21 replies to this topic

[Jan Roman]

Hello,

I am quite new to GW2 and I recently started to WvW. I've been trying to read as many guides as possible and I am starting to understand basic principles of World vs. World battles. However, one thing makes me think.

I played WvW for about two hours yesterday, and I managed to loot only 1 Badge of Honor. GW2 wiki says that every killed player should reward 0-2 Badges, but after looting between 10-20 bags, I recieved only one badge. Does it depend on the damage done?

If I am right, what is the best way to obtain starter PvP armor? I would say Karma and crafting would provide some pieces of armor and powerful weapons.

I hope this is not a very stupid post, but WvW system is not an easy thing to learn, especially when you are new to the world of Guild Wars.

Thank you and happy hunting!

[adra12]

Unfortunately the badge of honor system is a rather fickle thing. Most of the time it seems whoever does the most damage gets the badges however sometimes they are awarded to whoever gets the last hit or finishes them in the downed state. Collecting badges of honor is not actually a viable way to get gear unless you do all of the WvW jumping puzzles every single day.

[Silent The Legend]

Well first of all you dont get any "starter PvP armor". Basically what happens is that you get Badges of Honor from kills(0-2 is correct, but they dont mean you get 0 1 and 2 33% chance each... more likely 0 66% 1 24% and 2 10% something like that) that will allows you to buy the super cool WvW Invader's armor which is a lvl80 exotic armor. However until youre lvl 80 you must go around with looted pieces of armor. Dont worry though, youre not going to lose so much damage and stuff(roughly 50% with drop gear at lvl 20 last time I played with an underleveled char. I know you may think 50% wtf but, ehy, youre a lvl 20 char with shitty gear, enjoy the fact that you can stand a fight! Resilience wont even bother you since if you know how to behave youll be fine). The problem is that at lvl 80 youll be forced to go PvEing to get all the max exotic gear and jewels, since the Invaders armor has completely stupid stats(Power, Toughness and Healing Power, good only for a guardian or a support ele basically) and you cant get the jewels materials from WvW.

[Jan Roman]

Thank you.

Right now, I am level 80 Asura Thief wearing mostly green Invaders Armor. It has Power, Toughness and Vitality, which doesn't seem so bad (more precision would be nice).

I've never been really interested in PvE so I was hoping there is a good way of recieving something to start with (in order not to be eliminated in a few seconds). I didn't really want to play Backstab build, but I am starting to think Bleed or Venom builds will require much more resilience and better gear in order to be viable (and more gaming experience as well of course).

I was a WoW player for a long time and the systems are quite different, but I think it's a shame you can't really focus on PvP only.

[Tarkus]

Its not a stupid question because we are all new at some point and the system isn't completely obvious to new-comers to the game. The armor advice that I would give you would really have to depend on what level you were, because tbh its best to go with armor bought off the market-place or by random drops in PvE/WvW is best for the levels 0-75. You can purchase semi-useful gear in the WvW lobby from the karma/badge merchants, but the stats aren't really the best for a lot of professions if you plan on fulfilling any other role other than a tank (Power/Vitality/Toughness).

At level 80 you should be able to earn far more money due to the higher tier drops that you get by killing players and NPC's, and I personally find that it is easiest to get gear from the Karma merchants in Orr (42k - Easy enough to get in 1-2 nights in WvW) or alternatively you could just buy them if you have enough dough.

Now in regards to the drop rate of badges, in theory you should be getting between 0-2 per player killed  but in my experience it seems like that you gain more badges when you do more damage. This could have been luck on my part, but when I was leveling my main from 1-60 as a thief I didn't gain all that many badges. However when I hit lvl 80 w/ Berserkers exotics the badge drop rate was very consistent so as I never needed to pay for siege again.

How to get more badges:

1. Kill more people - higher damage will help you here (more cases = higher drop total)
2. Possible link with total damage dealt increasing total drops although it would be good to get a confirmation of this

IMHO the armor that you can get via badges isn't worth the grind, and if you do get badges please save your gold and buy siege.

[Meldios]

Jan Roman, on 19 November 2012 - 02:56 PM, said:

I was a WoW player for a long time and the systems are quite different, but I think it's a shame you can't really focus on PvP only.

QFT. Anet better be listening.

[GrandmaFunk]

Jan Roman, on 19 November 2012 - 02:56 PM, said:

...I think it's a shame you can't really focus on PvP only.

That's what Structured PvP is for.

WvW was specifically made as a PvP / PvE hybrid.

[Jan Roman]

sPvP has one major flaw for me. I lack the sense of progress - you gather ranks and you can buy prettier armor, but there's no real sense of getting somewhere. I believe sPvP will suit me more probably, but it's not what I've been hoping for.

After I spent a couple of hours in WvW (around 10 hours I would say), I ended up with 14 Badges of Honor. This is clearly not a good system to gather PvP armor. I've bought some Invaders rare armor with karma, but just as a desperate measure. I will try to focus on sPvP since there is absolutely no way of gathering WvW PvP armor in a reasonable amount of time.

[Impmon]

The cost of badge armor doesn't make sense really in relation to other 80 exotics you can obtain for 1-2 gold.  This should've been adjusted in beta.  There are no tangible rewards for WVW, no gear, title, character progression.  You can start at level 1 if you want.  You can spend an hour upgrading a keep to have it be taken in 20 min if nobody comes to defend.  

WVW right now is basically a big playground with 100s of kids trying to kill each other over the sand pile.  Thats about it.  Some people have convinced themselves this is fun repeating the same process daily.

[Trish]

yeah, badge gear is ugly and expensive, with only 1 stat allocation option.

But you get three things from WvW.  karma, silver, and badges.  karma and silver are obtained from objectives, with no worries about having to loot bags on the ground mid fight as well.
(Dailys can be saved up to for MASSIVE karma boosts as well. And are account bound, not character)

Cash and karma are far better options for gearing up.

Cash.  Buy things on the trading post. No pve needed. 2-2.5 gold per item.   Pretty much any stat build you want.

Karma.  Orr.   This may or may not require some pve.   If the temples are controlled, then its simply a matter of running down to them, and buying what you want.  If they are not controlled, you might need to organize taking them back.
http://dulfy.net/201...rma-armor-sets/
Karma gear is the cheapest by far though. and 3 stat builds.


Impmon, there are many titles from WvW.

Edited by Trish, 24 November 2012 - 02:20 PM.

[Krill]

You usually finish about 50-90% of the daily achievment playing WvW...just be sure to finish those out every day, and save the karma juggs to use with boosters to get your karma armor. For most non-glass cannon builds the power / toughness / vitality exotic karma armor is just dandy.

[RivenTheValorous]

To clarify, Invaders is Power/Toughness/Vitality (not Healing). This is actually a good set for almost any class in WvW. Glass cannons get generally stomped so it makes a lot of sense that this is the set for Badges. Additionally, you cannot get these stats from crafting. WvW, AC, and HotW are the only places.

[Leoveo]

Impmon, on 24 November 2012 - 02:02 PM, said:

The cost of badge armor doesn't make sense really in relation to other 80 exotics you can obtain for 1-2 gold.  This should've been adjusted in beta.  There are no tangible rewards for WVW, no gear, title, character progression.  You can start at level 1 if you want.  You can spend an hour upgrading a keep to have it be taken in 20 min if nobody comes to defend.  

WVW right now is basically a big playground with 100s of kids trying to kill each other over the sand pile.  Thats about it.  Some people have convinced themselves this is fun repeating the same process daily.

Its much more fun than running around a pvp tournament capping points. Would rather cap a castle, tower or supply camp in my own armour set i've spent a whole game acquiring than doing repetitive tournaments in a different set of armour. However, wvw is only viable on large scale if you have a good computer. It taxes the processor heavily.

[Tellia]

adra12, on 19 November 2012 - 01:58 PM, said:

Unfortunately the badge of honor system is a rather fickle thing. Most of the time it seems whoever does the most damage gets the badges however sometimes they are awarded to whoever gets the last hit or finishes them in the downed state. Collecting badges of honor is not actually a viable way to get gear unless you do all of the WvW jumping puzzles every single day.

yea this is correct.

the easiest way to get badges (besides the jump puzzle) is to be the person who spikes a downed player and defeats them. the drop rate for badges when you do this seems to be considerably higher than the normal bags you get for damaging people. i have farmed many badges on low lvl alts this way, even getting badges from people i didnt attack at all. i just ran around ccing people and being an opportunist trying to be the 1st to spike other players. there are times you get no badges but more often than not, theres 2 waiting to be looted.

personally i think this is an incredibly unfair way to reward the badges. 1st of all as i described, people spiking often get badges when they didnt contribute anything else to the death of the player, imo the people actually damaging these people should get the rewards. it also makes it easier to farm badges on melee toons...you get way more chances to spike people playing guardian, melee warrior, melee thief, etc, than you do anything ranged like engineer, bow ranger, non-dagger elementalist, etc. which is more bs. 3rd it makes people more interested in spiking than doing other things in the heat of battle, like killing other players, cc, reviving, supporting with heals or fields...as soon as a player gets downed they all stop doing these things and run to try to be the 1st to spike.

Edited by Tellia, 02 December 2012 - 03:25 AM.

[Zheo]

This may sound fickle or egotistical, but  I assure you it's not. What I want is my name to show up, not "Insert Server Here Invader/Defender".  I want people to recognize my name and either cheer or run in fear.  It was a wonderful thing in WoW when your reputation lit up chat like a Christmas tree. It was something you earned through actions, either positive or negative. Your teammates cheered when they saw you coming to save the day, and your enemies went "Oh shit...he's here".

I can safely say the same of other people I saw. Many were the times myself and my archnemesis charged into battle in the midst of a PvP map to see who was sharper on their skills today. We laughed our asses off about it after on the forums and complimented each other, but it was nice to have people know who you were.

[Vihar]

There are no rewards for WvW worth the effort or mentioning.

   You should decide whether you want Karma gear, or crafted gear, by deciding what stats you want in your gear and finding the set that matches those stats.

   Forget buying gear with badges, it is ridiculously expensive, ugly, and has only one set of stats that most people don't want.

   Generally, karma gear will go for 42K Karma per piece, and crafted gear will go for 2-3 gold per piece.

   Badge gear is hundreds of badges...and I don't know anyone who got any other than myself for two accessories...because they had Toughness and Vitality.

   I have no intention of buying any more, those pieces just fit with the build I wanted, is all.

[Zheo]

I really think that ANet needs to speed up some of the WvW changes...maybe not the December update, but early January for sure as we all get back from the holidays. Not QQing, but I think that ANet should consider adjusting their release timetable on this...even if its phasing in a new reward system and saving new maps for later.

[Piteous]

Zheo, on 04 December 2012 - 06:36 PM, said:

I really think that ANet needs to speed up some of the WvW changes...maybe not the December update, but early January for sure as we all get back from the holidays. Not QQing, but I think that ANet should consider adjusting their release timetable on this...even if its phasing in a new reward system and saving new maps for later.

Agreed.

[GrandmaFunk]

that's not how development works.

also, devs enjoy seeing their family over the holidays too.

[Drtrider]

I have about 400hours of playtime on my 80thief. I do quite a bit of solo roaming. Most of those 400hours is in WvW. I'm sitting on about 600 badges right now. Mu suggestion is to get a small group, and start grabbing supply camps/sentrys. Even the guards can drop badges. Or, try joining a zerg and do as much AOE as possible.

However, as other above  me stated, as it stands right now WvW is not the quick way to gear. I'm hoarding my badges right now untill Anet comes out with new stuff to spend them on. (Which they said they're going to do)

[Antithesis]

It seems to be mostly damage related.

You can be the first to "finish" someone that has been downed and still get nothing if you
didnt do any other damage.

I have also got badges for big AOE damage to players, but not killing, and moving on to other targets to
later get a loot and badge drop when someone else kills them.

[Zheo]

I imagine it's something along the lines of "DId you do X% of damage over Y period of time" so if you take a potshot at them, and then they run off, and then you hit them again, and then they run away to get killed by someone else you probably wont get credit. After dealing a sufficient amount of damage you ultimately qualify for a loot bag.

So:

1. Damage
2. Damage
3. ????
4. Profit.