Guild Wars 2

I like the changes you proposed, but my main problem with berserker-spec is that it does nothing for support/tanky builds, which was the role that warrior filled more times than DPS in the meta before HoT.

For those kinds of builds to be viable, berserker spec has to compete with either defenses or tactics, cuz I don’t think ppl will drop discipline for it.

Compared to defenses, berserk needs to mainly compete with cleansing ire, dogged march and other self-sustain traits and in tactics, you have all the good support stuff with the shouts. The Berserker-spec offers nothing like that, which is why I would propose the following changes:

- Smash Brawler and Savage instinct get combined into 1 trait
- New supporty/Self-sustain Tier1 trait introduced
- Completely redo Dead or Alive: Make it another support/sustain oriented trait.
- Eternal Champion and Bloody roar get a small buff, like a 2s taunt or maybe some protection for each enemy taunted and Eternal Champion could maybe give some AoE-Reg/Prot when breaking out of stun as well.

For the new support/traits I have some Ideas:
- Pulsing AoE Reg and/or condi-removal every 3 seconds while in berserk-mode.
- AoE Protection when entering berserk-mode.
- AoE-Stunbreak and small stability duration when entering berserk-mode.

Well, buffing Warrior and Thief is kinda a no-brainer, I’m pretty sure we’ll see some buffs on December 1st.

Condi-Cleanse is no Problem though, there are some Tempest builds that have more than enough to fill the role of a Shoutwar.

Also, Thief is still decent against Rev, likely one of the best counters. But you’re right, Rev kinda replaced the thief to a certain extent and does almost everything better, so you won’t run a thief just to have a somewhat decent counter to the rev (counter is probably too strong of a word, it’s more or less one of a few builds that isn’t heavily unfavoured in the MU against Shiro/Mallyx). ^^

I’d love to see a DMG-boost to S/D-Thief and generally a bit better utility for Thief (since there are much more counters to stealth, this is a necessity IMHO). Also, I’d love the traitline for berserker to have some good options for sustain/support/utility, it can’t compete with the usual traitlines when you want to go for a support/bunkery build.

I can kinda see that we might get one incorporated into “Tempestuous Aria”, cuz atm it’s just way too weak. They could also buff the skill in another way, cuz I don’t really think a CDR on shouts is needed for Tempest.

Acotje.5689:

They could just release a pvp version HoT for lets say 20€.
Unlocks all elite specs and rev ONLY in pvp.
Also unlock every rune/sigil/amulet.

Pretty sure you had this option in GW1
But then people may cry p2w even harder, cause thats how the GW2 community works.
Or PvE’ers will cry that they want a PvE version or w/e

I think this Idea could work pretty well, +1!

messiah.1908:

1v1 tempest is strong sustain. you forget that after 30 sec or 1 min help will arrived for 2v1 you. thus rev cant take ele down in 30 sec . the ele will stay in water and cleanse and heal with auras and stand on the point ….

Rev can definitely take down ele in 30 seconds. Also, if they send support, why can’t your team? then you’ll be in a 2v2 with a rev that’s fine and an Ele that is either already dead, or cannot possibly survive another spike.

Really, if the Rev isn’t simply bad, the MU is almost unwinnable for Ele and it takes no time for the Rev to down him.

To be clear, I’m talking about Mallyx/Shiro Viper Rev. If it’s a Shiro/Glint rev, the MU is quite different and Ele should be able to sustain quite well.

I’ve been toying around with S/W as well, here are my comments to your build:

- Currently, I don’t think you’ll get around using auras and heavy support with condi-cleanse, reg/vigor and prot for the team, since Ele is nowhere near as strong in 1v1’s anymore and the main focus of the build is to be strong in teamfights and only be used in 1v1’s if absolutely necessary.
- You are not gonna get around using earth either, especially not on S/W, which is just way too easy to burst down without stoneheart. Also, if you are planning on using the build as a 1v1-build, using diamond skin is also very helpful.

Here’s how I would play the build with a heavy focus on teamfights and strong support and on-point pressure:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJBLhdSfJ05A2fJYhJwhJW2AM396fdwSsCSBjghHQA4CC-TJBGABK8AAA4EAk++DMVGAA

The runes are pretty much a personal preference and depending on your and the opposing team’s composition. You can go durability, leadership, hoelbrak, strength, surging, even monk, water or grove are cool options!

The benefits of the build compared to other Ele’s like D/F or Staff are:

- Absolutely insane protection-uptimes and high uptime of other boons.
- better on-point pressure
- high amount of shared mightstacks

It is worse against spiked dmg than D/F and worse in peeling and relieving pressure than both D/F and Staff though (since no schocking aura, static fields etc.) I don’t quite know how well it does in 1v1’s, but it sure is worse against Nec and viper mallyx with their boonremoval.
It’s not as good on open terrain either, cuz the most DMG from scepter and Warhorn can simply be evaded, that’s one main reason why I think the build is most suited for teamfight around small nodes.

Loop.8106:

Or you can just buy the game like the rest of us. But hey what do I know?

Yepp, GW2 isn’t a F2P game, making the core game F2P is a standard marketing-option for MMO’s and doesn’t indicate that users who don’t pay should be able to enjoy everything the other users do.

ANet has to make their own choice if they think it’s worth making some F2P-players happy but possibly have less ppl buy the expansion, there is no legitimate reason for F2P-users to have beef with ANet about this.

Viper Mallyx Shiro Rev completely tears apart tempest, so just don’t run condi-only amu.

Mallyx is just too strong against Ele’s, it:

- Removes their boons at an insane rate, which is excrutiating for tempests.
- It negates a big chunk of DPS and the biggest weak-spot of the Rev, conditions.
- If you run the double stability, you negate a ton of CC, like schocking aura.
- The DMG is easily high enough to get through the high sustain of the tempest.
- It also has some decent ranged options, like the boonstrip for example, which comes in very handy to stay at range against schocking aura or generally mainhand-dagger wielding tempests.

first of all, you posted to wrong link, secondly, fresh air marauder is complete trash right now and believe me, I’ve tried out several variants of it.

It just is nowhere near the level of other marauder builds like rev, engi and DH, it’s worse in pretty much every aspect possible. Also, Tempest does absolutely nothing for the build and is even counterproductive, since the overloads often put him too close to the action to not instantly fall.

I can see some cele-variants being semi-useful, but marauder just accentuates the eles problem while totally neglecting it’s strengths.

I just love how at the same time some ppl say the meta is too bursty and other say it’s too tanky…. clearly shows the quality of posts in this forum. :P

Knight Amu and Dolyak signet…?

@Topic: I guess balance patches should be a bit more frequent than we are used to, with ANet having a higher focus on PvP and it being a new expansion and all, but no1 knows for sure…

I’d be really surprised if we’d have to w8 for longer than 2 weeks for another balance patch, since many things are glaringly obvious that they need to be changed.

I used to think so too, but ppl just have to realize that Ele has another role now. Ele just isn’t the 1v1 roamer anymore, but a teamfight/tank and only secondarily used in 1v1’s, where the goal is to only win against non-1v1 builds and simply survive against others.

Unless they nerf at least reaper and rev (especially mallyx), ele is too weak in 1v1’s. I don’t think it’s impossible to win against engi without diamond skin and I actually prefer stoneheart for that MU, since he’ll have more than enough physical DMG to keep you below 90% to make the non-crit of stoneheart better when he tries to hammer you down after slick shoes or Hammer5.

I often prefer to go full defense with Ele’s – it’s very strong in teamfights (especially staff-ele) and for 1v1’s, you’ll be able to stay alive better. TBH, in many 1v1’s, the builds are so tanky, it’s useless to go for more offensive runes like strength or even hoelbrak, you won’t kill them anyways, so why not go durability? ^^’

I also feel that Ele offers enough strength in teamfights that the other builds don’t do, to justify the fact that he’s not godmode in 1v1’s anymore. I absolutely love playing Staff in teamfights and most of the time, I can at least hold a point against the stronger 1v1-builds and that is IMHO a fair deal for the Ele.

ReaperJr.5967:

PowerBottom.5796:

I’ve played a D/D Tempest quite often, the way the build works is it’s very similar to the role of a D/D-Ele before HoT, but better in teamfights. It is not as good in 1v1’s though as the old D/D-Ele, mainly because there are much stronger 1v1-builds atm., but it can hold it’s own in many MU’s (some are slightly Ele favoured, some are slightly in favour of the enemy, but most are winnable or you can at least hold the point for some time). Now I didn’t go with Diamond Skin, cuz Stoneheart is too important and condi-removal is quite good with the build (so Stoneskin would literally only really come into play in a 1v1 vs condi-necro’s – it’s up to you if you value winning that MU over being better in teamfights or VS Rev’s for example)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAoYn0XCdOg9XCWYCcYilNAzdv+XPsErgUwIY4BEAugA-TJRHwABeAAAOBAk2f4YZAA

MU’s:

Vs Marauder Rev: Be sure to use schocking aura well (after he has used Sword 3 for example) and switch to earth when he uses Sword 3. Pressure well with Fire breath and use overloads in a way he won’t be able to innterupt them with Staff 5 or chaotic release. Many Rev’s nowadays don’t run many Stunbreakers (1 on each stance only), so if the stability fades out, you can try and go for some burst-combos with CC. During Melee-Pressure, you can kite pretty well while overloading Air or Water for example: You can avoid the melee DMG while also dealing DMg or healing.

VS Necro: Don’t think you will win the 1v1 and hold the point, if you wanna win, you’ll likely loose the point, cuz you can’t be near the necro when he’s in reaper-form. Just run around the edges if possible and overload sth. It’s really hard to pressure the nec since you are melee only, so you have to just bomb him down when he’s out of reaper shroud and safe the overloads to kite when he’s melee.

VS Engi: Watch out for slick shoes and if possible, stay in earth to go for the overload if you feel he’s gonna use it (most Engis use it as an opener, so just open in earth-form). Be sure to dodge hammer 5 and don’t feel the need to stay in the fields to keep the point at all cost. Like with the other MU’s, use the Air or Water overload to do sth. useful while you are staying at range/kiting.

VS other Ele’s: You’ll have more DMG than them, but they’ll have more sustain, it’ll likely end up a draw. Most important thing is to cycle through your overloads correctly and use schocking aura in the right way: If he’s trying to overload Air, use schocking aura, if he has schocking aura, use earth or water overload or heal yourself. So when he’s in air, switch to earth, when he’s in earth, don’t switch into air. This interrupt VS stability “minigame” gets more complicated if he uses Staility on Overloads, but then he’ll lack tons of healing, which means you can win the MU easier with pressure. Against S/F, you might consider not overloading at all unless you are very sure all of his many ways of interrupting cannot be used. it’s really hard, but it can be possible with keeping CD’s in mind and properly LoS’ing.

VS Druid: Well, you aren’t gonna win this one, but you can try not to loose it (which is hard cuz druid has many ways of forcing you off the point). Best advice I can give is to position yourself in a way that the pet isn’t between you and the druid when he uses staff 1 and to pull the pet away from the druid when he has the circling orb around it. Also, I often just purely pressure the pet, since I won’t be able to kill the druid anyways, so at least I can mitigate the amount of DMG I receive, force him to switch pets and maybe kill the pets so when support arrives, it’ll be easier to kill the druid.

Vs Mallix Viper Rev: Yeah, ain’t gonna happen, you’ll loose. :P

Question, why do you run 1 3 1 in water instead of 1 2 1? How do you cope with cc spam? What about DH and Chrono?

I go 1/2/1 when I use a weapon set with non-defensive water spells, like Focus, but on Dagger offhand, I have 1 heal with condi-remove and 1 aura, which will also remove a condi and give me prot, reg and vigor. reducing the CD of those by 33% is alone worth more than just one small AoE condi-remove roughly every 10 seconds (in relity, you’ll maybe make use of it every 15 seconds or so.) Also, the ice aura is insta-cast, which means it’ll actually help against CC (prot etc. against spiked dmg), while I don’t know how exactly how cleansing wave will help against anything other than fear (which isn’t such a big thing anymore, since shoutwars aren’t played, and smart necro’s will much rather keep the perma-stability than use it for the fear).

DH: Really annoying to fight against, since the CC will likely be hard to deal with. Best tip is to engage them without them having already pre-trapped the spot. Another tip is to trigger the traps and insta port out of them, cuz you won’t get out any other way except with earth overload, which is a decent option as well. Evade the AoE of Bow5 so you’re not getting stuck in the little areas, cuz he’ll just go at a distance and spam arrows on you. You’ll have to do a lot of LoS’ing though, which makes it harder to fight them on certain nodes. If you can LoS, again use the time to overload air or water, you can even overload fire for the mightstacks and go back to the middle of the point when the overloads end, so he’ll have to deal with the fire-tornado (not always possible, but a good option when he for example is out of bow and has already use his traps.
Play really defensive in general, since your sustain and dmg will win in the end, but the DH has a lot of potential to kill you quickly.

Chrono Marauder: Pressure pressure pressure. Don’t let him LoS you, avoid Sword2 burst-spikes (either look at the icon that appears of the little shoe or listen for the very easily distinguishable sound-effect. If you are too late to evade, at least be rdy to switch into earth for the stoneheart. Use the time where he is using the shield block to overload. Avoid GS-2 and 5 especially and safe your teleport to get on top of him when he tries to LoS you. If he uses Elite-Well, always have teleport or earth-overload rdy to escape it if possible.

Chrono Wellmancer: Don’t stand in the wells or Staff 5, safe your teleport for the Elite-Well and again use the time he’s using the block on his shield to do sth. useful. Try and pressure him off the point, so he’ll has to use his wells off-point (which will mean he’ll either be off-point longer, or he won’t use his wells in the best way possible). You can do this for example with a good Air5 knockback and burst (he’ll have to often use the stunbreak/distortion well), good pressuring or on overload placed on point (again, you can LoS to overload and go on the point just for the lingering aftereffect of the overload)

*edit: Sth to add to the well’s: There is a well you can and actually should often stand inside, which is the heal well: If you can pressure the Mesmer out of this well before it ends, you will have a huge advantage. So safe your Air5 or at least pressure him heavily with a fire burst-combo when he uses the Heal-Well.

I’ve played a D/D Tempest quite often, the way the build works is it’s very similar to the role of a D/D-Ele before HoT, but better in teamfights. It is not as good in 1v1’s though as the old D/D-Ele, mainly because there are much stronger 1v1-builds atm., but it can hold it’s own in many MU’s (some are slightly Ele favoured, some are slightly in favour of the enemy, but most are winnable or you can at least hold the point for some time). Now I didn’t go with Diamond Skin, cuz Stoneheart is too important and condi-removal is quite good with the build (so Stoneskin would literally only really come into play in a 1v1 vs condi-necro’s – it’s up to you if you value winning that MU over being better in teamfights or VS Rev’s for example)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAoYn0XCdOg9XCWYCcYilNAzdv+XPsErgUwIY4BEAugA-TJRHwABeAAAOBAk2f4YZAA

MU’s:

Vs Marauder Rev: Be sure to use schocking aura well (after he has used Sword 3 for example) and switch to earth when he uses Sword 3. Pressure well with Fire breath and use overloads in a way he won’t be able to innterupt them with Staff 5 or chaotic release. Many Rev’s nowadays don’t run many Stunbreakers (1 on each stance only), so if the stability fades out, you can try and go for some burst-combos with CC. During Melee-Pressure, you can kite pretty well while overloading Air or Water for example: You can avoid the melee DMG while also dealing DMg or healing.

VS Necro: Don’t think you will win the 1v1 and hold the point, if you wanna win, you’ll likely loose the point, cuz you can’t be near the necro when he’s in reaper-form. Just run around the edges if possible and overload sth. It’s really hard to pressure the nec since you are melee only, so you have to just bomb him down when he’s out of reaper shroud and safe the overloads to kite when he’s melee.

VS Engi: Watch out for slick shoes and if possible, stay in earth to go for the overload if you feel he’s gonna use it (most Engis use it as an opener, so just open in earth-form). Be sure to dodge hammer 5 and don’t feel the need to stay in the fields to keep the point at all cost. Like with the other MU’s, use the Air or Water overload to do sth. useful while you are staying at range/kiting.

VS other Ele’s: You’ll have more DMG than them, but they’ll have more sustain, it’ll likely end up a draw. Most important thing is to cycle through your overloads correctly and use schocking aura in the right way: If he’s trying to overload Air, use schocking aura, if he has schocking aura, use earth or water overload or heal yourself. So when he’s in air, switch to earth, when he’s in earth, don’t switch into air. This interrupt VS stability “minigame” gets more complicated if he uses Staility on Overloads, but then he’ll lack tons of healing, which means you can win the MU easier with pressure. Against S/F, you might consider not overloading at all unless you are very sure all of his many ways of interrupting cannot be used. it’s really hard, but it can be possible with keeping CD’s in mind and properly LoS’ing.

VS Druid: Well, you aren’t gonna win this one, but you can try not to loose it (which is hard cuz druid has many ways of forcing you off the point). Best advice I can give is to position yourself in a way that the pet isn’t between you and the druid when he uses staff 1 and to pull the pet away from the druid when he has the circling orb around it. Also, I often just purely pressure the pet, since I won’t be able to kill the druid anyways, so at least I can mitigate the amount of DMG I receive, force him to switch pets and maybe kill the pets so when support arrives, it’ll be easier to kill the druid.

Vs Mallix Viper Rev: Yeah, ain’t gonna happen, you’ll loose. :P

just a very bad idea, sorry….

PvE Elements are an important part of many great PvP-games and theres a reason why: They make the game more interesting, give the players more options and fighting NPC’s is still a very good option for creating secondary objectives. Or do you want a treb, shrines or another node to capture on every Map?

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

PowerBottom.5796:

Rising Dusk.2408:

Diamond Skin: Gain Resistance for 4 seconds when attuning to Earth.

The counterplay here is to either strip the Resistance or to condition burst the Elementalist after the boon has run out while Earth Attunement is on cooldown. This also rewards effective play on the Elementalist’s part better, as they can counter an incoming condition burst by saving Earth and swapping to it when it hits.

I see some Problems regarding PvP:

Diamond skin is a necessity currently against reapers to stand a chance of winning the 1v1, but it’s also the class that gives the least farts about boons such as resistance. Yes it’ll make the MU harder for the Necro if you run it compared to like stoneheart, but the class against you need diamon skin the most will have the easiest time to deal with it, while other classes like engi will likely have just as hard of a time, if not harder, against resistance as with the resistance.

What I like about it is that it requires more skill and isn’t completely useless in teamfights.

4 seconds of resistance alone might be too weak though, they should add some other effect to it, like for example 4 seconds of resistance for you and 2 seconds for allies in a small radius (like 240). It would make the skill even more interesting to use, it wouldn’t change 1v1’s a bit. It would also require very good timing, so unorganized teams (that have a harder time with getting rid of resistance because of communication and a well worked-out team setup) wouldn’t be faced with a way too strong skill, but Top-teams could make great use out of it, but also have the skill and organization to deal with it better.

I like the idea of giving a bit of Resistance to nearby allies when it procs. It does improve teamplay and creates a fun play/counterplay mechanic. The one thing I’d keep an eye on is multiple eles cycling through to keep perma-Resistance on the team, but the proposed radius is small enough that it doesn’t allow for that to happen without opening themselves up to a variety of other attacks.

well, you also have to know that stoneheart is pretty important for ele’s to survive burst in teamfights. That’s why most eles that actually run diamond skin, also run a focus, since it offers an additional CD against burst. If multiple ele’s run the resistance, it’ll simply mean that multiple ele’s are either way easier to burst down, or loose a lot of teamsupport, since they have to run Focus.

Could it be abused as a hard-counter to condi-only teamfight-builds? Of course, but that is a risk you will have to take when running rather gimmicky comps like that.

Rising Dusk.2408:

Diamond Skin: Gain Resistance for 4 seconds when attuning to Earth.

The counterplay here is to either strip the Resistance or to condition burst the Elementalist after the boon has run out while Earth Attunement is on cooldown. This also rewards effective play on the Elementalist’s part better, as they can counter an incoming condition burst by saving Earth and swapping to it when it hits.

I see some Problems regarding PvP:

Diamond skin is a necessity currently against reapers to stand a chance of winning the 1v1, but it’s also the class that gives the least farts about boons such as resistance. Yes it’ll make the MU harder for the Necro if you run it compared to like stoneheart, but the class against you need diamon skin the most will have the easiest time to deal with it, while other classes like engi will likely have just as hard of a time, if not harder, against resistance as with the resistance.

What I like about it is that it requires more skill and isn’t completely useless in teamfights.

4 seconds of resistance alone might be too weak though, they should add some other effect to it, like for example 4 seconds of resistance for you and 2 seconds for allies in a small radius (like 240). It would make the skill even more interesting to use, it wouldn’t change 1v1’s a bit. It would also require very good timing, so unorganized teams (that have a harder time with getting rid of resistance because of communication and a well worked-out team setup) wouldn’t be faced with a way too strong skill, but Top-teams could make great use out of it, but also have the skill and organization to deal with it better.

I think a main reason why certain non-elite specs aren’t being played is because of only a few elite-specs and what they mean for the metagame in general:

1) D/D-Ele would still be decent, if it weren’t for both revenant and reaper, both regarded as being too strong even for elite-specs. Revenant kinda replaces D/D in the 1v1 roamer department and Reaper would render D/D Ele useless cuz he won’t win against him on the node.

2) Bunker-Guard is heavily suffering from the meta-game shift away from classes he performed very well against, like Thief and a generally more burst-oriented metagame, towards a more sustainy metagame, where the highest DPS-classes don’t care a flying fart about the guards small amount of blocks, like Rev.

3) Shoutwar: I think this one could still kinda work, we might see this one being played more often soon.

4) Thief: We still sometimes see regular D/P-Thiefs, but the current meta is pretty strong against it, with more reveals and better classes fitting the role (again, rev.). Also, ppl rely less on stealth-openers, since many teams choose more sustainy and less bursty comps that don’t need to burst sth. down out of stealth to kill sth.

So the Problem might not be that all Elite specs are simply better, but that the shift in the metagame forced the non-elite specs out of the meta. It might suffice to nerf certain things and maybe buff a few other things and let the meta form a bit more, to see whether or not Elite specs will continue to rule the meta.

sephiroth.4217:

My thoughts???

My thoughts is that Diamond Skin is utterly useless. THE ONLY REASON it’s effective, is because Tempest Aura builds that spit out protection and heals. The protection is the bloody problem.

Protection on Tempest build is 40%.

40% reduced damage. Take Earth for another 10%. Frost Auras for ANOTHER 10%. Scrapper Runes for another 7%.

-67% physical damage, heal abuse and immunity conditions.

Diamond skin IS NOT the problem. It’s just part of it. The real issue is nearly 3/4 damage is negated passively as a permanent bonus.

Taking diamond skin is still a huge disadvantage in teamfights and against non-condi-builds, even if you have tons of protection and it’s often only taken on D/F-Eles cuz they have good counters to spiked dmg on Earth with the focus.

Even in certain 1v1’s, taking diamond skin can cost you the MU, best example is VS rev’s.

Diamond Skin isn’t OP, it just requires counterplay: Just send a rev to where the Ele is instead of the reaper and you are fine.

Just to be clear, I don’t like the trait, but it clearly isn’t OP because it’s a tradeoff you make by taking it and good rotations can easily counter it. That being said, in random teams it surely is hard to deal with, with ppl not rotating properly etc.

assassin.7895:

i just watched helseth stream and saw ostrich eggs latest performance, it was really embarrassing. he also has 0 swag and helseth couldn’t procede watching the interview because of him. NA is really really bad, once more proven.

The performances on NA weren’t that good, but I think a big reason could’ve been the lapse in judgement to allow so many players to switch classes when they clearly weren’t as good on them as on their main. That’s the job of the team and the players themselves to accurately reflect their own skill on the class.

Also, it was the first day of pro-league and ppl might’ve been very nervous.

I thin the most telling fact is that in EU ESL, which was notorious for no1 ever running necro, it’s suddenly one of the most played classes. ^^’

Also, thief and war clearly are a bit too weak atm.

Before nerfing everything, I’d start by buffing those 2, because buffing stuff might offer counters to things that are very strong, which would make nerfing them obsolete.

Loop.8106:

In all seriousness though, this trait needs to be looked at. In basicly every “high” mmr game theres 2 cele eles duo queing (and yes they are really duo queing) running Diamond Skin.

And why is that? Because it’s the only build with a chance of winning against a condi-reaper. Literally no build stands a chance in a 1v1 against a reaper. And ppl forget that taking diamond skin is a heavy commitment: You basically make your build very strong against 2-3 popular builds in a 1v1 (that can easily change their build a little and completely negate diamond skin), but you’ll loose tons of survivability in teamfights, where diamond skin is almost always basically useless and stone-heart is absolutely amazing and almost necessary against spiked dmg.

Do I like the trait? Hell no, but atm, it’s necessary for Ele’s to be somewhat strong in 1v1’s against the extremely powerful 1v1 builds out there.

Ramoth.9064:

Ross Biddle.2367:

In the case of Chrono, the Chrono line remedied pretty much all the underlying flaws in the Mesmer class.

It’s not so much that Chrono made Mesmer redundant, rather Chrono fixed Mesmer.

All future Mesmer elite specs that don’t offer the answer that Chrono did to the Mesmer riddle will never be used nor viable

What were the underlying flaws for the mesmer btw (serious question).

- movement speed (time marches on completely cures that)
- condition-removal (heal-well + time marches on makes it a bit better)
- Glass-Cannon being the almost only option (helseth’s support/bunker with wells is now a very viable option)
- Stealth being the best option of survival by far (now you can go for well of precog and shield)
- teamsupport very lacking (wells + alacrity make this a thing of the past)
- Portal having to be picked everytime, now there are builds that aren’t forced to pick it and offer enough without going for a portal.

@Topic: There are still viable options for non-elite spec builds. Ppl have to realize that this game isn’t a F2P game and ANet wants them to buy the addon, so they want elite-specs to be better.

CC is getting a bit out of hand, true…. especially cuz of the DH IMHO.

You guys trying to apply a business-model that’s for a very specific kind of game to a game that just isn’t that. Just because the core game went F2P, doesn’t mean ANet has to or wants to follow the business model of many other F2P-games out there, since the “real” game (HoT) is NOT F2P.

The F2P part is not meant to be able to compete with the players that bought the game, F2P-players should call themselves lucky they can even play sPvP without the Addon. I mean, you couldn’t play SC:Broodwar Ladder when you only have the core game.

Flumek.9043:

Hello.

Diamond skin.

Criticize.

Thank you

a very dumb trait, but I feel for certain MU’s it’s necessary for the Ele to have a chance in the current meta… But it’s stupid that it shifts those MU’s from unwinnable to basically a freewin.

It just needs to be reworked completely and then Ele has to be balanced accordingly.

Agreed, the Daze is IMHO the biggest problem of the traps. Generally the amount of CC that the DH offers is insane, so it can definitely be reduced a bit without making the build obsolete, cuz I think the build is pretty fun. I used to play ranger trapper and got smacked around; DH feels like the ranger trapper should’ve felt. ^^

Photinous.4628:

Endless healing settler druids

Settler? I pretty much exclusively see celestial, since dmg-output is pretty low with settlers when using staff. Also, Hp pool is low as well.

Druid is a very strong bunker though, I give you that.

Photinous.4628:

Permanent resistance bunker revs

Almost never seen a rev running anything else than marauder DPS…. resistance revs get absolutely wrecked by Necro’s with some boonstrip though.

Photinous.4628:

Stone heart tempests

I’ve run a supporty/bunkery tempest almost exclusively since HoT and I can tell you that most builds use diamond skin, since you’ll loose to almost every other bunker in a 1v1 without it (druid, engi, necro)

Photinous.4628:

Celestial scrappers with permanent stealth to escape

Stealth really shouldn’t be a problem in the current meta, there is more than enough reveal around.

Photinous.4628:

40k hp necros with carrion amulet

Yeah, Necro is pretty strong, especially in 1v1’s, but I have no problem against them since I started using diamond skin.

Photinous.4628:

Yawn. Bring back the old meta, HoT has really turned this game into endless on point fighting.

Meta is too berzerkery, meta is too tanky, my class is too weak…… just play the game. At least be somewhat specific or think about how to deal with the stuff you’ve mentioned before opening another one of these topics.

I don’t think the traps need a big nerf, what I find really hard to deal with and very frustrating are all the CC that comes from the DH and the Traps add quite a lot to it:

- Multiple dazes from the traps
- Longbow 5
- Elite trap
- Spear of justice pull
- Knockback by shield or possibly close range arrows if traited

That’s just insane… I think the dazes on the traps simply need to go and Longbow 5 needs to be tweaked.

I’ve been playing a bunkery/support tempest mostly since HoT and tried all kinds of different builds, this one’s currently my favourite:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAoYncMAFYi9XCWYCcYilNAzdvGYPsDPgAQBsoHsBvBA-TJxHwACeAA62fAwJAoYZAA

It’s a good support in teamfights, one of the best probably, but it’s not as strong as current other builds in 1v1-situations.

I think the build is currently a bit behind reaper and druid, but not by too much.

Most important thing to survive is being able to deal with Sword3 (block’s, evades) and to be able to kite the auto’s IMHO (CC, being ranged etc). This heavily depends on the build you’re running though.

What’s really helpful in terms of DMG are conditions (as stated by the OP) and boonremoval.

The warhorn has some potential in PvP, but it’s just so “slow”:

- In general longer cast times than for example offhand dagger.
- many effects, like the fire-field, the dust storm, tidal surge etc. just spread so slowly and because they are a rather small linear AoE, ppl will just move out of the way.
- The possibilities for interrupts are also very slim with tidal surge and cyclone.

I just feel like I’m playing in slow-motion when I’m using the warhorn. Currently, I never use it in Conquest and only sometimes in Stronghold.

I currently run this build (in stronghold mostly with staff though)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAoYn0XCFYi9XCWYCcYiFRAzttOXzrDBgBQCs4F0ATBA-TJxHwACeAA62fAwJAoYZAA

I like the build quite a lot, although it’s not top-tier IMHO, because of a few reasons:

- boon-duration is quite low, so mightstacking and taking full advantage of the AoE protection isn’t THAT powerful.
- The best thing about the shouts is IMHO soldier-rune, other than that, they are a bit weak… just a tiny buff would be enough IMHO, like the suggested might on “Feel the burn”.
- The Elite shout is also pretty lackluster; the heal is way too low and I mostly just use it for AoE shocking aura; I’d buff the heal and lower the CD.
- I really like “Eye of the Storm”, but it’s also a tiny bit too weak and if I wasn’t running soldier-runes, I wouldn’t run it. It should IMHO also remove movement-impairing conditions or sth. of that sort.
- Harmonious Conduit: i don’t like the fact that this skill is pretty much a must have if you want to use your overloads in teamfights; make the 1 stability baseline and give us sth. else.
- I also really don’t like the rez trait “Arcane Ressurrection”: I feel it could work well with the build, if it simply applied the Aura when you start the rez (just add a 20s ICD or sth.) I feel that good rez-traits can make or break a bunker/support.

I like that the DMG is IMHO very good for the amu and runes I’m using, the overloads really help out with that.

Again, I feel the build is decent and just gets overshadowed by various builds that are simply too strong atm.

well, don’t believe everything written in this forum in terms of PvP…. actually, you can pretty much ignore 99% of it. :P

PvP in this game is absolutely amazing. Right now, balance is kinda wonky, but thats normal after a big expansion.

I’ve played several competetive games on a very high level (up to semi-pro in sponsored teams, Top-20 PvP Guild in GW1 and I’ve played in the swiss national team for SC2) and GW2 is among the best. There’s still tons of potential to be used though, but the core mechanics in the game are definitely amazing.

but just go play it for a few days, watch some streams and make up your mind. Best thing to do is probably find a few friends, since the PvP random-group community is pretty much cancer. :P

there are tons of counterplay possibles, but I agree that not every build has them available. It’s a very strong skill I agree, but I think it’s one of the cornerstones of why rev even works.

best counters are evades or blocks. Interrupts are kinda hard to land, since many rev’s run a decent amount of stability.

Rev is currently a bit too strong, since he can go full glass and still win many 1v1’s against 1v1-builds and pointholders need to make great efforts in their build (or even choosing to play different node-holders or 1v1-builds), simply because of the rev. I don’t think they need to change things like Sword 3 fundamentally, they can literally just tweak the DMG and maybe make some of the defensive CD’s not have such low CD’s.

Puck.9612:

Jack of all trades, master of none. Agood ranger can adapt to fill pretty much any role on the fly but there is always a profession that can do the job better. This is why they do well solo queuing but are rarely seen in competitive teams.

I don’t know of any Ranger build that would fit this description…

- PewPew has very low sustain and can’t hold a node against most 1v1-oriented builds. Also, it gets hard-countered incredibly easy by the vast amount of projectile reflects/absorb currently in the game (it will get even worse with HoT).

- Trap-Rangers have low mobility, at best mediocre sustain, few stunbreakers and get countered by decent condition-removal and absolutely shredded by most necro-builds.

PewPew is decent at a low skill-level cuz ppl don’t focus him properly and run bad compositions that can’t deal with ranged stuff shooting from far away up on some cliff or sth.
Also, most ppl don’t know how to properly LoS.

I absolutely hate having pewpew’s on the team, it’s just a bad build at a decent skill-level when you don’t run a very specific comp.

well…. Thief is pretty bad in random groups, because he relies heavily on teamplay:

1) Stealth-openers and stealth-movement as a team are often crucial in competetive teamplay. Doesn’t really work in random groups.
2) Stealthing a downed player often doesn’t work on lower levels as well, cuz they’ll break the stealth.
3) Thief is one of the best classes when you wanna spike a target down quickly, but this often requires good timing together with other players of the team.
4) Decapping and +1’ing isn’t easy, especially if you don’t have proper communication with the team. A thief needs to know where the opponents are or when they were seen last where to make accurate assumptions about whether or not to decap a point.

So yes, if you wanna play a Thief in random groups, you’re gonna have a bad time…. In proper groups with TS and good players, Thief’s are still among the top-tier classes for all the reasons named above.

not necessary.

Especially not a few days before HoT. -.-°

This is amazing!

I’m really thankful ANet finally recognizes how important this is for e-Sports, especially spectating.

There are 1v1-servers which can be helpful, but the builds used in them are often strictly 1v1 and very rarely used in competetive sPvP.

There are some very informational and good streamers on twitch though, where you can learn a lot and that also frequently answer questions in the chat. Best ones are probably the dudes from “The Abjured”:

- Phantaram (Ele, other classes as well)
http://www.twitch.tv/phantaram

- Five Gauge (mostly Engi)
http://www.twitch.tv/chaithh

- Magic Toker (mostly Thief)
http://www.twitch.tv/magictoker

- Noscoc (mostly Necro)
http://www.twitch.tv/noscoc

Other than that, my best guess is to just ask in the mists if you can observe or sth. I don’t think it’ll be easy to get sth. though, but you can try. ^^

hardest build was for me Mantra Mesmer. Only if you really use Mantra of Distraction for smart interrupts and not only for the free stun because of confounding suggestions. ^^’

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQJARWl0nhy0YNawWNQtGLnG05Tiy1JDwCCaZGaeCA-TZBFABCcBAEvMwH7PswhAAgnAAA

Reasons

- Knowing what to interrupt.
- Being able to actually interrupts it.
- knowing the teleport-spots for Staff 2.
- Smart use of Portal.
- Pretty squishy build that can’t simply rely on stealth, but you need good positioning and awareness.
- Managing Mantra’s and channeling them at the right time is crucial.
- Teamplay and communication is key for the important spikes/stuns/boonstrip. If you make a mistake, often the target simply doesn’t go down.

Vamp runes aren’t that great….. Sure, they are insane in the current meta of the top-level teams, but if just a few start running conditions, vamp-runes are actually very bad, cuz they keep you from cleansing your conditions while you are ticking down.

No need to nerf them until we see if conditions are useful in the competetive meta with hot.

It’s kinda narrow-minded to just talk about hard to master classes, because there are huge differences between certain builds. if you talk about mechanically challenging, there are a multitude or aspects to consider:

1) Number of skills available (more skills equals more CD’s to keep in mind and more options to choose from)
2) Number and impact of very timing-critical skills (reaction-speed). Best example is interrupts. An interrupt with for example powerblock attached is way harder to use effectively than, let’s say Drake’s breath.
3) Ground-targeted VS player-targeted: IMHO, one of the hardest builds to play are those where you are constantly forced to change between aim-sensitive ground-target skills and player-targeted ones. D/D Ele for example has almost only skills you can fire off without having a specific target, this makes quick aiming quite a bit less important.
4) required APM: There are builds/skills where you need many more clicks to use them effectively than other. One of the highest APM-requirements is definitely Fresh Air Ele. To use this build effectively, you simply need to click more buttons in the same amount of time.

Some of the hardest builds to use are IMHO fresh air ele and powerblock mantra-mesmer (that doesn’t simply rely on using the interrupts as free stuns cuz of confounding suggestions).

D/D-Ele is actually pretty easy to use in terms of required mechanical skill (IMHO, much easier than staff-ele). There are Engi-builds, like marauder Nade-Engi with multiple Kits, that are pretty hard mechanically because of the number of skills, clicks needed, reaction speed etc.

So simply in terms of mechanics, Ele has probably the hardest to play build overall (fresh air), but most other Engi builds (especially marauder nade with 2 kits) are harder to play mechanically than for example D/D-Ele.

“C.A.F: Entering this form now has a 10s CD. Charging of Astral force by healing has been reduced by 40%. Charging of Astral force by outgoing strikes has been increased by 200%. You now retain half your current astral force if you decide to break form early.”

This makes me really excited because of druidic clarity and celestial shadows.

If a build is specifically designed to dish out huge amounts of burning, it’s no problem that it kills you fast.

pack a few cleanses and use them at the right time, it’s as easy as that. Also, not every build is inherently strong against conditions and thats how a game like this should work.

I’d actually very much appreciate a bit of condi-damage on the staff, to make the staff more viable on condition-builds. This is IMHO important since the whole celestial avatar form is heavily tied to the staff….

ReaperJr.5967:

Pvp wise.

I’ve tried tempest with different traitlines over the beta weekends extensively. Unfortunately, eles are still locked in water/arcana/cantrips builds. There wasn’t a decent build for tempest.

Tempest/water/arcana is nowhere as good as other elite specs, and sacrificing water or arcana leads to gimmicky builds. Cantrips are still essential and there was no room for shouts. Hugely disappointing.

When is this ever going to be fixed?

I think that you are mostly right, but I also feel that it has gotten a little bit better with tempest:

- Shouts+Soldier runes can be decent for survival/condi-cleanse. I’ve tried some hybrid-builds with 2 cantrips and 3 shouts and it kinda worked!
- Dropping water might also be a possibility, because with stuff like diamond skin, water overload, shouts+soldier runes, you can have pretty decent condi-cleanse and healing while not going into water.

SchmendrickTheMagician.8247:

Mallyx lost all of its appeal with the self-condition change. Pain Absorption makes no sense now. Why draw conditions from allies if you can’t use them?

Mallyx skills really feel lackluster now. Maybe simply should have made Mallyx stance make allies unable to cleanse you.

The only thing really dumb about the old Mallyx was that you could give back very strong conditions in too high durations, like fear for example.

Change it back and make it apply 1 second duration every 1 second pulse, but lower the energy-cost a bit.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

There’ll be more supportive damage for Celestial Avatar by launch… possibly from trait modifications or from skill changes.

An issue which should not be decoupled here is that Celestial Avatar felt gated behind staff use (and troll unguent), which left a ranger with one damage-focused weapon option and one support weapon. I’m making some changes to astral force rate gain to try to address this. Ideally it should be possible to build up your astral force without -needing- to run staff, but running staff should speed up the process by nature of the heals it provides. This would yield the option of running two non-staff weapons while still having Celestial Avatar available.

Celestial Avatar healing is the best available by a decent margin right now. One issue that came up is that the healing coefficients are so insignificant that running with healing stats yields very little reward.

The best healing in the game being available without using any healing power; this is not good for the game.

The berserker meta not be the only consideration requires that other stat combinations be rewarding.

Being able to run two more damage-focused weapons (if that’s your thing) and still have Celestial Avatar available should address some of your offensive concerns if you want to play a bit more offensively as a hybrid. If you want to focus on being the top offense then you probably shouldn’t be selecting the Druid specialization.

That’s all I’m going to say on the subject for now (though I will continue to read constructive feedback here and elsewhere) as there is plenty to be done in order to address these and other issues. /me ducks back to work on Scrapper and Druid.

pretty cool, thx!

This addresses all the things I was concerned about with the Druid!

Mallyx isn’t fun anymore, doesn’t have a role (as counter D/D and counter condi-teamfight) and all I do is basically spam the boonremoval.

- Because you don’t have basic condis like bleeding without sigils, stuff gets cleansed more easily
- No real range-options and the change of Mallyx and various other aspects (low amount of stunbreakers) make Mallyx-rev useless in teamfights now.
- Very very low amount of condi-cleanse was tolerable in 1v1’s cuz of the resistance-uptime and the fact you gave the condis right back. Now, the dmg is way too low to have a chance against D/D-Ele and other 1v1-builds.
- Pain absorbtion is now utterly useless because of the change of the Mallyx-Elite. Why would I take the risk to absorb all the condis in a teamfight if I can be killed with one simple boonstrip? Condis are way easier to remove when they are on multiple targets anyways, cuz of all the AoE condicleanse…. With the old elite, it was risk VS reward; I had to choose when to take the risk to get the reward – now it’s risk VS no reward. ;(

Just as I said when I heard about the change; it’s just a bad idea in every aspect imaginable: You took an amazing skill with tons of synergy (and more than enough ways to counter it, like boonsrtip) and teamfight-potential, which actually gave the rev a few pretty clear roles and made it uninteresting und useless.

I’m heavily in favour of changing it back, since I had no Idea why it got changed in the first place: you could’ve maybe just tweaked the numbers a bit.

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

PowerBottom.5796:

found a bug:

ancient seeds doesn’t seem to work with spike trap.

Other than that, I quite like the Druid, it’s really fun! I wish the stuff would scale a bit more with healing power though.

Perhaps it is because the trap deals the damage before the KD, did you deal damage with an attack while they were knocked down?

Of course I did. ^^’