Guild Wars 2

The last time that necro countered thief was when dhuumfire could be triggered by all attacks. Ever since, each and every meta thief (power) build has been a hard or softcounter to necro/reaper in pvp. The removal of geo and hydromancy sigils made this match up even more lopsided as reaper has lost its only reliable (instant) source of damage.
Same goes for zerk warrior, it was countered by thief pre-patch and should now be at a bigger disadvantage.
Engi on the other hand used to be a counter to thief (only if the thief allows it and chooses to fight), the removal if geomany hurts them as well but id guess they are still favored, not sure though.

people consider the lowest mobility class in the game as op at roaming. lul.

Ohoni.6057:

Erzian.5218:

Imo every game mode should have its own unique rewards (including skins), as it encourages playing different parts of the game.

Again, though, there is NO benefit to ANYONE for any player to be playing a part of the game that he is not enjoying.

For me, having a motivation to try and play other areas of the game as well as having unique rewards is clearly a benefit. Just because you do not like it, that does not mean there is “NO benefit to ANYONE”.

Imo every game mode should have its own unique rewards (including skins), as it encourages playing different parts of the game.
If you want an item from another game mode, just man up and go through it (what plenty of people do every day).

Want something? Earn it.
It is that simple.

EU top 10:
2x thief
2x warrior
1x mes
1x nec
1x dh
1x druid
1x engi
No idea what “TEE MONKS” was playing.

I don’t really know 11-25, but I do recognize 2 ele players there so if you are missing eles you can find some here.

the numbers on the leaderboards actually do lie because people are smurfing. Smurfing on the other hand is only logical, when you are in a comfortable spot on the leaderboards because once your rating is high enough, the risk of losing a match is not worth the reward of winning a match. If you are rank 1 there is no reason to play more than the minimum games. If you are 2nd you could try to get rank 1, but when you have to win 3-5 matches to make up for 1 loss, you are probably better off being just 2nd.

Nonetheless overall numbers have certainly decreased.

The thing that changed between seasons 5 and 6 are the ease of accessing asc gear. -> people who played for the rewards left
The other change was the end of esports -> the people who took this game seriously left
the game also has 0 modes that promote teamplay.

Nikkinella.8254:

Taobella.6597:

^ CD i suggested was not to kill the build it was make it so if they face roll keyboard it not instant win =p

That would have been my suggestion as well. It would be balanced that way. It works pretty much in the same way that blinding ashes works on ele, which blinds something you burn. That has an 8 sec cooldown and all it is is a simple blind. And ele has nowhere near the access to burn that a necro has to chill. Yet an 8 sec cooldown is fine for that and doesnt make it useless, it keeps it from being overpowered like deathly chill is.

Those of you being carried by that trait need to realize this. It will still be good even with an icd, you just wont be able to roll your face across the keyboard anymore and will have to space out your chills intelligently to get the max out of it, but it needs an icd. You shouldnt be able to solo stack that many bleeds in such a short amount of time.

Internal CD would result in quite the opposite of what you supposedly want to achieve as it would punish thouhtful players who combine their different sources of chill for a spike and those who actually hit their highly telegraphed rs4+5 combo.

Apart from that: berserker, thief, chrono and druid are all counters to reaper because of the high amount of cc and condition removal/resistance they have access to.

Id be happy with having mark of horror as an elite skill instead of lich form.

Edit: I do like plague though, but that doesn’t mean that it couldnt use a buff or two. Perhaps a 4th option to transfer conditions to nearby foes.

Feanor.2358:

“Best” is relative. Perhaps it’s not best for doing speed runs with the top guilds. But it’s pretty kitten hard to beat condi ranger’s dps if you’re not in that league and it’s among the easiest dps classes to play. Perhaps only the thief is easier.

Idk about d/d thief but staff thief is a lot harder to play than condi ranger. Condi ranger is so easy, because you dont have to worry about fully executing your auto attack chain and all your skills have enough casting time, that it is easy enough to not lose much dps because of pressing buttons too slowly (which is pretty much only a fresh air issue, maybe engi too, idk).
I am sure you can play condi ranger without knowing the rotation and still hit 30k dps just by making sure that you use t5 / sb2 after weapon swap and standing behind your tsrget. The remaining skills, you can just spam off cd.

apharma.3741:

Wasn’t GW2 essentially advertised as some kind of middle ground though? There were no concrete roles, you could play a healer, a damage dealer, buffer etc and not be penalised too much?

or you could have played a necromancer who could neither heal, deal damage or buff

Just like today.

sephiroth.4217:

like, every Ranger takes Druid/survival

lul

leman.7682:

I will be testing the new dps with my friends, but there are some interesting venues worth exploring with trait/rotations for raids. Possibly even something new for PvP, but that’s yet to be determined.

It would be interesting to see what the dev behind these changes thinks of GS’s usability and position in PvP and PvE right now.

From what I have briefly tested for pve (sr, reaper, spite):
- Shroud 2-4 are a dps loss compared to shroud 1 (with dhuumfire)
- GS has higher dps than shroud overall despite the auto attack being weaker
- Overall dps is still trash compared to other dps classes and probably behind condi nec which also got minor buffs.

Dagger auto attack outperforms sword auto attack by ~7.5%. Staff auto attack without staff mastery is nearly the same as sword, but applies vulnerability which puts staff above sword and dagger (if you only auto attack and hit all attacks).
With quickness the the difference between sword and dagger drops to ~4.4%. Doesn’t that suggest, that sword after cast is actually better than dagger? (Assuming that quickness reduces activation time, but not after cast. No idea how exactly quickness works :s)

fun fact: pistol whip is a dps loss compared to auto attack, even with the lead attacks trait (trickery trait-line).

No there isn’t a competitive scene. ESL is for 1v1 and 2v2 but not for the actual gw2 pvp game mode, which is 5v5 conquest and even if there was, there are not enough teams on a similar level and not enough changes in the meta game to keep it interesting.
Obviously, the absence of cash prices is likely to influence their decision but you cannot blame them for that. If anything it is surprising that the played for so long given how pathetic the competition in this game is.

martin.1653:

I really hope this is a good troll to make Anet wake up.
Smite looks like a bad joke.

Smite might look like a joke, but gw2 actually is a joke when it comes to pvp. There is no competition, there has never been any competition and there probably never will be any competition, simply because not enough people are willing to put serious effort into it.
This most likely boils down to two things imo:
a) There is no environment that supports proper competitive play (team arena is unlikely to fix that because of the low player pool)

b) The game is plagued by a skill/class design philosophy that gives people the impression that the outcome is not determined by their own efforts but by builds. Be it low cd high impact skills like skull grinder, super annoying pets like smokescale/bristleback, instant/low activtion time skills that do have high impact like steal/dh f1, an abundance of defensive skills or dodges like the meta chronomancer/daredevil/revenant, or spamable soft cc/conditions like reaper/chronomancer. Obviously there is a difference between good and bad players but this does not become apparent to newer players, the game simply feels “spammy” and “random”, which does not encourage people to stay and improve but to stop when they lose (as it is very difficult to see why you are actually losing or what the other person does better).

suffish.4150:

competitive or really an ambitious player

Guild Wars 2

lul

Eleazar.9478:

But you clearly don’t ranger. Pets only attribute burst damage and that’s the new ones. Most of them are just utilized for utility.

Yes clearly, I don’t play ranger I am only trying to make your class look bad so wvw players wont ask me to reroll from my guard/rev/ele to my ranger anymore :^)

idk what you guys are on about, bronze games are carry-able on no amulet core ranger. I wanted to get my f2p account to 0 rating (or whatever the minimum is) but it is actually really difficult to lose without playing very very poorly or going afk. Even on troll builds. If you are stuck in bronze, you don’t belong anywhere else.

Pet accounts for a considerable part of ranger damage but that damage is not available in big fights because the pet doesn’t survive for more than 5 seconds. You are basically playing a class without class mechanic.
It is that simple.

Well timed interrupts should be rewarded. The problem is that you are currently not rewarded for good timing, but for using head shot as much as possible, because every ability in the game triggers PI.
You should be rewarded for interrupting the correct skills, not for interrupting “something”.

Reading might help. He has addressed both your points already, although his comment towards los is debatable.

Lordrosicky.5813:

Pi is the best trait in the game.

Pretty sure “Dash” is a lot better than PI. With the exception of a few traits, which make or break complete builds or even classes (e.g. elemental bastion, monk’s focus, sleight of hand, there are probably some more I can’t think of atm), dropping any trait and replacing it with dash is major upgrade.
The reason why hardly anyone complains about is probably because IMS access is over the top in general, as any non dh class has at least 25% ims without actually investing anything meaningful (rune, weapon, trait/utility that is not the best option anyway) into it.

edit: To the whole debate: People complain about passive stun breaks because the player doesn’t have to actively do anything but they fail to realize that skills and traits like PI, plague sending and plague signet have an equally passive component, with the difference that the opposing player does not have control over when to trigger it.

Their mere presence puts pressure onto the opposing player. Players have to play around head shot regardless of whether you use it or not. Obviously this is not necessarily bad and exists in another games as well e.g. all of the gw1 interrupts or nyx assassin’s spiked carapace in dota2. It simply leads to mind games, which is good. However, a problem arises if the cost of the skill/trait, that has to be preemtively counterplayed, is too low compared to the cost of counterplaying it.

While head shot costs 4 initiative, it also is on a 0 second cool down. This takes away the usual option of fake casting/canceling casts to bait out the skill and then using your own skill, because you actually have to bait out 3 head shots in a row, before you can cast something. This is not your usual mind game where you have a 50:50 chance and if you win, you will be able to cast but one where you have to consecutively and quickly win three 50:50 mind games in a row. This issue can also not be solved by an internal cool down, the cool down would have to be on head shot.

Obviously you can use a comparatively long defensive cool down to ensure that you get a skill through. However, since you trade your cool down only for the opportunity to cast but not for an actual resource (your opponent sees that you have stab/projectile block up, thus is not going to invest anything), this is only an option for key skills such as your heal.

Annabel.5127:

So I’ll ask again — if nothing has fundamentally changed, where was the QQ months ago?

exactly, it didn’t exist. why? because thief isn’t broken, Helseth just doesnt want to worry about good thieves, and bronze forum warrior kids need something new to cry about after losing their ranked q.

The revenant, the class that was blatantly overpowered and has overshadowed thief (and other classes), has been nerfed so hard, that thief is now the best roaming/+1 class in the game again.
It has nothing to do with a change in mentality (in fact many have people have argued that thief is op, long before HoT), but with a change in the meta game because of the more recent balance updates.

Annabel.5127:

Where was all this QQ months ago?

Thief hasn’t changed, and the only thing that has is players mentalities.

Every non-thief, non-warrior class has received massive nerfs which is an indirect buff to thief and warrior. One could argue that reaper hasn’t been nerfed for a while as well, but it has always been countered by daredevil, so it doesn’t matter.

Power block used to trigger on auto attacks, they changed it so that it only affects other skills. Therefore the technology to distinguish between autoattacks and other skills is most likely already there. Even if it wasn’t, it should be very simple to implement. It is literally 1 if-statement or 1 if-statement per interrupt skill/trait at worst (which are only a few).

Crinn.7864:

Erzian.5218:

It should not trigger on auto attacks. That goes for all “on interrupt” traits/skills in the game, though.

My programmer’s gut tells me that the game engine makes no distinctions between AA casts and any other cast.

A ICD would make more sense anyways.

Code is already there, as they changed mesmer’s power block to only increase CD of non autoattack skills.

Wolfric.9380:

i would jsust drop placement matches and set players according to their PvP rank.
rank 20 is mid bronze and 80+ high silver then fight up …

#Prince Vingador for rank 1

It should not trigger on auto attacks. That goes for all “on interrupt” traits/skills in the game, though.

I wonder what all the people who are crying did before HoT. It is not like you need it or it gives you any advantage, it is just another (expensive) skin. It is about the price of a legendary or ghastly grinning shield. If you want to so badly, just buy it.
The only thing I find a bit disappointing is that the different armor classes are different unlocks instead of a single unlock for all armor classes.

or any other place?

ranger/druid has been neglected in wvw for years. Arguing that it needed a nerf because of completely meaningless open field 1v1s is silly.
While a nerf was definitely needed in pvp, it didn’t need one in wvw. And if for some reason the ability to reset useless fights was an issue, they could have instead put internal cd on celestial shadow like 15 sec and/or reduced stealth duration by 1 second.

it is a bunker/support class whose survivability is entirely reliant on stealth. Pretty sure the best team comp does not involve druids of any kind, so nerfing wont do anything to improve balance, which is in a pretty good state atm anyway. Probably better than it has ever been.
Don’t get me wrong, druid is not underpowered but its not overpowered either. The one class that every team needs is an ele. Apart from that I’d guess that rev, mes, reaper and scrapper are slightly better than druid, warrior and dh. Idk where thief is but I’d guess its somewhere in the middle.
I wouldn’t even necessarily say that ele is overpowered, it is just the only class/build that truly fills the support role, since druid is some crossover between support and bruiser.

Matches during the day are a lot better actually. It feels like playing with people instead of bots. Guess the main reason for the poor matches was the low player pool.

Idk I have never had trouble solo carrying bad teams vs other bad teams (apart from the occasional blow out), but this season it seems impossible. If I put myself in outnumbered situations, half of the teams I am on will lose 4v3 and if I try to support them in team fights 1-3 people die before the first celestial avatar is even charged.
It is kittening ridiculous and I really do not know how to win those games that I should supposedly win. It is frustrating. Meanwhile, I need more than 60% win rate to even break even on mmr. Some matches are close but if I played like the majority of the players in my games (teammates and opponents alike), I am 100% sure I’d lose nearly every game with less than 200 points.

Yes I can duo queue and win a lot more, but honestly I should not have to duo queue just to get somewhat enjoyable matches.
Maybe it is just because I mostly queue late night as I have connection issues during prime time but this still blows :|

I wonder how I am supposed to win every game (since I lose nearly twice as much rating for every lose than I gain for a win) while my team can’t even win favorable match ups 90% of the time.
This is the worst pvp experience I have ever had in this game far. It is actually worse than season 2 and 3. When I do the highest damage on my team as a mender druid while I have a reaper and a rev you cannot possibly tell me that I am on the better team.
edit: language

and this is why it is good that anet does not listen to the player base when it comes to balancing.

JayAction.9056:

It’s extreme nerf after nerf after nerf. Like, if Rev was this overtuned at HOT drop then PLENTY of other specs should be seeing nerfs like this too.

Do you mean like the 29829408204928402 bristleback nerfs? Smokescale nerfs? removal of chill damage? a thousand dh trap nerfs? true shot nerf? quickness/slow nerf, which mostly affected chrono? the removal of clerics amulet to nerf ele? the removal of merc amulet to nerf necro and mesmer? countless nerfs to celestial avatar skills or more recently a 50% nerf to its recharge? the necessity to run healing power on druid? the removal of daze on scrapper gyros?
Many HoT specs have been nerfed massively. Rev has reigned supreme since the introduction of HoT and has been the very best class since season 1. It is about time to bring the class in line with other classes.
Yes, rev has also seen nerfs before but for some reason those nerfs were not comparable to scrapper, reaper, ele, druid, chrono and dh. The only 2 classes that haven’t seen any major nerfs are thief and warrior, but that is probably they haven’t had any major
success in pro league.
It is funny how spoiled revenant players are though.

thijsken.5031:

Erzian.5218:

1v1: thief
else: thief/reaper

@thijsken

when does an ele 1v1 a thief?

And as I said thief can’t do the same job rev did:
1: they can’t stick that well to an ele as a rev ( due to dying to aoe cleave).
2: thieves are rarely in big teamfights to begin with (in contrast to ele).
And yes reaper but ele can go alot more anti-condi now, which is the issue i adressed.

As soon as the ele leaves earth/earth5 is on cd he should die vs thief+reaper. Especially if he doesn’t have lightning flash. I mean: Ele dies 1v1 vs either of them if it doesn’t have diamond skin and dies 1v1 vs thief if if it has diamond skin. If you have thief and reaper, you should be able to take down an ele, especially since ele vs thief often ends rather quickly. At least that is what I took from watching drazeh and denshee.
When I duo queued with rome, we managed to kill most eles in less than 10 seconds once they left earth or used focus 5. Obviously most of them were just random eles but then again I am also just a random reaper.

Idk you just cannot tell me that ele becomes unkillable as soon as revenant stops being blatantly overpowered.

1v1: thief
else: thief/reaper

@thijsken

Why are the ele, engi and core guardian buffs pvp only? Lookts like “Lets split skills for absolutely no reason” to me :/

forum bug. bla bla

Ohoni.6057:

If you want something, you have to earn it. That includes doing something you might not be fond of

Yes to the first bit, no to the second. You should definitely have to earn your rewards, but you should also enjoy the process, because this is a game, not a job. You should never be funneled into content that you do not enjoy for long periods of time just to get rewards that you’re after.

What if someone only enjoy role playing in divinity’s reach?
If they want a legendary badge next to their name, should they get it for typing x lines of dialogue?
If they want legendary weapon, should they get it for using x emotes?
If they want to be rank 1 on the leader boards, should they get it for using fancy words?

+ map completion doesn’t even take that long. It should take less time than reaching legend with 80-100% win ratio (depending on the map you want to complete) if you take queue time into account.

edit because I’m stupid and had 3pips/win in mind, which was only possible in season 1 and very unrealistic.

If you want something, you have to earn it. That includes doing something you might not be fond of (In fact many pve players do not like map completion etc either).
Pretty simple actually.
Also as I already said, Literally all the legendary weapons from the core game are tradable, thus not pve exclusive. You can acquire them by opening the trading post.

You can earn legendaries in pvp, it is called tournament of legends. Or you just buy them on the trading post.

He actually only added up the numbers of the best available weapon combination and just listed the other weapons. Numbers might still be off because of other factors such as weapon swap, blocks ending prematurely (e.g. ranger gs) or simple miscalculation.
For instance ranger s/d should be below 15sec: 6*1.5 (dagger4) + 4*0.75 (sword 3) + 6*0.5 (sword2) = 15 <- This is without taking the casting time of the skills itself into account so the actual number is below that. Adding weapon swap (as his calculations are for multiple sets) further decreases the evade up time.
Cant be bothered to check other weapon sets though.

Kenaz.3198:

thanks for the replies and help guys, i guess i’m just bored of being the support, but i really enjoy playing as ranger/druid, so i decided to play as ele for a while, maybe wait a dps buff, grind enough for kudzu or feel like i want to play ranger/druid again.

Viper ranger has great dps. If you want to use a longbow, you should go condition warrior as its the only class whose meta build uses a longbow.

they should just add more damage modifiers. I mean literally all they have to do is look at the dps numbers and calculate the difference. Then add the missing amount in the form of damage modifiers to the specializations. There are enough useless traits that they could change anyway.
E.g. -10 % from chilled foes becomes +10% against chilled foes.
Change the 10% against vulnerable foes with an axe to just 10% against vulnerable foes.
Revert back the curses minor to 2% damage per condition instead of the current 2% crit chance per condition.
It might still miss a couple of percentages to be on par with other dps builds, but its fine if it has a little less than a tempest since its baseline survivability in pve is a lot better.

The way I see it: staff is inferior because it is terrible at +1 (which is a major part of your role). Basically the more cc a class has in addition to damage, the more effective it is at killing a target in +1. Staff thief, however, has very little cc. This is especially true if you run acrobatics (= no panic strike).
The fact that you have no stealth aka no surprise element, makes this even worse.