Guild Wars 2

Embolism.8106:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Embolism.8106:

Fay.2357:

I love sandy, but he’s not fully informed about scepter. Due to how the auto functions, it performs faster the closer you are to the target. At melee range, it becomes very similar to the attack speed of the sword. He also doesn’t seem to realize that confusing images actually does more damage than blurred frenzy, in a quicker package now that it’s been buffed.

I still wouldn’t normally recommend using scepter for various reasons, but the particular case discussed here makes a lot of sense for it.

In my build, I use mainhand sword because I need the instant clone from iLeap to start the rotation, and I want the defense of blurred frenzy to be available.

Oh no, I’m not saying I’d take MH Sword over Sceptre, but if you’re looking to have two MHs then with Chrono there’s no sense in doubling up on Sword still is what I’m getting at.

There’s no sense to take one sword and one scepter. That being said I have been overly harsh. When someone says something that seams pretty trollish I tend to try to spur them on to get a better laugh but that’s probably not one of my greatest quality’s….

Just go test it in HotM. If you’ve never used it before, and from how you keep repeating yourself it’s obvious you haven’t; you can’t really make a judgement.

I also haven’t used staff guard. Using your theory I have to test that out before I make a judgement on how good that is?

@Fay

Yeah I would like to see some DPS tests. That’s really the only way to settle things. With quickness and alacrity and sandy testing scepter at max range it might be better. But I really don’t think it was tested at range. Only one way to tell tho.

Embolism.8106:

Fay.2357:

I love sandy, but he’s not fully informed about scepter. Due to how the auto functions, it performs faster the closer you are to the target. At melee range, it becomes very similar to the attack speed of the sword. He also doesn’t seem to realize that confusing images actually does more damage than blurred frenzy, in a quicker package now that it’s been buffed.

I still wouldn’t normally recommend using scepter for various reasons, but the particular case discussed here makes a lot of sense for it.

In my build, I use mainhand sword because I need the instant clone from iLeap to start the rotation, and I want the defense of blurred frenzy to be available.

Oh no, I’m not saying I’d take MH Sword over Sceptre, but if you’re looking to have two MHs then with Chrono there’s no sense in doubling up on Sword still is what I’m getting at.

There’s no sense to take one sword and one scepter. That being said I have been overly harsh. When someone says something that seams pretty trollish I tend to try to spur them on to get a better laugh but that’s probably not one of my greatest quality’s….

Embolism.8106:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

I understand that PART of the reason scepter wasn’t taken was because of the clone summon. However, that is not the whole reason why it was not taken. Literately, I don’t mind discussing things with people, but when people say stuff of the sort like this, it makes me think: why do I even bother?

The other reason people like to repeat, Ether Bolt’s slow attack rate, is actually an anomaly that disappears when you use it in melee range. The issue is Ether Bolt does not progress to the next skill in the chain until the previous projectile has hit, so the further away you are the slower it is. At melee range however it’s as fast as Mind Slash.

I don’t think the people that tested out scepter used it at max range……… seeing as dungeons are done in melee……………

Embolism.8106:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

See, i don’t mind answering questions that ask why scepter isn’t good, but I hate it when people walk into a discussion about future meta builds and state that scepter is better than sword. I would advise reading the guide by one of the best ( if not the best ) mesmer pve players that I’ll link at the bottom of my post. It will tell you why scepter isn’t good.

Did you even read the guide you linked? It clearly states that the main reason is because Ether Clone replaces Phantasms. Again:

Embolism.8106:

The main reason Sceptre wasn’t used is because Ether Clone replaces Phantasms, that’s not an issue with Chronomancer. You should know why the meta is how it is instead of just parroting what everyone else says.

Ok, let’s just post what he says clearly so no one gets confused.

“In terms of viability in PvE, the scepter is slightly lacking, but can be used in open world areas by people who enjoy a more condition focused approach. It will be mentioned later that the AA has a phantasm restriction, COMBINING THIS WITH THE WEAPON’S OVERALL SLOW ATTACK RATE AND CONDITION DAMAGE FOCUS , make for a suboptimal weapon choice in min- maxing dungeon party situations.”

Embolism.8106:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Seriously, first someone claims scepter is better than sword in dungeons

Way to strawman. I said you’re better off using two different MHs with their own skills and CDs than doubling up on Sword. Confusing Images is basically a second Blurred Frenzy that does more damage and you won’t lose much DPS with Ether Bolt provided you’re in melee range, which you would with Sword anyway.

The main reason Sceptre wasn’t used is because Ether Clone replaces Phantasms, that’s not an issue with Chronomancer. You should know why the meta is how it is instead of just parroting what everyone else says.

I understand that PART of the reason scepter wasn’t taken was because of the clone summon. However, that is not the whole reason why it was not taken. Literately, I don’t mind discussing things with people, but when people say stuff of the sort like this, it makes me think: why do I even bother?

Embolism.8106:

You misunderstand how Phantasmal Haste works. It reduces their attack CD, not their conjure CD.

Don’t knock on Sceptre if you never tried it. It’s actually a good Power weapon, the Ether Bolt chain doesn’t do much less damage than Mind Slash and Confusing Images does a lot more damage than Blurred Frenzy. Ether Clone can be pretty useful in a Shatter build with no DE, and since this is a Shatter build you won’t have problems with Clones overwriting Phantasms.

Domination also gives you up to +30% damage on your Shatters, and remember this is a Shatter spamming build. You also can help stack Vuln with Diversion.

kitten , got confused with the other trait. But its not like the other trait options are any better.

“Don’t knock on Sceptre if you never tried it. It’s actually a good Power weapon, the Ether Bolt chain doesn’t do much less damage than Mind Slash and Confusing Images does a lot more damage than Blurred Frenzy. Ether Clone can be pretty useful in a Shatter build with no DE, and since this is a Shatter build you won’t have problems with Clones overwriting Phantasms.”

See, i don’t mind answering questions that ask why scepter isn’t good, but I hate it when people walk into a discussion about future meta builds and state that scepter is better than sword. I would advise reading the guide by one of the best ( if not the best ) mesmer pve players that I’ll link at the bottom of my post. It will tell you why scepter isn’t good.

“Domination also gives you up to +30% damage on your Shatters, and remember this is a Shatter spamming build. You also can help stack Vuln with Diversion.”

True, I didn’t think about the 30% damage on shatter, that is nice. And the vuln from diversion can be nice but you have to be careful because you don’t want to interrupt the boss. Like i said I don’t know the actually math behind it so we will just have to wait and see what the people who do do the math say.

EDIT: Forgot the link lol http://dulfy.net/2014/07/21/gw2-mesmer-pve-class-guide-by-sanderinoa/#Scepter

AlphatheWhite.9351:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Have to go with Miku on this one mostly. Drop the staff. Also, drop the shield unless for some reason without it you can’t manage to keep up perma quickness. I believe something like this will be the new meta pve: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQRAsc8dnsICtqh9fCmfCUrhlVjqcDGhAo+Yj2pFd6OjqA-TxRBABXt/o8oQ9Diq+DZKxy7kAAwTAwMlgBAOAGuwFuwBrv+6rv+6N8wDP8wDPGg8A-e

Lol.
1. That build provides 18s of alacrity, which isn’t enough for any fight that might go longer than 15s to be balanced out by the dps you’re gaining. And any fight (HoT raids?) that runs even longer or requires the team to be moving about will be additionally hampered.
2. The number 1 lament of mesmers in pve is how hard it is to get dps out of phantasms (due to cleave and setup time), but here you are insisting that said low and unreliable dps is superior to eking out greater performance from your allies. I don’t get it.
3. Without traiting focus for reflects, why do you care about focus?

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Might is provided by the warrior, and fury by the ele.

See the above points already made by Pyro (before you even responded) about the dps gains for not requiring the warrior to foot the might bill. You haven’t given any reasoning to dispute the point, so why should we accept your assertion?

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

And herald will NOT get taken because rev isn’t going to get taken for dungeons.

Care to substantiate that claim? There have been reports that revenant dps is very competitive (BWE3 testing required), and the synergy between revenant and chronomancer in allowing warriors to go without PS (warriors themselves still being taken for banners), there is a lot of reason to suspect Revenant will have a place alongside chrono.

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Ele, ele, warrior, chrono, thief/ele ( you might be able to get away with no thief depending on the dungeon and if the mesmer swaps to PU for skips then swaps back ). Obviously utilitys, traits, and weapons can get swapped around for the encounter but I think this will be the general build.

I think you’re right that the thief will not be needed for most dungeons. Thief stealth escorts already swap a bunch of traits when they do skips, it’s hardly going to be remarkable for mesmers to do the same. And with CS+Alacrity, Chronos will be even better at skips than they are now. Thieves are frankly out, unless something changes.

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

And idk what chaos is for at all.

You missed the part where he said it was for 15% boon duration, which is a key element of the build’s quickness sources.

Obviously we disagree on the might, as that’s the other part that brings in Chaos (12+ stacks of might from BD), and some other minor boons from BD (fury, regen, vigor).

I would concede that for record speed runs, any group will work to account for specific kill times, so the exact build of the chronomancer will be adjusted as needed to account for variations. 15s boss fights, for example, will be met with a shift to more dps as desired. Easy changes will be used liberally.

“Lol.
1. That build provides 18s of alacrity, which isn’t enough for any fight that might go longer than 15s to be balanced out by the dps you’re gaining. And any fight (HoT raids?) that runs even longer or requires the team to be moving about will be additionally hampered.”

Maybe I’m missing something buttttttttt, how does the Ops build get that much extra alacrity? The heal well does apply alacrity plus condi removal so yeah I’m thinking that will definetely be better than I originally thought. If it is better than the signet then you can simply swap that into my build. Feedback will still be taken over a 4th well if reflects are needed. Sooooooooooo, there actually isn’t a difference in alacrity between our builds at all? Not to mention 18 seconds should be plenty. And you talk about raids, and yet the post says: [PvE] The New Chronomancer DUNGEON Rotation?

“2. The number 1 lament of mesmers in pve is how hard it is to get dps out of phantasms (due to cleave and setup time), but here you are insisting that said low and unreliable dps is superior to eking out greater performance from your allies. I don’t get it.”

Greater performance? How so? His extra teeny tiny boon duration? The might that the warrior will be providing? The fury the eles will be providing? And focus still does projectile destruction even without the trait. Heck, my build does greater team support than his AND better DPS. Not his does greater performance.

“See the above points already made by Pyro (before you even responded) about the dps gains for not requiring the warrior to foot the might bill. You haven’t given any reasoning to dispute the point, so why should we accept your assertion?”

But yes, revenant does do good damage. But just because there damage is good does NOT solidifiy there damage. Just take chrono for example. Crap damage? Check. Still gonna get taken probs? Check. Personal damage isn’t the be all end all. And having looked at revenant more, he can stack some might and fury. But how long does it take for you to get that 25 stacks, eh? Thus revenant will NOT be taken.

“I think you’re right that the thief will not be needed for most dungeons. Thief stealth escorts already swap a bunch of traits when they do skips, it’s hardly going to be remarkable for mesmers to do the same.”

Have you even ever done a dungeon with a decent thief/played a thief in a dungeon before? You don’t have to swap traits at all! Seriously, first someone claims scepter is better than sword in dungeons, then someone makes a statement that shows he/she understands absolutely 0% of a thief. Plz go read up about dungeons and meta builds before posting in a discussion about the new potential meta.

“You missed the part where he said it was for 15% boon duration, which is a key element of the build’s quickness sources.

Obviously we disagree on the might, as that’s the other part that brings in Chaos (12+ stacks of might from BD), and some other minor boons from BD (fury, regen, vigor).

I would concede that for record speed runs, any group will work to account for specific kill times, so the exact build of the chronomancer will be adjusted as needed to account for variations. 15s boss fights, for example, will be met with a shift to more dps as desired. Easy changes will be used liberally."

15% boon duration, OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Amazing. In fact lets all go givers gear for the extra boon duration too!

Embolism.8106:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Have to go with Miku on this one mostly. Drop the staff. Also, drop the shield unless for some reason without it you can’t manage to keep up perma quickness. I believe something like this will be the new meta for mesmer: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQRAsc8dnsICtqh9fCmfCUrhlVjqcDGhAo+Yj2pFd6OjqA-TxRBABXt/o8oQ9Diq+DZKxy7kAAwTAwMlgBAOAGuwFuwBrv+6rv+6N8wDP8wDPGg8A-e

Might is provided by the warrior, and fury by the ele. And herald will NOT get taken because rev isn’t going to get taken for dungeons. Ele, ele, warrior, chrono, thief/ele ( you might be able to get away with no thief depending on the dungeon and if the mesmer swaps to PU for skips then swaps back ). Obviously utilitys, traits, and weapons can get swapped around for the encounter but I think this will be the general build. And yeah staff does pretty bad DPS if you swap to it in combat tho the phantasm can be nice if you have 5> condis on the boss. And idk what chaos is for at all.

EDIT: linked the wrong build in my original post >.<

What’s with Harmonious Mantras in a build with no Mantras?

Also, again Phant Haste is useless in a Phantasma Shattering build. And why Ineptitude?

Switch a Sword for a Sceptre, it does nearly as much autoattack DPS at close range and Confusing Images does more damage than Blurred Frenzy; plus since you’re Shattering Ether Clone is a benefit rather than a hindrance.

Signet of the Ether is not needed IMO, go with Well of Eternity.

Again I’d go Domination instead of Dueling, more DPS that way.

Harmonious mantras is for when you take condi removal mantra/stability mantra/healing mantra. It’s not like there is anything better to take lol. And phantasmal haste reduces the cd on your phantasms so you can re-summon them faster.

“Switch a Sword for a Sceptre, it does nearly as much autoattack DPS at close range and Confusing Images does more damage than Blurred Frenzy; plus since you’re Shattering Ether Clone is a benefit rather than a hindrance.”

Just wha, just WHA. Are you for real?? Scepter in the only weapon I don’t use in dungeons. All the other ones I use frequently but scepter is just useless. Remember, this is for pve dungeons not pvp. This is the first time I’v had someone tell me scepter was even close to useful in dungeons. As for the signet, it can be good for keeping up more reflects and more phantasms in general but the mantra is also viable. Now that I remember it the healing well is getting condi removal so it can be used if you need condi removal. Otherwise not much of a reason to take it. As for domination being more DPS, idk about that. You lose perma fury for your phantasms plus Fencer’s Finesse compared to 0.5 more damage per vuln stack and 15% damage to your phantasms. I personally think dueling is better but I don’t know the math between them so I ain’t going to say one is definitely better than the other.

@Fay

Shield is only essential if you don’t already have enough quickness. Which depends on how long the fights last and the dungeon. I don’t think you can say shield is definitely needed. Then again I don’t think its fair for me to say its definitely not going to be used. It really all depends, so it will probably be used sometimes and sometimes not. And you make it seam like warrior does uber damage like ele lvl? I may be wrong but I don’t think its that close at all. But yes, revenant does do good damage. But just because there damage is good does NOT solidifiy there damage. Just take chrono for example. Crap damage? Check. Still gonna get taken probs? Check. Personal damage isn’t the be all end all. And having looked at revenant more, he can stack some might and fury. But how long does it take for you to get that 25 stacks, eh? Thus revenant will NOT be taken.

“Without chaos you lose your uptime on quickness.”

Again, all depends on how long the boss lives and the dungeon. But I can asure you that teeny tiny extra duration will NOT be worth it.

Have to go with Miku on this one mostly. Drop the staff. Also, drop the shield unless for some reason without it you can’t manage to keep up perma quickness. I believe something like this will be the new meta for mesmer: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vhAQRAsc8dnsICtqh9fCmfCUrhlVjqcDGhAo+Yj2pFd6OjqA-TxRBABXt/o8oQ9Diq+DZKxy7kAAwTAwMlgBAOAGuwFuwBrv+6rv+6N8wDP8wDPGg8A-e

Might is provided by the warrior, and fury by the ele. And herald will NOT get taken because rev isn’t going to get taken for dungeons. Ele, ele, warrior, chrono, thief/ele ( you might be able to get away with no thief depending on the dungeon and if the mesmer swaps to PU for skips then swaps back ). Obviously utilitys, traits, and weapons can get swapped around for the encounter but I think this will be the general build. And yeah staff does pretty bad DPS if you swap to it in combat tho the phantasm can be nice if you have 5> condis on the boss. And idk what chaos is for at all.

EDIT: linked the wrong build in my original post >.<

Chaos Archangel.5071:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

(my response is from a pvp perspective)

GOOD MESMER

• Have different ways to engage a fight.
• Can run multiple builds, but have one mastered.
• Knows PU isn’t as cheesy as everyone proclaims.
• Can fight other Mesmer confidently.

NOT SO GOOD MESMER

• Will spam their rotation immediately, usually starting with greatsword.
• Cannot land a shatter burst without sword (I’m somewhat guilty of this. xD)
• Random dodges all day. (again, me)
• Has trouble vs other Mesmer.
• Uses greatsword at close range.
• Always engages from stealth.. Literally. Always.
• Does not shatter! (Worse thing to do as a Mesmer on any build!)

---

What say you?

What’s wrong with using GS melee range? GS 2 actually benefits from being in melee range.

GS in general benefits more from being further away for several reasons:

- Since you lack any sort of real defensive skill, you benefit from kiting and remaining at range (which is why the GS trait cripples on each skill).

- All skills are 1200r (giving you an advantage against many other weapons, though moreso in WvW). Autoattack does more damage the further you are.

- You’re right that GS2 is better for closer ranges, but GS2 tends to be used in shatter-combos (such as GS2 + GS3 & F1 in about 1 second), and shatters in general are better the closer you are.

So when you see someone trying to spam greatsword auto right in your face, you know there’s a problem. =P

Dodge is your defense! And no GS 5 isn’t 1200 range. I don’t think a blanket statement like GS in melee is bad is a good idea. Cause there are tons of times where it IS useful. Not to say there also aren’t plenty of times where you want to use it at range.

Dodge is your defense period, no matter what weapon.

And yeah GS 5 isn’t 1200r, true, but it does emphasize the ‘you want to be ranged’ theme of the GS with it’s heavy push. You say “tons of times where it IS useful” in melee, but I honestly can’t think of many outside of a Mindwrack shatter burst where it wouldn’t be wiser to just switch weapons when up close, mind elaborating? There are far more ranged applications IMO.

@Ithilwen When each shatter is hitting for about 1.5-2k, landing even a 1-clone shatter is around 3-4k as long as you’re close enough for iPersona! 0-clone Diversion (daze) shatters are great for interrupts or to save you from attacks like 100blades, heartseeker, ect. And if you’re running a Domination specced build, it’s likely each shatter is stripping boons too.

Try out close-ranged shatters for your particular style. Don’t go out of your way for it, but let the opportunities come.

" I honestly can’t think of many outside of a Mindwrack shatter burst where it wouldn’t be wiser to just switch weapons when up close"

This is half of what mesmers job in a match is. You attack from range, but if that’s all you do you won’t be a effective mesmer. GS burst is way faster than any sword burst. And like for bursting out of stealth when the enemy isn’t expecting it this is the way to go. If your right next to them and in stealth they can’t see the GS 2 blade compared to say sword where they can dodge the 3. If you watch say helseth play you will see him use GS both in melee and range. Yes you will be using range more often than melee but that’s true for mesmer in general. Mesmer melee burst is just as crucial tho and GS does that very effectively.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

(my response is from a pvp perspective)

GOOD MESMER

• Have different ways to engage a fight.
• Can run multiple builds, but have one mastered.
• Knows PU isn’t as cheesy as everyone proclaims.
• Can fight other Mesmer confidently.

NOT SO GOOD MESMER

• Will spam their rotation immediately, usually starting with greatsword.
• Cannot land a shatter burst without sword (I’m somewhat guilty of this. xD)
• Random dodges all day. (again, me)
• Has trouble vs other Mesmer.
• Uses greatsword at close range.
• Always engages from stealth.. Literally. Always.
• Does not shatter! (Worse thing to do as a Mesmer on any build!)

---

What say you?

What’s wrong with using GS melee range? GS 2 actually benefits from being in melee range.

GS in general benefits more from being further away for several reasons:

- Since you lack any sort of real defensive skill, you benefit from kiting and remaining at range (which is why the GS trait cripples on each skill).

- All skills are 1200r (giving you an advantage against many other weapons, though moreso in WvW). Autoattack does more damage the further you are.

- You’re right that GS2 is better for closer ranges, but GS2 tends to be used in shatter-combos (such as GS2 + GS3 & F1 in about 1 second), and shatters in general are better the closer you are.

So when you see someone trying to spam greatsword auto right in your face, you know there’s a problem. =P

Dodge is your defense! And no GS 5 isn’t 1200 range. I don’t think a blanket statement like GS in melee is bad is a good idea. Cause there are tons of times where it IS useful. Not to say there also aren’t plenty of times where you want to use it at range.

DE baseline? When will this suggestion ever stop. It would be a terrible change for pve.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

(my response is from a pvp perspective)

GOOD MESMER

• Have different ways to engage a fight.
• Can run multiple builds, but have one mastered.
• Knows PU isn’t as cheesy as everyone proclaims.
• Can fight other Mesmer confidently.

NOT SO GOOD MESMER

• Will spam their rotation immediately, usually starting with greatsword.
• Cannot land a shatter burst without sword (I’m somewhat guilty of this. xD)
• Random dodges all day. (again, me)
• Has trouble vs other Mesmer.
• Uses greatsword at close range.
• Always engages from stealth.. Literally. Always.
• Does not shatter! (Worse thing to do as a Mesmer on any build!)

---

What say you?

What’s wrong with using GS melee range? GS 2 actually benefits from being in melee range.

Xyonon.3987:

Curunen.8729:

Fight, fight, fight!

:D

Yea it’s again one of those “no-i’m-the-best-mesmer-here” threads :P

I’m not trying to say I’m the best mesmer out there at all. I’v been defeated a lot in dueling arenas, and that’s just dueling arenas yet alone pros. And as for the fighting, it was kinda hard to take the one guy serious when he said: “People are just stuck in some rut of an idea that you must have certain skills on your bar, or you can’t function. They all use the same cookie cut build they got from someone else. I call these skills crutches, band aids that allows you to not become a better version of the player that you currently are.”

Chaos Archangel.5071:

If you wanna frighten me, you’re gonna have to meet me in the arena Smallfry.

Keep in mind that our outgoing boon duration is higher than our incoming (3% for each boon on us, in a boonshare build it averages to 15% boon duration)

Fury it isn’t uncommon to stack 30+ seconds of thanks to the dueling minor trait and bountiful disillusionment. (BD)

Might comes from (BD) and everyone and their momma squirts might all over you anyways.

Retal is a bit trickier, it comes from temporal curtain’s light field and chaos storm (both of which are somewhat unreliable. Retal is the least plentiful boon besides aegis)

Aegis comes up pretty often, surprisingly, but completely uncontrollable. Chaos Storm and Signet of Inspiration combined means aegis every 15s at least.

Perma swiftness, though, is definite. Sigil of Speed grants 20s of swiftness per kill. Combined with chaos storm, chaos armor, and signet of inspiration along with temporal curtain and on average I share 1 minute and 30s of swiftness (not including duration increases). It’s not uncommon for me to give out 2 mins of swiftness on a boonshare.

Perma regen comes from phantasms chaos armor and signet, I never actively attempt to grab this so I can’t explain the mechanics behind it but chaos armor is almost constantly activated on me, so dancing around two of my phantasms tends to be enough.

Edit: And here’s a thread dedicated to the discussion, with builds and all.

Ok, I will reply to this in the other thread. And I’ll take you on anytime in the arena. When is this going down? I’ll make you think twice before you insult the FRIGHTENING french fry!!!

Silverkey.2078:

Well I guess there have been different kind of posts here because there are different possible bunker mesmer:

• the bunker core-mesmer which almost only work properly with mantras because of the way the inspiration tree is designed. Since I play it, I can tell you in does produce boons in huge quantities! The main downside, as was pointed, is the mantra recharge.
• the chronobunker which uses wells for a lot of chaos armor uptime (with both staff and sword leaps on the wells) + very strong and unique support (high quickness uptime, high alacrity uptime, now AOE blur etc…). For this one, I actually personally abandoned boonshare because the signet just didn’t fit in my utility bar (null field + 2 wells). However, alacrity is really strong: don’t forget, it reduces the cooldown of both the offensive burst skills AND the defensive ones (healing in particular). So by speccing into alacrity and wells, you are helping your team immensely. Also, most wells require your team to stand in them only for the last pulse (except precognition but in this case this is not a risk :p ) so it is easier to pull in an organized team without exposing it to too much risk.

Since this discussion went beyond the scope of the thread, I suggest to start a bunker thread. Actually I will do it right now.

Ty, will be responding to that sometime. I just hate it when you have people talking about tons of boons and alacrity and all this other stuff and I’m like, uh, sorry to inform you but, you can’t take all that stuff.

@chaos

Its the FRIGHTENING french fry dangit! Not some casual french fry about to be eaten! Moving onto more serious subjects.

Mind posting the no chrono build you talk about with the specific traits? Also you mention all these boons and yet I don’t see how you can get half of them. Perma regen? Perma swiftness? You won’t be able to get perma fury AoE also because of the signet recharge tho you can get perma self fury. How are you getting perma might? Also how you getting so much aegis and retal? The vigor comes in 5 seconds every 10 seconds. While you may have decent uptime on vigor your teammates aren’t. I think that’s all simple. Chrono isn’t so much since we have yet to use it extensively. I’ll leave my response to the chrono build in the new thread sometime ( I’v had enough typing for now lol ).

Absconditus.6804:

Silver wrote near-perma Protection in the first bullet point above the sentence stating perma Regen + Protection + high Might, as in.. perma Regen, and (near-perma) Protection, and high stacks of Might. I don’t see “PERMA protection” in there. The sentence doesn’t necessarily even say permanent Might for that matter.

As for how to gain rather consistent Protection? There’s this trait you see, that gives us Protection whenever we gain Chaos Armor, and we have a few fields that we can leap on to gain that, as well as a few options for leaping. I believe we additionally have this skill on our Staff that allows us to apply Chaos Armor. As for that trait, I believe it is called Chaotic Dampening. If not, it should totally be called that.

And if you didn’t get that I were advocating lockdown Mesmer being underrepresented (and why), and how they can re-channel their Mantra(s) rather easily, that it’s rather ridiculous to insist on staying on-point if it gets you killed.. and well, nowhere mentioning bunkering, then yeah… Forum Diversion? Irregardless, if someone are dutying bunkering with their Mesmer, and enjoy it, all the more power to them. They know if it works for them or not, and they may play it in a way that’s not conventional.

Ok, so this is at everyone cause I just can’t stand this we can take 100000 utilitys thing. PLZ POST THE BUILD YOU ARE DISCUSSING. Now I know silverkey did post one, but that’s not chronomancer build and there have been several posts talking about other utilitys. So far people have mentioned 6 utilitys. The thread can’t go much farther if this continues. I’m starting to think I’m getting swarmed by trolls for the lols ( not you silverkey, you so far seam reasonable ). If you expect me to take you seriously then you must do this.

Ok so near perma protection not perma protection. And when your talking about a bunker mesmer you can’t just switch to talking about a interrupt mesmer without showing your talking about interrupt mesmer not bunker. If we were all to do that communication would go down the poop shoot.

@alpha

I’m confused. I can definitely see perma protection IF you run wells and signet of inspiration. But then go the mantras people are talking about. I just need to know what build people are arguing for instead of a 6 utility build.

As for the quickness “bullkitten”, your presuming that it would be more efficient to take timewarp over moa. As seen so far this is NOT the case. But that does remind me mesmer does have moa which can be good. As for well of action, you need to all stand in the small well when it ends. This is just screaming AoE MY TEAM DOWN PLZ. Also now people are talking about shield instead of pistol? This is the type of stuff I’m talking about. You can’t take 6 utilitys 2 offhands sword ( to have the multiple leap finishers abs was talking about ) and scepter and staff. Of course a type of build like that might be able to beat a guardian at bunkering. Also you have to have all allies standing infront of the wall it shoots out. I think its safe to say this will NOT be the case. Hopefully that showed why I imagined guardian had better quickness.

You talk about mesmers are known for a lot of boons, and yet all I have here is the potential for perma protection if you choose to take that over some other stuff. As for what boons, you can check the list I posted in my link. And actually there is a higher chance of some conditions getting converted. The last condition applied is the one that gets removed or converted. So the question is what are the most likely conditions that are going to be applied last. Or you could think about what boons aren’t too useful at all to give and see the likelihood of you getting that and it being the last condition applied. Blind, confusion, cripple, immobilize, and poison are the only ones that don’t give overly good benefits. Those are hardly as normal as say bleeding, vulnerability and burning ( except for poison ). Also you mention BD. how can you keep up 10 stacks of might with just BD? I would need to see it to believe it haha.

As for this portal thing all I trying to say was that it probably wouldn’t be worth it to replace it with a well if you were a roamer. Which is where this whole bunker mesmer talk started. And you mention me underestimating alacrity. You again have to group up to get the benefit from it. Which is such a high cost that it does more harm than good. I’m saying bunker mesmer doesn’t stand a chance because its weak in the support role. But yes, if you took the signet you could spread the stability. But then what about this alacrity and well of action and well of precognition and mantras people are talking about? You can’t take 6 utility slots.

Silverkey.2078:

We give a mass of boons with mesmers. Without boonshare you only give:

• regen as long as you have a phantasm around
• chaos storm gives a few boons including aegis fairly easily
• bountiful disillusionment gives its boons AOE by default
• random staff boons

With boonshare, this just becomes insane

• You can do an easy rotation to give near-perma protection
• you have random boons from many sources
• might quite easily if you use chaotic interruption
• duplicate any boon given to you

the main problem is the random component, you cannot exactly give aegis when you want. But perma regen + protection + high might is nothing to sneeze at.

And the healing is fairly strong with mantras, condition cleanse too.

And no quickness on 24s CD, but guardians keep it for reviving, we use the rune for that.

May i ask you how you are getting this PERMA protection? And yeah, you have RANDOM boons from places. Yay swiftness I always wanted you! Like staff 1 clones which will die in under a second if your on point ( which is what a bunker does ). Or your signet which is only on you presuming your not using it. I also thought we agreed back a little bit in the thread that you needed bountiful disillusionment for mesmer to even stand a chance. And its not like your going to get tons and tons of boons from your allies at all. And yeah you can’t get the aegis when you want. Granted mesmer does have more mobility than bunker guard, but its team support is nonexistent. Not to mention ele has both mobility, group heals, and good bunker potential ( along with burning and LW…. ). I don’t see how you think your going to come close to guard heal with mantra heal. It just doesn’t compare. That being said you do have nice condi removal. And the revive allies 20% faster rune doesn’t even come close to 50% AoE faster. With chronomancer however you would be really useful in the rez category. With well of precognition and well of action you would have really good rez ability. I think meta battle ( probaly the ONLY time ill be quoting them lol ) nails it in there guardian bunker guide: Keep in mind that your role as a bunker isn’t just to keep yourself alive – in fact you should keep most of your supportive skills for your allies in case they need to be healed, cleansed of conditions or protected by boons. You should be the first in line to res them as well.

To sum it up these are the strengths and weaknesses with guard and mesmer:

Guardian:

1. Good AoE healing ( beats the mesmer healing )
12. Condition removal ( equal )
2. Protection ( better than mesmer unless I’m missing something )
3. Aegis ( better than mesmer )
4. Stability ( equal or potentially guardian, guardian has longer lasting stability with more stacks, but one of them has a fairly long cd )
5. Quickness ( guardian )
6. Additional boons ( guardian way better, shouts convert 1 condition into a boon in addition to soldier runes, you can check the conversions at the bottom of my post, simply said tho, they are good conversions )
7. Mobility ( mesmer by far )
8. Rez potential ( mesmer with chronomancer )

@nearlight

Did Mime replace it with decoy? Or portal? I’m saying portal is so valuable it would be hard to compete with on a roamer mesmer ( which I do believe will still be the meta if you look above ).

@mister abs again

You won’t be taking CI in a bunker build as I showed above. You aren’t going to leave the point open for 5 seconds. Sure the chaos storm will give a few conditions but half of them don’t affect you much because the mesmer is bunker. Sure he will get dazed, but much better one person gets dazed than the point be left open for FIVE WHOLE SECONDS. Also what pro plays are you talking about? The CCing in the 0.75 seconds up or maybe the interrupting the banner rez? If you mean the CCing in 0.75 seconds well then you must be watching some random team in a tournament isn’t even in the finals. Same goes for banner CCing. Actually, now that I think about it, haven’t paid too much attention to warrior meta fora little. Last I know it was shoutbow with no stability, but that may have changed. If so, then yeah I can see it not being CCd. But you have to remember that it has a whopping 3 minute cd. As for the whole CCing thing, you still didn’t say anything about aegis. At all. Or stability. Or instant cast cc’s. or cc’s that are so fast that you don’t have time to select the right target and cc it. As for standing off the point, you want to keep the point. That is CRUCIAL. Same thing goes for making sure they don’t cap the point. one of the basic pvp things to know is: always always always try and make sure they don’t get a decap/cap on the teamfight. If you need evidence go check out some finals of some tournaments with decent teams. That’s half the job of a bunker. This is why you would need bountiful disillusionment. Without it mesmer can barely support the team AND also can barely bunker a point.

“E.g., you may have lost the point for 6 points ticked over to the enemy team, then you ended up killing whatever opposition that was there and take it back for the duration of, let’s just say 20 points, to your team. Who benefit in that situation? The opposing team that managed to decap and tick 6 points? Or you who’s controlling the point currently while the opposition was sent back to their spawn, giving your team 5 points (or more, if there were additional stomps performed) in addition to the points ticking in while you’re in control. Hopefully, if applicable to the match and situation, you were clever enough to send them off just after a 15 second window (:01, :16,1, :46), to capitalize on the time they are kept out of the match.”

Or you could, you know, take a guardian, not have to worry about losing the point at all and still win the fight there? Instead of taking a mesmer where you give up the point and win the fight. Option C wins.

You can’t take chaos, dom, inspiration and chronomancer. People keep talking about chrono wells and inspiration is a must just like chaos. You can’t have 4 traitlines. As for your illusions stripping the aegis, YOUR NOT GOING TO HAVE ILLUSIONS UP IF YOUR BUNKERING. I think I’ve already said that before. If onpoint is taking so little damage that you can just keep up illusions ( that happen to remove the aegis just when you want, cause illusions attack 50 times per second ) then you can have your thief bunkering the point. And you don’t need too many aegis to screw up a mesmer with mantras. 2 interrupts in a row to his heal skill is enough easily to take him down. Guard can easily provide that. Which is why you take bountiful disillusionment.

“And if there’s multiple people there, and you are alone, you are in trouble regardless. Most professions are, even the almighty cEle is going to face some trouble when they get outnumbered. Actually even more so when there’s a +1 in a lockdown Mesmer to harass them. You can perhaps survive long enough for your team to assist you, but if they delay on that, you are faced with the choice of either eating dirt, or trying to tail it out of there because it’s futile, and you’d rather they didn’t get the +5 and benefit of you being taken out of the fight for x amount of time.”

This is true for both mesmer and guardian. If left to a 2v1 against glassy builds no guardian or mesmer bunker will be able to hold off forever.

Hopefully this explained to everyone why mesmer bunker is a bad idea cause this was a lot of righting for me ( the reason I didn’t reply yesterday, I had already had enough of typing paragraph after paragraph, ug, is what I get for trying to go into as much detail as possible ).

EDIT: here is the wiki post for the conversions of condi to boons with pure of voice https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pure_of_Voice

Absconditus.6804:

Multiple mantras might seem like a bit of a hassle to maintain, but one, even two are not that hard to channel up safely (it’s just annoying when you got multiple, in my opinion. Those not phased by it, all the more power to you, I salute you for your perseverance). You can easily cover one (if you feel it’s worth it/not a waste at the time—assess the situation) with a Distortion. Or through LoS, ally body blocking/guarding, distance created from kiting, CC through lockdown, waiting until you know there’s no interrupts coming your way (reading your opponent and thus recognizing when they are out of options to interrupt you—you know, what most decent interrupt-oriented Mesmers have conditioned themselves to do), etc.—There’s a few options to be had.

Yeah, you can use distortion, just remember your no longer tanking the point then. Idk what you think someone standing infront of you does. Cause it does nothing at all. As for distance, that also means your not doing your job and holding the point. CC is a option for cc’s that have a cast time. But not all ccs have a cast time. And a block from a enemy guardian to stop that totally screws you over. Or multiple ccs from different people. And as for waiting for when there is no ccs up, GL, cause you will be waiting for like, the entire fight lol.

@silverkey

Good people will take advantage of that 0.75 downtime of stability, trust me. Like i said f4 means your not longer holding the point. You would need two illusions to cover the full channel, meaning a totally of 3 seconds where you didn’t hold the point. You can have another bunker/tankier person to hold the point for those 3 seconds, but you also have to have 2 illusions up. If your bunkering a point your illusions won’t stay alive that long at all. Would be hard to finda time where you had 2 illusions up and a team member ready to hold the point while you cast your healing mantra. And like I mentioned above you can’t rely on interrupts to be able to cast things. That being said bountiful disillusionment would solve this problem. But I think the main problem with bunker mesmer is the fact that it contributes barely anything to team support. Sure you can bunker a point maybe, but what about healing for your teamates like guard does? Or blocks for your teamates like guard does. Or protection for your teamates? Or 5 seconds of quickness every 30 seconds? Mesmer is a selfish bunker while guard can bunker just fine now AND provide some really nice group support.

tobascodagama.2961:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

What mesmers in tournaments are running mantra of distraction? And if there are mesmers that do that, what skill do they replace?

Solo Queue Mesmers are usually better off running MoD than Portal, since Portal requires team coordination to use most effectively.

This I can see. Portal does require coordination. But I think the same is true for wells.

@ silverkey

Seams like there is one big flaw in your build. you will get interrupted like crazy when channeling your mantras. The thing is, every time you charge a mantra you have to blow TWO charges from mantra of concentration because the stability lasts 2 seconds while the mantra cast time is longer than that. And the mantra has a 25 second cd.

MailMail.6534:

Silver responded well enough for me in terms of “what is currently meta” debate in terms of Portal/Blink/Decoy. I’ll reiterate, that is not the most consistent trio being used by all mesmers in the current meta right now. A lot of them are taking MoD. Some of them are going with Mantras even after the nerf. I will respond to some of these points though.

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

That leaves you with 1 stunbreak which you want to save for your allies unless in dire need. And if your using well of precognition as a stunbreak all the time ( which you no doubt will if that’s your only stunbreak ) then it would probably be better to take blink or decoy because your not getting the revival potential from well of precognition.

I know reviving is what we have been discussing a lot here, but let’s not forget that this aoe blur can be used for other things a well… coordinating long burst rotations (continuum shift comes to mind) without being interrupted, comboing with other wells to guarantee safely sitting in them for positive effects and also just mitigating huge incoming burst rotations from the enemy team. This skill is more than a rally-utility. That’s what IoL is for.

Again, let me emphasize: the typical Mesmer is slotted into a roaming role. That of the chronomancer does not have to fit that role as well. On the contrary, it can do well as a support build that generally stays mid to help support your team in the big fights. I’m not going to downplay portal’s effectiveness, because there’s nothing bad you can really say about it other than that you need concise coordination. But I do honestly think with this latest update that you will be seeing a lot more Wells from Mesmers and for good reason.

I still think without a doubt that Blink is our best stun breaker and nearly necessary in all builds, but I’m not opposed to the possibility that we could see our utilities mixed up a bit with how good Wells [and Alacrity] is for team support.

What mesmers in tournaments are running mantra of distraction? And if there are mesmers that do that, what skill do they replace? And of course chronomancer doesn’t have to fit the roaming role. But if it doesn’t it has to have a equally useful role. I highly HIGHLY doubt were going to see chrono bunkers in tournaments. Guardian bunkers 10x better. What do you see in chronomancer that all of a sudden changes the role? There isn’t anything. As for portal needing coordination, the same can be said for wells. This is presuming you have a team that can coordinate. I also think you value alacrity too highly. As for well of precognition being used to coordinate long burst rotations, your basically screaming I’M GONNA BURST YOU if you lay down the well to do a burst rotation. Not to mention, almost all the mesmers burst IS IN MELEE. Its not like you can just pop the well and nuke them while standing in it all the time. And all your doing is making it so that you don’t die/don’t get cc’d during your burst. Really REALLY don’t think it will be used in this way. And I think I’v already shown that no more than 1 well is going to be used in a chronomancer build so combining it with other wells doesn’t work. And yes i can see it being used to save alive allies just as much as downed ones. But only when he doesn’t have anything else up to save him ( such as dodges, blinks, blinds, invulns, blocks, LoS cc, cc from the team etc ).

@Abs(conditus)

Plz reread my post. Most of the skills there have a long cast time. If you watch any of the tournaments with decent teams you will see rez banner getting interrupted again and again and again. Ranger isn’t taken in tournaments for a good reason. And engi NEEDS a stunbreak. The skill isn’t even a instant revive, it just pulses so it can be outdamaged. So what you going to replace? Grenades are a must. And so is toolkit. Something as small as a pulsing rez doesn’t come close to what grenades or toolkit do. And I can agree, decoy CAN be replaced if something is good enough and still live. But that leaves ONE slot open for ONE well. I ain’t arguing well of precognition can be taken.

“People are just stuck in some rut of an idea that you must have certain skills on your bar, or you can’t function. They all use the same cookie cut build they got from someone else. I call these skills crutches, band aids that allows you to not become a better version of the player that you currently are.”

????????????????????????????????????????????

Skill crutches?!?!? All the pros be using skill crutches. And they got better at the game using skill crutches that prevent someone from getting better. Yep. OK. Seams to make total sence. We are talking here about changes to the current meta build that might be the new meta. Not changing some whack a doodle build that isn’t run in tournaments ( for a good reason ). As for some people thinking well of precognition being broken, , I don’t think its broken at all. Especially cause blur doesn’t effect the downed person at all. I think it’s something that MIGHT have a chance of replacing decoy.

Absconditus.6804:

Silverkey.2078:

why does “45” “s” get kittenized?

I think it is because it reads it as “a buttocks” in 1337 speak.. or something. The filter is overly sensitive. I can’t imagine what else it would triggers on it for, and regardless, for it to trigger on that word is just ridiculous at any rate. Oh no, someone wrote a slightly cruder word for buttocks on the internet, or a wild donkey, call the censorship police! Like i said before, I bet by next year, all we can read on the official forums are paragraphs of kitten. “Kitten kitten kitten, kitten.. kitten kitten kitten kitten. Kitten! Kitten kitten.”

Back to the well, why use the well for a resurrect, when you could much quicker push out a banner, or Signet of Mercy, Glyph of Renewal, Signet of Undeath, Toss Elixir R (from slotting Elixir R), Nature’s Renewal (from sacrificing a Spirit of Nature) for that matter. We are the only ones with a semi-terrible revival skill (out of the professions that has one, out of which only Thief does not), which places them back into downed state if there’s no opponents finished off during the window. Yes, these revival skills has a much longer recharge, but fourty-five seconds is still a rather lengthy recharge nonetheless (and I guess in that sense it’s not totally unbalanced if it truly is 3s of basically evading anything thrown your way as a team standing on it).

Just relised you either edited your post or I didn’t see there was more to it. In a pug pvp match those are certainly viable options IF you play those classes. but in pug servers your teammates aren’t gonna do a quick rez. This idea is strictly for more organized groups that work together and are on TS. Most of the resurrects you listed have a long cast time and thus can be interrupted. In tournaments most of those will just get interrupted again and again. As for toss elixir B, engi needs kits to be effective and thus grenade kit and tool kit are taken. For your third slot you need a stunbreak or you will be targeted again and again in a team fight and get massacred. Thus, slick shows is taken. I would say it actually probably does a better job of securing stomps and rezes. And ranger normerly isn’t taken, not to mention the spirit has like 0 health.

Not only that but you would need 2 illusions + f4 off cd to match it. What happens if your teammate gets downed and you have 0 illusions up? By the time you can get 2 up its probably too late. As for being the end of PU, I think chrono could be better, but we will have to wait and see. And no doubt you could still run PU either way, tho you might not be as efficient as a chrono person ( we will have to wait to see ). And what is this chrono bunker you are talking about that is"close" to guardian efficiency? I would have to see it to believe it.

Xyonon.3987:

Neither blur, nor invulnerability does affect people in downed state.

I like to have different skills in my bar in pvp than blink, decoy and portal for once and this skill might have a chance! The end of PU maybe? Or maybe gasp BUILD DIVERSITY!!! :O

Hehe, yea, I think it will be worth using like this in pvp

Ok, that’s good to know. And yeah I could easily see chrono making an end to PU. But that remains to be seen.

Well of action is good. But if your already taking well of precognition what are you going to swap it out for? Blink? That leaves you with 1 stunbreak which you want to save for your allies unless in dire need. And if your using well of precognition as a stunbreak all the time ( which you no doubt will if that’s your only stunbreak ) then it would probably be better to take blink or decoy because your not getting the revival potential from well of precognition. Which would leave you only with portal, blink, and well of action. Still only 1 well. And portal can do so much great stuff that I really don’t think it would be worth taking well of action over it. I mean portal in itself can save allies ( granted on a longer cd ), not to mention decap points, lord rush, regroup/pullout of a fight. And there isn’t really a reason to take both of them. They both do the same thing basically, and with the cds + alacrity you would probably have them up in time for the next time someone goes down. As for the alacrity well, you all would have to be in the small radius at just the time it ends. The cleave they can do to you then makes the well do more harm than good.

MailMail.6534:

I haven’t used Decoy in the last year…. Blink has always been my only stun breaker for quite some time. lol I usually value condition clear over Decoy and portal is usually on my bar as well.

Keep things in context though. Chronomancers aren’t regulated to just Blink/Decoy/Portal and based on twitch streams and videos, that’s been proven to be true thus far in these betas. On the contrary, if the chronomancer is providing a different role than classic Mesmer, then indeed defense might just be more valuable than blink. Though it’s hard to imagine not being able to blink on top of kitten tower. >_<

Now for a “classic” meta build, that’s a different story.

Just because some people who play the betas use other stuff than blink/portal doesn’t mean its a good/effective thing to do. I think its safe to assume the meta ( blink, decoy, and portal ) will stay the same unless the wells are useful. I think well of precognition will take decoys place. What do you see in the other 3 wells? If you take neither blink nor decoy your gonna be left with well of precognition as your only stunbreak. And I think the idea was to use it to save your allies not to use it as a stunbreak.

@Zenith

I don’t think anyone is arguing that well of precognition>shadow refuge or vice versa. That’s a totally different discussion which has nothing to do with this thread. All we were saying is that it’s better at rezzing downed allies. As for not all classes being able to cleave, most classes can. Warrior has Lb and axe and sword and hammer ( whichever ones you like lol ) which all cleave. Guardian has GS and scepter if you play DPS guard. If you play tank guard its not like your really going to be doing much damage but you still have mace and staff which cleave. Ranger has LB 5 and GS/sword if you play DPS ranger. If you play condi ranger you have torch 5 and entangle ( if you aren’t spirit ranger, but then again, ranger isn’t that good in pvp anyhow lol ). Thief has dagger 1 and SB 2 n 4. Engi has rifle 3 n 5. Grenades. Bombs. If you play condi you got pistol 4. Meser has sword 1 n 2 and GS 5 n 3. Ele has LW and fire 234 and earth 4. Necro is useless just like ranger but has wells, staff 2345 and dagger ( depenging on what you play ). This is just listing some of the stuff, not even mentioning the fact you can still hit with projectiles if you aim your camera and move a little. As for ruing the skill for pve, I hope this doesn’t happen either, but you would only really take it if A: you had to really carry your group or B: in challenging group content.

MailMail.6534:

This should definitely replace Blink as the mandatory stun beaker for Chronomancers. Echoing Silverkey, this will surely define the Chronomancers role as significantly different from Mesmer. This is a good thing.

The utility is strong. Hopefully it doesn’t prevent stomps or else it would be a little bit on the powerful side. Did they lower the CD? 45 is befitting for this one.

Edit:
How I remember the mechanic of our wells- “1 tick 2 tick 3 tick BOOM!” So in total you have 3x of one effect and 1x of another.

Interesting, you would take it over blink instead of decoy? On a lot of maps there tons of places where only a thief/ele could follow you ( sry necro you don’t ever get taken your excluded lol ). That is presuming they know where you blinked to ( kylo middle point ). And blink can be used to set up bursts just like decoy can. In addition blink has a shorter cd. Why would you take it over blink instead of decoy? Am I just missing something stupidly obvious?

NeroBoron.7285:

I think it will be nice for group support and will be picked by because you can use it in many situations not only in PvP, also for wvw and pve
Stunbreak, damage negation, rezzing, regrouping, stomping.
A free rez not all just like with shadow refuge. I don’t expect that the blur is applied to the downed person. Else a stomp could be evadable by this?! :O assuming that is not applied to the downed person you can still damage the downed person apply poison and so on. Also the stomper could be quicker than you rezzing. But yes it makes it safer for your group to res.
We gonna see in the next beta weekend.

I expect a little increase of the cooldown like up to 50~60sec afterwards :S

I think the blur does get applied to the downed person but he can still get stomped ( is this right silverkey? ). Even if the downed person is totally unaffected by blur, you can still probably get the rez off ( unless its like a thief with poison with all enemies ready to cleave or something ). If the blur does work as I think with a downed person then I could easily see a 90 second cooldown if not more.

Curunen.8729:

I thought it was only 2 × 1 second Blur ticks, and the third tick simply gives the 35 endurance?

Maybe I’m interpreting it wrong, but to me it seems the Blur was moved and split over the first two ticks.

Well of Precognition: Updated functionality. Now gives blur for 1 second per pulse during its active portion instead of on end. When it ends, allies within the well regain 35 endurance.

This is how it works: Once you lay down the well you immediately get blur. The well pulses 2 times after that ( for a total of 3 seconds of blur ). On the third second after laying down the well you get the endurence. Hope that explains it.

EDIT: dangit Silverkey beat me too it as I got myself confused for a few minutes lol

Silverkey.2078:

Fay.2357:

Tbh I think it’s way strong. I think it would be balanced if it didn’t apply the blur to a downed body, that way they could still poison/cleave to try and prevent the res. This way it’s literally a free res every time you use it.

I’m also curious as to whether blur stops a stomp from landing, same with distortion (distortion sharing). This came up a while ago, but I don’t think it was ever tested.

I was the one asking about the distortion sharing on downed people. The answer seemed to be negative, and while I can’t say for sure, this is my impression on the battlefield.
I would not be surprised if the same thing happened for this blur.

Even if this was the case, you can get a rez off way before they can stomp the downed guy. The only problem is that while rezzing you can easily get cleaved down by the enemy team. But this is where well of precognition comes into play.

“Shadow refuge still allows you to cleave the refuge area. Stealth-rez is hard to counter only if the elementalist uses its downed skill 2 while the thief stealths him/her.

Blur has less counter."

^^this. You can still be cleaved down while in stealth. Not to mention well of precognition has a shorter cd.

Absconditus.6804:

I’m not convinced the duration has not been tampered with when each pulse is supposed to give 1s of Blur. It seems a bit rash to give each pulse on a 3s well, immunity to anything but such things as, e.g., Retaliation and/or Shocking Aura. Even if it’s on a Fourty-Five Seconds (45s is kitten.. ok then.. WHAT?!) CD. We’re talking about 5 targets having the benefit, not just one Mesmer. If it isn’t adjusted accordingly, then it’s downright overpowered and most likely considered mandatory for clashes on points, never mind for resurrecting. 3 seconds of straight up immunity is huge when you can cover so many people at once.

They would have mentioned if they did do something like change the duration of the well. Also condi damage does still hit while you have blur on. As for using it to clash on points instead of resurrecting, I highly doubt that would happen. Like you said yourself, the wells aren’t huge. And the ability to rez someone is big. Think about, until the guy comes off respawn and actually gets to where he needs to be, your team is outnumbered. If both teams are even, that’s 30+ seconds where the enemy just dominates.

Silverkey.2078:

Chaos Archangel.5071:

With it being a stunbreak, it’s very interesting.

3 seconds of blur for your entire team is very nice especially for guaranteed stomps and safe rezzes. Its hard to say, because right now all the wells are awesome at this point, and each one could find a place in any build.

I think this is the key point in here. All wells now start to be worth of a spot in the utility bar. And that is the way all skills should be. In any case, it will be difficult because we have only 3 utility spots. Action + Precognition are great tools. But so is Blink, portal etc…. So taking wells will be at the cost of some mobility. And that is great because it now defines 2 different roles for the mesmer:

• the roamer, as is “meta” for mesmer, with great mobility and great single target burst, currently with stealth
• the team-fighter/point defender: less mobile but a great addition to any team fights. Using wells, maybe glamours (time warp/null field), maybe boonshare etc…

I don’t get what everyone is seeing in all the other wells. Am I just missing something obvious? What roles do you see the other wells performing that would be better than portal,blink, and decoy/well of precognition.

Absconditus.6804:

Ok, let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. Yes it’s 3 seconds, out of 9 in total. 1 second every 3 seconds. Even if your team is decent, if the other team is decent, well, the other team can work around that with, e.g., just one Mantra of Distraction placed right as the Blur goes away. You have a generous 2 second window to deal with the evades.

Also, a lot of resurrects would mean that you have a lot of team members downed in the same location. The well isn’t that large, haha, you sort of make it sound as if it’s gigantic. And, if your team suffers from downed players on a regular basis when clashing, it is having problems. But sure, the well seems interesting enough, but as Chaos says as well, there’s a whole lot of other interesting wells to select from as well.

Well, well, well, seems we get to write well a whole lot with our new wells.

here is how it works: the well pulses once every second. For the first 2 seconds it pulses blur. So there isn’t a 2 second gap at all. And I’m talking about only using this to save one person not multiple ( if you have multiple people down this probs won’t save you ). And like I said above there is no gap so they can’t stun/daze you between pulses. As for having downs a lot, people do go down ( even in world tournaments ). Now we can all guess how many downs per match have to happen for it be worthwhile to take the well, but that’s sorta what the thread is about. Is it worthwhile or not? I for one think it is worthwhile but we won’t really know until we have more time with chrono. And as for there being other worthwhile wells to choose from, the only other one I can think of that might come close is well of action. But I still think well of precognition is better ( by a decent amount ).

Absconditus.6804:

Well, since I am not shackled by Decoy, as I haven’t touched the skill for the better part of a year, if not a bit longer now, I can give up Decoy, sure. I don’t run stealth, and can contest far better thanks to it. It also helps with my interrupts, since I can get the pressure I want directed on me, and my illusions are allowed to live that much longer, doing what they do before I shatter them. But this is besides the point, on topic;

How this would be a free resurrect(?) I don’t see. “Blur”, nor Endurance equals a resurrect, so.. what do you mean? That you might not be interrupted for 1- out of every 3 seconds, when trying to resurrect a team member that went into Downed State? I do think the well seems mildly enticing, sure, but as for which skill I’d replace, I don’t know. Maybe Blink, I don’t really need it when having Phase Retreat as an alternative. I know I won’t replace Mantra of Distraction, I love my interrupts way too much, but I guess I might swap away Null Field, it’s the skill I tend to replace the most as-is, depending on what I want (e.g., if I want to put Portal into my setup).

If your team is decent 3 seconds where your evading is amazing. I think you could get a lot of rezes off that you wouldn’t be able to without the well.

@chaos

The only other well that I think might come close is well of action for the same basic reason: helping with rezzing and stopping the enemy from rezzing. But I think well of precognition does the rezzing better while well of action does the preventing the enemy from rezzing better. Ultimately I think well of precognition is better but I’ll have to wait and see. I can’t see a reason to take the other two wells at all in pvp.

Well of Precognition: Updated functionality. Now gives blur for 1 second per pulse during its active portion instead of on end. When it ends, allies within the well regain 35 endurance.

Is this a free rez every 45 seconds ( or less with alacrity : D )? And if so do you see it as being a must on your skill bar in pvp? And what would you give up? Decoy? Discuss!

Me: So it isn’t that big of a deal at all it ( quote )
Him:make a mountain out of an ant hill just because they’ll have to do Mossman on a group with most classes. ( quote )

Anyone see anything wrong here? : P

“I just find it petty that people whine about Anet not fixing bug/taking advantage of AI deficiencies yet when they do make a change they complain it’s not to what THEY wanted personally fixed.”

So you think it’s petty to think some bugs would be better off getting fixed and some are ok now?

“because part of the damage with this neglect is that people get used to their crutches and take it as tacit approval by devs that what they do is intended”

Who here said anything about the wolves leashing being intended?

“Which led us to the whole Lupicus projectile hitting melee humping his legs fiasco as people built up over the years the expectation that they should not have to deal with it.”

While it can be fun because of the greater difficulty, some classes ( looks at you necro ) take years ( or more ) to solo him on. I mean condi range solo? ewwwwww

I’m still waiting for my answer from my previous post haha.

bladex.9502:

Wish triple was still here so I could explore it more :/
A lot of the stuff is closed off by really high gates that cant be goated over, unlike the gates in the normal TA path

Last time I was there I was able to still actually get to the places so there should be a way ( don’t remember where been a long time ).

EDIT: Just checked it out and you can just get on the branches above the bee place and drop down ( if I’m understanding you correctly ). If your NA and still need help you can just send a whisper if you see me on.

Zenith.7301:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Zenith.7301:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Zenith.7301:

Underwater safespotting and this are not mutually exclusive fixes. Both should be done.

Why? It juts makes you certain classes that have a lot of AoE potential to solo him now. That’s the only thing that changes with this change. Why is that good?

You shouldn’t be soloing group content to begin with. It’s a fun challenge and all, but it’s testament to how inferior the PvE in this game is when you don’t require a coordinated group doing multiple tasks to defeat “top end content”.

And so by fixing this bug it somehow changes that? The change did nothing but make you get a class that has a lot of AoE potential. Nothing else. That’s it. So my question is, why is that A GOOD change? Why should they make it so that only people with a lot of AoE can solo it when dungeons already have tons and tons of bugs?

For there to be a change there has to be a reason as to why change is needed.

Better question yet, why is it so important for you to solo it to begin with?

Better question: why do you want only certain classes to be able to solo it enough that you think a change was worth the effort?

And honestly yeah I hope the raid isn’t soloable. That would just be a slap in the face if it was that easy. And quite honestly I normerly don’t even do dungeons anymore yet alone it’s been months since the time I got mossman to 1%. And I could just take a condi engi or something and probably do it ( tho I wouldn’t have enough AR for 48 yet alone 50 ). So it isn’t that big of a deal at all it just there isn’t a reason for the change ( at all ).

Zenith.7301:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Zenith.7301:

Underwater safespotting and this are not mutually exclusive fixes. Both should be done.

Why? It juts makes you certain classes that have a lot of AoE potential to solo him now. That’s the only thing that changes with this change. Why is that good?

You shouldn’t be soloing group content to begin with. It’s a fun challenge and all, but it’s testament to how inferior the PvE in this game is when you don’t require a coordinated group doing multiple tasks to defeat “top end content”.

And so by fixing this bug it somehow changes that? The change did nothing but make you get a class that has a lot of AoE potential. Nothing else. That’s it. So my question is, why is that A GOOD change? Why should they make it so that only people with a lot of AoE can solo it when dungeons already have tons and tons of bugs?

For there to be a change there has to be a reason as to why change is needed.

Zenith.7301:

Underwater safespotting and this are not mutually exclusive fixes. Both should be done.

Why? It juts makes you certain classes that have a lot of AoE potential to solo him now. That’s the only thing that changes with this change. Why is that good?

Card.9704:

I spent ~2hrs getting him to 70% ish on my altruistic paladin before my hands cramped up. I made almost 5g in mats and stuff though… they need to nerf wolf drop rates huehueheuheuheuhahaha

You make it seam like you need your hands for the altruistic paladin solo. : P

Yeah why this over the water safespotting? Seams stupid ( then again I shouldn’t be surprised lol ). Guess I gotta find a new class to solo him on, dang 1% left and I could have already had him.

Treyu.9714:

AlphatheWhite.9351:

Treyu.9714:

I found some differences between the video build and the linked one. The runes used in armor. The video uses Rune of the ranged (precision + ferocity) and the link uses rune of the scholar (power + ferocity). Which one should i get? I guess one gives you more direct damage and the other one is dependant on critics, but i am not sure

Scholar. If the person in the video used Ranger, it’s likely because they mistakenly(?) thought illusions counted for the companion bonus. It could be a very good set if they did.
A similar alternative would be Eagle, but in practice Scholar still out-performs in any content where you can keep decent uptime on 90%+ health (easy in speedruns, but for anything else you’ll have to decide for yourself).
The truth is that in any build with decent precision/ferocity, power adds more oomph point for point than either of the other two. This is why Berserker adds more dps than Assassins, even below max crit.

Another possibility to consider would be Pack, which doubles as a superior power/precision set with a nice +swiftness bonus. The 10% damage on scholar is superior, but Pack has its place when you’re trying to boost your crit chance without paying too much in power.

tl;dr: Scholar is the #1 dps rune. Other runes have situational value depending on what your needs are.

Thanks for the info. I already have full berserker set (power/ferocity/precision) but I saw that this build uses Assasin set, which must be crafted… Not sure if getting a new full Assasin set will give me a significant benefit compared to my full Berserker set, considering the time and money required to get it now that I have my full exotic already…. what is your opinion?

There’s only a small difference between assassins and beserkers. You probably wouldn’t notice the difference.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Regardless of whether linecasting was used or not, is there really any rational argument to be had that Ice Bow 4 shouldn’t be nerfed? It clearly deals way too much damage to bosses with large hitboxes, even if you don’t take the further step of glitching out the casting area.

Yeah, I think it should be like ranger 5 on LB

TheRandomGuy.7246:

Shiki.7148:

And finally at the guy that said Brazil wasn’t linecasting: Yes, for all intents and purposes he was. Because lupi stood against a wall and setting the AE marker half on a wall naturally causes all hits to only apply on the part that is on the ground. Line casting is simply doing that anytime, anywhere by casting the spell directly after dodging while targeting at max range.

You are still talking about this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1UoLamBy5k ? Because they killed lupi on his spawn point away from any walls.

lololololololol

Shiki.7148:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

Nemesis.8593:

flow.6043:

Nemesis.8593:

Kravick.4906:

I’m still waiting for you to show me the base numbers on that DPS of warrior vs necro that I asked for almost two years ago.

You can always do it yourself… record a warrior run, record a necromancer run…
…
Come on, do your part

Nemesis.8593:

Kravick.4906:

The burden of proof is on your end.

Do i not keep saying i am working on part II… What do i keep saying…

Ohhhh you’re ignoring what i say because you are trolling… oh man… you got me good there…

So which is it?
Are you asking others to do those calculations (which have been done many times anyway) or are you doing them in part 2?

Also, we’re really not trying to be rude. But Nemesis, whenever someone challenges the things you say you’re accusing them of being trolls. Why would you expect to be taken seriously when you’re not extending the same courtesy to others?

I’m not even sure what he wants, but if it’s even remotely relevant it will be in part II, if it’s not… it won’t be.
If any of you would like to invest idk how many hours of work, for free.. to satisfy someone else’s curiosity… by all means… in fact… while we are at it… can someone provide me with some elementalist footage, when he is NOT using the Icebow ?

I’m having a difficult time obtaining some

I am doing enough as it is for the community… for free…
You will thank me one day.

Would you mind sharing your thoughts on this?

He makes it seam like linecasting is the easiest thing in the world. Plz go post a video of a daily dungeon tour where all the bosses were linecasted. And yes, a FEW bosses have a large HB, but that’s a FEW. Also, you don’t need to linecast to blow up bosses, it’s the fact that bosses have like 0 HP ( which I hope they change in raids ). Also, necromancer isn’t taken because they do slightly less DPS than a warrior, it’s cause warrior can apply banners while running in and then apply AoE might while in a fight. And for what its worth, I think it’s stupid to kick a necro that joins a group. In a casual tour your not going to notice the different between a necro and some other class. Also, just because you find some stupid people in the game that kick necros etc doesn’t mean that’s the majority of people that wear zerker gear. You also make it seam like skipping mobs is a exploit? Go into arah in a “all welcome” group and you will see the hardest part is the skipping. Of course, you can just stealth past which does lessen the skill required pretty much, but you would need to buff thief/engi if you were to take away most of there stealth.

Well…i saw that DnT video ONCE, then tried it for fun… got it down first try. So yeah, it IS that easy on almost all bosses cause they do not friggin’ move or they charge the enemy currently closest to them. The only boss I’d have problems hitting it on is Flame Citadel p3 endboss because he chooses who to go after seemingly random and then goes in his invuln phase, generally running all over the place.

For reference, this is the video i watched before trying out Line Casting :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJncPGDJ9Ho

Try it yourself in the PvP lobby, it is really, really easy.

I’m asking for a video. Because anyone can claim to do it just fine. AND it matter how much time it takes you to get in position and actually do it. Doesn’t matter if you can do it if it takes 10 seconds to do it when the boss is already at like 2% HP. Not to mention you will be out of range of PS and banners then. Even if you can get this down on almost all the bosses perfectly ( which I would like to see lol, if you recorded a dungeon tour or something where you did it I would love to see ), there is other above mentioned factors to take into consideration which I highly doubt nemesis thought about.

EDIT: what Spoj said lol.
EDIT 2: linecasting on stationary mobs in HotM? I ment against real bosses not target dummies.

Nemesis.8593:

flow.6043:

Nemesis.8593:

Kravick.4906:

I’m still waiting for you to show me the base numbers on that DPS of warrior vs necro that I asked for almost two years ago.

You can always do it yourself… record a warrior run, record a necromancer run…
…
Come on, do your part

Nemesis.8593:

Kravick.4906:

The burden of proof is on your end.

Do i not keep saying i am working on part II… What do i keep saying…

Ohhhh you’re ignoring what i say because you are trolling… oh man… you got me good there…

So which is it?
Are you asking others to do those calculations (which have been done many times anyway) or are you doing them in part 2?

Also, we’re really not trying to be rude. But Nemesis, whenever someone challenges the things you say you’re accusing them of being trolls. Why would you expect to be taken seriously when you’re not extending the same courtesy to others?

I’m not even sure what he wants, but if it’s even remotely relevant it will be in part II, if it’s not… it won’t be.
If any of you would like to invest idk how many hours of work, for free.. to satisfy someone else’s curiosity… by all means… in fact… while we are at it… can someone provide me with some elementalist footage, when he is NOT using the Icebow ?

I’m having a difficult time obtaining some

I am doing enough as it is for the community… for free…
You will thank me one day.

Would you mind sharing your thoughts on this?

He makes it seam like linecasting is the easiest thing in the world. Plz go post a video of a daily dungeon tour where all the bosses were linecasted. And yes, a FEW bosses have a large HB, but that’s a FEW. Also, you don’t need to linecast to blow up bosses, it’s the fact that bosses have like 0 HP ( which I hope they change in raids ). Also, necromancer isn’t taken because they do slightly less DPS than a warrior, it’s cause warrior can apply banners while running in and then apply AoE might while in a fight. And for what its worth, I think it’s stupid to kick a necro that joins a group. In a casual tour your not going to notice the different between a necro and some other class. Also, just because you find some stupid people in the game that kick necros etc doesn’t mean that’s the majority of people that wear zerker gear. You also make it seam like skipping mobs is a exploit? Go into arah in a “all welcome” group and you will see the hardest part is the skipping. Of course, you can just stealth past which does lessen the skill required pretty much, but you would need to buff thief/engi if you were to take away most of there stealth.

Khristophoros.7194:

TheFrighteningFrenchFry.3275:

He makes it seam like linecasting is the easiest thing in the world. Plz go post a video of a daily dungeon tour where all the bosses were linecasted. And yes, a FEW bosses have a large HB, but that’s a FEW. Also, you don’t need to linecast to blow up bosses, it’s the fact that bosses have like 0 HP ( which I hope they change in raids ). Also, necromancer isn’t taken because they do slightly less DPS than a warrior, it’s cause warrior can apply banners while running in and then apply AoE might while in a fight. And for what its worth, I think it’s stupid to kick a necro that joins a group. In a casual tour your not going to notice the different between a necro and some other class. Also, just because you find some stupid people in the game that kick necros etc doesn’t mean that’s the majority of people that wear zerker gear. You also make it seam like skipping mobs is a exploit? Go into arah in a “all welcome” group and you will see the hardest part is the skipping. Of course, you can just stealth past which does lessen the skill required pretty much, but you would need to buff thief/engi if you were to take away most of there stealth. But then again, I don’t really expect much, after all, this is coming from the guy that thought stacking on bosses was effected months after the 2nd feature patch which kinda shows you have no clue what he’s talking about whatsoever.

Dude I’m pretty sure his point about linecasting is that the meta is only optimal when you linecast icebow. So he’s calling people scrubs who run the meta and don’t know how to optimize it.

I think that’s really his only good point in the video and it explains my experience pugging.

Sometimes I get groups that are all meta besides my necro. Either by accident or they didn’t specify in the LFG. But usually these groups aren’t particularly fast compared to when I just have a random assortment of professions. Rarely I get people abusing linecasting and doing everything correctly and then it’s really fast.

Sometimes I get random pugs without eles, without anything resembling meta, but it’s really fast. Usually these groups have engineers… because you don’t have to abuse anything special on engi to get massive DPS, you just toss grenades. It blows my mind that engi isn’t more popular.

Yeah, the meta is only optimal when abusing linecasting, that’s why in the world records eles are still taken and engis aren’t………… gotcha.

EDIT: in restricted record runs linecasting isn’t aloud if you weren’t aware

Ohoni.6057:

50% of what? But this is my point: Other content has exclusive rewards, what’s wrong with raids having exclusive rewards? Your saying you don’t want ANY content to have exclusive rewards?!? Or are you saying you just don’t like raids and you want the rewards but are fine with other stuff for some reason having exclusive rewards? If your answer is A, then I advise you go to a different game cause I highly doubt anet is suddenly gonna say screw you exclusive rewards to all its content. If it’s B, then you just chucked logic out the window. I don’t see any c, but if you got one please do explain. But so far either way you slice the pie its not looking good for you.

I would go with A. While the raid content bothers me personally more than the other systems, ideologically I’m opposed to anyone not being able to get the rewards they want just because they can’t or don’t want to participate in one specific aspect of such a multifaceted game. So this is the topic I am most vocal about, but if someone else really cares about making PvP armors less exclusive, then I certainly wouldn’t argue against them.

The raid issue is a new issue because raids are new to this game. They were not in it before, and therefore everything related to them is a new discussion. Other content might have been in some ways similar, but that does not mean that just because previous content did something a certain way, that raids have to follow suite, or that it would justify raids following suite.

How about a pve/pvp split?

I don’t pvp that much (so it’s not for me), but it seems a reasonable compromise for high prestige items.

I could agree to that, IF raids are considered to be on the “PvP” side of that split. I have a feeling that raiders and PvPers have a lot more in common than raiders and PvEers. However the split ends up, there needs to be a split between raiders and general PvE players.

GW2 though is in definite need of CGC and rewards go hand in hand with that, as it will require some time and dedication to complete (it wouldn’t be challenging if it didn’t) the situation is unavoidable that people who cannot spend that time will not get those rewards.

It isn’t even remotely unavoidable. You avoid it by providing alternate methods for those people to acquire those rewards. Boom, avoided.

This is by design and complaining that something other people will love exists because it doesn’t fit with your life priorities isn’t fair – its your life and you decide what to do with it, sometimes this will put you in a different camp from certain other groups (be it photography night, spawning children or going fishing at the weekend).

I haven’t heard anyone seriously complaining that raiding exists, only about the negative impacts that it could bring to the game, such as locking up exclusive rewards. So long as non-raider players are not incentivized to participate in raiding, it’s a “live and let live” situation. But so long as non-raider players ARE incentivized to raid, well then it’s war, and one side has to burn.

You know (as you seem experienced in gaming) that the CGC must have special rewards linked to it. They are adding Legendary backpacks to PvP and Fractals and new weapons too (Fractals being reduced in required completion time). There will be plenty to do and get for those who don’t have time for raiding.

Like what? You just listed two things that are no less of a time/skill investment than raiding. It’s like you just said “you don’t need to be a doctor, you could also be a lawyer or a hedge-fund manager, like, whatever.”

Then they are being bloody hypocrites. You can’t be ok with exclusives for content that YOU like and then not ok with them when you don’t like the content.

Of course you can. People can care about what they care about and not care about what they don’t care about, that does not make them hypocrites. What would make them hypocrites is if they care about it in their own case, but actively fight against it in someone else’s case.

So if someone says “I care about these rewards being exclusive, but I don’t care about those rewards being exclusive,” then that is not hypocritical, their degree of investment is their own business. It is only hypocritical if they say “I care about these rewards being exclusive, but I don’t want you to have these other rewards because they are exclusive to something I like.” I am not taking that position, and so far I don’t believe that anyone has.

It is more accessible.

Let’s wait to see if they’re actually hard before we get into that part though.

I don’t buy that they can ever balance it out. If the raiders like it, then it’ll be too hard for most players. If it’s easy enough that most players can do it, then the raiders will drown the forums with their tears about how it’s too “casual.” My assumption is that if they’re going to bother with raiding at all, that they will at least try to err on the raider’s side, at least at first. After a few months, they might give up on that though.

There needs to be a reward for doing Raids. Hopefully these rewards will be sellable. Otherwise, outside of trying to sell a path, they’ll be no reason for me to repeat the content.

There should be rewards, just not exclusive ones. The amount of rewards you get should be comparable or better than other activities in the game. If you enjoy raiding, so that on a level playing field raiding is how you would prefer to spend your time, then great, it’s available for you! If you don’t prefer raiding, and would not do it unless bribed into it via exclusive rewards, then also great, you don’t have to raid! Everybody wins!

Ohoni, you don’t deserve the rewards because you don’t want to do the content. Thats as simple as it gets.

It’s also a nonsense statement. "deserving " a reward is entirely based on meeting an arbitrary goal put there at a developer’s whim. They are free to change that goal at their whim. If they choose to say that players “deserve” the armor for completing the raid then that’s what players deserve. If they say that players can also “deserve” the armro for completing some other challenge, then players deserve that too. I’m just pushing that they adopt the latter position.

There a lot of things locked behind certain content… do you see an uproar in the community of players complaining about PvP getting their own exclusive stuff? or fractals getting their own stuff?

Yes. You don’t? There’s not so much of it right at the moment, because neither gameplay type is particularly novel, but each time they’ve added exclusive rewards to those modes there has been some degree of negative response, and there continues to be under the surface. I imagine that vocal criticism of raid armor will die off too over time, after the game releases and people have fully tried it, but don’t confuse that for acceptance, it just means that people have given up on trying to change something that they still do not like, and that still makes them less happy about playing the game.

Raids shouldn’t be any different. Disagree all you want, I know this won’t stop you , but sooner or later, you need to realize that you are not going to change anet’s stance on exclusive rewards.

Why? They’ve changed their stance numerous times before. Just coming up we’re going to be getting non-RNG routes to earning Fractal weapons, non-RNG Precursors, why should I not expect to ever see them change their stance on raid armor?

This game (or any MMORPG) would be a disaster with your views of a reward system. Thats why there is no MMORPG out there that does not have exclusive rewards.

I’m playing Marvel Heroes at the moment, and it doesn’t have exclusive rewards. Much of the loot is themed, and more likely to be acquired directly from certain scenarios, but almost every item in the game can be gained through some alternate means, and those that can’t are just stats, not skins, so it really isn’t that important.

Ok, well, I highly doubt Anet is just gonna say screw you exclusive rewards to all its content. HIGHLY

Ohoni.6057:

So you want a game where everything is given to you on a silver platter? Sad to say, this isn’t the game for you then if that’s what you want.

No, why do people keep reverting to that? Why does it have to be 100% or 0%, why can’t it be 50%? I want it to require effort, just effort in the methods that people prefer doing.

Nobody will be punished for not playing raids just as nobody is punished for not playing dungeons or PvP or WvW.

If there is legendary armor that you can’t get unless you do the raids, then you are being punished for not doing the raids. Feel free to argue that you’re fine with that, but don’t try to argue that it’s not happening.

Exotics are good enough for anything and are attainable easily enough.

Stats are irrelevant to this discussion, we’re talking about cosmetics, which are more important.

Legendary weapons, racial gear and dungeon items have been in the game from the start and haven’t been a problem at all.

Because they haven’t been locked behind raids. It’s the raids that are new.

There’s nothing stopping a hard-core raiding guild (those will come, probably from the same people doing speed-runs of current dungeon content) from advertising in map chat full-runs of a Raid Wing for a certain amount of gold.

And there’s nothing good about that either.

Arenanet already said the rewards will be exclusive. While it is all possible to make different routes and such for it, they have not decided to do so.

Yes, which is why we’re asking them to change that, which is something they could do. I really don’t understand why people keep insisting on pointing out obvious facts that everyone already understands.

50% of what? But this is my point: Other content has exclusive rewards, what’s wrong with raids having exclusive rewards? Your saying you don’t want ANY content to have exclusive rewards?!? Or are you saying you just don’t like raids and you want the rewards but are fine with other stuff for some reason having exclusive rewards? If your answer is A, then I advise you go to a different game cause I highly doubt anet is suddenly gonna say screw you exclusive rewards to all its content. If it’s B, then you just chucked logic out the window. I don’t see any c, but if you got one please do explain. But so far either way you slice the pie its not looking good for you.