Guild Wars 2

ScribeTheMad.7614:

Ah! So I’m not crazy. >.<

I get this all the time and it drives me nuts. Mostly noticed it on my Ranger (greatsword/sword) but had seen it on others, could never figure out what was causing it, kudos for figuring that out! I leave auto-attack on but still tend to button mash a bit as I find sometimes my character looses her target and just stops attacking.

Yes, it’s a bit crazy on the sword ranger, the “leap” auto-attack cancels every kitten dodge, making the build not viable at all.
And you wonder why all rangers are going full ranged when the most enjoyable weapons are melee…

Give us and answer Anet, you can’t have a game that relies on dodge and something that “randomly” kittens it up, it really drives me mad when I have to double dodge with my mesmer to make sure I dodge a deadly attck.

I really feel the need to bump this topic.
This is the worst bug regarding combat.
I’m a mesmer and I often go melee, I know well what and how I have to dodge attacks but I can’t predicts when it’s going to bug out, leaving me with half (or zero) endurance left and completely exposed to the attack.
For subject Alpha, which is very predictable, I have to MANUALLY disengage from melee combat BEFORE dodging or I take the risk that it will cancel my roll and I’ll go down.
Here’s another video I just recorded: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=um4qeR8KFn8

Mesmer are godly in pvp, especially with a shatter build.

Also a pretty decent dps in pve.

But don’t worry about your low damage at level 8, a mesmer doesn’t really shine until level 30 or something.

“Taking turns until they die”

What amuses me the most about this is that simply having EVERYONE in the room running around with defensive skills makes this as easy and without deaths (or really few).

The real men kill the mobs as they spawn, of course.

Now what I think about this… I don’t think much as long as there’s a thinking behind it, I find stupid to take turns and pay a repair bill when there’s a safer way.
When I lead groups, I usually propose my allies to choose between what I call the “kitten” way or the “manly” way. (They want to first one most of the time anyway)

Everything’s fine for me except Mind Stab.
Illusionary Wave is absolutely godly to push mobs off a downed ally or to interrupt bosses like the Powersuit when he heals, the Golem in COE when he starts spinning, the final bosses of AC explo before they scream, etc…

Of course, greatsword alone lacks a lot of things but that’s why you have two weaponsets. I mostly use it when we engage combat to do a quick berserker+mirrorblade then I swap it for sword/focus and only ever take the greatsword back for those “oh kitten” moments or when I have to interrupt.

souless.1935:

No one is saying pulling sparks is not possible but EVERYONE is saying that the DPS method is FAR easier. No one is stopping anyone from patting themselves on the back, by all means go ahead…but that does not change my comment and the accuracy of it.

Bullkitten, 3/4 of the posts are about “specific classes and build required” or “bugged sparks” or whatever.
The so called “DPS method” is an exploit and it’s harder to pull off than simply running the sparks yet everyone and their mother complain that the boss is hard because they can’t beat her with the dps method. It’s also not a “consistent” method since I can’t do it with any class/build.

Next time, bring your dps guys and follow the REAL method, it should be easy peasy and give you way more time than needed for the sparks, if you can’t beat her like that, you’d better give up. That’s my final tip for those who are desperate.

I bring my guildmates and friends two times a week in there for their title and we had zero unsucessful run so far so don’t tell me the real method is unreliable.

I agree some tweaks are needed, but you wouldn’t know about them since you’re just using the lame kitten method.

Arah is my favorite dungeon too, it’s so huge and full of details, really feels like you’re exploring what’s left of a city after a cataclysm.

And it has some of the best bosses in the game (Lupicus and Alphard)

souless.1935:

bugs are bugs and speaking as if they do not exist does not change the bugginess of the spark run. If you want a CONSISTENT finish of this level, DPS, timewarps, etc.

I’m sorry but I fail to see which bugs you guys are talking about.
Otherwise, we wouldn’t be able to do TEN PERFECT spark runs one after another to beat her.

Aggro them and drag them over their slot, the area where you place them is even larger than the visible circle.

Still wondering why people think a high dps is required for this boss after I gave a couple of tips on the first two pages.
The only thing that’s needed is coordination to run the sparks faster than she heals then repeat until she’s dead.

You don’t need warriors, time warps or whatever.
5 guys (or 4 if one is petrified) aggro the sparks and place them asap, it takes a few seconds, and you get her down little by little.

There’s no need for specific classes or build required but the higher your dps, the more time you have to place the sparks.

You don’t need any for 10to19, but 5 will help you a lot until you learn how to avoid agony.
For 20to29, you’ll need atleast 10-15AR to survive the Jade Maw and 25-30 for level 30+.

I could understand your frustration if it was 20 or 30+ and still, it’s very possible to pug this everyday without any issue.

Agony resists isn’t required at all for this whole fight even at higher difficulties, watch the boss and when he turns toward you and fires his arrow, dodge it. If you get hit, with 5 or 10 agony resists, the arrow does very negligible damage.

Other things that might help you are the reflect spells and mass pull spells to grab the elemental grubs toward you and kill them asap while being protected from fire arrows with the reflect.

Of course you don’t need any of these to suceed but it might help.

Be creative, be clever, and don’t give up after two tries.
It will become easy as hell afterward.

Massi.5097:

Can you tell us this correct way to run them so?

Well, we fought Simin against a wall and the moment she turns invisible and starts spinning, we all spread out each one running toward his spark asap and kiting it back to its slot.
What’s important is that you define some order, usually, the guy with the closest spark (that would be me) places it first then run away from the statue to let the others do the same. We did this to ensure no one stole the aggro for someone else’s spark.

If someone was petrified when Simin turns invicible, he would leave a message in the chat and I had to run his spark after mine.

We were fast enough so she didn’t heal more than around 30-35% of her hp each time while our dps was around 30-40% each phase, depending on the bursts we had available.

You have 2 ways to beat her:
-Your dps is crazy and you take more than 50% of her hp each time so you have enough time to run the sparks before she outheals, even heard of some groups killing her in one go.
-Your dps isn’t good enough and you have to run the sparks faster. A rule of thumb would be to remove at least 30% of her hp each time, if you can’t do this, there’s no way you can run the sparks fast enough.

Hot Boy.7138:

Anyone beating Dwayna encounter legitimately got lucky by having the sparks go in to it’s spots without too much of a delay for her healing to be an issue. And that’s getting lucky, because the sparks rarely do as they’re supposed to.

So if you beat Dwayna, it’s not because your group is any more skilled than any other group, you just got lucky.

I hope you’re joking… right?
We went through at least 30 or 40 spark runs with my group to finally get the hang of it and take her down slowly but surely. Our dps was abysmal so our margin or error for sparks was nearly zero.
Each one of us grabbed his spark and kited it to its respective slot then you get the kitten out and let the others who have the furthest sparks do the same.

There’s no “luck”, do it well and it works EVERYTIME, never seen a spark flying over its slot.
The way you run the sparks defines your sucess.

Also, where did the topic about asking some questions to the Arah dev went? My post even disappeared.

Awesome, I always find playing WITH the game a lot more exciting than just playing the game.

Not the brigthest idea to show it though.

I just finished this path with my guild, first time for everyone and we didn’t read anything before going in there.
The whole path took us 2h40, Simin alone took 40 minutes of constant bursting and learning how to effectively kite our sparks (each player in charge of his spark while I did 2 because one player was constantly petrified).

The fight is all in the spark management, define and order, define a strategy but don’t let things go out of hand.
Place your spark, don’t come close others then get the kitten out and let the others and the others only do their job, they will learn.

Once it’s done, burst her, really. We could do maybe 30-35% each time, the amount of damage you can deal in the time before she stealths defines the time you have to gather the sparks.

Tooks us about 30 spark runs, and maybe 10-12 time warps.

The things I would change:
- making the spark follow its first target and never change
- reduce the boss’ healing or make her appear for longer
- increase her damage A LOT, there’s zero threat in the actual version
- make the petrification something you can actually dodge instead of targeting the same player randomly the whole fight

Really enjoyable dungeon, makes me wonder why the other ones didn’t get so much attention.

It’s halloween all over again.
Disabled players, camera issues, hitbox, bad design etc…

The new puzzle is easy as hell thanks to clocktower whiners, so don’t start and kitten things up again.

With a bit of luck, I reached the end of the puzzle on my first try this night, thought it was easy enough for everyone to complete, then I went to bed.
Today, I wake up, eager to see the praises for the new jp, and kitten, you guys are whining again.

Hey I’m the mesmer who recorded the video.
We had to burst through the poison instead of using the regular strategy because it was bugged and bringing the crystals to the console wouldn’t work.

The usual strategy is to assign 2 people to the console and one to the fan, their job is to keep things running at all time.
The console guys have to pick up the Tears and bring them to the console while the fan dude have to press the fan button once the two side consoles are ON.

Notable skills for this boss from what I know:
Mesmer iWarden (Focus phantasm), he absorbs ALL the poison bolts for as long as he’s doing his animation
Guardian blue bubble thingy, absorbs all the bolts too, stay near him while it’s up

The mesmer’s Feedback bubble doesn’t work.

I agree that’s really unfair, not only for this rng reason but because only jewelers can make these.

Why aren’t these jewelery items sold by the dungeon vendors like all the armors or alternatively, why can’t we tailor/leatherworker/armorsmith craft dungeon armors like jewelers do with tokens?

Make it fair for everyone.

Help me run Arah p4 and I’ll tell you how it works.

I have faith in you again.
See, that’s the kind of communication we need. Would be awesome to have your views on the changes you make too from time to time, you know, the thinking behind the changes.

Robin Hood.8123:

Is it fair to run arah in a random group with other classes, knowing to be a millstone around their neck all the time?

I wouldn’t go that far, mesmer is still VERY strong in PvE, may it be survivability, support or damage.

This delay is really killing my enjoyment.
Now, from the moment you want to do an action to the moment it does the effect, there is:
1. Character animation
2. Illusion idle delay
3. Illusion animation

This is a lot longer than the travel time of a projectile or a simple melee attack from other classes. The time it takes for a cripple or a root (1h sword “3”), is crazy. Add to that the many conditions/bugs that can make it fail and it seems terribly wrong.

I love the mesmer because it’s a very active and fast paced class, please don’t add all these delays and things slowing down the whole gameplay.

Levetty.1279:

Ranger is the most useless class in the game, yes even after the crippling nerfs/bugs introduced to Mesmer thats how bad Ranger is, so I don’t know why you brought them up.

I was reffering to the hotfix right after the Lost shores patch that fixed the newly introduced ranger trap bug reported by the devs themselves.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/Game-Update-Notes-November-15-2012
Not about how bad ranger is.

Agony punishes groups who fail to avoid it.
I’m not saying this in a sarcastic way, but I think the main goal of every group after level 20 should be to work on a strategy to avoid agony.

Agony works like everything else in the game, avoid it and you don’t even need that resist and unlike some other attacks, agony attacks are very predictable and avoidable.

Most of the time, I forget to equip my rings and it doesn’t make a difference until Jade Maw which is the only exception.

A group strategy can be a heavy use of reflecting or negating skills, or that guardian tome to heal everyone (works wonder on maw), or the simple “pay attention and dogdge when the boss faces you”.
Anything that negates the attack that agony is linked to completely negates the agony.

I understand it affects people with high hp more as they have more to heal afterward before the next agony attack hits but even then I don’t see it as something you have to take in the first place. Except for Jade Maw, there’s no unavoidable attack/agony in Fractals.

Except for a very few bosses, you can go melee on almost everything.
People tend to freak out and go ranged on nearly every boss now, that’s pathetic and it leaves me alone in melee as mesmer, soaking all the instant melee hits when I’m not running after the boss who’s himself running after some ranged warrior/guardian/whatever.

And that’s really awesome because even in the Charr/Ascalon fractal, I can’t kittening summon a berserker on the Oil pots or even attack them most of the time.

Hey, what do you think?
This isn’t ranger or warrior.

Seeing all the bugs we still have from the beta, I wouldn’t even bet on the next patch.

Robert Hrouda.1327:

18. Ascalon: Mesmers cant create Illusions with dodging while being a Charr.

I’d like to add something to his one to make it clearer.
The mesmer trait “Deceptive Evasion” that’s supposed to spawn a clone when you dodge doesn’t work when the mesmer is transformed like in the Ascalon Fractal where he’s transformed into a Charr.
It doesn’t work in the third path of AC explo either during the part where the players are transformed into ghosts.
Then again, during the “Grenth event” in Cursed shore, when fighting the high Priest of Grenth, players have to turn into some black form to kill the Shades and Deceptive Evasion doesn’t work in this form either.

I already made two topics in the Game bug forum about this specific bug. Please do something. AC explo p3 and the Charr Fractals are both VERY frustrating because of this.

My runes are all Divinity ones so I suppose they’re good enough for both defense and offense.
Other than that, I don’t mind changing my gear but I want to make sure I don’t waste mats and money.
I have 18k+ hp atm but zero toughness.

10/30/0/0/30 Melee Power shatter build
Just reached level 20 with a more of less “full” Berserker setup but now I wonder how I should balance my gear to get more defensive stats..

The vulnerability on shatter trait is very good.
Also, before Time Warp, use your F3 with 3 clones + yourself, instant 24 vulnerabilities!

If you switch Illusionary Persona for Imbued Diversion, you can apply 18 vulnerabilities on mutltiple targets.

I just crafted the Flux Matrix focus and it’s really weird.
It clips through my hand and doesn’t even have the flashing effect it had on the preview.

I don’t know how it is supposed to be but it’s very disappointing in its current state. Felt like I wasted golds.

My question is simple.
Is there any known pve build using torch offhand?

I’ve been trying things for a few hours and I don’t seem to find a good synergy between torch and our traits.

The prestige is pretty awesome for its Blast finisher but the phantasm is really awful, he’s useless for raw dmg, conditions (confusion) or shatter (long cd).

Ditton.3149:

Oh noes..I have to do lower levels to help other people…what a travesty that my leetness is hampered. Blizzard was RNG all the F’n time, you get a chance to get something nice on bosses but there was never a sure thing for your class and even if it dropped there were others there who rolled for it unless you had a point system for loot. Your guild or group should have no issue running you through a couple lower dungeons to get you the ring imo.

Oops, for a second I thought we were playing a revolutionary MMO.
Had enough raiding, gearcheck, rng, dkp and kitten, I thought Gw2 was different…

So, I play once a day and hope that I get a ring so I can go on.
If I don’t get one, I can just log out and wait for the next day.
Brilliant.

I don’t have enough skillpoints for the illusionary wall climber.

Deceptive Evasion aka “Clone on Dodge” doesn’t work in the Charr Assault Fractal.
It seems that being in a different form prevent clones from being summoned while dodging because this exact same thing happens in the Path 3 of Ascalonian Catacombs when you are transformed into a ghost or during the Grenth Event in Cursed Shore when you walk into the black well to be able to hit the Shades.

Topic posted in Game bugs forum as well
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Mesmer-trait-not-working-in-Ascalon-Fractal/first#post765429

Jasher.6580:

I can’t get to grips with it… I am incapable… the dungeons were fine without them. I can’t work for map completions because they vistas are impossible for me, I don’t like PvP… the only thing I could do well at in this game was dungeons… and now they are adding jump puzzles in there to gate me from it as well… I’m more than a little saddened by this.

Not to gate you from it, but to force you to get better at it.
Consider it part of the challenge.
There’s no MMO law saying dungeons can’t have a little platforming and “mini-games”.

WaystedMined.7831:

The difference here is jumping puzzles such as this actually do hamper individuals who want to play the game, but due to disabilities lack the fine motor skills to perform them. Previous jumping puzzles were mostly “optional” and would not hamper an individual’s attempts to advance a character’s equipment. The jumping puzzles in FotM do interfere with those individuals.

Jumping is one kittening key along with your forward key. What kind of disability lets you play the game normally but prevents you from pressing one single key?
Jumping puzzles aren’t harder than the rest of the game to disabled gamers.

Also, Arenanet is trying new things by implementing these little “puzzles” in dungeons and it’s a really enjoyable change of pace in the middle of the mob bashing.

Don’t you like new things?

This game is a lot more about movements than your traditional MMOs.

Deceptive Evasion aka “Clone on Dodge” doesn’t work in the Ascalon Assault Fractal.
It seems that being in a different form prevent clones from being summoned while dodging because this exact same thing happens in the Path 3 of Ascalonian Catacombs when you are transformed into a ghost or during the Grenth Event in Cursed Shore when you walk into the black well to be able to hit the Shades.

Better get used to it.
If jumping wasn’t a mandatory thing in your previous MMO experience, it is now!
And I love it.

They should really make them potions of dungeon slaying instead of mob types since it’s also the idea behind these pots.

I usually notice this when I’m fighting Subject Alpha because I always end up dying when it happens.

When you swap between your weapon sets while dodging, two things can happen:
-You swap late and roll normally then keep attacking with your new weaponset
-You swap early and it cancels the whole dodge then you attack with your new weaponset (or you die if you were, for example, dodging one of Subject Alpha’s attack while switching to your ranged weapon)

I made a short video to show what happens, first time I swap late, then early.
http://youtu.be/2IMom3Xn5as

Paths 1 and 3 are 15-18min each and P2 is around 30.
Making CM the shortest dungeon along with AC.

As to where the skips are, I’ll let you figure out.

I would, also, like some “balance” in the difficulty and some more work in certain dungeons and bosses.

Take, for example CM butler path.
There’s this boss, Wahlen or something, he throws bombs so fast the only way to avoid them is to dodge before he actually throws them, pure luck.
There’s also this tunnel with the traps and the riflemen on the other side or that big room full of bandits that you can skip hopefully.
Finally, there’s the last boss where it’s nearly impossible to wipe. He does this circle of spikes aoe that’s undodgeable because instant.

Of course, all of this isn’t that hard. What I mean is that there are stupid ramp ups in difficulty and mechanics that simply don’t follow the game design with its dodging system.

Vewen.8016:

Hey, I could be wrong but are you a mesmer on the Far shiverpeaks server? You look awfully familiar, and maybe you recognize me too. We had a talk once where you said you disliked the tier 3 human cultural boots, and I found your weapon mesmer’ish. The name’s Alasah.

Yep, that’s me.

I think there is but not sure, I know there are two pistols and a focus.

Can we regroup in this topic all the armors and weapons that are very “mesmer-y”?

I know it’s matter of taste and some will choose to wear an armor that’s mean’t to protect your vital parts but I’m talking about armors/clothes that fit the mesmer idea and artworks.

I’ll start with the well known weapons that are Vision of the Mists and Whisperblade, both being some kind of phantasmal swords.

CM both 1 and 3 take around 16min each.

Ranged isn’t super recommended for a shatter build though since Illusion Persona requires you to be at close range.