As for proposed changes to the skill, I think it should be 33% reduced damage and condition duration at 33% HP or something along that standard… basically work as a condition removal alternative that is stronger than empathic bond but only works for important parts of the fight like when you’re going to die. The nerf to the reduced damage more to help along the lines of keeping it a balanced skill.
I also think it would work much better if damage was calculated slightly differently when the skill triggered. For example, say you take 5k damage normally and only 1k damage is needed to put you under 25%… then the remaining 4k damage has 50% removed from it so you only take 3k damage overall instead.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Where would Bark Skin see the most use in what builds?
I’ve used it in “tanky” dps builds (by tanky i mean something like valk or barbarian/knights something that isn’t totally damage oriented) and i’ve also used it in bunker builds and it works really well in both, ESPECIALLY if you’ve got a heal like TU or are running a lot of regen because it makes you extremely hard to kill once you drop into that 25% threshold unless they’re condi damage.
I personally think it works best when using HaO paired with high regen uptime, the regen itself tends to keep you alive long enough for HaO to come back off CD and allow you to shoot back up in health and really throw people off.
Pve/dungeons/fractals/wvw?
And also it just negates direct damage, not condition damage :/
does the beast master signet trait affect Signet of Stone being able to negate conditions? or not? i haven’t tried that yet, though i’ve wanted to since like forever lol
Normally sPvP, but i’ve used it in Dungeons/Fractals before, didn’t really notice it there but that’s because i normally don’t get downed very much….
Also, it’s good for toughness AND vitality builds, toughness builds it cuts the balls off of like all damage you take, and for vitality builds it gives you the tankyness you normally lack (granted only for a short time)
I’d argue its effectiveness on toughness builds. I have toughness up the butt and still get hit with some pretty heavy damage depending on the opponent. If you’re fighting an opponent that doesn’t hit hard, you don’t need it in the first place. I still get hit with 5k+ damage at times, and that’s more than enough to skip the entire pool of HP that would even trigger your bark skin. Even if it doesn’t, a single hit from a thief or warrior can do 1000s of damage even with 3000+ armor. Bark skin still won’t keep you alive for more than a couple hits if you don’t have a high health pool. This isn’t for all enemies of course, but for most scenarios Empathic Bond is a better alternative since it weighs as a much more beneficial skill over the course of a fight than one that only keeps you alive for a few more hits when you’re already going down.
And in response to an earlier post of yours, even using a regen build, I’d still recommend Empathic Bond over Bark Skin. We don’t have much condition removal and a regen build is centered around strong regens and large uptimes. Poisons generally last for a long time when they’re applied, so without Empathic Bond, we’re suffering huge losses in HP just from 33% reduced healing due to poison. This doesn’t even account for the other effects of conditions that can completely kill a rotation or flip a fight that are removed instantly by your pet. Overall, I just view Empathic Bond as a much more useful skill to regen builds in this conditions meta. Even a glassy thief will drop poisons on you. The only times that Bark Skin might be a better choice would be when fighting warriors and mesmers, and fighting one of these rather than something else (not even counting when you run into a group) is in the minority of encounters from my experience. Empathic Bond has got it beat in almost every aspect outside of strictly determined 1v1 dueling, at least in my opinion.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
I fought a really good ranger tonight, was reigning health like a feind and evading everywhere, was a really long fight but was able to drop me in the end most damage came from conditions and pets. Don’t know the build but was supper annoying to fight.
Ye you see one of those once in a blue moon. I think the problem is that their damage mostly come from the pet. If you keep an eye on the pet and time your dodges you should do fine.
You’re better off tacking on -cond duration % food. The pets don’t deal anywhere as much damage if they can’t hit you. They are dumb as hell. It’s the ranger’s soft CCs that are doing all the background work. If you drop those freezes and cripples quicker, the pet is little more than a yappy dog that can’t quite touch you for the most part.
Also, if you’re fighting a condition ranger, those conditions do a hell of a lot more damage than people give credit for… especially the poisons which sap 33% of your heals while being relatively easy to tack on.
Keeping on the subject of this thread though, would say the terrormancer necros and certain pesky thieves.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Where would Bark Skin see the most use in what builds?
Vitality based builds. Otherwise it only gives maybe one or two hits extra before dying (assuming the hit that enters you into that 25% HP threshold leaves you with any viable amount of HP to begin with). The problem with it is more in that when you enter the 25% HP threshold, a lot of the time you will actually have a lot less than 25%. You are more likely going to be at 15-20% HP when its effect even starts taking effect. If you’re unlucky, you could be looking at something even much lower, but at best, you can’t have much more. At this point, unless you are using a high vitality build, you’re only looking at like ~3k HP. How much will 50% damage reduction REALLY help you at this point? Not much in comparison to the much more constant effect of empathic bond.
Vitality based builds will allow you to enter the threshold with much more of a health pool to work with. Additionally, you are less likely to enter it after a big hit that leaves you with only 1k-2k HP (in which case, 50% damage reduction doesn’t really do you any good anyways).
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Now it’s chest thumping when no one cares, because there are no rewards and no glory to be gained.
Have fun winning nothing this week BP. Please feel free to win. (We had enough of your tears when you were crying yourselves to sleep during League. So our bottles are full, but we’ll see you next League, and pound you into the dirt where you belong.)
P.S. I think most of us just feel sorry for you at this point.
Look back at your league rewards and tell me again that those matches matter.
A couple yellows and a few greens. The yellows didn’t even salvage for anything ;(
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Hello Ehmry Bay. I know I don’t speak for Borlis Pass. But I do speak for almost 400 WvW players on borlis pass.
Welcome. Welcome to the blasted desert of reality. The cold hard existence of the real. Where mommy yaks bend and the illusion of relevance is no longer present to hold your hand and wipe your nose when the going gets tough.
And the going is to be very tough. Mommy yak is no longer present Ehmry. You are here. With us. Alone. To our crystal desert pals, I can say we honestly don’t care how the chips fall this week, or the next. So long as Ehmry suffers. And they will suffer. The chickens come home to roost my friends, and your alliance with yaks means nothing now.
You belong to Borlis.
Lol you’re a joke. Please keep talking.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
You are in PvE so why get so upset about WvW? You aren’t helping your server yet you blame its shortcomings this week on us. If there weren’t so many people like you saying “welp! PvE week!” like you did at the beginning, BP could be in a much better position right now.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
EBay’s obviously a lot different than last Spring, though nice to see Menorah back. BP is different too, but not as much, Kalkz notwithstanding. Just fact, not server bashing. I have nothing against Ebay, actually always respected the old Ebay a lot. This Ebay I’m not too familiar with, other than Void who I like. BB has had some good gvg’s with those guys.
Y’all sure do draw a lot of conclusions about all of us based on some forum posts from a few.
Thank you for the nice words. We acutely are the same Ehmry bay, few new guilds and commander but mostly the same. Most of PK is now Void and most of FTF is now ZoD. And we have been trying to get more organized as a server.
I can same the same about a lot of BP post making conclusions about us
Just out of curiosity what do you think is deferent about ehmry bay?
No Rekz, no GF, thought there were a few others. We gvg’d Die this week, pretty sure they weren’t around before. I thought you guys were new too, didn’t realize you were FTF. We (Soul) had an awesome gvg with FTF way back when, nice to see you still around. I knew Void was from PK. Menorah, I did not mean I don’t respect this Ebay, just that I’m less familiar with your server now than when we fought every week. Does the original dumpster man Archer still live?
Ah I know, I was speaking more generally. I said “you” but I don’t mean you in particular.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
The only things different are that we had transfers off. The people you see are the same as the ones who were around before, just many have different tags. If you respected those before, I’m not sure why there wouldn’t be the respect now.
Also Zara, where is the hostility coming from? Did I do something to offend you, or do you respond with acid to all old friends that take a break from the game and miss the drama?
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
If BP wins, it’s because EBay is a terrible server that is only a shadow of its former self.
If EBay wins, it’s because EBay is a terrible server that is only a shadow of its former self.
Also, when is there ever a situation in which anyone needs to server bash?
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Don’t put much weight on it GabGar. The same people still crying about an alliance are the ones saying “focus EBay”… which is somewhat ironic when you think about how the purpose of an alliance is to focus one server.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
not that I’m aware of. But the 4/5 spots are going to be either EB or BP; and EB realllllly hates BP (not sure whether the feeling is mutual. all I know is, YB people aren’t as positive about BP as they are about EB, so if we’d get our pick for 4th, we’d go for EB. /shrug); so they want to finish higher than BP – that being the reward
The hate between EB and BP is stupid. A couple people had an argument and shared their hate for the other on a large scale. Suddenly you have servers rallying against each other because of what was originally a grudge between only a few individuals since people are sheep baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. Now it’s devolved into a bit more than that, but originally it was just people parroting their commanders.
That’s beside the point though. Beating SBI helped two servers more than it helped one. That’s the bottom line, really.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Walking loot bad (ranger) ((pun intended)) looking for friendly victim… er… enthusiast to test new build on in controlled environment. Come alone to windmill and ignore the four other naked bearbows that will attack you on sight.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Overall, yes, but the amount of QQ generated by the SBI/YB/EBay matchup was worth all the unbalanced, awful, nightcapping, supply cheating, hacking, poor sportsmanship BS.
I wonder how high on the list of “biggest WvW upsets” it would rank
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
A lot of BP players blame EBay already for “riding Yak Bends coattails”. They ignore that their forum warriors, a very select few who are very obvious without being named, have ticked off so many people from both sides that an alliance isn’t needed to focus down their server.
Your server is an attractive target. Blame the people who made it so satisfying to punch in the face.
Just keep our heads down and everything will be okay. At least you admit we’re being double teamed.
While on the subject of forum warriors, don’t forget how vile some of yours were back during the EB/BP/AR days.
Ironically enough, the people who were most offensive back then are on your server now embraced as loving friends. Nothing against them, I hope they’re happy where they are now, but if you want to bring up our “vile” forum warriors from the past, I don’t see how so much animosity can be directed towards the much more sporting ones now… especially when you guys pulled the whole “we forgive you for everything you ever did wrong to us now that you transferred over.”
I don’t know. I could be missing something, but I don’t understand all the cries of foul play when there is just as much of the same sentiment on BP to focus the hell out of EBay whenever we are matched up. Of course a double team will happen. Yak’s may be the biggest and baddest of our three servers at the moment, but they’re just an extra like any other server paired up in a BP/EB matchup. What are they supposed to do, sit on their thumbs and wait for all our commanders to shake hands and make up?
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
I just realized that the same people crying “alliance” are the same ones who did so last match-up when we overtook BP.
Not even worth explaining to them. The people who would listen don’t need stuff like this debated, and the loud ones who will always scream foul play when things don’t go their way are the ones we’ve been seeing posts from.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
What people may not know, and this is actually very hush-hush info that I’m sure will lead me to get banned from the forums and ostracized on my server, but I cannot take it anymore.
The fact of the matter is that, yes, last matchup against YB and SBI there was an alliance.
It was just with YB and SBI.
You see, that last day, where Ebay finally overtook SBI in PPT? Well, the dailies that day were for repairing and capping, y’know how that is. So what Yak’s was doing was just knocking down SBI walls so SBI could repair and get their dailies. SBI responded by allowing them to knock down their walls, so YB could finish their meta achievements.
We just happened to show up and walk through the holes in the wall before SBI could repair them. It’s no one’s fault, really. We weren’t aware of any alliance that day. We certainly didn’t mean to upset SBI to such a degree. I assume that YB thought that SBI would just retake the stuff, so YB moved on to the next structure to knock down.
So, really, there you have it. People should be congratulating Ebay for pulling one over on two larger servers. But nope, we have to be insulted and mocked, just because of some petty jealousy. It’s really quite sad.
And, really, with the way BP is acting, it doesn’t really make us look like the ugly girlfriend. It makes us look like the head cheerleader. The bride, to BP’s bridesmaid.
Now, now, BP, you’ll never be a bride like us if you keep giving it (your borderland) up to every young gentleman caller that ram their way past that gaping opening you call a gate.
I love you whoever you are.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
A lot of BP players blame EBay already for “riding Yak Bends coattails”. They ignore that their forum warriors, a very select few who are very obvious without being named, have ticked off so many people from both sides that an alliance isn’t needed to focus down their server.
Your server is an attractive target. Blame the people who made it so satisfying to punch in the face.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Yep. Expected 7th, finishing higher. The BP poll had your server predicting 2nd place witha good amount saying 1st. I’m not going to tell you everyone on BP is terrible for finishing lower than expected so I don’t understand why you feel the need to demonize all EBay players for spicing things up.
Turn off your computer and take a walk, bud. You’re taking this way too personally.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
I can top that. I got an infraction for circumventing the swear filter by using the phonic spelling of the letter F out in a post.
I can top that. My account name has been infracted/changed so many times that it now glitches when I’m logged in and switches between two of them every hour or so. People can’t send me mail most of the time.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Nah posting names incites a witch hunt. Better to send evidence to exploits@arena.net. They respond quickly to issues sent to that email. Using the report feature and/or stirring up the drama pot does nothing to help.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
Not SBI’s argument, bud. A few people from SBI are arguing that. I really hope you don’t believe EBay to be a hivemind as well. There are people from our side making stupid cases that are not worthy of our collective acceptance.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
I hope FA and DB gangs up against SBI and teach them a lesson.
You hope FA and DB gangs up on SBI for pointing out you 2v1 this week?
How come the only server that seems to be embarrassed by this is Yaks..
EB doesn’t seem to care, and freely admits it… SBI is pointing it out…But Yaks is acting all insulted when we point out the obvious.
Insulted? Lol no.
It’s you who are getting the taste of your own medicine and hence the crying.
We are embarrassed? Nope. It’s you, who should be. You guys chest thump, QQ on here how strong you guys are and still would finish 3rd? Can there be more embarrassing situation than this? :p
I’m going to guess relying on a 2nd server to win would be a more embarrassing situation.
Are you sure it is more embarrassing than relying on fairweathers to win?
Nope, i’m pretty sure relying on your own fair weathers + an entire other server of fair weathers is more embarrassing.
Explain to me how we are relying on Ebay at 4 am server time, when our tick is 400+ and ebay is struggling to hold their own BL.
Don’t you realize that we’re just trying to make it look like we’re having trouble in the middle of the night? I thought you got our super secret alliance memo explaining the importance of misdirection.
Faux, the super commander of YB has spoken, They didn’t need your help at all.. you didn’t help them at all..
It was all them.
You’re right. I didn’t help them a single bit. I haven’t even logged in this matchup :P
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
I hope FA and DB gangs up against SBI and teach them a lesson.
You hope FA and DB gangs up on SBI for pointing out you 2v1 this week?
How come the only server that seems to be embarrassed by this is Yaks..
EB doesn’t seem to care, and freely admits it… SBI is pointing it out…But Yaks is acting all insulted when we point out the obvious.
Insulted? Lol no.
It’s you who are getting the taste of your own medicine and hence the crying.
We are embarrassed? Nope. It’s you, who should be. You guys chest thump, QQ on here how strong you guys are and still would finish 3rd? Can there be more embarrassing situation than this? :p
I’m going to guess relying on a 2nd server to win would be a more embarrassing situation.
Are you sure it is more embarrassing than relying on fairweathers to win?
Nope, i’m pretty sure relying on your own fair weathers + an entire other server of fair weathers is more embarrassing.
Explain to me how we are relying on Ebay at 4 am server time, when our tick is 400+ and ebay is struggling to hold their own BL.
Don’t you realize that we’re just trying to make it look like we’re having trouble in the middle of the night? I thought you got our super secret alliance memo explaining the importance of misdirection.
Ehmry Bay – Grindhouse Gaming [GH]
Menorah | Charr Cat | Some Cat Thing
Still running my old RRR build because why not
