Guild Wars 2

Same. Seems like after….2 weeks? I can finally play again.

Bananaheli.8501:

Having the same problem, started maybe 5 or 3 days ago.

A lot of people are having the same problem since the server “maintenance” last week: High latency by default, ridiculously high (and long duration) spikes and disconnects, only happens in GW2.

This seems to be more focused on the nordic countries, but not exclusive.

Best I can tell it’s some routing issue on ANet’s side (their or their ISP’s), but they stubbornly refuse to admit it and even have gone as far as telling some people it’s their ISP (regardless of the fact that it’s on their side and happening to multiple ISPs since their last maintenance and only in their game).

They haven’t even dignified us with a post or explanation.

It’s been a week now. It’s frankly disgusting and I seriously wasn’t expecting this from ANet. I expected this from EA or Microsoft…

This is disgusting.

ANet this is your fault. This started for several entire countries, with different ISPs, after your maintenance, for YOUR game only. This is YOUR routing issue. We are paying customers and you won’t even acknowledge the situation?

This has been over a WEEK for most of us. A week! A week that paying customers are being essentially locked out of the game. Are you going to deal with this or just tell us to go elsewhere?

Any reliable and free VPNs you guys recommend?

It’s bad enough that I need a third party program to actually play this game, I really ain’t going to pay for it too.

bumping this up cause it’s still an issue…

It would be very nice to get at least one post from the devs saying they realize this is an issue and are, at least, looking into it?

You know, given that it’s been a week of this now…

Delvoire.8930:

Hmm.. I’m guessing Half-Life must be a good game then?

You should play it.

Obviously give it a discount on the whole “outdated” issue… It was released in 1998 after all.

Still one of the best examples of story telling in a videogame. “Show, don’t tell”.

lordkrall.7241:

We didn’t get any information at all about the Queens Jubilee update either.

Yes we did

lordkrall.7241:

I would assume it is simply because they don’t want to spoil anything.

People who don’t “want it spoiled” can simply not read it. It is a completely conscious and willing action to turn on the website, go to “releases” and then go to the specific release. You can’t really trip and not only go to the page but read the whole thing as well.

Is it a new thing, that now all we get is the crappy trailer that says nothing at all?

What happened to the proper preview notes we’ve been getting for a year now? Fixing what isn’t broken?

apollo.9817:

As already mentioned a lot of player from Norway are having issues with high latency only in GW2 during day time.

Can you merge the threads for easier Network issues reports?
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/tech/Crazy-lag-past-couple-of-days/first#post3515339

This please.

Since the “server maintenance” the game has been completely unplayable for me.

Thought it was just me…

Country: Norway
ISP: Telenor
Server: Aurora Glade

Absolutely unplayable. 1 to 3 seconds delay on everything average, with “waves” of upwards of 10 seconds of delay. “Lag warping” and outright disconnects as well.

lordkrall.7241:

Sounds like a rather bad idea (even though I personally would qualify).

Hiding current rewards behind something that can no longer be completed is never a good idea.

This. I have enough of an issue with the current LW rewards being “one time only” as is.

I’ve been here since the start, but it’s extremely bullkitten for people who weren’t. “What’s that? You didn’t know/couldn’t afford the game earlier? Well…kitten you! You’re a B class player now!”

Hate it when games do that.

Actually… E = 3 backwards…

Half-Life 3 confirmed.

Delvoire.8930:

See, he laid it out pretty simply. Most video game story lines are not great nor good. If you take out the immersion of the player or the fact that you, the player, are involved in the game, the stories generally aren’t that great. It’s just the fact that you are more personally involved in that game that you think the stories are better than they are.

For instance, Super Mario. That story isn’t great by any means. Princess is kidnapped and Mario rescues her. Because you, the player, are Mario though, you feel a sense of achievement at the end of the game and are rewarded by rescuing her. He feel that the story was good. That’s out on a limb, I know, but it’s just an example.

Hold on there. Different issue entirely. Yes, most videogame’s stories are bad. No, being “immersed” in it doesn’t make them any better if they’re bad to begin with. Super Mario’s story is crap. That’s why nobody played Mario for the story. People played Super Mario because of the gameplay. Not to mention that Super Mario is a game “from a different age”, back from when games were made by 1-3 people. In fact it hasn’t been that long since most games did not have dedicated writers (which isn’t to say some of them didn’t end up having good stories).

Which isn’t to say games have brilliant stories these days… Some do. Most don’t. This does not in any way exculpate the poor writing or invalidate the fact that the writing was/is bad.

I recently wrote about how GW2 did, and continues to do, a lot of things right. If it didn’t I wouldn’t be playing it. Not once did I mention the story or story telling. That’s one thing they really could improve on…

Which leads us to the other side of the Living Story issues: Gameplay wise.

Gameplay wise the LW had (has?) one major core issue: its transitory nature. THAT is the one thing that completely destroys and undermines the fun of the gameplay changes. The crushing majority of it is temporary. The achievements are temporary. The rewards (at least most of them) are temporary. What this means is that every release becomes an initial grind to complete all the content as soon as possible, to guarantee you acquire it before it expires, followed by burnout.

See crappy MSPaint graphic
(Paint skills off the chart, I know…)

The players feel forced to do the content as soon as they can, to guarantee that they acquire it, and proceed to grind it out. Once that’s done the last thing you wanna do is go back and do more of it for fun.

Take Super Adventure Box for example. In its own right an amazing addition to GW2. However, also a temporary one, with temporary skins you can only acquire THAT update… Result? People grind SAB out to acquire the skins, quickly getting sick of it. And when they do want it? It’s not around. Cause it was temporary.

I’m not saying it’s not ok to have some temporary content. I think the Wintersday event is a good example of good temporary content. It’s available around christmas and, at least so far, returns every year with (mostly) improvements. But those should be few and far between… The norm should be permanent content… Why is something like SAB even gone? Why are the SAB skins temporary?

I understand the point of course: forcing interest. Trying to force players to play NOW… However by its very nature that leads into that rather negative loop of small peak of excitement followed by burnout/exhaustion, etc…

THAT is what’s wrong with the LW system. I’m not the first person to mention it either. In fact that has been mentioned to death and back… So when I read an interview and I hear a dev say that “the problem” with LW was having both story and gameplay content together I’m confused… Why did we bother?

Eh… What do I know…

2/2

For the unaware I’m refering to this interview . Read up, it’s an interesting interview.

It’s nice to know ANet has identified that the current LW model isn’t working, and is willing to change that. That said, one paragraph specifically made me cringe. Made me wonder whether ANet had actually understood what went wrong with the whole Living World program in the first place…

“It’s very distracting to players,” observed Johanson. “It’s almost a muddled message, where we put these releases out and we want them to be excited about the story, to follow the story, and we also want them to be excited about the features that are coming with it. And either one or the other tends to be the thing that people cling onto.” And the other thing, people ignore.

This is what ANet considers went wrong with the LW update… That, essentially, people are too stupid to follow both story AND gameplay releases. That’s the one thing they think went wrong… That they were releasing story and gameplay…

…oh god…

Colin… Colin… No… No. No! No!

Colin, the current LW system was flawed in two different directions, one pertaining to the story delivery, the other to the gameplay delivery.

Story wise it had two major flaws: flow and quality.

As far as quality… I’m sorry but Scarlet’s story so far is terribly written. I’ve been on and on about its many issues, and so have many others. Not going to repeat myself. You guys are saying that it’s all justified because of the ending, I’m not buying. I’m not seeing how any ending ever conceived can justify all the writing issues Scarlet has had so far. PLEASE prove me wrong. If you do I will personally write an extensive public letter of apology to your writing staff.

As far as flow it’s very simple: too little too far apart. Even if we disregard the quality issue you’ve simply given people too little story. With far too much nothing in between. Consider the following: The LW story has been going on for a year now. You could sum up the entirety of the story in the back of a small napkin, leaving nothing relevant out. In fact you guys did a video sum up of it in less than 1 and a half minutes! And that left no relevant part of that story out!

That has nothing to do with having gameplay and story delivered together! Nothing to do with even the 2 week update rate! You could have made the bi-weekly update work for the story, but there’s simply not enough story here. How can players stay engaged in the story when it’s moving at less than a crawl? It’s like trying to be interested in a very small book reading 1 or 2 sentences every two weeks! The little story we did get, regardless of quality, has been stretched so thin it broke.

It doesn’t help the case that unlike, to quote the interview, “a show like A Game of Thrones (and the book series A Song of Fire and Ice beyond that)” the LW updates don’t come with re-runs or tivoing. If you weren’t in the game before you a certain part of the story came to pass that’s it. You can’t go back and relieve it. It’s just gone. This hasn’t affected me because I’ve been here since the start of the LW, but I’m sure people that joined halfway through would be even less compelled and interested in knowing what the hell is going on.

1/2

I’ve beaten this particular dead horse into a fine paste… So here ya go, if you’re interested

Because I’m not going to re-write 3 pages of text explaining everything that’s wrong with Scarlet as a character.

Orpheal.8263:

Just only that E=mc2 has absolutely nothing to do with nuclear bombs >.>

E=mc2 is Albert Einsteins formular for is world known theory about relativity, and that is PHYSICS, not CHEMISTRY.

His Relativity Theory was all about timespace continuums, gravitation and the speed of light, not about the theory how to nuke the world best into a quadrogazillion-superbillion pieces

Actually, while “E=MC2” is, indeed, physics, the equation itself and what it represents (i.e.: mass-energy equivalence) was fundamental for the development of nuclear physics and crucial for the creation of the atomic bomb.

Then again nuclear bombs are, mostly, the work of physics, not chemistry either… So… Not sure what you’re getting at…

Mada.5319:

Would they have retconned the known events of the Fall of Abaddon and modified it to include Scarlet and asuras? (* cringe *)
How else would we have gotten this information?

Honestly, whether the elections were pre-set or not will never be known. There’s nothing they can say, show or do that proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that they had no hand in the results. Either believe them or don’t. We knew this since day 1 of the “vote” though. Doesn’t really matter.

That said, given their reckless disregard for story, lore, consistency, quality, etc… in lieu of shoehorning Scarlet into everything I have very little doubts that had Evon won the election (assuming the whole thing wasn’t rigged of course) then we would have simply found out that Scarlet was behind or somehow related to the Fall of Abbadon as well. Maybe some time machine/time traveling plot of some kind. Hell, I wouldn’t be particularly surprised if they simply went with “because we said so”.

That’s why I’m tempted to believe the “election” wasn’t rigged. Yes, the whole result seems so incredibly convenient for the whole thing… but I’m also perfectly willing to accept that ANet would have just railroaded the story back to Scarlet either ways.

BobbyStein.2315:

Actually, we have metrics on every LW release. While SAB was indeed successful in terms of participation, so were the other releases (Scarlet ones included). I understand that forum feedback can color perception on which releases were the most popular/best received/most enjoyed but opinions on this are largely anecdotal. Please keep that in mind.

Which metrics Bobby? Share with us.

I’m not asking for exact numbers, I’m just curious as to what metrics you’re using.

BobbyStein.2315:

Now to your question: will we see a return of SAB? That’s not for me to say, but if it were to come back, what would people like to see from it? Harder/easier content? New world? More/no Moto story?

The thing I want to see the most, by far, in SAB, like most good things related to the LW releases, is for it to stay .

SAB is lots of good fun, but, like everything else, grinding it non-stop for 2 or 4 weeks because it’s going to be unavailable afterwards sucks the fun out of it.

I want it to be around so I can play it when I feel like it. Like right now.

That’s the biggest issue with LW updates in general. As has been explained and evidenced for a year now.

JonPeters.5630:

I was simply stating that the problem is we are not going to address the issues that the passive sustain is creating until we make the active use have a place in combat so even if it is not THE PROBLEM, it is the blocking issue.

Jon

Jon, how is this difficult? Honestly?

You just need the active heal to be a good heal to begin with. Right now it’s a crap heal. Especially with War you don’t want to stop to heal all the time, you want one massive heal, even with longer cooldown.

I’m of the opinion that the the other, non HS, Warrior heals could use a bit of a buff in raw heal. Then, you just make HS have either slightly, or similar healing but granting none of the other buffs. The (weaker than it is now, evidently) passive healing becomes a bonus.

Seriously, you have this mechanic down perfectly in Signet of the Dolyak vs. Stance.

Passives should be bonus compensation for an otherwise weaker version of a skill. HS’s passive should be a bonus for a slightly less efficient active heal. It shouldn’t be THE heal.

Edit: Another alternative is make it a “conditional” passive. Such as Signet of Malice or Signet of Restoration. The problem with HS is that it’s a permanent passive. It has no counter play. Thief’s Signet of Malice only heals as long as they hit something. Elementalist’s Signet of Restoration only heals so long as they’re attacking. HS has no downsides. You can kite them, you can stun them, you can do anything and they’re still passively and permanently regenerating health.

TurtleDragon.3108:

That build doesn’t contribute anything to the team except some vuln stacks and some condi removal.

Well, it does bring one thing… One thing Rangers don’t… They kill kitten a hell of a lot faster!

TurtleDragon.3108:

but it still brings enough to the party to make it worth bringing one ranger.

You’re kidding yourself.

TurtleDragon.3108:

ProxyDamage.9826:

I can’t think of a class that’s worse for PvE than Ranger.

Necromancer

Full berserker necro with dagger/whatever (focus?), wells and piercing life blast.

Not fantastic, and yet better.

OP, I was going to try to give you some advice, but my most honest piece of advice is “don’t kittening bother”. Not worth it to the Nth degree.

I just use a Greatsword. Yes, it’s not optimal (with the 0.05 less power scaling and the marginally slower auto-attack), but that’s a small price to pay for not having to deal with the atrocious sword animations/sticking.

That’s when I bother to use a ranger. Usually out of boredom or stubbornness. If you want optimal then I seriously suggest any other class. Try a Warrior. Or Guardian. Or Mesmer. Or literally any other class. I can’t think of a class that’s worse for PvE than Ranger.

Danikat.8537:

. My aim is to have a mix of direct damage, critical hits and condition damage coming from both me and my pets. With some toughness thrown in for defence (and Signet of Renewal for condition removal).[…] I mainly do *PvE *…

Incompatible.

First of all, PvE and PvP are two completely different beasts entirely. With very few exceptions trying to use a PvE setup for PvP or vice versa just results in one of them, or both, sucking.

For PvE you want neither condition damage or toughness. PvP is an entirely different beast.

Lastly, and again, with very few (even less than before) exceptions hybrids just do both things poorly. Stick to conditions or white damage.

Since you said you were mostly PvE we’ll go with that. Gear is berserker. Completely. Regardless of other issues. Build depends. If you want something that also uses traps I’d suggest longbow and sword/warhorn (greatsword if, like me, the Sword’s mainhand animation becomes unbearable to you). At least 30 points in Skirmishing to get the juicy precision and critical damage. Also get Trapper’s Expertise and Quick Draw OR (if you find that you don’t use longbow skills all that much and mostly rely on the auto-attack) Trap Potency. As the adept trait try Companion’s Might. Put 30 more points in Marksmanship, simply because everything else kinda sucks more for PvE. Grab Piercing Arrows and either Spotter (probably better for PvE) or Eagle Eye (1500 range isn’t all that in PvE, but it’s funny and you get some damage for free) and Steady Focus.

Your last 10 points go to either Beastmastery with Master’s Bond or Wilderness Survival.

As far as skills go Healing Spring is all the condi removal you need for PvE for the most part. You can ditch it for Signet of the Hunt for MS bonus (surprisingly useful) or Lightning Reflexes.

As for traps, the most important is Fire Trap. Ditch the generally underwhelming Viper’s Nest. Flame trap is the best trap for people with low condition damage. First, Burning is the highest base damage condition in the game (iirc?). Second, it’s on a minimal 15 second cooldown, so you can spam it. Third, it gives you the best combo field in PvE: Fire! Fire field + Blast Finisher (warhorn #5, or someone else in your party) = Might stacking! You can keep Spike Trap for additional tagging in big events and some CC while you’re on your own (bosses and champions aren’t immune to immobilizes or cripples).

End result is something like this

That’s pretty much the best PvE build you can get in the “trapper” line you were talking about.

Durzlla.6295:

The part I bolder is totally false, you know where rangers die? Melee range , you know where a ranger isn’t beaten? At ranged, I run LB, Axe/dagger for a reason and it’s sure as hell not for the min/maxing damage nonsense it’s to survive and win.

This is so incredibly, utterly, completely false, it’s not even funny. Greatsword is one of the ranger’s best weapons. In dungeons, Sword/Warhorn is very common for good reason – best power scaling, good party buffs and a blast finisher.

Axe/dagger is a crap combo. Especially if you’re also using Longbow. Longbow is a power weapon. Axe/dagger are condition weapons (and meh even for that) with absolutely horrible power scaling. You also got no mobility and no melee, so someone puts up a reflect and you do nothing. Someone gets close to you and you do nothing.

If you were talking about PvE then you are the “bearbows” any decent dungeon runner runs away from like the godkitten plague.

We’re also not “unbeatable” at range by any stretch of the word or imagination.

Brando.1374:

instead of bleeds on the aa change it to torment so they will have to stay within melee range or they will take extra dmg.

Something I’ve considered. However, changing both bleeds to torment would be potentially ridiculously OP. Keep in mind that movement is very important in this game, and so long as they were moving they’d be tagged for 3 bleeds each torment… That’s a lot of damage. Maybe Bleed on the first attack, torment on the second? Or torment on the last instead/with of poison? Again, testing dependent.

Dalanor.5387:

1. Same as scepter, why would i go to melee? As a melee weapon it should do more (direct) damage, which wouldnt happen with the same condition application it has.
2. Mobility is 100% we wont ever get. End of story.
3. OP.

2/10, wouldnt implement.

3 skill

• Unholy Ground
  Curse the ground you stand on, corrupting 2 boons on nearby enemies and chilling foes that stand in the area
  Damage: 400 (1.5 power scaling)
  Chill: 1 s (1 stack per second for 5 seconds)
  Radius: 360
  Range: 600
  Combo Field: Ice
  Duration: 5 seconds (how long it “pulses” the 1 second of chill)
  Startup: 1/4 (character is immobilized during the cast, movement interrupts cast)
  Cooldown: 15 s

Note: The boon corruption and damage only happen “on cast” the pulses are for the chill only.

Animation: A mix of the Mesmer’s Mind Stab “ground stab” animation, with Unholy Feast’s special effect (the green AoE circle and “biting” SFX). Alternatively, using the Guardian’s “ground slam with the palm of their hand” animation instead of the Mesmer’s “ground stab”.

Explanation: The sword’s “burst” skill. High power scaling, converts two boons to conditions, and leaves a “chilling field” for 5 seconds. Sort of like a well effect, but without being a well. Like some Orian mages/priests do.

Before you start calling “OP”, the power scaling is a meager 0.3 over Putrid Mark’s. Level 1 eviscerate is 2.0 (level 3 is 3.0). 1.5 is a Final Thrust when the enemy is over 50%. It’s strong, but it’s hardly going to “one-shot” anyone. On the other hand it’s a radial skill with 600 range, and you get some nice utility to make up for it. Given that the Necro is a class of attrition it felt more consistent to give him better attrition tools and some burst instead of pure burst. Additionally, if you’re not a power build this skill doesn’t really do much damage, seeing as the base damage is relatively low.

Dual boon corruption is useful for any build, but specifically favors condition necros since it can not only remove troublesome boons (such as stability) but also convert them into damaging conditions.

The chill is an additional way to stick to your target, useful for any build with a sword. Remember, we’re melee here, this is on a 15 second cooldown, and we don’t get an auto-cripple on the attack chain or the leap like the war. Besides, the chill is only useful so long as the target stays in the AoE, so they can roll/blink out of it and they only get 1 second of chill. Hardly the worst thing in the world.

Why ice field? Fits thematically, and it gives us one more combo field to play with. If you’re using a staff you can get some chilling attacks, or use putrid mark’s blast finisher for an AoE Frost Armour. A neat bonusif you’re willing to sacrifice putrid marks for it (or have someone else blast finish).

Synergies with off-hands:

• Focus: #4 would come with extra power damage and boon removal, giving you up to 5 boons removed (2 converted, 3 removed) and #5 would give you a priceless extra chill to help you stick to your target. Very good for power builds.

• Dagger: #4 gives you some condi transferal (always useful) and a blind (helps melee a lot), while #5 would give you some extra bleeds and weakness. Would also become easier to hit since you’d be in melee with your opponents. Good for condi builds.

• Warhorn: A long daze and swiftness with a cripple would go well for either power or condi builds.

Potential traits:

Honestly, I think this could do without traits. If any, I’d consider one trait

Sword Mastery.
Master Tier (Curses tree? Maybe?)
Critical hits with sword grant 1% life force and 2 s cripple
Cooldown: 4 s

Almost 50% cripple up time would be make it very difficult to get away from the necro. Lots of room to fiddle around with this one though. Longer cripples (and life force generation), but with a longer cooldown would make it easier to remove, but much more painful if you find yourself without condi removal.

And that’s basically it. Keep in mind that, again, all values are eye balled, and a lot of things could be easily adjustable to fix practically any imbalance.

Thoughts?

2/2

Just a little concept I’ve been dabbling with.

Why?

First of all, it always bothered me that the Necromancer couldn’t use a sword. Swords are among the most iconic necromancer weapons, right after staves and scythes (generally used as a staff). I always wondered how a one handed sword would work for Necros in this game (if at all).

Additionally Necros have, in my opinion, a severe flaw in their current weapon selection: They have 0 weapons with cleave, and their one melee weapon is single-target, low mobility and power spec only.

So my idea was to give Necros a new melee weapon. One with cleave and that can be used as both condition and power spec. One that could provide an inherently high synergy with both, and with the off hand weapons, without becoming overpowered or “doing everything”. Conceptually it’s inspired in both the Warrior’s sword and the Necro’s scepter.

So without further ado…

The Weapon

Warning: All values are theory-crafted and eyeballed. Final values would depend on testing and posterior adjustments.

As a one handed sword, this weapon only has 3 skills, leaving the final 2 skill open for off hand weapons.

1 skill – Auto-attack chain

• Crimson Cut
  Slash and bleed your foe.
  Damage: 202 (0.7 power scaling)
  Bleeding: 4 s (1 stack)
  Range: 130 (standard melee range)
  Startup: 1/2

V

• Blood Reaping
  Slash and bleed your foe.
  Damage: 202 (0.7 power scaling)
  Bleeding: 4 s (1 stack)
  Range: 130 (standard melee range)
  Startup: 1/2

V

• Dark Touch
  Strike and poison your foe.
  Damage: 202 (0.8 power scaling)
  Poison: 4 s (1 stack)
  Range: 130 (standard melee range)
  Startup: 1/2

Animation: Visuals could re-use the Warrior’s sword chain animation, with Necro’s scepter timing. If you really wanted to go through the extra work, you could add a small black and green glow to the sword during swings.

Explanation: Pretty much a melee version of the Scepter’s auto-attack, with decent power scaling (but low base damage). As far as condition damage goes I’d say the Necro’s Scepter is in a pretty good place, so I figure I’d start with that, but give it an appropriate power scaling. Base damage is relatively low, similar to Warrior’s Sword, but the scaling is slightly (0.1 to 0.2) better (we don’t get quick weapon switching or Final Thrust to make up for it, and our bleeds aren’t as long).

Considerably lower than the Dagger’s 0.9, 0.7 and 1.2 scalings, as well as lower base damage, but we do get bleeds and poison to compensate as well as cleaving.

2 skill

• Nether Walk
  Defy space and time, transversing the netherworld to your enemy, blinding enemies on departure and arrival.
  Damage: 250 (0.75 power scaling)
  Blind: 6 s (1 stack)
  Range: 900
  Startup: 1/4 (the least possible, just so it can be used while stunned)
  Cooldown: 8 s

Note 1: Can be done targeted, to a player or untargeted, using ground targeting.
Note 2: The blind at the start and end of the blink is “instant”, it’s not a “on-going blind field” kind of thing. It blinds up to 5 people around the start and end of the blink only the moment it’s used.

Animation: A basic “blink” type move, with a small particle dark cloud at the start and finish. Think of a “poof” type thing. Like Nightcrawler.

Explanation: Movement skill. Essential for a melee weapon such as this. Essentially a savage leap that is a blink instead of a leap (Note that wile Savage Leap says 600 range, it’s actually 900 range on the leap itself. 600 is the range on the hit). Why? Simply put Necros have terrible mobility. If they have to rely almost entirely on one skill for it, it needs to be kitten effective. Blinks are faster and less susceptible to movement impairing skills. The blind on start and finish is for extra defensive purposes as well as synergy with the Chilling Darkness trait.

1/2

Gold. I wish my ranger was a norn just to kitten around with this.

Not the worst I’ve seen, but room for improvement.

• You’re running a shout-based build with one shout. No. Ditch FGJ (crap in WvW anyways) and the 30 points in Tactics. Instead, take either Endure Pain (useful to mitigate that first wave of damage in a zerg), Dolyak Signet (more stability is always nice) or Signet of Stamina (condition removal on a relatively short cooldown). Alternatively, consider either Stomp (more CC once the enemy’s stability runs out) or Bull’s Charge (good to get out of a sticky situation).

• I’d recommend at least 20 points in discipline with Mobile Strikes. Possibly with a greatsword or sword+shield/warhorn on switch. Nothing sucks more than running with a group and getting CCd and singled out and away from the rest. Even if you don’t run either on switch (a longbow is a good choice for AoE, might stacking and condition cleansing through CI) having an immobilize removal on Earthshaker alone (and possibly Bull’s charge) can be priceless. You also get the priceless minor trait “Fast Hands” as a bonus. I personally don’t run a warrior build without it.

• No reason to run Warrior’s Sprint. You said it yourself, you’ll be in a zerg most of the time. Zergs provide pretty much perma-swiftness, which overlap WS rendering it null. Better to take something like Signet Mastery or Vigorous Focus (depending on what you end up using more)

• Trade Sure Footed for Cleansing Ire. Seriously. Cleansing Ire is a godsend. Use it. If you absolutely want sure footed then sacrifice Merciless Hammer for it. Not CI.

• The last 20 points are a toss up. Personally, given what you have, I think I’d rather put them in Arms, get that juicy Unsuspecting Foe (downright priceless for any hammer or mace build – That’s 50% free crit chance whenever you stun someone!), and a bonus of Furious Speed and both minor traits (because why not).

• Your stats are a bit inefficient. Allow me to try a better configuration, “better bang for your buck” if you will (see link). Keeping the same quality you have in the same places.

Final Build after my changes would look something like this:
Version A

Version B

I didn’t include off-hand weapons since that depends on what you want to use. As previously mentioned I’d consider GS (for disengage power), Longbow (more AoE and free condition cleansing) or Sword + Shield or Warhorn. Sword + Warhorn is very popular in zergs for the team-buffing abilities.

Stat wise you do sacrifice 5k health (2k, actually, since the rest came from the traits), which does hurt, but you do so for a massive boost everywhere else. Remember, with Unsuspecting Foe the magical number is 30% (crit chance). With Fury (20%) you get 50%. With Unsuspecting Foe (50%) you get 100%!

Anyways, that’s my 2 cents.

solrik.6028:

Shall I assume that you did not use an utility skills and only pew-pew’d from 1 to 80?

No, but I can assume you never leveled a warrior or guardian. Correctly at least.

… Although how one can level a soldier or guardian incorrectly is beyond me. Bloody things practically auto-pilot. Maybe if you do a condition build for PvE…?

solrik.6028:

I would like to see you stand in one place with thief or guardian while fighting 10-15 at once without dodging or using anything defensive.

Now do the same with the ranger using a pet that has at least one aoe ability and piercing arrows.

Having leveled every class to 80 the easiest, by FAR, were Warriors and then Guardians.

High DPS and innately high survivability. Who cares about the pet tanking when I can tank while doing double the DPS?

Yelloweyedemon.2860:

Then 95% of my oponents in WvW while roaming are terribad players.

Seems legit!

That seems about right actually.

Kagamiku.9731:

ProxyDamage.9826:

Full berserker is the only right answer in PvE. If you’re not full berserker you’re doing it wrong.

It’s a game. Play however you like. Just don’t try to force people to play your way.

Something doesn’t feel right here…If you’re playing for fun, and defensive build = fun. Doesn’t that make defensive build the right way?

Fun is subjective, personal, and completely irrelevant in this kind of discussion. Some people have fun getting their genitals kicked.

That said, allow me to clarify: OP is asking if defense warriors are of any objective use or advantage: No. They are not. Performance wise, if you’re not going full berserker you’re simply doing it wrong.

Can you complete dungeons at all with it? Sure. Some people do naked runs. Does it bring any advantage? No. Same as naked runs. Is it fun? Irrelevant. Depends entirely on what you construe as “fun”.

Kagamiku.9731:

Also, keep in mind that full zerker is only superior because of the added damage it provides. Losing 20% damage to be able to take a hit or two is well worth it to players not skilled enough to avoid a lot of the mechanics throughout dungeons/fractals. The only scenario where full zerker is guaranteed to be the superior choice is when the player never downs. If a bit of extra tankiness provides someone will longevity to survive throughout a battle when they normally would not with full zerker—zerker may no longer be the superior choice. Regardless of preference.

No, zerker gear is better because there’s no reason for defensive play in PvE. Things you can tank you don’t need to, since you just maul them anyways, and things you’d want to tank you can’t anyways, since they hit too hard to be “tanked” – and don’t have to anyways as they can be dodged/avoided.

What you are talking about is a handicap.

Zerker is the superior choice as far as gear goes. Much like a bicycle with no training wheels offers better performance than a bike with training wheels. If you’re not good enough to run it, or have some physical disability that keeps you from being able to use zerker gear to it’s fullest potential, then yes, it’s better for you to play with a more defensive set. It’s still a handicap. It’s still underperforming.

If you won duels as a 30/30/10 full berserker ranger you were playing against crap players.

30/20/20 with a good mix of berserker and knights/soldiers can do…something… Provided you outplay your opponent…

30/30/10 full berserker is only for zerg play kitten ing around from 1.5k range.

Einherjar.5293:

But are defense warriors ok at all in a casual explorable run or do people just want zerkers today?

Dead weight.

Full berserker is the only right answer in PvE. If you’re not full berserker you’re doing it wrong.

Edit: Before the mental diarrhea above spreads any further, regarding parties and “who to party with”, the answer is, as usual, simple:

• The most efficient way to PvE in this game is full berserker. Anything else is inferior performance wise. This is not an opinion, this is a demonstrable fact.
• That doesn’t mean that this is the way you want to play the game. You’re free to play how you like.
• PvE in this game is easy enough that you don’t need to “min-max” to simply complete it.
• The secret is to party with people like you. People that want to play the game the way you do. A proper party description, or a quick chat after you join a party, really helps. If you want a full zerker optimal party, put that in the description. Ask for gear checks. Kick people that don’t meet standards. If you want a chill party put that in the description. Kick people that start stressing and kittening about your performance.

If you join a party with a clear set of standards and goals you don’t match you’re either trolling or a kittening idiot.

It’s a game. Play however you like. Just don’t try to force people to play your way.

This is really simple.

I have 2 variations of the same. Which I use depends on what I expect to find, party composition (if any) and personal mood:

0/20/20/0/30 in both cases.

Furious Speed and Unsuspecting Foe in the Arms tree.

Cleansing Ire and Shield Mastery in the Defense tree.

Signet Mastery, Mobile Strikes and Burst Mastery in Discipline.

The difference is whether I take Mace/Shield and Greatsword or Hammer and Sword/Shield. The former is better for small scale fights and 1 on 1s, while the later is better for larger scale fights and zergs.

Another good option is 0/20/20/10/20 with Hammer and Greatsword (or Sword/Shield). Pretty much the same but you sacrifice Burst Mastery for Leg Specialist. Obviously don’t take Shield Master if you’re not running with Shield. Take Dogged March or something instead.

Stats is usually a mix of berserker and either knights or Soldiers. In the Knight’s set I have around 3 or 3.1k armor, then everything else is damage with ruby orbs and everything, and my Soldier set has Melandru runes. Again, depends on how I feel about it and what I expect to be against.

Einherjar.5293:

I’m mainly a PVE player and i like to do dungeons sometimes. […] I find toughness to be a difficult stat for me. […] I’m only lvl 56 and just came back to the game after 4 months. Any help would be appreciated.

There’s your problem: You’re still a newbie, so you’re thinking “typical MMO”.

This is GW2. In PvE Toughness is incredibly easy to consider – you want none of it. Full berserker. Anyone telling you otherwise is either still a newbie and learning, or a scrub that refuses to learn.

Simply put, the current state of PvE dictates that there are only 2 kinds of mobs: Trash mobs that you don’t need to tank anyways, they just die straight away, and hard hitters you can’t tank anyways. Therefore you learn to dodge the big hitters and killing things as fast as you can to minimize exposure.

Yes, you’re going to find it a bit harder at first, since you might not to be used to dodging important attacks (don’t bother dodging the crappy ones) and will still try to tank stuff. But trust me, learning to berserker is the only skill there is for PvE in this game.

I’ve suggested this exact thing months ago. When ascended weapons were announced.

I’ve since been saying that the only way to salvage the whole Ascended debacle is to remove Ascended gear’s stat increase over exotic and give them the “stat change out of combat” feature.

EVERYONE will want to do them because of the convenience factor. But NOBODY would feel forced to do them¹ since they would not offer any statistical advantage.

That’s how you do horizontal progression instead of vertical…

¹ Except the Fractals crowd, but that’s the entire point of Fractals…

Ehhh… I think you’re all playing a different game from me…

Don’t have issues beating MMs with any class… they’re pretty unthreatening. What they really are is kittening annoying as hell to fight. Anything with lots of minions is a royal pain in the kitten simply because of the clutter.

Depending on how much AoE you have, your build, and how squishy the particular MM you’re facing is you either just train the necro and ignore the minions or kill the minions and laugh as the necro can’t do jack.

I got it after the “play anything you want” round, which was also the only round I played in that one.

The “play anything” round is the last round of each “match”, so I assume you have to play at least ONE round and be there by the end (after the “play anything” round).

Christmas Eve…

That said, earlier today Aurora Glade was as full of people as usual.

HorrorDuck.8415:

Also can I switch “bull charge” for “throw bolas”?

You CAN. Should you? No. Bull’s charge is a mobility skill. Throw bolas is just a projectile.

What this means is that Bull’s Charge can be used for more than CC. It can be used to get you out of a situation, or chase someone. And even if the enemy dodges? You still end up next to them. Bull’s Charge also can’t be reflected or blocked by anti-projectile skills.

Additionally, since it is a movement skill it synergizes with Mobile Strikes, giving you one more skill to get out of an immobilize. The mobility you get from everything together is ridiculous: 600 range (Leap) + 450 range while evading (WW) + 1200 range (Rush) + 900 range (Bull’s Charge)… That’s 3150 units of range! BEFORE you factor swiftness (which changes some skills, like Rush, giving them more range… although Chills and cripples will have the inverse effect)… All of them breaking immobilize.That’s insane.

HorrorDuck.8415:

KK, so what are the weaknesses of the build? http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fIAQNAR8ejkOBvxOGPMRCEkCNsKOKAQmQpwOqjUBxA-j0CBIgJDdRQmyYIa0HwpqCRJPaslRFRjVXDT5SQWDLp2bFRrWKA90VB-w

For my sake, I would do one more change: remove dogged march for Shield Master. You’re using a shield. Shield master is all matters of good… That said, you are using Melandru, so… Not terrible.

Weaknesses?

First, you have no range. This isn’t terribly given your mobility, in many cases doesn’t matter that much, but if you can’t physically cross the distance to your opponent you can’t do jackkitten (in WvW this is important in sieges, both attacking and defending).

Second, be wary of stun builds. Immobilize isn’t a stun. It’s both better (not nulled with stability, not removed with stunbreakers) and worse (specific anti-immo traits such as mobile strikes, is removed by normal condition clear) when it comes to clearing, but it has one major downside: It does not disable your opponent attacking… Stun does. If you immobilize an opponent, keep in mind they can still stun you, which leaves you at a disadvantage.

Third, you have limited condition clear. You don’t have any easier to hit bursts (such as Earthshaker) or Longbow (which doesn’t even need to hit to begin with), so you NEED to stay on your target to clear. This isn’t all that bad, since you have some mitigation from Melandru and your mobility is top notch, so getting to your opponents shouldn’t be too hard, but if you’re enemy manages to avoid you entirely at first, it can be difficult to get back to after you’re loaded full of condis to clear them.

There is nothing there that’s impossible to deal with, mind you, (except lack of range in siege wars…. You can’t do kitten there, equip a longbow if you must), just limitations to keep in mind.

I’m used to opinions on forums, especially balance opinions, being at a “bellow subhuman” level, so I’m impressed when I actually see one that makes sense even if its off the mark… Surprised.

That said, I’m saying it’s actually a suggestion that makes some logical sense, not necessarily that I agree.

Why? Because I’m not sure that would be a nerf to the mobility. On the contrary. With burst mastery you can have a burst every 7 and a half seconds… Rush has a 20 second cooldown… I understand what you were trying to do, make rush more restricted/situational without simply upping cooldown (which isn’t necessarily a good idea), but I think it backfired. I don’t think almost 3 times more Rushes would be a nerf.

The only time it would be a nerf would be exactly the only time it shouldn’t be nerfed and it’s perfectly fine: outside of combat.

Night Sentry.3902:

December 14, 2013

6 Months ago I brought you Mace/GS warrior before the Mace buff. Back when mace was considered the most useless weapon.

Before Mace buff? Meaning, back when mace was a useless pile of trash? Wasn’t that before CI and the Healing Signet buff? I.e.: Back when Warrior had practically no sustain, and Mace/GS was , in fact, a pile of kitten?

That’s what you’re bragging about? Ok then…

As for the build, it doesn’t make any sense to be perfectly honest.

First of all, why rifle? Longbow outperforms it in just about every sense except standing on walls taking pot-shots with killshot…. And even then Longbow is better for siege fighting due to both AoEs vs. rifle’s none. Longbow gives you better control, and better burst (not to mention more reliable) at the trade of some sustained DPS and some range… Given that it also has the single best synergy with Cleansing Ire, it’s pretty much the weapon of choice for ranged warriors these days for good reason.

Second, frenzy? Really? The Bull’s Charge > frenzy > HB gimmick was already a pile of feces back when quickness gave you the unnerfed 100% speed, now that that’s halved it’s essentially suicide.

But let’s accept the build as is and look into traits:

Why 30 points in defense when you take practically nothing of significant defensive value?

Dogged March is incredibly overrated, but you ARE running runes of melandru, so, sod it. Let’s go with that.

The real crime comes next: Balanced stance over Cleansing Ire…For what? Spiked Armor as a Grandmaster trait…

There aren’t enough words in the world to explain how… atrocious… that choice is… To put it in basic terms: You have 0 condition cleansing. You’re taking an absolutely crap trait (Spiked Armor), that only has a minor use against power builds and an “auto-stability” vs. ANY condition removal. One good condition build and you are dead. No ifs, you can’t clean anything.

And what about zergs? You can take single-target pot shots!

It’s not utterly useless… But… If this is your “OP”, boy there is a LOT of OP stuff out there!

Eiland.1405:

Today’s QQ is about the skill still sending in your last target direction even though u removed target before use, that’s right , right when u r trying to get away.

That’s lag, or user incompetence, I don’t have the data to ascertain which. It has nothing to do with the skill itself and is the same for any targeted skill in the game.