Guild Wars 2

In ranked/unranked PvP.

My only regret is ignoring the class for the longest time. I’m still inexperienced because I only play D/D cele in PvP atm. I don’t know how to play staff. And I don’t know how to play the class AT ALL in PVE.

The team support is amazing. I think it’s a well balanced class and hope it remains the way it is. Mesmers are a royal pain but I’m willing to cope.

Nilkemia.8507:

There is no such thing as “good”, just who gangs up on the other more, who watches the points better, who has builds that allow them to win with minimal effort/counter other builds easily, or just who plays dirtier.

That’s a very communistic way of looking at things while dismissing the abilities of those who really are better than us. I may not be one of them but I acknowledge good players when I encounter them.

Good question. This is what I think:

You know you’re a good player when you are sincerely confident enough to believe it without peer validation. Confidence, not kitteniness.

You gain confidence from initially getting beaten up a lot and then learning from your mistakes. You gain confidence when you are aware and keep track of your contributions to the team.

Flumek.9043:

1v1 , you hit me i hit u aka DPS vs EHP = Rampage wins , even before patch (dmg reduction and more armor).

Reality:
Mobilty, stabilty, stomping, CC, COOLDOWN , stance vs. spectral yes/no carrying on…… im just baffled at the devs letting this slide by, while someone had enough thought to nerf lich down to 15s to prevent “too long traited duration”… no words

Knocked down Lich duration from 30s to 20s to 15s with the same long CD. Meanwhile buffing Rampage damage and reducing CD. In addition, warriors have utility skills that further enhance the effectiveness of transformation.

It would be nice if someone in the balance team mains a necro.

blitzkrieg.2451:

Comparing mesmers to rangers is some of the most ridiculous kitten I’ve ever seen, but yea man mesmers are kind of insane atm, you can still kill them of course but wow they’ve really lowered the skill necessity on that class by ALOT. Used to have to be good to get rewarded on that class, now it’s just simple. So crazy how different shatter is prepatch vs postpatch. They really dumbed the class down hardcore.

Absolutely. The barrier to entry playing an effective Mesmer used to be very high. I read a thread some time ago referring to mesmers as the cerebral class. Margin for errors were so slim. Now I see Mesmers fearlessly free cast like tanks with little consideration to terrain, positioning and timing…while still being effective.

I was also listening last night.

There was a thread a few days after patch about engies that’s kinda relevant to the points made. It’s not as “optimistic” yet the attitudes seem the same.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/Sad-End-for-The-Engineers

OP made valid points.

on a positive note for stronghold, I didn’t mind:

• short queue times
• the huge influx of new pvpers evenly distributed. if they’re on your team, they will also be in your enemy’s team

conquest had longer queues and familiar names

ReaperJr.5967:

Don’t focus on building might over landing your skills though. I see many eles do that and get 20+ might but do no damage lol. Other than that, you can check out phantarm’s video for d/d rotations

Hi ReaperJr, yeah, building might isn’t second nature for me as of yet so I tend to lose focus. I know you veteran eles build might as easy as breathing but I’ll get there…maybe.

Noticed eles are popular on classes to nerf list but I think people that post those don’t play ele. IMO eles are nowhere near as annoying as rampage warriors, Mesmer lockdowns and MM necros.

Ok so that’s less bad

If rangers aren’t important enough to be re-included in the game’s practice section, I wonder how it stacks up to other classes when balance updates take place.

It appeared for a brief time with the Halloween content when the water combat section opened up.

It’s just really sad when a main class isn’t represented when all the other classes are present. Maybe people will complain less about rangers being OP if they had the means to practice against it, even if it’s only an NPC.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

Hey all, I’m looking into these!

Heal As One – Does not give regen and swiftness when Resounding Timbre is traited. Please look into this as well. Thanks

Heal As One – Does not give regen and swiftness when Resounding Timbre is traited.

I love the class but it’s absolutely sad how underrepresented it is with the balance team. It’s neglected proper. I’ll confirm this on the bug forum for rangers.

BlackTruth.6813:

Engi atm is extremely hard to build. Like not even slick shoes is viable because burst is back to where it was during launch.

It should have been that way though, I feel like Engi shouldn’t have gotten Cele and slick shoes in the first place just to be viable. But I feel like Hundred Nades shouldn’t have disappeared either.

TL;DR Playing an Engi nowadays is hard, unless someone already has a sleeper build in mind.

Yes, and I don’t know why people include it in overly biased classes to nerf list. What’s interesting is that they give no real reason why they list the engies there in the first place.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/Profession-nerf-list-ranking/first

I hear you OP.

The win/loss of late is as “streaky” as ever especially if queuing solo. Being on a losing streak deflates the heck out of me so I stop at around 5 losses.

Was on my engie today when my solo pug team with 2 thieves, necro and ele faced a full premade with 2 guards, Mesmer, ranger and either warrior or necro – forgot.
Somehow, we won despite being a pug team with a hard-countered comp.

About rangers, it’s the class I’ve had the most success with when stacked in a ranked solo queued team, i.e. 4 rangers, x or 3 rangers, x, x

Yes OP it is indeed quite shocking.

I question the thought process of the individuals involved in these updates.

Or, maybe as Login.5102 suggested, it would be nice to have an experienced necro in the balance department.

nearlight.3064:

If you play D/D or D/F the trick to “offensive rotations” is to build might as efficently as possible, which means maximizing fire field blasts and leaps to get tons of might and fire auras (which can be traited to give more might). So that means fire field, earth, blast by rolling/magnetic leap, 4 skill, water for frozen burst.

Other than that use air autos a lot, don’t sit in water/earth too long, and use drake’s breath/burning speed as much as you can.

+1 Thanks for the tip.

Right now I am playing d/d. Mesmers can be a royal pain so I try to get close enough to apply burn on them after capping.

Implementing something like this will eliminate wasting everyone’s time (queue time plus time in mis-matched game)

Could be a huge improvement to our enjoyment of the game.

-

You know, call me an idealist, but why can’t we just do that already? I mean, nobody likes a 4v5, so why not afk if you realize that the other team lacks a member?

-
Indeed. I’m the same way when someone on the other team rage quits or disconnects. I also suggest they cap a point to get credited if they’re below 30pts.

But I’ve also been on the other side of the table and sadly good sportsmanship and maturity levels differ from person to person. The team w/ 5 would sometimes reinforce their false sense of superiority by taunting, zerging, point farming and spawn camping the disadvantaged team.

+1 TY all. Been playing with d/d and s/f. I’m still a bit uncoordinated tho. Lol.

In ranked pvp, eles are more likely to focus on the objective instead of chasing people around with all the high deeps going on. A few ranked matches felt like a hotjoin circus….except you can’t leave or swap teams.

I know a lot of the suggestions from that list were covered on the forums. The difference is the general fairness the suggestions were for all classes.

Class bias, if any, remained very subtle unlike the stuff people post about like nerfing their counters out of existence. Hope they consider that list.

Oh, and it’s great for necros to have Bhawb. He’s the necromancer lobbyist, always looking after balance concerns for the class.

SlayerSixx.5763:

Stab is stab at the end of the day. He didn’t refer to juggernaut, he referred to stab.

At the end of the day, stab will be on some kind of cool down, ready to go home to see his wife and kids while juggernaut stab will still be up if you don’t swap out of FT

A serious note about another engie issue.

In a game that promotes so much vanity as this, I nod my head in disbelief that the Bomb Kit animations were approved by the higher ups in the company.

My engie now refuses to be seen in public with the Bomb Kit equipped. The wooden bomb that sorta makes him look pregnant coupled with the bad posture is terribly unattractive

Uhhhh…. grats?!?!?! If one dropped for you in HoTM

If not, then I have a similar story; When I was floating in space last week, I threw a horse on a trampoline.

Hey guys,

I am humbled at how well you veteran elementalists tank, heal, cleanse and dps at matches. It’s one of the classes I admire yet find mysterious (due to my lack of experience)

Spent a bit of time playing glass s/f fresh air pre-patch. I believe the d/d rotations were L, F, E then W when I played it a couple years ago when boon duration stacking was a thing.

But I’d love to hear what your favorite rotations are post patch for:
d/d, staff, s/f, s/d, d/f

thanks!

Several engies tried this on me and it is very dodge-able. The tells are obvious and it does have a 1/2 cast time.

I missed a dodge on one attempt and from full hp, it got me down to around 40% hp on my necro. Note that I was standing on my well that granted me protection. Engies got squishier with this patch so maybe grenadier is a trade-off? If it isn’t intentional and bound for a fix, then the engie class as one poster said, is underwhelming and will even be more so.

Condi can work if Juggernaut and IP synergized. If anet grants engies that ability, the engie condi build will only be 1-2 notches below the current elementalist.

I’d hate to see engies running condi and DPS on the same level as DPS rangers before the LB buff last year. Even then, rangers still had a few condi builds (played trapper, poison master, survival trait) that were effective.

I love the songs from the Fallout series. Don’t you?

It’s only $5 cheaper than buying directly. I’d be cautious.

Friendlier and more helpful to other rangers. I’m sure there are exceptions haha. This is just from my observation in hotm and pvp. Even on the forum, there’s less toxicity from rangers. Not sure how they are in pve though, haha.

In matches, it’s common to see thieves, guardians and warriors criticize others with the same profession. Thieves mostly. It’s a hard class to master and the really good ones I admire. And when the rangers got the buff last year, they formed some sort of camaraderie, which I thought was cool…even though I was an outsider coz I played condi at the time.

Exciton.8942:

Jurica.1742:

Vapour.7348:

what counters mesmer – thieves and condi pressure

most thieves are bad and it’s not rare to see mesmers outsmart them.
thanks to ele and warrior cleansing, condi builds are played much less.

mesmers counter:

shout warriors – meta
dps guards – meta
power necros
power rangers
cele rifle engie – meta
turret engie
d/d ele – meta
fresh air ele
staff ele

mesmers arent the best at holding points and their mobility is crap. but the poor mobility is somewhat compensated by their portal.

I used to queue with a good thief and together we’d prevent anyone from reaching our points held by downing them in less than 5 sec.

Out of everything on that list, mesmer really only counters the celestial classes, meaning no DPS guard, no sf ele, no power necro, no power ranger, turret engi ok but that isn’t played much anymore.

Even against cele class, it is only a soft counter since you can remove their boons in team fight. But that is it. It is not advisable to waste your time 1v1ing a cele ele or cele warrior. A good cele ele and warrior have about equal chance to beat mesmer as well. I can probably even beat a lot of similar skill level mesmer on my shoutbow.

That list is kinda hilarious to begin with. DPS guard counters mesmers. How can it be the other way around? SF Ele and power ranger are about equal depends on LOS.

The only 1v1 a shatter mesmer is likely to take is probably against cele engi.

I play gs/staff mesmer and by no means am I “pro” or even good at it but I don’t think the list is that inaccurate. But I’m iffy about is the dps guard. On a 1v1 a mesmer can usually beat a warrior and dps guard but given the game’s conquest mode, they would usually end up capping while you attacked from ranged. Especially for dps guard, I’d only get closer to them once their hp is low enough to execute the final shatter. But the point is lost by then.

I’m still honing my timing and positioning and I’m sure you guys know more about mesmering than I do

Premades – hate or love?

Neither. When I solo or duo queue, I don’t get intimidated going against full premades as much as others. They are not all unbeatable, they are not all using voice comms. Sometimes the synergy between the players in a solo queued team is greater than the premade so they end up winning.

On the other hand, the system have placed me in a 4 man guild premade and lost, sometimes by a huge margin.

So when I solo queue and face a full pre, I just tell the team that theyre not all unbeatable, respond fast to contested points etc etc.

TheFamster.7806:

or just queue ranked/unranked over and over until you can’t take it anymore.

+1

Yes, the owl does crazy damage plus chill. It works well with elementalists. It gets killed pretty fast in team fights but I love it in 1v1s.

Hmm I’ll try double dogs, interesting concept. I’m sure my drake wouldn’t mind a break

SpellofIniquity – glad you have love for drakes. The river drake is by far my favorite

BUT guys why no love for the condi cleansing brown bear? Are bears really that bad?

choovanski.5462:

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t everyone being carried by their builds?

I’m pragmatic so yeah absolutely

Poison is the warrior’s kryptonite. Aoe poisons render the battle standard useless for its intended purpose of reviving. Sure it’s a good strat but still very harsh.

In most cases, you can identify an engineers skill by how well they time and land certain skills

I main a power necro so when rangers got that buff, I despised them to no end. I even rolled a condi ranger build to counter the DPSers.

These days I mostly queue solo ranked and was really impressed at how power rangers excelled at the conquest mode. For organized teams, I think rangers are in a similar boat as power necros.

I’ve only played the power ranger build in 280 or so matches so I’d appreciate tips and combos you guys have with pets.

Right now I use the wolf and sometimes swap that with the bear for cleansing. The marsh drake with its aoe poison is in a permanent spot. I’ve seen it cut a thief’s hp to half.

Courtyard was the replacement for capricorn. Now that you’ve mentioned it, I DO think a water-less capricorn would be a better TDM map. It was larger, had different terrain, had structures like the ship and the building you could use for defense. It was basically a fun, bright, happy map that many of us enjoyed.

This display of immaturity happens often. I suggest that you remain resilient or take their taunts with a light heart.

Tiny victories like killing an outnumbered opponent mean the world to them because they don’t win much and/or are new.

I’m more disturbed when opponents humiliate and insult their teammates on mapchat. Getting teamed up with newer players happens to everyone. Not only is it awkward but I just end up disliking their negative energy and have more sympathy for their teammates.

Ah the 10v10 hotjoin zergs in capricorn where you could do 50+ kills (mostly from cannon). Was a tad bit zergy but fun while it lasted. I miss the map more than the zerg tho

Laraley.7695:

I think you only won because the other team ragequit when they saw all the rangers.

Hahaha. I would. I think they fought to the very end, bless them.

Archon.6480:

:) Especially Esparie! That little Sylvari is a master! (Take a look at the picture again):

Omg it’s Esparie!

I can relate with Extreme.8350 about the 4 ranger team.

Rangers annoyed me to no end when they got that buff last year so I ran a condi build to counter the dps builds.

My opinion on the ranger has changed dramatically because they seem to get the work done. This is a recent solo queued 4 ranger team I was in on my alt ranger. Granted, there are still a lot of inexperienced rangers but overall, they are reliable teammates.

I queued solo here on my aoe condi ranger and went against a full premade. My team may have been a 2 or 3 man pre. Sucks solo queue is gone but don’t be too too discouraged going against premades. Just remember that they’re not all unbeatable.

The objective of tpvp is so simple yet many people can’t seem to fully grasp it. You and your friends need to capture and hold the points on the map for as long as you can..

That’s it, that’s the entire objective. Master map rotations and you guys will be better than 90% of all the PVPers.

If you keep the objective in mind, it’s favorable to play builds that offer good mobility and sustainability.

The reason they merged team and solo is because there weren’t enough full made teams.

I queue solo 95% of the time and although it sucks going against a full pre-made, I’d use positive psychology and tell my solo queued team “not all premades are unbeatable”.

I’ve been in many many matches where my solo pug team were victorious against premades. Even when we lose a very close match, if everyone gives their best, we still end up enjoying the round. This is likely to occur when the MMR of the players and the teams are just about the same instead of the average of extremes. And you have a better chance of that when there’s a bigger pool of players around.

If no one rage quits or AFK, the 100-500 matches are always due to lack of coordination no matter if you’re going against a solo pug or premade team.

There’s a difference between teams ARE zergy and teams that SEEM zergy.

The ones that are zergy usually get out-rotated and shouldn’t be a concern.

The ones that seem zergy appear that way because they beat you in fights (team or 1v1) and your teammates are out spawning making you outnumbered on the field. That’s how you get 1v2, 1v3 on a point. Your teammates aren’t around

When gold sellers PM me, I’d send a party invite and ask if they could join my team and carry me. No response. Rooooood. BLOCKED

Sounds like a fun idea. I’d let my characters volunteer like I did IRL with Jimmy Carter’s Habitat for Humanity

Aww man I miss LA. Especially before they merged servers. Lots of interesting stuff on chat.

I haven’t been keeping track of HoT and all the changes going to be made but some of my stuff appear as lvl 82 on BL. Does that mean the level cap will increase to 82?

Feeding both ends of ranked pvp spectrum is a tough job. The posts I’ve read on here confirmed the suspicions I had in-game

Matches had a streaky pattern where you’d get 7 wins in a row followed by 6 straight losses so on. It wasnt win win lose win lose lose win win lose win lose win like before.

Then I read this :

Cynz.9437:

how matchmaking works:
your win rate <= 50% – you get decent matches
your win rate > 50% – you get worst teammates possible vs best opponents possible; the game will keep stacking odds against you untill you drop down to 50% win rate again

Anti-Competitive

I’m hoping the above quote is incorrect but I fear he may be on to something because during the 2nd test ladder, I couldn’t seem to go beyond a 52% win rate queuing ranked solo. If games are “fixed” to where experienced players suffer un-needed losses to cover for inexperienced people, then what’s the point of having a leaderboard in the first place?

It seems very communistic and anti-progression while robbing us of our enjoyment of the game. We queue with intent to win, not lose

Then we are given the advice of forming a team or else be ready to pay our dues of 5-10 straight losses.

Solution

Since habits are hard to break and a lion’s share of the pvp pool are solo, can’t we just prevent highly uninformed and inexperienced people from queuing ranked? It’s not unreasonable and they are the leading contributor of the imbalance. The system is broken because there is no opportunity cost for anyone to enter the matches.

I know there are exceptional players in unranked that would be warmly welcomed in the ranked pool.

We still have the issue of going against pre-mades but to be optimistic, not all pre-mades are unbeatable. I can cope going against them but it gets demoralizing when we get teammates without a clue at the same time.

Most pvp matches the last few days have been unplayable after 3-4 minutes in the game. I would lag and then get a disconnect. As a courtesy to teamates, I would re-log but end up disconnecting again. Not sure whose end the lag is originating from. I do cringe seeing losses stack up while collecting desertion points.

Here’s the weird thing: I have 2 accounts in NA and one have been more problematic than the other.

Gabby.3205:

Pimsley.3681:

Out of all the races, it seems to me that Sylvari had the most pleasant demeanor minus the baddies.

Asura were and will always be arrogant. Seems they lack conscience. Charr are war mongers. Humans were common and predictable. None of my characters are Norn coz I never really cared about oversized humans that drink a lot.

The Norn are incredibly nice and pleasant to be around, too. Gentle giants, you know

I think you’re right. They seem to cause the least trouble