Guild Wars 2

godofcows.2451:

honeycakes, in wvw, if you stand out in front, you get focused in .5 seconds.

Maybe your server is special, but on every other I’ve been, zerg stacks swiftness when not engaged in combat, usually when waiting for the tail to catch up at nearest sentry. Well, what do I know, maybe a sentry focusing you is a problem for you.

You can level with pretty much any stats in the game. It’s just about your preference.

If you however prefer to kill things fast, go for power—→ precision —-—> ferocity as they become available to you. It might seem redundant to buy gear when leveling on TP, or bother with things like food/upgrades, but these things certainly do add and they are not expensive. You don’t need to buy the best stuff on TP, anything is better than having 20lvls low gear just cos nothing good dropped and lvl up chests give 1 piece per lvl.

I normally get gear with power stat, put power runes in and add some cheap power or precision food (also gives you more xp on kills), plus a bloodlust sigil on my weps.

If you find yourself too squishy, go for vitality, ignore toughness on thief.

I was so unhappy with WvW xp account bound change, I used to make new alts just to run in WvW with invader title and kill all those that wanted a free loot bag.

I hate how people focus me in team fights cos of my wvw rank (EU T9 doesn’t have many platinums) but I do exactly same to enemy players xD

I like thief in WvW cos I can stealth sneak into a tower enemies are capping, then I wait for RI to finish and cap it for my own. No need to buy siege or waste time building it :P

When I don’t play a thief, I pick on enemy thieves to make their life miserable.

I lie about having lag to avoid TS cos:
1. I don’t like all the social stuff like small talk,
2. I often don’t register others are talking to me and when in a fight, no time to respond anyway.
3. When I die some sort of unglorious death, I rage way too much for others to hear it.

Sebrent.3625:

I imagine being able to hit multiple targets (cleave) will be beneficial in clearing opposing NPCs. This could create an Axe + Drake + 3 NM that works well.

I’m concerned though that Elementalist will still retain their “Best in Slot everywhere” status in the new format given that they can probably extend their boons to their NPCs, heal their NPCs, and have great AOE/cleave damage.

Rangers can do that as well.

Hi, first, front of the zerg is where all the buffs happen, ie stacking swiftness which is faster than speed runes out of combat. Make sure you stay at front, not tail of the zerg. From your post I assume you are D/D ele? Then use your gap closers if you need to catch up with those at front, dagger air 5 gives you swiftness and you can use your weapon blast skills on static field to stack more swiftness.

Slot lighting flash and fgs. Optionally you can just swap one of your utilities for speed signet, but it’s redundant if your group/zerg has a good swiftness uptime.

As an ele you won’t benefit from getting speed runes.

For tier is this for?

Azure The Heartless.3261:

Kite, know what Guard utilities are, poison uptime, when they blow shelter and virtue recharge burst them and make them panic.

If they hit you first, disengage Dont blow initiative, poke at them from far range until they blow utilities.

get their mace crack. If you land it on them you win. For this reason its best to run 6 in trickery so you can steal every 21 seconds.

That and knowing when to kite with bow is what kills my guard.

Reminds me of one really good thief in EU T9 that managed to land every mace crack on me. While it is super annoying to be interrupted all the time, it’s also sooo sexy to fight someone skilled.

If you want want consistency with what comes first, stealth or dmg, you could end up with black powder + HS into a target causing reveal too. I am sure that would make all d/p thieves super happy.

Nyx.7342:

today i first advertised AC All Paths Zerk Only and got 3 warriors.

So i left and advertised Ac zerk only no warriors and got 2 warriors.

i left and advertised the same thing again and got 2 warriors.

once again i left and advertised the same thing and got 1 warrior. I decided fine w/e he cant be that bad, and then it turns out he and 2 others’ weren’t berserker.

How hard can it be to read the lfg. The warriors in my first two attempts were astonished i even tried to exclude them and one started getting mad when i asked him to switch xD. Oh it was annoying but it was fun.

When I log to my warr and go for dungeons, I don’t expect people question my competency to finish that dungeon. I do top dps (dat axe 5 or killshot woooow ) and support the party with banners and might, 5 warrs = 5 x the best (even better if all are PS, we support each other).

How dare you ask me to switch a class when I want to facetank the boss for you?!!! It’s your fault your lfg didn’t ask for all warrior group, I am here kindly offering you my awesomness.

Bow to your superior and don’t talk when I ignore your lfg.

Are there actually any calculations on class dps in pvp/wvw? Having highest single target dps in fully buffed pve party doesn’t translate same to pvp.

One of the reasons I keep playing other classes more and more is that I like to see crits, I am fine going zerker with the risk of dying really fast if I screw up, and I simply get the dmg I like with other classes.

Ofc I can’t stealth sneak on someone or get away as easily as with thief but honestly, I go into a fight for the fight, not chicken around and run when I am in trouble. After 2yrs of playing thief, I am bored of that and I want to stay in fights.

I doubt anyone is asking for thief dmg to double or to get vit/toughness a warrior has. Small buff here and there would be enough, or simple things like removing CnD dmg reduction in pvp.

Terrorsquad.2349:

I know, I know, premades sometimes lose to SoloQ’ers, as do I but it creates a total other effect: the premade gets laughed at and called noobs and whatnot, even when it was clear the matchmaking was a joke..

I’ve been there myself…

That’s what normally happens to our fun-guild pvp matches, we are all noobs, low pvp ranks and our opponents can see that even from out team composition (usually 2+ mesmers on team). So we kinda don’t expect to win that many matches but it gets frustrating when we are often matched vs team of dragon ranks.

False or uneducated claims, I am glad GMs check the reported account first.

Months ago on my old server Vabbi, one very popular commander used to tell zergings to report me cos he didn’t like roamers and there is no way a thief can take a tower that was taken by enemies 5mins ago. It got to the point when he told people to report me even when there was a visible cata/ram I used to break wall/gate.

Or when I transferred to Yak’s, 2nd day and one of our T3 towers was under attack by enemy server. No siege in, so I built 1 AC and I used it. 10 mins later I got flamed in map chat for wasting supplies. Somehow building that one AC was a proof I had to be that troll who built dozen rams in keep lord room.

Staff ele can’t be glass dps? And how do you know the pugs are non-zerkers?

To me, it sounds like you are too salty about others wanting you to play something else then what you want.

You can either stay d/f and find a group that doesn’t care or switch to want they want. Contrary to want you are trying to imply here, it’s zerker groups that ask me to switch weps most often.

I think the healer hate in gw2 is mostly due to people not understanding what a healer should/can do. This is mainly relevant to healers themselves.

PVE
I’ll talk about guardian players since that’s what I’ve come across in dungeons as the class used for healing.

I am personally okay with someone playing healer buid in full zerker party if the person is at least somewhat useful. That’s where the problems start. Stuff like speccing for max healing and completely ignoring other skills the class can use to actually prevent the party from taking dmg. What is the point of speccing for shout heals and then the party dies cos there was no reflect or stability when needed (stab is often used to heal, not for the stability itself). The usual healer guard has staff and mace/shield cos max heal potential. No gs 5 pull when need, light field everywhere and often mobs are pushed away from dps with shield skill – super to reset defiance on bosses befor ice bow 5 reaches them. Is it really surprising that I think that whoever takes a healer guard to PVE, just wants to troll others?

I think majority of players would be fine with a healer in party if the healer players would provide support and healing, without the annoying stuff.

One more thing to add, GW2 has some really messed up agro mechanics and often the squishiest party member gets all the agro instead of the tank/healer. With some bosses, high vitality makes you virtually invisible to the boss as long as there is a squishy in the party. Specced to take some hits to help your zerker buddes? More likely you are hurting them by doing this.

WvW
Healer specs are far more useful here than in pve, but the rest of the party needs to be competent playing dps builds and needs to be able to cooperate with the healer to utilise his build to max.

You can argue that dps in wvw is that’s needed to win but put 400HP/s regen on 4 zerkers, add occassional burst heal here and there and you got unkillable party. I’d go with healing ele rather than guard in wvw.

This bug sometimes goes into extreme mode when the affected player is lifted up into air, a lot higher than jumping/skills reach, all chained up with immob, and then he falls down. Happened to me 4-5 times so far, once I saw it on enemy player. Survivability so far is 0%.

Smart thief leaves the bar before a trouble starts.

I use plate of orrian steak fritters over plate of truffle steak cos I am cheap.
Omnom pie if running with party.
Mango pie if I am really broke.

I grinded some of the Dry Top recipes on my main account, the lifesteal/+40 condi duration food is very nice with S/D but pricey and I think it’s more worth on some other classes/builds (like rabid engi).

If you run might stacking S/D build, try nopalitos saute/fried golden dumpling with bountiful sharpening stones for +30% boon duration over might on dodge food (the base might from that is just 5s). You get 30% from consumables, 30% from traits, that’s for all boons, making vigor etc last a lot longer. With strength runes, might duration is at 105% (capped at 100%) which is overkill, with hoelbrak 90%/-20% condi dur. With bountiful theft, you have vigor for days and also vigor is 100% endurance regen, might on dodge food only 40%.

yeah it works but it’s a bit counterproductive if you use hidden killer

pupi.2465:

Lest say, 1vs 3+ for those group encounters in wvw, i mainly roam alone.

Been using the steal build 2/0/0/6/6 , but not having success in general, any tips?

When using 2/0/0/6/6, what do you usually die to? If you really like that build, just find some comprise to help you counter what kills you a lot. I personally find 2pts in SA far more useful than full acro, especially in wvw.

Whirling axe is my most fav bundle, but not as much vs warriors as rangers or thieves. You might use it against warr inside black powder but otherwise it’s like asking to be killed. So usually I throw it away when fighting a warr and save it after a fight for reflects and the dmg it deals to squishier enemies. Cast basi and when thief uses SR, spin for the win in his refuge. Really nice in team fights vs pugs.

2nd on my fav list is the water field from ranger, especially vs condi ranger. Warning – use of this bundle promotes HS spam :P

The least fav skill I can steal from another player is consume plasma, while it’s really good, it’s also the most boring bundle ever. Even engi gunk is more fun to use, at least I can roast my enemy in a puddle of filth.

YourFriendMarvin.4127:

“Oh my ribs”
“Insert Random Phrase Here”

Woudn’t ever work, you see, my norn thief is so fat, even guardian hammer can’t touch his ribs. Perhaps if you aim lower, the affected character could drop [Walnuts] so people know where to dps the downed body.

Scoobaniec.9561:

Rednik.3809:

Scoobaniec.9561:

That said, hammer revenant with Jalis legend will wreck any turret engi on a sight.

So it gonna be only 6+ months before we get something in meta who can properly wreck that extremely skillful l33t pro-player class?

Never heard of esport?! Patience mastery coming soon

Laughed so hard I forgot what I wanted to QQ about in this thread.

ThyShadowPaladin.9521:

Had a PS EA warrior camp Longbow the whole run… even when we were stacking for trash mobs…

Was doing AC story with my staff ele so things were dying fast and someone noted it party chat. The only other lvl 80 in party responded with what’s on screenie. His secondary was lb and I must add he did try to go for killshot on every boss. double range the new warrior meta!

Am I the only who is super excited over the coming change in bronze match ups? Nothing worse than logging to wvw and seeing all maps are green, with servers we’ve been matched with for weeks and weeks.

Sorry WSR it has to be you, I’ll send flowers on friday’s reset.

Moxx in NA

On other hand, I am quite glad you won’t use your commander tag to take BT zerglings on a wild chase after me :P

That’s some godly thief you met there, doing insane condi dmg with SWORD/PISTOL and bow offhand, burst dmg too and stealthing 24/7. The best part is that most people posting here didn’t notice/keep ignoring this bs in OP’s posts and just QQ’ing about thieves being op.

No wonder all of you get owned by thieves, the class is a hard counter for every player with afk brain.

rabidsmiles.5926:

Helly.2597:

You know you can stow pets right?

You know that when you take damage they come out right?

However, if I use my cat tonic, the pet is GONE. Like completely so if I take damage while stealth running (IE in Arah before Lupi when you jump down in stealth, the kitten pet pops out and screws everything up)…I stay a cat and the pet doesn’t pop ruining things.

Awesome tip for my ranger! ty!

TyPin.9860:

But the OP talked about jumping, not leaping. That imob stops “unprotected” leaping is totally okay imo.

Sometimes when it stops a non-evasive leap, the game registers the player as “in the air” and that combined with immob is what people here are complaining about. Jumps, leaps, funky terrain + immob = gg.

The first is a compilation of some lfgs I’ve seen in past few days.

The 2nd is a screenie from coe p2 last alpha fight earlier today, I knew it was a noob run so I didn’t expect anything amazing. All fights were rez fest but when we managed to get to the last fight, 3 people died at the very start including this P/P thief (red chat). I don’t mind running dugeons with new players from time to time but I am allergic to people that are useless and still complain.

Ravinsild.4637:

Well I always enjoyed stuff like White Mage and Scholar in FF14 and all healers (Holy Pally, Resto Druid, Resto Shaman, Disc Priest, Mistwalker, etc…) in WoW. I even like support in games like Heroes of the Storm, League of Legends and DotA 2.

I guess this game just doesn’t have that though.

There are few builds that can replicate the healer role pretty well, they are just not needed in the current pve.

One of them for example
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/elementalist/Aquatic-benevolence-rune-of-the-monk/first#post4185521

The torch part is usually too painful, even when I lfg “… know torch part”, I normally get people who keep following me from torch to torch. Stacking is too strong in pugs when they shouldn’t stack.

thief/thief is okay
thief/mes is nice
war or guar/thief or mes works well too
mes/mes is a distaster unless they are both good and can cooperate well

Generally combination of power/condi is very strong as it puts a lot of pressure on your target.

If you and a friend play same class, don’t forget strengths/weakness of that said class are much stronger in duo. Yeah, thief/thief can stealth for days but get they get cc’d or dps guard passes by and they are downed in no time. Thief/thief also needs a good cooperation, often when a roaming with a less experienced thief, he drops SR just on top of us when running and gets me revealed. Two good thieves can cause a lot of havoc among enemies. I personally don’t like mes/mes at all, they seem to be countered any condi build/heavy classes really fast.

TyPin.9860:

But please, just stay civil, if others play the game for the PPT (even if you don’t care).

TyPin.9860:

There was this ele even. He defeated me after a long fight but let me res after our fight and bowed to me. I wasn’t intending a duel, I attacked him, while he was gathering iron and I got punished for it. Then he let me res, so that I could go on, kill other players and the dollies, who just passed me. That is just stupid.

You set a good example there.

I made a thief first and spent some 40-50min playing thief, I didn’t notice any change except for the xp bar with masteries. Hard to compare the class gameplay in the new environment since everyone had full cele and I never played celestial with thief. The usual class mechanics seemed all same.

Silv.9207:

I’ve some friend in the italian comunity and they try the Beta Stresstest, with the revenant and the new www border.
They simply sayd that the revenant is Really OP. And that in the new border they will have a very good position and they will be so useful that everyone will have one.

The EU beta stress test took place on two small pve maps (after completing story after character creation), there was no new bl border map at all.

Unholy Pillager.3791:

Jayden Ennok.3687:

I have yet to see a nerf post on melee power rangers, really don’t know why nobody complains about them. Melee aa hits almost as hard as lb aa, all that while that power ranger afk’s at safety of melee distance.

Mind-boggling o_O

I hope you aren’t serious. A thief calling ranger power melee no-risk?

My post was sarcasm to all those defending ranger longbow, I hate that weapon so certainly I am biased against it, lb is the reason why I also generally dislike the class.

OP was talking about power rangers and how everyone wants them nerfed but I really don’t see people asking for melee power ranger nerf. It’s lb they want nerfed.

And why I wrote my first post the way I did. Some 2 months ago I got my ranger to 80, so just as I play my thief (double melee), I decided to try this on ranger too. Melee power ranger is kitten hard to play, first you got figure out how sword works, then you need to gear up/trait so you do some decent dmg with it.

The dmg on melee is just miserable.

People often argue it has evades and cleave and so on but it’s still melee, the player takes risk to go into melee.

Now compare melee power ranger with power lb ranger, the latter’s only positioning requirement is LoS to land dmg and the DMG IS HIGHER THAN WITH MELEE. This makes my brain hurt. Yeah sure, LoS counters dmg a ranger player does. And you know what? Melee does no dmg whatsover the moment enemy moves out from the melee range.

I know I am a noob with ranger and that the pros out there can own with theirs but I’d just like to play melee ranger without thinking I kitten my dmg by not using lb.

If this is your first thief/you are fairly new to the game, don’t spend much time leveling with condi builds, the extra vit/toughness would make you comfortable taking hits you shouldn’t take as a thief.

Leveling with power makes you learn the class better and when you’ll want to try condi, you can play those builds without much practise. If you lvl with condi and would want to switch to power, it’d be a lot more difficult.

I have yet to see a nerf post on melee power rangers, really don’t know why nobody complains about them. Melee aa hits almost as hard as lb aa, all that while that power ranger afk’s at safety of melee distance.

Mind-boggling o_O

Direct dmg BURST? You realise that if the ele is squishy, you need to deal dmg as low as 1200 to invalidate diamond skin. Nothing to call a burst here.

If you chose to keep your current build then kite around till pets deals enough dmg. Btw drake often tail swipes just after pet swap, makes it easier to land on melee enemies if you time your pet swap well.

You could add a bit of power into your build by just swapping corruption sigil with bloodlust, you’d be surprised how many people assume you run power build and then they not ready for a condi bomb.

Reviera.5183:

In my oppinion, I think stealth shouldn’t even heal period, the heal stealth is one thing, but when they can heal with EVER stealth and then they can use weapons/armor Runes/sigs to heal and stealth altogether.

also a stealth bug all stealther classes are using to “finish” you, how to hell are they able to stake you when a guardian clearly can push you 10 feet away when you lack stability, and then still be able to stake you? whats more is they Im hearing rumors that they apperently can stake you from almost 10 yards away. make it to where you actually have to be traying to climb on top of the player in order to finish them, not from a foot away nor 10 yards.

and ANET, you have an obligation to make sure no one is toying with your admin rights. Cut out ALL possable third party systems. yes you know exactly what Im talking about, from all normal player systems.

Other classes can use those runes/sigils etc. as well. And guess what, even other classes have access to additional heals specific to their profession.

So cos thieves have no stability except for their elite, they shouldn’t be able to stomp anyone? When other class uses utility/whatever trick they have to stomp, it’s skilled play but for thieves it’s a BUG? lmao

funassistant.6589:

CrimsonNeonite.1048:

It really isn’t that simple once you stop using Shadow arts, you can’t really one shot either way, as a thief.

Maybe you worded it wrong or I didn’t understand correctly. Shadow Arts doesn’t increase your power by any way? So when you stop using it, you’ll be able to spec into more offensive lines.

SA thieves are brainless players that can play like idiots and still not be punished for their mistakes. Makes for flat gameplay.

Considering that SA builds are in most cases either backstab builds or P/D condi, that 5pt gm minor in SA actually makes backstab hit just as much or even more than investing those points in DA. Condi build also benefits from the might.

Why would those builds invest in offensive trait line if they get superb survability of SA and high dmg too?

morbidillusion.2759:

The average player still seems to think that thieves are massively overpowered.

Average player can’t figure out stealth so yeah. Most of the playerbase doesn’t even bother to get better at fighting what kills them most. The other day I met enemy ranger (in wvw) who reacted to me killing him by telling me how OP thieves are. When I asked what key he has for weapon stow, he didn’t even know it exists. No wonder he died to reflect. 8k AP guy with gold rank in wvw, ranger main.

The only thing that keeps thieves in pvp is SB 5.

DDueces.9547:

/Should opposing players be able to find you when invisible in shadow refuge and recovering from a downed state?* Multiple times they run around random searching for a hit, then magically know right where to stand. Does damage show for opposing players? Should they be able to pummel you when invisible?

Why not, stealth doesn’t equal to invincibility.

TymX.8017:

Asura:
-Radiation field: Poison and weakness sound good, but the enemy can just walk out of it Can be good if you are condi and flip camps a lot
-Technobabble: Can save my life, but I already have a daze on my steal In hands of a good thief, it’s deadly, especially if opponents don’t expect this and use their stunbreaks on basi/daze from steal. Tho I found this skill to be best on ele.

Sylvari:
-Grasping vines: 10sec immob on a 45 sec cooldown can be deadly Never tried

Charr:
-Shrapnel: Can be good to a pistol/dagger thief, but as a sword dagger not much use for me I didn’t like any of the charr racials, either the dmg wasn’t good or they didn’t fit my playstyle

Human:
-Only their elite, Reaper of Grenth sound useful Actually the condi removal skill can be quite good. Cooldown on Grenth is just too long

What are your opinion? What is the best thief race for wvw?

I’d go with human or asura.

Meryn.6875:

Turk.5460:

This would require a re-work of all on-weaponswap sigils

Dont they have internal cooldowns already? That should be enough, Ele can swap attunements very fast as well without having unbalanced on-swap sigils, or dont they trigger on attunements?

9s icd

Watch ranger’s animations, and dodge/evade/reflect or LoS the knockback. If you miss it or get surprised, use stun break. Simple.

Aomine.5012:

Skullface.7293:

Aylpse.6280:

-If you are being reflected, you can *dodge, weapon-swap or use any other attack skill to stop Rapid fire.

Or you could also stow your weapon instead of wasting a dodge or a weapon swap you don’t really want. Key binding stow weapon is so so good!

Yeah, recently trying to set stow on hotkey, and oh boy, it is really useful.
It is not just rapid fire, it is useful on sword too! It’ll actually stop the sword auto chain and allow me to dodge!

Key binding stow is probably the best advice, especially for lb ranger.

Herr der Friedhoefe.2490:

Played some EoTM this morning while waiting for others to come online. IA doesn’t work on many of those bridges because they are slightly uphill. Don’t get me started about stairs. This class was supposed to be about mobility because of our lack of stability.

What’s left to nerf? Stealth of course.

IA never worked on Eotm bridges as far as I remember, pointless to call it a nerf.

azyume.6321:

If going to thrown numbers then the same can be said for warrior gs rush, which currently is something very close to 1800 units.

And please, if going to say about those players that stay near the safety of a tower, any class do it. You won’t believe how many warriors, eles, guardians, rangers, necromancers, thieves, I tried to fight that ran to their keep and started to hit me with their range weapon or simply shoot the cannon. There are players and players, you can’t judge everyone because of the actions of a few. However, it was said something about group fight, so that wouldn’t be the case but a rather sniping during small scale or zerg fights.

The warrior still has to get into melee range to do dmg with rush, in melee aoe/cleave hit him, that’s why being melee is riskier than range.

Yes, any class can chicken near tower, only rangers can apply high dmg to targets up to 1960 away from that tower. Not saying this to reason whether they should or shouldn’t be able to do that, I said it as I believe it’s the main reason why power rangers are seen as “none wants to fight” type of players.

azyume.6321:

Asking why someone decides to play a power ranger is the same as asking any other class why they play power glass cannon build. You want burst damage, you want to kill things fast, you want the thrill of deadly conclusion if you make a mistake. Great risk, high reward.

Nothing is more boring to me than fighting with a tank that hits like a wet noodle but only wins because outheal and hits with a kittenload of conditions. If I have a chance to burst you down in 4 seconds with my glassy ranger without much room for mistakes, I will take it.

Also, I don’t know what you means “no one wants to fight”. Just because the main weapon is ranged means they don’t fight? Does that means only melee constitutes a fight for you? Sorry to say but there are many ranged builds available for roaming for all classes.

Power rangers are very vulnerable on melee range, if you can’t get to it, you should check your skill rotations.

By the way, longbow have 1500 units range with the trait Eagle Eye not 1800.

Actually it’s around 1960 when traited.

By “no one wants to fight” I guess he meant that many rangers engage in a fight only in safe distance from a tower (what they can run with stone sig active/gs block) or when they are in a group.