Guild Wars 2

I want to discuss the inherent problems of AI Builds in this game, for everyone that dont knows what an AI build is: An AI build is a build that relies heavily on Minions like the Necromancers or Engineer Turrets. In GW2 these builds have quite a low skillcap, they are really easy to play, because a MM dont has to do that much. On the downside these builds are pretty weak when it comes to highly organized play, because most of your Damage comes from an AI which is still pretty dumb (but apparently better than that of most sPvP Minion Masters)

On overall AI is not really dependand of player skill, which leads toa Problem: AI Builds being unfair because playing these doesnt involves Skill. As a result these Builds are quite useless in any organized enviorment.
Back in GW1 AI Builds where viable and involved a lot of micro-management, i would like to see that again in GW2.
The reason why Anet should not just buff either the AI or the raw stats is that this doesnt changes the core Problem of Minion Builds: they dont rely on player skill… therefore an AI update to Minions (exept Ranger Pets) is not likely to happen.

Therefore we need ways to value player skill in those Builds to get them out of their current Cheezy state.
Any suggestions ?

ok, remove conditions, they deal damage once put on, baring cleanse they are free damage you dont have to push buttons outside of the intial press to get. Remove auto attacks, dont promote skill, just auto attack.

Death shroud 1? it needs to be aimed, no more targeting, to low skill.

The anti AI movement is the most crybaby tear filled bullcrap ive seen anywhere. as you pointed out, in high levels of play the AI restricts you more then aids you, if you lose to AI, its a l2p issue, and if you need it to win, its also a l2p issue, soooo either way this is a “Get gud” issue.

i don’t really see ai builds becoming much harder to use since i’m fairly sure the gw2 engine has none of the pet/hero controlling code left from gw1 and i don’t know how feasible it would be to implement back in, especially at this point in the game’s life

and if the minions would become controllable, i am quite sure that we would see even more complaining about ai builds, and not from the people playing them – it would be just an echo of “MINION BUILDS CONTROLLING THEIR MINIONS TO FOCUS ME?? OVERPOWERED. PLEASE REVERT CHANGES PLZ.”

the possible changes to make the builds somewhat harder would be to make the builds more reliant on the secondary abilities that replace the minion button after you’ve summoned them, and the addition of abilities from gw1 like order of undeath, jagged bones, armor of unfeeling, painful bond, spiritleech aura and the like and then making these builds more reliant on them as well to succeed.

I’ve made a big post on how to make them good. Basically:

1) Make all passive damage increases instead change their active abilities. Basically, summons that have support for a full summon build (turrets, minions, spirit weapons, spirits, phantasms) should all have their damage and utility mainly focused around their active abilities, and should have traits that boost this, in unique ways.

Example: Necromantic Corruption is no longer just passive boon removal, it adds specific boon-related utility to each of the minion actives.

2) Fix AI, make it no longer react on its own. They only attack when the player signals them, and don’t remember targets, they just attack what you attack when you are attacking it.

3) Fix some of the few issues that exist. Shadow Fiend has a TWO SECOND post cast activation on Haunt, that is absolutely ridiculous for an ability that isn’t killshot or something. Give all actives decent reads and counterplay, fix bugs.

TL;DR fix bugs, make AI all active (but not give them micro like pets), push utility/damage to actives.

I’ve part taken in discussion about summon/pet builds in the topic Guardian Spirit Weapons -PvE/PvP and was wondering about other players thoughts regarding encounters with these builds?

I find many players dislike summon/pet builds in pvp encounters. Usually complaints are against;

• summon/pet builds performing to great in passive enhancing builds
• unable to fight or target the player due to the summons/pets.

But the reason I’ve made the topic is to discuss if encounters with these builds could be made enjoyable through improving counters to this style of play?

To start in any encounter that I enjoy there is always plays & counter plays.

So:

• What are the existing counter plays to summon/pet builds?

At the moment the only real counter I see to these builds is AoEs. Could more counters be created? To quote myself.

Bezagron.7352:

So Tarsius it the passive play that’s at least one problem aspect (And I agree largely passive play should not create high preforming builds).

• So what can be done about it?

I see two actions;

1. Make them more active. (more complex control schemes, active skill effects)
2. Punish them for they type of play. (summon/group focus punishing skills)

First agree they need more active game play but it’s the second option I feel could help the most.

For me it’s this group punishing skills that could open up the counter plays to pet builds, zerging & stacking game play. Could group punishing skills work?

They could have or be:

• AoEs or single target
• Greater effect / more damage for the number of targets within an area
• Greater effect / more damage for having active summons
• Greater effect / more damage for number of summons
• Deny / disable the passive effects gain from group/summons but does not remove from the source of effect
• Take control of targets summons
• Skill effect is mirrored in part or in whole back to the group/summon(s) or from summon back to summoner.

Having this counter play could turn what is now unenjoyable into enjoyable.

What skills could be created? (Examples would be interesting to discuss.)

Again quoting myself regarding targeting

Okay so targeting a problem what can be do to improve or provide counter play?

Remembering this targeting noise is one of the benefits of summoning builds. Like stealth’s targeting benefits, being untargetable.

I think this targeting noise should be an advantage but through these new counters can be turned into a disadvantage, providing the counter play to this noise.

Granted, I never play an MM in pvp. But from personal experience the ai and path finding of minions is pretty terrible. And people still complain about losing to these builds? Those minions are often retreating, or not doing anything at all, or they get stuck on the most simple of terrain. With all the problems going on with the ai, I really don’t understand how anyone could fall victim to them.

I understand that targeting might be difficult when there are so many targets around. But as we all know, the targeting in the whole game is TERRIBLE. So fix the targeting.

I think it is a valid point though that unlike GW1, the minions in GW2 do not require any active management on the part of the minion master. But the game designers have removed an energy requirement from the casting of spells, and they’ve also removed the need for corpses in order to create minions. So when you strip away so many interesting mechanics, I’m not surprised that what you’re left with is very bare bones. And I can’t really think of a way to fix it. I sure as heck don’t want minions nerfed into uselessness. If their damage is reduced, then we might as well all roll a power-mancer from now on.

Shifting more of the power to the active skills is best for minions and turrets. Spirit weapons just need buffs period, but the actives would be the best spot for them.

Ranger Pets and Phantasms I think are in a good spot right now, barring some AI improvements.

Maybe Turrets are easy to play in PvP, but in PvE, it’s actually harder to use Turrets and not die than it is to use Kits and not die, in my experience – enemies straight-up peel off of other players to converge on me, if I’m running Turrets. Surviving that, with three or four skills creating stationary things, and changing my Toolbelt skills into detonations, leaving me with nothing but dodges, my Elite and my intentionally-kitten main hand weapons, can be…difficult.
PvP, obviously, is a bit different, as people don’t typically actually have aggro tables, and hopefully realize that charging into a nest of stationary defense tools is a bad idea.
Unfortunately, people get forced into it because that’s the primary method of point gain in sPvP, which has all of one mode. Seriously, why aren’t there more modes for this thing?

Anyway, as somebody who’s almost always used Turrets, they could definitely use more active play effects; Detonation and Overcharge are both very limited options. Definitely agreeing with Bhawb.

I agree. I’ve been a mesmer since launch so this may sound weird coming from me. But I strongly feel like phantasm builds are very cheesey. There are two traits that buff phantasms damage by 15% each, and another that gives them perma fury. Those traits should instead buff mesmer’s auto attack damage, instead of phantasms damage in my opinion.

I just wanted to add that builds that rely heavily on AI are too rewarding for the amount of skill it takes to pull it off. I think it’s good this game has some easy to use builds for people who are generally not great at mastering classes, but those builds shouldn’t be as strong as they are imo.