ShadowKatt.6740

But here's the thing. No one is going to argue that Celestial gets a LOT more points than any other armor does. The math is super basic. And yet even with the staggeringly high number of points that celestial gear has it is STILL outperformed in DPS by 'zerk and Viper gear and in healing by....Apothecary? I don't have them all memorized. The point is that if it has SO VERY MANY points and it's still outperformed by other builds, then it doesn't need to be changed. And if it WAS changed then celestial would probably become worthless, which seems to be the goal here. This whole thread has been one exercise in taking away the toys of other people. I don't like what they have and they shouldn't have it. If you kicked down celestial down to the same numbers as the other armor you might just get that, and it might actually achieve the goal of forcing people to either find new gear or just quit the game. And then what? Dunno if you remember but the relic system was put in place because the devs looked at certain armor sets that weren't being used and instituted a whole new system so their neglected runes could get used. Now if they find there's an entire armor set getting next to 0 use, what're they gonna do? Either nerf EVERY other armor, or buff Celestial again, and we're right back here. This whole conversation is a circle of pettiness.

kitten, was that the rule? I've been screwing that up for years. I'm such a bad player.

You're totally right. One day I went to change it because I knew it was there, and on a particularly bad day (Yes, there are better and worse days even with vision), I went to see if I could turn it up....and it's already up all the way. Which is just kinda terrifying. Small must be absolutely microscopic.

I wouldn't bother. I have a build that capitalizes on invisibility and for me at least I find it worthless. It's got good meme value, but that's about it, and it's not going to help you in a fight. Let's be real, stealth really has no role in Guild Wars 2. It's an option, technically, but all stealth options are too short to actually infiltrate anywhere, and there's really nowhere to infiltrate anyway. And in combat, forget about it. At least thieves get stealth attacks, we just get invisibility for the lulz.

Eh, I disagree. I see it as the budget gear. It's the Honda Accord of armor stats. It's cheap but reliable, fun but not performing, does everything you need it to do without being good at any one thing. It doesn't race like a super car, it doesn't haul like a pickup truck, and it doesn't have the super economy of a hybrid. But it's affordable and that's what made it the most sold car. I run celestial. I did so because when I looked at the cost of making ascended armor I knew I could only make ONE, so I made celestial. Now I can run power builds, condition builds, and support builds effectively. Not great, I cannot output top tier DPS or healing, but I can hold my own in any content. ANd honestly that's what this thread feels like, a lot of whining that "Look at those people having fun. I hate them!" because they made celestial gear and then forgot about their gear entirely and just went to play the game, frolicking through the battlefield. It reeks of jealously and envy.

Have you tried just seeing better? Get gud. I kid, I kid, hell I can barely see what I'm doing half the time and I can barely read the chat as is (retinal detatchment in one eye, severe astigmatism in the other). I would kill just to be able to make the text bigger. Unfortunately though, I think you're probably SoL on this one. WvW has been begging for years for colorblind options given that the most common form of color blindness is Red/Green colorblindness.....and the three factions in WvW are Blue, Red, and Green. Anet has already shown pretty definitively that they are NOT interested in making the game more accessable.

Reporting this thread for harassment and personal attacks. Leave my Celestial gear alone you big meanie.

I can't believe you're making me argue for this, but why? The way I see it, if any spec, including core, should be all about the boons it should be Chrono. Given that their whole schtick is time control, Chrono should have a massive amount of boons and condition to give, in particular Swift, Super, Alac, Quick, Slow, Daze, and Immobile. There's really no other spec we have that's more in line with being the "support" class that we keep getting told we need than them and they should be able to give lots of boons to support that. And yes, I am aware there are a lot of other boons out there. Full Might and Fury are mainstays of almost any group build, I get that. All I'm trying to say is that Chorons should be good at boons, and should be unparalleled in both speeding up allies and slowing down foes. And the other specs? They do need to shine but they have to shine their own way. They don't need to boon like Chrono because they aren't Chrono. We don't need overlap when we have choice.

There's a lot to unpack there. First off, the Guardian being the golden child. I'm not about to argue with you, I agree with you. But it speaks to a whole different problem. We're talking about balancing the professions but that's not going to even be possible until you get people that want to do it. And those are the people that should be doing it. If you DON'T want to do it, which the current team doesn't seem to want to, those people should be FIRED and replaced, and if the next devs don't do the job they should be fired too. If I get a job at McDonalds and refuse to put cheese on burgers because I think they're better without cheese, I'm getting fired. I'm not doing the job. neither are they. And so we can see a cascade of failures all the way up the chair because the buck stops at the top, but it indicts everyone under them that let the buck get to the top in the first place. If you care about your product, you will do what you need to to keep it going. Such as it is, I think we can only assume that they don't care. Then there's what you said about looking at the why players don't play specific professions or Especs, which I feel like was more or less just repeating what I said, so I'll repeat you repeating what I said, and then you can repeat my repeating of your repitition. Repiception. But tying it back to what I said above, you need people that care, and you need an enviroment where they can take the time to do it. I stated in a previous post that they're most likely using things like Snowcrows because it's the fastest, most efficient way for them to tweak their balance patches, even if it is -completely- wrong. And I'm sure they're doing that because the higher ups are breathing down their neck "Get the next balance patch done by the end of the week or else you're getting written up." Again, a failure all the way up the chain. Even if the devs did care about really balancing the game they doubtfully have the time to do it, and so they probably stop caring and just say "What's the strongest build in the game? Nerf it. Save, publish, close." I don't know anyting about GMs going invislble but I don't think they would need to. There's nothing stopping the devs from hopping on a character and running, I dunno pick something, the Svanir Shaman with all the other players and saying "Hmm, maybe this is a bit too spongey" or running a little WvW and getting ganked, pulling up that players build and saying "Hmm, maybe something here could be tweaked." That takes time though, time I'm sure they're not being afforded. I don't have any good solutions though. Like I said, this is a failure that goes all the way up the chain. We want to hold the devs accountable, but what about their superiors? The lead designers? The heads of the game? The board? I don't know.

Pros: A Chronomancer is never late. He always arrives precisely when he means to. Cons: More or less the same for any other mesmer, really. I don't main Chrono but from my perspective it's not that different from a normal mesmer. I do think it's a little more reliant on shattering than a normal mesmer, so it doesn't really fit the condi builds as well, you know the whole drawn out, death by attrition playstyle. Also, Chrono's get wells. Wells are cool, but they have this big weakness where if you just take one or two steps backwards, you know, out of the well then the well isn't doing anything. Are these game breakers though? Of course not. I have been warming up to my chrono using a shatterstorm build, a scepter, and just all the clone generation I can get my paws on. And I'm at a place where I can almost generate more clones than I can shatter though in longer boss battles I can run out....eventually. It certainly seems better suited to that, whereas the Mirage seems better suited to keeping its clones out and using them to wear down their targets, which core mesmer also does well. So it's a different playstyle which is exactly what it should be. Not better, not worse, just different. Edit: I totally forgot one really big pro. Chronomancers are still the OG Alacrity/Quickness profession. No one does it better. You can't do both at the same time anymore..as far as I know, but with Qlac being THE meta that literally everyone is chasing, it does put the Chrono in the enviable position of leverage over groups that want their boons.

Well, it's not that easy, and I hate that I have to defend Anet here but I do. Back in GW1 we had a VERY limited pool of traits to invest in. Myself being a Me/Mo, my traits as you would know them today were Fast Casting, Illusion, Domination, Inspiration, Healing, Protection, and Smiting. And we had LOTS of skills from all of those and each one was tied into those lines. Your Domination spells were affected only by Domination, your Smiting spells were only affected by Smiting, and so if a skill was overperforming then you could address that skill individually, or if the whole like was underperforming you could adjust at the trait level. Super simple, and GW1 had GREAT balance. GW2 can't do that. The problem is that when you play, say, Mirage, whether it's Power Mirage, Condi Mirage, or AlacHeal Mirage, they all share the same traits even though they're trying to do the same thing. So how can you possibly balance that? It's not an unfortunate side effect that all of our PvE builds are getting nerfed into the ground as they keep balancing off golem benchmarks, it's literally impossible to avoid. So what can we do? Fortunately, the answer there is actually easy: STOP USING BENCHMARKS. No, really, that's IT. Start using other metrics to balance and things will get so much better. And I know because I DO this. I develop games myself, I do my own balancing. It should not be hard to either use or write a program to find out how much everything is used. What weapons are most and least used, what professions are most and least used, what skills are most and least used, and then look into WHY. The problem with that is that takes time and NCSoft/Arenanet are corporations, so time is money. That's why the benchmarks are being used. It's the fastest way to balance the game even though it's balancing the game as well as slapping F1 tires on your pickup truck. Yes, you've managed to change your tire in 1.24 seconds. And now your truck drives like a wreck. Welcome to the current state of GW2.

I believe you, because I think a lot of people see the elite specs that way. And that's not your fault, that was the asinine people at Anet that named it. "Elite" specialization was a kitten poor name because it makes it seem like they should be better. They shouldn't be better. They should be different, but they NEVER should have made the core profession irrelevant. Since I'm a mesmer I'll use mesmer as the example. We have Core, Chronomancer, Mirage, and Virtuoso. Given that Weapon Mastery has rendered weapon choice largely irrelevant as well I won't comment on that, but let's take a look at what's unique to each spec taken more or less verbatim from the wiki: Mesmer: Illusions, both in the form of Phantasms and Clones, the latter of which can be shattered for great effect. Mesmers also have immdiate access to Glamors, Manipulations, Mantras, and Signets Chronomancer: Gain a new set of shatters that either hit multiple times or affect the flow of time. They gain access to wells which let them alter pockets of the battlefield and traits that let them affect time on their foes, their friends, their illusions, and themselves. Mirage: Become intangible with the Mirage Cloak, making you as untouchable as a desert haze and graning you the ability to retaliate against your foes with vicious ambushes. Use Deception skills to confuse your enemies, outflank them, and simply be as elusive as the oasis on the horizon. Virtuoso: The walking hair trigger, always ready to go off. Eschewing clones for blades held always at the ready, they use their mental Psionics to cut down everything in front of them, behind them, or just everywhere at once. Death by a thousand cuts. I want you to note though that nowhere in there does it say that any of these really care about the other. They're not in competition. They're not trying to do the same things. Mesmers are illusionists, Chronos are time gods, Mirages are assassins, and Virtuosos....are weird, but that's not the point. The point is that there's no heirarchy here or at least there shouldn't be. Your choice of what you want to play should NEVER be determined by benchmarks. It should be solely down to WHAT do you want to do. Unfortunately, that would be an ideal world. What you said about Anet wanting to make more money is true and that's true of every company. Power Creep is literally and deliberately a function of them wanting to always up the ante to draw in more players with absolutely zero regard for the players that are already here or the long term stability of their product. It is short term gains for long term losses, but it doesn't have to be that way. If we had a balance team that cared more about the game, and actually played the game instead of watching videos or reading forums about Snowcrows then you'd have a lot more flexibility in what you wanted to do with your character without having to worry about how badly you're kneecapping yourself through your choice of, or abstinence from, your Espec.

Look all we want is consistency. If you're going to ruin 3 out of 4 specs, just do the last one already. It's the waiting we can't stand.

And yet you're wrong because THAT is the core arguement every time changes for the Mirage come up. I never said they were the best at it. I never said they were even good at it, because I don't play it and I don't want to play it. But I'm here. I read. I remember. And the complaint that keeps coming bck over and over and over again like syphallis is "MiRaGe NeEdS mOrE aLaCrItY". Why? Raids. Fractals. Strikes. Literally ONLY the game modes that demand that you maintain every boon all the time so they can scratch out the absolute top tier of damage and the DPS players demand that you provide them with the boons they need so they can do their top damage. And the rest of the game needs to be run through the grinder to cater to that. Which I shouldn't need to explain given the conversation here particularly around snowcrows which I'm now convinced may be the worst thing to happen to Guild Wars 2 period given that it appears that's the benchmark we're using for balance rather than the actual game and what actual players are doing. The Mirage has an identity, it doesn't need one. But right now the Mirage is in the position of telling it's dad "I just want to dance!" and the father is slapping it across the face and signing it up for the army. I already explained what the MIrage does that no one else in the game can do. Mirage Cloak and Clone Retargetting. Lean into that! We should have more traits that give Vigor. More Vigor > More Endurance > More Mirage Cloak > More Ambush. It's so obvious that Stevie Wonder wouldn't trip over that. And Clone Retargetting should be easier, or reworked so that maybe our clones just stay out instead of needed to be retargetted at all, falling into the theme with the whole desert mirage thing. Mirages aren't temporary, they remain until you wander into them. That's what the mirage NEEDS right now. Just lean into what it does and make it do it better. ANything else you want to do can come secondary. Still want to run a Power Mirage? Zerk gear, Dueling and Domination. Want Condi instead? Viper with Dueling and Chaos. Support? Chaos or Illusion and Inspiration. But those should work with the primary mechanics of the Mirage, not replace them.

And yet, when the new rifle was released everyone lost their mind over it because mirage couldn't give alacrity with it. "The rifle is a dead weapon if it cannot provide alacrity" they all cried, because every time you turn around that's literally all anyone does with the Mirage, outside of those niche players who play it for fun. I think the biggest problem si that the mirage just sucks at what it does. The mirage has two main selling points: Mirage Cloak and Clone Retargetting. Mirage Cloak gives ambushes, and the ambushes are....trash. I mean, let's be honest, they are. Greatsword is great for tagging, and dagger has some decent spike damage, but that's about it. Staff only gets used for its alacrity and if that went away no one would touch it. Then there's Clone Retargetting. On paper, you should be able to carry all your clones from the time you generate them on your first target all the way through to your last target in a group. On paper. In practice, it's difficult to time at best, and at worst it just doesn't work. The two things mirage needs to do well because they are exclusive to the Mirage and all anyone care about is alacrity on ambush. I think this goes way beyond the nerfs we're being hit with. The Mirage is in desperate need of a retooling to make its primary abilities more spammable and hit harder if it wants to have any hope of having a live outside of Double Tap > 1 > Repeat.

You say that as if you expect to get one. If we're lucky they may drip feed us details on the new weapons before the next drop in February, but don't count on it. They already did that, and ran a beta. They likely figure we've seen as much as we have to, wait for the official release.

Thank you. Thank you for this gift. I'm going to save this, and I'm going to share it, for every person that says that tries to argue that Mirage is not simply a monkey to provide alacrity and dance for the entertainment of everyone else. I will share this with them. Mirage should never have had alacrity. NO ONE else should have ever had alacrity. It should have stayed with Chrono, or better yet, never have existed in this game.

I'm not going to rehash what I've already explained in another thread. There are more travel items that function like lounge passes without being lounge passes. Your arguement is entirely baseless. It can and should be fixed to function as a return to position.

No. Absolutely not. Old Lion's Arch is a snapshot of that place in time. It does not need gliders nor does it need mounts. It needs to stay as it is. The only thing we need to do is fix the Lion's Pride key.

BuT eVeRy PrOfEsSiOn NeEdS a SuPpOrT BuIlD......

Here here, seconded.

I have seen that! Only once, and we were on the recieving end.....it went very poorly for us, total slaughter. But I remember that. I was in awe. I just stood there and let them kill me because, I mean, come on. They earned this. I even tried to replicate it, but since I'm not in a guild, or a discord, I can't coordinate. I know how, I'm just not social enough to. As for the rest of what you said, it's the same arguement I've been having for a long time here, and it's an agree to disagree. You talk about how inflexible it used to be when you were demanded that you must play this build on this profession....and I mean I came here from Guild Wars 1. I remember when you had groups that said LF Trap Ranger, LF Interupt, LF Bonder, and so on and so forth, and if you didn't come with the build they wanted then they'd kick you out. But you also didn't need to go with them in the first place. It's interesting because I've also been talking a lot about the toxicity in Raids and apparently in the T3/T4 Fractals (and presumably Strikes as well, haven't discussed them yet) because you have Fractal/Raid/Strike groups that will tell you exactly what they want, exactly what you need to do and how you need to play or you can hit the pavement. And the funny thing is that most people have turned around and told me that if you get hit with that, find a new group. You don't have to put up with that and there's plenty of other groups you can run with. ANd I say it's funny because that's actually the answer to what you just said. You call it inflexibility and from a certain perspective you're right. But I'd counter with two points. The first point is that I don't see it as inflexibility. I see it as what I can do that NO ONE else can do. You shouldn't be making demands of me to do what I do, you should be BEGGING me to do what I can do, because I am the gatekeeper. You want my alacrity? Seduce m- I mean, convince me. You want 10 man quickness? THen make it worth my while. I'm the one with the boons you want, I will play my way and if you're willing to work with me I can provide it, OR I could just find another group that will let me play my way. Secondly, ironicly, you talk about having all these options but the way I see it at the end of the day it only ends in one of two ways: Either the game gets balanced enough times and adjusted that literally every profession plays the same way with the same skills and the same boons, just different names and colors, OR we just have competing metas. EVERYONE can do Quickness, EVERYONE can do Alacrity, so now we only really care about who does it best, and when that Raid group posts in the LFG they're only going to care about the one profession that does the best at boon uptime and everyone else can be told to switch to that profession or pound sand, and you're right back where you started again except this time instead of being told to bring your own boon build, whatever that may be, now you're being told to play the build AND profession the group demands. Look, I get it. I'm not dense, I'm not stupid, I understand your arguement and I understand my own. I think the only thing everyone agrees on is that where we are right now sucks, whether you believe that the professions need more variety, like you seem to, or you think they're overly homogenized already, like I do. All I can really say is that if we're balancing on the edge right now and have to fall down on one side, I would much rather fall down the side where we all have more exclusive abilities and we can flip all the rude, demanding, dictatorial groups the bird and go find someone else than end up in a game where I can play what I'm told to play or I can be replaced by literally anyone else. At least one of those I still have value as my chosen profession, whereas in the other I am literally just a universal spare part to be slotted or discarded as needed, or rather, unwanted.

I think the amount of money I've thrown into the trading company says otherwise. But believe it or not, when Guild Wars 1 came out that was their tagline selling point: Buy the game, play for free. Forever. So why don't you ask Arenanet/NC Soft if it's not good enough to pay for.

MCs? OH! Mystic Coins. Here I thought we had an excess of rappers. I was just going to throw a large crate of microphones to keep them busy and leave them all unplugged.

I feel ya, I really do. Once upon a time, back in the way before (that is, before the Wizards Vault replaced dailies), you would come across the daily "Do 3 events in [Insert Map Here]". Now in general, this wasn't a problem. Most maps have enemies of a decently high level that you can rock it with other people. But whenever you had a "Do 3 events" in Queensdale, Metrica, Caledon, Wayfarer, or Ashford I always tried to plead with the people on those maps to make sure to share. I'm not even a power player but when your enemies are level 3 they die from my mere presence. As a mesmer I can literally let my clones solo an event and they do ZERO damage. So now you throw in a bunch of level 80 players with siege turtles and now siege skyscales and yeah, it's basically impossible. Now, obviously we have the wizards fault and that daily has been dodo'ed. But the situation hasn't changed. Unfortunately you're right, Anet isn't going to fix this nor can they fix this even if they wanted to. The only solution, and fortunately GW2 has the resources for this, is community. People need to understand that when you're on lower level maps that you don't have to do much for gold level participation. You can dip in, nuke an area with five baddies, and be on your way and you got gold. Not only that, but you leave plenty of the event for other players so they can get gold too. This means that we all have to be a little more selfless, a little more conscientious, and a little more empathetic. And to our credit, we have a communtiy that largely fits that bill. We just need to exercise it a bit more.