Guild Wars 2

A question; Is it only me, or does ranger pets now follow you even though you are stealthed? Been playing only an hour, but had a fight 2v2 with a ranger against a thief and a warrior, the ranger put his pet initially on guard on the thief, and it followed the thief even though he/she stealthed, using all tricks to get away. Hell it even leaped after the poor guy when he used a teleport stunning him at trasmissions end. Looked a bit like Benny Hill show. Anyone else has any imput? Never seen this before though

ArcTheFallen.7682:

killimandros.5087:

Brome.7036:

Killimandros, thieves are not near the top of WvW OP list. If you can’t beat one thats fine. At least learn the class you are trying to get nerfed or you just sound bitter.

WvW power rankings! you heard it here first!
1. Ele
2. Mes
3. Guard
4. Thief
5. Necro/Eng
6. Ranger
7. War

always delighted when the pros add to the discussion

since you edited, ill do it too; I am not gonna argue 1v1 or 1v5 etc. I am only gonna discuss stealth and culling issue. Then again, I play a thief so umm, did you read what I typed? All question answered.

To Banjal, that discussion has been going on since Wow, maybe even anarchy online (who had camo I believe, correct me if im wrong). This is how the devs have decided the class to be. Its a 1v1 scenario, doesnt affect culling and is another discussion imo.

One thing I have been wondering. Yes, stealth proccing culling or whatnot is annoying. But has it really affected your WvW match?

If you arent mindlessly running around in a huge zerg, but trying to react and respond to movements in a group on TS, yes it afgfects the wvw match very, very much. Because unless you abuse the mechanic yourself, you will very often end up being attacked without realizing the enemy is there. Most annoying is the fact it only benefits the huge zerg. The zerg can normally see smaller groups just fine, while smaller organized groups wont see the enemy zerg. So culling due to stealth is actually a zerg booster, not a zerg buster as it probably intentionally was supposed to be, making wvw organized groups/fights become stale and more of a who can abuse the culling the most rather than movement and good organization

wish.3102:

Musty.3148:

Hell, I’ve been saying this for months, I stopped playing my 80 thief because it’s an imbarassingly easy class to curbstomp people with. Any of you kids playing them should be imbarrassed for picking and continuing to play such an imbarrassingly OP class.

And you should be embarrassed about spelling that word incorrectly twice while spell checkers exist in web browsers.

Thief is fine as it is. You can crush scrubs, but you can do that on any class. If people know what you’re doing and they’re level 80, they put up a good fight, just like with every other class.

Well, MY spellchecker is bound to another language than english, I get red lines every word I write. Remember not all are native english speakers.

Brome.7036:

Killimandros, thieves are not near the top of WvW OP list. If you can’t beat one thats fine. At least learn the class you are trying to get nerfed or you just sound bitter.

WvW power rankings! you heard it here first!
1. Ele
2. Mes
3. Guard
4. Thief
5. Necro/Eng
6. Ranger
7. War

always delighted when the pros add to the discussion

since you edited, ill do it too; I am not gonna argue 1v1 or 1v5 etc. I am only gonna discuss stealth and culling issue. Then again, I play a thief so umm, did you read what I typed? All question answered.

To Banjal, that discussion has been going on since Wow, maybe even anarchy online (who had camo I believe, correct me if im wrong). This is how the devs have decided the class to be. Its a 1v1 scenario, doesnt affect culling and is another discussion imo.

Brome, this isnt spvp, its wvw. Huge difference. The second part didnt make sense. Maybe im just tired :-) Got it now. I dont really wanna add into the 1v1 or 1v5 discussion, which class is op or not. Only issue with stealth and culling.

Stiv. I already answered that one. What was your point again? I believe you are trying to say stealth isnt a problem combined with culling? If that is so, we disagree. I am very specifically targeting stealth as a major cause to culling, from personal experience both ways. I am not targeting any other mechanism (altough portals also create rendering issues), symbols, boons, etc. etc. These MAY add to the rendering issue, but stealth most definitively does. Do you deny it? SR is the single ability which causes LONGEST rendering/culling error time, hence why I specifically use that skill as an example. There are other thief skills also making rendering timer bug out, like, hide in shadows, infiltrators arrow, blindig powder, shadow return, cloak and dagger, smoke screen. Some affect other players, some only the thief, some shorter time as well.

Aurust.8961:

I didnt read any of the posts here at all since im assuming its more qq about thieves. Get more survival stats and immobilize. Stop crying.

Generally tl;dr posts tells me more about reading abilities which probably are nothing compared to your leet player skills. If 3 liners are too long and make you feel dizzy, maybe glasses could help you?

To Sintacs. Good arguments there. Valid points and duly noted. I guess it comes around then more to how you enjoy playing. If there were no culling issues at all, I wouldnt really make any complaints at all either. I bet theres tons of things that might cause culling, but Im gonna make an argument which is probably quite weak; other games same type same scale doesnt have culling issues. Yes, lag, yes bug and bug, but culling? Nope. As you see, weak argument. Now I didnt play much gw1, but I cant remember culling being an issue there?
I am not against stealth classes. Theres a reason I am enjoying my thief. dps wise, I dont see a huge problem, a thief isnt as viable in a warband as many other classes, its a roaming class and having abilities to roam is ok. Only thing I have a problem with, is culling due to stealth. Be it from any class actually. My personal radical solution, which quite understandably many are against, would be to remove stealth until culling is fixed. Thieves would be crap, below ranger (how I wish my ranger had cluster bomb btw) in wvw, most likely. I also understand this is not gonna happen. It would require rewamp of 2 classes, unto something totally not recognizable from the original class, unfair to all who rolled initially these classes.

ArcTheFallen.7682:

Culling is the issue, not stealth. There’s no point in adjusting something that isn’t broken. And culling happens without stealth too. So removing it isn’t gonna do crap against zergs who just randomly load over the horizon.

I dont know if I should reveal this to you, but, if your wvw group want to use culling as a strategy, the best way to make sure you are not rendering as normal for your opponent, is by using stealth or portals. The longer stealth conditions your group is under, the longer the culling.

Actually I also believe player collision would work wonders against culling, as it would spread out the zerg a bit more, making, yes, less rendeing issues.

you even linked first how to stealth more than 10……..We saw 2 thieves making SR. Then all disappeared. Maybe a mesmer, maybe more SR. Fact is, they were stealthed almost until the end of the battle. When fighting RG, most of them were stealthed the entire fights we had. Several minutes. Occationaly some would pop out of stealthj and disappear again. This happens on all servers where zergs fight zergs. Its a problem with stealth. What was your point again?

and to Roysten; any stealth abilities effect culling. SR is the one which longest duration.

oZii.2864:

killimandros.5087:

Sifu.6527:

killimandros.5087:

Sifu; you need 3 thieves, 13 players of whatever class with their brains connected to their spine. You make 3 SR, people enter and can attack unseen. 15 people stealthed. You have 4 thieves. You have 5 thieves…see the problem? SR last so long with the culling and a handy mesmer a huge group can attack unseen and fight unseen 15-20 seconds. I have a thief, as I pointed out. Its not hard to make a puzerg stand under the hut, add swiftness on them and finally memser stealth line. Culling takes care of the rest. The bigger group, the longer culling. Hence its a problem in WvW not pve or spvp.

Take a look at how some of the most known guild groups abuse this. A couple of weeks ago, we fought RG. Most of the time we were running around without seeing them. If stealth makes this possible, be it thieves, mesmers, its a huge impact to wvw. It is THE biggest problem, because it ONLY gives huge groups benefits. The bigger the grooup, the more effective the stealth.
and Sifu, I just noticed your last 50 posts are all about defending thieves abilities, so Im not going to argue anymore with you :-) (apart from the one where you challenge anyone to fight your p/d build, which is the same one I use, its neat)

What are you suggesting to fix this?

Are you suggesting abuse of culling doesnt exist? I was merely pointing out how I personally (and if you didnt know about it, I cant help you) experience culling abuse, both from the receiving and giving point of view. How to fix it? As gamebreaking as it is, stealth timers must be ended immediately on damage in wvw. At the same time reduce stealth timers in general to make up for the culling. Personally id like stealth to be removed, added with something like camouflage on non movement, but I doubt many would agree with me on that, so im not gonna discuss it, its just my personal preference as I believe fighting something you see (especially when fighting classes who initially CANT stealth) is more entertaining than the current state. And please dont give me any infractions for this that Im writing. If you feel offended go out and breathe.

Its obvious from your suggestion that you want stealth removed. Yea adjust stealth timers and reduce stealth timers. Or just have the mesmer in your zerg run mass invis maybe? I am sure there is a mesmer in every zerg. Its not like Red server has access to mass invis but blue and green don’t. Everyone is affected by culling so while it sucks its not like 1 server doesn’t get culling and the other doesn’t.

Just make the argument to fix culling instead of trying to adjust class abilities for a bug that everyone gets.

Oh its obvious I want stealth removed, hehe. You read my post, have a cookie. Btw, did you really complain about rangers birds? hm. But, that was my personal opinion, yes I play a thief and yes Id like stealth removed until culling is fixed. I also suggested as a more moderate approach to reduce stealth timers and make stealth break on damage (so you can actually see the warrior getting ready to charge or 10k blade you and respond by dodging). I know by your posts you dont want changes to stealth, so we can agree to disagree. I also said I have both been on the receiving and giving end of culling abuse.

Sifu.6527:

killimandros.5087:

Sifu; you need 3 thieves, 13 players of whatever class with their brains connected to their spine. You make 3 SR, people enter and can attack unseen. 15 people stealthed. You have 4 thieves. You have 5 thieves…see the problem? SR last so long with the culling and a handy mesmer a huge group can attack unseen and fight unseen 15-20 seconds. I have a thief, as I pointed out. Its not hard to make a puzerg stand under the hut, add swiftness on them and finally memser stealth line. Culling takes care of the rest. The bigger group, the longer culling. Hence its a problem in WvW not pve or spvp.

Take a look at how some of the most known guild groups abuse this. A couple of weeks ago, we fought RG. Most of the time we were running around without seeing them. If stealth makes this possible, be it thieves, mesmers, its a huge impact to wvw. It is THE biggest problem, because it ONLY gives huge groups benefits. The bigger the grooup, the more effective the stealth.
and Sifu, I just noticed your last 50 posts are all about defending thieves abilities, so Im not going to argue anymore with you :-) (apart from the one where you challenge anyone to fight your p/d build, which is the same one I use, its neat)

What are you suggesting to fix this?

Are you suggesting abuse of culling doesnt exist? I was merely pointing out how I personally (and if you didnt know about it, I cant help you) experience culling abuse, both from the receiving and giving point of view. How to fix it? As gamebreaking as it is, stealth timers must be ended immediately on damage in wvw. At the same time reduce stealth timers in general to make up for the culling. Personally id like stealth to be removed, added with something like camouflage on non movement, but I doubt many would agree with me on that, so im not gonna discuss it, its just my personal preference as I believe fighting something you see (especially when fighting classes who initially CANT stealth) is more entertaining than the current state. And please dont give me any infractions for this that Im writing. If you feel offended go out and breathe.

Sifu; you need 3 thieves, 13 players of whatever class with their brains connected to their spine. You make 3 SR, people enter and can attack unseen. 15 people stealthed. You have 4 thieves. You have 5 thieves…see the problem? SR last so long with the culling and a handy mesmer a huge group can attack unseen and fight unseen 15-20 seconds. I have a thief, as I pointed out. Its not hard to make a puzerg stand under the hut, add swiftness on them and finally memser stealth line. Culling takes care of the rest. The bigger group, the longer culling. Hence its a problem in WvW not pve or spvp.

Take a look at how some of the most known guild groups abuse this. A couple of weeks ago, we fought RG. Most of the time we were running around without seeing them. If stealth makes this possible, be it thieves, mesmers, its a huge impact to wvw. It is THE biggest problem, because it ONLY gives huge groups benefits. The bigger the grooup, the more effective the stealth.
and Sifu, I just noticed your last 50 posts are all about defending thieves abilities, so Im not going to argue anymore with you :-) (apart from the one where you challenge anyone to fight your p/d build, which is the same one I use, its neat)

Im not trying to force anything on anyone. I am just merely pointing out the fact this thread intentionally was NOT about the thief on a small scale note, but problems one of its abilities would make in a wvw situation. Maybe you need new glasses or someone to help you read and explain text /facepalm. Theres countless threads about thieves being op, while this one interestingly enough started off as pointing out problems STEALTH can make. I really wanted to add “political uninterested” in anciant greek, but ill hold myself. ThaT was to Stiv (shrugs).
If you didnt know SF affects a large gfroup of players, maybe you would be better off not adding into the discussion. Mesmers also have mass stealth abilities, but much shorter duration and hence shorter culling time. SF can make people stealthed much longer. Add Blinding power, and you can hide (WITH mesmer) a huge group for 15 seconds while in combat. Unless you actively abuse this bug, and you do not see any other way to win an even fight, you would probably understand the issue. Add how this is a zerg BOOSTER, not buster (which is wat the game needs to split up zergs and stop lag/culling issues), its a BIG problem. If you are a small group, you will be seen by the zerg, but due to stealth/culling abuse the small group CANT see the zerg. Logical? Not….

Just remember this thread originally wasnt about thieves 1v1, it was about abusing the stealth mechanic, which is the most interesting topic. WvW is about large scale combat, not 1v1 or 1v5, thats spvp. Problem is still; Thieves have abilities which makes large group of players invisible for a long time, due to culling bugs etc and whatnotwhatever. Anet need to divide these issues into 2 separate ones, thieves abilities into one (balancing issue) and their ability to cvreate huge disparities in the wvw scene when 2 equal groups fight each other. How are they going to fix the culling abusing warbands?

Rayya.2591:

killimandros.5087:

As a thief, if they /Anet) cant fix the culling, numbers of people stealthed/abuse of stealth, id rather see it being removed. Yes. Instead add camouflage maybe, or add tricks to the tief class like hard to catch. Making them more evasive, faster and increase range of pistol. Give them some symbols maybe? I dont know, fact is, it doesnt work, like it is right now. It just doesnt work.

is thief, not ninja
thief = stealthed
detected thief = dead
works as intended

It doesnt say so in the class description, sorry. Stealth is supposed to last short. And, decected thief uses infiltrators arrow x 2 dodge x 2, shadowstep plus steal to get away from ANYone when not stealthed. Then he pops stealth again. Thbis while 6 people chasing. Then he shadowsteps back to do whatever he was doing leaving the chasing pack confused. But, this is a 1v1 or even a 1v5 thingy, which I dont wanna argue too much about. Its more stealthed thief stealth warrior, guardian. necro, ele, warrior for 15+ seconds.

SoPP.7034:

I’ve long maintained that as a thief player I am OP. Even tonight I stomped a number of opposing server players. Never died once and escaped with relative ease every time.

Most people that don’t want the changes to thief, exclusively use thief and have no real perspective. I have a number of geared up lvl 80’s now and I use my thief when I want to relax in WvW. I do a lot with very little effort.

In many ways I don’t want my thief to be nerfed because I have so much fun with it. What makes me ask for a nerf is because I have perspective. When I play on my other toons, it’s just insane what a thief can do.

This is more or less my own experience. I enjoy playing my thief, but I cant help thinking some of the things I do are wrong. I enjoy playing my guardian as well, not so much my ranger. Even I know all 3 classes quite well, I just cant counter a decent thief on my guardian or my ranger. I can easily take on any class on my thief. But, I dont want to focus on the one vs one problems. If they want thief to be the most effective class in 1v1, no problem. Its the mass combat abilities with the stealth plus culling which worries me. This IS a big problem the more players fight each other, and I dont think it should be this way.

As a thief, if they /Anet) cant fix the culling, numbers of people stealthed/abuse of stealth, id rather see it being removed. Yes. Instead add camouflage maybe, or add tricks to the tief class like hard to catch. Making them more evasive, faster and increase range of pistol. Give them some symbols maybe? I dont know, fact is, it doesnt work, like it is right now. It just doesnt work.

Sifu.6527:

killimandros.5087:

Sifu.6527:

killimandros.5087:

Yesterday my guildteam witnessed 2 thiefs making shadfow refugee, a group of 20 people entered, and thats the last we saw of them (they were roughly 8-10 sec. run away from us). Luckily we spotted them and were prepared for incoming, which came, invisible of course. So there we were spamming aoe against an invisible force attacking us. In the mid fight 2-3 of them appeared, then when the match was over we could see most of them again. Still a couple of “red” guys popped up a bit after the actual fight. This is what stealth plus culling does. Players WILL abuse this mechanic as long as it is not considered an offensive exploit. Was this intended Anet? Is this how you want WvW to be played?

Yes working as intended.

If you would, go watch some of the guild vs guild fights (25v25). Almost all fights begin with mesmer’s veil ability. At least with SF, there is a limit on how many players it will stealth. There is no such limit on the mesmer’s veil ability.

I just went through all class mechanics, responses from Anet on this issue, and I cant find anywhere where it is stated that in a group of 25++ fighting each other, it is intended that one of them should be able to stay stealthed, incvisible, for 20++ seconds, not including the time it takes from the stealth was cast to the moment the combat started (in this case about 8-10 secs). If you have other info, please highlight it and preferably link to official response/explanation. As far as I know, no class should be able to stealth themselves, permanent or for such a long duration. Not to mention a full warband. Am I wrong? Add this into huge battles, the ones at the upper tiers, and you can see the immense lag this creates as well. ANd yes, I have a fully decked thief so I know what I can do to stay permastealthed and stealth many people for long duration times. I am kinda hoping it was not intended, because it is so out of balance, specially to classes with little to no AoE.

I tried to search for it but I couldn’t find it. Nor could I find anything that would hint it is an exploit or not intended.

I re-read your original post and I am confused. I thought Shadow Refuge only affected 5 players…is this incorrect?

If 3 thieves pop it, thats 15 people. Not hard to organize. Add the mesmer line and then its invisible wb. Shadow refuge is preferred because it holds stealth the longest, intentionally. It also abuses the culling the most because of that. 7 seconds become 15 seconds no problem in huge battles. You wont see this is pve or spvp because the numbers arent comparable and big enough to create a problem. Playing my thief in spvp is like playing another class.

The lower the tier, the less culling and lag issues, is my experience. Around tier 4-5 its almost fun :-)

Sifu.6527:

killimandros.5087:

Yesterday my guildteam witnessed 2 thiefs making shadfow refugee, a group of 20 people entered, and thats the last we saw of them (they were roughly 8-10 sec. run away from us). Luckily we spotted them and were prepared for incoming, which came, invisible of course. So there we were spamming aoe against an invisible force attacking us. In the mid fight 2-3 of them appeared, then when the match was over we could see most of them again. Still a couple of “red” guys popped up a bit after the actual fight. This is what stealth plus culling does. Players WILL abuse this mechanic as long as it is not considered an offensive exploit. Was this intended Anet? Is this how you want WvW to be played?

Yes working as intended.

If you would, go watch some of the guild vs guild fights (25v25). Almost all fights begin with mesmer’s veil ability. At least with SF, there is a limit on how many players it will stealth. There is no such limit on the mesmer’s veil ability.

I just went through all class mechanics, responses from Anet on this issue, and I cant find anywhere where it is stated that in a group of 25++ fighting each other, it is intended that one of them should be able to stay stealthed, incvisible, for 20++ seconds, not including the time it takes from the stealth was cast to the moment the combat started (in this case about 8-10 secs). If you have other info, please highlight it and preferably link to official response/explanation. As far as I know, no class should be able to stealth themselves, permanent or for such a long duration. Not to mention a full warband. Am I wrong? Add this into huge battles, the ones at the upper tiers, and you can see the immense lag this creates as well. ANd yes, I have a fully decked thief so I know what I can do to stay permastealthed and stealth many people for long duration times. I am kinda hoping it was not intended, because it is so out of balance, specially to classes with little to no AoE.

Yesterday my guildteam witnessed 2 thiefs making shadfow refugee, a group of 20 people entered, and thats the last we saw of them (they were roughly 8-10 sec. run away from us). Luckily we spotted them and were prepared for incoming, which came, invisible of course. So there we were spamming aoe against an invisible force attacking us. In the mid fight 2-3 of them appeared, then when the match was over we could see most of them again. Still a couple of “red” guys popped up a bit after the actual fight. This is what stealth plus culling does. Players WILL abuse this mechanic as long as it is not considered an offensive exploit. Was this intended Anet? Is this how you want WvW to be played?

Actually, player collision would most likely solve the culling issue….food for thoughts Anet

Flussufer? Dakitten is dat you smoke over dere and have some spare?

muylaetrix.2096:

Teamkiller.4315:

If you’re not convinced, just watch any number of Red Guard’s videos. They wipe hundreds with a group of like 20 all the time.

hundredS ? i thought there was a cap of 166 per server per map.

a

Thats 86 players MAXIMUM each fight. Now if we play numbers a bit, hehe. Let us assume HALF of those saw RG during the fight (rg play heavy culling folcused play), one fourth were organized and half of these again were level 80, 70% of these with excotic armour, thats RG wiping 7 people….im impressed.

Havent had the time for many fights so far this week, but that german guild 2 posts above; The game is not about who can run to spawn fastest you know…thats not facemelting, FYI.

I just have to add that devs are planning a buff to thieves hurhur next wvw patch

Just wanted to add CNTK had max number of 17 online yesterday. A very smallish bus I believe.

I feel sorry for you guys, I really do. Its the situation which occurs when the easymoders move on, unfortunately

Afaik the strength of it single buffed (or boon) is not enormous, but, lets theory craft a bit; the problem isnt treally within the item itself, it is within the dot removal abilities which will be wasted on a boon which might seem small and insignificant, but could take up position in queue when removing far worse stuff. So, if you have an ability that removes x number of anything negative on your skillbar, and it removes this one, but lets the critical one remain….what do we get then? Is it still useable? Yes, very much. Another example why this is balancing on the edge, imagine a party with 4 full groups (20 people), where all run this, and hit….that is litterally taking away ALL armour you have. You are naked, and your party dies within aa very short time. I am all for abilities which is successful in zergbusting, but not passive ones.

Sacrx.6721:

Lol you guys are taking it out of context. No one said anything about teach you a lesson no idea where it came from. I just found the ram thing funny as it was mistake drop for golem, then i think pryda did a few troll rams, that said we was not stupid enough to build them. Thats all on gandara.

As for Killi. I did not mean anything by bringing in crimson name i thought it was mostly ex crimson is why i said it. As for what i said we are on same page then when i ment bitter it seemed the way your other posts came across in terms of gandara being beat and piken rising but its maybe annoyed you wont fight piken guilds anymore i can understand that.

Nah, seriously, fighting the more organized guilds on PK is what this game has to offer atm., and is why we would never join pk :-) (because then we cant fight them hehe). Then again, cntk is a small scale guild. On our wvw evenings, we have managed to pull out 3 full groups, but I see 4 groups minimum a number where invincibility becomes possible (if you negate all the negative effects one can not control like lag and culling). I believe I saw RG runninmg around with 4-5 groups (I may be wrong as well, but knowing your numbers I believe thats a fair number). Of the Piken guilds, I would no doubt rank RG as the major opponent on a wvw scale (very likely becauise I know the coordination it takes and the dedication from the members), followed by TuP I believe. sIN also hits like a truck, but they seem (a big seem there, I cant tell numbers exactly) to have bigger numbers.
As of now, zergbusting as we know it from WAR is very hard for smaller numbers not only due to the culling, which can be hardcoded, but mainly because of the Rally! thingy. Potentially if one in our group die, we get 10 extra enemies again risen from the dead without anyoen even ressing, which is a horrible idea, especially when you have to move so fast to avoid the slower aoe attacks from the zerg. If Anet would remove the Rally thingy id be happy :-)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17lkdqoLt44 I miss the good old bomb tactic vs zergs :-)

Im not bitter Sac. Had some good fights against you lot. And tbh I also heard about that “teach us a lesson” thingy first day of the week . Read my post, the one you copypasted and see what I said about fighting organized guilds (and well, I consider RG one of those obviously). WOuldnt it be the natural thing for a Gandarian to make the other on the server care less about forumfights eh? :-) Btw, were not Crimson, were cntk. I believe theres a couple of my mates there in Rg no? :-) It was good fun having you on Gandara, and it also was good fun fighting you lot, altough on uneven terms. But, for auld long syne, dont drag Crimson into this. We had good fun together back in WAR, and theres no need to get emo either way Sac. I know what you lot are doing, I see how you work, pace and movements as always, and I appreciate it. First day at Gandara I tagged along with you on my Guardian, and immediately pickled up a few good moves, thanks for that. I know you want your lot to get to the top, focusing on that. I wish you best of luck, and I am fairly confident youll make it as well, seeing the effort your server puts up. I am not gonna be part of any thing between you and anyone on Gandara feeling bad about being rushed by you, that would be kinda hypocritical considering how we used to roam ourself, and I dont feel bad for them either. After all, its about grouping up and play the game, even for the pugs (which Ive had the pleasure to see has been happening quite well recently at Gandara).

Dont worry too much about RG and Saccy tbh. We wont see them for a while, and think about it this way; If they need to “give Gandara a lesson”, what does that say about them :-) Gandara as a server will miss the fights against some of the Piken guilds. I know I will, thats why we moved to Gandara after all, because there are a whole bunch of skilled guilds at Piken, and good fights to be had. To those guilds I salute and may the battlegrounds never be full for you :-)

no big guilds Lurannio, only easymoders :-) (if that was your "eh?)

finally approaching the end of full week piken zerging. Seeing some more gandara guilds moving to Piken, good luck with that.

As long as the system still allows transfers, I duly hope it doesnt involve real ranks as it would destroy any decent server. Easymoders will flock to those servers even if it included paying money and having to stay out of wvw for a week. Realm transfer should only be allowed to low/med populated servers.

Unfortunately for the many guilds I truly respect on Piken it looks like you are the server on the rising. I just hope for your sake you arent the next Blacktide, although there are some guilds joining you from that server already. If that happens, I also hope you can stand the period of trouble coming, and maybe I can fight the ex WAR guilds again on their way down again :-)

Do you all use skale venom? Just curious as we havent decided wether to risk it or not

Hm, out of curiosity; How many of the natives are actually against this move, and how many of the hate posts come from NON natives? I see…I believe if you all are so worried about this servers health, it might be a good idea to stop the hating against it :-) Fight them when they get to your tier and see what happens. You might be surprised you might get good fights from them :-) Wouldnt that be better for all the servers if the wvw guilds got a bit more spread out?

Dearest Anet gameplay programmer; would you consider buffing thieves a good way to balance out wvw? And would you in any way consider engineers so op. they deserve a nerf? Thank you so much for the time spent answering :-D

Dont boast too much Pikens :-) You know RG are going soon, as they did already. Wamgor was always (in WAR) a big mouth with little to less to show for it, so id ignore him. He is by no standard Piken Square.
We are still gonna roll up our usual days, avoid the zergballs Red Gaurd and Syndic (where did your guild go btw Syndic?)- Fin. please respond to messages??!-
Were gonna try finding those good gvg fights (HoB, VII, TuP minus Wamgor to avoid the whining. Funny how things never change. Was gonna put up some forumposts from WAR where the whining from Wamgor about RG was immense, but nevermind. People who remember know).

Hope RG had a nice holiday at Gandara. Good luck wherever youre going next :-)

First of all, I want to pass out respects to a top tier guild jumping down to bottom ladder. That move increased my respect for you guys a lot. It takes a lot of self esteem to do that, knowing it will litterally take months to get such a low server up the ladder (if that is your intention), and I will follow with interest.
Second of all, there is the cheat reports. I seriously hope they are all false claims. I am inclined to believe they are, and that they will soon be forgotten. Best of luck.

So many comments to my info about rangers being buffed? Well, all I can say is, in 2-3 weeks I will say “what did I say”…but then again I might be more informed than you. ACtually, there will be a big buff next patch.

Rangers are getting a good buff next patch. Wait until then.

1: Add warbands options (ability to group with 20-25 people, see their boons etc etc))
2: Remove aoe limit to heals and damage. As of now, it only supports the zerg.
3: Remove all aggressive NPC’s (apart from guards) in the lakes.

3 easy to make changes.

Dee Jay.2460:

Then again, 90% of Rangers are pretty poor players so there’s that.

But again, I don’t know Rangers well enough to give tangible advice on their specific mechanics.

Just lol. 90% of thieves are ofc awesome elite players?

Im also quitting until Thieves are being changed drastically. I dont care about any sort of discussion. This is the reason I personally cant enjoy playing, so obviously I quit until its being worked over. If not, then its a perma glhf :-)

Thieves are being nerfed january patch. Now move on to something else.

Not talking for anyone else than me, but I really do not have much to discuss with the former GH guilds, especially after the recent comment about my guild leaving the server (cntk), which tells me generally what to expect from such a meeting. I can positively say noone has ever inquired anyone in my guild about the near or far future of our server. Last time I went to take a dump, though, I had a long mind boggling thought about ginger-cookies, if you want to spread any more slander.
When it comes to this weeks matches, UNTY looks like a fairly organized guild. Apart from that, noone really comes to my mind.
I see some new commanders in the lakes, which is fine, and oh, I havent seen any trolling in /team since, about friday I believe, which is a great relief.
Weve had, as always some good fights, some less good ones, but were still learning

Gunnars lost 2 pug guilds before this matchup. That, in it self, is no big deal, at least nuch such a big deal as you try to make out of it. Since I joined this server, Ive still missed the pleasure to see these 2 guilds make any sort of difference out in the lakes. Yes, I know they had 2 commanders (pug.herders), which is fine. But, when facing any organized opposition (aka not another zerg), I have yet to see they manage to stand their ground. Add that they bring together maybe 20 members, on a good evening, it really is not such a great deal. Weve lost better more numerous and more important guilds. Might I add to the trolling-part, that one of these 2 guilds, presumably was the reason GH lost maybe the 2-3 better, organized guilds on the server? So please, if you want to troll said guilds, I will do nothing to stop it.
GH didnt need those 2 guilds more than we need any 20 extra PUGS. Actually, you can double that number and do it again, and then you can add in 2-3 actually organized guilds (running around on mumble cross-discussion the definition of a puggie is NOT organized). Thats what the server needs. And AG is doing exactly the same that german zergver did last week. Dont even rememver the name of it. I remember AG, because when we fought them last time, I remember them melting quite quick and handsom to any organization. Very subtle and quick ressers they have though. I guess that classifies as a positive sidenote. These are my thoughts about the latest drama in w3, and If I read them myself, I would probably not spend 1 second to think about it, because quite frankly, the path of pug guilds does really interest me just as much as the famous paint-drying watch.

There need to be some sort of negativity playing in a huge zerg. At the moment, w3 is nothing more than who can raise the biggest zerg, and cover 24/7. This gets boring (too boring) both for the lower ranks (who dont stand a chance) and the upper ranks, who get bored and maybe ask themself if this really is the challenge expected (how much skill dopes it take to make 60 people run same direction).

The zerg mentality, must be busted, so, there need to be implemented zerg busting options. Firstly, the downed state as of now, is very pro zerg. A team of 10 might be able to stop a brainless zerg, but not to stop the ress-chains, so they will nevertheless lose in the end.
Another pro-zerg, is the map design. The maps, are probably too small, making it easy for a full zerg running around stopping any attempts at capping waypoints. Said waypoits should also be uncappable, for a specific period of time, lets say 10 minutes. As it is now, again the zerg wins. Either they just zergrush to the swordmark, or they recap any point in excessive speed. The supervisor buff, is only negative to small groups, hence favours zergs yet again.
The xp-loot system favours the zerg. If you just make sure you are there, tossing in some aoe at times, you get loot, gold and xp. To get these said items as fast as possible, the zerg is the better way. A small group will have harder time getting these items, because of being caught up with the zerg when trying, and taking longer time capping anything. Again pro-zerg. Solution would be to divide into contribution, meaning huger groups=less xp and less gold. Simple as.
I get back to the maps again. Small group, has no chance to sustain the same speed as the zerg, Speedbuffs favours huger grouyps, as there are more dishing them out, making it impossible (almost) for a small group to play the ambush game. If the zerg wants to get you, it will. Period. Wheres the skirmish options? What about diminishing returns? Instead, speed portals stack, benefiting the group with the more speed auras (aka the zerg).
The whole 5 man limit aoe favours the zerg. Why? Because it means having to spread out to avoid aoe damage is really no issue if you are many. Spreading out ambush style, or even small group bombing is impossible for a small team. Coordinated zerg bombing just doesnt work with Anets game, as theres only a specific number who can be targeted. Hence braindead bots will easily survive any small ambush attempts. Why an aoe cap? Anti-zerg, would be to give some smart aoe classes the chance to actually hurt and split up the zerg. Me, as a lb ranger see zergs standing in my barrage, shaking it off. I couldnt kill anyone in a zerg if I tried for an hour with my barrage. Again very pro zerg and anti tactical play.

As it is now, theres plenty of really small guilds, with only 2-3 members active running around zerging, and being successful in the game that way. There is no need to join a well orgfanized guild, because zerging does the same job, so its hopeless to try to explain to less organized players the benefits of joining coordinated guilds, because, quite frankly, there is no such benefit. New players see the biggest zerg wins. Hence they want to join that zerg, and will leave up the ladders until they find a zerg big enough to accomodate their personal needs (which is why the gap between the tiers will never change, as the upper tiers will always get fresh blood from zergligs replacing those leaving the game due to bore, which eventually wil hit anyone only running in a zerg).