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this spec is the plague of pvp. id like to hear dev comments at this point about when and how this is gonna get nerfed. none of us wanna wait another 6 months to be proven right.
i would say the main problem with this spec is that it has absolutely everything. it can bunk, perma invuln for a while, toss out 6s moas, blink and teleport around, while mindlessly spamming damage. but the MAIN MAIN problem is invulnerable, invulnerable, invulnerable, invulnerable. u serious?
the secondary problem is that your average pubber doesnt know how to fight this. as the poster above me mentioned, to the good players it’s extremely un-fun and annoying to fight. for 70% of the player base, they will just feed into these chronos. the soloq experience is absolutely ridiculous because of this spec (along with a few others) – low effort, easy to learn, no risk. people dont know how to fight it, and even if they figure it out, the other team just needs to get 2 chrono mesmers. now your average pubber needs to learn how to fight two.
like what the kitten were u thinking designing and testing this? how many ANet devs need to get owned 2v1 before changes are made?
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^because over half of the core GM’s in the game are garbage, as well as many weapon sets. all that stuff needs to be brought up. this way u get 2 birds with 1 stone. competition for elites, as well as iteration on old garbage.
you wont be able to land concussive shot reliably in a team fight without piercing arrows. not when there are 4-7 character models in a small area (counting mesmer clones, pets, and such). but i wouldnt pick LOYF just for this reason though. it just has too many other good perks imo.
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^i tried that exact build back in October. at the time, the damage was decent but i couldnt survive. i want to love the build i really do but there are the issues i ran into while testing these days:
- one stun break is just not enough
- waiting around for the seeds to pop for the condi cleanse is super risky; the condi bombs are real; i feel super dependent on the instant cleanse from WK, but maybe that’s just me
- isn’t it super rough without any toughness? there are some pretty scary DD builds out there. not sure if the heals could make up for it. i do like the rune choice…wouldnt work any other way, as you mentioned in your comment
i’ll definitely try it out. how about going into NM instead of BM?
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^or just directly counter them by speccing into heavy CC and condi pressure.
i give zero kittens about balancing elite specs. bring up the core specs to the same level first. this should be priority.
I believe this is the wrong way to go:
- buffing a core class also buffs the elite spec. As long as the two don’t have clear role separation, they don’t work independently.
- It is easier to bring the elite spec (only one traitline, 1 weapon, 1 skill category and 1 class mechanics) to core level than the core (5 traitlines, many weapons, many skills and 1 class mechanics) to elite level.
- pre-HoT was reasonably well balanced, with all classes almost as viable (ranger a bit weak but still played sometimes, ele a bit strong, the rest fine) and some having decent build diversity (medi-power-guard, medi-burn-guard, bunker guard for example, shoutbow and rampage warrior, etc…). Bringing elite specs in line means that this balance and diversity immediately comes back too.
- power creep has really made the game less fun. PvP has become AOE CC and AOE damage and passive survivability everywhere. No need to target, no need to time your skills, just use everything out of cooldown and it will work more or less fine. Every class evade or blocks for half the time.
So no… nerfing elite specs is by far the best way to go.
(or maybe I misunderstood your message, it was not fully clear to me)
i dont think buffing core specs necessarily buffs elites. look at your typical elite spec. look at what GM’s it relies on, then simply buff the other ones to make the player have to decide between giving up the synergy of the elite spec’s GM, and picking up a new combo of GM’s.
this isnt a simple task. whoever is developing and testing would have to explore synergy between GM’s, not the individual GM’s, and have a goal in mind as to what the final build should feel like. this requires 1) a superior understanding of their game, and 2) a vision. sadly, the devs simply dont possess these characteristics, so they just keep pumping out new content without iterating on the old. They gamble with buffs/nerfs/ammy removals, without having a vision of the end-product, hoping the mess will somehow work out. there is no foresight in pvp development, which is why the game will always be Build Wars: one or two builds are the best for any given prof, and once you figure them out, theyre locked into the meta due to superiority. this is why i always get excited when a huge patch comes out, try playing the builds i want to play, usually end up unlucky because said builds arent as good as the meta ones, quit the game for 6 months. rinse and repeat.
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I did multiple testing on LOYF, Quickdraw is a much superior trait hands down.
if youre using the SB as your main weapon, then it really isnt. it might be better if you go staff/SB or something to that effect. LOYF is superior for SB using for the reasons in its description: flat CD reduction on ALL abilities (not just the one you immediately use upon switching), piercing allows concussive shot to land every time in team fights (this is huge), and the small perk of the extra condi damage.
Quickdraw is better if youre using axe or torch in your build, to repeat the nukes back to back. if youre relying on SB, LOYF is the better choice hands down. if a/d s/t builds were still a thing (which they are not, not by a long shot since cele and settler were removed), Quickdraw would be the better choice. with the removal of cele and settler, it was a nail in the coffin for the niche condi bunker ranger builds, which werent even that good.
i give zero kittens about balancing elite specs. bring up the core specs to the same level first. this should be priority. this was their biggest broken promise, that elites would be on par with score specs. what a disaster.
Thank you very much, I will most definitely be giving this a shot.
alternatively, if u wanna go core ranger, and have unlimited condi cleansing in current meta:
ive had better results with this. still trying to decide SoS vs. QZ. it’s really tanky and the CC + poison/bleed pressure eats druids for breakfast. for some reason, this build also crushes power revs and does fine against necros too.
you can also forego NM tree and go druid instead, without staff.
celestial is up often, and ancient seeds are constantly proccing. has a bit less survivability due to no Protective Ward and the extra vigor.
correct me if im wrong, but im finding glyphs to be ineffective currently, due to the delay in the condi cleanse. condi pressure is insane now.
This is a modification to an older build i used to run.
I love using druid and Ancient seeds, with Concussive shot and Spike Trap, the synergy on that feels really good.
I had to go with Signet of Stone, there’s too much bursty damage out there to not have this, especially when using Toll Unguent (in my opinion).
Overall, pretty good condi cleansing, between celestial form and survival skills (running 3 total).
Wolf for a little aoe fear, smokescale for some damage and blind.
I also went with Mercenary’s Amulet, a little more defensive than rabid, and the crit on Rabid is not as necessary when not using Sharpened Edges.
Other than that, I could use some help on runes for the shortbow. No crit means Sigil of Air/Fire are not worth (?).
Let me know what you guys think, thanks!
oooh i love this. i debated running torch instead of dagger. will give it a shot.
ive had some probs with the skirm/wilderness/druid spec due to lack of protection from Protective Ward. makes things hella hard at times.
^thx man.
i just wanted to confirm real quick that im finding the rabid core spec much more effective in soloq, when it comes to making SB work anyway. i think the high toughness works so good with Protective Ward. u can go sharpening stone or QZ in the last utility slot. from the ideal angle, QZ will net you about 13 bleed stacks, whereas SS will net you 16 on a lower CD, but at the price of 1) not having a second stun break, and 2) no superspeed.
on a good team, or say u have a good theif friend with you, that concussive shot will net you a kill every single time. 2s daze/stun is huge. might also be interesting trying SB with staff on a typical druid build, instead of sword/dagger or whatever u guys are running these days.
the other thing ive done is swapped the hound for spider.
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It’s weird they remove that and then go ahead and add things like Mercenary.
I think the whole pvp amulet stat system could do with another overhaul, including normalising 3 and 4 stat amulets and providing more customisation either via jewels or something new.
+1. patch after patch, i cant help but feel the devs are completely lost, and have no vision.
right before i left (last october), wasnt everyone playing cele druid? then they removed both cele and settler at the same time.
i seem to be missing something…why did they remove this ammy? as far as i can recall, this ammy was only used for niche bunker ranger specs, which werent even that strong. now as im raking my brain, trying to make a core ranger spec work, im becoming frustrated with the lack of condi + heal stats. was anything OP with settler?
i really dont think druids are god tier. not with all the condis flying around.
i am however noticing some pretty obnoxious daredevil builds out there. hopefully i figure it out, but im getting a bit worried.
Also, mistsim:
The problem has largely always been the high DPS on the pets. Without that pet DPS, a mender’s/cleric Druid can’t do anything. It can’t even hold side nodes because it won’t have enough offensive pressure to keep things like Revenants or Berserkers off of them.
but when do you DIE as a druid? i die when i get cc and condi pressured by 2-3 people. i dont DIE when my pet dies. in other words im saying dont worry so much about the damage, but focus on killing the druid.
you can have 10k hours on ranger and still be a bad. the problem with druid has never been the dps from its pets lol. it’s the sustained damage, and sustain itself.
i do agree that PoS is garbage. in a real situation against great players, it rarely hits unless you cast it on the downed. strangely, im enjoying WD a lot more than PoS, and it’s PoS that’s making OH axe underwhelming.
Yes, spam as much condition as you can, so they can cleanse everything as they take celestial form.
Pretty much nothing can beat druids. Maybe only Daredevils, but that is big maybe.
spam condis and CC before, during and after they go into celestial form. if you cant kill a druid using this strategy youre bad. druids are a lot stronger against power builds.
Pet deals damage. Use DPS to kill pet. Game over for Druid.
this is terrible advice.
druids get owned by CC and condi pressure. spam immobs, spam condis, daze, stun, etc. druids are much worse off in the current condi meta than they were in the power meta.
hope not. it’s a failed game mode. i hope they re-allocated resources to creating more unique conquest maps, with different mechanics.
The build looks pretty solid. For the druid build id actually change the glyph to another trap or muddy terrain. And then change verdent etching to natural stride. Better strafing potential and better if you are playing as a roamer.
Dunno if that would make the build any better but it seems like a pretty valid 2nd option.
i am not a fan of his builds i kill them to easily. however his glyph is a good choice low cool down and it will hold and bleed anyone with his next attack giving him time to run or finish them off. i use that glyph on my cliric and condi build
huh, interesting seeing as literally no one is running these builds yet. at least, i havent seen a single ranger trying out SB, maybe because it’s so bad or seemingly bad. good luck with your clirics bro.
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The build looks pretty solid. For the druid build id actually change the glyph to another trap or muddy terrain. And then change verdent etching to natural stride. Better strafing potential and better if you are playing as a roamer.
Dunno if that would make the build any better but it seems like a pretty valid 2nd option.
that’d give me the extra mobility and dps. for the price of less condi cleanse, one less stunbreak, and CC from AS and daze. it’s a decent alternative. im a bit nervous running with just one stunbreak and no invuln though.
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SB will never work in a competitive AG or ESL match.
Not with that attitude
Oh, isn’t it general consensus that SB is super underwhelming for top tier?
u just never know. im just testing things thoroughly as i do every patch, and i noticed some efficiency in SB this time around. these are my attempts to make the new SB work. weird things become popular because they synergize with other elements in unforeseen ways. like right now, the condi and cc pressure are so insane that i just dont find the old druid builds too effective. they were weak against heavy cc and condi pressure before, but we didnt notice it due to the power meta.
s/d/sb synergize because of poison and bleed stacking, and chaining 3 evades while your condis tick on the target. this weapon combo is super old school, when cc’s werent spammed as much, so chaining evade frames made you god-like. i ran it with various power builds though.
concussive shot, previously somewhat irrelevant, is now a super strong offensive tool especially with AS. chaining evade frames combined with a few on-demand condi wipes from WK allows u to stay virtually condi-free for a while, instead of waiting on glyphs to pop. and u absolutely cant heal through the current condi pressure. in a sense, these builds are just an adaptation to the evolving meta. with a good team, the cc bleeder druid build i posted would be strong for locking fools down. the rabid variant is an attempt to make the core ranger relevant. it’s a bit tougher from the druid build, due to Protective Ward, so probably better for soloq.
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too soon to tell which specs will be OP, and there are plenty of counter-picks to be had.
SB is interesting because it actually has decent applied damage through bleeds if you’re able to cc your target. secondly, concussive shot got a massive buff and it’s a super important skill now. 2s daze/stun on a low CD can net easy kills. SB works best with canines, but this is nothing new.
the following builds are meant to exert a huge amount of soft and hard CC, as well as bleed/poison condi pressure. survivability is more than decent in condi meta. there are two types of builds: rabid core ranger, and merc druid. i like running rabid on core because u have access to Protective Ward, which helps with the low HP pool. Merc works on druid because we have celestial and more CC. both types of builds use s/d/SB for the evade spam and needed mobility. u can try running sb/axe/d, but u have no mobility so you’d have to make it up elsewhere.
i dont like running SoS on either, because when i die, it’s always from condis.
this one is more team-oriented. it eats other druids, and revs for breakfast. ancient seeds to maximize immobs. the amount of CC you bring is absolutely bonkers.
this is a relatively viable core ranger spec. i find it better for soloq, druid is more team-dependent.
burn variant
let me know what you think, and how these can be improved.
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just do something about moa, i’ll be happy. i think there is a consensus in the community about that.
I feel gw2’s competitive pvp would really benefit from a selection phase. the opposite team doesnt have to know your build, just the prof. there is definitely an element of counter-picking and RPS mechanics in the game. this feature would require build loadouts to be in the game.
what do you guys think?
Also, I am one who says Staff does more actual damage in PvP than LB, and I stand by that. There is simply too much projectile hate floating around. LB arrows get swallowed.
in october i played in the top mmr with a might-stacking marauder staff build. arguably the most popular competitive druid build was the cele gs/staff, which also revolved around might stacking and spamming staff AA.
not sure why this is a new topic all of a sudden. not to mention all the misinformation. in fact, LB hasnt been competitive since the xpac’s release.
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“double blink” hahaha this is funny.
I don’t disagree that mesmer is pretty strong and a little overtuned, but OP doesn’t understand the class one bit.
Maybe he was referring to the all mighty mimic which has not been gaining popularity recently but is still a thing.
my point is, double anything. if they want to.
That’s just flat incorrect. Not like opinion wrong, but fact wrong.
stop hijacking this productive thread. chronos are insanely OP right now and need to be toned down.
im not asking how to fight this broken spec. im asking what the devs are doing to fix it, and when. thanks though.
Unfortunately the devs can’t issue a L2P patch. Their hands are tied. This is something you have to do on your own, padwon.
i have over 2k hours in spvp and i played at the top mmr with the best players in the game since leaderboards came out. ive seen all iterations of the mesmer and all the metas. nice try though. this patch is pretty close to being good, but this chrono garbage is the outlier.
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“double blink” hahaha this is funny.
I don’t disagree that mesmer is pretty strong and a little overtuned, but OP doesn’t understand the class one bit.
Maybe he was referring to the all mighty mimic which has not been gaining popularity recently but is still a thing.
my point is, double anything. if they want to.
^u can use rabid for your ranger, it’s quite good. but honestly i think it would be far better to just fix the mesmer.
Real question is: what are we going to do with thieves?
Dodge non-stop, +20k damage in 2 sec, perma-stealth, unlimited mobility, and these are just main problems.
haha yeah i just experienced this. it’s broken AF, but an entirely different topic. likely just a pub stomping build.
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im not asking how to fight this broken spec. im asking what the devs are doing to fix it, and when. thanks though.
i just think they need to scrap every map that revolves around manning some sort of environmental weapon. players want to win the map by using their characters, not by spamming 1 on some objective.
why is it ok to double moa (up to two people) for 6 seconds each? or whatever the duration is.
double blink, double moa (on 2 people), constantly kittening various condis in a pbaoe while perma-blocking, good condi cleansing. what do? (other than run or kitten)
i feel pvp devs are always taking 2 steps forward and 3 steps back, with every single major patch basically. why is this a recurring problem? why buff something that’s been hella problematic for months? why not test things first? why not run it by us?
i want to love this trait. two simple things need to be done to make it effective:
1. up its bonus damage to like 35-40%
2. move empathic bond out of there so that core ranger can still hhave some condi cleanse outside of wilderness
i love the idea of the poison ranger, and i want to love this GM. it’s so close to being good.
One of the single lowest damage weapons in the entire game =/= “a ton of damage”.
You let me know when you kill someone on staff auto. It’s quite literally impossible if the person isn’t AFK.
cool story man.
i really like spirit watch.
you guys have to keep cranking out more interesting conquest maps. i hope youve abandoned SH development. conquest is a great game mode, and it simply needs a variety of mechanics to keep it interesting. temple and foefire are my favourite maps of all time.
the other good sign is that people are actually VOTING to play skyhammer and spirit watch. which is nice. after 2k hours of spvp, id say my least favourite right now is khylo.
the other issue you need to keep in mind while developing new maps is you shouldnt be locking players out of using their characters in favor of some environmental weapon. this is why khylo and skyhammer are the most disliked maps. nobody like manning trebs and cannons. people want to play their characters. what does work, however, are interesting beasts, verticality and perhaps environmental effects. for your next conquest map consider adding weather to change fighting conditions on the capture points, or on the way to the points.
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staff AA spam does a ton of damage on power builds, which makes it easy to fight from any position. and it’s not constrained by range.
im not denying the LB’s pressure. we were discussing AA, and i think staff has much better applied dps from its AA.
Thank you very much, I will most definitely be giving this a shot.
alternatively, if u wanna go core ranger, and have unlimited condi cleansing in current meta:
ive had better results with this. still trying to decide SoS vs. QZ. it’s really tanky and the CC + poison/bleed pressure eats druids for breakfast. for some reason, this build also crushes power revs and does fine against necros too.
you can also forego NM tree and go druid instead, without staff.
celestial is up often, and ancient seeds are constantly proccing. has a bit less survivability due to no Protective Ward and the extra vigor.
correct me if im wrong, but im finding glyphs to be ineffective currently, due to the delay in the condi cleanse. condi pressure is insane now.
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staff has better applied DPS in pvp. LB arrows are constantly blocked, deflected, reflected, destroyed, or evaded.
“Pay-to-win” has become a buzzword for any perceived injustice where paying players gain access to content which is not immediately accessible to non-paying players.
It doesn’t even matter if the content provides a competitive advantage. So long as it’s desirable and exclusive it will be labeled “pay-to-win” and judged accordingly.
Still, it baffles me how someone could consider an expansion “pay-to-win” content. I’ve always considered expansions to be different games entirely.
Thread should have ended here.
MMORPG expansions are not pay-to-win. The game was updated. That update was called Heart of Thorns. If you don’t want to play the updated, current version of the game, that’s up to you.
it’s pay to win for PVP because the elites are OP compared to core specs. if you can play an elite, you will be losing. that’s first.
secondly, they promised, time and time again, that elite specs will not be the next level, the next power creep. that they would be on par with the core specs. this was obviously stated by those who did/analyzed zero pvp testing (i.e. Colin at the time).
im just frustrated that the recent updates totally killed any semi-viable condi bunker ranger, with the removal of settler and celestial. trap ranger is ok, but succumbs too quickly to condi spam which is everywhere now. i wanted SB to work, but it just doesnt.
i played the kitten out of druid when HoT came out, and i dont wanna do it again. the fact that core ranger is so bad still is pretty depressing.
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Might I ask why you don’t want to buy HoT?
Investing in the game helps it grow and evolve. Elite specs are a big part of that process.
but this game hasnt grown or evolved. i feel like i wasted my money. needing to buy HoT makes pvp pay-to-play because the elites are OP compared to core specs. they said they wouldnt make it this way, and they lied hard.
what are you even talking about man? attack soak with what, a few evades? you have no invuln and no condi cleanse. the build is ridiculous and you’re completely delusional.
right now there are no viable core ranger builds.
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i played this game pretty competitively until last october. came back, and i simply have no idea where any of the damage is coming from. everyone is just mashing buttons and radiating aoe condis.