Guild Wars 2

Lalnuir.4957:

Raincrow.1840:

Rangers are pretty much worthless during a siege otherwise.
The guard ability is basically worthless at any other point in the game.

The fact that you have to equip an otherwise worthless ability just to get your class to contribute more than a single AOE on a long cool down during a seige makes this ability perfectly balanced.

Yes because if you can’t aoe walls during a siege you are worthless . . .

Not like there is anything else you could do in a siege, you certainly couldn’t
~ build an ac to aoe the walls
~ man whatever siege your team is using to take the structure
~ keep watch for incoming enemy reinforcements
~ guard your catas/trebs if you aren’t ramming
~ run supply to build more siege

Rangers: manning siege

rhonyn.6810:

Tallis is correct though…..TC gains more rating from taking points from BG then they do from taking points from SoR. And that benefits you in the long run if your ultimate goal is improving rating….as TC has the lowest rating TC actually benefits the most out of the 3 servers if all the scores are close (regardless of placing 1,2 or 3). Now you could argue its in TC interest to attack SoR over BG, to get BG out of the tier asap, and get a smaller (easier?) opponent (Stormbluff?)…but that is a different argument then you’ve been making

All that being said “alliances” will never work in practice. People are self motivated and generally have a poor grasp on server strategy (and rating math).

The argument that I have been making is that we should not be teaming up with SoR but rather doing exactly what we have been doing: hitting both SoR and BG as we want the points from BG as well as a weaker SoR. I don’t see what’s hard to understand, to be completely and perfectly honest. Alliances only happen when people see the short term over the long term.

Dayra.7405:

@Kerithlan: A good WvW-zerg-necro uses wells not minions.

I should clarify: those complaints aren’t mine. They’re the ones people comment on the most in the necromancer forums.

Tallis.5607:

Mikitten058:

So are you saying you would like SoR to not attack TC while TC attacks SoR?
Or saying you want SoR and TC to only fight BG?

I want to have fun
And happen to think that it would be more fun if both TC and SoR attacked BG. Your opinion may be dofferent, ofcourse, but I prefer winning against BG then loosing against BG.

Kerithlan.1659

Red still mostly helps Blue rather than Red when Red and Blue gang up on Green. Blue still wants to make sure Red doesn’t have an opportunity to take points from Blue but rather Green.

That’s not true.

Instead of having two enemies, you only have one.

You got, basically, two options:

<b>Option 1 is what we are doing now.</b>
Red versus Blue & Green
Blue versus Red & Green
Green versus Red & Blue

<b>Option 2</b>
Red versus Green
Blue versus Green
Green versus Red & Blue

In option 2, both Red and Blue will be able to capture more points AND both Red and Blue will be able to better defend.

I find it hard understand why anyone can disagree with that.

.

Ofcourse, <b>Option 3</b> would be the best for Blue…
Red versus Green
Blue versus Red
Green versus Red

And let’s face it, that is what you are hoping for: that SoR attacks TC, BG only attacks TC and leaves SoR alone.

But… how can you still hope that this will happen, after been in the same tier with BG for three months? Do you still believe that BG will leave you alone when you attack TC?

So, once you understand that option 3 is off the table, you should see that option 2 is better for you.

Saying it a thousand times doesn’t change how it works. TC pairing up with SoR to double team BG helps TC the least, as it only strengthens SoR and gives TC a bigger struggle long-term. There’s no need to continually drag people through this pointless alliance nonsense.

If you want TC to win, then TC needs to not take points, but deny points from SoR and BG. By keeping the score between TC and SoR close, we gain points. By preventing BG from defeating us by as large of a margin as they did the previous week, we gain points. We want TC to become stronger and both of our opponents to become weaker. Anything else is harming us long-term.

Once people start to realize that, then we can move on. Unless of course you just want to flip around between second and third place forever, which is cool if that’s the goal.

LieutenantGoogle.7326:

Kerithlan.1659:

Guardian: manning siege
Warrior: manning siege
Thief: everything with an emphasis on culling exploits
Ranger: manning siege
Engineer: manning siege
Mesmer: ganking
Elementalist: 1000000 hour duels
Necromancer: logging out

Did I hit all of the horse-beaten, generic complaints, or did I miss some?

Well this is a bit depressing to read while I have a necro in the making :/

I was just ribbing the overall community over their most common complaints.

Necromancer is fine once you’ve figured out how it works. It’s not as straight-forward as some of the other professions. The biggest complaints have to do with the bugged minion AI.

Guardian: manning siege
Warrior: manning siege
Thief: everything with an emphasis on culling exploits
Ranger: manning siege
Engineer: manning siege
Mesmer: ganking
Elementalist: 1000000 hour duels
Necromancer: logging out

Did I hit all of the horse-beaten, generic complaints, or did I miss some?

Caelib.2497:

I find it really amusing that during primetime, when the numbers are even in most Borderlands … Blackgate is usually in last place. Then, when America is sleeping and Blackgate doesn’t actually have to face any players, they gain all of their points. Doesn’t that make everyone on the Blackgate server feel dirty? That all of your points are gained by non-competition? If you ever move up to Tier 1 … it’s going to be a very sobering experience for you.

If that was 100% the case (which it’s not), then it actually highlights a problem with how WvW handles population in general, not with Blackgate. If we’re in Tier 2 and we can’t get 24/7 coverage like the Tier 1 servers have, then there’s a bigger problem here.

Tallis.5607:

Mikitten058:

Sunspots.9861:

TheDevilWithinU.7092:

Peetee.9406:

Chessrook.8643:

Yanno, I find it interesting, SoR, that you don’t seem to understand how much damage BG is doing to both of us. We have both been attacking Stonemist, true, and we’ve both broken through on different fronts… maybe not the inner gate on your end (As far as I know) but still…

So then why are you sending zerg forces at Ogrewatch? We’ve been trying to hold our forces back off you. Through a combined two-pronged assault we could probably be able to wipe out the forces in Stonemist Keep. Then of course fight each other for whoever ends up owning it in the end, yes, but still…

At this point I don’t care who has Stonemist as long as BG doesn’t still have it fortified and waypointed by tomorrow morning.

Thats how we roll, playing for 2nd before it was cool!

We don’t play for second.

But you have been second for almost 12 weeks.

Doesn’t mean we play for 2nd.
We want to win, but fall short of it.

You win by attacking the 1st, not by attacking the 3rd.

Kerithlan.1659:

Nothing personal. It’s just how the game is designed to be played. Alliances only work if 1st and 2nd want to push 3rd out of the tier, or if 3rd is stupid.

This is all true for the points that you get.
But… the RANKING is different.

The 2nd in the ranking gets more RANKING when they take 5 points from the 1st than when they take 5 points from the 3rd.

Taking one camp from BG gives SoR 5 points.
Taking one camp from TC gives SoR 5 points.

But in the first case, BGs points will go down. And when BGs point go down, SoR gets a better ranking then when TCs points go down.

The system that they use gives a hoigher ranking when you win against a higher ranked opponent than when you win against a lower ranked opponent.

Unfortunatly, not alot of people think in terms of ranking, but only think in terms of points. Untill that changes, BG will be safe.

Viewing it via ranking doesn’t change anything that I’ve stated, actually. Red still mostly helps Blue rather than Red when Red and Blue gang up on Green. Blue still wants to make sure Red doesn’t have an opportunity to take points from Blue but rather Green.

When you look at it from a ranking perspective it’s pretty much exactly the same as viewing it from a match point perspective because the points do nothing but reflect where ranking is going. If Blue takes a Red camp then Blue is still denying Red points and preventing Red from taking ranking away from Blue.

Unless all of this was exactly your point and I misunderstood your post.

Ardon.4105:

tkalamba.2541:

pot.6805:

tkalamba.2541:

Veltoss.9135:

I really hope TC/SoR focus more on each other and fight for second this time around rather than putting so much focus on BG. You guys won’t win that way. :<

Technically wont win focusing on each other anyways. The idea of focusing on the leader is to deprive them of getting the potential points they need. If we ignored you and went after each other, it more or less means you can do what you want. It makes no sense to focus on each other.

Doesn’t make sense for SoR because you are already in 2nd and want to keep it that way. BUT it does make sense for TC if they actually want to progress and move into 2nd place. Afterall, you have to be 2nd before you can become 1st. TC ignoring SoR only helps SoR hold 2nd place while it guarantees that TC will stay in third.

What ends up happening is 2nd and 3rd fight amongst themselves, allowing 1st to steamroll in potential points. Fighting for 2nd doesn’t work in anyones favour except for 1st place. If both 2nd and 3rd set their sights for 1st, they serve a dual purpose, they not only work on getting themselves potential points, but they deprive 1st from theirs preventing a massive point lead. The 2nd and 3rd place would be smarter to focus on 1st to actually have a chance in a match. It also keeps things much more interesting and competitive.

Easy to say from a second place perspective, but if TC ever wants to progress, they have to focus SoR. What is much more likely is that the people on TC will do what they want because they’re not a hivemind.

Tarnished Coast should be focusing on preventing Blackgate and Sanctum of Rall from gaining a higher number of points over them than the previous week. If TC teams up with SoR then only SoR benefits.

2nd + 3rd = 2nd wins out the most
3rd + 1st = 3rd wins out the most
1st + 2nd = 1st wins out the most

The reason is that 3rd’s goal is to deny points in order to move up. 3rd gets to move up faster if 2nd is denied harder. 1st won’t be able to earn as large of a gap over 3rd if 1st is actively helping 3rd, and so 3rd will earn points from that while also earning points from 2nd’s denial.

2nd wants to deny points from only 1st in order to move up, and the easiest way to do that is to get 3rd to attack 1st. If 2nd and 3rd are leaving each other alone and allowing each other to gain points, then while both 2nd and 3rd will gain points and 1st will lose points 2nd will still come out better. The reason for this is simply that a strong 2nd place is bad for 3rd, as it means that 3rd will essentially be gifting 1st to a different server, even if they themselves move up a slot.

1st wants to deny both 2nd and 3rd from gaining points, but for different reasons than 3rd. 1st needs to ensure that 2nd does not replace them and take their spot. The easiest way for 1st to do that is to push both 2nd and 3rd down while keeping scores tight. This benefits 3rd place as well as it means 2nd will experience the most pressure, which translates into easier and more controlled wins for 1st. 1st wants to slowly and steadily gain more points from 2nd and 3rd each week with consistently larger wins each week while keeping 3rd close to 2nd. Doing this means that 3rd and 2nd will flip flop without ever threatening 1st.

So in short the only way Tarnished Coast is going to play for first is if we successfully deny points from both SoR and BG. An alliance with either of our opponents hurts us more than it helps us, while it only benefits the two of you. Don’t tell us to team up and to “play for first” when that’s what we’re doing.

If BG wants to ignore us so that we keep points and move into 2nd then hey sure great, whatever, but we’re not going to ask for it and you aren’t going to do it anyway, and even if that does happen we’re still going to fight you.

Nothing personal. It’s just how the game is designed to be played. Alliances only work if 1st and 2nd want to push 3rd out of the tier, or if 3rd is stupid.

Waffler.1257:

Tyrlis.8072:

CD has had a surge in players, but I only know of one new guild that transferred, and they’re only around 50 members. I think it’s all the holiday returnees coming back in to the battlegrounds.

SoH was holding the SE quadrant in FA BL for reset night, had some good fights with GODS and PTX and many other guilds. IoJ didn’t show up on the FA BL for the first few hours so we were fighting FA from 3 sides.

I myself didn’t play for awhile because I couldn’t stand playing against TC, ever single time we’d go to Golanta they would have a perma stealth thief abusing the capping mechanism (before it was patched of course). Then of course the holidays happened and I was visiting family, but now I’ve been in WvW a lot more lately.

Pro-tip: when we played against CD you guys rarely killed the guard NPCs. Golanta is really easy to defend when no one from the invading team does corpse sweeps or kills the guard patrols. On more than one occasion I was resurrected by a Cabalist NPC and able to hold the circle until reinforcements arrived because you guys stood in the middle of the camp spamming aoe’s.

I’m not saying that our night shift did or did not abuse thief stealth (as I was asleep), but during all of our match-ups against CD I was playing camp defense. I can tell you that, from our side, most of it while I was online was people like me standing in or behind buildings, dying 30v1, and either running back from the keep to stand in the circle or being resurrected by NPCs.

If you still have problems with that stuff then make sure to at least aggro the roaming camp guards, because Golanta is hilariously easy to defend otherwise. Sit near the supply house when taking the camp and have a few people scout/sweep the southern hut, not in the center.

IMHO I’m on the all or nothing bandwagon for these things. The less buffs that I’m unable to strip/cleanse the better — at least until we go balls out with the whole “consumables in WvW” thing and hand out portal guns and stealth kits to everyone.

Kanji Maki.1695:

Shame on you, little TC punk. Smart enough to hack yet not smart enough to move out of aoe O.o I love kids sometimes……dont let this happen again TC.

Chat: “Aoe him”
>Target portrait is clearly a female character

Guild Wars 2 and ArenaNet do not cater to such chauvinistic belittlement. Don’t let this happen again, SoR.

Krakah.3582:

2 – Should be moot the the vast majority of users are on broadband circuits, very few are playing on dial-up. Hell cell phone data plans are faster than dial-up.

3 – Note this is a personal preference, if I had a mid to low end rig, I’d trade hands down the overwhelming amount of particle effects to have player models drawn, even if it’s just colored Gumby avatars. I would love to see options to lower or selectively disable enemy or friendly particle effects to some super base level or not show some at all.

To your preference at point 3:
Personally I only encounter culling issues when I smash into zergs of 35+ and my laptop is 10 years old and below minimum hardware requirements. What’s most annoying to me is that, due to playing on absolutely the lowest settings and without proper shader support, I can’t see important things like combo field boundaries, targeting circles, red rings, the particle clouds that denote pathing for some personal stories (example: Captain Weyandt’s spectral trail doesn’t render for me), etc.

I personally would rather have a version of skill effects for crap-level systems that utilizes minimalist resources, as it’s only Guild Wars 2 that this computer has those types of issues with. I’m sure that tournament gamers would prefer such minimalist features as well, and it could potentially sort some of the culling issues out.

I think the answer is providing super low quality options/support as well as the super high quality support rather than altering the game to only appeal to computers closer to my end of the spectrum.

Mighty Assasin.3816:

UnholySteve.8362:

Id very much like to see the proof.

There’s a reason for no screenshots/video posted in the forums already.

Spoiler:
They don’t exist.

More like:

Spoiler:
It’s against the forum’s rules.

New topic, score update please.

Kilger.5490:

Makes sense a low level guy is going to drop low level equipment. I mean thats what they would carry right??

“Ha I just killed that level 5 warrior and he dropped his Mighty Country Boots! Score!”

Grizm.4560:

Burl.9567:

covenn.7165:

@TC people last night in their homeland. Taking your hoard on a tour of your borderland last night was some of the most fun I have had in a long time. Hope you enjoyed the trip around the map.

Who would have thought they would follow a 10 man with their 45+ from Longview up to the north camp, back around to the west camp, back up to longview while a group of 15 takes an upgraded garrison?

Our performance the past two weeks has been horrendous. People are acting like they just installed the game. A lot of our regulars are absent (holidays, mid-semester break, whatever the reason).

Few hours ago people were actually telling others NOT to buy some of the upgrades at TCGarrison. Their reasoning was that it either wouldn’t get done before BG got there or we wouldn’t have a steady flow of supply to get it done. Then we sieged Hills to the point that you couldn’t walk without tripping over an arrow cart while leaving Bay empty and made out of popsicle sticks.

Both Bay and Hills were lost, and TCG just flipped after someone purchased an upgrade so that the supply would be drained while it was under siege (one of those upgrades someone told people not to purchase earlier). A tactic we have seen since the game came out and yet people still stand there with their mouths hanging open wondering what happened. “Who did that?” “Who dere? Who dat?”

Blackgate’s movements on the map and tactics for taking each location have become so predictable it’s like a train schedule at this point. And we’ve failed repeatedly to anticipate and prepare for any of it and then act surprised as it’s happening.

Upgrades and supplies need to be managed. Keep getting caught with our pants down (insert obligatory ERP joke).

I wouldn’t consider myself a regular, but I used to put in at least 14 hours a week defending EB. I simply haven’t had as much time to play the past few weeks (I’m not even at home right now while posting this), and as such when I do log in it’s to meet up with the randoms I’m unfamiliar with in TCBL (which usually needs the most help).

I would assume that there are many other puggers in the same boat that I’m in, and that what we’re seeing is a lack of direction caused by too many unfamiliar faces and too many new faces paired with a lack of our usual leadership.

10/10 would laugh again
A+++++++++

JaredKincade.9761:

I find it hilarious you continue to refer to a server with hundreds of individual WvW players as if it has one consciousness.

Nice speech, but you missed the point of my post. I was not referring to a single consciousness, but to the single particular mindset that has harmed not just your server but all servers. Instant gratification isn’t always better. That guy needs to understand this.

jportell.2197:

Tallis.5607:

ColinJohanson.2394:

It’s worth noting, while they said we’re not working on new versions of the home maps currently, they didn’t say anything about new maps in general…..

Also I’ll throw out that the work our WvW guys are doing on culling and progression systems are extremely large, these are feature systems unto themselves. For example a lot of the culling work requires re-building almost entirely the way our game compiles, loads, and handles assets in general. For many companies, this task could literally years, we’re trying to pull it off in a matter of months, these guys are rock stars.

I know some of you got the impression there isn’t much development going on here, but I was to clarify you couldn’t be more wrong. There is a boat load of very serious WvW being done, much of it they discussed in this interview. Major features require many month long projects, our hope is you’ll start seeing the major fruits of those labors starting in our February update.

You’ll hear more details from our WvW team once stuff gets closer to finalized and tested, but we think you’re going to be thrilled with the stuff that’s coming. As an old DAoC fan, I’m freaking stoked about what these guys are doing.

With all due respect, but some issues should NOT take long, like the mesmer hop-hop-hops on a wall and takes a keep with friends nevrer breaching a wall.
Or the we can’t see the target but we can take it out nonetheless.

Not to mention the very, very annoying we-can-catapult-a-wall-down-without-any-yellow-crosses-comming-up.

These are all very, very annoying issues, that should not take alot of time.

I understand that culling is indeed very, very hard to fix, but you also got to have some quick-wins imho.

Catapulting a wall down without sword crossings coming up is done because the people doing it were sneaky and set the cata w/o aggroing the NPC’s and there are no players there to defend it. It is not a game bug. It is how it was designed. Once the team of super ninjas is in (can be array of classes… Usually have at least one thief or mes though.) And go to fight the tower lord THEN the swords come up… Stop calling something a bug when it is simply a mechanic of the game.

I kind of have to agree with this post. It rewards tactical play. It has to deal with oversights in tower design, sure (I’m pretty sure that if the NPCs were real people they’d raise an alarm), but it is what it is.

An interesting fix to that would be to get NPC scouts to run toward nearby towers and keeps Dynamic-Event-style — the NPC would run at the players, do a beckon emote, and then when talked to show the player where the enemy was hitting on the map.

Doing it this way would add another layer for the ninja group to overcome as it would require them to find and kill the scout/runner in order to remain hidden. That’s a bit closer to real warfare too: kill the scout, better chance of success.

Most champions have stability built in via Defiant, which ignores crowd control effects. This is a crowd control effect.

Daecollo.9578:

Wait, so a 20% chance to bounce is good! I only have to spend 20 points in trickery (condition specced!) to get it when its only really good in Sword/Pistol spec.

If you used it in D/P, the pistol attack would bounce and destealth you, so not good at all for D/P!

P/P? Nobody uses P/P because P/P sucks.

10% more damage? so the 87 damage (lolpathetic) attack (x2 less damage then PISTOL autoattack.) is now 95 damage!

Oh yeah, black powder can cripple foes, because people would spent 6 initiative (half of it.) to cripple the foe for 3 seconds!

Wait.. why am I arguing this, making it have a low chance to cripple, a low chance to bounce, and deal 10% extra damage is completely worthless.

That changes nothing. Just like most traits, those are secondary, passive, automatic effects that happen whenever you use the skills. I fail to see how any of this changes the fact that, like most other professions’ combo fields, you already have traits that affect this one.

Sifu.6527:

Kerithlan.1659:

Daecollo.9578:

Nate Rush.6970:

Are you going to increase guardian symbols or necro marks while you are at it? Or is this post specifically for another “thing” the thief needs to beat all classes.

There are already traits that double the size of marks and symbols…

Writ of Exaltation – Symbols are larger.
Greater Marks – Increases area of marks and marks become unblockable.

They double the size of the area pretty much…

I’m tired of this crap, I’m asking for something thats not overpowered, infact very underpowered in pvp and in some cases pve to be buffed to be reasonable, Black Powder isn’t overpowered, its a very fair attack, infact its a bit underpowered, the reason is, you can stand out of it and still hit people with melee attacks, which is stupid.

Asking it to be buffed to 240 meter field is completely reasonable.

It’s not a mark or a symbol, however. It is a combo field. Please direct me to any other profession that enjoys the ability to trait for larger combo fields.

Were it a trap, then I might understand the request (as rangers can trait to improve trap size). However it is not — I’m unable to trait Purging Flame to have a larger area. I can, however, cause it to recharge 20% faster, last longer and use ground targeting. You can trait Black Powder to bounce to additional targets, deal 10% more damage and cripple foes.

Do you not see how it is silly to compare Black Powder to Seals and Marks?

Ele’s can trait to increase their staff aoe’s (healing rain, frozen ground, geyser, lava front, static field, are combo fields…). What was the point of your post again?

I’m not certain that I’m understanding the point of your post, actually.

Traiting for area attacks is not traiting for combo fields, it’s traiting for area attacks . I don’t think you understand what those are.

Some combo fields are also area attacks; not all area attacks are combo fields. You’re not traiting for combo fields. Failing to see how you’ve rebutted anything.

Dredrum.2563:

What bravado? Just stating facts, until SoR/TC can put up an Oceanic Assault there is no competition.

If we were to throw in the towel (which, mind you, isn’t going to happen), it’d still take you at the minimum two weeks to move up. You need to beat SoR by at least 85k points next week, or else you’ll be going negative.

Dredrum.2563:

A Treaty won’t save SoR/TC your servers honestly don’t have the round the clock coverage that blackgate does. Recruit more Oceanic WvW’rs. Coming from a blackgate original I was there when the server went to t1 and it wasn’t pretty, the zergs were bigger the exploits were way more often. I’m honestly quite happy staying in the t2 bracket. So Sor/TC you want to make a treaty maybe you should make a treaty to throw in the towel and ensure blackgate moves up a tier cause we got no problem leading t2 bracket week after week, and this isn’t because we are more skilled it is just a numbers game in our favor.

Don’t drown us in your bravado, you’ll be losing points next week. We don’t even have to do anything for that to happen, as you’ve done it to yourselves.

Edit: In fact if you had been patient you’d be moving up to Tier 1 after next week with the way SBI has been falling after getting hit by a transfer exodus, but instead you’re with us for another two weeks at least. Maybe more if SBI gets some reinforcements.

scyro.1205:

Thanks, but are there any bankers in Black Citadel? I can travel to Lion’s Arch, but it’s a lot easier for me to stay here and find a banker. I must have circled around here dozens of times unable to find the sources I need. Any bankers here, or are those places mandatory? I cannot seem to find a banker in Black Citadel. If you’ve found one, can you notify me on whereabouts they are?

Go to the crafters, the bank is over there.

Incidentally, any crafting station also doubles as a bank, so if you find one of those crafting towns while out exploring the world, you can use the bank there.

Edit:
You can also just jump into your home borderland for WvW and use the bank or a crafting station there. If you don’t want to exit out to Lion’s Arch when you finish, then hit F12 and go to the character select screen, then log back in. It’ll put you back where you started.

Daecollo.9578:

Nate Rush.6970:

Are you going to increase guardian symbols or necro marks while you are at it? Or is this post specifically for another “thing” the thief needs to beat all classes.

There are already traits that double the size of marks and symbols…

Writ of Exaltation – Symbols are larger.
Greater Marks – Increases area of marks and marks become unblockable.

They double the size of the area pretty much…

I’m tired of this crap, I’m asking for something thats not overpowered, infact very underpowered in pvp and in some cases pve to be buffed to be reasonable, Black Powder isn’t overpowered, its a very fair attack, infact its a bit underpowered, the reason is, you can stand out of it and still hit people with melee attacks, which is stupid.

Asking it to be buffed to 240 meter field is completely reasonable.

It’s not a mark or a symbol, however. It is a combo field. Please direct me to any other profession that enjoys the ability to trait for larger combo fields.

Were it a trap, then I might understand the request (as rangers can trait to improve trap size). However it is not — I’m unable to trait Purging Flame to have a larger area. I can, however, cause it to recharge 20% faster, last longer and use ground targeting. You can trait Black Powder to bounce to additional targets, deal 10% more damage and cripple foes.

Do you not see how it is silly to compare Black Powder to Seals and Marks?

Daecollo.9578:

TeamBattleAxe.3901:

Black Powder is incredibly useful. Just ignore the initial “blind radius” and remember that any projectile finisher you use while standing in it will also cause blindness, even if the enemy is outside of the field radius. For example: pistol and short bow auto-attacks will cause blindness. You can also use Heartseeker as a leap finisher through it for insta-stealth (useful if you’re running D/P).

If anything, traps need a larger radius. That rectangle target is just crap when necros get a nice big radius for their marks.

The problem is, nobody uses P/P, they would be using S/P or D/P.

And … about the stealth thing, why would it matter if the field was bigger then? it does not effect that style of game-play a single bit.

The field lasts 4 seconds, which is forever. It also counts itself as a projectile finisher for causing blind, so just using the skill blinds your target. And pistol #4 is still there you know, lol. Same with the ` key and your shortbow.

Hit 5 → hit ` → hit 1 or 3 → you’re welcome.

pot.6805:

Kerithlan, I appreciate your analysis but that just shows the problem with the glicko system anet set up. THe majority of people want to win their given tier each week, not focus on minute theorycrafting and paragraphs of analysis and be forced to play a certain way. And good luck getting your whole server to do one thing so you can gain 5 more glicko points every week. The system is flawed, it doesn’t work for the wvw system as it is set up currently. The fact that you can win your tier for 7 weeks straight by an average of 40k yet not move up is just dumb, I don’t care what anyone says about the ratings blah blah blah.

I wasn’t defending it — I was just explaining how it works and why the current scoring is the way it is. It also allows us to understand that Blackgate won’t be moving up a tier next week as you will be losing heavy points to SoR. If Blackgate wants to move up sooner rather than later, then Blackgate needs to gain very few points against SoR next week and gain approximately the same margin of growth against TC, then maintain small growth against each.

The only other way you’ll move up now rather than later is by focusing TC incredibly hard. You need to deny us points to an equivalent degree as SoR (2x+ from last week) and prevent us from sticking close to SoR, but that isn’t going to happen in just two days.

Your best bet to keep points next week is to help keep TC’s score tight with SoR’s to minimize the amount of points you’ll lose to them. You’ll likely lose points to both of us next week due to earning too much from both of us this week, even if you blast us out of the water by 100k each. It’s just that it’s going to be a more significant point loss to SoR unless you can keep the point difference above or around 50k.

Here’s my prediction from last week. I’d hazard to say that it was accurate thus far.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/wuvwuv/22-12-BG-SoR-TC/page/10#post1091434

phaneo.4597:

phaneo.4597:

Are we losing the matchup? Yes. Are we gaining ratings? OH HELL YES.

Don’t get too excited about that. History has shown that a server generally is expected to gain rating during its first week in a tier. We’ll probably either gain a small positive next week or dip anywhere from 0.1 to 20 points.

This week’s scoring doesn’t matter for two important reasons:
1. Blackgate has a new opponent, which means they can’t go as strongly positive this week as they’re no longer beating Isle of Janthir. This usually results in the top server in the tier tanking in points. TC experienced this when CD and YB swapped places in Tier 3.

2. It’s the holiday, and so population coverage has been shuffled around. We won’t get a realistic representation of how well Blackgate and Sanctum of Rall face up against Tarnished Coast until at least this coming Tuesday (when Blackgate is back in action after the weekend).

Due to these two factors, our score this week does nothing but confirm that we’ll be here next week. It doesn’t accurately represent our ability to play in the tier. We won’t understand how well we’re doing until this time next week when things are more normalized.

What we’ve learned this week is that Tarnished Coast is capable of playing in this tier, but only just. We need significantly more coverage to remain competitive during certain time frames. Unless we play the ranking system intelligently, we’ll drop down to Tier 3 again within a few weeks. As it’s nearly impossible for the entire server to get on the same page at all times, I’d give it 5 weeks without coverage transfers before we’re in Tier 3 again, based solely off of how the ranking system works.

Jahn.7019:

Whatever score has the LARGEST point differential between BG and TC. As you clearly saw when it was BG/SoR/IOJ, BG won the matches by this lead amount now but got very little rating boost because SoR and IOJ were in the tier so long.

The huge point rating gain is all coming from TC, as TC sits in the tier longer, BG will gain less points from every win, to which after a certain point they will start LOSING rating unless you are winning with even bigger amounts again. And you will get the same BG/SOR/IOJ effect where you can win by huge amounts but get very to little no boost or even lose points at which point BG is going to sit in T2 for an extended period until a T1 server has a bigger rating drop. But you can’t count on SBI losing a big rating next week either, as they sit in that spot longer they will lose less rating for coming in third also.

BG’s huge point rating gain this week is coming from both TC and SoR, and TC’s rating gain is coming from SoR only. Time in the tier doesn’t matter as long as the first place server isn’t over-zealous. Inconsistency is what keeps matchups stale/stagnant, not how long a server has been around. If BG wins with a score of 197k this week and had a winning score of 237k last week, then the only thing that matters is that BG won over both TC and SoR by a significant enough margin, which they’ve done this week. The winning score doesn’t matter — the difference between victory margins does.

Glicko ratings consider time, yes, but not in the way you’re presenting it to be. Glicko rewards reliability, not exponential or sudden growth. Blackgate has a greater chance of upward progression in its current state by earning small, but consistent, gains over its opponents. Any sudden growth will harm Blackgate long-term if it isn’t supported by consistent scoring the following weeks. That’s why when servers get transfers/better coverage they move up — they are now consistently scoring more points each match when compared to their opponents.

Thrashbarg.9820:

What would make the most sense would be for 1st place to focus 2nd (unless 3rd gets too close in points), for 2nd to focus on 1st (again, unless 3rd gets too close in points) and 3rd to take as much as they can wherever they can. No alliance required, but maybe asking too much in the common sense department.

1st and 2nd, your real enemies are each other. 3rd, well, as the zombies say: “Kill everything!”.

First should be trying to ensure that they gain a consistent increase over each of their opponents, while second should be trying to lose a small/tighter number of points to first and a consistently larger number over third place, and third place should be trying to lose smaller/tighter numbers of points to both first and second. This makes an alliance between any server valid from week to week — in fact, it would be best for second and third place to gang up against first place for the first half of the week, and for first and third to gang up against second for the second half of the week.

This week BG is hitting that goal vs TC but not SoR, SoR is hitting neither goal, and TC is hitting the “keeping points close” goal vs SoR. That’s why our points look the way they do: SoR is giving up too many points compared to last week.

It is very likely that BG will not gain as many points next week (they’ll likely lose points or remain roughly the same), while TC will lose points or remain roughly the same and SoR will gain points.

BG will gain less points not because their skill has changed, but because they will not be able to improve upon their victory margin this week versus SoR. SoR will gain points because of that. TC will likely remain consistent, unless SoR earns significantly more points over TC compared to this week, or BG earns the same margin against TC as they are winning over SoR this week (in which case the roles will flip again in two weeks and TC will make significant gains rather than SoR).

BG wants to be consistent in order to move up, otherwise it’s going to flip back and forth forever. I suspect that this is why SoR and IoJ were against BG for so long.

Smokee.1754:

@ Jahn – We do understand how the rating system works. We do also after reading your 20 posts understand that you want us to fucus TC cause you are afraid you might actually loose to TC. The thing is though, that alot on BG dont head out to WvW with the aim of maxing the score. We head out there to have some fun. Things are different when something is at stake, like the first week we were in Tier1. Reality is that facing a different enemy at this point will only slightly change our score, and that some people are resting and charging up their batteries for that first week in tier1, where we know sleeping wont be allowed.

Points here as of this post:
BG: 157,431 // +265 ppt // +33.766 rating
SoR: 98,984 // +205 ppt // -33.621 rating
TC: 95,295 // +225 ppt // +0.540 rating

You don’t understand how the system works, then. BG lost a ton of points last week because BG was unable to beat TC by a margin larger than the previous week (as there was no match-up between us). Last week, BG defeated TC by 50,074 points. This week, TC is losing by 62,136 points. Additionally, last week TC lost to SoR by 25,926 points. This week, TC is losing to SoR by just 3,689 points. Last week, SoR lost to BG by 24,148 points, and is losing to BG this week by 58,447 points.

The net result of all of this is that, realistically, SoR is playing against TC this week, and BG is playing against BG. If the goal is to keep BG in Tier 2 next week, then SoR and TC are not playing correctly, as both servers are losing to BG by significantly more points than last week, which is allowing BG’s ranking to go up. If the goal was to prevent BG from moving up to the next tier, then both TC and SoR would be denying BG points and minimizing the effect of BG’s Asian/Oceanic crews.

If the goal is to push TC down a tier, then BG is playing correctly and SoR is playing incorrectly, as BG has a larger point jump while SoR has a significantly smaller point jump. The difference in points between BG this week and last week for TC is -12,062 additional points lost. The difference in points between SoR this week and last week for TC is +22,237 additional points gained. TC is earning an additional 10,175 points this week, which is why our score is more or less stable. BG has done everything they can to push us down this week -- our fate is in SoR’s hands until Friday.

If the goal is for SoR to gain points this week and move closer to 4th place, then none of the servers are playing correctly. SoR is hemorrhaging points to TC and failing to gain a net positive against BG, BG is placing too much pressure on SoR and not enough on TC, and TC is gaining too much ground compared to the amount that SoR is losing.

Realistically, Tarnished Coast is playing for second this week, not first, while both Sanctum of Rall and Tarnished Coast are failing to contest Blackgate for first. Sanctum of Rall is therefore playing to defend second place, while Blackgate is playing for sweeping victory rather than playing for consistent point denial. If Blackgate were to pressure Sanctum of Rall and ease back on Tarnished Coast for the rest of the week, then Tarnished Coast would claim second (and additional points from SoR) without threatening Blackgate’s upward momentum vs Tarnished Coast. The problem is that the gap between Blackgate and Sanctum of Rall would increase even more, which is only going to hurt Blackgate next week.

Stating that Blackgate is playing incorrectly against Tarnished Coast this week is simply not true — they have increased the point gap between this week and last week by about 24%. The “sweet spot” that BG should be looking to hit should be about a 15%-20% point increase every week against us in order to remain positive — this gives BG about 4%-9% wiggle room against us with the current score posting. Anything more than that will become too difficult for them to maintain, and anything less than that will be too small to be significant long-term.

If any alliances are to form, it would be in the best interests of BG to pair up with either TC or SoR for the rest of the week. In particular, it would be SoR that BG would want to help. BG is winning against SoR by over 2x their last victory margin compared to last week, which is going to be difficult if not impossible for them to best next week. Meanwhile, the gap increase in points over TC is only around 24%, which is much more easily overcome. SoR would benefit from this by increasing the point gap over TC, and salvaging their falling ranking.

jkctmc.8754:

Bakitten291:

jkctmc.8754:

In WvW……

As my Warrior, I’m going to kill you every single time we engage. You just can not handle the damage my build puts out, nor do the damage needed to kill me. Running 3100 attack, 3200 armor, and over 50% crit hit (65% crit with full adrenaline) with Knights Armor, you just do not stand a chance as a Guardian in killing me.

Shelter eating a 100b and giving me might on every block would say otherwise. Not saying warriors arent tough and can deal alot of damage but even the best geared are still killable. Its just dependant on avoiding the big bursts they can do, and using the right defenses at the right time. Focus #5, shelter, and aegis use can negate alot of damage warriors can put out. Te biggest thing is just watching for the quickness buff with warriors. The second you see it throw up a block and eat their burst.

I don’t use Greatsword brother. And “if” I have the quickness buff up on my bar, I’m going to stun, or knock you down long before I use it. <grins>

You act as though playing against guardians doesn’t come along with having stupid amounts of stability/stun breaks.

Azuriel.9137:

Kerithlan.1659:

Have fun playing wrong then. The name of the game in GW2 is bob and weave, and dodging in and out of melee-mid is how the guardian was designed. Dodge in -> attack -> dodge out -> support -> repeat.

Bob and Weave? The name of the game is to have fun and play “How you want to.” There is no wrong way. Like I said, I stay up close and personal, dodge up close and make sure myself and my warrior are all set. My group very rarely ever run into problems. I’d be lying if I said i never do, and so would anyone else.

Take your “playing the game wrong” attitude somewhere else. No wrong way, No right way.

It’s not my attitude, it’s ArenaNet’s. Whenever they’ve described combat and dungeons in the past, they’ve deliberately set time aside to discuss how players switching roles in combat (in this particular way) is an integral part of their system. Not my fault if you don’t like it.

Azuriel.9137:

Kerithlan.1659:

If you’re not playing your guardian mid-range then frankly you’re playing wrong.

This statement alone makes your argument… Invalid.

Have fun playing wrong then. The name of the game in GW2 is bob and weave, and dodging in and out of melee-mid is how the guardian was designed. Dodge in → attack → dodge out → support → repeat.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Hide_in_Shadows
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Infiltrator%27s_Strike

Just swap up your bar for the duration of the fight. Use sword/pistol for the interrupts and shortbow for kiting/range/better dodging (you’ll dodge better when you can clearly see what’s important or not).

That might not be the best setup but it’s a decent enough start to get yourself going. Just play around with it until you get yourself into a groove.

Toast.6459:

My guard’s yellow spear does more damage than my exotic trident, makes me wonder why trident is even an option, the damage is awful.
Question answered. >.>

I love the trident actually, it has a lot of healing potential and generates combo fields. Sure it isn’t great at damaging but that’s not what it’s supposed to be for. I see the spear and trident as opposites more or less — one is for damage and the other is for support. I use both equally.

Mumu.6203:

I kinda like underwater combat but I hate the “dead but still able to move” and the “no stomp” downed mode.

These are my only complaints too, it makes fighting mesmers a pain. I’ve lost underwater team fights because people kept fighting clones instead of looking for the downed mesmer swimming away and recovering.

Tajz.9826:

Wow, TC is the first server who get full on transfer? (Not even SoS is full…) We must be very careful when all the zombies are back to their coast from their new year vacation :P

Remember that we’re the NA Roleplay server, so a lot of those transfers aren’t going into WvW but rather into Queensdale.

Gobi.7508:

Score Update @ 10:20 am Eastern time

Irrelevant really, but your picture highlights some of the problem with breakout events. You guys were winning with 605/695 total ppt and still had a breakout event available lol.

Don’t worry though, if we took back Greenbriar you’d get to put him to use! I wasn’t online so that’s as much as I can comment.

DreamOfACure.4382:

Guardians can be mid-line supports too if they choose to go Staff/Scepter and completely spec for support, in which case they need the extra range to stay safer.

It’s not out of the question if you do it right.

But I’m guessing the OP is directed towards less component guardians.

Oh, and FYI: Most players don’t go to the forums. Only especially useful stuff like gw2lfg.com get wide-spread in the actual game community

Mid-line works well for Greatsword, Sword, Torch, Focus, and Shield too. With the sword it’s about juggling 2/3 and your offhand after dodging or while kiting. With the greatsword it’s about proper use of 2/3/4/5 and (when you’re with other players or have fire fields) your whirl finishers.

The only weapon we have that wants you standing relatively still is the mace. All of the other ones are about creating distance, closing distance, or controlling positioning. You should be kiting/circling while auto attacking, sure, but focusing on one skill and deciding that one skill and that one skill alone make the guardian melee-dps only is just stupidity.

If you’re using your greatsword or hammer and aren’t pressing ` to get at more active skills in favor of auto-attacking, then you’re terrible. (That is a general “you”, not directed at anyone in particular.)

Nayru.4537:

Guild Wars is a video game. Video games are for gaming. Role playing is not playing the game. If you want to role play so badly you can use external IM software. What do you have to complain about?

My favorite part about the MMORPG genre is that it includes the term role playing.

I’ve gotten three of these before from Black Lion Chests. I used two of them to prevent me from needing to restart jumping puzzles completely over, and one of them to bypass a champion in order to get a vista.

I don’t see the big deal, personally.

nelopp.6140:

/Sigh

Why are people complaining events that is totally voluntary….
If you can’t do it, find other things to do.
You look like a PVE-er complaining you can’t play pvp while there are pve events for youto do.
(BTW I finish it after 5 tries, once you get pass the snowflakes, it is easy.)

Because people like to experience content? It doesn’t matter that it’s voluntary… I mean, the only proper response to that is, “duh?”

In my case it’s something that I’d love to experience and check out but am unable to due to my connection and due to the insistence that players complete the puzzle together (? — why? It’s not as though it’s a race or a competition; there’s literally no benefit for the players involved ArenaNet.), but I’ve come to terms with the fact that I won’t be doing this.

Telling me that it is voluntary doesn’t negate the fact that — for people like me — it’s artificial content gating favoring those with higher end computers or connections over those who do not.

Here’s my real problem with how the holiday jumping puzzles have been handled.

A bunch of people show up in a room then stand around for a minute or two doing nothing. Then, they’re thrown onto a loading screen, and whoever has the fastest connection or computer can begin the puzzle immediately. Once the puzzle begins for one person it begins for everyone, and so whoever has the slowest connection is basically screwed.

In my case there are two simple fixes:
1. Instead of putting us into a waiting room and then having us load, make the waiting instance the same as the puzzle instance. Put in an invisible barrier that disappears at the end of the waiting period and allows access to the puzzle. Doing it this way retains the instanced feel of things without punishing people with slower connections. There’s no point to making us wait, then making us load, then screwing over slow connections so that they have to wait, then load, then repeat.

2. Make it a solo instance.

Azuriel.9137:

Guardians are very good healers, but only on the frontline for yourself and whoever happens to be close to you, which should be other guardians or warriors.

Guardian is very much not only a front line combatant in the same way that the ranger is not only a back line combatant. Guardians are very much mid-range skirmishers — every single one of our weapons except for the mace has an attack or utility skill that reaches 600+ units (not to mention the plethora of gap closers to support the play style).

If you’re not playing your guardian mid-range then frankly you’re playing wrong. I play a power/precision shout build usually, but whenever I have at least two allies with me I swap out my jewelry for cleric/sapphire gear. Scepter/shield + greatsword or Scepter/shield + staff are all you need, and you should be switching between them often.

I was able to keep a party of glass cannons up using nothing but a standard shout rotation and Tome of Courage three times in a 45 minute run of CoE. That’s one true heal every 15 minutes. I’m not posting this to rub myself in places but to highlight how easy our profession makes it to play heals and support at mid-range. I’m fully aware of the fact that it was the profession and not the player that made this possible.

Frankly and honestly, a guardian that spends most of his/her time in melee is a guardian that doesn’t know how to play. Telling me that guardians are only good at healing in melee is like telling me that mesmers don’t need to use clones — it’s false. Telling me that healing as a guardian is a detriment to your team is false — at the very least, Empower (staff #4) will make up for the fact that you’ve swapped to a different weapon for 15 seconds.

Water sigils are pretty terrible imho, the 30% chance to heal only procs on critical hits. Almost worthless on a full cleric build. Bring Hydromancy or Life sigils instead.

Greiger.7092:

The jumping puzzle is not required in any way. The rewards are just a little karma, which people who have a bunch of trouble with the puzzles could easily get elsewhere, a couple gifts, again easily gotten elsewhere, some snowflakes and the occasional oddball, none of this is unobtainable or particularly hard to get elsewhere. You also don’t need the jumping puzzle to get the achievement for the holiday.

Jumping puzzles are part of the GW2 experience, and I hope it continues to be. Some people can’t do the puzzles and I’m sorry for those people.

We could do two different difficulties of puzzles, one with a time limit and one without, but if we make the untimed ones have the same loot as the timed one, noone will do the timed one, if we give the timed one better loot folks will continue to complain that the JPs are too hard and that they should be able to get the full loot.

I had a humanities teacher pose something similar in class once. Parks have been getting pressured by some groups to make all their hikes, trails, and even mountain climbs wheelchair accessible. Some have had to do it. Not to bash on the handicapped, but doesn’t making all these things easily accessible to anyone ruin the point?

Timed is fine — I just don’t want to be paired up with other players while doing it. They load faster than me which means the puzzle begins while I’m still loading, so I can’t even attempt it.

SmokeyNYY.7841:

Man I see a lot of TC crying on this thread. I thought they were better than that. Where are all the real toasters at?

Staying quiet, mostly. In-game or out of town, and off of the forums.

If healing is your thing then just bring along Tome of Courage as your elite and full heal the party every 3 1/2 minutes.

You have exceptionally poor luck then, as I regularly find level ~76 blues in Queensdale. It was at the point once where my bag was literally filled with nothing but 76 blue cabalist gear.

Shini.7542:

And what you want to do if there are 10 people building it instant? Switching map with 10 ppl, come back and you got your golem (let’s say 11 in case it gets a bit dmg).
Next thing is that you can build them directly at your legendary defenders making it almost impossible to destroy without having any balists at your site (which would come close to spawn camping again).

Increase of the siege block buff would be a first solution to this special problem.

Two people with supply can build a ballista, I don’t think it’s a big deal. A roaming scout party of 2-5 could handle any immediate threats and let the team know. I’m not trying to be insulting or belittling when I say that perhaps the answer is to train better scouts.