Guild Wars 2

Zerk warriors are either utter-fail or super-runners.

Checklist of good zerk warriors:
1. Understands melee boss mechanics and times dodges and skills well.
2. Uses banners (discipline, strength) because it helps the entire team improve DPS.
3. Uses other banners (defense, tactics) occasionally for eles and guardians.
4. Uses elite banner under two conditions: (a) difficult resses, (b) improving team DPS further.
5. Switches to rifle (not longbow) for ranged damage.
6. Does a good amount of weapon-swapping in general, getting in and out of combat depending on skill cool-downs.
7. May trait banners for regeneration.
8. May run with shield and fully absorb first hits/distract enemies for several seconds for pulling or gathering.

Checklist of bad zerks:

1. Runs with multiple ‘selfish’ signets. Signets are fine for doing content solo, but bad in teams.
2. Does not understand the utility of banners.
3. Does not understand how the interactions of other team members create opportunities for burst damage.

BoogerSammich.7189:

Necros, Rangers and Engineers.

+1. I literally skip a heart beat when that happens.

I have 4 toons at level 49. Imagine how enraged I feel now at this upcoming update. And leaderboards? I think people at high levels should be at least compensated somehow (items, laurel refunds etc). This is simply sick.

Guess I will be a happy camper with Path of Exile and SC2 for a while.

Here’s my experience with fractals 38/48:

- I have four characters at fractal 49 (ele, war, guard and mesmer – yup all the best classes).
- I also run fractal 38 because pugs don’t always handle fractal 48 so well (especially the grawl one). I also do 38 for the easy 10k+ karma.
- I did not notice a significant difference in the rewards between fractals 38 and 48. I did manage to get a precursor drop and an ascended box at 38 though. This doesn’t mean 48 drops are bad, maybe RNG was just not on my side.
- I have got almost all the fractal skins at this point, and zillions of fractal rings. More rings than I can equip on my 9 level 80 characters.
- I have seen an ascended box drop in one out of every 5-10 runs. This is a team drop, not personal. So, if I would have to guess, it would normally take someone a month to get a RANDOM ascended box drop from a moderately high level fractals. At least it’s free…

I’m pretty sure that a grenadier engineer (ranged grenade thrower) can put on show some pretty respectable DPS + conditions + heal allies within range.

I use my engineer in TA paths – it’s awesome.

Pugging allows the instance opener ‘hijack’ the party and act like a control freak – I think it’s a great system.

/end sarcasm

Seveleniumus.5973:

Mirsa.1628:

CoE is incredibly easy with an experienced berserker group.

//Haru

Coe is very easy period…

Disagree, try it with a few longbow rangers. They are awesomely kittened.

The Demonic Spirit.3157:

Hi guys , I finally maxed my 6th character ( got 6 80es ) .
I will begin doing FotM ( did few in the past ) , but what is the easiest class to do that ?
I got >
MM necro > http://tinyurl.com/opjsdrw
Demolisher engineer > http://tinyurl.com/ac2zh5v
Trapper ranger > http://tinyurl.com/pwmk5ox
Banner/signet/shout warrior > http://tinyurl.com/p6fn8wn
Cleric guardian > http://tinyurl.com/osugavl

I know that each class/build has its own pros and cons , but what is the easiest/fastest one according to your experince and my builds.
Thank you

Fastest would be warrior, easiest would be guardian and mesmer (so go make one in case you need to teleport people around)

GW1 had better dungeons than GW2, period. Not only were the dungeons better designed in every aspect (including rewards), but GW1 also enjoyed the success of perfecting the ‘Trinity’ system.

Trinity meant that everyone was held equally responsible in their roles, and this produced better team-work in dungeons. It was also quite satisfying seeing this system scale with difficulty, as in the elite dungeons where most teams would normally take 3 healers out of a part of 12. In most cases, different elites were used on the healers as well. GW1 diverse builds allowed trinity to shine fully.

GW2 doesn’t have a Trinity nor a diverse build system, so it will never come close to GW1 in delivering player satisfaction. Living story is great from a business standpoint but I don’t think the majority of the players welcome it too much.

I sold two Sunrises for 2500g each over the past month.

I have some 3.1 mil karma still which I plan on using when the new set of legendaries come out. Don’t like the current ones very much.

- Stopped doing Teq because he is too smart for me
- Do the other dragon events on parked characters
- Do temples on parked characters for guaranteed drops —> 90 Dragonite ore daily is good enough.

- Stopped farming Scarlet’s invasions because it is boring
- Stopped farming bosses in zerg trains because it is mindless
- Do invest on the TP instead to ‘keep up’ with inflation.

- Orr is mostly dead
- Living story is so-so
- Do fractals because ascended gear is better

- Do daily achievements
- Do log off and spend time more productively

Having played both Guild Wars, I feel that by buffing monsters/bosses to ridiculous health pools, Anet pretty much killed the necromancer in GW2.

The necro in GW1 was one of the most powerful classes. With pretty much any good curse/death magic build, a necro could significantly reduce the pressure on the team.

It is not possible to do the same with a necro in GW2 because conditions and minions don’t do jack on bosses. Therefore, no one wants a low DPS necro in the team. Even after speccing with all berserker gear, a necro can only dream of out damaging a poorly specced warrior.

I feel that the necromancer and the other weak classes should be removed entirely, and they should just focus on warrior, guardian and mesmer. They don’t have the attention span to balance all the classes.

I remember that. The zerg was fighting the candy corn boss. I got downed, nobody ressed me – so I teleported to the res point. On the way back, the skeleton boss took keen interest in my Asura necro and followed me all the way to the zerg. And for the next few minutes, the two bosses tag teamed and killed off the majority of the zerg force…as you see in the picture. It was total mayhem, most people had to use res point at least 3 times before we cleared it all.

Attached proof I was there

My chars and their roles:

80 War # 1 (human female): Fractals 48+, 55 AR, super-high speed runs in CoE, SE
80 War # 2 (asura female): Living story, gathering and dungeons such as CM, AC, CoF
80 Guard (norn female): Fractals 48+, 55 AR, only used in grawl fractals where pugs suck
80 Ele (norn female): Fractals 48, 45 AR. Also use it for nuking zergs in WvW
80 Mesmer (human female): Fractals 48+, 50 AR, and used in dredge/asura fractal for porting through.
80 Thief (human female): Gathering in Orr, temple runs, casual WvW, and bombing in dredge fractals
80 Necromancer (asura female): Tormenting zergs in Lord’s room in WvW
80 Engineer (charr male): Grenadier, super easy TA dungeon runs.
80 Ranger (sylvari female): Dragon bosses

Others:
2 Engineer: Storage for trinkets
2 Guardian: Storage for weapon skins
2 Warrior: Storage for materials

I was trying to get 5 more scraps so I could turn them in for 1 ticket. But I’m so kitten ed off right now that I won’t be supporting this game via cash anymore. Scraps should NOT be hard to get.

A couple of weeks back, I opened 25 chests, got 5 scraps.

Today, I opened 15 chests, got 0 scraps. ZERO!!! This is really ridiculous. What kind of sick RNG is in the game?

Solution: They need to give out 1 scrap for every 5 keys purchased at the same time – Guaranteed bonus. I think it is extremely fair, and keep the kittenty scrap drop-rate from chest opening as it is now. What do you think?

Nevermind, found it under weapons.

Historian Symon no longer has the ‘Gift of Ascalon’ which is needed to make Sunrise/Twilight.

Does anyone know where this gift could be purchased from?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Gift_of_Ascalon

I do consider myself a dungeon/fractal elitist. However, I do pug a vast majority of GW2, so I have seen the entire spectrum of GW2 players.

Player skill hierarchy:

1. Inexperienced newbie – someone with a non-80 character attempting to do dungeons/story-lines for the first time ever. You see a lot of these in AC and CM. They are good at taking orders but slow in execution. So, they may fall behind and die when the team starts skipping enemies.

2. Experienced newbie – has a level 80 character and is just starting out completing the GW2 story-lines and dungeons. They may appear in any dungeon group and it is sometimes easy to identify them based on the appearance of their gear which tend to be generic (mostly rare). They are similar to the inexperienced newbie in mentality but have a higher survival rate in dungeons. In addition, they are also tend to be bad at weapons management and can be seen meleeing the boss when they should be ranging and admit that they don’t have a ranged weapon…

3. Skilled Veteran – Significantly better than the newbie groups in character resources and knowledge about dungeon mechanics. Mostly wear exotic gear, know what to skip and how to fight bosses. Sadly, the majority of the GW2 player-base is below this skill level…

4. Elitist – Applies optimal control theory for maximal benefits. Will most likely be seen using heavy professions (wars/guards) and nothing short of berserk gear. In addition, they use ascended weapons and trinkets, again berserk of course. Will also run optimal traits (builds) which provide group benefits (stacking might, removing conditions etc). Will attempt something a few times and will rage-quit when time constraints are not satisfied.

5. Overlord – A very very small portion of the GW2 player-base who could potentially solo the whole game, including dungeons. Can face-tank the toughest bosses with sheer arrogance and joy. In fact, the fear of death itself transforms into power and the determination to succeed. These guys never give up even if it kills them. Their knowledge of their class/gear is second to none.

In GW2, the amount of achievement points one had used to mean something but now not so much because whoever does the living story religiously can stack up some serious number of points over a short period of time.

However, elitism is BEST addressed in another MMO game called Tera. In Tera, the number of dungeon completions per dungeon is publicly visible in game for each player. So, you know exactly how experienced your team-mates are. I wish they would do this for GW2, that way elitists can find/band with other elitists and newbies can be with fellow newbies. And if someone (an elitist) was vocal about the dungeon running strategies, then it’s only because they are trying to improve the skill level of the newbies (and perhaps other reasons, lol). However, because some newbies have issues with taking advice let alone following them, elitists eventually get fed up and rage-quit. Elitists are not going to spend hours trying to help newbies learn the ropes.

For WvW, I prefer celestial gear/armor/weapons…

Berserk gear = high risk
Berserk gear = faster completion time (i.e. higher rewards per unit time compared to other gears, except perhaps assassin)

Good player skills = low risk
Good player knowledge = faster completion time

Berserk gear + good player = high rewards + low risk = ultimate profit?
Berserk gear + bad player = high rewards + high risk = ultimate fail in pugs, guaranteed.

Yeah, I like this:

30, 40, 50, x0 = chance of ascended weapon box
26+, even levels except x0 = fractal skin chance
27+, odd levels = ascended ring chance

That way, people don’t have to wait for others to load even levels only all the time.

Green pets will go around 2-5g each
Rare will hit 20g+
Exotics will go 200g+

The first generation pets will spike in price between Oct 14-17 and then die down to levels slightly higher than what it is today. I think they will still be producible from second generation+ lower-tier pets.

I currently have around 2000g with me, after having invested 1000g over the weekend. My investment profile is very balanced (over multiple items per market):
1. Pets (30%)
2. Skins (40%)
3. Weapons (30%)

I just focus on these 3 markets, and reap decent profits. If all goes well, it is fairly simple to make 20-50g a day, 100g+ during updates etc.

I have another 1000g invested in long term reserves in the same markets,. plus probably another 700g+ in materials for an incomplete legendary (only missing the precursor).

I use “Herpwell kitten -i-n-t-o-n” on my storage alt, because all he does is stand in front of the TP.

Fractal levels are character-bound.

Guardians/mesmers/warriors are the highly wanted classes for fractals, but you can use any other class that interests you.

Emanuel.9781:

Is this where i get all botthurt and report posts that hurt muh feelings? To me it looks like that’s what most people are doing.

Indeed, I think you are just kitten that I had to reply to your post. If you have nothing to discuss about this on-going abuse, then go troll elsewhere where I am not around.

Emanuel.9781:

The dungeon master title isn’t worth anything sadly.

No one asked for your opinion what it’s worth.

I am just pointing to the fact that dungeon abusers will kick anyone regardless of skill level.

Dungeon master here.

Some pug cowards (in same guild obviously) kicked me at the end of COF 2 (@ crystal room). I know it’s just COF 2 but this sort of behavior is exactly why ANET should implement a 1 minute countdown and not instant-kicks. In that 1 minute, the person who is getting kicked should get enough info/screenshots to know who exactly is kicking and who have agreed, and can file a report to ANET.

Dolan.3071:

I like it, this a classic tafu thread.

Tafu threads are good for GW2 – exposes widely accepted bugs/problems/changes faced by players that developers need to give highest priority to.

Minis only loot in Tera and it’s very cute.

In GW2, they implemented AoE pickup which is a sub-standard solution, but it is better than nothing (like at release)

Mirta.5029:

mage.3570:

Rest assured, if you see someone with a ‘Dungeon Master’ title, the higher the probability of a smooth and possibly fast run.

well think of it this way. I got my extra AP by getting dungeon master for extra money. On P1 and P3 of arah I’ve spent 4 hours (each) and barely rolled past to the end of it. I bought Arah P4 and P2 because it infuriated me. Now I am good at some dungeons (CoE, Cof (even P3), SE, CM), however I’m crap at others (Arah, I hate Twilight Arbour). The fact that I have the title does not mean that I’m good at a particular dungeon that I might be trying to run.

Well, you bought your title, I didn’t. Can’t assume that everyone who got that title did it through cheating. Now, I will digress and offer a solution to this problem I have seen in a game called Tera:

In Tera, you get a rating per dungeon. In other words, the more you complete a dungeon, the higher your rating (and hence experience) is for that dungeon. And the best part is, you can easily see who is experienced and who is not by simply inspecting their profile. Obviously, Tera is more hardcore MMO than GW2, so the possibility of these features being integrated into GW2 is close to zero.

Back to GW2:

Even though I mostly just mess with the TP these days, I can still run a vast majority of the dungeons without major issues. Arah can still give me some trouble, but DPS checks etc doesn’t matter to me anymore because I have a bunch of alts with extremely high DPS gear/trait sets. I am currently working on fully gearing my ranger. All other classes have been maxed already.

Not to mention, running five different dungeon paths gives +5 AP from Hobby Dungeon Explorer completion each time.

Rest assured, if you see someone with a ‘Dungeon Master’ title, the higher the probability of a smooth and possibly fast run.

Vol.5241:

lol I had 6k AP before I started learning all the dungeons. Just cause the guy has high AP doesn’t mean he is a dungeon crawler.

Heck, I have +8.5k AP and I don’t know how to do Arah.

I guess you accumulated most of your AP from PvP?

It would be better if Anet split the AP from PvP and PvE to make AP better reflect the proper level of experience.

AP means nothing if the guy is playing on an alt and is still learning the ropes of the profession/skills and not the dungeon.

AP means something if the guy is playing on one of his mains but doesn’t know the dungeon

AP means everything if the guy is playing on his main AND knows the dungeon extremely well.

Translation:
1. A noob is a noob and a pro is a noob when it comes to using new professions.
2. A noob is still a noob in the dungeon, but as long as follows instructions, he’s useful.
3. A pro is a pro and must be followed. He’s the leader from who you learn runs.

Dan.5416:

If you want to nerf new characters tickets – remove mail! Simple! But now I have nearly 100 useless tickets on my alts, and still need to buy them for my main, where your logic, Anet? First think, than do is not your way to fix problems?

Increasingly, Anet has been using the one of the following strategies to ‘fix’ problems:
1. Make the problematic item ‘soul-bound’
or
2. Make the problematic item ‘account-bound’

Problem solved!

Xcaliber.7903:

In ~800 hours of play I’ve salvaged ~6,000 items. Some of those items were stacks of profitably salvageable TP items.

At current gem/gold transfer rates (~32g for 800 gems), that comes out to ~615k uses for this to pay for itself purely based on salvaging alone. Personally, the convenience of a few extra slots saved by only taking 1 slot vs. ~6 that I usually use just isn’t worth it. To each his own though.

I was going to do some similar math, but yes, the conclusion is obvious: IT IS NOT WORTH IT!

mtpelion.4562:

…. so that I have more options for how I want to play each day.

Nope, wrong. With the latest update, you will soon find out that having more alts gives you fewer options to play in dungeon groups, as they will demand very specific classes/builds to maximize rewards versus time.

Rephrased:

Character diversification is a completely different animal. Having multiple characters slots is not going to do darn thing for you when it comes to the character diversification. Leveling and progressing multiple characters is something some people can do, some people can’t. It has nothing to do with how many character slots you have and having more slots should not give you a distinct advantage.

But as we all know, more characters slots is always good for storage (a resource). So more alts (another resource) should not be frowned upon by those that don’t have or did not bother to level.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

“Alts are useless [because I can no longer use them to get extra shinies for something I’ve already done]!”

You know, oddly…I don’t have this issue. Oh don’t get me wrong, I did this exact thing in GW1. You get a lot of lunar fortunes when you can rerun the event quests on 44 different characters. Netted me 8-10 celestial minis each year….and they sold nicely later on. However, I can probably see that this was never really anets intent for the content. In a sense it was an exploit that they allowed because there really wasn’t a way around it. They are fixing some of that issue here. Leveling the playing field a bit between the people that make so many alts, and people that don’t (for any number of reasons). Just because you have more alts doesn’t mean that you should be able to make gold hand over fist faster than someone else by exploiting the ability to do something easy but lucrative repeatedly. Its wrong, and as someone who has done it, I know it’s wrong.

Consider this:

As an experienced trader, suppose I find a lucrative item on the TP. I buy and sell vast quantities of this item in a controlled fashion repeatedly because I have much more gold (or time, or perhaps both) than someone who just started the game. By your logic, this must be wrong! I must not make more money than someone who is inexperienced because the GW2 philosophy is to level the playing field (i..e rewards) for all!

I look at alts as ‘extra resources’ which gives opportunities for ‘extra income’

ASaturnus.4980:

-snip-

I have alts because I want to have a choice between different play styles in every part of the game. I see that compromised in WvW, although I can accept it. I don’t have alts because I want to get things faster than people with one character.

Wrong. You don’t have a choice. If the alt-token restriction is not lifted, expect to see warrior/mesmer/guard groups mostly for dungeon clears and to some degree, even fractals.

I have said this in another thread recently. The GW2 playerbase is expected to see more discrimination from this point onwards in PvE dungeon clears:

1. Class discrimination: Warrior, mesmers and guardians only because they are considered by many as the 3 best classes in the game.

2. Build discrimination: Zerk or gtfo (especially if you are a warrior or mesmer). For the guardian, don’t expect much of a fallout because people love guardians so even PVT stats will do.

Many groups still won’t take you if you run a zerker build but have a ‘weaker’ class such as ranger, engineer, thief, necro and even sadly, the ele. So, the best way to save your time and everyone’s time would be to level a mesmer, warrior or guard first and then deck them out appropriately.

Jski.6180:

mage.3570:

Jski.6180:

Well should you be able to out do ppl who do not have alts? Think about it if they let every thing be hero bound as in event dailies etc.. then the game would move from the casual type of play to the more hardcore type of play. This is simply not what GW2 is about. Even when you look to other games most dailies are only one time per account most of the time any way.

People who have alt characters did NOT get them for free. They spent hours leveling each up, or spent gold (which took hours to farm) to level via crafting. Therefore, it is only fair that hard work gives better or more rewards. This should be an option available to those who feel they would like to play that way. Those who feel this is too much (i.e. those with one main) should just back off and not criticize others for the way they enjoy the game.

Right now, ANET is limiting the way players can play GW2 … and going against the promises they made in their manifesto. Simply unfair and bad business practice.

And not every one wants to level alts and spend that time working on them. The way players are “If there a better way of doing something THAT is the only way of doing it.” If you make it where ppl who have alts get rewarded more for having though alts then every one will be “forced” to level up alts.
Has nothing to do with the manifesto its out right silly that you bring it up (in a way the manifesto is becoming as bad as the random things ppl use in politics such as the berther movement). The argument means nothing at this point when you bring up the manifesto point.

What it all comes down to is you guys want to be reward as much stop trying to hide your true meanings it all comes down to greed nothing but greed.

What you call greed, I call opportunity, but you probably won’t understand that.

All these stupid account-bound changes ANET has been making is basically telling the players to play GW2 the most efficient way, i.e. bring the best classes for dungeon clears. This will lead to more class discrimination than anything else.

Previously, people complained about COF P1 being infested with warrior/mesmers. Now, they will do the same for ALL dungeons. So, this means my engineer, ranger, thief and even ele will be instantly kicked from groups because they are looked down upon by majority as weaker classes. Hence, the death of alts.

Jski.6180:

Well should you be able to out do ppl who do not have alts? Think about it if they let every thing be hero bound as in event dailies etc.. then the game would move from the casual type of play to the more hardcore type of play. This is simply not what GW2 is about. Even when you look to other games most dailies are only one time per account most of the time any way.

People who have alt characters did NOT get them for free. They spent hours leveling each up, or spent gold (which took hours to farm) to level via crafting. Therefore, it is only fair that hard work gives better or more rewards. This should be an option available to those who feel they would like to play that way. Those who feel this is too much (i.e. those with one main) should just back off and not criticize others for the way they enjoy the game.

Right now, ANET is limiting the way players can play GW2 … and going against the promises they made in their manifesto. Simply unfair and bad business practice.

I fully agree with the OP on this one. GW2 is becoming increasingly non-friendly for alts in PvE. I have all level 80 fully-decked multi-purpose alts except ranger which is being leveled slowly and am quite frustrated with the decisions ANET has been making.

The last update pretty much was the nail in the coffin for alts. Since dungeon tokens and gold rewards are account-bound, there is absolutely NO reason to run the ‘weaker’ classes for dungeons. Simply load a warrior/mesmer/guardian and rush through the easy dungeon paths once daily. No reason whatsoever to play on a ranger, engineer or thief or the other weaker classes (except for ele which rules in AC dungeon).

Extremely unhappy with the account-bound limitations with each update. Not going to support a company like this with anymore gems purchase.

Account wallet = best thing ever.

Period.

I have 4 characters with +45 AR and I approve the OP’s message.

I hate doing dailies…

GW1 was epic in all departments. GW2 only looks epic, but fails in several departments.