Guild Wars 2

I don’t know if its viable playing against really good players, but you can certainly hold a point 1vs1 or even 2vs1 for a while.

It depends on how you spec but basically the pros are lots of healing, blocks, invuns, and knockbacks. Shield of courage (traited) gives you 12 secs of near invulnerability and condi cleanse while still being able to contest or hold a point. Plus 3 secs of invun from renewed focus gives a lot of time for help to come.

Cons are lack of ranged attack if you don’t take LB, and you are vulnerable to rev, some thieves, and heavy/sustained condition damage. Also you don’t have a lot of access to stability, unless you give up some condition removable or other benefit. I’m not sure if its possible to bring a lot of group support either while still being a strong bunker.

Its a strong combination, but I wouldn’t call necro squishy: more like a high damage tank with lots of easy to land cc and aoe cleave.

Their tankiness is partly why the combo is so good. Also works well with druid: its hard to effectively spike down the healer when they are standing right to an aoe cleave machine, especially without a premade.

I just noticed that if you lose a game in the “placement” games when one of your teammates has dc’d for the whole match it is still counted as a loss. Is that a bug or is it intended?

Imo the removal of daze was a huge nerf. I found that aoe daze to be one of the most annoying aspects of fighting DH. I haven’t played enough since the nerf to tell how big of an impact it has had, but in the past the daze was behind many of the times I was “insta gibbed”.

Nightmare.1234:

The guardian change seems ok, it nice that they pushing base guard as the healing support spec and dragon hunter as the damage spec. But this dont work with most other elite specs due to them adding mechanics instead of overriding them. You cant fix chrono over base mesmer because you gave it a overpowered mechanic that combined with the core mesmers shatters, you gave daredevils extra dodges and added bonuses to dodges. You gave breserker extra burst skills and let them keep the old ones as well. Necro and guard the only specs that had mechanics swapped out, not added to. These two classes i would say are balanced ( ok base necro shroud needs love) but still hot elite specs broke the game, and anet need to address op mechanics first to put core and elite specs on par before gutting vaiable builds and classes. The rev nerf extreme but at least fix mallyx traitline and make ventari traitline NOT only useful when using tablet.
I will be running core only builds in season 5 in protest.

As I explained in my post directly above yours, there is no reason to not take DH because it still provides far better support (healing and damage mitigation) even with the changes. The buff to the core spec only really empowers a burn guard build, which is a damage build anyway.

The changes look promising, and I like the upgrade to the core guardian virtues.

The main buff seems to be to virtue of justice, which might make a burn guard a little more viable, but as a support or bunker guard the DH virtues are still too good not to take.

On paper the CD reductions and heal buff to virtues of resolve and courage may look strong, but its still far too little to pass up on 6 secs of being basically invulnerable while able to cap a point and a 5,000 or so heal, movement, and condition remover that we get with the DH line. Not to mention that the trap heal is also far better than the other options which also pushes us to take the DH line.

Perhaps if you made shelter a consecration (to benefit from the trait), upped its healing and reduced its cast time, gave a serious buff to virtue of resolve- perhaps through a trait – and made courage have a 10 sec CD (I mean its only aegis, which basically does nothing in the current state of the game) or made it have a better active effect, players would be more likely to run something other than DH?

ReaverKane.7598:

So, the brave new pvp selling point of the expansion was dropped from the get go, and now we’re finally seeing be put down like a lame horse.

But is it the game mode’s fault? Or simply a apathetic community and lack of investment from Anet?

To me Stronghold was the game mode that showed most potential out of any other that we have. It had a huge strategic component, and unlike stack-DH/Chronos/Tempests-on-point-and-win (aka Conquest) the game mode allowed more variety and less copy the meta and spam rotations.

Personally its disheartening that it got disregarded so quickly by arena net.

Totally agree, I loved stronghold but its basically been killed, rip.

Crimson Shi.5047:

Yasha.5963:

Sad to hear that King, although I hope you’ll come back after realizing there is (almost unbelievably) still no other game atm with small scale pvp as fun as in GW2 (even after HOT).

I often take breaks to search for some other pvp fix, basically for the reasons you mentioned above, but always end up coming back.

I disagree, currently enjoying pvp in World of Tanks, and Warships atm.

Ah yes, but those are very different types of games. I mean specifically third person fantasy/rpg type “battlegrounds” with persistent characters.

I quite enjoy ESO for example, even though that is more like WvW, but I can’t stick at it long because you have to focus so much on gear/leveling it ends up feeling more like pve.

Then there are games like OW and so on, but they are first person shooters and don’t have anything like the build customization of GW2 (or other similar games).

So yes certainly there are other good pvp games, but nothing that brings together all the elements that gw2 does. Even upcoming games that are somewhat similar (like gigantic) look kind of lackuster in comparison.

Sad to hear that King, although I hope you’ll come back after realizing there is (almost unbelievably) still no other game atm with small scale pvp as fun as in GW2 (even after HOT).

I often take breaks to search for some other pvp fix, basically for the reasons you mentioned above, but always end up coming back.

I’m in the same boat OP. I just started playing thief again and I couldn’t work out why my auto attack went on cd when I tried to attack from stealth. Of all the things Anet could nerf, haha, this is ridiculous.

xKratos.4758:

https://www.twitch.tv/xkratosz/v/97198878

Memes and Dreams bois.

Yes, I know it’s unranked and yes I know they’re prolly all PvErs. But to the people who kept saying the meta is awful and stacking DHs equal free wins, this VoD highlight just show that it mainly a L2P issues. So, just git gud bruhs

In the fights you won you outnumbered the enemy, often 3-1, and in one of the mid-fights the enemy streamed in one at a time to feed you guys. It was so face roll that you had an inventory screen up while spamming auto attack, lol.

Don’t let people put you off necro- it is monstrously powerful once you learn how to pvp.

The issue is not the class but actually learning the mechanics of the game. Its going to take a while to do that because you basically need to get an understanding of what every class/build is capable of, as well as understanding rotations, when to run/when to stay and fight etc.

Probably the best way to understand classes/builds is to make a few characters of different classes for spvp. You only need to be level 2 (I think) to get into the spvp area and then you are auto leveled to 80 while playing spvp. Start off by picking a class that annoys you the most or that you find interesting. Try and fight necro’s with that class so you can see the weaknesses/strengths of both classes. Repeat with a couple of other classes.

The easiest class to play without question is going to be DH, even with little knowledge of pvp you should be able to kick some butt.

Its kind of funny that most of what you say in the OP are issues that players complained about before HoT was released. For some reason the devs thought it would be good to make all those bad things even worse with HoT.

Of course “for some reason” = pve. Obviously no consideration was given to pvp in designing HoT. And that is a real shame because imo even now it still somehow has the best small-scale pvp of any mmo.

I don’t play in teams much any more, but it seems strange to not let teams queue at all. Isn’t this meant to be a team based game?

Rogue.2768:

hello! Right now I’m trying to decide which mmo I should pick up and play, but I wish to focus on pvp. I would be really grateful if you were to please explain how the pvp is right now? Are there a lot of people that do it?

I played wow for quite some years. Are there any similarities with it? For example battlegrounds, 2v2 ect. arenas? Do you earn any kind of rewards from pvp? Is it balanced?

Thanks for your input!

Pvp in GW2 was much, much better when it first launched and for some time after that.

It is still the best mmo for small scale pvp (much better than WoW, Rift, etc), but many people here have played it for a long time so when you ask “How is pvp right now?” The answer from almost any vet will be something like “It is bad right now” or “The worst it has ever been”. But they are comparing it to its glory days not to other mmos.

Compared to pvp in other mmos it is the most sublime, skill based game on the market. There are several maps where you go 5v5 against another team, there is no gear- or level-based advantages, and you can play any class and gear them out as you please with any ability available to the class.

The pvp games pop constantly 24/7 with little wait (unless you are playing during the competitive league season, when the queues can take longer to pop), and you get pretty good rewards for playing that you can use in pve or for crafting.

ResJudicator.7916:

This thread is ridiculous. A.net is a business. They need to make money. A.net does not have any obligation — moral, legal, or otherwise — to give free trial players an equal playing field. It doesn’t matter whether you want to classify it as P2W, B2P, or whatever. The fact remains the same: A.net doesn’t owe you, the free trial player, an even playing field.

The expansion is dirt cheap and reasonably priced relative to other MMO expansions. In the time you’ve spent complaining about the free trial, you could have earned enough money to buy the expansion.

One of the OP’s arguments (I think) is that Anet could well make more money by returning GW2’s spvp game to a level playing field.

Also I don’t think free trial players can post on the forums, so you are talking to people who have bought the game and feel that spvp would be vastly improved if the HoT/core power gap was leveled out, either by actually balancing them, or by allowing everyone some form of access to the HoT specs in spvp.

Jourdelune.7456:

Yasha.5963:

Jourdelune.7456:

BrotherBelial.3094:

Jourdelune.7456:

BrotherBelial.3094:

Jay.3409:

agreed. elite spec should be free in instanced pvp like arenas.. ( not so much with wvw as gear matters there )

i bought gw2 before hot, so spending another $50 just for elite spec dont seem worth it tbh..

Then don’t buy it.

Everyone if failing to note one important thing, ANet needs to keep the lights on.

Giving P4F players the Elite specs takes away a reason to buy the game. You know, the thing that funds ANet, you know money, cold hard cash. Now currently P4F players are leaching(for lack of a better word) of others who have stomped up the money to support the game. So the should have every advantage available to them over a P4F player.

I like many others have paid for the game, and HoT, bought gems, can someone tell me why P4F players should get the same things? And no because they are at a disadvantage is not a good reason, If they enjoy the game that much, that they feel they are missing out, buy the game. It’s not a lot of money. it’s £30 on amazon in the UK. That’s a take away, a trip to the movies or a meal in a restaurant.

People who play the game for free don’t deserve anything. They should be grateful they get to demo the game, then buy it later and not have to start over.

Look at it this way, If you are a 100% PvP player, and when the next Xpac came out if ANet said everyone gets the elite specs for free, then anyone who is a 100% PvP player would not buy the next Xpac, I mean why would you? ANet needs a hook for all game modes to get you to buy the next Xpac. They need the money, with out it the game shuts down.

Look for bold.

There is less than 2000 spvp only players. They still pay for GEM with Money.

The suggestion made, still ask spvp players to pay GEM to unlock specialization.

If that would been the case, the 50 000 new pvp players that left on HoT, would paid GEM / Money to unlock that…

So, spvp players would bring more money than Buy to Play one (90$ to unlock all, versus 50$ to buy to play).

Who in the blue hell would pay $90 to unlock the elite specs when you can buy all the game for $50? I’m sorry but you are talking crazy.

Please, stop disrespecting players because they don’t think like you.

Most F2P players, will unlock stuff they want over time. And usually they will not unlock all but simply once or twice per year.

I understand we are B2P players, fine… but please try to understand the people that do F2P and why they do it.

Why? They are most likely are 100x populous than B2P one.

Compare the little millions box sales of anet to the 80 millions of Lol (only that game), should be enough for you to understand.

I just want to note that even if players could buy HoT specs with gems the game would still be p2w because the HoT specs/etc are more powerful than the core specs. Players would still have to pay money to be on an equal footing.

Not saying its a bad idea though (in fact I think its a great idea).

I think you are going to far with this.

Many champions/hero in LOL/DOTA2 are OP and can be unlock with gems/gold/whatever the in game currency is.

It is pay to win, only if you are stuck to put money to get the OP spec. If you have another way to use that “thing”, it is not P2W.

And in reading this thread post, the game is P2W for F2P players, while B2P players think it’s a B2P game.

Unfortunately, that don’t change the fact that it’s P2W for F2P players and this is a terribad reputation if you want to have more F2P players joining in.

Well I think the major imbalance between core and elite specs are the main problem: the free heroes/rotation heroes are usually just as strong as the locked heroes in moba.

But what you say is true, if the elite specs were unlockable with in game currency (gold to gems) it would go a long way to making spvp more accessible.

sephiroth.4217:

I make useless builds useful.

Throw some random idea together like tonights S/W sage burn might stacking Ele, drop 20 bleeds and 12+ burns, watch people melt then laugh it off when people start raging about skilless builds.

That sounds like fun!

I like Coliseum, not a big fan of Capricorn but its ok.

I love it, but it never pops for me anymore.

Dr Patrik.3642:

Silverkey.2078:

To some extent you could say “well those added mechanics come at the price of a minor trait” but let us be honest, they are usually much stronger than just that. And even DH and Reaper’s mechanics are in general straight upgrades to the core mechanics. Try to compare the amazing “1 aegis” of F3 for core guardian to the 5s block of DH. “oh but it’s not instant”… yeah huge tradeoff!

Now although the DH virtues are a major upgrade, the nerco/reaper shroud is closer to what I’m proposing. The main thing is that reaper shroud doesn’t have the range that necro shroud does and therefore can more easily be kited. Now it doesn’t really make a difference in build choice since the rest of reaper shroud is just better, but it is the closet in-game example to my idea.

Lol, reaper shroud is massively powerful, it gives the necro very strong aoe cleave with quite a large range that is not blocked by some pillars and comes with stability and a gap closer, among other things.

It is the very definition of what you are talking about in terms of how the HoT specs take away the weaknesses of a class. I imagine the next expansion will give them blocks, evades, invun, perma-swiftness, and stealth as well.

Jourdelune.7456:

BrotherBelial.3094:

Jourdelune.7456:

BrotherBelial.3094:

Jay.3409:

agreed. elite spec should be free in instanced pvp like arenas.. ( not so much with wvw as gear matters there )

i bought gw2 before hot, so spending another $50 just for elite spec dont seem worth it tbh..

Then don’t buy it.

Everyone if failing to note one important thing, ANet needs to keep the lights on.

Giving P4F players the Elite specs takes away a reason to buy the game. You know, the thing that funds ANet, you know money, cold hard cash. Now currently P4F players are leaching(for lack of a better word) of others who have stomped up the money to support the game. So the should have every advantage available to them over a P4F player.

I like many others have paid for the game, and HoT, bought gems, can someone tell me why P4F players should get the same things? And no because they are at a disadvantage is not a good reason, If they enjoy the game that much, that they feel they are missing out, buy the game. It’s not a lot of money. it’s £30 on amazon in the UK. That’s a take away, a trip to the movies or a meal in a restaurant.

People who play the game for free don’t deserve anything. They should be grateful they get to demo the game, then buy it later and not have to start over.

Look at it this way, If you are a 100% PvP player, and when the next Xpac came out if ANet said everyone gets the elite specs for free, then anyone who is a 100% PvP player would not buy the next Xpac, I mean why would you? ANet needs a hook for all game modes to get you to buy the next Xpac. They need the money, with out it the game shuts down.

Look for bold.

There is less than 2000 spvp only players. They still pay for GEM with Money.

The suggestion made, still ask spvp players to pay GEM to unlock specialization.

If that would been the case, the 50 000 new pvp players that left on HoT, would paid GEM / Money to unlock that…

So, spvp players would bring more money than Buy to Play one (90$ to unlock all, versus 50$ to buy to play).

Who in the blue hell would pay $90 to unlock the elite specs when you can buy all the game for $50? I’m sorry but you are talking crazy.

Please, stop disrespecting players because they don’t think like you.

Most F2P players, will unlock stuff they want over time. And usually they will not unlock all but simply once or twice per year.

I understand we are B2P players, fine… but please try to understand the people that do F2P and why they do it.

Why? They are most likely are 100x populous than B2P one.

Compare the little millions box sales of anet to the 80 millions of Lol (only that game), should be enough for you to understand.

I just want to note that even if players could buy HoT specs with gems the game would still be p2w because the HoT specs/etc are more powerful than the core specs. Players would still have to pay money to be on an equal footing.

Not saying its a bad idea though (in fact I think its a great idea).

I do notice a lot of noobs seem to play necro, but when you encounter someone who knows how to play its pretty much gg.

Cynz.9437:

Dear Anet, please give actual banns to afk’ers. They ruin game for other 9 players and go unpunished all the time.

Say a word on forums – get insta banned. People grief other players in game – nothing is done about it. Why? Why is griefing in game is accepted?

What do you suggest they do Cynz? I have been reported for things like going far point, for running away from lost fights, for defending home against a thief/rev that keeps trying to decap, and running a certain build.

I wouldn’t trust any player driven reporting system in this game given what I have experienced.

Saiyan.1704:

Jourdelune.7456:

Saiyan.1704:

Jourdelune.7456:

We are discussing about a lost opportunity to grow the spvp players base with an underpolish F2P system that got a bad reputation of P2W (even if it’s just 50$) by most F2P players.

There’s no evidence of whether or not Free games would produce higher population growth over Payed or Subscription based games.

Secondly, to say the F2P aspecy of GW2 is"underpolished" is subjective. I personally think it’s doing exactly what it’s suppose to do.

Jourdelune.7456:

If someday you are able to do Mark Parkman Abilities (mass domination) over all F2P so they know this is B2P, please do it. On the meanwhile, why can’t Anet make some little changes so SPVP can GROW out of serious F2P PVP players?

Thank you,

In the PvP scene, GW2 HoT is considered an entirely new game where the core game converted into a demo, practically forcing competitive players to rebuy the game when Anet literally said these Elite specs will simply be “a new way to play”.

Yea I can see why some people are infuriated. There should be two different queues for core and HoT players but we all know that’s not realistic at this point.

The reason why I quoted you was because, although I understand players frustration on Anets decision makings between HoT build’s power creep vs core builds, the game’s business model is still B2P.

Sorry, August 2015 had queue pop of 3 seconds. This is enough for evidence about the F2P population. I don’t need number from Anet, even if it would be cool.

The last time we had queue times less than 2minutes was when Anet deliberately made it so, via the matchmaking algorithm but I forgot which patch that was. Queue times came suuuper fast but with a cost of matchmaking quality so they reverted it. There has been no other event that increased matchmakimg queue times due to popularity.

Now, August 2015 was the first beta weekend. Free to Play players population was at its peak in early Q1 2017, not in August but there were indeed more Beta testers in August and September.

There is no proof that population effects queue times in fact, there’s more evidence that suggests queue times increases more when there’s a higher player population due to servers being full. This was seen during the Beta Stronghold event.

I seem to be constantly matched with the same players when I play (on either my team or the opposition). I don’t know if that is due to the way matchmaking works or the population, or a combination of both but it makes me feel like there are only 20 or so players in diamond/legend playing the game (and it was the same at all ranks).

You didn’t really explain why they are “the noob class”. Can you elaborate?

I think it is mainly because they designed the HoT specs/classes around pve. I thought the original idea for spvp was to enhance the horizontal progression system by giving players more choices for builds/abilities/etc.

However, they seem to have dumped that idea and focused on a vertical progression system that probably makes a lot of sense for pve, but is pretty lame from a pvp perspective.

Nice description, haha. The answer to your question is that HoT happened.

Not only are the HoT specs/abilities/etc OP, they tie a specific weapon and class upgrades to the extra class skill-line HoT added. That means out of the three skill-lines we can use, we have to use the HoT skill-line for one, effectively cutting build diversity by one third. That is compounded by having a weapon also tied to the skill-line, meaning players will mainly use the HoT weapon as well (since it usually has synergistic traits in the HoT skill-line), resulting in even less build diversity.

For example in HoT guard virtues get a major upgrade with awesome active abilities that are better than most utilities/skills. But you can’t use the upgraded virtues unless you take the Dragon Hunter skill line. A similar thing is true for other classes.

Btw the DH you mentioned was most annoying? That has actually been nerfed a couple of times! Here is a great video showing how much skill it takes to play spvp with a HoT build:

Great video, awesome display of skill!

Crinn.7864:

Ross Biddle.2367:

Then nerf the passives to the point it’s crazy NOT to use the actives

The passives bad already. The f3 passive is 1 aegis every 40 seconds. The f2 passive is 84 heal. The f1 passive is 2sec of burning every 5 attacks.

You have to realize that the old virtue’s actives where just as bad as the passives.

This is exactly why I like the idea of the new virtues. They are fun (much more interesting than the old actives). But they are incredibly strong compared to the old virtues, which is baffling because it means you basically have to run DH as a guard (or be much weaker).

To me its beyond a matter of nerf this/that HoT trait/spec/ability. I can’t help but think that HoT is an almost totally pve driven and inspired expansion, it seems to go against many of the core concepts that made GW2’s spvp so outstanding- like coming up with different builds, the level playing field, fairly clear tells, etc.

I still love the game (spvp), but really, wtf were they thinking when they made HoT? Obviously not spvp.

Exciton.8942:

I know I can still try to avoid the F1 spear throw in the first place. But if you ever get hit by the first part of F1 skill, you seem to be completely at DH’s mercy.

The second pull part is unblockable and unevadeable. During the whole time being attached to the spear, the only option is using an invulnerable skill. The DH can then use LB2 or some other hard hitting skill to bait out your dodge and then interrupt it by the pull and then chain together some other powerful attacks.

There are quite a few other pull skills in the game and they are all evadeable. I don’t understand why this skill has to be this extra strong.

I like the DH virtues more than the guard ones because they are more interesting- actual skills rather than the more passive core guard virtues. But like nearly everything concerning HoT specs, it is difficult to understand why they are so strong.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Yasha.5963:

Yes of course its too strong. Needs to be blockable, have a shorter range, and better animation tell.

It should be melee range to land, the purpose being to pull back in targets trying to flee.

Second half should be dodgable, evadable, blockable, fail to LoS, and catch all those terrain bugs

I would prefer to have the core virtues buffed than tone down the outlandishly OP DH virtues.

Brack.6172:

Is that even normal, aNet?
When we hop in the match first thing we check is how many guardians enemy has. If two or more it goes “crap, no chance”.
I roll power ranger (which is rare since druid is almost as OP as guardians) and I pay for my damage with my vuulnerability.
Guardians pay nothing for their damage as well as the defence.

You say you always ask for fun when developing.
Where’s fun in that?

Totally agree, good example of risk/reward as well. Most of the meta HoT specs are pretty OP though.

BlackBeard.2873:

Silv.9207:

Why make elite and core on par if ANet don’t want to lose the only reason pvp players have to buy the game/expansion?

People would still want to buy the expansion to have alternative playstyles. Buying the expansion would be like getting 9 new classes with all new build options, but you aren’t left in the dust if you DON’T have those traits.

For instance, if they nerfed all elite specs, you would still need your elite spec to play support as a druid, as your other lines aren’t as well focused on that. Most of the elite specs tried to open up NEW capabilities for the class, but that doesn’t mean they need to be STRONGER.

Only ele really made a spec that was “more of what you already do, just slightly different.”

Yasha.5963:

I think one of the main things that makes HoT specs more powerful is the special class abilities connected to traitlines (at least for some classes).

For example, Guard gets a massive virtue upgrade for taking the DH line, Ranger gets a whole new skill bar, and Necro gets an upgraded shroud and powerful melee abilities. If those abilities were made baseline and the vanilla trees altered a bit to synergize with them core and HoT specs would be balanced, or at least more balanced.

What they have done is to fundamentally change the classes rather than expand the choices available to players to build their class.

I actually think the necro and guard one is a GOOD design, as they both simply replace something already there. The power-level of the alternatives offered in these cases just needs to be toned down to match CORE. Ranger doesn’t have to give up anything to get CA form, so it is just a straight-up buff. Tempest, Chrono, Herald, Scrapper, Druid, Berserker, and Daredevil all get straight-up buffs added.

I think they really should:
1. Nerf elite spec lines quite a bit
2. Buff core profession-specific lines (like arcana, beastmastery, illusions, etc.)
3. Make those prof. specific lines an “elite” line, along with skills tied to it (arcane skills, ranger shouts, etc.)

I agree that “nerfing” the HoT specs and buffing core would be great, but the problem is baked into the design of HoT. The point I am getting at is that new abilities and weapons are tied to the new HoT trait lines, which is totally different to how the core specs work and one big reason why they seem OP.

I also think the whole concept of only being able to equip a certain weapon/access OP skillls if you have that trait line is kind of weird. Seems like something thought up in a pve factory.

Yes of course its too strong. Needs to be blockable, have a shorter range, and better animation tell.

Solstace.2514:

People often scream about poor rotations during a match that is going south, but it doesn’t always mean your team is rotating badly. You can lose because your players aren’t good, you have bad class match ups or for a variety of other reasons.

There are tons of different strategies depending on what your team make up is, what the other team has and how the match is going. Often times the trouble I see is when your team is not on the same page. Different players may be using different strategies- neither is bad but they don’t both work at the same time.

I use a simple strategy where I try to have 2 pts capped the majority of the match. I want my team in even or +1 fights unless we have a good bunker holding a point. I adjust accordingly. If my team focuses on 2 pts, I find we usually win. If we push all 3, that frequently leads to losing 2 pts unless the other team is not equally skilled.

Very good points. Rotating so you can have favorable match ups can make a huge difference.

I think one of the main things that makes HoT specs more powerful is the special class abilities connected to traitlines (at least for some classes).

For example, Guard gets a massive virtue upgrade for taking the DH line, Ranger gets a whole new skill bar, and Necro gets an upgraded shroud and powerful melee abilities. If those abilities were made baseline and the vanilla trees altered a bit to synergize with them core and HoT specs would be balanced, or at least more balanced.

What they have done is to fundamentally change the classes rather than expand the choices available to players to build their class.

You shouldn’t have lost a pip if a player left the game.

That is a great post OP, you clearly describe exactly the kinds of choices we are faced with in many games.

For your first point, in general I would go and take far if the team fight mid was going badly or a thought I couldn’t make a difference at mid. Especially if you are using the “immortal” druid build you should be able to hold far for a while, and can probably even escape back to mid to meet with your respawning team mates if things go south. Although one player actually reported me for going far like that, haha, so get used to the hate tells.

Point two- I usually just try to hold two points, but if the entire enemy team is wiped a fast player really should at least decap any undefended node.

Point three is a real dilemma. I think it depends on the class you are playing. I tend to try and hold the point even against a hard counter and then sneak away when I know I can’t hold out any longer.

If you can 1vs2 on an enemy held point for a fair amount of time I think it is a good idea,
if you die quickly it was a bad idea.

sophiewhite.3149:

Yasha.5963:

sophiewhite.3149:

this thread still going on? fine its pay2win so is every other mmo. now go away and live your life instead of constantly complaining here about how you hate the game. you will get nothing free. nothing will change for you. bye.

I don’t think anyone posting about this hates the game, in fact GW2 is my favorite game for this kind of pvp. There are many reasons why I think it is fantastic, a big one being the normalized, level playing field in spvp. It really set GW2 apart from every other mmo, which like you say is p2w: there was absolutely no form of p2w in spvp before HoT, it was amazing.

Even now its still by far the best, but disappointing that there is even an element of p2w introduced.

listen i would waste my time convincing you that you do stand a chance at winning with a base build. but everyone in this thread has proven to be far too stubborn to change their mind. literally arguing for the sake of arguing.

Of course players “stand a chance” of winning with a vanilla build, but it is much easier to “win” with the HoT builds because they add some extremely powerful traits/etc. Every HoT class/skill line is basically a straight upgrade from the vanilla version. The fact that a player can pay to become more powerful in what was supposed to be a level playing field makes it p2w.

If 1) HoT was required to play spvp, or 2) the HoT specs were not OP compared to vanilla specs, or 3) the HoT specs were available to everyone in spvp, then we would be back to a totally non-p2w game as it was pre-HoT.

sophiewhite.3149:

this thread still going on? fine its pay2win so is every other mmo. now go away and live your life instead of constantly complaining here about how you hate the game. you will get nothing free. nothing will change for you. bye.

I don’t think anyone posting about this hates the game, in fact GW2 is my favorite game for this kind of pvp. There are many reasons why I think it is fantastic, a big one being the normalized, level playing field in spvp. It really set GW2 apart from every other mmo, which like you say is p2w: there was absolutely no form of p2w in spvp before HoT, it was amazing.

Even now its still by far the best, but disappointing that there is even an element of p2w introduced.

Trevor Boyer.6524:

Druid needs:

• less cele force gained from random regeneration effects/healing
• more cele force gained from damage dealt

This would keep bunker specs the same so long as they keep attacking but also enable DPS specs again as they would have practical access to cele avatar this way.

Quite a good suggestion, imo.

I find most druids go down really quickly, you just have to time your cc and burst. Some players are really good and can contest a point for a long time but the same could be said for any class.

Velimere.7685:

Yasha.5963:

You said in this very thread that being able to buy an advantage with money in a pvp game is not p2w.

See below:

Yasha.5963:

even buying better gear and so forth with in game currency bought with real cash is not p2w in their view.

Velimere.7685:

Pay-to-win is being able to buy gear and/or other items that other people cannot otherwise obtain.

Now kindly cease with your altogether offensive attempts to misconstrue via straw man.

You seem to have accidentally omitted half of what you actually said, here is it for reference:

Velimere.7685:

Pay-to-win isn’t being able to spend money to buy gear and gear modifications that other people can grind to obtain. Pay-to-win is being able to buy gear and/or other items that other people cannot otherwise obtain.

In my view, which is also likely the view of anyone who plays competitive esports-type games (like LoL, SMITE, etc), paying money to buy an advantage is p2w.

Since you believe “Pay-to-win isn’t being able to spend money to buy gear and gear modifications that other people can grind to obtain”, which basically opens up a game to extreme cases of p2w, I don’t think I or other people interested in promoting GW2 spvp as a top class esport can have a constructive conversation with you.

Your idea that “Pay-to-win isn’t being able to spend money to buy gear and gear modifications that other people can grind to obtain” is basically the antithesis of one of the keystones that makes/made GW2 spvp the premier “battleground” type pvp game in the genre: a level playing field where skill, not gear/levels/money, is the deciding factor.

There are several mmos that have great pvp and combat mechanics, but in those games a player can just buy the best gear with real cash converted to in game currency and dominate the game: something that you believe is not p2w and is apparently totally fine. The shift to a similar direction by ANET with HoT is disturbing to players like me who love GW2 exactly because it is not like that.

sophiewhite.3149:

Zero.6592:

TheDevice.2751:

Struct.7453:

So your saying just play DH and win? Ha, you know the trap trick only works the first time. If you don’t learn then its natural selection…

The funny thing is people keep saying that but none of them must play necromancers.

CC + tRAps is death to any necromancer. The highest most precious comodity in this game right now is stability and necromancers have the least

Actually I just want to remind everyone what necromancers lack
- The least Stability in the game
- The least (zero) blocks in the game
- The least (zero) invulnerability in the game
- The least mobility in the game
- The least hard cc in the game
- The least healing in the game

I’m pretty sure I can go on. So maybe you’re right. Just don’t play necromancers this season is maybe what Anet is trying to tell everyone huh?

Oh and you’re comment means nothing when talking about objectives like Chieftain / Svanir and Lords.

EDIT: and another thing.

ITs funny that you bring up the exact same retort every other person brings up when talking about DH. I’m tier 7 Diamond and there are STILL full teams of DH. I’m sure when and if I get to legendary it will be even worse. 4+ DH a game. about 6 on average. This is not amber.

So what you’re saying is NOBODY has figured out how to not die by DH. Not even in Legendary. lol

Dude why do you even play the profession you seem to hate so much? You must have made 200+ posts about the inferiority of Necromancers by now. If it really is that bad, why don’t you just delete it and leave the weak profession to other people?

not everyone is so weak as to ditch a class they enjoy because it isnt amazing at pvp. some people just play to have fun and wait their turn to be op again. as the cycle continues on.

Those people don’t make post after post about how weak the class they play is, or make threads that essentially ask for the skill set of another class to be added to “their” class kitten nal.

The issue with DH is not limited to necros, if anything with all the hp, shroud, stability, auto procing chills, and massive aoe damage necros are relatively well equipped to deal with DH.

Velimere.7685:

Yasha.5963:

Phaeton, its no use reasoning with Velle, he/she has already posted that being able to buy in game advantages with cash is not p2w- even buying better gear and so forth with in game currency bought with real cash is not p2w in their view.

Please don’t project your own personal opinion onto someone else as theirs. Just because you personally believe that it’s okay to have a pay-to-win system where you can have an advantage over other players via a cash shop doesn’t mean that’s someone else’s opinion.

You said in this very thread that being able to buy an advantage with money in a pvp game is not p2w. I believe the exact opposite of this which is why I am somewhat disappointed that GW2 has introduced an element (albiet very minor at only USD50) of p2w to the game.

(Actually note that by your own definition of p2w, gw2 is actually p2w since you cannot obtain the advantage in game without paying real cash for it).

Here is a reminder of your definition of p2w:

Velimere.7685:

Pay-to-win isn’t being able to spend money to buy gear and gear modifications that other people can grind to obtain. Pay-to-win is being able to buy gear and/or other items that other people cannot otherwise obtain.

kdaddy.5431:

@ supreme.3164

I didnt want to argue points of view of builds with you but i would like to point out that in the Pro League every ele used full shouts and a dagger.

Just a fyi on what those bad eles are playing.

Ele still seems pretty strong to me, the main difference this season is that I actually see them die sometimes when being focused down. Whatever adjustments were made were spot on imo.

abc.5790:

Relative to most game developers and publishers, Anet is one of the least money-hungry. They could have offered an xpac discount for pvp only but it’s probably too late in the product cycle for them to do that now. $50 for the xpac is cheap. Paying for the core game is cheap considering the countless hours we’ve benefited from it before it became free. I don’t know, maybe I’m just rich.

I totally agree, and I think they have actually succeeded to some extent in toning down the relative power of the HoT builds.

Its also true that how much something costs is important. While I feel the game now has an element of p2w that wasn’t there previously, that “p2w” element amounts to only USD50 which is much less than every other mmo that I know of- where you can spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to gain an advantage in pvp.

However, I think what some people are saying is something like “isn’t this a lost opportunity?”. By going f2p, GW2 might have had the potential to gain a portion of the f2p MOBA market, but since you have to pay USD50 to have a reasonable chance at winning, ANET has kind of shot themselves in the foot because anyone who actively plays those types of games is likely to see HoT as a form of p2w and therefore be put off.

cyyrix.6105:

DH is anti-fun for sure, but not to the same extent as turret engi / bunker mesmer / spirit ranger.

Anet almost always nerfs FOTM builds. I doubt DH will be an exception.

Turrent engi was really horrible, at least DH has some class.

Phaeton.9582:

Velimere.7685:

Phaeton.9582:

Velimere.7685:

Secondly, most skill-based games are buy-to-play.

If by ‘skill-based’ you mean ‘competitive’, you must be talking to us from the 90s.

In which case, why is HoT even relevant to you? Go play some Ultima or something.

You must know absolutely nothing about skill-based or competitive games if you think my factual statement only holds relevance to the 90s. Sorry, but the majority of registered ESL games require you to buy them. People foolishly think that free-to-play MOBAs are the majority of such when there’s actually only a handful of popular ones.

ook friend let me put it another way

How many of these ‘skill based or competitive’ games sit behind paywall that crops up biennially and bears little to no relevance to the competitive game itself?

Why do I get the feeling you’ll tell me why this is a widely adopted business model.

Possibly because you’ve posted the same opinion 50 times in this thread.

Let’s not fight; she’ll make you to stay with your aunty and uncle in bel air. Trust me on this one.

Phaeton, its no use reasoning with Velle, he/she has already posted that being able to buy in game advantages with cash is not p2w- even buying better gear and so forth with in game currency bought with real cash is not p2w in their view.