Guild Wars 2

I think you might have better luck in this section of the forum: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/guilds/guilds

Nerf BS and buff other builds – like they said they would several patches ago? I can always dream.

Eviscera.9703:

I agree that the BS thief should get abit nerfed in damage, but also compensated in health / armor or something else. I don’t think that the problem comes from the backstab itself, the combination between being behind the target, full berserker gear and the 50% damage signet is what makes it so kittened up.
Anet seems to nerf the kitten out of thieves without giving them something in return. An example is Dancing dagger that got nerfed by 50% and CnD by 33% without an compensation?!?! That’s just crazy imo.

It would go a long way towards fixing BS damage (I don’t consider it a nerf since I consider it to be broken) if they removed the ability to precast with steal/mug. Make it cancel the cast like using another skill or dodging does and they will still have BS from stealth but without the broken mechanic in place right now.

Regarding the nerfs to dancing dagger and CnD (and HS) with nothing i return, it was probably because they were judged to be OP and thus simply nerfed instead of had things moved around.

Huh, seldom I see an OP where I actually can say I consider pretty much everything stated to be false. Of course, it’s 3 months old and the meta has changed but it still shows an amazing lack of insight into other classes.

Considering Anet have already said that shatter mesmers (the other fotm) will get nerfed, I really hope that BS thieves get hit with the nerf bat as well. I’ve got nothing against thieves (I wouldn’t have a lvl80 thief otherwise) but the current abundance of BS thieves isn’t only ruining spvp, it’s also ruining the rep of all other forms of thief builds.

astrocanis.3195:

mavet.3047:

SoulstitchMMO.1396:

Buying gold, and 4 hours later you’ve got a max level toon, with full exotic gear… You can then go into WvW.

Isn’t this only slightly ridiculous. Giving people who buy the gold this advantage?

Um, you DO KNOW, that this game is PAY TO WIN – right?

Except that the items you can buy are only marginally better than the rest. As a PTW game, GW2 is quite poor in that respect. Having said that, I am enjoying the game.

Just ignore him. If you look at his posting history it’s quite evident he’s a troll.

It’s a good vid, I’ve also posted it on my guild’s forums :p (Vanishing Legacy, also on Gandara)

There’s no “best class” really, it depends on your play style. For solo pve I’d probably say warrior is the easiest one since mobs very rarely try to get away from the hard hitting, channeled skills, and you’ve got the highest hp and armor in the game. For spvp you’ll get boosted to lvl 80 and have access to all skills, traits and gear so you can easily try out what suits you best. Thieves and mesmers seem to be the fotm right now but mesmers will be nerfed soon.

This is another good warrior wvw vid from this week: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCRpSy6LA3s

digiowl.9620:

Given that he brings up the prisoners dilemma (a questionable structure outside of a paranoid baseline) i suspect the whole thing is rigged based on “neoclassical” economic thinking. Do ANet have an economist on staff to manage and structure the in-game economy?

Yes, John Smith is the Anet “resident economist”: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/john-smith-on-the-guild-wars-2-virtual-economy/

I definitely recommend finding yourself a guild, you might want to take a look here: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/guilds/guilds

For dungeon groups and such there are 3 common ways:
1) Ask in chat in Lion’s Arch for groups (it’s the main hub)
2) Ask in chat in the zone where the dungeon is
3) Use http://gw2lfg.com/ to find or advertise for a group.
4) Ask in guild chat (once you’ve gotten a guild)

For normal groups when leveling it’s probably best to ask in map chat or in guild chat. There are quite often mentions of group dynamic events in map chat so you might want to keep an eye on it for that as well.

astrocanis.3195:

Kakeru.2873:

cesmode.4257:

Uhm, you cant level to 80 in 4 hrs. Assuming youare talking about being bumped ip to 80 for wvw, this is practical as they want people on some what level playing field…and adhere to the “level the way you want”.

Buying gold via the game wont get you kto 80. Explain this please.

It can with maxing multiple crafting proffestions .

The most I’ve ever seen going is about 12 levels.

You get 10 levels for taking a crafting skill 0→400 (well, a bit more if it’s a really low level character). Since you can have all crafting skills one one character and there are 8 crafting skills, it will give 80 levels in total.

Don’t forget the smoke fields (especially OH pistol 5) if you’re going for a more tanky build. I don’t deny that some other classes are better at tanking but I’d say thieves still have plenty of it through other means.

Edit: One more thing. I don’t think Anet meant for all classes to perform equally in all roles (or if they did they’ve failed spectacularly). Some classes can tank better, some can burst better, some can provide more support, etc. It doesn’t mean all classes can’t tank, burst, support, etc., to some degree but they seem to have various strengths and weaknesses.

Yes, why can’t Anet punish people who actually work for a living and contribute to society rather than have time to waste sitting home all day, playing computer games and being a general drain on resources (be it their parents’ or wellfare)? /Sarcasm

People who claim this is p2w have nonidea what that term means. Being able to spend gold to get more quickly to the point where you want to be (which often isn’t lvl 80 unless you’re only interested in WvW since that would mean losing out on a lotif content) isn’t p2w since they aren’t getting more powerful than people who play normally. Pay to progress is completely fine and a model that also fits people who don’t have the time to play for hours upon hours every day.

brunohstein.9038:

Rainu.6871:

-Thieves have the minor trait Feline Grace which makes dodges only use 35% endurance (it still costs 50% but then 15% is returned).
-Thieves can trait to gain vigor on heal.
-Thieves can trait to gain vigor on steal.

Using a d/d condition thief I’m very seldom out of ways to avoid damage with lots of dodges, death blossom, roll for initiative and withdraw (which is both an evade and grants vigor)

And how do you do in WvW or sPvP? I run a similar build and it works well in dungeons, but fails in PvP.

I totally agree with the original post. Thief is already not that great, but those nerf requests are still coming. I am already considering leveling another profession.

I do quite well in WvW, running with a group (not a zerg) and using Short bow for sieges. Spvp is just a piece of cat babies so I don’t do it anymore and just hope that Anet will fix it before it’s completely dead.

-Thieves have the minor trait Feline Grace which makes dodges only use 35% endurance (it still costs 50% but then 15% is returned).
-Thieves can trait to gain vigor on heal.
-Thieves can trait to gain vigor on steal.

Using a d/d condition thief I’m very seldom out of ways to avoid damage with lots of dodges, death blossom, roll for initiative and withdraw (which is both an evade and grants vigor)

Hello and welcome! I recommend checking out this link:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/OMG-If-you-only-knew-this-tips-for-new-players/first

Keep moving when fighting.
-many new players are used to the standard MMO style of standing still and unloading your skills. In GW2 this won’t work for long so get into the habit of moving/strafing from the start
Learn when to dodge.
-Lots of enemies have heavy hitting attacks, often with added knockdown, daze, etc. By learning to recognize the animations that signal these attacks (glowing rays is the most common) you can see when to dodge and completely avoid the attack.
Gather nodes.
-Get gathering tools (and keep them up to date). Gathering from nodes give you xp and the crafting skills require quite a lot of mats.
Deposit collectibles.
-In your inventory you can select ‘Deposit all collectibles’ from the cog. This will place all crafting mats you’ve gathered into your bank and free up a lot of inventory space.

Quite a good summary. I also find thieves quite bad in dungeons and while it’s true that a good player will make it work, the same good player could probably perform even better on another class. As long as it’s not a GC BS build in a dungeon, it should be ok (too bad that’s what so many people insist on bringing though) as long as the person knows when to dodge.

Not towards you no, your post simply reminded me of all the QQing on the spvp board They have more fields than us, that’s for sure (although smoke fields are very nice) but their confusion stacking isn’t really a problem for most other classes (thieves get hurt more due to skill spamming) and unless it’s a scepter build (which usually is quite bad) the condition is on a quite long CD actually once they’ve run through their cycle. As I mentioned, portals allowing them to back guard so effectively is IMO the biggest issue.

Depends really on what you plan on doing with your thief. I’d say that despite having some support abilities (smoke field/black powder can be really good) it’s the class with the least group support in dungeons. If you decide to be brave and not follow the cookie cutter BS build but still want d/d and some AoE options I can strongly recommend going with a condition build. The poblem there though is that since you can max out bleed stacks pretty much on your own, the damage will take a hit if there are any other condition builds in the group. Generally, I usually prefer to bring another class to dungeons over my thief but the thief offers it’s own interesting playstyle as well.

I always find it kinda ridiculous when thieves who claim that avoiding BS is an l2p issue are complaining about mesmer bursts. With the current exploit they do about as much damage as a BS combo vs glass cannons with longer CDs and a longer set up plus you can see them coming. It’s not that mesmers are (normally) OP but rather that so many thieves are used to being able to burst people down so when a class that can do the same gives us a taste of our own medicine some people instantly cries OP. In both cases (thinking of a mesmer not using the exploit) it’s a burst that can kill a glass cannon if they don’t have a skill available for stun break/remove immobilize and can’t react in <1 sec. Mesmers are a bit OP in spvp, yea, but that is more due to portal than their burst.

Lvl 80 thief (condition specced) here, yes mug→CnD→BS is OP. I’d suggest removing the ability to precast with mug, the damage would be the same but it would give people a reasonable amount of time to react in comparison to other bursts. A thief is better when leaping around like a true fighter instead of relying on hiding like a coward

One idea that was suggested in another thread was quite good: disable precasting + steal/mug. It would do a lot to fix one of the most OP combos we have without really affecting any of the other builds.

Nicklin.3168:

The game is solo-able up to lvl 65 that is. After that, you pretty much need a group to do anything PvE. Go to any map in Orr and see how many people are spamming lfg for events.

It is soloable all the way to lvl 80 in CS. The reason people ask for groups for events is because they’re farming them and having a group greatly helps with tagging mobs in the DEs.

1. They’re the same as far as content goes. Some servers are more active than others ut that’s pretty much the only difference.

2. Power increases direct damage. Vitality increases health. If you mean Precision then it increases your critical hit chance. For more info, see http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Attributes

3. Dynamic events are good for xp and can often chain into one another. Get harvesting tools, keep them up to date and harvest the nodes you see since you get xp from harvesting and mats to sell or use for crafting yourself. Crafting is the fastest way to level but can be quite expensive.

4. At the moment you can change servers for free once per week, this will change at some point in the future but to date has been given and there will be notifications about it in advance,

OH dagger4 is often used to transfer conditions to your enemies (e.g. after BiP) and the dagger5 is nice for the weakness. Warhorn has better synergy with a power build but a d/d build is quite viable as well.

Condition builds with Epidemic work great in WvW, power builds with wells are nice for dungeons (as are well builds for healing, protection, etc). Minion master builds are pretty much never used past ca lvl 55 since the AI leaves too much to wish for, the only exception being the elite flesh golem for pve leveling.

I guess he meant that while the xp gain is supposed to level out at mid level (30 IIRC), lower levels have a somewhat modified xp rate. In other words, comparing e.g. 35 and 55 zones might (I have no idea if it will) give more equal results.

You continue to gain “levels” after 80 as seen on your xp bar. Every time it fills you gain another skill point.

As has been stated, nodes are individual.

Everyone who has “tagged” a mob gets full xp from it and loot. Tagging means you’ve done 5-10% damage (IIRC, I’d guess it might be different for champions and such). No idea about having a higher percentage of damage done increases the chance for better loot but I doubt it although it would be kinda difficult to reliably test. It seems that in WvW you have a higher change for badges if you do more than just the minimum to tag an enemy but this is purely subjective speculation that has been going around in zergs.

Reinholder.3460:

It’s not even the consideration of the back pieces. It’s downright insane that the function to be able to preview skinns irrespective of class has been taken away – seemingly as a response to the continuous and steady stream of complaints that Anet get about making the black lion trading post eve DISTINCTLY usable.

It’s been confirmed that not being able to preview gear you can’t use is a bug and will be fixed. Not being to preview on the TP though, that is truly annoying.

Anet have said there will be something akin to a scavenge hunt for precursors, no ETA has been given though. If you’re interested in the legendary I’d recommend getting the other ingredients first and then worrying about the precursor.

An AC speed run is way faster than 20-40min (I know we’ve gotten to the cannon building stage on path 2 in ~5 min from opening the initial door in the dungeon) but they’re kinda difficult with low level players and even more difficult if people aren’t very familiar and preferably on voice chat. Still, since xp isn’t affected by DR that is probably the fastest way to level if you can find a group that’s up for it.

Edit: note that speed runs are suboptimal if you’re going for anything except xp or tokens.

To paraphrase a class comparison some time ago (although then it was pce with warriors and engineers):
“An ele can output the same damage as a thief but rather than just mashing a couple of buttons they need to play Bach on their keyboard” :p

Not sure about story modes but the xp reward for an explorable path is 70% of the xp for the next level (total, not counted from where you’re at atm) and IIRC isn’t affected by diminishing returns so it’s a quick way to level.

What level is needed depends on the dungeon, you can theoretically do any exp dungeon at the level it is but several dungeons will give you major problems if you try though. AC is probably the easiest and while having some level 80s along really speed things up you can do it at lower levels as well (I think lowest level group I’ve run it with was 2 lvl 35s, a lvl ~40, a lvl ~60 and a lvl 80). It’s probably doable with only lvl 35s if everyone knows what they’re doing, what attacks to dodge, etc, but I’d still expect a fair share of trouble even then.

Most dungeons have paths of varying difficulty, the easiest ones shouldn’t be too much of a problem but the harder ones can be a pain (SE, how I hate you).

Anet have said that they are planning on making precursors available through more methods (IIRC a scavenge hunt was mentioned). It’s been a while since though so not certain if that is still on the agenda.

Fun thing btw, with the exception of dusk and twilight (and perhaps some other, haven’t checked in about a week) the precursor isn’t the most expensive part. If you’re going for a weapon that needs charged lodestones you better take out a second mortgage

It’s more CPU dependent than most other games with “pretty graphics”. A high end graphics card combined with a mid range CPU will still give good performance in games that are GPU dependent but GW2 spreads the load out more.

I’d say it comes down to the group and the dungeon. A good group usually has a mix but some dungeon paths are more forgiving or punishing than others. Protecting Magg right before the boss in CoF is a pain if you have too many GCs but Project Alpha in CoE or even protecting the ghost essence collectors in AC path 3 are a pain if you have a group slow on damage.

PUGs are a bit of a gamble, ypu might end up with a good composition or it might be horrible. It does seem that most people who don’t know how to do a dungeon (I despise the term ‘noob’ ) are GCs, something that might stem from GCs being very good for leveling and they stick sith what works in open PvE. Being a GC in a dungeon is perfectly viable in most cases but it requires you to know how the fight mechanics work, what tododge and when. Look at it like vit/tuf is your safety net for when you mess up, more experienced players have fewer fubars and snafus while inexperienced players will benefit from being able to stay upright despite a few mistakes.

Lvl80 thief (among other chars) here. The biggest problem IMO is the delay in thieves appearing from stealth. It’s not the only thing though, mug+BS(+HS) is also way too strong. It’a not unique to thieves that the burst is too high but with thieves it’s particularly bad since it can be done without the enemy player even seeing you first so there is no way to avoid it (especially with the problem of stealth not going away directly/model not loading).

I like the idea of a mobile thief who dodge around the enemy rather than just stealth+BS, making the d/d condition build more viable would be good since that’s the type of gameplay I’d like to see more of, agile combat over just using a bugged stealth system.

Fuz.5621:

MistyMountains.3751:

Gold has 0 effect on ur power in this game, “where” have you been?

Bullkitten.
How much does it cost to make the quiver? The ectos alone are worth a fortune.
Money DOES give you an edge against other players, period.

Two things about this. First, if you’re concerned about agony resistance then you can also get a backpack with AR from fractal drops (and you should have enough for it at the point when you start needing that extra resistance), also Anet have said that they will make them cheaper to craft. Second, if you’re looking at stats then the ascended backpacks are (going by gw2db) worse than getting even a rare one and putting in an upgrade component. If gw2db is wrong and the MF’d ascended backpacks also include an orb then they have 4 higher mainstat and 2 higher secondary stat.

I’d say move along since:
1) this seems to be a troll (or OP is a kid who feels cheated that people who can’t play for hours upon hours every day can have the same stuff he does)
2) there is already a longer thread about the gemshop and if it provides any real benefit so this one is likely to get closed.

I have a Razer Naga and it works perfectly. When I first got it a little over a year ago I thought I’d only use it for MMOs but I find that the precision is so great that my “normal mouse” just feels so inadequate in comparison

Best thing to do if you have the possibility is to try them out IRL in a store or some such to see how they feel in your hand. .

Not using dual axes myself but isn’t axe5 quite good at quickly refilling your adrenaline level after an eviscerate (e.g. if you’re using the traits that give buffs at higher adrenaline levels)

Quaz.4931:

This current system feels like it screws over the common player.

Two things:
1) who exactly is “the common player”?
2) how are they screwed over by this?

I see it as we have a limited amount of resources, 24h per day. In order to advance in GW2 someone can chose to either play for a few more hours or if they have a job they will do it, earning money that they can decide to spend in GW2 to get to the same level as someone who can sit and play all day. The important thing is that they don’t get to a level above people who don’t spend money, they only (might) get there faster. Considering how easy it is to get exotics though from dungeons (which also give you good gold) it’s a very small benefit though.

A very good read!

As someone who was really excited about the pvp pre-launch and now only do WvW once or twice per week I agree with the OP. I have the naïve hope that the reason there have been so few pvp updates are because Anet has realized it was a flop and are working on a completely new system. Likely? No, but when is a better time to hope than christmas

Fully upgraded fractal backpack is 24/17/17 + whatever stats you might have on your infusion. The standard one not having an upgrade slot isn’t a bug, you just have to upgrade it to get the infusion slot.

If you enjoy FFA with lootable kills you might actually be interested in trying out Minecraft multiplayer on anarchy servers. You can’t level up of course (well you can but xp is only used to enchant stuff and is reset on death) but you can gain better items by either crafting or trading them, or by killing someone else who has got them

On topic: I wouldn’t play on an FFA server since the game isn’t nearly designed for it but if a server could be set up without specific balancing or such that would take away HR from the current game then by all means, implement one!

I also get the distinct feeling that people are using p2w in a non-standard way here. P2w usualy refers to either being able to obtain better gear with money than is availible in game or being able to obtain gear immediately which would othervise require an absurd amount of farming/time. GW2 has in no way got the first one and the second one comes down to your definition of “absurd amount”. E.g. Planetside 2 also has a system where you can buy stuff with in game credits or buy them with RL money, that can be considered a p2w since the amount needed for a new weapon is along the lines of 3€ or ca 200h of game play. In GW2 you can obtain gear much quicker through e.g. Dungeon runs and if you combine that with some crafting you’ll have your character geared up in no time. As I said in an earlier post, what the gem→gold system does is allow people who don’t have as much time to do dungeons nor enjoy it to get their gear if they want to play WvW or some such.

Ascended gear and vertical progress might become a problem but at the moment it’s kinda moot to use it as a claim that GW2 is a P2W since we know nothing about how they will be acquired yet.

As for being able to use RL money to skip a time grind, that does not make it P2W. I’d generally say that people who feel that using money to bypass a time investment lack 1) a job and/or 2) a (social) life. For kids it’s alright to spend time instead of money to reach a goal but this model is great in that it also allows adults who might only have a very limited amount of time to enjoy the game without first having to grind for it if they’re willing to spend some of the cash they earned at work (while kids could play).

Warriors are a bit more limited than some classes in what they can do but what they do they tend to do well.

My warrior has PVT armor, berserker GS, cleric rifle and sapphire jewelry. I run a healing shout/damage hybrid and can remove conditions group wide, apply 10 stacks of vulnerability, and give my group fury and might all while healing them. Add in monk runes and the elite signet gives everyone aegis on a 48s CD. I will still often bring my guardian if there are none in the group from before but if there is an AH guardian to compliment this one then it is a dynamic duo I’d rank warriors as the second best dungeon class atm but not the second most fun to play though.