Guild Wars 2

The league system is just plain obsiously geared towards low MMR people.

From my understanding, you lose less and win more pips with a low MMR (got 2 pips for wins more than once and no i don’t tank my MMR, i’ve just got less than 50 ranked games). While being a high skilled player such as Helseth gets you really punished if you lose and barely rewarded for winning.

I think this system COULD work if Helseth and many other experienced players were grouped with similar-skilled players AND were already in a rank reflecting their skill level (ruby / diamond at the least). These guys have so much to lose and so little to win I don’t even understand why he bothers (love is a curse i guess).

From what I see, unless Helseth groups up with his team and goes on roflstomp rampage there is no chance for him (and similar players) to get to an adequate division. I don’t think it’s fun, nobody does.

But hey, top priority is privileging casuals in a competitive mode right ?

Was it like that in GW1 ?

Dungeons were not intended to be soloed, and were because mechanics could be avoided single handily (LoS, vertical ledge…).

Not going to happen there.

A solo practice mode for bosses could be nice though.

From what i’ve seen, the precursor is the main obstacle in the completion of the new legendaries. The other parts are pretty much easy (100 T6 mats, 250 T5 for gifts) so I’m guessing this is why the precursor crafting is costly.

Someone did the maths on Nevermore ; it cost him ~2.4kg I think. Which is significantly lower than most two handed weapons.

The only thing I feel sorry for you are the Energy Crystals requirements that just stop your progression. At least for me with bolt I knew I’d be done with it in 10 days.

The only big issue I have about DH are the limited dodges at my disposal to evade the obvious big hits.

I believe there is a 0.5 sec animation over a trap before they start doing the damage. I’ve tested it on a necro and you can effectively trigger a trap, dodge it as a result and get next to nothing damage-wise.

The longbow #2 is easy to spot, so if you get an 8k you kinda deserved it.

My only issue is the spear of justice pulling me into his traps. Sure stability helps, but its on such a low cooldown it over takes my stab uptime. And dodging it + #2 LB just indicates I have no dodges left so opens the way for a JI burst.

A quick fix would be to start the CD on traps once they decay or are triggered and give them the ability to remove for a reduced CD. This way DH will have to actually think before laying them and not be able to lay down one layer, then JI + trap on spot.

SarcasticSeer.9152:

Vapour.7348:

Posts like these are ridiculous because as a Reaper I can say exactly the SAME thing about Diamond Skin Auromancer Tempest – It’s literally like hitting a wall. Nothing I could do to drop its HP below 90% when running the Reaper build you are complaining about.

I could say the same thing again with Daredevils.

And yet again with Mallyx/shiro heralds.

That’s 3 counters, to me that says the build is fine.

Hello there! I noticed that you forgot that in Reaper’s Shroud the Necromancer gains access to some abilities they may not have in humanoid form. Fortunately, I was able to log into my Diamond Skin Tempest Auramancer. This allows me to present you the total health of one, and the armor I have in Earth Attunement as well.

Executioner’s Scythe Calculations
Damage Done = (weapon strength) * Power * (1.5) / target armor
Damage Done = (1111)(1900)(1.5) / 2698
Damage Done = 1173.6
Damage Needed To Cross Below 90%: 1899

So, one Executioner’s Scythe isn’t enough to get them below 90%. However, let’s couple together Executioner’s Scythe with Soul Spiral, which is another move the Reaper has at their disposal.

Damage Done (12x) = (weapon strength) * Power * (2.8) / target armor
Damage Done (12x) = (1111)(1900)(2.8) / 2698
Damage Done (12x) = 2190
Damage Needed To Cross Below 90%: 1899

Hmm. So it looks like even though Executioner’s Scythe alone isn’t enough to get the Diamond Skin Tempest below the 90% threshold, but it seems like Soul Spiral is adequate enough to do so.

You forgot to multiply this number by .33 due to protection (7 seconds on a 8,25 CD), and add the infamous cele regeneration (500 HP per sec) which is also close to permanent.

Also the fact that diamond skin makes you immuned to fears, so basically a carrion frost fire has only 2 option to dent you :

- Use elite skill (1.25 sec channel) and pray you don’t switch into air and blind them so that he can use the scythe reliably (1.25 sec channel).

- Burn the signets to corrupt your protection + regeneration and try the burst (assuming you are kittened and didn’t blind us), then watch you heal and reapply protection. Congrats we burned a 24 CD skill + burst while you just used a heal + 8 ICD attunement, now we are doing next to 0 damage.

Oh, did I mention the perma vigor, the in-built evade skill on dagger and earth #4 focus ? And of course, you don’t take any breakstuns, so a lucky scythe is an auto-win right ?

Least but not last, boon corruption is random, condition transfer is random (100% love it when I transfer cripple instead of my 13 stacks of burn or when I corrupt might instead of stab or protect). So there isn’t even a garantee to convert your stability into fea… I mean strip it.

If you struggle against a necromancer, you should probably let your cat play in your stead.

Honestly, I’d trade a 10% damage reduction on chill anyday against a clear, funtionnal and reliable table of boon corruption / condition transfer priority that would state something like :

- Stab > Resistance > Protection > Regeneration > don’t care
- Fear > Damaging conditions by intensity > Chill > don’t care

An easy fix : have levels of difficulty for the raid that impact the rage timer.

DPS meters can and should be implemented in the only content where it is relevant (Raids).

The question is, can the raid content be cleared with subpar dps ?

The only information at our disposal is the gear. But sadly, this is not nearly enough to get a grasp on one’s true dps, wich involves traits, skill rotations and such.

In the same way that we have AR checks before fractals, having dps checks beforehand will only make a clear representation of one’s contribution, and I dare to think people will not be prone to dps check the tank or healer.

Will this shut down build diversity ? No. The requirements emerging from the content are already set up. You NEED dps in order to pass it.

Would it enforce the dps-meta (joke intended) ? I believe it will encourage decent players into becoming better, and prevent the non-hardcore ones from joining the dreaded elitists scumbags.

1) Go full glasscannon.

2) Grab a shield.

3) Practice you invulnerability / bloc rotations (sword #2, shield #4, well, f3)

4) watch non-necros try to follow up and die

5) Laugh off their corpses

Shield gives extra quickness to your group and CC, can’t go wrong with it. Plus I find it very useful in DS during the circle numbing phase, when I have to run through a dozen archers and trackers.

Oh, i didn’t even go further than 10 – but i am lvl 50. (I might just do one 50 to get the fractal skin vendor, but I can’t be bothered by the kitten instability)

No, what really put me off was that I had two bank tabs full of rings. And lost money in the process (~ 10g)

My concept of pve is that you should be rewarded for doing the content, not punished for doing a necessity (freeing inventory space).

If fractals don’t drop ascended gear (or at such low rate), they are a big waste of time.

Farm Iron Ore, contribute to decreasing their overall price. Make everyone happy.

(You may want to do the same for Flax seeds)

Have you tried the ley-lined armor ?

Most pieces looked quite nice on male charrs.

I am so glad I sold my +10 infusions before HoT…

Since the ring salvage at 1g per charge I have been avoiding fractals as plague. No regrets.

Skoigoth.9238:

Exos.3472:

Self-sustain isn’t meta.

How do you know what will be meta in raids? Are you beta-testing them? Because if not…

It would be pointless to state meta for raids without knowing it’s content, I was simply stating why necromancers have yet to find a competitive spot in actual pve content.

Their selling point is the full glasscannon setup with high sustain (LF generation, high HP pool, possible investment in HP/Toughness due to 100% base crit chance – too bad cavalier is Toughness+).

Until pve content does not require defensive stats to be doable, Necromancers are unlikely to be the preferred choice.

Guide for killing a DH as a reaper in a 1v1 :

1) Rush in, blow DH’s cds

2) Get downed

Edit : let him think you’re done for

3) Spam 1 then 3 when available

4) Down him

5) Profit

10/10 works in marauder / zerk amulet

Self-sustain isn’t meta.

Roaming wise, Warriors are good for running away and dropping rez banners. While they have good mobility (sword/greatsword) they can’t lock on to targets unless you hamper this with a hammer or to a lesser extent, a shield.

Edit : if you feel insecure, you can always use rampage (if you are not shrugged off by the nerfs).

In zergs, the cc from hammer is nice, but the rez banner is probably the only thing you would want from him a Herald could not do better…

Use wurm.

→ Pop pet in safe.

→ Get hard focused.

→ Chicken out.

→ ???

→ Profit

It’s from the guild merchant, unlocked at level 23.

You can buy the recipes off from the TP, but as I recall the light version is quite costly.

Other than than, I’m fairly certain you can buy it from the merchants in HoT zones, namely the Itzels, the Exalted and the Nuhochs.

Start gathering from those maps tho.

Make the bounty very low at start, then grow exponentially based on kills & map objectives ?

This might encourage a little more the zerg play, but I think the prime issue here is to make people stay on wvw they should be able to play along the wvw mechanics, have fun AND earn adequate rewards.

Chronommancers aren’t widely represented because the new elite profession is very different in comparison to its base class.

We need time to treat it as an entire new profession and work around its skill ceiling, but believe me when chronos are ready you will be kissing their glamorous kittens.

How would getting gold from killing other players as a new reward impact wvw ? I was imagining a system where the higher the ranks, the higher the reward.

Will this suffice to tone down k-train and / or promote an open world pvp environment ?

How badly can such a system be abused ?

Would this be healthy for this game mode ?

Shtos Vant.4182:

Warrior Sword/Shield / Longbow
Not Berserker.
Trait immob on cripple in tactics line, even throw a sigil of incap. on the long bow. As mentioned before, headbutt/bulls rush/bolas all utilities possible to snag someone.

Tactics/Defense/Discipline. I’ve been a monster with that lineup for picking off tails. The longbow wears ‘em down, then when you catch up with the sword leap it’s just a final thrust from all being over.

I also had success with GreatSword/Longbow. Tactics/Strength/Discipline. Glassier, but if you land 100 Blades it’s game over.

In the HoT world, though, I’ve found warrior to be very niche in only this role- and behind the curve elsewhere. I’ve taken to running a Deathblossom/Lotus dodge spam thief. Catches stuff pretty darn well if you go d/d and d/p for teleport/shadowstep/daze steal

Now I want to test that sw/sh & LB in a viper + militia combo.

Wolfric.9380:

Druid ?. Very solid roming class. I play ele and pair with a druid trapper and its great.

Mind elaborating ? So far the druids I have been against were solid condi specs with massive heals that would tear me down very slowly.

I don’t recall the ranger to have many escape mechanics, as its prime defence consists of 1.5k range. NSFT.

(NotSorryForTrolling)

Thank you very much for those elaborate responses.
I am pleasantly surprised my feeling for the mesmer as a roamer was rather accurate, and while it remains true that their mobility out of combat is lackluster their burst and escape abilities make up for their viability as roamers.

Revenant will probably be a strong alternative when I find a good roaming group since they seem to miss on speed stacking. Unless I use that brick wall for explosion material (dwarf legend I think), which would then help a lot. I don’t find mesmer to be that effected since i can blink and Chronos have that nice +25% boost.

And Straegan, any input on elems ? They seem like more than decent roamers.

Interesting.

You are specializing in RS skill 2, our main movement gap closer – I actually remember this skill being quite deadly on celestial necromancers, since we could follow up with fears, immob an other nice stuff once up close.

I think the main reason we are failling is because we just went full pve (valkyrie amulet, wurm rune + spite + SR + reaper and 0 sustain since BB got hammernerfed).

Hi !
Now before anyone stops me, I know the new borderline maps are not friendly to roamers, hence why I believe the choice of class is fundamental.

My goal will be to tag along the tail of disorganized enemy zergs and pick off targets left behind. Maybe in the forseeable future I would like to group up with fellow roamers to take on bigger targets. Who knows.

Anyway, my concerns for a good roamer should be :

1. Mobility for obvious reasons
   - out of combat travel to catch up zergs, chase targets and so on
   - escape possibilities since I will always be outnumbered
   - stealth is optional, but has its weight

1. Burst because I can’t afford to hang around
   - power or condi, it doesn’t matter both can be fun

1. Support
   - since i am aiming for small scale fights, on-the-fly group support can spike the dps even more, help in disengage and many more.
   Note : please note that i am not tied to one type of support, each class has its perks (mesmer pu will give stealth whereas rev will give boons & auras…)

So far, classes I am practising with :

1. Chronomancer
   Very promising, especially with the specialisation giving us extra mobility, a unique boon and a very interesting new mechanic skill. I believe the chrono to be a high floor and high ceiling skill cap, whose strength is 100% depend on player’s skill.

I am considering a PU chronomancer power shatter spec for hit and run tactics. The problem is that i will probably run just one well (the staby invu one) since mass invisibility is a given in this context.

1. Warrior
   Sceptical, since I am having a hard time adapting to the new changes on the greatsword, and going greatsword / sword + wh OR sh is over reliant on teamplay. (F1 sword for immob and focus). The support is nice tho, but I don’t like the idea of being a one trick rez bot teammate and a warhorn blower.
   The problem I feel is that Warriors without rampage have low damage compared to other classes, and when taking it they forgo the banner in favor of a telegraphed shot.
   Of course, popping rampage out of stealth can be funny…

I will probably try :

1. Thief / Daredevil
   At lost. It has long been considered THE roaming class by design, with its superior mobility and stealth generation. But this class just keeps getting nerfs (destroyed the s/d build, increase in revealing abilities which indirectly impacts their stealth mechanics) and questionable buffs (double pistol).
   I haven’t tried the Daredevil, but it looks like a fantastic dueler, with high mobility and fast paced gameplay.

1. Guardian & DragonHunter
   Mixed feelings, I’ve heard DH is the guardian godmode in a similar way chrono is to mesmer. While I don’t like roaming as a guardian (mobility problems) the mediguard is still solid. I could use some opinions on DH though, since I haven’t touched it yet.

Insight on both classes would be welcome.

Besides, the classes I am considering :

1. Revenant
   High expectations. This class appears to have all I am looking for ; high sustained dps, above average mobility and chasing ability, group support and to top it off considerable survivability (active and passive) even in glass canon. People tend to say the only drawback to this class is its absence of stealth.
   Really if this is its only fault I just can’t see any reason to play warrior anymore.

1. Engineer / Scrapper
   Highly Interested. Another class that appeals by being able to do everything.
   I’ve also heard the Scrapper can keep 100% stealth uptime for him and his team mates (I know there is a visible drone thougt), so I can see many uses for commando operation-like on big zergs.

I would have listed the elementalist in there as well, but the mechanics just don’t seem all that natural for me. I have tried many times to settle down and try the class out, but the failure is so hard I just can’t even see a starting point to improve. Of course, insight on what i am supposed to do as an elem and advice on it will be well recieved.

All point of views are welcome.

The question should actually be what the Rev CANNOT do.

I used to think Rev’s weakness was its mobility… until I tried fleeing from one.

If skill #3 was a grab similar to necrotic grasp (reaching target’s position instead of grabbing him to us) on a low cooldown… this just might solve some of our mobility problems.

I understand reaper is supposed to stick to its target by continuously applying chill. But we have 1 gap closer on RS and no suitable initial chill (#5 won’t hit on not-immobile targets) and going out of RS just after the gap closing makes me feel uneasy.

Sure, we have an AoE grab on our gs, but the long cooldown just makes it too risky to initiate.

It would make sense IMO for the Reaper who is a melee spec to have the tools to stick to its target.

PS : many of my pvp friends (and myself) are avoiding Reaper since it’s just too easily kited.

I’m trying to find a use for skill #3 greatsword… 900 range maybe ? Or change it to a second CC since Anet doesn’t want to give us mobility.

Bearhugger.4326:

Berserker is 10/10 on style, 1/10 on usefulness.
Then you have Dragonhunter that is 1/10 on style, 10/10 on usefulness.
Reaper is 10/10 on style, 10/10 on usefulness.
Daredevil and Tempest are 1/10 on style, 2/10 on usefulness.

Then what did I do to deserve a trap DragonHunter in my fractal party ?

Reaper is a one trick pony, once you stop being afraid of that big scythe and notice it takes ages long for our attacks to load they will quickly go back to the grave.

I didn’t find Daredevil to have many changes compared to pre-HoT thief. Although they did improve his duelling ability, which I feel happy for them.

As for Tempest. I don’t play one, but I’ve yet to see a elem-player complain about anything on it… which is quite disturbing considering gw2 community is a whinning fest.

PS : I also include myself inside the complaints, since corruption doesn’t work as intended.

Title is rather explicit. Since the chances of the B.R.U.T.A.L spot where these were farmed, I have great difficulty finding them anywhere.

I have nothing against removing a potential over use of spawning mobs, but in return should’nt it be just to increase their apearance elsewhere in a non-farming inducing way ?

So far, I’ve noticed we can get a few in Dragon’s Stand after a successfull meta event. But they run in packs and often with elites/veterans so it’s near impossible to go there solo.

I do meet some of them here and there, but never consistantly so this is getting quite problematic.

I want to complain about light armor no having enough ‘ragged’ leggings to actually be creative.

So that means we still have to spam might even if we already have a rev or warrior stacking might for us ?

Anet definetily doesn’t want necromancers to be part of any group content.

The problem with the reaper is that gear stats are never distributed to optimize our dps.

- trinkets do not have a pure valkyrie stat, so we can’t stack the wurm’s rune +7% ferocity from vitaly passive as massively as in pvp. [250% critical damage in pvp]

- there is no Power/Toughness/Ferocity with major Power stat, making Cavalier a dps loss. that’s really bad because otherwise death magic (14% toughness converted in power when in shroud) would go wild with furious sharpening stones (100 toughness & +10% toughness converted into ferocity)

I was having fun with my duumfire reaper :
- zerk armor + scholar runes
- sinister trinkets

I decided to switch death perception for duumfire since sinister gave me enough precision with the new reaper trait. Also Worth saying the precision buff is active in AND out of shroud, so its cool.

On exotic armor / weapons & ascended trinkets i could get around 1.7k to 2k ticks of continuous burn and a burst of 1k poison from my spin2win. If i added the raw damage i would get to 8k dps per target, which I thought was respectable.

Then I discussed my results my a friend using a Sinister Engi.

And I cried… and cried… (20k dps)

PS : I believe necromancer’s selling point has always been its survival and still is. The melee version makes sense in high density opponents getting killed and usually outlasts any other melee professions when it comes to facetanking while wearing no defensive stats. This of course only applies to open pve, since in pvp a melee necromancer is a mesmer’s fav target to moa…

Not impossible. But unless you range and kite all mobs (hence doing low damage), have a perfect knowledge of the boss mechanics and are lucky it’s closer to impossible than easy.

I’ve seen people solo the story part rather easily, but for the explorables it might be done in ele. But i’m quite skeptical about the damage of a lvl 35 ele (you are missing on too many traits imo).

Just… Why ?

Now that most of our current farming places have been guttered, that the gold income is low and that we have to invest heavily to get back into fractals (consumables, ascend gear…)

Just… Why ?

Aylpse.6280:

Others are locked into some lines/utilities. (Im looking at Ele, Warrior and Ranger mostly >>)

Nearly any class has that problem.

Can you play necro without soul kitten ? You’re doing yourself a disservice by forgoing that unblockable life force generator staff…

Can you play guardian without virtue ? I mean, if you’re not giving away stability there’s something wrong, very wrong going on.

I think what people are expecting is to be given alternatives to those central cores that would still work. (For example as a zerk necromancer, spite and soul reaping are mandatory, but you must then choose between death magic or blood magic. Both of them have their pros and cons, )
But then again, its easier said than done.

What a disappointment.

I guess it will still stay as a default choice when slayer potions don’t cut (mob variety / unknown type) which can be relevant when fighting mossman.

That’s nice.

I did some rough maths in WvW where guards buffs and bloodlust + might made me go up to 4000 power, so crit damage was a thing.

So i’m wondering if in pve ferocity will give better returns than flat damage.

I have a question for you dear min maxers.

On the valkyrie reaper setup.

10% slayer potion or Furious Maintenance Oil ?

Only case i see this becoming a thing is if the raid content forces us to take a few hits from mobile and untelegraphed enemies. We could then soften the dps loss from some toughness in a rather elegant but costly way. One would then make use of a cavalier/assassin mix that would not be as bad dps wise (or even equivilant if we had a stat cavalier with major power).

But arms trait line is stupid. The signet mastery should never have been moved from discipline to a condi oriented branch. /rant off

5 cele necros to the rescue !

I’m not so sure about warrior, but on some classes a full berserk set can get you past the 100% precision cap.

Since there is a consummable for converting toughness into ferocity and professions usually convert toughness into power, i’m fairly sure by replacing the extra precision (understand anything over 100%) with toughness should resolve in a dps increase. (I did some quick maths for necromancers with the cavalier set and it had a 6% increase in EP vs the zerk set, but i’ve yet to find a way for warrior to get that much precision).

But i have to admit in pve with the slaying potions i’m quite skeptical about the dps gap…

The day they introduce the power/toughness/ferocity (power major stat) armor and trinket stat, my hopes of a dps build superior to the zerk shall be reborn.

Too bad the warriors trait for stacking toughness is in defence.

Obindo.6802:

Fast hands Baseline and Blind immunity

Your standards are too low. We should have 5 stacks of stability pulsing when we activate a stance, instant reveal debuff when near stealth enemies and 100% uptime for rampage.

oh. and a macro for pvp-ing while afk.

I doubt it would change anything.

Warriors already have a very offensive toolkit built in their weapons & traits. They need the utility bar mainly for defense and/or support.

The only place one could find it viable would be in pve where you do not require much defense mechanism (so far for warrior).

BUT. To justify not taking banners, the damage from those skills should be higher than the dps loss witnessed overall on a group. Which is unlikely to happen.

All in all, I believe physical skills should be something more or even something else than damage. I would argue emphasizing the CC part of it for instance. Making some cool judo-like moves on enemies in a kungkittenmaster b&n style would be awesome.

Cooldowns on greatsword are so low, i don’t feel the need to swap weapons in a normal rotation (dodge/dodge/heal/burst/hundred blades/whirlwind/rush/auto/burst rince & repeat… or something like that).

if you master the greatsword, you have covered 90% of the warrior in pve.

To some point it can.
Remember when guard symbols were bugged and didn’t ha limitation on the +10% damage buff ?

It was guard hammer meta or get the kitten out. But in their defense, fractals 50 in 20 minutes was awesome.

OP clearly is a joke, warriors are rarely welcome when the group has a ps.