Guild Wars 2

As many have pointed out in this thread, healing is intentionally weak in this game. We should be actively avoiding damage. A lot of bosses will 1 or 2 shot you, so healing is of limited use anyways.

So is there any way to make a healer class that makes sense? I definitely think there is. I think we can make healing a useful and fun mechanic that fits with the active playstyle mentality. Here are what I consider some starting ideas. I am sure they are not polished/balanced as stated.

1.) Make all rev heals work on downed state. Every class in the game currently takes on the role of healer as needed through the revive mechanic. I think revive is one of the most powerful healing abilities in the game. It is a repeatable heal for 25% of your ally’s health with no cooldown. A healer class needs to be better at it than anyone else. Warriors have elite banners, necros have shroud 4, the list goes on. Rev needs to outperform those classes to warrant bringing one into a party.

2.) Mesmers and gaurdians turn projectiles into dps. Let rev turn them into healing. Make protective solace heal allies inside of it for each projectile absorbed. Make it scale with damage. Absorbing all of a lupi aoe should heal the entire party to max. Compare this to the pure damage done through reflects, even without cheese walling, and it seems fair.

3.) Natural Harmony is not useful right now in pve. On top of that, it’s just not that interesting a mechanic. Its as vanilla as a heal gets. It is comparable to ele water field, except we can’t even blast in it. Instead here is something I think could make meaningful impacts in battle. Make it so all allies within a certain range of the tablet gain defiant stance for a few seconds when you activate this ability. This encourages you to react not to a team mate getting downed, but to the enemy getting ready to finish them off. This gives you the ability to fully heal a teammate but only if you time it skillfully. However, there is a problem. If your teammates dodge, they won’t gain any healing. That’s not good, its rewarding failure, and punishing success. Instead, make it so If one of your teammates dodges/blocks/evades/aegis/endure pain/etc an attack while this defiant stance is up, the healing is doubled instead of negated. This rewards the healer for landing a good heal, and the healed for actively negating it.

4.) The elite skill is pretty meh. It seemed to be between 5 and 10k healing total. Hardly even above the aoe heal (number 8 ). I think an elite heal skill should be something you use when everything has really gone south. It needs to really make an impact. It needs to save a party from a full wipe if used skillfully. Trash mobs can just be blinded, and bosses have defiance. So the knock back isn’t really that big of a deal. Here is what I propose. Make it ground targetable. You click the ground, the tablet races over there. This also lets us easily see which enemies will get caught in the blast. Then the tablet blows up, just as it does currently. But, enemies caught in the blast gain a new debuff. All outgoing damage is turned into healing for 5 seconds, 10 seconds with a gm trait. Buff the crystals to heal like, 5k each. Also, every downed state ally within the blast automatically has one crystal land on them, helping to revive them. Make the skill use 75% of your energy bar. Also make it a blast finisher, because its about as blasty as a skill gets.

So those are some starter ideas I had. I know some of them could be pretty powerful. But honestly, if the healing isn’t powerful then no one is going to bring a rev with their dps where it is right now. And of course, as always, the most important thing to do is to add new permanent challenging content. If a healer class is ever going to be valued, we need content challenging enough that even good players will make enough mistakes during the battle to need healing. Healing in this game is currently always a crutch, for when players make a mistake. But if bosses in dungeons were not dying in only 30 seconds, more players would actually be making mistakes.

really wish we could get this back. I loved carrying banners between fights. You get swiftness, a blast that won’t put you in combat, and fury/stability. Banners management was a skill worth having. Now they just get thrown down for one fight.

restrictive.
weak.

So much this. I often play with my camera zoomed in to a stupid degree, and still can’t see Archdiviner. Seriously, lupi is easily my favorite fight because its the only one where you can see the tels.

Yeah I think in old content revenant is not looking good so far. It seemed like hammer was highest dps option. Surprising because its range is 1200 compared to mace/axe which is a melee set. The next specialization needs to be direct damage focused I think. It seems like rev has a lot of conditions built right into its attacks. Maybe something like sinister/Rampagers would be optimal? If Rytlock is the first rev, Id imagine sword is gonna be its dps weapon.

Side note, I really want to try 5 revs all on ventari just stacking/healing each other like crazy.

Maybe future content will be more appropriate for rev?

Thank you! This will really help new players

I consider citadel of flame path 1 to be the easiest. Before you run a path, you can try reading the guides here:
http://gw2dungeons.net/
This site is very useful. It also tells you how long most runs are, and rates their difficulties.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/updates/Game-Update-Notes-July-7-2015/first#post5256146
From the notes “Fixed a bug in which the attack targets of some bosses could not be hit by melee or ground-targeted attacks.”
I was hoping that this would fix cof p2 final boss, but it did not. Standing on the rock does still work though =/

Something to consider. All trade is essentially paying people to do stuff for you. Legendaries? Paying people to do map completion. Ascended? Paying people to gather resources. +20 ar infusions? paying people to do fractals.

Is paying someone to do a dungeon really that different? Its not like its the only example of buying achievements/titles.

Sorry that happened to you OP. I buy paths sometimes. Real life is busy. Sometimes I get home from work after midnight. I (and many others) appreciate the service you provide to us, and I hope you won’t let this one bad experience soil it forever.

Selling paths is totally legit. Players who don’t like dungeons don’t have to force themselves to grind content they don’t like. They can do the content that they enjoy more. Similarly, players who don’t want to grind all of the jormag collection can do dungeons instead.

Overall I am in full support of choices. I use to play runescape before they started putting restrictions all over the economy. A completely unregulated economy can be pretty awesome. People really find interesting jobs, and provide some pretty cool services. To me that feels like a richer world, full of choices.

Man this is so sad. They clearly have that information available, because it is necessary for the achievements. They just can’t be asked to put in an UI for it. Was cool to see some red though.

This thread really should be stickied.

GreyShark.4293:

Wethospu.6437:

CoE exp

Player freezes after destroying the crystal

• Reproduction: Destroy a crystal very fast after it appears
• Prevention: Use stability to prevent the effect
• Fix: Wait a bit

There is actually an other fix. The frozen player can use an “Ogre pet whistle” to free himself from the freeze. Despite having a 30 minutes cooldown, this consumable is still convenient at times^^

The pet will create an extra Teeth of Jormag in P2 and P3 though, but is mostly a melee creature so it shouldn’t spawn an extra Teeth of Primordus in P1 and P2.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ogre_Pet_Whistle

The whistle always acts as a stun breaker, but works also specifically against this freeze.

Do the other pets work as stun breaks? I experienced something weird with ember in arah last night.

Lets put it like this. You do 100 runs with random pugs (same dungeon path) who all have over 3k ap, and 100 with players who all have under 3k ap. You seriously think those two are gonna take the same amount of time?

There is a good chance pugs don’t know what they are doing no matter what. The idea behind ap requirements isn’t that ap is a perfect method. It’s about improving averages.

I pug every day, usually between 3 and 6 paths. My (possibly biased) experience is that once I started putting ap requirements I started having a lot less wipes, and a lot more team oriented behavior. I’ve pugged every path of every dungeon. People are blasting stealth, stacking might/vuln/fury, blinding, deep freezing, etc. I get rangers with good pet management and necros running power builds. All of this is common in my groups. Rarely are mobs knocked out of stacks. We frequently don’t even bother los pulling. We often stack right on bosses. Mesmer’s using focus pulls. People help carry banners.

I see people always complaining about pugs, but my pugs usually go pretty well, and they always have ap requirements.

dlonie.6547:

Too easy: no reset on wipe, OP rezzing by NPCs, actual fight went waaay too fast. Ofc, this is LS so the bar is necessarily lower than it would be in a dungeon, but I’d love to see a more challenging version of these fights in future instances.

….

- Add subchapters to the story journal. Let us jump right into an encounter we want to play. This will make the replayability of these lovely encounters so much more enjoyable.

I agree with getting rid of npc rezzing.

I think the biggest thing to increase replayability is rewards. Overall the entire structure needs to be changed a little bit for some of the instances if we want replayability on the scale of dungeon replayability. But if some these instances gave a new dungeon currency I think it would be minor tweaking to bring them up to par. Things similar to what you said.

Lord Kuru.3685:

• Way too easy, but that’s expected as they’re meant to be accessible to everyone.
• Way too gimmicky: particularly the Caithe episodes and Glint’s lair. This is an RPG, I want to create/play my build and use it to defeat foes. I don’t want premade builds forced on me (Caithe) or puzzles where I just use environmental weapons/effects to win (Glint’s lair)
• Challenge mode: pray you do them in few tries because having to go through the same unskippable multiple times cutscenes is torture.
• I don’t think I’d willingly replay any of those instances: once I got my free Ascended Sinister trinkets, I left those forever.

1.) I agree. With a couple exceptions if I remember. I thought some of the achievements in seeds of truth were challenging. In particular I am thinking of the battle with Togonn Windmane who summons those walls of sand and such. Of course, the first time you do a piece of content your figuring out the right strategies. Once I started bringing more blocks/evades (at the cost of a little dps) it wasn’t tough.

2.) Well, I kinda disagree. I mean usually we do fight as our normal characters. I think the occasional bundle fight can be fun. In fact I am still waiting for a dungeon fight where we do the whole fight in power suits. Still make it challenging, but a uniquely different experience.

3.) Yeah unskippable cutscenes are complete crap design. I liked how some of the challenge motes were at the exact spot, so you could retry challenges without redoing the cutscenes. But the one where you stealth through the asura lab was frustrating if you needed to go in a few times to figure out the mechanics.

Hey guys, I’ve been wondering what your opinions of living story season 2’s instances are. These challenges are the most recently added examples of instanced combat. I know they were not exactly traditional dungeons. But maybe these types of things are representative of where anet is planning to take instanced combat? If so maybe we could create some feedback that could help make such instances more appealing to the dungeon community.

I thought the challenges were fun. Some of them were definitely a nice change of pace from just pure combat. I think that if anet had worked a little bit harder on it, they could have made some of them into more repeatable content.

I also noticed they basically added a challenge mode to a lot of the instances. I know I have seen that idea tossed around on these forums in regards to dungeons.

What do you guys think? What needed to be added to those instances to make them into next generation dungeons? Of course a dungeon currency is missing. But I doubt anet wants to devote so much time to designing new dungeon skins. If some sort of alternative repeatable daily reward had been added to those instances they would have gotten a lot more replay I think.

I pug pretty much every dungeon I do. I do daily runs, usually an hour or two a day. Ap requirements on your lfg help a lot. I know a lot of people on these forums disagree. But to be fair a lot of people on these forums never pug either. Yes, you can have low ap good players, and high ap crap players. But on average, people over 3k ap are going to know how to play more so than people below it.

Something else they could do. Since daily completionist now give 3 spirit shards, maybe this would be a good time to do some of the following:

-bring back daily dungeon runs, do it similar to pvp. Arah OR Ascalon. Coe OR Ta. etc. Give us some choice. Don’t restrict us to story modes either.

-get rid of daily fractal. get rid of daily 1-10, 11-20,21-30. Replace it with just daily fractal run. Which would be a set of 4 fractals, done at any difficulty scale. Similar to the current daily fractal it should have a tome of knowledge.

One shard per run is a noticeable amount higher than it was a month ago. Each dungeon gave 75% of a shard before the traits overhaul. Now they give 0%, and your asking for 100%. I think they should implement something like every time you repeat the dungeon hobby explorer achievement you get either 3 or 4 shards. Which would put it back near the original 75% of a shard.

This isn’t make or break for me in terms of doing dungeons. But considering how dungeons are literally abandoned software at this point, I’ve gotta wonder if anyone even realized that they were nerfing dungeon rewards a bit.

Windsagio.1340:

Or balancing for the speedrun crowd is not their priority.

The speedrun crowd is not the end-all and be-all of pve.

I think you may want to reread his original post. He was originally commenting that pvp requires more balancing than pve, not that anet doesn’t care about pve. That seems smart. PVE is cooperative, so overpowered skills help everyone. PVP is competitive so overpowered skills benefit only the players on the side using them, and hurt the other players. So PVP deserves more balance. The flip side is that pve content gets dull and predictable. So pve needs less balancing but more new content. I would say anet does a decent job of adhering to that. It’s just unfortunate all that new content is never instanced.

However I think we can all agree, the people who get the most from anet in terms of developer hours are the people who just love buying gem shop cosmetic skins lol.

As for the OP, the rules for the speed run records are just agreed upon by the community. It’s arbitrary. A lot of people are convinced that these abilities will get nerfed within the month. What’s the point of accepting them as speed run records if the records must be reset in only a month?

You lose swiftness when you enter water.

Duke Darkwood.4237:

thrag.9740:

How can you talk about precedent when your comparing a beta you get into through a random drawing to a beta you farm a rare drop for?

Yeah, how DARE they treat one random drawing the same as another?

Yes, because I was clearly comparing the fact that both were random and not the time investment.

dsslive.8473:

thrag.9740:

Seera.5916:

thrag.9740:

dsslive.8473:

thrag.9740:

The portal beta was in no way advertised as a stress test as far as I can see. It was advertised as a beta. Why would people assume it was a stress test?

Can anyone find me where it was called a stress test? All I can find is the original post:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/claim-your-spot-in-the-next-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta/

No it wasnt advertised as a stress test, so far the only stress test advertised was for the new wvw map.

But previous closed beta’s (announced as closed beta) should have given you an idea of what this one would be like. Here – https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/upcoming-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta-tests/ – was the very first closed beta announcement, a closed beta that was very short amount of time during the day. It was no different with the closed beta for which you could farm for a portal.

When there is clear precedent of what a closed beta is, i hardly see how this is even in the slightest “deceiving”.

How can you talk about precedent when your comparing a beta you get into through a random drawing to a beta you farm a rare drop for?

Because the precedent they were talking about wasn’t related to how the participants were chosen.

The precedent had been set for closed betas being short hours on one day during the week.

Sure. Or you can phrase it as "the precedent had been set for closed betas which you get into through random selection being short hours on one day during the week.

If stuff changes, you should expect different results. After all, in mmos, one of the best known precedents is, that actively working towards a goal should give better results than passively working towards it. So why would players expect a rare drop they farmed to be equivalent to random email selection?

Whether the method of obtaining a beta invite changed or not has no influence on what a closed beta actually is. It is not Anet’s fault you talked yourself into believing this closed beta would be special and be longer than the last one. They didn’t deveive anyone. They have no control in what you tell yourself something will be if you disregard the precedent set for it.

They chose the hours because they have to be hands on to get as much information as possible. This wasnt a marketing event, this was testing. Thus they need to be there working on it, thus it needs to fall during the time they work. It’s as simple as that.

A single pre existing beta is hardly a precedent. A much more well known precedent in mmos is that drops are a reward for playing. If it wasn’t a marketing event, don’t give it away as a drop.

Damian Vryce.9417:

Beta tests are never for your conveniance get that through your head already. You can keep whining that you think the times sucked, but these kinds of short tests have to be held during anet working hours meaning crap times for a lot of people.

Drops are a reward for playing the game. If the beta was not meant to be a reward to the player, do not give it away as a drop. That’s giving out mixed signals.

Roundabout.1752:

I read through the complaint threads listed what I saw was a handful of the same posters complaining again and again because they couldn’t play on date set for the closed Beta test.

Sorry I had to reply out of order. This took some time. I ran through all those threads, and copied every name down from each thread. Then I went ahead and counted all the unique posters:
Number of unique posters: 18,11,4,29,9,47,10,8,28
Which adds up to 164.
When I then combined it to make one super list, and deleted the repeats there were still 128 unique posters. Now, I obviously didn’t sort out people unhappy/ people happy about the hours. So that is not saying, 128 angry people. But there were 128 unique accounts on those threads.

However, I don’t think anyone was praising Anet’s beta access hours. At most they were defending. At worst complaining. Some numbers to think about I suppose.

Roundabout.1752

:Beta tests are not set up for the players, they are for testing the game, your convenience is of no importance, AT ALL. The sooner people realize that the sooner they can get that chip off their shoulder and get back to enjoying the game, if they can’t or won’t maybe they just need to move on, period.

Then don’t make beta’s a drop to be farmed. Because drops are all about rewarding players.

Linken.6345:

They farmed for a unkown beta, they got a date and time. That they then couldent attend is not anets fault

Doesn’t matter if it is or is not anet’s fault. More unhappy players is bad PR. I want HOT to sell as well as possible. Leaving discontent festering is not achieving that goal.

Read my original post, this thread has always been about the restrictive hours. Most people work monday – friday, that’s reality. A large portion of this community is probably in school of some kind where classes meet monday – friday. I have never complained about the length of the beta, only its unavailability to a lot of players.

Whether you believe it was not deceptive, or I believe it was deceptive; is meaningless. Those threads show that players were indeed deceived. They did not expect the hours to be so incredibly restrictive. The first weekend beta can either be a bitter reminder of that time Anet unintentionally tricked them or a warm welcome to the future of gw2. I know which one I think will do a better job of winning back the community.

Ok, we can go back and forth forever about whether the Tuesday hours were predictable. Frankly neither of our own personal opinions on that are necessarily indicative of whether the event was deceptive or not. Instead, I again, present the evidence that the event was indeed deceptive:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/European-Beta-Times
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/South-America-Beta-time-AWFUL
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Beta-times
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/HoT-Beta-Not-on-a-weekend
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Beta-Testing-Times-quite-disappointing
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Next-time-tell-us-the-test-duration-first
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/So-much-bitterness
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/beta-times-for-EU-is-big-joke
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Beta-time-set-up-for-NA-players

And I say this. It seems based on these threads that a non negligible number of players were indeed fooled by this. And when the first weekend beta comes out, I think a lot of them are going to remember that they were fooled. I am tired. I am tired of seeing so much botched publicity from Anet. From the 50$ expansion not including a character slot, to the hint that they would not be grandfathering our traits in with the traits rework. Huge reddit threads, official gaming websites, all telling the outside world that the community is unhappy with the state of affairs in this game. It’s not good for bringing in new players. It’s not good for my favorite mmo, and it seems to hurt the odds of more meaningful content (i.e. not gem shop skins) being added to the game.

So, I say, they should give the portal owners access to the first weekend beta. Because the beta event can either be good PR or bad PR. And angry players seem to shout louder than happy players.

Seera.5916:

thrag.9740:

dsslive.8473:

thrag.9740:

The portal beta was in no way advertised as a stress test as far as I can see. It was advertised as a beta. Why would people assume it was a stress test?

Can anyone find me where it was called a stress test? All I can find is the original post:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/claim-your-spot-in-the-next-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta/

No it wasnt advertised as a stress test, so far the only stress test advertised was for the new wvw map.

But previous closed beta’s (announced as closed beta) should have given you an idea of what this one would be like. Here – https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/upcoming-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta-tests/ – was the very first closed beta announcement, a closed beta that was very short amount of time during the day. It was no different with the closed beta for which you could farm for a portal.

When there is clear precedent of what a closed beta is, i hardly see how this is even in the slightest “deceiving”.

How can you talk about precedent when your comparing a beta you get into through a random drawing to a beta you farm a rare drop for?

Because the precedent they were talking about wasn’t related to how the participants were chosen.

The precedent had been set for closed betas being short hours on one day during the week.

Sure. Or you can phrase it as "the precedent had been set for closed betas which you get into through random selection being short hours on one day during the week.

If stuff changes, you should expect different results. After all, in mmos, one of the best known precedents is, that actively working towards a goal should give better results than passively working towards it. So why would players expect a rare drop they farmed to be equivalent to random email selection?

wow, I can’t believe you made this current thread, after this one:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Bug-Lupicus-Necrid-Bolt-hits-in-melee/page/9#post5098118
got locked. So much dedication, you deserve some credit. And a truthful answer about whether this was intended or not.

It’s funny, Anet screwed up a few dungeons in the April 1st patch, for example they made COF p1 literally impossible. They jumped in and fixed that so fast though. When I think about this lupicus bug I get depressed for the dungeon community.

Also I did lupicus without cheese yesterday. It appears his bubble in phase 3 is still broken as well.

I like to phrase it for my non dungeon friends as, his range attack his in melee now, and his worst melee attack can now only hit at range.

dsslive.8473:

thrag.9740:

The portal beta was in no way advertised as a stress test as far as I can see. It was advertised as a beta. Why would people assume it was a stress test?

Can anyone find me where it was called a stress test? All I can find is the original post:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/claim-your-spot-in-the-next-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta/

No it wasnt advertised as a stress test, so far the only stress test advertised was for the new wvw map.

But previous closed beta’s (announced as closed beta) should have given you an idea of what this one would be like. Here – https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/upcoming-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta-tests/ – was the very first closed beta announcement, a closed beta that was very short amount of time during the day. It was no different with the closed beta for which you could farm for a portal.

When there is clear precedent of what a closed beta is, i hardly see how this is even in the slightest “deceiving”.

How can you talk about precedent when your comparing a beta you get into through a random drawing to a beta you farm a rare drop for?

No one disputes that it said one time access. Can we stop acting like that’s what is being complained about.

The issue is, and has consistently been, the incredibly restrictive hours, and not warning players about those hours before hand. It was deceitful.

Again, Anet never explicitly lied in anyway. But purposefully hiding the truth to avoid lying isn’t the moral high ground.

The portal beta was in no way advertised as a stress test as far as I can see. It was advertised as a beta. Why would people assume it was a stress test?

Can anyone find me where it was called a stress test? All I can find is the original post:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/claim-your-spot-in-the-next-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta/

Yes, but it would also serve as a correction to the deceptive portal beta, which I have already given evidence above that quite a few people were not happy with the hours.

Players feeling like they can’t trust a company is a problem.

lol, Arenanet’s staff was busy, so they took time out of their schedules to remove content from the game.

Oh I fully support you on that, and I strongly judge Anet’s ethics because of the SAB coins issue. I bought the ultimate edition in response to the changes to grandfathering in traits, and also the veteran incentive, so I have a lot of gems to coast on for a long time. But the next time I want to buy something, I believe I will purposefully abstain because of these actions.

Players feel cheated both on the SAB coins and on the portals, and I believe Anet should address that.

Sure, you can claim that. Just like I can claim that if the beta had been a weekend event there would be fewer complaints.

But what I have presented is evidence of discontent in the community. What you have is just an untestable opinion. Do you think it’s a good idea to leave this discontent as it is? Because recent actions seem to indicate that Anet wants to make its customers happy.

Seera.5916:

It wasn’t deceptive at all. The previous betas were just a few couple hour events on a single day. There was nothing said that said that this one would be any different.

For something not deceptive it sure did deceive a lot of players:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/European-Beta-Times
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/South-America-Beta-time-AWFUL
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Beta-times
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/HoT-Beta-Not-on-a-weekend
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Beta-Testing-Times-quite-disappointing
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Next-time-tell-us-the-test-duration-first
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/So-much-bitterness
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/beta-times-for-EU-is-big-joke
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Beta-time-set-up-for-NA-players

Duke Darkwood.4237:

they were told, explicitly, what the Portal would offer them

That is actually incorrect. No one was told what the hours of the beta were ahead of time. In fact, that lack of information is exactly why so many players got burnt.

This is me and my group of friends after we 4 manned Arah p4 for the first time. My friends (the fashionable ones) are on top of the final boss’s altar. I am sitting in front of it. There was a large amount of dancing too.

Please guys, I am not saying I ever expected it to allow access to multiple events. I am not saying Anet ever blatantly lied. However, they were absolutely deceptive. That may or may not have been intentional, but it was the result.

What is the point of giving the beta to only people who prepurchased? Anet already has their money. Allowing the portal access to a single additional closed beta would make a lot of players feel like they were not deceived, and additionally it would let them see how fun HOT is, encouraging them to preorder.

Oh my goodness, once you guys get the word entitlement in your head you won’t let it go. My exact words, " It really seems like the portal should give access to the first weekend beta event". Not pushy, not authoritative, not demanding. Simply stating my opinion about how an unfortunate situation might be effectively corrected. How should I phrase this in a way to make you happy? I will change my original post to accommodate.

I would say the line has been drawn in the wrong place because so many people were alienated. This is not a 1% thing. Most people have jobs. A lot of players do not live in America.

I encourage you to read this and find for me the phrase, “stress test”.
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/claim-your-spot-in-the-next-heart-of-thorns-closed-beta/
I was able to find the phrased “pve closed beta”. Giving me the impression the portal was to grant access to a beta, not a stress test.

Can we stop with this talk about who owes whom what. I’m not saying they owe us anything. Where exactly did I give you this perception of entitlement?

I am saying right now we have a poor situation where a large amount of players farmed for something and didn’t get to experience it’s reward. So, I think that situation could be improved by extending the portal to allow access to a single beta weekend.

Public relations matter, if Anet had told their customers ahead of time how restrictive the hours would be, no feelings would have been hurt. But they didn’t, and as a result a large number of players were left disappointed.

I don’t think all the players who spent a lot of time farming to try a beta see it that way.

Fixed. Do you want to play games with semantics or do you want to discuss the real issue?

I don’t think the players who spent a lot of time farming to try a beta see it that way.

from the Faq
https://help.guildwars2.com/entries/91220997?_ga=1.114280065.768698183.1399179455

“I found a “Portal to the Heart of Maguuma” but I haven’t pre-purchased Heart of Thorns. Can I still participate in beta weekend events?

No, the “Portal to the Heart of Maguuma” was only used for one closed beta event. If you’d like to participate in the beta weekends, you can still get in by pre-purchasing Heart of Thorns."

So after a lot of players spent a lot of time farming, only to be unable to even play that first beta because of the incredibly restrictive hours your not even going to give them a single weekend event? I mean, anyone who had a job couldn’t play. Most outside of America couldn’t play. It really seems like the portal should give access to the first weekend beta event. Not all weekend betas, but at least the first.

Don’t a lot of eles consider focus to be one of their best weapons? Doesn’t seem like warhorn could beat focus easily. A main hand weapon seems like it would give you more options.

oh yeah, i think asked my question poorly. I am not saying rifle is good compared to melee weapons, and I pretty much always run the gs + axe/mace as a fast hands ps war.

I just mean that if you have to range, why does rifle get such a bad reputation compared to longbow? I know the bow is necessary for cleansing ire in pvp (i never pvp so thats the extent of my knowledge). But it seems like rifle is a solid choice for pve, if you insist on ranging something.

So here is an example. I am working my way up through fractals right now. I am only at level 16 though. When we fight the boss in the reactor fractal, it seems like people always range it. If I am going to range it, should I bring longbow or rifle? Should I bring fast hands and constantly be swapping?

Purple Miku.7032:

I would like rifle to be good so that I would have an excuse to make predator as it’s one of the coolest legendaries in my opinion.

Sadly if I made one I would never get to see it.

Hey, I’d really appreciate your input on this, because I never get why rifle is seen kitten bad, but I know your pretty knowledgeable in all things warrior haha.

1.) Bullets can pierce. So, for example, at copper champion rifle seems like the winner.

2.) If you bring crack shot and Leg specialist you have a hard cc on an 8 sec CD. Rifle seems a lot faster at stripping defiance than anything a bow can do.

3.) you can keep things nearly perma crippled, even bosses with a defiance bar. So it seems like rifle makes it easier to avoid damage.

4.) With crack shot you have perma 8 stacks of vulnerability. So it seems like in a group setting rifle could be the better weapon if your party isn’t capping vuln?

I am pretty sure what happened here is, Anet didn’t want dungeons to give the spirit shards because in the future exp on a lv 80 is going to be a huge deal for masteries. Once HOT comes out the exp will be really useful, maybe Anet felt it would be too much to give both.

Or maybe they just forgot about dungeons.

well I don’t know much after yesterday’s patch. There were many eles who ran scepter/focus and lightning hammer in dungeons. Lava axe (to the best of my knowledge) is almost never used.

So I would assume lightning hammer is still viable, I haven’t heard about any nerfs to it.

Something to keep in mind, with the expansion pack heart of thorns, other classes may get rifle. In particular, a lot of thieves are hopping to get a rifle as an assassin style fighter.