Guild Wars 2

Ya man, the nerf screams from mostly clueless are no longer funny. I do however think there are some changes that can help the class and make it a bit less effective against clueless:

1) Traps: The following will make traps weaker against less skilled players, but slightly more useful.
Reduce the daze to 0.25 sec from 0.5 sec.
Reduce their duration from 3 minutes to 20 seconds, to prevent the doubling up.
Reduce test of faith upfront damage by 25% and redistribute over the duration, so overall damage stays the same.
Increase the boons provided. Test of faith protection 7.5 secs up from 6. Procession of Blades fury to 10 secs from 8 secs. Light’s Judgment Swiftness 20 secs up from 10. Dragon Maw might duration from 8 secs to 15 secs.

2) Celestial Weapons: We can all agree that these utilities suck.
Give them all a standard CD of 45 secs and duration of 45 secs. The CD starts with casting not after it terminate/dies. Increase the weapons HP significantly so they do not die in a matter of seconds.

3) Shouts: Not terrible, but rarely used except stand your ground.
Hold the line base CD 25 sec from 30 sec.
Retreat base CD 25 sec from 30 sec.
Save yourselves base CD 40 sec from 50 sec.

4) Mobility outside sPvP could be better. Since signet of Wraith is almost never used, it could be changed to provide 25% movement speed. It will never see day of light in sPvP, while still be useful in PvE (maybe WvW?).

5) Great sword needs love. Rarely anyone use it anymore. Not sure how.

I think Blood Stone Fen is definitely a step in the right directions:

Pros:
1) Finally, short meta events, which are also interesting. Anet needs to stick with that going forward.
2) Air combat
3) Interesting mobs.
4) Easy to navigate.

Cons:
1) Way too crowded with mobs.
2) Small (that ties in with being too crowded). Not much to explore (something I love about GW2 maps).
3) No regular vendors :/ Only vendor you can sell stuff is on the ship. No vendors to buy salvaging kits and node farming tools.

Overall the pros way outweigh the cons. I am hoping this is the direction the maps will go in the future, while being as big and explorable, like HoT maps, while being easy to navigate, unlike HoT maps.

OriOri.8724:

@Otto GS is our only ranged power weapon. The burst with skill 2 even relies on your starting at range so that by the time you blink over and shatter everything hits at the same time. Once that shatter lands I’ve never seen a mesmer continue to use GS if the other player isn’t downed, I’ve seen them switch to a close range weapon like the sword to finish it up. Even though the shatter relies on being next to them, I don’t think that GS was ever designed as a close range weapon for mesmers.

I totally agree with you, GS was not designed as a close range weapon. The problem is power shatter, which is nearly the main reason anyone uses GS, requires you to be close. Illusionary blade does not work well max range, so again you need to get close. You are losing damage if you are far you are losing damage if you are close. It just does not work well.

Sadly, GS is a relic of the past. It works, but it is a poor choice and largely inefficient compared to what most other classes/builds can dish out.

Some of these changes are good. Problem Mesmer has is all auto attacks suck and majority of survivablity (especially from sPvP side) is tied to inspiration.

I want to comment on: "GS1 is fine the way it is, the whole weapon is designed around fighting at range anyway. " This is absolutely incorrect. GS damage relies heavily on skill 2 and shatter, which makes fighting at range extremely disadvantageous, even though the AA more damage at range. Now if they remove the minimum range and increase skill 3 damage, GS maybe useful. Currently it sucks.

cletiscake.9173:

1. Scepter 2 ability gives Might when you stand in the symbol, which seems weird to me because this is a ranged + ground targeted attack. You want to cast this at range and you want to stay at range – this is the reason why we’re using ranged weapons in the first place. So i’m not sure why it’s required of you to walk in your symbol after you’ve cast it on a target, placing yourself back in melee range, in order for you to benefit from the Might stacks. Seems unintuitive to me. My suggestion here would be to provide one stack of Might for every time those fists deal damage to a target. Probably just your main target, not targets in a radius. This way you can cast the symbol, stay ranged, and still get the Might stacks.

2. The reduction in range from 1200 yrds —> 900 yards. Again, doesn’t make sense to me considering this is a ranged weapon. Makes even less sense considering everything I just said about Scepter 2 ability. The reduction to 900 yrds further promotes going closer to melee, which again, doesn’t seem like that’s what I want to be doing with a ranged weapon.

3. The changes to Scepter, IMO, feel like the only real viable “ranged” weapon is the Bow. If I choose a ranged weapon, I shouldn’t feel like my effectiveness is reduced unless I get closer to melee. This seems like bad design, because if you want a real “ranged” weapon, now you need to spec for it. This is something we’ve already been doing, but this change only pigeon-holes us that much more. And it’s not exactly fair because what happens when more Elite-specs are released and we no longer spec into DH. That means we lose our only ranged weapon by default.

The bow doesn’t make any concessions when it comes to being effective at maximum range, so why does the Scepter? Am I the only one who feels this way?

Scepter is a short range weapon that works better when you are close to your target. In fact it is the single most powerful single target ranged weapon With torch for any power build and is guard strongest single target weapon. Just do not expect to use it at 600 plus range. Ideally, you want your target to stay in skill two symbol, which will require you to stay close.

emkelly.2371:

Again. On point, how the hell do you expect anyone to take the point from a DH without going through your trap? Any trap but sure, lets use test of fate as an example. You drop it, we come to take point, we Trigger it. We try to kill From ranged, oh look you have a shield and longbow, also you can teleport to us and drop your trap. remember it’s instant cast.

so lets say I try to break the trap and dodge backwards out of it be fore it’s activation time. Oh wait, Daze, that’s right. Lets say i’m a Dare devil and dodge Through it. Okay that works, once, if i’m lucky enough that i don’t get dazed. buti still have to reset, then i still have to do it again when you lay your trap again.

People don’t hate DH because of it’s damage, or even it’s traps. they hate it because of it’s everything. A well played DH literally has an answer for anything 1v1 on point.

I will go on good faith and assume you do not understand the mechanics. Pro tip (not really) from Darknicrofiapro tip: 1 dodge activates all traps and you take no damage/cc.

Another pro tip, thief is bad against guard. At equal skill levels guard should win (or thief escapes).

Third pro tip, if you see a guard running too much traps (known as trapper), focus fire them. They die fairly quickly. Just do not go and stand where the traps are.

Fourth pro tip, if you are fighting a trapper guard, if you have a blur spell (and half the classes do) or use a block, you can trigger all traps for no damage.

To be honest, all DHs traps are fairly easy to deal with except test of faith, which is why guard have been out of the meta till recent patch. And the reason they are in a good place now has nothing to do with traps.

I love these threads. It shows you how little knowledge people have.. Yes traps are easy to setup but also easy to avoid. Outside test of faith all traps that deal any mentionable damage have activation time and cast time. And to be honest majority of dh builds run only 1 offensive trap which is test of faith. If you are getting outplayed by a DH, traps are Rarely the cause.

P.s. Guard have been under performing before this patch for a while. Guess what, traps where available then and they did not get buffed in the 7/26 patch.

What is with all these too easy too hard threads?! Story content is not supposed to be difficult and it surely is not..

Well OP, mace, sword and scepter were garbage tier until the recent patch. From PvE, even with all these changes Guard is not the highest dps and on the weaker side of support, so why nerf anything?! For sPvP, yes symbol Guard is strong, but hardly OP. Considering lack of mobility and naturally low HP pool, a nerf will return these weapons to useless.

Unless by end of this balance cycle (October), the changes proof Guard in sPvP is destroying every one (unlikely cuz it has not happened so far) why there should be a change?

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Start Up Costs (for a new race)

• Create three variations each of the L10, L20, and L30 chapters of the Personal Story.
• Insert new race into all the other chapters.
• Insert new race into LS2, HoT, and LS3 chapters.
• New & adapted stories must be translated into French, German, Spanish, and Mandarin.
• Hire male & female voice actors (in all five supported languages) to cover all of above, plus skills.
• Create new cultural skills.
• Figure out what to use as new race’s home city, starter areas.
• Invent cultural armor (3 tiers, 3 armor weights each)
• Adapt/QA all existing armor, weapons, backs, and gliders so that it works for new race.

Ongoing Costs (for a new race)

• Write new race into new stories.
• Ensure actors (in all five support languages) are under a contract that makes them available at the appropriate times.
• Also ensure actor availability any time there’s a new elite specialization
• Extra time for rendering/QA for weapons, armor, backs, gliders.
• Extra time for animating new skills (for elite specializations).

(I’m sure I’m forgetting something)

---

The short of it is:

• Huge initial costs.
• Increased costs for new stories, skins, and skills.

What else could ANet do with those same resources? How much more story? How many more armor sets, outfits, weapon skins?

I’d love to see a new race; I’d just rather see all the other things we’d miss out.

Illconcived summarized it pretty well. It not going to happen. Too much cost and would not cause enough traction.

As someone who usually obtain all or two of all three dailies through PvP, I agree that the old PvE dailies are much better than what they are now. Thanks, I do not want to do adventures. I am not interested in re-doing puzzles I have done before and I most definitely do not memorize their names, so if for any reason I want to do one of these puzzles I have to google where the kitten is it.

I feel bad for people who only do dailies through PvP.

This thread reminds me of recent game when I was fighting a condi necro on my guard defending a point and defeated him. He/she starts QQing about how oped traps are. Aside from heal the only trap I was running was test of faith which the necro did not even tank, just got hit by the trigger damage twice.

Face palm.

Azukas.1426:

Malkav.4609:

I personally have no problems with solo play in PvE content as a Mesmer. When if comes to grouping are you calculating the spectacular amount of damage you are contributing to the other people in the group? Just using some DPS meters results of the dps that the Mesmer is directly outputting on their own on a dummy is all but useless for a realistic view of the Mesmer.

Figure out how much dps a Mesmer adds to the rest of the group, then multiply that times the number of group members. Now add that to your dps from the dummy. That will be a much more accurate picture of what Mesmer brings to the table…

Shhh you are going to make the locals mad with this logic, objectivity, and truths

While the OP was over exaggerating, the above statement summarizes the state of Mesmer: support bot in every game mode, weak solo and extremely limited options, as almost all builds running the same trait lines with almost identical trait selection. How is this a good state for the class?!

Varezenem.2813:

otto.5684:

A question on the patch notes if someone is familiar and/or tested:

Rift Slash: Weapon damage has now been incorporated in this skill’s secondary damage component. Base damage has been normalized.
Precision Strike: Weapon power has now been incorporated in this skill’s damage. Base damage has been normalized. The cooldown of this skill has increased from 5 seconds to 6 seconds in PvP only.
Unrelenting Assault: Weapon power has now been incorporated in this skill’s damage. Base damage has been normalized.

“Weapon damage has now been incorporated in this skill,” what does that translate to in terms of the skill damage as a percentage, buff or nerf? Also, when the notes say “normalized,” I assume that all 3 hits for PS and all hits for UA deal the around the same damage. Correct?

It means that they are using the sword weapon strength (level 78 exotic sword for PvP) instead of the utility weapon strength (690). It was bugged before you can read is as a 15~44%(ascended sword) damage increase assuming they didn’t nerf the skill coefficient.
But seeing the results in game they most likely did nerf it to give the same output in PvP.

I did limited testing yesterday, and its seems PS, UA and third sword AA are hitting in PvE between 5-10% stronger. I have not seen PS bug out so far, but UA has a new bug as already noted.

As for the changes, not much has changed. Overall it seems it that sword and staff will be the only viable weapons, with staff’s damage remaining in trash mode. You would have to use power builds with Glint as the main legend in everything. The problem with Rev more than any other class was diversity and bugs. The patch did not remotely address diversity (the Ventari/salvation changes are useless) and we still have glaring bugs.

A question on the patch notes if someone is familiar and/or tested:

Rift Slash: Weapon damage has now been incorporated in this skill’s secondary damage component. Base damage has been normalized.
Precision Strike: Weapon power has now been incorporated in this skill’s damage. Base damage has been normalized. The cooldown of this skill has increased from 5 seconds to 6 seconds in PvP only.
Unrelenting Assault: Weapon power has now been incorporated in this skill’s damage. Base damage has been normalized.

“Weapon damage has now been incorporated in this skill,” what does that translate to in terms of the skill damage as a percentage, buff or nerf? Also, when the notes say “normalized,” I assume that all 3 hits for PS and all hits for UA deal the around the same damage. Correct?

Saiyan.1704:

otto.5684:

I am not the most experienced guardian, but guardian has a fundamental design issue. Initially guard was designed as tanky/support class primarily, that is a bit slow but survivable. HoT turned this 180 degree making guard primarily a burst dps class. Sustainability is middle of the pack and closer to the low side and mobility is terrible.

Then traps, the ultimate one trick pony. At there current iteration, only Test of Faith is worth using. Using other dps traps make you weaker, and do not provide much in terms of either area denial or damage, since people avoid them anyway.

Guardian traps should deal quite a bit less damage and should be more frequent for their utility use. At the same time the following weapons need help to desperate help in either damage or utility: LB, GS, mace and scepter. Utility wise: Concentrations are not usable much outside WvW. Shouts have too long CDs. Spirit weapons.. no comment. Then guardian needs a buff in mobility as well and things should be in a much better position.

It is anticipated that guardian will get buffed next patch, but it may not be in a useful way.

Hate to be that guy but this is a bit wrong. Guardian’s used to be a BIG Burst dps class back when Zerkers were meta. Even when Celestials came out, Zerker Guardian was still there to make Thieves (and other zerk builds) QQ. 7k Whirling Wrath + 3k Smite Condition was no joke.

The Spec patch hit and you’re right, Guardians did a 180 but in a positive way. We had a viable range weapon, had better sustains (compared to core) and still remained Bursty with a twist of CC. All that got nerfed to the ground… now we’re simply mechanically flawed because we have weaknesses that weren’t nearly as big of a deal post HoT.

The biggest issue with DH traps is, there’s way too much on a single utility. Traited Smite Condition, traited traps, Heals being meditations and can proc Smite Condition, it’s these items that creates huge windows if opportunity for other classes to take advantage of. It’s also the reason why, if used all together, can down an unaware; unskilled, opponent in soloQ. We have soloQ players telling devs to nerf us and competitive players asking for a buff. Both are right, in their own way…

I have not been around long enough, but seems like I missed on the good old days! I play primary guardian and rev. I find that guard performs better in terms of damage and much better survivability against conditions, but as games get tough, I always feel I would have been much better as a rev. Much better survivability and team support.

There is no question that as the opposition gets smarter, DH loses much ground due to very easily avoidable damage mechanics and easily interrupt-able survivability mechanics. The lack of mobility as well does not help. Lets cross our fingers for some useful buffs that do not involve traps.

Lahmia.2193:

otto.5684:

Lahmia.2193:

alain.1659:

Guys if the mesmer with all its blinks, portals and stealth gets movement speed, Guardian should get it too. End of the story.

Mesmer has 1 blink ability, portals are useless for personal speed and stealth only helps with movement if you have PU traited. Dragonhunters have 2 leaps (gs #3 & f2), 2 targeted teleports (sword #2 600 range, and a 1200 range meditation) and probably the easiest access to swiftness of any profession.
Also you could potentially argue to get anything on a profession by comparing it to another.

I agree that you could potentially argue to get anything on a profession by comparing it to another, however there is so much wrong with your statement. You are confusing gap closing with survivability. When people are asking for mobility they do not want to jump in but jump out of melee range. Gap closing ability on under performing weapons means nothing. Currently the only mobility skill usable in combat to avoid damage is Wings of Resolve.

As for easiest access to swiftness, hmm?!! Can you maintain 100% uptime on swiftness? Sure. I could say the same about every class. Can you maintain any uptime on swiftness without using useless utilities and weapons in sPvP and WvW? No. Only time you can do that is in solo PvE, and no one gives 2 cents about that. Even there, most other classes have so much better and easier options.

Bottom line is guardian is under performing in sPvP, and the days of guardian being slow and tanky are way long gone. So options are: buff damage, buff sustainability or buff mobility. The third will be most useful and least likely to make guardian OP.

Would a single 25% movement signet/trait achieve this though? It would be a nice gesture but nothing more. That was the point i was trying to make (though failing I admit).

Indeed it wont, yet it is a step in the right direction. Here is an example of how can this be done to help mobility, without making too many changes:

- Defender’s Dogma (DH trait minor master), also increases moving speed by 25%.
- DH runes in addition to providing 5 stacks of might also provide swiftness lasting 8 secs.
- Wings of Resolve cast time from 1 sec to 0.5 sec.
- True shot is now be cast while moving.

There is much that needs changing, but something like the above can be a start.

Lahmia.2193:

alain.1659:

Guys if the mesmer with all its blinks, portals and stealth gets movement speed, Guardian should get it too. End of the story.

Mesmer has 1 blink ability, portals are useless for personal speed and stealth only helps with movement if you have PU traited. Dragonhunters have 2 leaps (gs #3 & f2), 2 targeted teleports (sword #2 600 range, and a 1200 range meditation) and probably the easiest access to swiftness of any profession.
Also you could potentially argue to get anything on a profession by comparing it to another.

I agree that you could potentially argue to get anything on a profession by comparing it to another, however there is so much wrong with your statement. You are confusing gap closing with survivability. When people are asking for mobility they do not want to jump in but jump out of melee range. Gap closing ability on under performing weapons means nothing. Currently the only mobility skill usable in combat to avoid damage is Wings of Resolve.

As for easiest access to swiftness, hmm?!! Can you maintain 100% uptime on swiftness? Sure. I could say the same about every class. Can you maintain any uptime on swiftness without using useless utilities and weapons in sPvP and WvW? No. Only time you can do that is in solo PvE, and no one gives 2 cents about that. Even there, most other classes have so much better and easier options.

Bottom line is guardian is under performing in sPvP, and the days of guardian being slow and tanky are way long gone. So options are: buff damage, buff sustainability or buff mobility. The third will be most useful and least likely to make guardian OP.

I am not the most experienced guardian, but guardian has a fundamental design issue. Initially guard was designed as tanky/support class primarily, that is a bit slow but survivable. HoT turned this 180 degree making guard primarily a burst dps class. Sustainability is middle of the pack and closer to the low side and mobility is terrible.

Then traps, the ultimate one trick pony. At there current iteration, only Test of Faith is worth using. Using other dps traps make you weaker, and do not provide much in terms of either area denial or damage, since people avoid them anyway.

Guardian traps should deal quite a bit less damage and should be more frequent for their utility use. At the same time the following weapons need help to desperate help in either damage or utility: LB, GS, mace and scepter. Utility wise: Concentrations are not usable much outside WvW. Shouts have too long CDs. Spirit weapons.. no comment. Then guardian needs a buff in mobility as well and things should be in a much better position.

It is anticipated that guardian will get buffed next patch, but it may not be in a useful way.

Out of all of Rev weapons and and traits probably sword mh is probably the least requiring rework. Is it bugged? Yes. Is it weak in PvP or PvE? No. I would argue is better than 90% of current weapons on all classes.

Devs time would be much better spent fixing salvation, ventari, jalis, myllax, mace, shield, hammer and staff needs some work as well.

Two things:

1) Power build not requiring shatter.
2) Inspiration not mandatory in everything.

Sadly, neither is likely to happen.

Its not necessarily melee unfriendly, its unfriendly to some classes due to game play design. I play melee rev, sword and staff. I have little to no problems and can solo majority of hero points. GL doing the same with thief. Its even easier on ranger, and not due to range, but due to having a large pool punching bag that mobs keep attacking and you can switch every 15 secs.

Generally classes with high sustain ability do well in HoT. Classes that do not, do not do well in HoT.

Buran pretty much nailed it. Plus OP most classes that are melee heavy can have close to 100% stability (eng, warrior and rev). So you are requesting trading stability for nearly nothing.

On poster mentioned using Salvation. LOL…. There is a reason no one plays that line or use Ventari legend. In their current stats even if Salvation gives 100% immunity to conditions no one will use it.

The primary purpose of a match making system is to ensure that games are competitive (also know as fun) for everyone. There is no doubt that the match making system is flawed. It is hard to pin point where, but there is a serious issue when the majority of the games end-up in a blow-out win/lose.

To the OP, I would say the beginning of HoT was turn-off for me as well. VB without the mastries is a major pain in the butt (same for all HoT maps). They where a major turn-off that for the first 2 weeks or so I did not play HoT maps, but leveled a Rev and ran sPvP. Once I began accumulating HoT masties, life was okay.

As for difficulty, it varies significantly based on what class you are playing. I find HoT maps on some classes/builds to be a struggle and face roll to the point of soloing champions on others. This has much to do class design and balance. The classes are balanced around sPvP in terms of survivablity. Problem is in PvE (solo in particular) survivablity works differently. Hit and run tactics do not work in PvE. Many mobs have CC bars that you have to break to CC them, where in sPvP you can instantly CC players. Some mobs like ranged Itzel can be only described as cheap.

Overall though, HoT content difficulty is in line with the power creep done between 6/23/15 patch and elite lines with HoT. In fact, I wish the raise the difficulty of some of the older content. I really dislike face rolling Cursed Shore.

Jack Skywalker.5674:

lighter.2708:

stopped reading after the first point..

say what..if you just swap invocation to retribution and use double stab trait you can avoid even more CC..

No…not really…if you get baited to dodge you are f@cked. Thats why most herald builds run both Retri and Invocation. I would love to see empty vesel be moved to an Elite Specialization so that we can have 1 stun break per legend and no 2 mandatory trait lines for whatever the kitten we want to play.

I would argue that that retribution is more flexible to drop than invocation, but overall the almost mandatory trait lines in sPvP is a problem for all classes across the board, not only Rev. Elite lines are 100% mandatory for all classes.

On other classes that I am well familiar with, you cannot play warrior without defense trait line. Mesmer as well you are have to trait inspiration. Both healing and conditional removal are tied to these lines, which are mandatory in sPvP. Now if anet give all trait lines a variant of damage, suvivability and mobility, that will be great. Until that happens, most classes are locked between 2-3 trait lines to select from beside elite lines which are mandatory. Currently Rev has only 1 build functional in sPvP and in PvE. Most classes as well have only 1 or 2 functional builds.

Staff is not tied to Ventari legend or salvation trait line. Staff 3, 4 and 5 skill are good in sPvP and solo PvE. Where it lacks, the AA is a bit under performing and should be only slightly behind sword AA. Staff 2 is useless. Costs too much resources and does not deal much damage.

Overall staff is decent and 2nd overall performing Rev weapon behind sword (probably equal if not better than sword in sPvP). If the devs buff the AA a bit and change staff 2 to be in line with sword and hammer 2 in terms of concept and damage it will be great weapon. As for Ventari and salvation, they absolutely suck.

I admire the effort the developers put in TD, but the map is not fun. Navigation is a major pain in the butt. It is very solo unfriendly on some classes, and the events are way too in frequent and the meta takes forever to complete.

TBH, difficulty aside (HoT content difficulty is about right), original GW2 maps design is better. There is no benefit in making navigation difficult. I admire VB (only after you have mushrooms and advanced gliding), but the rest of the maps are largely unrewarding with very long meta events. I generally find Ascalon, Shiverpeaks and Orr more interesting than Magma Jungle. Orr is also more rewarding.

If there is any thing learned from HoT, is to make navigation easier and meta events much shorter (20-25 minutes tops).

I have been doing a lot of sPvP lately and most of the games are a land slide win/lose to the point I am not even sure if there is a match making system or is it completely RNG. Is there a functional match making system outside of leagues?

Everything for Jails except vengeful hammers is borderline useless in every context, and not because the effect is necessarily terrible, the costs are way too high for effect. Inspiring Reinforcement area is way too small to be effective and costs too much energy. Forced Engagement low CD, but way too high of a cost to be considered. Rite of the Great Dwarf is the biggest offender. A slightly stronger “protection” at a ridiculous cost and 1.25 cast time?! Who thought this would be remotely useful?!

Same for Ventari. To be fair I cannot comment on Ventari in detail, but I tried it before and after buff, pretty darn weak. As well, I never see anyone run it in any content. It does not heal enough to be considered as support or sustainability. It does not offer damage or mobility.

As for trait lines, the entire Salvation line is useless because Ventari is useless.

Opinion here, I think both salvation line and ventari should provide some buffs to staff in the sustained damage department.

Devastation, while defiantly strong, lacks survivability. It is dropped in SPvP in favor of retribution.

Opinion again, I do not like the herald line. It has way too many buffs to support, damage and survivability. It is true that all elite lines do as well, but majority of classes are usable (while not optimal) without their elite lone. Reverent is not usable without herald in any content in any form. I am not sure there is a solution for this without an entire restructure to the class, but it surely is poor design.

Josh Davis.6015:

The trait is actually working as intended (25% chance to apply torment), but the tooltip is incredibly inaccurate.

That said, I don’t think it’s GM worthy with a 15s ICD. How does 10s sound?

Even with 1 sec ICD this will be useless.

Jack Skywalker.5674:

If they removed unblockable from PT and set the energy cost back to 20….would that redeem Shiro?….make it back the go to gap closer for Revenant.

Sounds like a good idea. The unblockable has its uses in sPvP, but for the most part is not much required. And having a leap with 5 sec CD that does not damage cost 2/3 of your energy pool is stupid.

Cool post from OP. The most hilarious thing is I did not realize it was 10 month old, which is sad.. Things broken for 10 month are still not fixed…

As other posters mentioned before jumping to new elite spec, the damage generally need to e fixed and streamline for most core weapons and traits. After that, probably and elite spec that does not rely primary on shatter.

I will talk from pure PvE perspective, I do agree with the OP. I have no idea where the puzzles are located and most certainly do not want to search for them (though I probably did them all once before). I seriously have no interest of doing any adventures, so why are they are forced through dailies. The old system was so much better, one vista, one mats farm and one event. Easy and anyone can do.

Having said that, for me personally it does not matter much.. I usually do one PvP game which gets you either all three or two out of three, but a good portion (if not majority) of the players do not PvP. In addition, most definitely I do not want to see players who never PvP in the PvP que to get the daily, just because PvE dailies are becoming a pain.

Crowley.8761:

Ehm.. Yeah clones are useless cannon fodder. That’s exactly what they are and exactly what they are meant to be and exactly what they should be. They distract both NPCs and bad Pvpers (which are a lot like NPCs). They provide you the additional boost for your shatter skills. Just little things though, like increasing the timer on your continuum split so you can summon two berserkers, drop two healing wells, double moa someone, drop two gravity wells etc. Or maybe add a bunch of torment/confusion on someone? Or just little things like chaining interrupts or even becoming completely unkillable.

But I guess that’s not very useful is it… Maybe they should just rework the entire class mechanic and have clones be like ranger pets instead (except you have three of them and they each do the exact same attacks and damage as you do…?) and just drop all this nonsense about confusing enemies and shattering clones at opportune moments. Not like it’s fun to play at all right?

While the OP surely does not know what he/she is talking about your statement above is way beyond exaggerated. On a basic level, phantasms and shattering work against each other as a mechanic. You need phantasms to deal damage, but also you need to shatter them for alacrity and healing. This maybe fine in PvP, since phantasms die too quickly so shattering them is the most beneficial use as they are just an over gloried clone, that is clearly not the case in majority of the PvE content. Even in PvP, while not impeding, in many situations clones and phantasms get one shotted by enemy players before they even have a chance to do jack.

Add to all of the above shatter and phantasms are accounted against Mesmer’s damage. Since these systems do not mesh together to begin with and Mesmer’s damage is s**t, the ending result is a class that is nothing more than a support bot for alacrity in PvE and portal/moa in PvP. The class is one dimensional support and that’s about it. In a game that is role neutral and all classes should have viable dps builds this is extremely bad.

lighter.2708:

ok guys, imo the removal of this amulet is not to balance classes, but this amulet is the amulet that kept other amulets from being used, no matter how you balance a game, condition builds will always take mercenary over every other amulets, it simply has the advantage over others and it is simply too good of an amulet. if it makes any sense.

I can use the exact statement for power build and marauder amulet. Almost all power builds use marauder, why? It has vitality. So.. should we remove marauder amulet as well?

This is a banded to counter exclusively one build for one class, condi mesmer, yet it wipes out a whole bunch of builds for several classes that are not even remotely out performing, now cannot even remotely perform.

The ever lasting question, how is limiting stats distribution options is good for game play?! Might as well have one amulet for everybody (and probably one build) and call it a day. Great balance idea.. isn’t it?!

Is the OP being dramatic? Yes, but that does not mean Revs are in a good spot. Only thing leaving Rev floating is glint, but the damage as power, condi, burst or sustained is okay to mediocre and only one nearly useless ranged weapon.

Since ever Rev felt like an incomplete class, but had pretty powerful damage output. Constant nerfs took away the damage and left it incomplete. It works, but it excels at nothing and is easily substitutable in every game mode.

Fay.2357:

Zenith.7301:

So are druids, but that doesn’t make the playstyle any less kitten for those uninterested in the buffbot/healbot role. I wasn’t a support class in GW1, I don’t want to be one in GW2.

Especially creating a role that revolves purely around alacrity when the PvP mobs are out to nerf it to the ground. Pretty terrible to have the class underpinned around one effect.

I want my old Well of Precognition back. If they’re gonna leave in this crap one, the least they could do is add some protection ticks to it and the end explosion could blind foes.

Druids are replaceable. Tempests can heal enough, mesmers can heal enough, guardians and engineers can even heal enough. Chrono is completely irreplaceable. No other class can do anything remotely similar.

Ultimately, you’re just complaining for the sake of complaining. “Oh woe is me, my class is only the best in the game at doing a particular role, I want it to be best in the game at doing the particular role that I like better”.

This patch literally had nothing but buffs for Mesmer, and you’re sitting here complaining that they didn’t buff it enough. Do you understand how absurd that is?

What is disappointing about the patch is not that it is a buff or a nerf, but is that it did not address main issues. Buffed a weapon that has little viability, without improving its viability. Just pure damage % buff, which was not the issue. Left over/under performing skills, weapons and traits untouched. The viability and effectiveness in PvP and PvE did not change and no new builds.

And the “role” is to supply alacrity in PvE and MOA and portal in PvP. That is not even even a full support role to begin with. Not every class need to be the top at everything, but you should have viability in almost every area. Beside the half backed support, what else do Mesmer offer?

Ragion.2831:

I want to switch my main character but to make one that I would be satisfied with, i want to level it to 80 without tomes which means lots of PvE.

I have a hard time stepping back into PvE after the brain dead feeling of going through the PvE in the vanilla area that insists on hand holding(still dont have map completion yet after playing for over 3 years).

So, has the difficulty improved in HoT? and are there any plans of making changes to the difficulty of the base game.

HoT is substantially more difficult than other GW2 level 80 zones. Speaking from my perspective, mostly a solo player, the difficulty is about right. It is not a push over and you are always at risk of dying if you make mistakes. Its not like Orr where you can go on cruise control and take your hand off the wheel.

Having said that, the content highly favors classes with larger HP pools. I would not go into hot as a thief with full zerker gear. You can easily get two shotted. Also, harder HoT stuff (or not meant to be soloed stuff) only few classes can tackle that. Trying to solo a champion and so forth, you need large enough HP pool and strong (usually multiple) sources of healing. It is not a questions of skill here cuz you will get hit, it is a question of can you afford to take hits and how fast can you recover.

My issue with HoT over other GW2 content is accessibility of maps. VB is highly accessible. AB not so much but manageable. TD and DS are just terrible. Getting a populated map with events is near very difficult, and meta events in HoT are unsoloable.

IMO I wish Anet would upgrade level 80 content difficulty to Magma Jungle level while maintaining the accessibility, but it seems Anet is going the other route and just nerfing HoT difficulty in the recent future. Remains to be seen.

Malchior.5732:

Roy specifically mentioned, and I agree, that energy regen wasn’t going to be added because it would become a necessity for every build (ironically what Herald is now).

Legends like Jalis and Ventari aren’t weak because of a lack of energy regen. They’re weak because they either have really bad skills or the skills just don’t do enough.

And their utilities cost wayyyyyy to much energy for their effects. Heck, even shiro.

Agemnon.4608:

otto.5684:

Agemnon.4608:

The overwhelming consensus last season was that revenant was overpowered. I thought nerfing overpowered classes lead to balance (you know, that thing all players want and devs actively work towards)?

The “Op” in sPvP was conditional build. The nerfs were all to power build. Makes sense does not?!

I played power rev and it did feel strong in 1v1 and securing stomp scenarios (between sword 5 or staff 5 for helping someone else secure a stomp by pushing off rezzers or dodge for stability for stomping ourselves) and a well timed jade winds could radically change things in a group fight on point.

Mallyx revs did feel quite strong though, the torment and confusion are an ugly combination since they make a player defeat themselves (confusion causes harm if you use a skill while torment does damage while you move) but were still somewhat beatable. Conditions across the board need toning down especially after the introduction of Viper’s where there are stats dedicated to prolonging them on top of the added potency.

I could not resist picking on your post. So we are balancing stuff based on 1v1 now?! And rev was not and is not the strongest point holder by any means. May I add that all what you mentioned, sword 5, staff and Jade wind, are still the same. So based on your statement I can conclude that anet nerfed the wrong stuff, right?

To be fair, I think anet had the right ideas in mind, but the execution was beyond terrible. What is really disappointing is that the under/non performing skills/traits are untouched. So we nerf power, leave everything else the same, call it a day, and play a different class I guess.

Agemnon.4608:

The overwhelming consensus last season was that revenant was overpowered. I thought nerfing overpowered classes lead to balance (you know, that thing all players want and devs actively work towards)?

The “Op” in sPvP was conditional build. The nerfs were all to power build. Makes sense does not?!

Since all the nerfs were focused on power revs the assumption is that power revs were tearing it up. Where they? They were pretty powerful in PvE, but other than that the answer is no.

In addition there is a serious issue with the current way sword is structured (and I am not talking about AA). It is clear Anet wants sword to be focused more towards single target, which is okay, except the damage drops significantly if there is more than one target, which is almost always the case in every game mode. This makes the focus of sword single target damage pointless.

Then what is really under performing, Jails, ventari and staff, is untouched. While not all the changes were not correct, but overall if the goal of these changes is to balance rev, they are epic fail changes on all levels and by all means. The missed the mark in every possible way.

So sword AA nerfed by roughly 12%, sword 3 by 21% and sword 2, which barely hits anything or anyone gets damage buff… I dont mind sword 2 getting a buff, but it needed to be done with restructuring the skill to be useful. This is just silly. AOE damage nerf and the single damage can be easily dodged by grandma.

While I am not a PvP player I can see how and CoR was too powerful in that realm. However the change makes it, and overall hammer, nearly useless in every realm.
Facet of light nerf is also silly. I will admit it can be sometimes OP. The skill needed some sort of restructure. Not just nerf.

Then none of the completely now working stuff, two utility lines Jails and Ventari are even touched…

If Anet goal was to nerf every possible build except Myllx, good job. And it is the only thing that is over performing to begin with. I guess time for rev to be taken out of the “wild” and archived.

Rym.1469:

Shifting DPS potential from Auto-attack to other abilities that consume Energy is absolutely needed and welcome. Bringing back resource management and increasing skillcap is always the right move.

I just hope that they will shave Power scalling a bit instead of nerfing base damage. Base sword damage might even need a slight buff, it’s the incredibly high power scalling that makes it ridiculous.

So lets say we nerf the sword AA, what will they buff? Sword 2? Maybe, but unless the damage triples it will remain nothing but a weak slow. Sword 3? It already outdpses sword AA on a single target. OH sword 4? Its a block. OH sword 5? Useless in every game mode, and needs a massive damage buff to be even remotely considered. OH axe, more for conditional than power damage anyway, but 4 could see a buff.

You know what is the only thing over performing? Glint.

Last thing we want is reverent to be useless damage and only support. I am not interest in running a boon bot.

Carighan.6758:

Uh, Mesmers are strong? I know we can do a decent chrono tank and support via alacrity at the same time, but that’s like the one thing I feel useful for. Alacrity supplier.

That is exactly my feeling. Powerful support (maybe even OP). But other than that do not offer much. Unless speced for tanking, survivability is not great. Power builds using GS, sword and shatter are borderline weak. Condition builds are even worse.

So yeah, mesmers are great alacrity and quickness suppliers. Not much otherwise.

Kaiser.9873:

Apolo.5942:

-A pain in the kitten to navigate.
-Full of powerful and bothersome yet irrelevant mobs
-Required for hero points that are necessary yet a pain in the kitten to get.

I actually kind of like VB compared to TD. VB is at least navigable, TD is atrocious.

Getting from point A to point B in TD is a major pain in the butt.

Hello, I am new to thief (to GW2 in general, this is my first post on the forums) and I am looking for advice. So far, I have mostly played sPvP and PvE (mostly open world).

PvE:
I have seen on guides that the preferred build is D/D, and honestly not sure how. So far I had most success with S/D. D/P seems to perform better as well. Not sure what I am missing.

sPvP:
First, nothing but D/P is working. I already scanned through the thief forums and it seems that it is not just me. S/P can’t hit and has no survivability. D/D requires so much emphasis on being in melee range and one missed cloak and dagger and you are toast. SB is usually alt weapon, but just for mobility and some aoe. Does anything else work?

For healing, I played so far mesmer, warrior and ranger beside thief and all three have better healing options. Combine that with lowest hp pool it does not work very well. With invigorating precision in the critical strikes specialization and the blinds from pistol I can stand my ground against most classes, unless heavy condition.

What do you do against heavy condition builds? Again, from all classes I played thief has the worst condition removal paired lowest hp pool and blinds do not perform very well against condition builds.

What stats should I use for D/P build? I am currently using Mara amulet and eagle runes.

Also, for utilities I am using Signet of Shadows, Blinding Powder and Shadow Refuge, plus Basilisk Venom for elite. I want to remove blinding powder in particular, but I cant find any other utility that is more useful in sPvP.

For game play in sPvP, so far I have been largely successful, 20 wins in 30 games. I try to avoid crowds and attack the least populated areas. In large battles, again low hp pool, between aoe and conditions I get burnt down easily. Not sure that I am doing something wrong, but playing on the fringes so far has been much more profitable.

Finally (this not tied to a specific game mode), I find it unreasonable that thief has about 25% less hp than medium hp pool and 45% less hp than heavy hp pool. I was one shotted so many times in PvE and in sPvP, if I am not super careful not to get in the thick of things, I can die so easy. Forget using berzerker in sPvP. Is it just my lack of experience or is it a class issue? Granted, high hp pool does not mean great survivability, but it can help avoid burst damage, especially when it is not avoidable or really hard to avoid.

Appreciate the advise