So Can we discuss about 4 necro 1 druid meta “again” ? I dont understand the logic behind this. I would prolly change 1 necro into a rev or ps war. Druid in pug is also awful because people never stack properly but that’s not my point here.
I just wanna say 4 necro 1 druid meta is terribad -_-. I’m actually amazed by how many people think it’s good. I’m at NA server, is EU meta also the same?
I think you’re confusing ‘meta’ with ‘popular’ and/or with ‘good’. It’s a popular choice because it works regardless of player skill. That doesn’t make it efficient or even good; it just makes it safe.
Which makes it impossible to find a fractal pug recruiting anything but condi necros.
I’m gonna start pugging fractals as a power necro for teh lulz.
Power necro is my main in fractals. Never had an issue with not being allowed into a squad that didnt specify condi necro. Hell some squads just want any necro lol.
It’s mine as well, and maybe 25% of the time someone gives me attitude for it. I have on occasion gone scepter in my marauder’s gear and power build because I couldn’t be bothered to argue or change my build.
Took me 35 minutes to do T4 fractals last night, I just want to get them done.
Before the AB multi-map was widely known, ecto prices had crept up above 50 silver each and still rising. None of those sinks have been removed from the game. If the supply spigot of AB were turned off, prices would eventually get back up to that level.
Or at least would, but with ecto prices so low I just save stacks in my bank…
I don’t find Fractal Avengers difficult to deal with, since downed #2 on every class deals with them. They’re a simple addition that adds a little depth to fractals.
What I don’t understand is how people actually get stomped by them. Maybe it’s my muscle memory from wvw, but it seems really easy not to get stomped. And yet, 2-3 times a week with pugs I see someone actually get stomped.
I could find a group, but coordinating a group of people to be on at the same time is a hassle. I only do fractals to feed my nasty wvw habit’s desire for ascended gear. I just can’t understand how after being exposed to it once anyone could actually be stomped.
I swear I just saw this thread.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Noone-does-vanilla-dungeons-anymore
BTW, try some other MMORPGs and you’ll realize just how good, our bad balancing here is.
“It could be worse” is not an acceptable excuse for… anything.
I am really looking forward to Tuesday’s class balance, spvp has been a nightmare as well, to the point where I stopped playing the season after like 20 games.
Anet cares about roaming in that they keep making changes to make roaming more helpful. Yak-upgraded objectives and the new skirmish system are fairly recent changes that encourage roaming.
The problem is neither the spvp nor the wvw teams have any control over class balance and the team that does is mostly interested in pve.
Spoilers concerning Living World season 3 episode 2 (adding to things already said)
We have Taimi in second episode explaining what is magic, how is it separated and how dragons absorb magic from dead dragons, and we saw that with Mordemorth. So it is clearly stated that Zhaitan is dead dead)
Taimi looked at the data for five minutes and is speculating, it doesn’t have to be true. She’s been wrong before..
It is 100% ovservable truth. We have destroyers who are Primodus’ minions running around with death and plant based powers. The result of gaining power from Zhaitan and Mordremoths death respectively.
Destroyers running around with Risen and Mordrem powers could have another explanation. Taimi gave a theory, but she isn’t the authority on Elder Dragons, she couldn’t even remember Steve’s name.
I don’t remember seeing Risen Mordrem.
There should be a free HoT legendary if you get Ultimate Dominator, honestly or AT LEAST the ones on the Trading Post.
Each maxed out title in WvW should give an ascended weapon/armor box. It’s essentially the only thing relevant besides ascended trinkets.
I.e. Defender of camp/keep/tower/SMC = Defender’s box of armor, Assaulter of camp/keep tower/SMC = Assaulter’s Box of weapons/armor
Then have X maxed WvW titles = legendary backpack.
Current titles:
Ultimate Dominator Get 250,000 total kills in WvW.
Yakslapper Kill 2,500 enemy supply caravans.
Leader of the Yak Succesfully escort 2,500 supply caravans.
Fixer-Upper Spend 10,000 supply on repairs.
Unstoppable Force Capture 7,500 objectives.
Unhappy Camper Capture 2,500 total supply camps.
Tower Toppler Capture 2,000 total towers.
Plays for Keeps Capture 1,000 total keeps.
Kingmaker Capture Stonemist Castle 200 times.
Immovable Object Defend 3,000 objectives.
Camp Counselor Defend 500 total supply camps.
Keep Guard Defend 1000 keeps.
Tower Guard Defend 750 total towers.
Royal Guard Defend Stonemist Castle 500 times.Then have reward tracks for ascended trinkets/backpacks. (Bloodstone fen / ember bay reward tracks do okay though)
Wvw needs new achievements as a general rule. sPvP has twice as many possible points as wvw.
You can get ascended weapons/armor/rings from level-up boxes and rewards track boxes, we’re in good shape for those as it is, since ascended gear is not necessary for wvw.
If the number of LW episodes in season 3 matches 2, there would be 6 more episodes. They have stated and thus far successfully met their goal of one episode every 2 months. Which puts the final episode of season 3 in September 2017.
The expansion would likely come at least 2 months after that.
So based on a bunch of seemingly reasonable assumptions that are subject to being wrong, I wouldn’t expect a new expansion before November 2017. Incidentally, that would be nearly exactly 2 years after HoT, which might have been their goal all along.
With toughness scaling and boon steal is gone. I think stacking necros doesn’t work that good anymore.
Add some class that have useful boons like might quickness protection should help the team better.
It’s not that it doesn’t work as well. Its effectiveness is exactly the same. The difference is now other classes aren’t as bad. Their main intention was to allow power builds to be as effective as condition builds.
What they did do was introduce toxic trail and condi bomb instabilities at higher levels, and necros are able to “return to sender” conditions either via minions or plague sending, increasing their DPS at best or just preventing them from dying at worst.
I am one of those voters as I am quite indifferent to them. The idea is decent, but it feels like maybe they should have had a higher supply cost, like twice as much as originally building the damaged siege. A catapult that costs 40 supply to build would take 80 to fully repair, for example.
I remember hearing stories of being able to fully repair golems with just two of the things, which seemed overpowered.
So really my opinion would have been somewhere in between, but these polls have a tendency to lack nuance.
Incidentally, exchanging gold for gems is one of the better methods that exist for keeping inflation low, since the Black Lion Company takes 15% of the profits.
Spoilers concerning Living World season 3 episode 2 (adding to things already said)
We have Taimi in second episode explaining what is magic, how is it separated and how dragons absorb magic from dead dragons, and we saw that with Mordemorth. So it is clearly stated that Zhaitan is dead dead)
Taimi looked at the data for five minutes and is speculating, it doesn’t have to be true. She’s been wrong before.
That said, I don’t think Mordremoth is dead and Caithe and Traehearne are actually champions of Mordremoth. We still have no explanation for the Pale Tree other it is a purified blighting tree, whatever that means. Mordremoth basically assassinated Zhaitan via Traehearne.
Gliding could work, but none of the current maps would support it. You’d have to develop a new map from scratch, and the last time we got one of those a vocal minority screamed bloody murder.
I found all tourneys silly as the winners were decided by the moment they started.
This, and Anet has in their possession data that seems to indicate a large drop-off in wvw population after a tournament ends, which they surmised was caused by burnout. Since Anet wants as many wvw players as will play, they are hesitant to hold a tournament out of concern of losing players from the game mode after.
This can be apply to sPVP too. The pvp lobbies are empty after a PVP season ends, which they surmised was caused by burnout. If Anet wants as many pvp players as will play, they are hesitant to hold a pvp season out of concern of losing players from the game mode after.
They are run by different teams. Anet also seems to be “all-in” on sPVP shelling out thousands of dollars that could have been spent hiring several developers full time to develop content.
I’m not saying they’re ideologically consistent, but they had admitted the player dropoff is the reason they don’t hold wvw tournaments.
You didn’t answer my question, there is a player dropoff after the PVP league, why don’t anet hold the PVP league?
That was the first thing I answered.
They are run by different teams. Anet also seems to be “all-in” on sPVP shelling out thousands of dollars
(…)
I’m not saying they’re ideologically consistent
I found all tourneys silly as the winners were decided by the moment they started.
This, and Anet has in their possession data that seems to indicate a large drop-off in wvw population after a tournament ends, which they surmised was caused by burnout. Since Anet wants as many wvw players as will play, they are hesitant to hold a tournament out of concern of losing players from the game mode after.
This can be apply to sPVP too. The pvp lobbies are empty after a PVP season ends, which they surmised was caused by burnout. If Anet wants as many pvp players as will play, they are hesitant to hold a pvp season out of concern of losing players from the game mode after.
They are run by different teams. Anet also seems to be “all-in” on sPVP shelling out thousands of dollars that could have been spent hiring several developers full time to develop content.
I’m not saying they’re ideologically consistent, but they had admitted the player dropoff is the reason they don’t hold wvw tournaments.
I found all tourneys silly as the winners were decided by the moment they started.
This, and Anet has in their possession data that seems to indicate a large drop-off in wvw population after a tournament ends, which they surmised was caused by burnout. Since Anet wants as many wvw players as will play, they are hesitant to hold a tournament out of concern of losing players from the game mode after.
I’d be happy if they stopped adding additional trophies to my already clogged inventory.
At least you can salvage these for currency if you aren’t saving them.
If they were a currency themselves, we could trade them to an npc for the second currency. Then they wouldn’t eat up an inventory space. Kind of like how pristine fractal relics can be exchanged for fractal relics.
In EBG you would be able to glide from Red keep or Veloka to Ogrewatch tower.
I’d rather do swamp than cliffside or thaumanova any day.
WvW is full of terrible players who only know how to spam 1 (and in case of rev maybe even 2) in zergs, so that might be an explanation.
It might be, but if we’re being dismissive of everyone in wvw you could argue any build would work, which makes the entire discussion fruitless.
I like the idea of skirmishes quite a bit. However like others note the 3-2-1 distribution needs some tweaking. perhaps 3-2-2 is the best idea I’ve seen proposed.
The other thing I’d really like to see is the API updated so the various statistics sites can update their displays with the new skirmish scoring data. I really miss being able to check on what the status of a match is quickly or see how matches I’m not actually involved in are going.
Good revs would eat this build alive. No stunbreaker, no stab, no mobility, no defense and relying on high casttime abilities and wells, both easy to avoid, to kill an enemy won’t work against anybody with a decent build who knows how to play – rev or any other class. You would get cc’ed and bursted to death before you even get a chance to remove some boons.
You say that, but I can’t remember the last time I’ve lost to a rev. I know I have, but it hasn’t been recently.
I’d be happy if they stopped adding additional trophies to my already clogged inventory.
I would totally buy them if it were an account wide buff.
how do you win against a revenant as a power reaper? because i only win if they are really bad.
Focus #5 removes 3 boons and chills, well of corruption converts boons to conditions including stability to fear. I also use an axe, and axe #3 converts a boon to condition.
Once stripped of their boons, revs go down easy with spike damage like axe #2 or switching to shroud and going to town. Alternatively, dagger #3 removes 2 boons and immobilizes.
I also don’t use power reaper, as I find base necro to be better for how I like to play. This build has proven to beat revs 8-9 times out of 10 in roaming situations in wvw. I don’t think it would work in spvp because of how spvp’s mechanics work.
stability should be a given for any necro because their defense is based around hitting. Condi necro will not suddenly be OP with stability. Condition cleanses are a thing, which is why I had no sympathy of whiners in season 2 because the majority of builds then had less cleanses then the accepted condition food pre-hot engi. I’m not sure about season 3 since I took a break then.
The reason why power necro suffers is because it lacks a role, they don’t synergise well with boon corruption which is basically the only competitve aspect necro has left. Lack of stability and focus fireability combined with lack of a decent ranged option will mean they will be even more simply singled out.
That is why when you add stab jsut to power aspects, power necro will have a role.
with what? Boon corruption is strong enough to be a role on it’s own in a boon heavy meta and is very difficult to replace. What will power necro role be that is relevnt and can’t be replaced easily by something which another class can do better.
When you add stab to the already sustained power necro you can be affective as bunker busting while staying on point. This will make power necros a really somthing to be feared in close range and not some ball you toss around.
if you havent noticed, boon corruption is dead. since Heralds.
As a power necro using a focus and well of corruption, in a 1v1 situation against a herald I win 8 or 9 times out of 10.
or replace Glicko matchmaking with a 1-up 1-down system (wherein the winner moves up a tier and the loser moves down a tier.) The 1-up 1-down system should work better with monthly linkings than Glicko, so we are most likely going to hold off on 1 month linkings until that system is in.
How would you feel about a modified 1-up 1-down system that still uses glicko, but in a slightly different way?
I could see a system where the highest glicko at the end of the match moves up and the lowest down. For example in T3 right now DB is in 3rd but has the highest glicko, would it be fair to move them down to T4?
If the match ended with…
DB at 1779 rating, but come in 3rd place
SBI at 1729 rating, but come in 1st place
SoS at 1710 rating, but come in 2nd place (these are the numbers at the time of writing)
DB would move up and SoS would move down because that was their rating position after the match ended. It would also provide some incentive to fight for glicko points even if the final results of the match are already decided and one side has a lead that can’t be broken.
This would prevent servers moving up or down too fast, because theoretically a server could start on T4 week 1, win T3 and move to T2 week 2, and win T2 and move to T1 in week 3. That’s 3 weeks to move all the tiers and if server relinks happened more often there’s a real chance of getting royally slaughtered week 5 with the new links.
I wouldn’t be upset if the different flavors of boxes were consolidated in some way. That would make it easier to let them stack for later opening, rather than having to open a dozen different kinds of boxes to stop them from eating inventory space.
Wait what? Boxes and bags with goods in them (usually a lot more than the 1 slot they take up) take up more space than what’s in them? I think you have that backwards….
There are 7 types of gilded strongboxes and they don’t stack.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Gilded_Strongbox
I’d rather they all stacked so I could open them later. 7 types of boxes takes up more space than what’s inside one of them. I don’t want to be opening boxes in the middle of battle.
And that’s just one of the types of boxes. 3 types of heirloom seed pouches, 3 types f elaborate ritualist bags, etc.
I wouldn’t be upset if the different flavors of boxes were consolidated in some way. That would make it easier to let them stack for later opening, rather than having to open a dozen different kinds of boxes to stop them from eating inventory space.
I don’t understand why people are so interested in changing point distribution from 3/2/1 to anything else, the absolute difference between first and last is the same, the only change is how glicko is scored. Adjusting the points to 4/3/2 or 5/4/3 does nothing to change the final results but slows down glicko changes so that bad matchups remain bad matchups for longer.
At the moment, top server gets same amount of points as two other servers summed up. Changing scores to 4/3/2 would bring it more together, make each skirmish much more important, hoarding points at the beggining wouldn’t mean as much as it does now since it would be much easier to catch up.
Overall, I really like the idea, but I hope UI will get some redesigning. It’d be cool to get some small reward for each place, like reward track potions.
It changes nothing about the match.
So there are 12 skirmishes in a day, 7 days in a week, and everyone starts with 3 points.
If you swept 1st place the entire week, that’s 12*7*3+3 or 255 points.
If you came in 3rd the entire week, it’s 12*7*1+3 or 87 points.
For a difference of 168 points.
Let’s adjust it so that it’s 4 for first and 2 for second. Now 1st place is 12*7*4+3 or 339 points. For 3rd it’s 12*7*2+3 or 171. The difference then becomes… 168 points.
Okay, so let’s take a look at your “catch-up” game, you got 3rd for 4 days and 1st the final 3 days and someone else did the opposite.
You: 12*4*1+12*3*3+3 = 159 points
Them: 12*4*3+12*3*1+3 = 183 points
For a difference of 24 points.
And adjusting to 4/3/2 you get…
You: 12*4*2+12*3*4+3 = 243 points
Them: 12*4*4+12*3*2+3 = 267 points
For a difference of, you guessed it, 24 points.
You’re not changing the final score at all. All that changing from 3/2/1 to 4/3/2 would do is change how glicko is scored. It would make exactly zero difference towards the match. By changing how glicko is scored, you’re slowing glicko adjustments and keeping bad matchups longer.
The loot is pretty terrible, even after they semi-recently bumped up the loot.
Is there another way I can get symbols of koda without waiting around for another half hour for a group?
I literally just need gift of ice and I can make frostfang.
sPvP and wvw reward tracks exist for every dungeon and give currency.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Honor_of_the_Waves_Dungeon_Track
The 7th, 17th, 27th, and 37th rewards give 60 tokens each for 240 total for the entire track.
Doing all the dailies in either mode will move the track forward by 3 rewards, plus whatever you got while playing.
So if you do the dailies for two straight days in each game mode you’d get 120 of the currency.
I don’t understand why people are so interested in changing point distribution from 3/2/1 to anything else, the absolute difference between first and last is the same, the only change is how glicko is scored. Adjusting the points to 4/3/2 or 5/4/3 does nothing to change the final results but slows down glicko changes so that bad matchups remain bad matchups for longer.
Come join SoS, we’ll make a run for T1.
The loot is pretty terrible, even after they semi-recently bumped up the loot.
I thought this system was supposed to nerf nightcapping. On Gunnars Hold I don’t see a difference compared to before, scores still run away with an utterly large gap.
Then again that might be due to the horrible server linking you guys come up with: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/What-happend-to-Gunnar-s-Hold/
Nightcapping happens because of coverage gaps. The need for coverage is still there. Skirmishes changed the scoring system so a server could not simply gain 50k points over one night and end the matchup in one day. Now, even if your server ticks 0 for 2 hours you still get a victory point. It equalizes the scoring for all timezones. Coverage and scoring are not the same issues.
I agree.
This is a great change because it minimizes damage during bad coverage times. Even if you get totally blown out during a certain time slot, you can make up the difference during the next one.
In T3 a lot of skirmishes are really close until the end, being off by as few as 20-50 points. That’s the sort of difference in score that provides urgency to defend something or go attack something, when that couple more PPK or that one camp can’t decide the difference between 1st and 2nd or 2nd and 3rd.
At no other time in wvw’s history has flipping a camp been able to provide as much of a difference in the entire matchup as with this skirmish system. Pushing your server up that one level gives a point that can matter in the final tally.
I think it’s a great change, and the 2 hours is about as long as I can play in one sitting, so it works out really well.
Absolutely, one skirmish last night ended with something like 12 points between us and Maguuma, was exciting to watch lol. It does put more emphasis on prioritizing so you can maximize points during a skirmish. PPK actually becomes important now and can tip the scales of a skirmish because those points matter more in the short skirmishes, 100 kills for example gives 200 points which can be huge in a skirmish.
for the third server, this system is a means of having some control in a match winner as well. Even if you can’t win, you might be able to steal some 2nd places from a server that ends up with the third server winning the week.
I wasn’t sure skirmishes would accomplish much at first, but I do like them now that I have seen them…..
I’ve noticed that as well, its been interesting watching YB this week kind of playing the spoiler/ninja role coming in out of nowhere to take 2nd place in a skirmish. I think the heavy PPT focus of skirmishes will work out good for servers like YB.
It does possibly work the other way too though. We were having decent fights and doing quite well. All of a sudden the fights stopped briefly. Could be for many reasons of course, but the fact we were doing well and it was like 10-15 minutes left in a close skirmish seemed like the other side was protecting ppk for that last slice of a time….
all that said, glicko reset at re-link is more important than any further scoring changes IMHO.
It’s interesting in that strategy has factored back in. If you know you’re going to get steamrolled in a fight and fall a slot in the scoring, you’re going to plan accordingly. It removes the “mindless zerging” aspect that has scared away many a pve newcomer.
You can make the decisions now where maybe it’s better to defend camps and protect yaks for 15 minutes than to attack someone. You can set yourself up for the next skirmish so that you’re in a stronger position.
Much better than the previous system! Skirmishes themselves may need something else for the average player to notice skirmish results, like a line in the chat box of war scores at the end of a skirmish, or even a minor reward for participating in a skirmish(though we have a good amount of rewards already).
I think this is a great idea, even if it’s just symbolic. 10 silver for 3rd, 20 for 2nd, and 30 for first isn’t game-breaking but gives a sense of progress.
It also lets everyone know that a new skirmish is starting so you better go do something to earn points.
I thought this system was supposed to nerf nightcapping. On Gunnars Hold I don’t see a difference compared to before, scores still run away with an utterly large gap.
Then again that might be due to the horrible server linking you guys come up with: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/What-happend-to-Gunnar-s-Hold/
Nightcapping happens because of coverage gaps. The need for coverage is still there. Skirmishes changed the scoring system so a server could not simply gain 50k points over one night and end the matchup in one day. Now, even if your server ticks 0 for 2 hours you still get a victory point. It equalizes the scoring for all timezones. Coverage and scoring are not the same issues.
I agree.
This is a great change because it minimizes damage during bad coverage times. Even if you get totally blown out during a certain time slot, you can make up the difference during the next one.
In T3 a lot of skirmishes are really close until the end, being off by as few as 20-50 points. That’s the sort of difference in score that provides urgency to defend something or go attack something, when that couple more PPK or that one camp can decide the difference between 1st and 2nd or 2nd and 3rd.
At no other time in wvw’s history has flipping a camp been able to provide as much of a difference in the entire matchup as with this skirmish system. Pushing your server up that one level gives a point that can matter in the final tally.
I think it’s a great change, and the 2 hours is about as long as I can play in one sitting, so it works out really well.
NA never had this much matchup variance as before. Servers going up and down tiers, ex-link server becoming hosts, ex-link servers becoming enemy servers in the next link and so go on. Before the links, what happened in NA was that most of the tiers were locked by glicko walls and population size differences, while the bottom tiers were just dead. Server linkings are a good thing. They create more matchup changes and actually promote more balanced servers when the links are made. The problem is that a lot of things can happen in two months, and what was balanced at the start of the link can not be balanced anymore as time goes on. So a decrease of the time in between new links to make the system catch up faster to the players activity would be much better.
Anet had to manually manipulate Yak’s Bend’s glicko to get these different matchups. Had they not done that, T3 would’ve been YB vs. SoS vs. SBI for most of the linking.
DB is currently bleeding so many points that it would be very difficult for a T4 server to move up at the moment. There’s a new glicko wall developed between T2 and T3 (not that any T3 has any business being in T2 and no T2 wants to be in T3).
http://mos.millenium.org/na/matchups
So chances are good for the next couple of weeks the T3 and T4 matchups will stay the same.
Another new trophy clogging up my precious inventory space.
Tarir is in a state of Groundhog’s day with HoT.
Also spoilers are appropriate less than a week from release.
Viper minions is a very common build for high level fractals. They removed toughness scaling which gives power builds some more credibility, but the meta is still to stack conditions and epidemic bounce. Condi builds have better condi cleanse, and you can get condi bombed in certain high level fractals.
Most fractals are pretty hostile to melee except in certain fights, typically bosses like old tom.
I needed one for Astralaria, but I wouldn’t call that a sink.
Why should Zhaitan send his Risen to a Place thats completely hostile and has nothing to offer to him?
A bloodstone exists in Hell’s Precipice.
And how would that have helped Zhaitan?
Bloodstones are basically made of magic. Dragons EAT magic. See where I’m going with this?
There’s a bloodstone in Arah (you run into it at the end of path 4 of the dungeon) and he mostly left it alone.
My mistake. GW2 uses a funky system like that.
In case you didn’t read the original post, the OP was trying to make axe a “viable weapon.”
No, it was a suggestion to change Rending Claws, followed up by asking if he is alone in thinking this would improve the axe. Answer: yes! Rending Claws is useless, the other two skills are not, therefore litterally any change to Rending Claws will net a buff to the whole weapon.
And I’m arguing the weapon is viable now, regardless of Rending Claws.
So it’s not an extreme outlier and a 25 stack of vulnerability is like adding an extra DPS to the party because the DPS of 4 condi necros becomes equal to that of 5, and you haven’t yet factored in your own damage. In most of these situations, the axe is the only source of vulnerability in the party.
Which means that those vulnerability stacks on Rending Claws are a lot more useful thank you think and in the case of a common fractal practice make it a good choice for parties.
Ok, I will concede the point that higher level fractals tend to have more condition builds.
However, you do realize that those 25 stacks are probably not all yours, and even if most of them are, they’re certainly not done by Rending Claws alone, more like a combination of several skills and traits. Unless you’re really just auto attacking with axe, in which case your whole point about adding 25% dps to everyone is kinda moot because this group buff comes at the cost of you doing no damage at all.
Again, if you’re taking an axe necro into a full necro party just for vuln stacking you’re doing it wrong. Pick a different build or a different class if you really want to be of use.
Admittantly focus #4 is involved, another underloved weapon.
Gravedigger is a greatsword skill, not a reaper’s shroud skill.
…I know. It’s a different skill on a different weapon, just like any off-hand weapon skills or utility skills or Shroud skills. You want to validate the current state of Rending Claws by making a dps calculation including all kinds of other skills, but you draw the line a swapping weapon sets? Really?? Going into Shroud for your “axe”-dps rotation is ok, but your second set doesn’t make the cut?
Do you really not see those obvious flaws on your argumentation?
If you go read what I said, I argued that I would factor in anything that affects DPS, that’s kind of the point.
RC doesn’t have to be overpowered to make the entire weapon good. There are skills on other weapons that are underwhelming but people don’t dismiss those as bad weapons because of them.
I never said RC has to be overpowered and I never said the axe is bad.
RC is bad, regardless of what context you’d like to see it in or whatever weird calculation your confirmation bias could cook up.
RC needs a buff and there’s absolutely no reason why it shouldn’t get one.
And I have argued that there is a fine line between RC being underwhelming and it being overpowered, so now we’re repeating ourselves.
The damage on Rending Claws when combined with its effects (vulnerability generation in common party setups) help make an axe a viable weapon in many game modes
Just for extra emphasis, this is wrong.
The damage on Rending Claws is practically non existent and its vulnerability application makes not difference in every game mode. Yes, every game mode. Even your fractal example.
Again, I’m not saying the axe isn’t a viable pvp weapon, it is and I’m using it all the time. However, RC is garbage, there’s no reason to ever use it other than clearing blindness or when you’re forced to use it because everything else is on cooldown.
0.77*power twice every 0.95 seconds is not practically non existent. It’s low, there’s a difference. Dagger #1 multipliers are .9 twice, .7 and 1.2 over 2.1 seconds. So the effective multipliers-per-second for AA are:
1.62 for axe (1.78 with Unholy Fervor) (Rending Claws)
1.76 for dagger (but can target 2 enemies if they’re within range)
1.2 for greatsword (but can target 3 enemies and gravedigger spam)
0.96 for Life Rend (1.13 with Reaper’s Onslaught) (Reaper’s Shroud, but can hit 3-5 targets
1.0 for Life Blast (up to 5 targets provided they’re in a line)
Just for emphasis, dagger AA is 8% higher than axe AA on a single target without unholy fervor and the same with it.
Then the question becomes what game mode are you playing and what are you trying to do? If you have a single target, axe is on par with dagger. Two targets? Dagger is twice as good.
But don’t take my word for it, go whack on a golem.
A well timed Axe #2 will drop a thief/guardian/elementalist in wvw.
A well timed anything can drop anyone, so argument invalid.
Not rending claws.
Well, I’m glad you finally agree that Rending Claws does no damage at all.
Never said it did a lot of damage. What I did say was:
- The damage output from using an axe is on par (albeit slightly lower) than other power weapon options, regardless of what Rending Claws does
- The damage on Rending Claws when combined with its effects (vulnerability generation in common party setups) help make an axe a viable weapon in many game modes
- Axe has support capabilities along side spike damage
To say it does no damage is disingenuous and to base the entire opinion of a weapon based on one skill is silly.
If anything they should add a way to trade ascended armor and weapon boxes from fractals for gold relics or weapons. I am drowning in ascended items
I’m drowning in weapons while I can’t get the types of armor I’d want. Even a 2:1 deal where I trade 2 weapons for a helm or pair of boots would be nice to have.