Henry.5713

They tank just fine while providing everything they always do when used as a second healer. As in, decent healing, group Quickness, a group damage modifier through the use of Signet Sharing, okeyish pulls and of course group Stability. They are able to swap to Bow of Truth for more healing, Wall of Reflection for easy reflects, Stand Your Ground for squad-wide Stability, Mantra for cleanses and so on depending on the boss your are facing. They may not be the META and be rarely seen as tanks in pugs but some statics use them. Other statics experiment with them from time to time. Think about why Druids or Alacritygades are made to tank in strong groups. Basically, if you are going to have everything (boons and all) covered already and you need to bring certain supports suchs as Druids and Renegades no matter what then you might as well make them tank instead of "wasting" an additional slot on a Chrono. You are able to adjust things slightly if there is anything else you miss. It is a way to min-max the squad damage output. Similar with Firebrands in weaker groups. If you are going to insist on having a second healer then you might as well make this healer tank. There are quite a few runs I have seen where people use a Minstrel Chrono and a Druid and an Alacritygade and then also a Harrier Firebrand as a second healer. The only thing they would really have to cover after losing the Tank Chrono is group Quickness. This can be done by using a cQuickbrand. Or you may even run an offensive Quickness Build on the old Chrono. Either way, you gain quite a bit of additional DPS over having a Minstrel Chrono alongside a Harrier Firebrand. Most likely a good thing with groups which already struggle with staying alive and all that.

I am happy for everyone who enjoys the more recent content or anything along the lines of grinding "special" skills and masteries unique to a specific map and all that. I am happy if they enjoy the story and mostly playing solo. Each their own. Means ANet is doing something right if people enjoy the current content. But there are also a lot of players who do not. Many of them quit for that reason. Personally, the only thing that would be able to keep me interested and active for a while is a lasting refocus on competitive group content such as raids, Fractals and WvW (yes, I know how unlikely that is). This would need to include frequent balance patches, new content, new challenges and possibly some innovations to keep things fresh. And I am not talking about replacing the other more casual content but about having both. Group content provides insane replayability. People continue to play such content for years after there has even been anything new. Something I certainly can't say about any Open World content unless it happens to be the most profitable farming map. Hell, I still log in once a week to raid with friends and I join WvW once in a while to play with people I know. There are a lot of players like me and a lot of players who might return if this happened. Because even the greatest replayability doesn't last forever if you just give up on the content in question.

Such a question would imply that you think content has been getting progressively harder over the years or that the overall population should have improved by now, while in actuality neither has happened.The population was, is and will continue to be rather casual. There are quite a few new or newer players and lots of long-time players who simply aren't able to improve past a certain point. Basically a level that they can't cross or aren't interested in crossing.Content released post 2015 were toned down in difficulty for this very reason. HoT simply ended up frustrating a lot of players. Not to mention that old strategies and information may be forgotten about or entirely lost. Dungeons are a good example of this.

Lost count on how many repeated kills I have done over the years, even with having multiple accounts and all that. It was never about the gold for me but it has always seemed a little strange that even the most profitable content allowed you to farm 24/7 while raids were designed with a long lockout. Adding daily wings and possibly even daily CMs sounds interesting. Players who usually stick to their static might do a quick daily wing once in a while. There are quite a few raiders out there who can't be arsed with gearing multiple accounts as well as those who haven't been able to do so yet. They would certainly be interested but they would also need to LFG with most likely half of their static missing or unwilling to join. Which would lead to a more active LFG and thus allow new raiders to get certain wings done more easily.

Was also reminded of the Dredgion from Aion. Seems unlikely that we'll see anything like that in GW2. A lot of the players have specifically chosen the game because it keeps the modes seperated. They usually either hate PvP and getting ganked with a passion or they couldn't care less about having PvE anywhere near their PvP content.

The use of KPs is a rather mixed bag. They are being used for a reason, a good reason, but some people do go too far at times with their ridiculous requirements.I have spend my fair share of time dealing with "3s" while running training raids. They were even more frustrating to deal with for all of the "2s". But even with how quickly the "2s" improved and with how much I enjoyed watching them grow, I still wouldn't invite them to my statics or any of my groups if all I am looking for are quick and easy runs and for every single person to be reliable. There might even be a short period of time in which veteran players would have to accept playing with unreliable squads and players but that period won't last very long. Let's say there are indeed large numbers of willing new players who are currently held back by the KP system. Quite a few of those players would then enter the raid scene all at once, in which case the veterans are even more likely to put anything in place as a safety net. Curious to see what that anything would be. I remember not being let into dungeon pugs back in the day due to my low AP. Back when I spend all of my time (speed)running dungeons. Situations which amused me even back then. That old "system" actually excluded those who spend the most time in dungeons, the one place that rewarded very little AP (at least back then).As many flaws as there may be with the KP system, it at least isn't terrible enough to exclude the most experienced and most accomplished raiders.

There is more to Snowcrows than just the golem benchmarks and the build window. They have done a good job with their individual build guides. They do indeed mention stuff like heat management. And they do mention the fact that some builds are harder to master than others and how much they rely on knowing the boss phases, interrups, animations and so on. They have said stuff like cSouldbest being beginner friendly and a good alternative for those players who do not want to get into Mirage or cFB for the time being. All of the information is there if you aren't too lazy to look for it. Frankly, the effectiveness of a DPS build greatly depends on the player in question and the squad they are in. Experienced players are usually able to pick up new DPS builds and have good numbers simply because they know the bosses well. It is even easier for them if they are in a static where they may expect similar timings and performances each raid. New players trying to run timing and burst reliant builds in pugs will have FAR more trouble with them even if you are supposed to play said build at some bosses because it is supposed to have the best numbers.

WvW is basically the combination of multiple PvP modes in one. It includes roaming and ganking (both solo or in groups), small skirmishes, organized GvGs, Open Field guilds of different sizes fighting eachother, server blobs, sieging, defending and more. Where would you even begin to balance this mess? Not to mention that different builds shine at different places and different skill levels. And there is no pleasing everyone no matter what you do. Let's say we try to go for a fully balanced WvW. Everyone has a different opinion on what needs to be changed, balanced or removed about WvW. So, which part of the community do we listen to? Do we listen to the solo roamer who wants more mobility after being chased down by blobs or do we listen to the blob players who can't do anything against roamers or gankers without outnumbering them?The mount was such a big controversy for this very reason. Half of the community felt like they aren't being heard, that the content they enjoy no longer has a place in WvW. A little overdramatic of course but they still had a point. ArenaNet needed change quite a few things about the mount to make sure it is even remotely balanced across all forms of WvW content. And people still continue to complain about the mount.

Anyone who has played the game for more than an hour or two should know that there have been EU servers from the very beginning. They are located in Frankfurt. This was obviously done fix latency issues for EU players. They should also know the game well enough to understand why content such as WvW requires multiple well populated servers and for them to be located at the same data center. SE servers would end up being quite underpopulated compared to the other regions. This would completely kill any group content. WvW in particular would either be impossible or be limited to three quite dead servers and an eternal boring matchup. And even if they made it possible (for the sake of an argument) for SE servers to freely connect to EU or NA servers when playing such content, you'd then be facing these very latency issues that made you ask for SE servers in the first place.Plus, most of the veteran SE players wouldn't even be willing to move there if it meant running into low population issues and more importantly no longer being able to play with their friends and or guilds. These new servers would only really work for those few remaining SE players who are mostly or entirely into solo PvE content. Hardly worth the investment on ArenaNet's part.

Personal perceptions about games may vary greatly just like with most things. There is almost always some truth behind any stereotype, including the one about the worst raiders. Having these people act toxic doesn't help. But we can't fix this issue only by telling raiders to act nice in raids. This general perception isn't only created by actual raiders. Many non-raiders have done their best to scare new players away while openly stating to have never even tried our raids themselves. I have had quite a few newbies tell me how surprised they are about the easy going nature of most groups they ran into. They usually expected so much worse from what they heard. Most of this so called knowledge seems to come from quite onesided stories told second-hand. There are some true ones out there but sadly also a ton of over exaggerated nonsense. Yet some individuals seem to have made it their mission to preach them like some gospel. Not to mention those who can't seem to differentiate between group requirements or rules and actual toxicity. On a lighter note, the "most toxic award" would certainly go to the hardcore WvW/GvG community as far as I am concerned. I mean, it is not even close lol.

Miss the periods of some what proper interaction between us and their balancing and design teams. I'd greatly prefer having that back over gaining another figure head to be nice to us and make people feel like they are being heard.

Of course raids will go down the same route as dungeons. This much should be obvious to anyone. ArenaNet decided to forgo further work on new content similarly to how they decided to give up on dungeons in the past. There will be nobody left playing raids other than a bunch of newbies wanting to but ultimately unable to acquire those exclusive rewards, again, just like with dungeons. ArenaNet might eventually give in to the complaints and make those rewards less exclusive or turn raids into some soloable thing. Well, maybe in a few years after raids have fully died. The raiding environment has been changing for a long time now. There are less statics and veterans by the day. People talk about how now we can focus on content for everyone. Who is that "everyone" we are talking about? There is no content that works for everyone.What do the raid veterans move on to? Fractals? Most of them lost interest in Fractals long before they stopped playing raids. Open World or Strikes? Good joke. PvP and WvW? Some might if they play PvP modes, lots of people don't. Most of these players simply quit the game.I am not trying to sound whiny here. Choices need to be made and some players will always be left behind no matter what they do. They probably decided to refocus on more profitable parts of the game. We shall see how things turn out. Short version: No amount of reward changes will ever fix the issues caused by a severe lack of new content in PvE.

Not sure about having a subscriptions these days but I would be willing to pay more or anything at all again (haven't really played or spend money in a while) if I could be sure to decide on where the money goes. But that is not how things work in the real world.You'd be lucky to have your money go towards Guild Wars 2 at all given how ArenaNet is owned by NCSoft. They will always have the last word on bigger investments or financial decisions. They will be sure to move their funds towards new projects such as entering the mobile market in the past which ended up dwarfing all of their other games.

I'm the exact opposite. I've been pretty silent and completely disagree with everything you are trying to put forward in this thread. You say people don't want to post in fear of toxicity but they agree with you..it goes both ways...i'm sure there are some people like myself who aren't posting because there is no use in wading into an argument where you get your arguments and point ignored and are called a toxic apologist for not agreeing with the OP. Agreed. Why would anyone even attempt to argue with people who make it so very obvious how much of a waste of time that would be? Acting this way and then claiming people's silence means consent and argeement is pretty cute, though. Something right out of the despot handbook.

Hard nerfs are fine, great buffs are fine. But using both extremes to fix a single problem is too much. I am talking about harshly nerfing build A while also greatly buffing an already "okeyish" build B to make people use build B more often. Has this ever worked out? It usually led to people completely abandoning build A.

Don't like Firebrands and Renegades? Talk to the people who kept complaining about Chronos and Druids and how much better the game would be if the other two finally saw some play. Oh wait...

I have done my years of pugging in this games. And I have certainly gotten kicked for no apparent reason. As much as some players complain about ArcDPS, things used to be so much worse. People would blame the pug or the guy with the lowest AP, your class or whatever reason they could find back then. Undeserved kicks may be annoying but you are allowed to continue instantly. They can hardly stop you from making your own group or joining another. The griefing that would be made possible if parties could no longer remove members (even for very good reasons) is a different story entirely. A lot of us played during the group-squad merging glitch and I take that experience as a pretty good indiction to what would happen if we outright removed kicking.People should be able to decide and vote on who they want to play with. A single person should be getting overruled by a majority vote. Either that or reintroduce a group leader again like in the old days. Getting rid of any control over your own group seems like a really bad idea to me.

It is time to move on to another game if you are unable to find enough like-minded people to run group content with, especially if this group content is the only thing you enjoy. Removing the very few means avaible to us to ensure we find the few remaining like-minded or equally experienced players will not make us stay, just like it will not make us suddenly enjoy playing the game in a more casual manner.

Builds get nerfed, but the game and it's players won't change. Chronomancers used to be the must-have in Fractals until they got nerfed hard. Then Firebrands took over and will continue to hold this spot until they get nerfed (if people complain enough). After that something else will be the best-in-slot and the cycle continues, etc... Frankly, there will always be a superior build for any given task. And it most likely won't be the build "you like to play". People need to either be open to playing multiple builds and even classes or they need to stop focusing on always wanting to play the best thing avaible if they refuse to play anything but the one build they like. The game is currently a bit of a mess BUT there will never be this true balance no matter what.Those who told you that every class can do everything equally well and at the highest level, unless you misunderstood them, clearly had no idea what they are talking about.

They have had a neutral stance ever since people started selling dungeons. It is unlikely that we will see this change now.

The Tempest only truely shines in WvW. There it does rather well with strong cleanses and a good healing spam uptime. They compete with Scrappers rather than with Firebrands, though. I mean, Firebrands are even more of a must-have in WvW than in PvE but that's different story entirely. What makes Tempests kinda undesirable in PvE, unlike in WvW and not unlike the Scrapper in PvE, is the fact that there is rarely the need to have a build that does powerful healing and strong cleanses only. There might be the odd boss or the weaker group in the need of carrying but pretty much any healing or cleansing requirements can be covered by Druids and Firebrands. Two builds you gonna have anyways and two builds with respectable healing when done right. Druid is kinda a mixed bag as they are only really being used in raids. The way they play does not fit into WvW squads and there are far better options for Fractals these days.People have asked and complained about why Scrappers and Tempests get such easy and strong builds in WvW while Druids continue to be rather inferior there. I guess this goes both ways and we would need to do a lot of rebalancing if we intended to provide all classes with good builds for all roles and especially all game modes. Firebrands certainly are the real must-have over multiple modes these days. Just for the sake of a fun discussion, I would most likely provide Tempests with their own easy Quickness and possibly a group damage modifier in the form of, let's say, Fire Auras. I would add a new Fire trait they would be required to spec into similar to how Firebrands have to face the trade off of speccing into Perfect Inscriptions if they want to share Signets.People would then basically get to pick between a Quickness Healer with stronger (and debatably easier) healing or a Quickness Healer with strong Stab and just an overload of boons. Both builds would have their own unique damage modifiers and their usual other tools.

KPs are hardly the most ideal solution but I prefer having something over having nothing.

All of these pointless currencies should either be removed or go straight to your wallet without exceptions. That part of the change is fine. But then ArenaNet can't be so oblivious to not know about how the currency "was used" by the community and why people kept storing them. Which means they made a conscious decision to remove these KPs. We know a lot of players wanted this to protect new players from being excluded and from some (supposed) toxicity. We shall see how things turn out now. I doubt Fractals will suddenly become more inclusive or any less elitist. And I think people will simply come with something else they can use as a safety net against wasting their time. But maybe I am wrong there. My hopes have been on an in-game "player inspection" window ever since people started asking you to ping your Berserker gear and check your AP in dungeons. But that seems as unlikely as ever.

The combination of Fractal God (plus Dances with Demons) will get you into almost any group just like before. We shall have to wait and see how this develops. The community will come up with some new ways of proving your experience soon, I am sure.

The downed state system adds another layer of complexity, as far as I am concerned at least. You need to know how to play around downed enemies and how to abuse bad players going for disastrous resses. There are instances where you are able to bait even full groups into downing to your cleave. And frankly, I assume they would give in and add additional panic buttons and or defensive auto traits or simply greatly increase base defenses / decrease burst damage if they were to entirely remove the downed state. It is specifically in place to allow for bursty builds as it provides bad players with a chance of recovery from their bad play. Having a few weeks of no downed state doesn't give people enough time to figure out how to fully abuse the situation with new roaming and especially ganking builds. I can only imagine how much people would complain about gankers picking off their entire groups again and again.