No, other classes and builds do not have this potential. Portal is unique. That is the problem with it: it is a bring the class skill. GW2 isn’t supposed to be a bring the class game. If you want to play that sort of game fine but everything the devs have said supports GW2 not being that kind of game.
Portal doesn’t fit with the way this game is (supposedly) designed.
. 1 shotting thiefs
.regenerate like no one else guards and Reflect damage 100% of the time
. extra life bar necro
.beserking warrior
.Portaling mesmeryeah only the mesmer has 1 unique skill
None of those are “bring the class” skills. Many classes have high burst potential, not just thieves. Many classes have great support potential, not just guardians. Many classes have great ability to soak damage, not just necros. I don’t know what you’re even getting at with “berserking warrior,” that’s just lol.
Thank you for proving my point for me: there are no other “Bring the Class” skills like Mesmer portal. Although if you knew what you were talking about a little more you would have mentioned one of the few skills that arguably come close to being “bring the class” besides Portal, in particular the guardian “you shall not pass” skill on staff5.
Pistol con build relies on picking skills like rocket boots and the bomb kit that give you access to decent duration burning. The pistol skills themselves arn’t enough to justify going con damage, especially given how bad engis are at stacking bleed.
With a grenade focused build the only BAD choice is dual pistols. That really makes no sense at all and can’t be justified except maybe in some really weird one-off circumstance I can’t think of right now.
Rifle has more mobility and more lockdown, shield gets you two very effective damage avoidance abilities. It really just depends on the situation. No real reason not to have both and switch them out as required from fight to fight.
For example if I’m sitting on a point shield is probably a better option especially if you’re facing any glass cannons. If I’m skirmishing I’ll use the rifle for the added mobility and the root.
No, portal is not fine. Portal is a “bring the class” skill. No other class has anything remotely like it. GW2 isn’t supposed to be a “bring the class” game.
Line of Warding.
Guardians obviously come the closest to mesmers in terms of being another “bring the class” class. But even line of warding isn’t really a bring the class skill. And even if it is “bring the class” the solution to that is to fix that ability.
“Bring the class” is against the GW2 design philosophy. We need to end all instances of it, not defend one based on the alleged presence of another.
Retal with 100% uptime or anywhere close is just stupid. Arenanet needs to get off the pot and decide what retal is.
1) Retal is a short duration, high damage ability used to punish someone who just attacks you through its duration. If so, uptime should be about 10-20% of the time at most, and the damage should be increased by about 50%.
2) Retal is an always up, modest damage reflect. If so, damage needs to be tuned down to about ~100ish per hit.
Right now it is both which is just stupid.
Yukishiro, I would argue that after having played with this build for a couple days. Single target damage is much easier, more consistent even though it depends on crits, and burst damage is crazy high compared to my previous grenade build. Plus it allows me to be much more mobile with more CC. This is what I was looking for when I started my Engineer.
It’s easier, sure. It’s not nearly as high. Obviously if you miss a lot of your grenade hits that will change the equation but that’s more of a player error kind of problem.
Also grenade build can have about the same mobility and CC. You can still use rifle skills. You have one less utility slot, but ice grenade is pretty good for CC/mobility itself. Anyone running grenade should be frequently switching to rifle for the CC and mobility it provides when needed, unless you’re running pistol/shield in which case you should be frequently switching out for the shield skills.
No, portal is not fine. Portal is a “bring the class” skill. No other class has anything remotely like it. GW2 isn’t supposed to be a “bring the class” game.
No, other classes and builds do not have this potential. Portal is unique. That is the problem with it: it is a bring the class skill. GW2 isn’t supposed to be a bring the class game. If you want to play that sort of game fine but everything the devs have said supports GW2 not being that kind of game.
Portal doesn’t fit with the way this game is (supposedly) designed.
Please appreciate the following facts:
1. Thief burst when using cooldowns is too high by any reasonable metric. Anyone who says otherwise can safely be ignored.
2. Arenanet doesn’t care. Get used to it. 2-3 second kills are common in this game and they arn’t anywhere close to a priority. Thieves and warriors killing you in 2-3 seconds will remain part of the game for several months at least.
3. Stacking toughness and/or vit is not going to save you and is not a great solution. Certain builds on certain classes WILL save you (plague necro is the best example) when your CDs are up.
Basically, either 1) get used to dying in 2-3 seconds, or 2) be one of the gimmicky builds that can easily avoid getting killed in 2-3 seconds, or 3) quit.
It’s pretty clear rifle isn’t intended to be a viable build for DPS. It is just too heavy on the utility.
But if you’re not switching it to occasionally for that utility you are doing it wrong. Having a ranged root, a leap and a knockback (even one that CCs you too) and not using them regularly, especially with a grenade build, is somewhat suicidal.
Use grenades for damage, use rifle for the root, knockback and leap. It is pretty clear from the way engi weapons are set up that rifle isn’t supposed to be competitive DPS-wise.
Portal is a dumb skill that is always going to be unbalanced as long as it’s in the game and is the only skill in the game like it.
The most obvious change (besides just taking them out of the game entirely) would be to make portals take 3-5 seconds to “activate” before they can be used and giving them an hp pool.
But repair kit portal is OBVIOUSLY ridiculous and it’s truly mindboggling it hasn’t been nerfed yet.
I struggle to see how a “bunker” necro can be so intimidating due to necros almost complete lack of stability. If you cant kill or move the necro then you just have to work around a bad matchup.
Plague is the best bunker skill in the game. 20 seconds stability, aoe blind every second? Yes please.
It does mean necros are somewhat gimmicky bunkers though because they are only super good at it for 20 seconds of every 3 minutes.
Initiative is a broken mechanic. The solution to a broken mechanic isn’t to give it to everyone.
Threads like this just prove some people will defend anything. Portal is quite clearly an odd skill out when you consider the basic setup of this game. This game is not set up around bringing particular classes to furfill particular roles and they’ve said over and over again they don’t want an EQ-style game where you have to bring a cleric to heal and a warrior to tank.
Portal is simply not remotely like any other skill in the game. It just doesn’t fit. The rendering issue makes it especially bad but even without that issue it just makes zero sense to give a game-changing skill like portal to only one class.
If every other class also got a similarly unique, game-changing utility skill that would be one thing…but they don’t. Guardians come maybe the closest.
Your original post relies on a thief having 140 trait points and 3 weapon slots and like 5 utility slots to be able to run both pistol whip and c&d backstab at the same time. I can see how that thief woud roflstomp my necro but that thief doesn’t exist. In reality they are one or the other. If they’re backstab spec the key is surviving their initial gib attempt. If they’re pistol whip they don’t do all that much dps so it’s not that big a deal just to pick a good time and pwn them. Not to mention if you have plague up it’s pretty much an i-win vs a pistol whipper. GG 20 seconds of stability. Even golem pwns a pistol whipper.
There’s not much one can do to reason with someone who displays no reason.
Dagger doesn’t cleave. Making it one of the kittenest melee attacks in the game.
Retaliation is not very good for dungeons because hitting them back for 500 doesn’t really matter when they have 50k hp and are hitting you for 5k a pop. So I dunno what that guy is on about.
Won’t let me quote for some reason, but @ the person who said no daggers cleave:
They just changed ele lightning dagger to hit 3 targets like 3 days ago – AND it has 300 range. Given that precedent I really don’t see what’s wrong with giving necro dagger either 300 range OR cleave. If they want to make it “hit three targets” cleave instead of true cleave that’s fine. I don’t think it really matters.
The point is just that necro dagger for some strange reason is the most limited melee attack in the game. Thief dagger is also 130 range no cleave but thief dagger has a gap closer built into dagger 2 and sort of into dagger 3, which also cleaves. Not to mention access to cleaving melee weapons too.
Right now dagger necro just feels so static compared to other melee classes. Not to mention it’s a total chore in PVE not being able to either stay out of mob melee range OR hit multiple targets.
Lol good lord some of you people don’t know how good you have it. Mesmer downed state is extremely good.
Scepter is not a hybrid weapon. Every single weapon in the game has direct damage on 1.
Scepter 3 is just a garbage skill that is totally out of place on the weapon. It’s like they wanted to make it nominally connected to conditions but the damage bonus per condition is just too low. If they really want to make it a hybrid it needs to do way more damage or have a much lower cooldown or something.
I don’t see where you get the idea necros shouldn’t be able to do damage when every other profession can. If we’re the odd ones out that suggests the problem is with our design not with the design of every other class.
P.S. Adding burn on DS as the 25 point curses talent actually seems like a really good idea the more I think about it. It makes DS something more than just a gimmick for condition spec and gives some decent “burst” in the sense that burning is the highest DPS condition.
No doubt power specs need some help too but that doesn’t mean we can’t throw around ideas on how to make DS more useful for condition.
Uh necro is actually pretty strong against thief. Sounds like a l2p or l2build issue. You shouldn’t get chain stunned and lose. Pistol whip (which seems to be what you’re talking about, if you’re not mixing two thief builds together) does pretty crap damage against a high toughness necro build. With 25khp, high toughness and either plague for the lolsurvivability or golem for the knockdown you should be able to last a while and then pick a good moment to shut the thief down.
That’s how it’s supposed to work. You arn’t supposed to be able to easily 1v2 people. If you want a game like that you should play a game where gear matters so you can roflstomp badly geared people. Then you can even 1v3 or 1v4!
It’s just an awful map. There is nothing to be done but scrap it completely. It is like a few of the wow arenas that way – just a bad idea that didn’t work out.
There’s nothing wrong with having fun with a build in non organized pvp. If it works for you go for it. But it’s not really going to be viable in more organized play. Especially with the current state of pets.
Making something 300 range doesn’t mean you can’t circle strafe or make you lazy. In fact, it means you can do so without losing dps if they step sideways for half a second while you’re doing it. It also raises the skill cap because it allows you to stay outside strict melee range while still doing dps.
But I agree adding cleave would be a decent solution too. It’s just that right now it’s IIRC the only 130 range weapon in the game with no cleave. Does thief dagger not cleave? If so I guess that’s another but again thieves are very different because they have vastly more mobility, much of it built into those very dagger skills.
Again not trying to be mean, but any build is great for pugstomping. Pug 8v8 is just a bunch of people messing around. It is rare to see someone remove a condition or focus fire or anything else.
In more structured play you’re going to get CCed and gibbed in 2-3 seconds or someone’ll drop an aoe or two or a moa on you and you’ll lose all your pets and be useless.
I’m pretty sure no one has ever thought of that one before. The originality of your thinking is very impressive.
Uh any ability that results in a 100% dps increases is always going to be problematic balance wise.
If you LIKE a game centered around avoiding 3 second 100%——>0% gimmicky combos on long cooldowns go for it I guess. But most of us don’t like that sort of game. It isn’t skill intensive, it’s just boring. Either you hit your 3 second 100%———>0% combo and win or you don’t and hit like a wet noodle for the next 40 seconds. Not particularly compelling gameplay.
I am making the assumption that the person on teamspeak constantly saying “losing mid” is the thief and he is in fact losing mid constantly, he isn’t just saying it to troll his teammates.
I don’t mean to be harsh but with that build you are basically not very good at anything. Using all your utilities for pets means your ability to apply and shift conditions is extremely limited. Pets are extremely unreliable so sometimes you’ll end up dying as they just stand there doing nothing. Your direct damage and condition damage are both weakish because you try to go for both. +40% bleed duration doesn’t help much if you are only stacking a few stacks of bleed in the first place and if your ability to reapply bleed is very limited once they remove it (which they will). Your survivability is rather limited because you have no utilities as such and have to depend on unreliable pet CC.
Don’t get me wrong if you’re having fun go for it but there’s not really any way to optimize a build that tries to do everything. You will always end up with something that does everything but nothing particularly well.
hi guyz, i saw lots of QQ and not much theory craft… i know that, you might feel hopeless against X or Y, but you just need to figure out how to counter it.
The balance might not be perfect yet, but every class is counterable/viable, and for such a young game, it’s quite an impressive feat.I hope you’ll enjoy the game, we are using a thief mid, instead of the classic Bunker Guardian: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYcFrmmikXY
Have faith in Anet, they are doing an amazing job with the balance, if you have a problem with a specific class/spec/strategy, feel free to ask, i’ll do my best to help.
Your video shows you trying to use a thief at mid and failing miserably yet still winning because mesmer is so powerful. I do not think this video shows what you think it shows.
Basically what your post actually shows is how unbalanced the game is. You are just relying on a being carried by one overpowered class to make up for not having another.
Just give necro access to burning via a talent at 25 curses, since the current ability there is pretty lame. It could proc off bleed or add a burn effect to chill (call it frostfire or frostbite or something). That would give necros some decent dps from conditions.
edit: One cool option that would sorta solve the lameness of DS for condition necros is to replace the 25 point curses talent with something that makes all DS abilities burn the target for 3 seconds (call it Spectral Fire). That would make DS a lot more useful for condition necromancers and help deal with the low dps from having only one damaging condition.
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300 range is still effectively melee range, it’s just not quite so punishing. It means you can actually take a step sideways now and then without getting the out of range message. It is what most of the elementalist dagger skills have for range and it works very well.
I try to get into dagger on necro but I just can’t, particularly in PVE, because it’s so clunky. Having to effectively stand close to still at 130 range just to deal damage to a single target is really awful compared to the playstyle of other dagger classes.
It isn’t about getting kited per se. The problem is the spec is meaninglessly static compared to other dagger specs, because of the meaninglessly restrictive auto attack. Play a dagger elementalist for about 30 seconds and you’ll see what I mean. Making dagger auto attack either cleave or have 300 range wouldn’t overpower it. It would just make it much less of a chore to use.
P.S. That trait is a 10% movement increase, not 15%. It doesn’t stack.
It is obviously absurd a thief steals an aoe fear that lasts 3x as long. That it hasn’t been fixed yet is mindboggling.
Nobody argues DS is pretty good on a power spec. The problem is that it is really lame for a condition spec, which is the most viable spec and certainly a big part of the class.
I disagree. The only problem with DS for a condition spec is building LF is a real pain. Other than that its fine. Even 4 is cool. Aoe channel that can crit multiple times giving the ability proc two different Bleed on crit effects, good times.
Only talking about spvp/tpvp
LF is very hard to build with condition spec and 1 is complete junk. Meaning there is never any justification for staying in DS more than 3ish seconds. Therefore making it rather lame.
Not true. With Full LF it hits just as hard as the staff 1. and since you get stuck in staff anyway what the big deal? If your staying in DS so long that it no longer does equal damage to the Staff your playing it wrong. Hell there is no reason to stay in DS for that long unless you go power. This does not make it bad or even useless. Its like saying the Staff is useless because of the 1 auto attack. So Condition Necro’s don’t get much out of DS 1 so what, they don’t get much out of the Staff 1 either. At least with DS your not stuck with it for 10 sec.
A class defining mechanic that reduces your abilities from 10 useful abilities to 4 abilities, with one of them practically useless, is lame. We may have to just agree to disagree. I think it has more to do with the defintion of “lame” than anything else. What you are saying is DS isn’t bad. I don’t necessarily disagree. But it is definitely lame for a condition necro. Your rejoinder that “it’s no worse than staff 1!” sorta proves the point. Staff 1 is also lame.
130 range no cleave is just /facepalm on a class like a necro that is very immobile. It needs SOMETHING. Either a range boost to 300ish range like ele dagger has, or ability to hit three targets (without extra LF gain). Something to make it not a complete chore to use in both PVE (because no cleave) and PVP (because such short range).
Dagger necro isn’t even so much bad as just such a chore to use because of the meaninglessli limited dagger 1. It just feels clunky. Completely different than any other dagger class. There’s absolutely no reason it needs to be the most limited auto attack in the game.
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Hope you’ve got someting for necro main hand dagger too. Right now it’s the only 130 range non cleaving weapon in the game. I realize not directly on topic for elementalists but they are both dagger casters and if you’re going to touch up ele mainhand dagger (which you should) you should also touch up necro mainhand dagger while you’re at it.
Nobody argues DS is pretty good on a power spec. The problem is that it is really lame for a condition spec, which is the most viable spec and certainly a big part of the class.
I disagree. The only problem with DS for a condition spec is building LF is a real pain. Other than that its fine. Even 4 is cool. Aoe channel that can crit multiple times giving the ability proc two different Bleed on crit effects, good times.
Only talking about spvp/tpvp
LF is very hard to build with condition spec and 1 is complete junk. Meaning there is never any justification for staying in DS more than 3ish seconds. Therefore making it rather lame.
Necro is actually one of the stronger classes against thieves. The key is just surviving long enough to outlast the initial CD dump (on a backstab thief – heartseeker is just a bad spec that should give you little trouble). At that point you can just load them up with chills and conditions and they have very little ability to counter it.
Both golem and plague are very strong against thieves.
Nobody argues DS is pretty good on a power spec. The problem is that it is really lame for a condition spec, which is the most viable spec and certainly a big part of the class.
Staff 1 just makes very little sense honestly. At the very least it ought to do something like +10% damage per condition on the target.
The only annoying thing about KS is when it is done with quickness up, because that makes it very hard to dodge.
But that’s a problem with quickness, not a problem with KS. Quickness needs to be removed from the game entirely or severely nerfed.
There’s nothing hard about Orr. It is just mind-numbingly boring having to constantly clear mobs that serve no purpose but to delay you.
The only way to get into trouble (as opposed to tedium) is when you try to avoid the tedium by just running through a bunch of the trash and hoping they leash.
The reward system is sorta borked. You should get rewarded for your contribution, not for how your contribution stacked up against other players. There should be no maximum number of medals. I am fine with gold/silver/bronze being competitive but you should never not even get a medal because there were too many players doing the event.
It’s pretty dumb honestly. I wish my pets were invulnerable and immune to CC.
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It isn’t a L2P issue in any meaningful sense of the word. Quickness is a 100% damage boost skill. It is the only buff in the game that is even close to a 100% damage boost.
The problem with a skill that boosts your damage by 100% is it means your damage has to either suck when not boosted or it becomes overpowered when it is boosted.
It’s like pally bubble from early in wow: pallys had to suck at everything baseline to make up for the 8 sec invulnerability. It took blizzard years to get the class into a decent place and it is still more prone to unbalance than most other wow classes.
It’s just a bad mechanic. Burst combos shouldn’t be based around hitting a button and getting a 100% dps boost. That’s just bad design.