Guild Wars 2

Crinn.7864:

The Game Slayer.7632:

Windwalker.7421:

Boonstrip is only a hypothetical counter that in practice is either ineffective (reapplication) or not available to condition builds.

All the meta condi builds have boon strip. Not sure what you’re talking about.

Last I checked there is only 1 meta condi class. Not much of a sample size there.

Also calling the end of Mesmer sword chain as boon strip access is a bit much. The Mesmer will never be able deterministically clear resistance because of the other boons warrior has.

(I don’t actually have a issue with resistance)

If there’s only one warrior on the other team then you’ll just have to put up with the fact that that they soft-counter your condi mes. If there’s more than one, switch Illusions for Domination, take the boonstripping trait, and switch sword for scepter. You can outkite a warrior without sword, and the scepter makes up for the loss in condi damage. It will serve you well against both warriors and guardians, though the meta condi build has more general applications. Warrior’s resistance really shouldn’t be giving you that much trouble on meta condi mes though, it takes time but they should be a guaranteed kill. Full melee is a bad matchup versus mes unless you have a thief’s mobility.

Wolfric.9380:

Huskyboy.1053:

Wolfric.9380:

Reduce cooldown of Phoenix
Reduce cast time and after cast of Dragon tooth.
Reduce cooldown of Fgs to 90sec.

This would be great for any scepter user. I pesonaly would realy have a 1/4 CT on Dragon tooth. More important then the aftercast. Of course if you lower the aftercast you have to be careful about the CT…. I prefer a very short cast time.
And 90s might make FSG actually pvp useful …. what? ELe and a useful elite ?

The aftercast on DT is fine, what’s not fine is how long it takes the tooth to drop. The skill is too powerful to have no counterplay, I think a 1s casting time, then it drops 1/4s after you finish casting, is fine. People should have some ability to dodge such a powerful attack and you should be vulnerable while using it, what you’re proposing is OP. Imagine if warrior was able to use other skills while Hundred Blades’ effect was occuring. I agree with your points on FGS and Phoenix, though maybe 15s CD for Phoenix would be enough

I think you misunderstood. I don´t want to lower the drop time just the casting time.
The result would be it still might not hit much, but its more a fire and forget cast AE denial.

Yeah haha I understood. I think fire and forget encourages low-skill play. When I said “should be vulnerable” I meant that it would retain its existing cast time, which leaves you unable to use other skills with casting times.

The problem with DT in my view isn’t that it’s high-risk (it is), the problem is that it’s high-risk, low-reward, as it rarely hits. I think it should be changed it high-risk, high-reward by decreasing the drop time significantly. The 1s cast time is extremely telegraphed with the tooth appearing overhead, I think that’s sufficient warning for a good player.

Wolfric.9380:

Reduce cooldown of Phoenix
Reduce cast time and after cast of Dragon tooth.
Reduce cooldown of Fgs to 90sec.

This would be great for any scepter user. I pesonaly would realy have a 1/4 CT on Dragon tooth. More important then the aftercast. Of course if you lower the aftercast you have to be careful about the CT…. I prefer a very short cast time.
And 90s might make FSG actually pvp useful …. what? ELe and a useful elite ?

The aftercast on DT is fine, what’s not fine is how long it takes the tooth to drop. The skill is too powerful to have no counterplay, I think a 1s casting time, then it drops 1/4s after you finish casting, is fine. People should have some ability to dodge such a powerful attack and you should be vulnerable while using it, what you’re proposing is OP. Imagine if warrior was able to use other skills while Hundred Blades’ effect was occuring. I agree with your points on FGS and Phoenix, though maybe 15s CD for Phoenix would be enough

Nikkinella.8254:

Divine.3279:

Xillllix.3485:

Divine.3279:

Would like to point out that this meta in my honest opinion has been one of the greatest we’ve had so far.

Unless you’re an elementalist and can only heal others with the 1 viable build while dodging like a monkey.

You know there’s other viable builds for elementalist? No one forces you to run meta. Meta just means the most popular and flavor of the month, and the elementalist meta is mainly run because IT IS THE BEST support as of right now. But no one absolutely forces you to run it.

Viable below gold/plat where you can fight bad players that dont know when to dodge. If you are playing anything besides healbot on ele, you’re a free kill to any player with a fraction of skill on any other class. Try getting to legendary on s/f fresh air ele, let me know how that goes for you.

Yeah F/A ele isn’t worth playing atm. It really just needs a higher burst to keep up, and Dragon’s tooth needs to fall very soon after it’s cast. Idk why the cast time is 1s yet it still hangs in the air for another second before falling. Between your weapon skills and utilities there’s enough to do well in most 1v1s, but right now it’s just not competitive with staff thief for its 1v1 and groupfight potential. Probs sounds like an odd comparison but staff thief is just preferable for the same role.

Yasi.9065:

MissCee.1295:

I feel fairly certain a good percentage of the current toxicity could have been avoided with a few small changes in the ranked system. Such as:

• no rewards for losing = no more afk farmers (or farmers in general)
• min match requirement (which we now have) = less leaderboard manipulation
• no class stacking = more fun matches and no 3-4 of one class & arguing over who won’t reroll
• no daily profession achievements in ranked

I could go on, but I truly can’t be bothered. My care factor lives at about the same level as Anet’s right now.

100% agree.

rennlc.7346:

(…)
If it’s not said in a way someone wants to listen to, you can tell them something an infinite number of times regardless how of basic it is. How something is said is probably much more important than what it is said.

When will people FINALLY learn that other players in PvP arent there to TEACH THEM. PvP doesnt work that way. You teach yourself.
You get flamed a lot? Told you are a noob, a useless rallybot? You cant rotate? Then go on youtube, watch videos, go on reddit/forums and read guides. Go train on golems. Go do scrims in custom arenas.

Stop expecting OTHERS to TEACH you. NEVER GONNA HAPPEN.

Lol this is not true at all. Most people you play with/against will not teach you, yeah, but I hardly need 9 other people per game giving me advice. At the very least you can get a lot of advice by going to a duel arena, dueling somebody, then asking them for advice on how to improve (assuming you lost the duel).

OriOri.8724:

@BlackBeard – I agree that chrono shatter spam is real and is a problem, but I disagree with your solution to that. Instead of increasing the CD of SoIllusions, I would change the active effect to just decrease shatter CD by 50% of their base CD. So if you aren’t running the Illusions line it would cut 25 sec off of Distortion’s CD, 6 sec off of MW’s CD. If you just increase the CD of the skill, it doesn’t stop anyone from using it in CS, and it doesn’t stop anyone from using all of their shatters twice or even 3 times in a row. Decreasing the active effect however does stop people from using all of their shatters twice in a row on core mesmer, or 3 times in a row on chrono. So this is a larger nerf to the optimal utility you can gain from the signet without just increasing the CD of it.

Yeah I support Ori on this, it’s nice when skills can be used more frequently but have weaker effects, instead of longer CDs but stronger effects. The latter just causes 1v1s to be decided based on who was fighting most recently, that’s not fair or fun.

ReaperJr.5967:

I know this has been mentioned before, but i feel the need to mention it again in case the devs missed it.

Apart from the fact that it has no counter 1v1, the only counterplay is to outrotate the said build. Unfortunately for me, my team mates feel the need to 2/3v1 said build on home node every game.. Unsuccessfully. I really can’t do much alone or even with a friend when that happens.

Let’s also bring up the fact that most defensive amulets were removed to prevent bunker builds from dominating like in S1. All in all, such a build shouldn’t even exist tbh. At the very most, if it’s going to be a bunker build, at least make it not be able to dish out damage (like paladin guard) and just be able to hold a node. Cheers.

I think one of the best ways to nerf condi thief would be to make DB a single-hit attack. As of right now it’s not countered by either aegis or blind, which together are used by a wide variety of classes for defensive purposes.

sophiewhite.3149:

Huskyboy.1053:

Rhiannon.1726:

With a “surrender vote” people would tend to give up with just 100 points behind instead of trying to turn the match.

Especially at Foefire you could be 200 points behind and still win.

Simple solution: require all connected team members to surrender before it takes effect, and still penalize people for AFKing if the entire team hasn’t surrendered yet. I see no problem with 4 people surrendering and 1 not, and the 1 person reporting their team members. Not that it would happen very often, but I’d be ok with that if it did.

weve gone through this before. it would end in people just afking until the vote went their way. as it is you cant punish afkers without punishing legit players and moving 1 step takes you off being afk. i vote no for a surrender option. it adds nothing to the game but incentive to give up. you know the saying quitters never win? this is that example.

I wasn’t being clear, by “punish for being afk” I meant that if somebody votes for surrender then AFKs, that should still be counted as match manipulation were it reported.

I don’t think a surrender option is really that important but it would speed up bad games. I’ve had quite a few games this season where I just wish the other team could give up, it’s boring to rolfstomp people repeatedly for 10 minutes. 5 minutes of that is enough.

If for example I had 2 games where the other team surrendered halfway through, that would give me time for an extra game. That to me is quite valuable, video games are a waste of my time but they’re supposed to be a fun waste of time.

Rhiannon.1726:

With a “surrender vote” people would tend to give up with just 100 points behind instead of trying to turn the match.

Especially at Foefire you could be 200 points behind and still win.

Simple solution: require all connected team members to surrender before it takes effect, and still penalize people for AFKing if the entire team hasn’t surrendered yet. I see no problem with 4 people surrendering and 1 not, and the 1 person reporting their team members. Not that it would happen very often, but I’d be ok with that if it did.

apharma.3741:

Cynz.9437:

I am not defending the build (it is probably one of the stupidest things produced by HoT) but can someone actually tell me how it is any different from current warrior or DHs meta builds? They have even more point presense than thief, as much if not more survuvability, just as low skill floor. Why do i not see you crying for nerfs for those classes? Why are they fine?

As far as counters go, i can deal with those thieves just as fine scrapper or necro. As thief (i play dp) i would have to give up point ew a bit but 1-2 burst is usually enough to finish those thieves off.

We’ve seen plenty of threads about DH and how brain dead easy it is so it’s kind of been done to death but by all means open another thread. Berserker is also stupid but we see less posts about that, the few I’ve seen have all talked about nerfing adrenal healing but really the culprit is spammable T3 burst skills.

Perhaps if you ask Henry he will make one about warriors, guaranteed to get a lot of attention and discussion.

I’m going to keep saying this until everybody agrees with me: the biggest problem with Berserker is Eternal Champion. I think it should work like necro’s Foot in the Grave rather than pulsing stability throughout Berserk mode. Giving amplified offense and defense at the same time is classic HoT powercreep.

The other thing that should change is the adrenaline generation on Cleansing Ire should have at least a 1s CD. Punishing players for successfully attacking warriors is total bullskritt.

JayAction.9056:

Huskyboy.1053:

JayAction.9056:

Abelisk.4527:

Rangerdeity.5847:

I agree you can pick the condi soul and mace axe but your second soul and second weapon are worthless in a condi damage build if you do. Honestly i want heavy access to torment.

Glint has Elemental Blast which deals 3 different condis including fire.

Sw/Shield is good for damage dealing and heals, though you could replace the shield with axe.

I’ve had a lot of success with the build, and I’m not even that good of a revenant to be honest.

That spec doesn’t work past gold/low platinum, and its condis are weaker than other condi specs and easier to avoid.

After a certain skill level you will not be landing many if any hits at all with mace. Since it has no snare or gap closer

Mace does not work vs competent opponents. The few hits that it does land are not drastic enough either.

Well Jay you’re thinking small. Rev hasn’t been good at 1v1s for a long time, and if you look at Dragon stance, it was clearly meant to be a DPS/utility role. Mallyx adds resistance onto the list of boons, which massively increases its usefulness to teams.

Mace certainly isn’t a great 1v1 weapon, but if you land the glint elite, you can easily follow that with mace 2 -> mace 3 for heavy condi application and some aoe might stacking. Mace is a bad 1v1 weapon (unless you’re defending a node) but it’s a great node fight weapon. It’s just situational, certainly not an all-around good weapon but it has its use cases like any weapon. Mace 3 aint bad at all but mace 1 & 2 are very difficult to land against anyone who’s paying attention, not including guards, who are forced to eat it.

I played that spec to rank 130 ish. Trust me, it is sub optimal.

I’ve tested many specs this season dropping in and out of top 250 and have figured out what works and what doesn’t.

Yes in low level play you can get a few hits and land kills. In higher level pvp no.

Rev condis do much less damage the other condi specs and their application is harder/worse.

If you are having any success with that build I promise you it is not because the build is great but because you are mechanically placing yourself in good positions/getting lucky and/or the enemy is not aware of what you are doing.

Actually the one time I climbed with that spec to low 100s, by the time I got to that rank most of the individuals who had seen the spec more than twice at that time were no longer dying to it, and its effectiveness plummeted.

Oh and staff is better than sword/shield as an off hand for that spec.

Mallyx/Glint Sword/Shield Staff with Destroyer Amulet is pretty fun, I’d suggest it. Overall it’s a bit slower than power rev, but has much more survivability, better team utility, and is useful in certain +1 situations against certain non-squishies like guard and magi/mender’s ele. The boonstrip matters more than the confusion but together it’s pretty deadly.

JayAction.9056:

Abelisk.4527:

Rangerdeity.5847:

I agree you can pick the condi soul and mace axe but your second soul and second weapon are worthless in a condi damage build if you do. Honestly i want heavy access to torment.

Glint has Elemental Blast which deals 3 different condis including fire.

Sw/Shield is good for damage dealing and heals, though you could replace the shield with axe.

I’ve had a lot of success with the build, and I’m not even that good of a revenant to be honest.

That spec doesn’t work past gold/low platinum, and its condis are weaker than other condi specs and easier to avoid.

After a certain skill level you will not be landing many if any hits at all with mace. Since it has no snare or gap closer

Mace does not work vs competent opponents. The few hits that it does land are not drastic enough either.

Well Jay you’re thinking small. Rev hasn’t been good at 1v1s for a long time, and if you look at Dragon stance, it was clearly meant to be a DPS/utility role. Mallyx adds resistance onto the list of boons, which massively increases its usefulness to teams.

Mace certainly isn’t a great 1v1 weapon, but if you land the glint elite, you can easily follow that with mace 2 -> mace 3 for heavy condi application and some aoe might stacking. Mace is a bad 1v1 weapon (unless you’re defending a node) but it’s a great node fight weapon. It’s just situational, certainly not an all-around good weapon but it has its use cases like any weapon. Mace 3 aint bad at all but mace 1 & 2 are very difficult to land against anyone who’s paying attention, not including guards, who are forced to eat it.

Berserkeremir.4631:

Evan Lesh.3295:

Bio Flame.4276:

Evan Lesh.3295:

Cynz.9437:

Evan Lesh.3295:

Found a couple minor bugs in addition to the lack of reshuffling. I’ve also worked on a new version of the matchmaker that will improve roster size and profession matching. We will likely trial it during the off-season.

If I remember, I will update the wiki!

So we have to endure the bugs and flaws of the current system (that certain players abuse) until next season? Lovely… :/

Perhaps you’d understand if you researched a bit on game development. Should be tons of resources if you feel like googling; things like quality assurance, build processes, release management, etc.

Since your reply was so disrespectful and pratronizing, I’ll answer on the same tone:

Perhaps you’re understand if you researched yourself on PvP-centric games and their balance schedule, such as GW1, LOL, DOTA2, Overwatch, etc…
There’s tons of resources if you feel like googling or better yet, just ask ANET’s Devs how they managed to do fast updates on GW1.

Get off your high horse, it’s not helping you, nor the players, nor the game, nor your job…

Didn’t mean to be disrespectful! I also don’t have access to a horse. I just didn’t want to try describing our entire internal build process to explain why a change won’t get to live as quickly as players may want. The bugs I mentioned for the matchmaker are so minor that they don’t warrant a hot fix. The new matchmaker is not worth risking game stability in a hotfix either. The earliest build to ship these on with adequate testing that doesn’t throw off the rest of the studio will be the off-season build.

There are a whole lot of other teams shipping things here that are part of the flow too, and its a fun dance to make sure we’re all getting things shipped with a comfortable cadence. If PvP was its own standalone product with no shared resources like the games you mention, then shipping changes quickly might be easier.

You and whole pvp developer team should apologize from us (the ones who gave precious time to enjoying the game and can’t because you didn’t done your job about fixxing that issue) apologize from everyone in the game about your mess. There is nothing more precious than time in this world and you are stealing from us cause you and whole pvp team didn’t do their job and not fixing that problem. Yet alone you didn’t even consider that important algorythm mistake as an issue. Me and whole PVP players are demand solution immediately

They obviously did reconsider the algorithm, they just didn’t get it perfect. Big deal. If you feel like playing is a waste of your timr, don’t.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

LucosTheDutch.4819:

Ameepa.6793:

I really do enjoy the kitten filter

It does help to keep the forum nice to read. It even changes the posts that would otherwise be full of kitten and kittens into readable versions that sound way less idiotic.

Are you kittening kidding me? You kittening think that godkitten kittening kitten bullkitten kittening up my entire post sounds less kittening idiotic than proper godkitten kittening swearwords? Jesus kittening Christ. The kittenty kitten filter is kittening bullkitten.

Seriously, for kittens sake. Aren’t we all adults here? What about the old saying “sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me”?

kitten. kitten. kitten. kittening kittens. kittening bullkitten. Godkitten it. I hate kittens.

The reason it’s here is because this is the forum of a business, not an unofficial fan generated forum. This is the face that ANet presents to any one who comes by to check and to all who post. A company that bills itself as being friendly and actively keeping the player base friendly can hardly have an official forum full of profanity. It looks bad.

In addition, profanity heats up conversations and derails threads as people get angry. Using the kitten filter takes the bite out of kitten kitten you and allows tempers to cool.

It serves a purpose even if you don’t like it.

Oooooh skritt just got real

It’s been a minute since I looked at this thread. I was thinking about how Dragon stance works (providing buffs to nearby allies) and realized that both Urgoz and Kanaxai are prime candidates for legends because their respective elite areas are exactly the opposite: they have debuffs depending on the area they’re in.

For example, in The Deep there are Aspects that reduce adrenaline generation, healing, blocking, and one that degenerates health, one that reduces movement speed, and one that CCs. There are a few more but if you want to know more you can visit the wiki. Urgoz’s Warren is the same with the area debuffs. Imo working this into something similar to the maintained Facets would be a really interesting counter to Glint’s aoe buffing of the team.

Papa Smurf.4792:

The following requests are what I would like to see implemented to improve quality of life.:

Faithful strike (Mace) – reduce cast time to 1/2 second, 1 stack of vulnerbility for 2 seconds in addition to the current healing.

Symbol of Faith (Mace) – Reduce Cast time to 1/2 second, Apply 1 stack of might per pulse, 2 second duration. Increase the Regeneration time from 1s to 2s per pulse.

Altruistic Healing (GM Trait)- Heal affected Allies for half of what the guardian is healed for. (Caster heals for 80 per boon, Affected allies Heal for 40 per boon)

“Recieve the Light” - Pulse Healing Around the Guardian at 600 Range Instead of in a Cone in front. Keep all modifiers the Same as they are now.

Empower - Remove Healing at the End of Channel. Change to Pulse 3 times, Heal, Grant 4 stacks of Might, and Remove 1 condition per pulse. Make Usable while moving.

Thats all I have for now, Constructive feedback always welcome. Lets get our Guardians better everyone

I generally like this thread and its idea, to buff base guard instead of DH. However I think you need a bit of a reality check: you’re asking for buffs, not QoL changes. QoL is fixing bugs, reducing particle effects on annoying skill animations, etc. Basically improving the experience of playing the game in such a way that does not increase or decrease the effectiveness of skills. What you’re asking for is an increase in the effectiveness of particular guard skills, so you want buffs to your class.

coro.3176:

Things I find to be too good:

• Ancient Seeds – Very strong trait if the target doesn’t have a condi clear ready. Then, if they do clear the immob, they get snared again unless they manage to move away quickly. Considering this is on a 10s cooldown, that’s a little low for such a potentially fight-ending trait. I would increase the cooldown or lower the snare duration.
• Adrenal Health – heals more from one trait than from most classes’ active heals + sustain skills combined. When you take into account this goes on a class with heavy armour, long invulns, and resistance, you’ve got an OP healing machine.
• Eternal Champion – long-lasting, high-uptime stability is dumb.
• All the traits that cancel cc. These are usually on a <1m cooldown and passively swing fights wihout the user really doing anything. The attacker sees a window and goes for their big cc move, only to have it blanked by a passive trait. These might be more balanced if there was an indicator on the status bar so the attacker could use a lesser cc first.

Yeah Eternal champion is actually one of the worst power creeps from HoT. People just take for granted that you have to constantly kite a warrior until berserk mode is over but… why? Being fully covered by stability for that long is bad design, just because some dude is really angry doesnt mean I can’t smack him with a beer bottle and knock him out. Without all that stability, the warrior is more vulnerable, and the advantage given by adrenal health is more easily negated.

OriOri.8724:

Huskyboy.1053:

OriOri.8724:

@HuskyBoy – How is Ross derailing a thread that complains about mesmers by pointing out why the chrono line is practically mandatory atm? Mesmer has its problems, especially chrono, and informing people about why their proposed change won’t actually solve any of the problems they have with chrono and will just nerf base mesmer to the ground for no good reason is 100% on topic

My thread wasnt complaining about mesmers, it was criticizing the 33% buff to SoI’s CD. The topic was very narrow and clearly-defined. Other things about mesmer might be tangential, but as you can see, the majority of Ross’s responses dealt with things other than SoI. The thread has a title, that’s the topic of the thread. If it ain’t about SoI’s CD then it’s off-topic, unless you have another definition of on-topic you’d like to share?

So to continue on-topic with Henry’s mention of SoI (he specifically mentioned it in his post), I think there are 2 different ways to go forward with nerfing it:

1. Only apply the shatter recharge to F1-F3. That way it doesn’t recharge Distortion, which is part of what gives condi mes its sustain. I’d even consider it just recharging F1-F2 since tbh Diversion is both offensive and defensive.
2. Revert the CD to 90s. It was 90s until just before HoT, now it’s 60s not including alacrity. Far too low for a skill that recharges multiple important profession mechanics. This is the definition of power creep.

I think one of those would be sufficient, both would be overkill.

One has to look at why SoI had its CD decreased so much before criticising it, and its because of how poorly designed mesmer is as a class right now. But if you strictly want to talk about SoI and absolutely nothing else, a better way to reduce its effectiveness is to just make it only recharge 50% (or hell even 66%) of the CDs of each shatter. So maximum of 6 sec taken off of MW’s CD untraited, 25 sec taken off of Distortions CD untraited immediately.

And you can’t discuss how strong Signet of Illusions is without talking about chronomancer. Because a large part of how powerful it is in the condi chrono build is because you can use it twice back to back with CS, and increasing its CD won’t change that at all, yet it will hurt base mesmer who is already in a pretty weak spot.

You say that we can’t discuss SoI without mentioning chronomancer, yet here we are. Fancy that. I like your 66% CD reduction idea better than my ideas tbh, that sounds like a good compromise.

I agree that base mesmer is struggling in all game modes, Chaos and to some degree Domination need buffs. And Inspirations’s GM traits should be revisited. I’ve also mentioned in the past that I think Ineptitude is too weak with the 10s per-target CD.

PlatinumMember.5274:

Huskyboy.1053:

nothelseth.4621:

Cynz.9437:

nothelseth.4621:

Cynz.9437:

The real question is, did Helseth also queue at 5-10 am like the rest of the top 10 (you know who i am talking about, i have seen you and have screemshots, don’t deny it) so he could farm players divisions (silver/gold) below him and thus never lose matches?

Oh that’s the ‘’real question’’ huh?

I didn’t do that a single time. My entire path was done on stream and primarily during primetime. My usual stream schedule is 16-22. This is easily verified by just looking at the dates/times of my past broadcasts.

I’d love to see screenshots of me qing at 5-10 am considering that I have a job lmao.

Like, a single one.

I can put a 500g reward on it.

Did you even read what i wrote?

I did.

I adressed your comment that suggested I could have been doing it at silly times. After that I also offered up to you and absolutely anyone if they could spot a single time where I’ve been qing at 4 am .

If you took the tone of the comment as something else it’s probably because it’s tiresome when people on the forum keep posting exaggerated claims as if they’re facts and then give no acknowledgement when called out on it. I’ve lurked for a minute and constantly seen it repeated. It would be nice to have this stop happening all the time.

Although let’s go ahead and prove me wrong;

‘’like the rest of the top 10 (you know who i am talking about, i have seen you and have screemshots, don’t deny it)’’

This suggests that the majority of the top10 q at 5-10 am which is the only reason they have the winratio that they have.

I’ll call you out on it. Give me 6 screenshots (majority) of the EU top 10 qing at that time.

500g.

Dude you posted a video of you doing just that on your own stream!

Just to save everyone the trouble you will get rickroll.

Don’t listen to him guys this is legit.

nothelseth.4621:

Cynz.9437:

nothelseth.4621:

Cynz.9437:

The real question is, did Helseth also queue at 5-10 am like the rest of the top 10 (you know who i am talking about, i have seen you and have screemshots, don’t deny it) so he could farm players divisions (silver/gold) below him and thus never lose matches?

Oh that’s the ‘’real question’’ huh?

I didn’t do that a single time. My entire path was done on stream and primarily during primetime. My usual stream schedule is 16-22. This is easily verified by just looking at the dates/times of my past broadcasts.

I’d love to see screenshots of me qing at 5-10 am considering that I have a job lmao.

Like, a single one.

I can put a 500g reward on it.

Did you even read what i wrote?

I did.

I adressed your comment that suggested I could have been doing it at silly times. After that I also offered up to you and absolutely anyone if they could spot a single time where I’ve been qing at 4 am .

If you took the tone of the comment as something else it’s probably because it’s tiresome when people on the forum keep posting exaggerated claims as if they’re facts and then give no acknowledgement when called out on it. I’ve lurked for a minute and constantly seen it repeated. It would be nice to have this stop happening all the time.

Although let’s go ahead and prove me wrong;

‘’like the rest of the top 10 (you know who i am talking about, i have seen you and have screemshots, don’t deny it)’’

This suggests that the majority of the top10 q at 5-10 am which is the only reason they have the winratio that they have.

I’ll call you out on it. Give me 6 screenshots (majority) of the EU top 10 qing at that time.

500g.

Dude you posted a video of you doing just that on your own stream!

OriOri.8724:

@HuskyBoy – How is Ross derailing a thread that complains about mesmers by pointing out why the chrono line is practically mandatory atm? Mesmer has its problems, especially chrono, and informing people about why their proposed change won’t actually solve any of the problems they have with chrono and will just nerf base mesmer to the ground for no good reason is 100% on topic

My thread wasnt complaining about mesmers, it was criticizing the 33% buff to SoI’s CD. The topic was very narrow and clearly-defined. Other things about mesmer might be tangential, but as you can see, the majority of Ross’s responses dealt with things other than SoI. The thread has a title, that’s the topic of the thread. If it ain’t about SoI’s CD then it’s off-topic, unless you have another definition of on-topic you’d like to share?

So to continue on-topic with Henry’s mention of SoI (he specifically mentioned it in his post), I think there are 2 different ways to go forward with nerfing it:

1. Only apply the shatter recharge to F1-F3. That way it doesn’t recharge Distortion, which is part of what gives condi mes its sustain. I’d even consider it just recharging F1-F2 since tbh Diversion is both offensive and defensive.
2. Revert the CD to 90s. It was 90s until just before HoT, now it’s 60s not including alacrity. Far too low for a skill that recharges multiple important profession mechanics. This is the definition of power creep.

I think one of those would be sufficient, both would be overkill.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Your error is trying to point at any one chronomancer trait or utility when only on the one meta condi chrono build is the synergy between all of it’s parts the problem.

The solution isnt nerfing any one part (as those parts could be used in any non meta condi chrono build and be fine) but rather shuffling the pieces around appropriately so that choices must be made and/so options/potency will be lost.

Also things like Adrenal health are only going to look OP vs sustained damage- condi’s, or annoying pew pew from sustain setups like druid with their rediculous staff etc. Of course that’s what everyone’s running these days for the sake of ease. However vs heavy burst damage and sustained high DPS, it’s easily kept in check. So again, you’re going after a symptom instead of a problem.

If you want to go after scrappers, half their elixer invuln durations so they can’t continually regen safely, escape safely, and reset continually safely. Punish them harder for eating all that mitigated damage to begin with.

Yknow Ross, maybe instead of derailing any discussion about individual mesmer traits/skills with generalizations about Chrono and the profession as a whole, maybe you could just stay on topic? I already had this experience with you where I made a thread about (guess what??) SoI and one of your responses was this:

Ross Biddle.2367:

You assume the next elite spec will give mesmer a viable build and that Chrono won’t remain utterly necessary due to the core problems inherent in mesmer design (and in the face of the meta).

And looking at CD’s objectively is a nightmare when, whenever you do it, it can’t be done as a standalone balancing act of the class in and of itself. You want to nerf a single skill or utility? Without upheaving all the other elite specs you threaten to unbalance the meta and potentially knock a class out of the competition. It’s laughable how few mesmers are playing right not in fact what with all the Dh’s, Ele’s, and War’s running around. Add to that the ever obnoxious druids and even necros, your desire to talk “objectively” about a tweaking a single utility is on par with the effort to take a leisurely approach to hiking Everest.

But yes, you’re right, CS doesn’t effect base mesmer. But Chrono effects every weapon, utility, and elite currently in play! Chrono may need CD increases, but base mesmer does not. Base mesmer operates at about 1/3 the potential of chrono given everything, it’s ridiculous having to run it in an elite spec age (the eAge).

I know it’s crazy to suggest it but the game needs an entire redesign once again to properly balance how weapons/traits/skills/utilities/elite specs work. The devs won’t be ready to admit it yet, and I presume the game will fall to the annals of history before it comes about, but balancing elite specs and the matter of core lines will never be resolved until they do.

While talking about SoI isn’t going to fix mesmer and Chrono, it’s better than discussing how we should be discussing Chrono as a whole. In my experience you’re the only person this invested in derailing threads that discuss mesmer skills/traits.

WELL YOU ALL CAN SKRITT MY SKRITT YOU SKRITTERS

So as many of you know, whenever a perceived inappropriate word is being used in a forum post, the censorship hammer smashes the bad word into “kitten.” For example, this word will become kitten nal.

This is a formal petition that for all future censorship instances, bad words instead be changed to “skritt” rather than “kitten.” That is all.

Arcaedus.7290:

Purification is definitely the best place for DH to currently be nerfed imo. Anet already made their stance on DH’s damage (it’s fine) and has just nerfed our utility (removing CC) so the only other fair way to nerf us would be sustain. The question is by how much?

Currently with 0 healing power, you get an instantaneous 10k health if you lay the trap with someone standing on top of you. You’re proposing dropping this number down to 8.5k with more up-front health which is more than fair but I think the regen should remain since every other trap grants a boon. Perhaps decrease the regen time down to 8s? This would be fair; overall, the healing of this skill (at 0 heal power) would go from 11.3k total to 9.5k total with more burst-sustain and less long-term sustain which is exactly what DH needs right now.

The pulsing blind is very interesting but I highly doubt that they would implement this; likely purification will just be nerfed with no other compensation. Honestly, this functionality belongs on Light’s Judgement trap if anything; I mean, look at that animation! The trap is pretty undertuned as is but that’s for another discussion!

I’m pretty sure I did my math right. It’s exactly 9321 healing total, including the regen, 8k without the regen. I’m proposing removing the regen, and making the sum total healing 6.5k. 3.25k on trap lay, 3.25k on trap trigger. I see your point about keeping the boon to maintain consistency, that’s kind of a technical point. It basically just makes you more vulnerable to boon steal/corrupt, but if that’s your intention then I can see why it makes sense. Really I just think the overall healing should be more in line with other healing skills, but that Purification needs a small boost as a defensive trap.

Rain.9213:

I actually think Jalis is just a few slight buffs away from being competitively viable.

-Inspiring Reinforcement shouldn’t take so long to lay out all the bricks and start pulsing stability. Considering it’s a very awkwardly shaped and small aoe, it should be faster.
-Vengeful Hammers still need to be fixed to stop turning off on environment.
-Rite of the Great Dwarf should have the condition damage resistance baseline instead of being forced to slot the now lame Retribution line just to survive condies.

That’s IMO what could make Legendary Dwarf pretty usable in PVP as you would provide excellent group support and not just a ton of boons while still being able to run full damage traits to still be a big threat in group fights.

In addition, Retribution should have a hammer trait. Obviously Ret is separate from Jalis but they’re actually supposed to go together, the way hammer functions atm it benefits more from extra dodges and damage reduction than sword or staff does. Invocation doesn’t work as well and so what else are you supposed to use with a hammer build?

Yannir.4132:

So 6,5k health straight up without waiting for the traps activation? I can climb on board that.

Ah I worded that incorrectly, I was just trying to say that no regen means that all of the healing would be at once rather than gradual like it is with regen. I still think that healing should be reliant on the trap’s triggering, but the distribution of healing should be 50/50 rather than the current roughly 20/80 split. 3.25k health up front is pretty nice.

godmoney.6025:

Sometimes it’s just impossible to do your intended role as a thief, because of your teammates.

Few games ago I was going +1 on close to make it 2v1. Our mesmer starts screaming at me to go decap far. I finish the +1 at close (in our favour and we get close back). Decide to make a run for far – but wait, mesmer decided to go contest far, and dies to druid and DH. Enemy Druid decides to camp at far – I see this and ignore far for now. Mesmer goes far again, dies almost instantly- he probably didn’t anticipate DH just left him some trap bombs under the druid.
Our team asks him why he is dying at far again – he replies – COZ IM DOING THIEF JOB. THIEF GO PVE FARM MUSSELS OR SOMETHING.

Because the pigeon-holed view of thief in some players minds are so obscured, they think when the thief is not on far – he isn’t doing his job – and then they decide they should be doing it. Sometimes there is good reason not to be on far – and while the mesmer above decides to go and try to cap a point with an enemy on it (and dies in the process) – our team is missing out on the great pressure he (condi mesmer) could have applied in team fights. Players like him make our ‘thief jobs’ so much more difficult.

Yeah I’ve both been the thief who’s criticized and been the person criticizing in that same situation. Did you happen to tell the team that the druid was temporarily bunking far? It’s really crucial to communicate that, if someone else goes far then you can 2v1 and win it. From there you can fullcap it and throw the other team off their rhythm. But that’s not gonna happen without your communication. Your mesmer was an idiot to try and do things by himself (without being good enough to win 1v1) but he didn’t have the wrong idea. Bad teamwork on his part is what made his effort ineffective.

So I’m gonna say what’s probably an unpopular opinion on this forum: as a heal, Purification is OP. Including the regen, it gives around 9300 health with no healing power. That’s more than 2/3 of Guard’s base health. I think the healing amount needs a nerf, but that there should be some give for the take.

The heal should be nerfed to around 6.5k total with no regen boon (it’s actually better to get the healing up-front rather than have to wait for regen anyways), but the trap should pulse a blockable blind 3-4 times. And maybe the traited slow could be applied twice, once on the laying of the trap and once on activation. I think replacing daze with a short slow was a bit overkill so imo the slow on all traps ahould be applied both on trap laying (AoE around the DH) and on trap activation (AoE within the trap’s radius).

The blind makes the skill more defensive but doesn’t return DH to full health, which in my view should never happen unless you’re using Magi amulet. My version of Purification gives more counterplay options to your opponent without being a straight nerf. Also, the blinds are a good counter to unblockable power warriors, one of DH’s predators.

sophiewhite.3149:

multiple ESL players streaming have said rev is perfectly viable. i think highly of their opinions much more than your average forum user.

What ESL players say offhand isn’t as valuable as you think. I’m sure you saw the forum thread where Helseth and Sindrener were arguing about thief; tbh while Helseth’s comments were true in the realm of ESL tournament play, Sindrener’s perspective was more relevant to regular ranked games. Thief isn’t played the same way and doesn’t face the same challenges in those 2 separate environments. And this was when they were both trying to flesh out smart-sounding arguments, not just thinking out loud on their stream where there’s nobody arguing with them.

On top of that general note, what does “perfectly viable” even mean? You’re not positively contributing to this conversation by pretending to quote multiple people whose opinions may or may not matter, I do not believe that they all said “Rev is perfectly viable” and just left it at that. Rev got all nerfs and no buffs outside of the Mallyx stunbreak, and it’s been that way after every patch. Rev is still around but top players are favoring it less and less as it’s now failing to prove its superiority at anything. Why play a class that barely passes the mark of what’s considered viable?

Abelisk.4527:

Here’s the build I’ve been running with Power Shiro

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlAQNAW8sn3guNSuQ7JRboVlsP0rS4IaWJ4EdsklNFyegHchtB4ALgNMlZNA-TZBHwAFOIAlvAAMLDwZ/BAPBAA

Loses extra boonshare potential at the sake of better damage.

It’s potent. I’ve really made dents with this build.

You could probably use rune of the daredevil since you’re getting extra dodges off of Riposting Shadows.

Aeolus.3615:

if i recall Anet reduced the initial heal form mace AA, but increased the stat contribution, maybe needs a higher base value with the actual stat contribution.
Chrury.4627 I would not mind with that, still needs to affect simbol regen its darn to slow to cast for its contribution.

One tweak could be distribute mace healing over the chain AA, increasing the healing output for allies from the guardian Justice, it feels that justice could play a good role also not only for burn.

Nah they increased both base healing and HP contribution. I’m saying they should reduce base but dramatically increase healing contribution. As it is right now I get about 250 extra healing from magi amulet, which is not very much. But increasing base healing rewards power builds, which isn’t good imo.

GrahamW.5397:

In wvw it is most definitely different. The amount of healing you get out of mace is insane. Well over 20k health, almost 4k armor on top of all the healing and boons your guardian will be throwing out there its one of the best support builds for wvw right now right up there with eles. . In spvp the balance is different and what makes it shine in wvw and the reasons why it does just aren’t there so you end up with a lack luster weapon that doesn’t really stand out or do much. If mace were to be used they would really need to adjust some of the cast times like op said, and even then i feel like it would still be pretty meh. Mace shield guardians used to be a thing spvp when the bunker amulets were around because thats what mace is good at. Without them it doesn’t really have a place. At least not in its current form.

I think for sPvP the base healing for mace AA should be halved, but the healing contribution should be MUCH higher, it’s really low right now. That way increasing the AA’s speed would benefit either power or healing builds, but power builds wouldn’t get much healing off of a faster AA.

Aeolus.3615:

I only use it for the symbolic avenger 10% damage boost with traps for spvp build… but i cant play much that build, anything that playsDH traps on the build its a build that carries the players… and i hate to feel carried.

The healing is minor(arround 140 heal ticks) on a skills that is almost 2sec to be casted it stops casting if i take finger from button for some time when im laggin a bit on WvW this is what happens most of the time, its not a good thing to sacrifice other preferable stats over healing power on guardian, you should use your blocks to increase the healing power while choose a build that carries u trough damage ouput, reason i use mace 3 mostly of the time, to increase via blocks the outgoing healing.

Mace 2 it works for you because u migh be using traps…..but meh.. with traps every one plays well…

Yeah I have been playing it in a DPS build, not healing. And like I said, I intended this to be an sPvP thread. Yeah it’s not so useful in WvW but that’s not where I’m using it.

Aeolus.3615:

ive been using mace since beta, and still use, in both pvp and WvW… its awfull due how most classes can sustain the damage mace does and how bad guardian stats are being used, we sacrifice to much o defense for nothing while most classes can do defense and offense at same time, and the symbol is awfull due every one has speed boost and healing power on guardian is very weak, its slow casting by the time you ended casting the 2nd skill “Symbol of Faith” target is already is bursting you or went to range, does poor defense for self or team, usually in pvp i only uset to defend against initial contact burst then swap to sword/focus.

Dont expect anything good in this game, about game balance, its a defensive weapon is ment to be slow and punishing the carrier, they compensated that with a block/aegis on mace 3 because, mace even with that fall behind the offensive weapons, as a defensive weapon.

Mace has a huge problem, that is Anet thinks defensive Guardian gameplay is strong.. while its a class that does no damage, no support or very poor support and has low surviability no matter how many blocks it has(even so we hear alot of bad players QQ how DH/guard has many blocks, sicne this game was built to gammers that want to kill target by just spamming 1 key), they are a very easy class/build to defeat due how Anet likes to unbalance and carrie players trough gimmick damage build vs defensive builds.

Anet poor resolve of bringing a decent gameplay decided to make not all weapons viable to be main weapons for every mode.

Actually symbol of faith is an excellent skill. Obviously it’s more useful offensively, but even if the person kites out of it you still get heals. You use it for sustain if you can’t use it offensively, you can always drop it then switch to longbow or scepter. It’s powerful enough to force someone off point yet also heals you, that’s the definition of offense and defense at the same time. It just needs to be reduced to 3/4s or even 1s, the cast time is unusually long by any standard, including other symbols. And like i said, the AA is 3/4s longer than other 1-handed weapon than guard has, that’s pretty unfair. It should be shaved down a bit, or at least have the aftercast reduced.

This is an sPvP thread

I’ve been trying it out, and I like the way it works, but the cast times are so slow. Incredibly slow. The AA chain completes in 3.25s according to the wiki, compared to 2.5s for sword and greatsword. Other weapons don’t have AA chains. Anyways that’s just too slow for sPvP I think, whether you want healing or damage. And the healing contribution on the 3rd AA chain skill is ridiculously low.

Also, the Mace 2 skill also has a long casting time. I think if the AA was buffed down to 2.5s for a full chain and Mace 2 was buffed to 3/4s then we’d be good. I would love to use it but the weapon overall is just not competitive, especially compared to sword.

Archon.6480:

Huskyboy.1053:

sexuallegend.2153:

okay first off OP, the top rank belongs to druid hands down. I can tell you aren’t incredibly proficient with the class at all. there isn’t one class that can counter dodge druid, which is my unique build and personally what I view as the meta build for druids. super high dmg warrior? no problem, just evade everything. condi shredder theif? cool just dodge and cleanse everything. condi mesmer with moa? cool just dodge and cleanse. high dmg thief? cool just dodge and heal everything.

Insane heals, high pet dmg, some of the highest possible mobility, second most stealth in the game….need I say more? lmao. the only weakness this build has is 1v4 combat or 1v3 vs good players.

Very important message here guys, plz pay attention.

Yeah, but what’s a Dodge Druid? Is that like a Chevy Guardian?

Tbh your comparison makes no sense m8. Clearly a Mitsubishi Mesmer is much more accurate.

sexuallegend.2153:

okay first off OP, the top rank belongs to druid hands down. I can tell you aren’t incredibly proficient with the class at all. there isn’t one class that can counter dodge druid, which is my unique build and personally what I view as the meta build for druids. super high dmg warrior? no problem, just evade everything. condi shredder theif? cool just dodge and cleanse everything. condi mesmer with moa? cool just dodge and cleanse. high dmg thief? cool just dodge and heal everything.

Insane heals, high pet dmg, some of the highest possible mobility, second most stealth in the game….need I say more? lmao. the only weakness this build has is 1v4 combat or 1v3 vs good players.

Very important message here guys, plz pay attention.

Sazdek.6830:

Helseth’s climb proved that by playing a good class with a good build and being generally better than the people in your ranking, you will climb. That’s all that it was meant to prove and it did. You can’t toss in the argument that “Well he didn’t play x subpar class so his climb is meaningless” because it just doesn’t apply to real life. You don’t play something not designed to do what you’re aiming for and then wonder why the hell your goal isn’t being reached. It’s like setting a goal of spending less on gas for a month while driving a Hummer.

DeceiverX’s position is that a player who belongs in Silver doesn’t possess enough skill to get from Bronze into Silver while SoloQing, despite possessing the same skill level as the average Silver player. Feel free to substitute Gold for Silver and Silver for Bronze, it works any which way.
And skill aside, your build affects your overall performance; power mes is undertuned in the current meta compared to condi mes, and so DeceiverX is saying that since the skill gap is massive (therefore boosting Helseth’s overall effect on his team’s score) a way of limiting Helseth’s disproportionate superiority to those in Bronze/Silver would be to play an inferior build. I don’t think that it would be enjoyable for Helseth to do that and I’m not making any challenges or demands myself, but it would make him slightly more comparable to an average player trying to climb out of a division where they “don’t belong.”

Helseth seems to be under the impression that his experience mirrors that of other players who belong in higher divisions; many people disagree, and this is why. Were he to limit his performance level to that of a Gold player, either by playing more poorly or playing a worse build, this “Helseth vs ELO hell journey” series would’ve more accurately portrayed a Gold-level player’s experience getting from Bronze to Platinum. But he didn’t. He played at a Legendary level on the highest-rated meta build (which he probably created and tested many times himself), and as a result did in fact climb quickly. Good for him, still isn’t really relevant to average players stuck in below-average divisions.

Xanctus The Dragonslayer.2318:

What is with this kittening bullkitten: Now you know how it feels. What kind of reasoning is this? U don’t justify nerfs out of kittening spite. Heck I play ele as well. Yes even i get kittening kittened of when I fight a mace bow warrior on fresh air tempest or some dps tempest. And almost kittening die when i get hit once or twice by a condi burst. If not waste all my kittening cooldowns on cleansing conditions, sacrifice sustain against power damage by running ether renewal Or either run water traitline and swap harmonois conduit for invorgating torrents which makes it super hard to pull of an overload. And then have practically no defences against the current incarnation of power warrior, even nerfed herald or thief. Because u cannot have a fresh air tempest/dps tempest with the sustain against both powerr damage and condi damage like most current power builds. Because thier armour is kittenedly low and thier hp is also kittenedly low.

We don’t have that privelege. But this is not the way to go.

Because some parents buy T-rated games for their kids before the kid is 13.

Nimrud.5642:

Was just about to write the same, still getting blowout matches 90% of the time. Still feels like its just RNG at the start (the game puts the teams together), and nothing significant after the game starts – just waiting for the inevitable.

And its not just some wierd forum dudes who come here and complain about it all the time. I’m a regular viewer of ESL players’ streams and its quite often the case with them as well. You see them going 2v1 or even 3v1 for minutes and their team still loses other caps. How can you possibly carry harder than that? You cant… this system is just not able to measure true skill level and potential. (Dunno which one does though…) What were those players doing in that division if they cant win 2v3s and 2v4s? Got a guildie, I could never ever beat him 1v1. Still he’s lower rated this season than me… Killed a necro on my thief in like 12 seconds last game, the next game a DH did the same to my ele… its just crazyness all over the place.

I believe Anet is trying, but if they do they are constantly overlooking fundamental things I suspect. It’s been the complaint since forever, and seems to stay so for a good while…

Yeah it’s a function of a system that gives you a rating based off of your team’s performance and the other team’s performance, even though you only impact 10% if a game’s outcome. Just as a great player can turn a game around by playing great, that amazing play can be negated by a permadead who is constantly feeding the other team in 5-point increments. 90% of the rating you gain/lose each individual match is determined by people other than yourself. People like to say that if you improve your skill level then you’ll win more matches, but that’s only true if your teammates are generally equally matched against the other team’s players. If they’re inferior then there’s a limit to which you can counteract that.

Also, just an overly detail-oriented note, it’s a bit easier to understand what you mean if you always put the number relating to your team first, such as “my team lost 356-500” or “we were in a 2v3 situation but we ended up winning anyways.” I got a little confused when you said “they cant win 2v3s and 2v4s?” I was thinking, yeah… of course they can’t. Then I figured it out.

Rashy.4165:

>Your idea of increasing the sPvP population is nice, but doesn’t solve the current issue of MMR mismatching people of disparate skill levels.

MMR mismatch is a result of the system not having enough players at different MMR ranges.

And as for taking a minimum of 3 months to get to Platinum level, that is entirely subjective. People learn at different rates. Most classes have a low skill floor to do well, and only some classes have a high skill ceiling to do really well. Learning conquest and rotation isn’t unique to GW2 as it’s conceptual.

Proportionately here means something along the lines of:
If say 80% of the playerbase is Bronze and the remaining 20% is Platinum or higher, and the game brings in 100k new players, those new players will more or less fit into those divisions with the same proportions, in theory. In practice, if the numbers are even slightly different (say, 10-15% of new players reach platinum level), that’s still a noticeable boost in population at platinum.

Yes, all of this did make more sense at launch, but it’s never too late to start. Frankly, the game was almost completely overhauled with new systems for HoT, which was 3 years after the game’s release.

When I said 3 months, I was assuming this person got help from Platinum or Legendary-level players along the way; I’ve had help from one person like that and I can tell you I improved a LOT faster once I started dueling him and got advice. There aren’t enough high-level players to come even close to having a 1:1 new player/experienced player ratio to make that happen. And that’s assuming that all experienced players would dedicate themselves to teaching, which is certainly not the case. It will be more than 3 months before a PvE convert can reach that level of play, there’s too much knowledge to absorb and comprehend, as well as mechanical skills to learn, for that all to fit into 3 months of play. That is, unless they have a dedicated tutor who comes prepared and is constantly available. Pretty much all of the the top players have been pvping since launch; it’s experience that makes them great. All the Platinum players I’ve been talking to have also been playing for years.

I’m interested to hear more details about your theory as to how new players and formerly PvE-only players would fit into higher tiers soon after starting sPvP. PvE players have a head-start since they will understand their favorite build’s offensive rotation reasonably well, though they’ll be using a different build for sPvP most likely. But they won’t understand their defensive skill rotation as PvE rarely forces the player to thoughtfully use those skills to the same degree as every sPvP match does. They simply won’t have the mechanical skill until they develop it. PvE players will certainly not understand all of the meta builds in sPvP at the moment. And everything I just said goes double for people new to GW2, they might have had relevant experience in other MOBAs, but GW2 is relatively complex and there’s a lot to learn. Rotating between points is not unique to GW2, but class/build matchups are different in GW2, so making intelligent rotations is mostly something that has to be relearned when starting GW2. +1ing a thief who’s fighting your DH is stupid, even though +1ing a 1v1 is generally a good idea.

To summarize, I’m just not seeing why increasing the numbers of players is the top priority, though it’s not a bad idea. It simply does not address how Anet could make systemic changes that, upon taking effect, will immediately make the ranked system more enjoyable, such as awarding/deducting MMR points based on individual contributions in matches. Increasing population is certainly not so important that other issues/improvements should not be discussed concurrently.

Abelisk.4527:

There’s a D/D condi build on Metabattle right now, and it’s perfect.

For mobility, spam heartseeker. You move really quickly.

With the meta build you can keep spamming Lotus Blossom and dodges over and over again. You also have two stunbreakers including a block.

There are enough condition covers to stack bleeds with. It’s priceless. You literally spam dagger 3 over and over again to the point where you win the 1v1.

This is cute. Yes, the D/D condi build works fine in fractals (where it’s categorized) due to the fact that monsters don’t really dodge or block all that much. In sPvP the reality is different; thief has medium armor and is in the lowest health pool, yet you’re relying on a build with obvious tells, little use of stealth, and which requires you to constantly be at melee range to win. If you choose Viper or Sinister amulet to make the CnD → Backstab combo powerful (I.e. make stealth useful) you lose pretty much all survivability. It’s a fail against a DH who can manage their condi clears, any meta druid, engi, or ele, all warriors who can time their CCs correctly, staff sw/sh mesmers, and who’s left really? It’s a great 1v1 build when you’re fighting a potato, not so much when it’s a moving target with dodges, blocks, condi clears, and/or ranged weapons. There is a reason that build isn’t listed under Conquest, that section is for builds that work at all levels of sPvP, not just bronze/silver.

Rashy.4165:

Huskyboy.1053:

Yes, I was being sarcastic. Anet is no longer a tiny developer, they can handle more than one problem at a time (they employ more than one dev). Saying as you did that we can only discuss other people’s pet peeves after your particular annoyance has been solved is a self-interested attempt to shut down other important discussions. Yes, we’d all benefit from a larger PvP population, no, that discussion should not eclipse all other discussion dedicated to improving the sPvP side of GW2. I would also point out that if the population were to increase, it would all be new people, and so would simply increase the number of “bads” in the lower tiers of sPvP ranked matches and wouldn’t affect higher tiers. It wouldn’t solve the issue of Silver/Gold-level players being stuck in Bronze due to not being quite good enough to carry 4 other players every match, and it would only increase the number of players in need of carrying. That being said, people who are stuck in Bronze who “don’t belong there” are only a portion of the sPvP population and I don’t think their concerns are more or less important than any other issues.

I have heard the idea of a sPvP-only client before and I think it’s a great idea, this should happen and I fully support it. Your idea of a sPvP-only GW2 account is a bit different, still viable and I like it. It would also help GW2 market itself as a MOBA within a MMO, which could take GW2’s sPvP situation in a more positive direction.

" and so would simply increase the number of “bads” in the lower tiers of sPvP ranked matches and wouldn’t affect higher tiers."

New to GW2 perhaps, but not necessarily bad players, or necessarily new to PvP and conquest. People learn at different rates. Bringing in more players would increase populations at all skill levels proportionately, not accounting for individual player growth from those new players.

“Anet is no longer a tiny developer, they can handle more than one problem at a time”

I’m aware. However, they’re also relatively small in size compared to the big names in PvP games. Due to that size, prioritization is important. Tackling more problems at the same times runs the risk of them being stretched too thin, not being able to dedicate enough time and resources to each problem individually.

Also, PvP population isn’t a personal annoyance. It’s a prevalent problem that’s existed since GW2 launched. Concurrent population is affected by that as well – why do you think they removed Team Queue and aren’t re-adding it now? Because they can’t afford the split in PvP population as it will affect queue times adversely.

It would not increase the number of people at all skill levels proportionately. All talent levels perhaps, but certainly not skill levels. It takes months to learn this game properly since you need to have at least passing knowledge of all meta builds, some extra knowledge about lesser-used traits and skills, high levels of proficiency in playing 1-2 builds, and of course the expertise to make logical decisions about when to rotate where. Even if a highly talented player starts playing today and has plenty of free time, they’d need a minimum 3 months to become a Platinum-level player, and that’s assuming they can afford to play 6 hours every day. Your idea of increasing the sPvP population is nice, but doesn’t solve the current issue of MMR mismatching people of disparate skill levels. We want the game to be fun now, not at some arbitrary point in the future. Gw2 is already 4 years old, it won’t be around for too much longer, so making the game more fun now is a priority. Long-term solutions that take time to be effective made a lot of sense at launch; now, not so much.

narcx.3570:

I’ve been dueling around with this, and I gotta say, the cast time on pain suppression makes the stun break a joke. You use it, but then you’re left channeling PS, and any good warrior or thief just instantly restuns you before the cast finishes—conversely any bad warrior or thief keyboard spammashing their stuns/interrupts also just interrupts it and locks out your casting. You can stow weapon to try and get a block up before that second stun comes, but it’s still not really fast enough—best cast scenario you get stunned but avoid the casttime lock.

With the high energy cost of pain supression, would it really be too OP to just let it be instacast…?

I also think it should be instacast. That being said, you can always weapon stow then dodge, or just dodge, right after activating it. That way you at least get the stunbreak without subjecting yourself to another immediate stun. Or you can just wait out the CC chain, with a condi warr this is totally fine, power warrior or thief not so much.

Rashy.4165:

Huskyboy.1053:

Rashy.4165:

No suggestion is worth implementing until ArenaNet can fix the biggest issue: drawing in many more players and giving them incentives to perform well in PvP.

Once we can guarantee that we have 100s of players at all skill levels queuing concurrently (this is the key, really, not just sheer numbers, but concurrent numbers), then we can start to talk about matchmaking and whether or not it’s working as expected.

Rashy is right. We can only focus on one problem at a time. LITERALLY. The devs are physically incapable of solving more than one problem in a given timeframe. Not possible, will never happen, let’s never discuss solutions to problems ever.

Not sure if sarcasm, but to elaborate:
Yes, there are plenty of issues that need looking into. Yes, all of them do need to looked at at some point in the future. However, not all issues are equal priority. The focus should be on the biggest issue, while working on the other issues simultaneously (lower priority).

And IMO, the highest priority right now should be PvP population. Matchmaking issues will probably fix itself if it has a healthy population of players to draw from. With a healthy population to draw from, they can implement additional controls to prevent class stacking. With a healthy population, you won’t have matches that are stacked against you, you’ll have more even matches where everyone is rated roughly equally. With a healthy population, proper solo and teamQ can be re-implemented, and separated queues won’t be a problem. Even with a healthy population, the game doesn’t need to be an esport, but it has a better potential to be one.

Class balancing is an on-going problem that can be dealt with by making far more frequent balancing updates, or implement a public test server (probably more work involved).

So, how to bring in more players?
The cleanest solution would probably be a PvP-only version of the game (GW1 called, it wants its idea back), that players can download for free, or for a small price. They get most of the PvP build interface unlocked (the core stuff that everyone gets, including all specializations). They can still earn reward track progression and pip rewards, but can only be fully taken advantage of if they buy the full game. Additional things can be unlocked by paying for it with gold, as it is for players with the full game. If a PvP-only player wants to buy the full game, they can pay a discounted price for it.

Of course, ANet will need to prepare for something like that, as the large influx of players could pose many problems.

Yes, I was being sarcastic. Anet is no longer a tiny developer, they can handle more than one problem at a time (they employ more than one dev). Saying as you did that we can only discuss other people’s pet peeves after your particular annoyance has been solved is a self-interested attempt to shut down other important discussions. Yes, we’d all benefit from a larger PvP population, no, that discussion should not eclipse all other discussion dedicated to improving the sPvP side of GW2. I would also point out that if the population were to increase, it would all be new people, and so would simply increase the number of “bads” in the lower tiers of sPvP ranked matches and wouldn’t affect higher tiers. It wouldn’t solve the issue of Silver/Gold-level players being stuck in Bronze due to not being quite good enough to carry 4 other players every match, and it would only increase the number of players in need of carrying. That being said, people who are stuck in Bronze who “don’t belong there” are only a portion of the sPvP population and I don’t think their concerns are more or less important than any other issues.

I have heard the idea of a sPvP-only client before and I think it’s a great idea, this should happen and I fully support it. Your idea of a sPvP-only GW2 account is a bit different, still viable and I like it. It would also help GW2 market itself as a MOBA within a MMO, which could take GW2’s sPvP situation in a more positive direction.

Rashy.4165:

No suggestion is worth implementing until ArenaNet can fix the biggest issue: drawing in many more players and giving them incentives to perform well in PvP.

Once we can guarantee that we have 100s of players at all skill levels queuing concurrently (this is the key, really, not just sheer numbers, but concurrent numbers), then we can start to talk about matchmaking and whether or not it’s working as expected.

Rashy is right. We can only focus on one problem at a time. LITERALLY. The devs are physically incapable of solving more than one problem in a given timeframe. Not possible, will never happen, let’s never discuss solutions to problems ever.

MissCee.1295:

Here’s the latest from Anet:

We are unable to disclose our procedures to players due to it being apart of our internal operations. As previously stated we are working to prosecute afk players as they get reported but it is all case by case. Sorry I could not tell you more.

I’ve kept pushing, my reply:

I don’t mean to be flogging a dead horse, but that kind of closed-lip non-response is not really good enough. No one who plays pvp cares about “internal operations”, what they want to see is a strict code of conduct openly being enforced. I am increasingly playing matches where map chat is announcing who is afk, who is a repeat dc. GW2 is an MMO focused on PVE, I totally get that. But if you don’t wanna do PVP well why do it at all?

Pretty obvious this is going nowhere fast.

At the point they’ve said that they’re not going to say anything, they’re not going to say anything. Not really worth arguing with support about it since they’re not in a position to implement changes anyways.

Depends on if you’re talking about Macebow or Ragezerker, the former is best for bunkering, the latter is good for killing. Macebow is useful when you take mid, then the Macebow goes to control far. A skilled Macebow can hold a 1v2 for a very long time, but also score kills in 1v1s. Mace/shield on any build is useful for shutting down an ele since they don’t usually keep constant stability stacked. But yeah, you sacrifice mobility for survivability and great 1v1 potential, that’s the rule. Can’t have everything.

Lukas.7159:

Yo People,

i recently collected a few funny twitch clips from several pvp streamers, thought i share them with you just in case you havent seem them yet

if you got more, would be nice if you could post them aswell

Outplayed in bronze: https://clips.twitch.tv/thelordhelseth/NiceWeaselANELE

Very serious PvP Mode: https://clips.twitch.tv/leet0/ModernKangarooWTRuck

Play of the week: https://clips.twitch.tv/xerrex/CourageousGrouseFrankerZ

Awareness of a dead fish: https://clips.twitch.tv/thelordhelseth/VastFerretPicoMause

Fighting skills of self proclaimed best thief eu (LUL): https://clips.twitch.tv/gingxfreecss/SmilingNightingaleDAESuppy

XD hahaha lol i am not boss NOOB XD: https://clips.twitch.tv/leet0/GleamingHerdRuleFive

not gw2 related, but our one and only cyka bleet0 strikes again: https://clips.twitch.tv/leet0/OutstandingMagpieBabyRage

Thank you for introducing me to LEETO, didn’t know human could make dolphin sounds until now.