Tridentuk.1625

I can recommend thief. If you like having map awareness, high kill participation, very low deaths, and having decisions to make- thief has a very low skill floor if you do your research and spend your first games experimenting to get to grips with the roaming playstyle.. but like others have said it's supposed to have a very high skill ceiling.. So in terms of continuous improvement (which I was also after, as a newer player also only been playing 7 weeks) it's got it.

You say you want to break a skill barrier 3+ times in your time- I've transitioned my playstyle and understanding about 5 times already after 70 games because the decision making is really the crucial point and that involves a wider awareness.

It's not much of a duelist/fighter though (or at least if you are dueling a lot you're playing the class wrong). Some of the really high level players who really know what they are doing will duel from time to time but it'll take months if not years to get to that level, I don't care what gaming background you have. The core of improving on thief is map reading and situational awareness.

You might, if you have a background in competitive games, get sucked into duels because they're so easy to win against mindless noobs in your first batch of games, but once you get placed and start playing ranked you will have to readjust and play the role properly.

@Avatar.3568

This is fantastic, thanks for going through all that effort

> @"Avatar.3568" said:

> So you wanna know what icon mostly could be which role?

Indeed.

From what I notice in guides and such most classes are likely to be 1 or 2 roles (elite specs taken into account ofc) if they are playing to meta, apart from rev which I hear repeatedly "can do everything".

Hi, I'm currently working on furthering my understanding of team synergies and how to adjust playstyle. Not sure how to communicate exactly what I mean, but let's just say I put a list down like:

What to do if...

- Your team has 3 teamfighters, a duelist/roamer - and other team has 5 strong teamfighters (so basically you know there's a high chance you'll lose most even teamfights)

- Switch that around, your team has 4 teamfighters, theirs has a defensive duelist and 2 roamers

- Your team has another roamer, enemy team has only 1

- Their team has 2 roamers and duelist, your team only has you

I guess some of these overlap, but just in general what are some common scenarios in terms of team comp and how you react to them in terms of anticipating how you will have to adjust playstyle? (noticed every guide from plat players takes these things into account).

Hey,

Coming from Dota, a huge part of my game was in the picking stage and basing how I was going to play the game based on what "heroes" everyone else picked (and therefore the overall synergy between myself and the 9 other players in lobby). I notice in guides from plat gw2 players that they always look at the icons at start and try to determine what roles the other 9 have, and therefore how they need to play. This is especially important as a thief main I would think.

So I've been studying a bit, and I've got the basic concept of the 4 referred to roles- DPS/Sup/Duel/Roam.. I get that this pigeon-holing is a little bit simplistic with some builds being hard into a particular role, and others having more license to improvise depending on the situation, but at this point I just want to get a handle on this first part. In order to do this, I need to first figure out what the general meta notion for class -> role is so that I can put that downtime to good use like I used to do in Dota.

The generalities I've picked up are things like:

-thief is almost certainly roamer

-necro is almost certainly dps

-guardian builds are usually some form of teamfight (either dps or sup, or blend of both)

The others I have some vague notions but far from certain. I haven't finished my qualifiers yet for ranked but I suspect I am in high silver / low gold meta based on guildies I've played with and their ratings.

Every single competitive game is the same deal.

Go to league forums, dota forums, sc2 forums- whatever ones you want, there will always be posts about crazy win streaks followed by loss streaks or vice versa.

Also people just have good and bad days, you may not be able to feel it but there should be days when your concepts are clearer, reflexes sharper, etc. You probably also experience this at work, but because the margins are so much tighter in matchmaking competitive games the results are more noticeable.

> @"Xentera.4560" said:

> > @"Filip.7463" said:

> > There is too low player pop. If u are p1, both teams might be p1+g1g1g1g1 so matchmaking is fair and its expected from you to take care over your team

>

> Except that by this argument more, and more players would get frustrated with this mode and leave, driving the population even lower.

All other matchmaking systems with 5 man teams work like this.. the only reason some are better towards the middle of the bell curve is if that they have more people playing. MOBAs for example DOTA you can get to around 3.5-4k (top 10-20%) with relatively even distribution of ranking/skill, but pro players if they aren't scrimming and playing random pubs will be 9-11k and get 4ks in their teams sometimes and in general will get like 6-7k average games.

The alternative is massively increased wait times (in DOTA this is an adjustable option, some high tier players take it and their wait times are like 20-80mins for a game).

My problem with your post isn't that you're saying it sucks, obviously it's far from ideal, but that you're blaming Anet without suggesting a reasonable alternative. I've had this debate countless times in other games and if you're a logical reasonable person the conclusion is always the same- either leave, make the point that you would prefer to wait an hour for a decent game, or see carrying games better than the opposition high ranked player as an extra skillset and challenge to take on. The reality of it boils down to that and no amount of finger pointing at Anet will ever change that.

There are some things that Anet could realistically change for the better (like the WvW world matching system), then there are things like this for which gamers have been having debates on various platforms for decades with no solution where you just have to accept the reality.

@kash.9213

Thanks,

this is why I made this, cos there are mechanics I don't know / didn't think about yet.

Throw Gunk is actually sick now that I looked up the finishers haha

Was wondering if people had their opinions about stolen skill and their rankings in terms of usefulness?

So let's say it looks something like this:

Very Useful-

1. Iceshard Stab : 6 seconds of chilled (jesus), makes it really easy to land skills and adds 4 seconds to their CDs, and obviously if someone is running away it's game over.

2. Consume Plasma: 2nd just cos of ease of use, can be used in stealth or before initiating at no real inconvenience.

3. Blinding Tuft: free stealth and blind, what's not to like? gives me an extra burst on pd or backstab on dp

4. Mace Head Crack: can be used before shadowstrike pd, or after backstab on dp, always kinda useful.

Situational

5. Skull Fear: up to 2 second fear, can make it easier to land skills and useful impactful dense teamfight situations

6. Healing Seed: heal is pretty minimal but can be useful against conditions if in teamfights

Very Situational / Rubbish

7. Essence Sap: 0.5 sec casttime for 1 sec slow... can see how it could be useful for very niche outplays but currently I don't even bother with it

8. Whirling Axe: can see it being situationally useful for power thieves but it's just going to be too underwhelming to bother on my condi

9. Throw Gunk: Not even close to worth 0.5 sec casttime for very minimal damage even on my condi

Have you checked here yet?

https://www.peuresearchcenter.com/benchmarks.html

Also reference gold per hour, or mention how many hours you've played to get 50 gold. If you say "can't get past 50 gold per day" that naturally sounds like you've literally stayed up 24 hours and you just can't manage to break 50 gold.

I think I probably end up with like 25-30 gold per day off 5 hours average (obviously quite abit more if you consider the value of alternative currencies). I'll do one run of icebound chests and winterberries, dailies, then play pvp and fractals, then do whatever. It varies though cos I tend to hoard my mats and sell a bunch at once when they overflow my 500 limit.

If you just grind all of the most valuable maps (and do tricks with switching characters and maps to reset) the benchmark would probably be something like 90-100gold/5hrs.

> @"RisenHowl.2419" said:

> > @"Tridentuk.1625" said:

> > I came here for the moving pictures. My mind has indeed been blown by what technology is capable in this day and age.

> >

> > I thought still pictures were amazing, but now THIS

>

> i haven't quite figured out how they get the little people inside the screens yet, but my best guess so far is a willy wonka-ish setup

I heard from my auntie's neighbour's friend that it's ghosts.. what you do is get a very experienced shaman to perform a ritual and the pictures come to life..

That's just what I've heard though.

@AliamRationem.5172

Beginners luck then.. maybe they recently programmed that in to try to incentivise new players into wvw who knows.

Thanks, saves me wasting my time trying to grind out asc gear from it.

I came here for the moving pictures. My mind has indeed been blown by what technology is capable in this day and age.

I thought still pictures were amazing, but now THIS

I was looking at drop rates for fractals and such, all the way up to t4, and they were complaining about "oh it takes weeks to get a weapon box/armor box or useful trinkets to drop"...

Meanwhile I've played WvW for basically a full single reward track's worth (half the Orr track I think? and half the warclaw) which is a really short time really.. I've had an ascended pistol drop, ascended heavy armor which I can't use, and 3 asc rings that were crap but still..

I never hear about WvW being a great source of asc drops, but if I were to average even half that rate it would be pretty good no?

@Armen.1483

Thanks,

I just think "screw it" I'll stick with thief to complete regular fractals and raids. My original plan was to have 3 different characters so I could be meta in all game modes but I'm starting to realise I'm still quite far away from hitting a wall where that's actually very important yet.

This is my thing- whenever I get into anything new I dive at it and try to learn everything as fast as possible, when actually I still have a lot of natural progression left to do.

@Yasai.3549

I want something to cover zerging and fracs/raids near the top of the meta (meaning it's something useful enough that some LFG groups will actually post for it) without it being a complete yawn fest like Guardian is to me. I don't mind playing support as long as it has some fun mechanics- mesmer definitely seems like it has the fun mechanics down at least. Fracs and raids are really the priority since I'm having a decent amount of fun playing thief in wvw and I have yet to try the pole dancer build which looks like great fun.

That's kind of how I play thief right now, skirting round the zerg looking for gank targets or looking for small skirmishes. While fun for me, like you say it's not exactly ideal in terms of impact.

@KrHome.1920

How the hell did you get 39k dps at 1k range out of thief? (not that I'm looking to get ideas or anything................ o_O)

I currently run my pvp condi pd in PvE, partly cos I want to continuously be practicing my mechanics for pvp/wvw, partly cos I like the tankiness as I'm learning fractal mechanics, partly cos I'm poor....

I get 13k out of it, and I'd expect to do a lot more once I switch to a more meta pve build but 39k from rifle deadeye? that would be broken

If you have enough cds when entering the fight you shouldn't be a sitting duck cos you can dodge roll, use autoattack occasionally, go into stealth and burst and then have another try at shadow striking when the opportunity is there.

I usually use stealth to get close (preferably right behind them where their camera angle is more inconvenient to react) and burst, if they just stand there get easy shadow strike, if they get a bit too far away or dodge then use dagger once if it lands just run them down for shadow strike, if not use stealth and repeat.

I'm also always trying to fight close to them in general and continuously forcing them to turn their camera around by getting behind them cos it disorientates them and makes landing shadow strike easier. If I have 2-3 tries at this, blow my offensive cds, I'll consider just blinking away using shadow refuge / dagger storm (which I try to save as long as possible) to disengage.

Tbh a lot of the time (maybe 33% of the time?) players are just bad and they'll stand there trying to cast stuff in which case it's easy to just burst while walking at them and get a casual ss, and the 33% of the time players are just better than you as a newer player.. well they're just better and you just have to get better in general- that's how I see it anyway.

I was playing some PvP with a couple of guildies and we ran into a 5-party who were coordinating. Basically they had a 4-stack of teamfighters and their roamer was laying traps that prevented me from decapping points without taking a load of damage, at which point he'd come and put me at a disadvantageous 1v1. Meanwhile they all sat at mid and dominated teamfights. My theory since they were dominating mid was to full cap and force them to disperse, but again the traps were the issue.

I do think we were at a disadvantage in terms of the experience level of our players (it was unranked), but even so I don't want to make excuses, it's more useful for me to just figure out how to carry the situation.

With my current knowledge I really didn't know what I was supposed to do, hence why I've come here looking for answers since I'm guessing I will run into this situation again in future. Particularly about the traps, I've never seen that before though I know dragonhunter is meant to have a build like that?

Heya,

I'm loving thief and will continue to main it, but am looking for a 2nd because thief is quite niche in a lot of respects.

For example, thief is kinda gimmicky in a zerg and not meta, can dps in fractals but not really meta, etc.

So how is Necro in terms of filling those gaps? Considered Mesmer (too overlappy) and Guardian (not my prefered playstyle). Necro does look interesting but I don't want to invest time into a class where I'll just end up picking thief anyway in the majority of circumstances- I want something which offers things that thief lacks in terms of role and content type.

Thanks

Thanks. That's all i needed to know.

Will look elsewhere although I would like to try mesmer some time in the future.

I'm trying to think of a 2nd main to have because thief tends to be quite niche at times and I want to enjoy as much of GW2 as possible (I also just have to get around to using all of the classes eventually to learn for PVP purposes). The two playstyles I liked the look of most when deciding were thief and mesmer, however I want to make sure that mesmer can fill in the gaps where thief can't so I don't have too many overlaps where I'm just going to decide to run thief anyway (both in terms of content type and role).

I mean ideally if I wanted to play something very different that could fill most of the gaps I'd pick Guardian but I just don't find it satisfying to play. My main priorities are evasiveness for outplays and mobility, and I don't think I've ever played a paladin type in any game ever. Even when I used to play melee carries in Dota it used to be guys like Sven or PA.

So my central question is: does mesmer fill in the gaps for thief? To give an example, can it play meta roles in fractals and such that thief cannot offer, or meta roles in WvW zergs, and then also more teamfight oriented roles in PVP? Does it offer these things in a way that thief can't?

@kash.9213

Yeah I've been fiddling around with keybinds so much, I'm just short of a couple of extra keys I could use but I really dislike moving my hand across the keyboard because I tend to miss and sometimes lose my original hand placement and I don't think it's something I can practice my way out of. I already got rid of the Fx keys entirely and put them on build/equipment shortcuts so that's "F" and "G" gone for using steal and stolen skill. H and B are special skill 3 and 4, which I couuuld use but then I'd be screwed for if I ever want to play an Ele or something.

I've basically rearranged nearly all the keys in order of priority and importance, but like I say I've run out. Had to put targeting tab on mouse 3 cos I have tab on switch weapons cos I use it a lot.

Also I know this is practically taboo but I'm going with autotarget on for now, it just feels like the extra 0.2 secs to click isn't worth it and I can always click other targets later (which kind of destroys this thread). Just have to avoid getting into the habit of autotargeting too much and trying to click whenever possible first.

@DeceiverX.8361

Thanks this is all the information I was after.

I do come with MOBA experience and so I get what you're saying about making the percentage plays even if they don't work out in selective individual matches because it will create a net positivee during the grind, and yeah I'm starting to see your point about the volatility in early matchmaking it kind of makes the meta all messy, which is a concept that is also familiar from previous games. I've had the occasional game where +1/decap has worked as intended and I feel I've influenced the result, but the majority of games are still very much "if I play well I'm just accelerating the train" or "even if I play well the impact is negligible". A lot of games I have allies try to run to the same decap which is probably sometimes partly my fault, but is also just a symptom of the lobbies I'm in, and I'm working on that so that even if someone should be fighting I can minimise the inefficiency by replacing them in the fight if I can correctly predict their intentions. In Dota we used to call this the "trench" where you just have to adapt to rise to a point where you can play normally.

What I think you were saying about in some games where it looks like a loss it might be better to try to fight and maybe create a 5v4 to gain a foothold is currently very useful thanks. I'll take that away and try it out if it looks appropriate.

Yeah I have enough mechanical stuff and just general map knowledge (my rotations are much slower than they should be just due to not knowing the maps well enough) for progression as well so I have no excuses, but I'll keep practicing this stuff and it will increasingly pay off in the long run I'm confident.

I'm completely the opposite to you, I love high learning curves. Easy games bore me pretty quickly, and I tend to play 1 game for years and years which means that it HAS to have a long learning curve to keep me interested for that long.

My previous games were Starcraft 2 and Dota, both of which require high APM and awareness so I'm very happy that I found GW2 to have comparable complexity. The cherry on top being the varied content which means that I can switch to something else if I'm not in the mood anymore.

I do agree about the leveling system, it should be elongated, as should everything else in the game. Some of the really high tier stuff should take years to master/obtain, and ascended stuff should take 3x as long. I've been playing just over a month and already have 1/3 of my ascended gear complete (albeit with lockdown I've had more time to play).

As for button pressing and mechanical skill, well in Dota it takes about 2000 hours played to not really be a nub, and 3000+ is required to start getting into the higher tiers (and that's meaning if you're talented), GW2 has those skill ceilings in terms of what it is as a game, and some players are insanely skilled, but to me coming from that game to this, this one definitely caters more for casuals.

For example, as a completely new player I can step into WvW and have a pretty good time, but in my previous games if they were unrestricted by MMR it would be completely broken for new players because the skill variance is so much higher between a new player and even an average one.

My point being that people have different perspectives, what's really great is that we can all have different perspectives and GW2 caters to the majority of them which I think is a pretty great achievement.