Guild Wars 2

DeWolfe.2174:

The least fun things right now is Druid perma immob, then Warrior and Mesmer perma stun, and then thieves perma evade. It’s like kitten Anet, how about get your butt’s into WvW and play it. Then you’ll get a clue how to balance it.

Anet wonders why WvW population dwindles. It’s because combat isn’t as fun anymore!

Reh.5986:

Yeah really sick of this one. Seems to get me 2 or 3 times a week.

Lucky you. If you’re a Ranger and using greatsword, it’s like every other attack.

The evade on the third attack in the auto chain gets me this immob bug constantly. I’m talking maybe once every other fight with a player (assuming I use my GS during said fights).

It effects all professions but I’m almost certain that it’s worst on Ranger. Staff, sword and greatsword all do it on a very regular basis and it’s incredibly obnoxious.

Wow, that’s bad. And here I thought the obstructed issue was annoying at Rogue’s Quarry in EBG.

BAITness.1083:

joneirikb.7506:

The linking system sure doesn’t seem to work very well with Glicko. Uncertain just how fast glicko reacts to changes these days, but it might be unavoidable to have Glicko reset, or at least a partial naturalizing of the glicko scores on new links ?

After all, the Glicko score represents the status the server used to have before linking or the previous link. Each link basically creates an entirely new situation.

I don’t know the number-crunching of Glicko, so don’t know how it would work with the current “faster change in glicko”, it might just end up making the winnder of T4 shoot into t1, get totally smashed, and get sent down to bottom of t4 again etc. So be careful what you wish for. :p

This is very true, and a real concern, but this linking thing is showing us some very surprising numbers. Right now the four-server-alliance is the most active WvW participant – by far. Comparing to BG, which is widely considered the most active server, the Quad server is about 40% more active (using kills + deaths as measure of activity). Part of this may be BG having an off-week and YB being absolute pros at avoiding fights at all costs, but the quad server is keeping a ridiculously high level of activity. It is rolling at a monstrous 1.28 kdr. The only server with a better KDR right now is JQ+AR, and they are not nearly as active.

What I am trying to say is, from the limited info we have, it looks like the quad server could be a real contender in any tier, and maybe even be the best server for the duration of the pairing. It depends 100% on whether or not their activity level stays this high.

But unless we get glicko resets, we may never find out.

Since Friday reset of last week, CD has had at least one zerg of 40+ all 24 hours of every day. I think it was two nights ago that was the least active I had seen them but they still had a blob that was map hopping. Otherwise, they have one massive blob in EBG usually ranging from 50 to 70, a blob in their BL between 30 and 50 and smaller groups usually 20 or less hopping maps. This is every. Single. Day. Since Friday reset and this is 24 hours a day.

To be honest, I’m not horribly upset because it’s been relatively fun. There’s non stop action and I stopped caring about PPT a long, long time ago. Still, their numbers are totally absurd whether I care about the score or not. Tonight when we were attempting to take SMC for like the fifth time, I had to stand back for a second to appreciate how many people they had in that room. Our own zerg had two tags and we must have been 40 – 50 tops but CD just swallowed our zerg like it was nothing.

I’m going to go on record and say that I’m not at all mad about this match up or Anet’s poor server pairing but I will say that it’s pretty kitten ridiculous. I believe what I had said in the server pairing thread was “Good LORD, four servers?” And I was right to be concerned about it. That many communities mixed in to one means that one servers down time will be another servers prime time. Effectively making their zergs prime time numbers all hours of the day and night.

Dadnir.5038:

Oh!

3 years ago while I was protecting a WvW camp, I ended up facing an extremly bursty elementalist. After a few bout during which he was kiting my pet, he finally unleashed all it’s burst cool down and I got down.

He then came to stomp me. But at the same time, while down, I used [F2] (I was using a bird this time and the pets weren’t nerfed yet). The elementalist as a good low life glass canon got one shot by the bird who finished him, and thus, saved my life.

This was the good days…

I miss the days when we could send our stealthed Jaguar’s up walls in WvW to kill people on AC’s ):

I’ve had a lot of these but I just had a very “LOL” one that I want to share and would love to hear stories from others as well.

Was having a little 2v2 skirmish in WvW, although it started out a 1v2. Me against a P/P Thief and glassy Dragonhunter.

I had gotten the Thief downed, but the Guard destroyed most of my health while trying to stomp because I hadn’t seen him coming/for some reason couldn’t cancel the stomp.

The Thief ported away and tldr; someone joined my side of the fight and revived me twice and the Guard revived the Thief twice. So it was kind of a back and fourth.

Eventually we got enough pressure on the Thief to win just about the time I downed for a third time.

The Guard went in for a stomp, I swapped pets to my Smokeskale and it landed enough crits to reach about 4.5k on him which was enough to down him as well.

Of course it was a pretty messy, clumsy fight between all of us but that clutch Smoke Assault from my pet just had me lol’ing.

Last night it also saved me from a backstab that I didn’t see coming. A Thief stole to me and I was hit with the daze, but as soon as he hit me, my Smokeskale immediately knocked him down which was enough time for me to react and kill him.

And lastly one of the most funny times I think, was having a very lengthy fight with a defensive D/P Thief. He was doing a lot of hit and runs. Eventually I got him in to a critical spot where he only had maybe 15% of his health left. He tried to range away from me, dropped his Pistol #5, I sent my Tiger in for it’s F2 attack and the Thief, mid leap through Black Powder, got nailed for 7k by my Tiger which took out the remainder of his health.

Anyone else got fun stories of their pets saving their lives? I don’t know why but it always puts a huge grin on my face when my pet is the one that screws someone over and not me, lmao.

Balthazzarr.1349:

Drop a stealth trap… right… it takes 5 seconds to drop one. So as he is stealthing he’s watching you lay the “trap”. You can stand there and try to lure the guy to it.. or he just stays away and ranges you and tries to lure you away. Stealth traps are great I guess if the person doesn’t see you put it down and runs over it. Greater if you have a few people that put some down. But just putting one down and expecting the guy to run close enough to it to be unstealthed? If he’s good that’s not likely… otherwise you have a chance.

I don’t know what people are doing when I place these things mid-fight but in my experience, they trip them about 75% of the time.

It’s like they think if they dodge just right they’ll be immune to it or something, I don’t know what they think. All I know is that as long as I have enough health to tank a few hits I’ll start setting one down and most of the time they’ll trip it as long as I stay close to it.

The odd time they’re smart enough to avoid it, they just run away completely. So either they forfeit and run or they trip it and die. Win/win.

Roaming isn’t about who’s the most skilled, it’s about who’s the smartest.

As a Necromancer, you lack disengage, blocks and invulnerability. This means that when you’re outnumbered, you’re going to need to be creative about how you defend yourself. Either you can straight up outplay your opponents, or you can use things like the terrain to your advantage. Find a cliff you can fear people off of for example.

Professions with high access to stealth are favored for roaming because roaming is a very vicious hobby. You’re going to constantly get outnumbered and hard countered so to do it properly, you should be roaming on something with high mobility, stealth and access to a lot of condition cleanse. Otherwise, you’re going to have a bad time.

That said, you can roam on what ever you’re comfortable with, just be aware that some professions are better than others. Necromancer is a powerful fighter but it doesn’t have a lot of the important tools that good roaming profession should have. This means that you need to be using your eyes and ears a lot more actively than a lot of other professions. You need to be constantly aware of your surroundings and your personal limits. How far can you push and how much can you handle? Use your “look behind” key regularly, even during fights, to prevent being snuck up on, whether it be from other roamers or a zerg. Once it happens, you’re probably not going to get away from it.

Don’t ever expect anyone to fight fair. You might come across people who want to duel from time to time, but if they’re not starting with a /bow, expect them to run away, call in friends, alt +f4, or any other dirty, under handed strategy they can use to win. And they shouldn’t be blamed for it either. There are no rules other than don’t hack, so why should people limit themselves on what they can do to come out victorious?

Stealth is a frustrating mechanic, many of us agree. But there are ways, albeit unorthadox, to counter it. Stealth traps are one of those ways and especially against condition Thieves/Mesmers, they will help you immensely. Just be wise about how you place them. What I do personally is look for a relatively tight spot to drop it, such as against a wall or on a bridge, where it will be harder to avoid. I then face my back to where they last were and pretend like I’m AFK or just panicking. 75% of the time, and that’s not a generous estimate, they will trip it when they try to backstab me then immediately try to run for the hills when they see they’ve been tricked.

Practice makes perfect. Just remember above all else to expect the unexpected and to play like your life is on the line. Because it is. Mercy isn’t a common thing among our folk and although I tend to be a passive roamer myself (in that I only attack who attacks/attempts to attack me first), I’m not at all against kiting in and out of towers, hugging supply camps or being just a general pain in the behind. Is it fair? No. Do I care? Nope. Don’t engage if you think you won’t win. That’s another mistake a lot of people make. Trying to fight what they know isn’t a smart idea to fight. Which again brings me back to “know your limits.”

Anyway, good luck out there.

Let me state before I continue that the following is not optimal.

I sometimes like to use A/A + GS or A/S + S/Sh.

With the latter, I roll Discipline, Defense, Tactics. It has decent mobility since I’m using Blademaster (reduces recharge on sword skills), blocks on both weapon sets, A/S has really solid burst with Impale → Eviscerate → Rip and both sets compliment each other fairly well.

A/A + GS is also fun, albeit not ideal. Whirling Axe can do some very heavy damage if you can manage to land the full channel and with Arcing Slice + Dual Strike + Signet Of Rage you have pretty high Fury uptime.

I’d say you should use what you find most fun unless it’s crucial that your DPS is at it’s peak (raids, speed clear dungeons/Fractals, etc). Otherwise, what’s the point in playing if you don’t enjoy it?

And for the record, I’ve gone as high as 50k with Whirling Axe on NPC mobs before.

X T D.6458:

It’s not something unique to players in upper tiers, a lot of people use forums as a means to vent, so naturally at times it will come to personal insults being tossed around.

Personally speaking I don’t go on the forums to engage in it, at least I try not to, although I admit I am as guilty of it as much as anyone else, because well a bad mood can get the better of me at times. Sometimes people reply very aggressively or insultingly to something you post and you feel that you need to reply in kind and that’s how it starts…

Also keep in mind the higher the tiers go the higher the level of competition is generally speaking, and competition can bring out an ugly side of people, and forums are just another place to express that, in game chat, ts etc it also happens.

tldr; Everyone gets angry, don’t sweat it. As long as you can own up to your mistakes.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

As for Unholy Sanctuary, I can see how it would be frustrating. I’ve used it a few times but I’ve had more of an issue with it interrupting my heal.

If it’s interrupting your Heal, you wouldn’t have gotten the Heal off anyway. So, still good for you.

Lol, valid point!

MethaneGas.8357:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Lol, too bad you’re not as nice as you are skilled.

I’m not going to argue, it’s just how I feel about condition Reaper. Since you’re being defensive and making assumptions, nothing constructive will come of it so I’ll just stop responding.

Ah, didn’t know I sounded like that..
Well… I just wanted to show my reasoning as to why I think condi Reapers are not that easy/forgiving by saying that other elite specs are strong/easy/forgiving too and essentially it balanced out. At least imo.

Then I apologize. It just sounded defensive to me because you had used multiple examples and quotations which sounded like a “wtf are you talking about” kind of tone to me. My bad for misinterpreting.

It’s hard to explain how I feel about it, but in my experience, it requires so much less effort compared to core Necro that I’m inclined to call it faceroll. The Stability, cleave and better Life Force gen just make it exponentially more forgiving than core Necro and allows for much easier multi-target management. If I were to try any of what was seen in the video with core Necro, I’d have been shredded in seconds. Not being able to tank CC’s or cleave opponents when they’re grouped together would be my undoing. As a Reaper? Smooth sailing.

Reaper is in line with the other elite specs, I totally agree, but that’s not what I was trying to say.

Anyway, I didn’t mean to start a thing over it. Just that any time I switch to Reaper (using mostly the same build that you are, with more toughness and less vitality) I feel like I could 1v5 all night long.

EDIT: Also, I’m not one of those people who thinks being a power build means you’re a better player or something. I enjoy condition builds and some of them take a lot of skill to maintain proper condition pressure. Believe me if you dug deep enough in my comment history I’m sure you could find me defending it. There’s nothing hard about being able to 1 – 2 shot someone even if you’re squishy as all heck. You kill them before it matters how squishy you are anyway.

MethaneGas.8357:

Whaaaaattt? That’s like saying “Oh, you’re playing a Scrapper? Get back to your core engi! You don’t need an F5, that’s making it wayy too easy. Not to mention the perma-stealth”
Or “You play a Druid? OP pets make it too easy, you should play core Ranger with no celestial form or OP pets”,
Or, “You play daredevil? Lol, you’re carried by extra dodges and interrupt spamming. You should play thief”
No one is going to do that because elite specs are simply better than the core. Sure, it would be impressive to play a core spec and fight an uphill battle (outnumbered against elite specs) but I’ll probably never do that, it’s already challenging enough handling a group of players as a Reaper. Literally 1 mistake = death. Why should I play a weak core Necro when everything else is overpowered out there? I’d rather play something more fun (Reaper) and also on par with everything that’s out there already.

Literally every elite spec is stronger than the core, and can be considered borderline OP. But comparing condi chrono and condi Reaper is night and day. Condi chrono is super tanky stat-wise, has insane mobility, has blocks, has evades/distortion and stealth. They’re night and day in terms of strength and mode of survival and ease of play.

I think people have this idea that if you play something glassy, it instantly makes you more valuable or skilled, but that’s not really true. If you play something tanky, it will take you much longer to win a fight, and you’ll have to really outplay an opponent or opponents to come out on top whereas if you’re playing something glassy, you burst the enemy quick and kill them before they can retaliate. They’re just different playstyles… not to mention many glassier specs have insane range too which is very low risk.

Lol, too bad you’re not as nice as you are skilled.

I’m not going to argue, it’s just how I feel about condition Reaper. Since you’re being defensive and making assumptions, nothing constructive will come of it so I’ll just stop responding.

DBL is going to happen eventually whether we like it or not, ANet has already decided it. It’s like playing rock, paper, scissors with someone and saying “re-do” every time you lose.

MethaneGas.8357:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Ahaha, impressive. And makes me want to hop on my Necro right now.

That said, my negative criticism lies in the condition Reaper part. Personally I run a core conditionmancer but when I’m in a zerg, I use the same gear, just swap to Reaper and it becomes literally hard to die. Frontline all day, so much Life Force gen and stability the only way something is going to bring you down is if you over extend.

Not insinuating you’re at all bad, from the video I can tell you’re great. Just saying condition Reaper is also absurdly easy.

Will check out your other videos to see if there are any where you’re using a less forgiving build :P.

Are you using a condi Reaper in a zerg fight?

I wouldn’t say that as soon as someone runs Reaper and it happens to be condi, it’s automatically easy or forgiving to play. It really depends how you build your character. I’d say that the usual perplexity condi with signets is more forgiving than the build I run, which is probably why you never encounter someone running the build I run. With a condi Reaper, you also need a ton of cover condis, otherwise all of your burst will be cleansed right off (which is why I often use Death’s Charge with Chilling Darkness and Path of Corruption and Torment sigil for cover condis, then Soul Spiral for burst). I think you can just as easily say every other elite spec is more forgiving or easier than the core spec, because it’s true. The game had a massive power creep and everything became stronger (burst, condis, CC, mobility, etc.). If you play something weaker (core spec) you will just be gimping yourself.

And sure, condi specs are usually face-tanky, but there’s a TON of new power combinations you can use which are just as strong as the new condi variants.

I don’t think condi Reaper is all that overpowered in a world of hammer revs, glassy druids with perma-CC, stealthy and sustainy scrappers, condi chronos, perma-evade daredevils, and dragonhunters, especially since Reaper stability was gutted…

I don’t think it’s OP, I think it’s easy. Your build might not be as easy as a Signet condition Reaper but it’s still not hard either. The added stability, cleave and Life Force gen just make it considerably more forgiving than core conditionmancer.

Again, I wasn’t insinuating you’re bad or that Reaper is OP. Just that with what I saw in your video, it became significantly less impressive because of the nature of your build.

It’s like watching a condi Chrono. The player can be extremely skilled but the skill is hardly even necessary when using such a face-rolly build.

Just my two cents though. If I see you pulling 1v2’s or 3’s with a less cushioned build I’ll be floored. But this isn’t about impressing me, just that I wanted to point out I felt you could achieve greater feats but instead opt’d for something less prone to failure.

Currently on GoM ( was on DH for the longest time. <- Carmen Stacy if anyone remembers me o/ ) and I certainly agree.

Although I’m finding the fights relatively fun, it’s still very clear that the coverage is in favor of the quad server.

The main issue I saw coming as soon as I saw that four servers would be paired together is that one server’s down time would be anothers prime time. They never sleep or die down because there are too many communities mixed together. It makes it impossible for the rest of us to compete, even if we can manage fight them when our servers are awake.

I’m not horribly upset or on the verge of quitting WvW by any means. I’ve been through much worse match ups. That said, it is still extremely unbalanced and I’d like to not see quad servers in the future… Aside from their total lack of discipline, they could probably compete in T2 with the coverage that they have.

I have a bigger issue with Plague Sending tbh.

When it procs on Putrid Mark or Deathly Swarm it’s just such a waste. Unfortunately I can’t think of a good way to rework it either so all I can say for now is that it’s frustrating. I’m not going to complain without ideas on how to improve it.

As for Unholy Sanctuary, I can see how it would be frustrating. I’ve used it a few times but I’ve had more of an issue with it interrupting my heal.

As Muchacho said, you’re forgetting that the trait ignores the cooldown. It will always proc if you have sufficient Life Force regardless of whether it’s already on cooldown or not. It can be quite powerful if used right, you just have to train your reflexes not to touch Shroud while you’re at critical health.

Ahaha, impressive. And makes me want to hop on my Necro right now.

That said, my negative criticism lies in the condition Reaper part. Personally I run a core conditionmancer but when I’m in a zerg, I use the same gear, just swap to Reaper and it becomes literally hard to die. Frontline all day, so much Life Force gen and stability the only way something is going to bring you down is if you over extend.

Not insinuating you’re at all bad, from the video I can tell you’re great. Just saying condition Reaper is also absurdly easy.

Will check out your other videos to see if there are any where you’re using a less forgiving build :P.

babazhook.6805:

I

Low on health it nice to be able to stealth off one of them Minotaurs

That is exactly one of the problems with them, lol. It’s just another free get away for Thieves which they already have enough of.

Jim Hunter.6821:

Shilajit.9023:

without few creatures bl would look lifeless. a few creature doesn’t hurt.

Another reason to make them white mobs.

I agree with the white mobs statement. There are some white mob deer near Speldan in EBG after all.

…. Plus I need souls to fill my Shroud sometimes… Don’t take that away from me ):

Sylvyn.4750:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

I’m actually having fun in this current match. All 9 servers that are against each other atm, rofl.

Gate Of Madness, Ferguson’s Crossing, Sorrow’s Furnace
Crystal Desert, Borlis Pass, Kaineng, Eredon Terrace
Darkhaven, Ehmry Bay

The blobs are insanity.

Did you end up transferring off SoS? To where? With the above matchup, for day 1 at least, it’s shaping up heavily in favor of the 4 linked servers team…unless there’s a counterbalancing SEA/OCX population to help out the other servers overnight, we’ll see.

Have been on GoM the whole time, actually. So I’m with FC and SF now.

Yes, it’s fun when everyone is awake, lots of action everywhere. Unfortunately the quad server has like 0 downtime because they have so many communities mixed in to one. When one goes to bed another wakes up. So they will almost undoubtably win the match. They rolled all the maps last night after everyone went to sleep and their blob was still like 40 – 50 deep.

I don’t mind being outnumbered and have never had a problem with uneven matches. I just want to be somewhere where I can count on people to back me up when I’m roaming about. I want to be with people who have a fighting spirit that will eat the tail of a massive blob as it passes by. So far, those wishes are being fulfilled so I’ll be happy with this match up for a while.

I’m actually having fun in this current match. All 9 servers that are against each other atm, rofl.

Gate Of Madness, Ferguson’s Crossing, Sorrow’s Furnace
Crystal Desert, Borlis Pass, Kaineng, Eredon Terrace
Darkhaven, Ehmry Bay

The blobs are insanity.

Good LORD. FOUR servers paired?

Victory.2879:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

I’ve been on I think about 10 servers now.

That sums up your problem in a nutshell.

You don’t want to try and build anything, but would rather bandwagon or server hop and just expect things to be magically better at the next place.

Wahah, no.

There was someone on a different thread who was talking about how often he moves and we share very similar opinions. We go where we have the most fun.

I contribute as much as a single guildless person can and often times I’m complimented on my scouting and defending. Being on SoS, this is the first time I haven’t contributed much of anything because I haven’t found it worth it.

Just because I’m having one bad experience doesn’t mean all the other times were. It just means I want to keep my interest alive so I move to different communities to meet new people and experience different cultures.

I’m a wanderer and I’m happy with how many friends I’ve made through out my journeys.

jamesdolla.3954:

Chris.3290:

SoS will have it’s day again, as it will always have a large casual OCX population.
The situation in NA/EU is unfortunate but T3 contains two other servers that are “broken” in other ways (SBI/CD has no organized guilds, just PuG blobs; Maguuma is losing a lot of guilds ATM, unwilling to push to change it’s situation) so it will likely to remain in that situation unless a large group of NA guilds transfer or they get a few more patient PuGmanders willing to rebuild.

what guilds did maguuma lose m8? can you name em? we lost 1. stop making stuff up please

Lmao, woah. You know that over reacting to something is a good way for people to see that you’re either lying or insecure?

Chill.

Appearing offline is the only thing you can do, although if the player is angry enough, they may send you mail or try to invite you to a party.

It’s not something you can really avoid 100%. Sometimes people get upset and sometimes they get unreasonably upset. Blocking them or appearing offline are your only solutions.

That said, if you’re like me, sometimes it’s best to see if you can calm them down. I know how frustrated I can get and I’ve sent some hatemail in the past so I can relate to people who are raging. I usually try to talk it out with them to see if we can come to an understanding so that they don’t continue walking around with that hate in their head. We all get a little mad sometimes, that doesn’t make it acceptable to be cussing people out but it doesn’t mean you should hold it against them either, yenno?

Please no to changing Master Of Corruption. Seriously people need to stop with this, lol. It’s so strong if used right. Just because it’s a risk/reward thing doesn’t mean it’s bad.

Necromancer
/age: 3,019 hours
/deaths: 4,501

Ranger
/age: 2,557 hours
/deaths: 4,124

Not gonna say my total playtime but I just hit 1,000 days today

Also, more than half of my play time has been in WvW/PvP so, I’d like to think that my high number of deaths are at least somewhat acceptable, lol. Especially considering I used to do a lot of roaming. I still do from time to time but not nearly as much as I did a year or so ago.

If you have a group large enough to defend it, you can build multiple trebs up by the Vista on the hill in front of Anzalias Pass.

Trebs from there can hit both outer and inner walls but before doing this, you will need to kill the outer and inner mortars. The mortars can reach the trebs relatively easily if the user has a sharp aim.

The reason the hill is a good place is because it gives you the high ground if the enemy comes in on the offensive which allows you to deny their backline as they push up the hill. It also allows you to stay out of their keep, avoiding damage, many deaths and often many re-supplies as well.

It can take a while, especially if those in the keep insist on repairing but that’s the advantage that the attacker always has over the defender. Time. Take the supply camps and wear them down. Taking a keep isn’t (shouldn’t) be an easy task so be patient!

lil devils x.6071:

They did think about it.. but then when people raged about NOT wanting the Megaserver EotM wvw solution, it didn’t work as planned. The original mega server WvW plan was the color based EotM system.

Lol, I also remember that people didn’t have names in EOTM when it was first released and it was so confusing. It was just player ranks, even for those on your own team.

Sagramor.7395:

In regards to #5, before megaservers this was almost a non-issue. You could just have someone pop out of WvW into a city and send the call out.

God I miss those days so much. I remember how many times I’d see a call for help in LA and I’d be like “will be there ASAP! Hold them as best you can!”

As someone who has been doing almost exclusively WvW for the last 2+ years, the times have changed… The times have indeed changed.

Argh, the nostalgia is killing me, guys.

Sarrs.4831:

Usually if you give a /bow that gets the message across.

Not always…

Sadly, I’ve had more than a few people still send hate mail after I bow or salute.

I remember this one guy got kittened that I had stomped him when it wasn’t a duel in the first place. He said I shouldn’t have bowed and that it was lame because I didn’t let him live. And yet he jumped me while I was trying to take a supply camp. I only bowed because we fought for a good 3 – 5 minutes and it was a fun fight/I felt accomplished that I had won with the odds against me.

XTR.9604:

gebrechen.5643:

Because no one likes “running from everyone to hide behind siege” aka YB

^ pretty much this.

People got tired of Yaks Bend and their ways. These days, Dragonbrand is the new Yaks Bend. They’ve adopted the siege wars approach that YB took to get to T1 and now they’re almost top of T2.

DB has always been that way in my experience. The only guilds that I can recall that actually fought and were worth fighting were [GFC] and [VP]. Otherwise the entire server would just camp towers with a heap of AC’s all day.

In fact I clearly remember one day where a group of them captured QL (we were blue at the time) and immediately after capturing it, I watched from the hill as they built about 8 AC’s on the walls and camped there for the next hour.

Doesn’t surprise me that they’ve only refined their siege humping routine since last I fought them.

These threads have been being made basically since Gw2’s inception. I’m sure if I dug hard enough I could find a few dozen.

WvW is not dying. It’s been through worse.

Treating others the way you would like to be treated is key. It’s not about honor or a sub set of personal values, it’s about making the game mode fun for everyone so you can all have those epic fights where you pat each other on the backs and say “good game!” If you’re always spawn camping, roaming in large gank groups that emote and pester solos or acting like hungry wolves trying to crack open a tower filled with a zerg half the size of yours it just becomes unfun for both sides. You can only farm easy bags for so long before it becomes boring and it gets lame a lot faster for the ones being farmed.

Learn to understand that all servers, maybe with the exception of BG, have more than a few hours during the day where they’re heavily outnumbered. During those hours you can PPT all you like but farming people off the map is just going to crush their spirits.

You can see all of this happen in EOTM at a much faster pace. It’s WvW on fastforward and you can see the attitudes change as the numbers fluctuate. When I command, if we’re the largest zerg, I don’t harass the smaller zergs until they quit because it’s no fun. I catch them if they’re in our way and when they’re big enough to fight back, either they’ll come to us looking to fight or I’ll test them out to see if they can handle themselves. Then you get commanders who like to spawn camp or defend everything on the map even when they’re clearly far too big for the other sides to fight, then the map dies. Which is exactly what BG is doing to it’s opponents.

Find a happy medium and learn to accept that WvW is never going to be perfectly balanced. Work together with your opponents so that the game can be fun for everyone and have a little grace during the hours your enemies are heavily outnumbered.

I appreciate the civil responses despite my negative attitude, everyone.

Just as someone who has done almost exclusively WvW in this game, it means a lot to me. So with how things have been the past few weeks, I’ve just been getting more and more frustrated.

As I’d said in the OP and @ others suggesting it, I will be moving. I just can’t until I can afford it which may be another week yet.

Jim Hunter.6821:

Just look at the scores right now, SoS night crew is going hard in a match they can’t win and Mag is losing 8 glicko points because of it. You are killing yourselves.

Justine.6351:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

I have a ton of stealth traps in my inventory and I use them shamelessly. I’m sorry but if I’m kneeling down for 3seconds in plain sight and you trip it, don’t hate on me because you’re careless.

Do you try any fancy combo in particular for them or just unload everything till they die?

I’ve considered something like spike trap stacked with stealth disrupter on occasion.

Just general bait. I drop them at any time. In combat, in camps, around towers. If it’s not in combat, I set them up in common places people will run through or at common stacking places in camps. Eg. behind the rock at Rogue’s Quarry or high traffic area like at the end of Dredge tunnels.

I wouldn’t say I have any fancy combos other than pretending I’m AFK, lol. Sometimes if I see a Thief lingering around an area I’ll set a trap then stand with my back to them on the trap. As soon as they trip it I lock them down with CC’s/immobs followed by the good old Quickening Zephyr → Rapid Fire or if I’m on my Necro I just obliterate them with a million and one conditions.

It’s sad how fast they die without stealth, really shows how poorly implemented it is when they suddenly become defenseless without it. That said, a good Thief can still handle themselves even when they can’t stealth. I’ve had my butt handed to me more than a few times by Thieves that were smarter than I gave them credit for. That’s why I try to live by the “always assume your opponent is a genius until proven an idiot” quote.

I have a ton of stealth traps in my inventory and I use them shamelessly. I’m sorry but if I’m kneeling down for 3seconds in plain sight and you trip it, don’t hate on me because you’re careless.

ArchonWing.9480:

-snip-

I appreciate the response but I want to state that I am fully aware of most of the problems both on my end and on the servers.

I don’t know how to justify how I feel other than that I’ve been a part of enough communities to see that the overall quality here is lower.

I’ll be leaving as soon as I’m able but unfortunately I can’t right now. I’ve just been trying to stay in EOTM since zergs there tend to stay together better during fights than zergs in EBG/the BL’s (which is saying a lot). Not to mention there are actually a good deal of fights where as any time I’m with SoS all we seem to do is get wiped.

If people disagree with me that’s totally fine. It’s mostly a matter of opinion how I feel I just wanted to vent because I felt it might bring up some interesting discussion and I didn’t have any where else I could release my frustration.

I appreciate the civil and constructive feedback as always though, Archon. I can be a jerk but I know to respect a good guy when I see ’m (:

Also, I play at all hours. Night, day, early morning. I don’t have a specific schedule.

It’s not even that it’s a terrible match up, it’s that no one has a fighting spirit. People would rather cap things than have any kind of conflict.

Don’t get me wrong, everyone is entitled to their opinion of what fun is and I guess fighting is not what most of them find fun. But when they’re forced to do so, people just run around like chickens with their heads cut off. I’m of 0 help as well because I’ll just immediately run away knowing our chances of winning are like 1 in 100. Doesn’t even feel worth the chance of a wipe to me.

It’s just plain not my kind of community and I feel out of place. Having been here for like the last 2 weeks now I’m slowly going crazy. I wouldn’t have written this if it weren’t for how many times small groups of Mags were farming our group trying to push SMC. We had a freaking tag up but no one was paying attention and kept falling for the same trick every single time.

I want to say I’m sorry to SoS for being such a debbie downer but seriously people need to get their heads in the game. There is no reason this server should be in such a high tier with the performance they have. Stop night crew PPTing and start learning to defend yourselves.

I’ve been on I think about 10 servers now and SoS is hands down, no contest, the worst I’ve been on. There are more organized groups in EOTM than what SoS can pull and they’re so bad individually it’s painful. I mean you should never depend on someone to help you when you’re roaming but just for context, I don’t think I’ve ever been at a greater advantage while someone else was with me since I’ve been on this server. Any time someone(s) else is around they may as well not even be there they die so fast. I may not be the greatest player myself but good god… I have absolutely 0 faith in getting help or being in a successful zerg. The only time they win is if they outnumber 3 – 1 and even then, there are lots of times they’re pushed back. This has been the most miserable few weeks in WvW out of my entire time in Gw2. I want out, but I don’t have the gems quite yet so I’m boned for now.

Ugh, that felt great to get off my chest. Mods delete when you’re ready. Will love to see responses until then.

My two cents on Hunter’s Call → Reduce cooldown 5 – 10 seconds, add pulsing Blind for every hit, increase damage 10 – 15%, cause cripple if target is blocking.

“Call hawks to swarm your foe Blinding with every pulse. Cripple your foe instead if they are blocking.”

Would be difficult to remove a quickly pulsing Blind and if it’s blocked, the Cripple gives you an easier time with kiting. Doesn’t sound too OP and sticks with the general theme.

DeceiverX.8361:

S/P is largely invalidated, though. P/P on Unload does way more damage with a much higher degree of safety, particularly when using DrD.

Hell of a lot easier to counter though, lol. Have met like maybe 1 P/P Thief that was actually a challenging fight. Otherwise Ranger pew pew > Thief pew pew.

But yeah if they catch you off guard it can get ugly fast. I had one destroy me on my Necro a few weeks ago and I was not at all expecting how fast the damage came, particularly because his other set was D/P which is what I thought he was going to attack me with.

Jim Hunter.6821:

Man I haven’t even seen a sword pistol thief in months. Actually the only one that gave me trouble recently was a staff thief that evaded for days and hit hard as kitten. I really need to spend a couple days on my thief to learn the staff animations, I just hate playing him now that they removed guard stacks and I don’t have a marauders set yet.

They’re definitely not that common, fortunately. But I’ve run in to more than a few and I’ve learned that if they’re running S/P, they’re probably really good. It’s not a forgiving weapon combo to use but if you’re good with it it, it’s so kitten strong. That Pistol Whip, especially if they Steal to you if you try to move away, is just so brutal.

Not a big fan of Warhorn myself. I used to use it a long time ago with my trapper build to blast fire fields but it’s definitely lacking.

Hunter’s Call is just on way too long of a cooldown. With the trait, it’s not so bad but it still feels like it needs something else. The best way I’ve found to use it (with a power build) is to do Hunter’s Call → Rapid Fire for a pretty nice burst. Not enough to warrant taking it over other offhand weapons though.

Call Of The Wild is nice for the blast finisher and everything but it’s really not necessary.

I don’t want to say it’s a “dead” weapon as there are worse ones in the game. But it is probably our worst weapon. Although mainhand axe on a power build might compete for that spot if you’ve ever tried it. The damage is pretty lolbad.

Jim Hunter.6821:

Crapgame.6519:

Berserker vs. others – everything is fine and fun until a pistol packing dagger wielding thief jumps you Then you melt like butter more often than not and Lord knows those little kittens are hiding in the weeds just waiting to bite at your ankles…

OP – nice video, thank you for sharing. I run LB/Staff in WvW but run Nature Magic, Beastmastery, and Druid instead. I tried a build similar to yours trying to min/max conditional damage with toughness and healing, couldn’t get it right. So I ended up this route using Celestial armor and power, toughness, healing power accessories. So I play the heavier sustain/armor (3200) with healing and kill them with boredom

No, seriously. That pistol packing mamma / asura I mentioned above, I don’t fret over them anymore – lol. On the other hand, that Necro…. But at the end of the day it is all about managing Celestial Avatar then the rest falls into place.

Again, thanks for sharing. Enjoyable.

I rarely have trouble with thieves. Most of the ones I run into are hot garbage, the good ones are still a pretty fair fight since they have to go glassy to be a real threat. And necros are easy bags with the mobility this build offers.

Seriously I think the one thing that kills me more than anything in wvw are “obstructed. .. obstructed”.
I can’t count how many times I missed a stealth or knock back because the grass was too tall.

I run a standard pew pew Ranger, Berserker/Assassin hybrid, 93% Precision with Fury, Longbow + GS and some poison stacking pets and do just fine against basically everything.

The only things I have issues against are Scrappers, Dragonhunters if they catch me in a bad spot, condition Mesmers and condition Thieves. Besides that, 1v1 I’ll win the majority of my fights. Although since I’m squishy as all hell and have terrible multi-target damage, it’s pretty rare that I win outnumbered fights unless I’m really smart about it. Especially considering I don’t run Druid for those clutch heal/stealth escapes.

Still, I always get a big grin on my face when a Thief tries to jump me and almost immediately gets 100 – 0 countered. As long as you’ve got eyes on the back of your head and know what kind of tricks they can have up their sleeves they’re really not that scary. Even though condition Thieves are the hardest for me because of their sustain, it’s the good S/P Thieves that I’m the most scared of.

Justine.6351:

Jim Hunter.6821:

borya.2964:

bigo.9037:

ah that’s not what I mean though.. I’m just trying to explain how and why, for pure dmg stats, zerker would still be better than this condi spec etc..

It’s kind of wierd to question the OP’s build that obviously works. The build she use seems to be effective in outnumbered fights when the one you actually use is not, or is maybe less effective (i also watched your vid), cuz in a pure power build, you have no damage while kitting.

Yup, the hybrid build works really well when fighting outnumbered and having to kite around for half the fight.
I flipped a camp, sat outside of bay and repeatedly killed groups of 2-4 players. It got to the point where they built a bali to….. I honestly don’t know what they thought the bali would do…

One time I was defending a camp for an hour+ agaisnt 2-3. I knew where it was leading to (4-5 rush) so I built an AC & Bali. They came and saw them. Didn’t enter the camp while a couple ran away. Standoff for about 5min and then the treb fire started…

Unfortunately the days of max upgraded camps is over for solo roamers ;-(
Now I have to try and take them while ebay defends them zealously at night. T3 camp with 1 defender, meh challenge. 2/3/4 defenders, eeks! Runaway from the wolfpack! Thankfully the “borderland tour” is always an option for great trolling opportunity ;-)

Lol, I remember back when IoJ was in T3 and having their exodus, I was holding a camp for upwards of 3+ hours trying to get Mendon’s upgraded. This was back when trapper Ranger was extra broken so I had like 6 people trying to take this camp from me until they gave up for a while, came back, then aggro’d the Arborial Spirit to crush the guards and kill me.

They then proceeded to sit in the camp with AC’s and other siege so I couldn’t take it back from them.

Picture enclosed (during Chinese new year)

Mobility
Thief
Ranger
Warrior
Elementalist
Mesmer

Viability
Thief
Mesmer
Elementalist
Engineer
Warrior
Ranger
Guardian
Necromancer
Revenant

Stealth
Thief
Mesmer
Engineer
Ranger

Burst
Mesmer
Thief
Elementalist
Warrior

Best
Thief
Mesmer
Engineer
Ranger
Warrior

Mobility
Thief and Ranger both have very high mobility with the proper weapon/utility choices. A Staff + GS Ranger can cover some massive ground but nothing compares to the near infinite mobility of a Thief. Warrior isn’t far behind if they choose to use Sword/Shield + GS and Elementalist is roughly the same with Fiery GS. Mesmer has poor landspeed but good mobility. With Blink, Portal and other skills like Illusionary Leap, they can be pretty slippery in a fight.

Viability
Viability means “capable of working successfully” by definition. All professions can be effective at roaming if the player is capable. That said, some are more ideal than others. Thief, Mesmer, Ele and Engi all take the top spots because they are equipped for dealing with being outnumbered as well as having moderate – high mobility. When roaming, mobility and the ability to deal with multiple targets are extremely important. Although Warrior is good in team fights and 1v1 for example, they aren’t very strong in 1vX due to their primary defenses being very easy to counter. I rank Revenant below Necromancer only because Necromancer deals with multiple targets better than Rev. They are both bottom of the barrel in terms of viability but again, that doesn’t mean it cannot be done, just that it takes a greater deal of skill.

Stealth
Thief and Mesmer are roughly the same here. They can come and go as they please which is what makes them the best for roaming. It’s not mobility nor is it dealing with multiple targets, but it is the ability to reset a fight just about any time they like. That’s something unique to these two professions and although a Ranger isn’t terribly far behind, their access to stealth comes at a much higher cost.

Burst
A full YOLO Mesmer can pretty much obliterate anything if the player knows how to do it right. S/P Thief is certainly a close second but but since it’s channelled, I would have to award highest burst to Mesmer which is nearly instant. Glassy Tempests can do some pretty mean bursts as well as Berserker’s with Gunflame.

Best
Thief is simply the best for roaming because it has it all. Mobility, the ability to deal with multiple targets and high access to stealth. Although Mesmer comes in a close second, they struggle to deal with multiple targets and if they’re forced to run, their only option is to use stealth to do so as they have very poor landspeed. Engineer’s can be quite effective with mobility and multiple targets as well but since their mobility often means having to sacrifice a utility, they’re not always the fastest on the field.

Of course this is just IMO, as was the OP, but in regards to Thief, I don’t think that’s something that needs to be argued. Thief is just the ideal profession to roam with despite not being the best at 1v1.

JoshuaRAWR.4653:

I really, really do not want to be mean here, but it’s just a simple matter of fact that you’re a bad player if you think this trait is bad.

It’s arguably one of the strongest traits in the necromancers kitten nal.

It’s a MUST in the condition based builds. You know necromancers can dump the conditions they’re currently suffering from, onto the enemy right? This makes corruptions even stronger than just having a flat 33% cd reduction.

I wouldn’t even say it’s “high risk high reward” gameplay..
Just don’t use a corruption unless you have a condi transfer up.

I actually complain to the druids in my group when they’re spamming cleanses because it hinders my DPS.

JoshuaRAWR.4653:

I actually complain to the druids in my group when they’re spamming cleanses because it hinders my DPS

Needs to be fixed ASAP. Happens to enemy zergs as well making it extremely difficult to avoid damage at times as you’ll have no clue how many players are attacking you.

dekou.6012:

Ganathar.4956:

dekou.6012:

This annoys me because it seems to be a repeat of the Phlanx armor debacle. For those who don’t remember, this is what Phalanx looks like:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/File:Phalanx_armor_human_male_front.jpg

Wow, that’s cool! I’ll just go and buy it for my female Warrior…

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/File:Phalanx_armor_human_female_front.jpg

…wait, where’s the cool helmet? The sleek breastplate? The practical, yet slightly intimidating pants? Why’s the female version made from a different material?

The issue isn’t as noticeable in the Envoy armor designs, but they still look off. The medium male design has a nicely detailed shirt, while the female one is just a bikini. It looks dumb, not sexy.

This is an issue with taste really. Male and female armors cannot be identical. Just look at phoenix armor. Most people agree that the male version is horrible, while the female version is great. In fact, female armors are generally better looking and more detailed. Just because one armor set ended up looking inferior for females, it’s not the end of the world.

Sure, in some cases they can’t. Kasmeer’s armor would look weird on males. However, nothing in the female physique is in conflict with the male version of Phlanx. The male model could easily be applied to females after some adjustments to make it fit their slightly different shape, like a wider hip, thinner waist and maybe some boob plates if they’re really necessary. Instead, ANet made a completely separate female design for no reason at all.

And yes, it’s not the end of the world and I don’t see anyone claiming it is. However, sometimes designers and/or marketing screw up and it’s good if someone points that out to them. I thought they learned their lesson after the community backlash from Phlanx, but apparently they didn’t.

Dark Souls has always had a good strategy when designing their genders. A female can wear lipstick and a dress? Identical dress and lipstick can be used on a male. No discrimination what so ever. There are literally dresses you can put on males.

The only issue I ever had is that their female characters have mosquito bite boobs. Now, I’m a woman myself but it totally bothers me how tiny those boobs are. You need at least a little more than that when wearing certain clothes for the proper amount of shape and appeal. Otherwise it looks too… Juvenile? I’m not sure how to explain it, it just always bothered me. Like I don’t think I’d wear a really high class dress if I had really tiny boobs. It’d be like a really thin guy wearing a tiny, thin muscle shirt, the ones designed for body builders. It looks awkward. Some apparel actually needs that gender definition.