Guild Wars 2

Ranael.6423:

Crystal Reid.2481:

A few development updates for you guys since there are some things I can clarify here.

While Forsaken Thicket was 3 wings that encompassed a complete story line, that does not mean all raids will be 3 wings. We’ll do that where it makes sense, and sometimes it will make sense to release a stand alone raid with 1 wing if we think we have an interesting story to tell there that doesn’t need to be stretched out over multiple releases.

Sorry to hijack your answer but if you think you can break the cycle by having a raid only composed of one wing, do you also think that now bosses could also not live in circular rooms/platforms ?

Slothasor? Trio? Escort?

All I know is I’m rooting for Astral Authority.

Cynz.9437:

Tim.6450:

People actually think that elite specs are so OP and need to be nerfed to the level of core specs which I consider an indesirable goal.

Actually we have every right to demand it since Anet did promise us (and lied just like about MMR reset) that elite specs will bring variety but won’t be stronger than core. The sole reason why elites are so overtuned is sales, nothing else.

Source?

If A-net is going to be buffing mobs, they need to do so in a gradual sense. By this, I mean the lower-leveled zones shouldn’t be changed at all; the mid-leveled zones should have enemies with a new mechanic or two; high-mid level zones should have a few new mechanics; and the 70+ zones should have the most new mechanics.

Yes, yes, it may put off current players who had the “luxury” to go through it when it was face-roll. But over-time, this small, incrementing difficulty will churn out sturdier new players who will have less of a shock going from The Silverwastes to Verdant Brink.

Crystal Reid.2481:

A few development updates for you guys since there are some things I can clarify here.

While Forsaken Thicket was 3 wings that encompassed a complete story line, that does not mean all raids will be 3 wings. We’ll do that where it makes sense, and sometimes it will make sense to release a stand alone raid with 1 wing if we think we have an interesting story to tell there that doesn’t need to be stretched out over multiple releases.

Thanks for the clarification.

rotsono.9176:

Kuya.6495:

Zintrothen.1056:

Kuya.6495:

Don’t you think it’s a tad bit ironic to see threads littering the forums complaining about pre mades and threads complaining about queue times?

There’s a simple solution that takes some time and patience on everyone’s part. It’s call making the game good. Give back SoloQ, and then more people will queue solo, thus lowering queue times. With fewer solo queuers getting in the way of premades, those queuing as a team will have more competitive games. If they didn’t want competitive games, then they should be in hotjoin or even unranked. There’s a place for every kind of player in this game, but right now, the PvP places are mixed together and it’s kittening things up.

That would substantially drive up the queue times for premades.

Then split up.

That defeats the purpose of a premade…

I’d like said bookshelf to be an item in one’s home instance.

I assume a future reaper elite spec will use a shield, be “undead / ghoul” focused, and that will give blocks.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

How time changes perception.

These forums were full of criticism of Scarlet (’s story) for a very long time.

I’m not sure I’ve seen Scarlet in Heart of Thorns, anyway.

Right? I don’t have an opinion on Scarlet, personally. However, the sheer 180* some of these forum posts have taken is ludicrous. I remember when everyone hated Scarlet as a character and wanted her gone.

It’s one of several reasons I can’t take these forumers seriously anymore.

Josh Davis.6015:

So, we’ll likely change things in phases so we don’t over-correct. Here’s what we’re thinking for a phase 1:

• Reduce downstate invuln duration to around .1s. This means you still get the full condi cleanse, but you can keep cleaving.
• Cap rally distance.

Thoughts?

Edit for clarity: these would be PvP-only changes. Also, not including any skill proposals at this point.

I say that is definitely great for a first phase. Hopefully it will be enough. Let’s try it, and see where that gets us.

Donari.5237:

Sorry, I have no idea If it’s not classical music it’s very hit or miss what I will know.

As to new emotes for loving cats, custom emotes will do the trick with a lot more flair than some random kneel or stoop with a hand wave will do. Just type /e (your text here). Eg, /e reaches his fingers toward the cat. After careful sniffing, the cat gives a quick cheek rub to his knuckles before allowing a neck scratch. A faint purr rewards him.

It went viral about half a decade ago. I’m sure A-net would approve.

Donari.5237:

Most cats will resist the whole hugging phenomenon. It’s a mark of favor for some of them even to let you touch them. So an animated cat pet emote might look just as foolish as RL attempts to touch a cat that just sashays that micro-step enough away to avoid the reaching fingers

Tell me you know the song I was referencing.

As long as we eventually get hammer (and bunny pets), I’m cool with anything.

Blaeys.3102:

snip

Dude, your viewpoint is full of so many contradictions it’s a flip-floppity pancake.

Just let it go. We’re all cool here

Tissitra.4153:

Ragnarox.9601:

Thief has 3 dodge rolls thus its equal to DH triple more heal. Get it now?

No actually since your statement appears to be nonsensical as thief dodges don’t even heal last time I checked. EVADING AN ATTACK will heal DD, but not dodging as such. So the correct math is as follows: 3*Thief dodge=3*0=0 heal.

Sustain=ability to replenish your healthpool over time. This is different from the ability to avoid damage va dodge/block/stealth etc. If thief has a third of dh’s healing while having the same healthpool, then it has a third of the sustain. PERIOD.

I thought sustain was a mix of damage mitigatuon/recovery. Whether someone slides more in the direction of mitigation, or more in the direction of recovery, both cases can be considered “sustain” as long as each case carries a little of the other.

I love cats. I love every kind of cat. I just want to hug them all, but I can’t – can’t hug every cat.

Tragic Positive.9356:

Sorry, this is not how advertising works.
I doubt you’ll get viewers like this.

I don’t stream myself, but out of curiosity, what would you do if you had a stream you wanted to ‘advertise’?

Lobo Dela Noche.5127:

Like I have mentioned before, they will never do an investigation or ban anyone for this. As they would be attacking arenanet employees and their friends & families, plus all of those that are promoting the game in one way or another.

The only way to fix this with out attacking those mentioned above is too get the information out there way before it ever goes live on servers. They won’t do that though.

Then people will complain that those who pay close attention to the news and manage to read it first have an unfair advantage over those who don’t. Plus, those screwed over from not doing so would be in a far worse spot, since the number of people then manipulating the market would be greater.

Keep in mind that the WvW and sPvP reward tracks for bloodstone fen give 50 rubies on completion.

Tissitra.4153:

Razor.9872:

Do you think you can express your counter-opinions without lines like “you’re 100% wrong”, “most of your suggestions are outright bad or useless.”, “your post is nothing more than…”? That’d be great.

The wording may be off-putting, but he is making one valid point at least: it is quite likely that many of the DH players who ‘generously’ accept in their posts nerfs to say procession of baldes or dragon’s maw play one of the meta builds, which use neither of these things – and in fact, if you take into account their other suggestions (see OP’s post), the meta builds would be either mostly unaffected or potentially even slightly buffed by the ‘nerfs’ they are so graciously accepting. I for my part provided above some rather concrete calculations to underline where I see a major issue that can be depicted in factual numerical terms: healing/sustain.

Only accepting ‘nerfs’ that largely either don’t affect or even buff the meta builds of your profession IS NOT being ‘rational’.

You’re right. Thankfully the OP didn’t do that.

Ubik.8315:

All elite specs should be automatically enabled in SPVP, particularly if they won’t nerf them all into the ground so original specs aren’t at a massive disadvantage unless you’re a 420pro.

Fair enough. But then what incentives sPvP players to purchase the expansion if they don’t play PvE or WvW?

Tissitra.4153:

Ragion.2831:

Before it was “dh is trash”, “dh is the worst class in the game”, “kys if you die to dh”. Dh got the buff it needed now its “dh is broken”," dh is op"," anet why you do dis".

Dont you guys get tired.

Dh is fine. Unless you play thief, there shouldnt be a problem with dh. The way traps were designed is pretty silly but at least it doesnt break the class. It could have been much worse.

This post contains no factual arguments (I would not count ‘Dh is fine’ as one), but merely thinly veiled attacks against anyone who might not share your opinion.

To reiterate: balancewise, I see no reason why the healing available to DH on marauder should be literally 3 TIMES what the best builds the other professions with the same healthpool have.

Ragion.2831:

Before it was “dh is trash”, “dh is the worst class in the game”, “kys if you die to dh”.

= fact

Ragion.2831:

Dh got the buff it needed now its “dh is broken”," dh is op"," anet why you do dis".

= fact

sinject.4607:

this is a terrible, terrible post.

you’re 100% wrong when talking about DH being only effective in “lower tiers” of gameplay. every profession that isn’t Druid/Herald struggles immensely to beat a competent DH- condition and power specs alike. I’m in Legend and I still haven’t seen even the slightest reduction in number of DHs.

secondly, most of your suggestions are outright bad or useless.

• Procession of Blades doesn’t see use. who cares. you’re purposely suggesting a worthless nerf to just say “DH was already nerfed!”.
• your “nerf” to Test of Faith is an outright buff.
• Traps being reduced in size wouldn’t matter. this is still Conquest; unless you’re willing to accept a 50% size reduction this suggestion means nothing because we still have to play around points and that inevitably means stepping onto a small area. another aspect of traps needs to be changed.
• why would you buff scepter? singlehanded DH weapons are already the strongest option available and you want to buff them. are you even trying to hide the fact you play DH?

the only good point you made was changing Shield of Courage into 160 degrees instead of 180, which i already thought it was due to the animation…

other than that one point, your post is nothing more than a poor attempt at trying to redirect the focus away from DH’s true problems.

this is what should probably be done overall:

1. nerf Purification considerably. right now it’s 2x as good as the next “meta” heal (Shelter), and yet it’s on a 4 second shorter CD. DH has roughly 15-16.5k in healing outside of their actual heal; in this context, Purification healing for 10k is completely unwarranted.
2. nerf singlehanded Symbols. the biggest problem with DH offensively is their multi-source pressure. Traps, weapon attacks, virtues, symbols- it’s too easy for Conquest. traps seeing a reduction in size would mean nothing as i’ve already mentioned.
3. rework Traps so that they actually function as traps and not easy AoE spam. nerf active duration slighty, make all traps have a cast time (Test of Faith being instant cast is absurd), and implent a mechanic that forces Traps to have diminishing returns upon different players stacking traps: let’s say four DHs place Test of Faith on top of a point, one should do 100% damage, the 2nd should do 50%, and then the next down to a baseline 25% for the next two. this drastically helps with the DH stacking issue in a way that promotes smart use rather than spamming them without negatively affecting traps in 1v1s or non-multi DH situations.

Do you think you can express your counter-opinions without lines like “you’re 100% wrong”, “most of your suggestions are outright bad or useless.”, “your post is nothing more than…”? That’d be great.

Muchacho.2390:

Razor.9872:

Muchacho.2390:

Razor.9872:

Muchacho.2390:

Lucred.1802:

Muchacho.2390:

Question why was the pve down policy removed in the first place? Just curious.

Popping back up in the middle of an aoe with a third of your health and no buffs (and potentially still having condi’s on you from downstate) and immediately going back into downstate happens too many times and is too random as it is. I’m okay with it happening a lot, I’m not okay with it being random/unintentional.

Especially since downed players don’t trigger traps, a valid strategy is to drop a bunch of traps on a downed guy then let him rez himself (5-15 seconds depending on class, if nobody’kittenting him), he’ll pop back up with almost no health and get eaten by the traps which will trigger before he has control of his character again and has no chance to block/dodge and go back into downstate. A player in downstate for extended periods of time (up to 45 seconds from one set of traps this way) is way worse than a dead player that will rez in 15 seconds.

Wait doesnt the pve downed penality only effect down state health? So what you are saying dosent make sense.

No. After a person is rezzed, they come back with a lower health-cap for a while. Be extension, this means their remaining health percentage is also lower, so the lingering condi’s and mid-cast cleave can easily wipe them out.

Honestly you really confused me so i checked it in game but the down penality only effects downed state health. I always got the same intial health after a rally but the downed health did go ftom 75% to 50% to 25% and 0%. Like the tooltips states.

“For each point, your initial health bar is reduced by 25%.”
Initial health bar = health after rally.

But that is not how it worked when i tested it in pve. I guess you have taken that quote from the wiki but i think it means the inital down state healthbar. Well if you dont believe me go into pve and test in on mobs.

I have. That is why I think it effects after-rally health too. Did your health not rally to 25% on your 3rd down?

Muchacho.2390:

Razor.9872:

Muchacho.2390:

Lucred.1802:

Muchacho.2390:

Question why was the pve down policy removed in the first place? Just curious.

Popping back up in the middle of an aoe with a third of your health and no buffs (and potentially still having condi’s on you from downstate) and immediately going back into downstate happens too many times and is too random as it is. I’m okay with it happening a lot, I’m not okay with it being random/unintentional.

Especially since downed players don’t trigger traps, a valid strategy is to drop a bunch of traps on a downed guy then let him rez himself (5-15 seconds depending on class, if nobody’kittenting him), he’ll pop back up with almost no health and get eaten by the traps which will trigger before he has control of his character again and has no chance to block/dodge and go back into downstate. A player in downstate for extended periods of time (up to 45 seconds from one set of traps this way) is way worse than a dead player that will rez in 15 seconds.

Wait doesnt the pve downed penality only effect down state health? So what you are saying dosent make sense.

No. After a person is rezzed, they come back with a lower health-cap for a while. Be extension, this means their remaining health percentage is also lower, so the lingering condi’s and mid-cast cleave can easily wipe them out.

Honestly you really confused me so i checked it in game but the down penality only effects downed state health. I always got the same intial health after a rally but the downed health did go ftom 75% to 50% to 25% and 0%. Like the tooltips states.

“For each point, your initial health bar is reduced by 25%.”
Initial health bar = health after rally.

Muchacho.2390:

Lucred.1802:

Muchacho.2390:

Question why was the pve down policy removed in the first place? Just curious.

Popping back up in the middle of an aoe with a third of your health and no buffs (and potentially still having condi’s on you from downstate) and immediately going back into downstate happens too many times and is too random as it is. I’m okay with it happening a lot, I’m not okay with it being random/unintentional.

Especially since downed players don’t trigger traps, a valid strategy is to drop a bunch of traps on a downed guy then let him rez himself (5-15 seconds depending on class, if nobody’kittenting him), he’ll pop back up with almost no health and get eaten by the traps which will trigger before he has control of his character again and has no chance to block/dodge and go back into downstate. A player in downstate for extended periods of time (up to 45 seconds from one set of traps this way) is way worse than a dead player that will rez in 15 seconds.

Wait doesnt the pve downed penality only effect down state health? So what you are saying dosent make sense.

No. After a person is rezzed, they come back with a lower health-cap for a while. Be extension, this means their remaining health percentage is also lower, so the lingering condi’s and mid-cast cleave can easily wipe them out.

Josh Davis.6015:

This is something we’ve been monitoring for a while. We’re looking at a couple of different options here, but we do need to be careful making changes to something that is so integral to PvP gameplay (and as a note, we’d be making changes to PvP only).

Below are some suggestions I’ve seen on this forum over the past few months. We wouldn’t do all of them of course, but I figured I’d throw them out and see how you folks feel about them.

• Implement 1-to-1 rally policy, similar to WvW. This means that only 1 player would rally per enemy killed, rather than up to 5. Would likely be the downed ally closest to the enemy player.
• Cap the range at which someone can rally.
• Bring back PvE-downstate policy
• Shorten revive/downed “invuln” buff.
• Reduce healing per tick when rezzing.
• Further reduce downstate HP
• Adjust outlier revive skills (Function Gyro)

- Shorten revive/downed “invuln” buff.
- Cap the range at which someone can rally.
- Adjust outlier revive skills (Function Gyro)

I personally like the sound of these changes. They would be small, but healthy shavings towards balance.

- Implement 1-to-1 rally policy
I’m on the fence about this. I can see the pro’s and con’s to both sides. So I’d leave it out for now.

- Bring back PvE-downstate
Na. While I can understand the appeal, I feel this effect snowballs too far in the stomper’s favor. To the point where rezzing is a burden, not a virtue.

- Reduce healing per tick when rezzing.
I’m against this. Team-coordinated rezzes are high-risk high-reward, imo. And professions without specialized rez’s should not be punished for the few who do.

- Further reduce downstate HP
I am against this as well. Reducing downstate HP would only bring more reward for cleave than stomping. Also, I feel like rez’s would occur faster, which would further make stomps obsolete.

If we’re going to call for stomp/rez buffs/nerfs, we’re going to have to be very careful about it.

Be mindful that the slightest buffage/nerfage could result in further imbalance; if stomps are buffed to a point they can out-stomp specialized rez’s, then there will no longer be any point to rezzing.

I remember in NSP during the Marionette fight, this one uber-troll was constantly sabotaging our chances at victory…

He somehow managed to get in and suicide every siege golem in every lane — every attempt we made. Also, he would use up all the repair hammers so we couldn’t repair anything.

He did this constantly for one to two weeks. It was really frustrating. I imagine our server may have won much sooner if it weren’t for that prick.

Oh, the memories. :P

sephiroth.4217:

I’m a casual player. I have friends, family and dependants.

This “Casual” game has already sold itself it me because it was advertised as “casual”…
I can level up a character to level 80 in 20 minutes with tomes then get out there and enjoy the game, no grinding or chore like work. You won’t find me in raids or new maps unless the game itself forces me there, eg: acquiring OP HoT stats

10/10 GW2 awesome game to relax and feel like a God with very little time and effort invested into it. – Reaper Alim.

“OP HoT stats”?

Like, Vipers? That’s the only one I can think of.

kdaddy.5431:

Razor.9872:

kdaddy.5431:

You actually said if you quit trying your a loser. You said it doesnt matter if it took you 3000 games.

“There is no failure except in no longer trying.” – Elbert Hubbard

kdaddy.5431:

So if i may can we settle some things. People are frustrated in PvP 99% at Anet.

“93% of percentages are made up on the spot.”

kdaddy.5431:

They are just lashing out at other players. If you look at the threads basically everyone is complaining about how quickly they die at times or the inability to kill another class because you are hard countered with the build you were trying to use.

I know you were trying to be positive but you came off wrong to me with some of your comments.

Hard-counters (soft-counters?) exists but this game is balanced as a team-game. Most battles are won not through knowing how to fight, but knowing when to fight.

“What is morale is what you feel good after and what is immoral is what you feel bad after” – Ernest Hemmingway

Losing alot of games in a row because of a unbalance meta game isnt accepting failure but knowing the failure lies with in the system that you have no control of. Playing DH and throwing down 3-4 traps as i 1 shot a ele/thief/ new player isnt good for anyone. Its such a blunder that Guardian traps are so deadly yet every other trap in the game is laughed at. This goes for alot of HOT spec/skills.

If you want to talk percentages lets talk of how many things Anet promised and failed to deliver. If i made up a number to show this then lets see it. Legendary weapons promised to how many we got? HOT specs will create more build options and will not be stronger then current specs, would you say this was a lie? Fractal leader boards? How about meaningful changes to PvP and WvW? Player frustration comes from a broken game and promises not kept, 100% of false advertisement can make people mad.

Before HOT simple small changes made would change fights. For instance if you played rifle/hammer warrior with carrion amulet and went power/def/disc with body blows and a confusion trait you can do alot of damage and condi on stuns. If you play ele with cantrips you might not be ready and play fire/water/arcane. You lack stability and will lose the fight. If you trade fire for earth and use the trait you get stability on changing to earth you have now soft countered the build.

Lastly if you have to pick and choose a fight when you are the superior player somethings wrong. If you are 10X the player i am yet you are a thief and im playing anything that you cant counter simply because you are a thief. Thats a problem and pretending like that isnt a issue comes off wrong.

0 -That quote is so general that it can apply to any unreasonable sense of insecurity or entitlement that provokes negative emotion.

1 – S4 is likely one of the most balanced seasons as far as matchmaking goes. Let’s make that clear before we continue, because matchmaking balance and profession balance are two separate things. You may not have control over the system, but that does not mean failure is originating from it. If a DH has 3-4 traps, they are setting themselves up for weakness. Any DH with that many traps that can 1-shot people is sorely lacking in defenses. They have about 7 seconds worth of blocks and then they are open for slaughter.

2 – I do not want to talk about percentages, that is specifically why I joked about their credibility. You are the one who brought up percentages to begin with. However, I will go through your support regardless. Legendary weapons were promised. Legendary weapons were delivered. There were not as many as you may have expected, but that expectation is on you, for A-net never made a statement on the number of weapons they would release. So by this, A-net fulfilled their ‘promise’. A-net never stated that elite specs would be a side-grade to existing build options. They simply stated that they would be introduced. Again, assumption and expectations on your part. A-net did not state that they were introducing fractal leaderboards with HoT. Rather, while talking about things they would like to bring to HoT, they mentioned that they were working on these leaderboards. There was no promise made here, but you asserted one. There were incredibly “meaningful” changes to WvW and PvP. However, “meaningful” is a very subjective term. So using it as your support is questionable at best. Your frustration comes from your own assumed expectations and imagined promises. You perceived advertisement that was not there, so naturally it was false.

3 – This is true; this is also true after HoT. For example, A Reaper with Soul Reaping will generally pick Dhuumfire as their grandmaster. While fighting a condi-Berzerker, the Berzerker will most often win due to their frequent access to resistance and sheer sustained healing and heavy CC (from game-changers like Head Butt, which helps complete their CC-chain). However, if the Reaper chooses Foot in the Grave instead, that extra stun-break and stability can quite often turn the tables. The Reaper can regain the initiative, and have more chances to reposition & boon corrupt.

4 – No, nothing is wrong here. That is part of what makes one player superior to another. Wasting one’s time in an up-hill fight is unproductive. However, choosing to re-allocate your resources to other positions is part of the strategy. Take an RTS for example; players are not definitely considered superior to one another on solely their unit choice production and micro-management, but also their ability to conserve resources and base format. In short, superiority is multi-faceted. Finally, I will address your last example as an extreme case. In that example, if a thief is 10x the player of another, that thief could blow up that supposed hard-counter in seconds. It is when the players are near-equal that one must begin to consider positioning and combat-choice on-par with reaction time and survivability.

tl;dr: Your support was unsupported, and you are attempting to point blame where there is none.

Would be interesting if the gyro somehow performed every finisher possible, every second. So putting it in a field would utilize every possible effect from it.

(On second thought, that would pretty much insta-stack 24 might)…

But still a cool idea.

Just a week after launch, I had managed to save together 2 gold. 2 GOLD! This is back when t6 mats were 10 copper and gems were 30 silver for 400…

I could have invested…I could have started myself on a path of rich glory — but no!

After completing a couple cow-defending events in Diessa Plateau, I came across a “cattlepult.” Chuckling at the name, I got interested and talked with the nearby Charr. He told me that I should attempt to guess where a launched cow would land (I skimmed the text) and so I guessed the tower. Immediately after making my choice, I realized to my horror that I had just put 50 silver on the line.

The cow launched. It flew far…but not far enough, and landed in the harpy roosts.

“Oh, too bad…want to try again?” He said. I could almost hear his smug laughter.

I had to do it again. I had to win back my hard-earned silver…so I guessed tower again.

The cow launched. It flew far…but not far enough, and landed in the harpy roosts…again…

“That one almost made it. Too bad…want to try again?” He said. I could swear he was smiling.

I felt sick. In less than a minute, I had torched half my savings. But I hadn’t learned my lesson yet. Determined to at least win once, and restore at least a quarter of my losses, I chose the harpy roosts.

The cow launched. It flew far…REALLY far…and landed on the tower.

“Wow, that was a good one! Shame you guessed wrong. I have one last cow. Want to give it one more go?” He said with glee.

I was dead inside. Utterly without hope. But still, I decided what was 50 silver more to my 1g 50s loss? I was already screwed, might as well complete the sacrifice.
So I put my last 50s on the line and chose the harpy nests (third option).

The cow launched. It hardly even made it out of the cattlepult…and landed just a few meters away.

“Aw, dang! That was a dud. Oh well, and sorry, I don’t give refunds.” He said smugly.

By the bear. By norn-self almost lost it then. All my despair turned to rage.

THAT CON-CHARR! I CALL HACKS! LETS SEE IF YOU GIVE REFUNDS AFTER I SHOVE YOUR SNOUT INTO YOUR SKULL!

But alas, he was a “friendly” NPC, so my frantic greatsword swings didn’t do squat.
And that is the story of my greatest launch mistake. And also why I will never EVER sucker up to gambling again.

FYI, your pvp gearset isn’t changed in your hero panel, but rather a special window found by clicking the helmet icon at the top of your UI while in Heart of the Mists.

100% agree. Having a gold option to go hand-in-hand with the gold skins would be awesome.

Draco.9480:

There’s no best DPS since each boss has mechanics. It’s really primitive to make it 5 people buff just to force that ideology of different composition which i don’t see any different. People still take chrono druid and warr. so what’s the point. It’s really stupid decision anet made while all other games can buff entire raid which can have variety of compositions.

Perhaps, but ratios vary. So comps can still feel different even with the same general professions.

DGraves.3720:

TheNecrosanct.4028:

While what you’re saying is absolutely true, and a direct result of a “No Trinity” game, it is still a choice to go for that. If inefficient builds and gear give people more challenge and challenge is what they want, it clearly is an option to go for those builds. “The game forces me” is not really a good argument, because it doesn’t.

I feel like this is the wrong way to think of this. The reason why is because this returns to “make it harder for yourself!” which defeats the purpose of playing the game to begin with. If I have to make a game harder, but cannot modify it in any way, then I must do so within the parameters offered. What this means to me is that in order to increase difficulty I have to play worse on purpose.

This goes back to my analogy of the testing; instead of the test being reduced down to the student’s level now we have the class grade being upscaled by the student. The student purposefully fails a test so it is harder to pass? That makes no sense. Doing that does not make for genuine difficulty. As a matter of fact that’s outright self-sabotage.

It isn’t that the game forces me not to sabotage myself but instead that we must, at some point, admit that self-sabotage is not the logical course of action and therefore not an rational and acceptable course of action as an option. As far as I’m concerned that’s equivalent to being upset that you type at 90 wpm with two hands so you cut off your arm to see if you can get there one-handed.

A Trinity game will invariably have more options for build diversity, because you have several roles that need to be performed. In GW2, these roles are largely redundant. It’s the nature of the game and has been since launch. Taking it from there, the only real challenge in GW2, once you are intimately familiar with your class and the enemies, comes from new encounters, new traits, new enemies, figuring out the new best build/gear/rotation after a “balance” patch, etc. (I put “balance” between quotation marks, because I find the balance part sometimes lacks from these balance patches).

The developers however constantly reduce the number of traits, merging them, and completely obliterating the original choice set because it was “too complex”. The developers reduced the enemy difficulty across all difficulties because it was “too hard”. The developers have greatly increased the ease of which one acquires things in the game because it was “too rare”. Am I angry with the developer? No. However the players demanded this, the developer gave it, the business thrives (sorta) but at the cost of the integrity of the game.

GW2 when launched is an entirely different game from it’s current state. A large complex set of maps with a gliding mechanic built in doesn’t change the fact that the game is rendered easier and easier every single patch and honestly it continues to drop in ease. That’s not a bad thing, for everyone’s sake, but over time what this does is it reduces the game to a very … primitive state.

“Destroy the red bar.”

Once you make it steamlined enough there’s no other option; you realize that a number of traits, kits, weapons, pets, etc. are all … worthless. It’s junk. And that is how the slippery slope begins. You build in more junk, you change up the base stats so you can implement “tougher to earn” armor for no reason whatsoever changing the game from casual to mild gear grind solely so that the “psychological feeling of accomplishment” is present but honestly is that not just the playerbase asking for WoW all over again?

And what happens when Ascended becomes the norm? Raids. Cookie-cutter raids at that. Same old “learn the encounter, play the encounter”. I do feel for developers though, they have to contend with YouTube basically telling people how to play their game and exploration is really a player choice but still.

I ran around with a full Clerics guardian for a while (full ascended as well, because he was my main Fractals character). Taking things out on my own took a hell of a long time and was boring as hell to me, so I changed it to berserker stats and adjusted the build to do more damage. The point is that most people, after having done everything many times, just want it to go smooth and be efficient. Almost no one wants to wipe over and over again in AC after having done it a thousand times, especially not when you’re used to fast and efficient runs (which I am). That was fun in the beginning of the game, but not anymore.

So yes, damage builds rule in GW2. A bit less so in Raids, but even there the tanks and healers don’t need to be full tanks and healers to perform those roles and can still focus mainly on dps gear. It also makes this game easier to solo. In a Trinity game, try wandering around the world solo as a healer and then take down your enemies. In GW2 every class stands an equal chance of defeating everything in a fairly equal amount of time (well, in principle, that is, but that’s the “balance” in this game). This is just one of the things in which GW2 tries to be different from the old MMO standard, and in that regard they definitely succeeded. The effects of that, however, are not everyone’s cup of tea.

This is where I disagree. Open World Mesmer is not Open World Warrior. The difference in heartiness is ridiculous. You cannot say “I am as effective against Champion X with my Mesmer as I am with my Warrior!” because it just isn’t true. The game has classes, it has armor classes (never could figure out why that was), it has lots of differentiation but both in leveling and end-game there’s a tangible difference between classes and their principle capabilities.

This is why player choice is not there. If you built a Mesmer in Nomad’s gear you’d still die faster than a Warrior in Berzerker’s gear. For the light classes other than active defense it’s all damage or bust; you will get murdered if you go otherwise. You cannot, and will not, succeed in any capacity trying to take a hit.

So no, running around as a healer with excellent HoT (Heal over Time not Heart of Thorns) and an inherent aura saving your life in some other games is significantly easier than trying to outpace even a champion skelk with a Mesmer in full defensive gear. And the cost analysis is so bad! You lose all the damage which only increases risk which only increases player error. You take all the damage which only increases impact which only makes the inevitable hit that much harder.

It’s an internal design lose/lose.

I pretty much agree. I think at this point we need to start asking the hard questions.

- What can A-net do to lean ‘casual’ players in the direction of self-improvement, so they would be content with pre-nerf HoT?

It seems other games try to build their difficulty very slowly over time. I had thought A-net was doing the same, but apparently HoT was too much of a leap?

Aeolus.3615:

Razor.9872, HoT mobs were amazing fun and hard at the beggining.

Yes, until many cried for nerfs. The mobs were just apparently too challenging for the average player.

It really is a conundrum. Making mobs harder (HoT) created a large out-cry from the community for nerfs. Many threatened to leave the game, and this forum was filled with out-cry.

But making mobs as easy as they are isn’t optimal either…I agree that the current mobs are often very face-role.

So maybe the solution is having difficult content be in its own instances, away from the main content? (raids)

Nope, not perfect either. There are plenty of people complaining on the forums that raids are too hard — despite them being out of the way of the maps and with the absolute forward-portrayed intention of hard-content. This is because of 1) shinnies ; and 2) story.

So Hard content would have to be instanced off from main content, not reward anything that can’t be earned from an easier method, and not present lore…

But then half the fun of doing hard content is gone…

It feels like there is no winning no matter what A-net does.

I may be wrong, but I’m pretty sure the lvl 80 boost can be used in a “trail mode” of sorts. It will send you to the Silver Wastes, and let you test out your profession at lvl 80 in a sort of trail area. Just be sure to not fully activate it.

Or you can go to PvP and try things out that way. Either one works.

1 – The game is pretty active. Especially with mega-servers and map instances.

2 – Dungeons – no. You can pick up dungeons fairly quickly, and runs generally don’t take over 40 minutes. Raids – yes (sortof). You will need to invest a lot of time practicing raids and getting good at them if you want to clear them consistently. But after you do that, boss-fights don’t take longer than 20 minutes (finding 9 other people set up the way the group needs probably takes longer).

3 – I say go and level normally. It will give you plenty to experiment with and you will allow yourself to be slowly introduced to your profession, rather than being bombarded with everything you need to know all at once.

4 – It kind of depends on what game-mode you will be spending the most time in, but I can try to provide some general tips.

• Active-defenses (blocks, blinds, evades/dodges, interrupts, stealth, invuln) are stronger than passive defenses (regen, toughness, etc…). But using them together and learning how your profession is designed to survive and flow is crucial to success. (Dodging is imperative!)

• Don’t worry about gear in your early levels. Just equip the best stuff you get naturally from enemy drops. Save your gold for when you hit level 80 and want to begin really specializing yourself.

• Pretty much the entirety of the core-game is easy-peesy. And takes somewhat of a difficulty jump in newer maps. That is part of the reason it is important to get familiar with your profession early on. Many people never needed to know anything past their auto-attack and maybe their #2, and were in for a rude awakening when they were suddenly expected to dodge out of Area-of-Effect (AoE) attacks and Character Control (CC) breakbars.

• Be sure to go through your settings when you start the game and check/uncheck/bind all the things you want to in order to customize your game for yourself. If you don’t understand what something is, just leave it for then. You can always come back to stuff later.

• Clicking the gear-icon in the upper right of your inventory UI and clicking “Deposit all collectibles” will send any “collectibles” in your inventory to your bank’s collectibles tab. Also, when you craft stuff, these collectibles are considered available to you without you having to put them in your inventory.

• You can have a default of 2 different crafting professions per character. When you level a crafting profession but then want to replace it with another, your progress is saved, and you can come back to it later for a small silver fee equated from your previous crafting level in that profession.

• The “Renown Hearts” on the map are simply used to point you in the right directions. They are not the “main content” on the map. But rather, they are generally near places where “Dynamic Events” take place. This is the ultimate game for people with ADHD; there is no linear path to take — instead, just go wherever, explore, have fun, and do what you want to do. (very little ‘hand-holding’)

This is all I can think of off the top of my head. Sorry for the wall-o-text. Hopefully this will help somewhat. And if you have any questions, feel free to ask them in map-chat! You can also join good guilds who will love to help you out and give you pointers.

Cheers, and happy adventuring <3

I actually haven’t got around to doing it yet. I can’t wait to experience the thrill of doing it for my first time

We are getting to the point where maps with map currencies (such as Drytop, and Silverwastes) aren’t being played very much anymore.

I would like it if there was a weekly map that gave greater rewards or perhaps a special type of reward (I know, I know, another currency).

tl;dr: Having a “flavor of the week” map on-rotation would be very refreshing.

I think this is very constructive criticism. Good post. I hope A-net reads this and brings it up in their meetings.

Dadnir.5038:

When looking at the Druid, we can say without a doubt that this elite spec come from the racial background of the human race.

Really? I don’t feel that way at all. In my opinion, Druid is more closely correlated to Norn than humans — and even that is a stretch.

Paulytnz.7619:

The funny thing is you are ALREADY “experiencing the end game content”. I see this all the time in these kinds of games. People always asking or saying things like:

“how do I make gold fast?”
“what’s the best/fastest way to make gold”
“that game content is pointless because it’s not the best method to acquire gold/xx item”.

Tbh I think there is an unhealthy mentality out there for a lot of players. I am not saying any of you that have posted here but I have seen it a lot in my time in online gaming and not only in this game. That unhealthy mentality is “got to keep up with the jones” or “I must get this fast or have it yesterday”.

I have had many many people on my friends list in another game I played on and off for 10+ years who had this mentality and for the most of them they never did get to really enjoy the game for very long.

Meanwhile I just did what was fun for me and funnily enough the gold/wealth just came with it. You see if the gold is not your focus it will build up without you even noticing it. Yet if your gold is the focus, even when/if you are doing the best methods to acquire that gold whatever you are doing will seem like a chore and you will feel that you are getting nowhere or too slowly simply because you are not enjoying that content any longer.

I am not here trying to preach to others how they should play the game. But I am saying a little of what I have seen a lot in my time in mmos.

Having said that, lower maps DO have worthwhile reasons to go back to them, some are:

1 – For fun or sense of discovery all over again.
2 – Map Bonus items you or others may need for crafting.
3 – Collections as other people have said already.
4 – Other achievements such as JPs, Kill xx monsters xx amount of times etc.

Maybe just take a break from focusing on making that gold for a wee bit and just have fun again? Who knows you may not notice it and that gold may just jump up a bit without you even realizing it or worrying about it.

^ This guy gets it. Just play what you want to play. Sure, you won’t have the shinnies to go hardcore-raid/fractal as early, but your overall experience will be more fun and it will last longer. Quality AND Quantity.

I wonder if the names are stored client-side or server-side.

If they are stored client-side, I wonder if there is a file that could be deleted?

EphemeralWallaby.7643:

Charr
Many builds to explore
Narrative
Large variety of content to do at lvl 80
Large variety of content to do before lvl 80
Non-competitive resource harvesting
Waypoints instead of mounts
Charr
Meta-events and renown heart quest system
Map diversity and scenery
Many treadmills that don’t feel like grinds
Movement during combat
Skills that don’t take up 1/3 of the screen
Charr
Gliding
No trinity/roles except the ones you make for yourself
Each profession feels different from all the others
Still functioning economy
Forum arguments

oh, and Charr.

~EW

Don’t forget about Charr. Those kittens are badkitten.

Djinn.9245:

Obtena.7952:

Djinn.9245:

Razor.9872:

Edit: Also, the mainstay of my response was directed toward your statement -

Astralporing.1957:

Raiders don’t group with raid noobs.

Which I presented as false.

Did you present this as false because you know for a fact that all (I’ll even take most) raiding groups in GW2 will group with raid noobs? Or is this just your opinion based on your limited experience?

Sure, there are engineered parties of 10 people that only raid with each other, but yes, there are raid groups that aren’t like that. In fact it had to be because every person that raids was a noob at some point. That’s not based on data, that’s just a logical conclusion.

Yes, every GW2 raider once had never played a GW2 raid. However it is my opinion that most raid groups are formed of guildies. I believe that its very rare for a PUG to become a regular raiding group. And since a raid group is normally a “full” group, why would they leave out one member in favor of a non-raider? And how would a non-raider find such a group willing to replace one of their regular members with a new raider?

A pug doesn’t have to become a regular to raid. I will repeat again as the hyperlink that I posted had stated — there are plenty of experienced raiders who continue to join pug groups throughout the week after they finish clearing everything in their main group. They do this because they are bored, but as a byproduct they end up carrying/teaching people new to raiding.

In conclusion, you don’t have to “become a raider” to raid. Just join later in the week, and you’ll likely run into experienced raiders looking to have more fun beating bosses.

Aeolus.3615:

Tissitra.4153:

Aeolus.3615:

We actually need to press a button for a “Passive block” ?… that needs to be timed against a heavy skill?

So that is a passive that 2 Automatic auto atacks can resolve…

The only passive guardian has a block it is the 40/30 sec on virtue… all others are active and need to be timmed againt certain skills.

Guardian/DH w/ob locks dies faster than a thief, guardian is a squishy class due its low health and heavy armro is just arround 7%-10% damage reduction , reason it needs the blocks to feel sturdier.

Go play as a mace/shield shout build and tell me how many matches u can win, or tank really awfull bad players.

Yeah of course DH just DESPERATELY needs to be able to heal fro 20k every 30 seconds and have more blocks/invuln than everyone else. And surely the only reason you see everyone and their mother playing it is simply that people pity it so much…

I do need that, i have 10k-17k HP… and cant escape, and btw show me that amazing build that ur talking about….

Only way to play guard/DH is trap/meditation otherwise cant do nothing, and DH need to have Virtue trait to have stability on its f3, if a DH pop ups F3 and didnt gain stability he can be disrupted even with the defenses up…..

QQ about blocks on guardian/DH is the same to ask to the player to put hand of keyboard, they dont have any other way of survival, and mace shield builds DONT DO DAMAGE, and not gain any surviability by just blocking a few auto atacks…

• Comunal defenses has a internal CD of 15 seconds

• On the above build to have stability and aegis on block aegis won heal since 3 traitlines are choosed no space for a 4th one.

• if a DH heals on block using mace shield (and heals for a good portion), it is a build that does no damage all u need is keep auto atack, even if they had 30k hp it is a joke of a build, also means DH had to sacrifice valor or virtues trailine to use honor, so he dont have stability or dont have comunal defenses.

• DH wings of resolve, is easilly interrupted, DH needs first to use stability to avoid it to get skill interrupted.

• All health is puer deppendable of 10k hp + stats, blocks are there to cover the lack of health class has a heavy.

• class is super weak outside DH with meditation and traps… wich exist to make class in pair with other classes damage.

• a guardian to heal 1.2k on block has to wear cleric wich is a auto kill for who is playing pvp, with a class that makes no damage and has 12k hp.

+1 for realistic statistics

Astralporing.1957:

Razor.9872:

Astralporing.1957:

Gunsnroll.2657:

Don’t tell me you can’t do one escort to unlock the mastery, come on.

You need people with raid mastery in your group in order to do the escort. Raiders don’t group with raid noobs.

Yes, there are raid training guilds out there, but they are for people genuinely wanting to start raiding, not for unlocking raid mastery bars.

Besides, the point remains. The exp bar is locked behind an activity that Anet specifically wanted to be done by only a small minority of players.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/The-super-easy-way-to-get-into-raids

Let me quote to you again the part of my post that you seem to have missed:

Yes, there are raid training guilds out there, but they are for people genuinely wanting to start raiding, not for unlocking raid mastery bars.

This thread is about non-raiders, if you haven’t noticed.

I did not miss it. And I am fully aware this thread is about non-raiders. But if you had read the OP’s post in the thread I provided, you’d have realized that since weekly-raiders clear the whole wing early, they are “left with not much to do during the rest of the week leaving most of us who like raiding to either PUG or form teaching groups just for fun and helping other people.”

You don’t have to join a raid guild or get serious into raiding to grab those mastery bars.

Just simply hop into a raid a little later in the week and it could end up being an easy-clear.

Edit: Also, the mainstay of my response was directed toward your statement -

Astralporing.1957:

Raiders don’t group with raid noobs.

Which I presented as false.