Why are medium armor classes not good in zergs?

Sure there are some staff teefs, droods, and the occasional holo, but lets get real... I think some medium armor specs have some great qualities: drood burst heal, staff teef damage, holo aoe burst. In your opinion what has to happen for these professions specializations (hot or pof) to become viable?

There's heal scrapper.

In any case, in zerg play, is about synergy aka what you can provide and how it compliment the team. This "provide" is then compared to other classes thus which classes can provide better. That's how composition is formed.

For these classes to be more viable, it simply has to provide something either unique and important or simply equivalent to what other classes are providing.

Because projectile hate, and a lack of scaling boon support.

Well, scrapper is different now, which of course meant Anet had to go ruin it.

@"SkyShroud.2865" said:There's heal scrapper.

In any case, in zerg play, is about synergy aka what you can provide and how it compliment the team. This "provide" is then compared to other classes thus which classes can provide better. That's how composition is formed.

For these classes to be more viable, it simply has to provide something either unique and important or simply equivalent to what other classes are providing.

Pretty much this except for scrapper they don't do anything that another class can't do better.

I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

Ok so what do you swap out? Herald for soulbeast? Chrono for deadeye?

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

Could work =)I would give it a spin and maybe change engagement styles to suit the comp!

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

I just thought of a good strategy!Soulbeast and Deadeyes excel at spike damage.40-50 soulbeast+ Deadeyes could stack invis from far, then approach the enemy zerg without them being aware, and attack their tail with one-shot high spike damage.Soulbeast and deadeyes all can open with 20K+ damage from stealth.40-50 soulbeasts + deadeyes one-shotting the entire enemy backline and cleaving them to death before disengaging easily with their superior mobility!

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

and there you have just supported my opinion:stealth must be removed from the game.

thanks g

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

Try it out dude. I could see it working pretty well defensively. We did a soulbeast/mesmer/Herald thing a few times that worked extremely well in defensive fights.

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

the only issue is spreading single target damage evenly across the opponents with minimal communication time. else that single target burst will be lost as overkill or in that downstate inuvln. its just easier to use AoE damage more efficiently than high single target bursts. thats why zergs usually only had a few people picking only the most important opponents, if at all. if there was an easy way to fight '50* 1vs1' then they would be good. but for that you would need something like 'claiming' a target. so that one can only be in combat with one person for example and that you can already reserve your target before getting in combat, then your zerg would approach the other one and tab->claim target, within a few seconds everyone would have their own target. (something like that would create many issues, so it wont ever be like that)TL;DR as long as combat system is not changed into 1 vs 1 based, it wont be efficient to utilize many of soulbeasts/deadeyes.

the other option would be to give them tools that can more efficiently be used in a team fight. but i prefer to see WvW as a whole, you dont need to be good in a zerg, you need to be usefull in WvW. you can work together with your server, without running together over the map - divide et impera

What would have to happen is that they would have to actually design and balance for WvW on an equal basis with PvP & PvE raids or you would need some happy accident where the balance/design from the modes they actually consider carries over into WvW. Contrary to the clueless delusions of some in this forum, the truth is they hardly balance for WvW at all, which is why you have the pitiful balance that you do as it is basically a case of whatever sticks from PvP/PvE.

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

Just imagine soulbeast spike damage is maul which hits 5 targets and can be done repeatedly on a very short cooldown + worldly impact to cleave all the downs.Dead eyes backstab followed by an evade storm combo to cleave all the downs.40-50 of them. Mouth-watering spike damage from stealth that will destroy the entire enemy backline unaware.And they can run off easily after.As you've pointed out, the issue is whether pug groups and guilds have players that are skilled and coordinated enough to pull it off =)

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

it can hit 5 target but its still about the area that you cover. the coordination to cover enough area, actually spread the damage evenly is soo much more than utilizing necro/rev/ele, that it wont be good realistically. it will look good on paper but thats it. because people often dont calculate in the required communication + coordination effort. you may pull it off once with a ton of preperation but not consistently, therefor its inefficient.

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

Choosing area coverage could be given at the party level is the squad.40-50 players = 8-10 parties.Each party has a leader that calls out the section/area of the enemy squad that he is bombing and calls target.In that way each party of 5 can cover a different area with 8-10 call-outs.Even if half the bombed areas overlap, that is still 4-5 areas bombed = maybe 20-25 enemies downed?

Also to link it back to OP's topic, I still feel it is not because medium classes are not good in zergs.It is because players don't think out of the box, don't have the skills/coordination to pull it off, it is easier to play with necro/guard combo.

One of the reason why small parties of mobile mesmers/theives/rangers can only nibble at zerg comps from far is because they are small in numbers and not very coordinated. Increase those numbers to 40-50, engage from stealth, and suddenly you have a real zerg backline buster.

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

sure there is a ton more ways one could coordinate a larger group, yet most basically use same 'follow tag, bomb here , bomb there' way to move the squad since the games launch.even 'issues' like pin sniping wich is the counter tactic to a very pin focused zerg was never enough to actually make people play different. we even have for quite a long time now squad markes with wich we could coordinate movements of several groups, without the people having to follow the pin - they could just move where the pin/party lead points them too.but this lack of improvement/development within the community, makes me question wether you would be able to gather such a larger squad of players that are willing and able to play differently.

using those profession you certainly wont be able to coordinate with such a 1 person centric squad. because such a squad lacks the communication/coordination tools.

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@MUDse.7623 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

I agree and this is why the issue is the players and not the medium classes =)

Maybe it's my server but I feel like I see a lot of medium armor floaters all over our maps supporting squads albeit loosely, but most of them think on your their own and on the move and just sort of glide in and out of team play naturally. Sometimes you can watch another player move and you say alright, they get it. You get enough of those players feelin it at the same time and suddenly you have a stupid squad full of floaters and roamers closing the distance of a blob push and sliding over and through them to wipe out their tail and set up a quick choke on their other side. You know the call has gone out and you'll soon see a second guild squad with some pugs come to the rescue.

Depending on the time of day and who's around though, there are times where you're all just getting scattered and farmed and you find yourself pretending you don't see that once eager and hungry ranger tag who's waving their hand towards you in downed state but you're too busy trying to out run that other thief so the enemy squad blows all their pulls on them instead. A big medium armor turnout can be a mixed bag and I get why a commander would be policing that class balance.

Where I am medium classes aren't looked down on as much as some other places I guess. The commanders here seem to understand that rangers actually are pretty useful when needing to get rid of siege that's too far for everyone else. My soulbeast is a true beast and unlike pure zerk, my marauader build provides me with some protection while I crush enemy. Not one at a time either.. many times I wade into the heat of the battle and use the #5 Axe strike after the #5 lb barrage and finish off the handful of enemy I helped drop.

Not everyone has to be a scourge or a healer. If you want great dps against more than one enemy at a time that's what I'm there for. My commanders know me.. send me on little missions... get me to do what they know I can do. It's called support and anyone who really thinks that it's all about the heavies and lights is truly thinking way too inside the box for their own good.

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.

You aren't wrong. But considering Anet loves to destroy niche builds with nerfs as collaterial damage, this really limits any kind of thinking out of the box since our genius balance team thinks otherwise.

That being said I'm even surprised they made engineer useful and even sought after in zergs. Must be a moment of clarity.

@ArchonWing.9480 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.

Then as collateral damage from Holosmith nerfs, the scrapper build that was welcome in zergs got nerfed.

Because no matter how much Rangers and thieves cry and moan that their class is viable it remains garbage, always has been garbage and will never be anything but garbage

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:

@Israel.7056 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:I think it is mainly because most pug and guild commanders rarely think out of the box or don't have the players with skills on medium classes to make a difference.They stick with the tried and tested necro guard combo which also happens to be easy for players to pick up.People rarely like change and don't move outside their comfort zone.

Just horrible strategy, the only classes that excel at serg combat are warrior and guardian.I would suggest a serg with 25 guardians and 25 warriors to melee train the BLIP out of the other serg.I don't know why people are still running the pirate ship bull shiito, that is old and boring!

A serg composed of 25 warriors and 25 guardians will destroy any serg.Melee classes are extremely overpowered in sergs, the fact that people don't play them just shows how many noobs are there in the game that like to press buttons and deal damage at a range.

Rangers and thieves have their place in ZvZ. Kill those who are left behind, single out weak targets (scourges-weavers) mid combat. And thats it. People "not thinking out of the box" well, tag up, get rangers and thieves and play against the scourge FB spellbreaker zerg and tell us how it went. This isnt your average 'players are bad' issue. I can play as roaming scourge, cant i? Yes. Sure i May get some kis here and there. But mostly, I will get farmed. Is it "a player issue"? No, it isnt. Scourge isnt favored as roamer, it is a sitting duck. The same principle applies to ranger and thief in zergs. Can they play in zergs? Sure. Are they efficient/great at it? No. Also, a mediocre scourge will do much better than a good soulbeast in a squad.

Any ranger build outside of soulbeast suffers in zerg play simply because the pet cannot survive all the aoe flying about. And soulbeast cannot merge and unmerge effectively for the same reason.