Dawnbreaker.4901

I didn't make a legendary weapon until maybe seven years into the game's lifetime. I made Bifrost because I wanted to. Someone else having it doesn't devalue my achievement. You've always had the option to buy the Gen 1 legendaries from Day One, anyways. I don't care how anyone acquires their legendary items - It's all worthless pixels in the end.

Having options is nice. I'm going to have to look at the traits as they are now and compare them to the update changes so I can prepare my Mirage setup ahead of time. I play a Dual Staff Mirage 98% of the time. I like the playstyle - If I can build a solo build and a group build that I like, then most of these changes shouldn't be a problem. I play Open World and Story content and that's about it, and I can play just about anything and be fine. I'm not a cutting edge player by any means. Maybe I'll like these changes.

This thread reminds me that I have to get the Etherbound Rifle skin unlocked before I forget again. I joked that Mesmer Hammer would be very funny, but since we're getting Rifle, I'm kinda hoping that we'll use the butt-end of the rifle more.

The amount of times I've heard "I don't know what this is, I don't know this does" is reason enough to tell players not to boost. I've played with people that don't know what combo fields or finishers are. I've played with people that don't know how to use their basic class mechanics - Necromancer's Shroud, Elementalist's Attunements, etc. Some of them don't even know how to Dodge. Reading tooltips for abilities is the absolute bare minimum players should be doing, and they don't even do that. "I want the cool dragon mount!" - Get out of the fire, first.

I'm better off playing another game. I have nothing polite to say beyond anything that's already been mentioned.

I'm not a "pro" at the game by any means - I tend to deal with buffs and nerfs as they happen. Dual Staff Mirage is pretty much all I play on my Mesmer. If the changes for Mirage pan out to be horrible, I'm probably not going to be playing it much, if at all. Alacrity application was bugged for nearly a month when the major changes to Staff were introduced a year or two ago - I didn't play the game at all during that time. The Confusion change could be good or bad. Probably bad. "Mirage can longer dodge while Immobilized" - That sucks. It's probably the worst change of the lot. "Chaos Vortex: Reduced clone bleeding and torment duration from 8 seconds to 4 seconds." - This, on top of the Confusion changes means it will probably be bad. For Open World PvE, you're probably fine. Open World PvE/Story content is generally pretty easy. If you're going to be doing instanced content, such as Fractals, you might want to prepare yourself, or plan on playing Alacrity Mirage instead of the Condi If these changes end up absolutely sucking, there's a ton of other classes to play. Unfortunately for me, I don't care about a majority of those classes. While I really only focus on Open World PvE content, these changes might make the Mirage considerably less fun - I value fun more than anything else. I won't know until the patch goes live. I've been enjoying my Tempest lately, but overall, the game has been less and less fun as time has gone on. I have little faith in the current Balance team to do anything worthwhile. I'm more on the side of "doom and gloom", than say, "sunshine and rainbows".

Two of the six characters I play the most are Mirage and Deadeye. I also have a Tempest. My Necromancer, Guardian, and Engineer all run Core builds because I don't find those Elite specs particularly fun. If I ever get around to leveling a Revenant, I might like Vindicator. I have little desire to play Ranger or Warrior.

I forced myself to "git gud" with the Elementalist. I practiced a lot and I'm happy I did because it's one of my favorite characters to play with, especially in a group setting. I don't play it as much in a solo setting, but I manage well enough. . The visuals and general vibe of the Elementalist always clicked with me, but I struggled for a long time to grasp the concepts of the profession. I actually stopped playing mine for a long time after I got to 80 and struggled to survive, but I largely understood that it was "me" and not necessarily the profession - Yes, Elementalist suffers in some areas, but it's more about being proactive rather than reactive. I found Staff to be far too slow for solo play. I didn't enjoy playing Dagger in either hand. Scepter wasn't appealing to me for the longest time until a more recent update made several skills cleave onto enemies - Though there are some issues I don't like with it, such as not being able to target allies with Water Trident. I eventually found that Tempest was the easiest for my ability level. Despite melee being a requirement for the Overload skills, I find I'm able to play at mid-range well enough. I began reacclimating myself to the profession by sticking to Air Attunement on it's own. I slotted some of the Arcane skills to buoy my lack of familiarity with the specialization. Eventually I eased myself into using two elements - Air and Water. Air is my primary damage Attunement playing "Fresh Air Tempest". I swap to Water when I need healing or condi cleanse and then swap back to Air. Eventually I started to weave in Fire and Earth as necessary, but I find myself ignoring Earth a lot of the time because I forget about it, despite it having some nice anti-melee and CC skills and other defensive options as well. This is the build I generally stick to, I swap traits and utility skills depending on my needs and who I'm playing with - My friends are of varying skill levels and ability, and your mileage may vary. https://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Tempest_-_Fresh_Air

I don't get enough sleep.

If you want the cool dragon, go get the cool dragon.

I played a Core build on my Necromancer for nine years before Harbinger was introduced. I'm considering going back to that build since, while, I don't hate Harbinger, I'm not really playing the specialization well and find myself making mistakes with it. I don't enjoy playing the Reaper or Scourge specializations either. I feel similarly with many of the other classes' elite specialization options. Mirage is probably the elite specialization I enjoy playing the most, with Core Mesmer being one of the more unfun/annoying classes to play.

Elementalist is one that I always struggle with despite having around 700 hours or so clocked on it. Fresh Air Tempest is probably the easiest to play so far, but it's kind of dull as I'm essentially camping in Air 99% of the time. It's one of the characters I play when I'm doing group content or helping new players in the Open World. It's the class I play to force myself to get better at. Mesmer is easily the class I have the best time on, though I strongly dislike the Core class gameplay. I am very used to the Mirage gameplay; So much that I find myself instinctively trying to Mirage Cloak on my level 30-something Mesmer.

I spend most of my time playing this game forgetting Kasmeer even exists. Conversely, I wish Marjory had a stronger presence in the game overall.

Mirage has been my most played character since the end of 2018. Behind that is my Necromancer and it trails off exponentially from there. Guardian was my main character throughout Core. I took an extended break during Heart of Thorns, returning to the game about mid-way through Path of Fire. I made an Elementalist at that point, but have never been good at it and the amount of struggling was enough for me to stop playing her entirely before I picked up the aforementioned Mirage. The Mirage was a clean slate character. I haven't played Chronomancer or Virtuoso for a particularly noticeable amount of time. I picked up the Mesmer because it was a combination of a Subtlety Rogue and an Arcane Mage (Two classes I favored heavily in World of Warcraft). Mesmer was something I enjoyed playing in the original Guild Wars and I tried Mesmer at the beginning of GW2's lifetime, but I couldn't get into the Core gameplay - Shatter builds weren't all that fun and I didn't really understand Mesmer's clone/phantasm mechanics back then. Mirage is really what got me to stick around. If it wasn't for Mirage, I probably wouldn't have experienced what the entire game has to offer - I still need to complete End of Dragons. I only just finished Icebrood Saga a few months ago when I was playing actively. My Necromancer remained with a Core build for eight years until Harbinger was introduced with End of Dragons. I did not enjoy playing Reaper or Scourge. I don't chase the Meta and I don't care to play popular classes otherwise. I have played on and off since Day 1 of Headstart Launch and Ranger is the class I've played the least. I have roughly 7,000 hours total played time with nearly 2,200 of those hours being dedicated to playing Guardian in the pre-HoT days. 7,000 hours may not be very impressive and I've played the game less and less as the years went on. I won't go into specifics, but generally speaking, my enjoyment of the game has waxed and waned since HoT release. I'll probably end up poking my head in again when the 10th Anniversary events commence, but I have little intention of sticking around for very long. As long as Mirage doesn't see too many hefty, dissatisfying balance changes, I'll continue to play the game until I'm sick of it and don't ever want to log in again.

I play at a casual level in Story and Open World content. I don't really do anything else. Harbinger is exactly the specialization I had been looking for on my Necromancer and it's the first time in eight or nine years I've switched her away from Core Necro. Virtuoso and Mechanist are alright for what they are. I may unlock Catalyst and Willbender eventually. I have little to no interest in the others.