Guild Wars 2

@OP I despise map completion. I have almost everything I need to make my legendary just from WvW and PvP. While I enjoy doing PvE maps I enjoy doing it on my terms.

But to put it frankly so what. Legendary items in games aren’t supposed to be an easy thing to get. And if it was ONLY stuff we enjoyed then yeah it would be easy. Or worse completely RNG based in order to keep EVERYONE from having one.

So im working through map completion bit by bit. You can do the same with WvW.

Often the dailies are incredibly easy. Are there gonna be roamers to kill you? likely. But there are sentries near your spawn on your Bl. Which are relatively safer. You can click on a camp and look at the map to see how active the area is around a camp you want to flip. Reducing teh risk of you running into another player. You can ask for HELP flipping a camp. Server hostility makes it almost a guarantee someone on your map wants to stab someone on the other server for you.

You can run a build solely dedicated to running away on a class with high mobility or stealth uptime.

Or you can learn how to fight and get the satisfaction of KILLING the SOB’s that got in your way.

Is it gonna be easy? No. But getting a legendary item shouldnt be easy. The gift of battle for you is much like the gift of exploration for me. Likely the hardest part to complete. But like the gift of exploration all it takes is TIME. I get your in a rush and you feel like this is holding you back. But honestly if there WASN’T systems built like this into legendary weapons theyd be completely useless.

I imagine we will fight steve in the LAST expansion. Now im not a marketing expert so take what I say with a grain of salt. I imagine waiting for the last expansion to do steve allows for the devs to experiment with ways of fixing underwater combat BEFORE that expansion hits. Likely in much the way they are constantly experimenting to try and make replayable maps with each living world release.

Also. If it is the last expansion then odds are by the time it has released they have already begun working heavily on there next project. So they can actually give the underwater combat some focus because even if it DOESN’T go absolutely amazingly as long as it wasnt a complete flop they can still release their next project.

This way Arena-Net can finish the story for the fans that are willing to take a chance and even perform a grand experiment so to speak on underwater content before their next release (to try and iron out many of the obvious problems BEFORE their next game that might feature it).

Honestly I think an MMO sized test base is too good an opportunity to pass up for anyone trying to solve a problem on that scale. And steve gives a very good excuse for the experiment to take place.

“I don’t like this’ “I disagree with you” “I disagree with your disagreement”

@Tragic Positive To put it into perspective. I used to run Smokescale/Bristleback exclusively (like almost every did). Ever since the pet change I started run smokescale/fire wyvern. Because wyvern is the best cleave pet in the game. And its auto attack tracks INCREDIBLY well once it starts firing now. (it has a lunge attached to both parts of the attack now)

In raids druids are part of the meta. Though we still have the public view of being buff bots our condi build as stated above is extremely competitive.

I havn’t done fractals in a long time But I imagine we are usefull their as well.

In SPvP I have seen people work with various types of builds. I personally run a Paladins amulet dps oriented build and have significant success with it. Though most druids still prefer the more defensive/support oriented builds.

Balthazzarr.1349:

I have a feeling that what someone is talking about is the ‘troll’ on “this” site dropping the siege on the tactic so that you CAN interact with it. In that case then it’s a super pain of course.. true epic trolling. But if it’s enemy dropping their siege on your tactic, other than hiding it, there should be no impact since you can’t interact with the enemy siege… :P

Placeable feasts prevent you from using F to activate the tactivator (while also consuming your most likely significantly more expensive food choice).

Enemy siege prevents you from right clicking to activate the tactivator (as right clicking prioritizes enemies above all else).

So depending on how well a place is covered. It really can be impossible to activate tactivators. No matter how carefuly your trying to look. Atleast not before the entire enemy force is ready and waiting to bomb the kitten out of the waypoint.

The Game Slayer.7632:

Why are you playing at 6-7 am? No wonder you’re getting so little. Play during prime time and you’ll get +10 per win and -15/20 per loss. (I’m r19 right now.)

Maaaaybe you should have read the whole thread first. I play at nearly all times of day depending on how my work schedule shifts. My average is 2-5 NO MATTER WHAT TIME OF DAY I PLAY ON.

Unfortunately I have to keep playing in order to do the minimum games necessary which means my rating is inevitably going to plummet unless I start duo queing in order to cheese wins. YAY.

I JUST HIT A NEW LOW. +1 BABY OH YEAH.

I play solo que. I play at nearly all times of day depending on the day (my work scheduel is topsy turvy). I average across all time zones anywhere from +3s to +5s. I know how rating is determined according to the info we have been given. This was meant as a comedy post.

Try +2s ladies and gentlemen. I have to win more than 10 games in a row to make up for 1 loss. Holy kittening kitten. I got more points on average near legendary last season.

(1780 rating as of this post)

Knuckle Joe.7408:

I would find it hard to believe that a ranger lost all of his pets lol, its a great idea tbh but the concept is a little odd or maybe grim. Not intending to bash your idea, but prolly would be better to say he’s just a animal spirit/totem caller kinda like the norns, instead of saying his pets DED.

No more grim than the “Lore” behind the dragonhunter. Zealots who have given up their protective nature in order to commit themselves to violence. Typically out of desire for revenge from the sound of it.

Considering how intense the fighting has been. Its actually more surprising we don’t see NPC rangers mourning the losses of there pets more often. Or atleast taking care of pets who have been critically injured. (Like losing limbs to a vinetooth).

I actually really like this proposal. Its unqiue. And seems to be well set for completing the intended goal of the spec.

I believe I would really enjoy running this spec with BM and NM in WvW. Turning my pet into a burst function in order to finish people off (likely with sic em) while supporting my allies and dealing more close range damage.

The block and mobility of the shield gives some interesting possibilities as far as close range survivability goes. Between rolling evades on gs and swapping to Sw/Shield when things get rough I feel it could act as a close range damage dealer/supporter.

On the other hand (also in wvw and potentially in PvP as well) I would like to try running something like this as an anti Pick tool. Thats often a roll I take in zerg fights when fighting other organized guilds.

The concept of a more powerful but temporary pet actualy works pretty well with beast mastery. As its a burst based talent line when used for dps. (Make the most of your pets cooldowns while combining them with your own to deal extreme single target damage in a couple seconds) Where as druid rangers have periods of down time while the pets and rangers cooldowns are coming back up. The “Strider” would push the extreme a little bit.

I guess my biggest question would be How the cooldowns themselves would work out. But thats a balancing thing in the end and not really part of this discussion.

As far as a Concept goes. This is great in my opinion. And I don’t think its as far out of anets sphere as people seem to think.

This would also be an interesting compromise for the people who do and don’t enjoy using pets on there ranger (although most pets now are MUCH more reliable than they used to be. Especially since the recent patch)

I would not at all be upset if Arena net announced something similar to this in their next expansion

Alright. adding my own story. I am a predominately solo que player. I reached legendary multiple times during the season before settling in high plat (Think the highest I got was rank thirty-something) My average before this happened i think was mid fifties.

In one day. ONE DAY. I dropped completely out of the top 250 and near the bottom of platinum. I spent the next several days working my way back up (again as solo que). Issue is this happened just a couple days before the season ended. So my final placement ended up being 104. (really wanted to get back into the top 100 atleast).

So yah. bad days happen. My rule now is that if I lose 3 games in a row I just stop and do something else for awhile. Because odds are by that point im tilting even if I dont realize it.

Dont worry about your games being off right now. They will get better. Thats the nature of it.

(NA BTW here)

Im actually finding wyvern (in this case fire wyvern) to be a pretty solid pet choice in PvP. Its a little squishy. But its massive cleave range. Attack damage. And now its INSANE ability to stick to a target makes it a pretty good sweeper. In a GS/Longbow shout build im getting it to do pretty significant damage. To pretty much the entire enemy team on point at the same time.

And it is VERY good at down cleave. Especially if your mauling rezzers as well.

I saw that it was a pretty decent success in EU. Which caused me to look at s5 in NA in a different light.

The NA scene was plagued with people who seemed more than happy to discredit the system (And in doing so take a kitten on the competitive spirit of every OTHER player in NA). And I feel it took too long for arena net to really respond to it. By the time others started to take the season seriously after the rise of smurff accounts and decay manipulation the season was almost over. But in the weeks BEFORE those situations arised I saw more interest in actually playing competitively than I noticed previously in other seasons.

So as far as a TEST season goes. Im pretty happy with S5. And it APPEARS that Anet has identified the main problems and can work on fixing them.

I will say the meta this time seemed a bit dull. Though it was definitely more balanced than we usually get. There was A LOT of defenses being thrown around. And for any class who didnt have many tools to bypass said defenses. Many fights on side nodes became waiting games. On the other hand I never really felt that any fight was IMPOSSIBLE to win as you sometimes had in previous metas between near equal skilled players.

I personally am looking forward to season 6. I want to see what it has in store.

You have a couple options. If you want to run offensive pets smokescale and bristleback are your best pet. (heh…get it?) A smokescale reliably hits with its burst and can chase an enemy through the zerg. Once smoke assault ends you will want to immediately pock the f2 in order to cause it to evade the various aoes around it. You can then pull the pet back and with a little luck itl make it back to you in tact. You obviously dont want to send it into the enemy MELEE train. But having it dive into backline is pretty safe. (I recommend sending it in at an angle to there zerg so it can bypass the melee trains bomb)

The Bristleback offers you the ability to provide ranged pressure on enemy downs and casters. Especially those that are isolated (out of hte range of the aoe reflection/bubble spam) such as necros/reapers and even to an extent mesmers and members of the enemy pick.)

A mesmer getting poked by a rangers longbow and bristleback autos at the same time is gonna have to pop something as in a dps spec youl be hitting him around 5-6k per duo shot with the use of something like sic em or stacked might (easy to do with guard+heal as one+zephyrs speed for quickness)

Then you have the option of defensive pets. I,E Canines. You mostly keep these next to you in order to disrupt anyone that tries to gank you. Aoe fear from wolf. Aoe immobilize from drakehound etc.. Combined with Beast master second tier top trait you can mitigate a good amount of a gank if your FAST enough. (Works great with beastly warden)

Finally you have support pets. With Moa’s being at the top since their recent buffs. These pets can also act as defensive pets. With their aoe heal, and decent burst attack. They also hit fairly reliably now that they have had their base range increased.

A big part of this though is that with beast mastery and nature magic a red moa provides permanent fury. And a Blue moa can give that list bit you need for a permanent protection uptime (combined from multiple sources) added another layer of safety.

And both provide there boons in an aoe to your allies as well. Making it very good if your in a party with other pick. As you can provide fury before an engagement and protection when your pulling off on top of your aoe stealth/superspeed and damage reduction combos.

Edit: The defensive and support pets will mostly stay by your side unless your close to your target if you are running a ranged build. Making it easier to keep them alive as they should be avoiding any aoes you do due to them following you around.

The offensive pets (smokescale and bristleback) both have unique features which allow them to exist further away from you (smoke assault/smoke field and extreme range (for a pet)+high toughness)

LinhZeri.6412:

Only thing that really messes Druid balance is the overpowered as heck HoT Pets (Looking at you Smokescale and Bristleback )… Who are bruiser.. do all the damage and yet no weakness of less life or toughness. They need to be brought down to the LOW level of the other pets… simple as that.

.

Try using those base pets in high level pvp and tell me how it works for you.

News flash. It won’t. Believe me. I have tried..and tried…and tried..and tried. Smoke Scale, Bristle back, The moas to an extent, and in VERY gimicky builds the tiger are the only really reliable pets that exist today.

The rest either pop or don’t have any impact on the fight whatsoever.

Hell. Most of the old pets died in 1v1s ACCIDENTALLY. Even if you were built to support them. Much less team fights where even the smokescale can pop if your even a second slow on its evade.

As far as the damage is concerned?

No.

Pets deal less damage in team fight scenarios as well. The smokescales burst for example will act like revenants sword 3. Spreading its damage over multiple targets. With 2 targets that cuts its burst in half. Something that makes druid on druid fights pretty kitten obnoxious (one of the biggest good plays in a druid duel is knocking a druid away from his pet and using your smokescale right then to land the full burst before he can pull it back to act as a shield)

The Bristlebacks burst can be ACCIDENTALLY DODGED IN FULL. And often is. Id say around 30% of my bristleback bursts land any damage. More often than not in a team fight its been accidentally feared by a reaper, had weakness put on it by a reaper so that its damage was pathetic, stunned by a scrapper aoe, hit by slow from a dragonhunter trap (spreading its damage further out making it more likely some of it is mitigated in part if less likely to be dodged in full) reflected by random magnetic aura # 362. Blocked by random guardian bubble#197. Or stopped dozens of other ways.

Bristleback is actually less of a threat to most platinum players than the smokescale. And the smokescale is only a threat in 1v1s.

To put it into perspective. I often EAT an enemy druids bristleback burst when I have guard up. Because it gives me a kitten load of might stacks. And because it doesn’t actually do enough damage to me for that tradeoff to not be worth it in a fight. Then I turn around and maul the kitten for 5-6k. (Oh god druid actually has plays that have a bit of intelligence in them? Who would have thought, Aren’t they just played by their pets?)

P.S.

Note that the above does not take into account PROTECTION. Which is spammed by most relevant classes at this point. FURTHER reducing damage passively since druid/ranger has zero access to boon strips…yay

I was going to make one of my long winded posts on the subject but honestly the OP doesn’t feel worth it.

The suggested change would be castration to the druid. And in case that gets censored what I said rhymes with defenestration. (Defenestration meaning TO THROW OUT A kittenING WINDOW which is what OP wants to do to druid)

You would render the druid completely incapable of doing its job. In EVERY way. Removing the few reasons for both DPS druids AND Support druids can exist. Effectively gutting the class.

No, With the power creep since HoT the base ranger lines do NOT offer enough sustain to handle what comes at them at high level play. Incase you FORGOT SOMEHOW.

Rangers used to be a focus target on a similar level to necros. Because the base ranger simply could not get away.

Ranger used to be FREE KILLS to organized groups. Because nothing the ranger did once it started to get locked down by skilled people actually mattered. They have zero chance of doing anything to stop there attackers. And relied on thieves or mesmers to peel for them over…and over…and over again.

“Suggestions” like this show a complete lack of understanding on how the class even functions. As well as a questionable ability to perceive reality. And just shows why the playerbase SHOULDN’T always have a say in how class balancing is done.

Druid is one of the smaller fish on the field today. The fact that you made this post tells me that you got trolled by one on home or far. And rather than figure out WHY you lost and what you could have done better. You came here to do what everyone else in this community has done before you. Cry until you butcher something you don’t like.

Whatya know. I ended up making one of my posts anyway. Sorry to anyone who has to read this.

Shadowstep.6049:

You can’t decap point when they pew pew at you from pillar…..

Yeah you can chase them to the pillar but by the time you get there you already took a lt of dmg and they can just jump down and back again.

Actually you can. EVERY class has a defensive option for ranged damage now

If you aren’t taking it and its killing you. Thats on you.

Edit: you can also stand UNDER the pillar and fire aoes up at him. Or just stay out of LoS so they cant do anything. While avoiding what few attacks they have that COULD hit you from there.

Well then lets get started.

Favors Ranged? Bite me. Only hte central area has any favoritism for ranged.

Every Melee build has just as much a chance on every single node.

Side nodes? Oh hey Many melee builds can now TELEPORT THROUGH MOUNTAINS. Letting them completely take by surprise any ranged build moving in on or standing near the point. And theres this giant mountain in the way blocking the ranged builds attacks.

Suddenly your fighting in a confined arena with multiple locations to LoS projectile/beam style attacks. Those pillars around the points?

Oh they jumped onto the pillar? Then they aren’t contesting the point. Enjoy your free decap. Or if your defending chase htem up the pillar causing htem to jump down. Enjoy the merrygo round where they jump up and down up and down and contribute nothing to there team while you have someone rotate to you to help you kill him if you somehow magically need it.

As for eating damage 24/7…Stop lieing…seriously. There are SO MANY TOOLS for a melee build to reduce damage from ranged attacks. Lets take warrior for example.

Blocks with reflects. Evading gap closers. Stances to absorb damage. Incredible regen. In the end it evens out. As its supposed to.

Guardians on sky hammer? Teleport through the kitten ed mountain. You can easily target the defender/attacker by scrolling all the way out and tilting your camera up as your approaching. Letting you get a target on him for a teleport into f1 into blade wall into shield knockback into pull back through the blades.

Similar with revenants. Teleport into sword 3 or staff 5.

Thief ditto.

None of the nodes significantly favor ranged. Even with the overhead platforms (Which the ranged defender/attacker has to GIVE UP THE POINT to get to)

The ONLY area where you have even the SLIGHTEST justification is the central field. Which you should be spending hardly any time in. And if they nail you in the field its good on them. Because that is what they are SUPPOSED to do. Its on you for falling for it/Not paying attention.

Other maps are BRUTAL for ranged classes. Offering large amount of LOS options immediately in range of the point. But never ONCE have I seen someone speak up against these. In that case its just fair play right?

Bite Me,

Shade

Edit: In other words get kittening good.

Edit 2: as for (non valid teleport pathing) Funny DH’s and theives and even mesmers/revs do it to me all the time. its something ive come to expect when I am attacking/defending a side node.

Since the news of the upcoming rev nerfs ive been trying to run dps ranger builds as well lately. Issue is against some comps it just feels like its almost impossible to land damage reliably. And I find myself in long drawn out duels which LUCKILY shout ranger is well suited for. But it defeats the purpose of the build as far as team fights go.

How have you faired against comps that counter the build you run? Do you still feel overall effective? (I.E. You feel that even in another setup you would have about the same effectiveness)

Playing DPS ranger atleast for me feels pretty RNG heavy. With the builds effectiveness depending less on the SKILL of your opponents than what build they happen to be running.

But then its been a long time since I ran a glass build. paladins druid being my norm. Which could color my perspective a bit.

sophiewhite.3149:

jewishjoyride.4693:

sophiewhite.3149:

jewishjoyride.4693:

Power rev will still be meta. Condi rev may or may not be.

Not much else to say.

from what theyve shown with necro and now revenant. they try to make kittenty builds good by nerfing the good builds. so this wont be the only nerf. is also like to know what staff brings. seeing as sotm was the only thing mildy useful on it. staff needs a buff now.

Not sure what you’re talking about as Necro/Reaper has a pretty wide range of builds you can queue and win with.

Your statement about staff shows a pretty strong lack of understanding of how staff works, and how it synergizes with the rest of the build.

sorry was referring to recent pve balance changes. ik ik different team same stance. this patch was supposed to be minor to “shake things up”. but please explain how staff synergizes well with the rest of the build. id love to know. all i know is its auto sucks staff 2 3 and 4 all suck. only redeeming quality is staff 5.

Staffs 2-4 aren’t bad. 3 is pretty kitten good as devensive skills go. 4 is nice in the right situations. And 2 can seriously kitten someone up if you land the chain propperly.

The auto attack is only moderate damage but it does offer some healing if you utilize the shards. (most people I know ignore them even when there’s 4-5 lying on the ground next to each other)

I think staff will be a good choice for a defensive/CC weapon. It just might not be a massive part of a 100-0 combo anymore. The CC alone from staff five will still be pretty kitten strong.

Nikkinella.8254:

I’m just hoping the fact they started splitting skills means they will unnerf some of the things that got undeserved nerfs because of spvp -cough- Ride the Lightning -cough-.

^ THIS is a good suggestion. And the kind of thing we should be thinking about now.

Oh my god people >.< Seriously? The devs flat out say here that the patch in question was largely made by the SPvP team. Of COURSE the changes are going to be focused on that. Especially now that they have skill splitting setup so that they can make actual changes on there own WITHOUT relying entirely on the balance team.

We are probably going to see PvP focused patches coming from them in the future.

WvW Is a WHOLE different beast. As Crapgame said WvW has armor,food,weapons and battles with 30+ players.

This skill splitting is exactly what many of us have been asking for and now that its happening your kittening because the patch isn’t all about you?

Anet is giving you the middle finger? No their not. I am at the moment though so /shrug.

If the patch isn’t about your game mode/class whatever don’t freak out about it. Maybe look at what the patch actually means. Skill splitting means that a small amount of the pressure is taken off the balance team when it comes to MAKING THE GAME BALANCED.

We should be kitten ed well rejoicing that this is happening. Not crying that its not all about us right now.

And don’t bring up the whole “Oh we have been disregarded for so long in favor of x game mode, This is just one more drop in the bucket of anet’s complete disregard for our enjoyment blah blah blah” I hear the same stuff in HoTM all the time in reference to PvE and WvW. And believe it or not I hear it in raids as well as someone complains that X skill got shafted because of Y game mode.

Let Anet do their job now that they finally have the tools set up to do it. We should be encouraging them and offering advice on what they could do with this setup. Not chewing them out in the most see through passive aggressive BS since my High School sweetheart left me for joining the military.

Intentionally missing a path of scars when fighting a thief or mesmer and using serpent strike to move back into position so it hits them on the way back to me.

Ragion.2831:

Shadelang.3012:

The ability to continue dealing damage in situations that would kill any other class are what I love. I just wish that ability was more valued by the community.

Edit: OH and the self reliance. The ability to self might, apply max vuln on your target, the ability to heal yourself through careful use of shroud to mitigate damage inbetween heals. There’s just so much play in the class its hard for me to give it up.

random question but bear with me. How long have you played necro in spvp?

Funny funny. I know about necro’s issues in PvP. (To awnser your question ive pvpd on necro and ranger since the games release I am however a PvX player despite having reached legendary every season so far in a rather small number if games each time..hitting legend x4 in the most recent season)

But the OP didn’t specify PvP in his title. He asked what made necromancer fun for the individual.

In PvP Necro has trouble sure. But in PvE (such as fractals and raids) and to an extent wvw as well everything I have said holds true.

There IS more than one game mode you know?

@sophiewhite I am not disagreeing with you. Nor am I attempting to agree with the OP. I just stated facts as I saw them. You’l notice I also didn’t ask for buffs anywhere in my post.

If anything I would like a dps meter in this game so I could see exactly how much dps that high HP pool actually gives. In an ideal game. The extra health would enable the build to deal damage when other builds couldn’t evening out the overall dps. Making the squishier builds better during burst phases for quickly pushing to the next phase. But making the tankier dps builds more reliable once that burst phase was over and the boss resumed its aoe based attacks which force glassier builds to dodge more/interupt there attacks to avoid damage.

I don’t feel the game is at taht point yet. But without the ability to actually SEE how much the difference is. It’s hard to know what I SHOULD be asking for. I want the build to be used for what it is. Not artificially tack on extra mechanics until its overbloated and destabilizes the classes build diversity.

But I am probably not going to GET my wish to know how much that HP pool actually gives. Which means that unless we DO get a random x mechanic thrown in or dps increases, power reaper is likely doomed to remain in the sidelines due to its lower cap on damage.

The ability to continue dealing damage in situations that would kill any other class are what I love. I just wish that ability was more valued by the community.

Edit: OH and the self reliance. The ability to self might, apply max vuln on your target, the ability to heal yourself through careful use of shroud to mitigate damage inbetween heals. There’s just so much play in the class its hard for me to give it up.

I play power reaper almost exclusively in PvE lately. Obviously not in raids but in fractals where the “meta” isn’t as strongly enforced.

Power reaper is definetly tankier than most builds.

Issue is it being more sustainable has no bearing in raids. So its kind of a mute point. Who cares how tanky a class is if the cost is damage. Thats the mentallity of hte current pve community.

In raids a power reaper is kind of wierd. It can stand in the black during gorsevals aoe’s and keep dpsing. It can survive the damage of sabetha’s final phases with minimal need for aid.

Ironically if a PURE tank was necessary in this game. A power reaper would be one of the best contenders. With access to a large amount of damage reduction, toughness stacking abilities. And abilities that enable a tank style reaper to deal more damage than any other “tank” build in the game currently does.

But none of that MATTERs in the current raid.

For example never losing dps uptime on gorseval doesn’t really matter in part because there are no methods of recording how much damage the reaper can do vs other classes that have to move out of the black. Does being able to stand in seekers and continue dpsing while using shroud to tank the hits close the gap in dps. With no way to actually see it ourselves the only thing we can do is say “well the potential damage of a theif or ele is MUCH higher”.

If an ele goes down they lose alot of dps. Meanwhile the necro is still dpsing just the same through whatever hit took the ele down. Hell the necro is probably the one ressing the ele. How much dmg does the ele really lose compared to the necro in that situation. How much dps gain is the necro responsible for returning to the grp while rezzing that ele in whatever damage field might have killed him.

There just isn’t a way to tell in the current game. So those situations might as well not exist in the current game as far as the playerbase is concerned. Only anet has really any idea what a power reaper ACTUALLY contributes through its large hp pool vs what it costs.

As far as Necro’s gaining group support. Honestly unless said group support was horrendously overpowered who cares? Do you REALLY think any amount of grp support they give a necro is going to outweight the massive damage boosts a druid gives? Or the sheer power of a chrono? Without it being brokenly overpowered?

Fat chance. There’s already a concern among rangers that the next elite spec for them is just going to be flat out ignored because people will still demand they run druid for the heals+buff combo. Making it a dead xpac for them class wise. (Wich sucks for people that don’t enjoy being buff kittenes like the game has forced them to be since release but still enjoy the class)

Hmm While the build is pretty terrifying when they hit you from stealth. In long term combat its extremely weak. Its GREAT for getting a quick kill. But its very vulnerable to even light pressure. (a paladins druid for example can 1 round them pretty reliably. And the burst on a paladins druid isn’t exactly massive).

Now I don’t PLAY mesmer. I just fight them alot. But in my opinion any nerf to the burst would have to come with a pretty decent sustained damage buff. So that they can have more long term pressure. Or a survivability buff of some kind but that would just make one MORE tanky dps build in a meta of fairly tanky dps builds (whatever the method they use).

The build is dangerous. But its not really meta for a reason. There damage is so heavily telegraphed that they have a really hard time landing htere full burst UNLESS they do it from stealth. And even from stealth theres quite a few things that can go wrong. (there have been times ive accidentally negated a mesmers burst simply because I was fighting someone else and dodged the entire thing by accident.)

I want to make it clear after doing both 75 and 100 as a Valk/Zerk Power reaper.

This is quite literally everything I wanted from the GW2 combat system when I first got this game years ago.

A good pacing to the fight, good map design all around that really makes you feel the menace from the boss, Combat requiring mobility and positioning. Strengths and weaknesses to going ranged vs melee (Attacks behaved differently depending on distance to the boss), Enough pressure in both areas that you WANT to go to where your most suited for the sake of survival, a reason to be a little tankier than normal and to bring utility skills instead of just dps boosts, (I brought rise and well of corruption to deal with boons and to help me if I get CC’d before that kitten combo slam).

All in all this fight made me WORK for it. I had to learn and pay attention and even then there was enough happening to me and my team mates that I found myself using every skill on my tool bar multiple times throughout the fight.

This is exactly what I wanted. And even though I know everything coming forward will be different. Hearing that this fractal is the “standard” moving forward just makes me plain excited.

(AND ALSO THAT MUSIC…gods I can’t believe how much I missed that song)

atheria.2837:

Wharrgarbl.9263:

Hello guys, id like your help today!

Background: came back (quit just after hots came out), and trying to L2P (fractals and new map). Thing is, cant deal with moving, dodging stuff, watching bosses animations and performing a rotation at the same time.

DPS wise, whats better to camp? Shortbow or Axe/X? Is it better DPS to camp sword/X as power build? (with LB opening, i do know how to do that).

Also, what are the best pets for FOTM in pug groups that dont buff much? Tiger + Red Moa for fury uptime? Tiger + bear to tank / something else? Does bear even tank in fractals?

For power druid, Staff and Longbow -

For condi Ranger, Axe/Torch second weapon choice is open, no others can do what these can in AOE for a straight Ranger

I take camps faster with my Power Druid than with my Condi Ranger

I think he means camp as in just camping one weapon. Not taking camps in WvW

DPS wise sword/axe would probably be a good starting point. Its a power setup. Offers two evades. And a high damage melee attack. Using axe 4 on cooldown.

If you want something a bit safer. Greatsword is a good choice. The dps use on it is simple (Use GS#2 maul on cooldown) offers a leap and evade on gs #3. And Its third hit in its auto attack chain is an evade. Making melee combat alot safer till you get used to combat in this game.

As for pets. Tiger is a very good choice. with it you won’t need a red moa as tiger gives enough fury while doing higher damage.

Moa is better in places where you know you will need to swap pets alot. In PvE you typically don’t have to.

For a secondary pet something that can CC for breakbars is what I would reccomend. Wolves, Pink Moa, or Electric wyvern’s are your best bet. Swap to cc and then go back to tiger like normal.

So if you wan’t it as simple as possible so you can just fight and learn the boss.

GS with tiger, Maul on cooldown (make sure to take the GS trait in beast mastery) use pet f2 on cooldown for fury generation. And use other abilities as you need to.

Its not OP…. If you KILL THEM by swinging your weapon around, dropping an aoe of any kind (they die pretty fast), directing your pet to attack them etc… the roots dissapear along with the entire stack of immobilize on you. The immob only stays if you let it survive long enough to fade on its own.

So reapers for example. EVEN CONDI REAPERS. Can flash into shroud. Use rs 2 to damage the roots and block the incoming rapid fire. And then auto once or twice to kill them. Or just transfer.

Most other classes can easily get out of it.

Its a grandmaster trait that can be killed. If it didn’t have the potential to be strong there wouldn’t be even the slightest point to it.

I like the idea behind courtyard. Id like the map to be a little bigger. So that a team can actually get the distance to regroup if they have the mobility to do so.

The map in its current form is great for an individual player to dissapear. But only at the cost of his team who are too cramped in with the other team to really break off.

On this note i have two ideas.

One is to make the map a bit bigger. Around 20% But keep the same general structure. This gives teams a bit more room to manuever. And allows classes that require set up to start (staff eles for example) the room they need to begin casting while watching for x thief or guardian teleport.

The other is to make the map taller add a whole nother level on top of the current one that looks down on the field. But can be reached via stairs or a small jumping puzzle like series of posts around the outer edge of the arena. Vertical play opens up alot of possibiliities as far as comps go.

The main reason I stopped playing TDM was because it largely became a murderball fest. The two groups would grp together and htens mash into eachother and whichever team had the better composition won the entire game. As that five would just camp the enemy teams spawn and demorilize there opponents.

A big part of why this was so succesful is that it fealt like you couldn’t ever get a non murderball comp the room it needed to manuever. Kiting out that ball and slowing down/sniping individual members (peeling the onion) is a pretty good way to tear it apart. But courtyard in its current form doesn’t really have the ease of manuverability necessary for a player to get out of the way without sacrificing other members of his team.

Just as the title says. I currently only play revenant for raids. And I don’t have any other classes that is raid viable that I have experience enough in to not be dragging down the team for several raid nights.

As it currently is I am getting alot of mixed information from Reddit, the PvE forums, as well as from some of my guildies. It seems like rev is currently in a grey spot. And other than boon generation and CC I don’t really contribute it feels like. As far as boon generation goes we have a dragonhunter for melee prot and our druid can always take over fury generation if needed. My ability to assist the chrono with quickness generation was the only truly unqiue thing I provided aside from being the primary Break Bar go to guy.

Ive heard talk of running two chronos. Or just having the one chrono run max boon duration on his own and replacing the rev with another class.

What I want to know is should I be looking to grab a different raid class? Or is what I provide still enough to justify my current place in the comp.

Fay.2357:

Shadelang.3012:

Hmm what would keep the chronotank from wearing commanders gear and using other methods of boosting its boon duration. We don’t take chrono tank for its dps ANYWAY. This would make it a more reliable tank for new mesmers. And boost its personal quickness generation. I believe up to near 80-90 percent if you commited to boon duration? Odds are if you used food you could hit 100%.

The chrono tank I believe would still be able to maintain perma quickness atleast on the DPSers correct? Which is where the main damage comes from ANYWAY.

See my post ~8 posts above you.

My bad I completely read right over that one. Thanks for the reply. So from what im seeing the talk about chronotank being dead is…Pretty much just an exaggeration. The chrono will just have to commit a little bit more gear wise to compensate.

Hmm what would keep the chronotank from wearing commanders gear and using other methods of boosting its boon duration. We don’t take chrono tank for its dps ANYWAY. This would make it a more reliable tank for new mesmers. And boost its personal quickness generation. I believe up to near 80-90 percent if you commited to boon duration? Odds are if you used food you could hit 100%.

The chrono tank I believe would still be able to maintain perma quickness atleast on the DPSers correct? Which is where the main damage comes from ANYWAY.

Completely remaking my post.

On the subject of making pets scale with the rangers stats. I feel you should think a bit more before pushing for this change.

The change would involve pushing pets and by extension the ranger himself to further extremes in either direction.

Either creating hyper burst builds. (Think bursts on the level of 23k+ plus every 15 seconds in a dps build)

Or Bunker builds that might as well have multiple heal skills (Imagine if moa’s aoe heal healed as much as heal as one. You think druid sustain is good NOW?)

The real downside is that you would cripple pet choice for both dps and bunker builds. MASSIVELY lowering the pet diversity. And completely removing most of the pets that are barely competitive choices. (with your suggestion a wolf would simply be too squishy for a dps build to take and wouldn’t have significant purpose in a bunker build except as a CC Bot. Meaning there would be better options)

Not only that but your suggestion would likely involve reworking the base damage of scaling of most if not all damaging/healing pet skills. And there still trying to get them working with the current system.

I feel like adding a pet trait line would be more realistic than what your suggesting. Just from a sure workload perspective.

DeceiverX.8361:

Aitadis.8269:

I don’t play boonshare much, but why is it okay for PvE to have 100% boon uptime but not for wvw. It’s a double standard the way I see it.

It’s making some people upset because it removes some professions from being in the optimal group setup. Unfortunately what they fail to realize is this is a fallacy.

The same people who are so interested in hardcore PvE are clueless when it comes to how metas and optimization against AI seems to work. The game will always be exclusive of certain combinations/builds just because the community deems it as non-optimal. And in reality, it’s not the game’s doing but the players. The entire point of hardcore PvE is optimizing groups regardless of the consequences to overcome some ridiculously exclusive content. True diversity is a lie in any PvE encounter, because forcefully “diverse” games are just forced optimizations.

Its more the fact that boon share expands the gap in potential between a SEMI organized group and an unorganized group so far that its actually better for there server if the unorganized group runs away because the odds of them even getting one or two reliable kills in a zerg with perma prot/resistance/25stacksmight/fury/retal/quickness without being so completely and utterly dominated that they lose half there zerg is almost zero.

A boon share comp can go alot tankier and do alot more damage all at the same time.

The rotation for quickness is actually a bit interesting to try and do in hte middle of a zerg fight where your group is constantly moving around.

If SOI is rebalanced this makes it harder for the chrono to act as a permanent boon bot. (Once the duration was stacked beyond x point they could maintain it permanently).

Especially with boons it can’t generate itself.

This change would force MASSIVE regearing for a zerg to get the same level of boon uptime. In many cases forcing them to give up either damage or sustain (depending on the class/build sourcing the boon) in favor of boon duration. Where as before they could just leave it to the mesmer once the initial stack got going.

So while it may still be possible. It will require a larger commitment to the playstyle as well as a larger cost in stats in order to accomplish it. Leaving them overall weaker. Not to mention it being more complicated on an individual level to pull off. ESPECIALLY if rev aoe boon duration gets nerfed a little as well.

It really depends on how the additional base boon duration on certain skills they talk about really turns out. I am looking forward to seeing.

Remaking this post to be a bit less salty and condescending

I don’t feel this change is going to have any significant impact whatsoever. (Or atleast no significant POSITIVE impact)

At most its going to cause the people complaining about premades to swap to complaining about how x class is such a hard carry in solo que. They will find SOME way to convince themselves and anyone that is also struggling that its anything but there fault they lost x match. Never mind if they ENJOYED the match because obviously that doesn’t matter.

This is from a predominately solo que players perspective. I suppose thisl make it even easier for me to hit legend each season. I just hate that the few matches where things were changed up (when I got put against a premade) are gonna dissapear for the fifth season.

Monotony will kill this game far faster that matchmaking or premades.

Then you have the people that are outright lieing in order to stress there point. THAT annoys me.

As another point. When I hit legendx1 I was pretty much ready to stop playing. But I started playing with a couple friends who brought THEIR friends and before I new it I had hit legend x 4. Those games I probably simply wouldn’t have played. And since we stopped queing I have done less than a dozen games sense. Don’t underestimate the ability of a team to keep playing. Especially when that team has a goal. If suddenly that goal dissapears. Or even the ability to HAVE a team at all dissapears. I think a surprising number of people will find that they don’t really feel like it anymore.

Ranger will never be meta. This coming from someone who has played ranger since released. Played as gank in multiple guilds in multiple servers. Reached legend in pvp in every season multiple times. Done any non raid PvE content (swapped to rev for that cause I don’t wanna be a healer >.<).

So I know ranger. And as probably a few of you can attest I at least have a SLIGHT competence with the class.

Play the build for its strengths. What a “dps druid” is, is a skilled self reliant unit. When played properly it doesn’t need anyone to buff them. Anyone to stealth them. Anyone to heal them. It is capable of each of these things. We are more self buff capable than any other class currently.

We can excel in small scale content. Whether that is knocking a necro away from his zerg and quickly nuking him down forcing his allies to save him before we stealth and leave or finish him with a stomp. Or scouting ahead of our zerg (ya know…ranging around. Like the class name ACTUALLY implies none of this sniper bullkitten). Or even moving slightly BEHIND our zerg to protect those that are falling behind.

These are useful tools. And the zerg can be better for them. That doesn’t mean the squad leader should bend himself over to accommodate us however. Hell BECAUSE of how were set up we can handle not being in the squad at all far better than most classes can. And can successfully 1v1 anything that tries to hit us as were shadowing the zerg itself.

Stop thinking like some god tier sniper. Our class is designed to be standalone. But we also have the ability to save friendlies (celestial shadow, guard, protect me and other skills that help get a friendly out of danger) We do enough damage to pressure enemy gank off an ally and even kill them if they don’t retreat. Buying time for that ally to get to the zerg for saftey.

And we have the CC and burst necessary to isolate and kill an exposed target without needing someone else to cover for us.

Hoping for us to get the ability to fire into zergs willy nilly and get kills is…kind of stupid and horrendously unfair to other classes.

Ranger is STRONG in what it does. Try doing that instead of trying to force some arbitrary definition onto the class.

At first I was against the concept of factions. But as time passes I feel more and more that it should have existed when the game first started. With a list of 10 (versions) of the server you could sign up to fight in. WIth your guild being able to chose ONE of those versions to focus on (enabling guild claiming etc) each week. But with individual players able to (Guest) on one or two other versions per week (meaning no one player could access more than 3 versions of the match).

Would it be a clusterkitten? Probably for awhile until people got used to it. But this whole concept of server identity seems like its causing more harm than good in a situation where the game can’t support it. (Or the game is perceived that way atleast by the vocal minority)

Atleast with factions you can have another kind of identity. One that won’t just get eaten when people move around.

Thats just IMO though. I don’t pay enough attention to the inner workings of this kind of system to really make a good argument on it either way.

Edit: I mean hell. Ive moved servers so many times that its just rediculous at point. And I just realised I can’t actually remember my “home” server anymore.

U.U Glad it got sorted out.

It is currently working for me in WvW. Testing it as im typing this.

The two current pets (smoke scale/bristleback) are pretty resistant to standard damage. (They have high toughness/evades) But they cave to aoe condi pressure.

This is gonna sound a bit wierd. But in my experience aoe burn guards and and other heavy aoe condi builds (like condi reaper if both you and the pet are in the ice/poison fields and he uses RS4) deal the mots reliable damage to my pets. Usually either forcing me to pet swap or making me try to cleanse the pet directly.

If the ranger is using signet of renewal STEADILY condi load the ranger and his pet at the same time if you can. He will either enter CA to drop condis or pop the signet. Sometimes if he doesn’t notice that teh pet is already loaded hel gib the pet at the same time. At the least it will force a swap.

Note im not gonna say this is GOING to work for you. But as a druid main these are the situations that my pet typically dies. Or the situations in which I watch someone elses pet die.

Started Saphire Ended Legendary x4

179 games played 136 games won. Forced 50/50 win rate my kitten .

All stats are given by the amulet and rune that you choose. All that a weapon does in T/SPvP is active that weapons skills for you to use in the match. Meaning that what the weapon quality/stat type is is meaningless.

You could have a nomads ascended greatsword (somehow) and it won’t matter.

All that matters is whether the weapons SKILLS favor one form of attacking over another. But thats up to you and the game mechanics.

foste.3098:

increase cele avatar cd to 15 sec.

This is probably the best way to nerf druids without destroying any builds be it support mender or power druid.
It would also let players use non dolyak runes since there would be no point to building for so much regeneration ticks with the longer cd, just my 2 cent.

If it was just Celestial Avatar skills that would be effected by this I would definitely be willing to try it. But this would affect druidic clarity and celestial shadow as well. Which makes me extremely leery of messing with the cooldown too much.

I am curious to see how it would turn out. But I am worried that so much of our survivability is tied into just ENTERING celestial avatar that a seemingly small change could affect a pretty big portion of our defense.

As for using non dolyak runes there have always been alternatives. A full shout ranger for example will almost never need to worry about astral force. A sword axe/longbow ranger has a good amount of AF generation through the use of multi hit attacks. Combine the two together and you get a dps build with pretty high CA generation as long as hes actively fighting. Kind of like a brawler build TBH.

Dolyak runes I feel are only really used in the current meta build itself. So targeting it (maybe just make it so that truly passive regen (like runes) don’t affect AF generation) would do less damage to builds that aren’t reliant on it. Where affecting CA cooldowns hits EVERY SINGLE even meta or near-meta build the class has at the moment.

Edited past this point.

On the nature of improving marksmanship and skirmishing I fully agree with you. Improving a line that doesn’t add increased defense will by its very nature force a choice for druids between offensive and defensive builds. Separating the two into types with strengths and weaknesses.

Unfortunately unless fortifying bond is either eliminated or made baseline nature magic will probably always be mandatory. That one minor trait is simply too important as it stands now. And the other goodies it has such as evasive purity and natures ward just add onto it.

I also hope to see additional changes to the base pets. Though many of hte pets will have a hard time surviving anyway even if they GET reworks due to the lack of any form of active defense. Its not the damage that makes the smokescale the melee pet of choice. Its the fact that it doesn’t nearly instantly die the second it tries to attack anything.

Alright made a post earlier but I deleted it because it didn’t really contribute to the convo at hand. Mostly just me bringing up a pet peeve when it comes to forum behavior.

As far as Druid goes. I don’t really know how it would even be possible to nerf the menders druid without painfully hurting the dps druids as well. One of the issues with elite specs is that you kinda can’t dampen there core functions without hurting the entire class. Since the odds of a viable build existing WITHOUT that elite spec is pretty much NULL.

Can you make a build and be succesful without it? Sure I hit legend in season one using bloody shouts on base ranger in the era of bunker tempests with perma magnetic aura. Would I recommend doing that? Hell no. It was an incredibly frustrating experience that I would rather delete every character I own and start over than repeat.

Im not sold that menders druid even needs to be nerfed yet. And I freaking HATE that build. As anyone whos pvpd more than 1-2 games with me here can probably attest to.

But if we DO as a COMMUNITY not as one or two freedom posters who feel like x class is repressing them from reaching their just rewards (since OBVIOUSLY there super skilled and they didn’t get outplayed a tall right?), then I feel we should be looking at how to widen the gap between a “bunker/support” druid and a “Dps” druid.

Atm the only difference between these two builds are amulet, weapons and MAYBE runes.

They use almost exactly the same traits.

If we were able to seperate them so that they weren’t so tied together we could start balancing one without shoving the hilt of the nerfbat through the others kitten. And I legitimately said kitten there because that would be horrible.