Guild Wars 2

Probably krait, annoying mobs with annoying abilities in an annoying environment (underwater) and just seem like wannabe-naga’s with no personality.

Well tbh the way most things are designed, it doesn’t actually encourage helping others, at all.

It kind of feels like they’re trying to replace the gear treadmill with a gold… “treadmill?”.

Ok the title is slightly misleading, but anyway.

Some of you may already do this but having tried it out as a legit build rather than just theorizing about it I think it works pretty kitten well.

The point is using the trait that applies confusion when people leave/enter glamours with your portal to burst people. Either running onto a busy control point with invis and dropping them or when melee are tunneling you.

Works great with the Blind on Glamour trait as well as each portal drop blinds and then confuses (with confuse on blind trait). Fantastic against melee.

Combined with Chaos Armor (with confuse on blind trait) people training you will get blinded alot plus acquire a crap ton of confusion. I’ve had a thief jumping around on me get 20 stacks in like 2 seconds between Chaos Armor and the tele’s, and just instantly die (4000 dmg per skill hurts).

The tiny size of portals and having 2 of them makes them shine. Keep in mind though they will only apply confuses when active, though the first drop will still blind.

The mage is still quite awful, I only use it with the condition removal trait. Since I ALWAYS take decoy (mandatory utility IMO) having 2 invis’s is nice, the channel on torch is quite horrible though, since you can’t dodge away or can basically have your invis interupted.

The condition trait with torch actually makes iMage pretty good, you remove a condition on yourself when you summon then the iMage’s bounces to allies remove a condition. So he becomes a sort of mini-Disenchanter.

Love the defender, recently fell in love with the Disenchanter.

That puppy strips 2 boons and 2 conditions per target every 5 seconds, (4 with trait).

With a 16 second cooldown I could make me and my allies nearly immune to conditions and enemies un-boonable lol.

It’s actually quite silly, though the fact that it stills spawns on your target is a bit lame.

Defender is just crazy awesome if you actually get the hp trait/signet and a little bit of tough/vit. A massive battery spread dmg shield with that extends his retaliation to everyone, very good stuff.

Well, when you’re leveling you can stick a Sigil of Speed on a weapon, 5 seconds of swiftness per kill, very handy when leveling up.

I don’t understand why they didn’t fix the warden’s AI.

It needs to actually try and get into attack range with it’s target.

The delay for the dmg/clone is also annoying.

I interupt it so much since I try to block then dodge right away.

Or a pistol main hand, since sceptre is a utility weapon really.

I’m actually kinda jealous, I wish I could get some but chaps. =[

I’m like 99% sure the Fury and Retaliation were permanent and didn’t have a fixed duration not too long ago.

I’m sure that was a secret (ninja change) and I assumed was an attempt to nerf phantasm builds (still good for 2-3 attacks but not further) so you were to shatter and rotate them more. Of course that’s not going to stop anybody. =p

The only thing I’m annoyed by is fury overriding retaliation and the duration on retaliation for Defender.

This doesn’t stop me from using these in builds, in fact for power phantasm builds I almost never use duelist as it’s inferior IMO. And if I’m ever doing the protection/regen proc set up it’s when I’m using staff or have access to chaos armor otherwise. (leap + glamour)

I would say it’s intended for healing power to not affect life steal, but since it does for Thief Venoms. =[

Lumines.3916:

I loved necros and was drawn to the aesthetics and concept behind their designs. Played it in all the BWEs, still play it from time to time even now.

However, I am upset that all our “strengths” when played to said strengths, are outperformed by Mesmers taking a similar role too. Phantasms > Minions, Staff/Sharper Images > Our condition build.

Necromancers are simply too pigeonholed right now and due to being balanced around DS, we were gutted in a lot of departments (mobility, stun breaks, damage). It’s a design that sounded good on paper but played out terribly both due to bugs and how skills function as of now.

Yeah, I’ve been playing mesmer/necro since beta and still can got on the mesmer with a condition build, or phantasm build, or power/burst build, or control/support build kitten around in pvp and just sob about how Mesmers are better necro’s than necro’s are.

And yes, mesmer’s can definately tank, I’ve messed around with a couple crazy Mesmer bunker builds.

@Asmodean

So you compared a weak direct dmg, condition auto attack to a high DPS direct dmg melee weapon?

Dagger Necro versus Dagger thief would’ve been a better comparison…

On top of that, outside of Necro dagger, Necro’s aren’t meant to be auto attacking for dmg, we rotate spells.

chuiu.4985:

Tested again with the fire pit in the mists:

0 SR -> 14 life force lost per fire tick
15 SR -> 14 life force lost per fire tick
30 SR -> 14 life force lost per fire tick

Tested with falling damage:

30 SR -> 37 LF lost for a fall (~8k damage)
15 SR -> 37 LF lost for a fall (~8k damage)
0 SR -> 37 LF lost for a fall (~8k damage)

And again:

0 SR -> 42 LF lost for a fall (~9k damage)
30 SR -> 41 LF lost for a fall (~9k damage)

I’m going to have to go with my previous conclusions here. Soul Reaping does nothing to our life force.

Yeah I tested this too, wasn’t making a difference.

It’s too difficult to test with actual player/npc dmg til we get duels.

The only thing Gluttony does is make deaths near you give 11% LF instead of 10%.

I’ve done support/bunker necro builds, but this just looks like an inferior wellmancer build.

For starters, Spectral Wall is pretty awful, and you’re basically giving up 2 utilities just to give an aoe chaos armor (and you weren’t staggering your explosions for double uptime, since they don’t stack) which is only going to give regen/swiftness on allies when hit, since they changed Chaos Armor for mesmer to no longer proc protection, but apply it when cast, you (and your allies) will only get protection if they actually run through the wall.

Compared to just going all wells, being more support (blind/chill field + boon convert) as well as more (and reliable) uptime on protection, and dark fields. I just feel it’s inferior. And it’s definately not reliable from what I watched, as your minions wouldn’t be detonating in the wall or detonating on other fields (such as your Well of Blood for a measly bit of retaliation instead).

And if you’re trying for a true “Boonmancer” build how come you didn’t go with 2 Water/Monk + 2 Grove rune combo?

Then the 5 point in Soul Reaping, that minor trait doesn’t actually do anything, it’s supposed to be a 5% overall increase in Life Force gain (i.e. 50 life force + 2.5 life force) but it doesn’t even do that. Not +5% life force for each ability that grants life force). Even if it worked it wouldn’t be worth it.

I’m not trying to flame you or anything, I just feel the specific build in the video overall is sub-optimal.

Mindx.9610:

I also switched to Rune of Lyssa for the boons with plague form

I would consider trying this with Golem as both summoning and activating the golem procs it (with a cooldown however).

chuiu.4985:

Found another one. Soul Reaping does not increase Life Force pool. Both tooltip on life force and actual life force don’t change.

Full SR should show that your Life Force bar has 130% when full. After some testing:

0 SR with full LF bar = 26 seconds of DS
10 SR with full LF bar = 26 seconds of DS
30 SR with full LF bar = 26 seconds of DS

And because there’s a trait, I decided to test with Vital Persistence.

10 SR with full LF bar = 34 seconds
30 SR with full LF bar = 34 seconds

Which actually ends up being roughly 31% increase.

Considering death shroud degens by like 4% or so a second of course it won’t boost how long you can stay in death shroud. It should however increase the pool versus dmg you take.

And Vital Peristence is working since % dmg reduction =/= % effective hp increase. 33% dmg reduction from Protection is around 50% effective hp boost.

You could probably test the life force pool increase by taking fall dmg with full life force.

Last time I tested it the bleed from Sceptre auto was actually 5 seconds base, and the 33% sceptre trait boosted it by exactly 45%.

This was before the patch though.

edit : Just tested again to be sure. Still 5 seconds base.

33% sceptre trait was boosting to 7.25 seconds + 15 in spite gave 8 seconds. 20% Hemo gave an extra second.

Each 20% of 5 seconds = 1 second. So 33% sceptre trait is still giving 45%.

Though I believe it’s just 33% for grasping hands.

It gives 1% life force per hit.

It’s not bad for necro’s that like to stick to people in melee range. Pop it before going into Death Shroud to tank multiple things.

He’s right though, it’s not that necro’s are super weak (we’re not super epic OP, but not terrible), we just have no interesting variety or builds, and I’m holding out hoping that Anet will get around to it.

Tooltips generally only reflect the condtion duration from your Power trait line. I can assure you 20% + 20% + 50% trait will give you 2 second fears, and 2 tics.

“me, a leader, I-I don’t think I can” as monotone as possible lol.

I agree.

My necro warhorn sounds like a demon burping.

Yeah I left it on for as long as I could hoping it would really change enough in later zones but it really doesn’t.

I eventually got sick of hearing the same stuff and turned it off. =[

The piano piece from some vista’s in sylvari areas was awesome though.

My char would shout “Eat my dust!” randomly at people running by even w/o me gaining swiftness. I just assumed he had tourettes lol.

I’ve done the 2 second fear build before.

It’s quite similar to a regular condition build, but with the Fear does Dmg trait (which is condition dmg) you have some nice dmg, as each fear will do 1500 dmg.

And btw you only need 20 in spite + 20% runes (with 50% fear trait) for 2 tics.

kagemitsu.3657:

I think it would be a super cool feature to have, for both HotJoin and tPVP.

People with not so amazing computers like me lag too much when recording matches with Fraps or similar programs, so an in game feature that does it for you and lets you download them to your HD would be great.

As he said, it would be awesome as I too don’t think my comp could handle recording a pvp match w/o hurting my performance.

As for a cash shop addition, I think that would just cause a s***storm, and since you don’t really earn gold/gems from pvping it would just be messy.

Lol, what I’m trying to say is, actual “zergs”, as in, just a giant mass of people running around glued together are rare. I saw one today in Foefire, literally everyone sitting outside of the gates killing anyone who ran through, with a billion pets.

Usually, however, people are mostly spread out (but 8v8 in these maps there’s not much room) and with people dying, respawning, and running back out any time you find yourself in an even fight, within 10-20 seconds 1-3 people come flying at you from every direction and zerg you down.

Happens alot with my own teammates as well, I run off to cap a point and get into a 1v1, then 4 of my teammates come out of no where, zerg the poor guy down, and I run off to cap somewhere else irritated, we don’t need 5 people on a point. >=[

It’s not 100% of the time, but it happens enough to drive me crazy.

Xynthe.7061:

Why on earth do you want ‘rewards’ for doing what you like?
If you like pvp, case closed. You do it
If you dont like pvp, why are you doing it?

Once the ranking system will be in place I hope the ‘purpose’ of pvping will be clear to most of you…

Until then, my question stands.

Hilarious considering that’s what this game is about.

Play however you want and still get your rewards/progress.

Ayestes.1273:

There are two ways to play open sPvP. In the zerg or out of the zerg. In the zerg you will get many, many team fights although they will often be imbalanced in terms of numbers through some reason or another. Out of the zerg you will fight many, many 1v1 and 1v2 fights which are completely winnable. Perhaps many of you need to try moving out of the zerg?

You must not play much spvp then. Actual “zergs” are rare from my experience. But you still get “zerged”.

Ayestes.1273:

Knote.2904:

Just give it the Stability treatment.

Becomes a boon, 33% increase only.

Change Chill to be the counter condition (-33% action speed) and adjust durations accordingly.

I would love to see that. =p

Chill would be incredibly broken, and Quickness would be terrible. Quickness could be a boon possibly, but 33% increase is nothing over the course of 4 seconds. Chill is already one of the most powerful conditions in the game.

Making Quickness a boon doesn’t imply it’s still only going to be 4 seconds, and applied from a single skill.

Same with chill, as I said, adjust durations accordingly. smh

I would love to see that, more options is ALWAYS a good thing.

Of course, people will come here and freak out assuming for some reason Anet will balance around it.

Just give it the Stability treatment.

Becomes a boon, 33% increase only.

Change Chill to be the counter condition (-33% action speed) and adjust durations accordingly.

I would love to see that. =p

Poxxia.1547:

@cainejw: … but if that happened, then it is a 3vs1 and perhaps you shouldn’t have engaged them?

With 8v8, it’s never you “engaging” them, it’s them “engaging” your butt hole.

Stu.2841:

Knote.2904:

I really do miss Jade Quarry and just having a billion different builds to play/tweak/mess around with, or Fort Aspenwood. Such fun.

The lack of build variety and conquest overload, and only 2/4 maps that I actually like, and the 8v8 clumped into said tiny maps, just drives me nuts lol. =p

I think the build variety is what i miss most, they really simplified the skill bar in GW2.

In GW you had 8 skill slots to fill to your heart’s desire with two professions to mix skills from. There were so many possible combinations from mixing your class with another profession and being able to fill every skill slot individually.

in GW2 you get to choose 1 of 3 healing, 1 of 3 elite, ~2 of 6 (ish?) weapons, and fill 3 utility slots from about 20 skills. Granted the trait rewards that you can choose from do add a lot, but I still feel like GW had more variety in the builds you could create.

Maybe I just haven’t played long enough or gotten creative enough.

Yeah playstyle customization, and deep class skills/mechanics is important to me in MMO’s, something I thought GW1 was amazing for.

I don’t really understand why they dumbed it down as much as they did, just removing dual-professions would’ve made balancing 100x easier.

Bounce skills that bounce to allies will never be good for tagging, besides Greatsword’s bounce skill, since they prioritize allies.

I really do miss Jade Quarry and just having a billion different builds to play/tweak/mess around with, or Fort Aspenwood. Such fun.

The lack of build variety and conquest overload, and only 2/4 maps that I actually like, and the 8v8 clumped into said tiny maps, just drives me nuts lol. =p

Spvp is definately annoying.

The 8v8 means you’ll hardly ever get any good 1v1 or 2v2 fights, usually ends up one person getting zerged. I get zerged down way more than I’d like to, it’s one of the reasons I prefer Kyhlo since it’s easier to avoid getting zerged.

And by getting “zerged” I don’t mean an actual mass of players roaming around in a giant clump, that’s easy to see and avoid, but you normally get 3-4 players that just come from every angle and jump you whenever you start fighting.

On top of the fact that nearly everyone is rolling with easy mode class/builds, it can make you lose your sanity. At this point whenever I want to bother with Spvp I either need to do a very tanky/well rounded build that’s able to 1v2/1v3 or atleast escape 1v2/1v3’s or play a gimmicky long ranged glass cannon cheese build to mess around with.

I really need to get some people to play Tpvp with if I want to enjoy pvp lol.

Yeah retal is it is currently is very poorly designed IMO.

It’s like having near 100% uptime PASSIVE 50% healing debuffs (although poison with how easy it is to stack in duration “almost” does this too).

Retaliation needs to either be stronger/scale again or just be a % reflection but having much more limited uptime so there’s thought to using it as opposed to just maintaining 100% uptime for some passive dmg.

Staff and Greatsword clones attack much slower than your normal Auto Attack.

Hopefully someone else can confirm this bug for me.

I was doing some Condition build in pve last night and while I was trying to do my Blood is Power —> Putrid Mark combo, when hitting 2 mobs with the same Putrid Mark would basically wipe all the bleed stacks on my target completely or pass them onto the other target instead. It was pretty weird/inconsistent and was sort of hard to replicate.

Hope you guys enjoy requiring Focus off hand. =p

I could’ve sworn I remember reading about how if you found a tactical spot to fire from the game wouldn’t punish you for it, along time ago.

Playstyle customization and complexity is important to me in MMO’s or RPG’s, GW2’s customization is definately way too shallow.

I was thinking of the “skins” idea just for normal abilities.

Like Skins for Necro’s Death Shroud, or maybe Mesmer Phantasms, or warrior banners, and w/e.

For a game where cosmetics are king, this sure is dissapointing.

Yes traits being boring is a huge part of why there are so few interesting builds.

There isn’t enough that actually changes how skills functions or changes your playstyle which IMO they need to work on still. On top of that, there’s still too much “cherry picking” going on, it’s usually like “2 out of these 6 traits are decent/good, the rest are crap”.

Traits like “Blinding an enemy now applies a 1s chill” for necro (which was one of the newest traits they added) are a great example of changing (well adding) to what an ability does, or traits like “Torch skills now remove conditions”.

Or to take it a step further, traits that actually “change” a skill, like how some Warhammer Online traits were, take away then add. X skill no longer does Y but now does Z.

If they don’t plan on adding new skills or weapon skills to customize playstyle, then traits are really the only way, it’s just so shallow atm. =/

My only issue is that the downed stated gives them an excuse to make mobs just throw endless amounts of dmg that can’t be 100% mitigated.

Being in the downed state most of the fight isn’t fun.