Guild Wars 2

Everybody plays for or against a profession and thinks it is Overpowered. Well I am simply going to say that is your opinion. There is no balance when everything is “overpowered”.

Arenanet will not listen to your complaints obviously biased against certain professions. Because all you want is for them to be nerfed and your own profession buffed. I will link “Playing to win” by Sirlin now.

Play to win, don’t be a Scrub

Inb4 " well ( insert class) is not overpowered at all"

Sirlin should be read and quizzed before any game playing is had.

Moreover, the whole idea if “balance” in class- and spec-based games is a lot more complex than we players make it out to be. For example, if a class is overpowered to the point of being able to solo everyone, but the only gameplay modes are based on team-combat and they’re really terrible at contributing to that, would they still need a nerf?

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. That’s still assuming there’s only one variable, “combat size”. There’s also gameplay mode, format, initiative (some classes are stronger when getting the drop compared to others), opportunity cost, CD-balance (some classes rock on their first fight, but if re-engaged within 30-45 seconds are really weak), etc etc.

So yes, balance is highly subjective.

As an additional problem, “is easy to play” is often cited as a bad thing. Consider that some players are much less personally skilled (as a player) than others. But they are still personal friends with a lot of really good high-skill players. You are a developer. What do you do?

Sirlin is absolutely right, and listening to him years ago turned me into a very competitive, and highly successful, player. This post is simply to further explain what Sirlin is going with in regards to competitive gameplay.

In the regards to this MMO, it has to do with the mechanics. The game’s not balanced around an individual, but rather the team. The question comes down to not the best class, but the best team composition and builds for every member.

Is there an unbeatable strategy, or is there a powerful strategy that has a counter? If there is a counter, then game on. If the counter is punishing, then perhaps a counter for this counter is required, and so on. This creates a meta-level situation where players compete back and forth, play mind-games, and attempts to push the odds of the battle in their favor. A person who’s had a lot of success using a powerful tactic may be hesitant in using this tactic against a player, in fear of reprisal. It goes back and forth.

Where the difficulty comes into play is the fact that, well, it’s an MMO, and they’re never really known for their balance. Tier lists aren’t an evil, and using an incredibly effective tactic isn’t a cardinal sin. As long as the game is playable at a high level where competition goes back and forth, the game is good. It’s competitive, and creates a competitive environment.

Now if the tactic is unbeatable, that is, one move or team composition is so powerful and effective that there’s no other point in using anything else, and it cannot be countered, then the game is broken. It becomes a game of whoever can pull off this one unbeatable tactic first/most effectively. In cases like that, the game isn’t great, and should be discarded. However, as long as a counter remains, the game is fair play.

@OP

This is right, but it’s also a fact that the classbalance is out of control.

Balance is an analysis of subjective feedback.

That is to say, options are considered balanced when players choose between them. Especially if they’re making choices when they know enough about the system to fully understand the implications of that choice.

Or in Sirlin’s own words;

A multiplayer game is balanced if a reasonably large number of options available to the player are viable—especially, but not limited to, during high-level play by expert players.

http://www.sirlin.net/articles/balancing-multiplayer-games-part-1-definitions.html
http://www.sirlin.net/articles/balancing-multiplayer-games-part-2-viable-options.html

I can’t say I’ve played many MMORPGs that are honestly capable of fitting that definition. For the genre, I actually think this game is pretty good. …But I don’t know if I’d go so far as to use it’s balance as leverage to put down other people.

I find it more helpful to use words like “enjoyable” or “not enjoyable,” “mandatory,” etc than “imbalanced” or “OP.”

However, “balance” feedback in general can be important. Granted, 90% of the feedback on these forums is not, but it can be. Balance decisions are important, even if “balance” is subjective.

I’m not sure what sirlin has to do with any of it. Yes, playing to win is fine, but no, that is not an end-all argument: “I disagree with your idea on how to make the game more fun because of Sirlin!” It’s a little weird.

Yes, ofc discussions are important. But I think like the OP, I wish people would realize that balance isn’t a hard number they can point to and demand it to be changed. This works in very limited environments in very sterilized game systems (WoW raiding is one example, and only after they homogenized virtually everything).

But in games where more is in the hands of the player, and where you got multiple highly different game formats, you cannot nail down “This is balanced” versus “This is not”.

In fact, you can hardly even say what is “more” balanced than something else, because if you were to ask everyone to rank everything from most overpowered to most underpowered, I reckon you’d get ~20 more variations than you ask people, as replies. :P

So really, as NevirSayDie says, maybe focus on what you think is problematic to sPvP, WvW or PvE, and why it is, and what is the problematic element (i.e., what aspect needs to be changed if you were to decide it).
Mind you, sPvP, WvW, PvE, none of these are “1v1”.

NevirSayDie.6235:

I find it more helpful to use words like “enjoyable” or “not enjoyable,” “mandatory,” etc than “imbalanced” or “OP.”

The best term is truly, as someone else said, “options.” As long as there are viable options, the game is competitive. The moment everything stagnates into that unbreakable team that uses this one tactic that has no counter, then the game is, for lack of a better word, junk. As long as options remain open over what players can do in arena, the game remains playable.

NevirSayDie.6235:

I’m not sure what sirlin has to do with any of it. Yes, playing to win is fine, but no, that is not an end-all argument: “I disagree with your idea on how to make the game more fun because of Sirlin!” It’s a little weird.

Sirlin has quite a bit to do with it. There’s too many people who think the game is focused on 1v1, or that their random, off-the-wall build should be viable, while they have no concept of what it takes to make sure all of the classes remain relevant in an MMO.

Thing is, nothing is stopping people from running hot joins and solo arena with their random build (hahahaha). Should you wish to create a build outside the meta that you enjoy, then feel free, and explore all the joys that would entail. Who knows, you may even discover a unique team synergy of your own that’s effective!

However, you can’t complain and say the game didn’t give you options to be viable and competitive when you blew right past them. If you choose a suboptimal build that wouldn’t mesh with any arena group, then that’s on the individual. If the individual didn’t take the time to focus in and research what kind of build is competitive for what role in arena they’re aiming for, then again, that’s not on the individual. You can’t fly an off the cuff “super sweet 1v1 condi/healing build” and expect to win in arena. You play it if you want, but you only play it under the understanding that you’re not being the best contributor to the team that you could be. There’s no award for losing, and you don’t get bonus pvp glory from “losing in the most creative manner possible.”

That’s essentially what the TC is trying to get across.

ricky.2679:

Arenanet will not listen to your complaints obviously biased against certain professions. Because all you want is for them to be nerfed and your own profession buffed. I will link “Playing to win” by Sirlin now.

Play to win, don’t be a Scrub

That is one of the most disgusting reads I’ve ever seen. He implies that you must win to win, and that that is fun. To the point where using exploits to win is a good tactic.

I love PvP, I win some, lose some but I play not only to win, but also to feel good about it. To know that I beat them, whatever they tried because I was faster, knew more counters, played creatively and countered him better. If I’d use bugs or exploits, where’s the merit of winning? Yay, I won because I used a bug, no sense of gratification in that. Nor in using one move over and over because there is no counterplay.

If according to this dude, that makes me a scrub then I’d rather be a filthy casual scrub than ‘an expert’. I play to win and feel good about it, not win because it’s the only goal that matter to the game.

On topic, Balance is not subjective. saying: I can’t beat X while playing Y so X is OP, THAT is subjective.

ricky.2679:

Play to win, don’t be a Scrub

This guy assigns way too much value to winning.

Aedrion.6483:

On topic, Balance is not subjective. saying: I can’t beat X while playing Y so X is OP, THAT is subjective.

Just on this point the problem is how do you define Balance in GW2? Most of the balance threads or complaints end up coming down to I can’t beat X, or Y is unbeatable, everyone is using Z so it has to be broken, sure I can counter A with B but A comes back to quickly, I can’t kill D because D has more mobility then my C. These forums are a showcase in how everything is all over the place, overreactions 1 day after patch hits, 3 days prior to a patch not having played any of it, or second hand information someones buddy told them about.

Many on the forums don’t care about the team aspect in GW2 at all and only want self efficiency. You can see it shine through in their posts like many have said to many people think this game is about 1v1’s. Why on this green earth is there so much focus on 1v1’s when there is no 1v1 game mode. Despite that you still have a chance win and it isn’t set in stone some fights are uphill battles.

Even you argue balance is a subjective thing , should we work towards to objective balance .

You still get standard to judge whether something goes wrong or not in every game .Sometimes that standard might not work well for everything, but having standard helps balance. that’s it.

ricky.2679:

I will link “Playing to win” by Sirlin now.

Play to win, don’t be a Scrub

People idolize this guy like he is some kind of prophet, and act as though everything this guy says is fact.

News flash: this is just one guy’s opinion. No matter how eloquently he puts it, or vehemently he argues it, it never was, nor will be, a fact.

Please stop pushing one guys opinion that agrees with your own as if its a fact. That is called “confirmation bias,” and it is one of the many psychological faults that people can experience.

As others have said, Sirlin’s entire opinion about “playing to win” completely misses the point of a game being a game. Especially something like an mmo, that is meant to be both fun and competitive for everyone, not just people exploiting every bug and OP spec out there.

When people complain about things being OP, it is because it actually destroys their fun. There are a lot of things in this game that do not adhere to the goal of making combat based on skill, and rediculous specs/combos that are discovered are a big problem with that. When some players make sacrifices and trade-offs with their specs, but incredibly simple specs have no holes and can wreck almost everything else easily – it is an issue. At that point, you either play that spec (which is often stupidly boring), or accept being frustrated when fighting it in a matchup overwhelmingly in their favor.Either way, the only people who enjoy themselves are the fools who ignore playing the game and “play to win, no matter how tedious and unfun it is”

Gredge.5719:

Sirlin has quite a bit to do with it. There’s too many people who think the game is focused on 1v1, or that their random, off-the-wall build should be viable, while they have no concept of what it takes to make sure all of the classes remain relevant in an MMO.

Thing is, nothing is stopping people from running hot joins and solo arena with their random build (hahahaha). Should you wish to create a build outside the meta that you enjoy, then feel free, and explore all the joys that would entail. Who knows, you may even discover a unique team synergy of your own that’s effective!

However, you can’t complain and say the game didn’t give you options to be viable and competitive when you blew right past them. If you choose a suboptimal build that wouldn’t mesh with any arena group, then that’s on the individual. If the individual didn’t take the time to focus in and research what kind of build is competitive for what role in arena they’re aiming for, then again, that’s not on the individual. You can’t fly an off the cuff “super sweet 1v1 condi/healing build” and expect to win in arena. You play it if you want, but you only play it under the understanding that you’re not being the best contributor to the team that you could be. There’s no award for losing, and you don’t get bonus pvp glory from “losing in the most creative manner possible.”

That’s essentially what the TC is trying to get across.

Yeah…but I never talked about any of that. That’s why I don’t understand what Sirlin has to do with it. I get it, play to win, don’t complain if you’re using something sub-optimal.

But that is not the extent of a fun game. That’s why I think words like “fun” or “mandatory” are much better than “OP” or even “options.” No one cares how many options there are if they’re not fun.

Games are about money, not winning. From the developer’s perspective, the only thing that matters is making the game fun so that people will spend money on it. The only line of reasoning behind any balance decision is whether or not people will like it, and in turn keep spending money.

Also, winning is about more than using the “best” specs. The people who insist on using only the “best” specs often find that by the time they learn a new “OP” build, the meta has already moved on. Often, it’s the theorycrafters, outside-the-box thinkers, who win. A top tournament last year featured one team relying heavily on spirit rangers—considered the most OP build in the game at that time—losing to a team featuring warriors using some crazy hammer/longbow build.

Something has really bothered me about that article that I have seen posted time and time again. If I’m not mistaken it was written in the time before patching your game was possible. Before, the only way to fix or change something in a released game was through an expansion pack. These days, if you release an imperfect but otherwise good product that actually has a solid number of players, you can try to fix those imperfections.

Yes, crying about things that aren’t going to change is pointless. Really competitive people are always going use the best tactics in order to win. Now that we live in the days where if you have a overly strong mechanic in your game you can change it. That makes it fine to debate about game mechanics these days because they can be changed While some of the points made hold up today, many concepts are outdated.

BurrTheKing.8571:

Yes, crying about things that aren’t going to change is pointless. Really competitive people are always going use the best tactics in order to win. Now that we live in the days where if you have a overly strong mechanic in your game you can change it. That makes it fine to debate about game mechanics these days because they can be changed While some of the points made hold up today, many concepts are outdated.

True, but you’re assuming they can be fixed, not only changed.
Changing them is easy. WoW has been doing that for over 10 years, now. They’re happily changing balance, left and right and centre.

As far as “fixing” balance goes, well, subjective. Plenty players leave the game’s PvP in frustration, citing that the balance is “worse than ever” or “still just as bad, after X years”. Others quit PvE Raiding, citing the constant need to change character because “blizzard doesn’t know balance”.
Others, me included, actually quit the game a while ago out of boredom over how balanced it has become (as this required reducing the effective number of classes, one of the few universal truths of RPG balancing).

And it’s impossible to get all these opinions to align far enough to even begin with “fixing” balance.

However, you can’t complain and say the game didn’t give you options to be viable and competitive when you blew right past them. If you choose a suboptimal build that wouldn’t mesh with any arena group, then that’s on the individual.

What Sirlin is describing here is not letting yourself invent excuses for not climbing the skill curve and embracing the depth a game can offer in it’s Counterplay and Strategy.

He’s not sanctioning Optimal as a design concept or inevitability in the slightest.

If anything his writing condemns it, as a game lacking multiple viable options at upper level play is considered imbalanced. What he’s saying in the Scrubs article would be non-applicable in such a system, as there’s no depth for you to embrace. Because Strategy and Counterplay and Mindgames all require a player to make choices in response to another player, and there are no choices to make if Optimal exists.

Carighan.6758:

BurrTheKing.8571:

Yes, crying about things that aren’t going to change is pointless. Really competitive people are always going use the best tactics in order to win. Now that we live in the days where if you have a overly strong mechanic in your game you can change it. That makes it fine to debate about game mechanics these days because they can be changed While some of the points made hold up today, many concepts are outdated.

True, but you’re assuming they can be fixed, not only changed.
Changing them is easy. WoW has been doing that for over 10 years, now. They’re happily changing balance, left and right and centre.

As far as “fixing” balance goes, well, subjective. Plenty players leave the game’s PvP in frustration, citing that the balance is “worse than ever” or “still just as bad, after X years”. Others quit PvE Raiding, citing the constant need to change character because “blizzard doesn’t know balance”.
Others, me included, actually quit the game a while ago out of boredom over how balanced it has become (as this required reducing the effective number of classes, one of the few universal truths of RPG balancing).

And it’s impossible to get all these opinions to align far enough to even begin with “fixing” balance.

I would say the only class in this game that is seriously lacking is Ranger. All it really has going for it is Spirits and a few tanky condi builds that are only strong for dueling. Mesmer doesn’t see a lot of play but it’s also one buff away from being an unbeatable god. People say that Warrior is OP but the strength of builds like Hambow (a lot of builds actually) come from the fact that the capture points are too darn small. To go the opposite extreme, Hambow on Graveyard isn’t that big a deal because avoiding the Hammer AoE is easy when you have room to move around. Same applies for Engis and certain Necro builds: they’re only good due to map design.

Nobody expects perfection, but if they can at least give each class a role I’ll be satisfied when it comes to balance. What I believe the real problem is boils down to the design of conquest itself.

Again, that’s highly subjective. You sound like you’re talking about tPvP?
That’s a minority format in a highly specialized setting. The majority of players of this game probably couldn’t care any less about tPvP balance, and would be mighty angry if changes are done for the sake of tPvP balance when it impacts their own gameplay in ways they do not like.

That’s the whole issue. Balance isn’t something you can agree on or distil into a number unless you look at a very very tiny slice of the entire game. And those slices they are quite often at odds with each other in balance needs.

Rangers are for example pretty good at:

• Dungeons, their buffs stack on top of other buffs which makes groups of Warriors and Guardians love them, more damage than other classes can bring to the party, even if personal damage isn’t that high.
• WvW material combat. Barrage, Hunter’s Shot, Traps, Entangle, these are all really good abilities. And Rangers are never really weak at this outside of the centre of the melee train. They make good second-row runners, they are very good at fending off the skirmishers, and they provide all around good variety to the group. They’re no hammerbros, sure. But that’s a warrior issue, not a ranger one.

Really, it’s subjective. Even Warriors are hardly almighty, despite how well they stand in all 6 major areas of the game.

I am referring to TPvP, and for good reason. ANet has said multiple times that the do not want to split skills/traits more than what is absolutely necessary. Knowing that it would make sense to balance around the most competitive format in the game. There are so many random variables in WvW, especially when considering gear and buffs, that balancing around it would have a dramatic effect on PvP. Winning matchups in WvW will probably always come down more to coordination, numbers, and good commanders more often than class balance. As for PvE, I honestly haven’t played it in months outside of guild missions but I have done map completion and all dungeons and while there may be an optimal way to do things, balancing around it would also not make sense because what’s wrong with PvE is that certain playstyles are not that useful due to the design of it. There’s also nothing stopping you from playing “sub-optimally” in PvE with friends while in PvP running a weak build will hurt your team.

It’s not subjective. While a single player may value the balance of one game type over another, from a dev standpoint they seem to know that having fun in PvP is very much dependent on class balance. In the other two modes you can run basically whatever you want without negatively affecting your allies, but it’s different in PvP. there’s also ANet’s “Esports” aspirations to take into account, if they want that to take off then PvP balance is the obvious choice to make balancing decisions on.

One thing I am thankful for is that unlike many games some Devs seem to actually be good at their own game. I played with 3 of them the other day and it was a slaughter. The other team didn’t appear to be bad it was just that they worked to well together they just lost every team fight.

Balance isn’t quantifiable, but you can certainly feel when something is wrong. Right now the only “imbalanced” thing in this game is some design decisions.

We aren’t seeing that homogenization happening in PvP though, the opposite in fact. I see an almost proportionate amount of every class except for Ranger. As mentioned before Mesmer is slightly down on that curve but I see at least 1 every few games where before I saw none.

making a balance plan that encompasses all at once is IMPOSSIBLE. What could be done is adding/changing mechanics that encourages change. For example, if they wanted to discourage zerging in WvW a bit, have the game apply some sort of debuff when X number of players are in close proximity. Maybe you want to discourage a team tanky and AoE focused builds in PvP, make the capture points larger and allow for w/e team has the most players on points to cap over the other team that is on the same point. Maybe you want condis to be better in PvP, have the amount of maximum stacks scale based on the number of players (no idea if that would work it’s just an example). You can focus on the balance of one game mode if you have the others designed differently. “One Size Fits All” balancing will just leave everyone annoyed. It would also be impossibly complex to ensure that enough playstlyes are both available and that none are too strong in any one mode. Right now ANet seems to be balancing for PvP considering almost all the major changes were to builds the community had a beef against.

Also, WvW balance should be based more around food buffs and the like because that’s what really throws things off. Many skills already have a cap of how many targets they can hit so it already takes into account how they affect large scale conflict, and the number is high enough that it doesn’t effect PvP very often outside of AI builds like Spirits and Minions.

I play WvW but I know that I would never want to have the game balanced over it., and PvE’s problems once again stem more from design decisions than balance.

EDIT: Umm…there was a post above me but now it has vanished.

Andred.1087:

ricky.2679:

Play to win, don’t be a Scrub

This guy assigns way too much value to winning.

Yup, kinda weird stuff as it brings back memories of Goldeneye and that one person we all knew who always played as Oddjob because they consider winning more important than having a laugh with friends.

We resent the person who plays as Oddjob like you might hate the adult that uses their full strength when playing football with a child as it’s obvious to us all that they prefer stroking their own ego above anything else.

You know, pvp is competitive.

If you don’t want to get killed by players who actually try, then play with your friends and play with them only. Because in a competitive game mode nobody will care if you just want to do a few friendly duels or just get a few points.

Balance is anything but subjective.

Something that can be proven, verified and or measured is a fact. An imbalance can be proven.

However, this does not mean all those people saying a certain class/trait/skill is unbalanced are correct.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Something that can be proven, verified and or measured is a fact. An imbalance can be proven.

Oh, you mean numerical balance. That’s not the same as the balance the players experience, though.

The balance we experience – and complain about or don’t – is subjective. The numerical balance can be mathed, but it’s only related, not the same.

Carighan.6758:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Something that can be proven, verified and or measured is a fact. An imbalance can be proven.

Oh, you mean numerical balance. That’s not the same as the balance the players experience, though.

The balance we experience – and complain about or don’t – is subjective. The numerical balance can be mathed, but it’s only related, not the same.

But what dictates the balance you experience in game, if not numbers?

But what dictates the balance you experience in game, if not numbers?

Game theory defines it’s terminology from the end user experience.
If you study up, you’ll see the word ‘choice’ abso-freakin-lutely everywhere, and words like ‘formula’ are far and few between.

The reason for this is that games involve things like incomparables, the dazzling complexity of player input in things like skill levels, and so many options interacting the possibility space goes beyond human capacity to mathematically model. Nobody’s really got an interest in devoting the rest of their life towards developing a game. So numbers are used to carve out a foundation for balance but after that the focus is on responding to player feedback with educated guesswork, intuition, and feel.

Usually you’ll see people define balance by the player’s behavior towards their options, because balancing options purely from an objective mathematical stance is just so technologically and productively unfeasible (if not outright impossible).

Vox Hollow.2736:

Usually you’ll see people define balance by the player’s behavior towards their options, because balancing options purely from an objective mathematical stance is just so technologically and productively unfeasible (if not outright impossible).

And WoW had a few moments during its life where it showed nicely that completely balanced options are not perceived as balanced due to player bias.
That is, players thought Frost Mages should be inferior DPSers for raids. That they were actually fully equivalent to the other specs for a short time didn’t make a dent. At all. Players still told Blizzard to “buff Frost for raids”, and the devs were baffled as both their simulations and the ones from EJ showed they were up there.

It turns out though, players rarely want balance. As you say, what we actually want is both choice, meaningful results from these choices and +gratification. By that I mean:

• If your class is balanced but provides absolutely no options (has but a single button you use, although timing and repetition make a huge difference in output so there’s room for player skill), players will get bored. They will also consider your class either underpowered (no options, cannot react) or overpowered (1-button class), but not balanced.
• If the choices don’t seem to do anything, this is perceived as unbalanced versus the choices of someone else. Look at atse in another thread saying that Necros chain-fear you four times. True, they can. But only a minority of Necros will go for that as they couldn’t do anything but that fear. Yet from the perspective of the attacked, Necros “have that choice, and it kills me”. If by comparison your own choice doesn’t feel as powerful (and keep in mind the enemy choice never was to begin with!), then players perceive that as imbalanced.
• Players want to feel like they matter. This is why so many players, no matter how well-designed WvW might be (it’s not, but it’s reasonably done tbh, just favours flipping too much and is too small-scale), perceive WvW as “bad PvP”. Because individuals matter less. And as above, players want their choices to matter. If you balance their character but all they are is someone moving around with 15 auras for the team mates, they don’t care for the balance. You could rather have them have a bunch of weak active skills.

Balance is a fickle thing. Balance is when your players think that the other class is stronger, but will think the same in vice-versa after they switch. That’s balance. Balance of choice, and that’s really the only balance you can aim for as a dev, as per what Vox Hollow said.

Balance is not subjective, it’s a real thing

mrauls.6519:

Balance is not subjective, it’s a real thing

[citation needed]

Carighan.6758:

mrauls.6519:

Balance is not subjective, it’s a real thing

[citation needed]

References

Dictionary.com, (2014). the definition of balance. [online] Available at: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/balance?s=t [Accessed 19 May. 2014].

Hrm, that’s the word definition. I was thinking more of a semantic definition in the context. Should probably use a [better source requested] now. :P

Yes, balance is a defined word. But what is “video game balance”. Or even just “MMORPG balance”. Or even just “GW2 balance”. Or even just “PvE Dungeon balance”.

The whole point of the thread is that this cannot be objectively defined, and I tend to agree. Players are not all looking for the same thing in a MMO, and no one has defined a “model citizen” yet.

Here is a quote from Jon Peters on balance

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/December-10th-Balance-update/3162445

JonPeters.5630:

If all we do is take the worst traits and buff them, then every patch everything gets stronger and eventually the game is broken. The word balance literally means reaching an equilibrium which is in between two end points. This means that in order to reach it things must assuredly go up and down.

The take away is there will never be perfect balance. He is talking about a trait in this case IP but same can be said of classes, modes, etc. There will always be movement trying to balance.

Right now there are going to be people that think this game is “pretty balance” you would probably have difficulty finding someone say it is perfectly balanced. On the other side you will find the other extreme “horribly balanced”. Thats why these profession forums kind of speak that the game is more balanced then people give it credit for since almost every class has been complained about.

Balance to me is every profession being capable of killing the other professions in a competent way

mrauls.6519:

Balance to me is every profession being capable of killing the other professions in a competent way

In what context? All of them? How is it translated to PvE?

mrauls.6519:

Balance to me is every profession being capable of killing the other professions in a competent way

Then the game is balanced for you since you can counter any other build by changing traits and weapons. I don’t think there are any uncounterable builds. Professions on the surface need certain traits/weapons to counter other builds.

Carighan.6758:

mrauls.6519:

Balance to me is every profession being capable of killing the other professions in a competent way

In what context? All of them? How is it translated to PvE?

Well professions killing professions is PvP :P in a PvE setting every profession is competent. I find GW2 to be a very skill based game

oZii.2864:

mrauls.6519:

Balance to me is every profession being capable of killing the other professions in a competent way

Then the game is balanced for you since you can counter any other build by changing traits and weapons. I don’t think there are any uncounterable builds. Professions on the surface need certain traits/weapons to counter other builds.

I do believe it’s balanced for the most part, but there are certain aspects where improvements can be made. My vision of balance is where everyone has the same access to tools and create their own destiny. That way, who can complain?

mrauls.6519:

Well professions killing professions is PvP :P in a PvE setting every profession is competent. I find GW2 to be a very skill based game

That’s a highly subjective perspective.
I’d reckon any of the – rather large – group of players never touching either PvP mode would substantially disagree with you, while still having their own ideas about what is balanced or is imbalanced. That alone shows just how problematic a topic balance is.

Further, you seem to be evaluation this based on “one character fighting one character”-scenarios. Something which happens, but the game seems specifically not be built for or even around this scenario.

Well since basically everything we’re saying is subjective, people shouldn’t knock PvP before they try it. The way I see it, if each player on each opposing team has the capability of fighting on equal terms 1v1 why would that change in an even matched scenario?

Numbers don’t lie.

Players, however, do.

mrauls.6519:

Well since basically everything we’re saying is subjective, people shouldn’t knock PvP before they try it. The way I see it, if each player on each opposing team has the capability of fighting on equal terms 1v1 why would that change in an even matched scenario?

Oh, heh.
In a mirror-match this could work, assuming the map is also perfectly mirrored.
But as soon as it’s no longer a mirror-match, stacking is different. Although this depends on just how far you’re willing to drive homogenization, because if you take it far enough, you effectively always have mirror matches.

Bringing me back to the concept of “effective number of classes”. A class in this case is a defined entity the player can opt into with defined downsides and upsides. In GW2, various combinations of gear+class+traits+weapons produce a class each, so I dunno, we have a hundred to two-hundred classes or so, eliminating the duplicates and the rather unreasonable ones?
Now, let’s assume for a moment we want all of these to be 1v1-equivalent to each other. This is a monumental task without homogenization, so that’s where we’ll go. But the moment we do that, what we’re actually doing is reducing the number of classes, not balancing them (different thing!).

Take that far enough, and at some point you end up with say, only 5 effective classes. At that point sure, in a mirrored map any “pro team”, or any random team given a queueing system which always brings one of each class, will have a proper fighting chance.

But is that still balance? All we did was a) reduce the number of effective classes until we can fit them all on the map and b) make sure it’s a mirror-match, effective-class-wise.

I said this before, balance in RPGs is impossible as long as there’s more effective classes than entities per side. This is why most RPGs don’t even try to balance, because it’d mean they have to fold the classes first (this is what WoW does for raiding balance, btw, effectively 3 classes, so even a 10man can easily find X / Y / Z of each type).

Can they actually be balanced? Depends on your definition. But it can’t be 1v1 balance. It doesn’t scale.

If you look at a more RPG-ish balance, say each class “contributes”. But they will do so in different ways. Say a guardian can erect lots of areas an enemy cannot cross, effectively zoning the enemy team. But let’s further assume that the enemy is already stacked on a specific spot and not willing to move from it: That Guardian is now useless. In this specific fight. In another, the enemies come at your team: The Guardian is pretty kitten powerful, slicing them into smaller subsets.
On the flipside, in the first situation a pure AE class will bring the pain, while in the second if the enemy spreads out they’re nearly useless.

→ Both can be “balanced”. But not individually and in each situation. Only “overall”, and how we define the “overall” and the “balanced” is up to each of us personally.

The devs so far seem to be aiming for… I really don’t know what. They patch balance too rarely IMO, we can’t judge it.

Fungalfoot.7213:

Numbers don’t lie.

Players, however, do.

“Numbers do not lie. Politics and poetry and promises, these are lies. Numbers are as close as we get to the handwriting of God”. – Hermann Gottlieb

I will be a scrub, after all, it’s just a stupid game. what do you actually win? Virtual respect, virtual wealth? I’ll do my winning in real life.

Is there a comprehensive listing of classes, traits and gear from the recent tournaments? That could be a start as to what seems to be working the best at high level pvp. Then we could aggregate LFG postings for 5 hours of prime time for each dungeon, and see what is asked for in groups, as a somewhat impartial list of desired gear/classes.

In the end, what it boils down to is list the desired attributes of a “perfect class” and then budget those onto the current classes.

For example, thieves get good combat movement, good ooc movement, high damage, and stealth, but low health and low survivability in a high direct damage build.

Guardians get high survivability but low combat movement, and low movement in general but decent CC and a large amount of projectile blocks (without good projectiles themselves). They also have very low access to conditions outside of burning, so that inhibits their ability to run a condition-based build that will be generally as effective as other guard builds.

Necros get high health, but lower armor rating, high condition management, area control, AI assistance, just a drop of stability, and/or control conditions, depending on their build.

The problem arises when some classes can have all of these attributes with very little downside, and that leads to discussions about what professions or builds are OP.

In most games with a division of labor(for lack of a better term), good middle-of-the-road classes are somewhat easy to level, somewhat easy to gear, and can hold their own in most game modes, while specialist classes excel geometrically at a small subset of skills or attributes, have a higher skill ceiling, but are massively underwhelming in other game modes, or situations. Condition necros against inanimate objects, for instance.

A class or a build that is easy to play and reasonably tough should have less overall payoff than one that is considerably harder to play and easy to kill.

In other words, if you are tanky, and super-survivable, you shouldn’t be able to kill things easily. And if you do have high damage, and lots of offensive boons/skills, you should expect to be considerably easier to kill, if you get caught.

Most people will take a philosophy, and build around it, falling somewhere in the middle, between tanky and glassy. Then, as now, you will see some classes/builds become more prevalent because they can do most of the things on the list really well, or at least reasonably well enough to get by in quite a few reoccurring situations in conquest-style pvp.

Bunker Meta is here and it’s strong. Conditions or Power damage it doesn’t even matter they still do good damage. Most players are a bunker of some sort because there is no monks. This is why you should of copied your own Guildwars 1 instead of WoW or LoL, Arenanet.

Zacchary.6183:

Sirlin should be read and quizzed before any game playing is had.

For all those serious about winning yes.

vincecontix.1264:

Zacchary.6183:

Sirlin should be read and quizzed before any game playing is had.

For all those serious about winning yes.

I’ll agree, because when players start complaining about other professions they are serious about winning.