Guild Wars 2

Completely disagree. I can’t believe people actually want less pronounced actions so that good players can’t counterplay them.

Most good players will stomp you with stability/blind anyways.

100% agree……………….

Yeah Poxxia, it definitely isn’t as trivial as I made it sound. I just tend to think it takes way more coordination to pull off clean spikes than just pressuring enemies down with AoE.

And to The Boz, I even said that pressing 1-2-3-4-5 isn’t the most effective way to do it. But the staff skills on necromancer can literally be spammed like that if you wanted to, and it would still be fairly effective.

Completely agree.

And why not have cast bars? It is proven that the best players can watch cast bars and the field at the same time. See GW1 as an example.

I think the root of this problem is how easy it is to apply conditions. Necros can literally aim their mouse on a point and press 1-2-3-4-5 and do a lot of AoE condition damage. (I’m not saying that this is the most effective way to do it. But it is kitten easy to play.)

It is WAY harder to apply constant physical damage. Burst teams have to coordinate so much to get the same results. They have to call targets, and wait for opportune moments to strike. On the other hand, a full condition team simply has to point and click all of their AoE conditions onto small fighting areas. And these condition classes build off of each other and stack in their effectiveness.

Physical damage is way easier to counter. Most of the damage from burst teams can simply be dodged or CC’d away. But conditions are easy to apply, and have really long durations.

If you get a ton of conditions on you, you HAVE to cleanse them or you’re dead, because they can heavily out dps physical damage in the long run. The ONLY way to counterplay long, passive condition damage is to cleanse them. Many classes either can’t afford to bring a lot of cleanse, or simply don’t have access to it. (See mesmers and thieves.)

Thats why this meta is so stupid. Whats the point of running highly coordinated builds that take a lot of skill to pull off when you can just sit there and press passive AoE damage to kill the other team.

Not to mention all of the people who solo queued when they were bored and tanked their rating. The team leader board should only reflect wins when you’re in a TEAM, so it should reset as well.

Spirit rangers aren’t OP because they are easy to counter at high level play.

In fact, I’d say they are actually losing popularity as teams have started bringing a lot of hard counters to stop them.

I would also highly suggest looking on the internet for a good PvP build. Most of them have been theory crafted and tested by players.

Sometimes it isn’t a bad idea to ask other people for their builds also. If you run into another warrior and you like his play style, you could politely ask for his build or just go into spectator mode and get it from him. Watch how he plays, you might learn something!

After that, just try to get to know each profession and its unique mechanics. Eventually you’ll learn how to play against each of them more successfully.

Hope this helps! You can contact me in game if you’d like some 1 on 1 help. I’m always happy to help the PvP community grow.

swiftpaw.6397:

jmatb.6307:

I know AoE is what you do to stop Spirit Rangers. The damage simultaneously drops the spirits, then you focus the elite, and then drop the ranger when they have nothing left.

I don’t want to play like that though.

This sums up the entire thread.

I can see his point. I too don’t like all of the AoE in this game. And I believe everything needs to be way more reactionary compared to passive. However, there is something to be said about adapting to situations and different metas.

Builds are not the only contributing factors. Normally the teams with better tactics and coordination are the ones who win.

jmatb.6307:

This coming from an “elite player” whose team runs two necros, two spirit rangers, and a guardian.

Sure, hit me up I want to put together a team of faceroll specs and call ourselves Team Cheese Squad

I know AoE is what you do to stop Spirit Rangers. The damage simultaneously drops the spirits, then you focus the elite, and then drop the ranger when they have nothing left.

I don’t want to play like that though. AoE is not challenging at all. I want to beat someone with skill, not spamming AoE from Necros, Engis, or spam evades with S/D.

When you have to target an area to beat one guy it’s complete garbage.

I do agree that there is too much AoE in this game, and some abilities are way too spammable. But with all of the talk of these “OP” builds, I’m a little curious.

What is the point of running an inferior build? Are we all supposed to kitten our team builds in order to say we take more “skill”?

You shouldn’t be saying: “Yeah we’re really the better team, but because you guys ran faceroll builds you won.” because everyone has access to these skills. You could have just as easily taken the same classes, and because you’re more “skillful”, won.

There is still a vast skill difference between the teams running these so called OP builds.

So you’re complaining about things being OP but refuse to take counters to them. Isn’t countering other teams strategies a good way of measuring your own ability to adapt to situations?

Jesiah.2457:

Okay lets just get rid of shadow refuge, one of the few good utility skills out of a repertoire of useless utilities! That’ll show those thieves who try to play something other than glass and be useful via reviving fallen team mates!

I don’t think it’s so much me missing the point, as you completely ignoring everything I said and instead only plan on pointing out what you have to say.

I’m done with this inane thread. I’d rather not lose braincells having a one sided “debate” with a mindless bunch of tools.

lolwut. xD I just said that stealth and thieves in general need reworking. THAT INCLUDES UTILITIES SKILLS… I also stated that we’d need to improve viability for many different builds. So yeah, you are still completely missing the point.

Jesiah.2457:

Unstackable … at 2 seconds max duration … would completely ruin Shadow Refuge utility, as it lasts three. I think when you mention unstackable you’re most likely referring to the infinite stealth duration thieves can get using D/P along with the trait infusion of shadow. #5 against a wall, then 2 until field is gone. Possible to stealth permanently, and I understand where the frustration comes from, as this is pretty stupid IMO.

You are completely missing my point. I basically suggested a full rework of stealth and the entire thief class. This would of course include tweaks to many of the weapon skills/ utilities to give thieves several viable non-gimmick builds.

I 100% agree that thieves should be revealed when you block something, however there are other things that would need to be balanced in order for this to work.

Currently, with the way aegis/blind/blocks work, this change would make thieves unplayable without additional balancing. Because most aegis and blind last way too long, and lack skill to use well.

ArenaNet needs to make these defensive abilities way more reactionary. You shouldn’t be able to just spam blinds/blocks in order to avoid damage. You should have to react to what other players are doing. Putting up a 30 second Aegis when you see a thief stealth would make it way too easy to counter them. Therefore, I believe the durations and recharges of these abilities need to be changed to allow for more skillful play.

The core issue, however, is that thieves need to start being changed from ultra stealth/evade/gimmick burst into a more well rounded class. I think ArenaNet should turn thieves into a high APM, highly mobile, highly reactionary class to play.

Make it so that thieves cant simply spam one skill in order to be successful. Maybe they could introduce skill chains within weapon skills that provide high risk/reward scenarios (similar to gw1 assassins). And get rid of ridiculous stealth durations! Stealth just isn’t a good mechanic for serious PvP. Make it so that stealth is easy to get, but is a very short duration (1-2 seconds) and unstackable (with tweaking of the revealed buff). That too would make stealth play more reactionary for skillful thieves.

Anyways, I think it is apparent that thieves need to be reworked to turn them into a better designed class. Just my 2 cents.

My guardian, Elegant Eternity.

Armor is:
Gladiator legs and chest
Heavenly bracers
Heritage pauldrons.

Dye:
Blue Rose
Lemon
Blue Ice

Here is mine