Guild Wars 2

Its WvW and the OP says new to level 80, so the most logical explanation is that the OP and his group were completely outgeared.

In spvp its hard to beat a bunker ele even if you are traps or beastmaster/bunker.

As others have said 3 traps is the way to go. If you are on a point you should be able to reapply your traps as soon as they are triggered, giving a huge amount of cc and condition damage. Your pet is very important too, you can use dogs for cc or cats/bird for burst. You probably just have to get used to the playstyle, it is quite different to a burst build.

Your traps should be doing most of the damage, followed by pet, and then you. Your job is basically to avoid getting hit while the condition damage and pet do their work. Try energy glyphs on weapon swap for more dodges if that is a problem- also hydromancy can be good against thieves if you swap just after they try and start to burst you. I don’t think torch is needed if you have fire trap btw, but u can try it out- I prefer the extra dodge and cc from dagger or horn for the speed/fury buff. Remember any cc/speed boost gives your pet time to do its magic.

Also note that this is not a tank build- you should be able to win nearly any 1vs1 if you start on a point with traps down, but in a 2vs1 you should lose (if enemy are decent).

Also- try and fit in natures protection if burst is a problem for you and increased pet speed (will help pet stay on target).

One more thing-entangle is great, but RAO is your I win button against guards and engis, and helps with eles a lot too if you havn’t got adept at doging their knockdown yet.

Oh nearly forgot, when you use healing spring use you sword’s monarchs leap to roll out of the spring and then jump back in for a free 1500 or so heal ( u can double click the screen to deslect you target before jumping back in if you don’t want to jump right on your enemy.

+1, totally agree the one game mode becomes boring and limiting after a while.

PowerBottom.5796:

Phantaram.1265:

nakoda.4213:

I would not be willing to pay to do something games have been doing for free for decades.

the reason I chose to settle on gw2 is that I am also not willing to pay sub fees for unfinished products any more.

I’d say owning your own server in a video game, at least in most of the games that is featured in, is not free.

I highly doubt that you will actually own a server and have better latency, control over server-specific-settings (region for example) and other stuff like that.

What it most likely will be is a “make custom game”-function common in every competetive Game and a necessity for e-Sports – they can’t make Players pay for that.

What they can do though, is make Players pay for some kind of a “deluxe-Version”, that gave you much more freedom about the Settings and the Options. PW-Protection and Map-choice should probably be in the free Version, but they could go way beyond that and add Options in the deluxe-Version for:

1) Number of Players
2) Changes in what gives how many Points (killing/capping/secondary Objectives)
3) Changes to the length of the Game and Points needed for the win
4) Blocking out certain Classes, Runes or Amulets
5) Chance to fiddle around with stuff like %DPS taken, Respawn-Timer, time to cap/decap Points
6) Hell, maybe there could even be some sort of a Mapmaker, where you could use a current Map and then place Nodes (maybe even only 1 or up to 5 or sth.) and various secondary Objectives on them (this would be the dream! ^^’)

And I see no Problem with paying for that, because it wouldn’t hinder e-Sport or rid any1 of a crucial Game-feature and give no1 an advantage through money, just a bit more freedom on how you want to play.

Again DN has had points 1, 2, and 3 since open beta. A minimap maker or something like that sounds a good idea as a paid feature perhaps, I imagine it would take a lot of work though.

You just need a tab on the spvp game browser with 8vs8, 5vs5, and custom. Click a tab and a list of servers appears. Under custom click create game room to set up your game (access options for pw protect, map, no. of players, etc) , or join one of the existing game rooms/servers if you want.

I think it would be strange to have to pay for that, but maybe if you can use in game currency earned through spvp as well it would be ok.

SAtaarcoeny.8476:

Yasha.5963:

SAtaarcoeny.8476:

So after watching the SOTG and hearing that balance was done by listening to the forums had me confused? i had to watch it a second time to make sure it wasn’t a joke.

I think balance should be done based off of whats important in this game; and in this game its point control:
Capping,
Holding,
Neutralizing,
(Team fights/1v1 contribute to the top 3)

Ok I’ll have a go:

Ele (10/10) for the reasons you mentioned.

Guardian (9/10): a well played guard can keep on a point, stop it from being taken against 2 players for long enough for help to come (ie great at 2 of your 3 points)

Necro (8.5/10): rez is a game changer, good at any three of your points.

Engineer (8/10): can be great at holding a point or as a roamer looking for the instant kill. KBs/nets/turrets etc are great for point control

Ranger (8/10): Trap ranger is good at defending a point 1vs1 but not 2vs1. Also not as powerful at attacking point. Other ranger builds are surprisingly good, people are just fixated on trap ranger. I would say BM or full dps build would be 7 or 8/10 depending on the make up of the other team.

Thief (8/10): Great at capping/backcapping, amazing burst and stomping abilities can change a fight. A caltrops build can keep a point neutralized against 2 players almost indefinately (depending on other builds).

Mesmer (8/10): again depending on build, but offers amazing team mobility through portal, and amazing burst or survivability again relevant to all three of your points.

Warrior (7.5/10): can have great mobility for capping fast, has great team synergy and can apply huge and powerful aoe damage, absolutely devistating when paired with good cc class like engi. Slightly behind the other classes overall on your criteria.

i think you might be forgetting to compare each class to all the other 8 in every different genre. the best at whatever you are judging should get more points and then less and less for each class below that. then you add all the points after every category and then you give the final score.

I find each class to be pretty even across the criteria you have set, as reflected in my scores. Guardians and eles stand out because they are the best node holders/neutralizers, while eles pull ahead because they have incredible mobility as well (for taking backpoint/reinforcing team).

There is no way that warrior can get a 3 and ranger a 9, for example. I think you are just being melodramatic and attention seeking. Of course it sounds way cooler to say that there are these huge balance issues in the game, but when it comes down to it each class shines in its own way even under your criteria for what balance should be judged on in tpvp.

Both ranger and ele were seen as the weakest classes in tpvp at one point, but now despite being nerfed (ranger at least) they are rated as the strongest. I think this demonstrates that any lack of balance is small and needs only slight adjustment, not the total overhaul your ratings suggest. In fact perhaps nerfing warriors would be the way to go-it worked for ranger after all.

Dragons Nest (a free to play pvp centric mmo) has had this feature for free since it was in open beta….

SAtaarcoeny.8476:

So after watching the SOTG and hearing that balance was done by listening to the forums had me confused? i had to watch it a second time to make sure it wasn’t a joke.

I think balance should be done based off of whats important in this game; and in this game its point control:
Capping,
Holding,
Neutralizing,
(Team fights/1v1 contribute to the top 3)

Ok I’ll have a go:

Ele (10/10) for the reasons you mentioned.

Guardian (9/10): a well played guard can keep on a point, stop it from being taken against 2 players for long enough for help to come (ie great at 2 of your 3 points)

Necro (8.5/10): rez is a game changer, good at any three of your points.

Engineer (8/10): can be great at holding a point or as a roamer looking for the instant kill. KBs/nets/turrets etc are great for point control

Ranger (8/10): Trap ranger is good at defending a point 1vs1 but not 2vs1. Also not as powerful at attacking point. Other ranger builds are surprisingly good, people are just fixated on trap ranger. I would say BM or full dps build would be 7 or 8/10 depending on the make up of the other team.

Thief (8/10): Great at capping/backcapping, amazing burst and stomping abilities can change a fight. A caltrops build can keep a point neutralized against 2 players almost indefinately (depending on other builds).

Mesmer (8/10): again depending on build, but offers amazing team mobility through portal, and amazing burst or survivability again relevant to all three of your points.

Warrior (7.5/10): can have great mobility for capping fast, has great team synergy and can apply huge and powerful aoe damage, absolutely devistating when paired with good cc class like engi. Slightly behind the other classes overall on your criteria.

To me 5vs5 hotjoin is not that much different to solo queue tourney. Still see people group capping and not really knowing what they are doing when I solo queue.

But I understand what Davinci is saying, it is kind of annoying reading posts demanding nerfs or saying the game sux because thief is so OP etc from players with 10 hours spvp experience and/or who haven’t seen the game from various perspectives (premade/ casual groups/ solo queue / 8vs8 / 5vs5 hotjoin) or played various classes in spvp.

One problem is that the game is skill based, so your uber gear can’t carry you, a good healer can’t carry you (no healers); you just have to get good (and run in a premade if you want to be good at winning tourneys). That takes more than 10hrs and rabbit rank.

Feedback from players that still don’t know most of the intricacies of the game is not appropriate for basing class balance on-although it is important to know what new players feel like.

I say as a rough guideline give it 100hrs spvp and playing across all spvp variants before demanding nerfs/buffs. Come to the forums and ask for help when getting beaten before that.

Vanthian.9267:

False, the balance is pretty horrible. The fact people play different things is because they like the sound of the profession and/or the way it plays, but not because the balance is “decent”. Same skill level people fight, Mesmer vs Engineer… who wins? Pretty easy and quick to answer.

Yes easy to answer: If both players are equally noobish the mesmer will likely win. If both are very skilled it will depend on what build each player is using.

The problem with so many of these feedback threads is that they are written by noobs like the OP that have limited pvp experience. Mesmer has been nerfed several times and are counterable depending on class builds, I don’t see any massive class imbalance in this game atm. Perhaps some classes could be toned down and others raised up slightly, but that is an ongoing process in any mmo as the game develops.

Duncanmix.5238:

What I learned from gw2 is: how people don’t appreciate good things and hold onto negativity blindly.
For example everyone forgets how:
- you need 0 grind to play pvp in gw2
- you can play any class at any moment in gw2 in pvp
- you don’t need stupid healers anymore and you’re free to choose your class as you like
Yea game is not perfect, but out of all mmos I played, its by far best. There is nothing even close to gw2 in my opinion.

I agree. And would add:

-you can even get bored of something you really like if you play it long enough
-one game mode in pvp gets boring faster than several game modes
-focusing on making an epsort before establishing a fun and popular game (mode) doesn’t seem to work
-throwing out all the successful and loved game modes/ranking/ladder/reward systems of your previous title is probably not the best idea
-“noob” is the most insulting word on the planet and can seemingly cause people to instantaneously combust

More game modes, better matchmaking in tourneys (ie no 4vs5 etc), and possibily a ladder to motivate you (or depress you depending on whether you solo join or are in a premade).

AlfredKlios.9657:

Warriors with their bulls charge ability? 1 STUN BREAKER, done. i cant beleive people even try to bring warriors into light.

My question, why isnt anyone mentioning how shorthanded engineers are? They bunker WORSE than warriors, and have no movement ability at all.

1) bullrush CD is low and warriors have other abilities to hold down the enemy. A good warrior would try and bait the stun breaker before using a quickness HB. A good warrior is in fact quite scarey.

2) Engis are very, very strong. To me they are one of the hardest classes to kill if played/built right.

Lordrosicky.5813:

Here is a typical occurance whilst solo queuing. But o yeh anet I should carry this team right?

And no it isnt just about ranks. It is about premades having tactics and most crucically having a good team composition. The necro/2 warrior/2 thief comp isnt exactly great.

It is a joke. The ladder is going to be a COMPLETE joke because people like me cannot get high on it no matter how pro we are.

Everyone on my team quit after about 3 minutes.

I agree that premades have a huge advantage over pugs, and that those games where you get crushed by premades suck.

However, I don’t have an issue with the ladder ranking. I don’t have much time to play with my guild anymore, but I accept that if you want to be serious about the competitive side of the game you need to be in a premade. You will actually become a better player if play with a premade as well.

Yiyojin.3241:

Yasha.5963:

OP you just described what my ranger is like when I play against a noob; its a very different story against a half decent player of any other class. Get better and your issue with ranger will go away.

“Get better and your issue with ranger will go away.”
This is always the defense from people with Op classes.

I play gw2 since October. And a lot of people consider me a very good player.
Man.. You know that gw2 is a scissors,papper,rock game.
Example. A build will destroy B build, B build will destroy C build, C build will destroy A build…..
Same is with classes, an A class will have advantages against B class, B class will have advantages against C class….

This is true. And anybody I mean really anybody knows that!
Now… If you look this from a different prospective, and you try to inamgin how this stuff works ikittenv5 team match. It does better.
I guess Gw2 was a game meant to be played in teams vs teams.
But this is not what MMO was/is. This is not the only thing that Mmo players want.
This game is good in a certain way… But it won’t hold the mmo hardcore players very long. Indeed is already loosing players.

Since is buy and play forever, this game will probably never die.. Because you are bored sometime and you will go to play a bit of gw2….
This game seriously makes me thing that is a Singleplayer game to play with friends and help each other out.. With the posibility to play some killing betwetn them in the aposite area.. a.k.a Hart of the mists.
And Pvp feels so much like COD mw2…

If you are having an issue with rangers just say what class you are and people can give you some tips. I have no problems with rangers and usually focus them down first (in hotjoin anyway) because it is easy to kill them unless they are good.

No need for the childish and practically incoherent tirade.

Yes.

But, I had to say that because of the way you phrased your question. I think there should be more game modes becasue it will be more fun; I’m not sure if increasing the number of game modes will be good for acheiving the esports dream however.

Volrath.1473:

Yasha.5963:

OP you just described what my ranger is like when I play against a noob; its a very different story against a half decent player of any other class. Get better and your issue with ranger will go away.

well it’s allot easier to come to the forums to complaint and demand nerfs
your quote is valid for thieves as well but hey whining won and the nerf bat is on its way.

Wen the thief becomes a free kill (in 2-3 patches at this rate) then every one will be happy! thieves will be owning with they’re warriors / Mesmers / Eles alts that will become mains very very soon.

Theives are OP so thats OK.

You missed out the cheesy guardian, warrior, and engi builds!

Guardians with endless stability and knockdowns and aoe pulls into holy symbols of fiery of death.

Warriors with ridiculously low CD bulls rush into hundred blades of whirling instant death.

Engineers with a thousand ways to escape, reflect, knockdown, and pull you into an a 100 nades insta gib.

Jeez I hate how people optimize their builds and use them intelligently!

OP you just described what my ranger is like when I play against a noob; its a very different story against a half decent player of any other class. Get better and your issue with ranger will go away.

It is pretty balanced. From your post it sounds like you play ranger. When you find the right builds and get experience you will be fine, ranger can be really good in hot-join and backstab thieves don’t pose much of a threat depending on your build.

I could write an essay on this but I’ll just point out three things that may help if you don’t already do it:

For downstate I suggest bringing a wolf along, it gives you up to 3 interupts (4 if you have another dog as well) when you are downed which is quite handy. If you are BM you can win one on ones from downed state even.

If you use a sword practise the jump back, turn around and jump further away gap opener- very good for escaping. Use the sword evade when thief goes invisible near you to dodge incoming backstab. Use evade when you are immobolized and people are beating on you.

Use RAO whenever you have to fight a guardian or engineer, its nearly an IWIN button against builds that rely on knocking u down to damage you.

Finally, its good to play against people that are higher rank than you because you can learn how to play properly. There is no gear gap like in Rift etc where rank 1s get demolished by rank 8s just because of the uber gear. Don’t hate on the great system, just get more skilled and you’ll be fine.

Paruza.3162:

I was browsing the forum here (I hadn’t read any of it before I posted). I didn’t realize so many other people felt like the Mesmer, thief + downed mechanics were “kittentastic” as well. If they didn’t break your target it wouldn’t be as bad.

That said, if any random person (like myself) can play pvp for awhile and independently come to the same conclusions as the more experienced players on this forum then there’s probably some pretty glaring problems to be fixed.

I’ve pretty much done everything in PvE (which I quite enjoyed actually, the fractals addition I think was great) I’ll probably give the game a break(again) and check back in a few months assuming something else hasn’t made me not care (like starbound).

I believe it is mainly the noobs that complain about thief and mesmer downstate, so other random people like yourself.

Totally agree, Asura are OP.

Two points:

1) This game isn’t really designed to have a “main” in tpvp. You can pick up other classes and get good at them too, although it takes a while. in other words, play a different class if you feel warrior sucks, don’t get too attached to one class. Also, many people will ask you to bring a certain class to tpvp so its beneficial to have a few that you are good at.

2) Move on? Where too? Is there another game with pretty well balanced action-combat instanced pvp?

No Walking.6349:

tpvp gives you cool titles and better gear.

I am not interested in those things, I just like playing good challanging pvp.

Anyway, I tried again today with the solo join tpvp and have narrowed down the problem to the cases of players not showing. I had a whole string of matches today with full 5vs5 teams and it brought the experience up to the level of an active 5vs5 hotjoin server.

There is still something lacking though-it just doesn’t differentiate itself enough from hotjoin 5vs5.

chrisk.4320:

Disagree. If you think hot-join is more fun than tPvP solo queue, you are the minority.

So you enjoy playing 3vs 5 games?

I’m actually surprised that many people have defended the status quo; unless I have at least four guildies/friends with me I find it really frustrating to step into tpvp. Of course the merry-go round of spvp hotjoin is also frustrating at times, but I think that is a lot to do with the one game mode (as Sylosi says above) and maybe 8vs8 being too large a number for these maps.

However, I think if there was some way to fix the issue of some players not showing up for the game it would make the solo join tpvp experience much better.

Or maybe after thousands of games I’m just bored with the one game mode and have more fun messing around and setting my own agenda in hotjoin when I can’t play with friends.

lvis.3824:

Where is hotjoin “better” ?
Hotjoin is in most cases circle zerging …

Sometimes, when people start to drop out ( most likely because they finished their daily ), it is fun because its 2v2 or something like this, but thats it.

In tPvP you have a team strategy, you synergize your builds for your team, and you call & get help if needed.

Also, you have voice to set up your burst etc.

This is much more fun then running in circles and blowing all AE abilities you have on random opponents.

• At least this is MY opinion on the matter *

I can answer that question. Hotjoin is better than solo queue tpvp.

All the things you said were good about tpvp I agree with, but it only applies to doing tpvp as a premade. None of those good points actually apply to solo join tpvp.

Solo queue is just a less balanced, slightly more boring version of hotjoin. I rarely see strategy or skill beyond what I see in hotjoin (reverse is often true) unless I do tpvp with my guild/friends (which is not solo queue!).

Let me stress though: tpvp with your guild/friends is a totally different story (and a very exicting one).

faeral.7120:

solo queue >>>>>> hotjoin

doesn’t matter if you face a premade or only have 4 players, that is what you should be hoping for if you want to grow stronger. measure your progress by personal discovery & performance improvement, not by wins or losses ( since both are currently meaningless both in hotjoin & tourney ).

In theory tpvp should be better than hotjoin, but in practice it is not. I find about the same level of skill in hotjoin as in solo join tpvp, except that solo tpvp is more unbalanced.

Doing tpvp as a premade is of course very good and really boosts your skill and understanding of the game . However, hotjoin is on the whole more challanging balanced and fun than solo tpvp, I really don’t see the point of solo join tpvp in its current state.

I think it is strange that hotjoin provides a better, more fun game experience than solo queuing for tpvp.

Tpvp in premades is a lot of fun, but solo join is quite bad in my opinion. You often get only 3 or 4 people on one team, a mishmash of skill levels, and premades vs pugs.

As far as I can see tpvp is really only suited to premade groups; solo join tpvp is just an inferior form of hotjoin but with better rewards The only upside over hotjoin is the 5 per team format (also in hotjoin, but mysteriously hidden at the bottom of the list so usually there are few or no active 5vs5 hotjoin servers), and the ability to play with 2-3 friends as a group (which u can pretty much do in hotjoin anyway).

Hotjoin has gotten a lot of flak in the forums, but it certainly seems to blow solo join tpvp out of the water.

Any thoughts?

That’s the longest whine about thief and mesmer I have ever read. He just sounds like a noob to me.

I do agree about having more game modes would be fun, but he seemed focused on his rant about theif and mesmer more than anything else. Yawn fest of a read, please don’t repost post this guys crap here again.

jportell.2197:

Edit: and for everyone else’s argument of starting the recharge when the phantasm is killed that keeps us from having multiple phantasms in a boss fight (which most teams love) and you are also ignoring the fact that every phantasm has had some form of cooldown increase since release and the attack rate has been decreased so we can summon them less often and they attack less often… And you whiners still aren’t happy.

Yeah I remember when mesmers were scarey, now after several nerfs they aren’t so bad and I can generally kill them on most classes. The only OP build atm belongs to the elementalist class.

Rump Buffalo.2594:

The same game mode isnt necessarily the problem, look at LoL.

..

LoL is not an action mmo battleground pvp game. It is more like a strategy game. I can compare GW2 to monolopy and argue that we should be playing on a board since that game was such a success.

Lets compare apples with apples. GW2 spvp vs other MMOs with battlegrounds. In this comparision, GW2 wins in about every aspect except that it only has one game mode. I understand the logic of why the devs went this way (to develop it as an esport), but it is also the only reason I can think of that the spvp population is small (well apparently it is small, maybe its fine). As much as I love the game, the one game mode does get a bit monotonous.

I also supose it lacks a way to hold players in, to motivate them to continue. Other MMOs did this through the gear grind, I hear GW1 did this through a variety of systems that were not implemented in GW2 for some reason. For me the fun and thrill of combat is enough to hold me; slowly getting more skilled and experienced, meeting some people etc. But oh what a delight a new game mode would be.

Yes of course it is fun. There is no gear grind so I play just for enjoyment-and there is plenty to be had here. A lot of people on the forums whine about it but I wonder if part of the issue is just getting bored with the game in general. If you have too much of something it inevitably gets stale.

I know people who played GW1 feel a lot is missing compared to that game, which seems a valid complaint; but the core mechanics are great fun nevertheless.

Also look at it in comparision to other similar game formats out there: Tera-has one BG and a 3vs3 comp (both at level cap lol) and is almost completely broken; Rift-pretty good BGs until level cap and then it deteriorates into a gear-grind lowbie ganking/pre-made stomps pug kittenfest; WoW-kind of like Rift except it is gear-based throughout with some nice stopping points at the 60 and 70 bracket; WAR-again similar to WoW with the gear grind except also has interesting RvR system, but the overall quality is just uninspiring.

GW2 spvp definately beats those games for the fun factor, and is more skill based to boot. Tera had a chance to be skill based (because you have to dodge and aim with very few lock-on abilities), but it actially takes the cake for the most gear-based of all above mmos and is broken in various other ways.

Rift, WoW, WAR, and possibly SWTOR (never played it) have the upper hand only in terms of having multiple game modes, which is actually a big plus, but the downsides far outweigh that.

Basically if you like to do spvp/tpvp its GW (1 and 2?) or nothing, because the competition sucks for various reasons.

Everytime I play I always think, wow d/d ele bunker is overpowered. Its a consistant thing. I just never get that feeling about mesmers, or any other class.

mongolianmisfit.8350:

CC and movement abilities are king on this map. But how is RTL any different (in regards to “fairness”) than a guardian dropping Sanctuary on the orb for a free pick up (and then continue to wall you up the ramps!!!)? Potato, potatoe. Some classes are better than others on Spirit Watch, just like a football team has designated players to achieve a certain play, it is the same thing.

My only issue is the fact that certain classes do seem to have to spec specifically for this map, which is tedious.

Because rtl is a movement skill, not a cc which other classes have and which work independantly of the orb.

Windfury.3598:

Yasha.5963:

Kasama.8941:

milo.6942:

Kasama.8941:

milo.6942:

you have no idea what this thread is even about.

Someone complaining that the Elementalist has a movement skill, and the Thief has none.

rtl is the only movement skill to not be affected by the orb slow

• The Thief has Heartseeker, Withdraw, and Roll for Initiative, that are all movement skills, just like Ride the Lightning. Next to that the Thief has a ton of snare skills, including casting caltrops on dodge roll.
• The Warrior has movement skills on greatsword and sword, and AoE weakness on warhorn. Next to that the Warrior has AoE fear, launch, and invulnerability utilities. Plus various condition removal traits like “movement skills break immobilize”.
• The Ranger has movement skills in greatsword and sword. Invulnerability from “Protect Me” and Signet of Stone, or various snare trap skills. You have condition removal from Signet of Renewal, Healing Spring, and traits, plus a ton of regeneration and protection on dodge roll. And finally AoE fear, protection, regeneration, or condition removal from pets.

The point is all the movement skills you list are effected by the orb’s slow. Its seems to about halve the effectiveness of the movement skills of other classes. What I (we?) don’t understand is that if rtl is not a teleport then why is it uneffected by the orb’s slow?

Obviously they are not “all movement skills, just like Ride the Lightning”, rtl has some special kittening OP status that sets it apart from all other movement skills.

BTW I think the idea of taking away all 1-5 skills on the orb carrier is one of the stupidest ideas I have ever heard.

I think you misread some of the posts here including mine. The suggestion is not to remove all the skills (although it started with that suggestion)but rather give you a set of new 1-5 skills witch are Orb specific. I don’t think there is anything stupid in that personally, the game is designed to pick up objects in the world and have bundles of skills unlock as a result. This idea is just an extension of that.
You clearly stated how less effective the rest of the movement skills are compared to RTL, this is the very reason why all carriers should probably have even opportunities where the orb is concerned. We don’t need a d/d elem + a 100% successful orb carrier or a bunker warrior running the all infamous orb and never dropping it.
Using the orb specific skills in a clever way while supported by your team so you can pull through is the real aim here. In other words putting back team effort into this map.
I don’t have anything against elementalists, my main character is an elementalist, although I enjoy playing thief in pvp more.

It would be totally boring to be orb carrier with specific orb skills or no skills (both ideas were mentioned above actually). The only issue is rtl not being effected by the orb’s slow, it is clearly OP. All my team just gasped-wtf- the first time we saw it happen. No need to throw out the baby with the bathwater just because of one bugged skill. Keep player skills and make rtl affected by slow, problem solved.

The bunker ele would still be a good orb runner even if rtl was affected by the orb’s slow.

Kasama.8941:

milo.6942:

Kasama.8941:

milo.6942:

you have no idea what this thread is even about.

Someone complaining that the Elementalist has a movement skill, and the Thief has none.

rtl is the only movement skill to not be affected by the orb slow

• The Thief has Heartseeker, Withdraw, and Roll for Initiative, that are all movement skills, just like Ride the Lightning. Next to that the Thief has a ton of snare skills, including casting caltrops on dodge roll.
• The Warrior has movement skills on greatsword and sword, and AoE weakness on warhorn. Next to that the Warrior has AoE fear, launch, and invulnerability utilities. Plus various condition removal traits like “movement skills break immobilize”.
• The Ranger has movement skills in greatsword and sword. Invulnerability from “Protect Me” and Signet of Stone, or various snare trap skills. You have condition removal from Signet of Renewal, Healing Spring, and traits, plus a ton of regeneration and protection on dodge roll. And finally AoE fear, protection, regeneration, or condition removal from pets.

The point is all the movement skills you list are effected by the orb’s slow. Its seems to about halve the effectiveness of the movement skills of other classes. What I (we?) don’t understand is that if rtl is not a teleport then why is it uneffected by the orb’s slow?

Obviously they are not “all movement skills, just like Ride the Lightning”, rtl has some special kittening OP status that sets it apart from all other movement skills.

BTW I think the idea of taking away all 1-5 skills on the orb carrier is one of the stupidest ideas I have ever heard.

Yes rtl is just silly on this new map (the map itself is awesome). Combined with frost aura, armor of earth etc it just gives that bunker ele spec too much of an advantage.

I don’t think I would feel particularly bad about it if this was just an isolated case, but that ele build is already OP in the other maps. It consequently feels like eles just got even more powerful, which is sad because there was a clear consensus in Guru’s state of the game that the ele bunker spec was OP.

I imagine that a lot of people feel frustrated that the end result of feedback was to go in the complete opposite direction and make that ele spec even more powerful.

I was having a great time in the new pvp map-which is awesome- and then I saw an ele rtl with the orb halfway up the stairs. For the love of god, ele’s (at least bunkerish ele’s)were the most OP’d class before this, but on the new map the situation is beyond ridiculous.

OP your post convinced me that all the talented devs are with Arena Net.

That WoW story is very, very scarey; and amazing that it could have come so close to disaster.

Kabangers.7263:

Death match:
To make death match work with no trinity I would propose allowing everyones #6 heal to be aoe within say 500-600 yards. Wuth maybe +10s on normal cd durations. Maybe 1pt forkill, playing to 20 or so. Downstate disabled in this mode.

Would attract casuals that just hop on to kill people for their 1hr a day they play. Would also promote teamwork as you can now actively heal your allies to keep them alive.

Why do you need the “trinity” to make Death match work? Also, in paids at least there is a lot of teamwork as is. Why do you need to disable downstate?

xHoudinix.4523:

That could be it. Seems a little unfair that you can be blind when downed and have to really on chance to stop the finisher when other professions have aoe interruptions or have ones to move them.

Ranger has an ok downed state. Rangers have an aoe interupt, some pets such as wolf have an f2 ability that interupts, if you are lucky canines will do a knockdown if you switch to them while downed, and of course pets will keep attacking while you are downed. Then when both parties are downed the pet revive (when it works) gives you the upper hand againt other downed classes except warrior and mesmer.

Thief I guess is meant to be an assassin-type class so have some good options to finish you off like stealth and various blinds.

Ranger downstate is actually one of my favorite things about the class because it has more strategic options than most other classes, and if all goes well you can turn a potential loss around.

xHoudinix.4523:

See while I’ve been playing the pvp matches, the stun will rarely work. Don’t know if I have to target or its something where it has a VERY short range and players are outside it, but the main problem I have with it is that it doesn’t work. I even try to let myself to into the down state, never hitting anyother key until I see them do the finisher and press 2, but nothing happens. I’m still finished off.

Thieves often blind you when u are downed, which will prevent your interupt from working, some classes use stability, mist form etc which also stops your interupt from working.

Btw you should see a “progress bar” above your downed skills when u hit your interupt. Sometimes if you hit f2 too late you get stomped before the interupt fires off (it takes a second or two to fire).

I think making chill aura only proc on attacks from within melee range would be enough of a nerf to make eles killable.

Atm you can only kill them with a very high burst class like 100 nades- and it is actually quite difficult to get that kind of burst off on the OP ele builds because of all the defensive CDs they have.

If chill doesn’t proc when the ele is attacked from range then they could also be brought down by sustained damage and could be chased to an extent (but still be very mobile).

kodesh.2851:

Plum Butter.4058:

The problem with enemy cast bars is that Arena Net wanted everything to be more reliant on the visibility of the world itself. That is why they were not in the game to start with and the UI is very minimized.

^^

This. No cast bars. It would lower the skill cap, not raise it. Memorizing the names of the most dangerous skills so you can interrupt them isn’t in fact, skill. Having a feel of what your opponent is/will cast next based on many hours of gameplay and by watching their movements, is.

This required situational awareness lends itself greatly to the immersiveness of the combat and gameplay. And I think it would be of too great a detriment to that immersiveness and feel changing character model sizes, for the tiny smidge of fairness you might add.

It’s also a totally hokey/kludgey way to fix the “issue.” I hope ANet has more class than to just resize a race model because someone lost at pvp.

I totally agree, having to read animations is a really cool aspect of this game. It is however much harder to see those asura animations, and I also find them more difficult to tell apart.

In WoW and Rift etc you grind for gear, in GW2 you grind for skill.

Both games have clear progression, WoW etc have gear-based progression while GW2 has skill based progression. If I want I can even spend some time to have pretty gear to go with my skill.

To me the pvp in those gear-based games is half pve, because that idea of leveling up your toon and getting more powerful gear to overcome more powerful monsters is the definition of a traditional pve rpg game. It really doesn’t have a place in competitive games/sports.

If you are feeling the need to get more powerful gear to incentivize you I believe that you are really a pver at heart. Just drop the cool pvp facade and get into your true love-pve, its nothing to be embarrassed about.

OGDeadHead.8326:

S H A K U R AS.9536:

I agree in 100%, asuras should be removed from pvp!

No!

Actually, everything seems easier when playing this race compared to my charr! It feels like I’m moving faster, the camera view is better – I never thought it could be such a huge difference in how the game feels and plays, and for some odd reason, it makes gameplay a lot easier!

Maybe all characters should be reduced to the size of asura in spvp?

The best counter for this is stability (and of course do not let the engineer get right on top of you). If you have stability and a ranged attack they will likely just run away (or die).

Sometimes those little Asurian engis can be an issue though, because you can’t see them behind the blades of grass until they are suddenly running between your legs and then -boom!

Dahkeus.8243:

Xsorus.2507:

Rambodacious.7495:

Hello friend,

Dunno why you posted all this stuff. I made a post addressing this very thing in the “how to counter a ranger” thread.

If classes are forced to bring builds and abilities that are sub-optimal for fighting the other 7 classes in an attempt to have a CHANCE at beating a trap ranger it means ONE thing.

Rangers are overpowered.

But hey, thanks for spending a large amount of time trying to prevent a nerf to a build that obviously needs one. Peace.

“I shouldn’t be forced to change my meta to deal with a new meta!”

^ That’s this thread in a nutshell.

It still blows my mind how the perception of rangers has gone from them being seen as an underpowered laughable class to now this scary overpowered class when next to nothing has really changed (especially for trap rangers).

The only thing that has really changed for rangers is that A) Java started running rangers mainly because he just wanted to try something new to keep things interesting and rangers main Achilles heel happens to come from skills/abilities that aren’t popular in the current meta.

I mean, rangers themselves don’t do anything really much better than anyone else. They don’t have amazing dps, they can’t bunker like other classes, but they just happen to be the right kind of mediocre to shine in the stagnant meta game that GW2 has created.

Totally agree with this. How and why suddenly the supposedly worst pvp class got to be OP after actually having two quite big nerfs (short bow speed and recently pet F2 cool down resets on swap taken away) baffles my mind.

Great write up by the OP though.

Your best bet is to attack people who are lower on health, preferably softer targets. Let your team engage first and pick the right moment for your lethal teleport in, quickness/stealth stomp then get out.

The above advice works well for question 3. Your SB does a lot of damage too, so you can soften targets up with that from a safe place until the time to strike. Be careful of the aoe.

In 1vs1 you are unlikely to oneshot anyone with decent toughness, but if you get that opener downpat you should be able do do well.

I used to regularly get 20 kills a match on my thief when GW2 launched (and I didn’t even know how to use the C&D teleport opener) but people are wiser to thieves now so you will just have to practice and get good at it.

I agree that the Asura have an advantage in spvp based on race. They are notably smaller than all the other races, which as the OP says makes it more difficult to read their animations and see which way they are facing.

I also find it difficult to tell them apart, because again the smaller size makes it harder to see detail that would distinguish them. This is especially true for fast moving or stealth based classes. That makes a difference in spvp because if there are 2 or more of one class but say with different builds (or if stealthing in and out/cloning) it becomes much more difficult to keep on target.

Unlikely that they will be banned, (funny thought though!) and the advantage is much less than say in a game like Tera where smaller races have longer reach and smaller hitboxes than bigger races. Nevertheless it is kind of sad that an unfair advantage due to race does exist in an otherwise extremely level playing field.