regarding condi mesmers, you can kill them without breaking a sweat using my cele build (posted in sig). you don’t see condi mesmers in the higher skill brackets though, and power ranger specs are generally much more useful overall. not sure how obnoxious condi mesmers are now, but a month or two ago when I was playing, I didn’t have much of an issue using my valk build either (26k HP, plenty of condi clears, and plenty of damage).
[off topic, regarding power mesmers: yes ive beaten some of the best mesmers in the game, not necessarily 1v1, but easily in a team fight, even when no one is paying attention to them. in fact, I make it my job to kill mesmers in a team fight. 1v1 it’s 50-50 chance against a competent Mesmer running meta. but chances are only this good if youre running a sturdy hard-hitting build that doesn’t rely on LB, like my Valkyrie one.
birds, maul, QZ, and taunt. dodge the interrupts intelligently, time your invuln and quickness properly, and just keep the pressure up until he drops or you die trying. you cant really approach mesmers if youre not hyperaggressive. ]
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as with most of your suggestions runeblade, I like the idea a lot. in its current form, MDG is known as Least Dangerous Game (LDG) because it poses no threat to anyone when youre not playing it, i.e. why would you want to stay under 50% HP for such a bad payoff.
also MDG should tick for like 3 might/second, each lasting 6s without boon duration. we should be able to get up to 15+ stacks of might if we’re staying at low hp for such a long time.
taunt for sure isn’t an I-WIN button. it works really nicely against thieves because you can 2-shot them if they don’t have their stun breakers up. but in general it’s not as on-demand as we’d like it to be. in fact, you can only do it once on-demand, and that’s when u swap pets in melee range. I really don’t understand the issue with this trait. rangers are still so lackluster.
imo you should ban Taunt, so we can actually see real rangers and not people being carrying by one trait.
no “real” rangers play without taunt atm. every ranger who you might consider a skilled veteran playing at the highest MMR is running taunt, and will continue to do so. i called this after 2-3 hours of testing on June 23rd. it’s an excellent trait.
playing the ranger at my MMR is masochistic and emotionally draining, which is why I’m taking a break from the game. it’s draining because I ONLY enjoy playing the ranger and other profs don’t really interest me. I mostly blame this on inactive and/or incompetent devs. the xpac and the next balance patch might change my opinion, but it likely wont. and if I have to wait another 6 months for things to look up, I certainly wont have an interest in that.
there are very, very few veteran rangers left playing at a high level because, as I said, it’s masochistic. you get better results at the same skill level for less stress with other profs. it’s simply horribad game development. this is also why most of the rangers left playing the game are angry, negative people, I don’t like interacting with too many of them sadly.
cele d/d ele would be neat if it worked like a bunker spec. kinda like pre-patch, but with a slight damage nerf. meaning that its CURRENT damage needs to be gutted with cele stats. it could do good damage, for example, with condi stats, knights, PTV, marauder, etc. but only at the cost of greatly reduced sustain.
I was hoping pvp designers would have learned something from the cele meta, but they never fail to amaze, in a bad way. it’s not fun when one spec does everything. these words need to be plastered all over their office imo, so they never lose track of it again.
What I don’t get is, if D/D ele is so OP why isn’t it always just a game of 10 ele’s?
you probably don’t understand a lot of things about this issue, but to clarify for you, in the highest MMR bracket against the top players in the game, we’re very often seeing 2-3 d/d eles on each team (unless phanta, wakkie et al get bored and run something else) duking it out and completely dictating the flow and outcome of battle.
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We’ll be keeping watch (and playing) over the weekend.
-Karl
less watching and less playing, more listening to players who have been playing, and more doing.
I’m still completely confused about ranger’s design. ive played every viable build in existence in the last 3 years, and only LB/GS builds had a distinct “feel” to them. condi melee builds didn’t feel like much, mostly evasion spam tanking. i think it’s really sad how most of our weapons and utilities still need so many tweaks or reworks.
i think melee-based rangers will have a much harder time with the reaper, rev and daredevil running around. no idea how good or horrible druid will turn out, but if it’s lackluster, we can basically expect even more LB spam from 1500. will be hard to stay relevant otherwise.
i think quickdraw works really well in 6/6/0/0/6 because of LTW. it’s basically a min-max’d LB build that also brings the most utility a ranger can bring (taunt, knockdown, and maxed ranged damage/ranged cleave and kb). condis aren’t really a problem in the current meta, and with this playstyle you can actually be relevant by cleaving and taunting from afar, and using spike trap defensively. this ensures condis from cele necros and eles don’t get applied to you. i wouldn’t run quickdraw otherwise.
so in other words, for a LB-centric build, quickdraw is an efficient single trait that increases utility, survivability and damage. condi pressure is minimal or nonexistent at that range, so you can really go all out with the bow. but you also have to cleave with it. so double RF with piercing arrows is neat for cleaving, double swoop or double hunter’s shot is neat for surviving. double PBS is neat for peeling.
what i don’t like about the build is that you cant freely engage some specs, whereas with valk/WK you can go kitten-deep on anyone at any time and live. and GS with remorseless procs and quickness is often the better cleave. with 6/6/0/0/6 at the very least you have to engage from a very specific location at the right time, so i see it as much less versatile.
i don’t know what’s going to happen with the ranger, but i think a lot of these power builds will become more relevant when the ele gets nerfed in the coming weeks/months. i think it’s really cool how there are 3-4 effective LB/GS builds, but I’m also kittened they haven’t fixed our other weapons. s/a and s/wh should be a thing. a/x should be a thing. SB needs to be reworked to reduce our dependence on spamming high rof AA.
the other thing to note is that the elite specs will turn this game into an even bigger circus. i feel ranger melee builds will be even harder to play with the reaper, rev and daredevil melee powerhouses running around. especially if our other melee weapons don’t get the reworks they desperately needed for 3 years. for these reasons , i fear LB will become the only viable power weapon, with GS remaining in the background in its defensive/skirmishing role.
i appreciate you putting the build up elsewhere, I’m kinda disappointed the valk beastmaster was downvoted on mists after being the top ranger build for a while. i dont even know who tends to frequent intothemists, but i think it wasn’t a very well understood build. at least it got lots of views and u guys are having fun with it.
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sadly, SB isn’t a viable weapon with any stat combination
Might want to check the recent meta battle? Several of those builds are great+ or meta. Meta is little more than “finished recent tournies with”. Cele Necro has a niche, but it itself isn’t OP. It just so happens to be great at letting nutlets kill themselves with their own stuff.
I find signet necros to be perfectly balanced actually. theyre strong, but nothing special. we’re only seeing so many of them because 1) there aren’t any other viable necro builds, and 2) theyre needed for boon stripping d/d eles, i.e. they have a role.
none of these specs could have been considered even remotely playable before multiple rounds of player feedback from mass testing. and theyre still not good.
I believe the druid will be rushed, and in a terrible shape for launch, going off the decision-making pattern of the devs. and it will take months before the elite specs don’t feel broken, in one way or another. this is why I cancelled my preorder.
When I say I’ve beat dd ele with ranger I’m not talking about +1.
neither am I, I said ALSO +1. as I said, it’s not really relevant that we beat some bad d/d eles 1v1 in our small worlds. and I’m not talking about them being unbeatable because they don’t have to be. in the “professional” scene, it takes 2-3 coordinated experts to pin wakkey, phanta or any of the other esport kiddies down. when it takes this much effort and resources to kill a d/d ele, then the other 4 people are free to wreak havoc on the rest of the map. the imbalance is therefore in the greater sense of the game mode, not some petty duel to see “who’s king”.
anyway, it’s so, so dumb that we’ve actually had to sit through months of this stuff. some of us playing in the highest mmr bracket called it about 3-4 days after the June 23rd patch. it’s this lack of awareness and prioritization that has made me completely lose all faith in the game’s devs, cancel my preorder, and uninstall until further notice so I can play others games that don’t stress me out in this way. at this point these guys have to impress for me to play gw2 again.
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I stated this before but -
ArenaNet this is how you fix ele’s
Take the condition removal from Water Magic, put it into Earth Magic. There is absolutely no reason for Diamond skin to exist, just put Cleansing Water into Earth Magic.
BOOM! Problem solved. You can no longer get high recovery and condition removal in a SINGLE trait line. So now-
- You can do very tanky with Arcana, Earth and Water, but now you lack the damage from fire.
- You can have high recovery and damage with Fire, Water and Arcana, but lack strong condition removal from earth.
- You can have strong condition removal and damage with Fire, Earth and Arcana but lack the recovery from water.
- You can have all three in Fire, Water and Earth, but lack the extra power and recovery from Arcana.
It’s that simple -_-
I got 4,000 hours on my ele, listen to the ele mains and freaking NERF ELEMENTALIST.
(And make Earth, Air and Fire traits grandmaster traits more fun while you are at it)
this sounds simple and reasonable. hope they read.
cele ele got buffed with the jun 23rd patch, that’s what I’m talking about. if cele ele stayed the same, without the burn stack damage increase, it would have been just fine in this meta.
@OP
Hey there. I’ve killed d/d eles with the class you’re playing now, mesmer. And I’ve also killed d/d eles with rampage warrior at its current state. d/d eles no problem with cele signet necro. you may think this is funny but I’ve killed d/d eles with a burn guard. it’s not fiction that i’ve killed d/d eles with a ranger.
but the funnest way to kill d/d eles is with a d/d ele and the reason i’m able to kill them with the classes above is because i know how to play one. im not very good, but understanding their attunements and CDs help a lot
This guy has got the answer. Play an ele and familiarize yourself with their cool downs. It’s the same in ANY pvp game you can play. You need to know what they have before you can counter it appropriately. I haven’t lost 1v1 against a dd cele ele yet as settlers condi ranger but I doubt I’ve fought the best. But I have played ele and I do understand their game plan.
this kind of discussion is moot imo. I mean, ive killed plenty of BAD d/d eles with my ranger as well. ive also killed good ones by +1’ing a fight. but GOOD d/d eles (pretty much all eles in the top mmr area) are a totally different story. and this is where you really notice how broken the thing is. theyre literally the best bunkers in the game, in addition to boasting huge burning damage and mobility. it’s totally broken, and as I said, discussing “how to kill d/d eles” is moot because knowing how is not an issue when every player in your game is extremely good.
I just don’t understand why this took two months to realize and communicate, not to mention probably another month at least to implement.
they need to do smaller tweaks to balance more often…not these large patches that break everything.
grouch, you are a gw2 god, second in power level only to Colin. anyway, this is great to hear. I’m looking forward to reinstalling the game when the ele is brought in line. cheers.
SH is bad. in its current state, id say most people prefer playing conquest. it’s scary how much dev time and “resources” when into this, and it’s so bad.
that’s exactly what i’m concerned about. and that’s exactly what i don’t understand about stronghold; they could simply make gvg work for gw2. we have the maps and the map mechanics, they only need to be tweaked.
yep. also, regarding GW2’s gvg, they could have also added a unique twist on 10v10/15v15/20v20 by giving each guild a giant dragon, either AI or player controlled. they could have introduced interesting mechanics for obtaining and leveling the dragon. and then created large open areas for guilds to fight over with their dragons. could have linked it to wvw progression/scoring as well. dragons with different skillsets could have been introduced, kinda like heroes are now.
and then they could have dedicated the rest of their resources to balancing and supporting conquest.
SH is bad. in its current state, id say most people prefer playing conquest. it’s scary how much dev time and “resources” when into this, and it’s so bad.
competitive pvp is a joke right now. team with the most competent eles wins. “just stack eles boys” – ANet
It’s too late anyway. You can’t even get a full hotjoin anymore, much less a reasonable que.
They had a perfect opportunity with this last patch. Problems were expected, but some things were so ridiculous that it evidenced almost ZERO internal testing.
The fact that some of these ridiculous things still aren’t fixed is why nobody plays anymore. The game is corrupted by rage quitting, no rewards, allowed bugs/OP things that never get fixed.
pretty much this. how some things go live is beyond me. I still cant understand why they don’t give us a PTR so we can contribute to the balancing process, instead of them relying on their inept internal testing teams.
it’s much more simple than that. balance problems wont ever be fixed because this is an MMO. they don’t have the resources to dedicate to pvp balance. right now, all the devs are scrambling to make the elite specs playable for HoT. thing is, elite specs wont be viable for at least 6 months after release. everyone who knows this game knows this.
currently I don’t think there’s anyone working on balancing pvp, as we haven’t had any significant changes since the big spec revamp. despite the promises. those who want balanced pvp should play a pvp game like any of the mobas, or the upcoming Overwatch. gdub has lots to offer, but prof equality has never been one of those things. if you want balance, play a game with a dedicated pvp team.
I also agree that burning itself doesn’t need a nerf, instead this problem needs to by addressed specifically for each profession. d/d ele for example shouldn’t be able to spam so many stacks. burn guards are totally fine on the other hand, as are condi rangers and engies.
now that I think about it, I don’t mind the new burn at all. I just hate it on the d/d ele.
there’s no point in playing the game until d/d eles and mesmers are nerfed. I actually picked up on this over a month ago in the top mmr bracket when all the esport kiddies started spamming their mesmers and eles. i decided to just take a break from the game. it was all mesmers and eles, played by very good players mind you so it’s not like we can armchair philosophize about “countering” these broken specs. pvp is pretty dumb right now and ive stopped hoping. still no balance patch since the spec revamp, ayy lmao. just play other games.
the main two problems:
1) amount of burn spam available to the ele
2) invis uptime too high for mesmers
I don’t care about Mesmer’s burst, and I don’t care about the ele’s tankiness. but these specs shouldn’t have access to survivability, CC, sustain and insane damage.
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Me and my team (E Dream) won a game versus the Abjured in the ESLs for the first time since 30 weeks with me on ranger. We are also constantly winning the Academy Gaming tournaments. Ranger is viable if the player is good enough.
I do agree with some of the much needed changes tho!
I do think power rangers are in a good enough spot if babysat by some amazing players. but I think you beating the Abjured once is an exception based on their mistakes, rather than a common occurrence based on your skill and contribution.
there is absolutely no reason to pick the best power ranger in the game (which very likely isn’t you) over an average mesmer. power rangers are okay, and with a few minor nerfs to d/d eles and mesmers, would be quite viable. as I mentioned in another thread, I feel power rangers are very good replacements for maurauder engies, zerker warriors, and a few other average specs for example. the top specs in the game right now are your cele d/d eles, interrupt mesmers, and signet necros. rest is just gravy. it doesn’t matter…thief, zerker warrior, ranger whatever.
regarding OP’s suggestions, they don’t even scratch the surface of what’s really wrong with the prof. ive never heard of him and he certainly doesn’t speak for the ranger community.
OH axe was never, ever viable, and wont be until sword is improved (for s/a synergy), and/or until axe 5 is reworked because it’s an entirely useless weapon skill.
birds are actually the best pets for any power ranger if speccing for beastly warden. pets don’t need overhauls. at least 5-6 are viable for competitive pvp, but others require f2 reworks. rangers have weak weapons, and also need about a dozen utilities reworked (spirits, 3 shouts, 2 survival skills, etc.)
but to reiterate the main problem with rangers competitively is that mesmers and d/d eles are so strong. the secondary problems are weak weapon skills and a dozen terrible utilities. the tertiary problem is a bunch of useless pets.
people are talking about rangers needing to become a high vit prof, and I couldn’t agree more. this would open up settler and rabid builds once again, as low vit ammies leave ranger too vulnerable to spikes. this is a very simple change that would as well give power rangers a slight edge they badly need, and would most definitely bring condi bunkers back. my cele condi bunker is pretty strong already, but the damage is lacking somewhat…the condi ranger just needs a little bit more oomph to be viable.
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I don’t disrespect the Abjured, but I do take issue with the balancing of this game. the Abjured has achieved everything with the double d/d ele + X comp. it’s not their fault the spec is broken. but they will abuse it to make money.
There hasn’t been another Abjured running 2 cele ele comp either.
There’s only certain aspects of the Ele that needs shaving. Doing so will not change their performance any, it’s more of a QoL fix.
Abjured is carried by wakkie and phanta. that’s all there is to it. the rest is gravy. d/d eles make this game dumb, and personally, I’m not even thinking of coming back until this garbage is resolved.
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I don’t disrespect the Abjured, but I do take issue with the balancing of this game. the Abjured has achieved everything with the double d/d ele + X comp. it’s not their fault the spec is broken. but they will abuse it to make money.
so happy I’m done with this game. as I mentioned elsewhere, the game is gonna be broken for at least 6 months after HoT is released. if you’re lucky.
these tiers you guys are making are silly. engies are bottom of the barrel, rangers are always more useful than any guard spec ive seen, and signet necros should be third or fourth.
warriors are middle of the pack along with ranger and thief. rampage has too much counterplay and beyond that, zerker wars don’t have much more to offer than a well played power Mesmer, thief or ranger.
the only outliers currently are Mesmer and cele ele, but they still haven’t been addressed and likely wont be. rest is fairly well balanced.
I lost my patience with the game and its devs, after 3 years. uninstalled and cancelled my preorder few days ago, might be back at some point. we’ll always be playing an unfinished and unbalanced product. for example, when the elite specs go live, 6 months will go by before theyre actually playable/viable. no thanks. also still no significant balance patch after the spec revamp. almost a month and a half now. yeap, I’m done here.
as a final nail in the coffin for me, stronghold was a flop imo.
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taunt wrecks bad thieves in general. working as intended. better time those stunbreakers well son. and you’ll have to drop SR. good thieves have adapted.
it also makes me laugh when I clear said warriors off my node. who’s next?
You’re not that great honestly, played against you many times in queues and you got rekt by Tarcis plenty of times on his very stream. So , who is next for you?
I don’t play against tarcis too often but I don’t remember getting wrecked by him too badly. but even if I did, great, it’s tarcis, arguably the best warrior NA. im not calling anyone out, im not esports so im not sure why ud even go there. I have some really bad games against good players, and i have some really good ones. im just opening a discussion – beyond rampage, zerker warriors don’t bring much to the table. that is the truth.
it’s so funny youre trying to make this about me when in fact it’s not, you sad man. but for your information, im not running the standard pew pew, I don’t pew pew much at all because LB is counterplayed pretty hard post patch.
and what’s wrong with adding in the RAWR, am I not a ranger? JESUS CHRIST SAVE US.
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it also makes me laugh when I clear said warriors off my node. who’s next? RAWR.
In the current state pew pew ranger simply has nothing on warrior. .
what’s a pew pew ranger? not sure what you mean.
Justin are there any plans to make MMR visible so we know how we stack up against other players? right now, we don’t really know what we’re playing for. hope you guys have something good in store for us by the time HoT launches.
also would you be kind enough to tell me how I’m doing in terms of my MMR?
it does, this is very true. but still. you know. signet necro takes a lot of skill to play. honestly the ONLY one so far that ive seen handle the build well is nos himself, but I guess people will learn. not enough necros play it sadly. those who do are god-awful. which makes nos pretty unique atm.
I would say rangers bring to the table higher single target and higher sustained damage. the taunt every 15s is another selling point. with the right build u can survive on point for a while and dish out big numbers.
I guess im just hoping ANet gives warriors some more build variety. their only build shouldn’t revolve around an elite, which it does.
problem with CotW is that swiftness, fury and regen are terrible boons simply because we have so many sources of them. the blast finisher is meh, but what truly makes WH a terrible choice is Hunter’s Call. I think this thing hasn’t been iterated on since the game launched and it’s kittening terrible.
because WH cant do any damage and its boons are lackluster, this offhand simply isn’t usable.
cele eles shouldn’t be able to faceroll 25 stacks of might and perma protection. I don’t even care about the burning much.
Wait till someone goes down, pop Rampage and just wail on the revivers. .
but good players don’t try to rez someone without popping their invulns and paying attention to the rampage. you see Rampage warriors wiping teams when going up against bad soloq’ers. and as I said, outside of rampage, what does a zerker warrior do except fight to stay alive? again, much more difficult against skilled players.
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^but at least the signet build is incredibly strong in the hands of a good player. in that sense, necros got a lot – a competitive spec.
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cele eles shouldn’t be able to faceroll into 25 stacks of might and perma prot. the burning is a secondary issue because you can actually have control over this by evading/cleansing.
I’m still debating between taking Wilting Strike and Two-Handed Training in the Beastmastery line.
two-handed training is a much stronger choice if one favours GS use. sadly, I don’t think marauder builds really allow for GS to be a true offensive weapon. on my valk build, I do most of my damage with GS + bird. I also have more mobility, cleave and burst, and I can contest points better due to the lower CD’s. even getting -20% cd reduction on the defensive skills could be more worthwhile than wilting strike in certain situations, i.e. when you actually need to get out instead of fighting. but WS does work very nicely with the wolf though.
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ive come to conclude that a good power ranger is better than a rampage zerker warrior in every single way. we have more survivability, our sustained damage is higher, roaming is as good, cc is better with beastly warden, and we have much more burst compared to a zerker warrior who’s not in Rampage. Rampage is also too easy to counterplay. I think other players are also starting to realize this.
thoughts?
I understand why new and experienced rangers feel this way. the truth is, while the ranger needs many improvements, you’re probably running inefficient builds. inefficient means that you’re so busy surviving that youre not doing any damage, or that youre doing so much damage that you’re not surviving, and feeding instead. think about that a bit. in my sig you can find the 3 most competitive builds for spvp, so start with that.
the other major tip I can give is learn to use the GS and stop trying to achieve everything with the LB. the difference between good and amazing thieves is the shortbow play. similarly for rangers, the difference between good and amazing rangers is the GS play. the glory days of the LB are actually over, in spvp at least, because the weapon is counterplayed hard. and it will get only worse when elite specs come out along with their projectile block spam.
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burn guardians are garbage. you need to learn to time your dodges, blocks and cleanses properly. also look into ways of having a large HP pool. cc the guard a ton, get him to blow his stun breakers and approach the fight strategically. you cant kill a guard with LB, you’ll have to mostly use the GS.
looks delicious. my only criticism is that the opponents seemed incompetent, but I guess youre not going for a “competitive” spvp build, just a fun one.
I actually don’t think the build needs any more condi cleanse, but you don’t have an invuln which is a pretty big problem against warriors and mesmers who could two-shot you. you could also try to work QZ and double birds into your build. it would greatly increase your applied damage.