Guild Wars 2

It’s RNG and it’s terrible. I’ve spent like 20 slivers trying to get a single Orrian piece. Combined with really low drop rate of crystals and slivers (I’m sure one day I’ll find some use for those 5000 arcane powders I got stashed up), it makes quite hard to get the gear you want…

I love the PvP in this game, but seeing as they put 10 times more effort in PvE events… I still wonder how Anet wants this game to become an esport when they treat PvPers as 2nd class citizens. If there’s a small bug in PvE, they release hotfix, but when it comes to pvp bugs and exploits they’re like ‘Oh, no worries, we’ll fix it, just bear with it for the next 2 weeks.’

Most of my team already found another game to play until 15th. And if they drop the ball with this patch, I guess they won’t be coming back for a while.

I guess, but it’ld have to be something much more meaningful than a simple 5 second boon. Fully charged Eviscerate or Earthshaker can turn fights 180.

Idea isn’t bad but without burst skills traits and weapon skills themselves would need extra rework. Look at Axe’s Eviscerate, Rifle’s Kill Shot or Hammer’s Earthshaker. Removing burst skills would seriously weaken many weapons.

It’s true, there seem to be less and less people playing. It’s most noticeable in paid tourneys, in EU prime time there’s like 10 teams playing in total.
We’ve faced Super Squad in every single tourney we played over last 2-3 days :P.

JonathanSharp.7094:

We’ll be touching most of the classes, if not all.

Capricorn is more geared for pub fun, and it’s not in our tournament rotation for a reason.

Glad to hear.
Could you elaborate what you mean by ‘touching’? Bug fixes, big balance changes, or perhaps just some small things?

I agree. It’s the worst of 4 maps, sharks or not. The day it’s added to tournament rotation is the day most of the serious PvPers go looking for a new game.

As Furbs said, trying to balance underwater combat just for 1 hot-join map seems like a waste of time. I can easily think of a dozen more important matters in pvp.

Well que times are weird. Sometimes we have to wait for 20min during prime time, sometimes it’s instant. Everyone stops playing around 2am :P.

Still, having more teams playing would help a lot

@Aragiel

I say play paids. You can’t improve by stomping pugs all day. Even couple hours of playing paids, facing good teams and observing their strategies can yield great results. though.

I love paid tournaments. Much more challenging and entertaining than free ones. Ask anyone from top teams – they’ll take a decent match over pug stomping any day.

On the other hand, I agree with the points made here. Barrier of entry is quite high for new teams. People losing in 1st round can easily get discouraged since they get nothing back for the 5 tickets they put in. I realize this mode is meant to be very competitive, but having people give up paids will only hurt everyone else doing them, due to long ques.

This problem mainly exists for teams that won’t make it past 1st round. Getting 4 tickets back for making it to the 3rd and 4th place is fine.
I can see two ways out of this situation – either implementing ladders ASAP or increasing reward for coming in on 5th-8th place a bit. Even giving 2 tickets back would help. Anything that would

On the other hand we need to remember Anet is still a company that needs to make profit, selling tickets for real money being one of the ways to achieve it.

Dungeon and high-level crafted gear.

Defektive.7283:

I still don’t understand how a Mimic skill is better than the original. (Whirling Axe for warrior doesn’t evade, it just does damage and very little at that.)

Dmg seems okayish (at least with burst builds I tend to use on Warrior), but still doesn’t justify picking axe offhand over shield or mace.

Tbh most of Thief Steal skills are quite powerful. 4s daze from Guardian, 6s chill from Elementalist or the tree from Ranger are also quite good. I guess very long cooldown (~40s) justifies it a bit, but gotta agree, the portable 100b Thief can steal from Warrior is way too powerful.

@aleiro Let me clarify During Dagger Storm they DO take damage from meele attacks. However for the whole duration they get stability boon (can’t be stunned etc.), plus reflect all ranged attacks (including the GS 4, Bolas etc. as they count as projectiles).

As for Whirling Axe (Warrior steal skill), they gain evade for the whole duration, just like during Pistol Whip, there’s no need to dodge, unless it’s for gap closing. It’s pretty much a portable, 360 degree Pistol Whip.

@phaeris What I meant was dodging at the exact moment CnD+Steal would hit, causing both of them to miss and making Basilisk go to waste (as it only lasts for 1 attack, whether it hits or not).

I realize it’s not easy, but it’s certainly doable.

Also, yes, avoiding Whirling Axe and Dagger Storm is important. In any other situation running away and showing your back to Thief is a suicide though, unless you use movement ability to run away (GS 3 or 5, Sword 2, Bull’s Charge). Turning around and running away only makes repeated CnD+Backstabs much easier.

’Don’t be a glass cannon 100b warrior’

OP stated couple times he doesn’t use GS. I suppose some people can’t be bothered to read anything other than the title.

IMO you should focus on learning how to avoid the opener backstab combo, as this is what eats a huge chunk of your health and allows HS spam to be effective.

Most thieves will use either devourer or basilisk venom (or both) to ensure the backstab. You should read it as a giant warning sign ‘HEY, IMA OPEN ON YOU NAO, ALRIGHT?’.
Opener combo is: 1. precasted Cloak and Dagger → 2. Steal → 3. CnD+Steal hit, stealthing the Thief, immobilizing you → 4. Assassin Signet → 5. Backstab
You only need to stop him at step 3 to make whole opener wasted, leaving half his utilities on cooldown. Easiest way to do it is to use Shield 5. It can also be done with well-timed dodge, but requires quite a bit of practice and reading your opponent’s movements, predicting the Steal shadowstep. Last option is to use Endure Pain and eat the whole combo.

As for countering HS spam – anything that affects movement will also work with leap finishers. Immobilize, cripple, chill (like sigil of hydromancy on weapon swap) will leave them jumping up and down in one place, wasting initiative and giving you 2-3 seconds to plan how to best hammer them into the ground.

As I understand it, they only increase in full seconds, so 6 sec, 7 sec, 8 sec etc, rounded down. So if you have say 7,75 sec, it’ll still be 7 sec.

At least that’s what I’ve heard on a Buildcast a while back, feel free to correct me if im wrong.

We got quite active Mists on Desolation.

@bwillb Strange. 90% of 8v8 matches I join got 6-8 thieves at least, sometimes up to 10 even.

@Highlet My win rate is 70%. It’s a fact, not a claim. I never said ‘I win matches solo’ though. Winning a match is a team effort, not a single ‘all me, all me’ person.

Devildoc.6721:

Half of a GOOD use of pistol whip is interrupting a skill and then following through with damage.

I think Head Shot is superior interrupt, simply because it’s instant and ranged.

Devildoc.6721:

Besides it would be incredibly imbalanced if we could move around while doing pistol whip, they’d have to junk the damage and totally ruin the skill.

Not really, there are other ways to balance it out – making you suspectible to root/slow/interrupt while channeling could balance it out nicely.

Garlic Sensei.4103:

thief class has been nerfed to the point its barely even played.

Have you played any 8v8 match recently? It’s rather easy to notice there are twice as many thieves as all the other classes combined.

bwillb.2165:

Heartseeker is a bit of a gap closer, yes, but it’s not like it does much damage if the target is above 50% health. It’s probably one of the most expensive gap closers you’ll find. Also if you’re using ranged weapons, you don’t need gap closers. Get 4 engineers focused on you and you’re really in trouble as they play ping-pong with your lifeless body.

Let me remind you, we are discussing HS spamming, so a case where your main damage ability is also your gap closer :P. You’re right about ranged weapons, just wanted to compare other meele classes though. Also, have you ever seen 4 Engineers on one team? In 8v8 there’s like 1 Engi per 10 Thieves :P.

Also, I find hammer Guardian to be the best ping-pong player. Ever tried trapping enemy between Sanctuary and hammer 5? Fun times. Two guardians can pretty much play a match using your body as a ball.

Man, we’re getting sidetracked.

bwillb.2165:

But what about your own teammates?

I can’t hit my own teammates with PW 0.o
Ah, you mean… Well I guess you could have your team set up some serious CC to help you with your burst. Utility slots are very valuable though and not sure how many classes got this kind of stuff as weapon skills. Hammer 5 on Guardian comes to mind, trapping people inside the circle…

bwillb.2165:

if 3-4 ANYTHING built for burst focus you, you’re going to have a bad time.

Yeah, I know. Actually, I just watched some team’s vid of a match they played against me and couple guildmates, turns out they had red mark on me 90% of the time :P.
Diffirence between HS and most of other meele abilities is range though. If you dodge/get swiftness/create distance in any other way, they have to catch up to you or use gap closers before they can hack away at you. HS is a gap closer on its own ^^.

bwillb.2165:

Now you’re the one only thinking about 1v1 >:D

You got me, wondered if someone would point it out :D. Well, in teamfights people other than your targets can dodge out instantly as they won’t be stunned ;>

I completely agree with most of you. The only problem is, you guys think in 1v1, while that was not the case in my post. Yes, Heartseeker spammers are easy to counter 1v1. Not so much however, when they’re in a pack. If 3-4 of those focus you, there is very little you can do to survive. They don’t even need to use Haste. I realize it’s not the case in tPvP, but quite common sight in 8v8.

And yes, I do agree that Quickness is one of, if not the biggest balance issue at the moment, be it S/P Thief, GS Warrior or SB Ranger. It needs to be toned down, and the PW change I suggested is supposed to go along with, not instead of Quickness nerf.

Problem I see with Pistol Whip is exactly as ClockworkOrange said. Without Haste it’s borderline useless, as everyone can dodge out of it after 0.5 second. You’ve just used 5 initiative to do 2k damage and can either break animation or spend the rest of it rooted, hitting the air.
That’s why I think removing the daze and making it usable on the move would balance the skill out nicely, making it actually useful without the Haste. Enemies would still be able to evade it, but there will be actually a chance to get all hits in.

Same thing here in Europe. Crazy lag spikes, ever since login server went back up last night.

Nande.6810:

Would you like to see a warrior running about with 100 blades? Thought not.

I wouldn’t care, really. Just as easy to counter. Perhaps even easier if they stopped using stuns/knockdowns prior to it. Wouldn’t even need stunbreak if you missed a dodge.

And 100b does about twice the PW damage.

First off, let me give you some background. I play Thief as my main character, with about 700 PvP matches played on it and 70% win rate in both 8v8 and tournaments.

Now, that we have (hopefully) “LOL GOT PWNED NOOB L2P!!!!111oneeleven” comments out of the way, let me propose how we can fix the ‘Press 2 to win’ problem.

1. Heartseeker
I think we all agree those guys are a plague. Usually dumb, not fun to play with/against, and main reason thieves as a class got bad rep. While easy to counter 1v1, extremely annoying in teamfights.

Now, how do we remove them?
Heartseeker needs to be made into actual finisher. This can be done by changing damage tresholds and severely reducing damage on high HP target:
Target below 20% – Current <25% damage.
Target below 40% – Current <50% damage.
Target above 40% – Same damage as autoattack.

This would remove the problem of Heartseeker spamming, while still keeping it a good finisher.

2. Pistol Whip
Ok, let’s get this straight – anyone who sits still through whole duration of un-hasted PW has no right to complain. It’s like entering into Hundred Blades of your own free will and complaining Warrior is OP.

It’s whole diffirent story when we throw in Haste though, as the target becomes pretty much permastunned.
Using Haste however is an answer to the main issue with the skill – being immobilized while channeling it, as you will often end up hitting the air after one second, pretty much wasting 5 initiative.

My suggestion would be to completely remove the stun from PW and in turn make us able to move while channeling it. That would allow the skill to actually hit with all the attacks without having to use Haste, while still being avoidable, Haste or not.

Unlike Eliteseraph, I’ve seen mesmers with burst builds. They revlove either around shattering clones or powerful phantasms.

How should you fight this class depends on whether they’re aware of you or not.
If they didn’t see you, you can try bursting them before they get a chance to get their buddies. I’ve seen CnD→Steal→Assassin Signet→Backstab combo dropping glass cannon ones instantly. The second you realize they’re aware of you, you should have your shortbow out. AoE damage is the best counter to mesmers, so Cluster Bomb them like there’s no tommorow. If you can’t hit both real one and his pets, it’s usually better to focus on destroying illusions first.

Also try to have some endurance saved. Dodge+ firing CB at your feet is the diffirence between live and death when you see 3 clones running towards you.

Good read.
I’ld love to see those features implemented, keep those ideas coming!

GG and couple guys from OBEY usually raid WvW around 8pm(GMT+1), going for as long as we have fun. Most of us leave when leader calls the raid, some of us keep going till 2-3am tho. I can say that in 8pm-11pm timeframe que is usually 30mins to 3 hours.

@zepitou So you claim to know the whole population of the server? Cool story, bro.

This matter can be easily resolved. All it takes is for ANet to show some hard data about where VS players are connecting from.

I think the ‘Duelist’ set you’re asking about is a white one sold by armor vendors.

Leather – I’m not sure what’s its name, but that’s skin of some lv 70-80 exotics. You get those for completing high level maps.

Drake Scale – ‘Emblazoned’. Skin can be crafted by lv.400 leatherworker.

Trooper – I think it’s ‘Noble’ set, avaliable from lv.40 dungeon.

Rugged – Lv.80 karma set, avaliable at temples of Orr while they’re not contested.