Guild Wars 2

Reposting from Reddit, modified slightly based on responses.

There have been many threads like this, but this one is mine. Note that it is long and written right before bed after a long dungeon circuit, so please forgive any writing errors that I’ve missed.

In the current state of the game, due to the existence of Defiance and dodging, raw DPS is king in high-end PvE. “Balanced” teams will always finish an instance slower than an experienced zerk team. This is boring – a far cry from the build variety of GW1 (with the exception of speed clears, which are highly optimized to bend the rules of a mission in the player’s favor and are an unavoidable consequence of having the thousands of specific skills that GW1 has) – and generates a lot of heat between the two impromptu political parties of PvE, the Elitists (“zerk or kick!”) and the Traditionalists (“variety is the spice of life”).

Here are the collected, abridged thoughts of my dungeon static on the issue of how to improve the PvE metagame based on our comprehensive experience. We have chosen to focus on buff-based balance adjustment rather than nerf-based because this tends to generate less negativity. The changes proposed are small and do not address game mechanics, which are much harder to change. The following are just duct tape style solutions, quick and easy alleviations of the most-complained about issues. Please note that this post ONLY pertains to PvE. PvP is a whole different animal.

To begin with, Warriors, Guardians, Mesmers, Elementalists, and Thieves are just fine (though we think Thieves need about a 10% higher base HP pool to really shine). They have their roles and are good at them. Don’t change them too much when the less desirable classes still need a lot of work, as that will alter the center of gravity, if you will.

Engineers and Necromancers can both be immediately and effectively improved by increasing their damage output. They have great support and utility and low damage output. That is fine from a team role perspective, but Guardians are a more min-maxed form of that very role. This means that from a team optimization standpoint, Engineers and Necromancers are effectively pointless while Guardians exist. Give them maybe 30-50% more direct damage potential to put them on par with Elementalists and then we will see less hesitation to bring them into high-end PvE. Another way to improve them is to rework condition damage but that is complicated and I don’t feel like getting into that now.

Rangers are a little more difficult. They have several flaws, but this can be summed up in one sentence: Rangers do a little bit of everything that other classes do better. I’ll make this quick so as to offend die-hard Rangers as little as possible.

Firstly, the main hand sword skill 1 attack chain, which is a Ranger’s single highest damage source, roots you in place, which is ridiculous in a combat system that emphasizes dodging. It forces the ranger to trade DPS for survivability. Lots of high-end PvE has three requisites for success: stack in one spot, apply as much damage as possible, and dodge attacks that take half of your HP or more. Remove the root and you have already made Rangers usable in those situations. I realize that stacking isn’t 100% required for success a lot of the time, but most teams agree that doing so drastically increases success rate.

Second, pets are a tactical nightmare. They are unresponsive and make aggro control difficult by breaking the stack and changing position unnecessarily. Stacking is the most powerful tool in a dungeoneer’s kitten nal, and breaking that stack reduces the likelihood of success and generally annoys people. Add a heel command to the pet that makes it stack with its owner and makes it dodge when its owner does. To avoid ruining immersion, make it only apply while the Ranger is standing still or against a wall. While you’re at it, give pets more HP to withstand hits from opponents like Bloomhunger at level 48.

Third, Ranger support is mediocre compared to other classes. Shouts are pet-oriented rather than teammate-oriented. Spirits die in one hit even with the Vigorous Spirits trait, can’t be traited to be near-permanent like Warrior banners can, and their effects have a 10 second cooldown (except for Spirit of Frost which is bugged). To begin with, make shouts give some noticeable benefit to other team members without excessively specific traiting. Then increase spirit health by maybe 300%, add a duration increase or recharge reduction trait, and remove the cooldown from the aura effects. Before you claim that removing the cooldown would make the Spirits too powerful, note that Guardians can already produce all of the possible effects of the Spirits by themselves with a boon duration hammer/staff/shout build. Also we think that Ranger greatsword and axe should get a damage buff to be competitive with other weapons.

If you worry that this kind of broad-spectrum improvement would make PvE too easy, that if all the classes were elevated to the same tier dungeons would become dull, I ask you: is it not already too easy with a full zerk team? Just do what GW1 did and add Hard Mode, a greater challenge for jaded veterans and better loot to encourage people to reach the level of necessary skill. I for one can’t imagine a better way to improve the staying power of the current endgame material and make GW2 PvE a more interesting and egalitarian combat experience.

There WILL always be elitists, there WILL always be that one build that works better. That is unavoidable and impossible to fix, so I have simply proposed ways to lessen the gap. I want to see players whose favorite classes are currently seen as inferior not always on the defensive. Those people have a right to play how they want without detracting from other players’ fun by slowing the team’s DPS by bringing an inferior class.

Please add your thoughts! I expect I have missed some things that people with other perspectives can fill in.

This game would be a whole lot better if people accepted the fact they got their kitten handed to them and improve themselves instead of waiting for nerfs by riding the Tear Train. :I

But if you buff the bad professions, all you’re going to achieve is make a new subset of the professions “bad”, which you’ll then have to buff. And then you’ll have again changed the subset of “bad” professions, which will need buffing.

The same is of course true for nerfing professions, but the difference is that by buffing the player characters, you’re making PvE content easier and risk running to a point where all characters are bursty, dulling PvP encounters into “who gets their burst off first without being foiled”.

Olba.5376:

But if you buff the bad professions, all you’re going to achieve is make a new subset of the professions “bad”, which you’ll then have to buff. And then you’ll have again changed the subset of “bad” professions, which will need buffing.

This is not necessarily true. There will always be classes that are slightly better, but if you elevate the bad classes out of their pit then at least they won’t get kicked on sight. Look at GW1, every class has a role and, with the exception of specific speed clears, is generally welcome on any PvE team.

Olba.5376:

The same is of course true for nerfing professions, but the difference is that by buffing the player characters, you’re making PvE content easier and risk running to a point where all characters are bursty, dulling PvP encounters into “who gets their burst off first without being foiled”.

PvP is already quite burst-heavy. The best case scenario, and I’m sure Anet realizes this, is to split PvE and PvP skill functionality. It worked fairly well for GW1.

I can speak for rangers as they are easily my favorite non-heavy class in the game: that pet needs to be made 100% optional. I think that alone has probably gotten me kicked from many dungeon groups just for showing up on the class, and having (ex)guildies announce “dont rez the ranger” pretty much sums up the experience. The vast majority of it is this obsessive focus anet has on that pet, if it was to be flat out removed and the ranger given a global dps increase of 15-25% (less than the pet actually adds, but quite enough) then the ranger would easily be on par (pve) with the warriors/etc. I should note here also that this supposed “70% player minion health increase” sure didnt seem to have any real effect against the first set of mobs i ran into inside the mad king’s labrynth. I do agree on the note about party buffs though, and think all those pet specific shouts need to be replaced with something more in line of guards/warriors.

Those are the only things stopping the ranger from being an incredible class… having “a little of everyone else’s but not as good” is actually an amazing blessing for anyone willing to explore it some… The ranger has the unique ability to mix hitting 10k-ish (8k without really trying) from longbow skill #2, with several potential aoes and combo fields that the ranger can finish on, then has more utility hidden in their weapon’s main skills than anyone really seems to see: the GS auto includes an evade every third attack, the sword has 2 different dodges that also apply conditions, the axe skill 4 is a pull and 5 is a projectile reflect and so many more…

Point is that the thing can’t really be hammered out min/max like everything else in the game because all it’s strengths are really based on how flexible you the player are willing to be, and how well you use/stack your abilities. In most other games the rouge/thief/assassin types tend get the dubious distinction of having to be played 100% or fail hard, here it so happens to be the ranger… who suffers more from discrimination, suffers from having that horrid pet forced onto us and all the issues it causes (thing even draws aggro when set passive), and lest we forget the fact that running up and hitting skill#2 on a warrior requires so much more skill that only the most leet among players can pull it off.

Just my own generally reviled opinion on the ranger, but overall I do like the suggestions though, and necros definitely need a pve dps increase on their power build too Xx

Zacchary.6183:

This game would be a whole lot better if people accepted the fact they got their kitten handed to them and improve themselves instead of waiting for nerfs by riding the Tear Train. :I

Yup. You all should look at the thief sub-forum. More Q.Q posts then there are actual discussions, quite disgusting actually considering that they aren’t #1 at anything aside from stealth access.

The game needs nerfing too, because constant buffing will lead to some problems.
For example current fight durations are so short compared to other mmorpgs, and constant buffs will allow all classes to do more damage against each other, so fights will be much shorter. They will need to buff hp and defense to compensate this, and this will mean a constant hp inflation of the game which deforms the game’s original mechanic. Nerfing is needed to preserve fight times and original fight mechanic.

Umut.5471:

The game needs nerfing too, because constant buffing will lead to some problems.

In PvE This logic is flawed because everyone well, most people are using the same warrior build that do massive dps. There is a couple reasons for that.
1) Support builds is useless.
2) Control builds is useless.
3) Tank builds is useless
4) Healing builds is useless
5) Mobs have a LOT of hp! 60k + is common. During level 4 candidate trail a normal mob would have 150k hp in a full group.
6) Armor make NO difference. Even with 4k armor you are still getting 2 shot by mobs.
You are still getting downed in a few seconds in pvp.
Only difference is that you do 10x less dps with no crits.

And so on. Before they have to worry about this they should give the game some more flavor. This is how it is in PvE right now.

I assume that you want to buff bad classes because so that they become more viable in dungeons equal to the good classes.

In my opinion, I don’t want buff or nerfs to any classes at all. The huge offenders are the dungeons themselves.

Notice the bad professions. They are all good at control. If control roles shine in dungeons, the bad professions will shine in dungeons. Mobs need to be changed so that control role is worth it.

I’ll take ranger as an example. This cause there has been a lot of ranger hate.
The first and most important thing I have to say is that there is absolutly nothing wrong with the ranger as a class. The class can be potentially as good as any class.

However the class has two major issues.
a: In GW1, but also in other games the ranger/hunter/bowsman class somehow is appealing to more laid back gamers then other classes. This means that the people who like such a class do that e.g. cause they get a cute bear running next to them all the time.
b: the ranger is easier to play and to level but cause of the wrong reasons. Ask the player versus player section what the most important thing is they would tell a new player and the answer will likely be to be mobile and dodge. The ranger comes from the traditional ranged DPS-school in trinity games. The one where you stand still and shoot your arrows from a distance. In GW2, the CC capacity’s of specially the longbow, combined with the tank capacity of some pets, this means you aren’t challenged to change that old school behaviour. Or atleast not untill you enter dungeons. The CC does nothing/nearly nothing. You damage is poor. Your pet is in the way and not listening and you suddenly got a kittenload of agro over you, while you never learned how to avoid it.

The same goes for PvP. Some thiefs specifically have been snearing bout rangers as being meat for daily’s. This not truthfull. Ask any thief if they would say the same bout a melee ranger with e.g. a GS. The answer is that they would approach with much more caution. It is the bow that makes the thief happy and not the ranger itself. A thief is trained to be extremely mobile from the beginning of the game. So 99% off all arrows fired by a bow will miss. On top off that the thief can easily ignore the pet and go straight for the ranger. The ranger is not trained in close combat and the result is that he looses within seconds.

There are very good rangers (I’m not one btw, but some of my friends are) both in PvP and in dungeons that really can kick kitten there. I truly believe that goes for all classes.

So instead of buffing nerfing classes, th

tom.7468:

1) Support builds is useless.

3) Tank builds is useless

6) Armor make NO difference. Even with 4k armor you are still getting 2 shot by mobs.
You are still getting downed in a few seconds in pvp.

These points are wholly false. It is true that control is moot thanks to Defiance and that building around Healing Power detracts too much from other important aspects of a build. But do not dismiss support and armor.

First of all, support can be defined as amplifying the abilities of other allies. Lots of classes do this well, and they have a marked impact on every battle. Mesmer, Engineers, and Elementalists can stack vulnerability and might for DRAMATIC increases in team damage. Thieves and Mesmers can reflect projectiles to decrease the damage that your party takes and therefore free up the team to focus on damage. In my experience bosses fall fastest when there is one support class to aid the DPS classes. Time Warp and conjured weapons are other sources of damage. Have you seen an untargeted Fire Greatsword skill 4 on a large boss? It’s a nearly religious experience.

Second, tank builds are vital in some dungeons to absorb alpha damage from bosses and to keep the heat on themselves so that squishier, higher-DPS classes can again focus on dealing their damage. Though this game has no explicit taunting skills, agro can be easily managed by knowing how the AI responds to proximity and toughness. I try to always bring one dedicated tank Guardian on my teams so that I know that the DPS can do its job safely. You can’t deal good damage if you’re dead (unless you’re a Necro).

Third, and I don’t know how you could claim this having played the game even for a little while, armor is definitely NOT meaningless. Have you tried killing a PvT Guardian in WvW? It takes like five people. According to the wiki, the damage formula is as such:

Damage done = (Weapon Strength) * Power * (skill-specific coefficient) / (target’s Armor)

This means that armor decreases damage geometrically. 2,000 total armor will take 50% more damage than 3,000 armor. I definitely notice the difference between my Guardian (3,330 armor) and my Mesmer (2,049 armor). The two have basically the same amount of HP but the Champion Ice Wolf at the beginning of CoE explorable will kill the Mesmer in one hit with its ice patch AoE while my Guardian is left with about 40% HP. In terms of combat, I’d say investing in enough armor to be able to take two shots instead of just one is very important. That’s basically increasing your survivability by 100%.

I miss the professionalism of other mmo companies I honestly do. I play an Engineer main and I unfortunately got my hopes up again about them actually doing something about turrets. Was of course disappointed because I expect the patches to actually work properly because I expected the testing to work prior to the patch going live. I know crazy right? anyway, in other games, and I’ve played games for years now, they’d patch that into the game whatever they might have missed or didn’t work properly immediately not because they made the mistake but because they knew it would foster a negative image. Here however apparently that doesn’t matter because we’ll still see threads like the ones praising the devs for a job well done but not specifying WHAT exactly they did right, and we’ll still see threads from people who join the forums complaining that people are complaining but not really understanding what the forums are for.

Sure rangers have a generalized feel but they’ve consistantly nerfed rangers on all fronts outside of burst damage and wonder why no one likes to play them. They’ve done the same with condition damage types which are severely hurting, they’ve made it impossible to use anything other then elixirs and grenades on engineers effectively leaving out all gadgets because they are pretty much useless or weak in PVE, they’ve seriously destroyed even their own trinity.

The list is long on what’s wrong with the game but we have people in these forums that just ignore the problems entirely and make it seem like we’re the devil for pointing out the flaws that yes we do expect the devs to fix in a timely manner because yes this is a product and we expect to get what we pay for including the statement about how the combat is in the game on their advertisement main page (which is far far from the truth at the moment sadly.)

Trickery combat doesn’t exist in this game. What I mean for that is strategy. All we have seen even in PVP is people running around using direct damage skills, no one is really doing trap trickery because it’s nerfed to the point of being pointless. In PVE it’s even worse. There are plenty of ways that mobs can trap us but players aren’t supposed to trap kill enemies? That’s not how it would be if this were anywhere near RL. For example, it wouldn’t take 40-50 hits of a flame thrower to kill a mob undead or not if this were RL, Mines would cripple, bombs wouldn’t take so long to go off. The physics are all off.

We were promise support changes but I really haven’t seen any of those either. My heals in my support armor are still tiny at best. Imagine doing a 4 step AOE heal process and only healing 3% of your friends health. Yeah that’s really what we’re looking at and then the engineer takes 4 steps why the ranger takes 2. Wheres the equal chances while fighting where is it that certain classes aren’t left out? I would totally come up with a better set of fixes and have this class revamp on track within a month hands down.

The way I see it, they really need to buff up the other builds, for example the condition damage builds, those bringing condition damage just have too many flaws in PvE like stack caps on enemies, and less effectiveness on structures, maybe have the bleed stack for each individual player, or even something akin to Dark Souls where you collect and amount and then a big burst of damage after it hits a threshold, though that might be too game changing. but the bottom line is that the zerk hive mind keeps overshadowing other builds and classes in PvE.

KenSniper.8690:

something akin to Dark Souls where you collect and amount and then a big burst of damage after it hits a threshold

A friend of mine came up with an idea for compounding conditions, similar to combo fields where if a specific set of conditions are on a foe they suffer a combo effect, like for every 10 stacks of bleeding they get 5 seconds of weakness, or something else. I say they should raise the bleed cap to 50 and add a poison stacking effect.