What meta do players want?

[otto.5684]

I want a meta where I do not end-up fighting the same exact builds every game, since there are only handful available. A meta that you spend half of your combat time CCed. And fights do not take minutes to resolve.

[Chaith.8256]

We want the last year of vanilla, from Celestial meta to Core Specs patch.

• Where duels end no matter the amulet, and half the core specs had a competitive duelist build.
• Duelist/2v2 focused comps, 5v5 teamfight comps, and +1 rotation mobility based portal comps can all take games off of each other when played at a high level.

Not much else you could've asked for, except for Ranger being useful.

[Moody Soul.5617]

@Broady.2358 I don’t care what meta it is bunker,one shot ,condi one shot,boon spam or burn weaver I just want to be able to play any class I want and not feel chucked by the fact that it’s out played by default by other classes like Mesmer is when it comes to fighting ranger it just shrugs off any burst if the ranger knows how to dodge and hit their heal skill (just another perspective if not listed already)

[Hirosama Nadasaki.6792]

I actually enjoy bunker meta a lot. Burst meta and condi meta (which was really just another flavour of burst meta) feels so uninteractive, it eventually boils down to who has the lowest ping, or who spots the enemy first, and there's so little variety because if your build can't immediately burst the enemy, you get bursted instead.From all the complaints I read about the bunker meta, I think the problem is not with bunkers themselves but with the conquest game mode.

[UNOwen.7132]

@Chaith.8256 said:We want the last year of vanilla, from Celestial meta to Core Specs patch.

• Where duels end no matter the amulet, and half the core specs had a competitive duelist build.
• Duelist/2v2 focused comps, 5v5 teamfight comps, and +1 rotation mobility based portal comps can all take games off of each other when played at a high level.

Not much else you could've asked for, except for Ranger being useful.

Im not sure we want the Celestial Meta. 4 Cele Eles in both teams was kinda absurd.

[Chaith.8256]

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Chaith.8256 said:We want the last year of vanilla, from Celestial meta to Core Specs patch.

• Where duels end no matter the amulet, and half the core specs had a competitive duelist build.
• Duelist/2v2 focused comps, 5v5 teamfight comps, and +1 rotation mobility based portal comps can all take games off of each other when played at a high level.

Not much else you could've asked for, except for Ranger being useful.

Im not sure we want the Celestial Meta. 4 Cele Eles in both teams was kinda absurd.

That was not the meta, that was a sub-optimal meme team. That's like saying right now 3 renegade is meta

[UNOwen.7132]

@Chaith.8256 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Chaith.8256 said:We want the last year of vanilla, from Celestial meta to Core Specs patch.

• Where duels end no matter the amulet, and half the core specs had a competitive duelist build.
• Duelist/2v2 focused comps, 5v5 teamfight comps, and +1 rotation mobility based portal comps can all take games off of each other when played at a high level.

Not much else you could've asked for, except for Ranger being useful.

Im not sure we want the Celestial Meta. 4 Cele Eles in both teams was kinda absurd.

That was not the meta, that was a sub-optimal meme team. That's like saying right now 3 renegade is meta

Well, I suppose youre right, but the meta was 2-3 cele eles on the same team, with the general trend being 3. Thats not great either.

[Eddbopkins.2630]

I'd take a dps meta any day of the week. It's really the only skilled playstyles there is. Being able to read the situation and execute a good burst while being able to be bursted you're self but avoiding it because of well times dodges really is the only fun way to play for me.

Having endless stream of sustain and condi spam is no fun and it's certainly not exciting to watch.

[Tycura.1982]

Power with meta condi builds only on Mesmer, Ele, Necro

Warrior as side node bruiser

Ele as weaver side node or tempest support

Necro as core terrormancer or scourge as a team fighter

Rev as power herald roamer/team fighter

Ranger as power dps/roamer

Thief as roamer

Mirage as roamer/side node condi mirage or GS burst

Guardian as side noder dragonhunter or teamfighter/support firebrand.

Engie as rifle holo side noder/team fighter

Essentially 2019 because things were more balanced then than now.

Give chrono IP backGive scourge personal shade back

[mortrialus.3062]

Necromancer:Scourge. Easily. I preferred when necro had an appropriate level of immense lethality with conditions, could single handledly carry team fights but was just as susceptible to being focused and the mark of a good necro was how they positioned themselves to being less vulnerable to being damaged. Plu setting shades and then pulsing damage out of the shades FEELS like necromancer game play more so than just being a tank. Like as a necromancer I feel thematically you should have minions. Your shades (minions) can do immense damage and corrupt but you youself are weak. I also prefer Necro to primarily deal condition damage gameplay wise. Power Reaper at its peak was also a lot of fun, with nuclear levels of damage but clear counter play and capacity to zone. Core necro is and has always been boring AF

Elementalist:
Fresh Air Scepter Weaver. Easily. I've always resented the idea of Elementalists having to play these sloshy minimal damage builds like CeleEle that do unimpactful damage over a long time until they win with largely unimpactfull sustain. If was in charge of balance elementalist would be significantly more akin to Power Mesmer as a build that off point nukes other players but is also extremely squishy itself. I feel like the overall purpose of Elementalists should be from design perspective is that you can build that to be nuclear levels of damage or tidal wave levels of sustain. I hate builds that try to be slushy builds where they do a gradual slush of damage and win with a gradual slush of sustain. Doubly so when its Guild Wars 2's premier "Fireball thrower" class. I prefer Elementalist to do Power damage gameplay wise. If anything in this game should be nuking and globalling players it should be a fully committed Power Burst Ele.

Mesmer:
Probably Axe+Torch/Staff Carrion+Ineptitude was my favorite build to fight / fight against. This was a shatter build which meant offensive shatters actually mattered. Which limited the strain and damage against players that clones could deal damage and kill, turret style. Also Portal was unnerfed in this era and Portal is just so fun. It feels great to always be thinking about two locations tactically because you can make an immediate impact on both. I greatly prefer Mesmer doing condition damage, largely confusion. It feels more "Illusory". Also compared to Sword/Staff Mirage it's capacity to abandon a fight and rotate elsewhere was less emphasized. Plus dropping a combat utility in favor of Portal meant a serious loss in survivability and your ability to respond to certain builds.

Thief:
I've never liked any thief build as a "fun healthy" thing for the game. Power Sword+Dagger Core was probably the least offensive to my sensibilities as I've aggressively hated every build that had come out since then. I've aggressively hated every version of condi thief I have ever seen.

Ranger:
Again, I've never particularly liked any ranger build. Core Era Spirit Ranger, Immortal Sidenode Druid, and Immortal Sidenode BoonBeast are probably my least favorite. I didn't hate Sic Em Sniper Soulbeasts the way others did. It hit very hard but you could focus it just as hard as a team. I'd probably go with that. Especially because on a thematic level rangers should be either sniping players. And if they're druids they should be keeping their teammates, not themselves, alive.

Engineer:
Honestly probably Rifle Holo. ProtHolo and scrapper have always had stupid levels of sustain to the point of being unfun. Post Rework Scrapper is quite frankly the most I've ever hated any build ever. Prot Holo only a bit behind. There's having advantages against certain builds the way POF Core Guard could shrug off condition damage, and then there is being stupid levels of immune like Rework Scrapper and ProtHolo are. Rifle holo had a mix of lethality and survivability and clear tells to make them fun to fight against. If there was any problem with them it was the absurd levels of sustain provided by Healing Turret and the 6 second stealth on Toss Elixir S. As long as they aren't stealthed dodging Prime Light Beam felt AMAZING. FUN even. As long as they aren't stealthed dodging Holographic Shockwave felt AMAZING.

Guardian:
Greatsword/Sword+Focus burst guardian. Easily. This was just a great build to play against and a great build to play in terms of feel. Just a great wide mix of skills, landing a Ray of Judgement felt amazing as did landing one. The ultimate beginner build that you can take to master levels. It had a high amount amount of sustain for the level of damage it could do. It could snap in and just obliterate you but it felt good when you avoided that. Also a fun build to 1v1 as it spent most of the 1v1 immensely lethal and the fight was mostly about avoiding lethal damage until they ran out of cooldowns, which wasn't excessively long and felt like a real chess match trade of blows.

I also especially loved the era when in Ranked guardians could go full support Firebrand or DPS Core core guardian and both were viably choices. Firebrand was probably the only "Support build" to actually play support and not just be unkillable on the side nodes like Scrapper and Druid became so it never offended me to the degree those builds did.

Warrior:Greatsword/Dagger+Shield Spellbreaker. I loved fighting these things. It was a mix of positioning vs immense lethality I really enjoyed. Overall it felt like what Core Warrior was meant to be. Just a straight up no frills fight. I do think Spellbreaker as a whole didn't live up to my Anti-Boon and Anti-Condi hopes but it was even in it's most potent stages one of the things I most enjoyed fighting. I genuinely miss them a lot.

I also loved and played a lot of Greatsword/Hammer back in Core. Hell of a lot of fun to bait cooldowns then Hammer Burst into 100 Blades and obliterate someone.

Rev:Both Condition and Power are okay with me tbh as long as it isn't Ventari bunk. Condi could probably get a trim interms of sustain and power could always have used some elimination of its ability to chain evades+Blocks+damage nullification. But I never particularly hated either play style. Both should be valid.

Everyone talks about power creep, despite us currently playing in an era where damage and burst is lower than it as EVER, EVER been. I remember the days of slushy unkillable Core+CeleEle. Of Zoo Necros and Rangers. Of literally Unkillable Chronos and Scrappers and Druids. It Sucked. Hard. PoF was probably the best this game has ever been Meta Wise as Firebrand as Support could make a real difference while everything else felt Threatening and Lethal damage wise. Nothing is worse for conquest than when something is super overpowered defensively.

If I was in charge of Balance those are the builds I'd shoot for towards being primarily meta and work on build variety afterwords.

[mortrialus.3062]

@Chaith.8256 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Chaith.8256 said:We want the last year of vanilla, from Celestial meta to Core Specs patch.

• Where duels end no matter the amulet, and half the core specs had a competitive duelist build.
• Duelist/2v2 focused comps, 5v5 teamfight comps, and +1 rotation mobility based portal comps can all take games off of each other when played at a high level.

Not much else you could've asked for, except for Ranger being useful.

Im not sure we want the Celestial Meta. 4 Cele Eles in both teams was kinda absurd.

That was not the meta, that was a sub-optimal meme team. That's like saying right now 3 renegade is meta

"Sub optimal" basically meaning "Wins everything except that one fight once a month against the meta team, of which literally one team is capable of running at an optimal level".

Core was a slushy, hideous mess where literally no one died unless they got focused 2v1 away from the Ele. It's hilarious now going back and seeing literally 15-30! minute long "OMG I'm So HYPE GOD OF PVP" duel videos and seeing the same people who posted those videos stick around to cry on the forums and say how great PvP was back in Yee Olden Day when even in their "Top Tier Highlights!" 1v1s straight up would not and could not end.

[xXxNikiGoesWildxXx.3678]

Damage meta sounds fun and have options for countering but it only happens in 1v1 fights, currently good example is thief vs thief.Problem is if you had damage meta in 5v5 then 1 dude get focused and bursted, so there is no counterplay but CC- locking someone and bursting it to death. That is why bunker meta exists and should exist to counter multiple players who focus fire one player. So if 5 noobs focus fire tank then they should be punished for wasting their cooldowns on target that can absorb all their spells. In every game, there are always some damage players around so it is not really full tank meta. Every tank has its own weaknesses, and is very vulnerable to +1 classes(fighting 2 enemies on node, alone).

Also for example, i am playing bunker renegade, and believe or not my class is very counterable, interupting summons, stripping my boons, applying poison, using retaliation boon against myself, slow/chill control condis to reduce my sustain over time overall, confusion to kill myself and so on. I am playing it for very long, maybe 1 year in pvp when nobody ever tried. I died so many times, but when mastered you almost never die again.

If we pick up a necro as bunker, you can freely burst it while it is out of shroud and while in shroud, bait it or CC.

About elementalist as bunker, applying chill condition to it makes it useless and worst class but also poison, confusion.

Ranger is a little bit problematic currently, since its greatsword 4 blocks for like 5 seconds and has still short cooldown(better spell than thieves dagger storm). So many passive healings. So many escapes, burst damage. Tanky classes shouldn't have mobility nor bursting dmg in their kit.

So instead of removing knight amulet, and any toughness amulets, arenanet could add negative stats for damage on those tanky stats or at least reducing offensive stats, so classes that go for damage but low defenses could compete with classes with tankiness but low damage.

[Eurantien.4632]

@Chaith.8256 said:We want the last year of vanilla, from Celestial meta to Core Specs patch.

• Where duels end no matter the amulet, and half the core specs had a competitive duelist build.
• Duelist/2v2 focused comps, 5v5 teamfight comps, and +1 rotation mobility based portal comps can all take games off of each other when played at a high level.

Not much else you could've asked for, except for Ranger being useful.

:(

[Aktium.9506]

@Chaith.8256 said:

• Where duels end no matter the amulet,I don't remember this part in that meta.

They only ended when the enemy Thief + Mediguard rotated into the fight as far as I can recall.

Whenever it was a fight with Cele D/D Ele(Cele Staff as well to some extent), Cele Rifle Engi and Cele/Soldier Shoutbow Warr they never really ended. Especially not sidenode duels between any of these. They just kept on in perpetuity .

[Chaith.8256]

@Aktium.9506 said:

@Chaith.8256 said:

• Where duels end no matter the amulet,I don't remember this part in that meta.

They only ended when the enemy Thief + Mediguard rotated into the fight as far as I can recall.

Whenever it was a fight with Cele D/D Ele(Cele Staff as well to some extent), Cele Rifle Engi and Cele/Soldier Shoutbow Warr they never really ended. Especially not sidenode duels between any of these. They just kept on in perpetuity .

If a cele engi was in the equation, the battle would end. (That was my PoV). I think it was a high end skill to get a fight to conclude as an Ele vs. Ele, but Phantaram was doing it.

[choovanski.5462]

decap engineer

[EVIL LAUGHTER]

[Arheundel.6451]

@"mortrialus.3062" said:Necromancer:Scourge. Easily. I preferred when necro had an appropriate level of immense lethality with conditions, could single handledly carry team fights but was just as susceptible to being focused and the mark of a good necro was how they positioned themselves to being less vulnerable to being damaged. Plu setting shades and then pulsing damage out of the shades FEELS like necromancer game play more so than just being a tank. Like as a necromancer I feel thematically you should have minions. Your shades (minions) can do immense damage and corrupt but you youself are weak. I also prefer Necro to primarily deal condition damage gameplay wise. Power Reaper at its peak was also a lot of fun, with nuclear levels of damage but clear counter play and capacity to zone. Core necro is and has always been boring AF

Elementalist:

Fresh Air Scepter Weaver. Easily. I've always resented the idea of Elementalists having to play these sloshy minimal damage builds like CeleEle that do unimpactful damage over a long time until they win with largely unimpactfull sustain. If was in charge of balance elementalist would be significantly more akin to Power Mesmer as a build that off point nukes other players but is also extremely squishy itself. I feel like the overall purpose of Elementalists should be from design perspective is that you can build that to be nuclear levels of damage or tidal wave levels of sustain. I hate builds that try to be slushy builds where they do a gradual slush of damage and win with a gradual slush of sustain. Doubly so when its Guild Wars 2's premier "Fireball thrower" class. I prefer Elementalist to do Power damage gameplay wise. If anything in this game should be nuking and globalling players it should be a fully committed Power Burst Ele.

Mesmer:

Probably Axe+Torch/Staff Carrion+Ineptitude was my favorite build to fight / fight against. This was a shatter build which meant offensive shatters actually mattered. Which limited the strain and damage against players that clones could deal damage and kill, turret style. Also Portal was unnerfed in this era and Portal is just so fun. It feels great to always be thinking about two locations tactically because you can make an immediate impact on both. I greatly prefer Mesmer doing condition damage, largely confusion. It feels more "Illusory". Also compared to Sword/Staff Mirage it's capacity to abandon a fight and rotate elsewhere was less emphasized. Plus dropping a combat utility in favor of Portal meant a serious loss in survivability and your ability to respond to certain builds.

Thief:

I've never liked any thief build as a "fun healthy" thing for the game. Power Sword+Dagger Core was probably the least offensive to my sensibilities as I've aggressively hated every build that had come out since then. I've aggressively hated every version of condi thief I have ever seen.

Ranger:

Again, I've never particularly liked any ranger build. Core Era Spirit Ranger, Immortal Sidenode Druid, and Immortal Sidenode BoonBeast are probably my least favorite. I didn't hate Sic Em Sniper Soulbeasts the way others did. It hit very hard but you could focus it just as hard as a team. I'd probably go with that. Especially because on a thematic level rangers should be either sniping players. And if they're druids they should be keeping their teammates, not themselves, alive.

Engineer:

Honestly probably Rifle Holo. ProtHolo and scrapper have always had stupid levels of sustain to the point of being unfun. Post Rework Scrapper is quite frankly the most I've ever hated any build ever. Prot Holo only a bit behind. There's having advantages against certain builds the way POF Core Guard could shrug off condition damage, and then there is being stupid levels of immune like Rework Scrapper and ProtHolo are. Rifle holo had a mix of lethality and survivability and clear tells to make them fun to fight against. If there was any problem with them it was the absurd levels of sustain provided by Healing Turret and the 6 second stealth on Toss Elixir S. As long as they aren't stealthed dodging Prime Light Beam felt AMAZING. FUN even. As long as they aren't stealthed dodging Holographic Shockwave felt AMAZING.

Guardian:

Greatsword/Sword+Focus burst guardian. Easily. This was just a great build to play against and a great build to play in terms of feel. Just a great wide mix of skills, landing a Ray of Judgement felt amazing as did landing one. The ultimate beginner build that you can take to master levels. It had a high amount amount of sustain for the level of damage it could do. It could snap in and just obliterate you but it felt good when you avoided that. Also a fun build to 1v1 as it spent most of the 1v1 immensely lethal and the fight was mostly about avoiding lethal damage until they ran out of cooldowns, which wasn't excessively long and felt like a real chess match trade of blows.

I also especially loved the era when in Ranked guardians could go full support Firebrand or DPS Core core guardian and both were viably choices. Firebrand was probably the only "Support build" to actually play support and not just be unkillable on the side nodes like Scrapper and Druid became so it never offended me to the degree those builds did.

Warrior:Greatsword/Dagger+Shield Spellbreaker. I loved fighting these things. It was a mix of positioning vs immense lethality I really enjoyed. Overall it felt like what Core Warrior was meant to be. Just a straight up no frills fight. I do think Spellbreaker as a whole didn't live up to my Anti-Boon and Anti-Condi hopes but it was even in it's most potent stages one of the things I most enjoyed fighting. I genuinely miss them a lot.

I also loved and played a lot of Greatsword/Hammer back in Core. Hell of a lot of fun to bait cooldowns then Hammer Burst into 100 Blades and obliterate someone.

Rev:Both Condition and Power are okay with me tbh as long as it isn't Ventari bunk. Condi could probably get a trim interms of sustain and power could always have used some elimination of its ability to chain evades+Blocks+damage nullification. But I never particularly hated either play style. Both should be valid.

Everyone talks about power creep, despite us currently playing in an era where damage and burst is lower than it as EVER, EVER been. I remember the days of slushy unkillable Core+CeleEle. Of Zoo Necros and Rangers. Of literally Unkillable Chronos and Scrappers and Druids. It Sucked. Hard. PoF was probably the best this game has ever been Meta Wise as Firebrand as Support could make a real difference while everything else felt Threatening and Lethal damage wise. Nothing is worse for conquest than when something is super overpowered defensively.

If I was in charge of Balance those are the builds I'd shoot for towards being primarily meta and work on build variety afterwords.

Yeah....luckily you are not in charge, ideally a game designer should not show such strong bias..as you do, basically hating anything that can challenge your mesmer .and "loving" everything you can kill easily with a busted spec like the one you've described as being "fun" to fight against...accordingly to you.

So mesmer should be this broken AI condi spamming "invincible" spec....while eles for example get constricted to FA ele...yeah, so for 90% of the fight an ele would have zero targets due to stealth uptime and the rest of the time distortion would be up..while the FA ele die fast to condi spam....

Ofc you love FA ele and hate d/d ele...the first is close to being a free kill requiring 5x more effort and skill than any mesmer build since launch...the other may actual pose a real threat due to its sustain

-You love spellbreakers because again..easy to kite with that 8s CD away teleport, stealth etc etc-You love sniper rangers because....evasive reflection...ez-You love burst guardians because....read warrior

Basically you love everything you can kill easy on your mesmer.......this is why I continue to say that player forums should not exist in any official manner or at the very least should never be taken seriously

[mortrialus.3062]

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@"mortrialus.3062" said:

Necromancer

:Scourge. Easily. I preferred when necro had an appropriate level of immense lethality with conditions, could single handledly carry team fights but was just as susceptible to being focused and the mark of a good necro was how they positioned themselves to being less vulnerable to being damaged. Plu setting shades and then pulsing damage out of the shades FEELS like necromancer game play more so than just being a tank. Like as a necromancer I feel thematically you should have minions. Your shades (minions) can do immense damage and corrupt but you youself are weak. I also prefer Necro to primarily deal condition damage gameplay wise. Power Reaper at its peak was also a lot of fun, with nuclear levels of damage but clear counter play and capacity to zone. Core necro is and has always been boring AF

Elementalist

:

Fresh Air Scepter Weaver. Easily. I've always resented the idea of Elementalists having to play these sloshy minimal damage builds like CeleEle that do unimpactful damage over a long time until they win with largely unimpactfull sustain. If was in charge of balance elementalist would be significantly more akin to Power Mesmer as a build that off point nukes other players but is also extremely squishy itself. I feel like the overall purpose of Elementalists should be from design perspective is that you can build that to be nuclear levels of damage or tidal wave levels of sustain. I hate builds that try to be slushy builds where they do a gradual slush of damage and win with a gradual slush of sustain. Doubly so when its Guild Wars 2's premier "Fireball thrower" class. I prefer Elementalist to do Power damage gameplay wise. If anything in this game should be nuking and globalling players it should be a fully committed Power Burst Ele.

Mesmer

:

Probably Axe+Torch/Staff Carrion+Ineptitude was my favorite build to fight / fight against. This was a shatter build which meant offensive shatters actually mattered. Which limited the strain and damage against players that clones could deal damage and kill, turret style. Also Portal was unnerfed in this era and Portal is just so fun. It feels great to always be thinking about two locations tactically because you can make an immediate impact on both. I greatly prefer Mesmer doing condition damage, largely confusion. It feels more "Illusory". Also compared to Sword/Staff Mirage it's capacity to abandon a fight and rotate elsewhere was less emphasized. Plus dropping a combat utility in favor of Portal meant a serious loss in survivability and your ability to respond to certain builds.

Thief

:

I've never liked any thief build as a "fun healthy" thing for the game. Power Sword+Dagger Core was probably the least offensive to my sensibilities as I've aggressively hated every build that had come out since then. I've aggressively hated every version of condi thief I have ever seen.

Ranger

:

Again, I've never particularly liked any ranger build. Core Era Spirit Ranger, Immortal Sidenode Druid, and Immortal Sidenode BoonBeast are probably my least favorite. I didn't hate Sic Em Sniper Soulbeasts the way others did. It hit very hard but you could focus it just as hard as a team. I'd probably go with that. Especially because on a thematic level rangers should be either sniping players. And if they're druids they should be keeping their teammates, not themselves, alive.

Engineer

:

Honestly probably Rifle Holo. ProtHolo and scrapper have always had stupid levels of sustain to the point of being unfun. Post Rework Scrapper is quite frankly the most I've ever hated any build ever. Prot Holo only a bit behind. There's having advantages against certain builds the way POF Core Guard could shrug off condition damage, and then there is being stupid levels of immune like Rework Scrapper and ProtHolo are. Rifle holo had a mix of lethality and survivability and clear tells to make them fun to fight against. If there was any problem with them it was the absurd levels of sustain provided by Healing Turret and the 6 second stealth on Toss Elixir S. As long as they aren't stealthed dodging Prime Light Beam felt AMAZING. FUN even. As long as they aren't stealthed dodging Holographic Shockwave felt AMAZING.

Guardian

:

Greatsword/Sword+Focus burst guardian. Easily. This was just a great build to play against and a great build to play in terms of feel. Just a great wide mix of skills, landing a Ray of Judgement felt amazing as did landing one. The ultimate beginner build that you can take to master levels. It had a high amount amount of sustain for the level of damage it could do. It could snap in and just obliterate you but it felt good when you avoided that. Also a fun build to 1v1 as it spent most of the 1v1 immensely lethal and the fight was mostly about avoiding lethal damage until they ran out of cooldowns, which wasn't excessively long and felt like a real chess match trade of blows.

I also especially loved the era when in Ranked guardians could go full support Firebrand or DPS Core core guardian and both were viably choices. Firebrand was probably the only "Support build" to actually play support and not just be unkillable on the side nodes like Scrapper and Druid became so it never offended me to the degree those builds did.

Warrior

:Greatsword/Dagger+Shield Spellbreaker. I loved fighting these things. It was a mix of positioning vs immense lethality I really enjoyed. Overall it felt like what Core Warrior was meant to be. Just a straight up no frills fight. I do think Spellbreaker as a whole didn't live up to my Anti-Boon and Anti-Condi hopes but it was even in it's most potent stages one of the things I most enjoyed fighting. I genuinely miss them a lot.

I also loved and played a lot of Greatsword/Hammer back in Core. Hell of a lot of fun to bait cooldowns then Hammer Burst into 100 Blades and obliterate someone.

Rev

:Both Condition and Power are okay with me tbh as long as it isn't Ventari bunk. Condi could probably get a trim interms of sustain and power could always have used some elimination of its ability to chain evades+Blocks+damage nullification. But I never particularly hated either play style. Both should be valid.

Everyone talks about power creep, despite us currently playing in an era where damage and burst is lower than it as EVER, EVER been. I remember the days of slushy unkillable Core+CeleEle. Of Zoo Necros and Rangers. Of literally Unkillable Chronos and Scrappers and Druids. It Sucked. Hard. PoF was probably the best this game has ever been Meta Wise as Firebrand as Support could make a real difference while everything else felt Threatening and Lethal damage wise. Nothing is worse for conquest than when something is super overpowered defensively.

If I was in charge of Balance those are the builds I'd shoot for towards being primarily meta and work on build variety afterwords.

Yeah....luckily you are not in charge, ideally a game designer should not show such strong bias..as you do, basically hating anything that can challenge

your mesmer

.and "loving" everything you can kill easily with a busted spec like the one you've described as being "fun" to fight against...accordingly to you.

PvP is at it's lowest it's been since I've started paying attention to population and all that while I've not been in charge. Perhaps that indicates a trend? The longer I'm not in charge of balance the lower PvP's population gets. Very clear correlation here. Explain that.

So mesmer should be this broken AI condi spamming "invincible" spec....while eles for example get constricted to FA ele...yeah, so for 90% of the fight an ele would have zero targets due to stealth uptime and the rest of the time distortion would be up..while the FA ele die fast to condi spam....

I'm pretty sure I mentioned Ineptitude Shatter as my favorite mesmer spec, explicitly because while it was powerful in it's day, and it was built around Confusion Damage, and WASN'T build around using clones like Turrets to grind down enemies with AI

Ofc you love FA ele and hate d/d ele...the first is close to being a free kill requiring 5x more effort and skill than any mesmer build since launch...the other may actual pose a real threat due to its sustain

No I like FA Ele because I think Ele should be orientated towards immensely powerful damage specs and immensely powerful support specs but slushy hybrids should be discouraged.

I liked playing against FA Weavers during the start of PoF because I felt as that that is what Ele should be; an extremely lethal off point nuker even more so than Power GS Mesmer is. To me, thematically that's one of the primary roles Elementalist should be performing. Simple as that.

-You love spellbreakers because again..easy to kite with that 8s CD away teleport, stealth etc etc

Spellbreaker is easy to kite despite Rush and Bull's Charge I suppose but it could also just slap you for 10k damage arcing slices if you aren't careful. The joy was in the push and pull. plenty of builds can blink away and run. But there was an art towards keeping a Spellbreaker on one side of a node you were contesting while maintaining yourself on the other side and still contesting.

-You love sniper rangers because....evasive reflection...ez

Throughout a majority of time Sic Em Sniper was a thing they had effectively 50% uptime on unblockable that punched right through Evasive Reflection.

Frankly I preferred Sniper rangers because thematically that's what they should be doing. And also because against them it was very immediate "Kill or Be Killed." And a fair amount of times it did end up just being "killed". There's an answer to the fight. Unlike peak Side Node Druids which could just sustain and survive against anything that wasn't a 3v1. Overall I come from a radical gaming philosophy that suggests that most of the time fights should have winners and losers and ties should be pretty rare. So while I don't mind the idea of a build that is noticably more tanky than other builds, and that tankiness should be a strength in their favor. Builds regardless of tankiness shouldn't be able to completely resustain over and over to full health without outright abandoning combat

-You love burst guardians because....read warrior

Core GS/Hammer guardian felt almost opposite in terms of vs Spellbreaker in a way. The general game plan against a Core Guardian is to avoid him and outlast his cooldowns that are keeping him both alive and immensely lethal. With spellbreaker you wanted to sabotage them before they can ramp up and start spamming their bursts and full counters back to back. From a mesmer's perspective it was almost the opposite style match up. Against a Spellbreaker you were rushing them down. Against a Coreguard you were trying to prevent being rushed downed.

Guardians, between Judge's Intervention and Symbol of Blades were also significantly harder to kite in combat without the use of No Port than Spellbreaker. And Spellbreaker could still just slap you for 10k damage if you screwed up your positioning as I mentioned before.

Basically you love everything you can kill easy on your mesmer.......this is why I continue to say that player forums should not exist in any official manner or at the very least should never be taken seriously

Yeah. Okay. Good.

I generally dislike things that violate the idea that between two combatants there should usually be a clear victor, yes. Look at Pre-HoT PvP videos and watch people who I can name who STILL post on this forum RIGHT NOW TO DAY who posted literally 10-30 minute long 1v1 duels on YouTube like they thought it made them look cool. Do you want me to link you some? I'll PM you. Frankly that was GW2 PvP's Original Sin. And it's been a constant problem ever since. A good PvP fight should be between 10-30 seconds. The game is never worse than when something is so defensively power crept it can survive against anything that isn't a 2v1 or 3v1 like Chronobunk, Pre-Nerf Druid, or Rework Scrapper.

[Dadnir.5038]

Ideally a meta leave room for any kind of build. One of the issue of gw2 is that the combination of traits, skills and gear tend to allow high survivability alongside high damage. And this in return leave the more "specialized" builds either less optimal or seen as OP. The meta needed is a meta where true rock, paper, scizor builds exist for all professions, not the current situation where every meta build is somewhere in the middle point of those 3 extrem.

[mistsim.2748]

Whatever meta this has evolved into, I like it.

There is a good balance between power and condi builds. The meta builds are not annoying to fight, as in you have a couple of options. Well, Malyx/Herald will be shaved, it's unavoidable. But still, I'm in Plat 2 with a relatively off-meta build and I do ok in this bracket. I remember the days of there being just cele eles and glass thieves in a match, it was truly cancer. When PoF launched, it was a different kind of hell due to unchecked power creep.

Best balance we ever had was late vanilla, right after burns were nerfed a bit and just before HoT launched. From HoT's launch until Feb this year, the game was unplayable to me and I played other, better pvp games (Dota 2, Battlerite). But I like it now as it reminds me of that brief vanilla period.

I just hate the game mode, I'm tired of it. 8 years of this crap. I'm pleasantly surprised GW2 still has a PvP scene given how stale things have been. The solution to population probs simply lies in supporting different and better game modes.

[mistsim.2748]

@Chaith.8256 said:We want the last year of vanilla, from Celestial meta to Core Specs patch.

• Where duels end no matter the amulet, and half the core specs had a competitive duelist build.
• Duelist/2v2 focused comps, 5v5 teamfight comps, and +1 rotation mobility based portal comps can all take games off of each other when played at a high level.

Not much else you could've asked for, except for Ranger being useful.

YES. My sentiments exactly, as per my post. Clear and varied roles, decent options except ranger as you say. As a ranger main, I still liked that time though.

At that time, I ran a Valkyrie ranger with Beastly Warden spam, at a relatively high level in soloq. It was meme, but still better than the glassbow build in every way at the time as a +1'er. It was short lived due to BW nerfs and HoT's power creep. Then druid had its place on the throne for a long time, but because I hated this cancerous playstyle, I skipped most of HoT. also I couldn't play my valk ranger because Reapers were absolutely shredding everything within 600 range for a long while (6-8 months?). I quietly left the game for a couple of years.

I guess my point is: I like it when I can play an off-meta build and stand a chance against meta ones if I play really well. Also, hard counters need to exist (for example the old necro for boon ripping bunkers), but there shouldn't be too many of these types of matchups.

For example, I like how they recently dealt with prot holo and core ranger. They implemented milder, strategic nerfs, which made room for my off-meta Soulbeast build on side nodes. We need this kind of approach for addressing other overturned meta specs, like symbolbrand and Malyx/Glint, which should hopefully slightly open up some space for other bunker-lite specs.

So yeah, now is good, but also that summer during vanilla before HoT launch.

Ultimately, I just want a different game mode. After 2 months, I'm already considering moving onto WvW for some roaming.

[NotFound.7813]

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@"Trevor Boyer.6524" said:

1. That's not what makes meta. What makes meta is simply the classes/builds that currently perform the 4 job roles the best: "team fighter" "support" "+1 Decap Roamer" "Side Node Duelist"
2. I want a DPS meta to return. People asked for "DPS to be lowered", they do not ask for "DPS to be halved intra-class wide". The truth is that DPS metas are just more enjoyable than sustainy metas. There is so much more room for high skill ceiling and counter-play during DPS meta.

I want a DPS meta where everybody plays a zerker core ele...no stealth...no 1500 pewpew.....no pet....no clones....no teleports.....no chain blocks etc etc....let's see how many would love "DPS meta" in that case.

I know that anything that isnt ranger is a big mystery to you, but you do know Elementalist has teleports, blocks and channeled invulns, right?

I call it BS when people say to love DPS meta when playing a class with several in built defense mechanisms, I'd take all these people ..put them into an arena and force them to play core zerk FA ele.

Every

class has several built in defense mechanisms. Ele does too, as seen above.

-A mesmer-thief-ranger main : " I love DPS meta"....yeah great kitten effort in saying that

I get why thief, youre obsessed with that class, and Mesmer is close enough to thief, but why would a ranger lover mention ranger here?

You can keep repeating this ranger mantra for as long as you wish...it won't make it that much more truthful and neither I do care about it,

you just ridicule yourself

every time you repeat it and now you trying to lecture me on ele....truly puts the cherry on the cake...as others pointed out already.....you are really clueless

I mean it cant be any more truthful than the absolute truth, so yes, it wont become more truthful by default. And given that you just made a grave error about Ele, yeah of course Im lecturing you about it. I know Ele well enough at least to not say something as wrong as "Ele has no defense mechanisms".

You

are the one who is clueless. There is a reason you got compared with Burnfall.

...I am laughing so hard now...you really have no idea.....

Got extended screenshots but again...I keep putting myself on display for everybody ...I'd like to see you, other than a forum warrior ...there is nothing to prove you know what you are on about

Well, at least you learned from last time when people laughed at you when you posted a screenshot of you having other classes as proof that you multiclassed. That being said, how do I know this is you? Besides, argumentum ab auctoritatem. If you have to rely on who you are (assuming that

is

you) instead of using actual arguments, that points to you not having arguments.

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@UNOwen.7132 said:

@Arheundel.6451 said:

@"Trevor Boyer.6524" said:

1. That's not what makes meta. What makes meta is simply the classes/builds that currently perform the 4 job roles the best: "team fighter" "support" "+1 Decap Roamer" "Side Node Duelist"
2. I want a DPS meta to return. People asked for "DPS to be lowered", they do not ask for "DPS to be halved intra-class wide". The truth is that DPS metas are just more enjoyable than sustainy metas. There is so much more room for high skill ceiling and counter-play during DPS meta.

I want a DPS meta where everybody plays a zerker core ele...no stealth...no 1500 pewpew.....no pet....no clones....no teleports.....no chain blocks etc etc....let's see how many would love "DPS meta" in that case.

I know that anything that isnt ranger is a big mystery to you, but you do know Elementalist has teleports, blocks and channeled invulns, right?

I call it BS when people say to love DPS meta when playing a class with several in built defense mechanisms, I'd take all these people ..put them into an arena and force them to play core zerk FA ele.

Every

class has several built in defense mechanisms. Ele does too, as seen above.

-A mesmer-thief-ranger main : " I love DPS meta"....yeah great kitten effort in saying that

I get why thief, youre obsessed with that class, and Mesmer is close enough to thief, but why would a ranger lover mention ranger here?

You can keep repeating this ranger mantra for as long as you wish...it won't make it that much more truthful and neither I do care about it,

you just ridicule yourself

every time you repeat it and now you trying to lecture me on ele....truly puts the cherry on the cake...as others pointed out already.....you are really clueless

I mean it cant be any more truthful than the absolute truth, so yes, it wont become more truthful by default. And given that you just made a grave error about Ele, yeah of course Im lecturing you about it. I know Ele well enough at least to not say something as wrong as "Ele has no defense mechanisms".

You

are the one who is clueless. There is a reason you got compared with Burnfall.

...I am laughing so hard now...you really have no idea.....

Got extended screenshots but again...I keep putting myself on display for everybody ...I'd like to see you, other than a forum warrior ...there is nothing to prove you know what you are on about

How can u be rank 500 but be a plat2 player

[Stand The Wall.6987]

@Chaith.8256 said:portal comps

bruh that skill was garbage why would you want it back?

[Doug.4930]

I'm happy with a meta that mitigates one class domination.

People love complaining about X class being broken whilst Y class is under powered and needs buffing (Y class being the one they play and X being its counter) and after reading through this thread its plain to see by some posters that that rhetoric is alive and well.

But at the end of the day a bad meta is when certain classes are favored too much across the board. So If X build has a far higher pick rate in comparison to other builds, then its a good bet that X build needs adjusting in a game where there is no holy trinity and all classes should be able to accomplish similar roles with no one class excelling too much in too many areas at once, coughprepatchholosmithcough.

So people can scream from the heavens about X build being toxic/broken/unfun/overpowered etc But the real defining factor that Anet should look at when it comes to balance is pickrate. If nobody is playing X build that everybody is on the forums crying about, then its a good bet those people don't really know what they're talking about and are probably just pushing their own personal agenda on whats "fun". Or they're just a bunch of rocks screaming that paper is overpowered. Likewise when it comes to Y build. If nobody is playing Y build then perhaps that spec could do with some adjustments too. coughpowerchronocough

So as long as there is good variation between builds and classes and we don't start seeing constant repeats of the same specs over and over again I'm quite content.

[Loboling.5293]

I'd be happy with the end of HOT meta. Glassy builds with limited support. Twitch gameplay and intense moments that got my heart pumping. Very skill base metal, but without the terrible PvP design that came with pof. (I mean did we really need stealth snipers, aoe spam necros, and even more of a support juggernaut guardian?...)

Pof ruined pvp, but in my opinion, they haven't recovered from it like they did when hot sort of ruined pvp. (Initial mes bunker meta)