Guild Wars 2

Yeah, we’re tired!
Please, make stealthed players invulnerable! It lasts only 3-4 seconds!

I’m tired to use skills and attacks to win fights too.

Please, ANet, give us a skill to instant kill everyone! It is balanced because it can be dodged!

/sarcasm

jportell.2197:

Yeah we have traits that stack… But this guy sorrow is saying that he can make Mesmer amazing in pvp without using ANY trait points. I challenge anyone to try and pull that off and be good/viable and good for their team.

No, I did not said you can be amazing in PvP without using ANY trait point. Read the post I made. I said that Mesmer & Thief do not need to put trait points into defensive traitlines to be effective (not amazing, effective =/= amazing) in their respective defensive mechanic, which is way different. Try to run a Necromancer without Death Magic or Soul Reaping or an Elementalist without Water Magic (for instance).

So, yes, you are arguing about a misunderstanding.

daydream.2938:

theres plenty of tteam fights or 2on2’s in games, and sometimes 1on1. Some classes/specs are better at 1on1, others in teamfights. Also, 1vs1 balance ISNT possible. If you allow build diversity players find ways to specalize, giving up 1vs1 power for team utility (ie mesmers who run illusion of life, portal, timewarp-3 of the 4 utilties geared towards team play).
Additionaly , no game in HISTORY with diverse classes has 1on 1 balance. Not wow, not league of legends, not dota.
Its not even a reasonable request, its literally impossible to do.
Team balance is more managable because alot of variables washout.

Yes, there are 2vs2 fights. But, exactly, where is the team cooperation? There isn’t. There isn’t a damage dealer, a pressure midliner, a support and healers. There are just a group of people swinging their weapons on each other.

This game was all built to be balanced around 1vs1 and it is far away from impossible.
Every profession can play any specialization they want. Just look at how traits and weapons are designed. The point is that some professions are too good at one specialization, making the other specs on the same profession (see the other weapons/traitline) and the same spec on other professions completely worthless.

Who wants to run a Greatsword ranger (a weapon set which yells “raw damage”) when there are thieves and warriors? Who wants to play as condition damage when there is thief which overshadow any condition spec in terms of damage?
That’s the point.

The game is made to be balanced for 1vs1, it is possible to balance on 1vs1, but it isn’t balanced at all.

Archaon.6245:

Sadly everyone else don’t give a kitten about 1vs1 here…this is a team based game you know and it will never be balanced for 1vs1, try metin2 next time..if ppl don’t pvp because they want a 1vs1 balanced game no problem for me, it’s like saying i want to play wow but i don’t want to farm stuff so ppl must change all mechanics because of me….lol….don’t think so…if you want to play a team based game you’re welcome…otherwise metin2 that way —>

Where exactly is team based balance if almost every situation in tPvP is 1vs1?
Guild Wars was team based, where you have to fight with your team in every situation. This game is just imbalanced. Period.

Empathetic Fighter.2065:

If actually experienced players and not hotjoin/WvW kids would answer, this thread would be so smaller. Why? Because ppl would agree that in tPvP (and this is the mode where A-Net is balancing the classes) a thief is one of the most difficult classes to play, also good players know how to dodge the dmg of a mesmer easily. As a mesmer you face most of the time eles. Telling me you don’t need any skill for these both classes is just lack of experience in real competition.

I like those random tPvP elitists.
They are that sad to the point they make myself feeling better.

@jportell: Please, next time avoid those wall of text and try to be as concise as you can.

1. Your experience isn’t a valid proof as my experience isn’t. So avoid to claim data about popularity based on someone’s experience, unless you have something reliable to back them up.

2. Stealth > anything. Stealth is by far the best for of defense. It has easy access and, if the thief has at least half a neuron, he won’t stand still in the same spot he stealthed. So, trying to hit a thief while stealthed is pure speculation, I won’t call it “vulnerability”.

3. Elementalists does not have the best DPS and burst damage in the game. All their damage output comes from might stacks and fury. They also need multiple skill casts to dish out some worthy damage and, stripping their boons, means in most the cases kill their damage.

4. True, other classes have teleports, but most of them are offensive and lower in number compared to thieves’ and mesmers’.

5. Don’t try to do theorycrafting about typical mesmer bursts without taking in consideration traits. I-Leap is on a 16 cooldown. You are hampering nothing by using it.

6. I said without traiting to be effective into. Like, 20→16 seconds cooldown makes such a difference. You can be still effective with clone/phantasms without any trait, that’s the point I’m trying to make. Thieves have worty stealth also without any point spent in Shadow Arts. You ignored the fact that at least 1 skill per weapon set is capable to summon clones/illusions at low cooldown untraited. A mesmer can shatter them to get distortion. A mesmer has also 3 utility slots. A sword mesmer has 2 seconds of invulnerability every 10 seconds. Do I have to say more?

jportell.2197:

Small window of time? Sooo just left hotjoin… The most popular classes there were

thief<war<guardian<Mes<Engi<Ranger<Necro

Popular based on what data exactly? I did not mention popularity in any of my post and I think you should too, unless you have proved and reliable statistical data.

jportell.2197:

Fun fact thieves died the most out of anyone on both teams…a single 100b can down you just as fast as a backstab thief and this is great if you just had to use all your CD’s trying to get out of someone elses damage…

Another made up statistic based on nobady knows. Use logic, not data you don’t own. A CnD (which has no cooldown, funny, uh?) is more than enough to get out of someone’s damage if you are good enough. If not, you can also use Shadow Refuge on a reasonable range away and that skill is a sure escape.

jportell.2197:

Guardians (to my surprise) do very good damage and they even have teleports? Apparently so! Actually they have more teleports in two weapons (or weapon sets didn’t get a close look) than I had in my entire build (Mesmer btw). Ele’s d/d, s/d, and even a couple staff had some of the best burst and condi’s combined with sustained DPS was still pretty impressive… etc

So, actually, you agree that Mesmer and Thieves deal the best burst damage in a very fast paced game with no dedicated healers, where the faster and harder the damage is, the better because there is none who heals you while you are getting killed.

I prefer to ignore the sentence about quickness rangers and also the nth made up statistic about where the complain about those professions come from.

jportell.2197:

And yeah thieves were able to pull their combos off… on targets that were unaware (ie already fighting someone else). Usually if the person saw the thief coming… the thief was toast…

Good point.
Sad thing is that thieves has a teleport as an opener and, unless he comes right in your face, you won’t see it and you don’t even have the time to realize that he’s a thief that the burst has started and finished.

jportell.2197:

If someone on the team called target on the mes… 3seconds mes=dead…. And the amount of time it takes for a mes to get a good “proper” Mesmer burst in equates to a total of 6 clones, 2 shatters, and a minimum of two weapon skills…. I don’t care if you have 20 fingers…

Stealth makes the target to lose. A proper mesmer know when he has been targeted.
The preparation doesn’t really matter, what matters is the ability to escape the burst compared to its damage. High damage -> easier to escape. Low damage -> hard to escape. Warrior is all about this, not mesmers.

jportell.2197:

That combo still takes time to pull off and if you just got dazed and have about 20 stacks of vulnerability on you either be ready to DODGE! Use a block (Did you know shatters could be blocked?!) gasp. Crazy right? But a shield stance warrior completely mitigated my entire combo because he had his shield up for what seemed an eternity then proceeded to smash me as I desperately tried to get out… Soooooo please…

Again with dodges. No. When you are immobilized (which is like how almost every mesmer burst works, with I-Leap and Swap) you can’t dodge. So, if you are one of the unlucky profession which have no access to either blocks or invulnerability (see Necromancers or Rangers) you deserve to die. Sounds balanced.

jportell.2197:

Thief and mes are only popular in hot join because of whiners like this and then the nabs/noobs/ or people that just wanna learn how they work… Pick em up and go see for themselves. That is all. have a good day.

Made up statistics part 3. Waiting for part 4.
But this one is served with a false assumption about myself, which makes the whole thing even funnier.
Who told you I’ve never played either Mesmer or Thief? I actually have rerolled Thief from Necromancer, just saying, and I’ve played Mesmer quite enough to say something about that.
Nobody complains about something they don’t know, unless they are stupid. FYI, I’m not.

Actually that is not all: You said something about require no traiting to be effective? Go take a Mesmer with no traits into hot join…. See how that treats you… You will have ridiculously long cooldowns on every skill and almost 0 reliable clone/illusion generation… etc

Let’s say “relatively long” cooldown. Because ridiulously sounds weird when we are talking about skills like I-Leap (12s cooldown), Zerker (20s cooldown), Duelist (20s cooldown), Warlock (20s cooldown), Scepter autoattack and, why not, clone on dodge.
Pretty long cooldowns! LOL

Jax.5261:

No I was talking about good players, not hotjoin/wvw.

I don’t know if somebody told you yet, but in tPvP the profession is still the same. Skills are the same, traits are the same => same profession. It’s not like that something change when you join tPvP except the number of players and the fact that you can join with a premade team.

Jax.5261:

Why would I play thief? They’re not very good, only really good players like Caed even do decently with them, but that’s because they’re good players not because the class is overpowered.

Man, you live out of this world or you are playing a completely different game or Guardian is a that stupid and easy to play class at the point that it makes a Thief looks like hard to play.
Try P/D + D/D with 0/0/20/20/30 and come back here again to say Thief is hard.
There are also some videos on youtube of people winning and killing people as a Thief smashing the keyboard randomly.

Jax.5261:

You may actually want to try playing these classes. Because your argument is very uninformed.

I did and I’m still doing it. I moved my main from Necromancer to Thief. I think you should too.

Jax.5261:

Dodging (and learning to play) is the answer to this ‘problem’
Warriors do more damage, therefore they’re OP by your logic.
They have more defensive abilities due to having lower armour.
Mesmers only have visual confusion if you’re new to the game and stealth is easy to predict and ends up weaker in tpvp when used in a large amount.
If everything were to stand still and afk, yes everybody would have a 1-shot kill build, fortunately they don’t and due to playing full burst once you dodge the burst (USING NONE OF YOUR SKILLS BECAUSE DODGE ISN’T A SKILL) you can use your skill against them without worrying too much about what they can do.

There is something you missed in my previous post. Looks like that making the text bold isn’t enough to get your attention.

not justify in any form that two professions are capable to deal such an high amount of damage in a that small window of time

Looking closely:

IN A THAT SMALL WINDOW OF TIME

So no, Warrior does not OP according to my logic.

You again missed what I wrote. I know, English isn’t my main language, but I don’t think I wrote that bad to make my post incomprehensible.

It doesn’t justify also that those profession have such an high amount of innate defensive capabilities coming from visual confusion, that don’t need any form of traiting to be effective into.

Looking closely:

that don’t need any form of traiting to be effective into.

THIS is the point. I’ve never said that they have other form of defenses (like visual confusion isn’t enough), but the point is THIS, which you accurately ignored.

And, again, you fell into the “dodge is the answer” argument. I don’t really care how fragile those professions are in your opinion, neither the fact that dodge isn’t a skill. I don’t want also to point out the imprecision of what you wrote (Do you really think that after the burst happens the attacker will be standing still? What is stealth for so?), fact remains that those professions can’t be that punishing for a distraction of a fraction of a second, expecially when you consider the situation of other professions.

Jax.5261:

IF YOU CANNOT HANDLE BURST, LEARN TO DODGE.
If you don’t know how to dodge properly you deserve to have a hard time. If there was no dodging in this game it would be completely different, but there is, so it isn’t.

In the case you missed what I wrote, I’ll write it again to you.
DODGING ISN’T THE ANSWER TO EVERY FLAW
The fact that you can dodge bursts, does not justify in any form that two professions are capable to deal such an high amount of damage in a that small window of time while other professions aren’t, which makes way more sense when you consider that every profession is designed to be capable to deal burst, sustained and conditional damage.
It doesn’t justify also that those profession have such an high amount of innate defensive capabilities coming from visual confusion, that don’t need any form of traiting to be effective into.

According to your logic, an instant-kill skill is balanced just because you can dodge it, which is stupid, senseless and out of every form of balance.

Got it?

Jax.5261:

Got bored of replying to somebody who can’t understand simple things.

Funny. It is the same thing I thought after your third l2p answer to my reasoning. But, despite you, I wasn’t worried to lose my argument to the point I thought that escaping was the only solution.

You said Thief and Mesmer in the OP, also in the topic title.
Enjoy your “L2P noob” storm from every Thief and Mesmer in this forum.

Laika.8795:

The pathing is a circle on a target that is immobilized, standing still.

When your target is moving, you’ll veer off to the right and out of range, no matter how close.

Especially in the context of this discussion, that is a major problem, when you can’t strip stability on a target that is running around like someone mainlining PCP.

The second hit missing, I could care less. If it was garunteed, it would be too powerful. But honestly, the first strike should occur BEFORE you roll like a kitten ape on a tangential direction.

It isn’t properly a circle. It is most likely an ellipse, adjusting according to the enemy’s back.
Just try to use Franking Strike more and you’ll see that making the first strike to hit is far from hard or impossible. It is just a matter of being in melee range.

Teamkiller.4315:

sorrow.2364:

aydenunited.5729:

Defektive.7283:

Ryan.9387:

sPvP is awesome in GW2. The depth of combat and the wide variety of effective strategies is just mind boggling. Anet did an excellent job managing to add such a high skill cap to gw2. I only want the fiery dragon sword to be fixed in the next patch. Apart from that gw2 is the best game I have ever played from a PvP perspective.

Said no one ever.

It honestly is one of the better PvP options for any MMO, and most likely the best from a non-subscription game.

Guild Wars 1. Enough said.
Compared to that game, Guild Wars 2 PvP is a pile of trash. Funny thing is that it is from the same software house.

Guild wars 2 is definitely better. Don’t let nostalgia glasses cloud your judgment. Hey, I wonder why it is most people who played Gw1 moved to Gw2 when it came out?

Anyways, I agree. sPVP is very fun for me. It’s an excellent place to have fun with friends and to try out new class builds.

No, it isn’t. Apart from raw game variety, GW2 lacks the deepness GW1 had in PvP. Yes, PvE is way better in GW2 but PvP? Seriously?
It is all based on a game mode which was removed from the original game because it was too stupid. How can it be better?

Saital.4819:

If we’re referring to CnD+Mug+BS combo, the key moment is between the mug and the backstab. During which you can dodge or block. If you are basi venomed then simply throw a stunbreaker in there. Even easier if your stunbreaker is also an evade (e.g. Lightning Reflexes). True, if the thief has Haste then your window of time is greatly reduced if not completely eliminated, but this is a problem with quickness in general and not with the thief.

Not any profession have access to evades, neither invulnerabilities. Not every Thief run Basilisk Venom. Devourer Venom isn’t an elite and it way more effective (no dodges, no evades, not stunbreakable).

We aren’t referring to a specific build, burst is a problem and looks like the topic moved in that direction, but those profession are filled with stupid mechanics that make them so powerful and I’ve addressed them in my previous posts and also other people did.

Quickness in one of the hundreds of problem this game has, if you want to talk about that, then we should move to another topic, but, of course, it isn’t quickness the problem itself. If Necromancer had quickness, it would be worthless.

But, anyway, this is still linked to the broken logic that dodges and evades are the answers of all the flaws this game has. They aren’t.

Saital.4819:

I’ll do you the favor of ignoring the fact that you just likened CoD to a competitive FPS title.

I don’t like CoD too, but if they make international tourneys of CoD, it means that there a little bit of competition, apart of everyone’s opinion.

But, hey, this is another example of how you hook to a worthless sentence to avoid the real concept behind.

Saital.4819:

Point? You had no point. The rest of the post that I had omitted was bupkis, consisting of citing anecdotal “evidence” of an extremely telegraphed mesmer shatter combo, and ad hominem attacks against the guy you quoted.

You did not read anything, or you have serious problems of understanding.
That guy was avoiding the point of my argument since 2-3 posts, whose posts you probably didn’t bother to check, while keep saying “learn to play” like a parrot.
The post you quoted was just the peak of the iceberg of the whole discussion.

You can also see a reference to my other posts also:

Also, I’d like that you address also the other things I’ve wrote in my last post, without you keep giving unwanted suggestions.

This implies that you SHOULD read my other posts before saying I have no point.

Laika.8795:

lol? no?

the pathing on this skill is beyond broken. two attacks after an awkward roll that more often then not sends you out of range? it’s almost a gamble to use without using steal to make contact, all at the bargain cost of 4 init.

I reiterate, this skill above most needs serious attention.

Seriously.
The pathing of that skill is just a circle, it works perfectly fine.
The first strike always hit if you are in melee range, just test it out by yourself. The second hit is the one which may miss, but it is only a matter of staying in melee range.
I know that from people used to press 2 to have all their problem solved this might sound weird or too hard, but you can make it. I believe in you.

It won’t work anyway. People join in and out in sPvP and there are for sure the guy who will cap every point and then he moves to bash everyone on sight.
The only solution is either play WvW/PvE or move to another game if ANet really doesn’t care about PvP.

Saital.4819:

Please for the love of god spend some more time coming up with an argument than you are right now.

Have you ever played any competitive online game in the history of ever? Have you ever considered that maybe player reflexes are just as key to success as any mechanic within the game? Or have you thought that maybe you should actually invest in better networking hardware before deciding to play a competitive online game with 200 ping?

Based on what you have stated, Hearts is probably an online PvP game that is balanced enough for you.

Yes, because every MMO has a profession which is capable to wipe his enemies out in less than a second if they aren’t fast enough to use the right skill at the right time (which probably the casting time make that skill useless anyway). But, most importantly, all the professions have access to that half-second-kill combo.

You play too many FPS, in the case you haven’t noticed it yet, this isn’t Call of Duty.

Also, good job into taking a sentence out of the entire context and completely misled the point I tried to make.
Do you guys really want to keep arguing in this manner?

aydenunited.5729:

Defektive.7283:

Ryan.9387:

sPvP is awesome in GW2. The depth of combat and the wide variety of effective strategies is just mind boggling. Anet did an excellent job managing to add such a high skill cap to gw2. I only want the fiery dragon sword to be fixed in the next patch. Apart from that gw2 is the best game I have ever played from a PvP perspective.

Said no one ever.

It honestly is one of the better PvP options for any MMO, and most likely the best from a non-subscription game.

Guild Wars 1. Enough said.
Compared to that game, Guild Wars 2 PvP is a pile of trash. Funny thing is that it is from the same software house.

Jax.5261:

You are 100% part of the problem, go practice before responding. None of it is hard to dodge you’re saying the same thing over and over. Even if you don’t like it you CLEARLY need to learn. Anybody can easily avoid it and when you do they have to wait for damage again. If you dodge a Mesmers burst you wont take damage.

There is really nothing to say here, I can’t have a mature argument with you without getting at the same spot you want to lead the topic.

According to your logic, an one-hit-kill skill with half a second casting time is fine because you can dodge it and everyone who complain about that skill should learn to play. I hope you realize how absurd is your reasoning.
Thank god you aren’t a game designer.

Some people like to stand out of the chorus just to get some attentions.
You can either give him the attentions he wants or either ignore him.

Jax.5261:

Actually no you just take note of the clone created, which is really simple, and you won’t get hit by swap. You dodge the leap and avoid the clone, easy enough for you to get now?
Also all AI in this game is kitten and can’t keep up with you perfectly. So no I’ve never had trouble avoiding it not to mention they’re really easy to kill.

I don’t know if you realize how absurd are the suggestions you are giving.
What if you dodge the leap? It doesn’t matters at all. The clone is still there, trying to stay in melee range, ready to being swapped.
The AI in this game is bad, you’re right, but not that much about clones and phantasms. All they do is bashing their target ‘till death and it is something they are extremely good at. It’s not like that the clone, once spawned, stay there in place staring at the fight like minions do, it only swings his sword on the target applying cripple over time, which makes harder to get away from.

If you add the fact that the I-Leap clone is just like the other clones AND the Mesmer itself, it makes the burst way too hard to avoid considering the amount of damage it is capable to do.

Also, I’d like that you address also the other things I’ve wrote in my last post, without you keep giving unwanted suggestions. How many times do I have to say that nobody wants your fake-guru-like tips? I and (I think) almost everyone here don’t care that much on how it is easy to you to avoid those spikes that takes place in a fraction of seconds, you know, not everyone has super powers, lightning reflexes and super-fast internet connection. So, is that hard to you to focus on balance? The real question is: is it fair that a burst that takes place in less than a second is capable to wipe away half a life bar and even more, considering the fact that is isn’t that easy (not for you, of course) to avoid?

Laika.8795:

lol, flanking strike will send you a mile away without steal precast. fix this kitten skill already, anet!!

lol?
Can’t really realize if this is an irony attempt or you are serious.

Jax.5261:

Umm yeah you got no clue, illusionary leap has tonns of audio and visual cues. Very easy to dodge and avoid the leap clone. Shatter is easy to dodge unless they Blink + Mirror, but due to human reaction time you can still dodge it. So yes we are talking about the same build but you obviously need to practice more.

You should take care to read what I wrote. Illusionary Leap has a poor 1s crippling effect. What has no visual clue is the Swap skill, the one which is available after the I-Leap cast, which is the one who gives the Immobilization I was talking about. It could happen in any moment without any visual clue after the clone is summoned and, after, you’ll find yourself immobilized with the mesmer teleported to you casting Blurried Frenzy and loads of clones shattering on you.

You can’t have a clear clue on when Swap happens, it is instant and the only way to effectively counter that skill is to be out of range of the I-Leap clone, something which is quite hard to do because of the snare it has built in and the fact that, probably, a whole fight and a bunch of other clones are wandering around.

But, keep this in mind, once the Swap skill is activated and you’re hit, you are dead or, if you’re not dead yet, you’ll be almost dead. How can be this balanced?

Your presumption is getting annoying to be honest. Just focus on the overall balance and forget about bashing people because you think everyone should learn to play except you. Nobody cares here if you think you are good enough to deal with any Mesmers and nobody said here that they want suggestions from you on how to counter them. I wonder when people realize what balance is and how it is not related to someone’s skill level.

Jax.5261:

A few things, I indicated above that I do play many classes and it’s that correct dodge rolls with stun breaks against p5 will completely beat a mesmer shatter build. This is irrelevent to your build or class. The only thing that should technically be impossible to evade is a blink shatter, but due to the mesmers not wanting to miss mirror images you can still dodge it.

Once you practice enough it’s second nature anyway, like dodging Banish. Infact I find the Warrior much harder to avoid since each hit will hit way more and is impossible to dodge everything, HB/Bulls Rush is easy to dodge and most skills are but frenzy + axe auto isn’t really possible to avoid.

What I’m trying to say is burst is much easier to react to than dps and if you do well against burst (dodge correctly) you easily win against them.

I don’t know if we are talking about the same shatter build.
The one I’m talking about is S/x mesmer which uses Illusionary Leap (then Swap) to immobilize the enemy in order to make sure he takes all the shatter damage plus the Blurred Frenzy damage.
This combo has really low visual clue, just a teleport and the burst start and, once it is started, there are few ways to prevent the burst. Dodge and stunbreaker are uneffective against immobilization, the only chance you have is to use a condition removal as fast as you can and get out of the mesmer range, but this is really, really hard to do, considering latency, the usual condition removal skills’ casting time and the very low time window the spike takes place.

Same topic applies to average Thieves burst, without considering all the stealth-reliant conditions builds, their burst takes place in a way too short time, it opens with a teleport and it is capable to wipe away more than an half HP bar if you aren’t fast enough. Also, tryhard thieves can also use Devourer or Basilisk venom to get the same effect Mesmer bursts take but, considering the very low time the bursts take to be performed, venoms are not that needed anyway.

DPS, on the other hand, is way more easy to avoid. Sustained damage from an Axe warrior can be prevented with a simple snare or either any movement impairment skill, something you aren’t able to do on teleport based spikes. Also, Frenzied warriors takes 50% more damage, so they won’t last that long.

I think you should check the bursts build we are talking about better.

Remove boons. Ele damage is all reliant to its might stacks and fury. Remove those boons and you’ll feel only itch.

Use Sword/Dagger or either pick bountiful theft.

Jax.5261:

Going to respond in general to the comments made. (from the point of view of my most played class: Guard)
Half the people saying that it’s just not fun to play against these classes and the other half saying they are overpowered.
It depends on what you find fun, I find winning and defeating my enemy fun. While they’re cloaked they don’t capture the cap point which means I’m pulling ahead. When they waste all their utilities on a burst I dodge then again I’m ahead. I pull enough ahead so that if I do mess up a bit I still have my lead to fall back on, to me this is fun.
If you’re losing to a Mesmer it’s because you’re missing the shatters which means it’s a L2 kitten ue (assuming they’re similar in skill level), I’ve only had a problem with one mesmer and it was a pretty even fight (believe he was in vexx), once you know which skills to dodge, shatter Mesmers are really, really easy to defend against. Once you can easily deal with them I’m pretty sure you’ll have more fun.
Honestly when I get home I’m going to make a video showing how easy it actually is to dodge Mesmers (blink shatter being the only thing impossible to reactively dodge).

The reason I’m so amazed at these threads is because these 2 classes are literally the easiest two for me to play against. When I play Guard it’s only if they have their full burst and I have no utilities that a thief can burst me, if they aren’t burst I don’t even have to worry about them. As a Mesmer I have my shatters and Sword 2 and Staff if playing more defensive, as Warrior if they get hit they pretty much have to fall back. As a Ranger I have to place my traps correctly beforehand, etc.
Mesmers to me are just really easy, easiest burst to dodge (especially if you miss an animation the teleport sound is so unique you just dodge without thinking) and they’re so easy to control, condition Mesmers are difficult but they’re Euro meta not NA meta yet.
And if you’re still having a problem after learning to dodge/stunbreak+dodge, start thinking of actual strategies against specific builds. For example saving GS 5 on mesmer or guard for shadow refuge. Maybe think of team counters, I know when my friend and I come up against D/P thief we just use binding blade and pull him into a mesmer shatter for an instant kill.

There’s so much you can do to beat these classes and make it fun, so honestly that argument doesn’t work either. Although I believe Shadow Refuge and Time Warp should be toned down (and possibly a counter for stealth to help out other game types in the future and wvw).

I think you should play against those profession not on a Guardian.
I think Guardian is the profession which feel less the impact of Thieves and burst mesmers, because they usually run with none or few boon removals and, coupled with the innate defensive capability of Guardians, the feel of Thieves and Mesmers is way mitigated.

Anyway, I think you are lying if you say that you put the same efforts to avoid the bursts as the Thief/Mesmer does to produce them. Working way harder to counter a mindless burst isn’t fun and isn’t balanced also. 10k bursts should be easy to avoid, like Hundred Blades is, and they shouldn’t be nearly instant with very low visual clue, no matter the preparation or the recharge time.

It is not about none is able to counter thieves and mesmers, when does people realize it?
It is all about that those professions are non-challenging, easy to play and too much effective compared to the efforts put into playing them.

This makes those professions extremely funny to play (don’t lie to yourself, winning is fun) but also extremely annoying to play against.

First time I ran a condition thief, I was able to hold 2-3 people all by myself spamming stealth and caltrops, something I was never able to do for a long time with my Necro, which is considered to be a “tanky” profession. Hell, that was fun, but I don’t think my enemies were happy to see me popping in and out of stealth spamming dodges (with the trait) and caltrops and I would never consider to blame those poor guys’ skills because of their loss.

You guys saying that Thieves and Mesmers are a learn2play issue are extremely arrogant.

Of course everyone can beat a Thief/Mesmer if he’s extremely good and practice a lot, but putting 3x of the efforts compared to how much Thieves/Mesmers puts into playing their class to effectively counter them is a joke and it is for sure imbalanced.

Well, I think for the same reason we have minor traits like Reanimator.
Nothing special.

uwo.8197:

There were some decent points in his post. I would love some arena; it would be good for the game balance and direction, if not a little painful for developers. Pets are pretty mindless and spammy. There were also some bad points.

Sure, GW2 needs duels, but only ‘cause they’re fun. Balancing around duels is a bad idea, which, incidentally, is something Blizzard developers have repeated often. That’s not to say that 1v1 should be way out of balance, and Reinhart has a fair point there.

I’ve frequently seen this argument that lack of a healer precludes balanced arena. We simply can’t know until it’s tried. Yes, if arena were introduced currently, it would be a mess. That’s because zero preparation has gone into balancing the game around deathmatch. But if developers were willing to try it and willing to balance around it, I think it’s likely that support characters would quickly evolve from the already existing design. At any rate, there’s been no space to look at this empirically, because we don’t have arena.

Actually, the game isn’t balanced around anything.
If the game was actually balanced around something, I’d say tPvP, we wouldn’t see a Mesmer/Elementalist/Thief in any team, and if it was balanced around WvWvW, we wouldn’t see that amount of thieves. Just saying.

Guild Wars 2 combat system cries for a duels but, still, we have none.

Do the guys here really think that the Guild Wars 2 PvP isn’t lacking?
Hell, we have only one game mode and, by far, one of the most boring according to a good part of players.
Guild Wars 1 had a lot of PvP options with a bunch of maps. There was RA, TA (and then Codex) for casual and semi-casual play, then HA for a more organized game and finally GvG to satisfy everyone’s taste about tactical gameplay.
Now look at Guild Wars 2. Where the heck is PvP?
6 maps of the same point capping. You like point capping? Fine. But you can’t debate this isn’t a proper sPvP.

I agree.
As a Guild Wars PvP-only player, I’ve forced myself to play PvP because I found it way too boring
.
I’ll pay 100$ too to have a Guild Wars-like game with better graphics and Guild Wars 2 skill/combat system. Why ArenaNet betrayed his most beloved fans, the PvP players?

I would like to try a build like this:

http://bit.ly/WBOtbY

With full Emerald and some Ruby gear and Earth Runes or any upgrade which increases boon/protection duration, but I haven’t that much money to test it out in PvE.

I think that this build is capable to deal quite high amount of damage while having great survivability. I just need someone to test it out in PvE, I mean, someone who has already ton of PvE gear xP

1. Wipe out the whole second HP bar thing. When you are in Death Shroud, Life Force isn’t your HP anymore.
2. Make multiple Death Shrouds, each one which a different purposes and a different skill sets. Then either make that staying in those Death Shrouds will give you a stat boost and will cost life force or make that staying in Death Shrouds doesn’t drains LF but Death Shroud skills costs LF to use.
3. Make Death Shrouds to replace your weapon skills, giving you access to heal and utilities.

wiazabi.2549:

And thats what is so annoying about necro, our class mechanic. We dont get to have short cooldown because of DS, we dont get to have good burst because of DS, we dont get to cast fast cause of DS.

Everytime something about necro feels lacking it also makes sense from a balance point of view because DS.

Other classes do not lack in these things cause their class mechanic doesnt force upon them a 2nd hp bar, its a terrible terrible way to design at class and its a complete mess to balance it. ANET doesnt even seem to wanna touch it anymore because of DS and how easily it can become OP.

How ofen have you started casting epidemic and either the mob dies before cast finish or your target gets cleansed.
Consume conditions same deal start casting and poof teammate just cleared em. ( underwater speed of it feels so much more responsive )

Where is the “I love you” button?

Bas.7406:

Actually you are incorrect. Guild wars 2 is not about being able to play any role, and this is where you are going wrong. Guild Wars 2 is about not having roles. Guild Wars2 is about being able to complete any facet of the game with any class without having to have assigned dps/tank/healer.

You mistook their we want everyone to be able to play without assigned roles as everyone can switch to whatever role they want. There is no tank, there is no dps, there is no healer. There are more bunkerish builds, there are more defensive classes, but there are no roles. If you want to do straight damage high end than that is the niche a thief or mesmer plays.

You can complete the entire game with 5 thieves in your group or 5 of anything because there is no need for tanks/dps/healers. That is the goal of GW 2. Now I see why you are confused.

Keep in mind that I’m not talking about ROLES

Please, I’ve used the word aspect for a reason. Probably I’ve used the word role, but I’ve specified that it isn’t meant to be used as the conventional meaning the MMO community is used to.

There is a reason if Necromancer have a power traitline and Thieves a toughness traitline.

I will not address any point of you guys because of lack of space, so I’ll sum up what I want to say as short as I can.

I’ve never said that any build should perform overall the same.
Performance mean performing good in a specific ambit they are meant to be good at. This ambit can be support, damage, defense, damage over time and so on. You can easily see that Guild Wars 2 is built to be balanced around any class being able to match any role they want, you can see that on how traitlines are designed, but any profession fit their role differently. This means that if you need a damage profession, you should never feel forced to pick a Thief. If you want to build a tanky profession, you should never be forced to pick a Guardian and so on. Keep in mind that I’m not talking about ROLES, obviusly a Thief or an Elementalist is always the best choice as a roamer and this is fine.

For instance, a Thief is capable to deal either burst and condition damage. Condition damage is dealt with high duration at short range and burst damage is fast, close range and single targeted. The Necro, on the other hand, is capable to deal conditions at range but with short duration, so they need to be maintained, while the burst damage is dealt at longer range but takes more time to be performed or at close range with Dagger being slightly faster. But, at the end of the day, the amount of damage they deal is the same, but they deal them in a different way and they are both effective and good at this role.

Every profession should be as viable as any other into every aspect and all in a different way and playstyle. This mean that as an Elementalist you are supposed to have access to a Warrior-like build (talking about learning curves) and as a Warrior you are supposed to have access to an Elementalist-like build.
This is far away to be impossible and there are so many ways to accomplish this target, expecially if we consider that Guild Wars 2 has a very limited number of skills and traits.

Bas.7406:

This was my point, you just agreed with me while stating you don’t agree with me. Either way this is a discussion I am covering in a column :P.

No, man, what we are trying to say is completely different.
What you have said is that it is fine that a certain skill level there is a discrepancy between two profession in terms of performance and it can’t be otherwise unless you have the complete equality. What I’m trying to say, on the other side, is that it isn’t and that you can get equal performance without have complete equality and this what we should aim to get balance.

Bhawb.7408:

Nerfs to FOTM builds or just very strong builds in general are a completely different issue. Then we start to talk about things that are just strong enough that they overcentralize the game, although they still retain counterplay. Or something which has such a small, specific counterplay that it is unrealistic to expect people to deal with it.

Nerf to FOTM builds or very strong builds is a balance issue. People like to win and they like more if they do it as easier as they can.
I can make you many other examples, like Hexway, Rspike, all the Assassins builds (Palm, Seeping, Shattering Assault and so on). Those builds became FOTM because they were overpowered. People like overpowered builds.

Bhawb.7408:

Its a gross oversimplification of their interaction, and has misleading ideas. It shows the relation between time invested and skill, but it leads you to believe that whoever’s line is on top wins. Also, the “perfect” curve is false. All that needs for balance is for the realistic in-game output of two classes to be similar at their highest levels. That means that even though elementalist “perfect” play will outclass warrior “perfect” play, it isn’t really possible for an elementalist to actually play perfectly, there are too many decisions going on at once, too many skills and CDs to track, too much to do that it just cannot happen. Warriors on the other hand can pretty reasonably do this nearly all the time. That means in a fight between a great warrior and a great elementalist, the warrior is doing his best to not just play perfect (because this isn’t too hard for him), but to force the elementalist to not play perfect, because that is the counterplay to the elementalist’s higher skill cap. If he cannot reach the cap, his advantage is lost, and he is stuck playing a very difficult class without the benefits of it.

OP is, in its simplest form, the lack of counterplay. At lower levels, counterplay can be skill, or playing on your opponent’s lack of skill, at higher levels, it could be using teamwork to beat a stronger opponent 2v1, or knowing their skill rotation and interrupting it, but the only time something is OP is if there are no tools available to you to defeat them.

My graph doesn’t show the relation between time invested and skill, that relation is personal an vary among all the individuals.
My graph shows the relation between skill level, which is of course related to time invested, because higher time invested means higher skill level and, most important point, it can be mesaured (doing an analysis on the mistakes someone makes) and does not vary from individuals. Obviously someone’s skill level isn’t a constant, but it vary related to many other factors. You can, for instance, one day being on a skill level and another day being on another skill level because you probably have fever, who knows.

That graph was of course a simplification, but it is only simplificated for informational purposes and does not lose its meaning.

What I want to point out is that in a situation of perfect balance, the only thing that matters is your skill level at playing your profession, not the profession you’re playing and those graphs show it nicely.

OP doesn’t absolutely mean the lack of counterplay. Lack of counterplay means broken. There are a bunch of examples back to Guild Wars of builds being nerfed not because they lack of counters, but because they were way too powerful and too easy to play. I don’t know if you played GW1 or not, but a good example of that can be SWAY or IWAY. If you didn’t, those builds were both nerfed, despite the fact that they can be easily countered by balling up and spamming AoE, since all the damage output is melee ranged.

lettucemode.3789:

sorrow, thanks for the picture. It really helped me understand your point. Here’s a question for you: given a game as complicated as GW2, do you think that such balance is possible?

Of course I don’t believe GW2 will reach the “Perfect Balance” state. But I think that if it reach the “Good Balance” state it will be more than enough to not notice any balance issues.

Bas.7406:

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Please, don’t confuse equality with balance. Equality means that you cut away any differences (thus balance two same amounts of the same material), balance means that you put some here, some there to make something weight as much as something else (so two different amounts of two different materials which weight overall the same).

Equality => Balance
Balance =/=> Equality

My graphs don’t imply that the performance level (weights) should be reached in the same way in every professions.

I’ve edited the post, it was probably some skydrive privacy settings.

Aaaand I got the occasion to test out the digitizer.
This is my idea of balance (those are learning curves by the way):

http://i50.tinypic.com/bjerkn.jpg

According to bas, we are in the 1st situation and it is fine as it is. Well…

I think the graphs are self explicative, but if something isn’t clear, I can write another wall of text to help you understand.

Obviously perfect balance is an unreachable situation, but I put it there to show what the target is.

Bas.7406:

Except you are incorrect in your assumptions. The lower skilled class can triumph over a high skilled class because there is less room for error. Because more people are able to play warriors than ele’s well you have class balance. A higher skill cap which is only attainable by a few can beat a similarly skilled warrior with all things being perfect. Because we are not perfect, the ele has a higher probability of losing the fight, and will definitely lose to a skilled warrior if he makes a single mistake.

This is the definition of balance. OP would be if the warrior was the best class to play regardless of player. The thief before they nerfed BS and HB were the definition of OP. You could press two buttons and no one could survive. That is OP.

You simply proved yoru inability to understand OP. OP is when a simple thing can wreck a complex thing regardless of skill level. In the case of the Ele versus Warrior, the Warrior will wreck the ele if the ele makes a dumb mistake. If the ele doesn’t the warrior will lose.

You said that if a Warrior is stronger at lower levels, than it’s fine that a higher levels it’ll suck balls compared to Elementalist. That’s not.

In a situation of perfect balance any profession should have the same chances to win a fight and those chances should be linked ONLY to the skill level, not the profession itself. That means that if a Warrior made a mistake and the Elementalist did not, then the Warrior should lose and vice versa. The result of a fight shouldn’t be only linked to the overall Elementalist skill level and attention. Yours is a distorced concept of balance.

Your words: “OP is when a simple thing can wreck a complex thing regardless of skill level. In the case of the Ele versus Warrior, the Warrior will wreck the ele if the ele makes a dumb mistake. If the ele doesn’t the warrior will lose.”
So, taking a medium skilled Elementalist, which still makes some mistakes and a completely low skilled Warrior, in your opinion, balance-wise, the Elementalist deserves to lose if he makes any dumb mistake while the Warrior can make any dumb mistake he wants and deserve to win? Is that balance? Seriously?

The Thief who can wreck people with 2 skills is not imbalanced, it is just broken and not working as intended. A Warrior which isn’t capable to be competitive in high competitive environments is imbalanced. A Thief which is capable to destroy people with ease at low skill levels is imbalanced. An Elementalist which has far way potential compared to other professions in high level plays is imbalanced.

Bhawb.7408:

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So, taking back the Warrior-Elementalist example, in that case Warrior is underpowered because they are not able to perform as good as elementalists do at higher level of skills, as you said. So none, if he wants to play at high levels, should pick a Warrior because it is cut off from any high competitive environment and therefor putting efforts into getting good as a Warrior is pointless. Is that balance in your opinion. NOPE. No profession should be cut away from any situation or any skill level.

The learning curve thing apply also at high skill levels, not only low levels.

Conclusion: You should at least check what your examples and ideas logically imply, before saying I have no idea on what OP means.

Bas.7406:

Yes, your concept of what attrition is is broken. A large HP pool is exactly how attrition battles are won. Avoiding and escaping are not attrition, so if we are an attrition class why would we have escape tools. Thieves, ele’s, and mesmers are escape classes so mobility is needed they are hit n’run. …cut

Except that I said avoid enemy to escape, probably not the best verbal form, I should have said don’t let the enemy escape.
Anyway I didn’t said that we should be able to escape.

Bas.7406:

Defense and escape tools are not the same please learn the difference. We have blindness, chill, retaliation, cripple, and immobilize as well as protection and siphon heals these are all attrition and defensive tools. We have access to more than any other class in the game. We do not have access to escape or high mobility tools, because we are not escape classes.

Another completely missed point by you. I’ve never mentioned escapes in that part.
So I’ll jump this part because I wrote what I wanted to mean in the next part of my previous post.

Bas.7406:

Who told you this? where did you get this misinformation? We have access to more viable methods to deal damage and heal ourselves with that damage than any other class in the game. Blood Magic is viable, your concept of the traitline is broken. You keep thinking we are like water elementalist. Except that’s incorrect because blood magic requires you to deal damage and gain heals from that.

Once again you are confusing attrition and defensive with healing.

So, according to you, Blood Magic and our healing skill (excluding the main heals) which scale just bad with healing power are just fine? You think that being healed of about 2k HP (not scaling with healing power) over an HP pool of min 18k HP and on a 4s channeling is fine? You think that being healed for 46 hp (not scaling with healing power again) is fine? Man, this is not healing, this is just useless skill and traits, this is why none runs Blood Magic, the healing amount is low, the time to get those heals is way too long and none of the heals scales with healing power.

Bas.7406:

Incorrect where do you get this information. Guess which class is the best at destroying boon classes? Necro’s! So let’s try this again.

How does boons translate to attrition? They don’t. Stop confusing an attrition class with a boon class. We have zero boon to damage traits so at what point did you confuse us with a boon class. And for Guardians and Elementalist to become that boon giant then they have to give up a lot. BTW, if you want to be entirely reliant on boons like the guardian than you are crazy. A temporary buff no thank you, give me DS anyday over the boon baby.

Who cares about removing boon, man? This is not what we are talking about.
The point is that a good attrition class is supposed to have access to a good amount of defensive boons. Don’t justify everything we lack with DS.

Bas.7406:

This is the first thing you have said that is correct. We are a pain in the kitten to flee from. RtL is usable every 25-30 seconds and is almost always used at the beginning of the fight. BTW, if they use RTL guess what I got to get them back. Chill plus DS 2. boom I am right back on them, thank you for participating. And when a theif runs (they all do) guess what that’s a WIN for me! ..cut

We are supposed to be the worse nightmare of high mobility profession according to developers. We are supposed to let none escape from us, or at least give them an hard time to escape but this is by far not the case.

DS 2? You serious? The time the projectile reached the target it is out of range.

If a Thief manage to flee away from you it is a loss, not a win, because you failed to impair its escape and you are supposed to do so.

Bas.7406:

Guess what happens when a thief misses his burst and can’t disappear – he dies. Guess what happens when you destroy a mesmer’s clones – he dies. Guess what happenes when a warrior misses 100b. He dies fast. They are niche classes we can avoid their damage and just keep trucking.

When a Thief can’t disappear? Never. Because Thieves, on the other hand, are best at what they are supposed to do and can easily vanish and go away, thanks to the load of stealth skills they have.

When a Mesmer has its cloes down? Never. Because they have short cooldowns and are available in multiple ways. So they, also, are best at what they are supposed to do best.

When a Warrior misses 100b? Probably sometimes, but who cares when you can still deal 2k damage per sword/axe slash. So, they are also good at what they are supposed to be good at.

Bas.7406:

I got distracted by all your kittens. What are you trying to say again? You can’t balance something that is balanced. We are in the middle of the road with everything. Isn’t that what balance is? What are you confusing balance with I want the best of everything?

We don’t get smashed and we don’t smash people. We are balanced. Just because a thief, warrior, or mesmer can wtf pwn someone in 2.5 seconds doesn’t mean everyone should be able to do that. That’s not balance, that’s imbalance.

Anet never promised balance. In fact, they have said numerous times they like having niche roles. Our niche role is simple, in a battle of attrition we will win. Our goal is to extend a fight, not avoid it, run from it, or blow through it. We extend fights, that’s why we have cripples, chills, fears, and multiple small healing returns because we are an attrition class.

The sooner you realize that it’s not the class that’s broken it’s your vision of the class that’s broken. Again doing everything the best is not balance, doing everything well is balance. We do everything well. I would say there are only two balanced classes engineers and necros and guess what they are the least played.

You don’t want balance you want niche. You want to be able to burst or be able to tank or be really mobile, but that’s not what we do. We outlast, we wittle you down in a million different ways. We take one target and make their life miserable.

It’s not the class, it’s your concept that’s broken. Besides everyone hates kittens, get a dog.

You still did not addressed what I want to address.
Is having an huge HP pool enough to make a Necro an attrition class to survive long enough the fights? Has the Necro good amount of tools to avoid enemy to escape?
The answer is NO.
Despite what you want to say, having an huge HP pool doesn’t help to live enough to make the fight long as they should to unleash what the Necro potential should be. Why? Because we lack of any other defensive mechanism.

We are supposed to have viable constant heals thanks to blood magic, but would you define Blood Magic traitline as viable? No.

We are supposed to have access to a good amount of reliable boons, but do we get enough? No.

We are supposed to be a profession which is hard to run away from, but do you think that the tools we have are enough? Do we feel that a Thief or an Elementalist has an hard time running away from you? No, just Shadow Refuge or RtL and they are miles away.

Of course we aren’t a profession which is supposed to be slippery as a Thief is, but we aren’t the profession the developers said we are meant to be, BY FAR.

We should be able to win attrition fight and impede enemy’s escapes as easy as a Thief burst down a single target and runs away, a Mesmer confused the emeny spamming clones or a Warrior deals massive damage in close range. This doesn’t happen in this game, unless we have played completely different games.

And this is the point I want to make, now you can make another l2p post.

Bas.7406:

You lost all credibility when you said Necro’s can’t survive well. Any semi decent Necro player that has a video (nemisis) is proof that you are not just wrong, but far off base. Your inability to think of anythign you have not come up with yourself is the issue here. Dimissing other opinions because of you lack of skill only makes you seem trivial, childish, and petulant.

I can give you references, and the day you step into a tournament (probably your first time) it will be proven to you time and time again by players who take the time to learn a class and think comments through before posting. There is a reason the necro sees the least amount of changes, because any changes made could swing the necro to overpowered quickly.

My lack of a desire to take the time to video my accomplishments in life are an odd thing to you. Because if a man don’t post on you tube he must be a liar? So everything you see on the internet is true!!!!? I always knew that the best players were on youtube..doh!

You have been countless alternatives to your play style, and your constant reply is always the same….“I am a great player, necro is broken. You are all liars and jerks who think you are better than me, but this class is broken because I can’t play it well.” If you can’t listen to others who have constructive criticism than you should roll a different class.

None of us are saying the Necro is perfect. We are saying you are playing it by focusing on it’s limitations instead of it’s strengths. We all agree that the Necro needs a few bug fixes and tweaks, but the Ranger is in massive need of an overhaul not us.

One final thing, learn to do the math before saying minions are bad. CD to up time to damage dealt, Minions are the single best damage utility we have not named Blood Is Power.

*THIS IS A kittenING BALANCE THREAD NOT A “IMPROVE YOUR SKILL” THREAD.

BALANCE: How Necro performs compared to other professions related to the effort you put into playing.

How many times do I have to say that? I never said here, neither on any part of all my posts that I don’t feel effective on my Necro. Those are only assumption made from you and any other l2p guys here.

This doesn’t mean by any form that Necros are well balanced and that the efforts I put in my playing are the same I put in any other profession to obtain the same results. You get the point or am I going to get another stupid l2p post?

All I see here is me trying to point out and get some sense on what Necro lacks and what should be improved and you and Talentless keep kittening about “l2p”, “Necros are fine”, “go play turneys”, “Minions are fine” and another bunch of bullkitten.

What I want to hear in this topic is WHY you think that HP and Death Shroud are valid alternatives to mobility, evades, invulnerability, boons, visual confusion and extra heals, not keep earing the same thing over and over on how I must be a bad player, how you guys are good at playing Necro and minion masters, how random guy none know is good at Necro and blah blah blah.

Talentless.5708:

I’m sorry, but I will continue to tell people who whine about the Necro as being underpowered to learn how to kittening play. I will not have scrubs who spend more time posting on the forums than learning their class continue efforts to convince Anet to buff something that needs no such buff. If you try to ruin the Necro by getting it buffed, you kitten well better expect push-back from people who dont want that to happen.

We may play the same class, but these forums show we are definitely not in the same class. Arguing that a Necro needs buffs other than a few bug fixes is absolutely absurd.

I’ve never said in any of my posts that Necro need buffs. What I’ve said is that Necro, right now and in the position it is, is not balanced.
It probably need a rework, probably need other classes to be balanced or the Necro to be buffed, I don’t care. The only thing I want to point out is that the Necro does not fit its design philosophy and it isn’t balanced as it is now.

Bas.7406:

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You lost your credibility when you said you are successful at playing minion master and probably you won’t get it back until you post a video of you being successful as minion master.