Guild Wars 2

As of late, a lot of threads have popped up about “Class ‘x’ OP” or “Skill ‘y’ OP” – err well, you know the ones I mean… I have no interest to outline all of these, because by now this should be common knowledge that those threads exist… sadly…

The thread I linked above (I mean it, read it) gives “Pride” as an example as to why people complain about certain things, and though there is some truth in it (people always blame factors for losing a fight/match), there is also some truth hidden within the threads where people complain – however (!), these threads usually fail to bring the real problem to the table – resulting in people raising pitchforks against an effect of the real problem rather than the problem itself … This is an issue….

People do not know how to pinpoint a problem and thus, everything is at fault. This is of course not exclusive to MMO’s, this is an issue with Human Nature. A large demographic of people are inherrintly lazy, they do not want to find problems and tackle them, that’s for the people who like to do that stuff – however, this same demographic of people loves to complain. Example;

• Your Smartphone does not work, who better to blame than the Manufacturer? But is this right? What if the problem was not the Phone, but your 2 year old Nephew who decided to use it as a hammer to disassamble a Duplo building, while you were unaware of it. Or you know, a more common issue, the device becomes slower, but is it because the Phone is badly designed, or was it because you decided to cram too much stuff on it?
  A smaller demographic of people try to turn their phone on and see it does not work, and start to wonder why – they need to know, and thus they extensively try to find the problem, see if they can fix it, and after it they think whether it was the device’s problem for not working or not.

I know, this does not translate 1-1 for MMO’s, and certainly not balancing, but maybe you can see my point; Rather than pinpointing a problem, people complain – human nature, nothing wrong with it… Problem of a problem, you see?

Just before you go to the “Ermergerd, this is OP” threads and point your finger at those who baselessly say something is overpowered, realize this;
People never complain without a reason (Unless they are Dutch, we complain about pretty much everything)

What does this mean you ask? Well, if a large demographic of people are complaining about something over a said period of time (this is important for later on), means that there is obviously a problem. Yes, I know, most of the time people fail to deliver the problem, or ignore those who have already given the answer to the problem, and from here we got those numerous threads complaining about the same thing, with the same people trying to defend their statements. Honestly though, it is better to try and defend a concrete wall from an incomming wasp so it would not get stung, because you are not going to ever win from those who have no interest in listening to those who know the problem, and got a solution

Anyway, if there are multiple threads comming into existance of the same problem (or rather, the effect), this means something is off, and thus balancing needs to be done.
Now hold on again! The complaints about Rangers or more specifically Longbows hold no ground at all! Remember when I said “over a said period of time” ? This means people need to be patient as well when it comes to calling out problems, since this might have something to do with General inexperience in combat – or more specifically, no experience fighthing Power Rangers since they have been non-existant for so long. Discussion and deeper explenations for this are On this page

Yes! You wanted to hate on something because it killed you, but someone else did this already! This means you are totally right about the problem, because there are so many complaints!

People like to join the masses. Beating knowledge with people numbers is also not uncommon, complain long and hard enough with a ton of people about the same subject, and you might see it change.
Though if you read the paragraph “The problem of a problem”, you will know by now that people have the tendacy to ignore the real problem, and complain about an effect rather than the problem… A good example was given in this post by Galandil. I will quote the important aspect for our discussion:

If you’re an old enough player of the game, you should remember that for quite a while thieves could melt most people down playing S/P with Haste (and with melting I mean it, quickness would last even during the stomping). Thieves pointed out that the problem was not in PW in itself, but in quickness, and that that effect should have been nerfed.

Guess what: first, Anet nerfed by 15% the dmg of PW, leaving quickness as it was. Months later, they proceeded to nerf quickness from 100% to 50% speed, never reverting the changes in PW.

I remember this and I was not even part of the competitive scene long enough to know the true effect – but everything he said is right; People complained in masses about PW, and thus the skill got nerfed, while in reality, the skill was not the culprit, the utility was… Now, PW thieves are so scarce, simply because it is not efficient enough as compared to other thief builds…

Bandwagonning makes you part of the problem of a problem. By just saying “Everyone is saying it is OP and so it needs to be nerfed” you are guilty of not only doing no research to pinpoint the actual problem, but also balancing mistakes in the near future. If only the large demographic of people had listened to the Thief Community, who were very much aware of their own issue, PW would’ve never been as overnerfed as it is now…
And do you think this is exclusive to thieves? Well, think again;

• Warrior Adrenaline changes – more specifically decay
• Necromancer’s Dhuumfire – this resulted in a year of nerfs before the actual culprit was reworked
• Mesmer’s Prismatic Understanding – resulting in many defense nerfs for Mesmers
• Elementalist’s Sustain – they were out of the Meta well over a year(!)

etc.

Now you know these sad facts, quite honestly, do not hope to see it disappear soon… However, if you read this, came as far to this, acknowledge that you were part of the problem and want to it to change, then make sure to do the following;

• Examine the problem; Why are you truly mad? Was it the problem, or an effect of the actual problem?
• Why does this problem exist; or, what was the thought behind it? What is the effect of removing it?
• Think of a solution; How would you change it? What would you do differently?

If we all started to start to tackle problems in a way that we both as players and as developers get more information, the less likely we will get classes nerfed to oblivion

We, the community, need communication.

Yes, this is actually asking for the impossible, since you have to literally prepare yourself for a waterfal of complaints, searching hours and hours for someone who can explain the problem and work from there – without people getting angry…

However, you, the developers, have stated you did not want to have “Whack a mole” Balancing, while this is just the thing that is happening now! Changes are either so major that they are making classes and builds nearly unviable, or so minimal that nothing changes – resulting in people getting mad over either the same old stuff, or over new things that they cannot adjust to.

I, as a player, do have a general idea for this to improve though;

• Formats; Formats to feedback on balancing, give us threads in which we, as players, can have a good setup to give feedback on changes and balancing. This will result in a more clear overview of problems and how they can be reworked, as you can “ignore” those not following the format, and let the playerbase discuss amongst themselves to “help” each other on pinpointing problems when they are faced with them
• One developer per class; A representative, a face, voice or simply letters on the screen to communicate with. This is important for all classes so that they will not feel neglected. Maybe it is asking for much, but if we say implement a good system for us players to express concerns within the classes, we can immediately get feedback on it
• Update your philosophy on classes; I mean it is quite the joke that Necromancer’s are meant to be an attrition class , yet within the current implementation in the game, you will find them either to be “Condition Burst” or “Power Burst” and trust me, neither fit “attrition” at all. Let us know why you want to make certain changes, what is in your heads, and what does this mean for the classes. We need to know…. Really, we do

Basically, get in touch, and let us be in touch. I am not asking the playerbase to become part of the balancing team, because this would only end in utter chaos, but let us know what you are working on – because now we can’t see it…