Guild Wars 2

Enektric.4527:

I don’t really think that every class should have a “kryptonite” because that defeats the purpose of a skilled match <Snipped as to not have a huge quote>

I think the idea of a “kryptonite” should be based on the build rather than the profession. But, I do think it should exist. It’s what promotes Team play. If there are no distinct weaknesses then its’ just slap 5 people together and go. But when you create weaknesses and strengths then meshing them becomes important. /shrug, just my take on that.

Am I the only one that think this tread is of?

In GW2 each profession should be able to suit absolutely every role in game. There shouldn’t be some “best at”. Balancing around a point of view like :

- Necromancer should be the best at condition
or
- Ranger should be the best range profession
or
- Warrior should destroy everything in melee

Would be a total change of policy of this game. What this game need is just balance of each “build type” without any favor for “nich build”.
With this in mind we can see that amongst all profession there are profession that are over powered in certain nich and other profession that totally lack certain build possibility.
With this in mind, I’d say that balancewise we should see :

- A slight nerf to warrior regen abilities.
- A look at FGS for elementalist.
- Some gadget love for ingeneer.
- A real cleaving weapon for necromancer and maybe some love for boon build possibilities.
- Guardian really need more than just burn in their condition builds (Grandmaster retal trait ain’t a solution).
- Rangers need some love on passive damage boost. It’s nearly impossible to be efficient as they are now and most of them don’t profit to their pets.
- Thieves could see some change on shadow art’s tree.

Overall, I really think that the stat healing power is underused because as it is now, this stat don’t give enough as a trad of over any other stat in this game. It would probably upset most of the community but lower all base heals and grant a better scalling with Healing power would probably add a new breath in game balance.

That’s all I can think of right now.

Jerus.4350:

Enektric.4527:

I don’t really think that every class should have a “kryptonite” because that defeats the purpose of a skilled match <Snipped as to not have a huge quote>

I think the idea of a “kryptonite” should be based on the build rather than the profession. But, I do think it should exist. It’s what promotes Team play. If there are no distinct weaknesses then its’ just slap 5 people together and go. But when you create weaknesses and strengths then meshing them becomes important. /shrug, just my take on that.

You don’t need hard counters to promote team play. Look at an fps game or rts game.

Hard counters are barriers to action combat. If you want to have fun in a fight you’re going to have less fun the harder something counters you, because you’re less likely to be effective. When you don’t feel effective you feel less like you’re contributing anything.

In your opinion, what should the strengths (s) and weaknesses(w) of each profession be? What’s your profession’s kryptonite(k)?

General:
EVERY class at high level(!!!) sould be able to choose between at least two viable builds which offers flexibility and more adaptability to different situations

War:
s: high aoe-melee-range dmg, offensive buffs(might, fury) while decent defence
w: low(!!!) single target dmg, low condition removeal, slow
k: mobile enemy/conditions

Guard:
s: medium aoe-melee and range dmg , defensive buffs(protection, realitation, stability) while decent defence
w: low single target dmg, good condition removeal but with high cooldown, slow
k: high single-target-dmg / conditions

Thief:
s: high single-target-dmg, high rate of enchantment remove, or lower rate steal, enchantments, party stealth, mobility
w: only few stunbreaker, conditional condition remove (only in stealth), very fragile
k: stuns, conditions

Ranger:
s: high range-single-target or medium-melee-aoe-dps, party heal + condition remove + vigor, lots of melee evades
w: slow at range, dmg shared with pet(requires control to keep up)
k: high-dmg enemy, few stun removes

Engi:
s: conditions,stun,kb, high vulnerability stacking
w: defensive enemy, stability
k: high-single-target enemy

Mesmer:
s: high aoe-enchantment-remove, enlarge party buffs, medium aoe-dmg, illusion, confusion, party stability + conditionremove, reflects
w: defensive enemy, immobilize
k: aoe-dmg

Ele:
s: highest aoe-dmg, medium party support due to ability to give all enchantments but on low lvl, party heal, few party condition remove
w: fragility, immobilize
k: defensive enemy

Nec:
s: high live pool, fear, aoe-condition, live-steel
w: slow, enemy with condition remove,
k: defensive enemy

Regardless of whatever balancing philosophies is done, it is always flawed from the get go due to balancing being centered around standing on a circle.

Lack of space, yadda yadda. The missing classes (only the short part).

Elementalists

Strength

• Flexibility
• Burst healing (self and group)
• Boons (self)
• Combos (fields and finishers)
• Condition removal (self and group)
• Direct damage (area)

Weaknesses

• Low health pool
• Restricted range (1 weapon set)
• Boon removal
• Interrupt

Engineer

Strength

• Flexibility
• (Point blank) direct and condition damage (area)
• Combos (fields and finishers)
• (Point blank) hard CC (single and area)

Weaknesses

• Low single target damage
• Low in combat mobility
• Lockdown
• Conditions

Guardians

Strength

• Healing over time (self and group)
• Boons (self and group)
• Condition removal (self and group)
• Burns (single and area)
• Chills (single and area)

Weaknesses

• Low health pool
• Low out of combat mobility
• Low ranged damage
• Boon removal

Necromancer

Strength

• Condition damage (single and area)
• Boon corruption (single and area)
• (Point blank) Lockdown, e.g. Weakness, Chills, Cripples and Blinds (single and area)
• Life leech and recovery (self)

Weaknesses

• Low mobility
• Average ranged damage
• Lockdown
• Interrupt

Ranger

Strength

• Ranged Lockdown, e.g. Cripple and Immobilize (single and area)
• Ranged Interrupt (single)
• Combos (finishers, above 20% projectile finishers)
• Reveals (single and area)
• Unique buffs through pet (self and group)
• Boons (self and pet)

Weaknesses

• Pet
• Low burst potential
• Interrupt (when at range)
• Boon removal

Thieves

Strength

• Direct and condition damage (single)
• Blinds (single and area)
• Boon removal (single)
• Stealth (self)
• In combat mobility
• Interrupt (single)

Weaknesses

• Low health pool
• Low recovery
• Lockdown
• Reveals
• Conditions

Warrior

• Close combat direct and condition damage (cleave)
• Close combat CC (single and area)
• Resilient against CC
• Durable in general
• Combos (finishers, whirl and blast)

Weaknesses

• Low recovery
• Low ranged damage
• Low out of combat mobility
• Conditions

In your opinion, what should the strengths and weaknesses of each profession be?

Thief:

Strengths.

• High singular damage output
• Having exceptional critical chance OR exceptional critical damage (not exceptional both) and been able to make builds based on the above characteristics.
• Burst when needed (the whole point of Iniciative).
• Having at least three main builds variaties: stealth-based, poison-based OR high movility-based.
• High movility and deception for both him and his allies.

What’s your profession’s kryptonite?

• Constant damage should get him out
• Should not be as effective if the enemy can anticipate his location
• Should have low hp and defense.
• Shouldn’t be able to remain constantly stealthed.

For necro:

Strengths:
Defense of and control over conditions
Soft CC mixed with hard CC
Strong direct damage potential
High hp
Boon corruption
Abundance of ranged AOE attacks

Weaknesses:
Sustain (lack of legit life force regen especially across builds, poor life siphoning, lack of synergy between heals and DS)
High cooldowns
Mobility
No cleave
Big damage attacks due to lack of active defense
Meaningful and/or low cooldown group utility and support

Kryptonite:
Focus fire
Situations requiring cleave for success
Sustain fights

Dungeons if possible could have a Random tileset like Warframe does to keep everyone on their toes, make everything random…not just 5 sets of possible outcomes of a generation.

If one instance there are flamethrower using charr with a windy path, then the next instance could be a spiral jumping puzzle path with flamerthrowers OR same spiral path but charr with guns, something like that, OR make new dungeons…we need more armor skins anyway lol same stuff gets boring. why stop at aetherpath of TA?!

For wvw: Ability to steal enemy siege thats placed and NOT in use(given theres an ability to destory the siege you already placed (ONLY BY PERSON THAT PLACED IT)

if i place a ram down and its built, then if i leave it, enemies can use an ability to steal (backwards engineer) the ram to use on the gate that was just used to flip something. If i do not TEAR DOWN the ram (since i placed it) then its my fault that they flipped it.

More wvw traps, Zerg penalty (if in a zerg 50+) then there will be some form of a debuff like “Low Field Rations: Take damage every second for each 10th player nearby, splitting off lowers this” at 50 1 tick per 5 seconds would take effect, at 60 2, and so forth…stress out that skill play should beat numbers

better fractal rewards, raise the chance of fractal tonic and ascended by 10% the higher you are in fractals. or lower the level of fractals the tonic can drop.

Legendary Food platters….bring them
Precursor Crafting (HURRY UP ALREADY!)
New Legendaries

Bring back Bar Brawl.

BIG ONE HERE: We ALL want to see the beta events like this…“Link”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJ4Qt0D91Wc

add it to a Meta event, it shouldnt be tied to only the beta, some of the best ideas were in beta…why retire them, Mass community events…the events now are currently cliche and hardly worth the effort. BRING THOSE EVENTS BACK!!!!!!!!!

Josh Davis.6015:

Great responses, all. Really impressed with the turnout. Posts like the ones from Holland, SuinegTsol, and pierwola (to name a few) are exactly the type of high-level role discussion we are looking for.

As a note, I want to be very clear that we’re looking for comments from all game modes, PvE, PvP, and WvW included. Don’t be shy.

I’ll be going through the thread quite a bit today, distilling your thoughts into something a bit more digestible that we can talk about on stream.

Thanks!

Fair enough.

Ranger specifically doesn’t truly have an issue AT range, but at MAINTAINING range, particularly the longbow. The longbow lacks “instantaneous” burst in favor of a more constant output, but most of the constant output comes from maintaining range, which is difficult with the lack of supplemental skills and utilities.

Maybe making Rapid Fire a bit of a “scarier” skill to get hit with so that it punishes classes that are attempting to close the gap and mitigate the damage output, and giving the weapon a bit more of a control style function (like a short immobilize) would differentiate it and give it a bit more “interesting” playstyle than just the “shoot an arrow, shoot a few arrows” playstyle, and give it an effective role that currently no other ranger weapon truly fulfills except the few stuns.

What if, Rapid Fire applied like, a 1/2 second cripple per shot, and LB 3 became a toggle so that part 1 stealths the player and pet, no arrow fire or anything so that the stealth is guaranteed, and part 2 was like, a 1s immobilize? Obviously those numbers aren’t balanced, but incorporating the core ideas into the longbow formula would be the key to making it a successful weapon.

As for the rest of the class, the biggest issues are trait organization and function, and how “vanilla” or basically lacking the utilities are as a whole, or without a heavy investment that doesn’t always create the desired traitspread for particular build due to wonky trait placement, like Skirmishing being a second Beastmastery traitline with some trap traits thrown it.

Most unbalanced class would be ranger if u ask me.

Most unwanted for dungions
most unwanted for wvw
almost never seen in sPvP

i guess there’s a lot of problems for this class

Put a limit on how many of what classes can be in SPvP tournaments (solo and team)

Shockwave.1230:

Jerus.4350:

Enektric.4527:

I don’t really think that every class should have a “kryptonite” because that defeats the purpose of a skilled match <Snipped as to not have a huge quote>

I think the idea of a “kryptonite” should be based on the build rather than the profession. But, I do think it should exist. It’s what promotes Team play. If there are no distinct weaknesses then its’ just slap 5 people together and go. But when you create weaknesses and strengths then meshing them becomes important. /shrug, just my take on that.

You don’t need hard counters to promote team play. Look at an fps game or rts game.

Hard counters are barriers to action combat. If you want to have fun in a fight you’re going to have less fun the harder something counters you, because you’re less likely to be effective. When you don’t feel effective you feel less like you’re contributing anything.

I’m not saying it’s the only way, but it adds a layer of depth to group composition. Instead of taking 5 good players playing whatever they want, you actually want to form a team that is cohesive and covers each other’s weaknesses.

Again it’s not the only way, but it is a mechanic I enjoy. Not even saying they should go that direction, just saying it’s a situation you can see in games and it’s a completely reasonable approach. I like the idea of having to form a solid 5 man team, rather than forming a group of 5 individuals who work as a team. I can understand where you’re coming from, but it’s just different approaches, each with their pros and cons.

As a note, I want to be very clear that we’re looking for comments from all game modes, PvE, PvP, and WvW included.

Hopefully I’m not going to come off as passive aggressively snarky when I say this, but;

I’m kind of at a loss to describe how classes can fill differing roles in PvE, because I don’t really feel like there are any?

Josh Davis.6015:

Hey everybody,

This Friday on “Ready Up” I’ll be joined by Game Designer Karl McLain and Game Design Lead Jonathan “Chaplan” Sharp for a discussion on balance design philosophy. “What’s that, and why should I care?” you ask? Great question!

We won’t be going over future changes we’re making, but rather discussing the ideas and philosophy that drive balance changes. We’ll also be discussing our vision of what purpose/role each profession serves in relation to another.

To get started, we’d like to ask a few open-ended questions to all of you. In your opinion, what should the strengths and weaknesses of each profession be? What’s your profession’s kryptonite? And remember, no single profession should be the best at everything!

We’ll be reading through your thoughts over the next few days, and we’ll try to address as much as we can on Friday. Feel free to post your thoughts below, but try to keep your replies relatively short (I’d aim for under 300 words).

As a note, the previously announced “State of the Game” episode has been postponed, but rest assured – it will happen!

Thanks all! Let’s keep this constructive.

Does that mean you will also, perhaps, update the profession descriptions found here;
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/

Because, in the case of the ranger at least, that description has plagued the community for a LONG while by being 100% incorrect and inconsistent with the reality.

Just askin though.

I hate Anet and balancing, after virtually every major, ‘balancing’ patch I am forced to (temp) retire a class and pick a new one to play. I have 8×80′s, 1 of each class for this reason, so when they over nerf a class, that character becomes my stand by the black lion merchant. Well, the character class that’s got awesome buffs becomes the class I play.

Its all so pointless…they usually destroy more builds than they create too.

All its about really is a cheap, easy way to try to inject some life into PvP, whatever effect it as on PvE or WvW they not interested in.

Josh Davis.6015:

Great responses, all. Really impressed with the turnout. Posts like the ones from Holland, SuinegTsol, and pierwola (to name a few) are exactly the type of high-level role discussion we are looking for.

As a note, I want to be very clear that we’re looking for comments from all game modes, PvE, PvP, and WvW included. Don’t be shy.

I’ll be going through the thread quite a bit today, distilling your thoughts into something a bit more digestible that we can talk about on stream.

Thanks!

While I understand that you are not going to talk about the even higher level discussion areas that some of us are bringing up regarding pvp, I certainly hope these don’t get brushed off.

Many of us were hoping tomorrow’s livestream would be pvp oriented, but clearly that is not the intent.

Guardian:
strengths→
healing and A LOT of damage mitigation.
Access to A TON of boons.
Team support.
Reflection
decent condition removal

Weakness →
high punishments for not being able to mitigate damage (not just low vitality)
access Hardly any conditions.

Warrior:
Strengths → High damage and low punishments for not being able to mitigate damage.
Access to damage increasing boons.

Weakness →
High damage is predictable. Not just long cast timers but it should be easily predictable when the hit will be. Long cast timers make it so you use your damage mitigation too early and do not help to see when the strike will actually land.
Low healing
Few ways of damage mitigation.
Bursts are even more predictable than the other attacks.
REALLY LOW condition removal.

Engineer:
Strengths →
Access to many combination fields and finishers.
Access to turrets.
Access to a LOT of boons.
A lot of access to non-damaging conditions.
Access to a lot of CC.
Access to boon stripping (to combat stability in particular)

Weaknesses: Low damage mitigation. Dependent on turrets and combinations of fields and finishers.
Weaknesses: mediocre damage and low sustain.
Weaknesses: Few damaging conditions.

Ranger:
Strength:
Settings traps and ambushes for enemies.
Access to REALLY long duration of stealth when not moving.
Access to a lot of damaging conditions in traps.
Access to a lot of non-damaging conditions in traps.
Access to traps that grant cc.
Access to boon stripping in traps.
Pets have access to non-damaging conditions.
Long range attacks.

Weaknesses:
Mediocre sustain
Mediocre damage
Mediocre pet damage.

Thief:"
High damage
Swift attacks
Long duration of stealth when both moving and when stationary.
Access to traps that grant a lot of non-damaging conditions.
Access to traps that grant cc.
Access to traps that grant damage boons increasing boons to the Thief.
High access to non-damaging conditions
Great bursts.
Access to many teleports and mobility
Access to a lot of stun-breaking abilities.
Access to a lot of conditions removal.
Good access to evades.
Master of getting away, even when caught.

Weakness:
REALLY low health
REALLY low sustain
Low access to CC
Low access to boons in general.
NO access to vigior.
Low access to damaging conditions. (bleed is the only exception)

Elementalist:

Strengths: Jack of all trades. Ele has access to everything.
This includes access to poison.

Weaknesses:
No bursts.
No stealth.
No confusion.
No torment.

Mesmer:
Strengths:
Access to low stealth duration.
Access to identical clones. (the interface should be copied from the original including buffs and strange icons)
Access to clones that mimic the movement of the real Mesmer.
The ONLY profession with access to confusion.
High bursts.
Master of not being caught.
good access to CC.

Weakness:
Low access to long conditions yet access to many.
Low sustain when caught.

Necromancer:
Strenghts:
Access to A LOT of conditions
Access to long conditions.
The ONLY profession with access to torment.
Access to minions.
High health.
Access to CC.
A lot of condition removal.
Master of conditions.

Weakness:
Low healing.
Low damage
Few stun breakers.
___________

Vox Hollow.2736:

As a note, I want to be very clear that we’re looking for comments from all game modes, PvE, PvP, and WvW included.

Hopefully I’m not going to come off as passive aggressively snarky when I say this, but;

I’m kind of at a loss to describe how classes can fill differing roles in PvE, because I don’t really feel like there are any?

There are damage, control and support roles – it’s just you’re expected to do all three – not just specialise in one.

And if ANet don’t stay true to this, we’re just going to end up with buffbots, tanks, healers and GW2 will be generic MMO #239612752362

So basically:
Guardian: Team support
Engineer: Anti-team Support on enemies.

Ranger: Ambushes, sets ambushes.
Thief: Ambushes on the move. Master of getting away.

Mesmer: Master of not being caught.
Necromancer: Master of conditions.
Warrior: Master of Damage and with low risks yet predictable and low healing.

Warrior:

Strength:

• Build variety with good access to most of weapons, boons, conditions, finishers, cc, bs, some self and group cleansers, some self and group buffing, and some reductions (off damage with endure pain, conditions with berserker stance, and cc with stability).
• Mobility with signet of rage, banners and some movement skills.
• _high armor, health and some regeneration capability.

Weakness:

• Mechanic points to brute and passive game play. Makes the class very strong and appellative in pve and wvw but limited in pvp.
• Conditions not only cancels all regenerative capabilities, but also kills the warrior very fast.
• Single and irremovable target. Without access to AI, teleport, stealth and evades, becomes easy to focus end inflict burst of raw dmg or cond dmg.

Josh Davis.6015:

Great responses, all. Really impressed with the turnout. Posts like the ones from Holland, SuinegTsol, and pierwola (to name a few) are exactly the type of high-level role discussion we are looking for.

As a note, I want to be very clear that we’re looking for comments from all game modes, PvE, PvP, and WvW included. Don’t be shy.

I’ll be going through the thread quite a bit today, distilling your thoughts into something a bit more digestible that we can talk about on stream.

Thanks!

Well then, I’m not going to be shy! I made a post earlier about Rangers, but here is a question that I would really like for someone to answer on the stream :::

What Profession would you say is the closest to your vision in terms of balance, and when are you going to adjust the other seven professions to the same level?

((Speaking of Rangers……

Ranger does not mean Range. The Definition of Ranger is – A person or thing that wanders or ranges over a particular area or domain. That’s what park rangers do. That’s what the original Rangers in the military sense did, and that’s what the original Fantasy Rangers did, going all the way back to Tolkien. Just because range is in the word Ranger does not mean that they should be best with ranged weapons.

…I just wanted to clear that up since many posts concerning the Ranger keep saying that we should be best at Range. Every profession should have an effective ranged weapon that isn’t totally overshadowed by the Ranger Longbow, and every profession should have an effective melee weapon as well that isn’t overshadowed by any one profession’s melee weapon. Every class should have effective builds for both.))

I would like to see more sensible balancing changes for PvE, but that could probably demand as much as an additional team to work on it, I fear.

When I played the beta of FFXIV:ARR, I eventually got hold of this spell called Sleep, from Thaumaturge class. If it was GW2, a spell like that would be balanced for PvP, and probably add a second or two of a stun under a high cooldown, it would probably be an utility or elite skill, and no one would probably use it in PvE. But in a game with more sensible balancing towards PvE, like FFXIV, a spell like that was really strong in even the most basic PvE encounters, as it helped you to not get eaten alive everytime you were unfortunate to draw too much aggro, especially while playing solo. The “stun” effect is long-lasting, yet the spell isn’t overpowered (it ends on being hit, and you don’t win fights with it, you just survive instead).

That is just an example of what it seems to be a random, useless skill outside of a pvp environment, yet it is not.

This attention to detail exists in GW2’s pvp balance, but it is completely non-existent in pve. Most of the time, most of the utility is useful in pvp, and too underwhelming in pve. In consequence, it takes the unique-ness out of most classes, which degenerate into dps-only builds + specific damage-blocking utility effects, and little else.

I would like to see a balancing team entirely dedicated for pve in this game. Is it asking too much? Is it not worth the investment? Clearly, some of the fault lies to encounter design, as well…

I would enjoy to see this topic discussed in the stream.

I would like to know if there is a balance philosophy for PVE. How does it differ from the one for PvP? How do you balance the mobs in PVE? What possibilities are present for certain roles among the mobs? What is the philosophy on synergies between different mobs? Should mobs copy successful strategies form players?

Mesmer
What should be the strenghts:
Similar to their GW1 counterpart: experts at counter-playing, punishing and control.

• Access to slow effects like Chill (while the ice flavor does not fits, chill’s mechanics are synonymous to Mesmer);
• Access to boon stripping and boon stealing;
• Access to tank-shredding tools (HP% damage skills, armor-ignoring skills);
• Access to punishing mechanics;

Weaknesses:

• Frail;
• Low mobility outside of specific tricks;
• Illusions as a resource cost;
• Illusions with a limited HP pool;

Problems with the current Mesmer:

• Many traits make clones too easy to get, dumbs the clone-resource playstyle, or lead to very boring, very passive, very generic DPS “phantasm builds”;
• Mesmers feel more like a minion master Necromancer type of class, than one of trickery, illusions and living hexes;
• Anti-play tools are too few, and sometimes underwhelming or lacking support: interrupts are clumsy without skill bars or with many skills not being telegraphed/ slow enough, boon stripping is decent but boon stealing is weak, HP% skills do not exist, and lack of access to chill;
• Phantasms act too much like mimics of other classes’ skills, and too little like proper “living hexes”. The ones that offer better crowd control are generally ineffective;
• Anet focused too much on their fencing skills (swords, blocks), on their chaotic skills (random stuff, staves), and too little on dedicated crowd-control builds, which Mesmers could have so many of…
• Mantras would work great in a turn-based RPG, where wasting a turn to charge them would actually mean a sacrifice. In GW2, they can simply be pre-charged before battle, which forces Anet to make them weaker, which in turn makes them ordinary skills with an annoying and unnecessary pre-charge mechanic, and an equally annoying “waste your remaining charges after battle, and charge it again, so you can start the next battle with them fully charged” mechanic.
• Mesmer’s utilities are some of the most creative – yet some of the most useless around, especially in pve (reflections as an huge exception).

Here is what needs fixing in one clear picture. Conditions, and the way PVE bosses are designed for it. Create a solution for the condition cap, so conditions are on par with direct damage. And don’t take the lazy way out by making every single boss completely immune or resistant for conditions and control skills, while direct damage is just fine.

That is exactly what is turning this game’s combat into a boring game of whack-a-mole.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Here is what needs fixing in one clear picture. Conditions, and the way PVE bosses are designed for it. Create a solution for the condition cap, so conditions are on par with direct damage. And don’t take the lazy way out by making every single boss completely immune or resistant for conditions and control skills, while direct damage is just fine.

That is exactly what is turning this game’s combat into a boring game of whack-a-mole.

What about hte fact that Direct damage is based on 3 stats (power, precision, and ferocity) where condition is just condition damage? I’d think that would need to be addressed if they want to have conditions and direct damage equivalent potentials.

Jerus.4350:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Here is what needs fixing in one clear picture. Conditions, and the way PVE bosses are designed for it. Create a solution for the condition cap, so conditions are on par with direct damage. And don’t take the lazy way out by making every single boss completely immune or resistant for conditions and control skills, while direct damage is just fine.

That is exactly what is turning this game’s combat into a boring game of whack-a-mole.

What about hte fact that Direct damage is based on 3 stats (power, precision, and ferocity) where condition is just condition damage? I’d think that would need to be addressed if they want to have conditions and direct damage equivalent potentials.

Because Condition Damage is based on Condition Damage, Condition Duration, and Precision (for more stacks).

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Jerus.4350:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Here is what needs fixing in one clear picture. Conditions, and the way PVE bosses are designed for it. Create a solution for the condition cap, so conditions are on par with direct damage. And don’t take the lazy way out by making every single boss completely immune or resistant for conditions and control skills, while direct damage is just fine.

That is exactly what is turning this game’s combat into a boring game of whack-a-mole.

What about hte fact that Direct damage is based on 3 stats (power, precision, and ferocity) where condition is just condition damage? I’d think that would need to be addressed if they want to have conditions and direct damage equivalent potentials.

Because Condition Damage is based on Condition Damage, Condition Duration, and Precision (for more stacks).

Is it affected by Precision, I admit I’m a bit noobish, especially when it comes to conditions? And condition duration isn’t a gear stat unless I’m mistaken.

Basically to max power builds you need 3 stat gear focused on that. With Condition gear you get secondary stats. I think that is enough to say that the potential shouldn’t be the same.

Great Topic..

In your opinion, what should the strengths and weaknesses of each profession be? What’s your profession’s kryptonite?*

It remind me the topic which i created long time ago some short after major patch.. however it removed to junk.. [copy/paste] The thread “Gw2 Philosophy?” has been removed from the forums as it is not an actual discussion. Please post a discussion thread and just just a question.

so it sounds good opportunity to continue from boss`s topic..

Josh Davis.6015:

In your opinion, what should the strengths and weaknesses of each profession be?

rather than Josh question maybe it would better if we started from Topic. [Balance Philosophy][Part 1]

from my view, as in topic ``Balance Philosophy`` it shall be,

• in Objective Risk/Reward factor in other words Challenge Rate/Efficient[effectiveness]
  and it should be in Transparent policy.

so, maybe just i am or there is a bug there..
i dont understand ppl in which Mode/Enviroment are they talking about..
OR,
i could already missed it that GW2 Modes already Described.. However from my side/experiance gw2 has,
Modes: in major pve pvp wvw and in minor/secondarly dungeon open map, solo spvp, t pvp, duel pvp, wvw solo roam, wvw solo duel, small scale, large scale, organized large scale Deathmatch[unoffical GvG], organized/unorganized[pug] large scaled groups roam[guild raids example] and etc etc..
- and the most difference between them are competition..
if i describe Competition.. it means to me,, where has Offical Ranks, maps, organizations, e-sports.. etc..
where the most objective Fair balances required..
SO,

• Balance Requires should be independence.. in other words Balances in Enviroments/Modes, in terms of Requires from where…
  otherwise,
  when u try to make eyebrown, u remove eye.. or i can say if u split above mustage, if below beard (eng is not my mother language/translated :S )

• 1) if not gw2 has any focus in semi offical ¿ – unoffical competitive areas as gvg or in casual/random generated(chaotic[comes from chaos theory] as large scale grouping and others except Tpvp, as meta says GW2`s game mechanic is for 5players vs 5players in structured mode[cap point or how u say mode]
  Please not be shy and say it in transparent policy.. that we(if anyone thinks as me the same) can be clear in Offically.. [not be me/us being pollyanna/happy dreamer/ obsession cuz of lacking transparency(could already missed if said)]

in conculision, if u say Anet(Gw2) vision is support just 5v5 players structed mode mechanic and e-sporting it.. [i can already missed any quote already, however u can reapat it Offically your(gw2) mission, vision and goal again[ ll appriciate]..)

so,

• pls just do Balances orientation FOR 5v5 structured mode.. (for details go sub forums for each classes where u should open it for)

or,

• 2) or is there any effort to make balances include for all modes in gw2, or from my view.. at least the environments as sync ed/organized large scale groups or more for GvG…

say it in OFFICALLY pls.. in transparency policy..

there are pleanty competitive players still in this game [Where most of them already retired/quit/abondoned from gw2] that we/they can go part 2 as your

In your opinion, what should the strengths and weaknesses of each profession be? What’s your profession’s kryptonite?*

question..

otherwise it makes me think in differ way which i dont like to see from kind of glassess..
as.. dont like to give name to anet as pitifullness, capitalist(just look for his pockets[profit margin/state]), unethicallness, ignoring unsatisfy anet customers/players..

(its all self subjective opinions)/imo [sorry for broken english and missing/skips nothing personal)

IN CONCULISON,

• First of all, Need OFFICAL answer from anet,
  - If your Balance Philosophy includes except 5v5 structured gaming mechanic and pve mode (as unoffical gvg, large scale fighting) so HOW?[Clearly pls][not politic/objective pls]?
• then it can make sense your question SWOT about classes.. in modes except pve(dunno of it excatly) and sPvP(5v5 Structured PvP mode)

Jerus.4350:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Jerus.4350:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Here is what needs fixing in one clear picture. Conditions, and the way PVE bosses are designed for it. Create a solution for the condition cap, so conditions are on par with direct damage. And don’t take the lazy way out by making every single boss completely immune or resistant for conditions and control skills, while direct damage is just fine.

That is exactly what is turning this game’s combat into a boring game of whack-a-mole.

What about hte fact that Direct damage is based on 3 stats (power, precision, and ferocity) where condition is just condition damage? I’d think that would need to be addressed if they want to have conditions and direct damage equivalent potentials.

Because Condition Damage is based on Condition Damage, Condition Duration, and Precision (for more stacks).

Is it affected by Precision, I admit I’m a bit noobish, especially when it comes to conditions? And condition duration isn’t a gear stat unless I’m mistaken.

Basically to max power builds you need 3 stat gear focused on that. With Condition gear you get secondary stats. I think that is enough to say that the potential shouldn’t be the same.

And it isn’t. Even with +100% duration on all conditions and max condition damage, Condition builds still do not out-damage Zerker builds. What we’re getting at is the massive discrepancy of Condition builds in PvE where the stack cap screws them.

Power builds, you have 1+1=2, and 1+1+1+1+1=5. Condition builds, you have 1+1=1.1 and 1+1+1+1+1=1.1.

Josh Davis.6015:

Great responses, all. Really impressed with the turnout. Posts like the ones from Holland, SuinegTsol, and pierwola (to name a few) are exactly the type of high-level role discussion we are looking for.

As a note, I want to be very clear that we’re looking for comments from all game modes, PvE, PvP, and WvW included. Don’t be shy.

I’ll be going through the thread quite a bit today, distilling your thoughts into something a bit more digestible that we can talk about on stream.

Thanks!

is there any trick that u could see my post before i submit it.. as when i preview it,, can u see it as well.. cuz i started it by time u posted.. :S kitten gonna take a coffee.. :P :S

and What is kryptonite mean excatly ? is it something as antidote mean.. ?

The thing I really wanted to hear about is what’s happening with conditions in PvE. Over a year ago Jon Peters said you guys had ideas and were discussing through options.

Can you tell us what came out of that?

Oh wait, I can see now that I should probably try to figure a better way to put this.

As far as I understand the roles in this game, they pan out to something like;

sPvP:
Bunker
Far Point Defender
Home Defender
Roamer

WvW:
Front-Line Zerg
Back-line Zerg
Havok
Roamer

PvE:
Berserker

Open World:
AOE Berserker
(Although the living story content is great at shaking this up)

I know Support/Control/Damage is how the skills and ultimately the classes differentiate themselves from eachother. But, for the most part, these three categories aren’t the Roles themselves. They seem more like tools selected in varying portions to fulfill roles.

(Like how in league of legends roles are a description of territory you’re responsible for, and champs with different abilities like tanking or ranged damage can fulfill the same role in different ways).

In PvE there seems to be very little in the way of spatial or resource things going on to create differing responsibilities among party members. The ones I’ve noticed so far are things like Ooze Bait in the TAether path puzzle, that exist only on an encounter basis. Standard combat against challenging foes in and of itself doesn’t seem to have these kinds of noticeably different roles between party members.

It kind of leaves me a bit unsure about what to say regarding PvE roles.

Nick.6972:

Here’s a question:
How many years will it take for you, Arena Net, to make Spirit Weapons on Guard actually usable in WvW and sPvP?

Hopefully never. No one enjoys playing against passive skills such as spirit weapons, spirit rangers and mm necros.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Jerus.4350:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Jerus.4350:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Here is what needs fixing in one clear picture. Conditions, and the way PVE bosses are designed for it. Create a solution for the condition cap, so conditions are on par with direct damage. And don’t take the lazy way out by making every single boss completely immune or resistant for conditions and control skills, while direct damage is just fine.

That is exactly what is turning this game’s combat into a boring game of whack-a-mole.

What about hte fact that Direct damage is based on 3 stats (power, precision, and ferocity) where condition is just condition damage? I’d think that would need to be addressed if they want to have conditions and direct damage equivalent potentials.

Because Condition Damage is based on Condition Damage, Condition Duration, and Precision (for more stacks).

Is it affected by Precision, I admit I’m a bit noobish, especially when it comes to conditions? And condition duration isn’t a gear stat unless I’m mistaken.

Basically to max power builds you need 3 stat gear focused on that. With Condition gear you get secondary stats. I think that is enough to say that the potential shouldn’t be the same.

And it isn’t. Even with +100% duration on all conditions and max condition damage, Condition builds still do not out-damage Zerker builds. What we’re getting at is the massive discrepancy of Condition builds in PvE where the stack cap screws them.

Power builds, you have 1+1=2, and 1+1+1+1+1=5. Condition builds, you have 1+1=1.1 and 1+1+1+1+1=1.1.

Cool just felt the need to point out the concern about gear stats and what not.

Here are some important questions for the developers:

1) WvWvW skill balance
- Why is WvWvW treated like pve for several skills?
- Why is revealed 3 s in WvWvW, even though stealth is obviously much more powerful in WvWvW than in spvp/tpvp?
- WvWvW meta aka Guardian Warrior Elementalist Necro (GWEN) or hammer warrior + staff guardian melee train has been the same since Autumn 2012. Any chances to shake things up? I consider this as the one of the most important reasons why many competitive hard core WvWvW players quit this game. “Hammer stun, blast water fields, double dodge left, stability, lines of warding, veils, strip boons, hit their backline now…” commander talk remains the same already for soon 2 years in this game. Thieves are most common roamers and enemy flank gankers in zerg fights. What do the developers see as the role of rangers and engineers?

2) PvE skill balance
- Just like in WvWvW certain professions are overly represented in dungeon runs, while some others are generally not wanted.
- most CC skills are useless in boss fights due unshakeable and defiant, single target CC is generally waste of time against normal mobs
- total armor is not important due very slow attack speed of bosses, making the fights all about well timed dodging/evade and berserker gear is still prevalent
- What about reducing the damage per attack, but increasing the attack rate of pve monsters? (while keeping the total dps roughly same, this would probably lead to more varied builds)
- Will the balance patches continue to revolve around spvp/tpvp ?

I would like to point out a serious mistake in many people’s replies. Warrior has the best in combat and out of combat mobility in this game, if you just build for it. Merely equipping a greatsword (no traits or utilities invested) allows warrior to outrun most professions. Combine with sword/warhorn or hammer (earthshaker is 600 leap), bull’s charge, dogged march, mobile strikes, signet of rage for another on demand swiftness (besides warhorn), signet of stamina and/or berserker’s stance, balanced stance and endure pain. After thieves warrior is the 2nd most common roaming profession in WvWvW. Mobility is king in roaming.

I also do not agree that warrior has low condition removal compared to other professions. Cleansing ire + warhorn + signet of stamina + “shake it off” + signet of rage (with 6x Lyssa runes) = massive amount of condition removal, especially if traited. Cleansing ire alone combined with longbow allows more condition removal than most other professions can achieve in long term without the use of any runes, sigils or utility slots. Mesmers, engineers and rangers are the professions, which currently struggle against conditions.

I know Support/Control/Damage is how the skills and ultimately the classes differentiate themselves from eachother. But, for the most part, these three categories aren’t the Roles themselves. They seem more like tools selected in varying portions to fulfill roles.

(Like how in league of legends roles are a description of territory you’re responsible for, and champs with different abilities like tanking or ranged damage can fulfill the same role in different ways).

And there is nothing wrong with that – if you force certain roles you end up having unpopular ones which nobody wants to do – it’ll be lf 1 healer all over again. For example take cof p2 – nobody wants to run magg over to the magmacyte, you get groups where all 5 people port.

In PvE there seems to be very little in the way of spatial or resource things going on to create differing responsibilities among party members. The ones I’ve noticed so far are things like Ooze Bait in the TAether path puzzle, that exist only on an encounter basis. Standard combat against challenging foes in and of itself doesn’t seem to have these kinds of noticeably different roles between party members.

You have certain classes brought for passive buffs, you have offensive buff-stacking pre and during fight and you’ll normally have a “defensive” buff class like guardian or mesmer for aegis, projectile reflection, stability and condition cleansing. Then you have engi and thief that can stealth which is unique to them and is a whole separate role entirely from the usual combat ones.

The whole “we need one guy doing this, another guy doing this, another dude doing this” already exists in the game, it’s just multiple classes can do each thing, and each class can normally do a slight part of it but either just to themselves or for shorter duration (or RNG) – your problem is that you don’t have the game outright spelling it out for you: YOU NEED A HEALER, YOU NEED A TANK AND YOU NEED DPS. The intricacies of the combat system in this game were so subtle we once thought warriors and guardians were #1 – but once we actually did research we began to realise that literally every class in the game was solid for instanced content besides necromancer which has decent DPS (exceeds warriors by like a whole thousand if in lich form) but lacks team utility.

Any balance done to classes is moot in pve due to how defiance works and how a lot of mobs are more susceptible to power based damage.

Mesmer

Strengths:
-Control/counter-play, through dazes and pull/pushes with our focus and gs, is a fairly established variant of mesmer builds now. More access to chill would be nice. Perhaps chill on shatter trait? Chill on clone-death? It’s secondary, but making sure it is out there. Boon-stripping is also part of this.
-Punishment should be the strongest points of mesmers, however the confusion nerf hit mesmers the hardest due to our large array of skills that have access to it. I believe a trait for our Confusion damage, just like for the Ranger’s [Poison Master], is needed to make Mesmers a more viable option for punisher-play.
-Single-target damage is our current strong suit, focusing our phantasms and shatters on a single target to give a streak or burst of damage. However, phantasm mesmer is nearly the only viable build in PvE right now because of this.
-Damage avoidance is our fourth strength, being able to dodge and stealth and divert damage so we never take it in the first place. Reflections is also a seemingly strong field of play in WvW and PvE, I hear.
-Conditions are a secondary strength, however not exactly weak, though most of our conditions play into punishment and control, such as clone-death traits and Chaos Storm and CI.
-Support is another secondary field of play, but can be specialized if skilled enough, however this is currently a high-skilled task for mesmers to accomplish

Weaknesses
-Massive AoE damage is our current weak point, as we can mostly not create large fields of normalized AoE damage. I’m okay with this so long as we can produce abnormal results through other means, such as clever use of reflections, clone-death, and AoE interrupts/confusion.
-Bunkering damage, as in taking all the damage head-on. It would not be the end of the world like it may be for thieves, however it isn’t the mesmer’s strongest point.
-Conditions cleansing are one of the weaknesses of mesmers, who have mostly abnormal and sometimes unconventional condition removals.

Kryptonite:
-Thieves hard-counter control with their Initiative
-Conditions are the main bane, as most mesmers don’t have an efficient and timely way of removing them.

Alright, now that i’m off work and don’t have to post from my phone n.n

Let’s write a proper post.

Firstly before Answering your question, Grouch, as to what we the players would like to see or believe. I must first return a question.

Why jump directly to Professions when the game is lacking a Core placement known as “Roles” and a definition for them.

In Gw2 you can tell someone there is a DPS / Support / CC trinity but ultimately that Trinity is very, very soft and has no hard definition and in many cases, no trade offs.

DPS = Doing damage. Easy to do an anyone can do it. Yes it is possible to deal much less damage than someone else which means inherently there is some imbalance of trade off here… at Face value only.

Support = helping your party. this is extremely vague and can fall to Boons as much as it can Pressing F to Rez a downed player. Support typically means damage mitigation or healing and Healing Power Scales terribly for all classes. It is also not carried by a boon (boons applied to others absorb relevant #’s from who they sit on rather than whomever applied them). This leads to a very self serving type of support rather than fostering the want/need to have a Support oriented Player in your group.

CC – Control also casts a wide net and can fall to Stuns/conditions/Damage etc.. Mirky waters. a large percent of CC is easily negated either (pvp (including wvw)) or entirely negated (PvE, boss buffs, invulnerable, shortened durations etc..) Playing CC is extremely unrewarding overall at this time.

Here’s the other problem with casting such huge nets over the entirety of the game.

It’s far to easy to do two or all 3 things at once, on one toon, with little effort.

Let’s look at Warriors for an example, specifically the Hammer.

Hammer allows for Manageable DPS
Hammer Contains Multiple CC skills
Hammer does not supply Boons

Warrior Traits allow for More damage
Warrior Traits allow for CC mitigation and Damage mitigation
Warrior Traits Supply Boons

Warrior Utilities Allow for all of the above + Healing

This is not how things tend to work and from my experiances in gaming and in GW2, is not how they should ever work.

There is virtually little to no trade offs. no punishments or “lacking” costs to Define any Roles in Gw2 beyond – Does more damage than X in Y situation because of Z.

That being said.

In your opinion, what should the strengths and weaknesses of each profession be? What’s your profession’s kryptonite?

I think its a good idea to allow for each profession to have its own core weakness and strength. It still maintains a sense of a “chess match” where in one piece is better suited to do a job than another. But it should not entirely negate all other pieces from preforming the same task (just less efficiently)

But here’s the problem

Gw2 has 8 classes.
Gw2 has only 3 “Roles”

Those Roles can be split:
DPS – Spike / DoT
Support – Boons / Healing / Some forms of CC
CC – Conditional / Direct / Punishment / Some forms of Support.

This leaves us with 9 potential Strengths / weaknesses.
or
some large number of potential combinations that each class could fill.. even considering we eliminate possibilities where in a class is Better in everything or does Everything well with no weak points. I’m too lazy to do this math….

So what would i like the Professions to be..
Not where they are now, I couldn’t really pin them all down as i Don’t play all of them. But I do play mesmer a lot.

I would like to see the Mesmer:

Gain more situation Damage and Control that is not subject to traditional Core R/P/S play. Things such a greater Damage when target has/lacks boons tied to traits. Targets take damage on boon/condition removal. Target suffers inverse effects of Boons/Conditions. etc..

See clones/phantasms altered to be a Useful but not Obtusely Defining mechanic for the class. Grant them triggers to explode when foe does X or Y.. give them Auras that create chaos on the battle field and strike fear into anyone about to join the fight. Stop attempting to Fix them and actually Fix the bugs associated with them.

See the classes Traits realigned and many of them Redone to allow for Diversity as a whole, not just Diversity of things you can do with your clones with a light peppering of things you can do while your illusions do all the work.

I’d like to see the class be balanced by diversity where in bringing the wrong build to a fight means that you will be a hindrance or in trouble until you can find a way to leverage the situation. Weakness in its own strengths if you will.

I’d like to see the Classes “Kryptonite” be Defensive/Smart/Organized Play by a foe. If the CC/Punishment is out played by tactics or a build that your build is not made to punish, you were out played, that should be your greatest weakness.

Not being able to Counter EVERYTHING at ALL TIMES.

Now my arm has fallen asleep, and i’ve run out of things to say.
GL on the Stream guys.

Necromancer

These opinions are based mainly on sPvP, small scale WvW, solo roaming.

Strenghts:
- Best boonhate
- Best condition controll
- Best aggressive self sustain and staying power over time
- Best damage and pressure over time in average, slow start, massive increase over time
- Strong offensive and defensive condition application, Best access to fear, torment, poison, weakness and chill.
- Strong offensive chasing potential
- Strong acces to combo fields and offensive group support
- Average reliable and persistent damage at all ranges.

Weakness:
- Poor escapes
- Poor combo finishers
- Poor defensive group support
- Low Burst/Spike Damage
- Average boon application to self, poor boon application to allies.
- Below average stability and stun breaks
- Poor damage migation

Kryptonite:
- Coordinated spike damage from multiple foes
- Coordinated chain CC
- Very fast position changes and stealth, preventing aggresion.

Improvements:
- Balance CD philosophy to short CDs with Skill damage/potency to medium to achieve a better power curve in prolonged fights.
- Reduce conflict between health sustain and DS
- Improve skill reliability against intelligent enemies (players) across the board (e.g. Wells, Staff AA, Dark Path, SoV)
- Improve and rebalance self sustain (siphons, BM traitline)
- Improve ability to chase and to prevent disengage
- Improve application of torment, poison and chill.

Suggestions:
- Able to apply revealed status / able to anchor enemy to an area without CC
- Special interaction or function with a condition via traits
- Sequence skills to allow better reaction to situations and to maintain a persistant, aggressive attrition styled gameplay.
- Means to prevent a complete shutdown of aggressive gameplay via stunlock or heavy CC
- Create synergy between boonhate and siphon via Spite traits. (e.g. Siphon on corrupting boon)
-Re-Arrange some GM traits to make more sense and reduce amount of GM traits based around minions

Support = helping your party. this is extremely vague and can fall to Boons as much as it can Pressing F to Rez a downed player. Support typically means damage mitigation or healing and Healing Power Scales terribly for all classes. It is also not carried by a boon (boons applied to others absorb relevant #’s from who they sit on rather than whomever applied them). This leads to a very self serving type of support rather than fostering the want/need to have a Support oriented Player in your group.

“self serving” like might stacking, fury stacking, stability, aegis, reflection …? If you want to clear a dungeon efficiently you need players maximising their team support at as small a tradeoff to their damage as possible – this means dropping one or two DPS traits in return for more support, dropping DPS utilities for more support utilities. Your idea of “support oriented” is probably healing power or boon duration stacking, but GW2 neither has that nor needs that.

CC – Control also casts a wide net and can fall to Stuns/conditions/Damage etc.. Mirky waters. a large percent of CC is easily negated either (pvp (including wvw)) or entirely negated (PvE, boss buffs, invulnerable, shortened durations etc..) Playing CC is extremely unrewarding overall at this time.

I didn’t know “enables the party to maintain full DPS uptime and rotations” = extremely unrewarding.

This is not how things tend to work and from my experiances in gaming and in GW2, is not how they should ever work.

There is virtually little to no trade offs. no punishments or “lacking” costs to Define any Roles in Gw2 beyond – Does more damage than X in Y situation because of Z.

In ArcheAge you can take different skill trees to complement your playstyle as best as possible – and there’s no drawbacks no matter which ones you take – it’s purely dependent on how well you feel they synergise. IIRC, in Aion you were able to choose skill trees at no drawback as well.

Actually, I feel Necro does not NEED any form of escape outside of WvW, and even there, they do have options (which are only really necessary for roaming, to be honest).

As for Necro’s lack of “team buffs”. I think that’s not really true. Necro, as a class, is not a Guardian. They are supposed to be the debuffers, and that means weakening the enemy as opposed to strengthening the ally. Weakness on a group of enemies is similar to Protection boon on a group of allies. Cripple on a group of enemies is similar to Swiftness to a group of allies.

With that said, I think Necro’s strengths should be debuffing the enemy, whether it’s chill, cripple, blinds or weakness. Unless you grab off-hand dagger, I think the Necro has limited options in weakness right now, which could maybe be improved (For example, adding weakness to Wail of Doom – warhorn daze, after the daze expires – or adding it into certain traits. Maybe adding weakness in trait lines which aren’t Spite, so the condition duration gained from Spite, mixed in with condition duration food isn’t out of control and perma weakness isn’t easily achieved, but is still there).
-I think the Necro is supposed to be the profession that doesn’t directly help allies by buffing them, but debuffs the enemies instead to INDIRECTLY helps allies (after all… it is a Necromancer, not a Guardian).

I don’t know what a Necro’s weakness should be because I think different builds make up for different weaknesses, but generally, I feel like a Necro’s weakness is ranged enemies. A Necro right now can kite melee really well, but ranged units are unaffected by chills and cripples so they can keep shooting.

-I think in group fights, such as WvW, a Necro’s kryptonite is anything that hits hard, is ranged and hides behind a good frontline (hard to get to). A Necro doesn’t have any deflection auras / walls / shields, and so while the melee atackers can be kited, range keeps shooting, ,and that is why I think range is the Necro’s Achilles Heel.

I will just list my thoughts on the Mesmer

Strengths that mesmers SHOULD have:

1) Offensive support:
Currently mesmers have very strong offensive support with things like boon removal (Null field and Shattered Concentration), and amazing positioning skills such as portal, and veil. I think that mesmers are in a great spot in this regard, and this was evident in the recent ToL. I would like to see mesmers offer more offensive boons like fury or might to their party, but I think that this should be a low priority.

2) Interrupts:

It is so frustrating to see the state of interrupts in GW2 compared to GW1. In GW1 interrupting a key skill could stop a coordinated spike from happening, or shut down a key player so that the rest of your team could follow through and win a team fight. In GW2? You stop a skill and a player continues with the rest of their skill rotation like nothing’s happened. Five seconds later they can click their skill. (Or in a thief’s case, they keep spamming their skill)

If your team wants to clear the stigma of a “spammy meta”, then you are going to need to make skills that punish people from clicking their skills on cool-down. The Mesmer is the best class to do this.

-Interrupting a skill needs to have a negative effect. Setting a skill on cooldown for 5 seconds is not punishing for interrupt builds to be viable in PvP. You could implement mechanics such as removing a small amount of endurance by interrupting a skill, or by putting a long cooldown on an interrupted skill (start with 10 seconds and tweak accordingly). All classes have access to at least 14 skills, it is OK if skills are put on a cooldown.

-You need to revisit power block. There were threads and threads where people discussed power block and the potential build diversity of a Mesmer, and they all seemed to be ignored. In its initial state Power Block was not overpowered (notwithstanding the PvE),and you should at least introduce it back into the game for a month or so.

-Mesmers need more AoE CC that is SKILL-BASED. I would love to see cry of frustration or Panic (as an elite skill) come over to GW2, as both would be perfect for this game.

3) In-combat mobility:
-Bugs aside, I think that mesmers have strong in-combat mobility that makes them a fragile, but hard-to-hit class through skills like leap, phase retreat, and blink.

Weaknesses:
1) Damage
- Mesmers have always had shaky damage due to the illusion mechanic. Shatters provide high burst and phantasms provide high sustained DPS, but they rely on frail illusions surviving throughout the fight.* I would like to see more damage on weapon skills (The mind stab chain has the lowest DPS in the game melee-wise), with the phantasm traits re-designed to increase party wide DPS instead of personal DPS*. For example, a trait that increases the power of nearby allies by 50 for each active phantasm. I don’t mind that mesmers have low damage, but it needs to be compensated in other places.

2) Conditions
- Mesmers are weak to conditions. With necros getting trimmed in the last patch, I think that this is an acceptable weakness.

3) Out of combat mobility
- Mesmers have terrible out-of-combat mobility, with swiftness coming only from TC or chaos armor. I would like to see a +25% movement speed on signet of midnight, in which mesmers trade in-combat mobility for out-of-combat mobility.

Kryptonite:
-Thieves. Thieves hard-counter this class way too much. Thieves have more in-combat mobility than mesmers (negating their defensive mechanic), they have skills that hard-counters a Mesmer’s primary mechanic (they can cloak and dagger off illusions and with the current initiative and skill design spam this skill until the Mesmer is dead, OR spam flaking strike and evades so that phantasms and shatters cannot land), and interrupts are USELESS against thieves (most of their skills have no cooldowns or ¼ cast time). A team with a mesmer has to build around others defending the Mesmer (watch the ToL games with a mesmer vs. a thief), because the Mesmer cannot defend themselves against a thief, and this is unacceptable. Mesmers need to have a defensive mechanic against thieves for them to be viable outside their current shatter role in PvP.

Warrior
- His opportunities to deal dmg are to simple – easy to manage but hard to realize against good players
Compare an eviscerate or hundred blades with an elementalist full burst combo
-His passive regen and conditionremove is still to high
- Stunlockcombos are way to strong – add some negative side effects
-Longbow f1 still to big /strong
-> Nerf the passive regen and the conditionremove and change the fact that warrior abilities are so extremly simple

Nekromancer
-add more stability
-lack on movementskills
-still not really viable in PvE ( dps comparison)

Elementalist
-pls nerf fiery greatsword skill 5 ,It can’t go on that you are able to burst bosses down in 2 seconds
-in pvp fine now
Thief
-S/D builds are still a way to strong I think
-hardcounters mesmer
-stay invisible by hiting enemys with poisn fields
EDIT:

CC – Control also casts a wide net and can fall to Stuns/conditions/Damage etc.. Mirky waters. a large percent of CC is easily negated either (pvp (including wvw)) or entirely negated (PvE, boss buffs, invulnerable, shortened durations etc..) Playing CC is extremely unrewarding overall at this time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1r1bfmoI4E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBtFWy-ccTk

I didn’t know “enables the party to maintain full DPS uptime and rotations” = extremely unrewarding.

I hope this isn’t a srsly try to show an implementation of crowdcontrol in PvE

Necromancer:

Strengths:
-Condition application and manipulation
-High AoE condition application
-High health bar

Weaknesses:
-Bad Power burst (ranged and meele)
-Lack of ways to keep on attrition (no stab, no gap closers, bad pulls)
-Vulnerability to CC
-Lack of party support

Kryptonite:
-CC-focused builds

What i think necros need the most at the moment is a weapon with a cleave auto-attack and group support(mainly for PVE)

One of the main reasons people hesitate when it comes to giving more support capabilities is that they would be able to do so much while still having good amount of tankyness(DS) so my proposal would be giving more uses to DS like:

Shadow Rush(F2 skill)
The necromancer uses 50% LF to leap towards the target
1200 range
20 sec CD

Deathly Gift(F3 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to give 2 random boons to himself and up to 5 nearby allies for 10 seconds
600 radius
15 sec CD

Life Force Overflow(F4 skill)
The necromancer uses 30% LF to overflow the life force from his body blasting the nearby area (similar effect to Arcane Wave)
600 radius
Combo Finisher : Blast
10 sec CD

This way we would have to choice on a certain situation if we want to be more tanky with DS or if we want a little more mobility(F2) or group support(F3, F4)

Its the way i can think of balancing support for necros without letting they keep all theirs tanky capabilities

maha.7902:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IaySIyZh4o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1r1bfmoI4E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBtFWy-ccTk

three videos from 1 subset of pve play does not a strong argument make..

i’m speaking in wider “game as a whole” terms, not in organized teams/guild dungeon runs terms.