Originally posted by Calerxes

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by muffins89
it's percieved depth.  gw2 combat is pretty shallow.  aside from combo's with other players it's standard themepark combat.  with movement.  oh,  and dodge. 

What are you implying? That "themepark" MMOs don't have any depth in their combat? Please don't tell me that sandboxes have more depth! 

@OP, I like the combat in Guild Wars 2. But as someone who has spent 1-3k on GW1, I can definitely say that GW2 has less depth to it. This doesn't mean it is shallow. It just means that GW1 had incredible customisation. No other MMO has such customisation as GW1. It's beyond me why ArenaNet decided to reduce the number of skills and make the skills bound to a weapon. I find it so annoying that my first 5 skills are chosen for me and I can only choose utility skills. They even impose limitations on how you chose your second 5 skills. You always need to have 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1  elite. Did I say that you only have a handful of elite skills? GW1 had 1500+ skills among 10 classes which works out between 100-150 per class. It was incredible variety.

As someone that has spent close to 10K hours in GW1 I can tell you that from those 100-150 skills per profession only 10-20 per profession were actually any good outside some narrow farm build.

The number of skills in GW1 that are simply outclassed or so situational that you are better bringing a skill that is generally more useful is mind numbing.

The choice in GW1 was between having a good build or having bad builds.

GW1 give a better illusion of freedom and variety than GW2, I'll give you that.

Example: GW1 Warrior in PvE (one of the professions that have the highest amount of viable builds).

Start by adding the sunspear warrior skill whirlwind attack. Add the kurzick/luxon warrior skill "Save Yourselves!". Get "For Great Justice!".

Axe - Why the hell are you using axe in PvE?

Hammer - Elite: Earth Shaker. No point using any other hammer elite. Then you either use Crushing Blow or Pulverizing Smash. Finish with Crude Swing.

Sword: Dragon Slash and Hundred Blades are both usable. Add Sun and Moon Slash. Maybe add Body Blow (strength).

Tactics: useless outside some narrow build/farm.

Strength: Enraging Change and Flail are usable although the "Deldrimor  rank skill" "Drunken Master" or pure consumables are better options.

That is the PvE GW1 Warrior 150 skills reduced th a dozen skills.

Warriors used a lot more than a dozen skills. It was not my main character so I can't elaborate much. You are also talking about farming builds. In PvP the meta changed quite a bit. Warriors are also the most restricting class in GW1 as a lot of your skills are tied to your weap. Dual professions made a lot of builds possible. You are only using skills from your warrior profession. If you are ele, you have sooooooooooooooooooooooo many builds and combinations with other classes.

From what I have seen from GW2, there is no way you have the same customisability and number of builds. Even ArenaNet admitted that they decided to comprise build variety for the sake of balance. I don't know about ilussion of choice to be honest. It is true that a lot of GW1's skills were very context specific. Some were outmatched by other skills in pretty much all situations. But GW2's current system feels incredibly restrictive. The fact that you cannot choose what combo of main skills you want is very underwhelming. Say I want to have stoning and earth shards in my build, I can't because of weapon restrictions. You are also forced into choosing 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1 elite. I agree that not taking an elite is crazy. But you can only have 1 heal. What if I want to have 4 utilities or 3 heals + utility?

I would take GW1's system any day. 

 

Did GW1 have an abundance of skills at launch? I only played for 10's of hours and started with Nighfall, the game just did not grab me I was an L2 junkie at the time.

The difference is GW had the Trinity - GW2 does not.

Originally posted by Calerxes

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by fivoroth

SNIP!

As someone that has spent close to 10K hours in GW1 I can tell you that from those 100-150 skills per profession only 10-20 per profession were actually any good outside some narrow farm build.

The number of skills in GW1 that are simply outclassed or so situational that you are better bringing a skill that is generally more useful is mind numbing.

The choice in GW1 was between having a good build or having bad builds.

GW1 give a better illusion of freedom and variety than GW2, I'll give you that.

Example: GW1 Warrior in PvE (one of the professions that have the highest amount of viable builds).

Start by adding the sunspear warrior skill whirlwind attack. Add the kurzick/luxon warrior skill "Save Yourselves!". Get "For Great Justice!".

Axe - Why the hell are you using axe in PvE?

Hammer - Elite: Earth Shaker. No point using any other hammer elite. Then you either use Crushing Blow or Pulverizing Smash. Finish with Crude Swing.

Sword: Dragon Slash and Hundred Blades are both usable. Add Sun and Moon Slash. Maybe add Body Blow (strength).

Tactics: useless outside some narrow build/farm.

Strength: Enraging Change and Flail are usable although the "Deldrimor  rank skill" "Drunken Master" or pure consumables are better options.

That is the PvE GW1 Warrior 150 skills reduced th a dozen skills.

Warriors used a lot more than a dozen skills. It was not my main character so I can't elaborate much. You are also talking about farming builds. In PvP the meta changed quite a bit. Warriors are also the most restricting class in GW1 as a lot of your skills are tied to your weap. Dual professions made a lot of builds possible. You are only using skills from your warrior profession. If you are ele, you have sooooooooooooooooooooooo many builds and combinations with other classes.

From what I have seen from GW2, there is no way you have the same customisability and number of builds. Even ArenaNet admitted that they decided to comprise build variety for the sake of balance. I don't know about ilussion of choice to be honest. It is true that a lot of GW1's skills were very context specific. Some were outmatched by other skills in pretty much all situations. But GW2's current system feels incredibly restrictive. The fact that you cannot choose what combo of main skills you want is very underwhelming. Say I want to have stoning and earth shards in my build, I can't because of weapon restrictions. You are also forced into choosing 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1 elite. I agree that not taking an elite is crazy. But you can only have 1 heal. What if I want to have 4 utilities or 3 heals + utility?

I would take GW1's system any day. 

 

Did GW1 have an abundance of skills at launch? I only played for 10's of hours and started with Nighfall, the game just did not grab me I was an L2 junkie at the time.

Yes it did. Add the skills from the following two categories:

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_core_skills

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_Prophecies_skills

In Prophecies, the first GW1 game released, each class has between 72 (mesmer) and 79 (elementalist) skills. Then consider the fact that you have two professions per character and you have about 150 skills to mix and match with.

By the time they got to Nightfall, each of the core professions had about 140 skills, assassins and ritualists had 110, and paragon and dervish had 85. Not to mention the shared PvE skills and faction based skills.

Regarding the previous poster who said only a few builds were viable - yeah that's a lie, only a few builds were popular or overpowered at any one time. That isnt the same as viable.   

Originally posted by evilastro

Originally posted by Calerxes

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by fivoroth

SNIP!

As someone that has spent close to 10K hours in GW1 I can tell you that from those 100-150 skills per profession only 10-20 per profession were actually any good outside some narrow farm build.

The number of skills in GW1 that are simply outclassed or so situational that you are better bringing a skill that is generally more useful is mind numbing.

The choice in GW1 was between having a good build or having bad builds.

GW1 give a better illusion of freedom and variety than GW2, I'll give you that.

Example: GW1 Warrior in PvE (one of the professions that have the highest amount of viable builds).

Start by adding the sunspear warrior skill whirlwind attack. Add the kurzick/luxon warrior skill "Save Yourselves!". Get "For Great Justice!".

Axe - Why the hell are you using axe in PvE?

Hammer - Elite: Earth Shaker. No point using any other hammer elite. Then you either use Crushing Blow or Pulverizing Smash. Finish with Crude Swing.

Sword: Dragon Slash and Hundred Blades are both usable. Add Sun and Moon Slash. Maybe add Body Blow (strength).

Tactics: useless outside some narrow build/farm.

Strength: Enraging Change and Flail are usable although the "Deldrimor  rank skill" "Drunken Master" or pure consumables are better options.

That is the PvE GW1 Warrior 150 skills reduced th a dozen skills.

Warriors used a lot more than a dozen skills. It was not my main character so I can't elaborate much. You are also talking about farming builds. In PvP the meta changed quite a bit. Warriors are also the most restricting class in GW1 as a lot of your skills are tied to your weap. Dual professions made a lot of builds possible. You are only using skills from your warrior profession. If you are ele, you have sooooooooooooooooooooooo many builds and combinations with other classes.

From what I have seen from GW2, there is no way you have the same customisability and number of builds. Even ArenaNet admitted that they decided to comprise build variety for the sake of balance. I don't know about ilussion of choice to be honest. It is true that a lot of GW1's skills were very context specific. Some were outmatched by other skills in pretty much all situations. But GW2's current system feels incredibly restrictive. The fact that you cannot choose what combo of main skills you want is very underwhelming. Say I want to have stoning and earth shards in my build, I can't because of weapon restrictions. You are also forced into choosing 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1 elite. I agree that not taking an elite is crazy. But you can only have 1 heal. What if I want to have 4 utilities or 3 heals + utility?

I would take GW1's system any day. 

 

Did GW1 have an abundance of skills at launch? I only played for 10's of hours and started with Nighfall, the game just did not grab me I was an L2 junkie at the time.

Yes it did. Add the skills from the following two categories:

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_core_skills

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_Prophecies_skills

In Prophecies, the first GW1 game released, each class has between 72 (mesmer) and 79 (elementalist) skills. Then consider the fact that you have two professions per character and you have about 150 skills to mix and match with.

By the time they got to Nightfall, each of the core professions had about 140 skills, assassins and ritualists had 110, and paragon and dervish had 85. Not to mention the shared PvE skills and faction based skills.

Regarding the previous poster who said only a few builds were viable - yeah that's a lie, only a few builds were popular or overpowered at any one time. That isnt the same as viable.   

Again just looking at the numbers of skills mean nothing.

Running an empty skill bar was also a viable way of finishing GW1 PvE.

Apparently loads of people like to gimp themselves.

Next people will post wammos with healing hands and mending...

It is very simple, in any game with limited party sizes if my build out perform yours I get the spot and you get the boot. So only the best builds are viable.

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by muffins89
it's percieved depth.  gw2 combat is pretty shallow.  aside from combo's with other players it's standard themepark combat.  with movement.  oh,  and dodge. 

What are you implying? That "themepark" MMOs don't have any depth in their combat? Please don't tell me that sandboxes have more depth! 

@OP, I like the combat in Guild Wars 2. But as someone who has spent 1-3k on GW1, I can definitely say that GW2 has less depth to it. This doesn't mean it is shallow. It just means that GW1 had incredible customisation. No other MMO has such customisation as GW1. It's beyond me why ArenaNet decided to reduce the number of skills and make the skills bound to a weapon. I find it so annoying that my first 5 skills are chosen for me and I can only choose utility skills. They even impose limitations on how you chose your second 5 skills. You always need to have 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1  elite. Did I say that you only have a handful of elite skills? GW1 had 1500+ skills among 10 classes which works out between 100-150 per class. It was incredible variety.

As someone that has spent close to 10K hours in GW1 I can tell you that from those 100-150 skills per profession only 10-20 per profession were actually any good outside some narrow farm build.

The number of skills in GW1 that are simply outclassed or so situational that you are better bringing a skill that is generally more useful is mind numbing.

The choice in GW1 was between having a good build or having bad builds.

GW1 give a better illusion of freedom and variety than GW2, I'll give you that.

Example: GW1 Warrior in PvE (one of the professions that have the highest amount of viable builds).

Start by adding the sunspear warrior skill whirlwind attack. Add the kurzick/luxon warrior skill "Save Yourselves!". Get "For Great Justice!".

Axe - Why the hell are you using axe in PvE?

Hammer - Elite: Earth Shaker. No point using any other hammer elite. Then you either use Crushing Blow or Pulverizing Smash. Finish with Crude Swing.

Sword: Dragon Slash and Hundred Blades are both usable. Add Sun and Moon Slash. Maybe add Body Blow (strength).

Tactics: useless outside some narrow build/farm.

Strength: Enraging Change and Flail are usable although the "Deldrimor  rank skill" "Drunken Master" or pure consumables are better options.

That is the PvE GW1 Warrior 150 skills reduced th a dozen skills.

Warriors used a lot more than a dozen skills. It was not my main character so I can't elaborate much. You are also talking about farming builds. In PvP the meta changed quite a bit. Warriors are also the most restricting class in GW1 as a lot of your skills are tied to your weap. Dual professions made a lot of builds possible. You are only using skills from your warrior profession. If you are ele, you have sooooooooooooooooooooooo many builds and combinations with other classes.

From what I have seen from GW2, there is no way you have the same customisability and number of builds. Even ArenaNet admitted that they decided to comprise build variety for the sake of balance. I don't know about ilussion of choice to be honest. It is true that a lot of GW1's skills were very context specific. Some were outmatched by other skills in pretty much all situations. But GW2's current system feels incredibly restrictive. The fact that you cannot choose what combo of main skills you want is very underwhelming. Say I want to have stoning and earth shards in my build, I can't because of weapon restrictions. You are also forced into choosing 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1 elite. I agree that not taking an elite is crazy. But you can only have 1 heal. What if I want to have 4 utilities or 3 heals + utility?

I would take GW1's system any day. 

I'm talking elite hm PvE areas builds.

PvP after the first year or so was defined by what was nerfed or buffed by anet or not,

The smite boon nerf for pvp was hilarious - it could have read unusable in pvp and be more useful that what it actually was.

Shall we talk about the presence of Necromancers, Assassins, Ritualists, Paragons and Elementalists in GvG? Or better the residual usage of these professions aside specific time frames cause by skills imbalance?

Dual professions was one of the worst mistakes because it meant many skills were better used by professions with superior primary attributes

The way enery management skills kept being nerfed because monks could use it, the way monk smite skills had to be nerfed becused mesmers were using them, rangers abusing daggers, blood spike, mesmer spike, ranger with ritualist weapon spike, the time GvG became a farming NPCs game with VoD change, the turtle play paragons allowed at nightfall releasem etc, etc. Funny times, but hey 150 skills...

What other professions skills do you want to use for a warrior?

You wamt to use daggers? Or scythe (was viable before the derrvish revamp and in fact the warrior was better with it than the dervish making the dervish useless for a PvE elite area team). The only non warrior skill I can see a warrior use is the assassin dearh's charge on thr Manly Spike teams.

You guys just don't get what viable is in GW1 and GW2 context.

GW1 and GW2 isn't about failling or not, it is about how fast you can do it.

A build that takes 1 hour to finish something other takes 10 minutes isn't viable.

Additionally if a profession slows down the run speed, it isn't viable.

So, yeah, indeed a PvE warrior is around 12 skills + PvE only skills, and that is allowing for builds that use heroes.

Originally posted by botrytis

The difference is GW had the Trinity - GW2 does not.

GW1 didn't have the trinity.

It had healers (the best were the ones that prevented damage instead of red bars up) but it had no tanks.

Unfortunately it had Invicibuilds that Anet left on so PUGs could actually do stuff.

The most degenerate type of play with instant spikes that decimated a bazzillions mobs.

Originally posted by Kuppa

Originally posted by Mad+Dog
[mod edit]

Biggest boost wins?? I'm lost...

sorry about that, seems I'm not allowed to have an opinion about GW2 combat...

he must be a GW2 fan boi, the mod I mean.

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by evilastro

Originally posted by Calerxes

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by fivoroth

SNIP!

As someone that has spent close to 10K hours in GW1 I can tell you that from those 100-150 skills per profession only 10-20 per profession were actually any good outside some narrow farm build.

The number of skills in GW1 that are simply outclassed or so situational that you are better bringing a skill that is generally more useful is mind numbing.

The choice in GW1 was between having a good build or having bad builds.

GW1 give a better illusion of freedom and variety than GW2, I'll give you that.

Example: GW1 Warrior in PvE (one of the professions that have the highest amount of viable builds).

Start by adding the sunspear warrior skill whirlwind attack. Add the kurzick/luxon warrior skill "Save Yourselves!". Get "For Great Justice!".

Axe - Why the hell are you using axe in PvE?

Hammer - Elite: Earth Shaker. No point using any other hammer elite. Then you either use Crushing Blow or Pulverizing Smash. Finish with Crude Swing.

Sword: Dragon Slash and Hundred Blades are both usable. Add Sun and Moon Slash. Maybe add Body Blow (strength).

Tactics: useless outside some narrow build/farm.

Strength: Enraging Change and Flail are usable although the "Deldrimor  rank skill" "Drunken Master" or pure consumables are better options.

That is the PvE GW1 Warrior 150 skills reduced th a dozen skills.

Warriors used a lot more than a dozen skills. It was not my main character so I can't elaborate much. You are also talking about farming builds. In PvP the meta changed quite a bit. Warriors are also the most restricting class in GW1 as a lot of your skills are tied to your weap. Dual professions made a lot of builds possible. You are only using skills from your warrior profession. If you are ele, you have sooooooooooooooooooooooo many builds and combinations with other classes.

From what I have seen from GW2, there is no way you have the same customisability and number of builds. Even ArenaNet admitted that they decided to comprise build variety for the sake of balance. I don't know about ilussion of choice to be honest. It is true that a lot of GW1's skills were very context specific. Some were outmatched by other skills in pretty much all situations. But GW2's current system feels incredibly restrictive. The fact that you cannot choose what combo of main skills you want is very underwhelming. Say I want to have stoning and earth shards in my build, I can't because of weapon restrictions. You are also forced into choosing 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1 elite. I agree that not taking an elite is crazy. But you can only have 1 heal. What if I want to have 4 utilities or 3 heals + utility?

I would take GW1's system any day. 

 

Did GW1 have an abundance of skills at launch? I only played for 10's of hours and started with Nighfall, the game just did not grab me I was an L2 junkie at the time.

Yes it did. Add the skills from the following two categories:

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_core_skills

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_Prophecies_skills

In Prophecies, the first GW1 game released, each class has between 72 (mesmer) and 79 (elementalist) skills. Then consider the fact that you have two professions per character and you have about 150 skills to mix and match with.

By the time they got to Nightfall, each of the core professions had about 140 skills, assassins and ritualists had 110, and paragon and dervish had 85. Not to mention the shared PvE skills and faction based skills.

Regarding the previous poster who said only a few builds were viable - yeah that's a lie, only a few builds were popular or overpowered at any one time. That isnt the same as viable.   

Again just looking at the numbers of skills mean nothing.

Running an empty skill bar was also a viable way of finishing GW1 PvE.

Apparently loads of people like to gimp themselves.

Next people will post wammos with healing hands and mending...

It is very simple, in any game with limited party sizes if my build out perform yours I get the spot and you get the boot. So only the best builds are viable.

 

No, some people just didn't feel the need to be a sheep. Baaa, baaaa, baaaa.

Plenty of skill combinations worked well, not everyone had to rely on the current FOTM builds to get through the elite dungeons. 

Not using typical builds in PvP made it easy to smash the FOTM sheep as well.  

Originally posted by evilastro

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Again just looking at the numbers of skills mean nothing.

Running an empty skill bar was also a viable way of finishing GW1 PvE.

Apparently loads of people like to gimp themselves.

Next people will post wammos with healing hands and mending...

It is very simple, in any game with limited party sizes if my build out perform yours I get the spot and you get the boot. So only the best builds are viable.

 

No, some people just didn't feel the need to be a sheep. Baaa, baaaa, baaaa.

Plenty of skill combinations worked well, not everyone had to rely on the current FOTM builds to get through the elite dungeons. 

Not using typical builds in PvP made it easy to smash the FOTM sheep as well.  

The difference between my posts and yours is that actually I can detail skills, builds, build names, metagame periods.

Your posts on the other hand are filled with generalities, that might sound good but show no insight into the actual game - "not needing to be a sheep" or "loads of skills work just fine" generally ended up in people pinging builds with ressurection, healing breeze, troll unguent, final thrust, heal party or any non-UA rez with a Monk, Defy Pain, etc.

It is especially fun because the builds that are better at doing elite hm content have always been those focused in Invicibuilds+spike and that hasn't changed since ursan was nerfed.

Your typical PvE player was still using Searing Flames heroes when others were already running Sabs or Discord.

Then your typical PvE player was running Sabs or Discord, with their N/Rt  healers when others were runnin E/Mo Ether renewal healers and finishing slavers and vloxen.

Of course full guild groups were running Shadow Form tanking (or Terra Tanking) with whatver spike.

But I bet you will post a few more generalities about sheep or fotm (as if anyone with all the professions at level 20 is concerned about fotm) instead of any shred of evidence you know more about builds (especially 8 or12 men teambuilds) than "there is loads of skills to choose from".

Also the story of GW1 GvG is filled with examples of FOTM builds winning - ever heard of rawr spike? They won a few months in a row using it and it couldn't be more fotm than that.

It would be interesting to read what builds you used to finish what dungeons/elite areas before the rit buffs.

Or even just post some PvE Warrior builds and see how far you can get from my skills selection in this thread or whatever profession you prefer.

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

The difference between my posts and yours is that actually I can detail skills, builds, build names, metagame periods.

Because you can just go to http://pvx.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page to find the sheep builds used over the years, whereas I would have to have photographic memory of what skill combinations I used over the past 6 years or so.

I believe GW2 has very deep combat mechanics.  The reason some disagree is that the game is so accessible and so easy to get into, people mistake that with shallow gameplay.

I have an 80 Engineer which offers more versatility, combo finishers, utility and varied playstyles than most other games have between two different classes.

I recently started playing a Guardian.  Check this guide out  https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/professions/guardian/Guide-PVE-Guardian-101-A-Beginner-s-Text  and tell me whether or not Guardian mechanics are shallow.  BTW... copy and paste the guide and you will see it's 50+ pages and its only as to ONE class in GW2.  Guess what, it's a BEGINNERS Guide! Talk about depth.   

The amount of controversy and different opinions this thread has created clearly shows that it's a not a black and white issue of depth vs. shallow.  The fact that there is a heated debate lends in favor of "depth."  

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by evilastro

Originally posted by Calerxes

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by fivoroth

SNIP!

As someone that has spent close to 10K hours in GW1 I can tell you that from those 100-150 skills per profession only 10-20 per profession were actually any good outside some narrow farm build.

The number of skills in GW1 that are simply outclassed or so situational that you are better bringing a skill that is generally more useful is mind numbing.

The choice in GW1 was between having a good build or having bad builds.

GW1 give a better illusion of freedom and variety than GW2, I'll give you that.

Example: GW1 Warrior in PvE (one of the professions that have the highest amount of viable builds).

Start by adding the sunspear warrior skill whirlwind attack. Add the kurzick/luxon warrior skill "Save Yourselves!". Get "For Great Justice!".

Axe - Why the hell are you using axe in PvE?

Hammer - Elite: Earth Shaker. No point using any other hammer elite. Then you either use Crushing Blow or Pulverizing Smash. Finish with Crude Swing.

Sword: Dragon Slash and Hundred Blades are both usable. Add Sun and Moon Slash. Maybe add Body Blow (strength).

Tactics: useless outside some narrow build/farm.

Strength: Enraging Change and Flail are usable although the "Deldrimor  rank skill" "Drunken Master" or pure consumables are better options.

That is the PvE GW1 Warrior 150 skills reduced th a dozen skills.

Warriors used a lot more than a dozen skills. It was not my main character so I can't elaborate much. You are also talking about farming builds. In PvP the meta changed quite a bit. Warriors are also the most restricting class in GW1 as a lot of your skills are tied to your weap. Dual professions made a lot of builds possible. You are only using skills from your warrior profession. If you are ele, you have sooooooooooooooooooooooo many builds and combinations with other classes.

From what I have seen from GW2, there is no way you have the same customisability and number of builds. Even ArenaNet admitted that they decided to comprise build variety for the sake of balance. I don't know about ilussion of choice to be honest. It is true that a lot of GW1's skills were very context specific. Some were outmatched by other skills in pretty much all situations. But GW2's current system feels incredibly restrictive. The fact that you cannot choose what combo of main skills you want is very underwhelming. Say I want to have stoning and earth shards in my build, I can't because of weapon restrictions. You are also forced into choosing 3 utilities, 1 heal and 1 elite. I agree that not taking an elite is crazy. But you can only have 1 heal. What if I want to have 4 utilities or 3 heals + utility?

I would take GW1's system any day. 

 

Did GW1 have an abundance of skills at launch? I only played for 10's of hours and started with Nighfall, the game just did not grab me I was an L2 junkie at the time.

Yes it did. Add the skills from the following two categories:

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_core_skills

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_Prophecies_skills

In Prophecies, the first GW1 game released, each class has between 72 (mesmer) and 79 (elementalist) skills. Then consider the fact that you have two professions per character and you have about 150 skills to mix and match with.

By the time they got to Nightfall, each of the core professions had about 140 skills, assassins and ritualists had 110, and paragon and dervish had 85. Not to mention the shared PvE skills and faction based skills.

Regarding the previous poster who said only a few builds were viable - yeah that's a lie, only a few builds were popular or overpowered at any one time. That isnt the same as viable.   

Again just looking at the numbers of skills mean nothing.

Running an empty skill bar was also a viable way of finishing GW1 PvE.

Apparently loads of people like to gimp themselves.

Next people will post wammos with healing hands and mending...

It is very simple, in any game with limited party sizes if my build out perform yours I get the spot and you get the boot. So only the best builds are viable.

 

OH come on - HH and MENDING WAMMO WAS DA BOMB!!! It is not as much fun as a W/E with meteor Storm in Jade Quarry lol

The problem was wo the 72 skills that mesmer had in GW1, there were many that were so situational to be useless.

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Originally posted by Faelsun

You can go on and on, however it would be repetitive. No matter what spec  you play it will be a dps spec, the cc effects are marginal and merely exist to accent DPS which is what GW2 pvp is all about, layers of dps. The boredom factor sets in when you realize that you cannot make a functional healer, CC, Support build that is not really just a DPS build with some perks. You quickly find out after a few weeks of never ending theory crafting and searching other builds online, that you are confined to play, conditions, bunker, roamer or some other Crit heavy build.

 

Its basically like saying there are countless ways to accept Jesus Christ as your savior, it doesn't really mean you have options. In GW2 if you have a build that even uses another RUNE this is different from the other guy who also plays ranger, you feel like you won a small victory. Slave 48 hours theorty crafting your necromancer only to find out some guy named Clerk already came up with the exact same thing down to the armor and weapon sigils.  You of course tried vampirism early on to find out how terrible it was, or some other things that LOOKED really cool. But you ended up with this damn condition build you hate playing, you roll an alt, thinking things will be different with a Mesmer or thief, but no.

Combat feels empty and dull to me, GW2 pvp is not something people give up as a l2p issue its something that you stop doing because you don't hate yourself.  Just my opinion maybe, but I played a lot of mmorpgs, GW2 pvp combat is fine the first month or so until the lack of debth really sets in.

Opposed to the awesome PvP MMORPGs where you are CC'ed until you die or CC them until they die or the most healers win.

And fotm was a word specially coined for GW2, right?

In other games all the possible builds are equaly viable and succesful and you are a snowflake!

Healing, dealing damage, supporting and CCing in the same character is boring but spending an entire match/dungeon just healing, ccing, tanking or dealing damage is the pinnacle of diversity and variation.

 

Oh are you trying to ninja some anti holy trinity arguent in there? The reason I tried GW2 in the first place was the lack of trinity, WvWvW, sPVP and lack of gear grind. The problem  is the inflexibility of the so called hybrids. Healing, damage dealing, support and CC are NOT all on an equal footing, as a matter of fact DPS is clearly the king to such an extent a true hybrid is impossible. The average class is not even as flexible as a WOW Shaman and ALL of them have a DPS focus. Snowflake? How about SOME deviation at all. All classes have not only limited weapon options but those weapon skills are all for the most part DPS focussed. Then about 20 skills that are in 4 or so skill types that are bracketed off and your choices dwindle as you further speciallize down the traits.

You act as if everyone is not already spending the entire match match just dealing damage and you are right it certainly isnt  the pinnacle of variation.  Just because every class has a mandatory heal slot doesn't make them really hybrids, it feels more like a FPS with a med kit honestly. And the chain CCing and healing in WOW is frustrating however, thier idea of CC in GW2 is laughagle, and healing what a few hundred points a tic compared to how much DPS burst.

Tell you what you map the amount of DPS per second ANY class in GW2 can do and put it side by side to any other type of Control, healing, fear, etc that it can do and explain to me how that its balanced.

It's very deep. You sometimes press 1, and sometimes press 2. Unless you have 1 set on autoattack, then you just press 2.

No, seriously. It's okay, and fun for a while, but deep? Reminds me of the review that gave GW2 a social score of 8 or 9. The zeal is strong.

Originally posted by Draron
It's fun, but not really in depth (IMO at least). 

But why? we have had some examples of why it can be considered deep but not much of why it is shallow, so what makes it shallow? just saying it is doesn't make it so.

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

Again just looking at the numbers of skills mean nothing.

Running an empty skill bar was also a viable way of finishing GW1 PvE.

Apparently loads of people like to gimp themselves.

Next people will post wammos with healing hands and mending...

It is very simple, in any game with limited party sizes if my build out perform yours I get the spot and you get the boot. So only the best builds are viable.

Only the best builds are viable if you PUG, yes. But when you play with a guild at least my guild are way more interested in resaults than your build and gear.

We know who is good or not and the good people are the one that gets invited to most runs, but someone playing really good with bad gear and odd builds still gets priority over someone that plays badly with good gear.

Of course we also try to teach the ropes to players not as good, our guild is based on IRL friends. We did also try to help people with builds in GW1 but some people are rather stubborn.

If you are good enough you can more or less use any build and still do well, even if you sadly might miss many PUGs. But whenever I do PUG now in GW2 I dont really bother about the groups gear or builds because I frankly think peoples personality is more interesting. Stuff we havnt completed have been to rude idiots who dies more than everyone eklse, try to shift the blame and then disconnects without warning, and my experience is that they often have good gear and builds they copied of the net.

I can pull a bad group through almost all stuff in PvE (besides the fractal in the swamp, you need 3 good guys for that one minimum) as long as they are willing to listen to advice and arent quiters.I can not stop someon with disfunctional personality to make playing boring or someone to disconnect the first time they die.

And since guild Vs guild PvP isnt in yet, I only care about gear and specs in tournaments.

Of course since I play in a guild I help people getting good gear and help out with the speccs as way anyways, even if we do have a few stubborn players like the necro who must have all his minions equipped at the same time...

Originally posted by evilastro

Originally posted by Gaia_Hunter

The difference between my posts and yours is that actually I can detail skills, builds, build names, metagame periods.

Because you can just go to http://pvx.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page to find the sheep builds used over the years, whereas I would have to have photographic memory of what skill combinations I used over the past 6 years or so.

I know them because I was an active member of the community.

Since I was an active member I even know the new builds wiki is http://www.gwpvx.com/PvX_wiki and not the wikia.

Lastly you assume I'm talking about builds on the wiki that were widely used.

Anyone involved in the PvE aspect of GW1 knows the PvE is composed by PuG play, Hardcore Guild play, casual guild play, H/H (replaced by player+7 heroes).

I wasn't even very interested in PuG play or  Hardcore Guild play due to the tank+spike aspect of it.

Originally posted by Alber_gamer

It's very deep. You sometimes press 1, and sometimes press 2. Unless you have 1 set on autoattack, then you just press 2.

 

No, seriously. It's okay, and fun for a while, but deep? Reminds me of the review that gave GW2 a social score of 8 or 9. The zeal is strong.

lol yeah go try that in competitive PvP and see what happens.

People making a case against GW2's combat based on PvE is  pointless because the current PvE content doesn't push player skill or mechanics as high as other players can.

Originally posted by Faelsun

The average class is not even as flexible as a WOW Shaman and ALL of them have a DPS focus. Snowflake? How about SOME deviation at all. All classes have not only limited weapon options but those weapon skills are all for the most part DPS focussed. Then about 20 skills that are in 4 or so skill types that are bracketed off and your choices dwindle as you further speciallize down the traits.

You act as if everyone is not already spending the entire match match just dealing damage and you are right it certainly isnt  the pinnacle of variation.  Just because every class has a mandatory heal slot doesn't make them really hybrids, it feels more like a FPS with a med kit honestly. And the chain CCing and healing in WOW is frustrating however, thier idea of CC in GW2 is laughagle, and healing what a few hundred points a tic compared to how much DPS burst.t

Tell you what you map the amount of DPS per second ANY class in GW2 can do and put it side by side to any other type of Control, healing, fear, etc that it can do and explain to me how that its balanced.

Pretty much all of what you wrote is false.

The vast majority of weapon skills perform multiple roles, including healing, protecting, crowd control, etc. You are rarely doing JUST DPS, much like you are rarely doing just healing or CC. Not only that but you also ignore the element of positioning and mobility inherent to many skills.

It isn't all dps... in organized team play team rezzes, stuns, and buffs/conditions are key

Again, most skills do dmg/heal, dmg/control, heal/support, etc. Damage is somewhat more prevalent and that is on purpose: the devs even said pre-release that offense was always going to break through defence eventually

Equipment + traits + weapon swapping + movement...there is a lot of subtle depth to combat. If you don't believe it, just watch good players vs bad ones.

Some games add a lot of noise to combat (e.g. multiple skills you never even use), but that isn't depth.