Guild Wars 2

Yashuoa.9527:

I am a new player to this game and choosing a profession isnt going really well.
Heart of Thorns (HoT) giving professions new spells has made this extra difficult for me.

I have made a few classes lvl 3 to test their weapons with different spells in heart of the mist. This has given me a better understanding of the game.
I have not checked out the talents yet and the stats on gear are still unclear to me too.

What I understand is that certain weapons fit better with each other due to the stats?

Basically I want to just start with a profession. I have this game for about 2 weeks already now and I still havent started yet lol. My little bro wants to start together and he will play warrior as his first character.

Main interest will be pvp.

I like a class that is skillbased. As in, being difficult but rewarding and stuff like having to time your abilities well. I like stuff like reflects, knockbacks, pulls, stun/daze and such.
Having stuff that is useful to my team is a big +. Like cleasing dangerous stuff from my teammates, having heals for them and protection spells.

I was thinking of going elementalist or maybe engineer as my first profession. Both would fit the above description the best right? Or some other class would fit more?

Which one would fit the description best?
What are the pros and cons?
Which would you recommend? Why?

p.s.

If a profession is hard to play I dont mind at all, as long as it is wanted.
I dont want to play something that no team wants, no matter how good you are because of the profession being in such a crap state.

I’m going to go through with my own pros/cons list. Its important to note, though, that people will often disagree, based on their own personal experiences with a class.

Warrior: very tough, and has some builds nicknamed nike builds that allow them to move very fast. Has some very impressive crowd control effects. Can do some great burst damage. Banners and shouts are used for group support, though I cannot attest to how good they are.

Guardians: many people consider this class the best at group support. Can set things on fire a lot, wears heavy armor like the warrior does and has lots of boons for supporting both themselves and groups, including some very good group heals

Engineer: tied for second place favorite for me, the engineer has some very good crowd control (I think a hammer warrior is better, but not by much); the engineer has a lot of great versatility and can do a lot of things (although of course, not all at once). I think its group support is somewhat weak in comparison to the two above classes, but has lots of area control ability (IE control an area) via turrets, explosives, and the like. Can reveal stealthed characters and some modest stealth abilities.

Ranger: I’ve been told the ranger has some impressive melee ability, but its real signature weapon is the long bow with the equally impressive range of 1500 (very few classes can match that, although notably the engineer when using Mortar can). They can also have some great pets that can add on some cc abilities, giving the ranger very decent cc if it wants. Pets can be awesome, but also contribute about 33% of his DPS and if not managed well can neuter you. Its group support is mostly based on spirits (I’m not sure how good they are with the patch), and can also use traps to help hold points; I watched a trap ranger once take on several people with a capture point heavily trapped. Has an ability that can reveal stealthed characters, and has some very modest stealth abilities.

Thief: Some people consider thieves THE class for solo work. Thieves can stealth a LOT, and unlike other games, there arent many counters to stealth. Also their attacks from stealth. Having been the recipient of one shot death blows from a stealthed thief doing a 16k backstab on me three times in a row one match, I can attest to it; many players find it very frustrating to fight against thieves. Thieves can perform venomshares, but doesnt have a lot of group support options. Playing as a thief in pvp and wvw will help you learn how to counter them. Most mobile class in the game.

(continued)

Yashuoa.9527:

Tzozef.9841:

First, decide through a process of elimination, in other words decide which profession you DON’T WANT first.

This will make it easier deciding.

Everything you described is basically either Elementalist or Guardian.

“I like a class that is skillbased. As in, being difficult but rewarding and stuff like having to time your abilities well. I like stuff like reflects, knockbacks, pulls, stun/daze and such.
Having stuff that is useful to my team is a big +. Like cleasing dangerous stuff from my teammates, having heals for them and protection spells.”

Elementalist seems to have more of what you are describing, Guardians have more protection spells, and many useful buffs for allies but less knockbacks, stuns, and pulls.

I suggest try both and out of the two decide what you like.

Yeah the past few days I have been doing the eliminating part and I have both professions in Heart of the Mist to try out.

Its probably gonna be a toss up between elementalist and guardian as my first character. Where I lean a bit more towards elementalist atm (also because I like their gear looks more).

May I ask you why you didnt mention Engineer?
Isnt that profession similar to Elementalist?

I really didnt think that guardian or elementalist are the highest skilled classes in the game… but admittedly I don’t like either class a lot. My main is mesmer, with secondary being a tie between engineer and necromancer. Revenant may make it up there too.

I guess the thing with engineer is… well, he’s probably the biggest oddball out of the group. In general I don’t think hes the highest skill to play, but I’ll admit he has a lot of diversity and is a lot of fun to play, lots of options.

I’m not sure how good his group support is though. Certainly not as good as ele or guardian. Id say you would take the engineer to have a giant… dare I say it, toolkit of options? But not for high skill or group support.

Guardian and ele are better group support.

Elementalist I decried my last post and just above as not having the highest skill requirements, but there is one caveat to that: the ele’s abilities can change based on his attunements, and eles often develop an attunement cycle they are constantly changing back and forth. Especially, from what I’ve been told, a dagger/dagger ele.

Yashuoa.9527:

Main interest will be pvp.

I like a class that is skillbased. As in, being difficult but rewarding and stuff like having to time your abilities well. I like stuff like reflects, knockbacks, pulls, stun/daze and such.
Having stuff that is useful to my team is a big +. Like cleasing dangerous stuff from my teammates, having heals for them and protection spells.

I was thinking of going elementalist or maybe engineer as my first profession. Both would fit the above description the best right? Or some other class would fit more?

Which one would fit the description best?
What are the pros and cons?
Which would you recommend? Why?

p.s.

If a profession is hard to play I dont mind at all, as long as it is wanted.
I dont want to play something that no team wants, no matter how good you are because of the profession being in such a crap state.

Ok, realize everyone has different takes, but I want to make a few comments here.

First, I wouldn’t say any class is in a crap state. I believe they are all good, and they all offer different strengths and weaknesses. Now with that in mind, since there isn’t a holy trinity in this game, each class can fill roles such as group support, dps, etc, but each does it in different ways: so it really comes down to your play style.

Ideally, if the developers meet the goals they are trying to get to, and if you want a class that relies a lot on skill but is rewarding, then once HoT is released the mesmer using the Chronomancer elite specialization is supposed to be the high skill required class of the game.

Whether the developers actually hit that mark or not is another story.

You mention pulls, stuns, knockbacks, etc, almost every class has access to different kinds of control effects. What matters is what kind.

For example, warriors and engineers have lots of knockbacks and launches. Necromancers have fear. Mesmers have lots of stuns and dazes. Etc etc.

As for reflects, that is mostly the province of mesmers and guardians if I recall correctly.

for healing support and condi cleansing, probably guardian and water elementalists are the best. I am curious about the engineer med kit, but I get the impression its not that great for group support.

Mesmers do not provide much in terms of healing, but instead their group support is along the lines of granting alacrity, quickness, slowing the foes, null field, area effect cloaks, etc. Necromancer has wells that can do such things as convert condis on friends to boons, for example. Warriors have shouts, rogues have venom share, etc.

The problem is pretty much every class has dps, group support, tankiness, crowd control, and other options. The question is how each one is implemented. Some are better than others, but they can all do it.

This also doesn’t take into account the other 4 unannounced elite specializations, and revenant is still so new that its hard to give a real honest evaluation.

So really your better question is, “What is your playstyle?”

If your biggest thing you want is a class that requires a lot of skill to play, then I’d probably say Mesmer, especially with the upcoming chronomancer specialization; maybe thief? If you want something wonky but with lots of varied options, engineer. The best of group support, probably a toss up between water elementalist and guardian. Want to faceroll someone in their face while still giving support? The aforementioned guardian, or perhaps a shout or banner warrior.

The list goes on and on. What might be better is, if you’ve played other mmos, what classes did you find most satisfying in those other games?

Hybarf Tics.2048:

Morfedel.4165:

Hybarf Tics.2048:

If it does have 3 maps or even 4, since I bought it a few weeks back, I’ll play it do the storyline kill the dragon, then uninstall and pretend I never heard the name Guild Wars 1 and 2.

Geez, if you hate it so much just get a refund and forget about it now.

Considering the original game had 30 maps including cities. Verdant Brink based on the wiki version of it is simply the ground level map. For the sake of argument you take that map and add the other 2 layers, even with the 3 layers a HOT map such as this is no more than one and a half GW 2 map. If you take 4 maps like another poster claimed it would give us the equivalent of no more than 6 GW 2 maps, which is barely 20% of the original map. For a normal expansion which means 10 to 15 maps of the original we would need 7 to 10 Hot maps. About what you said I don’t hate the game I love it but I simply dislike being taken for a ride and 4 maps would make me feel like I was taken on one.

For 35 years I’ve been playing consoles and PC games, now it’s only PC and to me an expansion based on everything I’ve seen and played, has always been one third to one half of an original map, any less than one third and it’s not considered an expansion. Some people won’t even consider less than 50% of an original game, depending on price and HOT is a good 85% of the original price, so spare me the fanboy acceptance of everything done by Anet, if it really turns out to be 4 maps than this expansion is worth no more than 20$ US dollars.

I dont give fanboy acceptance of everything anet does. I’ve busted their chops on several things. However, I also won’t sit by and accept ridiculous comments like the one you made either.

Of course, feel free to make baseless accusations like fanboyisms to anyone who disagrees with you. That’s also known as ad hominem attacks. Here’s a link for a definition of it in case you are ignorant of its meaning: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

The point I was making was that if you dislike it so much why bother even playing it?

And btw… it isnt just about maps. Its easy to say 4 maps isnt enough… but its also about how big the maps are, how much content is in it, how much mechanical differences there are, etc etc. Simply saying 4 maps is worth 20% doesnt even begin to address all the other elements that makes up the expansion… including the size and density of each map.

You may be right, there may be a scarcity of content, but simply saying “there’s only four maps” doesn’t begin to address the issue.

But way to go on the ad hominem attack.

Mystic.5934:

If I was in a zombie apocalypse… equipped with a infinite-bullet pistol and a sword… I would hold the sword in my right (dominant) hand and pistol in left. I feel like I could aim well enough with left hand, but when things got really serious I could use my right for the important things.

Untrue. Zombies in the zombie apocalypse only die with head shots, and your offhand just wont have the same accuracy as your main hand.

You’ll just have to master juggling so you can toss weapons back and forth between your main and off hands as needed.

Coarr.3286:

isn’t waiting for the release the challenging group content? :P

Lmao!

You have won many anets!

Sariel V.7024:

Coulter.2315:

The Dragons need to be more visable and communicative with the players (be it through avatars and champions or themselves), but we need that connection to the villian.

Play a sylvari. Watch the dialogue. I’ll say no more.

Don’t just watch, listen. Play the living story once as a non sylvari then as a sylvari.

Its like playing an engineer vs the other classes in that last living story part where scarlet meets her fate.

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Basically, the “choice” is toe the melee line, or be treated like a noob, kicked and/or insulted.

Or form your own party… Stop pretending only people asking for zerk runs can do that. There is a very clear and obvious choice, stop pretending to be a victim when you’re just being lazy.

The evidence hurts.

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Basically, the “choice” is toe the melee line, or be treated like a noob, kicked and/or insulted.

Or form your own party… Stop pretending only people asking for zerk runs can do that. There is a very clear and obvious choice, stop pretending to be a victim when you’re just being lazy.

Don’t think you read my post properly.

Making your own groups is both something you shouldn’t have to do, to avoid these kind of issues and also something that won’t even, fully, solve the issues, even if you do.

It’s just papering over the cracks…

You shouldnt have to form your own party? Wow, how lazy.

Listen, the problem is people. People will never change. And its highly unlikely anyone will ever come up with a perfect solution. I don’t know of one any mmo has really found to fix issues like this.

So really, you don’t have a lot of choice. Find a way to work within the system, or wring your hands and cry woe is me. Frankly forming your own group and advertising for the specific kinds of people you want will help tremendously.

WoW has, for one.

All the choices offered are far more equal now, than they are in this game.

Yes, you still have the trinity there and you don’t have as many weapons choices, but each equivalent class and role is far more equal, as are their talents and so on.

This game, pretty as it is and well meaning as its devs no doubt initially were, seems to have all the issues WoW had 4 years ago, plus some extra ones thrown in for good measure.

Also, it’s obviously not about laziness, it’s about the fact that forming your own parties doesn’t really solve anything and is, also, potentially, off-putting to people.

Especially newer, or more shy, people.

But, I’ve discussed all this several times before, on this forum and it’s really not the main point of this thread, just a side issue.

So, apologies, OP.

What are you talking about? I was talking about people being jerks, not about things like class balance and the Holy trinity etc etc. I have no idea how your response has anything to do with that.

It’s all part of the same issue.

I was responding to what had been said.

If you, genuinely, want to be reminded of the course of the conversation, I suggest you reread it.

I did. During that conversation was mentioned that you toe the melee line or get kicked.

Then a response was form your own group to which you responded you shouldn’t have to form your own group.

THAT is what I was responding to, that it seems very lazy to be unwilling to form your own group. Is a simple easy solution. It allows you to form a group much less likely to boot you for not playing a meta. I was talking about human nature and people being jerks and booting people. Your response had nothing to do with my response.

Mine did. I directly replied to the part about people kicking other people and being jerks, which you brought up.

Helps if YOU pay attention. Go back and read it again.

I’m well aware of what was said.

It’s you who seem a little confused.

Oh I’m quite clear.

And incidentally I wasn’t the only one kittenponded the way I did to your post, in case you didn’t notice. That being the case, perhaps you didn’t sufficiently make yourself clear.

I’m pretty sure I did.

There again, people do love their stock answers, on here, don’t they?

So, no real surprise that I got two of them.

So you’re telling me you DIDN’T complain that people get kicked for not playing melee ?

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Basically, the “choice” is toe the melee line, or be treated like a noob, kicked and/or insulted.

Or form your own party… Stop pretending only people asking for zerk runs can do that. There is a very clear and obvious choice, stop pretending to be a victim when you’re just being lazy.

Don’t think you read my post properly.

Making your own groups is both something you shouldn’t have to do, to avoid these kind of issues and also something that won’t even, fully, solve the issues, even if you do.

It’s just papering over the cracks…

You think making a group so you can play with likeminded people isn’t a good solution? No one can help you..

Here you go tigaseye. As you can see I wasn’t the only one. But go ahead and keep saying that we misunderstood rather than your mispeaking.

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Basically, the “choice” is toe the melee line, or be treated like a noob, kicked and/or insulted.

Or form your own party… Stop pretending only people asking for zerk runs can do that. There is a very clear and obvious choice, stop pretending to be a victim when you’re just being lazy.

Don’t think you read my post properly.

Making your own groups is both something you shouldn’t have to do, to avoid these kind of issues and also something that won’t even, fully, solve the issues, even if you do.

It’s just papering over the cracks…

You shouldnt have to form your own party? Wow, how lazy.

Listen, the problem is people. People will never change. And its highly unlikely anyone will ever come up with a perfect solution. I don’t know of one any mmo has really found to fix issues like this.

So really, you don’t have a lot of choice. Find a way to work within the system, or wring your hands and cry woe is me. Frankly forming your own group and advertising for the specific kinds of people you want will help tremendously.

WoW has, for one.

All the choices offered are far more equal now, than they are in this game.

Yes, you still have the trinity there and you don’t have as many weapons choices, but each equivalent class and role is far more equal, as are their talents and so on.

This game, pretty as it is and well meaning as its devs no doubt initially were, seems to have all the issues WoW had 4 years ago, plus some extra ones thrown in for good measure.

Also, it’s obviously not about laziness, it’s about the fact that forming your own parties doesn’t really solve anything and is, also, potentially, off-putting to people.

Especially newer, or more shy, people.

But, I’ve discussed all this several times before, on this forum and it’s really not the main point of this thread, just a side issue.

So, apologies, OP.

What are you talking about? I was talking about people being jerks, not about things like class balance and the Holy trinity etc etc. I have no idea how your response has anything to do with that.

It’s all part of the same issue.

I was responding to what had been said.

If you, genuinely, want to be reminded of the course of the conversation, I suggest you reread it.

I did. During that conversation was mentioned that you toe the melee line or get kicked.

Then a response was form your own group to which you responded you shouldn’t have to form your own group.

THAT is what I was responding to, that it seems very lazy to be unwilling to form your own group. Is a simple easy solution. It allows you to form a group much less likely to boot you for not playing a meta. I was talking about human nature and people being jerks and booting people. Your response had nothing to do with my response.

Mine did. I directly replied to the part about people kicking other people and being jerks, which you brought up.

Helps if YOU pay attention. Go back and read it again.

I’m well aware of what was said.

It’s you who seem a little confused.

Oh I’m quite clear.

And incidentally I wasn’t the only one kittenponded the way I did to your post, in case you didn’t notice. That being the case, perhaps you didn’t sufficiently make yourself clear.

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Basically, the “choice” is toe the melee line, or be treated like a noob, kicked and/or insulted.

Or form your own party… Stop pretending only people asking for zerk runs can do that. There is a very clear and obvious choice, stop pretending to be a victim when you’re just being lazy.

Don’t think you read my post properly.

Making your own groups is both something you shouldn’t have to do, to avoid these kind of issues and also something that won’t even, fully, solve the issues, even if you do.

It’s just papering over the cracks…

You shouldnt have to form your own party? Wow, how lazy.

Listen, the problem is people. People will never change. And its highly unlikely anyone will ever come up with a perfect solution. I don’t know of one any mmo has really found to fix issues like this.

So really, you don’t have a lot of choice. Find a way to work within the system, or wring your hands and cry woe is me. Frankly forming your own group and advertising for the specific kinds of people you want will help tremendously.

WoW has, for one.

All the choices offered are far more equal now, than they are in this game.

Yes, you still have the trinity there and you don’t have as many weapons choices, but each equivalent class and role is far more equal, as are their talents and so on.

This game, pretty as it is and well meaning as its devs no doubt initially were, seems to have all the issues WoW had 4 years ago, plus some extra ones thrown in for good measure.

Also, it’s obviously not about laziness, it’s about the fact that forming your own parties doesn’t really solve anything and is, also, potentially, off-putting to people.

Especially newer, or more shy, people.

But, I’ve discussed all this several times before, on this forum and it’s really not the main point of this thread, just a side issue.

So, apologies, OP.

What are you talking about? I was talking about people being jerks, not about things like class balance and the Holy trinity etc etc. I have no idea how your response has anything to do with that.

It’s all part of the same issue.

I was responding to what had been said.

If you, genuinely, want to be reminded of the course of the conversation, I suggest you reread it.

I did. During that conversation was mentioned that you toe the melee line or get kicked.

Then a response was form your own group to which you responded you shouldn’t have to form your own group.

THAT is what I was responding to, that it seems very lazy to be unwilling to form your own group. Is a simple easy solution. It allows you to form a group much less likely to boot you for not playing a meta. I was talking about human nature and people being jerks and booting people. Your response had nothing to do with my response.

Mine did. I directly replied to the part about people kicking other people and being jerks, which you brought up.

Helps if YOU pay attention. Go back and read it again.

Tigaseye.2047:

Morfedel.4165:

Tigaseye.2047:

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Basically, the “choice” is toe the melee line, or be treated like a noob, kicked and/or insulted.

Or form your own party… Stop pretending only people asking for zerk runs can do that. There is a very clear and obvious choice, stop pretending to be a victim when you’re just being lazy.

Don’t think you read my post properly.

Making your own groups is both something you shouldn’t have to do, to avoid these kind of issues and also something that won’t even, fully, solve the issues, even if you do.

It’s just papering over the cracks…

You shouldnt have to form your own party? Wow, how lazy.

Listen, the problem is people. People will never change. And its highly unlikely anyone will ever come up with a perfect solution. I don’t know of one any mmo has really found to fix issues like this.

So really, you don’t have a lot of choice. Find a way to work within the system, or wring your hands and cry woe is me. Frankly forming your own group and advertising for the specific kinds of people you want will help tremendously.

WoW has, for one.

All the choices offered are far more equal now, than they are in this game.

Yes, you still have the trinity there and you don’t have as many weapons choices, but each equivalent class and role is far more equal, as are their talents and so on.

This game, pretty as it is and well meaning as its devs no doubt initially were, seems to have all the issues WoW had 4 years ago, plus some extra ones thrown in for good measure.

Also, it’s obviously not about laziness, it’s about the fact that forming your own parties doesn’t really solve anything and is, also, potentially, off-putting to people.

Especially newer, or more shy, people.

But, I’ve discussed all this several times before, on this forum and it’s really not the main point of this thread, just a side issue.

So, apologies, OP.

What are you talking about? I was talking about people being jerks, not about things like class balance and the Holy trinity etc etc. I have no idea how your response has anything to do with that.

Tigaseye.2047:

Coulter.2315:

Tigaseye.2047:

Basically, the “choice” is toe the melee line, or be treated like a noob, kicked and/or insulted.

Or form your own party… Stop pretending only people asking for zerk runs can do that. There is a very clear and obvious choice, stop pretending to be a victim when you’re just being lazy.

Don’t think you read my post properly.

Making your own groups is both something you shouldn’t have to do, to avoid these kind of issues and also something that won’t even, fully, solve the issues, even if you do.

It’s just papering over the cracks…

You shouldnt have to form your own party? Wow, how lazy.

Listen, the problem is people. People will never change. And its highly unlikely anyone will ever come up with a perfect solution. I don’t know of one any mmo has really found to fix issues like this.

So really, you don’t have a lot of choice. Find a way to work within the system, or wring your hands and cry woe is me. Frankly forming your own group and advertising for the specific kinds of people you want will help tremendously.

Seera.5916:

Endless Soul.5178:

Morfedel.4165:

You know, there are always other daily catagories than fractals you can do. No need to hate on fractals, just do other dailies.

Of course!

But I think the point OP is making is that in order to complete the daily, OP would HAVE to do a Fractal because Fractals take up two spots in the daily completion list.

OP does not have to do a Fractal to do the Daily.

They can pop into PvP or WvW to complete the Daily today. They are choosing not to and claiming that they can’t complete the Daily today.

They are confusing the ability to do something with the desire to do something.

However, I do sympathize as not everyone likes WvW or PvP or dungeons/fractals and if you happen to not like any of those three, when double fractal days come up it means one would have to do something they don’t like to do the Daily. And I’m not sure that’s something that ANet intended for the Daily.

Intended or not, fact remains is he has lots of choices. He is by his own decision limiting himself.

Double fractals are going to be a rare event. OP: if you simply cannot bring yourself to do wvw, or pvp, or fractals, and its a double fractals day, well, either dont do dailies that day or swallow your distaste and do one of them.

Maybe they will change it, but even if they do, I highly suspect it will be some time, as they have a lot more important things on their plate right now.

Relshdan.6854:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

According to the latest data-mining, it seems we will have 4 maps included with Heart of Thorns (possibly/probably? at release), at least. Whether there are more at release, or not, is speculation. Whether more maps will be released with further updates, again, is unknown.

Good luck.

if these 4 maps are multilayered and sized similarly to the full verdant brink map, i can’t see it being fair to expect more (in terms of maps), unless you want to wait a couple yrs for HOT.

i’d be fine w/ just 3 of these at release. baring bugged event chains stalling out, there appears to be alot to do/explore.

any less would likely be disappointing (since they already got my money), unless the “challenging group content” makes up the difference.

One of the data mined maps is called Dragon’s Stand. Wanna bet thats Mordremoth, and that is the challenging content?

Well maybe not, or maybe not just that, but still…..

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

According to the latest data-mining, it seems we will have 4 maps included with Heart of Thorns (possibly/probably? at release), at least. Whether there are more at release, or not, is speculation. Whether more maps will be released with further updates, again, is unknown.

Good luck.

The question is, are those different maps, or just areas within the map?

After all, each map is divided into named areas. This could have been a similar idea here. Do we know for sure these are actually MAP names and not just area names within a single map?

Hybarf Tics.2048:

If it does have 3 maps or even 4, since I bought it a few weeks back, I’ll play it do the storyline kill the dragon, then uninstall and pretend I never heard the name Guild Wars 1 and 2.

Geez, if you hate it so much just get a refund and forget about it now.

Gaile Gray.6029:

I was wondering: Are they designed to be rather like a jumping puzzle? Meaning: If you don’t hit the right spot you will fall and you may die. Or do you think this is a systemic issue that should be adjusted through design?

I’m a major jump/miss/die JP-er, so I had to ask.

In this regard I think it should be more like he jumping pads in Tequatl, in that in these cases you are using them for their intended purposes and you should not be killed by it

It would be neat, though, if you could deploy your glider while at the top of your arc and fly somewhere else

hello? Anyone home?

You know, there are always other daily catagories than fractals you can do. No need to hate on fractals, just do other dailies.

Ok so I’ve NEVER had lag in this game before. I mean, like, almost ever. Once in a great while perhaps, but it went away quickly.

And then suddenly a few months ago (??) it started lagging. At first it happened for a couple weeks, then it stopped.

then it started again, and never completely went away.

It is characterized by basically the game not responding. I can run around, but everything else in the game stops, or look like they are running in walls, etc. Eventually the game catches up and rrestores me to where I should be.

Usually its just a few seconds, but once in awhile its been for a couple minutes. When it catches up, its like everything went from pause to superspeed. One time I froze in a wvw camp I was fighting for against an enemy, when suddenly it froze. I figured I’d come back dead… it stayed frozen for like a couple minuetes at least…. when that happens I normally get disconnected, but this time, suddenly it was like watching a movie in super fast forward, a friendly zerg came through, killed everything, revived me, and kept going, all in a matter of a couple seconds.

It was actually kinda funny… except it was making the game hard to play.

Since all this has happened, I’ve run a system wide scan including registry cleaners, malware scanners, virus scanners, I’ve reinstalled the game, run the gw2 diagnostic (which did NOT do what it was supposed to do btw), port checker, rebooted the computer, restarted the modem….

And I want to note this is the only thing it does that with, this game.

Nothing has changed. I installed the system virus/registry scanner suite, that was it. No change in hardware, no other installations, no change in isp, nothing. Never lagged before.

Watching my ping its been hovering between 100-200 much of the time, but as I walked in right before starting this post, I noticed it leaped up for a couple seconds to over 700!!! (and right now its 0ver 300… seriously wth)

When discussing this with some friends they noted they had similar issues, with not having lagged before and now they are.

So my question is, did something change with gw2 that is causing all this? Because for the life of me I havent changed anything, and all my diagnostics and system checkers are coming up empty handed. What would be causing such high pings where I never got them this high before and I haven’t changed anything with my isp?

Alpha Z E R O.8504:

So i just seen this, seems like gw2 player base has been dropping for some time now.
I have to say, i myself stopped playing a while ago. Gw2 was my favorite game and LS2 totaly killed it for me. Anet went in the wrong direction with LS2. It gave me zero reason to play more than 4 hours every 2-4weeks. Unlike LS1, were i would spend every day farming and grinding in LS1.
Its sad for me not to play this game, im a preorder 3 day before launch player, and i so want to play Gw2. I really hope that the new dlc will change the current setup, but if its anything like LS2 then i guess ill wait another year or two.

http://massivelyop.com/2015/07/02/world-of-tanks-swtor-rocketed-up-the-raptr-chart-in-may/

Never heard of raptr. Lots of people haven’t. It isnt really a tell tale sign at all.

And btw, gw2 was never meant to cater to a farming/grinding crowd. It happens anyway, but it wasn’t the intention of the game. So complaining that there isnt any farming/grinding to do in ls2 just made me laugh.

That was my question, what earns the reward. I’ve been told map completion, events, etc

Ronah Lynda.2496:

Chicho Gosho.6507:

Sinope.5630:

Kaiyanwan.8521:

This is not a beta, this is a demo for a) tricking people to pre-purchase the game and b) actually rewarding people who got lured into the trap.

The area to play in is so tiny that there should be no surprises for the QA team, the duration is too short to get any valuable data from the “test”.

Real beta testing is a thing of the past or – in rare cases – some more serious companies than ANet, this is just a teaser for the hype.

Feel free to send feedback, but don’t expect anything to change.

Beta test weekend my kitten…

I have to agree with Kaiyanwan.8521, this is not real beta testing situation. It is just a teaser for the hype.

In real beta testing there should be a document where all testers can read known issues relating to this beta testing. Those issues are what QA team have seen, but Anet haven’t got time to fix yet. When people are testing they can read from that document what issues are already known and that way they can find out what issues are new ones, so they can report only those new ones. That is Beta testing.

So my guess is this, people are sending bug reports what are already known by ArenaNet. People are feeling important by doing reporting and they think that they are really beta testing the game. But infact they are doing same reports what QA have already done before.

So this is not real beta testing situation, it is just try to start hype train again.

I have played almost every MMO from the past 10 years(granted some of them only for a couple of hours) and i’ve played in multiple betas. I have never seen anything even remotely close to what you are talking about. Betas have always been done like this weekends beta.

MMOs have Alpha tests which is for “their close friends”, then they have closed betas for the “hypers” who signed in and been RNGed and later the open betas for the “hyped croud” created with the help of " the hypers". All leading leading to a full release for “the general public”
A-nets betas are a mixture between closed & open betas due to pre-purchase system, similar to “founder’s packs” in F2P MMOs.
The word “beta” is put in there to cover up any bugs while the real reason is to get the feedback from the players of their likes and dislikes. They dont necesarrely care about bug reports – they have testers of their own – they just need to see what people enjoy and what not. This is what they “test” and nothing more. Plus they create a marketing campaign.

This isnt entirely accurate. Bugs that are not found by a limited number of people internally can suddenly crop up with a lot of people playing the same thing. Its a whole economy-of-numbers kind of concept.

However, yes, they are also testing the balance and enjoyability. They have already done some substantial adjustments to the Revenant by using this method.

That doesn’t mean that they arent ALSO marketing. There is nothing evil or sinful about marketing. But the people saying this isnt a beta test are flat out wrong and ignorant.

rapthorne.7345:

RubiBayer.8134:

I wanted to drop in and share a few things. First and foremost, I’m sorry it’s frustrating. It shouldn’t be that.

Hopefully it will help when I tell you I checked in with the team that’s in the office this weekend for this event, and they’re aware of the problem with events stalling out. I’m at home, not in the office, so I don’t have more details, but I at least wanted to let you know.

Please don’t feel like you’re not contributing. We want you to have a great time, but this is also a true beta: Everything you tell us is helpful and making a huge difference. (See the revenant.) So let me assure you that the things you’re doing this weekend are making a direct impact on HoT.

Now as far as the gameplay. If something is blocked to the point where you are completely stalled out, beating your head on that wall, and you can’t do anything else to contribute to beta feedback or enjoy that particular part of the game, head off in a different direction. There are a number of specific things we need your help with this weekend, and if you spend some time with them instead for a while it might give you a more enjoyable experience.

Try out the new revenant, roll a class with an elite spec build you haven’t done yet, try Stronghold. Let us know how all of those things feel with different builds and classes, and what you think we should do to make them better.

If you really want to hang out in Verdant Brink, run around with an eye to daytime vs. nighttime. We want them to feel like two completely different maps, so think about that and let us know is we’re headed in the right direction. What we can do to make that experience better? (Besides make the events not stall out. :P )

I hope that helps as much as it can. Thanks for helping us test HoT!

The biggest frustration point for me isn’t the bugs or insane OP mobs or even having to resort to mob grinding for masteries due to event bugs, but the complete lack of developer interaction.

This is a bloody beta test, the developers should be interacting with us, collecting feedback, responding to concerns and making people actually aware that problems are being noted. It takes all of a few minutes to type up a forum post, so why doesn’t this get done? It’s frustrating to no end that you guys don’t even interact with us properly when we’re testing your product, let alone the general every day lack of interaction.

I’m not usually one to be short tempered with such things, but this is such a glaring flaw in Anet that has been ongoing for far, far too long. It needs to be fixed and fixed soon.

I’ve done a lot of betas. WTH do you mean by interact? Come in and hold your hand?

I’ve NEVER seen a developer interact in any way except to take bug reports and work on them. In fact, I’ve seen more responses over the course of the game here in GW2 than any other mmo i’ve played, period.

So let me get this straight: ANET said this was a beta test. They wanted things tested. Bugs are popping up. They need to be reported and fixed.

And yet this is some kind of marketing scheme rather than a beta test? You do realize how little sense that makes, right? Who in their right mind would have buggy material out for a marketing scheme?

so, they have flaws they need to identify and fix… and yet its not a beta test.

rolls eyes

So how is the map reward system supposed to work? how do you earn them?

I was thinking one initial pull followed by chilled slow and weakness. No float or anything else.

From what I remember reading, and I could be wrong, they were going to have three completely different zones, and each zone is going to have those three biomes, or levels. In essence, that’s effectively 9 maps if I am remembering correctly.

Verdant brink we are getting only 25% of the map, and it’s a convoluted, twisted maze on just that 25%.

I do think therefore, that we will be getting quite a bit of real estate. Could I be wrong? Sure! I can’t prove a thing I’ve typed. I’m just going by recollection of what I think I remember reading.

But I suspect that, while the horizontal land area won’t be huge, we will have a ton of vertical area.

EDIT: on the other hand, it could be that they just meant three maps, not three zones, and each biome is one map. If so, that’s three maps. Still, between the horizontal size of each map and its maze-like design, I think it will be pretty substantially interesting, at least for a time.

Well, they added Vinewrath. Not as challenging as the Marionette was, but still better than nada.

Morfedel.4165:

What skins are those ?

ahem… eremite… what skins are those?

What skins are those ?

So, lots of things we can test out. Furthermore, we will get to keep our advancements from one bwe to the next.

So, lots to test. What will you test first? And where?

I’m thinking Im going to test chronomancer with hang gliding in the map area, to test my fav class’ specialization, enjoy the joys of hang gliding, and test how the new content is evolving.

But testing the specializations in known content might be better for the specialization testing.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Donari.5237:

I’m a bit sad to only have one slot. Now I have to choose whether to test one thing and advance its masteries enough to give feedback on higher tiers, or to smorgasbord the start of multiple things.

I think I’m leaning to testing Chronomancer in as much depth as I can.

You’ll be getting four beta character slots to play with – have fun!

Woot!

Hate to be a spoil sport here but we kinda already saw those in the HoT trailer too.

I wonder if they will serve as some kind of hybrid between spirit weapon, turret, and clones? Perhaps fire some turret like effect thats weaker than a stationary turret, but can be commanded to home in and self destruct when you hit the detonate turret option.

Just guessing, realize.

Morfedel.4165:

Silverkey.2078:

To see if this is on purpose, how does the longbow on ranger behave with “Lead the Wind” or warrior with “Dual Wielding” since the wording is similar?

That’s a good question. Has anyone checked these two, because the wording IS similar. The answer to that question will most likely verify what the devs had in mind for this one.

Or, of course, a dev could stop by and tell us whether its Working as Intended, or Bugged, so we can know whether or not we need to emotionally prepare ourselves for a nerf or not lol

I just had a friend with a warrior try out Dual Wielding. It appears it functions the same way, according to him; if so, then it may actually be that this is performing as intended.

anyone have any counter evidence?

Zarathustra.1458:

You don’t get it, without a recharge trait, mantras are now worse than they were before the patch. I would rather the patch had never happened, or see CS deleted from the game than “fixing the bug”. The mantra gameplay now is clunky, painful, and slow. Prior to the patch we could reduce the cooldown and kinda get around this. Now though, mantra cooldowns are far too long for anything other than the kittened healing mantra. Once more the balance team show they are kittening morons.

I disagree. To make mantras worthwhile you had to use several traits; now that several traits have been combined, for all classes, mantras had their compressed… and got more besides from the inspiration line.

When using mantras, i’ll usually use the healing mantra, concentration, and often resolve and/or distraction. Sometimes i’ll blend mantras with signets, such as mantra of distraction and signet of domination.

And as such I DO find them worthwhile. shrug but as usual, YMMV

Photoloss.4817:

Morfedel.4165:

I think some of you aren’t getting it. It was pretty clear that mantras were not working as intended, that they didn’t intend for them to recharge in the background. Was it nice? Of course! But it wasn’t behaving as intended.

Say that to the pre-specialisation traitline swap on HM. At this point there’s no way of distinguishing between a genuine bug, an intended change that didn’t make it into the published patchnotes, and an intentional nerf malevolently “disguised” as a bugfix.

When in doubt, don’t trust anything and assume Bugnet has even less of a clue than you do, seems about right so far…

Bugnet LOL!

Silverkey.2078:

To see if this is on purpose, how does the longbow on ranger behave with “Lead the Wind” or warrior with “Dual Wielding” since the wording is similar?

That’s a good question. Has anyone checked these two, because the wording IS similar. The answer to that question will most likely verify what the devs had in mind for this one.

Or, of course, a dev could stop by and tell us whether its Working as Intended, or Bugged, so we can know whether or not we need to emotionally prepare ourselves for a nerf or not lol

I’m sure we can expect some. Probably more than one. I must say, I love all jps that dont have a timed component to it (which basically means I hate skipping stones, winter wonderland, and mad king’s clock tower)

So, with that in mind, I’ve been speculating, what with the deep vertical nature we are expecting from these new maps, what kind of jps we might see. I’m rather excited to see them… as long kitten they aren’t timed lol

I couldnt log in… to the forum much less the game. This was some server issue. I’m back into the forum now, though, and just got into the client as well.

Adrenalin.5719:

When thiefs are only allowed to have one viable build, Mesmer need to have only one viable build, too.

Justice.

One viable build? I beg to differ. we have many viable builds. We just had one that was OP.

I think some of you aren’t getting it. It was pretty clear that mantras were not working as intended, that they didn’t intend for them to recharge in the background. Was it nice? Of course! But it wasn’t behaving as intended.

As for being junk, I really disagree. I sometimes use one mantra, Mantra of Concentration, as a combo stunbreaker/stability. I think its the only skill we have that does both (other skills we have does one or the other, but not both), and it does so to a few allies as well.

Mantras have their place. Even with the “nerf” to make it behave as intended. And yes, I will still use the mantras as is when I’m feeling the desire for it. I see no problems.

As for mirror blade. Hm. Well, nerfs arent fun, but I didn’t see a problem with it. On the other hand, I wasnt running the meta build power shatter I’ve been hearing people talking about, reducing someone from 100-0 in an eye blink. Just because powerful or not, it just isn’t my style… and I suspected a nerf was coming and I didn’t want to get too dependent on it. I do think I want to research it though and see for myself how it worked.

Necrotize.2974:

Hard to balance D/D ele without affecting all other ele builds? Guess Mirror Blade never got that message. Heck, the mantra recharge and Harmonious Mantra nerf hurt even mesmers in PvE, arguably more than those in PvP.

Not all builds use or rely on mantras and GS. I dont use mantras much, and I use GS only somewhat. Depends on what I’m doing.

So, no, MB and mantra nerfs did not hurt every build the mesmer had at all. It hurt some specific builds.

But by the same token, I think they could find ways to nerf D/D ele without hurting the rest of their builds. Primarily by going after specifically a trait or two, and the dagger skills if necessary.

Jordo.5913:

They said on a live stream that you need level 80 + 60 hero challenges to fully unlock everything on a profession

You sure about that? And is that referring to masteries as part of it? Because if not, I could have sworn that simply being level 80 was enough to unlock all the traits and skills.

Well, I still want a staff and torch skin, so my mesmer can have every weapon a mesmer can wield all phantasmaly

Haleydawn.3764:

Because Mesmer phantasms don’t wield daggers, which is where they are from.

Not really accurate. They dont have a phantasm wielding a focus for instance.

I’ve seen games with multiple rangers, thieves, and engineers too.

I recall exactly two games, ever, that had a disproportionate number of mesmers. The first was prepatch (8 or 9 of the 10 were mesmers), and once when my team, as a joke, decided to go all mesmers.

And i’ve seen high numbers of other professions too at one time or another.

I like both the OPs idea and the racial specialization idea. Very cool ideas, but my suspicion is that neither idea would come to fruition.

But who knows, one can hope.