Firebeard.1746

> @"mindcircus.1506" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > The whole premise of this thread is someone defending their ridiculous lfgs and you're telling me i'm crazy for believing it's normal lol.

> Actually the premise of the OP was that it is their LFG, if they want to set a barrier for entry they are completely within their right to do so and it's no one's business to say anything.

> It is still correct regardless of how you feel about those barriers.

This has nothing to do with what I was responding to. I was responding to someone's comment about high standards in LFG and they acted like I was crazy thinking they existed. You can't tell me OP isn't whining because they're saying "LF Anything", I have no entitlement to Anyone's LFG standards. I completely agree. I also believe that it is completely within Anet's right to stop pushing content that the community doesn't do in response to said standards.

> @"Vilin.8056" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > I've seen similar attitudes in strikes as well. It's not like i've never worked with the community before. Literally after tons of people wipe to mechanics on whisper "if you dps isn't 10k, don't join as dps" and kicked people. I was the healer. The run didn't succeed. And it wasn't because of dps. I never vet my member's dps when i start runs and usually if i have the right healers, we always succeed.

> Simply because you have multiple dps players that actually went above 10k in these successful fights without you noticing.

>

> I've had 3 continous wipes with 2 heal scourges and 2 healers trying to help a casual squad, the heals got everyone up throughout the fight, boon was consistent, but there isn't enough DPS to finish the fight before the enrage timer.

That's because too much of your group was healers. You can do Bears, Fraenir & Shiverpeaks with just one. I'll start running arc because I'm curious now. I've only done up to 3, but even on boneskinner you can usually do 2 if at least one is an HB or Scourge heal. I've only taken up to 3 on jormag. Of all the times I've wiped on Jormag, I think timer was one of many. 90% the time, it's because the group can't survive bullet hell end phase. If you think group DPS is low, swap to one of your DPS toons. I'm sure a single good DPS can carry. I usually run my Elementalist and fill with DPS to get 2/2 bonus chests and solo heal the 3 easy ones (and can sustan might on my own). People on these forums talk about carrying like it's the worst thing in the world. O no! You helped someone! How terrible! I think the game could do a better job of finding a nice way to communicate to people that they can improve performance. Especially with the 1:10 ratios that exist in performance, but helping a community in an MMO isn't the most terrible thing ever.

> @"Astralporing.1957" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > > @"Cyninja.2954" said:

> > > Which community? The raid community as a whole? The game's entire community?

> > >

> > > The most important aspect to raiding is and always has been: understanding. Understanding of how group content plays. Understanding of mechanics. Understanding of visual information and reacting to it.

> >

> > I mostly mean the PuG community in LFG. I for the most part refuse to join raid lfgs for this reason.

> But a lot of your comments do not really apply to the "pug community" in LFG. Did you consider that, at least some of your bad opinions might be based on unsubstantiated hearsay that you never verified, because you never even tried to?

>

> I mean, i'm not a great fan of raids and raiding in general (and especially of the impact of the "raid mindset" on the rest of the game), but even for me some of your opinions about raid PUGs seem to be more of a distorted view of it rather than an accurate description.

Most of the requirements i see in lfg are ridiculous enough for me not to disbelieve them, and as far as t4 fractals go, i trust my guild mates

The whole premise of this thread is someone defending their ridiculous lfgs and you're telling me i'm crazy for believing it's normal lol.

I've seen similar attitudes in strikes as well. It's not like i've never worked with the community before. Literally after tons of people wipe to mechanics on whisper "if you dps isn't 10k, don't join as dps" and kicked people. I was the healer. The run didn't succeed. And it wasn't because of dps. I never vet my member's dps when i start runs and usually if i have the right healers, we always succeed.

> @"Cyninja.2954" said:

> Which community? The raid community as a whole? The game's entire community?

>

> The most important aspect to raiding is and always has been: understanding. Understanding of how group content plays. Understanding of mechanics. Understanding of visual information and reacting to it.

I mostly mean the PuG community in LFG. I for the most part refuse to join raid lfgs for this reason. Am debating what to do about my plans on t4 fractals from here because my understanding is it's all glass cannons except healbrand.

> @"Cyninja.2954" said:

> > @"Mad Queen Malafide.7512" said:

> > > @"ButcherofMalakir.4067" said:

> > > > @"Mad Queen Malafide.7512" said:

> > > > People asking for LI requirements for Strike Missions are being stupid. This isn't a raid.

> > >

> > > And? You mean they dont know that it isnt raid? How is that relevant to asking for Li? I think it is quite smart when your goal is to play with someone who played decent amout of raids.

> >

> > It's like asking for the army to resolve a domestic dispute.

> >

> > You are raising a super high bar and asking for the best of the best, to do content that is really not all that difficult at all. So all you are really doing is excluding players.

>

> This is actually incorrect, but many less experienced players don't understand why. The requirements setup for many groups are not asking for "the best of the best". Far from it.

>

> There is a multitude of players and skill levels for instanced content, both for fractals as well as raids or any other content which requires group compositions. Most PUG or normal LFG groups ask for somewhere between minimum and acceptable levels of performance. Even the 500-750 LI and above groups accept a varying degree of performance, obviously on a higher than average level, but no where near top performance.

>

> The problem is:

> Most players with less experience assume that the bare minimum or acceptable skill is already high. That is not the case. Take a look at some optimized speedrun kills, or last years Elitist Raiding Party 3 tournament, THAT'S top level of play. Unfortunately, the skill level for many inexperienced players drops far below acceptable levels even beyond the lenience most groups are willing to extend on average levels of performance.

>

> So no, your assumption that being adequate is in any where near "best of the best levels" is incorrect. No one is looking for that in public groups.

I disagree with this. Most pugs ask for high bar, not bare minimum. When i was asking if my engi could dps in raids, i was told i'd be kicked from pug groups with less than 25k. Just cleared soulless horror on a community run, only 2 of our dps were around that. Most Pugs, especially the ones with stringent clear requirements are asking for a raid that won't possibly take more than 1 attempt.

I agree with sentiment that there's an entire range in terms of "acceptable" but the community as a whole refuses to realize this. If they did, this discussion wouldn't be happening. This is not a raid only issue, but i feel like it happens more in raid lfgs.

Do not monetize this feature: legendaries are already heavily monetized and all that will do is disincentivize people from acquiring them, essentially killing the economy.

How are they monetized?

1) Through gem to gold conversions -> anyone who doesn't feel like farming gold can buy the gold outright, I bet plenty of people do this.

2) Gear templates themselves -> If the legendary armory essentially acts like it lets you have 1 copy of each legendary per gear template, this increases the value of players adding more gear/stat sets to their arsenals, as they can quickly bring a new gear set online, permanently and easily without stat swapping, by buying the template.

> @"hellsqueen.3045" said:

> Can I complete with a decent group?

> Yeah sure I can, but compared to other fractals it is just really frustrating to go through and can really be one that makes or breaks a group that is just your average T4 fractal group as opposed to a "We need this this and this, don't have it don't join" sort of thing.

>

> The smaller platform size compared to other fights, combined with so many different AOE types and all those diggity dang mobs pushing you and not a real way or mechanic type to prevent certain things just really makes for the worst fractal boss fight I have experienced.

>

> Bring Forth The Tempest, seems like the perfect triggering line for unlocking the stun bar and preventing a few series series of strong gusts.

>

> Having both the damaging AOE drop and the shark to share, while those are fine, with all the other AOE clutter on this stage, it often makes for a confusing time when you add the adds that you have to deal with, or suffer. There is just so much visual clutter going on with the tempest, the cone, the condition bomb, the shark, the enemies regular aoe attacks. It's christmas light vomit on my eye balls. The amount of times someone is running away with the green simply because there is just too much going on, too much visual clutter all in a very small space. Not to mention your team dealing damage and their AOE effects to add to that vomit of light.

>

> I would like to see more love given to the condition bomb as a mechanic of dealing with the mobs, drop it on the ramps when you have it, and it will kill mobs while it exists there.

>

> I know there is going to be a lot of:

> "Git Gud" type responses, and as I said it's not that I can't get a group to get through it. I do get through it well enough.

> But the experience feels unenjoyable, stressful because there is no way to prevent certain aspects and just the all around confusion with the visual clutter in a small space is so much.

>

> I can't think of many fighting spaces as small as the ship that have that same level of clutter. Usually it's all well spaced out, there are few AOE's happening at once but letting them happen or not working around them properly can be catastrophic (eg. The first fight in The Shattered Observatory with the orbs that you have to hit away or your whole team gets knocked back and potentially knocked off due to the size of it's explosion when dead centre)

>

> I am not saying remove what's there, just rework some of it for different purposes.

>

> What do you guys think?

> What would improve the experience for you?

> Etc

Are you just trying to lol dps the boss without dealing with adds? In t4 is it not reasonable to just kill the adds? On lower levels it's actually a really easy fight if adds are down. The adds are intended to be killed imo. It's fine if you juke with profession mechanics (reflects or aoe), but just fyi, there may be a more fool proof way. Every time i've done this fractal people look at me like i'm an alien when i say we should do this, but when they listen we usually down it just fine.

> @"artcreator.4859" said:

> Hello,

>

> I was recently going through all the PoF maps again having fun exploring and I noticed a real problem in the game.

>

> I was having fun climbing this hill in the highlands when I came across this misty area with giants roaming around it. I felt fully immersed, the mountain climb was awesome, the environment was awesome, and now there was a camp filled with giant beasts roaming this misty landscape. I quickly enlisted the help of a nearby player to help me take one of these guys down, we charged in and the giant died almost instantly. The immersion was broken.

>

> Guild Wars 2 seems to have a real difficulty problem, I mean that giant was as easy to kill as a dolyack. The more I thought about it the more I realized the games had this problem for a while now, in many of the maps.

>

> Please make the stuff a bit harder, at least make it make sense, a giant, or a djinn should be considerably harder than a moa. They don't feel that powerful and it really hurts the story. I want to actually have to play with people for some of these beasts, it doesn't have to be a well-designed boss fight, just make some creatures more powerful, so you need a friend to do them. GW2 is a casual game so it shouldn't be that often you come across these guys, but every now and then would be a really nice change of pace. The only way to really make things harder now is to get a lot of enemies in one area.

>

> As it is now, The small pact commander, alone without the pact, is the strongest thing on the face of Tyria. Noting feels epic anymore.

>

> My request for the next xpac or living world episodes is too please make some harder stuff to kill

>

> let me know if you think this would be a good change or not

There is literally a 10x difference between 2 different players. You know what's great though? They added bounty boards, they're group open world content and usually have enough mechanics that they can't be done solo. Some of the easy ones might, but mid tier to legendary ones can't be, period.

> @"LadyKitty.6120" said:

> Though Kitty's personal favourite choice of boonbot for Whisper and other strikes where people don't stack well is scepter+warhorn aura tempest. By spamming all shouts and pre-casting Wildfire+Phoenix+Dragon's Tooth, you can get yourself to about 15ish might in seconds and then spread it to allies with Heat Sync and then just rotate Fire-Earth (Sand Squall for boon extension)-Water (for heals) through the fight spamming shouts and skills and the squad has most excellent boon uptimes through the fight. Heat Sync and shouts have massive radius and thus even spreading out widely doesn't usually drop the boons at all and the other healers can focus 100% on healing without worrying about boon output. That probably sounds like invalidating Kitty's earlier point of "why Kitty insists on healers bringing might and at least some fury instead of being pure healers due to low opportunity cost" but warhorn boon tempest isn't used as healer in every single squad and Kitty's ended up cursing low fury uptime in pretty much every squad where she's been power dps and her sub's healer was heal scourge, staff tempest or scrapper. Feels sad as reaper trying hard to put the supports' boon efforts to good use by dpsing well. ._.

>

This is my Jormag personal favorite as well.

> @"Tails.9372" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > > @"Tails.9372" said:

> > > > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > > > People line up day in and day out for the abysmal chance at an ascended drop from TT or Teq.+

> > > That's because they want to have the skins.

> > >

> > > > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > > >There's tons of people shooting for ascended gear out there, i'm actually curious why they wouldn't be trying to earn them via strikes.

> > > Because there's generally no point in doing so. Just farming gold is a lot more effective in getting you asc gear. Getting asc gear through SMs costs 1800 shards vs. the ~300 gold (assuming you also have to level your crafting skills) you can get from [insert gold farm here] and most people this content aims at probably already have asc gear so it's mostly useless as a reward.

> >

> > No one telling me to do tt or teq has advertised it as skins, but okay.

> You were talking about asc gear so ofc. it's about the skins, if it's not for them then the ~2,5 gold and achievements are the other reasons to do teq but no one is there just to "gear up to asc" through boss drops.

I'm not crapping you: no one ever said 2.5 g and a cool skin to me. Also, leveling crafting skills, when i did it, was on the order of hundreds of gold, so maybe that initial 500-600g for the first set is a little too much for some people.

> @"Tails.9372" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > People line up day in and day out for the abysmal chance at an ascended drop from TT or Teq.+

> That's because they want to have the skins.

>

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> >There's tons of people shooting for ascended gear out there, i'm actually curious why they wouldn't be trying to earn them via strikes.

> Because there's generally no point in doing so. Just farming gold is a lot more effective in getting you asc gear. Getting asc gear through SMs costs 1800 shards vs. the ~300 gold (assuming you also have to level your crafting skills) you can get from [insert gold farm here] and most people this content aims at probably already have asc gear so it's mostly useless as a reward.

No one telling me to do tt or teq has advertised it as skins, but okay.

> @"Asum.4960" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > > @"Ayrilana.1396" said:

> > > > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > > > > @"Asum.4960" said:

> > > > > > @"Jimbru.6014" said:

> > > > > > Strikes were supposed to be a gateway to raiding. Instead, Whisper and Boneskinner especially have become roadblocks. I have been told by a number of experienced raiders that there are at least a couple of raid bosses that are legit easier than those two, and I can believe it.

> > > > >

> > > > > That's mostly a perception thing as the average quality of Strike groups is significantly lower than that of Raid groups, making them appear a lot more even than they actually are. Even experienced Raiders generally slack a lot more in Strikes, because they can.

> > > > >

> > > > > A good group can full clear all strikes (5 bosses) in ~15 minutes and if an experienced 10 man group approaches them with the same dedication as they would a Raid Wing, they are practically just sneezing the bosses over.

> > > > >

> > > > > So while Cairn with 7-8 well played 30k DPS players feels easier than WoJ or Bone with 5 <10k DPS players who make plenty mistakes, if you were to take the same group into the respective other fight the difference in difficulty would be very apparent.

> > > > >

> > > > > I think WoJ and Boneskinner are placed quite well in their difficulty, putting Strikes in a good middle of the road position - although that doesn't mean there can't be more Strikes of a bit lower difficulty in the future again, I don't think these require any nerfs.

> > > >

> > > > So the only way I've been able to reliably PuG boneskinner and Jormag is by stacking healers (and running my auramancer in whisper). I'd been having trouble with whisper ever since I came back, but then i realized, after I took my auramancer in again, that I may have been carrying my group before I took my last break. I prefer at least 3 healers on Boneskinner, but 2 works if they're worth their salt, if you have heals and everyone dodges, it's fine, so I think that's okay. I don't like whisper. That last phase is a poopfest. Not to mention buggy. I can't always clearly discern all the mechanics going on there's so much.. I did 3 healers on my last whisper run. 2 might be okay, but healbrand and auramancer take the cake in terms of making it puggable. The perma protection from auramancer (and range on shout heals) and the blocks from HB make the chains and some of the other mechanics less brutal. Granted, your team mates still have to avoid the mechanics, they're just given more time to with those buffers. Because protection doesn't keep you alive forever and you can only block so much, there's a limit. What really makes them hard is that there's no proper guides on them and people don't know what to build. or how to run them. I do have to say though, my most unsuccessful runs have been commanders trying to assemble raid meta comps, as opposed to survivability. Sure you make not get 2 bonus chests, but they're puggable if you focus on surviving first. The DPS bar isn't really that high.

> > >

> > > You can cheese the last phase of Whisper with I think it was Flesh Worm. You won’t have to deal with the orbs.

> > >

> > >

> >

> > I don't think cheese mechanics are anything we should rely on people new to raiding to do off the bat. I'll for certain try to spread this knowledge, but I don't consider it good design, even if there's a workaround. Interestingly enough, the player in the video didn't have 25 stacks of might at end (maybe 9, but it's hard to know how much was self buff vs. others), but did have regen. it also didn't have alacrity and quickness. This basically means that if it was a raid meta comp, that raid meta mechanics weren't working towards the end at the last phase. Even with no orbs. Though im' interested to know what composition this top raid guild was using. This was a GS power chrono it looks like.

>

> I wouldn't even consider that strategy full on cheese and I do like boss design that allows players to come up with creative tools to circumvent or change up mechanics (as long as it doesn't completely trivialize an encounter) and don't consider it bad design.

> I don't see circumventing the orb spread at WoJ with a Flesh Wurm to be all that different from circumventing Hands at Deimos with a Handkiter, kiting Flak shots at Sabetha, etc.

> It's just a creative and sound strategy to solve a problem. That is what makes fights interesting.

>

> The reason they didn't have boons in that video didn't have anything to do with Raid Meta comps not working there, besides them clearly not running a Meta comp.

> Ideally you want a guardian to run Stand Your Ground at WoJ to pop right after everyone is back after the 25% clone phase to prevent the knockback, and then just all stack slightly out of melee range and quickly DPS it down, with a ranged weapon option, fully buffed.

>

> Also if you are struggling with WoJ and spread downs, or just in general especially on Boneskinner, a Heal Scourge is highly recommended.

I don't have issues with the strategy being there. I have issues relying in some rando to do a very specific thing at a very specific time or the whole group wipes, especially when it's supposed to be a learning experience. That's potentially setting up 9 other people for failure, while they're learning content. If anet thinks that wurm juking was the intended strategy for the last phase and it's completely fine, i'm going to flat out say it's terrible design.

Also i've had people try wurm juking in pugs that have failed fyi.

> @"Ayrilana.1396" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > > @"Asum.4960" said:

> > > > @"Jimbru.6014" said:

> > > > Strikes were supposed to be a gateway to raiding. Instead, Whisper and Boneskinner especially have become roadblocks. I have been told by a number of experienced raiders that there are at least a couple of raid bosses that are legit easier than those two, and I can believe it.

> > >

> > > That's mostly a perception thing as the average quality of Strike groups is significantly lower than that of Raid groups, making them appear a lot more even than they actually are. Even experienced Raiders generally slack a lot more in Strikes, because they can.

> > >

> > > A good group can full clear all strikes (5 bosses) in ~15 minutes and if an experienced 10 man group approaches them with the same dedication as they would a Raid Wing, they are practically just sneezing the bosses over.

> > >

> > > So while Cairn with 7-8 well played 30k DPS players feels easier than WoJ or Bone with 5 <10k DPS players who make plenty mistakes, if you were to take the same group into the respective other fight the difference in difficulty would be very apparent.

> > >

> > > I think WoJ and Boneskinner are placed quite well in their difficulty, putting Strikes in a good middle of the road position - although that doesn't mean there can't be more Strikes of a bit lower difficulty in the future again, I don't think these require any nerfs.

> >

> > So the only way I've been able to reliably PuG boneskinner and Jormag is by stacking healers (and running my auramancer in whisper). I'd been having trouble with whisper ever since I came back, but then i realized, after I took my auramancer in again, that I may have been carrying my group before I took my last break. I prefer at least 3 healers on Boneskinner, but 2 works if they're worth their salt, if you have heals and everyone dodges, it's fine, so I think that's okay. I don't like whisper. That last phase is a poopfest. Not to mention buggy. I can't always clearly discern all the mechanics going on there's so much.. I did 3 healers on my last whisper run. 2 might be okay, but healbrand and auramancer take the cake in terms of making it puggable. The perma protection from auramancer (and range on shout heals) and the blocks from HB make the chains and some of the other mechanics less brutal. Granted, your team mates still have to avoid the mechanics, they're just given more time to with those buffers. Because protection doesn't keep you alive forever and you can only block so much, there's a limit. What really makes them hard is that there's no proper guides on them and people don't know what to build. or how to run them. I do have to say though, my most unsuccessful runs have been commanders trying to assemble raid meta comps, as opposed to survivability. Sure you make not get 2 bonus chests, but they're puggable if you focus on surviving first. The DPS bar isn't really that high.

>

> You can cheese the last phase of Whisper with I think it was Flesh Worm. You won’t have to deal with the orbs.

>

>

I don't think cheese mechanics are anything we should rely on people new to raiding to do off the bat. I'll for certain try to spread this knowledge, but I don't consider it good design, even if there's a workaround. Interestingly enough, the player in the video didn't have 25 stacks of might at end (maybe 9, but it's hard to know how much was self buff vs. others), but did have regen. it also didn't have alacrity and quickness. This basically means that if it was a raid meta comp, that raid meta mechanics weren't working towards the end at the last phase. Even with no orbs. Though im' interested to know what composition this top raid guild was using. This was a GS power chrono it looks like.

> @"Asum.4960" said:

> > @"Jimbru.6014" said:

> > Strikes were supposed to be a gateway to raiding. Instead, Whisper and Boneskinner especially have become roadblocks. I have been told by a number of experienced raiders that there are at least a couple of raid bosses that are legit easier than those two, and I can believe it.

>

> That's mostly a perception thing as the average quality of Strike groups is significantly lower than that of Raid groups, making them appear a lot more even than they actually are. Even experienced Raiders generally slack a lot more in Strikes, because they can.

>

> A good group can full clear all strikes (5 bosses) in ~15 minutes and if an experienced 10 man group approaches them with the same dedication as they would a Raid Wing, they are practically just sneezing the bosses over.

>

> So while Cairn with 7-8 well played 30k DPS players feels easier than WoJ or Bone with 5 <10k DPS players who make plenty mistakes, if you were to take the same group into the respective other fight the difference in difficulty would be very apparent.

>

> I think WoJ and Boneskinner are placed quite well in their difficulty, putting Strikes in a good middle of the road position - although that doesn't mean there can't be more Strikes of a bit lower difficulty in the future again, I don't think these require any nerfs.

So the only way I've been able to reliably PuG boneskinner and Jormag is by stacking healers (and running my auramancer in whisper). I'd been having trouble with whisper ever since I came back, but then i realized, after I took my auramancer in again, that I may have been carrying my group before I took my last break. I prefer at least 3 healers on Boneskinner, but 2 works if they're worth their salt, if you have heals and everyone dodges, it's fine, so I think that's okay. I don't like whisper. That last phase is a poopfest. Not to mention buggy. I can't always clearly discern all the mechanics going on there's so much.. I did 3 healers on my last whisper run. 2 might be okay, but healbrand and auramancer take the cake in terms of making it puggable. The perma protection from auramancer (and range on shout heals) and the blocks from HB make the chains and some of the other mechanics less brutal. Granted, your team mates still have to avoid the mechanics, they're just given more time to with those buffers. Because protection doesn't keep you alive forever and you can only block so much, there's a limit. What really makes them hard is that there's no proper guides on them and people don't know what to build. or how to run them. I do have to say though, my most unsuccessful runs have been commanders trying to assemble raid meta comps, as opposed to survivability. Sure you make not get 2 bonus chests, but they're puggable if you focus on surviving first. The DPS bar isn't really that high.

> @"zombyturtle.5980" said:

> Nothing wrong with playing off meta. Just dont join groups looking for meta builds. If you see a group asking for raid LI, or specific roles like 'qfb, hfb' stay away as they are specifically asking for meta builds and wont be happy if you join. Most other groups should have no problem with what you are running and I'd advice report and block if they flame you.

>

> As far as your builds go, minstrels is fine in strikes/fracs as there is no aggro mechanic. If you ever plan to raid however, you need to be at 1k toughness only, otherwise you may steal aggro from the tank and mess up the raid.

>

> Diviners is kinda a wasted stat on firebrand unless you are the only source of might/fury as you can quite easily upkeep 100% quickness, and stab where necessary, with base stats.

>

> Im not sure what anet can do about it, other than ban players who harass others but that takes time and alot of evidence.

>

> > @"Mad Queen Malafide.7512" said:

> > There are a lot of players with a very closed mindset. The type of players that only run meta builds, and often do not know how to stay alive with them, or how the builds are supposed to work. I've tried to convince some of them to make their own builds and learn how to create a proper build of their own, but it is wasted effort.

> >

> > There are a lot of custom builds out there that are not meta, but could very well out perform current meta builds. I can't even count the number of times I've seen players drop like flies, while I was the last person standing. So many people that just run berserker builds, and then die almost instantly.

>

> In general, while its ok to add a few defensive stats to your build while you are learning, its best to stick mostly to full glass cannon. Other wise you get into bad habits of ignoring mechanics and relying on your toughness to carry you. This will make it 10x harder if you want to progress into more challenging content.

>

> Off meta builds rarely perform better than meta, even on average players (condi weaver ect being the exception) as long as the player understands where their dps is coming from and doesnt mindlessly follow rotation. I agree there are too many people who dont bother to actually learn the build and just copy it. I also agree that many people overestimate themselves and join groups they arent ready for. However being the last man standing doesnt always mean you are playing well. For example, usually rangers playing longbow at max range will die last, but they definitely arent contributing much.

When you're pugging, the game changes a bit. I ran a heal druid build on jormag and it was a poop show. Auramancer did way better, 100% up time on protection gives people a little more time to react to mechanics and can be the difference between a wipe or success. I have 95% bd on my tempest and can provide 25 might when pressure is lower. Also tempest has better heal range which helps with the last phase.

Some of the raid strategies the community had built around super high dps are actually quite fragile and not very learning new stuff friendly, which is what strikes are supposed to be.

> @"Mad Queen Malafide.7512" said:

> There are a lot of players with a very closed mindset. The type of players that only run meta builds, and often do not know how to stay alive with them, or how the builds are supposed to work. I've tried to convince some of them to make their own builds and learn how to create a proper build of their own, but it is wasted effort.

>

> There are a lot of custom builds out there that are not meta, but could very well out perform current meta builds. I can't even count the number of times I've seen players drop like flies, while I was the last person standing. So many people that just run berserker builds, and then die almost instantly.

This x1000.

> @"Mad Queen Malafide.7512" said:

> It is one of the few Strike Missions that requires a bit more coordination. Players need to learn the mechanics and when to dodge. I like that there is a strike mission that is somewhere in between casual and raid level difficulty. But yeah, if you join a random group, most of the time players will be down on the ground.

The end phase is not coordination or dodging. What usually happens is the group can't stack again because there's 5 different mechanics going on at once (so no heals, no boons, or they're very sparse). I'm sure there's more holes for stacking and boon sharing in most raid encounters. In fact, I don't think any of the raid encounters I've done have been that crazy at the end. Soulless horror is hard, but it's still not bullet hell. And I'm not sure a raid that was comprised only of WoJ's end phase is doable, or if it is, requires very niche builds & ranged stacking, which is nothing that this community does right now, and I would argue inappropriate for beginning content.

> @"Astralporing.1957" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > The loot tables on the weekly chests from the emissary (echo/hum chest) show a highly scoped subset of exotics all of them precursors. So your chance of getting a precursor is much higher than a random exotic, if the chest rolls an exotic. If you do the weekly emissaries.

> >

> > Edit: I just looked at the loot tables again.

> Yes, they are present. Point is, loot tables from common mob drops could be also presented in such a way, with a separate all-precursor category. Notice, that it doesn't mean the chances of obtaining those are any good - in both cases it's an _ultra-rare_ category. The same category as, say, permanent contracts in black lion chests.

>

> Frankly, seeing as you can only open one weekly strike chest per week, but can murder hundreds of mobs in just a few map metas, you are more likely to get precursors from other sources than from strikes.

>

> And, to repeat my earlier point you skipped on - it doesn't seem to me like the precursor prices have tanked lately. Am i mistaken?

>

There's actually 4 different chests, one for each echo. Also, it's very efficient -> you actually only need to do the strike mission once for the echo. and then 3 for dailies at some point. Note these can overlap and generally don't take more than 10 minutes (so you're doing 4-7 strikes a week). Howler is only 100g as of now. not sure if that's a drop, I haven't been watching precursors much lately. I was initally snagged on strikes for VM, ice shards and ease of ascended gear acquisition.

> @"DirtyDan.4759" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

>

> > Also kitty, auramancer worked like a charm. I did take an extra healer as the end phases get a little dicey and everyone is spread out. I used earth attunment trait line for extra protection, my squad felt way more durable. I guess I won't be disconinuing use of my tempest healer support any time soon even though I just geared up a druid. I also marked my healers with my commander tag, I think that helped as well. We did have a healbrand. I think we had 2.

>

> Your druic can give 10 protection with traited stone spirit and 100% boon duration. Spam the flip skill of it (Quicksand).

Good to know, but i think shouts have larger range and can incidentally give more healing with elemental bastion, which is ideal for the last phase. Also, the flash freeze shout gives a large radius of aoe healing.

> @"Astralporing.1957" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > Also, not sure exotic farming is that effective: i get maybe 1 for a given open world event but that's like in an entire month. There's tons of non precursor exotics, i believe the only exotics that drop from weekly chests are precursors, or maybe one or two selectable stat charr legion ones. So you're far more likely to get one once you actually have one drop as most are precursors.

> i... have no idea what you tried to say here.

> 1. weekly chests do not "drop" precursors. They have a _chance_ to drop them. **The same, as any content that can drop level 80 exotics**.

>

> >

> > Actually good point: how many precursors have you received from farming sources of random exotics? And over what time period?

> I never bothered to actually farm anything. I guess i am too casual for that. In my whole history i dropped around 10 precursors or so. Half of them from the forge (no, i'm not heavily forging stuff, i just throw a bunch of rares into it from time to time), the other half from trash mobs. I still in fact remember my two first cases: one was Energizer from Barracuda in Twilight Arbor story mode, the other was Lover from a random risen mob around Dwayna Temple (normal, map mob, not even an event one). Didn't drop any in over a year, but that's not surprising seeing as i barely play anymore.

>

> Yes, weekly Strike chests can drop precursors. But the same is also true of most mobs in this game. And while the chances of precursors in the Strike chests might be a bit higher (it's still abysmally low, if you wonder. You're not very likely to ever see one), you can kill a _lot_ of those common mobs during a week.

>

> By the way, how much do you think precursor prices changed since weekly strike rewards were introduced? I mean, if they supplied precursors in any decent quality (and certaily if they gave "a ton" of them, like you said originally) the prices should have tanked by now.

>

The loot tables on the weekly chests from the emissary (echo/hum chest) show a highly scoped subset of exotics all of them precursors. So your chance of getting a precursor is much higher than a random exotic, if the chest rolls an exotic. If you do the weekly emissaries.

Edit: I just looked at the loot tables again.

> @"Astralporing.1957" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > No long term goals? A ton of precursors can drop from the weekly chests (not all)

> So, how many did you drop so far?

>

> (seriously, precursor drop rate is so high you're better off going for content that drops rares/exotics and forging those - or just farming for gold directly In both cases you'd probably get your precursor way faster than hoping for a lottery win in strikes - and since all those types of contet have a chance of dropping precursors as well...).

>

Seeing as how i've done like 4 weekly chests total, not sure that's a good enough sample size (some of those span multiple weeks, i haven't always done the required ones, i actually do easy ones frequently for volatile magic and cash). Ascended armor and weapons, both random and purchasable are a huge deal as the stats can be swapped on them at any moment with the mystic forge. Also, strike missions make breaking into other content easier as well because you can outright buy selectable stat exotics with shards. You can also earn selectable stat ascended trinkets easy with season 4 currencies and ice shard conversions, the only missing slot, back, can also be earned via achievements. People line up day in and day out for the abysmal chance at an ascended drop from TT or Teq. If people aren't doing them, it's because they're lazy or unaware at how effective strikes can be. There's tons of people shooting for ascended gear out there, i'm actually curious why they wouldn't be trying to earn them via strikes. I do think they have an issue when it comes to advertising though. I didn't learn there were precursors or ascended gear in the weekly chests until today when i previewed the loot.

Also, not sure exotic farming is that effective: i get maybe 1 for a given open world event but that's like in an entire month. There's tons of non precursor exotics, i believe the only exotics that drop from weekly chests are precursors, or maybe one or two selectable stat charr legion ones. So you're far more likely to get one once you actually have one drop as most are precursors.

Actually good point: how many precursors have you received from farming sources of random exotics? And over what time period?

> @"Tails.9372" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > No long term goals? A ton of precursors can drop from the weekly chests (not all)

> Yeah, gen 1 precursors... but ok, let's take a look at our options for getting our hands on a gen 1 precursor here:

>

> option A: play strike missions and pray that, not just any precursor but the one for the legendary you want to make drops

>

> option B: just run the most profitable gold farm and buy the precursor you want from the TP

>

> Option B is clearly the better choice here. When I said "any worthwhile long term goals" I was refering to stuff like unique aura infusions or an asc/leg version of the runic set. Something that can't just be acquired by other means.

>

> And no, the lack of a long term goals isn't the main issue here either but they would definitely help which is why I mentioned them.

>

>

You can also trade the ones you get for ones you want. Gold farming is relative - it's easier for some, not others. You also get some pretty quick cash per day if you just do bears, fraenir and shiverpeaks. Also note the more people that are open world farming the more the gold supply depletes. On some level, gold farmers are dependent on the economy where most the cash comes from other sources (fractal junk, raids, dailies, strike chests, pvp). If everyone copies the gold farmers the economy will tank and no one will make anything.

> @"Tails.9372" said:

> > @"Astralporing.1957" said:

> > if strikes end up as a dropped content as well

> They most likely will be, player participation is probably going to be even worse than raids because the "target audience" is even more niche and they also don't offer any worthwhile long term goals for the players to work towards. Sadly A-Net still doesn't seem to understand what the actual issue is.

No long term goals? A ton of precursors can drop from the weekly chests (not all), also there's a chance for ascended drops, in additon to the fact that spamming forging steel is probably one of the most efficient ways to get enough currency for outright buying them (not sure if shards are capped per day, but still, do it daily). I would say they're more efficient than fractals and easier to get into.

> @"LadyKitty.6120" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > I don't know if it's all the returning players or what, but i'm starting to hate this strike. Stacking feels nigh impossible for boon sharing towards the end with so many mechanics. It also doesn't feel like rezzing is worth it either. Literally finish a rez and the next one pops and kills someone else. I feel like before, the end was always a poop show, but there was enough dps to get us through it, even without stacking (and no one was really going for specific comps).

> >

> > Is there any proper guide on this? Someone has have to have figured out some cheese.

>

> If people feel like they can't really cheese a boss, that's a good sign in Kitty's books as then the boss is more than just a glorified dps golem that many actual raid bosses have become (which is why Kitty personally likes it).

> But even then, good dps helps a lot and a good heal scourge even more so (and Kitty's not talking about mere ressbot but also barrierbot/boonbot while at it but only those who have watched Kitty's exploits on Youtube know how powerful it can be).

> Boons-wise, a good scepter+warhorn tempest (aka Auramancer) helps a ton due to Heat Sync's and shouts' massive ranges.

> So Kitty would personally do stuff like auramancer+healscourge+healbrand (mace+shield) or 2 staff/axe+shield healbrands+staff tempest/heal scrapper (heal scrapper has the strongest heals in the whole game and 2nd strongest resses(Function Gyro+Toss Elixir R) if played properly).

> Some people (especially raiders) look for druids but to be honest, druid is really weak for a boss like that. It already has weak heals if mightbotting (just slightly above other boonbotting meme healers like heal deadeye and heal chrono) and its main heals are burst-type centered on itself so especially if you're running dual-healer comp with druid as main healer, the heals mightn't be enough (pun intended) unless the squad does mechs well and druid actually knows how to heal properly (which has already been an issue in raids, to be honest, as lots of people just make a druid to have a healer-option available if really needed but don't bother with actually learning it).

Also kitty, auramancer worked like a charm. I did take an extra healer as the end phases get a little dicey and everyone is spread out. I used earth attunment trait line for extra protection, my squad felt way more durable. I guess I won't be disconinuing use of my tempest healer support any time soon even though I just geared up a druid. I also marked my healers with my commander tag, I think that helped as well. We did have a healbrand. I think we had 2.

> @"Hyrai.8720" said:

> > @"Firebeard.1746" said:

> > This is the problem though: if the leechers never succeed the popularity sinks and it kills the strike. Strikes are supposed to be puggable on some level. And explaining the mechanics doesn't take too long. The same stratification that killed raiding will kill this strike. And is about to, actually. I don't want to be an kitten asking for kp on a strike. Once that becomes a thing, that means that it's not really a strike and is the same broken thing as raids. I know the mechanics, i did a ton of attempts today, but having it blow up in my face so many times makes me not want to do it any more, and as soon as i'm asking for kp, i'm not building any community and don't feel like it's a healthy mmo activity.

>

> no, THIS is the problem: if the leechers keep leeching, the experienced players will get tired and either stop doing the content or join a static or put up ridiculous kp walls. (that's what we saw in the past with raids)

>

> and where does that leave the leechers?

> will they stop playing the content? then its them who are killing the content, and everyone else is happy to play "dead" content without any leechers.

> or will they suddenly start joining or creating training groups because there is noone to leech of? then why didnt they do so in the first place? - i'll tell you why: because they are not really interested in doing the content. they just want easy loot.

>

> those who _are_ interested will always find a way to do it. be it by learning it themselves or by joining a group of experienced players who are openly willing to teach them. (usually marked with something like "training" in the lfg description...)

> if you are one of those willing to teach: nice, i respect that. you are an enrichment to the community.

> but the same way you will have to respect that i am not willing to spend my limited playtime teaching or carrying others.

No one is making you do anything. But i'd argue that the moment you don't feel like working with other players to climb that mountain, and you just do it rote for rewards, then it's awful mmo content.

I also want to take some time to address anet's mechanics design: it's above and beyond anything in any other mmo in terms of difficulty. There are times in jormag for example when it's difficult to see your chains because of other mechanics/explosions going on like orbs. Basically anet has no problem throwing a visual flare in your face and telling you to manage more than one mechanic at once.

Also, this is in boneskinner and largos twins: the reaction times are awful. You don't have a ton of time to even notice they're happening. I think someone said on largos the pulsing aoe is like .8 seconds to notice, human reaction time is like .2. You have .6 seconds to not get distracted by your action bar, rotation or even another mechanic. I can't remember being asked to do this in any other mmo. Beating mechanics like these feel like an accomplishment, but doing it in the wrong environment (a non dedicated community) feels like wasted time and lots of aggravation. I also wonder if older people or disabled ones are incapable of beating these mechanics, especially when they overlap.