Defending against Touchers in AB [Archive]

plagatus

12-09-2006, 18:14

This isn't a complain about them. If it's affective, use it - by all means. But there are LOTS of complaints about them in AB. So this is just an fyi since there is no armor against touch skills.

But if you don't like them, hate or despise them, bring a necro (primary/secondary) and have them equip shivers :). Shivers will interupt spell casting when the caster receives cold dmg.

Personally, I've never found too many in a group at a time. So it hasn't been much of an issue but I bring shivers just in case and it works well against all casters (except those with spellbreaker/hex breaker).

Now there are other skills out there that are effective as well and use those to if you dont have a necro (primary/secondary) on your team. It's just that shivers lasts for x seconds and the spell interupting is constant until the hex wears off or is removed.

/discuss - GL HF

dirtycash

12-09-2006, 18:36

Any build that requires spamming a 1 or 2 skills is quite easy to counter.

Diversion. They are down for a whole minute.

Magi_ofDeath

28-09-2006, 04:35

Wait till "can't touch this" from Paragon.

nightrunner

28-09-2006, 08:37

But if you don't like them, hate or despise them, bring a necro (primary/secondary) and have them equip shivers :). Shivers will interupt spell casting when the caster receives cold dmg.

The whole point is that the Touches aren't spells, they're skills. That's why Expertise affects them. Spinal Shivers won't do anything.

Toucher's DPS is actually really bad, and they have to expend a lot of energy to maintain that DPS too. Their advantages are that their damage is hard to mitigate, and that they heal themselves at the same time as dealing damage, making them ideal for soloing. However, they still need melee range, and can't heal if they're not attacking. Furthermore, their healing is pretty weak, and it's not hard to outdamage it.

Also, this thread has been created multiple times. Please search before creating a new topic.

Bravo

28-09-2006, 11:36

For 10-34 seconds, whenever target foe is struck for cold damage while using a skill, that foe is interrupted and you lose 10-6 energy or Spinal Shivers ends.

Actually it would work, he just messed up the 'skill'->'spell' property twice...

Parker Bsb

28-09-2006, 12:51

Diversion stops 1/2 their damage
Spinal causes you to run out of energy and they will still get hits thru
Snare + kite is by far the best way to kill em - I havn't AB'din awhile now, but we always used to bring one character with a snare and degen... GG touchers

BTW as night mentioned this has been discussed to death

http://forums.gwonline.net/showthread.php?t=411880

http://forums.gwonline.net/showthread.php?t=404124

Serendipity

29-09-2006, 10:53

I am not sure about this and I'd be glad to get a confirmation.

I found myself 1v1 versus a touch ranger with my hammer warrior. I hadn't a lot of options except running, but since I was the last of my team alive... (RA)

So I activated Frenzy.

I got the impression I didn't get double damge since they are just stealing life.
And I outdamaged him, plus a few KD.

So did I dream that ? Or can Frenzy counter a TR ?

Parker Bsb

29-09-2006, 14:46

Serendipity

29-09-2006, 14:56

I'm never good at the mechanics - altho reading the skills would indicate touch would deal double damage. Heal Signet on the other hand would not matter as touch skills ignore armor.

Frenzy - "For 8 seconds, you attack 33% faster but take double damage."

Heal signet: "You gain 40..130 Health. You have -40Armor while using this skill."

Again I could be wrong but the wording makes me think not.

Apparently, from another forum, Frenzy doesn't double damage from life stealing skills. (Probably because double life steal would be overpowered)

This is rather odd because other ignoring armor damage are doubled (for example Ineptitude.)

So if you think you can outdamage a TR with a warrior, this is a good idea (granted there is no one else targetting you.)

Puntarunt

29-09-2006, 16:23

Life Stealing is different, its more like a Loss of Life as opposed to Armor Ignoring Damage.

As a contrast, I believe Life Stealing will not activate skills like Illusion of Weakness which activate when damage drops your life to a certain, and Life Steal yet again isn't considered damage.

Roade Clan

29-09-2006, 16:29

yes, using frenzy on a touch will not double his damage output. it is one of the best ways to take out a touch with just a warrior. i run w/n and bring wild blow and plague touch along with frenzy. break his stances, touch off his throw dirt, and wail on him with frenzy and a hammer. they will usually just break off after a kd or two, if they arent alrdy dead. just a simple adjustment, easily done without having to drasticly alter your build.

rentauri

05-10-2006, 15:43

I just run a Domination Mesmer with Arcane Larceny/Arcane Thievry. Touchers have one spell and that spell is required to any prolonged fight. Disable that one spell and a toucher collapses under the weight of it huge energy needs.

rentauri

05-10-2006, 15:43

Juiced

10-10-2006, 09:18

Diversion and degen, cripple and degen, even an energy burning/degen build u normally use on casters can bring them down, since no energy means no damage and no healing for the toucher. Normally my fire or water elementalist has no problems with a toucher either, their weakness is that they are predictable. I think it is funny to switch to R/N and only take BR and bow skills (eg apply poison, hunter's shot, pin down, savage shot), everyone will think u are a bloody toucher, while in fact ur a small interupting damage dealing battery. Touchers aren't that good and they aren't untouchable for sure :tongue:

Cirian

10-10-2006, 11:17

I'm a Rt/Me and I beat them with healing and degens. Their efficiency is poor, so it's easy to run them dry and eventually they just keel over.

Tzimovo

10-10-2006, 11:59

An Assassin with high dmg output and "Expose Defenses" defenses also works nicely against them.

The discussion reminds me of a scene with a toucher during one of the matches yesterday: one of my group (R/Rt) was pestered by a toucher. That touchy guy was dead in 5-10 secs and must have felt like a hedgehog with all those arrows in his body when 4 rangers chose him as prime target. :grin:

Ryuujinx

11-10-2006, 02:37

Touchers go poof come the 27th "Can't touch this" paragon skill...

but I run a snare ele, simple to take them out when they can't get to you, snare and kite....vapor blade here and there. Fun times...

quago

11-10-2006, 06:09

I defend myself against touchers by either outdmg, outheal, kite(mostly siphon speed), edenial, or interupt. Mostly in ab I use MM or assassin's promise ms spammer so I always outdmg them.

Selene Raseth

12-10-2006, 03:42

Touchers using only the vamp touch and vamp bite will not deal more damage, but ones that include touch of agony or wallow's bite will get the double damage from frenzying. Just something to keep in mind.

And health steal did used to do double effectiveness against frenzy over a year ago, it got changed unfortunately :) Still miss that good old 220 shadow strike, or the 468 dmg and 468 heal from a vamp touch, vamp gaze, vamp touch. The good ole days where any full health warrior running frenzy would die and have the necro go from near death to full health at the same time. Pretty sure it was because of that imbalance that it was changed.

ColdEden

13-10-2006, 04:10

I love all your strategies, and will certainly try them out... though I have to say my favourite method for destroying touchers is ice spikes, maelstrom, mind freeze, vapour blade, and slash-command laugh.

Granted, you're out of energy and exhausted, but seeing that toucher die a horrible painful death it so worth it.

nightrunner

13-10-2006, 05:37

My favorite strategy for countering Touchers is this great new skill called "Running were my Feet."

TechnologyMage

14-10-2006, 10:34

I prefer to educate touchers about the skill called "crippling anguish" =D

Kalidri

31-10-2006, 16:09

I like to play "All This Base Are Belong to Me" with touchers. If I am running something that does not have snares (because of team balance...such as a monk), and I am alone I love to lead a toucher back to a captured base. Its amazing how many of them get blinkers and go into kill at all costs mode. I especially love it if I can bring them to the elementalist base! Also if your team is taking heavy losses, going to a ressurection point can often guarantee a similar sticky end.

cytomatrix

02-11-2006, 19:33

Psychotic

02-11-2006, 21:41

i definately agree cyto, running as a sin can be incredibly effective. I went against a team in RA, they easily ripped through my team, but unfortunately, they had no snares(though they did have speed boosts, the constant speed boost from shadow of haste outdid them). To try to 'trap' me(as I was using shadow of haste), they divided, and i just picked them off 1 by 1. I was finally defeated by a stance-based hammer war, after taking the other three out, as he unleashed an adrenal spike on me keeping me down...
On topic: edenial, shutdown, cripple/snare, and degen all get at touchers, as stated before.

cantalus

02-11-2006, 23:13

"The whole point is that the Touches aren't spells, they're skills. That's why Expertise affects them. Spinal Shivers won't do anything."

shivers interupts skills, not just spells

as for touchers, i find wither quite useful

FlyingHippo

13-11-2006, 02:24

My cripshot kills them same as any other tank. And theres no way hes ever gonna catch me. As of now there is no skill in either ranger or necro that allows you to move faster than 33%(I use Dash + Natural Stride). Only way it would work is with dodge and rampage as one and considering hes taking OoB, hes never gonna catch me. Let alone he has cripple on him.

Just make sure none of you allies try tanking him :undecided:

Fortunately touchers have died down, and everyone knows how to kill them. Now we gotta worry about RaO and SF...

ixznay

22-11-2006, 07:06

emmm...

personally i never find touchers a problem.

In AB, u have a team that supports you and the best way to counter a toucher is teamwork.

upier

22-11-2006, 11:25

Most of the touch rangers are noobs. In AB when i am running away from the touch ranger and from their team members, he is gonna think that i am scared. I have seen many touch rangers in AB thinking that i am failing and chasing me while calling me "n00b sin!!" in global chat. When i am actually taking him to a place where anyone else can interupt our touching session. When he is out of the reach of their party members. I do my business(in like 5-9 seconds) and get back to my party. It can be funny sometimes when people(especially touchies and wammos) think running away is a sign of defeat. Well.. not really when its in the case of sins. GG touchies
actually i wouldnt limit the stupidety to touchies only. any class that just blindly follows somebody is either certain that they are godly or is in for some heavy ****.
my most fond moments or ppl chasing me involved me running mantra of persistance + heavy illusion and a warrior thinking i am easy bait (in FA though) so he chases me to the far end of the map (i was luxon) behind the commanders - where i stick IB on him - for around 40 secs he was moving at half speed. no point in degening him since he might actually die from that :wink: - just make him feel useless. so i go to the mine start taking it over - and i see that the 40 secs are almost over - so i slap it on him again. the poor boy.
or another warrior who kept yelling squishy mesmer in the local char since he had IB on him non-stop and he couldnt touch me. then after constantly chasing me and getting Ib on him like for thr 5th time in a row (i know - persistant little bugger) he saw me running for him and then he ran away from me. and till the end of the match he kept outside of my aggro bubble :grin:

but back to touchies - there is nothing more fun then touching a touchy - the damage a vampiric spirit necro can so is insane and i have to say that there were times when i shouted in the local 'touchy got touched'. i know -i am sooooo evil :mwahahahahahhahahhahahah:

Elslav

22-11-2006, 12:36

1 touch can be nice pressure on your team, but they wont be sole damage and able to take people down on their own really. The 2 lifesteals do 65 dmg each and will rip thru their energy fast even with OoB. Best way to handle 1 touchy is to let them nip away at who they want while you wipe out the rest of their team, always moving helps.. but it seems sometimes the touch spells have a bit a range to them

yoyoyouyo

04-12-2006, 02:36

Touchers arent good if there is a lot of them on a team, maybe 1 or 2 for a 4-4-4 match, healers are essential.

Son of the hood

26-01-2007, 07:47

emmm...

personally i never find touchers a problem.

In AB, u have a team that supports you and the best way to counter a toucher is teamwork.

true true, but notice how you have to rely on the team to take out " one toucher "

Everyone calls Touchers noobs etc etc, but they still put the fear of God in ppl.

Aikawa

29-01-2007, 18:11

I think some people on another fansite ran a fun test a while back. They let a wamo with decent tactics points spam heal sih against the touchers attacks. Result; toucher cant take down a wamo. Dunno about you but im always thankfull for the free faction whenever we run into some.

Aikawa

erk

01-02-2007, 03:31

true true, but notice how you have to rely on the team to take out " one toucher "

Everyone calls Touchers noobs etc etc, but they still put the fear of God in ppl.

I fear a good Assassin more than a Touch Ranger.

Hardly need a team to take one out, anyone with a Mes secondary casts blackout on a Toucher and they are off line for 5sec. Energy Burn or a degen spell is nice after that, when blackout recharges do it again.

Any anti kite skill that slows them down will allow you to comfortably walk away from them and then attack from a distance, as after all they do need to get into touch range to hurt you.

If you have a pet use Disrupting Lunge to shut down one of their touch skills for 20sec. and do the other touch skill 5 sec later when DL recharges.

Paragon can use "Can't Touch This" so for 20 seconds, the next 1...4 touch Skills used against you fail.

The list goes on, a bit of imagination is all thats' required. My Bunny Thumper has killed countless Touch Rangers one on one.

CassiusDrehyg

01-02-2007, 09:03

The simplest toucher counter ever:

Learn to kite.

GunnerDude

01-02-2007, 16:28

Easy to counter a touch ranger. Bleeding + posion + other degen. Then you slow it down some how. Then start running away and let the degen kill them.

rexkenley

01-02-2007, 17:28

Easy to counter a touch ranger. Bleeding + posion + other degen. Then you slow it down some how. Then start running away and let the degen kill them.

Not so anymore, many veteran touchers now bring health regeneration. The best one I have seen is a toucher who survived multi trap attacks and hexes. Suffice to say trapper, mez and necro were not happy about it.

erk

02-02-2007, 05:58

Not so anymore, many veteran touchers now bring health regeneration. The best one I have seen is a toucher who survived multi trap attacks and hexes. Suffice to say trapper, mez and necro were not happy about it.

What Troll Unguent with its 3 sec cast time during combat? It's going to do bugger all as a Touch Rangers attribute points have to go into maxing out Expertise and Blood magic to be effective, not Wilderness Survival.

Health regen are usually skills that get blacked out with most other touch skills disrupting setups.

Shallowrain

02-02-2007, 15:07

One of my favorite things to do is to kite a toucher who's focused on me, while the Saltspray dragon/ Elite Elementalist NPC are set to follow me. They get tunnel vision on me and get blown away.

rexkenley

02-02-2007, 17:56

What Troll Unguent with its 3 sec cast time during combat? It's going to do bugger all as a Touch Rangers attribute points have to go into maxing out Expertise and Blood magic to be effective, not Wilderness Survival.

Health regen are usually skills that get blacked out with most other touch skills disrupting setups.

Troll Ungent? That's old school. Blood renewal is what the new generation of touchers are bringing. Any toucher who brings troll deserves to be interrupted.

erk

03-02-2007, 08:26

Troll Ungent? That's old school. Blood renewal is what the new generation of touchers are bringing. Any toucher who brings troll deserves to be interrupted.
Shh... you will give them tools to use against us. They are out there watching you know. Especially since Nerfnet yesterday made it impossible for my Bunny thumper to kill a Touchy anymore by nerfing RaO duration from 22sec to 12 sec. but still leaving it as 25 energy to cast.

AKamouri

04-02-2007, 18:47

erk

04-02-2007, 23:09

I just Cripple them and jack my speed (Siphon Speed, Dash etc.) and just pick at them with Bow Attacks, normally theyll break off once they see that theres no way they are gonna close enough to touch. If they arent too bright and stay on me, just keep laying the cripple on them and make 'em my personal pincushion.

i dont worry about touchers that much

Yeah they are not that bad, there are more annoying things nowadays, there are a lot of tanking builds that just waste your time instead of capping, that can cost you the win. At least touchies either die, kill you, or you run and the game keeps moving on and not much time is wasted either way.

CassiusDrehyg

05-02-2007, 15:44

This is why AB is a big waste of time. MMs need to learn to take Rend Enchantments to kill those stupid tanks.

Sharn mes

08-02-2007, 10:04

Teamwork will defeat tourchers for sure...

Slowing their movement and then kill them while they walk aroud is fun :)

rexkenley

08-02-2007, 16:37

Teamwork will defeat tourchers for sure...

Slowing their movement and then kill them while they walk aroud is fun :)

Yeah, except when touchers team owns your team because your team is completely engrossed with the toucher.

Parker Bsb

09-02-2007, 14:01

erk

10-02-2007, 08:13

Any team engrossed in killing a toucher when other more dangerous opponents are around - deserve to die.

Step 1: Snare the toucher,
Step 2: Kill the rest of their team (3v4 should be not to bard)
Step 3: Kill toucher, or snare toucher again and ignore...

Agreed. To win AB you should not be fighting you should be capping shrines. If you want to fight go to Random Arenas instead.

R A N D O M

12-02-2007, 05:39

The simplest toucher counter ever:

Learn to kite.
^^ yupyup kiting FTW!

X H K

14-02-2007, 03:11

Lets get a paragon. "Can't Touch This" makes a huge outcome. Get battle Cry and a good amount of Command, touchers have no use but to ragequit.

Sharn mes

14-02-2007, 08:12

Agreed. To win AB you should not be fighting you should be capping shrines. If you want to fight go to Random Arenas instead.

If your not fighting you cant win in AB...

How do you suggest to cap shrines? :grin:

infoscott

14-02-2007, 17:11

Last time I checked none of the shrines have toucher NPCs. Erk implied scrimmaging other players. Leave the toucher alone and capture control points.

Aikawa

17-02-2007, 07:39

Touchers = free faction. And yes they seem to return, seen some pop up again lately. Dont mind aslong they are not on my side ^^;

Aikawa

BunnyLord

17-02-2007, 10:45

Touchers are not as lethal as A/W Prison Spikers. They are the real threat in the battlefield right now. Touchers can be easily countered because of the addition of many skills such as You're All Alone, Zealous Benediction, Icy Shackles, Can't Touch This, and some dependable speed boosts.

Like some already mentioned, old school skills like Crippling Anguish, Diversion, Cripshot (<-- you cripple two touchers simultaneosly) are still viable.

KaliMagdalene

08-03-2007, 13:32

I was invited to do some AB last night, and lacking anything better, I yanked my hero's toucher build just to save time, and...

I found that all of the weaknesses are true.

I also found that relatively few players capitalize on them. The biggest threats I encountered were assassins and elementalists. The former hit me with multiple conditions and a huge amount of damage, and knocked off my stance. The latter either dropped flaming rocks on my head or snared me with water hexes. Most players just died screaming or running away. My energy problems were relatively minor, even when I dropped offering of blood for a second speed boosting stance. I noticed the lack in the second case, but I only ran out of energy a couple times and racked up more kills and suffered fewer deaths.

I did get hit with diversion a couple time, which got one of my touches. I was still able to kill with the other touch...more slowly, obviously, and I didn't have energy troubles at all at that point.

Weirdly, everyone else on my team got yelled at in tells for being cheap or playing a toucher (the R/D was amused by this accusation), but no one addressed me that I noticed. I certainly got no nasty tells.

I don't think I'll do it again. I'd rather play an elementalist, necromancer or mesmer. The touch build is easy, but it's a weird playstyle for me. It's better left to Acolyte Jin and Margrid the Sly. :tongue:

Son of the hood

08-03-2007, 14:30

wow this thread is still going...Toucher FTW.

Lunari

08-03-2007, 20:24

Touchers arnt dangerous. Atleast not anymore. Runaway or outdamge. Which will happen fast.

erk

09-03-2007, 04:12

I just made a Touch Ranger and tested it against NPC's in the Isle of the Nameless, I found it could kill the axe and hammer warriors easy enough, but prot Monks and anyone who kited a lot were very hard to kill, the Toucher would always run out of energy even with Offering of Blood equipped. My fire Ele kills more NPC types than the Toucher. What's the trick to keeping up the energy?

Son of the hood

09-03-2007, 07:19

there aint no trick...you just keep an eye on your enegy.

when I used to play Toucher once my energy hit around 10 pips just hit OOB.

Lunari

09-03-2007, 16:08

Make sure you kill before your energy runs out. Or skip a touch here and there.

rexkenley

09-03-2007, 17:39

Offering of Blood - energy boost at cost of health

mmorpg man

06-05-2007, 12:07

blackout is the best to use. touched target foe cannot use any skills for x seconds

Zalis

08-05-2007, 16:54

I usually just make them waste time by switching targets. They'll chase you around and then a caster can take them out. Or wait for their stance to drop and then beat them senseless.

mmorpg man

14-05-2007, 15:20

the problem are sins/dervs/ele that use shadow form/vow of silence/obby flesh

kronzz

15-05-2007, 13:11

Cripshot and keep spiking them whilst they're trying to touch you?

Remember, no attack = ho heal

Wuzzman

16-05-2007, 13:59

Cripshot and keep spiking them whilst they're trying to touch you?

Remember, no attack = ho heal

untill he turns around and starts touching the wammo hitting him.

Some Dude

17-05-2007, 12:42

the problem are sins/dervs/ele that use shadow form/vow of silence/obby flesh

The problem is people who stand their "duelling" with a "tank".

shardfenix

17-05-2007, 22:48

Spinal Shivers - For X seconds, whenever target foe takes cold damage, that foe is interrupted and you lose X energy.

What's qour cold damage? Wanding them? vamp touch is a .75 second cast, and wanding is a 1.33 second action. Just bring any ranger build and dshot + savage shot the touch skills. It's so easy to guess when theyre gonna use it because touchers generally aren't smart enough to know rangers have interrupts.

Kendel

18-05-2007, 03:28

Spinal Shivers doesn't work... not unless you have cold based spells or more members. it'll lower the damage a bit if it gets through evasive stances but its hardly an effective use of your time.

Mantra of Persistance works wonders vs Touchers. My recent Crip Anguish/Illusion of Pain build drops any toucher it meets. They take there time to die, but they're almost completely useless in that time if people don't get too close or just mob it.

Grenths Grasp is great fun. I almost killed off 3 touchers alone using solely Grenths Grasp, Called Shot and Apply Poison. Eventually i just ran out of energy :( But i had completely taken them out the match for a good 30 seconds at least while they scuried to kill 1 person.

You should either focus fire on, leave someone who can actually counter them to deal with it, or ignore them and kite. If you KNOW you can't deal with them stop wasting your time. If you THINK you can deal with them, again, stop wasting your time. You can either deal with them/shut them down partially or you will just die to them. If you merely think you can deal with them, you probably can't.