Guild Wars 2

Dear Developer and User of the official Forum,
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I hesitated to make this post, but got encouraged after I shared my ideas with fellow guild mates and friends. And being constructive is probably better than just flaming on the subreddit. My point:

I think 10-character-wide shared buffs – including boons like might and buffs like Empower Allies – would be benefitial for Raiding in PvE, big-scale fights in WvW and even Open World PvE events.

And I will elaborate on that. (In advance: I am far more familiar with Raids in PvE than playing WvW, so my arguments may be stronger when refering to raids. I tried my best to get informations about WvW from my fellow guildies and friends.)
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But what are the problems with the current system?

Following may seem trivial, but stick with me. There are boons and buffs in the game as we know. They are – depending on the game mode – strong, especially if you have access to multiple buffs at the same time. So there is a incentive to get those boons that are mostly beneficial for your game mode. Thats for example Quickness or Grace of the Land for Raids, or Resistance in WvW.

But very few – often only one – class can give or give reliable a certain buff to 4 of his squad members. That leads to a superior composition, where certain classes get far more spots than other classes. In the raiding meta you maily want to keep Quickness, Might and Grace of the Land as good as possible while also having access to buffs like Alacrity, Spotter, Empower Allies, Ranger Spirits and Warrior Banners. All of them are on only 3 classes and they take up 6 of 10 spots on a Raid squad – and 5 of 10 before the balance patch. Currently you take 2 Druids, 2 Chronos and 2 Warriors, because only one of them can only provide the wanted and superior buffs for half the party, while no other class can give these buffs or can give them satisfyingly.

The buffs are so strong that nerfing the source will increase the demand of the source. That hurts class (and build) diversity.
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What would 10-character-wide boons and buffs change?

If, lets say, a Phalanx Warrior would share its boons and buffs for 10 people satisfyingly, only every 10th spot would be reserved for a Phalanx Warrior – instead of every 5th. In a Raid squad that would mean you should bring 1, but 1 is enough.

In a common Raid squad that would only pre occupy 3 spots with fixed classes (/builds), 4 if you would have to run the pre-patch Chrono + Revenant combination to archive 100% Quickness, leaving 6 spots for 5 remaining classes. I dont know the exact established composition for WvW, but i am sure that it will open some spots there, too.
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Would’nt that lead to a super group in Raids?

There were concerns about 10-character-wide buffs leading to a supergroup before the Raids were released. What I mean by a super group: You are most optimal using every class exacly 1 time in your suqad (And only 1 class twice of course). A super group would only mimic diversity, because you have every class in it, but only 1 Raid squad composition is viable. I don’t anticipate that either. But that will not necessarily happen. To be honest I even highly doubt that.

Besides the boons and buffs I talked about, the classes in Guild Wars 2 have access to a lot of utility, like removing conditions or removing boons, and have different ways to damage opponents. There will be fights where a role is needed, and fights where its not. So a squad may want to take a Necromancer or a Revenant to absorb their team mates conditions. Either one works, and thats the way it should be. But to prevent something like a super group the abilitys of a class should rarely be unique for that class. Luckily we have most of the unique abilitys on these 3 classes for PvE. Most of the others are interchangable between classes if needed, like the Revenant and Necromancer example.

I think it’s also a fine playground for upcoming Elite Specialisation. You could give the great quickness or might stacking abilitys to other classes and give the remaining classes Raid relevant utilitys that they can choose from depending on the encounter. If different Elite Specialisations offer options for all classes, there is no need for any class, but every class can be taken to a Raid. And limiting the need for these buffing roles to 3 or 4 will give the developers much more freedom for the designing for Elite Specialisations since there are more spots for unspecific utilitys in a squad.

What about WvW?
To be frankly honest, I have much less insight in the WvW meta. But as far as I know permanent boons have been a problem there and especially Resistance has been inconveniant.

On the one hand I believe that more spots for other roles than boon buffers could give the opportunity to take more classes that remove boons from opponents. Also there are WvW exclusive options to counter a boon heavy group, like boon removing traps or besiege weapons.
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What about Open World PvE?
It would be beneficial there, too, because its far easier to run a “close to optimal composition” by random, because you don’t need more Chronomancers etc. than there are. It would reduce the discrepancy of time between an organized and a non-organized attempt. Also it would give the developer the opportunity to make these more challenging, because they don’t have to struggle with the fact, that you run increadibly less damage, just because the Open World suqad mates run the “wrong” classes.
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Thank you for your time
I hope it is comprehensive and makes some sense. For game modes like Fractals or Structured PvP these changes have no effect, because you don’t encounter more than 4 allies, and from my perspective all large-scale game modes would benefit hugely.

Please tell me your opinion and suggestions, I hope to start a discussion here. And I also hope that the developers will think critically about that idea, and share their thoughts.

I 100% agree with you. Nerfing certain boons with the current limitations only causes more class stacking in order to get the same effect, not class diversity.

So we really want 1 warrior 1 mesmer 1 druid 7 elementalist groups?

Aint that even more limiting?

What we need for classes in GW2 is everything. Let any class be able to stack 25 might and let any class boon share and keep the boons up 24/7. Problem fixed.

Linken.6345:

So we really want 1 warrior 1 mesmer 1 druid 7 elementalist groups?

Aint that even more limiting?

What would prevent you from taking other classes in regular, non speed clear runs? Pre-Patch many classes were far more accepted than the patch before that (were Ele had far more damage output than any other class). But you still had only 4 slots. The balance between that classes nearly didn’t change, so I don’t see any reason 7 Eles would be considered mandatory for non-speed clear attempts.

also eles are very squishy, and you need to be good at them to make them viable. depends on the boss, but on matthias you want a necro, on slothasor you want guardians, on vale guardian you want conditions etc etc.
i think diversity means versatility which means optimal conditions, stacking elementalists could mean ressing people all the time

Linken.6345:

So we really want 1 warrior 1 mesmer 1 druid 7 elementalist groups?

Aint that even more limiting?

Nerv the dmg of ele and give some other classes viable damage builds.

We got some seriouse problems with balancing and build diversity anyway. At the moment most classes got 0-1 viable build for high end pve especally raids. There are alot weapons, skills and traits that got no place in any gamemode. i hope we get a big overhaul of the trait system, weapons and skills with the next expansion, whenever that comes. But i’m afraid of new unbalanced elite specialisations.

Let’s forget about the Elementalist for a second, because it derails the discussion. It’s not only wrong that you would have to run 7 of them – but also irrelevant in this discussion.

I am talking about a way to open spots for DPS and utility roles – not about the balance between the competing classes for these roles. So please let us focus more on the topic now.

I totally agree with you!