a wave of 3 in front you can generally tank this then the next wave dodge, dodge for your life as the second wave is typically used for mind wrack over the first, of course this is unpredictable somewhat.

Conditions is the answer and patience and only pounce once distortion / decoy is down, decoy can be countered, too if you use shortbow lay a poisson field down first in a bid to rip him out of stealth of or fire the explosive shot thing, a heavy stealth build and a very well controlled thief will be able to take a well played mesmer, not easily mind you.

we have a lot of ways to close in on a mesmer too, f1, short bow, shadowstep, HS, gun, Sword (if positioned right ofcourse)

probably missed some as i am rather new to thief but a mesmers worst enemy i can tell you by far is conditions.

I’ll add the shatter builds your encountering are ridiculous at the moment and as a mesmer myself i want these to be toned down, there’s burst and then there’s execution.

1: Ranger
2: Mesmer, Elementalist, Guardian, Engineer (well played one), Necro
3: all of them have pluses and minus’s, all instant 80 so to be honest you need to test and decied this for yourself.

3: allm again its really personal preference most effective when played well i would say, Thief, Mesmer, Engineer, Elementalist, Sniper Warrior, Necro.

4: all, its really personal preference most effective when played well i would say, Thief, Mesmer, Engineer, Elementalist, Sniper Warrior, Necro.

5: only you can answer this, for me Mesmer / Ranger.

6: again really only you can answer this again for me Mesmer / Ranger.

Every class can do everything you need to pick one you’re going to enjoy, for instance i love doing fractals on my ranger and having abuse ‘’ranger suck, no dps this that and the other’’ then when they see me micro managing and keeping my pet thus my DPS alive i generally get a slight compliment.

all professions can Bunker (tank) DPS and burst some more than others but you really need to test these out, best way to do it is to go into PvP instant level 80 test some builds you might like for yourself a long with various weapon stes.

dont forget if you do go focus it also pulls back/forward players and NPC’s

About the levelling thing being my first character was (and is) a mesmer i had no trouble levelling infact i thought it was easy, the first ’’big’’ boost i got is when i started getting clones on dodging, awesome.

and as Irena said 40+ you will walk through PvE like butter, and were not the worst soloers by a long shot we can build so many different ways it is actually a little unbelievable you’ll be able to solo most champs, slowly and strategically but there all do-able.

i actually agree with Vaya, although i think the Marksmanship trait line should have an option to make the pet simply materialistic or a boon/condition conductor and nothing more.

however as i said i agree with Vaya and think he/she is spot on were meant to co-work with out pets, not co-working with our pet(s) no matter how dumb the AI is, is almost like saying to a mesmer ‘’dont use your clones’’ or ‘’dont use stealth’’ to a thief, they get hit hard by effectivness if you go that route.

Welcome! glad your enjoying it so far, if you ever want someone to run with or even talk to in-game i’d be happy to be there.

you should try some WvWvW too thats extremely fun, especially when you get to know the guilds and guy(s) your fighting

Why not start one and try to get people on board? Bas at the moment has gotten a necro, mesmer, ranger podcast going as is working on the others so this could be included into the blog, hell could even be on auto-play when you bring up the site.

Lets be honest i have played this class for no more than a month but i can see the pet is the majority of the problem, it’s dumber than a corpse, give us an option to get rid of it and be a true ranger, utility? sure, boons, condition removals, ’’sacrifice’’ to absorb the damage we would take etc.

There are so many ways to keep pets with a lot of utility but removing the dependability, once i’m home from work i can theory craft or w/e but until then im stuck with this small addition to the topic.

never seen any sort of black dye, white dye or celectial dye

2-3 days is enough it will just be a long journey, hell its a long journey anyway i would do what Markus suggested go for a high level exotic, Vision sells for a lot so if you could make a few of these in the fraction of the time it takes to do the legendary then you could possibly buy the legendary sooner than farming it, depending on luck etc ofcourse too.

Gunnar’s Hold, i enjoyed fighting you guys, not because we won but because you guys where gutsy

not any group in T1, if you ask me my experience with T1 (my first server) was the same every day take a keep, sit in a keep, grab the points open world fighting i personally found next to nothing all the people would do is run to a keep or try to take you there anyway or even a camp, i’m not saying its always like this but thats my PERSONAL experience.

so i transfered to Far Shiverpeeks (no idea what tier tbh havnt checked) as a freind is there and i have to say the WvWvW is a completely different ball game it is so much more active on the field, keeps and things are obviously still defended it just feels like more happens and the power shifts between places 1/2/3 for instance we went from 3, to 1, to 2, to 3, to 2 last round this round were ringing up the rear of Z’ Germans to tak spot 1.

ill be biased and say Far Shiverpeeks has very active and very fun WvWvW at least for the last 3 rounds (rounds as in server changes etc etc)

however i am on EU if you on US i have no idea. although i hear T2/3 are very fun too as there all pushing to get up to t1.

as for 500 player limit i don’t think so but tbh i have not looked into this.

We have Justin Beiber, life is goofy.

100% accurate representation, my cat walks around with a greatsword and everything.

haha you know what thats a great idea im going to get my fiance’ to do my armor dyes tonight :P

it’s better than the zones being dead, right?

i cant say i’m mad on the undead theme but i do enjoy the zones.