Swagg.9236

At the time of posting this, there are 105 people idle in TF2 center. These are bottom-tier population hours since NA runs that game. I don't think you could ever get 105 active GW2 PvPers together to take advantage of a GW2-specific site as good as TF2center (that is if anet would even let one exist). GW2 also lacks the depth of TF2 6s. There isn't a lot to break down post-match. Stats like "Damage dealt" or "Damage dealt per second/ minute" aren't super insightful when all the classes deal damage so freely and even "support" builds can regularly close a kill or kill-assist in any fight. Even if you wanted to statistically capture something like "Total Time spent decapping/contesting/off point" with a post-match plug-in, GW2's trashy source code is guarded like a papal election. You can't make it work very well. Do what you wish, but I only pray you aren't so utterly deluded about this game as I was in 2013. If it works, cool, but don't expect success here. Anet is aggressively antithetical when it comes to player-driven content. I'm pretty sure that people even found a way to complain about and/or indirectly nerf Asuraball.

Honestly, anet should've stopped developing so hard back in 2012. For those who never knew, the in-game LFG/Party-finder option didn't exist in launch GW2 and nobody had any in-game means to reach out and form parties for dungeon runs beyond map chat or whispers. Within a single month, there was a player-maintained, third-party website that did everything GW2 players needed for ad hoc LFG purposes. Anet shut down the site after they pulled up their underwear and actually made an LFG tool only about 3 months after the game finally launched. What I'm getting at is that, if anet weren't so trash and controlling about how people played gw2, you'd probably have a site like tf2center for PvP in gw2 by now-- that is to say, a site for gw2 pvp that would make up for the game's inherent lack of features. Then again no guarantee because gw2 is WAY less fun than TF2 and the community of the former is way more dead than the latter. Gw2 almost certainly has no players who are capable or willing to collaborate and push such a passion project.

It's pretty difficult to even be "good" at GW2. It's too simplistic and dependent on instant-speed hard counters to drive interactions. That's precisely why match fixing is the way by which people hit the top.

Don't mind all those anonymous "confused" faces. They just don't want to hear the truth.

Rotations aren't hard. GW2 was never difficult. In fact, it was probably harder when the way to kill things wasn't really with rotations or gear but more along the lines of positioning/luring enemies and timing certain abilities (mainly reflects and line-attacks but also Mimic when that skill was actually cool). The fact that you cited DPS checks as the things by which you're gauging difficulty already shows how braindead GW2 has become.

GW2 was never difficult, and the only thing that gatekeeps anyone from t4/CM statics is generally just a super boring gear grind. t. 2012 zerk meta

Considering anet's track record of spilling the stuff in which they have most pride/confidence first, this is a SUPER BORING patch lmao. Guardian SIGNET UPDATE, BOIS, LET'S GOOOOO. Also, banners giving boons is not an "overhaul," but since anet runs on 1yr intern contracts, they have to make whatever the turnovers can do with this game's eldritch spaghetti engine seem like something on the cusp of expansion-tier.

Zerk staff ele when the rez trait was busted: Core zerk spinguard with sanctuary and wall of reflection: Runner up goes to core scepter/dagger burn ele with no stunbreaks because I never made a video from all that footage.

I told people that this is what happens when your game is excessively simple despite its vast amount of elements. Anet decided to add a 9th class one point when GW2 barely needs three max to do everything the engine has to offer.

I'm pretty sure people would throw a massive fit if they died to core condi ele, so I'm down for it lol

No, I don't mean what core builds people play (of which those ranger and mesmer builds--even core necro now--are HARD sells lmao), but what is the core GW2 game as a product? What are people playing when they're just doing F2P? People paid for it at one point. Nobody got compensated for that, so what is that product then? And what does that make the current dynamic in which core is effectively classed out of end-game or competitive content? Seriously, the list of """viable""" core builds you presented was more anemic than the PvE meta when this game launched lmao.

I'm saying that there are options that anyone can use regardless of monetary investment, and then there is the reality that nobody in PvP or end-game PvE is going to appreciate or invite your participation if you aren't using the builds which are locked behind monetary investment. Or is that wrong with another helping of random capital letters?

Then what are people even playing when they play the F2P/core version?

Ok, but again, you have to buy in to compete. Guild Wars 1 was B2P because there was no F2P version of the game. GW2 certainly does have tiers of investment. The true whales get hooked by the gem store, but are you really going to argue that GW2 F2P options are going to collectively compete in with somebody who bought into all the expansions (in any mode)? Again, this is mostly a question of why people feel so motivated to defend PvP skill continuity in a game with PvP so utterly defined by meta-overwriting patch notes and expansion drops. Seriously, why? It's ok to be honest about the time you put into GW2 (PvP); it's just not healthy to pretend that it's something more than it truly is--that is, unless you really want to take a 2014 sword-dagger/shortbow core thief build into a season and rely on that well-honed continuity of meta skill progression that is supposed to defy how 5 other classes are currently just "2014 thief but better" now due to patch notes.

In the case of GW2: PvE could be described as "buy to play." Players get content (what little there truly is), but there is generally also the knot to address where new specs have historically released in states either outright better than previous build iterations or, at least, receive a number of generous touch-ups to "quickly" (at anet patch release speed anyway) elevate them to equal or slightly higher than their predecessors. What this really means, though, is due to how homogenized all the possible options are, player choice and commitment doesn't really mean anything. This can often lead to exclusionary nitpicking in team environments, but it also doesn't inherently give the solo player enough of a challenge to feel like their choices matter. It's B2P at the expense of being an engaging experience; and in environments where people are aggressively attempting to clear content, it's very possibly a P2W situation (because players might be consistently excluded without the "right/best" classes or gear sets). PvP, however, could be quite arguably described as P2W. Statically, if you really want to look at it without the self-centered Damocles sword of "my time invested in MUH GW2 PvP SKILL is worth more than your observations" looming over your head, it's not difficult to spy the trend of every expansion dropping on its respective GW2 PvP environment like a 9.0 earthquake hitting a decrepit parking garage. It's not always a COMPLETE turnover of class/spec representation (although, you can't argue that "core" specs have been struggling to tread water since the dawn of HoT), but the issue is that GW2's skill ceiling height is not truly defined by a universal, interactive slope of progression. The paradigm shifts in jarring, up-and-down jerks heralded by patch notes; and to refuse to buy an expac in the midst of one's release is akin to entering a surfing competition, but only receiving a boogie board: sure, you'll hit the waves, but you'll never truly stand up if you don't buy in to all the required equipment. This isn't a game like Quake, Melee, or TF2 where you can see a honed skill difference across a continuity of fundamental player techniques; GW2 patches are deliberately designed to overpower or smother what players are currently doing prior to their respective releases. By this point, though, with how most PvE players who regularly do that content have long since collectively gone full-180 from the days of "But, you can't kick me from your Arah party just because I'm a Necro/Ranger/Engie!" it's actually kind of hysterical to see GW2 be so abrasive and neglectful of the people who just want to see what it's about. Either somebody gets duped into buying all the expansions just to participate in what probably ought to be the baseline experience, or they likely just get bored with the core game like most people did back in 2012 lol (nobody remembers this game's pop going from maximum hype train to a comparative ghost town in only about 6 months post-launch; and don't even try to defend it with how dead things got in 2014). This is to say that while there might have been a buffer to save new players from this kind of close-minded environment in PvE (as opposed to PvP's inherent, esoteric swamp of passive gameplay and opposition to innovation which rivals even the Adeptus Mechanicus), now even PvE isn't safe from the "Why are you playing that class/build?" question. tl;dr GW2 PvP was never really competitive from the outset, but people who invested so much time into GW2 want to justify their loss. Just accept things for what they are, dudes. Why are so many people so vitriolic over this? You can't say you got anything out of GW2?

You'll get crayon-eaters anywhere you look across Tyria and its myriad little pocket dimensions.

Eles were ranged spike damage and area control in a game that made sense. For some reason the sequel just kept giving them melee weapons until there's no significant difference between them and warrior anymore.

It would be way better to wholesale replace traits with a more flexible, resource-driven, scaling system based around utilities and profession mechanics.

For GW2: PvE could be described as "buy to play." Players get content (what little there truly is), but there is generally also the knot to address where new specs have historically released in states either outright better than previous build iterations or, at least, receive a number of generous touch-ups to "quickly" (at anet patch release speed anyway) elevate them to equal or slightly higher than their predecessors. What this really means, though, is due to how homogenized all the possible options are, player choice and commitment doesn't really mean anything. This can often lead to exclusionary nitpicking in team environments, but it also doesn't inherently give the solo player enough of a challenge to feel like their choices matter. It's B2P at the expense of being an engaging experience. PvP, however, could be quite arguably described as pay to play. Statically, if you really want to look at it without the Damocles sword of "my time invested in muh GW2 PvP skillllll" looming over your head, it's not difficult to spy the trend of expansions dropping like a 9.0 earthquake on a decrepit parking garage. It's not always a complete turnover of class/spec representation, but the issue is that GW2's skill ceiling is not truly defined by a universal, interactive slope of progression but far more by jarring up-and-down jerks heralded by patch notes; and to refuse to buy an expac in the midst of one's release is akin to being thrown into a surfing competition, but only receiving a boogie board: sure, you'll hit the waves, but you'll never truly stand up if you don't buy in to all the required equipment. This isn't a game like Quake, Melee, or TF2 where you can see the skill difference across a continuity of similar player tools; GW2 patches are deliberately designed to overpower or smother what players are currently doing prior to their respective releases. By this point, though, with how most PvE players who regularly do that content have collectively gone full 180 from the days of "But, you can't kick me from your Arah party just because I'm a Necro/Ranger/Engie!" it's actually kind of hysterical to see GW2 be so abrasive and neglectful of the people who just want to see what it's about. Either somebody gets duped into buying all the expansions, or they probably just get bored with the core game like most people did back in 2012 lol (nobody remembers this game's pop going from maximum hype train to a comparative ghost town in only about 6 months post-launch; and don't even try to defend it with how dead things got in 2014). tl;dr GW2 PvP was never really competitive from the outset, but people who invested so much time into GW2 want to justify their loss. Just accept things for what they are, dudes.

GW2 has no real resource or time-investment mechanics to govern keen action, so historically the classes with the most buttons generally pull the most weight due to the sheer length of their rotations. It's braindead. This went for firebrand as well, but naturally, you can make anything outright bad if you just crank the numbers really low regardless of how many buttons the user has to press.

Rose-tinted glasses aside, the meta back then was about as shallow as it is now, and the proof is in how those same people continue to hold on to the absolute c r u s t i e s t and most faded of glories earned at a time before most people currently even looking at GW2 even played the game. Imagine flaunting a trophy earned in 2014 when the game plays so differently now that whatever "skills" developed then are just barely applicable anymore (or entirely irrelevant). That was always GW2's biggest flaw: it has no patch-to-patch continuity; changes (even somewhat minute ones in big enough volume) often hit so hard that people will abandon entire builds or be forced to take certain hard counters to address what a new set of damage rotations can suddenly do. There's no universal skill floor by which people can base their experiences and development with the game; it's just a bunch of old fogies all respectively stuck in their own shards of time saying how "Oh, 2014 was peak because X and Y" or "Late-HoT was the best because A and B." If you can't stretch a continuity across the game collectively, then where are the skill floor and ceiling supposed to even be with respect to each other? How does anybody know what the peak is even supposed to be? It's the peak because anet bought its way into ESL for just long enough for it to look really silly when the league suddenly died with no promised future? Heavens above, Team Fortress 2 had a player-funded prize pool league which lasted 3 times as long as GW2 ESL lmao

I'd argue the game died when anet decided it was a better idea to throw money down a pit to bribe ESL into a handful of pity seasons rather than actually make a dynamic game. That or maybe the condition stack update.

Just remove stunbreaks from all current sources, make dodging the way to do it, give everyone 4 dodges, and then remove the evades and blocks baked into all the skills that deal damage.

Endurance regen balance is just a numbers game. That's super easy to manage with half a brain. The question is why don't players have 2-3 built in stunbreaks for the purpose of build diversity options when everybody would prefer to have 2-3 stunbreaks without completely ruining their builds or constantly picking the same, overpowered but boring instant-buttons that are often best used reactively rather than proactively? Why isn't a universal mechanic like dodging the source of stunbreaks?

CC can have damage the moment dodging breaks stun. The reason why CC is even more anti-fun in GW2 than the baseline dreadful experience is because stun breaking in GW2 has extremely arbitrary and asymmetrical availability depending on which class you play. One can even go so far as to cripple a build by trying to make room for a stunbreak skill (but people still do it because so many stuns and dazes in GW2 are often tied to ranged, instant or passive sources; and nobody is going to contest a focused mode without being subject to, like, seven CC skills spit out simultaneously from several opponents back-to-back). If there is no universal, resource-limited way of dealing with the fact that so many opponents are going to, with relative impunity, take away a target's ability to play the game, then players need a universal, quick-access stunbreak; not random sprinkles of stunbreaks scattered across a bunch of arbitrary "skill types" which offer zero baseline playstyle synergy (and often outright conflict with or contradict each other). You can condemn this idea all you want, but what that position really means is that you don't want anything to change and you're all perfectly content running the same 3-6 utilities that every class runs regardless of espec. You're beyond basic. CC might have once been a thing to use to secure damage, but right now, with so much CC and damage both based on rotations and also hitting instantly or while insulated by some kind of invulnerability, you really might as well give people the ability to break the rotation chain for some actual combat interaction. Right now things are so passive because of how damage works and how long CC chains can carry on if left unbroken. Things border on Shadowverse-tier.