Resistance sharing is stupid and should be nerfed. It is a strong boon that should be mostly limited to self-applying.
The durability rune 4th bonus should be changed so that the defensive boons are applied to the equipper himself instead of to the whole party.
I would also like to see the mesmer glamour trait changed to additional boon ripping rather than applying resistance to allies.
Resistance is necessary with the current state of conditions and siege, there is no way around it. Limiting it to personal use means you would have to give more access to other professions, currently it is not really possible for most classes to get a use out of it unless applied by another.
Changing durability runes boons to only be self applied would have to go along with increased time on those boons, because currently it is to short to justify that kind of nerf. Durability is basically the only good defensive rune we can use in wvw, unless you run a gimmick gvg build and use mercy runes.
You need to consider balance for defense vs offense. I had a look at certain recent gvg and it takes so long for anyone to die. I would say in current meta, defense is too strong.
You never had durability rune before HoT and ppl were fine with other condition reduction runes and food. I don’t see why it can’t be so in current meta where condition cleanse from a lot professions are abundant.
Also, it is bad to have one do-them-all defensive rune. It has been removed from PvP long ago for balance reasons. In WvW, it is even stronger.
Resistance sharing is stupid and should be nerfed. It is a strong boon that should be mostly limited to self-applying.
The durability rune 4th bonus should be changed so that the defensive boons are applied to the equipper himself instead of to the whole party.
I would also like to see the mesmer glamour trait changed to additional boon ripping rather than applying resistance to allies.
You can’t just use one tournament to judge the profession balance.
Warrior shined a lot in proleague season 2 final.
In the more recent world championship final, the composition revolves around how to make the best out of necro’s superior fire power. So it gets hard for warrior to find a place.
But meta shifts, I won’t be surprised if ppl can come up with composition that makes use of a warrior.
20 games, 15 wins. Completely lost interest to grind after the first week of the season.
In random queues, there are three popular specs that counter mesmer pretty hard.
1. DH
Traps+symbol have ridiculous cleave on clones. You are force to go melee to do any damage. But they have high uptime of block as well.
This is a matchup I almost never take. But in skirimishes and teamfight, they still hard counter us as they keep cleaving out our clones. Biggest headache for mesmer this meta.
2. Staff thief.
Again, tons of on-point cleave and clones die super fast. It is easy to 1v1 them if you can kite off point. But when you are under pressure to hold a point then the fight becomes more challenging. You have to play really aggressive and not making any mistakes. The staff thief has pretty good sustain so if you need to win before using up your cooldowns. Luckily, staff thief is not very good at chasing. So you can still bail out.
3. Tank druid.
Just too much sustain for us to fight against. Maybe you can get a good moa burst but the chance to win is still low. Again, a matchup i will try to avoid. But they have good mobility so you might be forced to fight against them
I agree some restriction should be imposed on frequent server hopping.
I am tired of the excuse of that they need to play with friends.
Why can’t you and your friends just settle on one server for some time?
Healer tempest is still one my of favorite teammate. I think it is quite strong.
What they need is similar to many other professions, more options.
If you buff necro survivability, then you have to nerf their firepower to compensate.
Give mesmer a trait that lets it strip boons whenever an enemy walks through a glamour… like the old blinding/confusion builds. Fixed and mesmer isn’t damaged because of crying.
As for glamour boon strip, should null field be made unblockable just like well of corruption?
If Mesmer’s Signet of Inspiration is the only culprit on the main problem here, then the answer becomes obvious…change it from copying all boons to copying 3 RANDOM boons on yourself to others. This guts the problem while still allowing boonsharing in a form.
Never like bringing more RNG into skills.
Just put a cap on the boon duration that SoI copies over.
Of course, they need to make this WvW only skill changes because boon copying is an essential part for mesmer to be viable in PvE raids.
What is the point of a tournament in a game mode that is poorly setup for competition?
Just some fancy reward?
I think you go either
earth/water/tempest
or
arcana/water/tempest
I realize i’m probably very biased against rev as a warrior player (base warrior, which makes it even worse).
But tbh I find DH rather enjoyable to fight. They have obvious tells to both their offense and defense, and if you play well they eventually run out of defense. Druids for example are a LOT more annoying to fight imo.
If you are a warrior and spec for high unblockable uptime, then DH is not that much a problem for you.
DH simply has a much much lower skill floor than Revs.
You will see way more decent DHs than decent Revs.
They want elite specs to be really attractive.
TBH, players on this forum contribute a lot to make the new profession and elite spec to be very overpowered in the first place.
Do you guys still remember the first couple of revenant testing weekends? The profession was so weak back then. But afterwards, players started to give the devs a lot of suggestions to make the profession strong and lots of those ideas are taken. Players who give suggestions love the profession they are giving ideas on. So they simply want the profession to be strong and have new shiny stuff. When you combine all those ideas onto one profession, the profession ends up being overpowered.
Similar story for other new elite specs, players on forum give ideas to make every weapon skill, utility skill and traits strong and powerful. The elite spec is bound to be very strong being developed that way.
You will need to rely on LFG to hop onto more populated maps.
Just like what you do with SW and other world boss events.
The game desperately needs solo queue.
They will not be used as precursors. Envoy II reward will be used as precursors
So you can pick any set you want without limiting your future choice.
tempests+reaper are the best counter to DH. Unfortunately they are so much harder to play than DHs this patch.
However, this isn’t a food stall or retail shop, it is called as what it is, a penalty. Also, it isn’t a matter of people (who transfers a lot) liking the idea, it is a matter of controlling the transfers to maintain the balance, balance that got broken by the players themselves every time we relink.
People transfer to either find fun elsewhere or to flock to a easy win. Neither of these will be playing the game if they are penalized for transfering… Your “balance” will be achieved by making these people just quit? I don’t think that people quitting a game when it’s already 4 years old is a good deal to it’s heath.
But you need to consider that the game also loses population due to highly imbalanced matchups.
Surely you don’t want to completely strip off players’ freedom. But there still should be some slightly harder restrictions to prevent easy large population shift.
You won’t see guardian using Zealot because of low base HP pool.
Zealot with only healing power won’t provide enough sustain for guardian to make a viable build.
Your chance would be better with the existing Mender’s amulet.
Thief vs DH is so hilariously one-sided matchup.
As a thief, you probably shouldn’t even go within 1200 range of a DH.
I think server is down atm. Not a PvP-only issue.
I know I can still try to avoid the F1 spear throw in the first place. But if you ever get hit by the first part of F1 skill, you seem to be completely at DH’s mercy.
The second pull part is unblockable and unevadeable. During the whole time being attached to the spear, the only option is using an invulnerable skill. The DH can then use LB2 or some other hard hitting skill to bait out your dodge and then interrupt it by the pull and then chain together some other powerful attacks.
There are quite a few other pull skills in the game and they are all evadeable. I don’t understand why this skill has to be this extra strong.
-1) every profession has way to play around the pull
-teleport out from the traps
-stability
-invulnerability-2) everybody can save a dodge and use it the second they get pulled in
-3) everybody can LoS the DH trying to use the pull, he won’t be able to pull you over from a lower level or from behind an obstacle
Not everything must be A to B gameplay…..
If you get tethered, obviously you want to run out of range or find LoS. But DH can immediately pull. If you waste a dodge, you are doomed.
Of course, you need to dodge after the pull. But again being pulled to close distance is already a win for the DH. He can play the mind game of pulling, waiting for you to dodge then burst.
The end result of this unevadeable pull is DH gaining an overwhelming advantage of mind game.
the only option is using an invulnerable skill.
Not every meta build has an on-demand stability like DH F3.
I know I can still try to avoid the F1 spear throw in the first place. But if you ever get hit by the first part of F1 skill, you seem to be completely at DH’s mercy.
The second pull part is unblockable and unevadeable. During the whole time being attached to the spear, the only option is using an invulnerable skill. The DH can then use LB2 or some other hard hitting skill to bait out your dodge and then interrupt it by the pull and then chain together some other powerful attacks.
There are quite a few other pull skills in the game and they are all evadeable. I don’t understand why this skill has to be this extra strong.
PvP is pretty much all cookie cutter builds right now.
I did try poison focused condition ranger before. It works but don’t expect it to be as strong as the meta builds.What are the meta ranger builds? Are they ranged at least?
http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Druid_-_Bunker_Druid
It is probably the strongest 1v1 build currently in conquest PvP. Staff is ranged.
Also has strong mobility and support.
surprised to see JQ so low on PPT.
They even have more total kills than YB. At what timezone do they gain that many kills? It has to be NA right?
You will see an engineer with a shield about as often as you find actual hackers in PvP.
I remember when I started playing this game 2 years ago, engi shield was considered the best shield in the game.
You need to look for specific guide for the class/build you are playing.
PvP is pretty much all cookie cutter builds right now.
I did try poison focused condition ranger before. It works but don’t expect it to be as strong as the meta builds.
Pearly – No, I play on US.
EW – I definitely prefer range, so Ele would be the other option then? Are they on par with Druids, or am I better off focusing on a Druid?
So in high-end PvE content, druid is the go-to healer because they not only heal but also gives out unique buffs.
Tempest is quite versatile but in PvE is mostly known for its high dps. Ppl do use it as a secondary healer sometimes. But in PvP and WvW, tempest is actually the best healer.
- Make all class viable in 1v1
- Make all skills and traits viable
- Option to use our gear stats instead of amulet (with proper balancing)
- Promote build variety with a new gameplay mechanic
- Add a 10v10 GvG gamemode with bigger maps
Why don’t you actually just go WvW?
Thief is by far the most fun solo roamer and it doesn’t hurt to bring two. Because as a thief, you can chase AND escape. For me, being able to kill ppl is the most fun thing in WvW roaming. Roam with double thieves means you can simultaneously burst and kill even some tanky opponents.
Another good choice is druid. Have mobility and easy to survive. The playstyle in a duo would be that druid attract attention and tanking while thief picking out ppl one by one. But druid doesn’t have good burst damage himself to actually kill ppl.
Scrapper is also decent, and the synergy is similar to druid. You can also bring good utilities including anti-stealth that really puts other thieves off-guard. The class struggles against good kiting though.
Last two choices I can also recommend are mesmers and warriors. Both can hold their own solo roaming. They also both bring in good damage. In a duo with thief, after any opponent is pressured by you, the thief can easily finish them off.
I am not sure how to 1v1 a warrior.
But I do know that you want to avoid 1v1’s in general. Because a necro caught up in a 1v1 is such a juicy target to +1.
It is harder than some of the other classes but not so hard that it becomes overwhelming to new players.
I think it is a good class to start with if you are really interested. Some reasonable challenge actually brings fun.
I only watched helseth, chaith and sindrener stream because all these three guys explain what they are doing. Really helpful.
Again, not having a mesmer is not the excuse.
They lost to VM, not 55 rnk or TCG.
TCG and 55 rnk each had a mesmer specialist. But VM doesn’t have one.
The lost simply because they didn’t keep up with the EU teams in their play level.I agree except for the last part. As you said Mesmers are good but overated, don’t need one to suceed, but if Toker was anything but a Thief they would have done lots better.
I agree if duplicate profession is allowed, Astral will do better with double revenants.
But with current rule, thief is their best bet.
They did have 4 very close games with 55 rnk last tournament with a thief.
I would even go as far to say they would beat 55 and gave TCG a run if they played the super aggressive necro build last tournament. Unfortunately this necro composition is only discovered afterwards.
(edited by Exciton.8942)
Again, not having a mesmer is not the excuse.
They lost to VM, not 55 rnk or TCG.
TCG and 55 rnk each had a mesmer specialist. But VM doesn’t have one.
The lost simply because they didn’t keep up with the EU teams in their play level.
In current meta, the class suits your need the most is mesmer.
Things can always change as meta shifts.
But if you don’t have the expansion HoT. The two classes you can play in PvP while not being too outclassed are warrior and thief. Other classes rely on HoT elite specialization a lot.
Astral’s composition is actually legit with a thief.
They have one thief roaming and controlling two points. The rest of the four team members fighting on the other point. They should win every 4v4 on paper because they have an elementalist while VM doesn’t. This is very obvious on their second map where VM even went for a 5v4 teamfight but still couldn’t gain anything out of it.
What VM did well is to exploit the lack of mobility in Astral’s composition. I think Chaith’s initial pick of druid is to deal with that lack of mobility. Engi is the better team fighter and worse roamer. So the counter to Astral’s teamfighting composition is to have two members roaming around to counter the thief(mesmer and druid in VM’s case) and let the other three take outnumbered fight. Even if they lose the fight they still have the other two points.
I don’t think you realize the difference of skill level between general ranked PvP and the level of play in the LAN tournaments. AA are definitely top tier PvP’ers.
I will say, however, that the classes that each respective player of AA is best at has fallen out of the meta and they haven’t been able to adjust to the HoT/mesmer comp. Chaithh had to fall back to engi, and they put up two great matches, but they are rigid when it comes to multi classing and that has definitely hurt them since HoT.
In the first season final, rnk 55 has to have Misha rerolling to necro. But they still managed to beat Astral who has probably the best necromancer in the world.
So I don’t think meta change is the excuse of not performing. They are obviously not as committed as the European teams. I guess lack of strong contenders is the biggest issue. They have slowly fallen down to PZ level recently.
This championship meta revolves around how to support to make the best out of necro’s big damage. A bit hard to copy to your everyday rank/unranked queuing.
Rev is in a unique place. I think it will be either a must-take or not being taken at all.
It essentially becomes replacement of thief after expansion.
Support oriented class you have engi, ele and ranger.
Dps oriented class you have necro, mesmer, warrior and guardian. Necro has the biggest damage. Mesmer has the best utility. Warrior and guardian are all-arounder with strong sustain and 1v1.
This is probably the most balanced meta after expansion. There is none kittened braindead specs. Even before expansion you have shoutbow warrior and celestial ele that are pretty next-level broken. So I am in general pretty happy with current meta.
(edited by Exciton.8942)
There is trait that makes daze into stun on 5sec iCD.
So usually yes, bursty mesmer will use either F3 shatter or mantra of distraction to stun enemy before burst.
With the new 2-hour skirmish structure, we can also rotate the host for the borderland map and simply reset the map after skirmish ends.
With too many maps, population is too divided onto different maps so it takes too long to find action. Also, for the ppt competition, it becomes more about capping undefended structures and backcapping.
I think there only needs to be one EBG and one borderland for most of the time. Only open up more borderlands at prime time.
The treb usage can be easily outplayed. However, it can be effective in some low-level games as players have no idea how to counterplay. This leads to some newish players thinking it is good to use it but in the end being detrimental to their team.
So I think removing the treb is not a bad idea. However, this also completely eliminates all the secondary mechanics on the map.
Ideally, I would like to see the treb being easier to access, easier to repair to make it actually an important part of the map.