Rangers traps are good. Thief traps are bad, rarely used and never traited.
A lot of thief skills/weapons come into play with better traits so try them again at level 40+. Sword+pistol is a simple melee combination that you could use at low levels. The shortbow is a balanced and fit for purpose but you should eventually find that melee does more damage and can be used safely with good use of skills.
It’s not speculation that Signet of Malice can heal massively. Thieves have made it work. Use it in the right situations with the right skills.
“I never use it because it’s not worth using IMO. It just isn’t a fun skill. My suggestions were things they could add to make it more useful.”
How can stealing a skull and fearing a necromancer not be fun?
There are plenty of storylines that could involve Trahearne without him doing much. For example, a smart elder dragon could want to break the Pact and decide to assassinate Trahearne. The threat from the remaining dragons needs to be re-established and this sort of storyline would prevent it from just being ‘Zaitan down, Jormag next’.
Your posts across the class forums certainly stir up interest Daecollo but the wild ideas can’t really be taken seriously.
Last week I did some structured PvP for the first time, stole skulls from a necro, and feared him and his minions. That’s good enough for me and quite fun too.
If you run a signet build you’ll get a precision boost for your knights gear and be able to run on auto-pilot across most of the open world with a greatsword.
As soon as there is a quest within the game for a legendary then everyone will feel that they are entitled to complete the quest and entitled to get a legendary. The whole point of legendaries is that players are not entitled to them and they are not owned by everyone. The trading post already creates an entitlement culture since players can put time into CoF mining and expect to buy a legendary and this does diminish the status of legendary weapons.
“Why level if we are just nerfed during the game. It really messes up the sense of accomplishment”
What are you accomplishing if you go back into a level 5 zone as a level 80 just to kill everything by sneezing on it? By dropping levels you can achieve everything in everything zone in the same way that a on-level player can achieve everything in that zone. You have more game content available to play as a challenge, for more fun.
There are a number of side issues with the gravelings that make them more difficult than just finding a dodge button. The leaps seem to have an aoe so if you go to revive someone you can easily get knocked down by a graveling leaping at the downed player. The leaps are far enough to come from off screen, again a problem if you have turned to look at a downed player perhaps. The walls of the caverns can force changes in the camera angles as you move. After the gravelings stop still and prepare for a leap they can they jump in any direction onto a moving target. Whilst this seems sensible to stop players running rings round the gravelings it does mean that players have to dodge every leap that might happen. Rangers pets are a good example of creatures that stop to perform an animation for their aoe attacks with a specific facing, meaning that they always miss a moving target. As previously mentioned you cannot break stun while mid air and the gravelings can kick you about so much that you don’t land before you are downed or dead.
The burrows fights are about momentum. If you have high dps you kill faster, you see less gravelings, you have to move/dodge less, you get further into the fight with your active boons, and so on. If you have to revive people then time is lost, more gravelings spawn, and everything gets harder and harder. This probably explains the disparity between the ‘AC is easy’ and the ‘never going back into any dungeon ever’ comments.
This skill should not be a skill it should be a trait, possibly on the trickery line. When any trap is triggered you can shadow step to your trap. This improves the other traps. It improves this skill. It improves traits. It doesn’t break balance. A new skill can then be made to replace shadow trap and it should not be another trap since there’s nothing new a trap should do.
I ran (literally) some tests on a training dummy in Lion’s arch. Without any speed buffs it was moving me about 1150. This was at the range where you could swing an attack for damage but auto- attacks will not start. With speed buffs it was moving me further than 1200. I was using a rifle range as the benchmark for 1200.
Once rush ran over 1200m and closed to the target without the rush damage. Auto-attacks were able to start though. Maybe that’s right, maybe not. I’m guessing that if you overlook movement glitches on obstacles, rush range is tolerably similar to 1200m.
There was probably one krait alive and you hadn’t searched hard enough to find it. They can get pushed through the ruins.
Given that underwater combat isn’t good enough to entirely support a major expansion, I think it is likely that a lot of the DSD’s minions will be encountered on land. None of the aquatic races seem to live in air pockets that could allow land combat in the oceans. Underwater inquest bases could support dungeons but not whole zones. I think it is therefore reasonable to speculate where the dragon minions would come ashore and need fighting.
A signets build is an incredibly easy and effective when leveling, to the point that warrior do not need to learn to play. So before ‘improving’ signets some consideration should be given to when they need to function better and how that can be achieved without further breaking solo PvE.
Thieves don’t have long range weapons since they are conceptually a skirmish class that moves in and out of melee.
The heals are balanced. Use the heal you need to suit your build and play style. Don’t be afraid to change the heals around if you’re using different tactics for different enemies.
Hide in shadows is not about breaking aggro. To break aggro you get out of an enemies roaming area and stealth could help you do that. Stealth gives you a brief respite from mobs targeting you with new attacks, lets you get trait benefits from going into stealth (shadow arts), and gives you a free powerful attack on weapon skill 1.
Even if the dungeon is only available for a short period of time they may be able to put the design to a number of uses. It could eventually become a fractal level. Explorable dungeon paths could be added but without another story mode to open them.
“Why does every major PvE concept, whether Personal Story, Living Story or special events have to end with forced group instancing?”
It doesn’t. There is one story dungeon at the end of the personal story. There is going to be one story dungeon at the end of this portion of living story. The last portion of living story, involving the karka, consisted of a series of world events and player feedback has probably persuaded the developers not to do the same again.
I suppose the bottom line is that if some challenging content (dungeons) are added to story lines then some players will have to change their play styles to get them done. If no challenging content is added to the game then players log off permanently.
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“My guild and I tried running Arah path 3 last night but ended after about 75 minutes. After we called it we compared stats and a few people werent really sure what target stats for arah should be.”
Sorry for an unhelpful answer but Lupicus is mainly about using skills and experience. Builds certainly help but are not crucial. 75 minutes isn’t a long time to look at Lupicus either. The best way to defend against Lupicus is to anticipate his attacks and be prepared with the right counters. More time in the arena will give you that experience.
If another release had gone by without group content, players would have complained about the lack of group content. A release comes along with group content and players complain that they have to do group content. This thread was sadly inevitable.
And no, the game would not be better if you could get the story and rewards of each dungeon by completing 150 mind numbingly boring solo tasks in the open world instead.
The pertinent phrase here is “walk into a trap”. Place your traps better or place them under mobs so they are triggered immediately. If you want a fire field then use an offhand torch. All your problems can be solved with a change of play style.
“I’ve been able to easily maintain the attention of the whole second pack in the underwater Fractal (the one with the Hypnoss mobs) at 40+ while dishing out nice #3 cleaves at opportune moments.”
That’s great. Can you give some tips? I often find myself sunk/netted/killed before I even start. I can single target with spear 5 for a bit while my team gets killed. I can block but nothing hits me. I can block and take enough damage during the block response to get myself killed anyway even with signet of malice. The krait often don’t swim into melee range for the block response and they always swim away from spear 2.
“Since you absolutely need an internet connect to play a MMO by its very nature, companies have learned that they can get away with skimping on the polish and release the game to start making money sooner.”
There’s no trend here. Initially MMOs were really, really, buggy. Everquest 1 was almost guaranteed to have servers down for hours after a release as they patched up the bugs, or patched the patch. WoW raised the quality when it was initially released but it was still buggy by current standards and had major failings such as queuing to log in. Since then a variety of MMOs have been released in a beta state or with very high quality, depending upon the manufacturer. GW2 is perfectly playable although it needs a lot of polish and is not delivering a much as it could.
It would be funny if an enemy could force one of the characters to attack the rest of the party. That might stop some of the bezerk builds.
“I feel that mobs feel too much the same, no strenghs, no weaknesses. Just DPS with few skills which do nothing else but damage.”
The enemies do pose threats but you might find that other members of your group are playing well enough to counter them while you are doing very little apart from dps. Stability, missile reflection, condition cures, blinds, weakness, protection, and so on may be keeping you alive and you may not realize it. Most trash mobs will mash up parties if everyone just goes for damage out > damage in. However the smart use of the right skills at the right times can provide a lot of defense without sacrificing much dps.
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If find the whole offhand axe concept wrong. Path of scars doesn’t do anything that a bow with piercing arrows doesn’t do better and it’s bad physiology to throw heavy penetrating weapons with the off hand. There’s no reason to use the offhand axe based only on path of scars.
Whirling defense has the numbers and useful missile blocks. However it just looks chaotic when paired with a main hand sword and isn’t working at the same range (medium) as the main hand axe. Rooting the ranger in place for 5 seconds feels completely wrong for both main hand options. Given that this skill is missile defense for rangers it is just not fit for purpose.
Other classes seem to have offhand/mainhand pairings that come together to be more than their parts. Rangers do not. I’d rather see the dual wield weapons completely redesigned rather than just tinkered with.
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Do all the story modes when they become available. I’d suggest TA first for exploration since CM has a lot of ambushes and you need a step up in dungeon tactics. AC is quite punishing for beginners and it is easy to make no progress whatsoever. There is an early encounter with a jungle wurm in TA that you might find difficult but once you’ve mastered that you can do the rest.
Shadow’s embrace has mixed bag of paths: 1 is short and potentially difficult, 2 is very long and average difficulty, 3 is short and not so difficult. Citadel of Flame has two easy paths that you can run quite quickly so head there when you can. CoF path 3 isn’t easy for pick up groups but a guild group should be able work it out, giving plenty of options for getting CoF barter currency.
It’s basilisk venom or nothing. Thief utility and elite skills are conspicuously absent underwater. Make your complaint at your local forum at the earliest opportunity.
Search, talk, and revive should not all share the same single tab in the interface. Autoloot would reduce that problem but not solve it. It needs a tab for revive, a tab for talk, and a tab for search/activate.
Could try group basilisk venom, runes for getting boons (aegis, protections) when using the elite skill, heals from using venoms.
Blinds and weakness are not going to make enough difference on bosses and you will need to be healing up rather than soaking damage.
You are still going to be better standing behind the boss. I’ve got a moderately robust build and I don’t even want to stand in front of trash.
Stealing is fine. It’s pretty good to have an instant shadow step that is generally available even when other skills are not.
Signet of malice seems fine. I wouldn’t use it everyday for everything but that doesn’t make it a bad skill.
At 3 seconds it wasn’t such a problem since you could intuitively get a feel for the skill timing. As it stands I’d like to see a better indication for revealed not least because if I’m waiting with my mouse above the cloak and dagger button, a tool tip appears and obscures that revealed icon.
Then again, we still haven’t got a decent indicator for being in combat and that’s worse. The disappearance of miniscule skill change arrows is not good enough.
Simin has some thresh holds where she changes behavior (her reset health). If you don’t do the sparks quickly enough she may not be past the thresh hold as you expect.
For leveling up you can just get more done with higher dps. There are plenty of weapon sets that can give you a knockdown, a block, or an interrupt and still keep the damage higher. An easy build for leveling up is a signet build but it doesn’t help you learn to play. Experimenting with a few builds yourself will be better in the long run.
This will be a long term issue but at the moment the endgame is quite flat and pets that can fight vs exotics can also fight vs ascended.
An ice elemental might not seem it at first but it is exactly the sort of slow big hitting mob that can’t do anything when blinded. If you try to kite them with caltrops they will do some area stuff that you have to dodge and then throw some ice at you from range. It will be hard work. Stand next to them with an offhand pistol and you’re probably ok.
So what’s the trade off here? Thieves have skills and utilities that need class knowledge to be used at the right times for good effect. Warriors can be played in much simpler way without the depth of class knowledge. That’s easier for warriors but a good thief with class knowledge can still do better than a warrior who hasn’t learnt to play.
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I’ll give you that. In many of these fights we may have just been behind the walls. Unfortunately, right behind the wall is usually just where I stand within a sword swipe of the enemy.
“You can reflect that dredge oscillator attack. They share the exact same graphic effect, which was the main reason I even attempted reflection, but nope. Can’t be bounced back.”
I’ve seen oscillator attacks go through smokescreens in Dredgehaunt cliffs, shadow’s embrace, and also in fractals from the dredge general. I asked guardian friends to test it too and after initially saying it was reflected, both saw the same shots go through the walls and hit them.
Are you wanting this for PvE, WvW, sPvP?
This attack is also used by dredge oscillators and some other foes. I suppose it is thematically an earth attack rather than a missile attack but it is annoying.
The first problem with traps would be caltrops. Caltrops just do it better. Wider area. Persistent. Multiple targets. Big damage. Long cripple. Repeatedly triggers signet of malice. Traps need some ideas that make them a good alternative to caltrops.
There still seem to be some freak deaths when falling on the harpy fractal. I’ve been hit by one bomb, I’ve only taken 5000 damage total, and I’m dead after falling from the ledge. So what’s happened?
This seems to be mainly happening 2/3 of the way along the series of ledges on the second set of harpies. I’m guessing it is to do with that the invisible barrier that players fall into and reset. I’m guessing that it is faulty, or too high, or too low, or missing, or something else.
If you are in open world and want to afk then just log out. You don’t even drop group.
This dungeon is probably now the third hardest. There are a lot of small things going on but generally when an AC fight gets out of control it goes completely irrevocably wrong. Players need to grab control of the events rather than let them happen. That’s fine for experienced players but really hard for new players to do. New players should be able to explore the dungeon and not just walk through it following a script.
There are a variety of one off uses for basilisk venom that are good, such as removing rage type buffs from bezerk units. More generally basilisk venoms fit into a line of thought seen typically in other MMOs – if you can control a fight then group dps will eventually kill the enemy.
“I simply don’t understand what’s wrong about trying to improve the signet build. I hope you want a balanced warrior as well which means they need to buff the signet build. Period.”
They might need to change it towards a PvP approach but they don’t need to buff it. A signet build steamrollers open world content so well that warriors never need to learn to play. Other classes have far more broken signet builds than the warrior. Period.
Pistol/dagger is another ranged weapon pairing as well. That can kite 3 enemies.
Thieves are skirmish class with instant movement (shadow step) between ranged and melee. Rangers have longer range and have more tools to keep enemies at range, starting with the pet. Both can be played for any balance of melee and ranged. There are any number of ways of dealing with multiple enemies but intitially the ranger does it better just because of the pet. Ultimately the thief has more variety of defense.
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