Guild Wars 2

sorrychief.2563:

Might as well buff warrior MH sword too because the MH sword autoattack chain doesn’t remove a boon or apply weakness.

Might as well buff my refrigerator too since it doesn’t have a sword; it has just as much to do with this topic as your warrior.

Tyler Chapman.1832:

Little treat for you guys we snuck in today

11. Fixed in feature build

Anyways tomorrow is my last day at ANet so you won’t be seeing this face on the forums any longer. Hopefully this forum visibility helped ease you guys over. Sorry for all the issues we never got around to I did my best to get as many bugs cleared in the last few months as possible.

~see you in game!

When I’m coming to the end of the development of a large project, one of the things I do is have the team pour over all the open bugs and make a final list of things that really need to get fixed before we disband the team and push it into really low maintenance mode.

Sorry to see you go Powerr.

But seriously, fixing a trait that’s been broken since BETA is not a little treat – it’s what should have been done over a year ago.
And significant bugs that last for 1.5 years is not the earmark of a AAA MMO.

I appreciate the ideas you put forth. However I don’t follow your logic. Mesmers were designed around clones in plural. As such, they serve specific functions (damage, conditions, defense, etc).

Do you really think the entire class needs to be redesigned to achieve the intent you have in mind? If so, then why are you still working within the constraints of a the given design?

Honestly it seems like you wanted to change everything around for the sake of changing things around.

Helseth doesn’t have a team anymore, per se. I haven’t seen him run with VotF in weeks. He may be playing mesmer, but he’s not really playing it competitively.
Sensotix is running thief on his team.

ANet will never nerf thieves. You are better off asking ANet to give Mesmers cheese builds like thieves do. I’d start with:

Blurred Frenzy on a 6 second cooldown, resets on crit.
Portal on a 45 second cooldown.
Blink on a 20 second cooldown.
Decoy on a 15 second cooldown.
Increase MH Sword damage by about 45%.

That would put our mobility, stealth and damage output on par with thieves.

It might sound insane, but:

Pistol Whip > Blurred Frenzy
Shortbow 5 > Blink
Shadow Trap > Portal
Thief Sword #1 > Mesmer Sword #1 (by about 45%!)

We should really do an objective analysis of how much more powerful thieves are then Mesmers. It’s insane.

AND… ANet buffed thief regen! wtf?

Tyler Chapman.1832:

Hence why we’ve kept the balance changes to a minimum amount.

Powerr, this makes me think that we’re still going to see the holy quartet of guardian+spirit ranger+warrior+thief.

Maybe this patch will just change it to a holy quintet (+ele) instead of actually changing the meta.

Put our mind at ease. Can you answer these questions about the new build?

Is there a profession/build now that will successfully counter hambow warrior?

Will there be an increased risk or disincentive for teams to bring double hambow?

Is zerker thief dominating all the roamer builds like they are today?

Is there a viable alternative to guardian mid-bunker?

Did you get rid of cheese-decap engie?
————————————————————————————————————————————————————-

And please tell me you guys didn’t do something dumb like give ele’s MORE immunity to conditions.

Hambow warriors are strong because they have:
– passive healing
– lots of CC
– huge AOE burn

And we know they are buffing elementalists.

So what do I predict?

Diamond Skin + near-perma-stability + poison + burst

That will ‘shake up the meta’ because they’ll create some horrible beast out of the elementalists that will make us cry for the days of hambow.

It’s not a problem. Moa one and focus fire him down. He may be alive when the Moa lands, but not for long.

Right before you drop the first warrior, Moa the second one.

Double Moa isn’t necessary (we could have the dropped the warrior in my anecdote with one Moa, but I landed the second Moa to rub it in).

Just a PSA to the mesmers out there.

MOA is a full transformation, meaning all abilities are replaced, including Healing Signet.

Fight cheese with cheese, I say.

I had a fight earlier with a full tank Warrior. There were 2 of us Mesmers fighting on point. You guessed it – double Moa→dead warrior. If I hadn’t known better I would have thought I was in Wisconsin with all that cheese in one place. :-)

Wow, that’s a lot of fixes in a single build. And apparently there are more things to come.

This massive update wouldn’t have anything to do with the upcoming Chinese release, would it?

Xyonon.3987:

Just tought about it. Since it has been announced that it will be fixed next week, it would be a good phant trait. But It seems unreachable (PvE):

We all would like to go for a 10/30/0/30/20 build, but where can we undo the 20 points?

0/30/0/20/0 is a must have I think. So we got 20 points left. 0/30/0/20/20 still seems less useful than 0/30/0/25/15 due the fact that atk speed is just rewarding if burst won’t kill the enemy or the phant won’t die too early. Or shall we really ignore the mantra trait? 0/20/0/30/20? 0/25/0/25/20? I think it’s still too far away since other traits are much more rewarding.

Wait – what’s getting fixed next week?

Josh Davis.6015:

I like both ideas, Thedenofsin. I’ve actually been talking with someone in the community about bringing SOTG or something similar back – I hope it works out.

Let us know if that happens – I used to watch every one of those SoTG videos.

Axelwarrior.9084:

I don’t think Mesmers need a trait overhaul to be effective. I’d say they’re already a pretty strong class and with a variety of viable builds, no less.

I wasn’t shooting for an overhaul. Most of the changes were just moving things around a little.

Axelwarrior.9084:

I like the Elite, though. Maybe 10% instead of 15% on the passive?

10% sounds good.

Great stuff Powerr.

Can you explain what is meant by, “after feature build ‘logged’”? I assume you mean, “fixed in a build slated for release after the feature build”.

Also, “Phantasms fire at inconsistent ranges at 800 to 1000 range.” – I believe you said this is as-intended. I’m having difficulty understanding this a little.

The spell actually has a 1200 range, but the Phantasms fire from 800-1000m.

I understand the concept of the 15% buffer range, but shouldn’t that mean the iMage should fire between 1020-1200m?

Josh Davis.6015:

Volrath.1473:

I got a question.

What is the purpose of Ready ups?

Good question. I’ll take this one! Before I was hired at ArenaNet I ran show called “Guild Wars 2 Guru’s State of the Game”. Aside from the forums, it was one of the main bridges we had with the developers behind PvP and balance. Unfortunately for the show, last summer I was hired on at ArenaNet and had to shut it down.

I know we can’t always talk about extensively about what’s in development, but ideally we’d like for Ready Up to fill that gap, even if we’re just goofing around on stream a bit, playing some casual games. Ready Up happens twice as often as State of the Game did, and we won’t always have things to preview. That said, when we are finally ready to show something off, Ready Up is going to be the place you’re going to check it out.

So it’s the ANet PR version of SoTG?

Honestly Grouch, I’d rather have the old SoTG back. What if the community put together a SOTG every couple of weeks and you guys sat in on them occasionally and provided feedback?

Oh – I’ve got an even better idea. Every week how about some of your Balance Team guys sit down and review the Mists weekly PvP match, then post some commentary reviewing the gameplay and your thoughts about how the game, and the meta, played out.

You could call it: Grouch’s Corner

I totally forgot about the passive for Signet of Chaos… How about:

Reduces the cooldown of your shatter skills by 15%

Azukas.1426:

1. I wouldn’t support any nerf to stacks of confusion from iMage. Even with this “nerfed” confusion, I can get it to tick for over 1500 with ease, so I wouldnt want it reduced to 2 stacks. Is rather see it upped to 5 stacks instead of what you proposed.

2. No need for all these stacks of might. I’d rather see more conditions over might.

Thanks for your reply.

Re #1) For group fights, the suggested iMage change could be a nerf to confusion stacks. However, for 1v1 fights, it would be significant buff, as the bounce would be permitted to bounce back. Right now the attack is not allowed to bounce back. Having it bounce up to 3 times could put 6 stacks of confusion on an enemy. If you popped Ether Signet, that’s 12 stacks of confusion every 5 seconds. Combine that with Scepter #3 and now it’s 17 stacks of confusion. (!!!)

Re #2) Regarding conditions vs might: I personally don’t want to see more conditions in the meta than there are now.

Carighan.6758:

That is to say, I’d nerf the element you’re trying to match, like easy access to Swiftness, Vigor or Lyssa-effect. Nerf them, they’re too available. We don’t need to do an arms-race in that regard, really.

I agree with you. I should have prefaced this post with the assumption that ArenaNet wasn’t going to actually make any substantial nerfs, as that seems to be there M.O. these days.

Raunchy.6891:

Changing scepter like that would make it have far too much clone generation unless you slow the cast speed of Ether Bolt by a lot.

It would increase clone generation a lot. Right now clone generation on the scepter is very slow, and the attack chain is tied to the projectile. So you have to wait for the projectile to reach its target as well. At 900m range, clone generation is pathetic. I think 3 attacks on the weapon chain just makes it too clumsy. If the clone generation is too fast with a 2 attack chain, then slowing the bolt would be a good alternative.

Raunchy.6891:

Also I’m not completely following what you mean with the blocks. So our block would act as another classes shield block I get that.
Also how the counters would work seems strange. So you wouldn’t have quick access to a blind or daze because you have to spend the first 2 seconds channeling a block.

The way it would work is much the way it does now. Scepter 2 and Sword 4 would block for the full duration, unless you ‘double tap’ the button. However, if you successfully block, the button would change to the counter attack. That counter attack would remain available for, say, 7 seconds after the first block before returning to normal.

Raunchy.6891:

I also don’t see much point in Phantasmal Mage putting reveal on a target. I don’t think that mechanic should be given to AI. Although to me this is just a minor gripe because I want this game to be more technical than it currently is.

I agree. However, I think Mesmers need better counters against thieves than they do now. Ideally I would like to see Mesmers have a weapon that would make thieves panic if they saw a Mesmer, much the same way Mesmers have to panic whenever they see a thief with.. well… anything equipped. iMage just seemed like a good place to put the attack, and 1 second of revealed on a 5 second cooldown on a slow-moving projectile seemed like a decent place to put it. It would force thieves to pay attention to the iMage and perhaps prioritize killing it.

Raunchy.6891:

Now this signet is a good idea. The only thing that could make it or break it would be the passive. Also I think there should be specific conditions applied but I can see how making it random can help both power and condition builds.

Yeah, I really like the idea of a signet Elite on a relatively short cooldown. I agree about the random part, but hey – it’s a Signet of Chaos. It’s gotta be random. :-)

Iavra.8510:

Too much revealed stuff. Rather than giving us (or any class) access to revealed, tone down stealth (be it for thieves, mesmer, engis or even rangers) if needed.

I understand what you’re saying, but I don’t think ANet is going to nerf thief stealth. Also, there’s only 1 revealed in all the changes. The others are simple de-stealths (with no revealed). And they happen if a stealthed opponent attacks while you are blocking, or on Mind Stab.

1) Thieves would actually have to be a little worried if they saw a Mesmer with a torch. That in itself is great. :-)
2) Thieves would get unstealthed if they attacked a Mesmer that was blocking. It would only punish players who are not paying attention.
3) Mind Stab unstealth is good risk/reward. The attack has a small AoE radius and a cast animation, so it would require quick timing for the Mesmer and/or a bit of luck.

Mesmers are not viable in the meta. Their primary issues stem from Thieves being the Apex Predator for roaming, a super-heavy bunker meta, and slow out-of-combat movement.
The following are a list of changes I would implement to make Mesmers viable, if I were a developer.

Domination
Ilusion of Vulnerability: Removed
Dazzling: Moved from Master minor trait to Adept Minor Trait.
Empowered Illusions: Moved from Adept Major to Master Minor Trait.
New Adept Major Trait: Arresting Influence Successfully blocking an attack grants might you might (3x, 5 seconds) and burns your foe (1s).
Reason: More build diversity (lockdown, signet, condition) without sacrificing Phantasm damage. Extra damage is warranted given the heavy bunker meta.

Dueling:
Protected Mantras: Removed
New Trait: Expeditious Mantras: Using a mantra grants the Mesmer and allies Swiftness (4 seconds, 360m radius, no cooldown)
Reason: Gives Mesmers on-demand swiftness which is good for PvP, PvE and WvW, but at the cost of a Mantra charge (and utility slot). This is a good trade and good utility. Could be used to vary up team structures.
Blurred Inscriptions: Activating a Signet now grants the Mesmer 1.5 seconds of Distortion and all active illusions 2 seconds of Distortion (up from 1 second).
Reason: Makes signet Mesmer more viable and provides situational use – can blow a signet to save illusions from short-duration AoE and the like.

Inspiration:
Vengeful Images moved to Adept Major trait. Now grants Phantasms 15 seconds of Retaliation
Vigorous Revelation moved to Adept Minor trait. Now grants 4 seconds of vigor per Illusion shattered
Reason: Mesmers need to dodge to remain competitive. Don’t care what ANet says. This move decouples crit-stacking and Vigor. Opens up build diversity a smidge. Vigor-on-shatter for a 5 point investment is good.

Weapon Skills:
Mind Stab: Stealthed targets hit by Mind Stab will be unstealthed (does not cause revealed)
Reason: Mesmers need some anti-thief tools. Mind Stab has a very small radius, so this would require some good timing/guess-work to pull a thief out of stealh. Good risk/reward.

Scepter Auto Attack: Ether Blast removed. Ether Bolt and Ether Clone damage scaling increased 15%. Clones created by Ether Clone attack with 33% of the Mesmer’s Weapon and Attack Power.
Reason: Scepter 1 auto-attack chain is terrible and the clones it generates are nigh-useless. This will increase clone generation speed and make Scepter clones useful. 33% AP is equivalent to about 2-3 bleed stacks – in-line with a Necromancer’s scepter attack.

Illusionary Counter: Blocks all attacks for 2 seconds. Blocked attacks unstealths opponents (does not cause revealed). Counter attack now controlled by Mesmer (up to 7 seconds after block).
Illusionary Riposte: Blocks all attacks for 2 seconds. Blocked attacks unstealths opponents (does not cause revealed). Counter attack now controlled by Mesmer (up to 7 seconds after block).
Reason: Provides Mesmers with better protection against attack spam. Thieves can easily spam attack to proc the counter attack and dodge it, basically making the entire ability a waste. This gives the Mesmer more sustain from spam and gives the Mesmer control over when to launch the counter-attack.

Phantasmal Warden: now fixed
Phantasmal Mage: Attack rate increased by 17% (from 6 seconds to 5 seconds). Damage scaling increased by 15%. Attacks can now bounce back to targets already hit. Max number of targets reduced from 5 to 3. Stacks of confusion reduced from 3 to 2. Attacks cause 1 second of revealed to targets.
Reason: iMage sucks with the nerfs to retaliation and confusion. Allowing the bouncing attack to bounce back increases the potential damage output of iMage for condition builds while increasing the damage scaling improves its performance for damage builds.

Temporal Curtain: Grants 12 seconds of swiftness. Refreshes swiftness (up to 12 seconds) when players cross the curtain.
Reason: This is really how it should work. :-)

Phantasmal Disenchanter: Increased HP by 33%. Cast time reduced to 0.75 seconds
Phantasmal Defender: Cast time reduced to 0.75 seconds.
Reason: These are way too long to cast. Disenchanter is good, but its HP pool is way too small. 33% increase means it will die in 3-4 hits.

New Elite:
Signet of Chaos: Grants the Mesmer and all Illusions: Swiftness (30 seconds) 5x stacks of Might (15 seconds) Your next 4 attacks apply a random condition to your opponent and a random boon to the Mesmer Cooldown: 60 seconds
Reason: With Warriors and thieves spamming Lyssa every 45 seconds, Mesmers need something equivalent. Additionally, swiftness uptime would be great for WvW and solo/hotjoin PvP.

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

Riddle: people tend to bring their leftover bread and old vegetables at my build, what am i?

Answer: A PettingZoo
New Riddle: When you fight over me, watch your step! What am i?

Glass panel in Skyhammer

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

Riddle: You won’t have to think about me during combat, just watch your health. What am i?

Agony?

Allie Murdock.8152:

Monthly basis is not 100% feasible right now like it was before.

Why is it not 100% feasible? Is it 80% feasible? Because I’d take a monthly update 80% of the time. Is it 50% feasible? Because I’d take 6 pvp updates a year. Right now it’s looking more like it’s 20% feasible, which is not acceptable.

League of Legends can push out a balance update every 2 weeks, and they aren’t even a self-titled AAA MMO. GW2 is a self-proclaimed AAA MMO – why shouldn’t the community expect regular updates to PvP?

This is not specific to EOTM, but for the life of me I cannot understand why I cannot launch cows with a catapult in WvW. If nothing else, it should be in treb mastery.

Fetchez La Vache!

Do you know if these fights were streamed? Linky?

Allie Murdock.8152:

We expect the feature build to sufficiently shake up the current meta. There will be lots… of fresh… stuff…

Monthly basis is not 100% feasible right now like it was before. We tried to bring you guys consistent updates, but as you noticed not all of them really shook up the meta. The upcoming build will do a better job at that for you. Hopefully in a good way.

OK here are some questions:

What is the ‘meta’ today, as defined by ArenaNet? I know what it is based upon watching and playing the game, but I want to know what ANet’s position is on that.

If you can’t get into details, can you list what roles you expect to be ‘shaken up’ by the meta?

Bunker?
Side Bunker?
Roamer?
Group DPS/Support?

Also, if we can’t even expect a monthly update, then how about you guys push all the knobs to adjust spell coefficients and durations into some kind of user-defined format via custom arenas, and just let the user community balance the game for you? That would free up your Balance Team to go do other things.

Nice post OP. However, this is GW2, where it takes 5+ months to change the coefficient of a single healing signet.

The kind of changes you are discussing are not possible with the teams and processes in place.

The PVP fixes in this game are actually worse than what I witnessed in Rift.

And Rift has the worst PvP in the history of MMOs.

HS Warrior, decap engie, et. al.

Id love to see a warrior wielding a halibut.

Fish Wars 2

PU is a cheesy build, but it can be effective against most opponents. HS Warrior, bunker guardian, thief, decap engie will still beat PU mesmer most of the time, given equal skill levels.

PU gives you enough survivability in many cases to run with Ether Signet, which can be a lot of fun. Starting a fight with double iBeserkers as a DPS PU can put your opponent in a huge hole.

Caedmon.6798:

Liewec.2896:

Sunt.6835:

How do you guys lose to hammer warrior ?

i mean srly stuns are annoying but i have no idea why u would lose in this heavy condi meta.

conditions? on a hammer war? yay.
hammer wars get a condi-clear every 7 seconds, which comes with a nice AoE stun and it also deals 4k damage.
after that the passive 545 healing every single second (thats 32,700 healing every minute without even doing anything) will top off whatever damage you managed to tickle away.

meanwhile they’re critting you with the damage of a glass cannon,
and if you’re lucky you’ll have stability, otherwise you’ll be stunlocked too.

balanced.

Wich can all be countered…I could sum up some nice things about most other classes that look plain ridiculous aswell.Also a warr, cannot cleans condis every 7 sec have constant 545 hp regen while still using earthshake right away..It doesnt work like that,and dont even talk about dogged march because thats just 3 sec of hp regen.

Double warrior is still the meta. Fact. That means warriors are overpowered, by ANet’s own definition. No high level competitive team enjoys double warrior. Fact.
If you think all that healing, CC, AoE burn, condition clear and stability can be countered, then that says everything I need to know about your skill level and perception of ‘balance’. It’s that mentality, combined with the Balance Teams ‘balancing’ that has ruined tPvP in this game, in my opinion.

runeblade.7514:

Okay, Anet nerfs hammer warriors to death. So what is next? A new meta will pop up and you will complain about that too.

I will be happy because I’m sick of this double warrior cheese meta.

And so aren’t all the competitive teams. Most of them refuse to run it, even though it’s the best comp. That should tell you something.

That should tell ArenaNet something.

Cynz.9437:

Thedenofsin.7340:

That’s nothing. Look at last week’s tournament:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv2_1BB1zmw

Deku.3129:

……..you can’t just spend all your init on dodging. This is like saying eles firegrab combo is op. It just isn’t relevant.

Yes you can. Most thieves spend the majority of their init on dodging and kill using autoattack.

that double sb thief is not really killing anyone… sb aa does like 500 dmg lol

1. 500 damage with 0.25 recharge is enough damage to kill any profession
2. He was naked
3. He wasn’t trying to kill anyone.

That’s not balanced. At all. It’s so broken that Blu and Jebro just laughed at it. I think Blu even said, “This is the game”. And that’s not good.

That’s nothing. Look at last week’s tournament:

Deku.3129:

……..you can’t just spend all your init on dodging. This is like saying eles firegrab combo is op. It just isn’t relevant.

Yes you can. Most thieves spend the majority of their init on dodging and kill using autoattack.

Thieves are OP and keep all the roamers out. Warriors are OP and keep the rest of the group fighters out, except for Spirit Ranger because his passive buffs are insane and he brings an autorez pet.
And Guardians bring all the buff sharing goodness.

They need to:
Give healing signet a passive heal component and an on-hit heal component
Decrease the HP of the spirit rez pet
Decrease berserker stance duration
Remove the healing from cleansing ire
Reduce thief auto attack damage by 30%
Reduce the duration and radius of warrior longbow burst

Deifact.3095:

What would be a possible solution to this? Make all characters human in WvW ? Increase asura size in WvW? (Scary!) I’m genuinely interested as to how this could be fixed reasonably.

A menu option that allows me to select a default character model for all PCs.

in PvP, Blu has already taken the initiative and banned Asuras from the NA weekly tournaments. https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/events/Mistpedia-Weekly-NA-Cup-Saturdays/first#post3723064

I applaud him for taking the initiative. I think the community needs to take the initiative and develop rulesets to work around the shortcomings in balance.

Considering it’s trivial for a thief to blind you in under a second, I think 0.75 is the right number. These are defensive Phantasms, not offensive ones. At a minimum they should be the same cast time, if not shorter.

Rainbow Sprint.3215:

The problem is that WE know the dragon has woke up, but there is no way our characters would know that until it attacks.

I think ArenaNet will tie up that loose end in the next LW installment in 2 weeks. They’ll find some way to reveal to the characters that the dragon as awakened.

Vuh,

I think you are better off just making that thread on reddit.com/r/GuildWars2, then linking it here. That will accomplish 3 things:

1) It won’t get deleted there
2) You won’t get infracted/banned for posting it there
3) The developers are more likely to read it.

Dual.8953:

stof.9341:

Fortus.6175:

Bran.7425:

Fortus.6175:

but I can guarantee you that the VAST najority of the players in gw2 would gladly have balance classes over toxic, unbalanced, annoying classes such as thieves currently.

That statement is equal bias as you should only speak for yourself not the vast “najorities”

Please show me a thread where people want classes to remain unbalanced and toxic.

You know, maybe the bias is not in the fact people might want or not the presence of toxic unbalanced classes, but that the thief is toxic and/or unbalanced in the first place.

And if thieves get nerfed to the point that they’re no longer “considered” the best roamer? Where will they go after that?

Then thieves will have to compete with Elementalists and Mesmers for the role of roamer on the team.

Then we may see more diverse team compositions. OH THE HORROR!

I’d start with:

Pistol Whip: No longer evades
Dagger #1 and Sword #1 damage reduced by 30% (including Stealth)
Black Powder: Now a dark field
Dagger Training: Also increases Backstab damage by 30%

Right now thieves do a ton of damage with their auto-attack and can conserve their initiative for movement and defensive abilities. Reducing auto-attack damage now forces them to make more tactical decisions.

Alice.8694:

It’s a nice idea but seems to be ultimately flawed by one simple fact.

The Op implies that scarlet had further plans, while the game does not support this. This seems to be the end game. And for proof I direct you to the console within the drill itself which was specifically designed not to be turned off regardless of scarlet’s well being.

She designed the plan to go on without her; this is her end game.

Having the drill go on does not imply this was her end game. It implies it is a piece of a process which she had no intention of stopping.

Further, I believe the game does support the idea she had further plans.

1. She created a watchwork army which she did not need to invade Lion’s Arch. This includes the Clockwork Oakheart, a twisted mechanized version of a potential minion of Mordemoth.
2. She created a mega-laser which she did not need to invade Lion’s Arch
3. She created hybrid Toxic monsters which she did not need to invade Lion’s Arch

There’s all these things she made along the way that she did not need to accomplish the goal of waking Mordremoth. However, these are all things which would be useful if she were to mount an assault on Mordremoth.

I believe the writers want you to think this is the end game. However, I’m pretty sure it’s not. Scarlet is dead, but I believe in LW Season 2 we will learn more about Scarlet’s true intentions.

“Caithe, someday you’ll see, Tyria needs me.” -Scarlet

I think that prophetic statement will become evident in LW Season 2, once we begin to face Mordremoth. We’ll need Scarlet, because we will discover that Scarlet had devised a plan on how to kill Mordremoth.

stay on topic, please.

iDisenchanter and iDefender.

That’s just one of them

ANet,

Have you changed your mind about the 8% HS nerf? I think the community would like to know if you plan on keeping the cheese meta around after this patch or not.

eleshazar.6902:

I don’t think you can compare this to warrior (or guardian) channeled melee skills. Warrior especially is tankier (even in it’s zerk form [yes my warrior is a zerk]), and can take hits while channeling their attack. A zerker thief would never be able to get off a single PW. Compare it instead to the mesmer blurred frenzy. Mesmers are a little tankier (mid tier health) but they have an evade all throughout that skill. Just no stun.

It’s fine to compare it to blurred Frenzy. However, mesmers are less tanky due to having fewer defensive abilities, less stealth, less access to blinds and teleports and wear light armor.

So pistol whip is like Blurred Frenzy, except Pistol Whip does more damage, stuns, has no cooldown and thieves have better damage and survivability than Mesmers.

So…yeah, it’s OP.

Allie Murdock.8152:

FYI, we don’t think it’s balanced. That’s why we’re still balancing it.

The OP actually makes a good point, though. For this particular feature build, we have not shared much about what’s going on, we get that. Don’t mistake that with we’re not doing much, though.

Thanks for the feedback

Are you balancing it Allie? I mean, truly, are you balancing it? Powerr the other day even said you guys were changing so much in this next build that you weren’t too sure how the balance would play out.

That tells me you aren’t actively balancing it. It tells me you are tossing everything in a blender and waiting to see what comes out.

I want my PvP to be a Chateaubriand, not meatloaf.

Allie Murdock.8152:

Hey everyone,

I’ve been seeing a lot of threads pop up with varying feedback about this skill. I’d appreciate it if you guys could toss some feedback in this thread about the skill, and try to be as concise as possible.

Also, try to answer these questions:

• Do you main Thief?
• When do you feel that Pistol Whip is unbalanced? (scenarios would be great)
  • How does it feel unbalanced compared to other class mechanics?
• What would you do to change Pistol Whip to better fit the class/game?

Additionally, if you feel Pistol Whip is exactly what it needs to be, I would like you to say so in this thread.

This thread is for me personally so I can properly communicate to the designers how you guys feel about it.

Thanks!

Allie,

The root cause is the Balance Team did a flat buff to thief regen several months ago. This made many abilities much more spammable than before.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that a spammable aoe ability that evades, stuns and does damage is overpowered.

The right answer would be to go back and tune down thief regen. They didn’t need the buff at all, considering they were all alone in the top roamer spot before the buff.

Given the balance team’s pattern of fixing their mistakes with band-aids, I’d recommend they increase the cost of pistol whip from 5 to 8 initiative.

I don’t play a thief. I play one of those classes that isn’t viable in the Meta because of thieves. (pick any one)

I’m talking about PvP. 1v1 is not a game mode.

Right now iDisenchanter dies in one hit from a hambow hammer. That’s not viable – that’s useless.

It should be either 0.5 or 0.75 seconds. Also, the current meta has so much AoE that these utilities are not durable enough to be useful. They need to have their hp boosted, especially for the disenchanter.

urdriel.8496:

mesmer is one of the best 1vs1 classes…….

and butter goes good on toast. But neither of those things have anything to do with GW2.

You want to 1v1? Go play Street Fighter. Thanks.

These utility skills have a 1.5 second cast time, making them next to impossible to get off in today’s cheese meta.

They need to have their cast time cut down drastically and their hp increased.

Also, you need to make Mesmers viable in your cheese meta.

Thanks.