Guild Wars 2

Man, never have I watched a GvG as emotional and focused as your guys’. This is really inspirational stuff, and really impressive. The keywords and the planning and the concentrated pushes, it’s all exceptional. I love that you guys included a loss in your videos as well, but that you are so strong as a group and are really coordinated.

I’m not into posting twice on the same topic, but I’m just really impressed. Great job once again.

Yeah, now this is an achievement to be proud of. Good show, [RG] and OP. You’ve always been a good guild to read threads with, and we all appreciate what you’ve done for WvW.

And to think we lost Leg Specialist for this crap!

Fade.9124:

can someone clarify what ‘modified conditions’ are?

Ones used by players with +X% condition duration so they last longer than normal. This makes sense because if a condition lasts, say, 140% its normal duration, 140-100=40%, so it lasts 40% as long as normal against Warriors using this skill.

Tell me, what if you didn’t know your commission for a particular job until after you had already done it firsthand? Would you do that job not knowing what you’re getting out of it? No? Didn’t think so.

It was hurt significantly by the loss of a double immobilize on Bladetrail thanks to the Leg Specialist nerf. The changes to Sword didn’t justify totally nerfing that trait into oblivion.

Guild challenges for the first time ever tonight! If you’d like to tag along, don’t hesitate to let me know!

#ibelieveinkarl

What I’m really curious about with the burning trait is if it applies like the Water Ele 30 trait where it can happen for a single skill then goes on ICD or whether it applies to a single target and goes on ICD.

Example: If you aren’t on burn ICD and you use Putrid Mark and it crits on 4 enemies in the AOE, do each get the burn and then it goes on ICD after that skill? Or does only 1 of the 4 at random get the burn and then it goes on ICD? This is kind of make or break for how valuable it is.

When you are testing for bugs, please remember to test them in PvE, PvP, and WvW. They can have different workings in all three, and so need to be tested thoroughly. If something is broken, please make mention of the format it’s broken in.

Also, remember that Torment doesn’t change its damage. It simply ticks twice when they are moving and ticks once when they are stationary.

The title for this thread is so misleading. I opened this expecting people to say they could salvage Cores for T6 materials or something crazy.

I actually vastly prefer account bound special skins like Fractal skins. It means that when someone sees it, they know that I did that dungeon and I got that reward. I didn’t just farm CoF 1 for a few days and buy it off of someone else who did. That means a lot to me. GW1 just didn’t have anything like that for me; you could buy essentially anything with enough ectos, and eventually it got to the point where I had so much money I couldn’t feasibly spend it all because there was nothing I actually wanted because nothing was prestigious. I think the equivalent of 3m plat is just wasting away on my GW1 account nowadays.

I don’t mind there being tradeable things for people to make money off of, and I actually actively think it’s a good idea. However, I hope that ANet remembers to also have some account bound really special gear for people who are willing to put in the effort so they can show it off.

Are you EU or NA? Furthermore, which guild missions do you need? All of them?

A lot of press goes to the condition stack cap for bleeds as the primary reason why PvE conditions are bad. That’s true to some extent because it means that in group content, condition damage plateaus, whereas power damage always stacks linearly. However, the real crutch to condition damage is that it is just bad in PvE.

Consider a Necromancer with 2100 condition damage (possible with max stacks corruption, ideal condition damage setup, no might, and 30 points in curses) keeping 15 stacks of Bleed (pretty common) that tick for 150 dps each on a target. That is 2250 dps. Let’s assume for the sake of argument that the Necromancer can keep up permanent poison on the target as well, for an additional 300 dps. That’s a total of 2550 dps that the Necromancer can do in optimal circumstances after significant build-up and maintenance of his stacks on the opponent. Let’s also assume for the sake of argument that there is no one else applying conditions to the target so we aren’t wasting dps (which is a big hit to condition dps that we shouldn’t ignore for the complete picture). Now let’s consider a berserker warrior auto-attacking with an axe with no might, and you see that this warrior without banners/might/vuln can do something on the order of 3000 dps just by auto-attacking without any prior setup.

The supposed balancing side to this is that the condition dps goes through armor whereas the power damage does not. That sounds nice in principle, but when you factor in that vulnerability offsets a majority of that differential, and the fact that vulnerability does nothing for condition damage, you see that power based damage outshines it still.

That’s how you know something is wrong.

The problems with condition damage that need to be resolved are as follows, and really, these two problems are the key issues with all of the classes that use them as a major component of their damage. These classes, the ones that are universally regarded as inferior for all PvE content, are Engineers, Necromancers, and Rangers. This is primarily because their power builds pale compared to those of other classes like Guardians and Warriors and even Elementalists, while their condition builds are totally worthless.

• The condition cap needs to either be removed or increased to such a level that a 5-man party could never theoretically hit it on a single target (thus wasting dps).
• Condition damage is pitiful compared to power-based dps in PvE

I think one thing that could be done to make condition damage really meaningful in PvE would be to double the condition damage formulae for PvE only (NOT WvW / PvP). So, for instance, that Necromancer which was above dealing 2250 dps after all the preparation and build-up would now be dealing 4500 dps, which is better than a Warrior just auto attacking the target for 3000 dps. The Warrior can augment his dps with vulnerability and other factors, such as burst skills and his 2-5 (100 Blades, for instance, deals 10000~ dps during its burst with proper team support in the form of might and vulnerability). In lieu of this, I believe that condition damage in PvE, were it doubled, wouldn’t be broken, but would in fact validate it as a legitimate means of dealing damage in high end PvE like dungeons. This alone would go a long way to improving the Necromancer/Engineer/Ranger odds of being useful in fast runs of difficult content.

What other ideas do you think they could explore? Do you agree with my synopsis and suggestion? I’d be curious to discuss the matter. Thanks for reading this.

This happened to my guild once. The way we solve it now is have someone sit in Frostgorge Sound until the actual in-zone event completes with a gold medal. When it completes with a gold medal, it always completes the rush. If everyone from your guild who participated leaves the zone before it completes, it appears to fail.

I agree with this post, and I think this needs to be addressed by ANet.

Sending this to the top for the new week! We’ve got guild challenges planned for Tuesday, Bounties for Wednesday, and Treks & Rushes for Thursday! Don’t miss ‘em! As always, if you’re interested in the guild at all, don’t hesitate to contact me with any of your questions. I’d be more than happy to answer them for you.

Looking forward to this week!

Curo.2483:

If enemies were balanced around zerker warrior DPS, it would be hell for the rest of us. You are never going to want to play a mesmer. It takes about 10x as many hits from a mes, and I’m not even exaggerating.

If things were balanced around zerker Warrior DPS, then maybe we’d actually see some meaningful PvE buffs to the other classes for some diversity in high-end PvE.

Good guy Bill is a hero to all Necromancers!

The only change in this list I really hate is the nerf to Leg Specialist. Being able to tag an opponent in WvW with both sweeps from Bladetrail for a 2 second immobilize was so utterly valuable that it’s scary to think how it’ll be without it.

They’re already in the game if you do the Dragon Bash story missions in Lion’s Arch.

I used a level 80 Warrior, punched everything in the face, killed them all in three auto attacks, and didn’t even get a chance to see any of their skills. Yes, just the type of bad guys I was hoping for.

What value is there in making presumptions about the implementation of a new trait that is only listed in a set of leaked patch notes that no one can confirm? Just wait a few days and we can test this ourselves.

Deamhan.9538:

Oh and which sPvP map has control points in water?

Hahaha… Someone’s obviously never played Capricorn.

Yeah, and Rytlock is a Warrior with an offhand Pistol.

Camaro Charr.2805:

I really don’t understand why necro is one of the most overplayed classes need a buff?

Lol.

Thorson.9218:

And what’s with SBI’s 80’s ganking uplevels? Never have I seen so much of that from a server (not even Ebay….they at least had the decency to just ignore them and let them reach a tower/keep). And by ganking I mean waiting around by our spawn and when an uplevel tries to get anywhere, one of your 80’s jumps them from behind and spikes them in about 3 seconds. We need more players to come to WvW and that lame BS is just going to send them back to PvE. If you want badges that badly, at least man-up and jump 80’s when you spawn camp.

An invader leaves the safety of their spawn and in a fleet of fancy gets killed by an enemy! Who knew it could happen? There are three exits to every spawn; if someone’s camping one, take your guys to another. Or, you know, just kill the campers. That works too.

Uplevels naturally get killed first because they are easy to down, easy to finish, and easy to get out of the way so you can focus on tougher opponents. I always kill uplevels first in 1v3’s or something of that nature.

You wanted it then, so you bought it then for the price it was at then. That’s all there is to it.

Thief condition builds needed a lot of help, and I think Torment will be perfect for them, and will allow Thief condition builds to pressure opposing players very effectively. We don’t know how it will be applied in their case, but I am hoping it is on Pistol mainhand, and maybe Unload, but not on Dagger or Sword mainhand or Dagger or Pistol offhand.

Just make your Charr / Norn the smallest possible size and you will feel like you’re running faster (even though you’re not) if that’s really an issue. I, personally, don’t have the issue of “feeling” faster on my smaller characters because I gauge movement speed by the speed at which the terrain moves around me, not the animation speed of my characters.

Conditions are a game mechanic, and there is nothing lore-breaking about burning on a Necromancer no more or less than there is any issue with fear on a Warrior, confusion on a Warrior, stealth on a Mesmer, vulnerability on a Guardian, the lifeless undead being made to bleed, or what-have-you.

Tonight is guild treks and rushes! Come join us for some fun! Next week Thursday will be our first adventure in the lands of Guild Challenges, and so we could use all the help we can get there!

If anything about the guild sounds interesting to you, or you’d like to know more, don’t hesitate to either post here or contact one of me, Azizrian.6490, or ArcTheFallen.7682 to learn more! We’d be happy to answer your questions, and even happier to go on adventures with you.

This is a topic that sort of bugs me a bit. I main my Necro and my Warrior both, and my Necro has a special spot in my heart. That said, Necros are pretty underwhelming in PvE, particularly condition specs. Why? Because damaging conditions are terrible in PvE.

• What good is a difficult-to-maintain build-up of 25 stacks of bleeding for 140 dps each if a Warrior, for example, deals 10k dps with the 100 Blades burst or 3.5k dps with axe autoattack that stacks linearly?
• What good does adding burn do to team-based PvE where Guardians and other classes can inflict their burns already, and your burns don’t stack in intensity with theirs? (This same issue is prevalent with poison as well)
• The chief strategy in PvE is to hold enemy mobs stationary to burst them down, which makes Torment totally useless against them. What good, then, is Torment in PvE?
• What good is a weakness buff in PvE when Unshakable makes it nearly totally ineffective against the enemies that you need it most against, bosses?
• Condition damage doesn’t scale to armor, hindering condition specs against bosses with special armor-driven mechanics like Dredge Powersuit when superheated.
• The above means that power-damage benefits enormously from vulnerability, whereas vulnerability is completely wasted on condition damage.

These questions wrack at the back of my mind as I read all of these changes. I would like to know what, if anything, is being done for PvE balance only to resolve these issues and truly help ameliorate class imbalance in speed runs of more difficult content. One large thing that could happen to help with this is to remove the bleed stack limit. All power-based damage in-game stacks linearly, whereas condition damage stacks linearly up to 25 stacks and then is wasted afterward. I realize there are technical challenges inherent to that, but that is just one thing in a long list of things that could help condition specs in PvE.

I’d like to hear some discussion on the matter because no matter how you cut it, condition specs are weak in higher-end PvE, and people always groan about it and kick others about it. Something absolutely must be done with it to make these specs meaningful in a PvE environment.

Amun Ra.6435:

You you know how torment will be implemented how exactly? That’s right you don’t. People have every right to be concerned about this given Anets past changes.

Actually, we know it’s a condition that deals damage, which means it will scale with condition damage. We also know that D/P Thieves and S/D Thieves do not invest into condition damage, which will make this condition minimally effective on them. So yes, I can safely say all of the things I said.

Any class can kill things in open world PvE because open world PvE is painfully easy. The only discussion really being had here is whether or not the Warrior is more valuable when speed clearing PvE content than the Necro, and the answer there assuming equally skilled players is resoundingly “Yes”. That isn’t to say that you can’t complete dungeons with Necromancers, because you can, but just not as fast as with Warriors.

Rennoko.5731:

Your exaggerated numbers of 9k DPS are what I am refuting, and pointing out you only get numbers like that in the lol worthy content that allows it. (Which is quite a bit, but not all of it).

Actually, if you do the math, a Warrior with proper setup can manage 10k dps during the 100B burst.

Warriors destroy that veteran giant so quickly anyway that they could probably get away with ignoring the grubs entirely. If you were really intent, you could line a few up and kill them with WWA / Bladetrail / Tremor pretty effectively too without missing a beat on the giant.

Vyxion.6358:

Torment is a condition, when was the last time you saw a condition build thief?
It’s not gonna be dangerous coming from a backstab thief or whatnot.

This. Seriously, guys, stop crying. D/P backstabbers aren’t going to be hitting you with this. S/D skirmishers aren’t going to be hitting you with this either. You’ll see this on P/D condition thieves, and honestly, they need a buff anyway. This is a good thing for the thief class, and won’t be harming the other classes’ viability.

They could double the condition damage on all classes and berserker gear would still be preferable in most cases.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

side note – Rising, take a break from WvW, and help me with Griffon JP, ktnx.

All a Guardian has to do to run it is spam Aegis with perma swiftness and you are practically guaranteed to succeed with the bomb so long as you know the path and don’t dilly-dally. Although you do know that you don’t have to actually open the chest at the end to get the achievement, right? You only need to reach it. That said, if you do need help, whisper me in-game sometime.

Vol.5241:

No JP is hard.

Except Griffonhook

Gives me nightmares to this day.

Guardian trivializes that content. ;-;

Nah, this is pretty much a fail. You’re the one who lost all that cash, so obviously the other dude frustrated you enough to get you to troll yourself. I’d call him the real victor here. I’d gladly take the ecto and mithril, hold onto them, and wave them in your face about the cash you blew on an unsuccessful troll.

You’re being a bit melodramatic by saying that it will ‘destroy WvW’. These bonuses really only help in open-field and in roaming (which is presumably why one traits so heavily into these lines in the first place). If you trait into AC’s, you do more damage to enemies, and that damage is far more significant than the gain you obtain from the guard defense passive. The same is true with the other masteries. I don’t see it as destroying WvW, rather it just helps players who do the things that get you these stacks in the first place (solo flip camps, deal with invaders trying to stop you, and so on). WvW isn’t balanced around the duel, and it was never intended to be.

slingblade.1437:

Props to BP for putting on a clinic on how to hold onto Hills. Glad we (SBI) finally got that sucker back.

This was probably my favorite part of the match-up (my least favorite part being this thread). It felt like a week-long siege to finally get that thing back, and it feels great finally having it.

The Guard Killer max-level trait should be just as good, honestly. It should add 50 Power for each stack to a maximum of 5 stacks, analogous to the Guard Defense line with Vitality.

sarah.3617:

It’d be nice if they had a way to convert merits into influence or something fun like that.

Yes. This please!

It’s surprising to me that you don’t have a guild, honestly. That said, I hope you find one suited to the type of runs you enjoy doing.

What Gravy speaks of is largely a consequence of having no real WvW guilds. We have guilds that show up in WvW, but never in serious force, and all of them are PvX and lack real motivation for major WvW coordination. Pubs will be pubs, and they are everywhere except on our TS, and they don’t really care to join when we tell them to.

Regardless of what makes BP successful, numbers or coordination or, more likely, a combination of the two, you guys are well suited to higher tiered opponents than SBI and AR.

Luthan.5236:

PvE achievement points got a leaderboard… and they don’t mean anything.

Technically it is a leaderboard for achievement points earned in PvE, PvP, and WvW combined. Having a leaderboard for WXP would be like having a leaderboard for PvP level or the number of skill points you’ve earned on a character.

This has been discussed and captured by a developer here.

There are many mobs in the game, such as those during the Ritual room event in CoF p2, that if you or an ally kill them, it will rally all players who tagged them. However, these same mobs that rally downed players do not ever rally players who have the Warrior Vengeance skill active. I validated this by using the trait Sweet Revenge that guarantees a 100% rally on mob kill, and noticed how I wasn’t being rallied by killing these guys.

This also happens in countless other locations in the game, and is a major detriment to the usefulness of the Sweet Revenge trait.