Guild Wars 2

Also, we increased the base healing for tempest, because we felt it was too low…

Awww bad idea.
Imagine it with all these CCs… you ask to to ruin pvp here

@Slim
Wow now that i think about it… it actually makes sense
Well i guess this is what creates that much hate about thieves- we either feel like gods to the person who got us as you said, and therefore get hated because that person thinks we’re OP etc and cannot accept defeat, or we just suck because of the team’s composition and the other stuff, and end up being hated by our team. Either way, we get hated
(Side Note: You wrote it in a brilliant way )

Serious Thought.5394:

This begs the question- would you balance by pro or by player? Because, the way you make it sound (and thanks for ignoring my post which literally said what you said…) you want the barrier to entry to stay so high that players freshly picking Thief will throw it away instantly. No one will pick Thief and go “jeez, this is fun, balanced, and enjoyable” it’ll be “why the kitten can they do that? better try me one of them other classes”.
To reiterate what I said earlier (and hopefully get someone to read it…doubtful. when you’re right, people look away or try to make you sound wrong)- the barrier to entry can be removed by increasing the hp from 11k base to the 15k base. This gives more leeway for mistakes. The barrier to viability can be REDUCED by making Preparedness baseline, as all costs to Thief weapons are based around ALL THIEVES having 15 initiative, thanks to that one trait. Don’t believe me? Play anything minus Staff (…), and watch how hard it is to be even remotely useful. The answer isn’t adjust init, because they gotta balance the 12 and the 15- the answer is just make it 15.

For reference- Rev has 15k hp, and can play marauder easily. Reason? Lots of self healing and a fairly durable class setup. Also, Mesmer’s got Illusionary Persona and a +15% phantasm damage boost because…reasons- but no prep for thief.

Anywho, betting money I get argued with for being right because someone wants to argue OR no one reads this.

tldr- you won’t read it, but the fixes are 15k hp (medium value, not the low value) and preparedness (+3 init) baseline. won’t happen, but it’d be the least amount of work for the devs and it’d bring players who thief back.

PS- I agree with Krysard to a point. Its not undertuned, but outdated and unloved. Weapons are just fine, the traits need help though. And a lot of our utilities (Signet of Shadows and Scorpion Wire are a fantastic start).

I 100% agree. And i want to highlight something- the people you all are talking about are professional players with ton of experience with the class .
do you really want to balance a profession around “pro” players? The community is much bigger, and most of the people who play pvp are -average+.
I think most of you will agree it is just not fair for normal players.

I’d like to see more guild-related activities, and also some new cool ESpecs..
I’d really like to see the idea of guild hall being developed into something even more amazing than it is now- maybe personal rooms in the guild hall that can be assigned to guild members, or guild master’s office? :P having sort of a housing system inside the guild hall could be amazing imo and ofc as other people already said- new skins!!! maybe dyeable weapons? It’s sometimes saddening when i find a good looking weapon but then understand it won’t go well with my armor colors :/ what about sort of underwater maps? Bringing back this amazing battle mechanic could be amazing (i said bringing back because it’s mostly not used in the game :/ and it was one of the 1st things that made me really excited when i just started playing the game) a new race could be amazing i remember that in the LS2 the priory mentioned an underwater dragon- it’d just fit in, having an underwater-based expansion! also, i heared that some people asked for having the underwater pvp map again.. just sayin’ ;D (i didn’t play it, though.. it was before i joined the game i just heard about it from my friend who played since launch )

Hey
Since HoT launch, i remember tons of threads about many issues in the game. People were angry about pvp balance, hard meta events, nearly impossible minigames and so on… But the thing i remember clearly from all those threads was that at some point, someone would say something like “well Anet doesn’t even care about it”, “OP, go check reddit if you want to see something”, “Anet went silent since HoT”, etc… It all sounded as the normal forum rants, but i actually found it somewhat true. I always checked the forums on daily basis since i started playing 7~ months ago, and i remember seeing lots of “red threads” (aka threads with dev’s response) pre-HoT, but around the launch of HoT- not much, if any. It kinda troubled me to think that those ranting people are maybe right in some way, tbh. Back to the topic, in the last weeks i noticed more and more threads about communication between the devs and the community. Yet, most of these threads remained unanswered or just got buried by new topics.
But after some time, i opened the forum to discover 2 “red” threads about communication! it made me really excited, tbh… And then, after Gaile’s communication threads, i started seeing more and more “red” threads!! Announcement posts, bugs explanations and even just discussing
I know i might sound over-excited, but it really makes me feel good to see that the game’s developers are listening to the players, give information and discuss things with them After a long time of hopeless feeling about the game’s future, i finally feel like we’re getting on the right track Sure, the game still has a long way to go by many means, but if the devs will keep communicating with us like that, i’m sure the game will only keep getting better! So i wanted to say: Thank you, Anet, and please keep up the good work you got here so many people that want to hear from you, and discuss things with you
/Cheer

Henry.5713:

Would be interesting to see something designed around our fields. Most of them don’t even have a good use in PvE. I’d much rather have our skills or abilities play a main role than gaining an object you have to use quickly (bombs during the sebetha fight for example).

Situations that would require you to use certain fields for their properties:
-Fire fields to burn an object or to light a fire
-Water fields to extinguish a fire
-Lightning field to electrify something
-Light field to damage some undead object
-Ice field to freeze something

The only downside is the imbalance between the amount of fields classes have. Still sounds interesting to me.

THIS.
Wow i always wanted to be able to use fields in a realistic way, like that.
Also, the anime Log Horizon is fuuuuull of amazing raiding ideas :P (also, i’d love to be trapped inside a game.. hehe ) just watching this anime like 4/5 months ago made me wanna raid

OP, you forgot we’re the only class (as far as i know) with no access to stability :P

Nice video, thanks for sharing it!
I tried the build you used (with some little changes for my playstyle) and it works perfectly! thank you so much for linking it ^^ it made me remember the playstyle i like, that i somehow forgot some time ago i guess i just needed the right build to remind me of this

vana.5467:

Zoltreez.6435:

eeeeeeeeh no
meta is full of bunkers that allready cant be killed
nerf the bunkers instead then we can start looking on the dmg.

To be fair, the ridiculous damage introduced by HoT was part of what promoted the bunker meta in the first place. If they just nerf defense, you’ll have people one-shotting each other left and right.

Aka zerker meta :P
And then the whole cycle of metas will start all over again…

Wargameur.6950:

Reem.3578:

I’d like to try and join the EU run, if there is a place for me there
I can fill any role, just tell me what you need and which gear to get

Character’s name: Hestia Shadowalker

Edit: character’s name

Of course there is

With Reem and DasPatAttack added to the team we are only missing 2 people on the EU side.

Yay! ^^
Just tell me the build you need me to use and the gear to get a little time before, okay?

Inspecting??? Hell no!!!! :<
^that wasn’t an overreaction
As people mentined above me, try imagining what it would do to the game…
Why did you suggest such a thing? (I really wonder, no offence! )

Xillllix.3485:

Gaile Gray.6029:

The team is actively working on balance changes.

This is my feedback:
You can’t have balance without build variety. If GW2 is to be balance Anet needs to start by making all the useless skills and traits useful, like the elementalist elites and overnerfed Ice-Bow, over-nerfed Engineers Turrets, racial skills, etc.

Diamond skin was once a useless trait like this.
need i say more?

Balance is not that simple- for example, the changes that made DS be that good are the healing that the auras give+protection, etc…
Some traits can synergize with others to the point they over-react to each other and create something really powerful.
When you try to balance, you have to try and think about the other things around it that might make the change unacceptable.

I can’t wait for the patch no matter what will happen, it’s gonna be interesting
I just want this meta to shift already, hopefully to the point that thieves are included in it… :P
The good things that i got in this meta is learning to actually play for fun and learn when to quit and go for unranked

Also, yay for communication!! \o/ you just made my day

Btw, red orbs can be immobilized, stunned and dazed as well.
Using pistol 2 to immobilize it and pistol 4 (if somebody’s using p/p) afterwards should keep it okay, because it takes 5 sec for the green circle to charge and it takes like 2/3 sec for 3/4 people to get into it.

I’d like to try and join the EU run, if there is a place for me there
I can fill any role, just tell me what you need and which gear to get

Character’s name: Hestia Shadowalker

Edit: character’s name

3 black diamonds are required for each armor piece.
last time i checked it, it was like 2.5 gold per diamond on the TP.
(2.5×3)×6 (armor pieces)= 45 gold= a lot of money.
And i didn’t even put the weapons or the accessories into it…
That’s all the math i need to see that sinister is for me :>

Hannibal.5739:

how about adding sais & shurikens

No need to implement new weapons- just make a shuriken-shaped focus skin and be done with this :P
(I hope they won’t read this thread, because it’s so like Anet to give us the worst suggestion ever made and say we asked for it lol)
Though i’d like to get it someday… any skill that uses shuriken/katana/any-ninja-stuff is welcome

Seriously, what’s the point? People will always find stuff to complain about. That chain will always repeat itself endlessly unless the devs could find a point of equilibrium to leave the balance at, something that i’ve never ever seen in any MMO yet.

Nicely done!!
And if any dev is reading this:
Please, please give us some access to stability!! ;.;
(Even just on impact strike…)
:3
I’d like to see more discussions in the chat, though
There’s nothing funnier than discussing some stuffy stuff there!

Paulie.6215:

We’re down to discussing the NEXT elite spec now? Have things gotten that bad?

Well…
Yeah.

I’m stuck for like 1 week in sapphire tier 3 =_=
I get 2 pips with 2 wins, then lose them both in one match or in the next losing streak.
Playing condi thief/tanky druid build. I used to play pvp all day long, but now I barely play 1 match in a day…

Narcarsis.5739:

Already works how you describe. The only two teleports are Portal and Spectral Walk.
Everything else is affected by player created obstacles. The game Judy’s assumes that if we have instant run speed we’re smart enough to run around an object rather than into it. You can see the affect of player made obstacles with Ring of Warding (Hammer Guardian) and Ring of Fire (Off-Hand Dagger Ele) as you can’t Shadowstep out of these without the negative affect.

Pretty much this.
Also OP, notice that using the thief’s skill 5 in shortbow (which is a classic shadowstep) to “jump” on top of the side-thingies around mid point in kyhlo is available only near places that are connected to the ground somewhere. If it’s totally seperated from the ground you’ll just get “no valid path to target”.

Hi! ^^
if there’s anything left, i’d like to recommend someone from the higher ranks in the guild i’m in, Exploration Unit [MAP]: ign- David.5761.
He’s the most dedicated guild officer i’ve ever seen anywhere- he gave everything he could and to build our guild hall and took the task of being the scribe, all by himself. He encouraged guildies to donate to treasury when they forgot to, and i’m sure we wouldn’t even make it to lvl 15 without him (we’re lvl 35 now). He used so much gold and materials to get the scribing to high enough lvl and he always fill our guild hall with new stuff. In my opinion, he deserves something really good (i’m gonna try and arrange something with other guildies, but i saw this post and though it’d be an amazing idea ^^)

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

you are of no help to your team if you die within 3 seconds.

And for that you need a bunker build…
Sad, but true.
(Note: i never use bunker build, and i HATE this meta.)

“Can quaggan help you…?”
(Gotta keep that awesome thread up troll face)

“Just keep running, you idiot!”

cocowoushi.7150:

Please consider curly hair for both genders next time. Long and short styles. Please!

Huuuuge +1

Gaile Gray.6029:

An Update from our Balance Team:

As developers, we try to push certain aspects of gameplay that align with our vision for the game, but unfortunately things don’t always pan out the way that we hoped they would. A current example of this is the bunker meta that has formed in PvP over the past two weeks across all tiers of play, from Amber Division all the way up to our Pro Leagues. We’ll be honest: we’re not happy with the current meta, and it certainly doesn’t do a great job of showcasing the things that make Guild Wars 2 great, namely our action-based combat.

While our post-HoT balance strategy is to deliver a major balance update every quarter, we do want to emphasize that if glaring issues arise during seasons we won’t hesitate to address them. To this point, on Monday we announced that we’d be making a few mid-season balance changes. After lengthy internal conversation driven both by discussion on our own forums and on other platforms, we have decided to implement one more additional balance change with this week’s update.

Mesmer:

• Well of Precognition: This ability now applies distortion instead of blur and prevents capture-point contribution. Casting time has been increased from 0.25 seconds to 0.75 seconds, and aftercast delay has been reduced from 0.5 seconds to 0 seconds.

A fair number of gameplay implications can arise from such a seemingly small change, so we want to be very clear with all of you regarding our intentions. First and foremost, we understand that this change may have impact on other areas of the game, and that is precisely why we’re viewing today’s change as a short-term solution. We’ll be revisiting all skills in our end-of-January balance update, and we’ll be sharing the specifics of the planned changes with you in early January. In the interim, because this skill will be classified as "no-cap”—meaning that it does not contribute to capture point progress—we’d suggest that you keep an eye out for mesmers using this skill in PvP matches, as they could potentially cause you to decap a point in a way similar to the stealth function. The change to this skill will now also prevent you from interacting with certain channels objectives, such as supply piles in Stronghold or the Meditation buffs in Temple of the Silent Storm.

This change will be included our in hotfix later today.

O.M.G.
Good job, balance team…
Finally, first step in the right direction.
Gotta endure the rest until january, i guess… x.x i think i’ll take a break from pvp until that patch. I feel that i’m getting too salty with this meta… As a wise OP frog once said: “better hold you breath!”

Drennon.7190:

They have your $50. They don’t care anymore.

lol on the post…
And the signature

But well.. i still think that an OP thief is better than a useless one. It can potentially keep some other classes in check and make the players be more aware to their surrounding in a match and require them to pay attention, as i said before… it makes me really sad to see how brain-dead this meta is, and how huge is the difference between the classes, efficiency-wise. I’d like to see balance in a state that you can actually play every class that you want and be viable/good enough. I can’t see it happens in the foreseeable future, but one can dream… :/

Starfall.6425:

Thief is a victim of it’s own game mechanics and how Anet progressed the PvP powercreep.

Thief has no viable bunker and no viable support so the only thing that is left is damage… with damage you have two options:

1) Either the thief is able to (nearly) oneshot people. Then he is extremely OP because of his stealth and disengage, he just resets the fight and tries again to oneshot you; no escape.

2) Or he isn’t able to oneshot anyone.. then he is basically useless because whenever he tries to engage he runs high risk of dying to direct damage or some aoe.

As long as this is the extend of thief mechanics he will always be OP or useless, never balanced.

Yeah that sounds right.
The only team support thieves had (to some extent) was stealth rezzing. Then came HoT with AOEs, hard CCs and tons of reveals flying around.
To make thieves balanced from the support aspect, there’s need to totally remake that class, because inserting random stuff with the next eSpecs won’t solve anything :/
Now imo, the problem is to find somebody from the balance team that cares about it

Urejt.5648:

cool but this is condi rev meta with perma resistance

Perma resistance is gone today
Yay!! \o/

@Aomine
lol
Yeah, having almost the same balance for pve and pvp is kinda bad :/ though i think seperating them isn’t really practical.. like, creating different teams and trying to get everything right sounds like one big mess.
I still hope it’ll happen someday

And hell, play thief for a little bit and come back to complain about stealth… it’s obvious. I can time my GS block as a ranger with the incoming backstab (yeah i already did… more than once). Pop up aegis, use AOEs, use some traits.. BE CREATIVE. That’s all there is to it. Think. Don’t spam abilities and expect to see everything running right into your face shouting and announcing their presence. PvP should be a matter of strategy and creativity under pressure, not spamming random stuff.

Everyone who get 1/2 shotted by a thief should simply start watching the screen and their char’s back while playing… don’t be surprised to get a backstab if you stand on a high wall near mid in the foefire without watching your surrounding. Playing braindead zerker and complaining about getting downed quickly is just… ridiculous. People hate thieves because having one in the opposite team means you gotta THINK, and people like to spam hard CCs and AOEs and see big numbers without thinking too much.
Note: that was theoretical. There’s not even 1 single thief build that can 1 shot somebody. Not even the signet-kamikaza. Backstab can get a maximum of 9k atm, and requires a hell lot of set ups to actually land it. Not to mention you’re most likely to get hit by random AOE or passive trait or stuff like that even before you land it. People who complain about thieves make me get amused and angry at the same time…

“More come, yes?”

“What’s complicated means?”

It always looked like thieves were “balanced” around what a 3-years-old-thief-main-veteran player could theoretically do with the given change.

A game must not be balanced around the most skilled players, imo.
how much “top” players exist?
And how much “average” players exist…?
Imo a game should be balanced around the “average” part of the game’s population.
The “average” people are the ones that literally keep the game alive- their money let the Devs keep maintaining the game. Besides, the “top” players just made the Devs throw away 200k$, but that’s another topic… (i don’t believe the devs used their own money for that…) “top” players are not indicators of balance. They are indicators for the potential of their specific builds. Balance the game about “top” players and you’ll get a massive decrease in the “average” PvP population.

Hi, this is my “tanky” druid build- made for holding a point and lasting long in tough battles. It involves lots of heavy CCs and combo finishers that can give a lot of support to nearby allies. I took soldier’s amulet instead of one that gives healing power because i wanted to be able to do some damage, even though my build is made as a point holder. I’d like to hear people’s ideas on how to improve it/its gameplay, and i hope other people could benefit from it ^.^
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vNAQJAWRnMqAlsiNsAWsCEtil/ADet+WrrLvuMQA4549DGelMtwA-TZBEABLcBAI+QAc0+DaVGAgnAAA

King Noob IV.3560:

why is everyone saying thank you like they saved thief but in another thread everyone says thief is still garbage

Saying “thank you” never killed anyone…
if i recall correctly. :>

We’re used to get nerfs, not fixes- that’s why.

ZonaMaster.6395:

Reem.3578:

If i understood what you meant correctly, then thief is -1.
Average player can make it to 0.
Good ones can even get to 1 (viable. Kinda…).
/rant

Side note: i wonder what was your motive when you posted it. just read other threads in this thiefy part of the forum and you can pretty much get an answer to thar question…
No offence, i’m just tired of those threads discussing the state of the class, when everyone with enough hours on a thief knows thief is trash-tier.

Lol i actually want someone to prove me wrong

I see now!! 0.0 you’re looking for trolls to feed!!!!

You know, you could just ask people to prove you thief is okay… there are some people that say it. Just call them out :P

If i understood what you meant correctly, then thief is -1.
Average player can make it to 0.
Good ones can even get to 1 (viable. Kinda…).
/rant

Side note: i wonder what was your motive when you posted it. just read other threads in this thiefy part of the forum and you can pretty much get an answer to thar question…
No offence, i’m just tired of those threads discussing the state of the class, when everyone with enough hours on a thief knows thief is trash-tier.

Curring.9752:

Reem.3578:

It’s because of the changes to pets and minions. Check it out in the patch notes here:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/updates/Game-Update-Notes-October-23-2015
It’s somewhere down there :P
So basically, player’s pets and minions take 95% less damage from attacks that were not targeted at them.

That is PvE only, if this were in PvP Minionmancers would be the only meta build.

Also on average the bristleback only does about 300 on it’s F2, it just hits a lot of times, it’s AAs I belive hit for around 600ish? I don’t tend to notice it’s AA. So yeah, that’s about right.

Oh now i see.. “non-players attacks”.. sorry, i was sure it affects pvp as well! >_<

It’s because of the changes to pets and minions. Check it out in the patch notes here:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/updates/Game-Update-Notes-October-23-2015
It’s somewhere down there :P
So basically, player’s pets and minions take 95% less damage from attacks that were not targeted at them.

Coo! Quaggan thanks you! good job on the quick response, Anet. It’s really appreciated!

Hmm notice they’re all DDs and use the endurance-giving signet… possibly bank/farming characters maybe they felt bank thieves are too good so they nerfed steal.. :P jokes aside, all these unicorns keep my hope up for the balance patch

+1

Plz don’t hit us, plz don’t h-… OUCH.
“Behold! the nerf-bat’s power!!!!”

Imo just play one. You’ll get to know its flaws pretty fast. And btw, you’ll also notice that there’s nothing such as “perma evade”.