Guild Wars 2

I have two points that I want to make that I hope will generate good discussion and perhaps help make GW2 a better game.

First, I really do not understand why heal spells have a cast time when most DPS spells do not. The result is that heal spells are often interrupted and or simply do not fire before being down. Now, I understand that some may prefer the ability to interrupt a heal spell, but then why not also a dps spell? Additionally, as others have stated (and some proven mathematically) DPS skills will generate more damage than a heal spell can account for by and large (hence the common theme from posters on this forum that this is really a pure dps game). That said, it just seems like an odd and unjustifiable mechanic to slap a cast time on a heal spell that cannot match the incoming dps from a dps spell that is instant. What’s the point?

Secondly, the other common theme that I hear is that the support capabilities in this game ‘feel’ limited to non-existent. I agree. We’re basically all standing around dps’ing and if one of ‘support’ spells happens to benefit, well that, for the casual player, is just pure coincidence. That said, why not allow heal spells to be cast on a friendly target? You’re still faced with the same CD, you still better manage it wisely, and yet it adds an element of skill and strategy to the game. This is just a suggestion… not asking for a full blown battleground healer class that could health through everything. Just seems like an obvious way to get ‘support’ back into the game while increasing the over tactical decisions made during play.

Everything has a cast time. Just some longer than others. Heals have a longer cast time so they can be interrupted. This is done primarily for pvp, where some classes can nearly top themselves up in just about one cast.

They want to avoid the trinity. However, it still remains if you really want to do it. My Elementalist friend had a high focus on providing boons, along with his passive regeneration aura. He keeps us on our feet. Supporting is boons.

Regardless, it would be neat.

do some more research on classes, there’s some very good support roles

do some more research on classes, there’s some very good support roles

@Rukia, thanks. Agree with you 100%

@Crass, just looking at my skills alone, I calculate my DPS to be 864 and my HPS (heal per sec) at 111. If everyone is similar or marginally close, this would seem to be heavily weighted toward DPS, which I am not the first to point. Obviously my analysis needs a lot of work. That said, look the forums… there are common themes that seem to be discouraging people, one of which is the role of support. Another example is the state of PvP. It’s not healthy and, in my view, this point is one aspect of it.

@John, I know and respect that they want to avoid the trinity, however even at the current DPS/HPS levels (see above), giving the ability pop your heal on another does not turn this into a healing game by any stretch of the imagination. Instead, it provides a layer of support that feels lacking in the game. Keep in mind that I am not the only to have said this. Also, I don’t doubt that there are eles running support. That said, I’ve only ever seen that rain cloud 1 time over my head and I rarely ever see water attuned eles. It could just be the server I’m on, but everyone seems to recognize that the best defense in this game is a strong offense, hence everyone is dps’ing.

Healing needs to be buffed.

Before the 5-man limit, support healing made a difference (at least in WvW on my Guardian). Now healing others is basically useless.

This is a flaw in the game. No one is asking for a return of the trinity, but ArenaNet has to satisfy those who want to play some level of effective healing support.

Best i can tell, ANet do not want healing to be able to produce immortal bunkers that can sit on a capture point in SPVP and survive the opposing team in full pounding on them. Necromancers could in some way do this in the betas via the Death Shroud mechanics, and it was severely nerfed right before launch.

Also, some of the stronger “heals” are actually grandmaster traits that attach heals to non-heal skills or similar. Examples being heal on shout for warriors and heal on boon for guardians.

Never mind that very few skills, a couple of water elementalist skills (healing triden on scepter and healing wave on OH dagger. The latter also available on dodge via trait) being the exception, do not get a 1:1 benefit out of healing power (compassion) trait points.

As for why support skills feel limited, it is because outside of might the boons are all or nothing. They stack only in duration, if that.

I wonder if stability could be turned into a defiant like boon, stacking in intensity so that each CC applied would be resisted and a stack of it removed. Tho i guess it would need to be a small stack to avoid someone running around immune for long periods (tho it could be counteracted more readily as people would do the same as with defiant on champs, pile on CC to reduce the stack).

Protection, being percentage based, could act the same way as might.

Fury as well, with higher stack giving a higher crit chance benefit.

Retaliation could really benefit from this in that it is in essence the boon version of confusion, or perhaps mirror a percentage of the incoming damage back based on stack size (right now it does damage based on defenders power).

The rest (swiftness, aegis, regeneration and vigor) would be more difficult to make intensity stacking. Aegis in that it hard blocks all incoming attacks, and so would make someone effectively immune with a high stack.

This would make the benefit of someone being able to pile on support more apparent, as there would be numbers on the yellow icons. And people would know it when those numbers are higher than they themselves can produce.

I always lean towards the Defensive side of the spectrum, and I’m satisfied with what we have.

Healing is only one form of mitigating damage. Unfortunately, it is also the most visible. If someone can heal themselves for 111 health per second, and they are taking 864 damage per second, then 13% of the damage is being blocked. With protection, it is 54%. Throw in blinds, aegis, dodging, and CC, and one can negate the vast majority of incoming damage for a time.

And to note, my self Healing per second far exceeds 111. It’s at least 10x that. I tend to play on the defensive extreme though, so I’m no where near 864 DPS.

I have this feeling though, that most players who see Healing as lacking haven’t quite grasped how Support works. A support build only using heals is similar to a condition build that only uses poisons.

And lastly, the goal of a survival built character is not to survive endlessly, but only to survive longer than what you’re fighting.