Guild Wars 2

I was itchy at first posting this here, but it concerns the general balance of all classes so it might as well be the place.

It was widely known that in PVE most people focus on going zerker gear and the like because of the insane difference of time spent doing the run. The difference of damage bewteen berserker and soldier, for example, is extremely high. On the other hand, in pvp there’s the infamous “bunker” builds that are near unkillable or that take several people to take down. The problem with all this are the extremes. There is no control whatsoever in stats, one can go as high in damage as they wish or as high in survivability and there’s literally no control. With full buffs and bonuses the difference bewteen damage of two people in berserker can be of X3! And with soldiers it’s probably hundreds.
Right now people have little to no incentive to mix gear up. Sets like rabid or shaman are often ignored for being sub-optimal. And by ignored I mean sent to oblivion.

How to fix this? Well, it’s easy.
“Diminishing returns” on stats.

What does this mean? This means that the higher you get a stat, the less effect it has.
Lets take an example. Each point of vitality would give 50 hit points if the total bonus is below 100 vitality, then after 100 it gives 30, after 200 it gives 20 and so on.
This is an imaginary example of course, and it’s just to represent how the mechanism works.

How does this improve build diversity? Well, say someone is wearing fullzerker. Right now, 100 points in power probably sound more attractive than 100 in vitality. But how about 50 power for 100 vit? 20? 10? That’s the choice, the higher you get one (or several) stats, the less powerful they become.

This gives the chance for people to gear towards condition and physical damage without dealing considerably less damage. It would give celestial a better place. Would diminish the gaps bewteen gears and people who maximize stats like no tomorrow.
The idea is to cut out the edges slightly so that gears aren’t so extreme and single-purposed.
Given how GW lets you distribute stats so freely, this idea lets you choose stats and gear sets without much fear of “screwing up” and also it would let the meta shift slightly away from berserker to other alternatives.

This is one of the worst ideas I have ever heard. Punishing a player for focusing his stats where he wants is in no way even remotely close to a positive way to promote build diversity.

I despise diminishing returns in anything. As a player I expect full value for every skill, weapon, rune, sigil, trait, or stat that I invest in.

I could care less, because, personally, I chose to ignore the meta and play the builds I like, the way I want to.

You ask how it doesn’t promote build diversity, well that is because it only forces a value lose to stats I want to put where I want.

You ask if I am mad, with a implication in the tone of your final question, in an attempt to provoke me, personally? That appears to me as an action of one who is mad. Why would I be mad about my builds that I enjoy, when I build how I like and ignore the meta? That is just silly.

Zephyric Reaper.3049:

I was itchy at first posting this here, but it concerns the general balance of all classes so it might as well be the place.

It was widely known that in PVE most people focus on going zerker gear and the like because of the insane difference of time spent doing the run. The difference of damage bewteen berserker and soldier, for example, is extremely high. On the other hand, in pvp there’s the infamous “bunker” builds that are near unkillable or that take several people to take down. The problem with all this are the extremes. There is no control whatsoever in stats, one can go as high in damage as they wish or as high in survivability and there’s literally no control. With full buffs and bonuses the difference bewteen damage of two people in berserker can be of X3! And with soldiers it’s probably hundreds.
Right now people have little to no incentive to mix gear up. Sets like rabid or shaman are often ignored for being sub-optimal. And by ignored I mean sent to oblivion.

How to fix this? Well, it’s easy.
“Diminishing returns” on stats.

What does this mean? This means that the higher you get a stat, the less effect it has.
Lets take an example. Each point of vitality would give 50 hit points if the total bonus is below 100 vitality, then after 100 it gives 30, after 200 it gives 20 and so on.
This is an imaginary example of course, and it’s just to represent how the mechanism works.

How does this improve build diversity? Well, say someone is wearing fullzerker. Right now, 100 points in power probably sound more attractive than 100 in vitality. But how about 50 power for 100 vit? 20? 10? That’s the choice, the higher you get one (or several) stats, the less powerful they become.

This gives the chance for people to gear towards condition and physical damage without dealing considerably less damage. It would give celestial a better place. Would diminish the gaps bewteen gears and people who maximize stats like no tomorrow.
The idea is to cut out the edges slightly so that gears aren’t so extreme and single-purposed.
Given how GW lets you distribute stats so freely, this idea lets you choose stats and gear sets without much fear of “screwing up” and also it would let the meta shift slightly away from berserker to other alternatives.

this is a terrible idea, anet please ignore this.

Celestial meta stronk

Zephyric Reaper.3049:

And continue with the current boring meta?

You would enforce a mixed-stat meta.
I’m serious. Same one setup, just a different selection.

Stats already kinda do have diminishing returns. You’ll get to a situation where a point of power is worth less than a point of precision, which is worth less than a point of critical damage/ferocity. Same with defensive stats.

The change also won’t actually change any behavior.

Sarrs.4831:

Stats already kinda do have diminishing returns. You’ll get to a situation where a point of power is worth less than a point of precision, which is worth less than a point of critical damage/ferocity. Same with defensive stats.

The change also won’t actually change any behavior.

Except people are free to choose from. You don’t have to go berzerer or gtfo because time spent killing is widely different.
At first celestial sounds like the perfect dream but if you only want offense and defense (no healing, condi) then you’re better off taking mixed armor.

It does change behavior because people would be able to gear for both condition and power without getting less than half of efficiency as it is now. The ratio can be less violent too, it could be 1.5 for start and then diminish to .5 Or even less.

It would also balance out a bit gear sets like dire which are somewhat absurd since they get both defense and offense.

Behavior would be: I could take some knight’s and valkyr’s instead of berserker without having my damage severely punished. Or, I could use celestial armor to get the best out of my wells as a necro.

As stats are right now, they promote specialization and very, very rigid gear set. Want condi? Go dire. Want power dmg? Go berserker. Want bunker? Go soldier.
And if you plan to spread your stats out then unless you invest a big chunk of your gear slots for it, then it would barely be a difference.

Zephyric Reaper.3049:

It would also balance out a bit gear sets like dire which are somewhat absurd since they get both defense and offense.

Soldiers and dire are both bunker. Seems pretty simple to me. Similar damage out put, exact same defense. If you want conditions for the sake of damage, and show up in dire, an informed player will laugh you out of the group.
I participated in some test with some other folks who were comparing damage from different professions with dire and soldiers. As it turned out the standard power build in soldiers gear generally out damaged the professions dire build. So I am going to assume you making this statement without having actually tested or even knowing this one way or the other right? It is pure perception, turned assumption, turned to stating it as fact???

Re-tweaking the stats is the kind of easy, spreadsheet work that ANet are trying with the Ferocity update. We know it’s not going to change much.

The suggestions most rallied behind are improvements to mob behaviour, attack rate (with reduced damage per attack, with occassional insta-downs that still require dodging and further versatility) and buffs to control (essentially by fixing the mess that is Defiant/Unshakable) and I still think these are the best ideas.

Admittedly, ANet has been demonstrating this approach in LS content (Aether pirates with their Boons and control skills, TA with their fast and diverse attack rate) but they’d benefit from doing a pass on all existing dungeon/fractal mobs and giving them similar tweaks.

best way to create build diversity overall:

Skillsystem from GW1.

easiest way to create build diversity in PvE:

Holy Trinity.

As long noone can really heal nobody wants to be tanky, as long nobody can tank bosses nobody sees the need for going for heal/defenseve support.
As long DMG/DPS is all that matters the meta won’t change.

PvP is fine. there are so many builds that you can play if you are playing them good because a uncommon build will always be surprising for the enemy which will lead into an advantage for you. after a balance patch some build vanish some new come that is the case in every MMO so far. Only difference in GW2 is that you might have to reroll professions not just traits if you want to keep your playstyle similar to the old one

WvW is a mix of PvP and PvE it will never be balanced to some degree.
In zergs the zerk will always be the meta. it’s all about stomping over the enemy as fast as possible.
in the other scenarios there are enough build that could come in handy

No to this …

What anet has to do in regard of WvW for example is to finally remove Buff Food/Items out of WVW and make these thigns PvE only.
That would instantly massively balance the whole WvW Game alot.

In regard of creating more build diversity anet just has to rework the Upgrade System, what they start very soon with the upcoming patch with Runes and Sigils.
However, the other Upgrades need to be looked at too, like Gemstones, Crests ect. by redesignign those weak crap low level upgrades, that nobody uses, because you can get very easily in this game more powerful thigns, before you ever get some of those low level weak things like Signets, talismans ect.
These weak upgrades need to get reworked, so that they become endgame content, that is useful with completely different new effects, that improve supportive or control gameplay.

Like Resistance/Movement Effects from Talismans or special Boon/Condition Effects from Crests and so on…

Theres far more, than just only Stats (Gemstones) or Stats/Effects (Runes) or Effects (Sigil, Weapon only)

Anet can add more Crafting Recipes for more Stat Combo Insigias.
The game is missing still toons of possible Stat Combo Insignias, which could create alot more of build diversity.

Anet can add more of the existing weapons as also complete new weaponds to the classes to give us more new weapon skills to create more build diversity as also add more Utility, Healing and especially Elite Skills, that would give us massively more build diversity

Anet could give us hopefully one day for all of our Classes some Sub Classes into which we could specialize our characters what would give our characters also more diversity and make our characters more unique over characters of other players with the same basic Class, that have chosen other paths of development of their characters.

The above point means also, Anet could implm,enent more new Trait Lines, as they come automatically into play, once we would receive Aub Classes, that we’s get also new Trait Lines that are bonded with the Sub Classes.

Anet could split up finally the whole Trait System into two different trees.
The Trait Tree and the Talent Tree, which could give us more and better access of our character development between active and passive elements of our characters, what would increase build diversity, because our builds would receive then alot more details that are divided up between active traits and passive talents and not just only traits ….

All of this is thousands of times alot better, than to add DR to Stats …

@OP

Your idea is bad and based on false premise. The difference between Berserker and non-Berserker gear is far less than what you claim it is. For example, Berserker (with the ferocity change) is only about a 50% increase in damage over Soldier.

Your idea also wouldn’t fix any problems in the game. In PvE, the reason players use full berserker is because there is little need for toughness or vitality. Most damage can be avoided with dodges, blinds, blocks, evades, CC’ing enemies, and just killing them quickly. NPCs need to have quicker moderate damage attacks in addition to telegraphed high damage attacks. They also need to have abilities which make them harder to kill quickly like stability and protection for a few seconds, or even just dodging attacks or moving out of damage.

In PvP, bunkers aren’t anywhere near invincible. They just take a while to kill, which means their teammates can show up and help them before they die. Guardian is so prevalent because of all the group support it provides in addition to being a bunker. All good players, not just bunkers, stay alive because they use defensive cooldowns properly and position themselves properly to avoid damage when possible.

I think this would have the opposite effect of what you want. Stats don’t need to be neutered the more you go into them, they need to be worth going into to promote real diversity. If there’s a leveling off effect, but you can get 80% effectiveness of the max by putting relatively minimal points into it, you’re just going to push people towards the middle, making actual choices relatively meaningless as there’s hardly any benefit to going past a certain point.

GM traits being roughly equal to each other in different ways would promote build diversity much better. Let’s look at the thief class defensive trees as an example. In shadow arts, you gain roughly 330 health per second in stealth. There is no equivalent for that kind of strength in acrobatics. Even if you only spend 25% of your fight in stealth, you’re gaining at least equal health regen to assassin’s reward (based on initiative regeneration) without having to continually attack/spend initiative allowing you to reposition yourself better. SA strength in GM traits is much better than SA, so there is usually no real decision that needs to be made if you are going to use stealth at some point during a fight (virtually every build except S/P). Creating equally strong traits that accomplish different goals would go a long way to increasing build diversity (which they are working on). Instead of “SRej: gain health” versus “ARew: gain inferior health” ARew needs to be something with a unique and equally strong effect like “ARew: Transfer a condition to your foe upon revealing yourself.” Now you’re making a choice between gaining health (and just removing conditions if you picked up SE on the way) versus removing conditions while increasing your damage output. Right now certain traits just outshine others by far which is what is killing build diversity way more than just flat stats.

Maugetarr.6823:

I think this would have the opposite effect of what you want. Stats don’t need to be neutered the more you go into them, they need to be worth going into to promote real diversity. If there’s a leveling off effect, but you can get 80% effectiveness of the max by putting relatively minimal points into it, you’re just going to push people towards the middle, making actual choices relatively meaningless as there’s hardly any benefit to going past a certain point.

GM traits being roughly equal to each other in different ways would promote build diversity much better. Let’s look at the thief class defensive trees as an example. In shadow arts, you gain roughly 330 health per second in stealth. There is no equivalent for that kind of strength in acrobatics. Even if you only spend 25% of your fight in stealth, you’re gaining at least equal health regen to assassin’s reward (based on initiative regeneration) without having to continually attack/spend initiative allowing you to reposition yourself better. SA strength in GM traits is much better than SA, so there is usually no real decision that needs to be made if you are going to use stealth at some point during a fight (virtually every build except S/P). Creating equally strong traits that accomplish different goals would go a long way to increasing build diversity (which they are working on). Instead of “SRej: gain health” versus “ARew: gain inferior health” ARew needs to be something with a unique and equally strong effect like “ARew: Transfer a condition to your foe upon revealing yourself.” Now you’re making a choice between gaining health (and just removing conditions if you picked up SE on the way) versus removing conditions while increasing your damage output. Right now certain traits just outshine others by far which is what is killing build diversity way more than just flat stats.

Well… I think you are onto something, but I believe your perception of SR > Quick Pockets GM trait comes from your experience fighting bad thieves. That extra initiative could end up being a much better return if it means evading a10k blow instead of dying. Therefore the thief needs to be pretty skilled to really benefit from QP and less skilled to benefit from SR. On the contrary though I do believe Quick Pockets, among many other existing GM traits that don’t see much light of day, could use a revamp.

I propose that Anet goes through each entire trait line for every class and rebalances the skills that are never getting used. If they could rebalance all traits so that one trait would create synergy with a multitude of other traits, that would allow for some diverse trait customization.