Guild Wars 2

Never has Blurred Inscriptions looked quite so good.

Definitely learned a lot from this video, thanks! Going to use some of these ideas for improving my open-world solos.

Bunmaster.9734:

I usually write a very very long msg with the paths at the end. Something like “Please be full meta berserker builds. Thanks. Also i am writting a long lfg for ppl who read. P1.” or something ridiculous like that.
A short lfg and ppl tend to filter everything you wrote and only see the paths you are running. You can make yours a tad longer by adding gearcheck to it.

I also do this. If you can hide the path so that you need to put the mouse over it to see it, you know they were at least forced to read the text. Whether they actually comprehended it or not is another question.

timmyf.1490:

dutchiez.7502:

timmyf.1490:

dutchiez.7502:

I like it, but how about this:

And now do this:

Scales 1-19: No turrets, no champs
Scales 20-39: Turrets, no champs
Scales 40+: Champs instead of turrets

Or something along those lines. Now you have an interesting fight with different mechanics that change (and become more difficult) as scale increases.

But noobs are still welcome at the lower scales. Even if they click the endurance bar to dodge. ;-)

I was just taking a shower and thinking about how I left this part out :P.
That’s exactly the kind of thing that could make for interesting mechanical scaling (changing the bosses/champions attacks, adding/replacing turrets and champions) and also numerical scaling (numbers on boss buffs).

I think, when talking about scaling, there are four things that are important:

1) Getting the right difficulty at the lower end so everybody can join
2) Getting the right difficulty at the upper end so elite players can differentiate themselves (with Fractals, you could argue there shouldn’t be an arbitrary upper end, but let’s leave that out for a moment)
3) Getting the right marginal difficulty so each scale up feels a little bit harder but not a TON harder
4) Potentially changing the mechanics as scale increases (or based on party comp or based on player choice) so that it always feels new and fresh

My concern – and I think the concern of a few others here – was about making sure #4 doesn’t break #1. The concerns of you fine rT and DnT folks is more around making sure that #1 and #4 don’t break #2.

I really do think it’s possible to hit all 4 of these points at the same time and hope that these things are strongly considered in future updates to Fractals.

This is a great post, and I think summarizes the concerns of high-difficulty players quite well. The example you guys came up with is also wonderful. A++ discussion!

Thaddeus.4891:

Weird because the last time i checked the meta right now is like

1 Warrior, 3 Ele, 1 Mesmer or
2 Warrior, 2 Ele, 1 Guardian or
1 Warrior, 3 Ele, 1 Guardian or ….

I don’t see SOO MUCH HEAVY THAT ANY OTHER PROFESSION CAN’T JOIN. Back in the days the meta was 4 Warriors and 1 Mesmer, but the community now know much more how each profession work.

Right now only Necromancer and Ranger are view as bad in PvE. While Warrior, Guardian, Ele and Mesmer receive most of the love.

Meta combinations actually often include Ranger because of spotter + frost spirit. Thieves as well for vuln stacking + high dps + stealth (+ fgs blink), depending on the path.

Nike.2631:

Wethospu.6437:

Highly coordinated in crafting?

Why not?

If there were spread across all the fractals 8 opportunities for advantage based on having a crafting skill of 300 in the party – one for each craft – then maximally optimized teams would plan to bring along characters that cover all 8 bases (and they’d even have 2 slots to spare!). Even if those events didn’t show up in any particular run.

I come to Guildwars 2 from other games that have fairly technical raiding/dungeons They’ve had years more time to develop their body of content. Being able to derive advantage from fairly obscure choices is normal to me. WoW has a raid boss that can only be started by having several expert fishermen lure the boss out of its pool by fishing for it. An example from LotrO:

“The fight is with a great beast and its tamer – but the beast is trained to lie still while the drums are played. If you have a drummer (only one class gets it natively, but other characters can be taught via a rare drop) you can fight the tamer one man down as they drum, and then fight the beast afterwards with your whole party. IF you don’t have a drummer, you must face both bosses at the same time.”

The world of Tyria has more ways of interacting with it than “I hit it.” Using those other mechanics for inspiration can add humor, introduce variety, and create a vibrant, memorable experience – if used well. And some of those ways involve spending time in game doing other things than combat and grinding gold.

I like the example from LoTRO— that involves an interesting new mechanic in combat, and differentiates the fight from others (though I feel bad for the drummer… I certainly hope they have to do something other than spam 1 the entire time). It doesn’t gate the content— you can always get around it. It’s quite similar to the Cliffside seals in some ways (party goes man down to solve some issue).

The WoW mechanic, on the other hand, is… bad. I guess people like fishing in WoW? But what does this add to the fight? How does it make things more fun? Unless you think fishing is fun (I certainly don’t, and I imagine many do not), there is nothing good about this. It’s just another gating mechanism for the game.

Along those lines, requiring crafting— there’s nothing fun about it. It’s just another gating mechanism that you have to worry about when composing your team. Everything interesting that can be accomplished with crafting— construction/protection fights, gathering materials, anything else— can be accomplished without actually gating the content with a level requirement in crafting. Take for example the “Protect the Barrels” Guild Challenge: all the construction of turrets in that challenge is conceptually similar to crafting (and really just involves pressing the f key a few times), but doesn’t gate the content at all. And it is completely optional— people can just DPS normally if they prefer. Building/repairing the barriers in the Marionette is another example of this done well— people can grab the kit to build the barriers if they think it will help, or they can just DPS the fight if they are über awesome. The situations where you have choice like this are great, and teams can adjust their strategies based on their composition.

Please no additional content gating. AR is bad enough.

Nike.2631:

phys.7689:

crafting might be a hard sell though.

You could sell it as an optional buff to a fight. Doing side activity X for about 45 seconds (on average) allows a Huntsman to produce an environmental weapon that rips 25% of the boss’ lifebar off with the first (and only) shot, then proceed to normal combat. Or you could build something that gives you an extra platform/more space during a major fight. There are a lot of possibilities to tie preparation into a boss encounter that is still resolved though combat.

I’ve also thought there was potential for tailors to do something with their “weaving skill” that’s so amazing a trio of Oh-Crap-Those-Are-BIG spiders bow in appreciation and scuttle away (leaving their chest).

But I totally agree that if their are branching paths to final victory, sometimes a good sharp, hard fight should be the preferred/faster method if your team can handle it.

While preparation for boss battles in some way could be an interesting mechanic, crafting is, I think, the wrong way to implement this. It’s a tool which has never had anything to do with combat, and involves clicking a button (and grinding up levels outside of the dungeon). This is not really particularly interesting. One of the points in the CDI which has been really well expressed is the anti-AR grind… let’s not replace it with a “must have crafting at 500 to get the best buff” grind.

On the other hand, if the mechanic was something like “interact with the mystic forge to produce a weapon of great power, while your teammates protect you from a wave of spawning enemies” (not dredge please), that could be more interesting. It would be more combat related and involved than “real crafting,” and would not gate characters based on their grind out in the main game.

Not gonna happen.

More or less community thoughts on stacking

Spoj The Second.7680:

But it does sound condescending if you say it to someone you arent friends with.

Watch out Spoj, you’re threatening his freedom of speech! God forbid someone ask you, very kindly and without judgement, to be polite. That’s not how we do things on the internet.

(fyi, I also interpreted it as very condescending. I’m a dude, fwiw.)

TooBz.3065:

I’m pretty sure Kai’s guide is just beserkers gear.

Just retrait to something like 10 (III)/20 (II,IV) /0/25(II, VIII)/15 (III?) or 10/30/0/30/0 for dungeons.

These phantasm builds are great for dungeons, but less good in the open world where your aren’t focusing a single target.

10/30/0/20/10 and 0/30/0/25/15 are the accepted meta-traits, with sword/focus and sword/sword.

You could easily take the 10/30/0/20/10 build and modify it to be similar to Lazy Kai for open world (putting the shatter spec in domination, deceptive evasion in dueling, etc.).

Tree

[img]http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png[/img]
Ugh… can’t get the image to work.

deSade.9437:

Erm, I don’t pug. Last time I did it was almost one year ago, and everyone was a scrub. Me included.
Still, you’re not the only one that isn’t objective, so everything is fine. Humans are incredibly bad at not making everything subjective.
Cats, on the other hand…
Yeah, you got it, I’m a cat. I’m totally awesome.

Little known fact: that’s a selfie in his signature.

Lately my guild does one trap. Charge the one closest to the pillar (southwest I think?). Aggro him to get him to drop AoEs on one person while everyone else is stacked, then pull him into the trap. Person runs to pillar, FGS’s drop, reflects go down, everyone rushes, ghost eater pops.

That’s a nice summary. All correct.

Anierna.6918:

maxinion.8396:

Tldr: FGS without a wall is kitten dps. Use hammer.

No. Summon FGS for the thief (he can blink rush 3 times), use 5 with your own FGS, then summon ice bow, use 4, then summon hammer.

Sure, if you’re going to do the blink trick it’s also fine (but assuming people know how to do the blink trick is a bit much, especially as the discussion is about PUGs).

Tldr: FGS without a wall is kitten dps. Use hammer.

Please read my above posts. There is a broad spectrum of viable, meta builds for almost all classes. It might not be the diversity you’re looking for— they’re all zerker or assassin based— but there is quite a variation in style.

Hell, five months ago people were laughing at the thought of staff ele as highest DPS. It was shown to be true, and is now widely accepted. Nike’s current warrior meta build is from July or so, and very different from previous builds. Changes and experimentation absolutely do happen.

A++ would pray again

Phantasms do get the buff.

Buffs like this are multiplicative. So 1.15*1.15 = 1.32— you get a 32% total increase from taking them together.

++ to Nevets for fighting the good fight. Very well said.

But hell, even the reset from 50 without any compensation is a slap to the face, considering PvP and WvW’ers get something when they’re reset.

Sword/warhorn ranger all the way. The spotter + frost spirit damage bonus is significantly better than anything a necro can bring.

xallever.1874:

maxinion.8396:

There’s many optimals out there. There’s a range of 4-5 “optimal” ele builds, depending on play style preference and the content (s/f + LH with or without persisting flames, staff, d/f, etc.). There’s many choices of guardian build (gs+s/f, or hammer). There’s many choices of mesmer build (various combinations which maximize reflect damage, or pure DPS).

There’s quite a bit of flexibility in the meta for all classes. The gear is almost always just zerker (sometimes assassin’s) but you do have choices.

I think those are viable builds instead of optimals. An optimal build (or choice?) depends on the team composition. There will always be a max DPS build for a situation and the optimal choice would be to use that build in that situation (reflect vs non reflect).

It’s nice to see a variety of builds with minimum DPS loss, but I don’t see anything wrong with one build having the most DPS than all the others.

The scale of the problem you see in LFG PUG isn’t about Ele making the choice between D/F Fresh Air or Sc/X LH or Fire staff. The scale is between a warrior meleeing properly and one that uses a rifle instead.

Absolutely agreed, especially with the last part. There is almost always a best answer, but the range of runner-ups is quite large, and gives quite some variation to the playstyles. Few are going to complain about using one of those runner up builds, but you’re not going to set records with them.

Nice for open world and leveling, pretty trash for dungeons.

There’s many optimals out there. There’s a range of 4-5 “optimal” ele builds, depending on play style preference and the content (s/f + LH with or without persisting flames, staff, d/f, etc.). There’s many choices of guardian build (gs+s/f, or hammer). There’s many choices of mesmer build (various combinations which maximize reflect damage, or pure DPS).

There’s quite a bit of flexibility in the meta for all classes. The gear is almost always just zerker (sometimes assassin’s) but you do have choices.

laharl.8435:

A certain “hated” person bragging about kicking arah sellers. This is after I whispered him that he was too slow in kicking me.

I lol’ed. Nice job.

CruleD.7380:

We’ll that’s broken design if you ask me.
No other MMO that I played does that.

Yup. It’s dumb and there is no excuse for it continuing for more than a year.

deSade.9437:

maxinion.8396:

Mossman and Archdiviner have fast autoattacks which can almost one hit at fractal level 50

Almost?
I’ll keep that in mind next time I wipe the muddy floor of swampland with my face.

I stand corrected!

They basically wipe me at 39, but I haven’t done higher myself and didn’t want to exaggerate.

Note that no one is happy with this situation, but we are forced to live with it because ANet.

Actually many max dps speed clear parties do include rangers, because spotter and frost spirit are jus that good. If you build it right, there is no reason not to bring a ranger. See the Max DPS thread for more discussion.

Psychol.5783:

Fror.2163:

Most of the 12k+ AP guards I played with were cleric staff guards. Doesn’t this say all?

What’s wrong with cleric stats for a guardian staff? I’m using it to buff myself and by the way heal if it’s in a combat.

Because it’s bad, because healing in this game is bad, because there is no real healing class /skills in the game. Your teammates don’t need you to heal, they need you to DPS so that the mob dies faster— they can take care of their own healing.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

RemiRome.8495:

Arah story so much fun.

Armor/weapon combo iffy

But yeah! Arah story! Shoot that dragon!

pew pew

Thaddeus.4891:

DogCompany.1062:

I go by Profession=Tank/Healer/build/traits. Class is Warrior/Guardian/Ranger. Anyways that’s besides the point.

Of course if you want to use your own words, that won’t help you communication well in the forums.

Profession is the official name for : Guardian, Warrior, Elementalist, etc. You can use also use the word class, it’s a synonym and everybody will understand you.

Tank/Healer just don’t exist in the game, so no need to have a word for it. But what you want to say is role. If you continue to use profession = role, nobody will be able to understand what you are trying to say.

A++, please use the names the game actually uses.

@Orpheal: you do realize that thread is locked, and had zero dev responses anyway, right? Great place for “discussion.” Anyway we’re using another thread for this in this forum now since we were asked to by Chris.

Tman.6349:

Serious question: What kind of ‘compensation’ is it that you’re after? Never mind if it’s justified. I’ve mostly just read arguing and tantrums on this subject, so what would you like them to do?

I think the most common proposal is a Title for every 10 or 20 levels that were taken away. Not even something that affects the game like items or gold, but just something that memorializes the very difficult achievement.

Mossman and Archdiviner have fast autoattacks which can almost one hit at fractal level 50, have smart AI which moves and follows characters, and have wide open arenas which prevent stacking.

The best gear on them is still, bar none, berserker.

I wouldn’t mind more hard bosses like Lupi, Archdiviner, and Mossman. In fact, I don’t think anyone is arguing against the inclusion of hard content— you’re talking to most of the experts in the game on this forum (myself definitely not included in that, but many of the posters in this thread are).

But you have to realize: even with hard bosses like these, people still play smart and use berserker gear. Passive gear is not going to be effective in an active game like GW2.

I wouldn’t say it’s quite so bad, Lilith. We haven’t had much about stacking or zerkers, which has been nice. The biggest problem was Chris’s dismissal of our largest concern, which is indeed super but actually related to ANet and not the community. I’m going to ignore the one troll which popped up in this thread as an outlier.

Lindbur.2537:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Viable-way-of-going-Gsword-Staff-PvE

I’m… Trying. I’m really, really trying.

Too true, Guhracie. I only started playing just as Fractured came down, so I wasn’t affected by the reset (and hell, I only run ~30ish fractals even now), but I really think it’s a shame that some really excellent people get treated like this.

Paul Kay.4891:

Pyroatheist.9031:

Paul Kay.4891:

What about the point about Celestial Gear?

Due to how crit damage currently works, celestial gear has a higher ratio of crit damage than it does other stats, and this is getting a huge nerf with the change to ferocity.

Paul Kay.4891:

Would you consider running something else than Zerkers if it got nerfed? If so, what =]?

We will run whatever is best. If they nerf power-based gear so badly that it becomes worse than condition damage, I’ll probably just stop doing dungeons altogether.

Paul Kay.4891:

Also, What’s PU?

Prismatic understanding, grandmaster chaos trait.

What’s the change to Ferocity =]?

Prismatic Understanding I assume is all about Decoy Mass Invisibility and The Prestige? How does that work?

Perhaps I could craft Celestial gear instead of making a mix of Knight’s/Berserker’s. Seems to fit my “rounded” build. What do You think?

Also, I respect your dedication to minmaxing :p Sorry we could not come to an agreement earlier:p

The ferocity change refers to the upcoming change in how critical damage is calculated (with a new base stat called Ferocity, much like crit chance is related to Precision). Celestial is expected to be hit hard by this, but we don’t know yet. I’ll use whatever is best at the end of the day, but I sure as hell hope it is something similar to Berserker’s as that promotes the most interesting/skillful play.

Celestial is fine for WvW. I wouldn’t ever bring it into PvE— stats like extra condition damage are not going to be very useful for you, while a zerker/knight’s/soldier’s combination focuses only on the important stats. Celestial is also time consuming and expensive to make compared to other gear, so I dislike it immediately because of that.

PU is a trait for making your stealth better (and gives you boons when you’re stealthed), and many pvp/wvw players use it. People make very bunker-based builds that are impossible to kill with this trait because they keep hiding. But again, that’s different from tanking, where you hold aggro and try to divert it from your allies. Mesmers can bunker (survive/hide) but they cannot really tank reliably.

The nerf incoming is going to nerf critical damage, and make every damaging spec slightly worse because of that. Berserker will be hit least of all. Once again, for PvE: zerker all the way. It’s better to have zerker trinkets and weapon, and knight’s/soldier’s armor if you want survivability.

Your toughness is a waste because you have no way of controlling the aggro. Guardians sometimes take full Knight’s gear to have more toughness to draw the aggro, and then spam blinds and aegis to mitigate the damage that they attract. You have no way, as a mesmer, to actively mitigate damage like this (actually, sword/sword would give you an extra evade and block, but you’re refusing to use them).

Remember: stats in this game do not make you a tank. Abilities and traits do. And as a mesmer, you just don’t have the ability to tank effectively. (You can bunker effectively with PU, but that’s different from tanking).

Paul Kay.4891:

hendo.1940:

I don’t see how you stacking toughness and vitality and hiding behind your illusions is “taking it like a man” whereas chaining reflects where even the slightest point of error causes you to be one-shotted isn’t.

I honestly don’t get this community.

Also:

1)Iirc Spatial surge is 3 instances of damage, Zerker is 4~ instances, Winds of Chaos is 2+ instances of damage. That’s insufficient?

Yes. duelist, 8 bleeds, warden, 12.

Then I pass off like 15+ might stacks from Mirrorblade on top of what bounced to my allies. Good for stacking, no?

No. Blasted fire fields are.

I fight alongside them, I just kite around until I got 3 illusions then I come in last. So perhaps it’s more about being a minion leader than a yolo tank.

Don’t Winds of Chaos/Mirrorblade illusions attack much more frequently than Defender and duelist, evening it out?

Otherwise; If the Bleed’s not that potent, then maybe I should just take Chaotic Dampening for Staff?

Blasted fire fields? Mind elaborating :p? You mean Combo Field: Blast? I’m not sure I know what you mean here :p

Illusions still don’t attack often enough to make up for the huge stacks from warden/pistol. This is a small additional source of damage for you, and the points might be used better elsewhere, like for Chaotic Dampening, as I suggested.

Blasted fire fields = Combo Field: Blast, yes. That’s what hendo was referring to— a good, useful form of support. The support you provide with boons as a mesmer is just bad, even with Chaos Storm and everything— it’s unreliable at best and ruins fire fields at worse, kittening off your team.

Every time you mention “tanking” you are making your build even worse/less effective/ more dead weight, even in PUG groups. We were talking 20-50% effectiveness before, but now we’re talking about 1-10%. If you’re using range weapons, why do you even need to have toughness/vitality for tanking? You already are putting an insane amount of points into Chaos for toughness, the extra from your gear is not needed.

Power + prec + crit damage are all crucial for PvE. Deviate from those three, and your build is getting worse and worse.

Paul Kay.4891:

maxinion.8396:

Paul Kay.4891:

maxinion.8396:

Such pyroatheist in this thread. Wow. It’s blunt, but he really does have the most accurate comments.

I’ll be a little more generous. If you’re running with a party that actually knows what they’re doing (all melee, all meta builds), a GS+staff mesmer build is 100% dead weight and the rest of the team is just 4-manning the dungeon. If you’re running with typical PUGs (shout heal rifle warriors, AH cleric guardians, etc.) you’ll be doing alright because everyone will be bad. If you’re fine with that, go for it.

Perhaps I belong to pugs, sounds like I’ll enjoy company of people who just want to have fun and not mechanical efficiency:p

Honestly that sounds best for you. Just make sure to join PUGs that say “anyone welcome,” and specifically avoid ones that say “speed clear” or “fast run” or “meta builds.” If you have a casual guild to play with, you’ll probably be equivalent to whatever builds (bearbows, etc.) they’ll be running as well.

The content is finishable with just about any build. If you’re happy with dealing 20-50% of the best damage possible, then you’re fine, but won’t fit into the meta-speedclear groups.

Here’s what I have more or less right now(gear exotic and zerker atm though, it’s “planned” gear):
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/mesmer/?4.2|6.5n.a1s.d1c.0.0|1.5n.a1s.d1c.0.0|5n.7m.5n.7m.5n.7m.5n.7m.5n.7m.5n.7m.d1c.d1c.d1c.d1d.d1c.d1c|41j.d1c.31j.0.3u.0.31j.d1c.3u.d1c.3u.d1c|k0a.f2.f4.0.k37|0.0|6q.3m.38.3l.3q|e

Bear in mind, 1.5 year gone and I’m still trying to figure out things

Feedback welcome :p

Ok, so feedback on this build:

1) Dueling: why 15? The 15, which gives bleeds to your phants, is useless (it’s only good for warden and duelist, who hit with lots of small attacks and give lots of bleeds). Either drop it to 10, or take it to 20 and take Deceptive Evasion.
2) Domination: you don’t have a 10 skill selected— I guess you’re doing Empowered Illusions though?
3) Chaos: why points in this line? You don’t take enough for Chaotic Dampening, which is the only useful one for you here. Maybe reduce dueling to 10 and take chaos to 20. Keep in mind though that chaos adds toughness, a mostly useless stat in PvE, while dueling adds precision, which is actually useful.

Your gear atm is mostly Knight’s it seems like. You probably should change that to Zerker as you mentioned in your comments.

Paul Kay.4891:

maxinion.8396:

Such pyroatheist in this thread. Wow. It’s blunt, but he really does have the most accurate comments.

I’ll be a little more generous. If you’re running with a party that actually knows what they’re doing (all melee, all meta builds), a GS+staff mesmer build is 100% dead weight and the rest of the team is just 4-manning the dungeon. If you’re running with typical PUGs (shout heal rifle warriors, AH cleric guardians, etc.) you’ll be doing alright because everyone will be bad. If you’re fine with that, go for it.

Perhaps I belong to pugs, sounds like I’ll enjoy company of people who just want to have fun and not mechanical efficiency:p

Honestly that sounds best for you. Just make sure to join PUGs that say “anyone welcome,” and specifically avoid ones that say “speed clear” or “fast run” or “meta builds.” If you have a casual guild to play with, you’ll probably be equivalent to whatever builds (bearbows, etc.) they’ll be running as well.

The content is finishable with just about any build. If you’re happy with dealing 20-50% of the best damage possible, then you’re fine, but won’t fit into the meta-speedclear groups.

Never forget.

Such pyroatheist in this thread. Wow. It’s blunt, but he really does have the most accurate comments.

I’ll be a little more generous. If you’re running with a party that actually knows what they’re doing (all melee, all meta builds), a GS+staff mesmer build is 100% dead weight and the rest of the team is just 4-manning the dungeon. If you’re running with typical PUGs (shout heal rifle warriors, AH cleric guardians, etc.) you’ll be doing alright because everyone will be bad. If you’re fine with that, go for it.

lol @ Purple. Now that’s a list.

Mai Trin? Mossman? Archdiviner?

But yeah, bosses dont move at all.

xallever.1874:

Is 2 ele not enough for the might stack?

Maybe more vuln?

More ele means more fgs means more damage.

Even without fgs, ele has one of the highest (if not highest) base DPS, so if you really want to maximize things, ele is quite useful. The 30/30/10 build provides vuln as well.

Purple Miku.7032:

Omg maxinion. That sounds like such a glorious moment to just stand there and completely forget about your surroundings. Nothing in that moment matters except for the fact that there is a ranger, in YOUR pug group, that isn’t an inept bearbow soccermom.

Humina humina humina.

Exactly this.

The kicker? Less than 2k AP as well.