Guild Wars 2

Today’s previewed changes to Guardians’ Spirit Weapons continues ANet’s confounding and unrelenting embracement of passive gameplay and low skill-high reward mechanics (AI, powerful auto-attacks and passives). This design philosophy is particularly unwelcome in PVP.

This has been a problem ever since launch 2 years ago, in a game that has more AI (Phantasms, Spirits, Spirit Weapons, Minions, summoned Thieves, Turrets, Elementals, rune set summons) than I’ve come across in any MMORPG before. Given the frequent criticism of AI and passives, the introduction of a mechanic to Spirit Weapons that increases their automated utility beyond when they would previously disappear, allowing them to do more work on behalf of the player, is what skillful play does not need. It is what PVP abhors.

This is not a complaint that this change will make Spirit Weapons OP. It may or may not be, but that’s for a separate discussion. The complaint is one of overall design philosphy that is familiar and voiced often: Low skill-high reward mechanics (AI, powerful auto-attacks and passives) need to be seriously addressed—not buffed; and most certainly, not done so 2 years after launch.

The change via Dulfy:

Spirit weapons – No longer lose your spirit weapon when you activate the command ability. Instead, they will naturally be able to use their abilities more once before dying.

And in Karl’s words from the video, the Spirit Weapons will “naturally be able to use their abilities more than once before dying.”

Pets have been an integral part of MMOs for a very long time. Many players, including myself enjoy them greatly. They have been in the game and promoted since before release. It is not like they magically added them in out of no where after 2 years.

You are free to search out and move to a MMO that has no AI what so ever. Good luck.

coglin.1867:

Pets have been an integral part of MMOs for a very long time. Many players, including myself enjoy them greatly. They have been in the game and promoted since before release. It is not like they magically added them in out of no where after 2 years.

You are free to search out and move to a MMO that has no AI what so ever. Good luck.

Um….this is kind of a cop out. From a pvp perspective, no one likes being killed by 4-5 “robots.” Most people can accept being outplayed by a human, however, most people don’t like being killed by the human’s computerized henchmen.

Sauncho.8076:

coglin.1867:

Pets have been an integral part of MMOs for a very long time. Many players, including myself enjoy them greatly. They have been in the game and promoted since before release. It is not like they magically added them in out of no where after 2 years.

You are free to search out and move to a MMO that has no AI what so ever. Good luck.

Um….this is kind of a cop out. From a pvp perspective, no one likes being killed by 4-5 “robots.” Most people can accept being outplayed by a human, however, most people don’t like being killed by the human’s computerized henchmen.

It’s been my experience that people don’t like losing no matter what the reason is. If you take out AI then you need to take out, any kind of passives. Guardian regen? Yep gone. Signets? Yep gone. Traits that automatically do anything? Yep gone, and the list goes on and on. In fact I can’t think of a single game that does not have some form of passive play. Good luck finding one though, let me know how that turns out for you.

coglin.1867:

Pets have been an integral part of MMOs for a very long time. Many players, including myself enjoy them greatly. They have been in the game and promoted since before release. It is not like they magically added them in out of no where after 2 years.

You are free to search out and move to a MMO that has no AI what so ever. Good luck.

Unlike most other MMOs with bigger numbers of minions, GW2 minions always take part in the fight, even if they don’t attack. The clutter the battlefield.

Look at how they want to buff bows on ranger. Well, it will still not work in PvP without piercing arrows. Piercing arrows is no choice it is a requirement… because of AI minions. When a mesmer just keeps spamming clones on a point, it does not matter if you can track the mesmer or not. You might not even want to attack the mesmer. Still the clones just passively sitting there will eat alot of your arrows.

They also eat away damage from AoE thanks to AoE caps.

Isn’t this a good change for active play? Right now the cost of using such skills is too high, so it promotes passive play. By lowering the cost of using this skill won’t they make the active skills worth using means that better players can achieve better result by using said skills. Isn’t that good for active play?

The same with the ele changes, now you have to control your elementals to achieve better results. Sounds active to me.

I’m all for removing bonus team members from PvP.

Spirit Weapons are some of the best designed AI in the game, requiring actual input to be successful. Just because you roll your face on a build without AI doesn’t mean you are playing more actively than someone rolling their face on an AI build. The most eSports game in the entire world – League of Legends – has a massive amount of PvE in its game mode, because (shock) whenever you make a gamemode more complex than DM you have some non-player mechanic you have to fight against.

I can’t for the life of me figure out what makes a full signet warrior build more active than an MM Necromancer or the soon to be Spirit Weapon Guardian.

The warrior fills their bar with signets. The warrior then gets all kinds of goodies to make them stronger and never have to click those skills again until they need whatever temporary passive goodies they want from them. Signet warrior even gets to HEAL passively.

Meanwhile the AI builds make the same sacrifice for their AI minions. They lose utility slots that otherwise could have been for vital stunbreaks, of which some signets are, and now have to track 1-3 other entities on the map and try and time the use of each minion’s active ability to chain control/burst the intended target AND have to deal with the hard counter of having said AI destroyed, rendering the entire build useless.

The change here actually encourages guardians to play more actively with their AI as it won’t be a one time use before losing the utility skill. Adding more control over the AI already in the game isn’t adding more AI dependency to the game, it’s making the AI properly dependent on the player. That’s a good thing.

Ehecatl.9172:

I can’t for the life of me figure out what makes a full signet warrior build more active than an MM Necromancer or the soon to be Spirit Weapon Guardian.

Or a signet ranger with a pet for that matter.

a full signet warrior doesn’t exist in pvp though, this is what all AI build needs to be at, not viable for pvp. Unless they can find a way to remove its passive power either giving player more direct control and have it do less things by itself then there is no reason these build should exist.

Lifestealer.4910:

a full signet warrior doesn’t exist in pvp though, this is what all AI build needs to be at, not viable for pvp. Unless they can find a way to remove its passive power either giving player more direct control and have it do less things by itself then there is no reason these build should exist.

Maybe not in High end PvP. Then again, neither do turret engies, or MM necro builds exist in high end PvP.

If you want to claim signet warriors do not exist in solo queue, I link you several videos. Signet warriors exist in the same level of players as most MM and turret builds.

Lifestealer.4910:

a full signet warrior doesn’t exist in pvp though, this is what all AI build needs to be at, not viable for pvp. Unless they can find a way to remove its passive power either giving player more direct control and have it do less things by itself then there is no reason these build should exist.

That is exactly what this buff to spirit weapons did. It decreased the rather steep penalty of using spirit weapon active abilities as well as improved those active abilities to encourage more active play from the player. No heavy AI build except perhaps turret engineers just send their AI in and then stop playing. They still have to utilize their weapon skills and time their AI’s active abilities properly to get the most out of the build, no different than any other active style of play.

Bhawb.7408:

Spirit Weapons are some of the best designed AI in the game, requiring actual input to be successful. Just because you roll your face on a build without AI doesn’t mean you are playing more actively than someone rolling their face on an AI build. The most eSports game in the entire world – League of Legends – has a massive amount of PvE in its game mode, because (shock) whenever you make a gamemode more complex than DM you have some non-player mechanic you have to fight against.

to expand on this

Yorick, Heimer, Zyra, Malz all have AI that cant be microed and all are average power level. And none of them are strong because of the AI either. Heimer is a noob trap, he has 3 turrets and if you walk into him you are a kitten and deserve to die, he cant chase you and has no mobility. All he is good at is pve pushing.

Like I hate seeing the fricken “omfg no more ai!” complaints. It just is screaming “Scrub alert” to me.

Ai is fine with me. Unlimited cc is not. #downwithturretengi

(Before anyone gets all technical, realize I’m using hyperbole)

you’re implying that spirit weapons will be PvP viable just because they don’t blow up when you tell them to attack (but they still die if you so much as sneeze at them and they clutter WAY less than, say, ranger spirits)

hell, now that just about everything melee can cleave, the complaint of using AI as body shields is kinda gone, isn’kitten even necros and thieves can tear through minions super fast, leaving a vulnerable ranger/guardian/necro with zero utilities waiting to die.

The problem with AI is that they deal damage passively, soak up AoE in large numbers, block projectiles, and clutter up the screen reducing visibility.

Shatter Mesmer is the best designed AI build in the game, it’s AI use is actually active via phantasm attacks on spawn and shatter abilities. They don’t stay on the screen very long. When they block projectiles or soak up AoE then the AI instantly die.

If all AI builds were like shatter, and actually took skill to pull them off, instead of the majority of them being like PU and passively summoning bonus party members to deal damage for the player, then people wouldn’t care, because the player is still actively dealing the damage..

illusion=clone+Phantasms as mesmer f1-4 skills source
after 2 years ,people in forum still don’t know this and consider themselves expert of active play .
just lol

the difference between mesmer and another ai spec. is clones are all mesmer has. and they have 0 health any bunker can one shot almost all of the mesmer clones. and they fall over in the face of the enemy ai.. if a mesmer could have phantasms that followed you around like a minion master there would be an issue. go summon 3 clones and see how good they are at killing turrets. i understand that they are easier to bring back but any way you bring them back is using resources and the next batch die the same.

Passive AI play means your AI friends do stuff for you without any command , and you can’t Consistently control them. In many pvp games it also means your lovely AI friends have enough damage and abilities to kill your enemies by themselves .

Engi turrets and necro minions are the things you should target with name of passive AI play.
About mesmer illusions , you really consider that every time those greatsword and staff clones walk towards you and explode is that all illusion suddenly get intelligence ?
Now the truth is there is a button on mesmer skill bar http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mind_Wrack

Also , dolyak Signet, healing signet , signet of Stamina , signet of restoration , ire and strength rune + celestial amulet . those things are far more passive to me than any AI builds.

musu.9205:

Also , dolyak Signet, healing signet , signet of Stamina , signet of restoration , ire and strength rune + celestial amulet . those things are far more passive to me than any AI builds..

In your infinite wisdom, would you mind explaining how one rune set is more passive then another? How is one a particular amulet more passive then another?

The idea of that is ridiculous. I could understand complaints about AI. I may not agree with them, but I can understand them. Comments like this though, clearly show when a poster isn’t participating in the conversation, but is here with a poorly thought out, personal agenda.

what would a patch be without an AI build getting buffed? XD
spirit weapons aren’t too bad (at the moment) they can hit hard, and the hammer CC is dam annoying, but the cooldowns stop them from being OP.

In order for AI to effectively deal damage passively they do need input from the player. Yes, they attack automatically, but the AI in this game is pathetic. Just moving drops their damage output considerably. If an AI heavy build really wants to capitalize on that damage output they need to bait the opponent into their AI and hit them with slow effects and crowd control for the AI to maximize it’s damage. Unless you’ve elected to stand still and let the AI swarm you the AI aren’t doing considerable damage. Not more than a good condition user at any rate, who also have the luxury of building tanky while maintaining good sustain.

At the end of the day though, I just find these complaints ridiculous. There aren’t any heavy AI builds at the highest level of play for very good reasons. The builds, even when used by an extremely skilled player, don’t stand up well to anyone with a lot of cleaving and AoE damage, which most professions have at least a little access to. Yes the minions do absorb AoE damage, but that honestly is a good thing. In a team fight of 3v3 if a meteor shower is cast and only does minimal damage to the actual players but completely wipes out the necromancer’s minions the fight is now effectively 2 1/2v3. The necromancer is crippled as it doesn’t have it’s main source of damage, doesn’t have any stunbreakers as they gave those up for damage, no utility, and no team support options. As a staff ele player I can say that destroying necromancer minions isn’t detrimental to my contribution to the team. It actually ensures that my AoE will completely ruin one of the enemy builds to the point of being dead weight for the team. Mesmer clones also eat my AoE though, and unlike necromancer minions those can be back within the minute.

Ultimately this boils down to people complaining when they lose to a build that isn’t viable at high end play and claiming those running said builds have no skill. That doesn’t add up to me. If they aren’t using a high end build and still beat you on your own high end build, wouldn’t that mean you got out played? Or something about builds countering builds which we are all completely familiar with and shouldn’t be getting this upset about.

In terms of which AI builds are the best in all around design I’d probably rank it something like this. At least in terms of making sure the player is the source of strategy in the relationship.

Best Designed: BM Ranger

Well Designed: Shatter Mesmer, MM Necro, Spirit Weapon Guardian.

Poorly Designed: Turret Engineer.

Terribly Designed: Condi-spam PU mesmer.

Good AI Appearing in Non-AI Builds: Elementalist Elementals (With patch), Any Kind of Ranger pet.

Awful AI Appearing in Non-AI Builds: Thieves Guild Thieves, That frickin’ Rock Dog, Pirate Parrot, Rune of the Flock Birds.

Not Even an AI Build: Spirit Ranger.

Edit: Totally forgot about other rangers in my list.

Forums posts like these make me want a giant red button that force everyone to play Minion Mancer necro or Spirit weapon guardian for 24 hours. Because most of the people complaining about these builds obviously have no idea what there talking about.

Most of the damage comes form passive auto attacks my left kitten cheek. I PLAY a minion mancer necro. The only times there auto attack damage is even remotely dangerous is when I cc something into a corner then immobilize it long enough for htem to be beat on.

The other 99% of hte time against players who are even SLIGHTLY good at the game its the bone minions doing over 80% of my killing damage. The rest is just attrition.

Liewec.2896:

what would a patch be without an AI build getting buffed? XD
spirit weapons aren’t too bad (at the moment) they can hit hard, and the hammer CC is dam annoying, but the cooldowns stop them from being OP.

them blowing up on command was really stupid, it was like using a ranger spirit’s active killed the spirit.

now they make sense, and they still have pitiful health, and still quite a bit of recharge time, but at least you don’t have to spec so heavily into them that you get the venom share effect: spent too many trait points to justify not having all slots be spirit weapons.

I don’t see anything will change with these buffs on spirit weapons at all.

Guardian will still have to sacrifice most of all classes just for bit added dmg.
Honestly will you ever equip bow with 60s cd?
No
Second thing, guardians weapons are so squishy and so easy 2 kill that is really not even a threat to any1 ,now they at least don’t suicide.
And last to have some dmg from these AI super killers, guard needs to spec as glass cannon and with weapons as utility its kamikaze build all over,so yeah still LOL when you see spirit guard:)

As far as AI goes Spirit Weapons are probably the most “legitimate.” They feel more like an extension of the player as opposed to something you summon and let do their own thing like Minions. They stick fairly close so they don’t feel like as bad of screen clutter like Ranger Spirits.

I don’t hate the idea of pets or AI, but I would rather they function like Spirit Weapons than minions.

EDIT: This difference is probably that Guard is generally in melee range even when using Staff or Scepter. With MM you are generally at range letting your Minions lay down pressure. With a melee class you feel a bit less swarmed imo.

Dice Dragon.4326:

Bhawb.7408:

Spirit Weapons are some of the best designed AI in the game, requiring actual input to be successful. Just because you roll your face on a build without AI doesn’t mean you are playing more actively than someone rolling their face on an AI build. The most eSports game in the entire world – League of Legends – has a massive amount of PvE in its game mode, because (shock) whenever you make a gamemode more complex than DM you have some non-player mechanic you have to fight against.

to expand on this

Yorick, Heimer, Zyra, Malz all have AI that cant be microed and all are average power level. And none of them are strong because of the AI either. Heimer is a noob trap, he has 3 turrets and if you walk into him you are a kitten and deserve to die, he cant chase you and has no mobility. All he is good at is pve pushing.

Like I hate seeing the fricken “omfg no more ai!” complaints. It just is screaming “Scrub alert” to me.

The difference though is that the AI in those games simply compliment the build, they aren’t core. For instance, most of yoricks damage from the actual spell instead of the ghoul, most of zyras damage comes from the actual nukes from the spells etc, the AI don’t hit hard and die really fast (one or two hits). Where as in this game, look at turret engineer for instance, the turrets have massive health poor, do insane amount of damage and have lots of CC. Same can be said for minionmancer, most of its power comes from its passive minions. I will reserve judgement on spirit weapon guardian until after the patch, however if those spirit weapons hit as hard as the player then it will just be poor design once again. Another thing that AI in this game does that league don’t is they clutter up the screen making it difficult to see kitten.

EDIT: also not to mention yorick and zyra has been continually nerfed for how strong they are due to passive sustain thru AI and heal (yoricks case) and just too much nuke from plants (zyra).

If you use all traits for spirit weapons: burn on hit ,50% dmg and 10% dmg on burning foe + cd reduction and durration that means you are looking at 6.6.0.0.2 and with zerker amulets sword and hammer can do each 1.5-2k dmg every 3 sec(4 sec on hammer) if i remember correctly my tests could be wrong on att frequency since i didnt use it for a long time but dmg numbers should be right.

Where does this leave you for survival utilities judge your self…

Lifestealer.4910:

Same can be said for minionmancer, most of its power comes from its passive minions.

This is blatantly false. MM has a max of 1.5k damage from its minions, and besides that all you get from them passively attacking is a tiny bit of HP/s and a bit of soft CC. That’s using every single minion available (including Blood Fiend which is absolute garbage), and blowing Bone Minions up, because for every second they are alive you lose DPS, plus its assuming you have all of the relevant traits, and that your enemy’s keyboard has become disconnected and is no longer able to move.

MMs strength comes from how difficult it is to kill it in 1v1/2v2 due to its ability to spread non-damaging conditions, CC, regain HP/LF, and overall outsustain just about any build, and then slowly wear them down through fairly low but consistent sustained DPS. The minion’s passive attacking contributes almost exclusively to the sustained DPS. However to get them to land any attacks at all against an enemy capable of pressing any combination of W, A, S, and D, requires you to actively land CC abilities (all of which are active). To get the minions to stay alive long enough to deal any damage requires active use of abilities to reduce enemy damage/heal minions. If the MM does not actively contribute to the fight, you can very easily infinitely kite all of the minions, and either kill them or just ignore them and go for the MM.

deda.8302:

If you use all traits for spirit weapons: burn on hit ,50% dmg and 10% dmg on burning foe + cd reduction and durration that means you are looking at 6.6.0.0.2 and with zerker amulets sword and hammer can do each 1.5-2k dmg every 3 sec(4 sec on hammer) if i remember correctly my tests could be wrong on att frequency since i didnt use it for a long time but dmg numbers should be right.

Where does this leave you for survival utilities judge your self…

yeah but then you’re dealing with a glass cannon that has no mobility or defense. it’s a sacrifice the player made, and more likely than not it’ll bite him in the rear.

zaxon.6819:

the difference between mesmer and another ai spec. is clones are all mesmer has. and they have 0 health any bunker can one shot almost all of the mesmer clones. and they fall over in the face of the enemy ai.. if a mesmer could have phantasms that followed you around like a minion master there would be an issue. go summon 3 clones and see how good they are at killing turrets. i understand that they are easier to bring back but any way you bring them back is using resources and the next batch die the same.

3200 base health on 80 isn’t 0.
That is about 30% of the low health classes: Ele, Thief and Guardian.

Varonth.5830:

coglin.1867:

Pets have been an integral part of MMOs for a very long time. Many players, including myself enjoy them greatly. They have been in the game and promoted since before release. It is not like they magically added them in out of no where after 2 years.

You are free to search out and move to a MMO that has no AI what so ever. Good luck.

Unlike most other MMOs with bigger numbers of minions, GW2 minions always take part in the fight, even if they don’t attack. The clutter the battlefield.

Look at how they want to buff bows on ranger. Well, it will still not work in PvP without piercing arrows. Piercing arrows is no choice it is a requirement… because of AI minions. When a mesmer just keeps spamming clones on a point, it does not matter if you can track the mesmer or not. You might not even want to attack the mesmer. Still the clones just passively sitting there will eat alot of your arrows.

They also eat away damage from AoE thanks to AoE caps.

Err… that’s why you take the high ground as a Longbow Ranger. A ranger on the same plane as you should either be stomping you, coming to stomp you, running away from you, rezzing someone or dieing.

With regards to the topic, You can still CC and condition spirits which you can’t do for turrets on the other hand.

Turrets don’t move, spirits don’t have AA, SW CD starts after death, elementals and summoned thieves are limited, banners are just buffs, illusions are class mechanic. None are perfect and fit a specific position you can’t expect all of them to be the same.

Ehecatl.9172:

Lifestealer.4910:

a full signet warrior doesn’t exist in pvp though, this is what all AI build needs to be at, not viable for pvp. Unless they can find a way to remove its passive power either giving player more direct control and have it do less things by itself then there is no reason these build should exist.

That is exactly what this buff to spirit weapons did. It decreased the rather steep penalty of using spirit weapon active abilities as well as improved those active abilities to encourage more active play from the player. No heavy AI build except perhaps turret engineers just send their AI in and then stop playing. They still have to utilize their weapon skills and time their AI’s active abilities properly to get the most out of the build, no different than any other active style of play.

Then why can’t they just take the next step, and get rid of the AI part altogether? If they’d just make the spirit weapon active abilities the skill itself. A ground targeted CC blast finisher for the hammer, or a healing rain that cleanses conditions for the bow, or a projectile blocking dome for the shield. Just adjust the parameters of the skills accordingly, and not have to worry about how faulty the AI programming is.

I’d much, much rather see that than any sort of buff to the current skills.

Black Box.9312:

Then why can’t they just take the next step, and get rid of the AI part altogether? If they’d just make the spirit weapon active abilities the skill itself. A ground targeted CC blast finisher for the hammer, or a healing rain that cleanses conditions for the bow, or a projectile blocking dome for the shield. Just adjust the parameters of the skills accordingly, and not have to worry about how faulty the AI programming is.

I’d much, much rather see that than any sort of buff to the current skills.

Because some of us enjoy (gasp) having to micro manage the summoned allies. In Guardian’s case some of the strength of having them out is their sustained presence, which you can’t replicate. Hammer gives some decent CC while you keep it out, bow gives condi removal, sword has damage, shield does… something. You couldn’t just remove the AI without completely changing how the skill worked.

Bhawb.7408:

Black Box.9312:

Then why can’t they just take the next step, and get rid of the AI part altogether? If they’d just make the spirit weapon active abilities the skill itself. A ground targeted CC blast finisher for the hammer, or a healing rain that cleanses conditions for the bow, or a projectile blocking dome for the shield. Just adjust the parameters of the skills accordingly, and not have to worry about how faulty the AI programming is.

I’d much, much rather see that than any sort of buff to the current skills.

Because some of us enjoy (gasp) having to micro manage the summoned allies. In Guardian’s case some of the strength of having them out is their sustained presence, which you can’t replicate. Hammer gives some decent CC while you keep it out, bow gives condi removal, sword has damage, shield does… something. You couldn’t just remove the AI without completely changing how the skill worked.

But that’s the problem with this game’s AI: You don’t micromanage them. The only thing you can do with any player controlled AI is tell them when to use a single ability, without even really telling them which target to use it on. With a ranger’s pet you can at least select the target, but I’d expect much more from an entire class mechanic.

That’s why people are opposed to player-controlled AI in this game. Because the player doesn’t actually have to be controlling them for them to work.

Black Box.9312:

But that’s the problem with this game’s AI: You don’t micromanage them. The only thing you can do with any player controlled AI is tell them when to use a single ability, without even really telling them which target to use it on. With a ranger’s pet you can at least select the target, but I’d expect much more from an entire class mechanic.

That’s why people are opposed to player-controlled AI in this game. Because the player doesn’t actually have to be controlling them for them to work.

The AI’s weakness is part of the challenge of playing the style. The AI will not beat a competent player on their own. You need to constantly be using crowd controls and positioning to get the AI attacks to land properly while also dishing out damage yourself to keep any decent sustain going. Sure, the AI will attack and follow the target on their own, but they won’t do anything worthwhile without the player actively using their own abilities to aid the AI and choosing the right moment to use the AI special abilities. Some players find it FUN to serve as the support role for the AI and enjoy the challenge that comes from trying to work with brain dead zombies to execute a tactical plan.

As a BM Ranger I greatly enjoy having my companion be my equal partner and not just a pet. My raven is the bulk of my damage and my sylvan hound provides some minor crowd control and support while I provide low sustaining damage and take the bulk of the incoming damage with well timed evades, blocks, and healing. It’s loads of fun. While I myself might not have absolute control of everything my pet does I still have to keep an eye on it and use the attack and return commands to make sure my pet doesn’t run off on it’s own and leave me vulnerable. I need to choose which pet is best in which situation. If I see a big AoE incoming I might quickly switch out my raven for my hound, because if I don’t my raven will get OBLITERATED. If I have my hound out but see a thief ganking my ally during a group fight I’ll switch out and use Sick ‘Em with my raven’s F2 to hit the thief hard to keep them off my ally, while also dueling someone else on point. It does take a level of micromanaging, and doesn’t decrease the need for highly responsive playing on part of the actual player. I would be absolutely livid if Anet removed all AI in the game and completely deleted my companion. Frankly I’d probably quit the game.

Yes, you entirely can. Microing your minions doesn’t mean you have to start orb-walking them, it applies to the various levels of extra management that you need to make. This includes healing them when they get low, using their actives before they die, setting up CC so they can hit, keeping track of their positioning and who they are attacking, using their abilities at the right time to maximize effectiveness.

For example, if Flesh Golem was simple “knock down players in a line” it would remove all the necessity of setting up CC so he can hit enemies, it removes the need for me to constantly weapon swap to heal him with renewal sigil and use Transfusion to keep him alive even through large AoE, of making sure he’s in the right position before activating him so that he even reaches the target and isn’t stuck on a pebble or immobilized. Its even possible to use his active as a way to get him out of danger while also dealing damage, or for him to catch up to a target.

With Bone Fiend it means I have to make sure I don’t activate him when he’s too far away or during the wrong point of his AA cycle (because it makes the difference between two shots of Rigor Mortis as opposed to one), and making sure I aggro at just the right time so that I don’t get aggro issues with melee minions, but so that he stays at range.

With Shadow Fiend it means using his active to gap close for him, while making sure he’s still in range.

With Bone Minions it means making sure that they are in the right area when I blow them up, because the closest one to me is the one that explodes when both are up (meaning I better know where they both are or one of them will blow his load way off target).

With Flesh Wurm I have to make sure to place him far enough away from the fight to keep him alive yet close enough to still help. When I’m far away (its common to leave him on a point when you rotate) I can watch his area of the screen to tell if a thief is trying to sneak a backcap by killing the wurm before getting on point.

All of these require you to have a unique focus on their actions as well as your own, and cannot happen without the existence of them as separate units. All of those things involve Micro-management.

Dice Dragon.4326:

Bhawb.7408:

Spirit Weapons are some of the best designed AI in the game, requiring actual input to be successful. Just because you roll your face on a build without AI doesn’t mean you are playing more actively than someone rolling their face on an AI build. The most eSports game in the entire world – League of Legends – has a massive amount of PvE in its game mode, because (shock) whenever you make a gamemode more complex than DM you have some non-player mechanic you have to fight against.

to expand on this

Yorick, Heimer, Zyra, Malz all have AI that cant be microed and all are average power level. And none of them are strong because of the AI either. Heimer is a noob trap, he has 3 turrets and if you walk into him you are a kitten and deserve to die, he cant chase you and has no mobility. All he is good at is pve pushing.

Like I hate seeing the fricken “omfg no more ai!” complaints. It just is screaming “Scrub alert” to me.

I probably wouldn’t use Yorick or Heim as sterling examples of AI done right since they’re both an absolute pain in the rear to lane against depending on counterpicks. Heim has some play since you can burn down turrets as they’re placed and punish him for his lack of mobility, Yorick on the other hand is like flipping the middle finger to your top lane opponent. He is universally loathed, even by Riot (who are too embarrassed to get on with revamping him as planned).

Does GW2 have any effective AI builds? No. Does this mean we should start on getting some? I should hope I don’t have to ask this question. In a sense AI builds are high-risk. You sacrifice most if not all your utilities, you toss out any trait synergy or complementary spike, you give up situational mobility all in the hopes of pulling off a one-trick pony. At the same time you aren’t really playing the game and it isn’t going to teach newer players anything other than maybe positioning (since they’ll be dying a lot).

My only input is that AI must be getting buffed for a reason, and it’s not because it’s as good as everyone seems to be complaining it is.

Annoying =/= Good

shimmerless.4560:

Does GW2 have any effective AI builds? No.

bruh

you understand that AI builds have almost without exception been present in every pvp meta since launch rite

AI even allowed a profession (ranger) that was otherwise regarded as the worst profession in pvp to become standard in high-level play

sinject.4607:

shimmerless.4560:

Does GW2 have any effective AI builds? No.

bruh

you understand that AI builds have almost without exception been present in every pvp meta since launch rite

AI even allowed a profession (ranger) that was otherwise regarded as the worst profession in pvp to become standard in high-level play

Spirits had weaknesses wide enough to drive a truck through and the shaky edifice was only glossed over by the Ranger being naturally strong at homepoint and the insane pressure from the burning and the rez elite. (Most modern Rangers do not play full spirits for this reason). If you took away Spirits said Rangers would just swap to Axe/Torch BM and still kill you anyway. The difference in role and even in performance is negligible.

Things like Spirit Ranger exemplify my point in that any AI build is going to be fundamentally unhealthy for the game. They can only be marginally successful in spite of themselves, and more than anything else they are subject to the whims of change and new patch cycles. They are overbearing in practice but they are such sluggish, one-trick ponies it is impossible for them to consistently work in the upper tiers without giving them some kind of ludicrous buff or benefit.

Lifestealer.4910:

Dice Dragon.4326:

Bhawb.7408:

Spirit Weapons are some of the best designed AI in the game, requiring actual input to be successful. Just because you roll your face on a build without AI doesn’t mean you are playing more actively than someone rolling their face on an AI build. The most eSports game in the entire world – League of Legends – has a massive amount of PvE in its game mode, because (shock) whenever you make a gamemode more complex than DM you have some non-player mechanic you have to fight against.

to expand on this

Yorick, Heimer, Zyra, Malz all have AI that cant be microed and all are average power level. And none of them are strong because of the AI either. Heimer is a noob trap, he has 3 turrets and if you walk into him you are a kitten and deserve to die, he cant chase you and has no mobility. All he is good at is pve pushing.

Like I hate seeing the fricken “omfg no more ai!” complaints. It just is screaming “Scrub alert” to me.

The difference though is that the AI in those games simply compliment the build, they aren’t core. For instance, most of yoricks damage from the actual spell instead of the ghoul, most of zyras damage comes from the actual nukes from the spells etc, the AI don’t hit hard and die really fast (one or two hits). Where as in this game, look at turret engineer for instance, the turrets have massive health poor, do insane amount of damage and have lots of CC. Same can be said for minionmancer, most of its power comes from its passive minions. I will reserve judgement on spirit weapon guardian until after the patch, however if those spirit weapons hit as hard as the player then it will just be poor design once again. Another thing that AI in this game does that league don’t is they clutter up the screen making it difficult to see kitten.

EDIT: also not to mention yorick and zyra has been continually nerfed for how strong they are due to passive sustain thru AI and heal (yoricks case) and just too much nuke from plants (zyra).

So explain to me how you die to a turret engi in wvw? oh, you dont? you only lose to it in Spvp where the game mode is kittened and rewards passive play? Passive play is not the problem, the reward scale is the problem. give me more points for mowing down players and maybe il lget off point. Till then, ill sit here while you lose for running into my IMMOBILE WALL and then complain at how op it is.

AI should be something newcomers can pick up and and play until they learn the basics of the game – not something a monkey can do and get carried by AI, this should never be that viable.

On my main acc I’ve spent most of my time on condi nec in PvP since launch, and sometimes while doing soloque I look at a sidepoint if it is a free-cap or not, then I see that nobody’s there but an army of turrets, and I realize I can’t go there, because turrets are immune to my conditions so I can’t deal with them (they are even self-repairing), but they can kill me without any input from the engi. Also I love how pets often just bodyblock significant projectiles by just staying close to their master and fill the AoE cap. Joke..

Once again guys. Spirits. Are. Not. AI.

Spirits don’t attack. They don’t move on their own unless traited and even then they just follow the ranger. They do nothing but give the passive chance to proc certain benefits with the player character’s auto attacks. The only other thing they do is an activated ability. The player can’t even choose where the spirit goes to detonate, they just do it wherever they happened to be standing at the time.

Spirit Ranger is no more an AI build than banners are for a warrior. The only difference is you can punch a spirit to death where as banners are immortal.

sinject.4607:

shimmerless.4560:

Does GW2 have any effective AI builds? No.

bruh

you understand that AI builds have almost without exception been present in every pvp meta since launch rite

AI even allowed a profession (ranger) that was otherwise regarded as the worst profession in pvp to become standard in high-level play

and without a single balance change, warriors pushed them out of the meta once people realized “hey, those spirits are really easy to kill with enough AoE and CC”. it only took a public event where an EU team massacred an NA team that had spirit rangers for people to realize that hey, maybe trying to counter the current meta works better than just waiting for nerfs.

BrunoBRS.5178:

sinject.4607:

shimmerless.4560:

Does GW2 have any effective AI builds? No.

bruh

you understand that AI builds have almost without exception been present in every pvp meta since launch rite

AI even allowed a profession (ranger) that was otherwise regarded as the worst profession in pvp to become standard in high-level play

and without a single balance change, warriors pushed them out of the meta once people realized “hey, those spirits are really easy to kill with enough AoE and CC”. it only took a public event where an EU team massacred an NA team that had spirit rangers for people to realize that hey, maybe trying to counter the current meta works better than just waiting for nerfs.

and all this despite that serveral hardcore rangers went out and said time and time again that “DO NOT NERF, BRING AOE”….

People simply refuse to listen to those who know what their doing. Simply because their experience is not backed up by inflated merits.

BrunoBRS.5178:

sinject.4607:

shimmerless.4560:

Does GW2 have any effective AI builds? No.

bruh

you understand that AI builds have almost without exception been present in every pvp meta since launch rite

AI even allowed a profession (ranger) that was otherwise regarded as the worst profession in pvp to become standard in high-level play

and without a single balance change, warriors pushed them out of the meta once people realized “hey, those spirits are really easy to kill with enough AoE and CC”. it only took a public event where an EU team massacred an NA team that had spirit rangers for people to realize that hey, maybe trying to counter the current meta works better than just waiting for nerfs.

one or two hard counters does not mean something is balanced

@OP:

You are completely correct. The AI in this game has become too much. There needs to be less of this, not more.

I sometimes do wonder if there even is a balance team. It is definitely the weak point in the game at this point.