Guild Wars 2

Jacks.5367:

When everyone is strafing and you throwing your lava axe is often miss.

I agree with Jack here.

But I think lava axe has some great potential as well. The combo fields make for some great synergy if you can set it up right. Zephyr’s Boon works with the Fire Aura from flame leap so you can do the following combo:

Fire element [drop all abilities] >> Ring of Fire
Lava Axe >> Explosive Lava Axe [3x Might/Blast Finisher], Flame Leap [Fire aura/6s Fury/6s Swiftness/Leap finisher], Ring of Fire
Earth Element >> Earthquake [3x might/Blast finisher], Churning Earth [3x Might/Blast finisher]

Bonus — With the exception of Churning Earth (optional), everything here is instant cast, and you’re building fury/might/swiftness while dealing a heck of a lot of damage (Flame leap alone does 1k dmg + burning without crit)

So the conjured weapon just gets added into your rotation as a different element. If the fight continues around your flame axe, you can do it again in 10s when the axe abilities/Fire element cycles.

As a D/D Elementalist running Zephyr’s boon—you get 3 auras using flame axe which is ~18 seconds of Fury overall.

Team Liquid Wiki

The term metagame literally means ‘beyond the game’ and refers to any planning, preparation, or maneuvering that a player does outside of actual gameplay to gain an advantage. The metagame has three major branches, which contain some overlap:

• Preparation done before a match to exploit current trends in StarCraft.
• Preparation done specifically to exploit an opponent’s or map’s style of play.
• Strategic decisions designed specifically to exploit a player’s reaction or weakened mental state in the future. These are also known as ‘mind games’ or ‘psychological warfare’.

This is exactly reinforcing my point. In no place here does it describe ‘Meta’ as the prevailing strategy, or most effective tactic (as described by your urbandictionary). In fact, all of these examples exactly describe the proper use of the term ‘Metagaming’ which is, as i’ve described: the game outside of the game.

“Meta” as its used in GW2, is referencing strategies used within the game. and would be in line with the urbandictionary’s definition.

Urbandictionary is a dictionary which is inclusive of commonly used slang. The argument here is not that it isn’t a word. It’s that it is a word derrived from a word being improperly interpreted.

It would be like someone saying, “That girl is anorexic!” and everyone who doesn’t know what the word ‘anorexic’ means assumes it means ‘really smart’ so the next time some other guy scores an A on his English test everyone goes “Dude, you’re so anorexic.” And then three more of his buddies adds it to urbandictionary.

Obviously, this is a pretty extreme example. But it helps to illustrate what’s going on with the word ‘Metagame’ or, as its used now, ‘meta’. This happens all the time in english—and this is no different. It’s not bad, it’s just a bit silly how a word like this could come to mean almost the exact opposite (in a manner of speaking) of the original term.

Soon.5240:

It’s the notion that there is some “ideal” build for each profession which will manifest itself organically from the variables & rules of the game. As the variables and rules of the game change, so will the “Meta”..

Meta is a prefix used to define an abstraction of a subject. So you’d be right in saying that builds and class composition would be a concept of Guild Wars 2. But it’s set within the rules/parameters of the game, which does not make it abstract since it is one in the same thing. A game is a set of rules. I would argue that what you’re really referring to is a strategy.

If you took this same concept and applied it to a simpler game, say the classic boardgame: “Risk” – you wouldn’t say that “Attacking Africa with 20 troops” as opposed to “Attacking South America with 15 troops” would be a form of metagaming. It’s a strategy—because its set within the rules.

If I was going to reach across the table and punch my opponent in the face for taking my (now unoccuppied) Africa and break up my set… That would be metagaming.

GrandmaFunk.3052:

The use of “meta” to describe the current climate of builds and how they relate to each other(and more importantly, which ones are in favour) mostly comes from the MTG scene, from which GW1 drew it’s philosophy and lingo heavily.

This was a great suggestion! I had not considered MTG. But I did a quick google, and actually I think that Wizards of the Coast would agree with me. However, given the definition they provided, I can definitely see how people would start using ‘meta’ improperly in this context. I pulled the following from the WoTC website:

Metagame – The composition of deck archetypes in a particular format/tournament.

“The metagame where I live is mostly a lot of combo, with some beatdown thrown in.”

This is also an advanced Magic concept where you build/choose decks based on the expected metagame at a tournament in an attempt to beat them. “Zvi Mowshowitz won Pro Tour Tokyo ’01 by metagaming against red.”

- Source:

I think this is sufficient in properly debunking the following comment:

Zephyrus.9680:

I don’t know the source for the definitions you quoted for ‘metagame’ in the OP but it’s kind of way off normal uses.

Furthermore:

Zephyrus.9680:

But meta also means ‘beyond’ (e.g. metaphysics).

Is not technically correct, see ‘meta-’ prefix from original post.

Joey.2769:

Most Effective Tactic Available…META see I helped >.>

This is by far the most compelling answer I’ve seen so far—and does more to alleviate my dislike for the word more than any argument provided earlier. But I think Joey just made it up…

Rackhir Tanelorn.9123:

In such a context the word I think works fine. It can still be used incorrectly (as can most of the English language) but it does have an appropriate usage and context here in GW2 WvW.

For sure. And to take it one step further, I feel that it was a word that was sorely needed. In trying to think of a synonymous word, it was difficult to place which is likely the cause for ‘meta’ to make it into mainstream usage.

What bothers me (‘bother’ might be too strong a word here), and the main point of this thread, was to outline how I believe the root word was originally ‘metagame’ which is, arguably, almost opposite of the current meaning of ‘meta’.

I think what people are taking issue with is that they cannot see how ‘metagame’ had evolved into ‘meta’. I outlined a situation in which I can see this occurring previously to dispel this.

Taking the argument one step further—I’ve heard people refer to PPT gameplay as ‘metagame’. IE: “That commander is great at open-field fighting, but his metagame [ability to take towers] sucks.” which is, even further, just plain wrong.

If people want to change the meaning of metagaming altogether, then so be it. But let’s not sugarcoat it, the current ‘meta’ was a mistake gone viral.

Sovereign.1093:

In gw2 the word meta replaced the old school term cookie cutter build which originally came from diablo 2.

I think you’re right. It means the same thing as a ‘cookie cutter’ and it definitely flows off the tongue better.

But I truly believe this word was a mistake—and then perpetuated by an audience who didn’t grasp the original meaning. I can definitely see how ‘Metagaming’ could be shortened to meta. And I can definitely see how a line like:

“The meta[meaning metagaming, read above] choice of [insert LoL character here] perfectly counter’s their opponent!”

Could be read as:

“The meta [meaning meta] choice of [insert LoL character here] perfectly counter’s their opponent!”

And spirals out from there.

Zephyrus.9680:

Because they’re using it as a prefix, and correctly so. They actually mean meta-something (usually builds/class).

I think you misinterpreted my post. What I’m getting at, is that ‘meta’ as a prefix is almost opposite of ‘the current meta’. To use your example: a ‘metabuild’ would be a build upon a build. Whereas, as a previous user mentioned, “Metabuild” in light of GW2’s interpretation, means a build that everyone uses.

A metaclass (as a prefix) would be a class upon a class (which doesnt even make sense unless there was class mixing).

edit:

This is still your misunderstanding of what people mean when they use it.

I understand what people mean when they use it as outlined in the original post. I just wanted to draw attention to how its changed from its original meaning (not unusual, in the english language.)

I never said it was bad. Just incorrect

EFWinters.5421:

Metagaming is not the same as the current meta.

And that’s basically what i’m trying to get at. The word has moved beyond its root cause due to an incorrect interpretation of the original root word (not uncommon in english).

It wouldn’t surprise me, either, if the cause of this disconnect between “Meta” and “metagaming” would come from LoL being that the age of the players in this game tends to be considerably lower than most other games.

Just seems silly that ‘Meta’ in its current meaning, is synonymous with ‘doctrine’ except maybe doctrine would imply an existence of more than one strategy, whereas ‘meta’ would imply the only good way to play.

styx.7294:

Nah, it’s more like if you have a bunch of databases and you store data on how many entries, what type of entries, etc. the databases have. Once worked at a company that had databases that stored info about their metadatabases that stored info about their databases. They called it metametadata.

Exactly right. Still nowhere close to the GW2 meaning of ‘meta’

Ironically, ‘metabuild’ in a more accurate sense would mean

A build developed using a previous build as a guideline or template… which is exactly the opposite of an insult. It would be like people improving upon a previous build.

Metadata, I think, just can’t be right. Metadata would be like the table of contents to a textbook

Kashijikito.1864:

For example, the game league of legends is notorious for enforcing a strict, rigid metagame on it’s players, forcing them to play certain characters, is very specialized roles, with similar items, if they want to play them at their maximum potential.

Another example of ‘Metagaming’ would be:

League of Legends: Knowing your opponent’s character preferences and choosing a character with a natural counter to it.

Kashijikito.1864:

The term meta didnt start with gw2 and isn’t restricted to guild wars 2.

It basically means the most efficient way to play.

The point you might have missed, is i think that ‘meta’ comes from ‘metagaming’ which would have started as early as D&D unless i’m missing my mark.

But ‘Metagaming’ is nowhere close to ‘meta’ from GW2 (which is the first time i’ve heard it used in this incorrect context). Unless it’s a short for something else.

“Min/maxing” would be closer to the correct term to use in place of ‘meta’ in context with GW2.

Is it just me, or is everyone you know and respect using this word/prefix wrong.

As per wikipedia (I can largely agree with this in my own personal experiences with the term)

~*~

Meta (Prefix) – to indicate a concept which is an abstraction from another concept, used to complete or add to the latter.

Examples: “Metamorphasis”

Metagaming – Metagaming is a broad term usually used to define any strategy, action or method used in a game which transcends a prescribed ruleset, uses external factors to affect the game, or goes beyond the supposed limits or environment set by the game. Another definition refers to the game universe outside of the game itself.

Examples (traditional)

From D&D: Your character has never seen a troll. You know Trolls are weak to fire from previous games. Your character, now, intrinsically, knows that trolls are weak to fire (cheating).

From other MMORPGs: You DDOS (denial of service) an opposing guild’s voicecomms. (Technically, voicecomms is a form of Metagaming)

Guild Wars 2: You have an extra account to spy on another server’s activities.

What Meta means in GW2 (near as I can tell) – The current prevailing strategy in both theory and practice.

Example: “The current meta is to use golems to take down towers instead of rams to prevent damage from arrowcarts”

Example: “Hammer warriors and cleric Guardians is the current meta for most guilds”

~*~

For some reason, it’s being used in a context that has nothing to do with meta. Am I the only person noticing this? I feel like im taking crazy pills.

The tl;dr of replies so far (for late joiners to this discussion)

Hexin.5603:

I couldn’t hear you over the noise of your hammer train beating Eva down last night …

Hammer train?!

I was playing staff ele in that GvG. There you go, generalizing again! I propose a new video… One demonstrating the blatant lack of class-equality in video games.

ELEMENTALIST EQUALITY NOW! STOP THE NERFS!

Hexin.5603:

The video is showing that women are on equal grounds, and the ones in video games who lack maturity to realize it – as soon as they realize its a women, react in a manner where women then have to prove they are just as good as men … or are seen as less than equal. And Geeks are geeks – both men and women. The ones who make people ‘prove’ themselves because they feel girls are not good enough are the ones are actually causing the problems. While most/many other men don’t care if your male or female, rather just that you are good, and not going to cause issues.

Male chauvinism exists everywhere – and when a male chauvinist can hide behind his keyboard – its that much more challenging/worse.

Accept female gamers, because they are just as skilled as male gamers. Same could be said for racism in gaming.

Ahem.

~*~

The video is showing that men are on equal grounds, and the ones in the internet who lack maturity to realize it – as soon as they realize its a guy, react in a manner where men then have to prove they are just as good as women … or are seen as less than equal. And bronies are bronies – both men and women. The ones who make people ‘prove’ themselves because they feel guys are not good enough are the ones are actually causing the problems. While most/many other women don’t care if your male or female, rather just that you are good, and not going to cause issues.

~*~

This kind of crap exists for both sexes. But just because it’s women whining about it, for some reason everyone’s ready to jump in and lend their support.

If that’s not gender inequality, I don’t know what is.

Genev.2450:

More like people are belittling their interests for the sake of their gender.

Female, male, don’t give a kitten, if you’re bad, you’re bad, if you’re good, you’re good /shrug.
There’s jerks in every culture or subculture, no reason to give these more attention that the others.

And yet, no one’s making a pity feel-good video about the poor Bronies.

Let’s make a video about that !

Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait…….

So.

These girls are upset because “Bullies” are saying that they ARE NOT geeks.

I wonder if the geeks of yesteryear would feel at all slighted by this…

Blades Of Fatalis.1279:

Good Fights this weekend. Had some fun fighting some larger groups, good fun.
Still looking for some more smaller groups to fight tho, HL normally will be roaming in CD or SoS bl depending on which has less FA owned stuff on it at the time we start with around 4-7 members. GLHF to anyone we meet out there.
Until then, heres some footage from this weekend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaK55eWoEaw

Quick note: HL wouldn’t mind some Small scale GvG’s this week, we normally field around 8 tops if anyones willing to do a gvg scaled down to 8v8 or lower depending on who we have on.
Don’t have a lot of experience with GvG’s, but would love to get some practice against other groups out there.

Awesome video. The performance at north camp was especially impressive.

First!

Fifteencharacterminimum

I think the missing piece here is that the churn is really only 1/2 of the whole picture. The truth is that D/D eles have a lot of AoE abilities that, if cycled correctly, can be dropped in about 6-8

So you’re getting 5x hits for ~3k damage on the initial churn (15k damage) + Bleed.
Then 5x earthquake and Earth spikes ~1.5k combined (7.5k damage)
Then 5x Ring of Fire, fire breath, burning speed ~3.5k damage (17.5k damage) + Burning
Then 5x Ice breath and Ice AoE ~2k damage (10k damage) + Chilled
And then lightning which is largely single target so we’ll factor it out.

So that’s 50k damage with 5 elementalists hitting a single target (ideal).
Now factor in that you’ll be hitting at most 5 targets (again, ideal)
50k damage x 5 targets = 250k total unmitigated damage to 5 players (+ bleed and burning)in 6-8 seconds because all of these abilities (excluding churning earth) is an instant cast.
(this is assuming zero crits and a reasonable power build)

Realistically, you’re not wiping anything because the DPS of five eles is spread out (usually) to over 7-8 players as they spread out some after the first hit. But that’s 7-8 players who are very nearly downed.

In essence, what you’re getting killed by isn’t a churn stack. It’s a stack of D/D eles.

But here’s the catch—once those 6-8 seconds are done these eles are wholly useless for the next 15-20 seconds. Hence—in the video why we use the guardians to cover us while our cooldowns recharge.

important this post sounds like im arguing that Churn bombs are OP. They really aren’t as mentioned earlier. The easiest counter is to just play aggressively. If your zerg is just milling about—you’re going to get wiped. It’s an organized team with an organized strat. Nothing more.

Adding another one for any skeptics (if you can stomache the music. This video was made as a joke).

Start the video at 4:00 to view 8x elementalist churn stack.

Edit: Oops, fixed the link.

We did this a lot in our early days in tier 3. Video below.

After having done it for weeks, I can confidently inform you that the tactic works—and it’s a lot of fun. But it’s largely only useful against headless zergs.

If a commander sees an elementalist churn bomb coming, it’s as easy as ‘CHARGE’. They go down like bowling pins. But without that one person telling everyone to do it, there’s not enough force to knock them all down. Without a commander, players just tend to stand there in a disorderly fashion waiting to receive a bomb (as shown in the video). 9 times out of 10 all you need to do is push.

For more videos on churn bomb, visit my channel on youtube. Almost every video preceeding Instant Replay #5 is an ele stack group

SpitFire.4690:

Is it true that GODS and RET’s leaders quit and transferred server?? Cause someone PMd me from FA that both guild is having major internal issues

We had 2/5 guild leaders in RET decided they wanted to try something new. We hope they’ll be back but there’s no drama about it. RET continues to collect bags like it always has

I haven’t heard anything about GODS

DBR.9876:

Umm.. Wow! That culling fix is amazing!

That’s impressive!

Thanks for the screenshot. This game just got real.

Im seeing a lot of whining and screaming about skins.
No one is talking about the removal of culling.

I’d like to assume that culling is, in fact, totally fixed then? Since no one’s whining about it?

Im stuck at work . Can anyone confirm that culling is a thing of the past. Can you see the enemy zerg coming at you from 1500+ range?

Tallis.5607:

The complete history of the FA – TC matchup in the past…

October 13 – 20 2012
1st Blackgate 442,949
2nd Tarnished Coast 102,076
3rd Fort Aspenwood 83,220
=> TC wins over FA.

October 20 – 27 2012
1st Tarnished Coast 413,816
2nd Fort Aspenwood 117,167
3rd Dragonbrand 82,352
=> TC wins over FA.

November 17 – 24 2012
1st Tarnished Coast 227.668
2nd Fort Aspenwood 198.906
3rd Yak’s Bend 190.939
=> TC wins over FA.

November 24 – December 1 2012
1st Tarnished Coast 256.950
2nd Fort Aspenwood 184.958
3rd Yak’s Bend 184.204
=> TC wins over FA.

December 1 – 8 2012
1st Tarnished Coast 279.596
2nd Fort Aspenwood 176.299
3rd Yak’s Bend 167.087
=> TC wins over FA.

December 8 – 15 2012
1st Tarnished Coast 261.804
2nd Crystal Desert 184.407
3rd Fort Aspenwood 177.955
=> TC wins over FA.

December 15 – 22 2012
1st Tarnished Coast 279,542
2nd Crystal Desert 173,515
3rd Fort Aspenwood 158,201
=> TC wins over FA.

February 2 – 9 2013
1st Blackgate 265,892
2nd Tarnished Coast 179,209
3rd Fort Aspenwood 162,260
=> TC wins over FA.

March 15 – 22 2013
1st Kaineg 220,054
2nd Tarnished Coast 200,080
3rd Fort Aspenwood 193,536
=> TC wins over FA.

March 22-29 2013 (too early to give meaningful data, but here it is anyways…)
1st Kaineng 210 936
2nd Fort Aspenwood 184 653
3rd Tarnished Coast 177 292
=> FA winning over TC

I fixed it for you.

I would like to issue a formal challenge to any willing participants—to host a zerg vs. zerg Naval Battle on Thursday (if possible, let’s make it a 3-way battle). Bring Lots Of Friends.

PM me here or message me in game to organize a time (Presuming scores get locked in).

Don’t forget to bring a towel.

IRSyKo.5843:

Wasn’t TC ust screaming and going in a frenzy last week?

Trolling the thread, chest thumping, smacktalking about this or that, and how FA makes excuses, smugness (The TC the old FA knew all to well)

Who cares dude. One thing you need to learn about FA is the score doesn’t matter to us.

Score is typically relevant to population anyway.

I care about the score

Just not enough to skip work.

Darknicrofia.2604:

the catas that hit the first door splash damage the 2nd door as well so by the time the first door was down the 2nd was down to 30%

you don’t get that with rams, which take significantly longer to bring down both doors

Pro-Tip! Thanks! Will have to test.

Darknicrofia.2604:

yes, because the keep has 2 doors…

You get more rams for the same cost (4x rams per door), and with more overall damage potential (catas do 50% damage to gates). And with the remainder supply you could even make some of the rams superior… Unless you’re using superior catas in which case you’ll get a full set of superior rams and take those doors down in half the time.

But maybe I’m missing something, because KN’s night crew does PvDoor as their end-game so this might just be a pro-tip moment.

wait…. you dropped 6 catas right in front of a door? o.0

Maniac.5163:

nibbles.2408:

Would someone from TC who plays in the SEA time against Meow/WM send me a PM? I noticed you guys kept your garrison this morning, and I’m looking for some advice as to how you managed that. Over on FABL we faced at least 50 KN invaders who (after we took out their 5 golems) just dps’ed the door down, so there was nothing our 15 defenders could do.

It’s a little frustrating to say the least, so I’m wondering if you guys are doing something differently than we are, have more people, or just aren’t getting as much attention because KN wants to keep us down in points.

Btw this is not a “Night Capping” or “PvD” complaint, I am just looking for information and this is the best possible forum to do so.

Biggest threat gets the most attention, pretty natural. Not to take away from the defensive ability of TC at all – I just see the pattern that Kaineng follows (rightly so) every SEA prime time. There is method to their madness

True story. Last week they kept flipping the TC BL. But just like when we were bottom of tier 3, it’s just a matter of logging on, and rebuilding.

No big deal.

FA+ [RET] Taking this game Thuper Therial.
(PS. The 2 hours of sleep is due to an early work schedule of 5AM-1PM)

To be a good commander—find 5 guys who will follow you (hardest part). Turn on your icon, and attempt it.

Leadership is a skill only learned by attempting. Attempt. Fail. And try again. Never stop trying.

There are considerably fewer posts on this thread this week.

Everyone’s playing hard, and I think all of the trolls (from both sides) are holding their breath to make certain they know the outcome before opening up with the smack.

ThaOwner.7560:

KrazyFlyinChicken.5936:

Deyja.6745:

Zoel.9154:

good fites in fabl tonite pink much respect

We were not in FABL tonight nor were we in any BL in any capacity above 15~, this is a guild PVE/bounty/Spvp night. I was leading a mixture of people and we are still waiting for you to finally come into bay after you spent 2 hours running around without setting up a single piece of siege. See you soon hopefully.

And apparently you need to spend more time in Raid of the Capricorn cause your boys seemed deathly afraid of that water

err why would we push into the water trying to defend a keep with inner walls down, thats just like asking for your other 30man group to push in behind us

but… your wall is up. As you can clearly see :P

We eventually built catapults on the wall because you refused to come play in the water

Deyja.6745:

Zoel.9154:

good fites in fabl tonite pink much respect

We were not in FABL tonight nor were we in any BL in any capacity above 15~, this is a guild PVE/bounty/Spvp night. I was leading a mixture of people and we are still waiting for you to finally come into bay after you spent 2 hours running around without setting up a single piece of siege. See you soon hopefully.

And apparently you need to spend more time in Raid of the Capricorn cause your boys seemed deathly afraid of that water

Garrison was a killing ground of epic proportions on FA BL. Every door down. All siege gone. A ravaged battlefield of bodies, bags and players

[RET] having some fun on Thursday night (Before reset)
This video was made as part of a “Competition” for silliest methods of wiping an enemy zerg. I think I won by default

A video about a bunch of silly things you can do with elementalists.

About 10 elementalists in this group with 2 thieves. Watch the might stacks and protection stacking

The video was made for a competition on ‘Random rampage’ or the silliest way to kill people on our server.

Scores! I need a minute by minute narration of what’s going on in there

When [RET] hits a battleground, we claim it.

With numbers? Skill? Luck?

Doesn’t really matter. The point is, we accomplish. We never allow numbers to be an excuse for getting wiped. Not when we were small, not now when we’re big.

The only guild I’ve seen so far that gives me pause is [RISE]. When I see them stacking, I build an arrow cart :P (Hi from FA BL btw. Good fights today.)

Sunspots.9861:

If you were on FABL last night, you might be in this movie! Remember to watch in 1080p and subscribe if you want to see more!

Am I right in assuming this is PiNK calling out BT to GvG fraps warfare?

Googled ‘Aspenwood’.

I found it:

Apparently Reddit has spilled over into the GW2 forums

I feel like the next doly parade is just going to be a massive 40v40v40 over an arbitrary geographical location…

Like high-schoolers having a gang-fight over who gets to hang out near the vending machines at lunch.

The smack talk has already begun….

Better bake some more love cookies Jayne.

Ethics.4519:

KrazyFlyinChicken.5936:

GFs to SoS and Kain.

Amazing week. Good luck SoS. You’ll do well in Tier 3.

TC welcome back to tier 2.
And our rematch.

I suspect this tier should be pretty evenly matched. Here’s to a good few weeks of solid WvW.

PS. Put up another yak parade

Thank you, appreciate the blessings. I wish I could spectate tier 2 – KN/FA/TC. That’s going to be one heck of a match.

PSS Put up a quaggan parade. Nobody would dare kill a non-risen quaggan.

No one is allowed to lead RET without a quaggan backpack

SHAKA ZULU.3128:

the Great Grub War.

The Great Grub War was caught on film and posted here for your viewing pleasure.
(Fast forward to ~10 mins for actual fighting). Never has a grub been so hotly contested

GFs to SoS and Kain.

Amazing week. Good luck SoS. You’ll do well in Tier 3.

TC welcome back to tier 2.
And our rematch.

I suspect this tier should be pretty evenly matched. Here’s to a good few weeks of solid WvW.

PS. Put up another yak parade