Movement in GvG

[Evil Gingivitis]

I'm just wondering how vD members and midline/backline players in general do to pre-kite/kite/position, do you use your mouse or your keyboard, or a mix of both?

I have same type of question for warriors, do you guys click or keyboard for positioning on your target and for movement?

Also if you have the time for an explanation as to why you do it that would be greatly appreciated.

[ket-]

ez, as soon as you see warriors coming on you, just run out of melee ward.

Ask T, he can confirm !

[SephiRok]

For me it depends, if I see someone going for me soon enough, I use click-to-move to kite as fast as possible. But if the target is relatively close to me—in range to do a Bull's Strike soon—I use my keyboard to try to avoid getting KDed.

In general click-to-move is my option of choice though. You can move in any direction without affecting your camera view, you can get to the target faster and you're also less prone to bumping into an object or a person.

[choppanda]

I'm just wondering how vD members and midline/backline players in general do to pre-kite/kite/position, do you use your mouse or your keyboard, or a mix of both?

I would say there is 2 different types of kiting, moving to avoid a spike and moving to reduce pressure.

The advantage of clicking to move is that
a) There is no turning delay involved, your character turns and runs forward immediately, giving you the fastest movement possible.
b) If you are a caster/monk, a lot of the time the other teams melee is coming towards your front so to speak, 'backpedaling' is a recipe for disaster as you will ´take auto crits, not really reduce damage much adn have bulls/prot strike trigger on you.

That being said, you don't have to be hardcore and only ever move with your mouse, most solid players tend to use a form of both.
Mouse movement is good for 'panic kiting' an incoming spike, or ranged damage (orbs, paragons rangers etc.), it is also good for precision movemnt out of or around area damage, and allows you to get away from say a wanderlust kd chain easily.
Keyboard movement (NOT the backwards key), is easier on you as the 'main' way of kiting, when aegis/DA/ward or some other form of defense is up and you are just running to reduce overall damage.
why kite with keyboard if its only 2. best? .. becuase it gives you the freedom to use your mouse for targeting your own team or move the camera around (both which I do a lot, even when playing warrior).

I have same type of question for warriors, do you guys click or keyboard for positioning on your target and for movement?

Ok this is really very complicated and have a lot to do with my 'feel' for the game, but I will try to keep it simple.
First off, I almost never click an actual player on the other team, ith a few exceptions, and there is a very good reason for that.
Mainly it is because I am using the mouse to move the camera around about 80% of the time (I play most of the GvGs holding my right mouse button down), and even on a warrior I sometimes use the mouse for moving, but almost never for kiting reasons.
So why not use the mouse for targeting, because any sort of precise mouse clicking takes hand/eye coordination to do, even more so when the other team and your own camera is moving around, and that means you lose focus on the game at hand.

So how do it target on a warrior? I use 'c' (Target nearest enemy), 'tab' (target next enemy) and capslock (target previous enemy). And here is were it gets hard to explain how I use those keys, because I do not think you can replicate it with success easily, it takes a lot of 'feel' for the game but the thing is, using keyboard commands to target means it takes a lot of conscious effort for me to change to the target I want (but only after a lot of getting used to it).
So how do I use this form of targeting? Even though I can never give a thorough answer as to how I would always do, because it is so situatinal dependent, I will try to explain a few ways I use my keys to target with.

C + Space, start hitting something right away, go observe a warrior from say a guild out of the top 100, and notice how much time he spends not attacking anything, or running through the entire team to get to hit someone specific for 2 swings before changing again, or he gets snared and instead of hitting the guy right next to him keeps trying to move after teh person which is jsut running away full speed.
This is where C + Space is your friend, many many times as a warrior you will get snared and 'kited' past/into other people, instead of looking dumb and hitting nothing for 30 seconds, use c + space to start hitting every time you are body blocked/think you are body blocked (this is re sync you), or snared but near and attackable target or without a target, if for some reason I have no target to attack (as said I will sometimes kite by clicking th ground), I quickly hit c + space so that I am swinging and gaining adrenalin while finding a 'real' target.

For the next few things let me explain how target next enemy works, after pressing arget nearest enemy (this is important to do, otherwise your 'next' enemy target will not be consistent), hitting tab will move your target to the enemy that is on step further away, as in, it iwll cycle trough the other team base on distance from you.

Target the next softie? this is specially relevant when fighting against SoD or other forms of heavy prot, if you are swinging away, and you see SoD go on your target, the best way to start hitting an unprottet target is doing 'c' (clear 'tab list') then hit 'tab' and 'spacebar'.

Want to target someone specific, this is were 'feel' for the game comes in, if I want to say target the mesmer on the other team for a spike but I am hitting their monks and don't have him on my camera view, or even if if I can see him clearly, the way I will usually do it is 'c' (to reset the target list) and then hit tab a number of times to get to him, if he is not in my camera view I will first move the camera quickly (note the 80% of the time spent holding the mouse key down), this might seem like a really slow thing at first, but after doing it for a few months you will develop a 'feel' for how many times to hit tab to get to your target, and also my 'enemy target' box on my UI is rather large, so that I can with a minimum of effort focus on the first 2 characters (what class my target is), this allows me to, with a minimum of conscious effort get to the target I want to hit or spike.
And why is this important, because your focus is better spend on other things (what is another long post).
And if you go 'on too far' well that is what caps lock is for, I don't think I ever use it anymore though, the few times I go a bit too far targeting I usually ops to cycle through the entire team, why? because it lets me know what skills they are using at this time.

All this might seem that I spend a lot of times hitting tab during a match? correct, I do, and I find that very helpful during a match, because it allows me to keep a track of what skills and when the other team is using their skills, which in return helps me chose when to spike more effectively.

Ok so when do I not use c + tab for targeting, say I want to hit someone but I would have to move past wards, area damage, spirits or other players, well, a lot of times you end up body blocked or in the middle of a lot of hurt if you jsut blindly target the person and press space to attack him, in those situations what I do is I use my mouse to 'navigate' near the person I want to attack, and then press 'c' to target nearest person.

That being said there are a few situations in which I would just target directly with my mouse, for instance if the other team is camping their wards or paragon shouts, and I spot someone outside it, then I may mouse click him for 2 reason
1) He is alone and usually not moving, it is fast and easy.
2) It is hard to judge how many times ot hit tab to get to him and in any case I care less about what class he is so I would have to watch the mini map to see if tab got the right target, which means I would have to spend the conscious effort regardless.

I will also mouse click if I see someone, usually, a mesmer stand and cast in an opportune spot for spiking and I just want to attack ASAP, using the mouse to click him will usually be faster in those situations, (as I start spike counting before I get the target, but usually need the target by the time I say '2').

Also if you have the time for an explanation as to why you do it that would be greatly appreciated.

think I did a bit of that, but in any case, feel free to ask if you want me to elaborate on something, I just kinda typed down what I thought without thinking much about structure or readability.
And my post was veyr warrior specific even though I use similar concepts for other classes I play.

[Evil Gingivitis]

Ok thanks for the response (and jokes)


Sephirok you mentioned keyboard vs Bull's Strike, but wouldn't Click to kite be more effective, because of the delay in of keyboard when you need to stop right away?


And panda I think you helped me answer, but I was unsure on your position on using a bull's strike and clicking closer to your target so you could get more hits in after he gets up again? or when they kite would you click for a shorter path and in turn more hits?

[SephiRok]

Sephirok you mentioned keyboard vs Bull's Strike, but wouldn't Click to kite be more effective, because of the delay in of keyboard when you need to stop right away?

Not if you get KDed. How would you stop on demand with the mouse, if there's a sprinting Warrior behind you waiting to Bull's you. What I do even more often than just keyboard move is click-to-move and hit a move key when I'm expecting a Bulls. If there's lag, it's a bit tricky, but you can also cast something (e.g. a Reversal) which makes you stop faster.

[choppanda]

And panda I think you helped me answer, but I was unsure on your position on using a bull's strike and clicking closer to your target so you could get more hits in after he gets up again? or when they kite would you click for a shorter path and in turn more hits?

When I land a bulls strike, on a target that is not prottet heavily, there is not really much to think about, hit frenzy and go crazy.. ideally what you are trying to achieve is making the monks spend too much energy over protting the target, or if no protting happen ,you want to try and get the kill.
After the target gets up, in some situations you might want to try and land 1 or 2 more swings if it is still low, but more likely the target got heavily prottet and its time to swap to another person.
In a nuthsell, the way to score kills by burst damage is normally going bulls -> (Executioners) -> Evisc -> Agonizing .. if the monks get the prot in, time to swap, if not you should score a kill if every attack lands, but there is never any reason to try and move after landing bulls

And no, if someone is kiting me, I wont ever deal much damage to him, ideally, when I am being kited what I want to do is wait until whoever is kiting me runs past another target I want to hit then I do C + Space and get off the kite train.
But most times I just 'auto attack' the person (with rush up), while finding a new target.
Keep in mind though, that we are talking seconds here, I wont ever run after someone for much more than 2-3 seconds at max, if target starts to kite, find something else to hit asap.

The exception to this is when them kiting is helping me achieve my goal, ei. if there is no pressure on either team, making their mesmer kite is good because it keeps them from building pressure, and if the other team is hurting alot, making thier monks kite will make it harder for them to heal perfectly.

[Evil Gingivitis]

So clicking after a knockdown would only be effective to body block someone and kill them off?

When you aren't doing that, you're just trying to spread pressure to the most soft targets possible unless you and your team wants/needs a certain player kiting?

Also, what do you try to do vs. Wards or a Blinding surge? is it to look for different targets for warriors?
and for wards is it to look for people outside the ward and go after them until they run in? or will you keep the strategy the same and just get the mesmer to harass the blinding surge/warder?

And another question for midline/backline, will you guys kite in circles without falling back (inside a ward or without one) or will you run straight back so the warrior will be forced to switch targets?

[SephiRok]

And another question for midline/backline, will you guys kite in circles without falling back (inside a ward or without one) or will you run straight back so the warrior will be forced to switch targets?

Mostly in circles, unless there's a special situation, I think.

For monks, I (prot) don't go too far since I have to be able to reach the front line (and I like playing aggresively), unless it's perfectly safe, or I think I'd die otherwise. On the other hand T often stays in the back with his LoD and Return.

[choppanda]

So clicking after a knockdown would only be effective to body block someone and kill them off?

Correct

When you aren't doing that, you're just trying to spread pressure to the most soft targets possible unless you and your team wants/needs a certain player kiting?

Right, in general I 'switch gears' between primarily spiking or primarily pressuring to keep the other teams monks of their guard, although, after playing a lot of games you start to realize that against certain builds I can never really create pressure so I primarily build adren to spike.

Also, what do you try to do vs. Wards or a Blinding surge? is it to look for different targets for warriors?
and for wards is it to look for people outside the ward and go after them until they run in? or will you keep the strategy the same and just get the mesmer to harass the blinding surge/warder?

If your mesmer has a decent ping he should be able to interrupt at least 1 out of 3 ward melees, as well as possibly pleak some bsurges, keeping attune down on the ele is also helpful, if you interupt enough wards and keep the bsurge hurting on energy then he wont affect your pressure too much.. although if the ward isn't getting interrupted and there is alot of blinds, I generally look for peopel to spike who are outside the ward.. or more often, I count my spike in 3-4 second downtime of the ward, that makes for 1 spike every 20 seconds which is oki.

[Henric]

WOW. I gotta say Panda, your Warrior explanation is absolutely brilliant. Its only sad so few Warriors actually play like that.

Having said that, only thing I kinda disagree is the part you say you almost never use Caps Lock now (R for me). I find it very usefull when playing and I disagree cycling through the entire team is more beneficial in that case but I guess its just playstiles.

Good job and lets hope I can meet you again on the battlefield someday soon (Making my comeback today after a year without GW, heh).

[choppanda]

Having said that, only thing I kinda disagree is the part you say you almost never use Caps Lock now (R for me). I find it very usefull when playing and I disagree cycling through the entire team is more beneficial in that case but I guess its just playstiles.

Ah, all I meant by it is, when you get used to targeting like this you rarely mistarget, and the few times it is usually when it is not so important a situtation so I tend to just take the extra time and do the full cycle, but yes you are correct, the previous target key is very useful.

[Evil Gingivitis]

Thanks for all the response and input, I have another question that's been eating away at me ---- When I GvG, I usually Monk (Backline) or Frontline (Not the Stand caller, it's an odd combination I know, I try to stick with Warrior unless we absolutely need the monk). I was wondering what kind of insignias you use and also special runes you use (like do warriors use rune of clarity at all?).


I'm mainly interested in Monk and Warrior but any role is fine, I just would like to know what would be the best thing to run (obviously it can vary, but most of the time I want to see what is effective).

An example: LoD - I have all health mods with a +10 vs physical on chest, Sup. Vigor, Minor DF, HP, PP and Rune of Vitae. (Would this be a good setup, or should I go with more help vs. damage and less health?)

[Karla]

I believe survivor insignias are the way to go.

hp>rest

@rok, cancel-action button works fine for interrupting click-to-move running too. It's nice for bulls especially =p

[sinText]

Now what about position?
I have noticed different tactics between the builds and also noticed as a group there a "good" positioning, but then there are also the "over-extensions". (Note: I monk a lot.) Would it still be ideal with the positioning to stay with in the bubble of everyone so if you are getting pounded on, you can get cover faster, and you can also heal the front line easier.
(I hope that made sense )