Guild Wars 2

MASSIVE WALL OF TEXT INCOMING. READ IF YOU DARE.

Alright, so I realize before typing this whole thing out that it probably won’t garner the attention it’d need to actually have some of these ideas implemented, but I’m going to say it all anyway just because I can.

So. PvE. It should be needs to be reworked. It should really be plain to see that when dungeon parties are dominated by warriors, guardians, and mesmers that there need to be methods put into place in order to make other classes more viable. I’m gonna try and be somewhat brief, but I have a lot to say so I’ll probably end up writing quite a wall. I’ll try and break it down into sections so people can just read the parts that they’re interested in. And please, DON’T comment on something if you haven’t read everything I’ve written about it.
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1. Split PvE and PvP mechanics.
This is really a no-brainer, and it needs to be the top priority. There’s absolutely no reason to keep things static between PvE and PvP when the meta-game for each is the complete opposite of the other. You simply cannot have balance in both unless you treat them as separate entities. It’s already been done with Save Yourselves and boon duration runes, so why can’t it be implemented for other skills, items, stats, boons/conditions, etc.?
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2. Put the Living Story on hold.
I’m gonna be brutally honest here: The vast majority of the Living Story content so far has been very boring and contrived. Lost Shores was a disaster; Flame and Frost was mostly bland (with the exception of the Molten Facilty, but I’ll get to that later), and dragging us back to Southsun Cove ended up not being worth the effort. This is compounded by the fact that the parts that did work (IMO namely SAB and the Molten Facility) are now gone forever due to some strange thinking that removing fun content is a good idea. The fact of the matter is that there are far too many people that are doing the missions on a one-and-done basis, and then going back to the rest of the content that’s been there since release. Meanwhile there are some rather large problems with the core game that have been seemingly overlooked by some bad prioritizing within Anet’s crew. To put it short and simple: Balancing and bug fixes need to come first, and added content should only come once the existing content is properly optimized.
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3. Add some incentive for end-game open world play.
As it stands right now, the only times I see high level players consistently doing open world content are at world bosses. There’s the occasional dungeon event chain or orrian temple chain that gets done, but even those for the most part are overlooked on many servers due to the simple ability to guest to a server that has already completed it in order to access the dungeon or merchant. Now, I understand that this sort of thing might be a little difficult to pull off, but surely there’s some way to motivate players to do them, right? Perhaps some sort of unique items acquired by actually doing the events, instead of just a merchant that sells them?
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4. Make conditions more viable in PvE.
As of today, condition-based builds are quite kitten in many portions of PvE. Because of the current meta of the game’s PvE content (which is pretty much just outputting the most damage in the least amount of time), DoT-based conditions are simply not desirable in most instances within the game. The very premise behind conditions is that they deal damage over time, and with the current meta the idea is to use up as little time as possible. As for non-damage dealing conditions (other than vulnerability), what’s the point? Chilling an enemy isn’t going to do much good when it’s stationary and simply spams one attack that doesn’t have a cooldown. Blind is next to useless when it only works TEN percent of the time it’s put on a boss. Weakness… Weakness is just completely pointless period. Both the enemies and the conditions themselves need to be reworked, so here are some ideas that I thought up:

-Have enemies that have physical damage resistance and/or condition vulnerability.
-Increase the condition stacking cap if possible.
-Add mechanics that encourage the use of conditions (such as bosses that have healing abilities that can be hindered by poison, or highly mobile enemies that are much less difficult to dispatch with the use of cripple).
-Completely revamp weakness. One idea that I was thinking of that might be more viable would be that weakness would increase condition damage on targets affected by it. It would work similarly to vulnerability, but apply to conditions instead. This would in turn make other conditions as a whole more viable as well. I’m sure there are plenty of other ideas that could work as well, but the point is that the AI is not going to be affected by a decrease in endurance regen, and glancing blows aren’t going to matter when they can still kill you in one hit anyway.

If conditions were made more powerful, this would hopefully result in an increase in condition-based class builds in PvE, which I’ll cover below.
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5. Rework dungeons.
This is a big one. I’ve been hearing rumors that this is a planned thing, and if it is, it’s really important that it’s done right. It should be rather obvious by now that at least 90% of this game’s dungeon content is a simple DPS hackfest. So many good mechanics that this game has are currently going to waste because there’s no need for them when all you need to clear dungeons are the biggest guns you can find. Some examples of dungeon mechanics done right in my view would be the Lupicus fight in Arah and the now defunct Molten Facility.

Lupi in Arah is definitely one of the more entertaining fights in this game. Between things such as the grubs and empower stacks as well as the timed dodging required for many of his abilities, and even simply the idea that it’s a boss fight that is actually not done best by just stacking on him in a corner. If there were more boss fights in this game that actually required precise use of the dodge mechanic as well as mobility, and maybe even environmental factors that could be put into play, or really ANYTHING that would involve more strategy than stacking and hacking away would make dungeons a lot more enjoyable.

The Molten Facility as a whole is a good example of a dungeon that was quite well done. Things such as the shield dredge that required CC, the frozen generators that had to be destroyed before clearing out the hallways, and especially the boss fight at the end that required players to react to their surroundings and pay attention to detail really made this dungeon FUN to run through. It’s really a shame that it got taken away, because from what I’ve heard from others it was very highly praised.

The point of this is, dungeons need more widely varied mechanics that promote clearing for entertainment, rather than speed and the reward at the end. Adding in platforming segments, puzzles, etc. would make it even better. And let’s not forget the fact that many mobs are skipped due to the wasted effort required to kill them when they can simply be avoided. Give us some incentive to work through every piece of the dungeons, reward us somehow for taking more than the minimum effort required; it would definitely make the full dungeon experience more worthwhile.
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6. BALANCE CLASSES.
This is probably the biggest problem with PvE as of right now. Warriors, guardians, and mesmers dominate the current PvE meta because it’s specifically geared toward their specialties. Now, I won’t go TOO in-depth into class balancing because that would require another thread entirely, but one thing that I DO want to emphasize is the need for every class to be equally viable, but simply in different ways. One thing that I think could make this work could be setting a baseline damage/armor/healing standards for all classes, but give each one the opportunity to expand upon these standard through their own unique skills and traits.

Ranger: Right now, the ranger is a really underwhelming PvE class due to the fact that a good portion of its DPS lies within an AI pet that the player has very little control over. How about instead of the player having reduced damage, it gets flipped around so that the pet gives EXTRA damage on top of the ranger’s adequate solo damage? This way, people will actually want to work with their pets and pay attention and make sure they’re alive so that the ranger is at maximum potential WITHOUT penalizing them when they simply can’t do that. Maybe throwing in some sort of more advanced pet mechanics (like I dunno, pet dodging maybe?) would help with that as well.

Necromancer: Necros are masters of conditions and outlasting the enemy. What’s the point of that when neither of those things are of any importance in PvE? Let’s give people a reason to take necros into dungeons. Make portions of dungeons more beneficial to players that spec more defensively than offensively. Make conditions more worthwhile, maybe by using some of the suggestions I listed above.

Warrior: Okay, I already know that anger will rise from some when I say this, but it really needs to be said: Warriors need a damage nerf. The fact of the matter is that their standalone damage is already competing with the best of the other classes. Their ability to quickly and efficiently stack might on themselves and vulnerability on the enemy simultaneously makes them way too powerful to allow for balance without them getting a nerf. Give them reduced base damage, but still let them build up might, fury, and vuln like they already do and have them use that to bring their damage back up to its full potential.

Thief: Give thieves the advantage of higher base damage at the cost of being less tanky and not being able to stack might and vuln as efficiently as warriors. Yes, thieves are still pretty strong as is, but that’s how they are supposed to be. The thief is the class that is MEANT to be the glass cannon, moreso than any other class in the game. Let them be the best at dealing direct damage, and in exchange make them dependent on allies for utility in order to maximize their potential.

Obviously there are more ways to work with this idea than I’ve typed out, but hopefully you get the idea by now.
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To summarize:
I’ve written a wall of text on how I think PvE could be improved. Would I like to see these things happen? Most definitely. Do I think Anet will actually take advantage of my advice? Not really, but I didn’t really have anything else to do today except type, and there’s at least a chance of things happening now, even if it’s slim. Hopefully I didn’t bore you to death, and if I did, sorry, but I felt like a lot of this needed to be said. I love the game, but I just think it could be SO much better if Anet strived to work on what’s already in it instead of continuing with gimmicky Living Story arcs.

So anyway, that’s it! Feel free to post any sort of agreements and/or disagreements (within reason, of course) and also any suggestions you might have, whether they’d expand on the ones I’ve given or they’d be completely new!

Oh, and TL;DR?
Quite simply, if you didn’t bother to read the wall of text, then don’t comment on it. Because I care as much about what you have to say to me as you cared about what I had to say to you. And if you didn’t read it, then I’m going to take that as not caring at all.

I’ve read it all Black Box and I’m glad that you feel the same way on what is wrong in GW2 as I do. Our solutions differ a little but the problems we face are the same. It makes me happy to see so many threads like this popping up on the suggestion forums, and even happier that people are spenidn so much time going into the details as well as offering suggestions on how to fix the problems.
If you haven’t already please check out some of my videos and threads on GW2 and how to improve it as they all cover everything you’ve brought up here.
The channel is DodgeThisBam and the most relvent threads here are “Risk Vs. Reward and the Underworld”, “Fix the (Un)Holy Trinity” and “Make GW2 more like World of Warcraft.”
However I’m not tyring to hyjack this thread so if there is something specific in this you’d like my feedback on let me know because going over the lot I’d just be covering the same ground again.
Thanks again for putting so much effort into this post and taking the time to let Anet know what you think could be done to improve thier game, I wish more users would take the time.

The Molten Facility has really given me hope that at least someone on the team knows how to make a good dungeon. If the same ideas that went into creating that are put to use in re-working our current dungeons (and making any new ones), we could see some really nice results.

Mist Y.5214:

The Molten Facility has really given me hope that at least someone on the team knows how to make a good dungeon. If the same ideas that went into creating that are put to use in re-working our current dungeons (and making any new ones), we could see some really nice results.

They put a lot of focus on control and support mechanics. How much faster did the first fight go when you launched that protector away from the center? That’s working with the GW2 Trinity properly.
The Trinity they proosed during development is still possible, But my hopes they will impilment it game wide are dimished more with each patch…

O.o 0 comments on engineer? the most gimpt class in the PVE game right now? seriously. Sure they’ve had some buffs and trait fixes but absolutely nothing on the scale of what warriors/guardians/or even elementalists find. There’s not fluidity when it comes to boons and boon building is limited to two types of cookie cutter builds (Elixir/FT) Nothing like my thief, and that’s another thing can we get a clear answer on just what the engineer is, is it an adventurer class (which is not evidently according to how it’s traits are laid out) or is it a soldier class? Please I’d like a response.

Spot on on the rest of the stuff tho. Especially the part about bosses/champions and how they make CC/condi worthless. One thing missing tho. The support classes. There’s no direct healing to speak of. There’s AOE’s that drop on the ground but here’s the problem with that. the AI of the bosses/champs know exactly where that is the instant it happens and about 85% of the time drop their own AOE damage zones right on top of it immediately. I’ve personally witnessed this in dungeons. If support is to be viable they need a direct heal or this AI needs to change so they don’t make those AOE zones useless immediately after dropping one.

Crossover between the Engi balance problems and support problems, we need fewer regens I’d suggest returning the AOE healing zone to EG in kit refinement and/or adding a direct heal to fumigate.

tigirius.9014:

O.o 0 comments on engineer? the most gimpt class in the PVE game right now? seriously.

I didn’t avoid talking about engineers because I don’t think they need a rebalance, but rather because I have absolutely no experience playing one and therefore didn’t know specifically what is wrong or how to fix it. I’ve heard from a few others as well that they are also in dire need of some fixing up though.

You’re just presenting complaints that have been addressed time and time again on the forums, reddit, and elsewhere. Although I think most of these have a ground, I will play the devil’s advocate now, and give you the reasons why (some of) your points could be contested:

- “Split PvE and PvP mechanics. […] why can’t it be implemented for other skills, items, stats, boons/conditions, etc.?”
- Because the more you split the two environments, the more you require players to learn the same thing twice, or to put it in other words, to confuse the memory training one puts into learning the optimal moment of a fight when to use a certain skill or combination thereof.

- “I’m gonna be brutally honest here: The vast majority of the Living Story content so far has been very boring and contrived.”
- To you. Not to many other people. And yes, we always hear many people complaining: it’s the problem of vocal minorities. The constant overflows in LA or Southsun during the events, people running around litting effigies or killing holographic mobs and so on I think speaks for itself. All in all, I’m sure ANet keeps a close eye on the thing. If they were bringing people away from events rather than draw them to the game, I’m pretty sure they would have shut down the living story project already.

- “Add some incentive for end-game open world play.”
- I agree with that, but I just want to point out that, from what I hear, this is a typical problem of every MMO. Personally, I would really love to see the precursor hunt involve some kind of varied and active partecipation in the meta chains, for example, but that’s just me.

In general, I would also point out that some problems (conditions, dungeon reworking, class balancing) are surely there, but are not as horrible as we usually portray them. E.g.: playing a condition build, IF you are in a party where AT LEAST another person has a condition build on the SAME condition(s), makes you lose a little percentual of your DPS. Yes, it’s true. It’s also not such a common situation, and it doesn’t ruin the experience: you will have just a little bit longer run. Luckily we are not in WOW, with enrage mechanics, optimized build, and a “get the noobs out” mindset. The only part of PvE where I really see optimal builds and maximized DPS having an important role is high-level fractals.

I want to say it again: I’m playing the devil’s advocate here. I think it could be interesting for the discussion.

- living story: flame and frost was really good imho and should have been permanent. SAB was good. southsun was ok. Dragon Bash … meh.

- your profession ideas are good.

- dungeon overhaul is needed, not just to make it more difficult but also to make it more consistent.

- split PVP/PVE. Yes, absolutely and most certainly the balance numbers. Have skills continue to do the same thing but different damage multipliers.

- condition buff is very much needed

- open world rewards should indeed be balanced. If all champion events in Queensdale would give chests, it would almost be raidable.

RedGlow.2715:

You’re just presenting complaints that have been addressed time and time again on the forums, reddit, and elsewhere. Although I think most of these have a ground, I will play the devil’s advocate now, and give you the reasons why (some of) your points could be contested:

- “Split PvE and PvP mechanics. […] why can’t it be implemented for other skills, items, stats, boons/conditions, etc.?”
- Because the more you split the two environments, the more you require players to learn the same thing twice, or to put it in other words, to confuse the memory training one puts into learning the optimal moment of a fight when to use a certain skill or combination thereof.

- “I’m gonna be brutally honest here: The vast majority of the Living Story content so far has been very boring and contrived.”
- To you. Not to many other people. And yes, we always hear many people complaining: it’s the problem of vocal minorities. The constant overflows in LA or Southsun during the events, people running around litting effigies or killing holographic mobs and so on I think speaks for itself. All in all, I’m sure ANet keeps a close eye on the thing. If they were bringing people away from events rather than draw them to the game, I’m pretty sure they would have shut down the living story project already.

- “Add some incentive for end-game open world play.”
- I agree with that, but I just want to point out that, from what I hear, this is a typical problem of every MMO. Personally, I would really love to see the precursor hunt involve some kind of varied and active partecipation in the meta chains, for example, but that’s just me.

In general, I would also point out that some problems (conditions, dungeon reworking, class balancing) are surely there, but are not as horrible as we usually portray them. E.g.: playing a condition build, IF you are in a party where AT LEAST another person has a condition build on the SAME condition(s), makes you lose a little percentual of your DPS. Yes, it’s true. It’s also not such a common situation, and it doesn’t ruin the experience: you will have just a little bit longer run. Luckily we are not in WOW, with enrage mechanics, optimized build, and a “get the noobs out” mindset. The only part of PvE where I really see optimal builds and maximized DPS having an important role is high-level fractals.

I want to say it again: I’m playing the devil’s advocate here. I think it could be interesting for the discussion.

As for PvP/PvE thing I can only say this: I prefer to learn my profession 10 different times for the different constests, rather than seeing it nerfed to the ground in PvE because too powerful in PvP. It is as simple as that and I know many people agreeing with this. After all, PvP requires a totally different gameplay already, having to make more and different builds would only make it more interesting than what it is right now.
As for conditions, they might not be as bad as they are said to be, but this does not change that no one will prefer a condition build to a DPS build. Whenever I join a dungeon /Any dungeons, recently HotW path 1/ I am fed-up to be asked if I have another character i switch on, because Necro is not good enough for anything and even more I am fed-up of that disappointment people show, when, after accepting your join party request, they find out you are a Necro and not a Warrior, Guardian or Mesmer. I am fed-up of that common “Oh no, a Necro…shall we kick IT?”
I want to play the professions that I enjoy, which are Guard and Necro, I do not want to always switch on my Guardian when I want to play Necro and neither I want to feel forced to play a zerker Warrior or a Mesmer, just because the common thought of most of people says these are the only worth professions. I deleted a level 80 Mesmer for how not enjoyable I found to play that profession.

Ps. i agree with the OP on almost all points and I truly hope this thread will be taken into account by devs, since it is perfectly written.

RedGlow.2715:

- “Split PvE and PvP mechanics. […] why can’t it be implemented for other skills, items, stats, boons/conditions, etc.?”
- Because the more you split the two environments, the more you require players to learn the same thing twice, or to put it in other words, to confuse the memory training one puts into learning the optimal moment of a fight when to use a certain skill or combination thereof.

The effects of the skills themselves aren’t what need to be changed, rather just the numbers between PvE and PvP should be separated. Take confusion, for example. In PvP, confusion is an incredibly powerful condition that can kill unwary players very quickly. In PvE, however, enemies have too much health and too slow action time for it to be of any effectiveness, at least when compared to simple direct damage. If they would adjust the values so that it did more damage in PvE to make it worth using while keeping it as is in PvP, there could be a better sense of balance between both without changing how it actually works.