Guild Wars 2

Chaba.5410:

Considering all the guilds and players that transferred to the T1 servers and then quit over the life of this game potentially returning to check out the new bl map… I cringe.

We could see that happening on former T1 servers too.

Very true, but that is likely a very small subet of the returning players, since I was thinking in terms of the game in general, not just old WvW players. Putting together what you are saying and what I am, T1 servers will definitely be changing to Overflowing instead of Full lol. It is quite cringeworthy to think about it that way, haha maybe Sanctum of Rall will suddenly find itself with crazy queues!

Chaba.5410:

Michelangelo.1742:

From what I have seen in NA over the past week now is that Fort Aspenwood is at about the WvW activity level that divides Very High and Full. That meens Yak’s Bend and greater are heavily over-stacked.

Yes, I think this too. NA’s numbers show that rank 1-4 servers are heavily overstacked and only some sort of implosion of all four of those servers will ever make them come off Full. And HoT hasn’t even hit yet, when every casual logs into WvW. My guess is that those servers are going to be completely miserable with very high queues at the release of the new borderland map.

As for the divide between Full and Very High in T2, it is still difficult to say. Compare the EU numbers. There isn’t the mass-exodus from a tier in EU I think and the glicko ratings there are closer and more stable. So there’s some full servers losing to very high servers. Also, FA’s population is probably not close enough yet to SoS’s despite what the rating shows since SoS gains a lot of rating through TF’s night-capping including going after easier FA objectives. What I’m saying is that the off-hours population still is worth more in PPT rating than NA.

I am assuming that over 3/4 of the players that are returning will not be on the top 4 servers because, well, there are 20 other servers that they could have chosen. That is not to say that they will have higher queues, because they will of course. I think the real interest of HoT is how the combination of returning players, new players (who won’t be able to select those top 4 to 5 servers), and current PvE/PvP players will have on the populations and ratings of the lower tier servers during the first couple weeks of its release.

You make a good point that rating doesn’t have as significant an impact as we may have thought, especially considering the instance between SoS & FA and EB & DB. They must be correlated somehow, because otherwise their calculation system is further shrouded in mystery. They may keep tweaking it so for someone like me who likes looking at numbers and data, this is quite exciting ^^

Runs With Scissors.2896:

Has anyone seen Tarnished Coast open a slot recently? I have been waiting for almost 4 days just to create a character…

It won’t open a slot until it’s population goes down to the level of Sea of Sorrows and Fort Aspenwood, so I don’t forsee that happening anytime soon.

SkyChef.5432:

Ebay doesn’t have numbers against NSP or HoD. But we have plenty of vets stay w/ the server the longest. Many from inception.

Yeah I know, I am just taking this from a ratings perspective. I thought it was interesting that Ehmry Bay went to Medium eventhough their rating has increased over the past 3 weeks. Might hint at some of the parameters that go into population calculation.

It will be slower than the Glicko rating by a bit, however, it does seem to be working. From what I have seen in NA over the past week now is that Fort Aspenwood is at about the WvW activity level that divides Very High and Full. That meens Yak’s Bend and greater are heavily over-stacked. We have also seen the threshold for Medium to High now that Dragonbrand changed to High and Ehmry Bay changed to Medium (which is interesing considering Ehmry Bay is doing pretty well since they have increased their rating over the past 3 weeks). It’s going to take a lot more time to adjust than a few weeks, so give it another 4 months to see the changes. However, HoT will throw that out of wack so it will be fun to see how all the data changes.

I personally use a Sword/Pistol, Shortbow and Pistol/Pistol for PvE. Full Beserker stat set, Power runes (choose whatever rune you want just make sure its main stat is Power). I use Strength runes at the moment (I used to use Mad King runes cause I thought the #6 was a lot of fun lol). Most important thing trait-wise is taking Invigorating Precision in the Critical Strikes line. The other trait lines I am currently using are Deadly Arts and Trickery. I swap between Signets and Deceptions depending on what I need. I don’t have a problem surviving, and it does good damage, so I think it is worth looking into!

What, are they actually? I have an ascended weapon box in my bank with [insert weapon]’s name on it!

YOUNGaz.5690:

Blinding shouldn’t do damage. Would pop you out of stealth using something like Blinding Powder if you’re already stealthed and it does damage. I do like a lot of your ideas though. Some of them might be a little OP working together though but I like where your heads at. I even proposed the endurance gain rolled into Assassin’s Reward in a thread a few days ago as well. I think that’d be a really cool idea and worthy of a acro thief GM.

I think Anet could work around blind not revealing the Thief when it starts ticking damage (like they did with Traps) and plus it works like a condition, just with an insanely high base stat. I am pretty sure there will be an OP nature somewhere cause I ain’t no dev (lol). Come to think of it, Pressure Striking + Bewildering Ambush would be really scary. And yeah! Assassin’s Reward would be perfect for what you suggested!

Acrobatics Master

Guarded Initiation – Gain resistance and 2 stacks of stability for 3s (10s ICD) while your health is above the threshold. What this trait does right now is just bad. Why would I take this over Hard to Catch? By making this change it gains the value it needs to see some real use. Counters all the pesky traits like Tempest Defense that proc on your daze and gives you time to remove some of the conditions from traps if you decided to run into a bunch!

Swindler’s Equilibrium – Weapon restriction removed, increased cooldown reduction to 2s on evade. I would be happy if the restriction to just sword was removed in all honesty, but a buff to the recharge reduction may also be necessary since it’s in the company of two other strong Master traits.

Acrobatics Grandmaster

Assassin’s Reward – Gain 1 endurance for each point of initiative spent. This is a good place to introduce an endurance trait, because Assassin’s Reward at present is weak. This will give a noticeable bonus to endurance replenishment that will be close to the bonus given by the old Feline Grace. And yes, I did not touch the crappy healing ability, I just doubled its scaling with healing power.

Upper Hand – You have a chance to evade attacks while under the effects of swiftness or super speed when opponents are past the range threshold. Upper Hand at present, like Assassin’s Reward, can’t hold a candle to Don’t Stop. Through, ironically, adding ArenaNet’s original concept for Don’t Stop to Upper Hand, maybe more people will choose it! I like the idea they had because it fits perfectly thematically with Acrobatics and is a strong mechanic.

In summary, now both Assassin’s Reward and Upper Hand have some more clout so they can stand on even footing with Don’t Stop.

Trickery Grandmaster

Bewildering Ambush – Rolled the daze from Sleight of Hand into this trait. I removed Sleight of Hand because I knew from the get-go that removing the 20% reduced recharge on steal was one of the most important changes to make. It made it hard for me to choose the other two Grandmasters, since steal is so prevalent, and that is just not good design. Of course, removing the 20% reduced recharge also means requesting the reduction of the base cooldown of steal to 25s. Now without its main draw, Sleight of Hand looked quite uneventful for a Grandmaster. However, I soon realized that the daze would integrate perfectly with Bewildering Ambush, leaving room for another more interesting trait to take its place.

Quick Pockets – Also reduces recharge on weapon swap to 5s. I made this trait into the Thief version of the Minor Warrior trait Fast Hands, except Grandmaster-style, because I retained the 3 initiative gain. I have always envisioned something like this on Thief, because we have, in a sense, no cooldown on our weapon skills. Therefore, by equipping the same weapons and choosing Quick Pockets as our Trickery Grandmaster, you have quite a large supply of initiative to spend!

Fox’s Promise – The only “actually” new trait I added to my suggestions list. I drew inspiration for this trait from a combination of the Guild Wars Assassin elite skill Fox’s Promise, Malicious Reprisal from Revenant’s Devastation specialization line and Ranger’s Signet of the Hunt. When you are blocked, you gain 2 stacks of Fox’s Promise. Your next 2 attacks are unblockable and deal 50% more damage (10s ICD).

In summary of the changes, I can see Trickery in an entirely different light now that I have many options outside of it for initiative recuperation and with the removal of Sleight of Hand’s overpowering 20% recharge reduction on steal. It feels almost refreshing actually, I kinda like it!

Shadows Embrace – Condition cleanse now encompasses all conditions. Thief is supposed to be weak to conditions, but it is slightly ridiculous to conform us to always have specific skills on our skill bar. What ArenaNet has done here would not be a problem if some of our skill types had some form of condition cleanse ability (venoms, traps). I don’t want to be disincentivized to take full traps or full venoms more than I am already.

Shadow Arts Master

Shadow Protector – Added a mechanic where regeneration you apply is 33% more effective. I think this is probably the top contender for most boring trait award, so let’s spice it up a little! Since regeneration is a defensive boon that fits with Shadow Arts and can be found on Thief elsewhere, I decided to up the ante on the trait instead of changing it completely. Now it’s stronger and has more synergies without blowing the trait out of proportion compared to its competitors in the Master tier.

Hidden Thief – I put the fall damage trait here so I could to add something interesting to Cloaked in Shadow.

Shadow Arts Grandmaster

Cloaked in Shadow – Blind now deals damage. Scales with condition damage and does not remove you from stealth. In addition to the existing mechanic, this gives Cloaked in Shadow some flavour that I think it was missing as a Grandmaster, because ArenaNet literally just moved it up to that prestigious position without doing anything to it. I got my inspiration from Deathly Chill in the Reaper elite specialization. A unique point to this mechanic compared to Deathly Chill is that blind will deal much more damage, because blind is applied and stripped off very quickly.

Acrobatics Minor

Expeditious Dodger – Increased the swiftness given to 3s. I think this needed to be able to upkeep swiftness better due to the changes they made with Feline Grace.

With respect to the other Minors, I think they should be left the same. The old Feline Grace is simply too powerful to be implemented again due to the vigor nerf. I find what ArenaNet has done with Feline Grace and Endless Stamina is creative and manages to be effective. It is more of a mechanic I would rather see in a Grandmaster trait so not every Thief carries it (see Assassin’s Reward).

Acrobatics Adept

Fleet Shadow – Gain 3s of super speed when you exit stealth. I think this trait was bland and did not fit well as an Acrobatics trait (seems more like a Shadow Arts trait doesn’t it?), so adding an element of movement outside of stealth was fitting. Great addition to aid kiting.

Pain Response – Cleanses 3 damaging conditions. I don’t understand why ArenaNet has not changed this trait to include confusion and torment. I did not want to negatively affect Don’t Stop so control conditions are off the table.

Vigorous Recovery – Gain 3 initiative when using a healing skill. Exactly the same change I made to Last Refuge. This is the last initiative restoration option I added to the core specialization lines. With only 5s of vigor given, this trait really felt less than satisfactory. To put this into perspective, you get 4s of vigor through evading an attack by just choosing Acrobatics!

In summary of the changes, just gave the traits slight bumps so they are more interesting.

Hey everyone, check out the photos I attached and what I wrote for changes I would like to see for Thief’s core specializations! Thanks for reading my ideas (some of those ideas are yours actually… our ideas?) and hopefully some even better (is that possible?!) ideas come out of this! All the traits I did not mention are fine and dandy in my opinion, and I feel if those were modified it would just push them out of balance. There are 3 posts choc full of goodness so hopefully you can bear it all!

Deadly Arts Grandmaster

Potent Poison – Increased the poison damage modifier to 20%. Most of the damage added from this trait is from the duration increase, while the additional 10% damage provides little bonus. This change will actually put the “potent” in Potent Poison.

Critical Strikes Adept

Side Strike – Increased the bonus critical hit chance to 10%. With all the shuffling I did, Side Strike started to look slightly underpowered. While I know 3% means very little in terms of actual gameplay, double-digits do look more impactful. Perception is everything!

Practiced Tolerance – Moved down to the Adept tier. Firstly, I wanted to either move this trait or Sundering Strikes down to the Adept tier because those two have essentially the same goal (increase damage) but have different ways of achieving it. We don’t want people deciding which one is better and never looking at the other again. Secondly, this is the one that moved down because we want Signets of Power, which is now a Master trait, and Practiced Tolerance separated. The damage modifier on Practiced Tolerance will likely discourage people of ever taking the signet trait and thus never making signet-focused builds (not good!).

Flawless Strike – Kept the name but changed its mechanic entirely. Now grants a 50% chance to restore 1 initiative on critical (3s ICD). This you may remember was a Minor Critical Strikes trait called Opportunist. I did this because the original would be obsolete next to Practiced Tolerance in the Adept tier. Choosing good ole Opportunist to fill the gap seemed fitting as Critical Strikes is lacking an initiative restoration option and I want to shake this feeling I have of taking Trickery for its initiative bonuses for every build I make. By having more initiative options in more specialization lines, people are not being punished in taking other traits because they can make it up elsewhere.

In summary of the changes I made, there is a nice balance of unique choices to be made. A critical chance increase, a ferocity increase, and an initiative upgrade.

Critical Strikes Master

Sundering Strikes – Increased the duration of the applied vulnerability by 2s. To put this in Sundering Strikes’ perspective, it ramps up damage, it is not like Practiced Tolerance which adds its damage bonus directly to your base stats. Not to mention it is arguably weaker than it. So it’s all around a better choice to stand beside our signet trait.

Signets of Power – Now a Master trait. This is the trait that made the move up because Side Strike and Flawless Strike do not have the impact to fill the position.

Ricochet – Changed the name of Ankle Shots to Ricochet and rolled in the namesake’s mechanics. Pistol shots have a 60% chance on critical to bounce to an additional target, up to a maximum of 3 targets. Increased the damage when foes are crippled to 15%. 150 range bonus is rolled into baseline. I thought it was a shame to leave such a unique and useful trait sidelined.

In summary of the changes I made, there is now (where there was not before) a nice balance of unique choices to be made. A trait that increases flat damage, one that gives bonuses to signets, and one that gives bonuses to pistols.

Shadow Arts Adept

Last Refuge – Also applies 3 initiative when you reach the threshold (25s ICD). This is in line with what I did in Critical Strikes, to reduce reliance on Trickery.

Omega Zoa.3859:

lol “hype” i was looking forward to “berserker” but now..eh..if this specialization revolves around condi dmg i am done with warrior and moving to rev.

Kinda unfair considering some other classes seem like a direct upgrade..looking at you mesmer and necros… and warrior..ehh…but i am guessing too early..POI shall decide the fate of my warrior.

I would hold off on calling them a direct upgrade. Reaper is quite slow, so it is actually a less powerful option compared with the rest of the profession atm (will have to see how the changes move the Reaper around). Dragonhunter and Tempest as well are just new playstyles. I heard the Chronomancer was a little too strong, so I expect them to dial that back. As a lot of people say, they are not supposed to be direct upgrades, ArenaNet knows that (hopefull) because that will upset the balance of the game and limit build diversity.

Potent Poison – Poison duration increase is not correctly displayed on the stats menu and has no effect on Dagger Training’s tooltip when toggled on.

I have been using a build with an 83% increase in poison duration, meaning the tooltip should display 3 1/2 seconds (actually 3.66s) for Dagger Training as well as a 10% increase in damage, but it remains at 3s with no damage change. It’s definitely connected to a Potent Poison bug, as the duration and damage remains unchanged on Dagger Training despite toggling on and off Potent Poison, but functions with other poison duration increase options.

Ok that clears it up a bit, I didn’t know what you meant from your first post at all. I can move Practiced Tolerance to the Adept tier and then move Sundering Strikes back up to the Master tier to clear up that issue, because those two should be separate as they are both flat damage boosters. I was going for increased usage when I made that HK change, but I see now that those niche builds that use HK would be totally eliminated just for a playstyle that would very similar to people who chose No Quarter, not to mention there would be less damage. Thanks for the input ^^

DeceiverX.8361:

This pretty much destroys the entire valkyrie signets concept, and stealth attacks aren’t counted as occurring while revealed, BTW, so HK also becomes nerfed into oblivion.

The intent was good to bring back riccochet, but these changes pretty much kill any possible D/D or signet build attempt.

I wasn’t trying to avoid changing existing builds, my goal was to squeeze Ricochet back in while cleaning up the Master tier so there are more “better” choices, because currently there is not a huge incentive to choose anything other than Practiced Tolerance.

Whether my idea for Hidden Killer is good or not depends on the person. I agree it would be better to be left the same for people using dagger mainhand and valkryie stats. However, is the current HK better than my idea for any other mainhand weapon? I would venture to say it is not. Sword’s meaty attacks are it’s dual wield skills, not Tactical Strike so that crit chance while revealed would be more useful. Sneak Attack (pistol stealth attack) only benefits from the first strike out of stealth, making HK useless for mainhand pistol users. For the sake of that trait being useful for a more varied amount of builds, I changed it. Sacrificing one build for the good of many others is a worthy trade-off.

Also, I do not quite understand what you mean by Signet builds being destroyed. Is that because of HK or moving Signets of Power to the Master tier? I think it is better suited there in a Master slot, unless Practiced Tolerance is 100% necessary for that build you had in mind (which I don’t think it is).

Angelo Wincor, a wearer of fine leather adventurer gear!

These are some changes I thought would suit the Critical Strikes core specialization line and I think some people will like it, especially those who enjoy pistols! I have all the traits shown, but the ones with changes I have (Changes) in brackets in the first column. Let me know what you think! Oh and you will have to go to the wiki to see what the traits were like before (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Critical_Strikes).

I moved Ankle Shots and Practiced Tolerance to the Adept tier and removed Flawless Strike so AS and PT don’t compete with Ricochet or Sundering Strikes respectively in the Master tier. I gave Ankle Shots a little 5% damage boost because I know a lot of us thought that 10% was not sufficient and moved pistol’s range increase bump to Ricochet.

I moved Signets of Power to the Master tier and added the effect that its passive effects are applied to nearby allies for 5 seconds when activated to add some flavour and give it a little boost since it is in a higher tier. Infiltrator’s Signet will have to have some magic done with it, as that won’t transfer well, maybe some cooldown reductions similar to Alacrity.

I added Ricochet back! ’Nuff said. Plus I used the trait photo from Invigorating Precision cause that was supposed to be Ricochet (clearly).

kaikalii.4198:

1. I play a bit of s/p in pvp, and I can confidently say that pistol whip does not need a buff. Yes, landing it is dependant on those skills you mentioned, but it though be, because it interrupts and does huge damage.

2. Totally agree.

3. Agree, all the venom except for BV should be instant cast.

4. I think that TG is fine, if a bit gimmicky. It would be really nice if ambush spawned the thief on the trap rather than wherever the thief who cast it is. It’s current functionality is kinda silly.

5. Ambush is just a generally clunky skill to use seeing at it requires line of sight for the return.

6. Dagger storm is fine I think. It’s not meant to do a ton of damage.

7. Lol underwater.

I’ll work on playing S/P a little more in PvP and see if I can get any better at it.

Shadow Trap definitely needs a rework so that you can teleport back even if you do not have a line of sight, because the skill’s tool tip says nothing of the sort so I think it is just down to ANet to make sure it does what it advertises. I can’t tell you how many times it has failed when I am in-range in PvP. Also if Destroy Shadow Trap was insta cast instead of 1 1/2 seconds that would fix the stun break problem right there, but that doesn’t help the fact that you would be teleporting away to wherever it was placed initally.

Skelk Venom shouldn’t be insta cast, because it is a heal skill after all and I want it to still have to ability for opponents to interrupt it, but I do think it should be reduced to 3/4 seconds.

Raiden.1375:

Tricks

Withdraw still needs its base healing increased by 10% like what was said since its cool down got increased to 18s.

Haste should have its cool down reduced to 50 seconds like engineer’s Elixir U.

Roll for Initiative should have its cool down reduced to 40 or 45 seconds to make it more on par with ranger’s Lightning Reflexes.

Scorpion Wire in general is very buggy/unreliable. Its velocity should be increased or whatever else it needs to make it much more reliable. A damage increase would also be nice, as well as crippling the pulled target. Its cool down could maybe be reduced to 15 seconds depending on how it feels after the above changes.

Caltrops should have its cool down reduced to 15 seconds, its duration reduced to 5 seconds, and its cast time reduced to 0.5 seconds. This would make Caltrops have the same up time overall as it has now, but it would be much more useful/accessible. Currently the long duration is wasted since opponents can just immediately walk out of the aoe circle, and then you can’t use it again for another 24-30 seconds. The Uncatchable trait in the Trickery line could also have an added effect of immobilizing an opponent for 1s when you cripple them to help. (10s ICD)

Signets

Signet of Malice should have its active heal reworked similarly to warrior’s Healing Signet. It wouldn’t have to give resistance, but something interesting that would make you want to activate it more in certain situations would be nice.

Signet of Shadows needs something more for its active ability. In addition to blinding, it could either stealth you, stun break, or just decrease its cool down to 20 seconds.

Assassin’s Signet should have its cool down reduced to 30 seconds.

Weapon Skills

[Short bow] Choking Gas should have the poison duration per pulse increased to 3 seconds. It should also apply 2 stacks of poison per pulse. Currently the 2 seconds of poison that this applies is very short, and the damage from the poison that this skill applies is lackluster, especially after poison stacking was introduced in the June 23 update.

This thread also has some nice suggestions overall for thief weapon skills.

I like your ideas, especially for Signets, because I feel in general their is a large incentive to not activate them, particularly the Signet of Malice and Signet of Shadows. Assassin’s Signet would get a lot more use if it’s cooldown was reduced, and maybe increase the appeal of actually activating Signets, which I think is lacking in current gameplay.

I also do agree Scorpion Wire’s velocity should be increased as it is very easy to avoid from far away (which is when you want to use it mostly).

If they actually did the changes you suggested to Choking Gas one of my builds would apply 8 stacks of Poison and 6 seconds duration for each pulse of the skill. I think that is a little strong, because I could apply 16 stacks of Poison easily. I do agree it’s lackluster damage-wise, but it is still a useful skill, so maybe only the duration increase.

Withdraw already had its base heal increased with the patch (I remember them stating that on the livestream), so I think it is fine as is.

Thought I would talk a little bit about some skills that I think should be looked at. These are all skills that I am disappointed in, in some shape or form. Let me know what you think!

1. Pistol Whip. While I cannot say I have any experience using it in PvP, I think synergizing it with Ankle Shots on the pistol-whip portion or giving it a cripple on the first sword hit would help its success rate a little more. It depends too much on Infiltrator’s Strike, Infiltrator’s Signet and Steal. Either that or make it faster still, maybe 2 seconds for the entire channel. Great skill in PvE though, where enemies don’t move too much ^^

2. Bring Ricochet back for pistols or make it baseline!

3. Skelk Venom. I think the cast time is a shade too long.

4. Ambush/Thieves Guild. Can’t help but feel unrewarded for using these skills.

5. Shadow Trap. I think this is the wrong Trap skill to have stun break because it is so awkward. The stun break is only useful when you have the trap near you, which a lot of times is not the case. Maybe modify Ambush into something entirely different that would fit this role.

6. Dagger Storm. I think the hit rate should increase when foes are farther away.

7. Make Deceptions useable underwater (trivial, I know, but they really need some tech for sphere-targeting so underwater can hit its stride)

NinjaEd.3946:

Acrobatics was always supposed to fit one of 3 key defenses on thief, evasion. Sadly they made this depenedent heavily on Feline Grace which was nerfed to no longer grant a unique endurance regen and bring us back to normal evasion. That is a big problem, because normal evasion is what many other professions have while also having proper healing without having to cower in stealth, higher health pools, strong defensive weapon skills or utilities, or any combination of these.

If thief had some viable methods of in-combat recovery so the loss of evasion was made up or they could help restore our evasion in a skillfull manner acrobatics would resume attention. Lately I see s/d users having SA over acrobatics simply because if offers more. It seems silly but that’s the reality even though SA has tons of flaws itself it serves as a better defense over a trait line dedicated to s/d.

I use Deadly Arts, Crit Strikes and Trickery for my S/D build… SA did not really fit how I use S/D, like at all.

I am a S/D fan, and I really must not play in a high tier (I just play unranked and ranked casually), because I can easily take down any D/P Thief I come across. I think S/D is in a good spot, and is a lot of fun to play. I firmly believe it is down to my own mistakes that I die, except for Mesmers, good ones always seem to just toy with me lol.

Hey everyone, just posting a question on what are the typical skill combinations used by Mesmers, as I fail woefully at fighting them and I need more information on how they work. I have a Mesmer and have played it in PvP recently, so I have a general understanding of the skills and traits. Any advice on how to counter those combos would also be much appreciated!

Thanks!

This long spiel is basically my opinion on what Revenant needs to be to be successful as a profession! Firstly, I support weapon swap, because the Revenant felt very, if in one word, limiting. Engineers and Elementalists have access to several other weapon sets whether it be Kits, Attunements or Conjure Weapons. Even if Engineer does not use any Kits, their utility skills give them a far more diverse range of skills to choose from that SYNERGIZE WITH YOUR BUILD (very important!) because of Toolbelt skills.

I think there are two problems here. First, Revenant has two VERY different Legends to choose from in battle and the particular weapon you have equiped likely does not synergize well with one of them. Second, every weapons’ skills and design are not enough to mold to every single Legend’s playstyle. This is a huge problem, because you are essentially forced to stay in one Legend and it flat-out makes you feel constricted. Weapon swapping somewhat fixes this problem, because you have much more situational ability that was lacking before.

The name of the game is synergy and I think Revenant lacks this somewhat. When I think of synergy I think of two or more things working well together, and in no way constricting but flowing together. I will start with weapons. They are the heart of every build, and while they need their niche, they need to be general enough that they are not exclusively associated with one Legend. I think in the case of weapons that synergy is best found through weapon swapping and weapon-specific and general traits. Heal, Utility and Elites need to be detached somewhat to open up build possibilities (less constricting and more freedom).

When it comes to Legends, they each need to be able to provide the basic necessities of any build (a stunbreak and condition cleanse or condition damage mitigation) so they are useable, otherwise the Legend is clunky no matter what else you do. Maybe the stunbreak on Legend swap should be baseline to allow more freedom in the design of Utility skills (every single Legend would not need a stunbreak). Another important thing is the synergy between Legends. They cannot in any way inhibit the effectiveness of another Legend and they need to be unique and effective in their own right to be able to lace together interesting combinations that each bring something important to a build. For example, Mallyx needs to be able to quickly apply conditions onto the Revenant so that it is not affected by Ventari, because you likely will have little to no conditions on you if you are swapping into Mallyx out of Ventari.

Those are my thoughts, I know they are quite general, but hopefully I made some good points that will help!

When I was soloing the instance for the achievement I saved 7 NPCs after talking to the Magister and could not find anymore…. and I did not get the achievement. I could not have done something wrong because no NPCs died… So what is going on?

Well its seems the solution is to just make certain armors salvageable now. There is no need to bring back the old mechanic for such a minor issue

With the randomizer not really doing a very good job my guild is always paired with at least one guild without megaservers…. I cannot imagine how crazy it is now. This is something they HAVE to change

Pibriamal.8719:

The patch notes clearly said that lower level creatures were rescaled. Newer characters get traits much later, so this is meant to balance it.

Works fine for me, I’d rather one shot trash mobs than waste time fighting them if I’m running through a map for completion. People complained about the zerker meta in PvE, lowering the health sponge helps that out a bit.

I am not sure that is what Anet intended though. Skelk (for example) should probably be the same difficulty to kill no matter what map they are in for level 80s

Yeah they did cap it, I saw it written in one of their feature pack posts. I don’t care much for achievement points, so it is not a huge change for me…. but at least there is a cap to position achievement points as something a little more than “I am the biggest grinder in the game” (there is no prestige in that whatsoever). The caps are still really high though, if people did 5 dailies everyday think they would still not hit the top by the end of the game’s life lol (about 5 1/2 years from 0 daily AP)

I was mapping on my lvl 80 ranger in Kessex/Dredgehaunt and I was finding that mobs were really easy to kill. Maul (GS #2) was getting one hit KOs (or close to it) on all normal mobs on each map. I do not distinctly remember that mobs were that easy to kill before the patch, so I thought I would post here to see if anyone else realized that.

Apparently ferocity scaling had some issues and also I heard all monsters were weakened since the traits system has changed so there may be incorrect scaling. If there isn’t an issue coming from the aforementioned points, maybe it should be made an issue because I do not think maps should be a breeze to go through.

Just an idea I thought up of the other day, sorry if it is in some part or another the same idea as someone else’s

LFG/Squad System (this system is terrible unless the score penalty is also present)

• Similar to the LFG system, when you enter WvW you can choose to create a group or join another

• There will be 4 different types of groups you can create/join; a camp/roaming squad (max 5 players), a tower squad (max 10 players), a keep squad (max 25 players) and a Stonemist castle squad (max 35 players)

• The creator of each group will have a Commander tag with a preset color of the objective type you are planning on assaulting/defending (red tag for camps, blue tag for towers, etc.)

• There could be a limit on the amount of groups of a certain type based on the number of objectives of that type on the map

• There should be some sort of customization of your groups such as options to reserve a certain number of spots for a) certain people, b) any guild members, or c) a specific profession that is needed

• You will be able to see all the different squad leaders on the map just like how Commander tags work

• The squad your in will have the leader with a yellow commander tag and all its members will be yellow dots

• Upon attacking an objective your squad is not assigned to (ex. tower squad attacking a keep), your squad can be switched to that squad type by a majority vote of the members

• You can easily detach members into a smaller squad group to run ahead and capture a camp if you are in a larger squad to avoid a score penalty. They can rejoin afterwards

Score Penalty

• The idea behind this is to control the number of people trying to capture or defend an objective. For example, if more than 10 people assault a tower or if more than 10 people are defending it a penalty of a certain time limit is given

• The penalty will stop all scoring by your server on the map for the allotted time. That way servers who group up into large zergs will never score any points on the map

• If a group too large for the objective captures it, it will not earn any points even after the server’s penalty time ends on the map. Defense time penalties will be longer than assaulting time penalties since defending an objective is easier

• There needs to be some sort of grace period before it is dealt or no penalty while the objective is not under attack so larger squads can run in and grab supply from camps or if your keep squad is running by a tower (there could be an event circle around objectives to ensure your squad does not run through the assault area)

So that was what I was thinking. I know it could be an organization nightmare, but at least it gives a chance for even battles when assaulting or defending objectives (people can still zerg all they want open field). Combined with a point catch-up system I think it would open up for some interesting and hopefully closer match-ups

What kind of issue are you specifically having that could be related to lag?
The game gets really choppy, making it difficult to move/use skills.

What server are you on?
Sea of Sorrows.

Has there ever been a time when you or a friend are experiencing lag, while others in your party are not?
Everyone in the group usually experiences it (unless someone in my group is having connection problems)

Has there ever been a time where one party in a map is experiencing lag, while other parties in that same map are not?
Not from what I can remember.

Do you experience the lag at very specific times?
When a large groups of enemies is nearby or when we are fighting each other. It is only when it is about 40+ players, otherwise it is not bad at all.

I know this is a very very small suggestion, but to hear waterfalls roar like they do in real life would improve the ambiance of the world! Based on the waterfall in Postern Ward in Lion’s Arch, the sound effect does not relate to the sheer volume of water falling (sounds more like a small cascade).

Would be excellent to see this implemented in the game!

1. Fog effects are on when stowed, unlike all other Ghastly weapons where they turn off when stowed

2. Fog effects frequently do not even work at night time (the bow only turns blue)

3. The bow will frequently (after I kill something and am out of combat) start bending and going back into its natural position at a rapid interval (looks similar to a fish flopping on the ground)

4. Bow will remain in its drawn position when stowed (bow is bent and the string is kinked).

Picture shows bug #4

I thought it was just because they were having TS3 troubles based on the forum posts I was reading… no sense in tanking in a server like BG since a large portion of the population plays WvW because they love WvW

Last name sounds Norn-like, but not too sure about the first name – I will give your name a 8/10

My male ranger’s name is Heru Wolfsen (last name is supposed to mean son of wolf)

9/10 for your ele, 8/10 for your thief, and 5/10 for your engi (sorry just don’t like the ring to it as a Sylvari name :S)

My one and only Sylvari’s name (and my second most played character) is Larenthir

treborIRL.4521:

i’m assuming because it was an evacuation…move to the outskirts of LA, instead of traveling far, far away. setting up camp near LA to take it back, sounds legit to me.

I am not just talking about setting up camp or the Living Story, I am talking about permanent additions to the other cities and if it would help put some life into them. If you want a story: they built emergency portals/mystic forge in the other cities and they were good for trade and relations between races so they decided to keep them. That is just as plausible as constructing new services in the Vigil Keep

trunks.5249:

because its war its safer at the vigils keep for now

Why do you think they decided to move the services there and not to the other cities?

Anet had a chance to put a mystic forge and new portals in all the other major cities and direct players to go over there to do what they need to do, but alas I was wrong they just moved everything to Vigil Keep and all the other cities will remain devoid of players!

My question is why did they do that and what is keeping them from moving services special to LA to the others? Is it a population issue, a lore issue or a community strength issue that they would rather have only one city have a mystic forge and portals to the other cities/the mists?

I feel they may have squandered an opportunity to improve one of the issues with the game, because I want to hang out in the other cities but I always end up in LA since all the others are always so deserted…

I want to know what Anet is planning to do in the future to keep the other cities alive and I think this is a good time to bring it up now that the most centrally located/popular city is uninhabitable!

I do not think the incentive to transfer is as high as some people may expect from my standpoint, because why would I pay gems (which cost real money) and leave my guild just for the possibility that I MAY get better rewards on another server. Seems like a worthless mission to me, but hey I am not everyone. It is obviously a major issue, but it is really difficult to implement a solution without changing the way WvW works with regards to how players are placed on teams. Arena Net I am sure will figure something out though

Well EotM is going to be the best spot for WvW eventually since the population is balanced, guilds are the main focus not servers, you can play for the entire match’s length and the best part of all: it has the chance to finally bring competitive matchups. Honestly it just needs guilds to hop in there so there are more organized groups

EotM is the format WvW should be following, scrap the server pride… I can live without that. Anet should be putting the lime light on all the great guilds that come out to fight everyday, because guilds are what make WvW what it is!

I thought I would “jump” into the conversation

Shiren.9532:

In T2 and below (probably even some T1 servers) queues only happen on a single map or two and a queue on all four maps is unheard of. So for those people this update is removing the number one incentive to transfer to a non-T1 server: no queues. Population imbalances are going to be even worse now.

Queues on all maps is possible in T2 and T3 as well, but on weekends only (otherwise its only max 3 maps (very rare) on weekdays). T2 has some good balance going now and perhaps T3 in the future if guilds coordinate themselves to make the servers balanced in their tier

Yeah not sure how it is going to pan out considering ppt is not exactly ranked higher than getting good fights, but I would personally would rather contribute while getting fights. Queues are still not bad at all so not sure if it will affect the server pop anyway other than keeping PuGs out of the main WvW maps

Well, as long as SoS, TC, and FA work together to make sure that we have a balanced population all round, I will be quite happy with what is going on right now. I am seeing a lot of positive comments from everyone here from all 3 servers so I think it could work out.

Well, I would imagine TC, SoS or Mag would not have the queue times that the other gold servers have. If you feel attached to the server, no one is going to stop you from staying there, but honestly those other three servers will be fighting BG, SoR and JQ so you will still get the gold league battles you want

Maybe you should switch servers then, because you should be expecting that on JQ when a new patch for WvW comes out

Haha I suspect sabotage, NSP is only playing you guys for one reason and one reason only … I guess Kaineng is losing points too fast (sorry Kaineng! you are still awesome!!)