Has EoD replaced a main or entered your rotation ?

[Gibson.4036]

6 hours ago, Antycypator.9874 said:

Willbender is much more fun than Firebrand in OW.

Are you running power or condi?

[kharmin.7683]

21 hours ago, Danikat.8537 said:

My main character is a ranger and I've been using untamed most of the time since shortly after EoD came out.

I switch back to soulbeast or druid occasionally, for example the build I use for the Dragon's End meta is actually a soulbeast build, but most of the time I'm using untamed. I really like it, especially the teleport skill, and having more control over the pet skills.

Same here.  We should compare notes sometime.  🙂

[Astralporing.1957]

No. Unfortunately, i just do not like any of the new especs. So, no matter how much advantage over old ones some of them might give, i will not be switching to them.

The only exception to the above is the Virtuoso, which i don't immediately dislike - but so it happens that i play mesmer probably the least.

[Gibson.4036]

1 hour ago, kharmin.7683 said:

Same here.  We should compare notes sometime.  🙂

What untamed build are you finding best for open world?

[kharmin.7683]

8 minutes ago, Gibson.4036 said:

What untamed build are you finding best for open world?

"best" is rather subjective.  🙂   As you're well aware, I'm very casual and don't adhere to standard builds; rather, I find things that I enjoy and thus work for me.  I use sw/d and lb because they fit more thematically for me than other weapon selections.

[&DQQgHh46SDt5AHkApQG7AAEblgGaAJoADxvtAC9AFSgAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=]

[Gibson.4036]

13 minutes ago, kharmin.7683 said:

"best" is rather subjective.  🙂   As you're well aware, I'm very casual and don't adhere to standard builds; rather, I find things that I enjoy and thus work for me.  I use sw/d and lb because they fit more thematically for me than other weapon selections.

[&DQQgHh46SDt5AHkApQG7AAEblgGaAJoADxvtAC9AFSgAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA=]

Maybe "favorite" would have been a better word?

I have the same problem as a casual myself. A lot of "open world" builds seem to really be "solo champions" builds, so I'm always on the lookout for people who have found a good all-rounder kind of build.

I don't need to kill the fastest, but I don't want to fall asleep because it takes forever, either. Don't need to solo every champ, but would like enough survivability that I can miss a dodge and not go down instantly. Need enough cleave to not feel like I have to kill ordinary mobs one by one. I play well enough I don't need "one key LI builds" but not well enough that I'm going to maintain some optimal rotation.

These kinds of middle-road, comfortable builds are harder to find people sharing because there are a lot more builds out there targeted to specific purposes.

Thanks for the link!

[Antycypator.9874]

1 hour ago, Gibson.4036 said:

Are you running power or condi?

Yes.

 

I mean... it's Celestial, super meme build.

[DragonMoon.6098]

Nope. My main character, the one I've played through all story content with, is a Ranger. I've tried seven ways to Sunday to like Untamed. I can't. I tried Power Untamed. I tried Condi Untamed. I tried Hybrid Untamed with Celestial stats. I cannot like that class. It's not that I have problems with dps or survivability. I just hate playing it. Having control over pet skills is nice, but not nice enough for me to want to deal with the class mechanics or fart can visuals. Every time my Norn girl shouts "BREATHE IT IN!!!!" I just picture a giant fart. Like what is she doing, giving a 'dutch oven' to the mobs? I'm sorry, but no. 

I'm back to her Condi Druid build for difficult (solo) content with Sick'Em Soulbeast for farming and most meta events. 

So far the only EoD elite spec that interests me is the Harbinger simply for the aesthetic...but GS Power Reaper will always be my go-to for sustain with dps when it comes to Necro. 

 

Edited May 9, 2022 by DragonMoon.6098

[Bizgurk.5639]

I already got kicked out of raid squads before EoD release for playing Alacrigade. All the nerfs to him and the buffs to other Alacs have made him more and more unpopular. With EoD his damage got nerfed even more, so I abandoned him. I really like his rotation, they way it changed dependent on what ability will be ready during a stance cycle, his CC and his support. I'm swimming with the stream now and play Mech and Mirage. Even though I miss playing my Alacrigade I play both with joy. I'm not into high skill ceiling build, so I can focus on mechanics.

My Renegade has become a Hammer Herald for Wvw, which I enjoy as well.

[Gibson.4036]

30 minutes ago, Antycypator.9874 said:

Yes.

 

I mean... it's Celestial, super meme build.

Ah, thanks.

What is meant when people describe something as a "meme build"?

[ASP.8093]

On 5/8/2022 at 9:22 AM, jaif.3518 said:

Some people have a main class, or main class per game mode (Fractals with X, WvW with Y, etc).  Others have altitis but often fall back on a few core comfort specs.

So, did one of the EoD specs capture you and enter the rotation?  Which one, what game mode?

Clear winners:

• I'm all-in on Specter. I love being able to fill a support slot as thief instead of having to go Rev for it. It also fixes a lot of quirks with the older condi thief builds (namely that half the build was fighting against the side effects of using Pistol/Dagger 3). Getting top DPS on thief feels great. Being able to keep up damage on the target when I'm forced out of melee feels great. Saving my party/subgroup with Consume Shadows feels great. Specter hasn't completely replaced Deadeye and Daredevil for me because their Power builds still feel better in competitive play or open world. I know a lot of thieves have switched to Specter in SPvP but I find the old Daredevil preferable in terms of mobility and in-and-out effectiveness.

Other observations:

• I tried Willbender. It's strong but not how I play Guardian. Firebrand is still PvE support meta so that's fine. Fighting Willbenders is pretty terrifying in SPvP but I don't play enough of that to find it oppressive. Same for Vindicator. It's not how I like to play Rev, it's strong in areas where I don't play Rev, I don't see it replacing Hammer Herald in WvW so I'm politely labeling it "Not For Me;" sometimes an interesting challenge to fight.

• I dusted off my long-neglected Warrior and had a lot of fun doing solo stuff as Bladesworn. But: I don't want to play it in SPvP/WvW or in instanced content with groups. The very thing that's fun about it in open world, the risk-reward balance of perfectly setting up your one big attack to kill, like, a whole pack of enemies, makes it fall off pretty bad as the boss mechanics get more intensive and sustained on-target DPS matters more than AOE or burst.

• I dusted off my moderately-neglected Mesmer to run around as Virtuoso. It's a real nice, simple spec, that gives mesmers something they've been missing — a way to bank all those clones when you're fighting stuff that dies all the time. The big easy AOE utility skills are also quite nice in open world. Not very excited to take it into instances because it's just a less-mesmer-y mesmer when it's time to do boss fights, though. And I'd feel gross making ascended Rampager gear.

Okay, this is just me:

• Oddly enough, the other big winner for me is… Holosmith. That's not an EoD spec! But having Healmech/Alacmech available makes me feel like I can invest resources into an Engineer without fear of finding them obsoleted in group content. Also, I've been able to do pretty well against the Willbender meta as Holo in scrub-tier SPvP.

[ASP.8093]

28 minutes ago, Bizgurk.5639 said:

I already got kicked out of raid squads before EoD release for playing Alacrigade. All the nerfs to him and the buffs to other Alacs have made him more and more unpopular. With EoD his damage got nerfed even more, so I abandoned him. I really like his rotation, they way it changed dependent on what ability will be ready during a stance cycle, his CC and his support. I'm swimming with the stream now and play Mech and Mirage. Even though I miss playing my Alacrigade I play both with joy. I'm not into high skill ceiling build, so I can focus on mechanics.

My Renegade has become a Hammer Herald for Wvw, which I enjoy as well.

For what it's worth, as far as I know, Ritualist stats are a nice damage upgrade over Diviner or Celestial for Alacrigade. (It's just worse than Viper Half-Alacgrigade, which you used to be able to play very effectively before the 5-player/10-player boon nerf.)

[Sindust.7059]

I used to play like this...

Power DPS -Holosmith

Condi DPS - Soulbeast

Alac - Renegade

Quickness - HFB

 

Now I play like this...

Power DPS - Holosmith

Condi DPS - Mechanist or Virtuoso (depending on whether 425 range of my flamethrower is sufficient for what I'm doing)

Alac - Mechanist

Quickness - Scrapper

 

The quickness part has little to do with EoD, I just finally got around to collecting diviner's gear in medium, and I never liked healing, so it was bound to happen. But the rest yeah. Engi was my main before, but now it's the only char I play regularly. 2 years ago when I read some beginner guide to help me pick a class for my first char said that engi was "versatile". Biggest lie I can imagine back then, but now the very reason I picked engi as my first char has become fact and not misinformation.

[Antycypator.9874]

59 minutes ago, Gibson.4036 said:

Ah, thanks.

What is meant when people describe something as a "meme build"?

Probably because it's overkill on self-sustain and tanky. You don't need full Trailblazer's armor to survive in most Open World situations, but some people are running these builds just for fun.

[Gibson.4036]

47 minutes ago, Antycypator.9874 said:

Probably because it's overkill on self-sustain and tanky. You don't need full Trailblazer's armor to survive in most Open World situations, but some people are running these builds just for fun.

Ah, thanks. I've seen the term thrown around, but never quite got what it was meant to say about a build. Equivalent to what used to be described as a "cheese build", sounds like?

[kharmin.7683]

2 hours ago, Gibson.4036 said:

Maybe "favorite" would have been a better word?

I have the same problem as a casual myself. A lot of "open world" builds seem to really be "solo champions" builds, so I'm always on the lookout for people who have found a good all-rounder kind of build.

I don't need to kill the fastest, but I don't want to fall asleep because it takes forever, either. Don't need to solo every champ, but would like enough survivability that I can miss a dodge and not go down instantly. Need enough cleave to not feel like I have to kill ordinary mobs one by one. I play well enough I don't need "one key LI builds" but not well enough that I'm going to maintain some optimal rotation.

These kinds of middle-road, comfortable builds are harder to find people sharing because there are a lot more builds out there targeted to specific purposes.

Thanks for the link!

My pleasure.  I enjoy the synergy with the melee weapons and the tiger pet working in tandem.  Switching untamed around is a fun bonus.  I have F1 and F5 assigned to side-buttons on the mouse which makes it smoother --- for me anyway.

[kettering.6823]

I've been a ranger main for a long time but I have been playing a lot more on my Mechanist since Untamed was such a disappointment (to me). I have encountered my fair share of people in the exact same boat as me lol

I also really, really love Virtuoso but I'm still learning how to play it properly. 

[Gunther Clone C.6742]

Virtuoso made Mesmer actually playable for me, same with Willbender for Guardian.

 

With Virtuoso, I don't have to micromanage and load up clones with every fight, and blades seem to materialize out of nowhere.

Willbender for me over tome anxiety. Props to you heal brands, but me pressing one button to have an effect proc every several hits is way easier for me.

I still play my renegade all the time too, I'll never forget him.

Edited May 10, 2022 by Gunther Clone C.6742
Misspelling/typo

[Zauriel Mooncat.4968]

Well no and yes? My main is thief and still is thief, BUT, the metas on eod (mainly on Dragon's End) work perfectly for me to test my 11 Ritualist and 5 plague doctors set and practice with my specter, honed my rotation with it and I have been getting a lot of confidence thanks to it to the point I tackled the new strikes successfully and now I am wanting to takle Raids, but I still fear people in there and I am not an overly confident person even with 34 LI at hand. 

Edited May 10, 2022 by Zauriel Mooncat.4968

[Donari.5237]

I seem to have settled on Virtuoso for DE meta runs.  It's fun and fast and powerful and doesn't have to be in melee.  I've barely touched Reaper since EoD launch, though part of that is that I use a Reaper to help friends out in HoT/PoF but in EoD I'm still working on the last few elite weapons and a number of achieves, in between which I go fishing (on my nominal main, a Daredevil, because he has my bait collection and that's too much bag space to lose for most of my alts) or do DE meta runs with a regular squad.

I know I like Specter, but as I'm not usually roaming with friends I haven't had a chance to practice support on her.  Mechanist brings me a lot of joy too.  But Virtuoso is the one I'm actually internalizing skill synergies on, which brings it on par with Daredevil, Reaper, and Chronomancer as far as my effective use of the profession goes.

[Vayne.8563]

My goto class for both open world and harder content has moved from mesmer to mechanist. It's a much easier rotation for my bad shoulder.

[Rysdude.3824]

Untamed just doesn't compete with Soulbeast or Druid.  I continue to use Soulbeast for Open World and Druid for roaming.

[Tukaram.8256]

No, but e-specs have never really attracted me.  My main 2 avatars are a core necro minion master/staff and a core ranger with pet/longbow.  I have tried any of the EoD e-specs, and not sure if I will bother. 

[IndigoSundown.5419]

Yes and no.

 

I enjoy Willbender and Virtuoso for open world stuff.

 

However, in WvW I run two Guardian builds while commanding, a very easy to play damage/support core build or a Support Firebrand.  In Strikes, I'm still playing a Tempest Shout Healer.  Not to say I won't replace these builds at some point, but I'm going to  have to work into something new to where muscle memory makes actions second nature, and I'm far from that now as I don't play all that much.

[Rivindor.7258]

Bladesworn is really fun seeing the big numbers and gets the job done in open world.