Guild Wars 2

I know, I was responding to the “not the stupid way currently possible” part of the comment.

fracture.9754:

Give necro a reliable way to stack some might (maybe not exactly 25 solo like ele, but you know…something. I said RELIABLE, not the stupid way currently possible) <snip>

You mean like this? =P https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXoUe8e4qT4

on topic: My Necromancer is the very first character I made and leveled up to 80, because I enjoyed the flair and gameplay of their GW1 counterparts.
But sadly I rarely play my Necro these days because of several reasons – below-average performance in group-based PvE (team support = next to zero), in WvW only really useful in zerg fights (which I rarely participate in) and mediocre performance in solo roaming and sPvP (because of lacking mobility and proper defense against cc).

For me it just is not a fun class to play anymore, except for occasional WvW roaming/havocing with my guild and… camping rich ore nodes.

Right now I´m hoping HoT will fix the team-support and sustain issues the class has and not just introduce a gimmicky specialization, leaving the classic Necromancer out in the rain :,(

Edit: personal résumé – Necros provide very limited/niche utility in a group setting (blinds, chills, boon-removal, vulnerability, fears), great AOE spike damage and decent sustained damage, but suffer to much from being outperformed by other classes in many areas.

“Yadayadayadazerkerrbadyadayadaplznerf”

No one is forced to run a specific set of gear under any circumstances. As far as I can tell, you can complete everything in this game using whichever stat combination you like. Naturally, people have become better since launch, therefore more people started using purely offensive stats for better kill-times/faster completion of content.
You don´t like the “active playstyle” associated with offensive stat combinations, or simply can´t pull it off? Fine. Use something else and stop bothering other people

/thread

Gaile, where are you in this darkest hour? =( Deliver us from the evil that is the Zerker QQ thread! ~.~

I´m just going to quote myself here…

Skoigoth.9238:

No one is forced to run a specific set of gear under any circumstances. As far as I can tell, you can complete everything in this game using whichever stat combination you like. Naturally, people have become better since launch, therefore more people started using purely offensive stats for better kill-times/faster completion of content.
You don´t like the “active playstyle” associated with offensive stat combinations, or simply can´t pull it off? Fine. Use something else and stop bothering other people

Can we PLEASE get a sticky/some kind of general discussion thread instead of a new “Zerker is bad QQ” thread every day? It is not like these “discussions” lead anywhere.

Let´s throw in Specter and Wraith.

I think both would be very fitting if the specialization builds upon spectral skills (which I feel are conceptually rather distinct and different from the remaining Necromancer skills).

naiasonod.9265:

Tree.3916:

naiasonod.9265:

snip

Nike had a good idea for normalizing stats. All gear is Celestial and trait distribution would control the stats on characters.

I could dig it. That’d be a rather decent baseline, in fact.

I agree, but I doubt something like that will ever happen.
People would rage even more about how they can´t be “special snowflakes”, which apparently is “what MMOs are about” for a lot of people.

Threads like this are rather pointless I feel (same old arguments as usual). Still, it amazes me how they´ve kept popping up so consistently for basically two years now and yet, I STILL do not understand what exactly the problem is.

No one is forced to run a specific set of gear under any circumstances. As far as I can tell, you can complete everything in this game using whichever stat combination you like. Naturally, people have become better since launch, therefore more people started using purely offensive stats for better kill-times/faster completion of content.
You don´t like the “active playstyle” associated with offensive stat combinations, or simply can´t pull it off? Fine. Use something else and stop bothering other people

xDudisx.5914:

I guess people are too salty today becuase of losing 125 power hahaha.

Yeah, right…

digiowl.9620:

During the room entry shot i don’t think they were so much floating as standing tall on their tails.

https://i.imgur.com/eytBbvE.png

Hmm I´m rather certain that they are floating, like the one in the cinematic trailer

digiowl.9620:

And during the “new allies” moment there is a tail poking out in the lower left corner.

https://i.imgur.com/vNzfTLw.png

I´m also very sure the one in this shot is entangled/being held down by mordrem vines and that the thing in the left corner is the tip of one of these vines.

Consider all hints at the White Mantle we were given during the last couple of episodes, the design similarities to the original Mursaat and the Maguuma Jungle as the main location for the expansion.
I think it is pretty safe to assume that the Mursaat will make a come-back in HoT.

However, even though it is probably highly unlikely, I wouldn´t count the Margonites out yet (because of… reasons).

Leo G.4501:

-snip-

I have no desire to get into an argument with you, because I think you and I are talking about very different (non-)issues.
I replied to you, because I felt you referenced the video I posted out of context, for whatever reason. Debating the semantics of “faceroll”? You only quoted this one part of my post specifically, so I tried to clarify my intentions behind linking the video.

Leo G.4501:

So can we please stop having useless discussions like this every week, yes? They make my eyes bleed…

That sounds like a personal problem, guy. No one’s forcing you to write or post here.

It is a personal problem I guess, I´m a bit masochistic.

Leo G.4501:

You act like I’ve never faced Lupicus with glass gear before. I’ve just not solo’ed him in any attempt. All I was saying is, the person I quoted must have a different definition of ‘faceroll’ than most.

Look… we might have different understandings of what the expression “faceroll” means (to me it means “to be able complete content without putting any/much effort into it”), but that wasn´t the point I tried to make at all.

I linked the video because Azhure claimed that using glass cannon gear yields almost no risk in dungeons, totally disregarding the fact that using more defensive gear is even less riskier (you practically can´t die, no matter what, hence my usage of the term “faceroll”).

Since you apparently have experience fighting Lupi , you should understand that the guy in the video would´ve been dead after eating the second kick (about 1 min. in), if he´d been using Zerker gear.

The argument “Zerker is bad, because low-risk/high-reward” is trash. It is simply untrue and disregards factors such as relative survivability in comparison to more defensive stat sets, player skill, familiarity with encounters and so on and so forth.
That´s the point I wanted to make in the post you were referring to.

I said it in a different thread and I´ll repeat it here.

GW2 has mostly content problems, not stat-balance problems, when it comes to dungeons (repeatable, instanced, group based, PvE content).
In the end, it doesn´t matter anyways, because a-net made it clear in the past:
They. do. not. give. a kitten. about. dungeons.

So can we please stop having useless discussions like this every week, yes? They make my eyes bleed…

Azhure.1857:

Skoigoth.9238:

-snip-

Well I suppose I’m different than most of the Anti-Meta people in this thread. I’m not here for its effect on community and/or the LFG tool.

No I’m actually against the Zerk Meta because of what you have in bold. Its untrue and I think you and I know it. It is low-risk/high-reward and not the other way around. That is my gripe with it.

As Jerus already pointed out correctly, what you said really only “somewhat” applies to low level dungeons and trash fights, because you can burn through mobs without much effort.

And still, even in low level dungeons (e.g. TA – level 55) I regularly see people playing glass cannon builds getting wrecked by mobs such as Malrona or Leurent, because they didn´t pay enough attention to the fight and/or are just not very experienced.

Then take a high level dungeon such as Arah and classic PUG-buster encounter such as Lupicus – arguably one of the more difficult encounters in GW2.
Then have a full clerics warrior, playing terribadly (on purpose, as stated in the description btw.), semi-afk facerolling poor Lupi solo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKO11Y55DTM

Now tell me, how is glass cannon gear “low-risk” compared to this.

dlonie.6547:

Serious question, what gear set gives a higher risk than zerker?

Rampager´s/Sinister probably

I get a very demonic vibe from the armor and, as we already knew, Rytlock apparently has been blinded… Remember what happened to Kormir when she got captured after the battle of Gandara? Maybe we´ll finally get the fractal about Abbadon´s initial defeat (I´m still pretty sour because people voted for that stupid reactor fractal).

May the fallen God of Secrets rise once more \(o_o)/

Vargamonth.2047:

Skoigoth.9238:

Threads like this one really amaze and annoy me. They pop up every week, rapidly explode, with a big portion of people talking past each other, throwing around the same old arguments again and again, and yet I still don´t understand why exactly some people think the established meta is supposedly bad for the game.

So, if any of those people could concisely and in a structured manner explain to me why purely offensive, high-risk/high-reward stat combinations being the core of optimized builds is wrong, it would be greatly appreciated.

I don’t think there’s any problem with that kind of builds achieving the best runs.
The problem is more in the line with having a meta stablished so close to the optimal, which means that a quite high amount of people can run those builds, follow some not so hard to pull off tactics and achieve better results than with most other compositions.
If the whole spectrum of defensive / balanced builds is there to allow different approaches with different degrees of difficulty, but any half decent player with a bit of knowledge and experience can perform close to an extreme, well, I might think there could be a problem with that.

But that´s a problem with the content, not with the builds/stats the make up the meta, don´t you agree?

Threads like this one really amaze and annoy me. They pop up every week, rapidly explode, with a big portion of people talking past each other, throwing around the same old arguments again and again, and yet I still don´t understand why exactly some people think the established meta is supposedly bad for the game.

So, if any of those people could concisely and in a structured manner explain to me why purely offensive, high-risk/high-reward stat combinations being the core of optimized builds is wrong, it would be greatly appreciated.

I personally really enjoyed this episode for the very reason that the story finally ventured into morally more grey areas. Yes, I felt uncomfortable killing these centaurs (since they were obviously innocent), but that actually made the story interesting and emotionally engaging for me. I really missed that in GW2 so far.

GW1 had a lot of shady characters with questionable morals we had to interact/cooperate with. A few of my favorites are…
Verata, one of the Necromancer Trainers in Prophecies. He is not reluctant to employ forbidden methods to further his knowledge of summoning undead minions. He kidnaps innocent people for his experiments and becomes the founder and leader of a secret cult.
Panaku, the crazed Assassin Trainer (Factions). He takes a bit too much pleasure in exercising his profession, but later on in the story has rather big change of mind and repents for his former deeds.
Nerashi, a pretty ruthless Sunspear Ranger (Nightfall). There is a quest in which she captures a kournan scout, whom your PC has to interrogate. After questioning the frightened and pitiful Kournan, Nerashi gives you two options. Either blindfold the soldier and send him into the wilderness, or let her execute him on the spot.
And Koss of course, because he is a kitten <3

I loved these characters! Not that I necessarily agreed with what they do or say, but I felt they spice up your group of allies/companions a lot. Running around with a group of white-Disney-knights, saving the day for everybody all the time, is boring.
For similar reasons I really like Canach´s character development throughout the Dragon´s Reach episodes. His “dialogue” with Anise´s illusion in Party Politics, where he (presumably) jokes around about planing to kill everybody, was quite hilarious I think.

So, if anything, please continue this style of character development! Be bold and make characters do questionable stuff. Give them a bit more “meat”, so that we have a reason to discuss and reflect upon their actions, and actually care about what subsequently happens to them.

Edit:
I forgot to add that I agree however with the criticism concerning the lack dialogue options for our PC. The stuff we have to say during these dialogue sequences with story NPCs is, for the most part, either horribly generic talk, whose only function is to further the plot (inform person x about event y, etc.), or inconsequential and stupid blabbering that makes our PCs look like total idiots.
More diverse and/or thought out dialogue options, even if they don´t really affect the plot, would be appreciated and, as for me, would greatly improve the experience of playing through the story.

nekretaal.6485:

Skoigoth.9238:

Oh look! Somebody summed up the situation very accurately.

Now I have even less incentive to replay the LS on any of my alt characters. Great! More time to grind for crests! T_T

This relatively short Living story awards a BL key. It’s a pretty sweet reward.

Yes, I agree actually, but I don´t want BL keys. I want a new look for my Ele =P

Seriously, the RNG involved in getting the Mordrem body parts was already enough. We didn´t need even more additional and annoying grind on top of that imo.

Oh look! Somebody summed up the situation very accurately.

Now I have even less incentive to replay the LS on any of my alt characters. Great! More time to grind for crests! T_T

Amanzaman.1297:

Skoigoth.9238:

Amanzaman.1297:

~snip~

Eeerrh, yes kinda, but that actually has very little to do with bows…

http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/158019?rskey=QbKPb2&result=1#eid

The noun ranger is derived from the verb “to range” in the sense of “to roam” or “to wander around”.

Wrong.It derives from the word range,not to range.Look it up in english language dictionaries.

Hmm… Sooo… you don´t consider the OED a dictionary of the English language then?

Here, I have another one for you.
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/ranger

Amanzaman.1297:

I stopped reading at
Weapons: Sword / Torch and Axe / Axe
I am a ranger.Word ranger derives from the word RANGE,not close combat.
If I wanted to do melee,I would have made a warrior or something..

Eeerrh, yes kinda, but that actually has very little to do with bows…

http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/158019?rskey=QbKPb2&result=1#eid

The noun ranger is derived from the verb “to range” in the sense of “to roam” or “to wander around”.

Loki.8793:

1. I would argue that group-oriented raid/instanced content is the main form of PvE in this game, and I would consider solo-oriented content such as world completion and dynamic events to be a transition or distraction from the main game. This is a team-focus game, so to balance around solo play is counter-productive.

Well, that´s your opinion. I enjoy instanced group-oriented content the most in PvE myself, but that doesn´t mean it is more important than other areas of the game and apparently the devs don´t consider it the core of the game either. Or how else would you explain the facts that they have disbanded their dungeon team ages ago and mostly balance the game around sPvP?

2. No, there actually isn’t. The meta for any class currently is to build as much damage as possible and take all the damage modifiers you can in your traits. That isn’t variety, and this touches upon what I said earlier, which is you bring classes for their support and utility over their damage.

First, the current meta builds for organized dungeon groups are not about maximizing personal dps, this is simply wrong. Ironically, you pretty much spelled it out in your second statement though. These builds are about bringing as much support/utility as necessary to successfully complete certain content while sacrificing as few personal dps as possible.
Secondly, I could link you at least 2-3 core builds for every class that are considered “meta”. The variety comes mostly from different choices of weapons, traits, utilities, runes and sigils, depending on what content you are intending to do and how the rest of your group is set up. Things like that determine your play style so much more than the stats you have on your gear.

3. If you call everything viable, then the term viable loses its meaning. I would argue only few things currently are viable in group play, and they all revolve around as much damage as possible. A defensive build is a hindrance more than an asset in a team-oriented situation with only a few small exceptions.

Apparently we have different understandings of what “viable” means. To me it means “you can make this work” and not “this is the best way to do it”. But let us not argue about semantics, it´s almost always pointless.

4. That is fine. The purpose of my suggestion wasn’t to get rid of a meta, but rather change the meta to include a higher variety of builds and to make defensive builds actually useful in a team situation.

5. This may be true. This is why I emphasized at the end to focus on the concept rather than the details I provided, and to discuss how this would change the game for better or worse.

Yes I got that, but why do you think this imaginary new meta would be less restrictive than the current one? I´m pretty happy we don´t have to deal with this “lf 1 tank, 1 healer, 3 dps”-stuff here in GW2.

6. I don’t see how this is something that conflicts with my suggestion. Rather, I feel my suggestion actually addresses this very problem.

I have to disagree once again, your suggestions are solely about stat mechanics and stat balance and not about encounter design at all.

I suggested this because I do not think the new mob mechanics will change anything at all. Different design encounters won’t be enough to promote build diversity. Good design can promote movement over stacking, but when you can mitigate 100% of the damage through supportive and utility skills and kill the husks just as fast with raw damage, berserker is still going to be the best in every scenario,

I guess it all depends on how far the devs will take it with their game design in the future. We disagree very heavily on how much build diversity there is in the game currently and whether or not the current meta is problematic after all.
In the end it doesn´t matter anyways, because anet made it very clear in the past that they do not give a kitten about dungeons

Maybe we should go to the sPvP sub-forum and start kittening there about balance…

@Loki: I appreciate the thought and work you´ve put into this, but in my opinion you got a lot of basic things wrong.

• “The zerker meta” is only really relevant for a small portion of PvE (by itself already just a portion of this game) – Dungeons. Nobody cares what build you are using when you are completing heart quests or random dynamic events .
• There is a very decent variety of builds within the meta. Out of all 8 classes, 7 classes are absolutely viable and even Necromancers are not so terrible that you actually couldn´t play them in dungeons at all.
• NOBODY HAS TO PLAY THE META to succeed at anything in this game!! The meta is about maximum efficiency, not viability. If you like to do Arah with a full nomad´s setup, I am pretty sure you can do that if you really wish to.
• If you try to “fix” the meta a new one will emerge and simply replace the old one.
• The suggestions you´ve made would be a huge step towards trinity game play. Without things like a “proper” aggro mechanic, however, this would be a total disaster and the new meta would probably become full celestial or something like that.
• You (as many others) are focusing WAY TO MUCH on stat balance, which is fine for the most part. I rather think that PvE has become stale and easy for many players because of a lack of variety when it comes to combat and mob mechanics.

Looking at what the devs have done in terms of combat/mob mechanics with the last couple of story updates (hard hitting trash mobs, mobs with tons of toughness, condi-spamming mobs, lots of hard CC, …), I am pretty sure that they will incentivize build variety and “out-of-the-box” thinking further in the future. This however has very little to do with stat balance.

Coldtart.4785:

Dalanor.5387:

Coldtart.4785:

PvE is incapable of ever requiring skill so it’s pointless to change it.

Which team did you participate in the most recent dungeon tournaments?

Did any of those players have to play mindgames against the AI?

Mind games huh? Sure brah…

Mara.6782:

have you tried using greatsword it have some evade and blocks?

A bit off-topic, but I appreciate it
Yes I have tried greatsword, but it does so much less damage now and has little flexibility in comparison to sword/x (or longbow even). I pretty much only use it for mobility now (trash running in dungeons, traversing maps I have no WPs on etc.). If I need a bit more survivability as usual, I swap around utilities and use sword/dagger, which provides one extra low cd evade.

@Walhalla: Oh yeah, I totally forgot about that =D Didn´t like it that much though. I think it was rather annoying and didn´t make fighting the thrashers that much more interesting or challenging.

Hmm I don´t know… I like that the devs are trying to make open world PvE a bit more challenging and less “brain afk”.

I recently started to play my ranger a lot more (cookie-cutter s/x – lb zerker build) and just running around in SW for ~30 min/~1 h every day, completing random events while hunting for chests, has been a great learning experience for me.
Zerker rangers are rather squishy and because of how the sword auto attack works, meleeing stuff can be very tricky. The fact that the Mordrem mobs can kill you very fast, if you are not aware of what´s going on in a fight, helped me a lot to learn how to survive as a glass cannon ranger in melee and thus improved my ranger play in general.

So, if anything, I´d like anet to make regular mobs in high level zones even more scary actually =P #bringbackretalwolvespls

HELLruler.4820:

I can see how much fun you’re having when zerging around pressing 1

Not that the trinity is perfect, but battles seemed more strategic. This game is just a dumbed down version with only one role to play (on PvE, that is)

I am sorry, I don´t want to be disrespectful, but what a comment like this tells me is that you probably do not have a good understanding of what “the zerker meta” actually is and how these builds work.

If you really think all classes in GW2 only have one role to fulfill, I strongly recommend you check out Nike´s latest series on what people expect from you in speed runs, depending on which class you play. Maybe that will help you to make up your mind and show you that “the meta” is not as static and one-dimensional as you apparently think it is.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLz0JN2v3KJMnowFZa4x5ViaTabVtzNQ8M

Iason Evan.3806:

Two paradoxical quotes from the same camp:

“This game is faceroll easy.”

“Zerker stats are all that matter.”

Hint: The first one is the only correct quote.

Hmm what are you getting at exactly?

First of all, one should keep in mind that categorizations such as “easy” and “hard” are very subjective.
I can quite vividly remember my first dungeon run ever. It was CM p1, still rather shortly after launch. We were all under level 80 and had no clue what we are doing, because back then nobody had properly figured out the game yet. After hours of failing horribly we decided to give up. Today you can complete this path in ~5 minutes even in pugs.

Secondly, stats in general are not “all that matters”. People focus way to much on this aspect of the game if you ask me. Yes, gear stats determine your game play to some extent (e.g. choice of direct damage vs. condi damage), but things such as choice of weapons, runes, sigils, utility skills, traits and an understanding of the game mechanics and knowledge of the encounters (!!) are at least equally important.

@acidbubble: When it comes to stat balance, I think the game is in a pretty good spot right now, with the exception of condition damage still being marginalized in most areas of the game. I think it makes sense that taking the most risks (no defensive stats) yields the best results (optimal dps) if played correctly.
I mean, why should people not be rewarded for taking these risks, let alone be punished for it?

Also, it astonishes me that a lot of people still do not understand that support in GW2 is not just “healing and tanking” and that support is hardly tied to gear stats. It is almost completely irrelevant which stat set I am using when it comes to things like damage nullification (blinds, blocks, reflects), damage mitigation (i. a. protection, weakness), passive healing (i. a. regeneration), endurance regeneration (vigor), damage increasing via boons/conditions (might, fury, vulnerability) and other means (traits such as spotter, empower allies and skills such as warrior banners, frost spirit, time warp), CC (i. a. stuns, interrupts, immobilizes), condi removal, CC mitigation/immunity etc. etc..

So, why then should people not go for berserkers/assassins gear if they can handle it? They can still be supportive to their group and on top of that dish out a lot of damage, which will result in fights ending much more quickly (which could also be considered a form of support).

WoodenPotatoes made two videos about these issues. While I do not fully agree with him on all points considered, I feel he got the gist of it and summarized it appropriately.

I got Error Code=5:11:3:159:101 when I tried to join a PvP solo arena match on Legacy of Foefire a couple of minutes ago.
Now I am stuck in loop (the start-timer of the match keeps resetting and can´t leave the queue), which means I can´t play the game AT ALL.

I just sent in a support ticket and hope they will resolve the issue quickly… this really sucks =(

kins.3294:

I dont know if you played during that halloween but all skins were obtainable through that chest at the end of the dungeon.

Stop spreading false information.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ascent_to_Madness

The now re-released skins (Chainsaw, Ghastly Grinning Shield, etc.) were never obtainable through the chest at the end of the Ascent to Madness dungeon.
The “exotics, including Halloween weapon skins”, Dulfy was referring to are totally different skins (Arachnophobia, The Crossing and The Mad Moon).

Edit: Misread something and removed quote I´ll leave my thoughts on why I think heal-centric builds aren´t the way to go in this game up here though.

Generally speaking, standing around face-tanking everything, while a healer sits behind you and makes sure you don´t die, is purely passive gameplay (from the “dps´/tank´s” perspective mostly).
GW2´s dodge mechanic however encourages you to be proactive and incentivizes high-risk/high-reward gameplay – the better you are at dodging, the less passive defense you need, i.e. the more damage you´ll be able to dish out.

The dodge mechanic itself is not the reason why heal-centric specs are mostly “useless” (when it comes to PvE). I think it has to do with the way many encounters are designed in this game – a lot of predictable, slow and easy-to-dodge hard hitting attacks and not enough scary fast hitting, unavoidable and frequent low damage attacks that self heals can´t handle sufficiently.
This favors defenses such as blinds, weakness, protection, blocks, invulnerability and evades over passive defense, in form of Vitality/Toughness, and healing.

I loved to pop this tonic in dungeons just for fun, when there was some downtime in pug-runs for example :< What´s up for nerf next? Pointless quaggan tonic nerf maybe, hmm?

If there was an issue/exploit connected to this tonic that needed to be fixed, why on earth would they not at least put a vague explanation in the patch notes as to why this functionality has been removed?

I really don´t get it… Is this asking for too much? Maybe I should be happy it is mentioned in patch notes at all, unlike most of the “stealth-changes” to dungeons that happen quite frequently.

It makes me very sad that by now even small things like this trigger so much disappointment and distrust in a-nets transparency police in me.

Gedekran.1487:

Wait longer? Longer than hours and hours the farmers would constantly fail it, forcing living story people to hope they could find another flow? No, it’s going to be a lot faster, even if it fails to complete than before.

Ayrilana.1396:

I’m sure that people doing the LS would prefer to wait longer if the event chain fails rather than not being able to do it at all.

I tried finding unpopulated maps with friends, out of curiosity, and we never had issues to find a mostly empty map in a very reasonable amount of time. It took me about 5 minutes alone and about 1-2 min when I had people helping me. But that´s not my point.

I´m not upset about the “fix” per se, it was foreseeable and people will find other spots to farm for sure.
I´m disappointed by stupid comments like Charleston Chew´s and by the fact that the fix isn´t addressing what I believe to be the real problems with large scale (open world) farming in general.

Charleston Chew.1209:

Thanks for the fix. Take that farmer boys^^

Comments like this are unnecessary and rude. Why would you be happy about this “fix” if not out of spite or schadenfreude?
It´s a loose-loose situation. The farmers can´t farm the event anymore (or at least not as efficiently as before) and the people who want to progress their LS will have to wait longer for the event to start if it had failed previously.

Again the core issues – that is, failing events to be sometimes more profitable than completing them and the lack of a place dedicated to farming (like boss blitz used to be) – have not been addressed.

That´s it guys and gals! Chronomancer confirmed!!! =D

Jokes aside, kudos to Seka for bringing general attention to this issue.
I´m really curious what caused this as well, but I doubt a-net will be releasing any information about it until it has been fixed 100%. If it´s replicable, it would be the ultimate tool for any troll lurking out there for sure.

one bug to rule them all

Kythan Myr.4719:

1. Do you think there is already enough challenging content that requires strategy and coordination in this game?

2. If Anet did design more challenging content, would there even be enough players to play it?

3. Is the zerg mentality too strong to even prevent some development?

4. What would more challenging content in GW2 look like?

1. Well, there can never be enough challenging content. However, it is also important to keep in mind that “challenging” is a very subjective term. Someone that just started playing GW2 recently and just hit lvl 80 will most probably find Arah explorable mode to be very challenging (to say the least). But someone who has been playing since launch and completed it hundreds of times probably wont. So I think you can´t answer this question with a simple yes/no.

2. Yes I think so.

3. Zerging only applies to open world content and I personally don´t really have a problem with it. Something that maybe could be improved a bit is cancelling out boss mechanics through mass-stacking. Would be nice to encourage people to stay on the move and be a bit more active instead of standing in one position spamming skills on cd. Aside from that, I think it would be stupid to design more open world boss encounters that require only a handful of people to complete it – that´s what dungeons are for.

4. What I personally would like see is…

• 4.1 More challenging solo content: E.g. a “hard-mode” revamp of the PS which would give me incentive to complete it on some of my toons and more arena-style encounters like the “Shadow of the Dragon” boss fight from the last chapter of the LS (I enjoyed that one a lot) or Liadri from the Queen´s Gauntlet
• 4.2 New dungeons (!) and serious reworks of some of the existing ones (!!!!) without all the time-gated kitten and more engaging boss fights
• 4.3 More world boss events like Triple Trouble or the Marionette, BUT not until there is a guarantied way of getting e.g. people of the same guild onto the same map (aka make “guild-raids” happen pls). Or, at least give us a queue system for megaservers, so that we can actually see if we are wasting our time or have a realistic change of getting onto the desired map. Spamming the join-button for 30+ minutes to be able to play with your friends/guildies/community and then not be able to because of “bad luck” is not fun.

/2cents

Ravezaar.4951:

Hint: can anyone even recall the last time the Devs played a Warrior ?

Öööhm, two days ago? Hugh Norfolk hambowing his way to victory.

fellyn.5083:

Probably because it is exploiting game mechanics for profit.

Who are you to judge where exploiting game mechanics begins? This is something only a-net has to decide, so stop throwing words like that around.

Btw, I was curious how bad the “toxic” behavior at coiled really is and did a couple of hours farming there today.
The group I joined was well organized, friendly and very good at quickly finding empty maps so that no one felt disturbed by us. The farm went on for hours without any serious interruption or people complaining much. However, at some point several random players came by and were seemingly confused because they didn´t understand what was going on. The most aggressive thing said to them was “get out of the circle” followed by an explanation about how the farm works. Not a big deal if you ask me.

I also had a lot of nice chitchat with people in my group and in local chat. One guy said he came to coiled three days ago to advance his LS and then ended up joining the farmers =D He also said that he was able to complete his LS step very easily afterwards because the group he joined changed map eventually.

Ensign.2189:

Wonderly.1324:

I wonder if that’s why they’ve delayed precursor crafting- because they don’t want to try and satisfy the “reward perspective” and accidentally break the economics side, and in doing so, lead to the eventual ruin of both.

That would be my assumption. Precursors are a huge, huge part of the economy – they aren’t like other expensive items / skins that are expensive because they only drops years ago, there’s an enormous demand for them and forging precursors sucks an enormous amount of end game material out of the economy. It’s what keeps elder wood and mithril above vendor value and is responsible for the high prices of T5 materials, keeps random rares high, impacts the ecto market as a result…it’s a huge cog in the machine.

Adding precursor crafting in a way that doesn’t throw a wrench in that is hard. I imagine that is what is taking them so long.

Arguments like this get thrown around a lot on this forum, but tbh, I never found them to be very convincing. In the end it all depends on HOW exactly said precursor crafting method would be implemented.

Just a few ideas based on your concerns:

• Make crafted precursors account bound so that people who want to make gold out of precursors/legendaries would have to stick to gambling with the mystic forge
• Make precursors crafting require HUGE amounts of t5 materials (wood, ore and leather; depending on the precursor), globs of ectoplasm and miscellaneous currently underpriced items
• Make precursor crafting also require a set of items that can only be acquired by completing specific content (you know, the “scavenger hunt thingy”) but in a none RNG way, e.g. through tokens such as pristine fractal relics, badges of honor, dungeon tokens, or maybe something that is the final reward of a pvp reward track etc.
• In the end, throwing rares/exotics into the forge should “statistically” still be the cheapest way of acquiring a precursor, both in gold and time investment (maybe through time-gating parts of the precursor crafting process)

To begin with, this would be a proper set of simple parameters to prevent long-term chaos on the TP I think. But that’s just me of course.

I doubt that we will ever get a sound and official statement about why precursor crafting never came out in the first place, but it would ruin the economy just never sounded like a valid excuse to me.

Alright, two things….

1. The fact that failing an event is more rewarding than completing it is a problem in and of itself. It is not the players fault, it is just horrible game design and I don´t understand why a-net doesn´t change it. And by that I do NOT mean increasing the time until events start, or removing loot from mobs, I mean ACTUALLY making completing events more profitable. Until this happens you can´t really blame people for trying to farm these events in the most efficient manner.

2. There are ALWAYS jerks on both sides of the argument, but that doesn´t mean all farmers are griefers, or similarly all people trying to complete such an event are griefers. From personal experience I can say that most people farming these events are nice, helpful and civil people, but they remain mostly silent. The ones that are vocal are unfortunately the jerks that are trying scare the “uninitiated” of the map/away from the events by insulting and harassing them. These people should be reported and warned/banned for a couple of days, no question about that. BUT, on the other side you also have people that harass and insult the farmers. Some of them actively seek to set the whole map up against the farmers, not because they actually want to complete the event, but because they take personal pleasure in ruining the farm for the others. They should be treated similarly to the griefers on the farmers side because they are doing the same thing: Insulting and harassing other players, therefore, report them if they say inappropriate stuff in map/say/whisper chat and hope they get a warning/ban.

Period.

So it´s an issue related to character height then and not race? Because I know for sure that at least my asura is max size (for an asura =P).
And yes, it only seems to affect the hero panel, not the gear preview window.

Edit: added screenshot

I think they are still completely bugged, but an official statement on the status quo would be much appreciated to clarify things (some people claim they unlocked them, others say they cannot whatsoever).

It seems pretty random to me which races are affected tbh. Both of my two human characters and my asura have this issue currently, but all others are fine if I recall correctly.

Just to clarify, I wouldn´t feel comfortable using this build in team arenas (in fact, I wouldn´t recommend playing Necromancer in teamQ no matter what), but it is definitely a fun and “fresh feeling” build for hotjoins and solo/custom arena madness.

Hey Fuchs,

I messed around a bit with your build in Hotjoins and soloQ today and I liked it a lot actually!
However, I made a couple of modifications based on my playstyle.

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fRAQNAnYWjc0Ubb5NG3wfbiaBB6GBmFboV0FG-TpBFwACOBAy3fYxhAIxRAAaZAAPAAA

The differences in elite skill, sigils and trait choices come down to preference I guess (except for Axe Training maybe, never play Axe without it seriously ^.^), but I would highly recommend trying out Celestial Amulet. IMO it works great with this trait spread and with the A/D + Staff weapon setup.

bump, this stuff is really annoying to deal with.

Bugged or not, if I´d by chance get my hands on any of the sellable items required for the treasure hunter achievement, I´d sell them right away and be happy with the gold.
Unless you are one of the “OCD-Completionist” type of players and can´t live without completing it, it is absolutely not worth going for this achievement right now.

“http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Enchanted_Treasure_Chest/Drop_rate”
“http://a.disquscdn.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/1296/4778/original.jpg”

Currently I have my ranger parked there and I´ve been doing the event daily for a bit over a week now.
So far, on three occasions (irregular intervals) I didn´t get the chests, neither the big one, nor the bonus chest.

Initially I thought it might be the daily reset bug people have been complaining about for while, but I´m not so sure about that anymore.

I don´t think it was part of the loot table prior to the feature patch (at least I can´t remember seeing it up for sale on the TP).

Its rarity probably has to do with the fact that most people run Arah less frequently than other dungeons because it can be hell if you pug it/don´t know what you are doing.

But of course it could also be bugged, you never know (see Final Rest, Chaos of Lyssa recipe).