Guild Wars 2

I love that exchange! lol

Chase.8415:

Vayne.8563:

Chase.8415:

Unfortunately making hints explaining the term unique wont resolve anything. If it were that simple, stickies in forums would actually work. When it comes down to it, this is simply user error. If you noticed that there were rings with Offensive and Defensive, with the same stats… logic would tell you that you cant have duplicate rings.

They also specifically state they are unique.

This has been discussed before.

A lot of people were complaining that it shouldn’t give you an option to buy something you already have, because it’s no use. However, this is not true. You can give that ring to your alt and it can equip it.

As opposed to former games, you could not simply obtain items that were unique and pass it to your alt.

You can also buy the ring on an alt…so you cut down on errors. These vendors are easy enough to get to for everyone. So it doesn’t allow one character to buy it, but since the tokens are account bound, you can save people some heartache.

Those rings are not only from the vendor, you can also obtain them from drops inside Fractal of The Mists LvL 20+. If you were to change the rings to be only bought on separate characters, this would mean you could not obtain rings by FOTM unless you specifically went with your alt.

Again, this is a fantastic feature of Guild Wars and I do not wish it to be limited or disabled due to a user error.

The dropped rings wouldn’t have to change at all. I’m not sure how what I said would affect you. If the vendor refuses to sell Character X a ring because he already has that ring, that has nothing to do with drops at all.

Rings would still drop in the fractals exactly the same way.

Substance E.4852:

Anet cares more about money than making the player base happy, plain and simple.

I saw tons of people running around with the Wintersday weapons. I thought some were nice but not worth the cost and that’s okay. It’s my choice whether or not to pay because I can weigh the cost vs reward as I see it.

I have no such ability to measure that when I have to gamble to get something. It could cost me one key or it could take one hundred. You don’t know.

I’m pretty much going to stop being excited for new content if I have to be rich in game or in real life to have a guaranteed shot at it even being available to me.

Make it available and let me decide if it is worth the asking price on my own.

You act as if there are no weapon skins in game that have been introduce that you don’t have to gamble for. Fractal weapon skins can be gotten without cash, guild rewards can be obtained if you join a guild to do guild missions, there have been weapon skins you could just buy in the shop, and more will be added to the game over time, including the new SAB skins. I already got a backpack skin for my Asura.

I agree that it sucks to have this sort of RNG in the game, but there have been other things added to the game after launch that you could either just buy or you could get with in game currency.

Chase.8415:

Unfortunately making hints explaining the term unique wont resolve anything. If it were that simple, stickies in forums would actually work. When it comes down to it, this is simply user error. If you noticed that there were rings with Offensive and Defensive, with the same stats… logic would tell you that you cant have duplicate rings.

They also specifically state they are unique.

This has been discussed before.

A lot of people were complaining that it shouldn’t give you an option to buy something you already have, because it’s no use. However, this is not true. You can give that ring to your alt and it can equip it.

As opposed to former games, you could not simply obtain items that were unique and pass it to your alt.

You can also buy the ring on an alt…so you cut down on errors. These vendors are easy enough to get to for everyone. So it doesn’t allow one character to buy it, but since the tokens are account bound, you can save people some heartache.

I don’t believe legendary kits will ever be available. I do believe that in time, legendary weapons on Engies will change the appearance of existing kits though.

I sympathize with the OP. It’s a crappy thing to have happen to you. Usually, for an update, there’s some sort of warning. At least I usually get one. If the OP didn’t, or if the game somehow crashed on him and he missed out, that’s a lousy feeling. It would kitten anyone off.

For what it’s worth (which is nothing at all) you have my sympathies OP.

The only real way to combat elitism is to not be elitist yourself. You combat it by providing the “other” alternative in the game world. It’s why I go out of my way to rez players, and often ask if someone needs a rez in chat before I do, since if they’re AFK they might well die again and break some armor.

I help out during guild missions and call out the guild bounty targets in map whenever I see them…even while our guild is doing our own mission. Might it cause us complications later? Maybe. I don’t care. I try to be community-minded.

The only way to combat selfishness is to be giving. Some people will never change, but there are a whole lot of people in the middle who can use another example of how an MMO community should be.

It needs to be communicated better. I know it, and would never have made the mistake, but I do see how someone who’s never played an MMO before might get screwed over by it. Wasting laurels or any other currency is simply not fun.

ScottBroChill.3254:

In a pokemon game, I don’t need to fight gym leaders, I can just keep leveling my pokemon against the level 2 caterpie’s because I like the battle sequences. In CoD I don’t need to kill things, I can just hide in a corner because I dislike dying. In GW2 I can use level 30 armor on a level 80 if I wanted to. Sure, If I don’t want to be the best I can be I can work at McDonalds the rest of my life and live in a crappy apartment, but does that mean I’m going to?

Does anyone else agree that this argument is invalid and doesn’t apply?

The point of no vertical progression is so everyone’s stat’s plateau. No vertical progression means that at a certain point I can’t get my stats better and nothing will be added to make my stats better, then I can freely be on an equal playing field as everyone else and truly play as I please. If your okay with not being the best you can be go for it, but human nature contradicts this that’s why there’s evolution in technology, life, and everything else.

Except that there WAS vertical progression at launch and no one said a word about it. Not one.

In fact, had this game launched with Ascended gear, the number of people that would have complained about it would have been tiny. I mean really tiny.

Are you really saying that exotic weapons to legendary weapons is so contiguous that they didn’t need a tier in between? Because last I looked legendaries took forever to get ane exotics took no time at all. That’s why I believe they needed to add a tier of gear.

It’s not unreasonable for a game to require BIS gear to be just a tiny bit hard to get. Exotics really weren’t. My dog could have gotten exotics just by saving her daily karma boosts.

mesme.5028:

Generalraccoon, what lvl do dungeons start at?:) ill try WvWvW too and guesting.

The first dungeon unlocks at level 30 for story mode and level 35 for explorable mode. However, you might find them tough to run at level.

I don’t know your server…you can try guesting to others to see if they’re busier though. Guesting is free. Find a server you like to play on and play on that server. It might help.

What server are you on?

munkiman.3068:

Arguably, no one needs to do anything… People want to play this game and they are going to want/expect certain things. Actually need doesn’t come into play with any game, period. Need is a term of convenience, it’s often supplemented for want with a sense of seriousness to a situation, like survival. Seems silly to call out needs versus wants, since so many people use them interchangeably.

I don’t think it’s silly at all. The fact is, even within the context of this game, many people feel they need something that the game doesn’t require them to have. And expressing this desire as need gives people reading a false sense of what the game is about.

In other games, you absolutely, within the context of the game, need certain gear to progress to certain dungeons or raids. That situation doesn’t exist in this game. Even something like the fractals.

Playing level 1 will eventually show you every single bit of content in the game, for which you need to special gear. In fact, people play up to level 14 with no special gear. So special gear is not needed. Beyond that the gear you need to go further is built into the fractals themselves. The gating is self-contained.

But no other area of the game requires ascended gear. People do…but the game doesn’t. It’s important to make that distinction.

I level by not leveling. I don’t think about it. I don’t care about it, particularly.

I run around gathering nodes, seeing that’s around me and responding to it. If a town is attacked, I jump in to help. I talk to NPCs, explore, do my personal story, some crafting…basically a bit of everything.

It’s not much of a system..but I like it…oh yes and I’ve turned off the map markers for zone completion. It just makes the game a whole lot less like a checklist.

I seriously doubt this will happen. If there is some sort of “sale” on transfers, my guess is it’ll be many months away.

Benjamin.6235:

Vayne.8563:

Vertical progression doesn’t have to define a gear grind. That’s your definition. There was vertical progression in this game prior to gear grind. For example, 80th level masterworks was inferior to 80th level rare, which is inferior to 80th level exotic. Each of those items are tiers of power within level 80.

The real issue, for me anyway, is whether or not I need to have that gear to play the game…since I don’t, it become a non-issue for me. I can completely ignore it, unless I want to do high level fractals (and if I do, I get that gear anyway).

I can get those exotics with a day or two of play with a character I level to 80 with an hour or two of crafting. It’s ridiculous to compare the grinding needed to obtain the two.

As far as the issue of this being a non-issue, then why do you care if ascended gear is obtained with laurels or guild tokens from time-gated content or something else that’s easier to obtain? If it truly is a non-issue for you, why are you even in this conversation?

I’m in this conversation for the same reason you are. To express my point of view, and the point of view of others like me. Just because someone says vertical progression is gear grind doesn’t make it so.

And the one elephant in the room that really makes the difference is gear-gated content. Because that’s the culprit in most games that really does force people to grind. Without that component, using the same language, gear grind, to describe what’s in Guild Wars 2 is at least a little misleading.

I’ve experienced gear grind in other games…this isn’t it.

And you can run fractals up to level 15 quite easily without any ascended gear. After level 15 you’d probably need some, but since you get the gear by doing the fractals, it’s a self-contained system.

Nretep.2564:

Morrigan.2809:

Except for Ele, Engineers are the only class who do not have weapon swap.
We have exactly 3 weapons to choose from.
Ele’s have many more that, they generally rely on attunement swaps not conjured weapons as a class mechanic.
Engineers rely on either kits/ nets to augment their weapons- Actually most engineers hardly use their weapons- this is the class mechanic much like attunements for Ele’s.

Weapon swapping classes are more than free to craft a legendary for both sets. I am sure many have.

I guess you don’t play an Engineer much?

let’s dissect this statement(s) a bit.

Engineers want legendary kits because they … want them. I want legendary weapons, because I want them, too.
Elementalists don’t use their weapon summons, but Engineers use their kits. How about we nerf each Engineer weapon kits to 50% of the current strength. Then you don’t use them >80% anymore and everyone is happy.
Just because you WANT to use them, don’t expect the system to bend towards your desire. Just becuase elementalists USUALLY don’t focus on weapon summons, doesn’t mean they can’t. They’re multiple traits which favor such builds. Even supporting the party – unlike engineers.

Engineer only has two weapons. Since YOU don’t like the shield. Elementalist only has two weapon sets, since I don’t like dagger and focus.
Engineer has three weapons and seven kits.
Elementalist has four weapons and five summoned weapons (not counting tornado ulti).

Seriously, I see no reason to favor engineers’ kits over elementalists summoned weapons. Or even secondary weaponsets from other classes.
Why not equalize those dual hand weapons with two handed wearers? Make only main hand legendary-able and the offhand automatically becomes legendary, too ?

This isn’t quite straight forward.

Elemental summons are pretty much one small part of the elementalist arsenal. An elementalist can get by quite easily without using a single weapon skill. It’s a skill option.

Kits are part of the engineer’s mechanic, and more comparable to swapping attunements. They’re not just weapon summons.

When Engineers were created, they were given very few weapon options (only 1 main hand, 2 off hand and one two hand) and that’s it…with no swap. There’s no attunement swap either.

So comparing Engineers kits to your summons shows a lack of understanding of profession mechanics. Without weapon summons you can have a perfectly viable elementalist. The same can not be said without kits.

While I disagree that this is the huge issue the OP claims it to be, he’s certainly not wrong in singling out Engineers for this kind of treatment, seeing as Anet has designed Engineers to use kits.

In fact, Anet went and changed sigils so they affect kits, because of this. Anet made no such provision for summoned weapons. There was probably a reason for that.

Well, the forums seem split right down the middle. I don’t grind this stuff. I’m not interested in grinding. I can do all the content in the game, except higher level fractals, without grinding this gear.

But what constitutes a grind and what constitutes whether you need this stuff or not largely depends on who you talk to.

There are tremendous grinds in this game, just like in Guild Wars 1. The difference between this and other MMOs, to me, is that this grind is optional.

As for rangers, yes, I know what the forums say, but if you’re not pugging and you’re in a guild, you can do just fine. We have rangers in our guild who I’d take over just about anyone else into a dungeon or fractal.

Raine.1394:

ScottBroChill.3254:

I think the problem is, is that ascended armor is always better than exotic and the rest of the max level armor. Not always necessary, but always better. Anet talked and talked and talked about how they didn’t want this and then added it once people got bored. It seemed like a last resort.

They said the game wasn’t about the grind to have the best armor. It’s supposed to be easily obtainable. So, in order to be as good as those that grind for armor, you need the best armor. Although maybe not a significant difference, it’s a difference and it adds to the sense that time>skill.

This. They added an element of game design, vertical progression, to address the bored people who “had nothing to do”. Vertical progression defines a gear grind. There is no question as to whether vertical progression is “grindy”. That’s what it’s for. It gives people something that they must do if they want to keep up with the ever escalating power level of the game. It provides a sense of progression and motivation for continued play. Horizontal progression also provides this and it doesn’t carry the additional baggage which includes a forced grind that vertical does. Need and want really don’t enter into the discussion around ‘grind’ in GW2. It is now ‘grindy’ by definition.

Vertical progression doesn’t have to define a gear grind. That’s your definition. There was vertical progression in this game prior to gear grind. For example, 80th level masterworks was inferior to 80th level rare, which is inferior to 80th level exotic. Each of those items are tiers of power within level 80.

The real issue, for me anyway, is whether or not I need to have that gear to play the game…since I don’t, it become a non-issue for me. I can completely ignore it, unless I want to do high level fractals (and if I do, I get that gear anyway).

ScottBroChill.3254:

yeah, but do the older generations have enough time in their lives to drive an mmo? that’s the concern. And the average gamer of my generation is like that. If somethings bad, theirs something better. WoW was able to succeed because before than the mmo genre wasn’t really accessible to the general audience. Being the first mmo to appeal to the general audience made a big impact and they capitalized on it. Anet apparently thinks that this same audience can be tapped into, but they(the audience) have way higher expectations. I see a lot of people mmo-hop now. They play all the free ones that are online and once one becomes boring, there is a handful of other ones to pass the time.

Yep, a lot of older people have time to drive an MMO. More than you think. Because we stopped watching TV. lol

Seriously I think you’d be stunned.

ScottBroChill.3254:

the nature of the gaming beast is changing though. People are less patient and don’t wait around for changes anymore. People of my generation in particular, and I’m 19 turning 20, are impatient. People younger than me are even worse. Game companies don’t really have time to wait around and test the waters so even though this is a new game, there is even more competition and so games that don’t satisfy are easily forgotten no matter how big they are.

For an mmo, people look for a large playerbase. Whether anet tells the truth or not about it’s sales, as long is it says they’re doing great more people are going to want to play. It would be a stupid idea to undersell their product, so lying or stretching the truth becomes for of a mandatory thing because this isn’t just a game for them, it’s a business.

Yes, I agree with you 100%. People of your generation are just like that. But the average gamer isn’t of your generation. The age of the average gamer is actually over 30…it’s getting older all the time, and many older people have developed some form of patience, if for no other reason than to deal with their bosses. lol

The point is, a game really can get along without being popular with the 20 year old demographic these days. You may not see it or believe it, but you can bank on it.

A lot of really smart gaming companies are.

Yep, they be phishing.

Several independent observers saw the high pop servers drop to medium all at the same time in Europe and US. After these observations an Anet employee comes along and says yeah, due to the success of our recent sale we’ve increased server capacity on some servers. I have two things I can believe.

A BUNCH of people in Europe and the US all left the game simultaneously or maybe they expanded the number of players who could be on a single server.

Sure, you can say Anet will say anything they like, but it doesn’t change the fact that server numbers have very very likely increased on certain servers.

This really isn’t rocket science.

Distaste.4801:

GW2 is doing alright sales wise, but I think the major driving factor right now is no subscription and nothing new coming out in the near future. A lot of people are in a holding pattern waiting for a new MMO to be released and don’t want to be burdened with a monthly payment.

GW2 development is doing horribly though. I’ve never seen such terrible patches, class balance, and design decisions in my entire decade+ of playing MMO’s. They continue to restrict and segregate instead of expanding and integrating. With each patch the game has become less and less “play how you want” and more and more “Play how ArenaNet thinks you should”. I think if ArenaNet had described the game as it is now prior to launch, it wouldn’t have sold nearly as well.

It isn’t all bad though, I mean I love the event system in this game and having to go back to quest givers is not something I look forward too. The ability to just jump on and play without worrying about missing a quest giver, having to share quests, or run back to giver upon completion is a huge plus. Sadly though the world events can only entertain you so long without better retention mechanics in place.

Overall, I think once another big MMO is nearing release GW2’s time will be over. If those MMO’s don’t embrace more complex mechanics in order to retain customers they will be 3-6 month MMO’s before people flock to another new MMO. I don’t think ESO will have the mechanics to retain people for long, but EQ Next is supposed to be more sandbox-like so I have more hope for it. Titan is a toss-up considering what they did to Diablo 3, but we will see.

Guild Wars 2 has plenty of time to fix things before the next games come out. Months is a long time to fix stuff. And I’m pretty sure that I’m seeing more people now, not less.

The thing is, not everyone runs off to play the next MMO. Once you’ve invested time and energy in an MMO, you sort of take ownership of it. You get to like your characters. You get to like your world.

Some people, of course, are going to leave, but I’m nothing thinking as many as most people think. And then, because there is no monthly fee, people might play another game and come back.

Several people who left the game have returned to my guild recently and they’re playing again…and enjoying themselves.

I just don’t think this game was designed to be played as your exclusive game. But I think it’s good enough for people to keepcoming back to. And that’s all it needs.

ScottBroChill.3254:

I mean one of the friends that quits thinks runescape is more fun, but that’s some other kind of sorcery…

One of my friends likes DDO more. But most of my Guild Wars 1 guild is still playing and enjoying the game. Even so, none of this matters.

What matters is that MMOs have NEVER courted the masses. There were too many really stupid things that they did. MMO people never caught on.

It was stupid to tag a mob and have to wait for a boss to respawn to get credit for a quest. That’s just dumb. It was stupid to have people stealing your nodes all the time, making farming and mining more important than killing the guy attacking you. Again, dumb.

There are so many things that the standard MMOs got wrong. Guild Wars 2 isn’t any great leap forward. It’s just a game that trimmed the stupid stuff that I didn’t want to deal with in the first place.

They made a beautiful world that people want to visit, that’s it. It’s like they keep saying, they’re not interested in just making a game, they want to make a virtual world and they’ve started doing just that.

It’s not your thing, I get that. It’s not your friends thing. I get that. But I don’t think that I’m such an abberration that something I’m looking for for years is something so far out of the public eye that there aren’t millions of others who are looking for something similar.

That’s my point.

Here’s the problem. Lots of MMO players won’t like this game. Lots of people who don’t like MMOs may. That’s an interesting comment, because there are more people who don’t play MMOs than do. In fact, there are more gamers who don’t play MMOs than do. By an order of magnitude.

The last time I researched this there were 200 million gamers, less than ten percent of which played MMOs.

So yeah, your MMO friends might not like it. People trained for years to buy into the end game fiction of MMOs today and gear grind and gear gated content, they might not get it.

But there are a whole lot of other people who didn’t like what was on offer there and those people get it. I think there are more than enough people.

I don’t really care if a bunch of raiders and competitive guys don’t see the appeal of this game. I don’t really believe that’s Guild Wars 2 main target audience.

With the age of the average gamer rising every year, more and more, games like Guild Wars 2 will have an audience.

Chuo.4238:

Vayne.8563:

And why did the just expand server volume to hold more people on various servers? That might be a better question.

Did they? Or has the name changed from “full” to “very high”?

No, I’m not a conspiracy theorist, and I’m not advocating tinfoil hats. I AM saying, however, that it’s not hard to create a perception that’s different from reality, and people often do…so I tend to ask myself questions before accepting some things at face value.

So my point is, we really don’t know, and there’s no way for us to figure it out.

They absolutely did. Apparently their recent sale did very well, and they have an influx of people coming in. This was said by a dev in another thread.

Re Transmuation stones, fine stones can be gotten from completing maps, rarely, and from black lion chests. You get several black lion keys from doing stories, and if you get them from chests you get them 5 at a time. Also, rarely, black lion keys can come from doing dailies, zone completions or even as random drops in game (though that’s mega rare. I got one yesterday).

And why did the just expand server volume to hold more people on various servers? That might be a better question.

Hope you bug reported it. I agree, if it’s off, it’s not working as intended.

ExZee.8109:

Vayne.8563:

I argue my point. I never insult people. Other people call me names a whole lot more often than I call them names. I don’t agree with someone’s point and that makes me an elitist?

I think you are confusing the word with something else. I’ve never considered myself part of any elite. If anything, I have a relatively low opinion of myself. Nice try though.

It wasn’t directed at you, I used your words out of context to reply to whoever it was I was replying to. The words (again, taken out of context) from whatever it is you said seemed to apply quite well to someone who is apparently so anti-elitist. So don’t take it personally.

No worries, mate, happens to us all.

Killnore.4832:

Haha, exactly. I mean the new Super Adventure Box i think is great and all but LOL, you need 250 stupid baubles for one bauble bubble, then need 50 + 1 g just to buy something decent, and there’s not even any armor. I was laughing with my mate yesterday about how they can change something fun into this painful grind for something that is completely worthless and achievable at any level.

You’re making that much more of a grind than it is. Check this out.

If you do zone 1, you get 2 bauble bubbles for beating the boss, once per day on each character.

I already picked up the backpack today and I barely spend any time in SAB compared to some anyway.

darkace.8925:

For me, it might as well be impossible. But that has nothing to do with server transfers. As long as there are people who know Obsidian Sanctum inside and out camping PvEers like myself (who have no clue what’s going on) it’s going to be impossible for me to get 100% map completion.

What about a guild? My guild does regulars WvW events and we help people get their completion. It may take some times, but it’s definitely doable.

Don’t try to do it alone, that’s all.

The only game I can ever truly remember grinding in was Elite: The Final Frontier. Or X2-The Threat.

Of course that game is grind, but I used to think like an hour had passed, and I’d look up at the window and the sun was rising.

Good times. lol

To more directly answer the OP’s question, I do feel like I’m progressing…but at a pretty slow pace. I’m going for a legendary and I’m slowly building up mats and gold I need. So every time I look at my mats and my gold in the bank, I see progress. Sometimes I buy something and there’s a setback and then I start growing again.

It’ll probably take me another 2-3 months to get my legendary.

It’ll happen when Anet makes observer mode and a paid tournament. Not until.

penatbater.4710:

After I finished my quip, I found myself playing more in the wvw than pve. Imo, do it if you really want it. I personally didn’t really really really want it, but it gave me a goal to do, and something to farm for.

Gratz on finishing quip, I hadn’t realized!

I’m going for the Predator, partly because I like the way it looks, mostly because I already have the precursor. lol

I think this game is about a billion times better with a good guild. I mean, this is true of most MMOs, but in newer MMOs, ones that haven’t had the time to make mass amounts of content, it’s much more fun to do this stuff with like minded people.

ExZee.8109:

Thayel.1236:

I read forums constantly but rarely post, but this I had to. Are you insane?! This is the very definition of elitism! 3 minutes?! Are you really going to complain over 3 minutes?! This guy even said he was told that had he done everything proper it would have shaved 20 SECONDS! Not 3 minutes.. 20 SECONDS! This is the reason so many people are anti pug and miss out on running dungeons. They hear stories like this and think OMG! If you are going to kick someone because he cost you 20 seconds in a run, you REALLY need to reevaluate your life choices.

I love this game and honestly have no life and play way more then I should, but even when we are trying to do speed runs in my guild with pug people we tell them what they could have done better and then run it again to help them improve. If we can make 10 minutes with even 1 pug we are ecstatic.

When this kind of stuff happens I place all the elitist (insert favorite expletive here) on ignore and never deal with them again. We play games for FUN. Not to be slammed because we cost someone a precious 20 seconds of their life.

I’m going to reply you with this:

Vayne.8563:

We’re the elite. We can treat people with disdain. That’s the very definition of elitism to me.

Because I find it to be beautifully ironic.

I argue my point. I never insult people. Other people call me names a whole lot more often than I call them names. I don’t agree with someone’s point and that makes me an elitist?

I think you are confusing the word with something else. I’ve never considered myself part of any elite. If anything, I have a relatively low opinion of myself. Nice try though.

I opted out by being low enough on the scale to have been pushed off already. Go me! lol

I think that’s why I consider what those guys did elitism. They’re keeping the knoweledge to themselves, knowledge they could have shared, which maintains an us and a them. We’re the elite. We can treat people with disdain. That’s the very definition of elitism to me.

khefka.2804:

Vayne.8563:

What did you think of Coffeebot’s data, though. That seemed to imply some sort of problem.

That data is completely at odds with what OP was saying, and I’m very doubtful it is correct. That’s the type of issue that one would think would have been discovered long ago, and no question be unbalanced if true.

Well, I know Coffeebot personally, in real life, and if he says that data is correct, he tested it. What it shows, to me at least, is that the animations of certain skills disadvantage certain weapons.

Again, for me, it doesn’t make a difference. He’s been telling me the shortbow is the better of the two weapons over the longbow, but I just don’t care. I still like the longbow better.

But if what he’s saying is right, it needs to be looked at.

projectcedric.6951:

Vayne.8563:

Fair enough point. I think it depends on your play style. I have some characters that use CC to an advantage, some that don’t need at at all.

If you don’t have the kill things fast play style, and not everyone does, it can come in quite handy, perhaps more often than one would think. Then again, it really does depend on knowing the skills of what you’re fighting.

Sometimes I end up using CC just to get guys away from me for the extra two seconds my self-heal needs to recharge.

I tried that other extreme end of things with my necro. Just pure condition damage and CC build, I don’t even rely on shroud. It can kill but it is frustrating. The amount of time that CC buys you to heal yourself plus the amount of heal combined, relative to your squishiness is just pathetic.

Yes, I know there is be a better way to play that profession that optimizes it, I’ve read the other builds. But my build, I believe, is already one of the most-straightforward way to play a Necro.

Basically, my point is that for professions and builds that do not rely on direct damage as their combat aspect, it is -probably- possible to reach the same effectiveness as those that do, but it requires much, much more effort, refinement and difficulty.

To me, this is not balance. Balance means that if certain professions require more difficulty and not-so-straightforward game play, that means that they must be able to outperform those professions that are easier to handle.

Yep, I agree with this. I used a lot of CC while leveling with my engie, because I don’t like the grenade kit and I grow bored with the bomb kit. So I used the rifle a lot, which has a lot of CC. And yeah, it took me longer to kill things, but I was having fun, so I didn’t care.

Combinations of netting, knockback and jumpshot to close or get away were particularly satisfying, particularly in Orr back in the days when there was mob density. I found it a fun play style in and of itself….and challenging.

Adine.2184:

Tifa Lockheart Ex.9614:

After having read different sections of the forum. I’ve come to realize that players have a lot of issue (including my self) with how certain things are being run in game. The answer to all your problem is simple people. “Option -> Log off game”. Go spend time with your friends and family. I do it daily after logging on to see if any guildies online then log off if nothing happening

Yea but you cant respawn when you log out of real life and that creates a problem .

Actually there are quite a few people who believe you do respawn…albeit in a different body, but still. lol

projectcedric.6951:

Vayne.8563:

But usually, most mobs that have powerful skills can only use them maybe once every 20-30 seconds anyway. They can’t use them every 5 seconds, with some exceptions. Again, it depends on who you’re fighting.

You’re not supposed to use knockdown to interupt a random skill. You’re supposed to use it to interupt a skill that means something, which is usually on a much longer cooldown…even for AI.

Then again, how much do these situations come by? The question here is the relative effectiveness and utility of CC and other stuffs compared to damage output alone, because that’s where the line between balance and variety is.

I honestly have never found myself in a situation where a CC skill could have made a difference. If I couldn’t sustain against a Champion, interrupting any of his skills didn’t change that. If I could, it definitely wasn’t because of a CC skill rather than a diversion for him to attack or I just had more damage and toughness than him.

It is much less of significance against regular and veteran mobs. I certainly don’t need to interrupt skills. It’s just a matter of killing things faster (as in farming).

Fair enough point. I think it depends on your play style. I have some characters that use CC to an advantage, some that don’t need at at all.

If you don’t have the kill things fast play style, and not everyone does, it can come in quite handy, perhaps more often than one would think. Then again, it really does depend on knowing the skills of what you’re fighting.

Sometimes I end up using CC just to get guys away from me for the extra two seconds my self-heal needs to recharge.

ExZee.8109:

Einlanzer.1627:

Look, you’re on the wrong page somewhere, but I can’t figure out where. I think you’re just over-complicating what I’m trying to say in your head.

My original hypothesis was this and only this – the skills were weighted and balanced around their activation speeds. This is a given, otherwise that metric wouldn’t exist. And in most cases this is fine, because you aren’t using the same skill more than once every few seconds. When a skill is set to autoattack, though, (typically #1 skills) its activation speed is mostly irrelevant because it is superseded by the animation speed, which is almost always longer (the degree of difference varies from weapon to weapon). This means that many of the #1 skills (or autoattack skills) have refire rates that are slower than they should be and are therefore weaker than they were originally intended to be. This has absolutely nothing to do with whether you have the skill actually set to autoattack or are pressing 1 repeatedly, because the same animation plays out regardless; I don’t even understand where that entered the equation or why it’s being discussed.

The evidence that this is not intended and is instead an oversight is very convincing when you start looking at the data for #1 skills across weapons and professions, as I have illustrated. I don’t have the exact numbers, but it’s very easy to determine even from a cursory analysis that the DPS for both Pistols and Longbows is lacking in comparison to Rifles, etc, and that most of this deficiency comes from the #1 skill. Specifically, it comes from the fact that those skills have animation durations that are far longer than the skill’s activation speed (that would be the ‘delay’ I was referring to) when they were probably balanced around the latter.

No, I now understand what your argument is and it’s as I expected – something that actually has nothing to do with autoattack. What you should’ve said is the #1 skill. The autoattack is a feature that’s completely different from the #1 skill, and your misplaced substitution is what threw off me and a couple of others. Not to mention <reads thread title>, <stare>

You haven’t illustrated anything, especially when it comes to anything with the word “data” in it. Like I’ve said in three separate posts now (since my very first, to be exact), you lack any evidence to support your argument. And with just a cursory glance, it really isn’t much of a problem when build viability pre-limits the weapon sets anyway and the majority of players lean towards specific builds that require specific weapons and have no problem ignoring the underpowered and the underused. Unless the number of viable builds increase to call for the usage of these underpowered weapons in the first place, people won’t care if it’s underpowered or not because there are no builds to fully support the usage of it. And I had to say the same thing twice in the last sentence, just to emphasize. It also doesn’t seem like it’d be a hard problem to fix, if Anet decided it needed fixing over other priorities.

What did you think of Coffeebot’s data, though. That seemed to imply some sort of problem.

Unless you get something like the engineer’s Big Ole Bomb which not only knocks foes back but also does a significant amount of damage.

Crazylegsmurphy.6430:

To be honest, I have no idea what “QQ” even means.

QQ means crying…complaining. The Q is a symbol of an eye with a tear coming down it. So QQ is someone crying/complaining about something.