In re: When to heal

Zerg, havok squad, and solo play

There are three classifications in which you should pay attention when using your healing skills.  They are when you're in the zerg, havok squad, or in solo play.

Why is this important?

It is important because you don't want to waste your heals, and you should keep these skills in check whether it be your main heal, normally skill 6, or that which comes along with your skills like dodge rolls, heal per skill, or shouts.

Zerg

You must heal on the engage when your hp goes 75-80 percent because the enemy can burst your health down from their coordinated attack; so don't be choosy when you cast it, when your hp is down to such hp, burst your healing - dodge/shouts/basic skill 6 heal.

The next best thing if your group is coordinated is to heal when your commander asks for a refresh, this is normally done with empowering from staff guardians, waterfields from ele or ranger, and blast from warrior warhorn or guardian hammer 2.

Havok squad

The healing here should be in tune with your commander or at your own discretion because the enemy isn't that many but as a general rule if your hp is nearing 50-60 percent, it's time to burst your heal.

Solo

You know when to heal depending on the enemy; so pay attention in this case. Trust your own judgment.

Items that may help healing

Omnomberry compote, mango pies, sigil of restoration are among the few that I know of; so take advantage of these.


-sov

Suggested Runes and Sigils and Food combination and a little bit about guardian warrior and elementalist unity

Of Food, Runes, and Sigils

Many players experiment and use what they feel is best but only through constant testing through new patches will you see what works best.

For now I've found the best possible combination which may help your toon as well as your wvw gameplay.

Important ingame commands.
1. /wiki food
2. /wiki runes
3. /wiki sigils

The following:

1. Sigil of energy - this is very good for dodging the enemy and works good with omnombery compote; so everytime you kill the enemy you get healed and the dodge will help you survive the enemy pushes.

2. Sigil of restoration - for every enemy you kill, if you're in a zerg, heals you, and  this works best with lemon grass paultry soup or mango pies and loafs of saffron bread

3. Rune of melandru - very good for warriors who use sword warhorn and hammer; this way the warrios can focus on stances and stunning the enemy and blasting combo fields.

4. Runes of the soldier - very good for guardians, so they can focus on empower, taking off conditions and giving boons to allies.

So far these combinations are worth contemplating and hopefully it helps your basic gameplay to be better.

Guardian Warrior Elementalist and Combo fields Update

It has been awhile since I've added something on the combo fields and professions synergy but here are some that may help you get your team in gear.

1. Staff/hammer guardians are very good, but as an alternative staff/greatsword guardians can do wonders too.  How?  Staff for empower and greatswords to pull the enemy for a fast kill.  Who then deals with the blast finisher?

2. Sword/warhorn/hammer warriors.  These babies deal with the blasting, stunning, and pushing whereas the staff/gs guardians can focus on the pulling empowering and staff spamming.  It's a good synergy between these two professions.

3. Staff elementalists.  Our basic sustain professions of whom work best with guardians together with their empower skills.  These are your main sustain troops, so keep them in check and well fed. :3

Try it out - sov

An alternative to zerging

 By applying the methods here, we took almost everything in our borderlands against SOR and MAG at our offpeak time, meaning when we had at least 1/3 the number of SOR or Mag but pressured them off.

The Zerg

A group of players stacking and following a commander.  This means is one of the best ways to win in wvw.  This group is fully stacked, coordinated, and a great fighting force.  If this group is supported by one or two teams of 10-15 players, it can push and take stuff faster and scarier than anything in this game.

However, many players find this means of fighting boring, too lagy, and extremely unfair and became the excuse of why a server wins.  i.e. that server has more players and coverage.  That brings us to this issue, what is the alternative to zerging?

Coordinated Teams

Teams composed of 15 members working together under a common goal to hit different targets on the map at the same time and commit to it regardless of losing stuff.  If your map is queued, you can have 6 teams of 15 and 1 team of 10.  That gives you 7 teams to hit different targets at the same time and commit to it until it is taken.  A group of this size can defend itself against a zerg by smartly manuevering around the map and doing hit and run strategies.  Think TPVP, each team hits supply camps rather than everyone stays to cap one point camp.  This is what these teams of 15 do.

To start

A commander gathers everyone in citadel, and composes the team composition ala gvg or who ever is available focusing on speed versus damage, and tankiness over burst.  Simply, you take your team of 15 including the commander and move to one spot, ask another commander or a good team player to lead another team of 15 to hit another spot, and so on.  This can be done with 15 or 10 players in a group depending on the map population of your time zone.  Then one team will commit and hit the most upgraded stuff of the enemy - your team of 10.  The rest teams of 15 will hit everything else, securing camps, towers, and other keeps as well as defending every now and then.

Note however

You are most likely to never defend in this case because the pressure is on the enemy.  They will choose to defend rather than attack because they don't want to lose an upgraded stuff.  In your case you must strengthen your resolve and commit and accept that losing stuff is okay, and you can take it back.

This is a gamble!!!

The only weakness of this means is that it requires team effort and cooperation.

The upside is enemy will always have one structure left of which you can only take by zerging it with your map.   But hey, at least you have everything else done w/o zerging.

Try this, play tpvp style and abandon zerging.

-sov

To win, play as a team and keep the communication flowing.  There is no other way.
 

Resupplying

 Dillema

The problem with inexperienced players is they only defend and stick to the structure, and by doing so eventually such structure loses all the sieges from the enemy attacks, and the repairs that are used consume all the supplies; therefore leaving said structure empty and defenseless.

The Art of Resupplying

The smart player always has supplies but once such players uses the supply what does he doe?  Such player resupplies; so said player is always ready when it is needed.  However, players can't always have supply in hand or should such player leave a group or a zerg.  It means that such player must choose when to resupply.

The following are situations in which a player should resupply from camps

1. zero supplies
2. after using supplies to rebuild and repair or build defenses
3. if in keep battle, and used siege to build but it has been destroyed, use supplies to build, and resupply
4. if dead in battle, revive get supplies from camp and run back
5. if keep has no supplies, or tower has no supplies, you can get supplies to repair and build your sieges especially if you die.

The following are situations in which a players should resupply from towers and keeps

1. When there are influx of yaks coming in and the tower or keep is full.
2. Where it's an emergency to close a door or wall and the siege breaking it is destroyed to keep the enemy in and kill them inside
3. When in case the enemy is inside and about to cap the keep, must deny supplies
4. When the commander says so.

Solution

So, don't just defend, also make sure you get supplies to repair stuff, especially when you get killed because you need to revive fast, get supplies, and come back to your team.

 

No tag, no players

I read lots of good ideas about players holding the fort if there is no commander, but I see different.  I would map hop in Tarnished Coast and see nobody playing at a borderland during prime time if there is no tag.

Of course there would be camp flippers, but that usually is it.  To take and maintain a wvw population base a commander is necessary, or in the least a capably player without a tag but is coordinating everyone; so they can rally to said player.

I find that picture is sufficient evidence to show that in tarnished coast primetime, the main borderland holds little to no land because there are no tagged up commander/s or a person coordinating a strategy.

Because wvw is a team play, which requires a lot of coordination, the server with no coordination despite the population will lose.

I find to win, a server must have the following at least:

1. Team work where the wvw players coordinate with each other, which means there should be many wvw guilds working together and commanders working together, and players working together for a common goal.

2. There must be supply, which is gold, for taking defending and keeping stuff.

3. Player coverage in relation to 1 and 2.

If you find your server suffering from wvw ills, take the stand, man up and be that guy who tags up.  You might hear bullshit from shitty players who don't know, but you are actually helping the server by just being that focal point because people will start following your lead.

-S

Second Best

Second Best

Problem

The best gear is expensive.  It means you will have to spend ample time gathering money before you can buy a piece.  You will have little or no savings. i.e. expensive food to support your wvw gaming.

Solution

Choose the second best gear.  If the best gear for weapons is the legendary, then the second best is ascended or if the best in your point of view is ascended, then exos are the next best thing.

However, the reason I wrote this is more inline for wvw food.  Check /wiki food to see your choices of that which you wish to use.  You then research the food in tp and see w/c you can afford.  You will be surprised that the second best food is almost as good as the best one; so you simply stack the 2nd best food and enjoy your wvw gaming.

-S

How to Support your WVW toon

The Problem

We don't make much as wvw players.  Thus, we can't easily buy gear, setup our heroes, and play as we wish.

The Solution

I'll share a few tips I do to make gold.  Some of which you already know, and some you haven't tried.  But by doing these tricks you can setup your hero to have at least exo gear, support your server, and have fun.

1. Karma.  You exchange your karma for your first exo armor sets at orr temples.  You get your first set of exo weapons from wvw or buy them from tp.

When you're geared up, you will get karma over time.  The karma you gather over the week- you should exchange for karma boxes in orr, and sell the mats therein to tp or use them.

2. Skill Points.  Once you've gotten all the skills, you'll be gaining lots of skill points.  You can use this to make normal sieges into superior.  You can buy the sieges from tp, transmute them with the necessary mats, and forge them into superiors.

3. Dailies. You need the laurel for ascended trinkets.  Do this first, it won't take long.

4. Salvage. The white, and blue gear you collect are things you should salvage for the mats and that which increases your magic find.  It might take a while but as time passes, your toon will be able to get more blues and greens from the loots rather than whites.  And you either use the mats or sell them in TP.

5. Mystic Forge. Forge greens, yellows into exos.  You can sell those exos or use them.  And you might get a precursor.   This is a nice way to make gold and get gear.  But don't buy the rares or anything, unless making sieges via the skill point trick.

---

Your toon will be setup and you'll end up with a good amount of gold to start with and enjoy playing wvw and gear up your toon.

-s

The importance of pressure

Pressure

We players may queue up a map but get stacked defending a structure.  When this happens we are either duty bound to defend or take pressure off our structure by having a group attack something else.  So, depending on the situation we strategize into either choosing to defend wholeheartedly until the enemy decides to give up or make a havok push.  Either way are good but there are optimal choices depending on our man power, supply, and the enemy.  This is pressure.

How to take advantage of pressure?

You as a commander or a sovereign must decide the best choice of action of which your team will rely.  If you only have one structure left, the best way to deal with this is to have a havok squad make a small push on a structure owned by the enemy.  Knowing this, you will split their group, thus be able to fail taking the havok target but successfully defend your land or vice versa or lose.  But doing something is the better than doing nothing.

I.E.  You have stonemist.  Your opponents solely push there.  You decide to defend it while sending a group of 10 to attack the enemy camps/tower/keep and consistently push on it till they get the enemy forces on their tracks or succeed.  By doing so, the enemy will feel pressure; thus exhaunt energy and thinking power.  Where you already knowing the tactic can smile with glee.

I.E. You have little or no structure in your land.  The enemy defends to their most.  Thus, you can't do anything here, you choose to hop maps and hit their keeps which will force them to jump to such location and defend or risk losing it, where you in turn can hop back and take land in your borderland.

Pressure Advantages

The enemy will be forced to choose which land to defend or give it away.  EIther way it is a PPT win for your team.

Disadvantage

The only disadvantage of this strategy is whether you have troops to deploy.  Else, it's best to fight to your last, rest, and try again a few minutes after break.

DO IT

So, do this.  Develop your own pressuring tactics while using my basic template as a guide.

-S