Guild Wars 2

Sleepy.2647:

Player skill and build has nothing to do with this topic, and it’s the only poor excuse people like you argue about in an attempt to be right.

I don’t believe I have made a statement to the point of me being right or wrong. I believe you have either misread or not understood the point i am making, or are to blinded by your own point of view to see it any other way.

I don’t believe that MF makes a large impact. I am not saying I am right in this point. I have asked for some simple or solid tests before I support the idea listed in the OP.

Thats all.

Simply grab all your buddies, do a quick video of a dungeon with MF gear and without, post it on youtube and link it here for people to see that it has a noticeable effect. Thats all I am asking for. A little substance to back up your statement.

Player skill can be as detrimental to a group as a person geared with MF. As the op states:

he will also be hurting the rest of his party (by doing less damage, healing less, taking more damage and thus requiring more frequent assistance from the others, etc.).

This too can be applied to a poor player or someone undergeared. It is a valid point to raise. By this rational any groups that have players that require the above should have all stats evened over the group?

Sleepy.2647:

The fact that there is people complaining about MF is a sign that something is wrong with it.

People complain regardless. If you always listed and reacted to everyone that complains you would constantly be changing things. This forum is full of complaints and not all of them justified. You would have ANET take on board every single complaint listed on this site and make the appropriate changes too?

maddoctor

but those MFers get on my nerves because as I said on my post on the first page, they INTENTIONALLY LOWER their character’s capabilities to earn more loot at the expense of my experience.

Just because you like to squeeze every last bit of efficiency out of your build, skill rotation and gear should mean that everyone must also follow suite and play as you play?

Come on guys, i am challenging the idea, not shooting it down. I am just asking for a bit of proof. Videos are easy to make rather than this – Take it from me, I was there I saw it mentality.

If an idea cannot provide a little proof to back it up from a simple challenge then it’s not worth diddly therefor how can a community support the idea and gain the attention of the dev team?

maddoctor.2738

An ungeared player has better stats than an MF set user

now you are just being ridiculous.

Sleepy.2647:

Why should anyone provide any proof to you about how MF hurts to the team when it’s so blatant obvious, it could be said the same about you, prove that it doesn’t hurt your team because so far everyone who says “it doesn’t hurt the party” simply says that with no actual proof or valid argument.

The burdon of proof lies with the person or people making the claims. The impact is not blatantly obvious. You have no proof other that theoretical imaginings and rough number crunching.

You cannot say that it adversely affects a group anymore that having a well geared player with a solid build who can’t play for crap Or having an under geared player in your group.

Account.9832:

What claims? That the MF is there instead of a combat stat? I would assume that much is obvious to anyone who can read the item properties, no?

Well your claims are twofold:

That a MF equipped player is a detriment to a group because of the MF stats instead of another combat/survival/support related statistic.

That and to quote for the second half

but he will also be hurting the rest of his party (by doing less damage, healing less, taking more damage and thus requiring more frequent assistance from the others, etc.).

As such you believe that ANET should average the MF over the group to deter people from going pure MF in dungeons in order to pull their weight. Or distribute better loot more evenly amongst the playing group.

Am I correct in my understanding of your position so far?

Account.9832:

The Magic Find set reduces your power by 115, reduces your critical damage by 8%, and reduces your overall damage (both crit and non-crit) by up to 10%

Please show how these numbers significantly hinder or impact a team from completing a dungeon?

How can you justify spreading the gear if the player has a skill build that accounts for the minute losses you listed above? Speccing for power/precision/crit in your build could more that account for the minor numbers you list above. So instead of going for a survival build they go for a more dps oriented build to cover the loss of power/precision/crit they get from equipping MF gear.

You have provided no actual proof, lets say in the form of a video testing in a dungeon with people running MF gear and without in multiple scenarios, that a group with people equipping MF gear have a significantly harder time completing said Dungeon.

OR in a single instance where a player with MF gear equipped requires significantly more assistance than others in a group.

I find you have provided very little in the way of a convincing argument or solid proof to your claim as to the significant detriment of a MF equipped person to a group. It’s no good making a claim without providing a modicum of proof to support your position.

If you can provide solid proof to support your statement I will gladly +1 your suggestion.

tl;dr

1. Prove that the lose of an additional Power/prec/tuff/crit stat impacts significantly on a players effectiveness.
2. Prove that a player with MF gear require more support on average that every other player in a group.

Or QQ less about MF.

Don’t worry about your skill allocation. You can reallocate them for a piddly cost at a trainer and I am sure you will do so more than once.

Don’t listen to the people on the forums when determining a class. Try them all yourself. A lot of haters on the forum.

Follow your main story! You get some handy rewards during the process and it helps you level. EDIT: Including Weapons and Armor. you really don’t need to purchase any until you hit 80.

Harvest, Mine & Chop everything you see. All materials are shared across your account. Something that is not useful on this character might be useful to another.

Complete maps 100% you get a handome reward for doing so.

Help your fellow Guild Wars 2 player.

There are multiple starter zones. Visit them all to begin with. It will stand you in good stead.

Complete your daily bonus’

Dance naked on top of a volcano.

push the space bar.

Guardian was easy and fun to get to 80. Rolled a number of classes after that my next favorite is the Ranger. I only play PVE and do world events and roam. Not much PVP and havn’t taken him into a dungeon. I have tried Ele, Eng, War & Theif. Only kept the Warrior and Ele but Ranger was my pick out of all those after my guardian.

What profession have you started with? make sure you choose one that suits your play style. Make sure you do not oever extend your self with mob battles. Dodge. Kite. Harvest. Crush your enemies, see them driven before you and hear the lamentation of the women.

Account.9832:

Currently, Magic Find is a very “selfish” mechanic in parties. If a player is in full magic find gear, he will get better drops, but he will also be hurting the rest of his party (by doing less damage, healing less, taking more damage and thus requiring more frequent assistance from the others, etc.).

A simple way to fix this is to average the Magic Find bonus across the entire party. That way, if a player chooses to give up on damage, survivability or healing in exchange for improved loot, other players will still need to work a bit harder but they will also get some kind of benefit.

Runes that assist MF also include other benefits to other stats like power, precision, condition damage. I don’t see how they are sacrificing any significant advantage by having increased MF instead of some other stat.

Do you have hard data comparisons to support your claims?

Banners are not supposed to be for DPS but for support. Nonlinear.9823 seems to use a banner to great efficiency in his videos comboing with a banner to produce up to 25 stacks of might for himself and potentially a party.

It would seem that your idea of how a banner should function and be used doesn’t match how the game sees how banners function.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/warrior/Video-How-to-Combo-w-your-Longbow

I liked hard mode in GW 1. It could be easy to implement by simply having the game prompt you to choose a difficulty from a main hub then load you in that particular server instance. Hard or Normal. Scaling does add a modicum of difficulty but I think hard mode goes beyond that.

I can’t recall if hard mode was available after map completion or if it was after your story was complete and you ascended? I do remember farming hard mode on my ele an w though. it was quite fun.

I noticed someone mention resources due to multiple instances for a zone? If you added hard mode with the current set up there would be only two instances. Normal and Hard. In GW1, which was free, every player went into their own instance ever time they left a hub. Not sure which would pertain to a bigger drain on resources. It worked on the free model in GW1 i dont see why it cant work here.

It can’t be for the loot as world drops currently scale to up to your level regardless of where you are roaming.

It seems many posters here don’t get the concept of Hard mode with reference to GW1

Raids have never been apart of the GW franchise. Not sure why they would add them now.

I have no problems in Orr. I can wander from one end to the other with out an issue. Is it a challenge? sure sometimes. Do I die? If I am busy looking at my map instead of fighting :\ do i expect to run through the entire map without an issue. no, of course not.

Level 80 Guardian.

Whats so great about waiting around for three hours trying to get the right group or even an interested group together that then goes to kill a giant frost worm for exclusive gear that you can’t get besides raiding which in turn locks people into having to raid for gear…..its a vicious cycle that is many hours of tedium followed by a few brief moments of pleasure. If I wanted that I would go back to work for another 8 hours instead of heading home to play guild wars.

Okay I am on Sanctum of Rall. I am from melbourne and there seems to be alot of activity on this server during the times I tend to play. Weekdays after work, friday nights, and the weekend if I get a chance.

Lots of people in the starter and some orr zones. much better than the last server I was on. Happy so far so will stick with this server for a while.

Great Albums so far. This should be a sticky. +1 for this thread.

Urthona.3198:

I run what the OP runs, generally, switching out the ten point trait in virtues depending on the fight. Retaliation isn’t always the most useful thing in dungeons.

Anyway, as for your build recommendation: Battle Presence is still bugged, is it not?

Arrgh is it? I see it applying to people in situations? I wasn’t aware. ^.^ no matter! Thats the great thing about posting on a forum! people offer alternate solutions.

http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mccM0z0zzMrGNmMGavm9MxGGzobMkMs8kiH707kiH707kiH70z7kNf70c7kNh70z7ofD70m

My current PVE Build. The rotation of shouts and hammer combo allows me to keep retaliation up for an entire fight. Works fine for me.

I don’t PVP so I will leave the advice on a retaliation build to the experts on PVP combat.

ref.8196:

For PvE, alturistic healing is the way to go for maximum healing, with the hammer or greatsword.

Altruistic Healing only works if you have a group around. It is not as effective if you are going solo in PVE. It also doesn’t work well if you are in a group and the majority of party members are out of your shout range.

Meditation is a viable alternative to swap into if you are on your own. Hammer & well pretty much anything as long as the hammer is equipped.

Fox.3469:

And yes it’s fun, i can take on 10 enemies, a few veteran mobs, even tanking champions is ok.

^^I really think this is all that matters in a build tbh.

You picked a fairly solid build. Any guard with 0/0/30/30/0 is solid.

I would look into the effectiveness of having the last 10 points in honor compared to spending it in Virtues, getting the extended boon duration bonus from the points, obtaining IX Absolute Resolution for the increased regen and the condition removal for virtue of resolve. With the extra 10 points in Virtues you also gain the retaliation boon each time you use a virtue, couple that with the elite renewed focus and its pretty tough to beat solo wise.

I see what you are sayin about the AH and the party boons through the staff. I just dont like it for anything other than running through a zone. That’s just personal bias though. personally if I was going to remove myself to a ranged support / heals role with your current skill allocation I would go with this build:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fUMQNApdWlcgqDnFyKEm4ESWBDE7BG9Rb01DKKiYIA

I like http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mccM0z0zzMrGNmMGavm9MxGGzobMkMs8kiH707kiH707kiH70z7kNf70c7kNh70z7ofD70m

This is the build I run for my solo play. Haven’t had a chance to test it out in dungeons yet but I am keen to. I haven’t got any ‘real’ armor just a complete set of the vigils.

It allows you to keep boons up longer which I believe is more of a benefit in solo play. Each point in virtues adds to boon duration. Plus keeping retaliation up for a whole fight in solo play mean more dps without having to spec for it in your gear.

What is your goal in group play? DPS? Tank? Off Tank? Support?

I don’t much like the staff period in group play I would probably go for mace/shield or scepter/focus for range.

Stand your ground should be a mist equip. Regen, stability and retaliation plus a stun break are too handy in any situation. Solo or for groups.

The big question is though: Do you have fun with your build?

Hostility.4961:

Now im off to make an elementalist that tanks better, gets away better, has better support, better dodge, 3 skills to gain distance, 98%!!!! imunity to chilled, immobilize and cripple. Does same dmg but more range. Wish i did it from the start before burning time and money.

Thanks for reading ^^

Good Luck leveling an Ele, their survivability sucks great big hairy balls. That might change once you get to 80 but tbh my Guard was a cake walk to get o 80 PVE, my Ele well I had to shelve it at lvl 24 because he is just to squishy and not much nukey.

So I went with Redknights build of:

30 Valor
I – Meditation Mastery
VI – Retributive Armor
XII – Monk’s Focus
20 Honor
II – Superior Aria
X – All symbols heal allies
20 Virtue
II – Vengeful
IX – Absolute Resolution

Utility Bars:
Healing Option: Signet.
At first, Shelter’s block may seem like a good idea, but eh.. the passive condition removal will help.

Utility:
7 – Smite Condition – Meditation
a fast 16 second heal and condition removal in one to keep you going with AoE damage.
8 – Stand Your Ground – Shout
Retaliation and Stability. Stun Breaker.
9 – Save Yourselves – Shout
Array of offensive and defensive buffs, don’t dismiss the Stun Breaker.
Elite: Renewed Focus

I have switched heal signet for shelter because I don’t need the passive condition removal as much in PVE.

Switched out symbols heal for symbols last longer because lets face it, hot footing it around Orr doing your story, I don’t get involved with many players. I may join an event or two if its on the way but hey, most people are pretty durable by this stage.

This build, for solo play, is great!

I just hit 80 on my guard and had irregular reward gear on him so I went out and bought the Vigil armor, just for some semi-decent gear while I work towards a better setup. Went for 4 superior runes of the water, will get 2 (only have 1 now) superior runes of the monk with the idea that the extra boon duration will assist.

Great build for me, working with the Hammer is a treat, combo of hammer and GS at the moment. Obviously that changes depending on the situation but I find I am killing things faster, staying alive longer and having an easy time doing it. I can keep retaliation up for an entire battle with the right rotation and careful management of the shouts! Most fights dont go very long but with the Hammer, extra boon duration and all the retaliation in the shouts I could keep retaliation up all day long.

Only thing I haven’t seen mentioned is that on the 3 strike of the Auto you can use JI before and essentially chase a target and pop the symbol on them. You can also evade and still have the last strike pop. I have done this many times in PVE ultimately though it is unreliable or I am just not good enough at it.

I believe most hammer builds are not DPS builds but survival builds anyway and while it puts out decent damage that is really a side effect of its true purpose. Making you hardier.

It has been said multiple times that the Hammer builds for Guards are mainly build around that team and that any guard caught in PVP with a hammer on his own is going to get pawned 9/10 times.

Anyway who just uses one weapon all of the time?

Yiyojin.3241:

Rangers are overpowered now.

said no one….ever…

I was tossing up between an Ele and a Ranger for my next alt. So I have rolled both. I prefer my Ranger over my Ele.

I only do PVE.

I have not had a chance to do any dungeons yet so cannot comment on that aspect. Pets die. You die. It’s a mechanic of the game, deal with it. My pets do not die from one hit, they take a little while. If I want a tankier per I equip one. If my pet dies, I swap it for the other pet viola brand new pet at my location.

There ARE a lot of haters and QQrs on this forum. Do not listen to them. Roll the what you want and judge for yourself.

Sounds like a good idea. If people do not want the pet why not let them choose? the game is supposed to be all about choice.

I would honestly rather the same set up as GW1. Where we got to choose if we were going to be a beast master and use a pet or not. As it sits we are lumped with a pet period.

I would rather just lose the pet and gain the damage from the pet as a permanent buff to my Rangers damage. – Rather have the choice to be a beast master or just a ranger.

Don’t get me wrong, my pet has come in handy a few times and I am utilising the great many pets at my disposal. I just don’t like that I am forced into using it as part of the class. when I think Ranger I think Martin Longbow from the “Magician” book series.

Long Bow, Short Bow, Great Sword, Axe & Sword – Not enough weapon choice? not to mention the Sword/Dagger, Sword/Axe, Sword/Warhorn, Sword/Torch, Axe/Axe, Axe/Warhorn, Axe/Torch, Axe/Dagger

That 11 weapon combinations to choose from and yet a Ranger needs a rifle? or more MH choices………..Please its ridiculous to ask for a rifle or more weapons! we have enough already imo.

Started off with a Warrior. Rolled a Guardian and got that to level 80 and got bored with the play style. Rolled an Ele, got to level 24 can’t stand the lack of dps and survival so I quit it and rolled a Ranger. Having a blast with it so far.

Next on my list will be either a Necro or Theif. I want another MM, I had one in GW1 and it rocked but I hear the Necro MM is not up to scratch so I might go with a Thief for sneaky backstabs. Unsure though as I am focusing on my Ranger.

So I rolled a new ranger recently, having leveled a guardian to 80 and an Ele to 24(had to give this one up) I have some experience with GW2. Currently a level 25.

My thoughts: Trait Points – Not as important as you level. For PVE I have chosen for precision and wilderness survival because conditions seem to be what I do. I expect I will reassess the distribution of these points once I hit 60 and again at 80.

Skills – There are enough skill points in this game to buy all skills. So like Pokemon you gotta get them all BUT there are some that are more useful that others. Traps are a must have, heals are a must have and movement modifiers are a must have(for me). Pick the skills you NEED first and the rest after you have what you need. Don’t forget you must have purchased a certain number of skills to open the next tier. You can see the number under the tier listing x/5 etc. The elites however are not available until level 30.

Pets – again as with skills you can get them all, so make sure you do! I am constantly swapping out pets to suit the area. Sometimes I want a tanky pet or dps or utility or a poisoner. I swap lots.

Weapons – I have unlocked most weapon skills except the warhorn. I might do that later but for now ima leave it as I dont rate it. I generally run with both bows so the news on the expected fixes in the next patch are exciting. I have not run into any trouble I cannot handle in PVE with this setup. This includes taking on multiple mobs +3 levels on what I currently am. Which is nothing special for a Guardian and freaking miraculous for an Ele so for the most part I am pleased with the Ranger.

IF I require a more melee based set up to cope with a situation I will opt for a sword and dagger. The evades, poison and bleed effect suits me fine. I would possibly also go with a crow for the blind.

Tips -

Quickening Zephire – Unload some seriously fast shots. Usually I use this with my Barrage and the the Hunters Shot & Rapid Fire skills for the ranger. Sometimes if I have their back I will pop QZ with the short bows normal attack to stack bleed and proc the bleed on crit.

Traps – At this point I only have 3 utility slots open so I run with Vipers Nest and Spike Trap. I generally lay both at my feet to control any mobs that like to get in my face. I use them often.

Heals – I use healing spring now but may look to change to troll ungent for better healing in solo play. Healing spring is good for groups and is a combo field.

Pets – I go for a spiders, they are creepy as hell and they spit a venom puff ball that is also a combo field as part of their normal attack. It couples nicely with the bows. For my tankier set up I will use the Brown Bear and the Artocas(sp?) I have bound their special attack (F2) and their swap (F4) to a more convenient location and swap and spam skills in combat as much as possible.

I may not be playing the Ranger right but the above is basically a summary of what I go for and what I have picked up so far. It works for me and I have a lot of fun.

So take what you will and leave the rest. If you take nothing thanks for reading!

So I rolled a ranger over the weekend, having a blast! Much better than the Ele I decided to leave at lvl 24. Anyway I have to say I agree with names not sticking to each pet.

Surely it would be relatively simple to save the name you allocate for a pet.

I would suggest they don’t make coin easily obtainable is because they would prefer you purchased gems with real money rather than grinding out some quick gold to swap for gems.

You can make a bit of coin by running dungeons in exploration mode. I heard about 7gold a run for AC.

Cant you already name your pets? I have a ranger, admittedly not played much, but i was still able to give my pet a custom name.

you should be able to type /afk and it indicate you are AFK. It was available in GW1 but is not in GW2.

I wonder if /away works and give a different indicator above your head like when you change your status to LFG?

So I rolled an Elementalist despite a lot of negative comments on this forum. I have to say the overall experience is enjoyable. The game play differs greatly from my guardian so I am still getting used to the Ele squishyness. I am alos getting use to the elemental atunement swapping on the fly and figuring out a good rotation to flick through in what situation. I mainly use a D/D while i am PVE I find it easy enough to level and play. It makes solo play easier imo that the staff although I do tend to switch between the two as required.

I think that is the key. Adaptability. Don’t lok yourself into a particular weapon set. Try them all and then go with the style you like best but be prepared to switch over to something else on a moments notie depending on the mob you are about to face.

So I have been playing GW2 for a couple of weeks now and really enjoy the game, the interaction with other players while out question and the active events that go on in a zone.

Extremely fun.

What I miss from Guild Wars 1 is:

The ability to hunt down and capture elite skills. I really enjoyed that part but now it seems we are spoon fed our skills and there is no real challenge or reward with our elites.

Multiple “Skills” for our profession! No longer can we have an individual build in the format of the old guild wars. We are stuck with the default skills for our weapon set of choice. I miss being able to create a unique set of attacks for my character. I would like to see the reintroduction of the ability to either purchase new attack skills from a trainer or go out into PVE and capture a skill from a champ to use.

I like how different weapons make different skills available, I would just like to see more of them so we can have varied builds out there and not just few.

I also miss my chaos axe

I agree. Also hunting and capturing the elite skills for your profession from the boss that wields them was great fun and forced people to visit and linger in areas they might not want to.

My keyboard comes with software to allocate different profiles for different keybindings. I don’t see how this suggestion adds anything to the game.

+1 I miss the unique names for those champion fights.

I dislike the idea of being able to represent multiple guilds. I think you join a guild you commit to that one. If you don’t like that guild you move on and find one that does.

Isn’t the purpose of being part of a team losing the definition of “me” and embracing the team as a whole? If you are slaying as a group who really cares if you are out DPSing another player? the whole idea of competing as an individual and measuring 1,2,3rd with in a team is counter productive. If you want to compete against players do WvWvW or sPVP.

DPS metres, tank metres are counter productive to being in an enjoyable group or team scenario imo.

I like events. I love participating in them with a large number of people. I think its great fun. I would like to see events that are “semi-permanent”. i.e. Orrians take over Lions Arch, if players do not combat the attack Lions Arch as a hub is disabled for a period of time until 1. player recapture it 2 npcs rebuild and repopulate. Fluctuating battle-lines that see different mobs taking over new zones etc. I think this would fit in nicely with the dynamic event structure of the game.

I would like to see the ability to knock NPC’s off cliff, ledges, balconies or anywhere else you can be knock off!

I have been knocked off ledges by mobs and find it grossly unfair that we cannot return the favor.

A small, simple issue that would offer hours of amusement if incorporated.

Isn’t it supposed to be “World” vs “World” why impose a limit? I like the matching of server to server via population better however not all populous on a server likes to WvWvW. I think you just need to recruit more players to your cause! Get on the recruitment cycle.

Do any of the Dungeons have POI that you might have missed? surely you would not have got map completion without them so all i can think is that the POI would have to be tied to areas that don’t affect map completion.

I chose Norn for my Guardian as it seemed appropriate. Massive tower of muscle wielding a hammer at the forefront of the fray, turning into a bear in the heat of battle.

Hell yeah.

I love the fact I get to smash my hammer in NPC faces, I love the fact I can solo mobs +3 levels without breaking a sweat. I love using judges intervention combined with banish to teleport and then smash a mob away. It just looks plain awesome.

The Human Stick.9310:

Skill Number:
1. Good Chain(No fix)
2. Best Skill (Good for Blast Combo)
3. sPvP skill (Worthless in PvE)
4. Knock Back (Hammer is Melee)
5. Worthless (Doesnt work in PvE or PVP)

I use hammer on my Guardian now. I like it. I just only use skills 1 and 2. I would really like to see more synergy.

1. Ok
2. Ok
3. Good for PvE. I use it to lock down a foe or multiple foes if I need to dodge away an heal.
4. Great as an interrupt. works on some bosses helps with damage mitigation as well. gives you those few precious seconds of regen that might save your kitten Plus used in conjunction with Judges Intervention is just plain awesome. Nothing like starting the knockback, teleporting to your target, setting them on fire and sending them flying like a boss.
5. I often use this in conjunction with 4 as an interrupt that doesn’t send them flying too far. Or paired with a scepter and smite. It has its uses, caging those centaur archers that like to run away when you close on them is handy.

I only do PvE at the moment, but I love the hammer. There is just something about it that seems so tough. Plus the free sign on the chain and the combo finisher is hard to go past. Hammer & Mace/Shield for PvE for most of the time.

Human warrior, Charr Engineer, Norn Ranger & Asura Necromancer