Guild Wars 2

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

umm I’m wondering where Robert Gee is :P

working on the next expansion?

babazhook.6805:

The argument is valid. If a given number of players could defend against a given number of attackers using siege before in a castle or keep and can no longer do that due to mechanics changes then it nothing to do with population or doing it wrong.

An outnumbered group should never be able to defend forever against an overwhelming force.
Defending requires fighting, not arrowcarts. If you don’t have the people to fight the attackers, you lose the objective, it’s as simple as that. This is a Player vs Player mode, not Siege vs Player.

Kodama.6453:

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

[…]You do know chronomancer’s entire traitline is built around alacrity right? […]

The whole traitline? There is 1 minor trait and 2 major traits which have something to do with alacrity. So this is the whole traitline?

Alacrity is the specialization mechanic – not only the traitline, the utilities and weapon skills are all designed around it.

Conner.5803:

Do 2 revenants on opposing sides cancel each other out?

You mean in WvW? We didn’t test it, but I would assume so…

DaVid Darksoul.4985:

My server is fine with population

DaVid Darksoul.4985:

when a 5 man party can use the event to open all the Towers and bring Keep gates to less then half so they can speed cap everything before you even have a chance to build siege to defend

Either your server is fine with population and can defend and win the Oasis event against a whole 5 man group, or it isn’t and your arguments are invalid.

/thread

We also noticed this and posted a video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMNo6pl0-3Q

To me, it looks like a bug. But with ANet is always hard to tell…

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Anyways. How does Mesmer feel since the alacrity & friends nerf guys? Is it really “mez ded” or more of a really inconvenient and ill-thought change that makes the class harder and less rewarding to play… But somehow still viable?

Isn’t that the description of Mesmer valid for the last 3 years or so?

skcamow.3527:

The alacrity nerf is so bad, this afternoon I started to take a second/third/tenth look at some of the other chronomancer traits and quickly determined that core mesmer may now be in the ballpark of coming close to chronomancer. Maybe this was the intent, to buff the core by severely nerfing the elite. Whatever the reason, in PvP well of recall is 100% necessary to maintain any stretch of remote viability of ANY chrono build, and that’s sad.

“Core mesmer has never been competitive – let’s nerf chrono to the same level!” — Anet

As I mentioned in OMFG guild chat: at least they can’t nerf the 3 weapon skills we didn’t get because we got “something just as good”.

The alacrity nerf is just bad. They could at least have changed the major trait to grant the 66% back for the mesmer… but alas, that’s not ANet way. When ANet nerfs mesmers, they double or triple nerf it. So now we have less uptime AND less effectiveness. And we’re stuck with skills with base cooldowns that accounted for the old alacrity. Who decided this either fails terribly at understanding the mechanics or just wanted to gut Chronomancers for good.

Well of Precognition is now complete garbage and on top of that it still has his 45 seconds cooldown and insane .75s cast time. And they made sure thieves could just ignore it if any chrono decided to slot it. Heh.

The scepter “buff” is a sad joke that I’m sure will make some PVE player happy for a tinypercent more damage if you sit facetanking a single target. People that think hybrid power/condi mesmer DPS will be viable will be sadly disappointed (or will keep living in their own imaginary world).

The Chaos Armor nerf was like: it gives too much blind. So, instead of reworking the chance to happen for blind (like: add weakness to the rotation, or lower the chance for blind and increase the chance for the other conditions) they removed it completely, swapping it for weakness.

Chaotic Dampening has been nerfed again because it was just too good. Boooo bunker mesmers! Not fun! ESPOOOOOORTSSSSSSSSSSSSS.

The buff to Restorative Mantras makes me smile sadly: I played support Tempest and our mantras can’t even begin to compare with what they can offer from that point of view. Mantras are the most clumsy skills in game (excluding Ventari on Revenant) and they want us to support people combining that with the most weird boon sharing in game (everyone gets double boons EXCEPT the mesmer).

Mistrust: buffed by 100%. Still complete garbage.

They even nerfed our CRAZY Resistance uptime: 5s every 90s on shatter, 3s every 180s on timewarp, 3s every 72s on veil, 3s every 32s on null field and feedback. WoW. Basically if we ran 4 glamours and chrono + inspiration we would still be worse than a Revenant with Mallyx. Crazy stuff.

Fhaeris.9237:

Feedbacks completely ignored.
kitten you, Anet.

Actually, Feedback has been reworked!
Ba-dum-tsss.

It really depends on what’s your role and in what scenarios you find yourself playing.
For my heavy havoc group I theorycrafted Teh Portalbomber that is meant to provide stealth for the group and long range portals: MI, F5, MI, portal entre, mimic, blink, blink, portal exit. It can also provide decent CC.

Since we’re here, can we have different colors for the names too?

Invictus.3428:

Menaka.5092:

For a skill named Shuffle, I would have imagined that it scrambles the enemy’s skillbar. That would be a nice mindtrick

But people already hate us enough like it is.

I like that concept, although I see it only as being used in PvP. Maybe if we add a “daze/stun” to it to PvE monsters.

It could mess royally with AI :°D

For a skill named Shuffle, I would have imagined that it scrambles the enemy’s skillbar. That would be a nice mindtrick

But people already hate us enough like it is.

Since the expansion I experimented a bit with a very tanky build I wanted to use for commanding in WvW.
It’s very similar to what many have been running in PvP, with a few obvious tweaks since WvW offers a wider variety of Sigils and some things work differently or not at all (illusion survival is basically zero).

Build: Chrono Commander
Video: Chrono Commander in big fights
Video: Chrono Commander (variation of the build) in small scale (sorry, audio is in italian)

I’m not suggesting in any way that this is better than Guardian/Dragonhunter for commanding. And, sadly, with the incoming wave of nerfs it will be even harder to play this.
But it is possible, you can be very tanky and survive in the frontline on a mesmer (well… Chronomancer).

I hope you’ll enjoy the fights

With alacrity gutted and all chrono skills (shatter, shield and wells) designed to work with the old alacrity and sporting quite long cooldowns, will the base cooldowns change?

Beta: gives unblockable, then gives invuln. Weird but interesting.
Launch: gives evasion. Great for PvP. Too great.
After the first round of crying on the forums: gives distortion. Crap for PvP but great for organized groups in WvW. (who gives a kitten about pve? NPCs won’t complain for sure)
After even more crying: complete garbage.

Makes me sad.

Svarty.8019:

I’m guessing that the guild upgrades weren’t behind a 3 month paywall in the beta, lol?

Nope, and we didn’t even have an hint about how stupidly time/money gated they would be.

During the beta, every upgrade was available for free and in unlimited quantities.

Changing that would make for a completely different experience in WvW – right now.

BUMP after the transfer to Far Shiverpeak!

what would be the role for this? in which scenario?

from what I remember the healing for mantras scales very badly with healing power, you should consider stacking increased healing to allies instead (for example the Delicious Rice Ball food, Runes of the Monk, Sigil of Benevolence)

I’m already in bed (EU, yay!), but had to log on the forums to share the pain with you guys.

Anet, I don’t know what changed in your testing practices, but this is shameful.
You can’t go live with such enormous, game breaking, bugs in a build that is supposed to change/fix only two small things…

Adding to the long list of ANet double-nerfs. Why the change to the cast time in the first place? Why all our wells have unusably-long cast times? Why?

Levetty.1279:

Delete PvP please.

I would rather have it but not have the whole game balanced around a 5v5 conquest mode.

I can confirm you need 3 people in each objective (sentry, camp, tower, etc)

“what are those purple flames?” “alacrity, it speeds up your cooldowns” “oohhhh I like that!” – my experience as a chrono in pve so far

Fay.2357:

Edit: I wonder if we could convince the mods to just merge every new whine thread someone posts into some big mega-whine thread so that we don’t have to deal with a new package of drivel every week.

“I’m bad and mesmers should be nerfed – master thread!”

would be a huge success

AlphatheWhite.9351:

Still useless in WvW, but a step forward is still a step forward, right?

WvW mesmers still have veil and portal! \o/

/sad

Ross Biddle.2367:

AlphatheWhite.9351:

Menaka.5092:

shattering actually treats you as an illusion, killing you as well.

o.o
I have to admit, this is the absolute worst case scenario that I’ve seen suggested, and yet it feels strangely plausible.

Wait wait wait, you’d use your shatter skills in PvE? Now we really are talking worst case scenarios :p

need to keep that alacrity flowing!

Dano.5298:

Just wondering if people think w/ Revenants if stab will work again or not.

Have to say, I tried to put up with the change (I’m a returning player) and the game is about 100x less fun the way it is now.

More than the revenant, I really hope that the new borderlands will make monoblobbing useless (because you can’t cover the whole map with a single blob)… if the fights get smaller, it’ll probably be easier to survive with the current amount of stability…

Tyler Bearce.3427:

Thanks for the report. Fixed in the HoT release.

Thank you for fixing it!!

• Start downloading the patch
• Stare at the screen while the patch downloads at 1Kb/s
• Restart the downloader
• Stare at the screen while the patch downloads at 1Kb/s
• Check the forums: apparently everyone has the same problem
• Meanwhile the download servers are dead and the download speed went down to 0Kb/s
• Restart the downloader again
• Stare at the screen in amazement while the downloader briefly touches 1Mb/s and then goes back to 1Kb/s
• Check the forums and reddit: same for everyone except a few (possibly fake) reports of people managing to download and log in. Apparently, World vs World and the trading post are down.
• Download stuck at 2%. Restart the downloader again. 1Kb/s again. Just give up and do something else in the meantime.
• Hours later, come back to the computer with the download still stuck at 19%. Restart the downloader again.
• This time it works! The downloader picks up speed and finishes in a few minutes. The hype is real. The downloader restarts and…
• New login screen! Amazing!
• Try to login: the login servers are down.
• Keep trying until I manage to log in.
• Log my main mesmer and watch the new video introduction.
• Find out how to unlock Chronomancer. Do I have enough Hero Points? Karma? Skill? Shinyness? Achievement Points?
• I would jump in WvW… but the servers are down. TP is down too. The reports were accurate.
• Funnel myself in the new Jungle with millions of other players. The lag is real.
• Quickly discover the mesmer release bug: shattering actually treats you as an illusion, killing you as well.
• Log off
• Get a life

Interesting that nobody mentioned the amazing amount of healing you can dish out with Druids and Reventaurs (Ventari Revenants) as a factor that will contribute to the new meta.

Also, Inspiring Reinforcement from the Dwarf stance – altho quite clumsy to use – could be an interesting development for the lack of stability in big fights.

For me the biggest question remains: will the new borderland map actually render the blobs obsolete? A meta based on smaller fights (20-30ish per side instead of 50-80) could change a lot from the current one in my opinion.

Looking forward to all the testing and experimenting with the new builds, classes and elite specs

I wish forums had a button to automatically ignore all comments similar to: “nooo this change is inconvenient for meee siiggh sooob”. This thread would be probably 2 pages instead of 8 with that on

Friday evening was arbitrary and people complained about it. Saturday afternoon (EU) is arbitrary and people is complaining about it. There is no way of pleasing everyone.

I personally stopped enjoying reset time after Season 2, when it became a huge and mindless lag/blobfest. No, thanks.

I understand some people might like that, and I’m sure saturday evening will still be like that, but this change has the potential to give a better picture of the servers relative strength.

The saturday afternoon population (often including more newcomers and casuals than the hardcore reset prime time/night crew) will have a stronger role in defining the PPT lead and I think it’ll feel like a “slow start” compared to the frantic reset evening and subsequent night capping phase we have now.

Did anyone else notice this? (quick example video in WvW)

When traited, Illusionary Wave pushback is broken: it still interrupts casts, but fails to move the targets away.

At first I tought it was the terrain, but it was a bit too consistent.

This was one of the various incarnations of my build for WvW raids (organized group of 15ish)

it’s a weird question tho… you’re looking for a build for doing what in which gamemode?

seems like a waste for pve honestly… if you want a bit more survival you can get a bit of soldier or knights/cavalier gear, no point investing in cele since we don’t have much use for the healing power

reapex.8546:

Only negative feedback I can think of is:
Mid-size and smaller guilds have not been invited to the beta

our guild usually runs 15ish people and about 10 were invited in the second and third stress test

Silverkey.2078:

Menaka.5092:

Just wanted to point out that while Engi’s Medical Dispersion Field has been reworked (from the patch notes: “Reworked this trait. The internal cooldown has been removed. This trait is now only triggered by your own healing, and the percentage has been increased from 12% to 20%”), we’re stuck with the current version of Healing Prism.

Why? Because they would not give two identical traits to different professions?
like “bolt to the heart”, “Executioner”, “Close to Death” or “Swift Termination”?

I don’t know why
The engi trait is a grand master major, so I can’t really ask for the mesmer trait to be on the same level, yet I would rather have that mechanic with a lower contribution (7%?) than the current one.

Just wanted to point out that while Engi’s Medical Dispersion Field has been reworked (from the patch notes: “Reworked this trait. The internal cooldown has been removed. This trait is now only triggered by your own healing, and the percentage has been increased from 12% to 20%”), we’re stuck with the current version of Healing Prism.

For WvW I really can’t say. I can see many roles that a chrono can play, I can see a few roles that a mesmer can play, but I can’t envision how (or if) the wvw meta will change and what I’ll play depends on too many factors.

Bump for truth (and it’s true for other mesmer skills too, eg. Timewarp)

Menaka.5092:

Shield
Finally feels like something worth taking in WvW. Tides of Time went from “will fail 50% of the time” to “will fail 10% of the time” and that’s… decent, considering it’s a mesmer skill (sigh).

after more testing I would review that to “fails 30% of the time”… some specific problems:

• using the skill from a cliff/wall, the skill travels at an angle to the target, then the return skills travels parallel to the terrain, never going back to the chrono
• if something “invulnerable” (eg. a buffed camp veteran, etc) is present on the return path, the wall sometimes disappears
• if the return path has some obstacles, the wall will sometimes disappear

Menaka.5092:

Side note: I had the feeling that Illusionary Inspiration worked… better. Not every time but… gonna test more today.

Disregard this. Still broken.

BlackBeard.2873:

clipnotdone.9634:

I’m not sorry

One word: mimic. Make it happen. I wanna see a one-man zerg of 9 charr.

Too bad it doesn’t work on elites :p

Shield
Finally feels like something worth taking in WvW. Tides of Time went from “will fail 50% of the time” to “will fail 10% of the time” and that’s… decent, considering it’s a mesmer skill (sigh). The block is amazingly good, I had some serious fun with Signet of ether resetting it until necros realized they could use unblockable fear to end it :P
Definitely a valid alternative to torch in WvW.

Wells
Still in a bad place. The damage is still non competitive with Mantra of Pain, the cast time and cooldowns are just over the top. I realize those cooldowns must account for Alacrity, but since Alacrity is tied to mechanics that hardly work in WvW (the phantasm, sitting still inside/around a well and shattering), I keep seeing a huge problem there.
The only one worth taking is the Elite well because it brings useful CC and damage, it’s still effective (and the visuals are extremely cool).

Side note: I had the feeling that Illusionary Inspiration worked… better. Not every time but… gonna test more today.

atlrising.5134:

Would they care if Mesmer players went on a strike and played other classes?

everyone except mesmers would enjoy that

How to get 150 ferocity as a warrior: equip axe.

How to get 150 ferocity as a mesmer:

• equip sword (main hand)
• equip another sword (off hand)
• be in combat
• fully complete a rotation having all your sword-related illusions up, hitting every time
• repeat the previous step

I don’t see the problem…?

Sviel.7493:

apharma.3741:

I think for most people fighting a condi PU mesmer it’s the confusion that really gets them. They feel they can’t cleanse or else they get hit with even more damage and so it feels very oppressive. Condi builds also really really hurt zerkers because of the low health pool on some and the way it keeps ticking. Fortunately I’m running inspiration which makes conditions a breeze.

I really do hope the WvW forum doesn’t see this thread -.-

As a WvW player, I’m fully aware that condi mesmers are not god mode or even good outside of WvW. However, they are really, really annoying within it.

WvW has many scenarios.

PU Condi mesmer was (is?) very good in a very specific part of WvW is, but saying that condi mesmers are very good in WvW is just flat out ridicolous. Any organized group has enough condi removal to counter even the most extreme condi pressure – and mesmer condi application against groups is just abysmal.

SIN.3186:

I am not a fan at all at the invisible decrease at all. That was a big hit in my opinion. Please tell me what you guys think.

PU was broken. 50% nerf is probably too much, but in line with other nerfs to mesmers (OMG MESMERS KILL IT KILL IT!). On another note, torch trait is confirmed as “working as intended”, so you have that.

WvW has many different scenarios…

When solo, Traveler is pretty much a requirement.

When in a group that can provide swiftness, rune choice depends on the build: I’m using Pack and Hoelbrak these days, but Strength could work too in some builds I’m testing.

After the expansion… we really don’t know how the meta will shift between the new map and the new elite specs + revenant. On top of that, I assume there will be plenty of new sigils/runesets. The introduction of Chronomancer will remove the requirement for Travelers in solo, that’s the only thing we’re pretty much sure about…

Pistol trait so strong that had to be nerfed before we could use it :°)