Guild Wars 2

Alright, drop Zerker for Marauder and trust us. You gain a total of 220 stat points, and almost no abilities in this game scale exceptionally well so a loss 340 ferocity is minimal and you trade 150 power for 150 precision, then randomly acquire 560 vitality. Otherwise, play Mercenary Revenant (not Herald, people stop using Herald if you aren’t going to support PLEASE) as Mace/Axe and Staff.

A really good way to learn quickly is look for the no progression hotjoins and start dueling. You will get wrecked, its natural. But the pace is much slower, and people are much more willing to teach (and they will give you builds).

Last, its important to try all classes. Not because “find the one you enjoy the most” even though thats very important as someone not invested to play won’t be invested to win, but because you then know how they all react and what they fear. For instance, I play Thief/Mesmer/Ele/Revenant (Druid is broken op, putting them down til thats fixed. I hate being op) and I could never figure out why Necro’s always destroyed me. I then realized that they push constant damage and aren’t afraid of heavy engagements, BUT they absolutely hate getting constantly poked.

:) Mail anyone of us in game and we will help when we can.

I usually try to share my builds, but people tell me they should never work. And then they do.

For Bunker, if you own Hot stick on Chronomancer and drop Mercenary Amulet. Grab stun traits and utilities, then just yolo. You won’t “crush fights” but anyone dumb enough to fight you will experience the purest manifestation of cancer. As for Ele, use Mender’s. Not the same broken level as pre-patch, but fairly decent. Guardian Support is a thing if you get a Reaper with Blighter’s Boon and you run shout. Otherwise, meh. This game has a lot of damage right now as people figure out how to bunker again. My advice is wait for metabattle to declare what is weak and what is strong (something everyone is forgetting and is whining about, forgetting that if they are lost metabattle will show the way) then to build to counter it.

TheOneWhoSighs.7513:

Serious Thought.5394:

Has anyone tried cancer perma block mesmer yet? If not, I recommend it. Makes PU look like a teddy bear.

I have, I feel like a decap druid does it better.
The biggest thing is that it pressures and decaps far point. But druids already do that.

I do think Mesmer needs light buffs, so don’t get me wrong. I just get confused when the community acts like its never played without alacrity before.

Whats your defense build btw?
Mine is Mercenary (trying to find runes/sigils but so far Guardian and Chronomancer ones are funny) with Dueling, Chaos, and Chronomancer (debating swapping to Illusions). Using triple well and the stun mantra. I got a penta kill yesterday from all the aoe condis that hit from 6 well bombing. Small moments like that make me really happy.

Most amusing stuff I’ve ever read. While you complain about your autos, I’m going to go troll people who are learning by two-shotting them with a combo that they can’t even respond to. Because, you know, Revenant needs buffs. Not even Herald, just Revenant. LMFAO.

Also, if people want to compare dps- compare everything else. Thief has no protection, Revenant can (with ease) obtain perma protection. Take your numbers, knock 33% off. Both classes can apply weakness, do not use that on your math. Now, Thief (without a gimmick build.) cannot stack might but Revenant can stack a base set of might to around 15 points, so set your rev numbers to 15. You see why your math is garbage yet? I can reach 25 might on my Revenant, but not in a “vacuum theoretical math”.

Also, day two. Time for some shenanigans with my burst ele breaking 20k damage per second for 6 seconds of total control. XD

Has anyone tried cancer perma block mesmer yet? If not, I recommend it. Makes PU look like a teddy bear.

Watching people praise a random guy is charming. Very charming.

That could work. I was focused on sustained damage over sustained killing. Will test. Good link doh.

okay. Will trade our mobility for MORE damage, MORE BOONS, and MORE conditions. If I can’t choose how I KITE a fight, I better kitten well be able to sustain a fight.

Patch is 5:41 (hours:minutes) old roughly. I love it.

Because omg the theoretics. People like op want a profession such as Thief to have NO options. We have no sustainable boons/conditions outside of regeneration and vulnerability, both via specific traits or weapons. We have no spammable defense outside of evades and a 15s block (+.5s cast time, so 15.5s) cd. Oh, and now our weapons are usable, manageable, and threatening. Its day one. Nerf it. I refuse to learn past day one, anything I see in this first (not even 6 hours, holy kitten) day needs to be nerfed.

Guys, the Thief nerfs are moments away. This much whining will guarantee hot nerfs. Inb4 Sword too clunky to auto with again.

Question- do you fight back? XD I will trade my dagger damage for a non-bugged pistol whip, your stability and retaliation on dodge, or even just your 4s taunt reflect. Trade? Cuz thats what the trade-offs are. You get a far more passive class against a far more active class. Also whoever listed that DD/DA/CS build…. what? XD

Oh but to satisfy your “Thief are whiners” : OMG IM TOO SQUISHY I NEED DAMAGE.

Edit: Will trade dagger buffs for some burning, protection, regeneration, retaliation, and stability. And chill. And might. Lol. Will trade damage buffs to actually have access to sustainable boons/conditions.

Thoughts as a Thief who has to fight both:

I enjoy fighting Vault players more because my rapid-strike build set-up tends to kill the spammers more. Weakening Charge is also very easy to kill players on. D/p is annoying to fight, not because its super threatening but because you know you have to play their game. I can kill both once I finally exhaust or bait them, but its admittedly much more annoying to kill a d/p.

rylark.3418:

Why do cast-skills follow thieves in stealth? For example, Mesmer greatsword autoattack, Ranger’s Rapidfire, etc. If a thief goes into stealth and the opponent casts a skill right before it, sometimes even after this happening, the skill tracks him. Why does this happen?

I’m more aggrivated with the Free Camera (Action Camera or whatever). They can aim skills at us despite being in stealth. Yay for them having more counterplay, but shouldn’t channels be dead by now? Not that it bothers me, but its hard to convince ANYONE to play stealth based Thief when “Well, I went into stealth and still died to Mirror Blade/Rapid-Fire/Gunflame”. :C Oh well.

Einlanzer.1627:

Jesus. Overbuff on Dagger and Staff AA while Sword and Pistol still suck.

My god he is terrible. At least we got the Withdraw buff finally.

Sword seemed fine to me. I do agree pistol needs legitimate assistance. I was thinking burning matching bleeding for sneak attack and/or that the Pistol auto (after using the trait, and prob with an CD) swapped one of your conditions for one of their boons. YAY POWERCREEP.

The sword seems so very responsive now. Just wish my autos could break the 2k damage barrier with my Marauder amulet. #TheDream

If you make a functional build, please list. This way we can help each other out.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoaVl0MhynYpTw3Jw/EHwEiORA8ex25TfuNA-TpBEABE8AAQ4EA8wRAw8yA+s/AAHCAA
D/p core (received a pseudo buff)
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAoYVn0MBFmilOB+OB8PhFkiyLGCiegrBCgFY+9r/+H-TpBEABmXG4hjAABPAAAOEAGcCA8Z/BA
D/d elite (read above)
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAqYVl0MhunYlTw0Jw/EHwEiORgM8ex25TfuNA-TpBEABE8AAA4QAYeZgHOCAIcCA8Z/BA
P/d power based, its an incredibly safe weaponset in either format, which are equally effective. You may even make it mercenary.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsYVl0MhKnYpTw3Jw/EHwElOBCgMoHFh4T4TjzoNA-TpBEABAcIAe4IA4z+DIcCAI4BAYeZAA
s/d core. new acro traits are much stronger than the build editor’s version.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsYVn0MBVOhlOB+OBkmilriqbAmuAYO6v+v3bDygPA-TpBEAB+s/AAHCgHOCAE8AAQ4EAYeZAA
s/d elite. imo this is the best build. at least, that I could figure out. it does better than the core, but it loses the damage in favor of just being more upfront.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsaVnMJCNNhdNBOOB8PhDYiynGnRbwL0g4H0JQAkBA-TpBEABmXGwn9HI4BAAwhAwgTAwDHBAA
s/p core. my current build. It seems to be doing fairly well, and I’ve been able to one shot a few players. if preparedness became baseline, I’d swap trickery for acro immediately. as it is, I’m having trouble choosing DA or Acro.

I do not play Staff, and so have no staff build. But I saw someone play this:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQJAWVn0MBFmiFOB+OB8PhFqiqLBCgDY+67+x3LE+gSA-TZRBQBa4IAsgLBwYKDAw9HAwDAAA

Anywho, if anyone has other builds to list. Or comment on these. I’m just trying to assist people getting back onto thief. Yay for buffs and reworks.

I was looking forward to trying Berserker on Mercenary again. Can someone test out this build and tell me how it goes? Also, is Kill Shot rifle as good as Gunflame yet?

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vJAQNApeUnMdA9kiVhAehAEliFjAzIAsBzZIjgVwH4d4ucfuA-TZwABAw+DAA
Mercenary Amulet or Carrion Amulet.
If anyone can test, I’d be really appreciative. I won’t be able to test it for a while.

Sword is doing very well now, in fact Acro/TR/DD and DA/acro/TR are VERY potent (I won some 1v1/2s and almost a 1v3 while testing). If you are playing S/d use those.

S/p…nothing really changed XD. You just got a random 5% more damage and a free evade free for 2seconds (which needs to be 3 seconds imo OR 40 down to 30 cd on it). Or you don’t bother and play max burst build (currently handing out and giving it more damage).

So ye I was having a blast.

Will trade auto buff on dagger (not sword, read previous posts why. and I can provide legitimate reasons as well) for preparedness baseline. Will do, like now. NOW. Comon.

That I agree with. I’m just personally sad because I play s/p and my build would love nothing more than to just DROP trickery. But Preparedness forces that to be impossible. I need SA because I play venom, I need DA for mug, then I can’t drop TR. So I can’t use DD either. :C rip

I still can’t justify using Staff. S/d is better now btw, play the bunker trait version and its just…nuts. Acro/TR/DD.

Still. Can’t. Drop. Preparedness.

Rip new acro line, you cannot be played on my main thief. And probably not on my off-thief either.

This is…enjoyable to say the least. I main whatever class is not op (I hate winning because my profession chooses, instead of my skill. dropped mesmer for half a year, on my thief now. will probably reverse that), so Yay for no goggles.

Non-Thief: This trait is passive. It gives too much advantage. Its so op. It has no trade-offs.
Thief: This trait makes me lose damage. I die to a glance. Why you guys complain about my mobility?

Fact1: Thief has the worst engage potential outside of the initial 3 seconds span (1 daze, 1 stun, 1 stun.).
Fact2: Stun reflects signs the lease on this Class having the worst engage. WTB a daze that doesn’t taunt for 4 second.
Fact3: Most Thief damage gets shrugged off instantly by bruiser builds.
Fact4: By the time a Thief kills a bunker (btw, the very definition of l2p right there), they probably got +1’d or just loss value.
Fact5: Adding engage to a class who’s strongest spot is the initial engage makes it stronger.
Fact6: Adding damage does not increase survivability. Thief will still not be able to safely engage in anything larger than a 4 man fight (1v3 or 2v2) without dieing to stray abilities and passives.
Fact7: This topic is losing sight of the facts. Please read this before you continue. I will continue to drop facts if anyone tries arguing with these current facts.

Deceiver- Yes it can, but its based on multiple hits or “Dps”. In a backstab oriented burst, you want DA- its straightforward and applies damage. In a staff build where you want to barrage someone til they die (or pistol/pistol or sword/pistol) you would want CS.

At least thats where my opinion sits. I’m parsing DA/TR/SA and CS/TR/SA atm, and so far DA/TR/SA is parsing far higher, far quicker. But then again, its a cheeky combo so targets are below 50% on engage.

I see you were finally taken by the Bound/Steal/Burst combo. Now to wait for you to swap from d/p…
Someday… :P

Good video though.

I want fire scepter auto to get buffed by cast time. Damage is fine.

What about Mercenary Amulet in spvp? I honestly think that will work well. Not as well as cele, but cele was an overly potent ammy to be fair (removal unnecessary ofc, but…ye). In my opinion also.

My problem is that I can’t pop all my venoms at once, or I lose damage (“This effect can occur once per attack”). So I gotta enter on Skelk, throw into Devourer the second the charges from skelk go, then throw skale to boost damage once dev drops. :C Rip. Even if it took away that “can occur once per attack” that’d be enough for me.

It might be enough to make me play S/D FA marauder again. Maybe.

But I still enjoy my Carrion version (soon to be “Mercenary”) more.

eldenbri.1059:

I’d like some suggestions on how I should be thinking about some specific scenarios that happen a lot.

As background, I anticipate playing a hybrid condi/power mesmer once the Jan 26 patch goes live. I’ve been testing something similar for the last week, and I generally feel like I can take most professions 1v1 (though some fights can take quite a while in the current setting). I’m always solo queing, and I typically start by going to home.

If I’m on home and one opponent comes, I always stay and try to win the fight and the point. (I think this is always the best strategy, but I’m open to suggestions.)

If two opponents come, currently I try to stay and defend the point as long as possible. This almost a guaranteed death. How should I be thinking about this?

If three opponents come, should I always leave? In this situation, I can see how having portal would be a huge help. I basically never use portal today because it’s tricky to coordinate with a random group.

Last scenario – let’s say I try to hold out against a 1v2, but help doesn’t make it in time and I die. When I respawn, how should I decide where to go?

The idea is, if you’re losing a fight hold them for 5 seconds with the point capped. That equalizes the value a LITTLE. One death= 5 points. You lose 5 points on death, they lose 5 points 5 seconds. Also on destination, it depends on class and style. Frontliners try to keep points favored or neutral, but never unfavored. Gankers just +1. Assassins just keep enemy AWAY from points. imo. read my sig doh.

So scenario 1 is win. Just beat em up, keep point capped and keep in mind its %.
Scenario 2 is the one I said above.
Scenario 3 is the same as 2. If you have coordinated group, drop portal and let em take then flip the point those 3 are not at- then bring your team on top of em if they still there.
Scenario 4 is just simple math. Keep track of where people are and where you are VALUABLE. Dieing on a point you don’t own perpetuates a loss. Killing someone faster on a point you’re winning expedites a win. This is general but its the concept.

I am ready to be corrected

K. If we ditch Venomshare, can we get some real venoms?

Also, if ED damage can be that high while they can have a SECOND heal like Infuse Light which doesn’t share the cooldown…it makes even less sense. If we go on a tangent, why is Hidden Killer an ok trait when the only ability that gains value is Backstab and yet no one with a real build (minus Valk, but then they just get DD runes) will use it anyway? I just took a look at the traits and lost my mind. Two traits for traps, two traits for venoms, one trait for signets, one trait for tricks, one trait for physical, one trait for deception.
Why are some of these worse than other classes? Trickster is worse than Ranger’s Wilderness Knowledge. I’m just pointing out I’d ditch our current buffs that are incoming for some bug fixes and some real trait checks.

:C Makes me sad man.

Wtb non toxic community. Paid for non toxic community. Moderators are toxic too, infracting my posts because they can. :C Idky everyone so aggro.

apharma.3741:

Serious Thought.5394:

vana.5467:

For reference, instead of these rando numbers:

Sword autos average damage coefficient/second
Guardian: 1.24… who has the capability to wombo someone into a one shot
Revenant: 1.54 (soon to be ~1.33)… infinite chase, infinite defense, incredible burst
Warrior: 0.97- … poor guy, he’s not even in the 1.0 club
Ranger: 1.06… and ladies and gentleman, DAMAGE+EVADES+CC+HEALS. yep.
Mesmer: 1.01…invuln, stealth, blind, block, cc, disorient and so on for days.
Thief: 1.15 (soon to be ~1.5)… meanwhile, dies to stiff breeze.

*using the changes revealed in the preview

Thought I’d add some meager context

It’s like a fruit kittentail with all these apples, oranges and pears…

You also forgot the blinds, teleports and stealth for days on teef.

You realize I’m not arguing for Thief right. Right? I’m just pointing it out. I play one shot Guardian, and my wep of choice is sword/focus. I think its absolutely fine. Minus the 2 skill. That thing sucks so hard, I always forget to stop wondering why its such a dry skill.

Think they’ll buff it one day?

#context(and idgaf about venomshare. its the argument for continuum shift)
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlAQBeutRieSkqSmrSosSgxSA
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vlAQBeutRieSkqSmrSosSgxSA-TZg9AAQZAA
As revenant

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQBZykIKgKAuAA
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQBZykIKgKAuAA-TZg9AAQZAA
As thief

I just look at revenant with its two heals and wonder…why is this ok :C

If you want context.
After Marauder (math):

Skelk Damage: 388X5= 1940 on a (after traiting for it) 32 second cooldown.
Enchanted Dagger Damage: 911X6= 5466 on a 30 second cooldown

Rip the dream.

Highest dps output is CS. Highest burst is DA/TR/X (or if you really wanna burst and are playing something that hits multiple times, e.g. unload or pistol whip or fist flurry- you play DA/SA/X…its just riskier). Agree to disagree yet?

Arcane Brilliance, Arcane Comet, Arcane Wave, Arcane Power, and Arcane Shield. Just for reference. I agree they need buffs, but these reward you for aggressive play so I personally believe them to all be fine. But I play an assassination ele. And I always will, unless something better comes up.

Can someone explain why they are “garbage”? Genuine curiosity. I do dag/dag fire/air/arcane with burn traiting and some other odd stuff (another one of my “omg that build sucks” builds that somehow completely works and kills people despite them knowing exactly what’s about to happen…permission to be proud?) and for me it works. I just Arcane Power into Burning Speed, Ring of fire and comet at same time with shield up the moment my ring fires off, followed by brilliance and earthquake into updraft to rtl and shocking aura through running away.

I afk’d if we were at 100-150 point deficit and/or no one communicated when it was required. Just made sense, why waste time on a loss.

Same here, went to Ruby was like “well Emerald was hell, and they say this is even worse…so ye no”. Then I played all the other games. I honestly think Anet should check out how Blade and Soul does its character skill progression. It seems more sensible to me. Involves far less passives, is more intuitive, and you have clear trade-offs 24/7. Inb4 infracted for suggesting.

Ithilwen.1529:

Wow Serious, we agree. I rather think it’s the latter.

When I’m not trolling, people tend to agree. And ignore, because the truth hurts.

I like the 2-3 combo after Torch 5? That’s all I got. I just want the auto to be better

I use it for PVP on my assassination build… :C I hope if you guys get your wish, I can still use Arcane to 100-0 someone in 1-2 seconds.

Edit: You think they’ll fix Flamestrike (scepter fire 1)? 1.25 second cast time auto for that little of an effect is…saddening. :C

Either they hope its enough and want to pleasantly surprised, it hasn’t crossed their minds to do so, or their terrified of community backlash. In all scenarios, it won’t come.

vana.5467:

For reference, instead of these rando numbers:

Sword autos average damage coefficient/second
Guardian: 1.24… who has the capability to wombo someone into a one shot
Revenant: 1.54 (soon to be ~1.33)… infinite chase, infinite defense, incredible burst
Warrior: 0.97- … poor guy, he’s not even in the 1.0 club
Ranger: 1.06… and ladies and gentleman, DAMAGE+EVADES+CC+HEALS. yep.
Mesmer: 1.01…invuln, stealth, blind, block, cc, disorient and so on for days.
Thief: 1.15 (soon to be ~1.5)… meanwhile, dies to stiff breeze.

*using the changes revealed in the preview

Thought I’d add some meager context

Not gonna lie, I’d love it if they just reset the traitlines back to the really old version with extra stats and then gave us 84 points (whether you had HoT or not, ofc). And then if they nerfed just about everything. I miss when picking my Mesmer meant “Going to be weak to ganks, but I can burst almost anyone in 1-2 seconds.” or picking my Ele (before Celestial) meant “Time for a real challenge”

God, I feel old. >.>
If I had 84 points, I wouldn’t have to complain about Preparedness or Fast Hands or … anything really.
Also my Thief build would be the REALLY old Pistol Whip with venoms build-
25/0/30/0/15. Updated of course with these traits would look more like: 25/14/20/10/15 to get some crit prowess and that new acro trait (I really don’t like DD, I just want the utilities :C rip).

Going to once again, leave this here
Just…because someone else is finally looking at lockdown…and I only play lockdown…
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsaVnMJCNNhNOBGPB8PhDYiiXoBxPoTgAID8hxZ0GA-TpRBABxXG4hHAAAHCgFOCARcCAUa/BA

Or if you feel especially ballsy…
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vZAQNAsaVnsMBFmiNOBGPBkmiFaCzLL8FKDaBgJUEYuC+BHhA-TpRBABAcIAi4EAEfZgr2fYhjAwDPAAA

The scariest thing in the game was a 30/30/0/0/10 thief, not because it was dangerous but because it had nothing to lose and would continue to scare you to death at all possible moments?

Or when Dhuumfire was hotnerfed because perma burn was too strong?

Or when ZooRanger was 1 a team, not because it was the best spec available but because it provided the most unique buffs?

Sigh. I miss 5 traitlines on 70 point curves with each point increasing your attributes. It actually felt meaningful to invest :C And if you want to know how they could have continued that, remember that 70/5 is 14, so 14X6 is 84. Tadaa. You could of had e-specs if you just added 14 points (without going into 6/6/0/0/2…that was just depressing).

I’m probably alone, aren’t I?
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/quickness-hundred-blades-pistol-whip
Good times :C

Darknicrofia.2604:

find Jessica Alba’s husband because apparently I now have body switching powers.

+1. Beat me to it good sir.

I hate pay to win, says playerbase. Anet then fixes the game by nerfing op (rev op, mes op, scrap op, reap iffy but strong, etc) and its “I paid you to make me strong, how dare you disrespect me”. Lol. Gotta love this stuff.

To quote one of my favorite characters “Therein lies the value of not being seen”. Builds work based on playstyles. If you prefer to yell “YO IM HERE COME FIGHT ME” then ofc this thing won’t work. But if you play like me and focus on locking your foe for the 1.5/2 seconds needed to finish it off, then this works. In fact, this is the only ele build I’ve run since arcane=burn became a stackable concept. I’ve dabbled in others, but come to this. I did check my in game concept/set-up:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vFAQJAoYnMIClMg1MAOOA8RgBBALCATgHQtJbDnBZFECOiA-TJRGwAMLDkZ/BAnAAFPAAA
Then I ran some field testing and…uh…ye. Forgot how much hilarity comes from an instagib burn ele.