Pugs are getting worse I think.

I think you missed the point. Tanking sucks. Guild Wars wasn't designed for tanking, warriors kill shit, and kill it good. weapons are for hurt not pretty pretty lookie here. Stab stuff, chop stuff, bash stuff. monsters go die die.

Tanking makes them go "lolwut" before running past you to the lowest hp, lowest al, squishiest, juciest caster on your team. Tanking mentallity is one of the reasons pugs suck. They think its the best method.

This is the bit where you deny it and try to back it up with slow completion times of elite areas compared to a stab stab warriors fast, non death runs.

Not to mention if it did work sins could do it better than a warrior.

[shadow form][deadly paradox][glyph of swiftness] + stab stab > tactics stance using paper weight

Well of course you have to be effective at damage dealing. But you also have to be able to survive being hit by more than one foe, Tanking is important, or maybe I should say "Surviving a beating" so that the monsters don't run by you and kill the lower hp characters. But as I said before, I am a damage dealer. I do not build "tanks" I just call warriors tanks because thats what they are, even when they are 100% damage output.

Res the person who can take the most damage and buy you the most time to get the party back to 100% so they can come in and help the warrior. Other professions can do more damage than a warrior, Fire ele for exsample. But if you res the fire ele first, more than likely he will just get killed again, as the warrior could have survived. I hope I made that a bit clearer, I am tired. sorry. My only "tanking" skill is endure pain. If that means anything.

As for a ranger using Troll Unguent, it sucks at a 3 sec activation time. My ranger and other characters always carry healing breeze and orison of healing, has saved our group from wiping many times.

Oh thats what tanking is!
/Slapsface
I though tanking was when you simply fail at everything. Oh wait.....

Tanking is bad, there are very, very, very few circumstances when it is useful and in those cases Elementalists and assassins do a far great job.

Please tell me you are kidding...

~A Leprechaun~

Monks shouldnt be rezzing people its the other 6 members that should have the rez and the monks should be healing.
Derv should have a rez before monk.
Monks need to be concentrating on healing party not rezzing.
1 of the 6 non monks should be rezzing as soon as someone dies while monk is keeping others alive.

You guys are probably correct, I am simply going off of what I have experienced in the pugs I have played in. And I'v never seen an Ele tank anything, they normally get killed very fast. Assassins are another story, Now with the update they are very good again. I don't know if they can absorb more damage than a warrior or not, But I will take your word for it. And Yes, just standing there taking damage does not help the party, But buying time for the party can mean the difference between a win and a loss.

Now I must really crash out. Been fun, good discussion, I will read more when I wake up. Thanks for sharing.

shadow form practically reduces damage they take to 0.

the term "tank" is taken from other games, its a well known term in gaming.
Aggro control to an extent can be done in gw, with your frontline actually being at the front, enttering a fight first. It is nothing like tanking whatsover.

(before anyone comments, i seid practically not completely so don't bloody well bother).

Nope! I have played every single GW class across Prophicies, Factions, Nightfall and EOTN. I have vanquished areas in HM with all my characters, played elite missions etc. Since Heroes came out I have completed 99% of GW without PUGS at all, Healing Breeze and Orison have worked for me and have always worked very well, most of my hero builds use it as well. My success is proof the idea works and the builds don't suck. I rarely use cookie cutter builds (Searing Flames exception), in fact I would never group with someone that found a problem with my build, because they work well for me.

I once made the mistake and removed Orison and Healing Breeze from my ranger to do Gate of Madness mission on the request of group leader, we failed the mission. Self heals are simply a part of most of my builds!

Troll Unguent may have a slight advantage in that its not an enchantment that can get removed, but its 3 seconds casting removes its usefulness to me, sorry, I can't live with that.

Yes but playing a ranger and actually getting hit often enough to need self heals shows your doing something wrong. An evasion stance for the few times a foe targets you works better than a self heal on a ranger, as does battle awareness. elemental damage can't take you down either.

Troll unguent is a decent self heal for a class that rarely gets hit, but even that isn't needed.

I love these "PuGs suck" threads.

The typical thought pattern is that "well, I'm better than the other players in the PuG, so they suck."

Chances are, however, that there are many players that are better than the people claiming this.

As a result, logic will tell you that if you believe PuGs suck, then you suck as well. The difference is relativity.

I'm a firm believer that that is why those who choose to play with heroes over PuGs because "PuGs suck" are kind of in a Catch-22 situation, and so they beat on their chests (and usually in All Chat or on fansite forums) to make themselves feel better.

That's why I think it's a better policy to simply play the game, do what you enjoy, and avoid passing judgment on others and how they play. Suggest improvements? Sure. Call them "bad"? Well, you can connect the dots based on what I said above.

Nope, PUGs aren't getting worse. PUGs have always been exactly as horrendously bad as listed in the OP.

Actually I am open to try out new builds, which stances are you talking about? I think I will give them a try and let you know how they work. The self heals are handy if my monk(s) happens to get into a bind too. Don't get me wrong, I have well over a hundred different builds saved and self heals are not on all of them, but they have saved my butt many times, especially if I have to keep an NPC alive during a mission or quest.

Wtf is wrong is people?!?

Today in Dragon's Lair... Two monks.

One pinged:
[mind burn] [teinai's heat] [meteor shower] [lava arrows] [fire storm] [glyph of lesser energy] [lava font] [resurrection signet]

12 in fire, 10 in healing (hadn't even done the quests yet for attribute points). So he's a monk, pretending to be an ele, and doesn't carry a hard res. UHM?

He left after deciding not to change his build.

The other one pinged:
[necrotic traversal] [vampiric gaze] [healing breeze] [deathly swarm] [putrid explosion] [animate bone horror] [heal other] [signet of capture]

Then he changed his build to:
[dwayna's kiss] [heal other] [healing breeze] [orison of healing] [restore life] [animate bone horror] [resurrect] [signet of capture]

WTF?!? Two res'es and still had the minion skill?!? Oh, and he was another 12/10 person. Too dumb to do the attribute quests.

This is EXACTLY the problem with heroes and henchies... they allow people to use the dumbest builds.

Oh, and let's not forget the hero build that the leader pinged on his monk:
[dwayna's kiss] [healing breeze] [healing touch] [words of comfort] [heal party] [resurrect] [rebirth] [word of healing]

Two res'es? Really? And apparently energy management is for nubs.

UGH! Frustration levels are SOOOOOO high. PuGs suck.

Maybe that's why they didn't "bother" to do the attribute quests, because they still can't do them. You can get the quests after you get to the South Shiverpeaks.

Heres my two cents and a bad PUG story, firstly monks should carry a rez, just dont use it during a fight, MOST other players should have a rez of some kind, and if they are Rits, Paras (sometimes) or monks should have a hard rez be it [Signet of return] or [flesh of my flesh] [death pact signet] [restore life] THIS SHOULD NOT BE USED DURING BATTLES THE SAME GOES FOR [rebirth] even [resurrection chant] or [renew life] are decent choices, but DONT USE EM MID BATTLE, UNLESS THERE I ANOTHER MONK TO COVER YOUR ASS, AND DONT USE TOUCH REZZES OR [Rebirth].

Majority of the res of the team should have something like [resurrection signet] or [sunspear rebirth signet] in case the warriors dont block the enemies and the monks die.

Now for a story. One day i was doing boreas seabed and joined a group and went N/R so i could get an interrupt for jade fury, and i took [concussion shot], which i admit was a bit of a poor choice, and was flamed for it being 25e despite the fact i had 40 odd energy, anyway i then changed it for [Distracting shot] and was then flamed due to the lack of damage output from it, yet these people couldn't read and see the 20 second disable time on it, i was then booted but the elitist leader because i was wearing my kurzick title, and that automatically makes you bad due to the fact i was an enemy of the leaders guild...

i saw them back there 15 minutes later saying "Damn we shoulda taken a SS necro...." In hindsight i probably shoulda taken [spinal shivers]
but hey everyone makes mistakes

About pugs being worse now. If they are, that is because all the players with some reason in their brain use H/H. Recently I have been PuGing for pre NF nostalgia, and I must say that they are the dumbest people alive, makes me glad there are heroes around nowadays.

As for the Monk carrying a rez or not.

I say that in PvE, Monks should carry a rez but NEVER, and I mean NEVER, use them during a battle. Back-line professions, especially Paragons, should carry a rez as well, preferably [Sunspear Rebirth Signet], [Death Pact Signet], or [Signet of Return]. [Signet of Return] is a good choice for ALL Paragons to use because they can still use their shouts *yes, I know, not chants though* while casting it. [Sunspear Rebirth Signet] should only be used on melee professions when rezing, unless all other rezes are used. [Death Pact Signet] should be used with few enemies nearby, and only on people who won't die right away after rez, to prevent the person with the skill from dieing as well.

Also, Melee should NEVER bring a rez, at least imo, they needs to keep damage up all the time *and when in a good team, which isn't PuGs, attempting to bodyblock, which means a GOOD team*.

PvP is a different story, EVERYONE except monks should bring [Resurrection Signet].

In short with my opinion on rez skills. In PvE, Monks=Hard Rez *preferably NOT Rebirth, unless a hard mission*, Paragons=Sig of Return, Casters=Death Pact Signet, Melee=none *unless they have a free skill slot*, for melee, a scroll of Resurrection would probably be better, at least imo.

Pugs suck because for every 10 "reasonable" players you get, you get 1 10 year old who got the game as a gift from his parents... (Please, don't start quoting me, You get the effing picture, I'm merely saying that it's someone who doesn't quite understand the full magnetitude of the skillbars, etc...)

Now, the 9 other people will simply vanish in your memories, because it was a "good memory". It was a pleasant ride with those people, and there weren't alot of troubles.

Now that 1 "retarded" person leaves a bad taste in your mouth, and every time you join a new pug, which happens to have a bad player, this taste gets even worse, and worse, and worse... These memories won't vanquish, simply because they add to the general concensus there is about "PUG"s...

The fact is that where as you need 6-8 average to good players to complete a Mission/Vanquish/whatever, you only need 1 bad player to ruin it for everyone. This simply puts alot more weight in the equation for "bad pugs"...
E.G.: Whenever your pug failed due to 1 person not knowing how to rez, or to aggro (or whatever once again), there still were 6 other people, probably as frustrated as you were, wondering what that 1 retard was doing.

No, Pug's don't suck, you just got to make sure you guide the people in the right direction (Even the retards) BEFORE the mission/... starts. If they refuse to coorperate, you kick them. (It's a win/win situation: You have evaded a waste of a few hours, he -the guy getting kicked- knows he has to change his attitude if he wants to get anywhere)

As for brain, common, we're talking about PvE here. Everything can be brought down to skill <-> counterskill, apart from 5-6 Area's in the intire game. (Such as DoA etc)
In a PUG, you need to make sure U have a strong leader. That's how it goes it nature, that's how it goes in a game. If you have 1 guy yelling: "retard, change that mothereffing bar to this: -pings a better bar- or get effing kicked" the pug will simply fare better. If however you, the leader, lack leadership, people will abuse it, and run their own "fun" build, not thinking about the team in general...

RA makes me cry.
PuGs make me cry.

In regards to carrying Ressurrection skills everyone, including the Monk considering they're more likely to survive a wipe, should carry some form of Ressurrection skill in PvE.

The idea is a party wipe should never happen. Saying a monk should carry a res in pug's is not a solution to the problem. Those people will learn its ok to wipe because you can spend 10 mins ressing everybody up and doing it again. Usually leading to another near or even total wipe.

My choice is to play with h/h or alliance members only and avoid this because i can. If i did pug i would start teams myself and meticulously check everyones bars and maturity levels. Doing that would take less time than the constant, weipe, res, wipe chains. But then h/h is still even faster, and alliance teams more so as i know everyones playstyle.

This guy fails at Guild Wars.

Fire elementalists can do more damage than a warrior. Maybe you just play with bad fire ele's.

/facepalm. I can't stop laughing.

"A ranger with nothing but interrupts, literally every skill except troll unguent"

lol...thats what rangers rock at wally whatever if thats not your style, I ll go through missions with ease with my super interrupt build/heros.

As for monks having a res, yes its best to have one imo, I use healers boon with res chant so its only 3 secs to cast..just in case!

What I find makes pugs worse, is ursran blessing hehe

Why would you need 7 interrupts? Savage shot alone recharges can be used every 5 seconds, if you were any good at your job you could do the same with 2 -3 interrupts.

~A Leprechaun~

Maybe you just play with bad warriors.

Pugs aren't getting any better. This is because players with even an low-moderate level of skill/experience just H/H everything. Nobody groups anymore, so pug players don't have role models and therefore dont get to watch and learn.

How sad is it that this is supposedly an MMO but nobody groups?

This is PvE....... I can beat PvE with crappy skills, no elite, and some shit that doesn't even belong on my Bar, it doesn't take much to beat PvE people, all my monks carry Res, no hex/condition remover, no prot skills and yet i can go through PvE on my own mastering more than half the missions along the way.

Ignoring the Monk rez debate, I'll say that PUGs are NOT getting worse. They have always been bad, and always will be bad. There are always people who are new to the game, and don't know what makes an effective build. The people who do know what an effective build is, and use one, don't always understand things like aggro. Although it takes SIGNIFICANT amounts of time, you can filter a PUG to make sure the people who join know what to do. Problem is that few people will wait to find a good team, and be content to fail several times at the sake of starting quickly. Only read first page, so I apologize if this was already mentioned, but you had to expect this at some point. Ursan has made PUGs worse. People who suck at the game can succeed when using Ursan, even in the elite areas. This allows them to think they are good, and they never learn important things like aggro control, pulling, hex/condition removal, target priority, etc., etc., etc. When they play a normal build (not Ursan), they fail to see a need for important things that Ursan can ignore.

PUGs will always be bad, and always have been bad. If you find a good one, you had a very lucky day.

Eh I get about 50/50 with PUGS, although I've noticed the ToA pugs getting worse.

As for monks using rez, Rebirth I will agree is bad, although I usually carry it if I'm going to FoW. But uh some guild mates and I did Tahnnakai Temple mission in Factions and I brought Res Chant and was Ressing during battle, healing doing this and that and it was working fine. So I don't know what you guys are on about monks with no rez. I only need 3 healing skills to keep the party up.

Pugs are getting worse since all people who could teach the newbies something are h/h-ing. And there are those people who think that they have all the knowledge in the world if they got a pvx wiki build.

Maybe I do, But I have never seen a warrior do more than 160-210 damage in a single attack on a low level monster, But Ele's can get much, much higher than that. If you know a warrior skill that can do more than a fire ele skill, please inform me, because I don't know of any.

Cool. This guy knows his stuffs well.

Insults yet no answers. On level 28 monsters warriors can hit for around 40-70 dmg, fire eles can hit for much higher. I am still waiting to hear what war skill can out do a ele skill. So far no one has offered anything except insults. Which leads me to believe no one has anything to offer and I am correct.

Necros do more damage than fire mage.

Why is Sab's build (and PvE is easy, remember) built on top of 3 necros, and not on top of eles?

The only ele you see in there is perhaps wards.


Fire ele is excellent in under 20 areas. Echo Fire Storm ftw. No, really.

But as you encounter 20+ mobs, effectiveness of fire ele starts to dwindle, and anything armor ignoring becomes king. Even mesmers get better than fire eles.


One exception is various nuking variations, but those rely on BiP and ability of a tank to round up the mobs. Couple that with long recharges on fire ele nukes, and you get something that is *capable* of dealing a lot of damage, but is in practice surpassed by many other classes.

It *can*. That is the key word. But they require long casts, long recharges, lots of energy.

In a Show-That-Crit contests that is played by Rogues in wow that may be enough. After all, 4586 is higher than 4436. But in the end, there's 8+ classes in a team, and mobs run, bunch up, scatter, spike, etc...

And if you want numbers on individual classes, dig up that master of damage thread. I believe in average dps, fire eles were outperformed by every other class except monks and Ursan.

Hunt, you are bad.

Eles have skills that cost energy, have aftercast, take cast times and have a recharge.

Warriors have Deep Wound, armour ignoring +damage, don't have cast times, can consistently attack them with free pressure.

I think Warriors win this one. Oh, and maybe you should look at Ensign's "Why Nuking Sucks" thread. I shouldn't have to give you the link, just use search.

And even then, just hit B, select any game, and you should find a melee frontline. I'm sure at least 1 team has a Warrior.

I will check that thread out, thanks for the reply.

On the monks carrying ress issue.
A monk is expected to have HB, 2 seeds, hex and condi removal, skills to heal directly, energy management, heal party and a ress.
Well now I would love to see a bar that contains all that and is effective at healing 8 man groups.
I say no to ress skills on a monk, however I do pack some scrolls of ressurection if we wipe. And in PvE there are ress shrines anyways in the hard areas

Usually if someone dies when Im healing it's because I died earlier due to overaggro or insane pressure (yes sometimes there are those noobwarriors that come and stand next to me after they aggroed...). So I dont actually see the need of a ress.

I switch targets often after interrupting one, like say two mag hydra's casting met shower, I will get both of them. Also I find letting off several interrupts in a row can be quite annoying for the monsters hehe. Also I tend to bring frustration along, last I used it, any interrupt sets the dmg off.

I've never had any pugs as bad as you guys....
Aside from the casual monk tanking and ranger with fire storm -.-;

My pugs were quite boring actually. Have the leader leads us thru it and people don't whine or complain :/

But now pugging on my monk, is a different story...*shudders*
Also, my monk always carries a res and no one complains about it, so I'm good