Guild Wars 2

Most definitely, you’ll want to take this weapon into WvW, and you definitely want it on your Engineer.

Engineers make great Condition Damage users due to an overwhelming access to all damaging conditions save Torment. They also make great Hybrid fighters for Solo’ing Dungeons or general PvE, so there’s also that.

But as a general rule, Condition Damage is rather moot and useless in Dungeons and Against most world bosses due to Condition Caps.

Here’s a Link to the Meta Build for Condi Engi Roamer:

http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Engineer_-_Double_Kit_Condi_Roamer

So, among the new Boon and Conditions, how will they change the dungeon scene? Let’s have a look-see:

Resistance

• /…/ When placed on a character, this boon will temporarily relieve them of all the negative effects that conditions have on the character. For example, if a character is running in fear with the fear condition, they’ll stop running in fear when resistance is placed on them. When resistance ends, they’ll resume running in fear. /…/

This is an interesting and possible very powerful Boon that can come in extremely handy against Condition-heavy encounters, though it strikes me as more of a PvP-centric boon that will probably not have much effect on Dungeons, as conditions are generally handled with relative ease through proper cleansing.

I do think Guardians will get ready access to this Boon, as well as Warriors and possibly Rangers and Engineers. It’ll be something look for.

Slow

• /…/ This will slow down animations and casts, allowing more time to dodge or interrupt the incoming massive attack. We’ve also improved both quickness and slow. Currently, quickness will cause your cast bar to cut out early. With the improvement, your skill cast bar will smoothly update when you gain quickness or slow, even during the middle of using a skill.

This one is more interesting, however. Mesmer, or its Spec, is most likely the one who will get the most access to this, possibly alongside Elementalists and Revenants. If so, this will present quite some hefty support against Bosses with quick attacks and cheap tells. Wether this will be useful or not might be situational, though, and act more like a crutch to new players.

Taunt

• /…/aunt will be used to both reposition foes and change your foes’ targets. For example, when used on players, it will force the taunted player to run at their target with their skill bar locked—minus stun breakers—and only use their autoattack skill to attack. This gives us the opportunity to use taunt in multiple ways, not just as a player skill, but also as a tool to create interesting creature encounters that utilize this taunt effect against players.

This one is the Condition people will yell “TRINITY PEOPLE HAVE WON, ANET HAS CAVED!” about. Meh, I doubt that, hard.

It’s a Control Condition, like Fear, meaning its prevalance will be limited in the same aspect. This, I see, will play a BIG role in the new meta however. This is a great tool for LoSing and might open up new tactics or speed up runs (Like the Dredge suit/Ice elemental in the Dredge fractal). Now, it’s not stated wether Taunt will override the current Threat generation and force an NPC Target switch or wether it will simply attack whoever’s the major threat without pause (Implied in “… It’s Target”.)

No matter, I see this becoming a useful tool for some bosses, but just like Slow I’m not certain about its Necessity. Again, just because you’re useful doesn’t mean you’re necessery, and just because you’re necessery doesn’t mean you’re important.

If you plan on doing a lot of Dungeons, then you will soon be swimming in Tokens of all kinds. Heck, it’ll happen even if you just do it casually.

Eventually, it won’t be any problems at all to keep several Gear setups in your backpack. Sure, I always go for Zerker first and generally always have Zerker trinks, but most of my characters have a Soldier set for World Bosses and quite a few have “Flavour builds” that I play whenever I run casually with PHIW-guildies, such as my Zealot Necro (Come at me, brah) or my Sinister Engi.

Just as the saying goes, “When in Rome…”. When in a Speed run group, Zerk. When in a casual group, do whatever you want.

I’m not sure about lore, but is it possible that perhaps there was a Big lake where the Dragonbrand is now? If so, that could’ve been a spot. There’s both Tenaebron Lake in Fields of Ruin and Blightwater Basin in Blazeridge Steppes that could’ve been sights of battle in the past, before Kralka woke up.

The combat here is awesome and has multiple layers of depth, strategy and skill levels that are vastly different from many other games’ layers of depth, strategy and skill levels. You just don’t happen to like it, so it’s a matter of oppinion.

I suggest finding entertainment elsewhere if this is what you feel like.

PvE (Dungeons, Assuming you’re using Meta Builds):

• God Tier: Elementalist
• High Tier: Guardian, Warrior, Thief
• Mid Tier: Ranger, Engineer, Mesmer
• Bottom Tier: Necromancer

PvE (World Bosses)

• God Tier: Guardian, Warrior
• High Tier: Elementalist, Necromancer (Whenever Condis. are necessery, such as Evolved Jungle Wurm)
• Mid Tier: Ranger, Engineer, Mesmer, Necromancer (Otherwise)
• Bottom Tier: Thief

PvP (Structured, Assuming Meta Builds)
With the coming changes to Might, the Meta might be looking at a great turn and as such it’s difficult to say which Professions will remain in which tier at the moment.

There is no Aggro System in place in GW2, because they have steered away from the classical Holy Trinity, thus it is impossible to make a “Pure Tank”. Furthermore, AoE Heals are relatively insubstantial and are used for Sustainance rather than Comeback, much like Damage Reduction Buffs in other games.

That being said, there is a profession for you, namely the Guardian. It doesn’t matter wether the Guardian is Geared out for max DPS (As is mostly the case in Dungeons and PvE) or for Survivability/Support (Which is often the case in WvW or sPvP), the Guardian will always be the king of Defense and Support no matter what group he enters. Having access to all defensive boons (Protection, Aegis, Regeneration, Stability and Retaliation) as well as plentiful Condition Removal, Projectile Defense and Healing.

It helps if you know that All Professions Have a Self-Heal that heals them for a substantial Amount, meaning you shouldn’t worry too much about watching their Health, and that all Professions have the ability to Dodge, completely avoiding attacks. Each profession has their own levels and tricks to sustain themselves, meaning they can often survive on their own. However, that only goes for so long and the Guardian’s purpose is to make sure his team makes it through the encounter even if their own resources are diminished.

Gear Choice (PvE/Dungeons):
Mostly, a typical “Tank” would gear up for maximum HP and Defense in PvE modes. As you cannot control Aggro (And thus direct it towards yourself) in GW2, stacking such Stats only affects your own Survivability and doesn’t help the team at all.
On the other hand, Max DPS gear means enemies go down faster. Dead enemies Don’t Deal Damage. A Coordinated team will make sure to have all their 5 members Gear out for Maximum DPS, trusting the innate Support of professions like Guardian, Mesmer or Elementalist to make up for any cracks in their defenses along with skillful play and learning the encounters. Guardians overall tend to sacrifice some DPS Traits for Supportive Traits, because they’re just that good at it.

So for PvE/Dungeons, go for Berserker Gear (POWER/Precision/Ferocity).

World Bosses (PvE):
Now, some “World Bosses” that spawn around the world of Tyria Cannot be critically hit, making stats like Precision and Ferocity useless against them. Not to mention, their AoE’s tend to hit hard if you’re caught off-guard.

Against these Bosses, use Soldier Gear instead. (POWER/Toughness/Vitality)

Braham’s bubbles -did- do things, though. They gave you Protection and Stability, meaning that if an orange ring showed beneath your feet while you were channeling, you could just ignore that.

Rox threw the fire into the ring, with an Audio cue so you knew when to look up for it. Kasmeer did what she does best and spammed Time Warp whenever the boss was vulnerable, I ended up killing it faster than my brain could catalogue (I was too busy checking my skillbar for CDs to notice how fast the Shadow’s Health went down).

The only one whos presence I missed was Marjory.

The problem is, we’ve proof that we -don’t- need the Power of the Gods to kill the Dragons. Zhaitan was taken down by Pact Tech and Magic alone. Sure, it’d be a boon, but the Dervish won’t be coming back as it’s remembered. There will be no prayers, because Charr would never stoop so low as to pray to the human gods for power. Neither would Asura. Only Humans and possibly Norns would consider throwing these Gods/Spirits a prayer.

Even if there shows up a Profession based around “the power of the human Gods”, it won’t be the same as the Dervish in terms of Thematics. Perhaps a Channeler that simply draws upon their power from fragments of relics, using it as a mere tool or weapon, but certainly no Prayers would be involved.

What all those people seem to turn a blind eye to is the fact that only the humans actually consider the Gods to be Gods in the sense of omnipotent beings that govern their lives.

Norn consider them spirits of action, Sylvari regard them as curiosities, Asura probably think of them as something to be studied and harnessed rather than venerated or worshipped and the Charr outright want them to come back to Tyria so they can stomp them to the curb once and for all.

Dervish is not gonna happen. A Dervish-ish profession might, but Dervish will not make a return unless ANet introduces Race-specific professions. And that is very unlikely, considering that they didn’t want to differ the races on anything but a cosmetic and conceptual level.

Let’s add about 2-3 more Death Match maps, and then split the Queues into game modes, so you can choose to queue either for Death Match or Conquest modes.

That way, everyone will be happy, and I won’t have to try and set a new record in Panic respeccing everytime it shows up while I’m running a Conquest build.

Didn’t have Room for Mesmer in the previous answer, so here it is instead:

Mesmer

• Difficulty: Hard
• Strengths: Boon Removal, Condition Removal, Projectile Defense/Reflection, Capable of High Burst Damage, Superior Mobility, Portals, Best Access to Confusion and Torment.
• Weaknesses: Lowest Armor Tier, Reliant on Phantasms for DPS, Reliant on Traits for Burst Damage, Very High Skill Roof, Lacks access to Boons or have them from unreliable sources.
• Playstyle PvE: Having fallen out of favor in most runs recently, the mesmer is nonetheless a contender in the Dungeon Scene. With superior Access to Projectile Defenses, any instances that are heavy on those will have you benefit from having a Mesmer on your team. Their easy access to Condition Removal as well as their Access to Portals make them one of the best Supporting Professions out there. They lack however in terms of DPS, as they’re heavily reliant on their Phantasms for that. Shatter skills are seldom used in Dungeons. Preferred Armor/Trinkets: Assassin/Berserker.
• Playstyle WvW: As roamers, Mesmers are rightfully feared for their confusing playstyle, often capitalizing on the human factor through the use of Clones and Stealth to disorient and confuse the player behind the other character.
  When in Zergs, the Mesmer’s duty is again that of support, using Portals to quickly move the zerg across the map and Veil to stealth the Zerg just before they charge an enemy, throwing the enemy into disarray. Preferred Armor: Soldier/Assassin/Berserker or Dire if Condition Specced.
• Playstyle sPvP: One of the most difficult professions to get the hang of, as they’re ruthlessly unforgiving if you mess up a Shatter or get caught off-gaurd. They’re currently favored as full Glass Cannon Shatter builds, capable of insane burst damage to unsuspecting enemies but being extremely squishy as a result. Lacking the Dodges and Continuous stealth of thieves, the Mesmer must often rely on the Human factor by deceit and confusing enemies with clones and LoS. Learning proper rotations is a must to even survive as a Mesmer in sPvP. Preferred Amulet: Berserker.

Let’s go over your choices one by one:

Elementalist

• Difficulty: Medium-Hard
• Strengths: Highest Possible personal DPS, Boons, Healing, Sustain, Condi Removal, Mobility
• Weaknesses: Lowest Max HP Tier, Low Armor, Low access to Damaging Conditions
• Playstyle PvE: Damage and Offensive Support, the Elementalist is a staple in every Dungeon group due to their unrivaled Offensive Support in the form of Might and Fury Boons along with their High-end Personal DPS using Fireball or Lightning Hammer. Furthermore, due to attunements they have access to a plentora of Support and Control skills for situational use regardless of their weapon. Their low Health and Armor, coupled with reliance on proper rotations (Unless using a Pure DPS-build with Staff) give them a high skill bar. Preferred Armor/Trinkets: Berserker/Berserker.
• Playstyle WvW: Wanted for their supportive skills and wide AoE with Staff, the Elementalists make up the sustain of the Backline in zergs. With access to all 3 useful fields (Fire/Water/Lightning) as well as AoE attacks and support skills, the Elementalist is irreplacable in the backline. Squishy still, however, they will generally be called out and focused by Hit-and-run professions such as thieves and rangers, so proper knowledge of disengaging and lockdown through CC is necessery to make the most of them. Preferred Armor/Trinkets: Soldier/Berserker.
• Playstyle sPvP: Celestial is the best friend of the Elementalist. Coupled with their own innate ability to stack Might, this allows them to build for complete Defense in terms of traits while retaining extremely high levels of DPS using Dagger/Dagger, or bunker down as Team Support and AoE damage with a Staff. Also a staple in most competative teams, the Elementalist is currently Top-tier in sPvP. The Skill roof is extremely high, however, and proper Attunement rotation as well as knowing the core of PvP is extremely vital for one’s success. Preferred Amulet: Celestial.

Thief

• Difficulty: Medium
• Strengths: High Personal DPS, Boon Removal, Highest Mobility of all Professions, Superior Access to Dodges, Superior Ability to Disengage and Reset fights, Highest HPS Healing Skill.
• Weaknesses: Lowest Max HP Tier, Condi Removal, Reliance on Initiative Management, General sustain outside of Stealth, Glass Cannon, Poor Range.
• Playstyle PvE: Damage Primarily, but brings their own levels of Support through Team-wide Stealth, Endurance Recovery and Perma-Blindness for mobs. A thief’s main job on a dungeon team is as the Vulnerability Capper and Single-target DPS, mixing Fast and heavy-hitting attacks with devastating Stealth Attacks. Proper Rotation is necessery, as well as Initiative Management. You’ll be very, very Squishy. Preferred Armor/Trinkets: Berserker/Berserker.
• Playstyle WvW: Thieves are much too squishy and has too poor Range to safely be a Backliner. However, thanks to their access to Stealth, mobility and ability to disengage easily they make for good Roamers, often solo. In zergs, the thieves will generally use their mobility and stealth to skirt around the Frontline and home in on squishy backliners or lone stragglers for a quick kill, before disengaging and picking a new target. Preferred Armor/Trinkets: Berserker or Soldier, sometimes even Dire for Condition-Specced Roamers.
• Playstyle sPvP: Very similar to their WvW counterpart, thieves work best roaming between points and catching enemies off-guard 1v1 or 2v1. They aim either for a quick kill or a quick Decap of an unguarded point. They fall quite easily to AoE’s and if they’re focused on team fights, so generally stay on the edge of those and focus on stragglers. Preferred Amulet: Berserker.

3 Lvl 80s. Warrior, Mesmer and Thief in that order.

I just wanted to make new characters.

Since the NPE, I’ve leveled 2 new characters from 1-80. Granted, they were number 13 and 14 on the list, so I already knew what I was getting into, what I was planning to use them for and what Traits are worth my time and not. To be honest, there was no major change from when I was leveling my other characters, and I adore the new leveling bonuses I got through the grind. If anything, this NPE shouldn’t change much for “Vets” of the game since you should have plenty of Skill Point Scrolls wasting about in your bank anyway (I can never seem to have less than 150 or so myself). Any traits I needed was easily procured.

While I agree that the Implementation of the new Trait Gathering needs work, the very Idea of it is something I actually support. What they need to change is how most of the traits will either take forever to unlock (100% Completion of Harathi Hinterlands? No.), or requires a Team because you have to fight a Champion (For an Adept Trait? Come on). Overall, Traits should be more Challenging than Skill Challenges but less Challenging than Group Events, and you shouldn’t have to waste more than 10-15 minutes unlocking them if they catch your interest.

Drax has a point in War being highly unlikely, but I’d also attribute that to the formation of the Pact.

Setting aside the fact that it’s actively working for a unified Tyria and as a multi-racial organization it helps individuals form bonds across archaic barriers, they -are- sitting on the best, biggest and most dangerous Tech in Tyria. Remember, the Pact killed Zhaitan, the Elder Dragon of death and darkness.
Doesn’t matter if it’s the Charr or the Humans who start it, Mommy Pact will look at them with a stern gaze and wave her weapons of mass destruction about, and they’ll just have to go to bed without dessert and think about what they’ve done.

Along with that, here are a few other very important notes to remember:

• 1. Don’t Stay on a Point another is Safely Capping (I.e no nearby enemies in sight). You’re not speeding up the process and are basically wasting space. At the start of each match, as an effect of this, only 1 Should go “Home”, as the node is called.

• 2. Pick up the Basic Terminology. Basically Home is the closest Node to your base, Mid is self-explenatory and Far is the one closest to the enemy camp.

• 3. Never sit on a Point, even as a Bunker. Check the map and your team’s healthbars, go where you’re needed.

• 4. Don’t rush into 3v1 or 4v2 if your team is losing. Feeding won’t do your team any good and will just frustrate you. Go elsewhere for free caps or kills where they’re outnumbered.

• 5. Don’t pursue a fleeing enemy Off Point for long. Try to kill him for quick points, but if that takes longer than ~5 seconds, you’re wasting valuable time you could be using Reinforcing Mid or Decapping Far. Don’t needlessly engage in fights off points, unless you’re doing it to keep them away from your point.

• 6. All of the above are situational and may or may not apply to any kind of situation you will find yourself in while playing sPvP.

• 7. Learn the maps.

Cactus Brawler.7415:

TheSwede.9512:

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Andred.1087:

qqqqq I losing

must be because enemies are cheap, nothing to do with me~

Just like in League of legends there are some classes that are simply numerically better for different situations.

Unless you think say a warrior that can build a crap tonne of toughness so he doesn’t take damage, vitality so that even if he takes damage he can soak it, and condition damage to damage you.

‘But wait’ you cry ‘Condition damage bypasses toughness’.

Indeed it does but a warrior can build so that not only can he cleanse all the conditions on him by shouting, but also that the shouts heal him as well.

There are just some builds that are legitimately throw your hands up in the air bull crap.

The problem with a Full Tough+Vit Warr is that he’ll hit like a wet noodle, and he’ll hit slow as well. He’ll be reliant on Cleanses and Boons to survive, too, because Warriors cannot heal up quickly. Constant application of Poison will disrupt his Healing Signet, Buffing yourself with Boons will render his bonuses moot because he can’t get rid of yours and without Stab, you can freely stunlock him to set up a spike. Celestial Engineer will wreck such a warrior easily.

My point is this: A Tough+Vit shoutheal warr is relatively harmless. Everything has a hard counter, as a team it’s up you and your mates to figure out what that is.

So you decide you can’t kill him and back away, so his team maintains the point, your team has to direct extra people away from other points to gang up on this one guy.

It is somehow not cheesy for one guy to tie up several members of the opposing team? By being unkillable unless focused down by a team?

I mean it seems the hard counter you are suggesting is to give the guy the point he’s defending or to weaken your attack/defense of the other points to take the one that guy is on.

I mean the build I posted has twenty seconds of stability, how are you going to stun lock through that?

I guess my point is if the way to beat a build is to ‘bring more people’ then I find it cheese in the extreme.

We’re delving away from the topic here, I’m feeling, so I’ll be brief because this is purely PvP mechanics.

Yes, if you can’t win a fight, DON’T keep on fighting. Rotate to another point, cap that. If he’s left alone, you’re team’s fighting 5v4 and should easily cap the remaining 2 Points and win the match.
EDIT: Forgot the situation where your entire idea was simply to decap and harass. Then you do just that and basically render him moot, but it’s generally only useful if A/ Your team knows what they’re doing and B/ You can keep more than just the warrior busy in 1v2 to let your own team fight 4v3 elsewhere.

Keeping more than 1 Person occupied in 1vX while remaining on point is the very idea of a Bunker build. The downside is that Bunker Builds often lack Mobility and Stopping Power, making them easy to outmaneuver through communication and proper rotation.

If you’re fighting him 1v1, your team is not weakened in the least. They’re at a 4v4 situation. If one of your teammates show to help, you’re 2v1 and should be able to finish it Quickly (if you Can’t, well sorry to say, but then that guy is out of your league). In that case, either you Rotate, or wait for your allies to finish their matches. (If you do get help, chances are they just beat their opponents and put them on Respawn.)

20 Seconds of Stability means Fear-locked if they’re fighting a Necro, or Yummy-mummy Boon-stealing for a Thief. Stability also does nothing against Conditions and actual damage, either. They just can’t be controlled, which doesn’t matter at all if you control the Range and Pace of the fight through Positioning and clever use of dodges.

As for the solution being “Bring more people”, it’s not what I said. The solution is sending the right guy for the job to deal with said Warrior. When i said “You and Your Team” I was talking about Communication, a precious tool that sadly doesn’t see as much use as it should in PuGs.

Cactus Brawler.7415:

Andred.1087:

qqqqq I losing

must be because enemies are cheap, nothing to do with me~

Just like in League of legends there are some classes that are simply numerically better for different situations.

Unless you think say a warrior that can build a crap tonne of toughness so he doesn’t take damage, vitality so that even if he takes damage he can soak it, and condition damage to damage you.

‘But wait’ you cry ‘Condition damage bypasses toughness’.

Indeed it does but a warrior can build so that not only can he cleanse all the conditions on him by shouting, but also that the shouts heal him as well.

There are just some builds that are legitimately throw your hands up in the air bull crap.

The problem with a Full Tough+Vit Warr is that he’ll hit like a wet noodle, and he’ll hit slow as well. He’ll be reliant on Cleanses and Boons to survive, too, because Warriors cannot heal up quickly. Constant application of Poison will disrupt his Healing Signet, Buffing yourself with Boons will render his bonuses moot because he can’t get rid of yours and without Stab, you can freely stunlock him to set up a spike. Celestial Engineer will wreck such a warrior easily.

My point is this: A Tough+Vit shoutheal warr is relatively harmless. Everything has a hard counter, as a team it’s up you and your mates to figure out what that is.

This is a great thread. I’m going to add to this by suggesting all play modes, just so one camp can’t whine about not getting the easy ones. Instead, they’ll take a little longer to complete, but you can do so doing whatever. I’ll call these General Dailies

• Daily Condition Applier: “That guy was supposed to be on fire anyway.” – Apply 30 Conditions to enemies.

• Daily Condition Remover: “Eww, you’ve got icky all over yourself!” – Remove 20 Conditions from yourself or Allies.

• Daily Reviver: “No, I did not just let you drop so I could get some extra XP. Honest.” – Revive 10 downed or defeated Players.

• Daily Boon Applier: “Sharing is Caring, especially when it hurts your enemies.” – Apply 30 Boons to yourself or Allies.

• Daily Weaponmaster: “When in doubt, Overkill.” – Use 3 Different Weapons to defeat 20 enemies with each weapon.

• Daily Fall: “When down, the weak stay on the ground and the strong rise back up. The smart don’t throw themselves off a cliff.” – Take Falling Damage 15 times.

• Daily Dodger: “You have an uncanny knack for simply not being there when someone tries to chop your head off.” – Evade 20 attacks.

• Daily Slayer: “It’s a good thing monsters have such a shabby legal department and no healthcare benefits.” – Kill 40 different monsters or enemy players.

• Daily Hero: “Saving up for the next time Daily Ambient Slayer shows up. You know, just in case.” – Collect 1000 Karma.

• Daily Ambient Slayer: “It’s not my fault that these things drop dead if I so much as sneeze in their general direction!” – Kill 50 Ambient Creatures.

1. The tutorial currently offer no Incentive to defeat the trash mobs on the way to the boss, since they way how you unlock Weapon Skills have changed. I suggest adding Level 0, White-quality weapons as drops to them.

2. The final boss fight in the tutorial is quite hampered by only being allowed to Auto-Attack it. I suggest that the Level-up is granted by the NPC before the actual Fight, so that the player gains at least 1 more attack to throw at it. As the fight is lengthier, it will teach them to watch their Cooldown on the 2nd Weapon Skill.

3. Add Dodge Prompts to the Boss’ by having the game Warn the player once they end up in the Red AoE circles, telling them to Doubleclick the Movement Keys, Press the assigned Dodge button or Click the Health Bar in order to dodge out of Harm’s way. This is the tutorial, and Dodge Rolling is such a big and necessery part of GW2’s Combat that it should be given light of even at the very start of the game.

4. The reward for Completing the tutorial, if you were to level up through it, should be the ability to select between a few different Weapons. (Such as Necromancer, who starts with Axe, gets to choose between an Axe, a Dagger or a Scepter.) Everything for diversity, drops aren’t always reliable for finding new weapons for your Professions (Especially not Elementalist and Engineer).

http://metabattle.com/wiki/MetaBattle_Wiki

You’re welcome.

Every build there’s got a little list at the end telling you what is a hard counter to these builds. No build is unbeatable, but if you’re in sPvP you gotta send the guy most likely to beat that build off to do just that. If you’re in WvW and end up 1v1 with the guy while Roaming, then there are just way too many circumstances to chalk up a loss to any one reason, and even then it’s mostly due to not knowing what your opponent’s running and being caught unaware by a spike.

Also, it’s never ever a bad idea to disengage if you’re losing. In sPvP, your team will (Most often) rather have you losing a cap and rotating Mid while healing up in 5s rather than you losing a cap and eating dirt for 15s. And while roaming solo in WvW, there’s never any reason not to disengage if you’re losing, because the place is huge. If you die and have to respawn, you’ll have to charge across the entire map again.

Here’s my list. I’m an RPer from Piken Square who spend 90% of my ingame time standing still in a circle being a total nerd:

1. Do 1 PvP match. I usually end up getting a Kill in. That’s 2/3 (Sometimes 3/3 if my profession of choice is daily).

2. Do 1 PvE Daily.

3. Profit

Takes me 10 minutes, tops. If I feel like additional rewards, I then go do the other dailies since now they’re no longer just a waste of time because even with Daily Completionist done I still get stuff for it. I love these new dailies, they’re great.

Oh, and Log-in rewards are even more awesome.

Again someone mistakes “Maximized Damage” for “No Support/No Tankiness”.

Maybe that’s true in games where Roles are hard set, such as WoW.

It’s not true in GW2, where support and Control can be done just as well by someone who’s Specced for max Damage. Just think about it for a second:

If Damage was everything, then why isn’t the Meta “Only Elementalists, 1 Warrior”? Because the amount of Defense and Support that a Guardian or Mesmer can bring outweighs their lack of damage dealing potential in comparison to Elementalist.
You don’t honestly think that the reason Necro and Engi are elected out of most dungeon groups is because of their “low” DPS, do you?

I don’t bring gear into this. Zerker gear is the Optimal gear as an effect of this, and nerfing it isn’t a question. If you want gear diversity, you’d need to completely overhaul the way Weapons, armor and trinkets work in this game.

The current implementation of Trait acquisition is something I’m actually all for, however I think that while the idea was solid, the actual practice was done with a little too much haste and too little consideration. I leveled a new character from 1-80, doing a wide range of PvE, crafting, EotM-running and PvP as I made my way through the levels. When I then hit 80, I had a staggering 2 traits unlocked from the casual PvE-ing. And none of those were useful to the build I was using while leveling, nor the one I’m now using at Lvl 80. At that point, it was with an exasperated sigh that I just went off to buy the Traits I wanted.

Here is a Checklist of what I think trait Acquisition should look like:

• Adept Traits should all be tied to challenges that you can Complete On your own.
• Master Traits should all be tied to challenges that are Split between Teamwork and Exploration of non-standard places, such as WvW or sPvP.
• Grandmaster Traits should be tied to bigger events or challenges that often require teamplay.

• Traits Should not be tied to Challenges that are already Very rewarding, such as Dungeon Paths. You already get a fat stack of Loot, Xp and Gameplay experience from it, it is better you place the Trait somewhere where the reward is usually less.
• In line with the previous, Traits should not be gatelocked behind challenges that are overly Long, such as 100% completion of a Zone, as that discourages its acquisition by working towards it in favor of a quick pay-up.

I personally think that the mantra for Trait Acquisition should be More work than a Skill Point, less work than a Dungeon Path. Traits are fundamental to your build once you hit 40+, and when you then find an interesting trait that you’d like to try out it shouldn’t strike you in the face that it’ll take at least an hour to get it, because just that trait is gated behind “100% completion of Harathi Hinterlands”. While certainly not an impossible task, it’s a long and time-consuming undertaking, compared to just finding 2 Skill points and 10 Silver to buy the Trait book from the vendor. That’s another point I’d like to adress:

• Acquisition through exploration should not be more Inconveniencing than collecting the Skill points and Coin necessery to buy the Trait Point.

But onto the actual suggestions, shall we?

• Easier Access – Adept Traits should be tied to Events, Jumping Puzzles and other undertakings one could do on their own. Master traits should be tied to more difficult Events and Jumping Puzzles. Grandmaster Traits should do fine as they are.

• Karma Sink – Many players, especially those leveling Alts, have an overabundance of Karma that they have nothing to sink it into. Why not add Trait books to some of the Karma vendors you unlock throughout zone completion in higher-level areas, or in the case of Orr to the Temple Vendors (Especially the Grandmaster traits that requires players to beat the temple event, only to find it already taken and safe.)

• PvP-only Reward: Trait Token – sPvPers obtain skill points and levels at a much slower rate than PvE’rs and WvWers. What if, in a specific Reward Track (Let’s call it the Leveling Track for now) unlocked at lvl 30, there was a reward that’d let them pick a Trait for PvE and unlock it as they wish? This could also serve as another incentive for players to try out sPvP. It could come in a variety of flavors, such as “Power Trait Token” or “Vitality Trait Token” to denote that it only works on a specific line, or it could be a catch-all for all kinds of traits.

The idea that everything is “Full-throttle-rocket” Damage in every direction is WRONG. You GEAR for maximum damage (In the case of the current Meta, often Full Zerker armor, weapon and trinkets) in PvE because the 2 “Support” Stats in the game either scale horribly with powers that heal other players (Healing Power) or just don’t get a big enough bonus from the gear it comes on (Boon Duration).

Basically, forget all the old preconceptions that in order to be good at Support, you have to gear a certain way. That is Not the case in GW2.
Even in Full Zerker gear, a Guardian’s role in Dungeons will always be the Support role, because Guardian is the undisputed King of Defensive Support, putting down Reflects and protecting his allies with Aegis, Protection, Stability, Condition Cleanses and Blinds. Even in Full Zerker, the Elementalist is the undisputed Queen of Offensive Support, with her easy-access Fire Fields and ability to stack mad amounts of Might and Fury in the blink of an eye. Heck, one of the reasons Necromancer isn’t liked much in dungeons is because of their lack of Support, so anyone saying that PvE is all about Damage really has no idea what they’re talking about.

But the most important thing to remember is: You don’t have to be either or, you can be both. With the changes to Traits, you can switch your build with the press off a button. There’s absolutely nothing that says you can’t have 1 set of Cleric gear and 1 set of Berserker gear in your backpack. The Mantra in Guild Wars 2 is “Adapt, adapt, adapt”, as you can change your build on the fly.
In a Speed Run group with people who can keep themselves alive on their own? Slap on that Zerker gear and go 6/6/0/2/0 and just melt everything with Fire.
In a casual run with people who don’t care for meta, speedrunning or either? Then you can slap on your Cleric gear and go 0/0/2/6/6 with clear conscience.

When it comes to Elementalists, I’ve noticed only a single trend among their powers:

They don’t seem able to directly manipulate, create or reshape living tissue

If we’re going with what powers are available to the Elementalist in-game, then we have:

• Fire Attunement – Fire, Heat, Magma, Lava
• Water Attunement – Water, Ice, Cold
• Air Attunement – Air, Lightning, Electricity
• Earth Attunement – Rocks, Soil, Sand, Magnetism

There’s no proof however that attuned to Water, they’d be able to control Blood (That’s Necromancy, or rather Blood Magic, another school entirely.) And while attuned to Earth, they show no proof of being able to Control Plants (Which falls under Rangers’ Nature Magic, if one would consider Entangle to be magic, or Sylvari racial skills.)

Simon.3794:

. greatsword lacks combo finisher.

Greatsword has a Whirl Finisher in Whirlwind Attack and a Physical Projectile in Bladetrail, that hits twice due to returning.

My turn!

• I spend about 75% of my in-game time running in circles somewhere in a city, lost in thought. I actually Can’t think properly unless my character is moving about.

• I secretly wish that Sword/Shield for Warrior will someday become Meta, because it’s my favorite setup. I’m also aware that this will never happen.

• I geared out my Warrior to be my main, with all Ascended stuff I could get my hands on. I now main Ele in PvE and Ranger in sPvP.

• I leveled 1 of each Profession to 80, and made sure I had 1 of each Race at 80 as well. I play maybe 3-4 of those on a regular basis.

• I have played for almost 2 years. My world completion remains at 69% and has done so for a Year and a half.

• I’ve bought more Black Lion Exclusive Armor Sets for just a single Costume piece than I care to admit.

• I got Tailor to 500 on one of my characters solely because I felt it suited her to be a master tailor.

• I kinda want to switch Race on at least half of my characters.

• I’ve repeatedly wasted all my Dungeon tokens on the wrong kind of Gear, either type or stats, and rather than salvaging them I’ve just thrown them away in frustration.

• I cannot gear my characters in anything lower than Exotics, not even if it’s just for looks. Some of my characters have 4-5 sets of full exotics. I have 13 characters.

• I never play thief in dungeons because I’m ridiculously paranoid about messing up when stealthing the team. I’ve successfully memorized and completed many skips solo.

Hoaxintelligence.4628:

What’s up with these dubble click to consume outfits??
Were are the actual armor sets, with 6 armor parts??
I dont buy it cause I want armor parts, and not just a potion.

Jungle Explorer Outfit 700gems
Ancestral Outfit 700 gems
Ceremonial Plated Outfit 700 gems
Shadow assassin outfit 700gems

These are outfits that I did want to buy, but didnt. Cause of the fact that they are potions.
1: The dye customisation is limited.
2: If you want to use 1 armor part of that armor set, you are screwed, cause you cant.
I know allot of people with the same thoughts.
Arenanet is missing allot of gems without knowing it it seems.

Outfits aren’t potions. Only Town clothes come as potions.

Furthermore, Outfits have a few Pro’s as well:

• No need for transmuting armor using Transmutation charges, making them great while leveling a character for the sake of not looking like you’re wearing a mix of cobbled-together matresses and Thanksgiving leftovers.
• All outfits so far has come with 4 dye fields, which is often more than enough to make your costume look somewhat unique (And to get the combination you want).
• You can always hide head, shoulders and gloves still, by unchecking the particular box on the armor before equipping the Outfit.
• The outfit, once bought, unlocks for all characters on your account, permanently. This includes new characters created after buying the outfit.

Warrior
Steel Wall – Stance. You and Allies in a cone behind you become Invulnerable for a short time. You cannot move or take action while Steel Wall is active.

• Duration: 3s
• Activation time: 1/2s
• Radius: 180
• Cooldown: 60s

Guardian
Fearless Signet – Signet.

• Passive Effect: Increases your Damage for each nearby enemy.
• Magnitude: 2% per enemy, 10% max (5 enemies)
• Radius: 180
• Active Effect: Grant Stability to nearby allies and extend the duration of already applied Boons.
• Stability applied: 8s
• Boon Extension: 8s
• Activation time: 1/4s
• Targets: 5
• Radius: 600
• Cooldown: 50s

Ranger
Master Scout – For a short duration, you grant Continuous Swiftness to nearby allies and Reveal (1s) nearby enemies.

• Duration: 10s.
• Pulses: 6 (Once on Activation, then every 2 seconds)
• Radius: 450
• Swiftness Duration: 5s
• Activation Time: 1/2s
• Cooldown: 50s

Thief
Feign Death – Second Wind – Trick. Feign a Downed state. Enemies attacking you will be Stunned and Blinded, while you Shadowstep away and gain Stealth. Activate again to cancel.

• Feign Death Duration: 15s
• Shadowstep distance: 600
• Stealth Duration: 6s
• Stun Duration: 2s
• Blind: 10s
• Unblockable
• Breaks Stun
• Activation time: Instant
• Cooldown: 75s

Engineer
Anti-Magic Drive – Gadget. Create an Anti-Magic drive at your location that transforms incoming Conditions on Allies into Boons, and incoming Boons on enemies into Conditions.

• Duration: 6s
• Pulses: 6 (Once every second)
• Conversions per Pulse: 2
• Targets: 10
• Radius: 240
• Activation time: 1 1/4s
• Cooldown: 75s

Elementalist
Elemental Harmony – Cantrip. Reset all Attunment Cooldowns and gain All Attunement Bonuses for a short time.

• Duration: 6s
• Activation time: Instant
• Cooldown: 40s

Necromancer
Nexus of Pain – Fatal Reverberations – Corruption. Heal nearby Allies, stacking Torment for each affected ally. Activate again to remove Torment from yourself and damage nearby enemies depending on stacks of Torment removed.

• Base Healing: 1.915 * (0.8)
• Torment Gained: 2 stacks (6s) per affected Ally
• Targets: 5
• Radius: 900
• Activation time: 1/4s
• Fatal Reverberations Damage at 2 Stacks: 1.298
• 4 stacks: 1.576
• 6 stacks: 1.845
• 8 stacks: 2.129
• 10 stacks: 2.556
• Fatal Reverberations – Combo Finisher: Blast
• Targets: 5
• Radius: 600
• Activation time: 1/2s
• Cooldown: 50s

Mesmer
Time Lock – Manipulation. Enemies in the Target area has their Cooldowns stopped, meaning their powers won’t recharge while Time Lock is active.

• Range: 900
• Time Lock Duration (Enemies): 4s.
• Radius: 300
• Activation time: 3/4s
• Cooldown: 60s

That’d be incorrect, because under no circumstances would I want to see Condi. Damage and Duration under the same banner, considering what that’d result in. I guess I just didn’t check enough of the latest threads before I posted.

Crazy idea, but what if Healing Power could determine Boon Duration in the same vein that Ferocity determines Critical Damage?

Would that make Zealot gear more viable in PvE to certain classes? (Such as Guardian and Elementalist) or would the merge simply add too little to make a difference?

Would this make Bunker Guardians in sPvP way too OP? Would a different scaling between PvE and sPvP fix this? Or would it only necessitite more use of Boon-stealing/Ripping/Transformation (And subsequently, making such skills more readily available to more professions)?

Discuss away.

The winner had indeed the best costume out there. Seriously inspired, it looks like something straight out of Cantha. Not Japan, not China, not Asia, but actually Cantha. The mix of western and eastern elements and traditions just mesh something incredibly together. Well done, indeed, Howell.

I don’t know if this counts, but I modeled Ccari’s, my Sylvari’s, outfit after a Fantasy Ronin-esque style, even using the Ceremonial sabres for effect and colouring her outfits after them.

First pic is stylized, second pic is the regular screenshot. Third pic is just a full shot of the outfit.

• Head – Orchid Helm (Tier 2)
• Shoulders – Dryad Epaulets (Tier 3)
• Chest – Snapdragon Coat (Tier 1)
• Hands – Winged Gloves
• Legs – Conjurer Pants
• Feet – Orchid Boots (Not seen, Tier 1)

I have way too many characters to post them all at once. Here’s my Human Warrior, Ranger and Elementalist.

Is it possible that you tried to Solo a dungeon alone at the first shot you got to enter? Otherwise, nice read. Duck/10, would read again.

Calling it a “Solution” is a misnomer. Stacking is not a problem, it’s just something Some people consider a problem. Others consider it to be just fine. Stacking is very much part of ANet’s “Play how you want” policy and if it were to be taken away that’d work directly against ANet’s intentions. Just as you’re allowed to not stack, the option to stack needs to be as real and viable as the opposite. The fact that it is the Favoured method in the LFG over Not Stacking doesn’t transform either of the two playstyles into some sort of objective, universal problem.

The problem arises when people who simply won’t go out of their way to find like-minded individuals decide to just join any random PUG group in LFG and then find themselves in a situation they’re uncomfortable/unamused with. This in turn is nothing but an after-effect of the shortcomings of the LFG-system (Which, admittedly, is still in Beta), faulty/lacking information in the advertisement from the posted groups and personal laziness on accord of the player seeking a group.

However, every individual needs to ask themselves the following questions before they start blaming the system or the trends for all their “Lack of fun”:

If you’re joining a PuG on LFG:

• Did the LFG post state, literally or insinuated, the requirements that I was looking for?
• Were there any level of communication within the group I joined?
• Did the group and myself agree on the specific requirements and what exactly they entailed?
• Am I certain I was teamed with like-minded individuals?
• Failing all the above, did I try to create my own group with requirements after my own heart?

If you’re creating a group in LFG:

• Am I entirely clear with my intentions in the advertisement post?
• Is there any communication from the ones who join me?
• Is it a good time of the day to be looking for people?
• Can I expect people that join me to have read and understood my requirements? (This is a trick question. The answer is always no)
• Am I patient enough to wait for my group to fill up?
• If I’m in a hurry, or just impatient, am I willing to compromise my personal enjoyment factor for the sake of having a casual run?

If everything just isn’t working for you:

• Have I looked for a guild and/or community that suits my needs?
• Have I considered starting and advertising for a guild and/or community that suits my needs?

If you can’t answer yes to all of the above (Save for the obvious trick question) then you really have no place complaining about playstyles and how they aren’t conforming to you and your personal preferences, unless you’re actually looking to get shot down by people from the other camp. Claiming there’s a problem with stacking is just as redundant and subjective as it would be to claim that there’s a problem with not stacking. Or that people should stop eating cheese because you think cheese is gross and thus it must be gross.

And Scruffy is the Mystery Machine.

From a Lore Standpoint, any profession is just as viable for any race. Charr dislike Magic and treat it with suspiscioun, but when push comes to shove they really couldn’t care less wether you rain steel, mortars or flaming meteors straight out of the skies on your enemies, as long as you get the job done and follow orders. One member of your Warband is even an Elementalist, Euryale, and you can later on recruit a Necromancer just as well.

Norn can logically be any profession, they do not take specific pride in physical prowess over intellectual prowess after all. All a Norn cares about is making their legend by being the very best (That noone ever was) in whatever they set out to master, be it smithing, hunting, elementalism or mitten weaving.

Sylvari are curious and tries their hand at just about anything they come across. Furthermore, their unique form of birth and afterlife (Awakening and presumably returning to the dream) gives them a whole other view on death, removing any bad stigma humans, charr or other lifeforms have of it.

Even Asura can be anything they want. If their profession requires physical strength or resilience, they’ll use magitech to weigh up against other races, if not focusing on other aspects such as speed and agility.

I’ll admit to brainfarting on behalf of the Elementalist and Soft CC. For some reason I totally forgot about half their skills. I always get impatient at the end of my posts and just try to finish them as quickly as possible.

As for Mesmer, I know the PvE Meta is Phantasm Zerkers, Zerker is The PvE meta after all, for all professions. Necromancer and Engineer PvE meta is also Zerker and not conditions, but like Mesmer they have very niched or non-existant roles in PvE for the most part, so I felt it more prudent to jolt down their main strengths instead (Even if it’s in other game modes).

Actually, you’re wrong about DPS being the only deciding factor. The core system relies on Damage, Support and Control, in all game modes and across all professions. No exceptions. The only reason people think it’s a DPS race is because of Berserker gear being the PvE Meta, but they forget all about sPvP and WvW where there’s an entirely different Meta.

• Damage – Self-explenatory, but comes in two distinct forms: Direct Damage, and Condition Damage (DoT’s). In PvE, Direct Damage is favorable, especially in teams and against World bosses because Conditions Cap way too easily, and even those with lower Condition Damage can overwrite your conditions easily, and constantly. In sPvP and WvW (Roaming) though, where you’ll often find yourself in 1vX situations, Condition Damage can be beastly however, and it allows you to slot more Defensive stat combos to be effective compared to Direct Damage.

Guardian and Elementalist are typically Direct Damage professions, Necromancer, Engineer and Mesmer are typically Condition Damage professions, Warrior, Ranger and Thief are about equally good at both. Certain builds deviate from the norm, of course, so don’t feel locked down to either of the two because of your profession. Hybrid builds are generally not useful, it’s better to focus on either Direct or Condition damage.

• Support – Support is the second cornerstone of GW2 and refers to the use of Boons, Conditions, Condition Removal, Heals, Blocks, Evades, Unique Buffs, Projectile Reflection, Wards and Combo Fields. Timing is everything, and I strongly advocate getting to know what kind of Support you can offer and to readily, and consciously, training to use it effectively just as you train to deal damage or dodge appropriately. Do not fall into the trap of thinking that you need Healing Power gear to be a good supporter, you don’t. What turns the tide in GW2 Is not Bursts of Healing, but correctly timed appliance of Boons, blocks and dodges.

Guardian is the undisputed king of Defensive support, bringing crazy levels of Condition Removal, Aegis, Heals, Projectile Reflection/Blocking, Wards, Protection and Stability. They’re also extremely good at stacking Might if built right.
Elementalist is the Queen then, bringing more Might and Fury buffs through their fire fields and blast finishers than any other profession. They can also spike heal by blasting Water Fields as well, and they’ve got a few more defenses lined up as well that can be used in a pinch.
Warrior and Ranger both bring unique buffs (Banners, Empower Allies and Phalanx Strength / Spotter and Frost Spirit respectively) to the party, making them useful allies at all times.
Engineer brings both Fire, water and smoke fields, amongst plenty of blasts, however they’re not as good as Elementalists in this regard and have lower overall DPS.
Mesmer brings portals, projectile defense and the wonderful Signet of Inspiration Boon share, but can’t reliably stack boons on the party themselves. They’re useful in certain situations, but mostly lose out to Guardians in that aspect.
Thief brings Loads of Stealth, Projectile Blocking and the only Energy Restoration skill in the game. Doesn’t sound like a lot, but what they have make a difference.
Necromancer brings almost no support to the team. They have some condition conversion and traits for support, but overall they’re much weaker than the other professions in this regard.

• Control – The last, but not least, aspect of the GW2 trinity is Control, which refers to the use of Hard CC (Knocks, Stuns etc), Soft CC (Cripple, Blind etc) and Line of Sight (LoS). Knowing when and where to throw down Hard CC or Soft CC is the key to mastering Control, and it will show on the player if they know how to do it properly or not, so do not skip out on this practice either.

Guardian has a few Launches and Wards, but they really shine while Spamming Blinds and Vulnerability on enemies.
Elementalists have a few Hard CC skills, but lack a lot in terms of Soft CC.
Warrior have Loads of Stuns and Knocks, loads of Cripple, Weakness and Vulnerability.
Ranger have Good Soft CC, not a lot in terms of Hard CC.
Thief is The king of Soft CC, best Blind spammer of the professions, Perma-Weakness/Cripple, Loads of Vulnerability.
Mesmer has pulls, knocks, dazes and some soft CC. They generally rely on clones and stealth to mindgame other players.
Engineer is the jack-of-all-trades and brings a little bit of everything. They can easily stack loads of conditions on enemies in a flash. They mostly rely on Soft CC, but their Hard CC skills are usually quick and good for surprise moves.
Necromancer makes up for what they lacked in Support, with their Control ability. No other profession can use Fear as readily as they can and they have plenty of Chill, Weakness, Cripple and Boon Corruption/Removal.

I once wasted all my current CoE and CoF tokens on a full armor set. Of the wrong category. I’ve done one or two pieces before, but never a whole, stinking Armor set. Luckily, this was after the patch that made Dungeon Armor account bound on acquire, so I could stuff it in my bank, but maaaaaaaaaaan did that kitten me the right off when I realized there was a load of red text stating “you can’t wear this armor!” in the item description.

To be honest, does it really matter if Puggies wear Cleric or the new Nomad gear? Sure, they’ll lose some DPS, let’s go with 20% just cause. If they were in Cleric gear before, they still weren’t responsible for more than 5% of the team DPS anyway. That means they’re now responsible for a whopping 4% of team DPS instead.
And unlike Cleric gear, Nomad stuff requires actual playing of the game, so all the Casuals will just whine about it and never actually get it.

Overall, won’t actually affect Dungeons at all, seeing as those who will be wearing Nomad stuff were those who ran Sentinel or Cleric before, and you wouldn’t want those on your team anyway.

The real letdown lies in the fact that, as someone stated above, we didn’t get something like POW/Prec/Condi. Damage instead, I’d have loved to experiment with that for Hybrid builds. Nomad gear… I don’t see any actual use for that even in WvW, maybe Zerg-leading Guards? I wouldn’t know.

Not a dungeon, but…

It PUGS me that you didn’t put a Pun on Bugs/Pugs in the title.

For some reason, the resolution and details on all my armor pieces are blurred and unappealing. I’ve tried to change just about every setting in the game but to no avail. Curiously, it only affects Armor pieces and character models, nothing else. Weapons for example are just fine.

Is this some sort of Driver issue? Or am I doing something wrong?

Well, if you can find dedicated “Refs” that wouldn’t mind running along with 64 groups each through the same dungeon path for a whole day, then optimally you’d only need 2 of them (But I honestly doubt that’ll be enough).

Maybe just find ~10 or so that takes turns?

This might be fun for when you feel like just kitten ing around in Dungeons, but my gripe is that you can get Traits that in no way correlate to your weapons or utility skills, basically making them useless. Random can be fun, but eh, I like each of my traits to serve some sort of purpose.

Have the Spectator be a Warrior, without weapons equipped, decked out in something like Shaman/Sentinel/Cleric gear with Healing Signet, Loads of Stances and specced for maximal survival? In that case, he can just stand around during fights, even if he gets attacked he’ll just absorb it all.

Point is, if the Spectator is the same Class with the same Gear and without any weapon, then all teams have the same conditions for clearing the dungeon. Heck, you could even ask people to Act just as Spectators, whose sole purpose is to follow the Team and stream videos, that way every team that runs the dungeon will have the same guy as a ref, plus that every team who participates would be gauranteed to have someone able to Feed their run.

There are downsides of course, not having 5 people as it was meant to be and the fact that the Ref Of course Cannot be part of any of the teams or even Guilds that compete, for the sake of fairness.