First impressions from a new player

[Percept.8503]

I played pvp about a decade ago when the game first came out, but dropped it due to rl stuff. Decided to take a break from wow pvp and check out gw2 and here are some thoughts as a brand new pvp player. This is from the perspective of a core thief, which from what I can tell is pretty bad and made even worse as an inexperienced player, but I just love sneaky classes.

 

1. Lot of spell effects. I know this ties into understanding what classes do what, but there are so many red circles and from what I can tell, just random things happening nonstop all the time that I'm never actually sure what needs to be 100% avoided or what can be traded into. I thought wow had bad spell feedback but this game is without a doubt significantly worse in that regard.

2. No class colored nameplates. Maybe it's an option that I missed, but I generally have no idea what I'm fighting against.

3. Lack of explanation of game mechanics. Some people in chat were nice enough to tell me that evade makes it so you're immune to all attacks except for unblockables. Still not sure if it's a 360 degree around your character or just from your front. Also not exactly sure what the dodge roll does. I assume it provides immunity frames but not sure if it lasts for just the duration of the roll or what.

4. Hyper mobility? I find it really hard to stick to any classes that doesn't want me to stick to them lol. I was fighting I think a gun thief and I think they were as bad as me because it went on for about 20 seconds or so of constant dodging and using gap creators and closers. Was fun tbh, just wasn't ever sure when the mobility would stop cause everytime I got on top of them, I would have like 1-2 globals before they poofed away lol.

5. Character models are tiny. That's the only way for me to really describe it, it feels like small character models make reading animations really kitten hard. Kinda ties into #1 with tons of visual noise.

6. What's the deal with flanking strike? I swear I press it and my character just yeets himself into a random direction as far from the enemy as possible.

7. Apparently if you teleport while inside the pvp hub right before you get a q pop you get a infinite loading screen and if you alt f4 and restart the game you get the deserter penalty lol. This is actually really kittening tilting

8. Newer players really need to be able to queue with only newer players. There isn't an actual environment to learn the game so you have to just do unranked and getting kitten on by players that know how to play the game is not fun.

 

Some things I think are pretty cool so far tho.

 

1. Not a ton of cc, from what I can tell. At least in wow, you can suffer from extreme amounts of cc preventing you from playing the game. So far in this game, I've been I think rooted and blown up, which is honestly preferable to being stuck in cc for 10+ seconds lol.

2. Maps seem good. Pretty simple stuff and the small minimap at the bottom right allows me to understand who is where and where I should be going. I love the maps and minimap so far.

3. I love how my character looks. Shirtless gigachad with a sword and dagger. Cool as hell

 

I'm honestly not sure if imma stick with it. I thought it would be easier to get into this game but I just have no idea what's going on half the time and it makes for a pretty confusing and frustrating experience. It seems like a pretty exhaustive barrier of entry to not be able to, at least from my perspective, learn what every class does simply by playing the game, cause I'm not sure what I'm fighting against and the animations just feel off and hard to read.

 

Seems like a pretty fun pvp experience if you're able to learn what all the classes and different builds do though. Also seems like a colossal amount of effort has to be put in to even reach the absolute minimum knowledge to understand what's going on, from a class knowledge perspective, as well as abilities particle effects.

 

Edit: So after playing some more I'm actually really starting to enjoy this game's pvp. Is still have no idea what's going on half the time, but if lots of aoe is dropping or some dude even looks like they popped a cd I just run and kite. Seems to be working out pretty well. Also I just got crit by true shot for 10k. Idk what's up with that but it's seems very not cash money

Edited February 18, 2023 by Percept.8503

[Kstyle.5829]

If you're used to playing wow you will have a lot to get used to. Wow has mitigation in PvP by default, this game does not. All characters have similar hp in that game. Some classes in this game have almost a third of the health of others with certain builds.  On a thief you die extremely quickly. 

 

Playing like wow doesn't work in this game past understanding the controls (you have to keybind everything clicking is not acceptable whatsoever). There's NO global cool down or macros just the cast time for skills. You can use instant casts during casted spells as many as you want. Sometimes pressing 5 buttons in a split second.  It's more like a fighting game .  You have to physically swing your melee weapon and connect with your oponnent. Theres no rng dodges and blocks. There's no macro game awareness like wow where you chain cc and use defensives for their cooldowns. It's mechanical skill and pressing buttons quickly, predicting and reacting to individual attacks.  There are strategies beyond that but its mostly just map awareness and when to run away from fights or engage. 

 

As a theif in this game you literally can die in one hit. You're playing an extremely unforgiving class and easily one of the hardest and most technical in the game. And you aren't sneaky because stealth only lasts a couple seconds in this game.  The only way to survive is know all moved in game and predict and dodge them. You have like 13 to 15k hp where other classes have around 30k and Necro is like 50k plus with shroud. Most classes can one shot you so you can't trade at all. 

 

Pvp does have problems but the things you mentioned are more of L2P issue.  On theif you never should be dueling people you mostly run around decapping bases and 2v1 fights. You have great mobility by dodging for swiftness, shortbow teleport, and dagger/pistol attack number 3. 

 

Unfortunately like any old and dying game the PvP community left here are mostly old players who have ten years of experience behind their back. It's not easy to get into as a new player. I played wow for ten years and was a top arena player and still sucked at this game bc of the faster pace. It is an amazing game just extremely hard to play. It's sad that a lot of games die for that reason..

 

I recommend you try some tankier duelist classes that are more forgiving.  Necro guardian and warrior are considered easiest and have good sustain. The things that can trade best will be high hp condition damage duelists or bruisers with armor.  There is really no sneaking in this game. But if you want a class that actually does big damage and can teleport around and run fast maybe try willbender.  Its easier than thief but it's actually a dps class that can kill people and top charts.

 

Thief in this game doesn't assassinate people, it's an annoying playmaker that steals bases, runs away, helps stomp people after they are downed and revive teamates with stealth. It's a great class but the damage is low overall. You also cant train people and do rotations on them like a rogue. It's mostly hit one time maybe a couple auto attacks, then dodge away when you see them swing at you. Then try to stealth and backstab them again.    If you don't have expansion still go shadow art trickery acrobatics d/p because sword dagger is not good in this meta, especially on a free to play build (most free builds are not as viable) Overall thief is really good and was my main for years it's just a niche role and requires a higher skill floor. Feel free to send me mail to this name and add me on friendlist  and I'll help you in game learn the ropes next time I get on.

 

 

 

Edited February 18, 2023 by Kstyle.5829

[Percept.8503]

kitten man yea idk then lol. I honestly do feel the uber squish that you're talking about and I def don't feel like I do enough burst at all. I went into the ffa arena that I learned about and fully expected to get kitten on but holy hell I did not expect it to be so bad lol. Even against what I'm pretty sure are spellcasters and with full uptime doing my combos their health bar just isn't moving lol. Meanwhile I'm getting shredded by dots and dd spells.

 

I love thief-like classes so idk if I'm gonna try anything else out, but hot kitten I know I suck, but I'm not an absolute ape when it comes to doing damage. Just feels like I'm not doing much. I will say I've had good success fighting I think engs, as I feel like they have no sustain like a thief so the damage I do sticks.

 

I really don't like how many classes have access to stealth though and I really don't like how I've experienced casters just dpsing me at point blank and winning trades. Just kinda confuses me quite a bit. I know I have no reference point for this game, but idk some stuff just seems off from an intuitive perspective.

Def most of the stuff I listed is a l2p issue but not sure if I wanna even learn lmao.

[Kstyle.5829]

51 minutes ago, Percept.8503 said:

kitten man yea idk then lol. I honestly do feel the uber squish that you're talking about and I def don't feel like I do enough burst at all. I went into the ffa arena that I learned about and fully expected to get kitten on but holy hell I did not expect it to be so bad lol. Even against what I'm pretty sure are spellcasters and with full uptime doing my combos their health bar just isn't moving lol. Meanwhile I'm getting shredded by dots and dd spells.

 

I love thief-like classes so idk if I'm gonna try anything else out, but hot kitten I know I suck, but I'm not an absolute ape when it comes to doing damage. Just feels like I'm not doing much. I will say I've had good success fighting I think engs, as I feel like they have no sustain like a thief so the damage I do sticks.

 

I really don't like how many classes have access to stealth though and I really don't like how I've experienced casters just dpsing me at point blank and winning trades. Just kinda confuses me quite a bit. I know I have no reference point for this game, but idk some stuff just seems off from an intuitive perspective.

Def most of the stuff I listed is a l2p issue but not sure if I wanna even learn lmao.

Well it's not a class for dueling like I said. the class roles in the game are dps, roamer, duelist, bunker. Duelists have a lot more healing. You aren't going to duel ppl on thief and win it's just not designed to kill players like that.  You mostly decap bases and finish off low hp targets and stomp them.  It doesnt have enough damage or sustain to win fights on its own.  Everyone in that duel arena is playing duelists classes. 

 

It's not like wow in this game you can pvp at lvl 2 so may as well try a bunch of classes and see what you. It's not like a rogue who is king of 1v1. Thief is probably the worst 1v1 class in the game. Definitely one of them.

There other thief like classes more similar to rogue pvp would be revenant or willbender. They are ninja classes that dual wield swords and teleport around. Rev is pretty hard like thief but willbender is easy.  Those classes are designed to deal high damage. Like at end of game on theif you should have top points for offense but only 150k damage maybe and couple kills. On willbender like 400k dmg and 15 - 20 kills.  Thief is for stealing bases and ganging up on ppl. If someone try to duel you a good thief runs away.

 

If your goal is hypermobile ninja burst melee glass cannon assassin and you want to just run around killing players you want to play a dps class like willbend or rev or holosmith. On theif your goal is to avoid combat unless it's a 2 or 3 on one in your favor. If anyone tried to fight you fair you run away. Take the bases where no players are that's how you carry games 

Edited February 18, 2023 by Kstyle.5829

[Kstyle.5829]

9 minutes ago, Kstyle.5829 said:

 

 

Stupid phone made me double post

Edited February 18, 2023 by Kstyle.5829

[Percept.8503]

51 minutes ago, Kstyle.5829 said:

Well it's not a class for dueling like I said. the class roles in the game are dps, roamer, duelist, bunker. Duelists have a lot more healing. You aren't going to duel ppl on thief and win it's just not designed to kill players like that.  You mostly decap bases and finish off low hp targets and stomp them.  It doesnt have enough damage or sustain to win fights on its own.  Everyone in that duel arena is playing duelists classes. 

 

It's not like wow in this game you can pvp at lvl 2 so may as well try a bunch of classes and see what you. It's not like a rogue who is king of 1v1. Thief is probably the worst 1v1 class in the game. Definitely one of them.

There other thief like classes more similar to rogue pvp would be revenant or willbender. They are ninja classes that dual wield swords and teleport around. Rev is pretty hard like thief but willbender is easy.  Those classes are designed to deal high damage. Like at end of game on theif you should have top points for offense but only 150k damage maybe and couple kills. On willbender like 400k dmg and 15 - 20 kills.  Thief is for stealing bases and ganging up on ppl. If someone try to duel you a good thief runs away.

 

If your goal is hypermobile ninja burst melee glass cannon assassin and you want to just run around killing players you want to play a dps class like willbend or rev or holosmith. On theif your goal is to avoid combat unless it's a 2 or 3 on one in your favor. If anyone tried to fight you fair you run away. Take the bases where no players are that's how you carry games 

 

I appreciate your response. It's a huge bummer that thief is basically relegated to being a base kitten. Seems kinda pointless to have one considering all the mobility other classes seem to have, on top of being more notable in fights.

[Percept.8503]

Seems like the two you recommend are behind paywalls. Bummer

[Kstyle.5829]

It's very useful though. You can teleport with short bow and use dodge to get swiftness. It a lot of mobility. It just is a big brain IQ playmaker not a cc god burst assassin like wow lol.

 

If you like windwalker or assassination rogue you'll like will bender. It uses dual swords, all 3 virtues teleport, sword 2 and 5 both teleport to target. So you can just sit on targets and do your dps rotation more similar to wow pvp

 

 

 

[Kstyle.5829]

7 minutes ago, Percept.8503 said:

Seems like the two you recommend are behind paywalls. Bummer

Well yeah but if you don't have any expansion you're at a big disadvantage in pvp tbh. There are 3 elite specs and I think like 6 traitline in total or something. And you take 3 lines so if you're taking the 3 best statistically it's always gonna be an expansion one.  It's not like that on purpose it's just a low chance that the three best specs would be ONLY free lines lol 

 

 The only free meta build right now is core necromancer which is like affliction warlock .  Burn guardian, core ranger and hammer gs warrior are alright too but most fre builds are downgrades of pay to use specs. The only really strong free one now is core Necro imo which is probably only free build better than it's expansion counterparts.

 

Good news is it's not like wow where you need every expansion to progress. Even endgame pve all expansions ascended gear is the same level its more of different options than upgrades but all of them better than nothing 

Edited February 18, 2023 by Kstyle.5829

[Kstyle.5829]

The website you should use for builds is guildjen.  The strongest free build is actually a healer called core shout guardian. But if you go in that site look up core cobdition necromancer it's one of best builds in pvp right now.  You could also try core marksmanship ranger. Those two are very easy to play. Necro just better right now. Once you get some practice you can try the d/p daredevil replacing daredevil with acrobatics and it's not too bad. But I would get hang of game on easier class so you dont ragequit lol. I play all the classes it helps me play theif more

 

Eventually the kinds melee assassin you want to play if you enjoy the game is probably willbender or revenant dual sword dps builds

Edited February 18, 2023 by Kstyle.5829

[Percept.8503]

Once again dude, I really appreciate you offering all this info. I pretty much hate anything caster related lol. I tend to only play and enjoy melee dual wield, which makes my situation a bit troublesome

[Kstyle.5829]

1 minute ago, Percept.8503 said:

Once again dude, I really appreciate you offering all this info. I pretty much hate anything caster related lol. I tend to only play and enjoy melee dual wield, which makes my situation a bit troublesome

Yeah not really a lot of free builds with that option right now. Willbender and rev both dual ninja dps and soulbeast is dual dagger DPS but need expansion.  Also is a dual axe berserker class that's pretty strong.  Thief only really good weapons right now is dagger pistol on daredevil trust me I usd to love sword pistol sword dagger daredevil and it's trash probably even worse on free more but you have a couple options otherwise get expansion and have a lot more. 

 

[Eddie.9143]

11 hours ago, Percept.8503 said:

I played pvp about a decade ago when the game first came out, but dropped it due to rl stuff. Decided to take a break from wow pvp and check out gw2 and here are some thoughts as a brand new pvp player. This is from the perspective of a core thief, which from what I can tell is pretty bad and made even worse as an inexperienced player, but I just love sneaky classes.

 

1. Lot of spell effects. I know this ties into understanding what classes do what, but there are so many red circles and from what I can tell, just random things happening nonstop all the time that I'm never actually sure what needs to be 100% avoided or what can be traded into. I thought wow had bad spell feedback but this game is without a doubt significantly worse in that regard.

2. No class colored nameplates. Maybe it's an option that I missed, but I generally have no idea what I'm fighting against.

3. Lack of explanation of game mechanics. Some people in chat were nice enough to tell me that evade makes it so you're immune to all attacks except for unblockables. Still not sure if it's a 360 degree around your character or just from your front. Also not exactly sure what the dodge roll does. I assume it provides immunity frames but not sure if it lasts for just the duration of the roll or what.

4. Hyper mobility? I find it really hard to stick to any classes that doesn't want me to stick to them lol. I was fighting I think a gun thief and I think they were as bad as me because it went on for about 20 seconds or so of constant dodging and using gap creators and closers. Was fun tbh, just wasn't ever sure when the mobility would stop cause everytime I got on top of them, I would have like 1-2 globals before they poofed away lol.

5. Character models are tiny. That's the only way for me to really describe it, it feels like small character models make reading animations really kitten hard. Kinda ties into #1 with tons of visual noise.

6. What's the deal with flanking strike? I swear I press it and my character just yeets himself into a random direction as far from the enemy as possible.

7. Apparently if you teleport while inside the pvp hub right before you get a q pop you get a infinite loading screen and if you alt f4 and restart the game you get the deserter penalty lol. This is actually really kittening tilting

8. Newer players really need to be able to queue with only newer players. There isn't an actual environment to learn the game so you have to just do unranked and getting kitten on by players that know how to play the game is not fun.

 

Some things I think are pretty cool so far tho.

 

1. Not a ton of cc, from what I can tell. At least in wow, you can suffer from extreme amounts of cc preventing you from playing the game. So far in this game, I've been I think rooted and blown up, which is honestly preferable to being stuck in cc for 10+ seconds lol.

2. Maps seem good. Pretty simple stuff and the small minimap at the bottom right allows me to understand who is where and where I should be going. I love the maps and minimap so far.

3. I love how my character looks. Shirtless gigachad with a sword and dagger. Cool as hell

 

I'm honestly not sure if imma stick with it. I thought it would be easier to get into this game but I just have no idea what's going on half the time and it makes for a pretty confusing and frustrating experience. It seems like a pretty exhaustive barrier of entry to not be able to, at least from my perspective, learn what every class does simply by playing the game, cause I'm not sure what I'm fighting against and the animations just feel off and hard to read.

 

Seems like a pretty fun pvp experience if you're able to learn what all the classes and different builds do though. Also seems like a colossal amount of effort has to be put in to even reach the absolute minimum knowledge to understand what's going on, from a class knowledge perspective, as well as abilities particle effects.

 

Edit: So after playing some more I'm actually really starting to enjoy this game's pvp. Is still have no idea what's going on half the time, but if lots of aoe is dropping or some dude even looks like they popped a cd I just run and kite. Seems to be working out pretty well. Also I just got crit by true shot for 10k. Idk what's up with that but it's seems very not cash money

You'll learn that the most important thing in this game is running away, staying alive is #1 priority 

[Kstyle.5829]

5 hours ago, Eddie.9143 said:

You'll learn that the most important thing in this game is running away, staying alive is #1 priority 

Yeah in wow you can just sit on a target and do your dps rotation and it takes like 20 to 30 seconds to kill someone..  So you have alot of time to think and react and game knowledge is based on who's casting  8 second long CC's and positioning.  This game you literally die in 1 hit as a thief. So your awareness is just when to go into a fight or run away from one. 

 

A thief is +1 class meaning you should join fights where you outnumber them, and run away from fights that you're outnumbered or 1v1s.  In fights with like 4v3 use your shortbow 99% of the time.  If its 2 on 1  backstab them and then dodge immediately and try to restealth and do that over and over.  If someone is low you can do daggerpistol3 finish them off and then then black powder on top of dead targets to stomp them and they cant interrupt you.  You never want to take any damage really.  If someone notices you and tries to attack you then you dodge and run away.  You don't ever trade damage

[Percept.8503]

4 hours ago, Kstyle.5829 said:

Yeah in wow you can just sit on a target and do your dps rotation and it takes like 20 to 30 seconds to kill someone..  So you have alot of time to think and react and game knowledge is based on who's casting  8 second long CC's and positioning.  This game you literally die in 1 hit as a thief. So your awareness is just when to go into a fight or run away from one. 

 

A thief is +1 class meaning you should join fights where you outnumber them, and run away from fights that you're outnumbered or 1v1s.  In fights with like 4v3 use your shortbow 99% of the time.  If its 2 on 1  backstab them and then dodge immediately and try to restealth and do that over and over.  If someone is low you can do daggerpistol3 finish them off and then then black powder on top of dead targets to stomp them and they cant interrupt you.  You never want to take any damage really.  If someone notices you and tries to attack you then you dodge and run away.  You don't ever trade damage

Ok this is really great info. I've been wondering how often I should be using my bow, so I'll try to use it a lot more now. My main problem is I know that I'm mostly a node cap kitten, but sometimes I'll get to a node and someone will be there so I just kinda go u.u

 

[Percept.8503]

I think I'm just gonna play something else. All the compounding issues I'm having coupled with basically an ignored and dead pvp scene makes this game not seem worth to get into

 

The final thing is is using the movement speed signet with dodge swiftness and having other classes catch up to me with W lol. Then one shotting me haha

 

Honestly really cool though that you can pvp right from the start and don't have to grind for tons of hours to get to this point lol

Edited February 19, 2023 by Percept.8503

[Hologram.2810]

Yea, I'm not a fan of how often there are one shot kills in this game. 😕 It was a stupid idea to put so often in the game, imo.