Guild Wars 2

It’s all right. Plenty of other games I can play while I wait.

I’d suggest serious sub-division of the topic:

Ranger Weapon Skills
Ranger Healing/Utility/Elite Skills
Pet Skills/Behavior
Ranger Traits

A separate thread for each, one-at-a-time, in that order. With clear ground rules to build on what exists – no complete do overs no matter how much you may object to what is in the game now. Getting approval for change always hinges on minimizing the chaos.

I have to admit, prior to this round of threads I was against a player council.

Now I’m considering it if it would give someone — anyone — real access to the people who actually make the decisions instead of a red named secretary passing notes and tossing out “insights” that are so simplistic and divorced from real gameplay as to be offensive. Busted Pet AI is “a broken 2×4.” Yeah, that one is going down in the Hall of Shame.

Someone genuinely dedicated to balance would never win a mob rule vote.

CDI – Deathshroud (Not weapons skills. Not Utilities. Not random Traits. Just Deathshroud.)

CDI – Mercantilism vs. Heroism: Rewards you can’t buy with gold

CDI – Dynamic Events vs. the Zerg: scaling for challenge at all attendance levels

CDI – Dynamic WvW handicapping: Strategy over Coverage

CDI – The Heroic Journey: Legendaries that are earned, not bought.

Pip.2094:

What armor you using in the first picture?

Norn Cultural Tier 1 for chest and gloves.
Aetherblade-style heavy armor for pants (gemstore).
Exotic “Named sets” boots.

There are some heavy pieces that are either entirely cloth or show a lot of skin.

Just go into the sPvP lobby and browse the locker there – you can preview everything in one place.

Star Citizen would be the only thing I’m currently waiting for… and its far enough off that GW2 will have a couple of make-or-break moments before then.

For me GuildWars 2 is its own worst enemy. It does so much so well, and yet the absolutely stagnant classes and one dimensional DPS-and-Dodge gameplay just doesn’t set much of a bar to rise to.

Ohoni.6057:

So basically ANet is just going to literally ignore the idea of making Fractals take less of a time investment? Sad.

Out of curiosity, how short is short enough?

I’ll mention again the possible advantages of a more reliable release cadence. Fractal players will be a lot more comfortable in the enduring value of their effort if they can trust that this branch of gameplay will receive regular, periodic expansion, either through new scenarios or new difficulty bands.

I sort of expect the new launches this summer to go exctly like the Diablo 3 launch affected Star Wars: the Old Republic:

75% of the population disappears one weekend and then comes trickling back over the next 10 days refreshed by their break and reminded why they played SWtOR rather than something else.

TESO and even Wildstar will only keep the people that like them better, and that means the percentage of people happier to be here goes up. Not exactly doom and gloom.

Neither of them appeal to me, so while I have growing concerns/frustrations with GuildWars 2, my interest is in fixing this game, not jumping ship to another.

Evan Lesh.3295:

If someone begins finishing while stealthed, they will start the animation when they reveal regardless of how far into the cast time.

So the game conspires to help them deceive us even when they are out of stealth?

Does this not strike you as just a tiny bit INSANE?

Can I get some sort of title or other visible flag that says “I am a PvP noob”?

Or possibly something that I can switch on that automatically displays to my teammates/allies some objective measure of my experience – PvP hours or ranks or something. That way when I do show up nobody is surprised I’m still figuring the whole process out .

(none of this visible to those nasty, nasty red name plates. Show no weakness!)

Contact support. No one here can help you.

I want to not be bored with the morbidly stagnant class builds and meta-balance.

I would like to feel joy in tinkering with traits/weapons again.

Ok, reality check.

One: March 18th is a maintenance patch. Expect a prologue scene at the Dead End and some bug fixes. And nothing else.

Two: IN WHAT UNIVERSE do you think they’d prep a major feature like this and not promote it in every corner of the web they can reach for at least 6 weeks before it goes live?

Is leveling really that hard?

I have 13 tomes of knowledge sitting in my bank because I tend to save them for the last few levels on the way to 80 because its annoying to gear for level 75 when you could get on with the business of gearing permanently for level 80, but on the whole level just seems pretty simple (I have nine 80s on my account).

I’m not against it, I’m just surprised by the enthusiasm for it.

I suggested a new Ward behavior mode a few pages back that should specifically help pets act sensibly in zerg vs. verg environments through a procedural behavior set .

A bunch of vendors disappear and a bunch of people come on to complain they still have old currency.

McWolfy.5924:

Do we have cancer?

Terminal petastisized tumors. They’ve spread out into all 5 trait lines.

And a total petectomy has been ruled out for treatment.

Just some thoughts to spruce up a boss encounter:

The Legendary Boss has three Elite “henchmen”. When the henchmen spawn they gain a 10 minute retaliation boon. They also try to stick extremely close to the main boss so AoE or even melee cleaves are likely to prompt savage damage feedback. There are three locations scattered around the perimeter of the room that can grant a fixated agro buff (as seen in the Aetherblades Twilight Arbor path).

Strategies include getting one or more of the fixated buffs and kiting the Elites away from the boss (an ideal job for Rangers…) or striping the retaliation boons as the henchman don’t have the means to reapply them.

Upscaling can include periodically reapplying retaliation and having the fixation buff sites move around randomly.

Mulling over a more elaborate offering relating to weapon skills, but let me put this out there in patchnote form:

Long Range Shot – Ranger Longbow Skill #1. Damage has been normalized to the previous 500-1000 value at all ranges. Each hit on foes at range 500+ inflicts cripple (1 second). Each hit on foes a range 1,000+ inflicts vulnerability (1 stack; 7 seconds)

Purpose of Change: Normalizing damage removes the need to remain at maximum range for optimal DPS, disrupting party cohesion. Improves the longbow’s functionality as a standoff weapon by rapidly re-applying short cripples until foes are within 500 range. Offers new skirmisher-style threat by building and maintaining vulnerability stacks against foes that are unwilling or unable to close with the Ranger.

Forzani.2584:

No win scenario for Anet

1. Try to match similar strength servers to battle each other = people complain about lack of variety.

2. More random matchups = people complain about fighting servers that are way stronger/weaker than their own. Too many blowouts.

I’m sure Anet, and all of us, would love to hear the solution. Complaining is easy, obviously. Tougher to solve the issue.

The solution is dynamic handicapping – if a server is low on people the maps get tougher for the others. Update it as part of every 15 minute cycle and you might actually have some interesting matches between even widely spaced servers.

So… my two most active 80 are both support builds wearing Zealots gear (Power + precision/healing). One is a regen-banner Warrior with sword/warhorn and mass cleanse on the warhorn. The other is a Battle Presence Guardian with empowering might. While pretty much awful at solo roaming, I found both of them work very well in zergs where all the other DPS intensive players benefit from the steady trickle of healing/might buffs and in particular both characters rocked the Marionette where pretty much every time they were on a platform with a small group the group casually smashed the warden despite the occasional goof or failed dodge. Brilliant berserker players may not need the help, but there are a lot less of them than there are people wearing all-berserker .

My sense is you don’t need a lot of support players, but a few of them can dramatically multiply the effectiveness of the oceans of glass canons wandering about.

Azreell.1568:

Nike.2631:

Con – Defeats the purpose of Dragonite: to require players to participate in larger [Group] activities to access ascended tier crafting.

So you want to force player’s to do content they may not want to do?

For the highest tier of rewards, clearly they do.

Pretty much the same as I have to do dungeons to get dungeon-skins instead of being able to buy them with mystic coins. That I want something, and have a lot of another thing (earned through play even!), does not mean there should be a line drawn between them.

I thought the entire point of this game was to play how you want to play or at least that’s what people on these forums who consistently defend GW2 say.

When I put up advertising hype and actual observable gameplay mechanics for comparison, the real world wins every time. I’m usually a lot happier when I play the game that IS rather than one that exists in some advertising-copy writer’ fantasies.

I am in favor of this because it allows people who have NO interest in farming the same boring events over and over a different way to get the same thing.

I doubt they needed a forum thread to tell them that people feel that way, and yet they launched the system we see now. The system may change over time, but if it does its going to because of gameplay metrics not because “I want to have X while still doing nothing but Y” threads .

Wait, have we decided that the Devs are incapable of keeping an eye on all classes because players have been asked to comment on one?

Con – Defeats the purpose of Dragonite: to require players to participate in larger [Group] activities to access ascended tier crafting.

I don’t miss those roles, but I do miss there being any roles.

“Does it make a difference if I can or cannot succeed in a scenario?”

This to me is the essential “is it win” question.

Things that save me time are valuable, certainly, but they are not involved in win/lose thresholds.

If VIPs got an extra armor slot, with the potential of adding 200ish stat points, yeah, I’d scream bloody murder. An expanded endurance bar that can hold up to 3 dodges? That’s a winning edge. Faster travel in PvE zones? Sure it nice, but its a convenience not an advantage.

kiwituatara.6053:

Can we get a rough idea of how long its going to take to fix rangers once the changes have been decided?

Its not a given ANYTHING seen in this thread will happen. It’s a discussion of ideas. Timelines are not even vaguely on the table.

HHR LostProphet.4801:

I think the shortbow needs the most help damagewise, the AA damage is painfully low.
I can hit for barely 2k while a thief can hit constant for over 4k.
Some reasons why this is stupid:
1. We’re supposed to be the archer class, the thief isn’t. So in my opinion, we should deal more damage with the AA than the thief is doing.
2. The main damagesource of the ranger shortbow is the AA, while the thief shortbow is meant to hit harder with his skills other than his AA.

Your pet is supposedly making up the difference.

((sigh))

kozmo.8760:

kozmo.8760:

How about this?

A new fractal with npcs from living story (kasmeer, marjory, rox, etc) where you have are being transformed into them (one player gets one npc skin, randomly of course) and you have to collect their armours to gear up. However, that would be a twist. Namely, if you already have thier skins you could skip that part and go straight to the next part which would be probably some kind of an epic boss encounter. Here comes the next surprise, if you have their weapons you would be able to get different encounter variation.

Or that crafting idea. I’m in love with crafting in general and I would like to see it expanded.

I feel like I should be able to set my watch by how long it’ll take our Elite Fractal Masters contingent to pop out and shriek “no no no!”

I did find the fashion match-up interesting, but a little specialized and likely to prompt a “It’s pay to win!” explosion since the skins come from the gem store.

Then post something inspiring instead of poo-pooing other people’s conversations.

Give me an interesting idea and I’ll elaborate on it.

dutchiez.7502:

Yes, ranger should be changed to be better suited for certain types of content (dungeons/fractals), but so should other classes (necro, engineer). This, however, has nothing to do with improving fractals and I don’t see how adding rewards only for a class that isn’t played that much because it’s not that great is improving fractals in any way for people that don’t play ranger, and I don’t see why devs should waste precious resources on adding stuff like pet skins in the game that are only going to be used by a small percentage of the playerbase.

Rangers are the only class in the game that has to go out and find their class mechanic. If Guardians could gather multiple virtues and assign them to slots f1 to f3, if the Elementalist had 20 attunements to choose from to fill the f1-f4 bar, if necromancers gained new deathshroud skills depending on which creatures they’ve killed… if any other class had expansible class mechanics I’d be lobbying for new elements of those sets to be placed in fractals too. If there is a way to make fractals play more appealing for more players, it should be considered. Just because only the Ranger actually has a hook of this nature doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be used to increase fractal popularity. Arguing against it based on what amounts to “we don’t want those filthy rangers around anyway” is just spiteful.

And honestly, the precious time required to repaint a critter skin and copy an existing stat blocks seem pretty low to me .

((pulls at hair))

New pet skins in the fractals wouldn’t make them more desirable. FIXING THE #)%&) CLASS so its not a GIVEN that bringing one is a detriment would make them more desirable – and is something that needs to be done regardless of if anything new is ever done for fractals ever again. Its a much bigger, vastly more important problem that will take care of host of truly minor objections to them actually having some nice cosmetic rewards once in a while.

So lets just pretend that Rangers are worth a crap and allowed to play in fractals by their betters and see if there’s anything neat or fun comes of the brainstorming.

Better creature AI, critters attacking with a cadence more like players (less 10k super telegraphed hits, more 1 second or less pokes), and creatures actually having boon/condition skills would reduce the need for split skills.

The problem is there are 2-3 entirely separate classes of opponents, and many skills/effects do not maintain steady value against each type.

dutchiez.7502:

I honestly don’t think putting class-specific rewards will do anything but annoy the people that like to have an effective party composition.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Putting pet/skins in Fractals is fine, just make sure they are accessible elsewhere (outside dungeons). Rangers are the least desirable in groups already; I imagine having something Ranger-specific in the run will make them even more so. Thanks.

Making rangers desirable is a better fix than making semi-exclusive rewards not exclusive at all.

You could put one new Ranger pet in each non-Boss fractal and pretty neatly cover all of their pet families using nothing but existing stat lines.

• Aetherblade Fractal: Holographic Watchdog (Blue ‘holographic’ style drakehound; Krytan Drakehound stats)
• Battleground Fractal: Armored Devourer (Iron Legion style armor-plated devourer; Lashtail Devourer stats)
• Cliffside Fractal: Circling Hawk (Golden hawk; Hawk stats)
• Molten Furnace Fractal: Molten Spider (Molten Alliance-style armored spider; Cave Spider stats)
• Snowblind Fractal: Partially-corrupted Moa (White moa with corrupt ice for plumage; White Moa stats)
• Swamp Fractal: Spiny Drake (scaled-down/re-colored version of Champion Marsh Drake from that level; Marsh Drake stats)
• Thaumanova Fractal: Hungry Anomaly (energy wisp; Boar stas)
• Uncategorized Fractal: Prototype Stalker-Golem (Asuan tech stone/crystals on cat skeleton; Lynx stats)
• Underground Facility Fractal: Rogue Ice Beast (Ice elemental style textures on bear skeleton; Polar Bear stats)
• Underwater fractal: Ghost Jelly (All white/slightly translucent jellyfish; Blue Jellyfish stats)
• Volcanic Fractal: Tame Destroyer Crab (destroyer crab; Carrion Devourer stats)

The question is do you make the pet always present or conditionally? While you could make it a random chance for the pet to appear, you don’t want the ranger holding up the group by delaying to check for a pet each time until they actually get it. What might be interesting is make the pet come out if you clear some portion of the fractal gracefully – either with a fast run or low damage/no hits or some other skill-based trigger.

DevonCarver.5370:

To pivot from that discussion, however, would WvW be better or worse off if we removed dolyaks entirely and went with the setup we use in EotM or something similar?

I very much like the Dolly’s as they give me worthwhile targets when I’m out playing solo.

…That said they are way, way too easy to kill while live player defenders are present. Dolyaks need something like a 2000 point armor buff per allied player present in a radius of 1,000 or so. If three people are escorting a dolyak, it should be IDIOCY to try and hit the dolyak first. Make dealing with those human guards first a tangible priority.

Xaylin.1860:

I personally would enjoy Troll Urgent curing specific conditions (e.g. Burn, Bleed and Poison) on cast. Not per pulse. And certainly not conditions in general per pulse. TU already is quite nice and the addtional general condition removal per pulse feels over the top.

I have to agree that clearing the three DoT conditions sounds both flavorful and very useful in the specific circumstances that would contribute to the Ranger delivering on the “resilient skirmisher” concept.

…Plus the in-game jokes about Troll Ungent being “Rub some bacon on it” would be hilarious .

Zacchary.6183:

Golem—is—the—optimal—choice—for—a—new—playable—race.

One—hour—flood—control—is—now—in—effect— for—Troll-o-Tron Ver. 6183.

Initiating—standby—mode.

You sir, win the internet for the day. ((applause))

My standard offer. $100, no questions asked, for playable centaurs.

Their racial skills just about write themselves from the unique animations already in game. The hit box can focus on the front end. All upper-body animations are already in place. Hide leg armor. Foot armor can be adapted from existing open-toed/open hooved versions used by the Charr. Bonus points for a new starter zone immediately east of Divinities Reach but not strictly required.

Phalaphone.1642:

First off Nike, I like the creativity and reasoning you put into these ideas many (if not all) were fresh and seemed effective. However I did have some concernes.

Thank you.

On *Marksmanship IV: Perfect Aim~

I understand the want for this but to me there seems to be no counter play. Some builds rely on protection and there is no way for them to alter to play style to counter this. They have two choices either run or try and fight without protection…
…Also how would an opponent quickly and easily know whether you are using this trait or not?

If Rangers are to “whittle down their foes” they need the tools to do so to bunkers. Bunker-busting is counter-play and even then it takes 2 traits to cover the bases since protection & regeneration are keystones to separate bunker strategies… To counter Perfect Aim you either stop maintaining protection if the ranger is alone or prioritize the ranger’s destruction if they are in a group (maintaining protection since it still mitigates all other enemies’ damage).

You are absolutely right that this effect needs to be clearly communicated to the victim. My first thought is ‘every time the ranger hits a target who has protection a prominent FX of a broken shield appears over that target’s head’. The target immediately knows the guy with the dog over there needs to die – exactly the response a skirmisher should provoke .

On Marksmanship IX: Mighty Signets~

This is an exact copy (barring differences in might duration and stacks) of the necromancer trait but it is one tier up. I don’t like the idea of spending 10 more points than a necro to get a better version (longer might or more stacks) of their trait.

Take this as a sign of how terrible of a trait Beastmaster’s Might is . I was trying to stick with the tools already in class where possible.

On Skirmishing X: Nature’s Venoms~

Depending on how much poison you run and the fields your teammates (pets) run this can become a no fun mechanic. Since if there is enough through projectile poison field procs and spider poison and so on… that it is impossible to counter all incoming forms of poison, you opponent gets punished harshly if they are bunker who relies on regen with little counter play.

Again I’m not sure how much counter there needs to be to counter-play . If your Regeneration keeps vanishing you can probably figure out why and reduce the priority of regeneration with the knowledge that you need to kill the ranger quickly because you’re not going to ‘outlast the outlaster’. I considered an internal cooldown, but so much regeneration is delivered as 1-2 second pulses even a 5 second cooldown would render the trait nearly meaningless as your target’s regeneration winks out for only moment.

I think there’s some interesting texture to be had that several classes have hp-over-time mechanics that are NOT regeneration that would remain effective. It also places greater emphasis on receiving direct heals & life drains, adding value to support builds. Those offer strong counter-play that is exterior to the character, promoting teamwork. Ranger damage is still poor enough/lacking in bursts that healing someone through it is a very plausible reply.

On Beastmastery III: Hunter’s Call

This reveal of trait would be useless in pve (to my knowledge at least) and extremely powerful in pvp and WvW. I don’t believe that this is the right way for Anet the address the stealth issue. It would create shout hunters to be hard counters to PU mesmers and thieves in general. This single targeting of one mechanic (that certain builds rely on) shifts balance but it doesn’t make it even. Just as many classes can’t do much against a thief in stealth, the thief couldn’t do much against a shout ranger.

We may have to agree to disagree that being revealed 3 seconds out of 15 (and tying up all three utility slots to do it if you intend to maintain that pace) is going to completely incapacitate even the sneakiest of Thieves. Again, the counter-play is don’t be a one-trick pony .

I’m not sure the game really strives for or benefits from countering counters ad infinitum. In some cases Rangers have been relegated to playing “paper” to some very sharp “scissors” without recourse. If this arms them with a “rock” or two, introducing the possibility that you may not want to mess with the guy with the dog because he might be built to school you is probably good for the meta-game . As long as those effects are well communicated once the battle is joined.

Wethospu.6437:

Highly coordinated in crafting?

Why not?

If there were spread across all the fractals 8 opportunities for advantage based on having a crafting skill of 300 in the party – one for each craft – then maximally optimized teams would plan to bring along characters that cover all 8 bases (and they’d even have 2 slots to spare!). Even if those events didn’t show up in any particular run.

I come to Guildwars 2 from other games that have fairly technical raiding/dungeons They’ve had years more time to develop their body of content. Being able to derive advantage from fairly obscure choices is normal to me. WoW has a raid boss that can only be started by having several expert fishermen lure the boss out of its pool by fishing for it. An example from LotrO:

“The fight is with a great beast and its tamer – but the beast is trained to lie still while the drums are played. If you have a drummer (only one class gets it natively, but other characters can be taught via a rare drop) you can fight the tamer one man down as they drum, and then fight the beast afterwards with your whole party. IF you don’t have a drummer, you must face both bosses at the same time.”

The world of Tyria has more ways of interacting with it than “I hit it.” Using those other mechanics for inspiration can add humor, introduce variety, and create a vibrant, memorable experience – if used well. And some of those ways involve spending time in game doing other things than combat and grinding gold.

maxinion.8396:

While preparation for boss battles in some way could be an interesting mechanic, crafting is, I think, the wrong way to implement this. It’s a tool which has never had anything to do with combat, and involves clicking a button (and grinding up levels outside of the dungeon). This is not really particularly interesting. One of the points in the CDI which has been really well expressed is the anti-AR grind… let’s not replace it with a “must have crafting at 500 to get the best buff” grind.

Its not actually required to do things wrong when designing an encounter . Off the cuff I’d set any actual skill requirement to a fixed value of 200 or maybe 300. When basing a scenario outcome off of crafting the critical question is “do you have the skill at all?” With 5 players with two skills each, a highly coordinated team will always answer “Yes!” PUGs will just get lucky some days.

IF I wanted to have a scaling threshold, I’d probably go with 100 + (fractal level x 5). That way you’re preloaded to go all the way up to level 80 at 500 crafting score (350 for our current cap of level 50). This would give you a TON of advance notice to decide if you wanted to build your crafting ratings for deeper dives.

On the other hand, if the mechanic was something like “interact with the mystic forge to produce a weapon of great power, while your teammates protect you from a wave of spawning enemies” (not dredge please), that could be more interesting. It would be more combat related and involved than “real crafting,” and would not gate characters based on their grind out in the main game.

Sounds like a fun encounter . I totally nominate fractals as the first place we actually SEE Zomorros in Guild Wars 2.

Killsmith.8169:

Nike.2631:

WAY OF THE SKIRMISHER: TIME IS ON MY SIDE

Wilderness Survival X: Martial Mastery – Critical hits with sword, greatsword, and spear attacks apply vulnerability (one stack; 5 seconds duration; 5 second cooldown) and recharge time for these skills is reduced by 20%.

I like these suggestions with one exception. The single stack of vulnerability on martial mastery is kind of weak. Maybe it could make vulnerability applied while wielding one of these weapons last XX% longer. Greatsword and spear would benefit directly. Sword would need either offhand axe, a sigil, or opening strikes to take advantage of it.

I’ve been looking at that one too. With the addition of an internal cooldown (which it needed) the basic effect is underwhelming. My thinking is to increase it to 3 stacks. There are comparable traits that add 5%, so 3% damage in a form that gives some protection to your other conditions and benefits your pet and allies is probably reasonably in-scale. I’ll update the original post .

phys.7689:

crafting might be a hard sell though.

You could sell it as an optional buff to a fight. Doing side activity X for about 45 seconds (on average) allows a Huntsman to produce an environmental weapon that rips 25% of the boss’ lifebar off with the first (and only) shot, then proceed to normal combat. Or you could build something that gives you an extra platform/more space during a major fight. There are a lot of possibilities to tie preparation into a boss encounter that is still resolved though combat.

I’ve also thought there was potential for tailors to do something with their “weaving skill” that’s so amazing a trio of Oh-Crap-Those-Are-BIG spiders bow in appreciation and scuttle away (leaving their chest).

But I totally agree that if their are branching paths to final victory, sometimes a good sharp, hard fight should be the preferred/faster method if your team can handle it.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

I like Urban to. It is probably my favorite because it has great lore executed very well, and a sandbox style approach to path and combat.

I to would love to be able to have siege in this fractal (-:

I still want to see a second fractal that uses the same map as the basis for a lane defense encounter like we saw at the Marionette. Maybe change the lighting to nighttime to improve the contrast.

When you arrive you’re all transformed into Ascalonian Soldiers and order to move forward to support Commander Dulfy where you have the option of running some of her siege weapons. When the gates fall you have to fight in each of three lanes chosen randomly from all the paths on the map again with the option to rebuild/use siege that may be lying about. In the final encounter you have to keep Captain “Rally to me! RUUUAAAAGGHH!” alive for 90 seconds. Then the outnumbered buff kicks in and you fight to the death (without equipment damage) to see how many juicy loot-piñatas you can bust before you go down like a goddang HERO!

Seriously, I want my very own “Boromir moment” where victory is determined not by living to see the dawn, but by how many Charr bodies you heap up before your inevitable demise.

And using the same map saves on development overhead . That my excuse and I’m sticking to it.

Wethospu.6437:

The gameplay is designed around combat.

Except for the parts that aren’t. And there are LOT of them. I’ve never had to kill a vista point for example and some of my best loot has come from map completion.

Every skill and stat (excluding magic find) is combat oriented.

I agree – since getting my crafting stats to 500 is how I’ve made 7 pieces of ascended gear, while killing things for weeks in WvW has only gotten me 2 Ascended chests.

Crafting is definitely a combat stat .

Also combat encounters scale.

Puzzles scale too. Its not exactly hard to lower the time limit to do X, Y, and Z. In the example put forward earlier of out-climbing a rising lake of lava, you can change the rate at which the lava rises. Poof! Scalability.

Which one has more room for innovation and tactics?

The one with more imagination being applied to it.

Dommmmmmmmmm.6984:

Apparently you did not read his post at all. Because if you did you would realize he is talking about cutting down trees in what is supposed to ‘challenging’ content. Also, the last thing we need is more GW2 endgame that consists of us staring at the crafting menu.

It wouldn’t take the crafting menu – the station only does one thing.

Also, my definition of “challenging content” includes preparing a team that has the full range of necessary skills – including crafting skills – to take advantage of any shortcuts that come up during the run. If they are well distributed they become very much a tool of the super-delvers rather than something for PUGs.