Curse

Lorekeeper · Dec 06, 2007, 01:58 AM // 01:58

Points of failure to note about zergway

1) poor healing ability against widespread degen (heavy reliance on shout/chant party heals)
2) reliance on physical attacks hitting to build adrenaline
3) reliance on ''fear me!'' shout to edeny midlines and backlines
4) reliance on disrupting chop to disable key skills
5) poor anti snare ability
6) poor running ability
7) poor holding ability
8) poor anti-hex utility
9) poor anti condition utility (heavy reliance on elite chant Song or Purification)

Points of strength to note about zergway

1) Natures renewal and tranquility make monking difficult
2) ''fear me!'' edenial is significant
3) disrupting chop can potential cause wipes if key skills get hit
4) can split very well because of high durability of entire team
5) paragon backlines hard to spike

notice how most of the strengths about zergway also form part of their weakness.

Here is a brief guide on how to exploit zergway weaknesses and how to avoid their strengths.

1) Make them miss.

Notice how numbers 2),3) and 4) in the points of failure list coincide with numbers 2) and 3) in the strengths list? These are the primary characteristic of zergway that need to be dealt with... physical attacks.

Here is a range of viable options to deal with physical attacks (will add more if i forget any). They include:

* Ward against melee - grants party members 50% block defense.
* Miss hexes like blurred vision/reckless haste/price of failure.
* Guardian - grants party members 50% block defense.
* Blinding surge - makes foes miss 90% of the time.
* Defensive Anthem - grants party members 50% block defense.
* Dust trap - makes foes blind.

* Ward against foes - makes zergway warriors move slower allowing party members to kite from them and so avoid being hit by their attacks.
* Grasping earth - same as above.
* Frozen burst - same as above.
* Ice spikes/deep freeze/freezing gust - same as above.
* Crippling shot/barbed trap/snare - same as above.

It is possible to run a non-overload type build successfully vs zergway by using ward against melee+guardian and perhaps a couple snares listed above.

--- order your midline and backline to ball inside the wards, making sure that your prot monk keeps guardian on itself+ward ele+heal monk... anyone being attacked by a zergwarrior should kite around the outer edges of the ward and as many zergwarriors as possible need to be snared so that they waste time running around the wards ---

It is possible to run a condition-overload type build using dust traps and barbed traps and crippling shot in combination with guardian.

--- order your trappers to trap defensively, planting traps at the monks or in kiteable areas so that monks can kite zergwarriors into the traps, keeping guardian on trappers and monks is needed for this to work well. Crippling as many zergwarriors helps party members kite ---

It is possible to run a hex-overload type build using reckless haste+blurred vision perhaps in combination with guardian and ward against melee.

--- order hexers with anti physical hexes to overload zergwarriors with hexes then ball and kite around wards keeping guardian on the hexers with anti physical hexes and on the prot and heal monk ---

Pressure the paragon backlines

The dual paragon backlines are the only healers in the build... and their bars rarely differ from team to team. They usually run a song of restoration and a song of purification paragon. The song of restoration needs to die first as it provides party healing for the whole zergway team... there are a few ways of pressuring out the paragon backline.

1) Interrupt their chants - with migraine mesmers or interrupt rangers or domination mesmers and pressure them out with continual dmg.

2) Force a paragon to infuse and spike it when it does - call a spike on one of the paragons and the other paragon will be forced to infuse. If not the spike on the first paragon will probably go through, if the second paragon chooses to infuse you can catch it straight after the infuse because it will be at 50% health. Success of this strategy depends on the nature of your spike... a strong spike will be able to kill the paragons regardless of an infuse... a medium strength spike will probably have to spike frequently to force mistakes and low energy through pressure.

3) diversion spam and catch key skills.

4) degen them out and interrupt attempts to party heal and self heal.

5) put vocal minority of the paragons or place a well of silence near them - most of their healing comes in the form of chants and ballads...

Capture points

I realise many people will have different strategies against zergways on capture point maps but here are a few of mine.

* when running a hex build make sure your anti-physical necros follow the location of the zergway warriors to minimise their threat

* send fast mobile runners to cap shrines that are not occupied by the enemy team

* keep the ghost alive and maintain at least 1 shrine with the ghost

* when running a snare character... snare the zergwarriors as much as possible or snare their ghostly hero - this will prevent them from reaching the shrines quickly.

* kill the ghostly hero... the paragons have poor single target healing outside infuse health and they struggle to heal ghosts.

* (room for more strategies as people post them)

Relic runs

* they have poor anti snare abilities so make sure your snarers are alive and able to snare any zergwarriors who try to run a relic

* paragon backlines perform poorly when split up... if you are able... threaten kills at multiple points on the map... on unholy temples threaten to kill the ghost after every 2min mark and threaten to kill their relic runner at the same time... this will force the paragons to split... and you should be able to kill the relic runner or ghostly depending on which paragon goes to save which.

* they rely on conditions to snare... bring a monk with Restore Conditions with you when you try to run a relic... have the monk keep guardian on the runner and itself to protect against zergwarriors

King of the hill

while hold the altar
* snare warriors
* protect monks with block defense to prevent them building adrenaline for dchop and fear me.
* kill Natures renewal and tranquility ASAP.
* hex zergwarriors with vocal minority to prevent their use of ''Fear me!''

to kick zergway off altar
* use same tactics needed to kill paragon backlines
* keep note that paragons have little ability to mitigate dmg or to heal a single target taking large amounts of dmg which means that they struggle to keep the ghostly alive on the altar.

Kill spirits

* interrupt the spirits before they are cast with something like Psychic Distraction.
* or dedicate someone to killing them once they are cast, be it a fire ele or warrior or paragon or mesmer with unnatural signet.

(if people post other good bits of advice on how to beat zergway i will do my best to add their ideas to my original post... to keep it all easy to access... i will of course credit ideas to their respective posters.)

Advanced tips against Zergway

Quote:

Originally Posted by elektra_lucia

* Guardian and SoA should be used on a 40/40 set at the right time.

* vocal minority will work on fear me too.

Elektra also pointed out that you should be wary of when the zergwarriors use disrupting chop... their attacks come at regular intervals depending on whether they have IAS or not... if you have only a single zergwarrior training you and you want to cast a spell, you should try to judge whether the zergwarrior has built enough adrenaline for the disrupting chop or not and cast accordingly... they tend to spam their skills on recharge so you the attack skill should come at predictable moments. Time your casting to occur in between their attacks... this will minimise the impact of dchop.

- disclaimer - this becomes harder the more zergwarriors there are training you... keeping track of the attack patterns of 2 or more zergwarriors is not easy. Good luck!

enjoy

TheOneMephisto · Dec 06, 2007, 02:05 AM // 02:05

Balling up in wards is a no against fear me spam. If you want to use wards, make sure that you kit around the edges and attempt to stay as far away from warriors as possible.

elektra_lucia · Dec 06, 2007, 02:18 AM // 02:18

When you kite and then cast don't cast instantly, the thing about IWAYers is a lot of them will be chasing you, and hit disrupt (while running). When you stop and then cast, it will be perfect timing for disrupt to hit. If you stop, kite a bit, stop, wait quarter of a second then cast/fake cast. You really shouldn't get interrupted. Remember to fake cast skills if you're an ele with glyph of lesser.

Don't always stay in low energy set just because there's fear me, imagine how much adrenaline he has built up, sometimes you can even wait for a fear me and then switch set to the best mods for what you will be casting. Then switch back.

Wards can promote bad positioning but if a well is up and a ward is on top of it, then you should ball up.

Gaurdian and SoA should be used on a 40/40 set at the right time. Casting during an adrenaline discharge won't be good.

Don't put wards under a bridge or something dumb. Or half in a wall, it's very obvious but so many people do it. That applies to all builds, but kiting is highly important when facing heavy melees builds such as iway.

If you have a trapper, note the positioning of him. Same goes to warder, at the start of the game make sure you understand your build and you don't just join it to play. You need to know who has the wards, so you can click his name and run to him. You should of course see the wards but sometimes it's nice just to click the warder guy.

vocal minority will work on fear me too.

shoogi · Dec 06, 2007, 08:37 PM // 20:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lorekeeper

5) paragon backlines hard to spike

http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/Cracked_Armor

Kyp Jade · Dec 06, 2007, 09:02 PM // 21:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by shoogi

http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/Cracked_Armor

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ballad_of_Restoration
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Song_of_Purification
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Purifying_Finale
(P finale takes the cracked armor away btw)

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Centurion%27s_Insignia
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Shields

and lastly

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Mending_Refrain

yea we can all link to wiki, not that it, you know, means anything

Lorekeeper · Dec 06, 2007, 09:44 PM // 21:44

i said paragons were hard to spike i never said it was impossible... theres no need to bring things like shellshock specifically to kill paragons...

i just wanted to make it clear that spiking a paragon with anything less than a dedicated strong spike will rarely result in a kill... and so everyone reading the guide should adjust their spike play accordingly. Adopting a pressure spike strategy with a medium strength spike build would be the solution... there is no need for things like cracked armour but if you can include that skill in a build that is successful in HA then all the better for you.

master_of_puppets · Dec 06, 2007, 10:01 PM // 22:01

Quote:

1) poor healing ability against widespread degen

Um What? The paras can get the unremovable mending refrain on the entire team which is +4 health regen for everyone, the 5 warriors can get their pets killed quick by locking them onto the opposing teams ghostly (ty, advanced pet controls!) so they have +9 or 10 health regen constantly (MR + iway) not to mention they can spam finale of restoration which heals for 70 every time something ends, and those shouts are ending consntanly. How is that poor healing ability against regen.

Quote:

4) reliance on disrupting chop to disable key skills

How about there are no hey skills to dcop when everyone is at 0 energy.

Quote:

9) poor anti condition utility

Sop para can spam his elite a lot using signet of agression and just chukcing his spear.

I dont think people should be forced to bring vocal minority, well of silence or a bunch of other crap.

Lorekeeper · Dec 06, 2007, 10:22 PM // 22:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by master_of_puppets

How is that poor healing ability against Degen.

because if you are running a degen build i would assume that you would have something in the build to counter the paragons shouts. Mending refrain only stays as long as the paragons are still shouting... if you think running a build based purely on degen is what i meant then i apologise for not making things MORE obvious than they should already be. Vocal minority is a perfect skill to take along if you are running a hex overload build with alot of degen...

Quote:

Originally Posted by master_of_puppets

How about there are no hey skills to dcop when everyone is at 0 energy.

your monks will only be at 0 energy if they are bad monks and you are a bad team and you didnt listen to anything i wrote in the guide... go figure.

Quote:

Originally Posted by master_of_puppets

Sop para can spam his elite a lot using signet of agression and just chukcing his spear.

or if you had ANY interrupts in your build at all you could prevent him from spamming this elite. If you are running a condition build i really hope you have the brains to shut down the SoR paragon and kill the SoP. Once again im sorry i didnt spell it all out... ill edit the guide for players like you.

Quote:

Originally Posted by master_of_puppets

I dont think people should be forced to bring vocal minority, well of silence or a bunch of other crap.

theyre not... you can beat zergway running a build that doesnt rely on hexes. But if the meta is full of zergways... its kinda good meta sense to run something that beats them easily isnt it? I mean thats how meta shifts are caused by the players...

master_of_puppets · Dec 06, 2007, 10:41 PM // 22:41

Pardon me your lordship I guess I dont have the brains to shut down the SoP and sorry that you have to edit your precious guide that gives players so much new insight, I mean who knew what ward against melee does or defensive anthem and that u can use them against zergway? ONLy considering one side of the battle, how a hex team counters zergway, what about NR and a bunch of other crap on the ranger and so on, dchop, etc. If youre loaded with nothing but vocal minority, wards, pd, what u gonna do against some other teams that arent iway or melee-heavy

How about instead of everyone having to run a hex build and wards, they nerf a brainless overpowered combo, I dont get the argument that SStance makes a whole bunch of skills usable, it doesnt make anything usable except Drunken and desperation blow which are the same skill. Why should the game should have a brainless overpowered combo just so one skill can be usable...

Lorekeeper · Dec 06, 2007, 11:01 PM // 23:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by master_of_puppets

Pardon me your lordship I guess I dont have the brains to shut down the SoP and sorry that you have to edit your precious guide that gives players so much new insight, I mean who knew what ward against melee does or defensive anthem and that u can use them against zergway? ONLy considering one side of the battle, how a hex team counters zergway, what about NR and a bunch of other crap on the ranger and so on, dchop, etc. If youre loaded with nothing but vocal minority, wards, pd, what u gonna do against some other teams that arent iway or melee-heavy

quite rightly pointed out. Hexways that are designed purely with anti-physical hexes will struggle vs caster heavy builds. But a good hex build shouldnt allow itself to be too vulnerable like this. Popular hex builds usually include 1 migraine mesmer sometimes 2... or even a domination mesmer of some kind... either PD or PB. These characters can help ease the builds weakness versus caster heavy builds. It also depends on whether you are running a hex build with a 3 monk backline or a 2 monk backline. 3 monk backline should be able to cope with builds that arent physical dmg heavy... meaning you can load up on the offensive hexers instead of adding in defensive utility. With a 2 monk backline you need to make sure i) you have 2 godly monks and ii) you include a couple of flexible hexers/utility characters who can mitigate some of the dmg your team might suffer from things like fire eles and water eles.

Quote:

Originally Posted by master_of_puppets

How about instead of everyone having to run a hex build and wards, they nerf a brainless overpowered combo, I dont get the argument that SStance makes a whole bunch of skills usable, it doesnt make anything usable except Drunken and desperation blow which are the same skill. Why should the game should have a brainless overpowered combo just so one skill can be usable...

it is a brainless combo... but its ridiculously simple to beat. I dont think Anet need to nerf this gimmick. I think if the playerbase was more aware of how to beat the build they would... and zergway will hopefully... in time... become less popular as people take their time learning how to beat it. Its been quite a while since HA players have faced such a build... zergway saw popularity in the 6vs6 days but lost popularity due to spiritways success. Now with spiritway more or less gone (with some exceptions) zergway is back... somewhat not as good as it was before (because of the nerf to drunken/desperation blow) and i am just hoping people soon realise what they have been doing wrong and start beating zergways left right and center.

wuzzman · Dec 06, 2007, 11:15 PM // 23:15

lol. I don't need vocal minority or well of silence to beat zerg way. Its kinda sad that players always opt to brute force what they can easily work around. And now days players complain about everything. "OMG WE GOTTA BRING INTERUPTS!!", "OMG WE GOTTA BRING ANTI-MELEE!!", "OMG WE HAVE TO BRING SNARES!!" No one uses diversion to divert steady stance, drunken blow, and desperation blow that warriors spam so much. Kiting warriors with no speed boost? Who ever heard of that it seems. Why are two motivation paragons able to keep an entire team alive? If you can't out heal 2 paragons then your pressure fails. I wonder what balance team doesn't have anti-melee, snares, and at least some form of interrupts? I like to meet that team, and get 1 fame.

Tyla · Dec 06, 2007, 11:23 PM // 23:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by wuzzman

lol. I don't need vocal minority or well of silence to beat zerg way. Its kinda sad that players always opt to brute force what they can easily work around. And now days players complain about everything. "OMG WE GOTTA BRING INTERUPTS!!", "OMG WE GOTTA BRING ANTI-MELEE!!", "OMG WE HAVE TO BRING SNARES!!" No one uses diversion to divert steady stance, drunken blow, and desperation blow that warriors spam so much. Kiting warriors with no speed boost? Who ever heard of that it seems. Why are two motivation paragons able to keep an entire team alive? If you can't out heal 2 paragons then your pressure fails. I wonder what balance team doesn't have anti-melee, snares, and at least some form of interrupts? I like to meet that team, and get 1 fame.

dont forget Vocal Minority also shuts down paragons energy management

either way, IWAY is easy to beat

wuzzman · Dec 06, 2007, 11:28 PM // 23:28

it does but unless I feel like wasting slot for the hex I or if I feel like owning iway especially hard I bring it.

6am3 Fana71c · Dec 06, 2007, 11:54 PM // 23:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kyp Jade

* bunch of links *
Yea we can all link to wiki, not that it, you know, means anything

Hahaha....oh, man. I love you.

Div · Dec 07, 2007, 12:06 AM // 00:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by shoogi

http://gw.gamewikis.org/wiki/Cracked_Armor

Paragons have 96 base armor with a shield before buffs like watch yourself. Even if you manage to apply cracked armor to it, they still have 76 armor, much higher than your typical monk/necro/rit backline.

Melody Cross · Dec 07, 2007, 12:16 AM // 00:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by master_of_puppets

I dont think people should be forced to bring vocal minority, well of silence or a bunch of other crap.

Why does someone always say this about shouts? "Forced" to bring counters. Do monks need ANOTHER string of nerfs because you're "forced" to counter them?

This is the key issue with the whole dang thing: How do you shut them down? Blind spam the paragons instead of the zergtrain pounding your backline into goo? Since most zergways rely on hexbreaker aria for removal, wouldn't it be nice to drop VM on the paras and then tear hex the frontline with total impunity?

I'm just saying: if you want an easier time against zergway, there's nothing wrong with building in some direct counters to shouts. Paragons and warrior shouts are thick in HA because most matches will see 8v8 play, so they achieve maximum benefit regularly. Its not like only zergway runs them either, so these skills will see play regularly, even in HoH.

Disruption is a key factor of this game.

GGs

stuntharley · Dec 07, 2007, 12:37 AM // 00:37

Or dont be bad at the game

Considering 90% of R0 to R8 run zergway. They're horrible.

Noone has skill anymore.

Kyp Jade · Dec 07, 2007, 12:57 AM // 00:57

I would like to know how a W/R benifits from Hexbreaker Aria, I have yet to see an iway team take the aria just for the paragons to benifit from when they cast infuse

wuzzman · Dec 07, 2007, 03:08 AM // 03:08

man this thread should been closed on post 1.......

sagilltwins · Dec 07, 2007, 03:21 AM // 03:21

I thought Zergway was dead? So i'm guessing people are starting to run it again?