Guild Wars 2

Well, at least it’s a good thing those Rangers don’t have AoE snares, fears, immobiles and knockdowns on short cooldowns.

Vydahr.4285:

Tman.6349:

Sorry for the negativity. I just don’t get it. Pretty sad that it’s now, arguably, better to take scepter in a power build instead of axe. :/

And this is why I switched. Even not counting condis, the scepter hits harder, even per second. Which… Is kinda sad. Buuut…. The scepter at least keeps with the look of a focus and staff

Not mention the 900 range and the poison uptime which, sadly, in the current celestial meta offers more offensive utility by itself than the Axe’s single boon removal. If scepter could build lifeforce better, it wouldn’t even be a debate. :/

The only thing I can think of to justify the new/future Axe changes, is that they intend to buff it quite a bit and have to normalize it and prevent the possibilities of exploits.

Right now we have a janky animation and a 0.25 sec (25%) increase in cast completion for an already weak, single-target autoattack on a 600 range ‘power weapon’.

Then we have the upcoming (ridiculous imo) nerf to Axe Training with the cool down reduction being tied to some convoluted rotation of autoattacks. The cd reduction nerf is also being paired with a nerf to the 10% damage modifier, which will then require Cripple on you target. Unholy Feast is the Axe’s only source of Cripple and gives 33% Cripple uptime (if not cleansed). In order to make the best of the damage modifier, axe will have to be paired with warhorn which has a tiny range, doesn’t synergize with axe well, and renders the 600 range of the axe useless anyway. And this is all supposed to “make a more dynamic and active weapon”? What a joke.

I just can’t begin to understand these changes without some form/intention of compensation.

Are the gonna finally give the axe a 900 range that we’ve asked for forever? Is Ghastly Claws gonna be made a whirl finisher? Is Unholy Feast gonna become a blast finisher?

We’ll have 3 power weapons. Two of them are melee: a single-target (two really) dagger with quick attacks and a cleaving greatsword with slow, powerful attacks. And…/sigh…then there’s GW2’s true ‘black sheep’ of all the weapons in the game: a medium-ish range, single target power weapon with pathetic damage, little synergy with the rest of the Necro as a whole, AND now it’s looking to get gutted further, to the point of being more of a liability than anything else.

Sorry for the negativity. I just don’t get it. Pretty sad that it’s now, arguably, better to take scepter in a power build instead of axe. :/

Let’s not forget the upcoming Nerf to ‘Axe Training’ with this garbage. I can’t even imagine the thoughts of whoever thought these changes were warranted/justified. This is just ridiculous in every sense cpof the word. I guess…maybe…Axe was Necro’s go-to weapon and was dominating every aspect of the game…oh..wait… :/

I never implied it was a good thing. O.o and, no matter what for or how useful it is anywhere, my point was that this makes a Master Minor trait useless. As for the party support aspect, I couldn’t have made my empathy more clear past stating that I main PvP Necro.

Don’t give up. This is a bug, and not a ‘feature’.

Kamara.4187:

If Anet wants to make serious money they will make GH’s able to be decorated with seating. Every game I’ve been in that had deco and housing made big cash off of players with a pinch for decorating….

Yeah. Since the announcement, I’ve got an officer (who LOVES to help the guild and is very much into fashion/(gemstore)/etc) who has received complete authority over the Guild Hall when it’s finally implemented. We’re saving/storing funds to help, but some people LOVE this sort of thing and will spare no expense/time to make it perfect. I’m very excited to see what she comes up with. I’m only saddened at the fact that the Guild/Alliance/Guild Hall system wasn’t carried over from GW1 (GW2’s ‘guild’ system is absolute trash in comparison), but I’m hopeful that this long wait will be worth it.

Yes Aguri, that’s generally true for Thief in PvP, but that’s not the only place Thieves are used. Also, what about SA line taking a hard Nerf with this bug or stealth rezzes or one of Thief’s few condi removals being severely hampered? Saying ‘eh, good thieves don’t stay in stealth that long anyway’ is completely wrong and nonsense. This is coming from someone that uses Necro/Mesmer for PvP BTW.

Plz fix this soon Anet. Why in the hell do we need 4 bug hotfixes after the very minescule patch/gemstore update today anyway?

Exactly. It never was 4. It was 2. They raised it to 4. Going from 2 to 4 is the opposite of what we’ve asked for for a long time now, and that is zero. Remove the profession dailies and replace with something that doesn’t drastically alter matchups. I thought my short quip was simple enough for anyone who’s seen one of the couple dozen past threads about this. Apologies for being vague, though.

Four goes in the opposite direction of zero….

Conditions tick per second. This is why they’re referred to as ‘DoTs’ (damage over time) and scale with condition damage. It would be a silly precedent to have ONE trait that ignores this general rule.

Mhmm. And that’s exactly why I said what I said in my posts. Soooo….?

*addendum (stupid tablet): and even pve, in general, BUT don’t be surprised if our stale, neglected dungeon content remains with a very rigid, the different, meta.

I’m excited overall. (My TP speculations MAY have little to do with all of this. Hehe.)

The good thing about all this meta talk (in all modes of the game) is that, with HoT, it is all about to be turned on it’s head. Not saying that I have a problem with ‘Meta’ in general, as I’ve been in an organized dungeon speedclear team, a ‘TP Baron’, a ‘go-to’ guild leader, and an sPvP enthusiast for nearly 3 years, but, so far, HoT release is looking to shake things up more than ever before. There will still be NO TRINITY ( so those idiots, after 3 years, can kick rocks), BUT I don’t think meta builds will be so cut-n-dry anymore. Condensed (more efficient/bang-for-the-buck traits) traitlines, stats moved from traitlines and normalized to base/gear, three FULL traitlines, AND new traitlines/utilities/weapons can’t Resist (hehe) shaking up every gamemode.

With other statements from Anet, like “each new specialization will gain existing utility types with the intention of introducing new/powerful, specific Runes/Sigils in the future (ie. Rune of Radiance and Rune of the Trapper)”, builds aren’t gonna be a matter of ‘take the best of the worst [here]’ like we’ve seen in the past.

The PvP/WvW will become much more complex

The best reason I can think of to not run meta is to run ‘anti-meta’ tbh. Very few understand or do this though. Meta Engi, Mesmer, and Lb Ranger can all be wrecked my condis, but few people are running condis b/c the amount of condi clears (including aoe) vs several of the other meta builds, ie war, ele, and guard mostly. The celestial builds rely heavily on boons, but very few people are running heavy boon removal/corruption builds at all. The berserker meta builds mostly have little condi removal and are rendered nearly useless with high Weakness uptime, yet 99% of the PvP playerbase have absolutely no clue how incredibly powerful Weakness is as a defensive condi.

There are plenty of reasons to not run 100% meta builds. Anti-meta builds are the #1 reason imo, but also meta builds are often crafted in a vacuum and tweaked to re-enforce themselves. If everyone only ever ran meta builds, then the meta would never change outside of sweeping changes to the game/mechanics by the Dev’s.

There’s also the reason that some don’t like how the meta builds play. Whether its a case of using setups they don’t like or preferring condi over direct damage or vice versa. Their build my not be top tier tourney material but they have spent a lot of time on it and have tweaked this build and it is what tuey feel most comfortable/productive with. Minion Masters are a good example of this type of group I’m trying to explain.

The worst ever reason (and I couldn’t possibly be more emphatic about this) is the PHIW ‘anti-conformist’ hipster crowd who believes running their I’ll conceived crap build is “good enough” and "at least they’re not being like everyone else (ie Metabattles per se). These are your ‘bunker’ Thieves/Mesmers, your ‘Healer/Support’ Staff Eles/Banner Warriors, etc. In my experience, these are thelayers with the most minescule understanding of PvP (or GW2 in general) yet couldn’t be convinced in a million years that they’re not the coolest to ever grab a mouse and keyboard. Utter frustration here in all my experiences.

Sorry typing from a tablet. Complete with terrible spell check that completely changes words and an inability to ‘reply’ to or edit posts. My most sincere apologies sir.

Asking for balance changes based on what’s accepted in the Dungeon Meta is never gonna be a good starting point.

There’s probably a good reason it’s still not been implemented into PvP in the last two years.

And yes condis work very well outside of huge groups of players. This is their design and seems to have been the intention as well. And I’d you think condi takes a lot of skill or investment or is high risk/reward, just hop over to the PvP forums and ask how they’d feel about the broken Dire stat being added.

The HP sponge mobs are also part of the problem, but no conditions should never be on par with Crit builds(in the short term). Pve mobs don’t clear condis though, so over a longer period I think they will catch up a bit more after the stacking changes. Crit builds require full investment into three stats, utilities AND quite a bit of investments in offensive traits to get the production that we do out of them. Condis can simply invest in one stat (or maybe two for Precision Condi Builds, which also increases direct damage however small) and a small amount of utilities and traits in order to be effective. The rest can be thrown toward heavy defense making sure to stay alive while condis passively tick away (while in stealth, LoSd, dodging, etc). This is the balance the have to work around.

Also, in HUGE groups of players sharing damage taken, sharing boons, body blocking, using aoe/splash healing everywhere, etc, what exactly is the point of “I’m gonna do small amounts of damage over time!” other than just to be different at the cost of your allies? I have never understood this. Condis suck in group scenarios b/c it’s silly for a group of 20 players to stand around trying to ‘bleed out’ a boss…just kill the kitten thing already! Why did you bring a ‘Soloers’ build to a huge group fight anyway?

0/X/0/0/X/X Apothecary with Might stacking.

A Dhuum’fire and Ice’ hybrid build with Rune of the Elementalist?

The projectile mitigation I was referring to is the F3. Backline Eles and Necrosis getting hit/rupted at range? Stand behind them and pop pop F3 while the wreck with Meteor shower and Life Blast or Lich Form. Trying to rez someone while a LB Ranger burst them from a far? Pop F3 to stay safe for the rez to avoid possible rallies. This goes for the F2 as well. Thief tele-d to spike your Necro? F2 over to him and pop the push back bubble for an epic save. I’m not saying it’s incredible right now. I’m just saying that it has potential and we’re in the dark about plenty of things that could change by HoT. No telling what kind of new runes/sigils we could end up seeing either. On of the biggest reasons of using existing utility types and categorize others that aren’t already, is that they have thoughts of creating new runes/sigils in the future for some utilities/specs. We could see a new Shouts rune, Traps rune, Wells rune, maybe a Traps sigil: Traps have 50% reduced cast/trigger time.

And once again ‘backline support’ is a complete term already. It’s not two separate descriptors. Even offensive back-liners are called ‘support’ in the classic sense of terms.
Support is never going to mean heavy healing in this game. Guardian is supportive by nature, and will have a secondary wraponset aside from bow. Back line support describes them just fine.

What profession are you using? I run power Necro and rarely loose against D/D. Patience, chill, weakness and boon corruption are what I have a lit of luck with. Use Well of Suffering, etc to lure dodges before poison/chill/weakness+boon corruption (immobile/knockdown helps here) . Weakness and corrupting Vigor will reduce their change to remove these conditions by taking out theoir dodge/damage. Chillmreduces strong cooldowns and attunement recharge. This will make them incredibly weak for a moment giving you the chance to setup a burst. Playing very aggressive toward them is key. With the huge amount of skills/recovers/boons on low cooldowns, you’re generally best off to end the fight quickly. Drawing the figh out much will almost guarantee your demise. This is just my experience though I’m, by no means, top tier.

Could even keep RP at GM minor and change Furious Demise to the new grandmaster (2% Crit chanceper condi). More reliable, constant increased Crit chance thought a fight would be more useful than short duration fury on DS.

These changes would be good for both full condi and hybrid builds IMO OP. Also, RP kinda sucks tbh. I think the free 2-16% extra crit chance is good for both tbh.
If we could only get one other support trait, allies receive +150 Ferocity (revert Axe Training and add this buff?), could be really nice.

Good changes. Maybe drop Terror down a tier. Make Lingering Curse, but up the increased +Condi Duration to 25%. Would help better with condi builds that don’t want to sustain with DS/RS in order to be stronger at maintaining heavy condi pressure. Also, then it wouldn’t compete with PoC for Dhummfire builds. And with the condi changes, my version would give a bit party support seeing the amount of might/Fury a party can maintain.

Also FitG changed to Grave Master: Entering DS/RS grants 1xStabiliy (5 sec) to allies.
Range: 1200 Allies: 5 * Breaks stun Icd: 10 secs.

Note: 10 sec icd looks low for this trait, but the other traits that would improve this one (and make it OP) are rendered useless by the 10 secs so I believe it is fair and balanced. This includes the fact that having to use it for defense/support greatly hinder DS/RS offensive capabilities on the battlefield.

This could find itself in a variety of builds with either suggested implementaion. Or even make it BM adept depending on how good "Vampiric Aura’ is and where it fits in. Going into BM could up being Adept major: Blood Bond: Up to 5 nearby allies gain 150 Ferocity.
Master major: When entering and exiting Shroud, you and allies gain ‘Vampiric Aura’ for 5 secs.
Vampiric Aura: attacks steal 250 health. 1 sec icd. *number scales same as the Necro’s normal ‘vampiric traits’ is power/healing, affected by bloodthirsty. Numbers could change.

These are practical AND Necro(ey) traits that would help.

A Necro could increase party Crit same by 10% and with good use of DS/RS add some extra team damage/sustain

Trait: Blood Bond. Your passion for death is contagious. Nearby allies gain 150 Ferocity.
Targets: 5

Idk where it could go really.
Blood Magic Master?

Revert ‘Axe Mastery’ change and add ‘Nearby allies gain 150 Ferocity’?

Not to mention that the chill uptime will wreck the CDs of condi removals after they’re burned through. Just some thoughts.

Looks like rapid application of chill+vuln will be good for covers too, IMO.

Dagger immobile- swap to gs- stack chill- shout that pulls enemies- swap to RS chill+stabo+charge- spectral grasp= win? Will still be weak vs teles, bit I don’t it’ll be nearly as easy to escape as we are now.

Also, the BM changes sound like they could even improve base Necro significantly (now that we have zero reason for speccing into Curses with the GM minor change and the revival of stats from trait lines).

/psyched

Vavume.8065:

Having thought about it a bit more they may well extend a re stat to exotics, since after all they did that with the magic find gear, so why not I guess.

B/c the change to Magic Find removed the stat from gear completely and leaving people with lvl 80 gear with only two stats would be unfair? That’s not at all, in any way, what is happening with HoT, despite the silly hyperbole in this thread.

Roe.3679:

Bhawb.7408:

What if Lich, Rampage, and the other transforms were changed similar to Guardian tomes? Most of them are used for only one thing, so if you can make that one thing onto an active it is pretty easy to make them normal skills.

Ex: make Lich form a significant damage boost for 20s, with pulsing stability like right now, and then have the #5 skill as a second active once you’ve used Lich. That is everything Lich is currently used for (except range), but can be counterplayed much better, and removes a lot of the annoying parts of Lich for each person (damage can be toned down a little, will require landing skills like normal, just hitting harder but the Necro actually gets to use their skills).

I really like this idea.

Excellent. Power Necro approves. Just give us a skill with stability that brings our Power up to 4k+.

#happycamper

*necros…stupid tablet :/

There’s plenty of time before HoT, play Power Necro for a week or two, and then come back to this ‘OP thread’ and comment again. With the limited mobility/disengage, the only players I can see making a genuine complaint are other necrosis tbh.

As for Rampage, eh, it is what it is. At least all their other ridiculous cooldowns are inefective for the time being.

I’m sure every staff wielding necro would love spammable Superspeed and stealth via Rune of the Trapper, but I don’t think this is a good idea tbh

Yes the F5 is perm for Mesmer. During the DH traits, he said the Adept Minor changes the Virtues for the DH. Mesmer didn’t have this. Also, Mesmer only got two new skills from the OH shield, so the new F5 adds a bit more to the profession. It seems like professions getting two-handers are getting new (different) mechanics, while those with one-handers are getting additional mechanics added to what they have. If this holds true, it could be good for both Necro and Ranger.

So how do you feel about ‘Stone Splinters’? The new Spec. uses longbow. Having traits that increase damage of the longbow is not out place in this line. Scepter can also take advantage of this trait. The DPs GM looked pretty ‘melee friendly’ if I remember correctly.

support=/=healing. ‘back-line support’ is a complete term, not two separate descriptors. The DH has an excellent projectile mitigator, cripples, a long range are vigor, a long range aoe snare/ward type skill, raged blind, cripples, vulnerability, traps to set down to discourage ppl from rushing the back-liners (for what it’s worth), as well as pretty decent looking offensive support. That doesn’t even include another weapon set or other trait lines.

I thought it was interesting they got a Ranger GM trait in their Adept slot though. O.o

Valkyrie and Cavalier

Marth Reynolds.8257:

Something like:

Sanctifier:
Weapon: Longbow, skills: Mantra’s.

F1 Sets all enemies near the target on fire while also removing up to 5 boons from the target.
F2 Converts conditions from allies into boons. (1200 range up to 5)
F3 Gives allies protection and swiftness while slowing and weakening the target enemy. (1200 range, up to 5 allies)

Longbow 1: Simply fires a high velocity arrow that pierces till it hits your target and removes a boon.
Longbow 2: Fires a piercing arrow that slows and burns enemies.
Longbow 3: Fires a slow arcing arrow at target area that immobilizes if it hits and then creates a symbol that grants your allies might.
Longbow 4: Creates a shock wave at your location that knocks down enemies and cures conditions from you and your allies.
Longbow 5, chain 1: Meditate for 2 seconds to prepare for a powerful shot.
Longbow 5, chain 2: Instantly shoot a powerful arrow of light at your enemy that stuns them and dazes all nearby enemies. Deals less damage for each boon on your enemy and each condition on you.

Skills:
Mantra of Tranquility (Heal): Meditate, charging a spell that heals more if you don’t suffer from a condition and removes a condition afterwards.
Mantra of Denial (Utility): Meditate, charging a spell that removes up to 3 boons from your enemy and up to 3 conditions from nearby allies.
Mantra of Misdirection. (Utility): Meditate, charging a spell that teleports your enemy 300 range closer to you and applies confusion. (1500 range)
Mantra of Retaliation. (Elite): Meditate, charging a spell that gives 3 seconds of high damage retaliation to up to 5 allies.

I’m not quite convinced my f1 skills are that good, but overall i think it would be quite interesting and possibly entertaining to have a weapon set based more on boon/condi removal and pursuit. It’s still quite lacking in the condition damage department though.

oops didn’t read the thread all the way. /cptnobvious O.o
the thing about the DH utilities was to bring in a solid condi build for guardian though while still using an existing skill type (they said this was for the hopes of future rune/sigil iterations) so we have to keep that in mind with these. looks like we’re kind of on the same page, though I really think only the Traps need changed. LB+Virtues are fine, imo.

Meditations…uhm…Mantras…idk how in the world that made it over their heads. Traps are a REAL stretch for the ‘Virtuous’ Guardian, imo. Sure Guardians are missing a solid condi build. Mantras are ranged and would allow for condi burst(or otherwise)+time to setup again even (given Guardians excellent active defenses). They could then be traited for ally support as well.

Mantra of Domination: Your presence confuses enemies on the battlefield.
Confusion x2 (4 sec)
3 charges
Rng:1200

GM Trait. Battle prowess: Your presence inspires your allies. Your mantras have added effects and their cooldowns are reduced.
Mantra of Domination grants Retaliation to allies near your target.
Etc.
Etc
Etc.
Your Mantras recharge 20% faster.

Meh. I know it’s not perfect, but I’ve had a long day and you get the idea.

Also, this specs’ name is Dragoon (long ranged infantry support).

ronpierce.2760:

What I wish I knew, but I highly doubt I’d ever get the real answer to, is was this even a little bit suspected as for the reaction, or did they really think it was going to hit it out of the park.

Unfortunately, the Necromancer design team was in charge of the new Guardian spec.
#outoftouch #sorrylowblow hehe ;p

‘Dragoon’? I know it’s not original, but neither the other profession names, besides Mesmer, really. I’ve always thought it had a nice ring too it though. The ‘Hunter’ part of the spec. name just seems so forced, in order to implement Traps imo.

When you build a game around active combat/defense and twitch reflexes with the philosophy of removing the classic Trinity model, a red flag should go off in the balance teams’ mind when some Dev has the great idea that a profession should “soak up hits”. Especially with the stat/trait system we have. You’re, pretty much, bound to end up with something that is going to be nearly god-like or nearly useless, w/o much room for error in between.

“Sorority Riffing” GM trait: Your ‘Pillow’ skills are accented with a fluffy bunny animation."

We get ‘Pillow’ skills to further alienate us from the rest of the professions. Necro’s ‘profession color’ is changed to Pastel Pink. Josh laughs maniachly.

This is not bugged. Your seeing the ‘damage’ from the ‘Vampiric’ minor and the ‘healing’ of ‘Vamp Rits’. Life leeching mechanism is kinda wonky as it’s not direct 1:1 and instead treated as a damage and a heal (other times the damage or heal can show up as [Leech] in the combat log. This has been a problem with Leeches in the combat log for a long time.

As far as statistical power creep, nothing is being added that players didn’t trait specifically for. Now, ‘pure’ specs are still gonna be able to maintain great damage while still being able to take some more defensive or even team-support oriented trait setups. I like it very much. As far as adding the missing stats in a way to not just add them directly to the Amulet, they could add the jewel system back in place to account for the missing ~700ish stat points and just make them with the current stat distributions of our Amulets. It might have to be scaled down a bit from 700 exactly, b/c we’re gaining two traits though. This way, pure specs could maintain their builds (6/6/x/x/x, x/x/6/6/x, etc) while still allowing others to run more hybrid or balanced setups. There is absolutely no reason to force ppl into taking any kind of hybrid/balanced “75%/25%” nonsense. This is part of “trying to maintain current builds” that they stated was their goal.