Guild Wars 2

Space Cow.2431:

GW1:

-7 of 1026 normal skills (roughly 125 per profession, everyone has 2 professions, second profession can be changed. 81 skills are common across all professions).
-1 of 293 elite skills (you can choose to drop an elite for a normal skill instead)
-200 attribute points (to distribute across 1 primary attribute and 8 of 36 secondary attributes)

But how many of these were added in expansions? I’m getting about half that just counting Core (which idk how many core skills were added later) and Prophecies skills, across 6 professions, which would be what was available when GW1 first came out.

You can’t compare the number of skills in a game expanded on for years to a game that hasn’t even hit their first expansion and it’s 8 months in. That’s not a fair assessment.

GW1 was a more skill-combination based, GW2 is more build based. GW1 locked you into your skills unless you were in a town because the synergy of those skills were important. GW2 lets you change everything but where you spent your trait point out of combat on a whim, because it’s based around the underlying structure built with your trait points. You’re also allowed two weapon sets in combat unless you’re an Engi or an Ele, who instead get kits and attunments/conjur weapons (which, if you want to see “limited weapons” try Engi, we have four: a two-hand, main-hand, and two off-hands).

They’re honestly very different combat systems—it’s not just a matter of “GW1/2 did it better” because they don’t have enough overlap, I don’t think, you make an objective assessment on that. Because part of it will be just how individual players grasp it, and where they’re preferences lie.

Someone mentioned above they found the traits unintuitive—I honestly had no problems diving right into that, and getting into habit of toggling major traits as I do/don’t need them for different situations. I know a lot of people really liked the dual-profession system in GW1, but for me that was highly unintuitive—try as I might I just specialized in one profession or another because I felt either I was locked into only a few attribute lines in each profession or felt far too split and under-performing trying to split myself across 6-8 lines total.

clay.7849:

Where’s the bull’s strike? Where’s the frenzy that gave you 33% faster attack but traded with taking double damage? Where’s deep wound?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Frenzy_%28warrior_skill%29 <—- You’re looking for this? The numbers aren’t the same but it’s the very same effect.

Deep Wound has the healing ineffectiveness through poison. I can see where they didn’t add the axe to the health pool, because HP in this game has so much variance by profession/vitality points.

Aegis still exists too, it’s just a 100% block. Healing class getting axed = lots of healing mechanics get axed, but healing is not the be all, end all of mechanic depth.

I do miss hexes, but Mesmers do still have a lot of ways to punish enemy behavior and force a split of attention kitten if you, kitten if you don’t situation. The Immortal build is a really good example of this. Other parts of hexes (like health degen) do exist in conditions, too.

GW2 has a lot of interesting if/then mechanics and extra utility for doing certain things, but they’re mechanics that come from traiting, or they’re types of skills specific to classes that are designed more strongly around “utility”. Classes in GW2 are not built with equal difficulty or complexity of play, which I’m sure Anet did on purpose so that people who like different levels of play can find a class they like.

(A lot of classes have build options well beyond “sit and dps” too, it’s just a matter of getting people to actually play those builds.)

One game has been out Way longer then the other so it should have more added to it. GW1 was not build in one day and was looked down on during its first year. They will add in more skills but you MUST make sure that the old skills are well made before you can simply add in more. Stop trying to think by adding in more skill that you will have better version of the old because that will not happen.

How many of those “awesome skills in the GW1 system” were actually used though?
A rather high amount of skills were never really used, AT ALL. And quite a few of them were duplicates from different campaigns.

lordkrall.7241:

How many of those “awesome skills in the GW1 system” were actually used though?
A rather high amount of skills were never really used, AT ALL. And quite a few of them were duplicates from different campaigns.

Yes, I agree that was the case. However, those skills were stepping stones more than anything else; I loved the growth of the character as I accumulated ever more powerful skills. Once you reach the top—well, of course I used only the best skills! Who wouldn’t? But the journey was interesting and varied, like any good RPG experience, and I felt powerful at the end.

The statistics you quote at the start of your thread concerning build diversity are largely academic and pointless because they avoid looking at synergy.

You wouldn’t run a sword skill, axe skill, 2h hammer skill, dagger on the same time on a warrior/assassin unless you were trying to do one of those cool weapon swap builds, that while cool are largely ineffective. In GW2 you have the advantage of being fully effective no matter what weapon you pull out. I find for melee classes or classes that depended on weapons in gw1 (warrior, paragon, dervish, assassin, ranger) that gw2’s system is far better. For caster classes you have more limited options in gw2 because you only have 5 ‘flex’ slots that you can use to variate your build, while in gw1 you often used those slots to put in various spells.

Then comes the problem with balance, gw2’s system is far easier to manage and understand than gw1’s system. Which pokes again at your statistics because there are several abilities in gw1 that are either mere copies of another, or do a very similar effect but one of them is just way better so people never take the other skill. So in gw1 where you had skill diversity you also had a lot of false choices. I would say the majority of skills in gw1 were false choices.
GW2 can fall in the same trap with the utility skills often I only find a small subset useful but with the trait system certain other utilities can be better with a retrait. For example warriors have several viable line of utilities right now, banners, shouts, stances, and some signets and physical abilities.
GW2 has a lot less false choices right now.

Guns and Giblets.9308:

lordkrall.7241:

How many of those “awesome skills in the GW1 system” were actually used though?
A rather high amount of skills were never really used, AT ALL. And quite a few of them were duplicates from different campaigns.

Yes, I agree that was the case. However, those skills were stepping stones more than anything else; I loved the growth of the character as I accumulated ever more powerful skills. Once you reach the top—well, of course I used only the best skills! Who wouldn’t? But the journey was interesting and varied, like any good RPG experience, and I felt powerful at the end.

Except this isn’t always true, they gave you the most powerful warrior sword combo in the game right from the beginning in prophecies. Sever→gash→final thrust.

Draygo.9473:

Except this isn’t always true, they gave you the most powerful warrior sword combo in the game right from the beginning in prophecies. Sever->gash->final thrust.

Yeah, I remember that on my warrior. I was thinking of other classes.

lordkrall.7241:

How many of those “awesome skills in the GW1 system” were actually used though?
A rather high amount of skills were never really used, AT ALL. And quite a few of them were duplicates from different campaigns.

Actually, in PvP, at one time or another, over 75% of the skills were used from each class. The elementalist alone had 90% of their skills used at one time or another.

Face it. There are flaws in the Guild Wars 2 setup and there were flaws in the Guild Wars 1 setup. There are also flaws in every other MMO on the market.

One game isn’t better than the other. People simply have different preferences.

I like them both…for different reasons.

clay.7849:

Actually, in PvP, at one time or another, over 75% of the skills were used from each class. The elementalist alone had 90% of their skills used at one time or another.

82% of all statistics are made up.

The nickname of GW1 among PvP’ers was “build wars”. Not the playerskill, but the team composition was the deciding variable in top matches. There had been only few viable builds for every class and a small number of team setups had been dominating all others. It’s also important to mention that the team compositions have been prone to strong extremes such as teams full of necros, rits or paragons. At times the balancing got completely out of control, because the skillsystem provided too much freedom.

Gw1 gave you the “illusion of choice” than real choice. Most skill/class combinations had been so useless that there had been no point of even trying them out.

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

Actually, in PvP, at one time or another, over 75% of the skills were used from each class. The elementalist alone had 90% of their skills used at one time or another.

82% of all statistics are made up.

I could go through and do the math on this one though.

In fact, the elementalist one has been done.

clay.7849:

I could go through and do the math on this one though.

In fact, the elementalist one has been done.

Feel free. I will be waiting.

Go to the Guild Wars 1 wiki and look up the guide to playing a ranger. This is a line from it, with regards to PvP.

Despite the flexibility available, bow-based Rangers have a very rigid optimal build:

The 8 skills are listed beneath.

Yes, there’s a lot of versatility, but there’s also a single optimal build. And why wouldn’t you want to use the optimal build in PvP?

FirstBlood.7359:

The nickname of GW1 among PvP’ers was “build wars”. Not the playerskill, but the team composition was the deciding variable in top matches. There had been only few viable builds for every class and a small number of team setups had been dominating all others.

This was never the case until, possibly, after Nightfall.

Vayne.8563:

Go to the Guild Wars 1 wiki and look up the guide to playing a ranger. This is a line from it, with regards to PvP.

Despite the flexibility available, bow-based Rangers have a very rigid optimal build:

The 8 skills are listed beneath.

Yes, there’s a lot of versatility, but there’s also a single optimal build. And why wouldn’t you want to use the optimal build in PvP?

Except, if you actually played PvP you would know that there was never one optimal build for any class in PvP.

There was a hell of a difference between a crip shot flag runner/splitter and a ranger spike.

FirstBlood.7359:

Gw1 gave you the “illusion of choice” than real choice. Most skill/class combinations had been so useless that there had been no point of even trying them out.

Well, let’s assume that’s the case for now and run with it.

Some people had a sense of choice in GW1, even if an illusion, and it was satisfying to them in ways that they haven’t been able to have in GW2. Is there a way to recreate that sense of choice in GW2? Or is that unreasonable for some set of reasons?

Guns and Giblets.9308:

FirstBlood.7359:

Gw1 gave you the “illusion of choice” than real choice. Most skill/class combinations had been so useless that there had been no point of even trying them out.

Well, let’s assume that’s the case for now and run with it.

Some people had a sense of choice in GW1, even if an illusion, and it was satisfying to them in ways that they haven’t been able to have in GW2. Is there a way to recreate that sense of choice in GW2? Or is that unreasonable for some set of reasons?

I think there’ll be more choice in Guild Wars 2 as time passes. I mean the current trait system didn’t even make it into the game until the last beta before launch. It was changed drastically from the original trait system and didn’t get a proper shake out. That’s happening now (and has been since launch).

In a recent interview, Anet is talking about making changes to the trait system, which is a decent start.

No one, as far as I know, doesn’t want more build variety. I certainly want more viable builds per profession.

clay.7849:

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

Actually, in PvP, at one time or another, over 75% of the skills were used from each class. The elementalist alone had 90% of their skills used at one time or another.

82% of all statistics are made up.

I could go through and do the math on this one though.

In fact, the elementalist one has been done.

So wait was every pvp game in GW1 tracked? Because your working with an game overall or was this counting pve well the very small pve that GW1 had. 90% is a very hard number to claim or was it on the lines one person running different skills for purely running different skills and yet your still counting that.

CakeGuy.4735:

Oh my, so it is balanced in your eyes young ones.

Whole game kids, what should the word “whole” consist?

Accessibility, gap between player skills, different types of gamers like casuals hardcores and the gap between them etc etc. Are also part of the list of aspects that one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

But why consider these aspects in viewing GW? Because at the end of the day. GW is an MMO or Multi Player.

You can argue all day about your own experiences and your own views. But you can never judge a game’s WHOLE balance using your perspectives as mere players.

Once again, more emphasis on the word “Whole” young ones

I’ve been talking about this for a long time…the forest and trees thing. Most people are looking at everything from their perspective…seeing the trees instead of the forest. Very few people have the ability to see the whole picture. I know I don’t.

Anet has more chance of seeing the whole puzzle than most fans..not all, but most. So what is said on the forums is best taken with a lot of very large grains of salt.

Jski.6180:

clay.7849:

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

Actually, in PvP, at one time or another, over 75% of the skills were used from each class. The elementalist alone had 90% of their skills used at one time or another.

82% of all statistics are made up.

I could go through and do the math on this one though.

In fact, the elementalist one has been done.

So wait was every pvp game in GW1 tracked? Because your working with an game overall or was this counting pve well the very small pve that GW1 had. 90% is a very hard number to claim or was it on the lines one person running different skills for purely running different skills and yet your still counting that.

No, at some point, 90% of elementalist skills were run at one time or another, in PvP.

See, what you don’t know about PvP in GW1 is that the elementalist was never a real damage dealer. It was much more a utility role. And, as such, there was never an optimal build. The elementalist rolled with so many different skills to account for many different things, especially in relation to the changing meta.

So, it is not even crazy to think that the elemenatlist used 90% of it’s skills at one time or another in PvP.

My guess is most people can’t comprehend the elementalist as anything more than a “nuker”.

I have access to about 3272 skills on my WoW toons, on average.

But I still find the skill system here better.

A tighter yet more functional list is much better than a list full of highly specific abilities that rarely come into play but must all be cross balanced.

The GW1 skill system has a LOT of balance issues, and these largely stem from ability bloat.

There are only so many ways to bash in skulls with a hammer… Better for the game to capture a small set of them, and then use ACTIVE GAMEPLAY like mobility, dodging, LoSing, and so on to breath life into it all.

Here, I feel what I do counts more than what button I have on my skillbar. And while the order I press them in counts, it is not the only thing that counts here, and its all much more integrated.

Keep it as it is.

clay.7849:

Jski.6180:

clay.7849:

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

Actually, in PvP, at one time or another, over 75% of the skills were used from each class. The elementalist alone had 90% of their skills used at one time or another.

82% of all statistics are made up.

I could go through and do the math on this one though.

In fact, the elementalist one has been done.

So wait was every pvp game in GW1 tracked? Because your working with an game overall or was this counting pve well the very small pve that GW1 had. 90% is a very hard number to claim or was it on the lines one person running different skills for purely running different skills and yet your still counting that.

No, at some point, 90% of elementalist skills were run at one time or another, in PvP.

.

Well ya that not a major claim then if they added in a new skill in any game its going to be used at one given time in pvp. Its odd that its not 100% if you ask me.

clay.7849:

No, at some point, 90% of elementalist skills were run at one time or another, in PvP.

See, what you don’t know about PvP in GW1 is that the elementalist was never a real damage dealer. It was much more a utility role. And, as such, there was never an optimal build. The elementalist rolled with so many different skills to account for many different things, especially in relation to the changing meta.

So, it is not even crazy to think that the elemenatlist used 90% of it’s skills at one time or another in PvP.

My guess is most people can’t comprehend the elementalist as anything more than a “nuker”.

So, where are your proof that “90% of the elementalist skills and 75% of the profession skills” where actually used at some time? And we all know that we talked about used for real, not used for 10 minutes because someone was bored.

CakeGuy.4735:

one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

People keep talking about balance, but that is not what this thread was about. It was about customization—the amount of skill options a player has, build diversity.

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that GW1 had fantastic balance. The issue is not how the system was implemented, but what the system consisted of. It had a great deal of variety. Even if some are going to argue that this variety was largely (or completely?) an illusion and/or poorly implemented, people like the idea of having a lot of options and a lot of choices and some (many?) players enjoyed working through the variety to grow and build their character.

At the end of the day, balance is irrelevant to the discussion because all that’s being said is that some players desire more customization. That GW1 produced customization at the expense of balance doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with GW2, which has produced balance at the expense of customization.

@vayne finally someone who also sees at least a noticeable part of the picture.

I’m just a new former so I don’t know this forest trees thing. But I totally understand your views.

Now let’s just leave this thread because I know that you know that everything we are talking about here is 99% pointless.

Perspective… It decides the people who will be stuck as mere gamers and those who will move onto the next level.

Good day young ones.

Guns and Giblets.9308:

CakeGuy.4735:

one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

People keep talking about balance, but that is not what this thread was about. It was about customization—the amount of skill options a player has, build diversity.

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that GW1 had fantastic balance. The issue is not how the system was implemented, but what the system consisted of. It had a great deal of variety. Even if some are going to argue that this variety was largely (or completely?) an illusion and/or poorly implemented, people like the idea of having a lot of options and a lot of choices and some (many?) players enjoyed working through the variety to grow and build their character.

At the end of the day, balance is irrelevant to the discussion because all that’s being said is that some players desire more customization. That GW1 produced customization at the expense of balance doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with GW2, which has produced balance at the expense of customization.

Well the lack of balance may of what kept GW1 from an E-sport level game like they are trying to do with GW2. Yes GW1 had torments but they where healed by Anet not by the E-sport community. You will find that most games that are ran for e-sports are some what simplistic when they first get in but they become more complex as time goes on. This is to make sure that you do not have one class wining all the time or one build to make sure there is an ok level of balance to keep the game competitive.

Jski.6180:

Guns and Giblets.9308:

CakeGuy.4735:

one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

People keep talking about balance, but that is not what this thread was about. It was about customization—the amount of skill options a player has, build diversity.

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that GW1 had fantastic balance. The issue is not how the system was implemented, but what the system consisted of. It had a great deal of variety. Even if some are going to argue that this variety was largely (or completely?) an illusion and/or poorly implemented, people like the idea of having a lot of options and a lot of choices and some (many?) players enjoyed working through the variety to grow and build their character.

At the end of the day, balance is irrelevant to the discussion because all that’s being said is that some players desire more customization. That GW1 produced customization at the expense of balance doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with GW2, which has produced balance at the expense of customization.

Well the lack of balance may of what kept GW1 from an E-sport level game like they are trying to do with GW2. Yes GW1 had torments but they where healed by Anet not by the E-sport community. You will find that most games that are ran for e-sports are some what simplistic when they first get in but they become more complex as time goes on. This is to make sure that you do not have one class wining all the time or one build to make sure there is an ok level of balance to keep the game competitive.

I love that you think you know even the first thing about PvP in GW1. Did you ever even go into Heroe’s Ascent let alone hold halls?

Did your guild ever beat a top 100 guild in GvG?

Did you ever even go into GvG and win a match against anyone?

Serophous.9085:

I guess what people should remember is with nostalgia, you only tend to remember the good times and ignore the bad. Its like with the WoW group. ‘BC was the best. BC was the greatest.’ Do they also remember when every 2v2 team was most like resto druid / class x? Do they remember feral druids having avoided the hybrid tax and were killing people and OP, resulting in the second biggest nerf at that time? Do they remember druids healing metely by shapeshifting? Nope! Those were the bad memories that they dont wan to remember as it would taint the happiness they want to feel.

This happens to every mmo. I bet if we could dig up the beginning forums of gw1, we would see just as many complaints as we see now.

Yah, and they had some of the same complaints. Game is for casuals, it’s a failure, etc…
Example:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blackace
A.)I dont think this game failed either, but it is not as succesful as people think it is according to the original focus the game claimed it set out to be

B.)This game is not free
a) this game wasn’t a complete failure…but if I was ArenaNet I’d be putting a tally mark in the “Failures” column. It fell desperately short of it’s original goal. The game is visually breathtaking and a lot of fun to play for a pretty good amount of time. But it didn’t achieve it’s primary goal. PvP lacks competition and original thought and the PvE is mindnumbingly boring after your first time through it. It’s going to take something drastic to save this game.

b) thank you for pointing out that the game isn’t free…I’m tired of listening to people argue that we should “take what we got because the game is free”…last I checked I spent 50 bucks on it.

http://web.archive.org/liveweb/http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/any-predictions-about-gws-futurei-t54392p2.html

Edit: they also complained about how grindy the game was. :-)

clay.7849:

I love that you think you know even the first thing about PvP in GW1. Did you ever even go into Heroe’s Ascent let alone hold halls?

Did your guild ever beat a top 100 guild in GvG?

Did you ever even go into GvG and win a match against anyone?

I love the fact that you constantly posts stuff on these forums, but whenever someone asks for an actual source you simply ignore it.

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

I love that you think you know even the first thing about PvP in GW1. Did you ever even go into Heroe’s Ascent let alone hold halls?

Did your guild ever beat a top 100 guild in GvG?

Did you ever even go into GvG and win a match against anyone?

I love the fact that you constantly posts stuff on these forums, but whenever someone asks for an actual source you simply ignore it.

Oh yea, that 90% thing? I don’t care to take the time to do hours worth of work just to prove my point. Sorry. I don’t really care if you believe me or not. If you played PvP from Prophecies through Nightfall you would just know the amount of builds and creativity that went into the game and the various metas.

Sorry?

clay.7849:

Jski.6180:

Guns and Giblets.9308:

CakeGuy.4735:

one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

People keep talking about balance, but that is not what this thread was about. It was about customization—the amount of skill options a player has, build diversity.

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that GW1 had fantastic balance. The issue is not how the system was implemented, but what the system consisted of. It had a great deal of variety. Even if some are going to argue that this variety was largely (or completely?) an illusion and/or poorly implemented, people like the idea of having a lot of options and a lot of choices and some (many?) players enjoyed working through the variety to grow and build their character.

At the end of the day, balance is irrelevant to the discussion because all that’s being said is that some players desire more customization. That GW1 produced customization at the expense of balance doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with GW2, which has produced balance at the expense of customization.

Well the lack of balance may of what kept GW1 from an E-sport level game like they are trying to do with GW2. Yes GW1 had torments but they where healed by Anet not by the E-sport community. You will find that most games that are ran for e-sports are some what simplistic when they first get in but they become more complex as time goes on. This is to make sure that you do not have one class wining all the time or one build to make sure there is an ok level of balance to keep the game competitive.

I love that you think you know even the first thing about PvP in GW1. Did you ever even go into Heroe’s Ascent let alone hold halls?

Did your guild ever beat a top 100 guild in GvG?

Did you ever even go into GvG and win a match against anyone?

I know nothing about it and i truly do not wish to know about it because GW1 IS DEAD and i will never play it. Also this IS a GW2 forum if you wished to talk about GW1 then you should go to GW1 forums. Any way GW1 was never an E-sport that alone shows a problem with GW1 pvp and Anet is trying to fix this with GW2 by making it an E-sport.

clay.7849:

Oh yea, that 90% thing? I don’t care to take the time to do hours worth of work just to prove my point. Sorry. I don’t really care if you believe me or not. If you played PvP from Prophecies through Nightfall you would just know the amount of builds and creativity that went into the game and the various metas.

Sorry?

So your posts are simply bullkitten that you don’t even want to try to prove correct?

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

Oh yea, that 90% thing? I don’t care to take the time to do hours worth of work just to prove my point. Sorry. I don’t really care if you believe me or not. If you played PvP from Prophecies through Nightfall you would just know the amount of builds and creativity that went into the game and the various metas.

Sorry?

So your posts are simply bullkitten that you don’t even want to try to prove correct?

No, they are right, I’m just not gonna do hours worth of work for someone like you. Why would I?

Guns and Giblets.9308:

CakeGuy.4735:

one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

People keep talking about balance, but that is not what this thread was about. It was about customization—the amount of skill options a player has, build diversity.

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that GW1 had fantastic balance. The issue is not how the system was implemented, but what the system consisted of. It had a great deal of variety. Even if some are going to argue that this variety was largely (or completely?) an illusion and/or poorly implemented, people like the idea of having a lot of options and a lot of choices and some (many?) players enjoyed working through the variety to grow and build their character.

At the end of the day, balance is irrelevant to the discussion because all that’s being said is that some players desire more customization. That GW1 produced customization at the expense of balance doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with GW2, which has produced balance at the expense of customization.

GW2 is more build-based and your customization is through your traiting, not your skillbar, and that you technically have much more free-form customization between fights because you can toggle in and out your weapons, utilities, elites, heals, and major traits at no expense (or need to go somewhere like a town) as long as you’re not in combat.

Not that there isn’t a disbalance between skills for viable builds/the necessity of CD reduction traits doesn’t limit you, but at least the first can be fixed (and Anet is trying to fix) to increase the breadth of customization, and the latter… I doubt if a change well be seen, I personally would have kept skill CDs lower and nixed reductions out of traits completely so it’s not such a problem for keeping up with the fast pace on combat.

And it’s of disingenuous, then, to compare GW1’s skill-diversity after years of expanded material and GW2 before its first expansion has even happened. Of course it has less customization than GW1—it hasn’t had the time to build up as many weapon sets, utilities, elites, etc. Your format is a little more locked but I honestly don’t think that spells the be all, end all of customization because each section can still be expanded upon to have more internal choice. Most classes at 5-6 different weapon sets to combine for two weapons sets (sans Ele and Engi, and Engi has even less weapon choice,) looks limiting when each weapon has a set skillbar, especially because not all weapons are of equal viability, but if we were looking at more like 9-10 weapons that could be combined into two sets, of weapons that are actually equally strong, would it really feel the same?

athuria.2751:

And it’s of disingenuous, then, to compare GW1’s skill-diversity after years of expanded material and GW2 before its first expansion has even happened. Of course it has less customization than GW1—it hasn’t had the time to build up as many weapon sets, utilities, elites, etc.

This is not true because prophecies was the first campaign, and had WAY more build diversity then GW2 does now. So… what now?

clay.7849:

No, they are right, I’m just not gonna do hours worth of work for someone like you. Why would I?

Because posting stuff and claiming they are fact but refuse to actually provide any proof is stupid and just makes you look silly.

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

No, they are right, I’m just not gonna do hours worth of work for someone like you. Why would I?

Because posting stuff and claiming they are fact but refuse to actually provide any proof is stupid and just makes you look silly.

Awww shucks. Guess I’m stupid and look silly now.

clay.7849:

athuria.2751:

And it’s of disingenuous, then, to compare GW1’s skill-diversity after years of expanded material and GW2 before its first expansion has even happened. Of course it has less customization than GW1—it hasn’t had the time to build up as many weapon sets, utilities, elites, etc.

This is not true because prophecies was the first campaign, and had WAY more build diversity then GW2 does now. So… what now?

A) I did say skill-diversity there, which isn’t exactly the same as build-diversity and I’d say there’s a strong schism between the two in GW2 than there was in 1 where builds were entirely around your skillbar.

B) So compare GW1 Prophecy’s diversity when it came out to GW2 as it came out, don’t try and draw comparisons between them when one gets an extra few years of development the other one hasn’t had, that is the part that’s inequal.

C) Which, yes, GW1 still had more skills coming out than GW2, but that’s because GW1 was based around skill-diversity because… that’s really all your build was. GW2 is a much broad base in build-diversity, where traits have a very strong presence in combat and are part of your customization, rather than just which utilities you toggle on for which fight. There’s also that we have access to more skills at once than GW1, so picking-and-choosing isn’t as significant an issue as it is learning to play all these skills off each other/being aware what every skill you have can do so you know what is good for which fights. Kind of like special enemy weaknesses/strengths did in GW1, where you had to change your skillset around sometimes to counter a specific group of foes (which GW2 has at a smaller degree, you just get to toggle them on in the middle of the field/dungeon instead of having to run back to town).

clay.7849:

lordkrall.7241:

clay.7849:

No, they are right, I’m just not gonna do hours worth of work for someone like you. Why would I?

Because posting stuff and claiming they are fact but refuse to actually provide any proof is stupid and just makes you look silly.

Awww shucks. Guess I’m stupid and look silly now.

Not so much “stupid and silly” as not using arguing your points properly. Anyone can come on to a thread and make claims. The difference is whether that person can back them up. If a person comes to a thread, makes a claim that x% of people do y, then they either need to prove it or they need to stop making these claims. It drags down the conversation when people make claims they then refuse to show proof for. And other people then think, this person is biased, has an axe to grind and doesn’t know how to debate a point.

clay.7849:

Jski.6180:

Guns and Giblets.9308:

CakeGuy.4735:

one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

People keep talking about balance, but that is not what this thread was about. It was about customization—the amount of skill options a player has, build diversity.

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that GW1 had fantastic balance. The issue is not how the system was implemented, but what the system consisted of. It had a great deal of variety. Even if some are going to argue that this variety was largely (or completely?) an illusion and/or poorly implemented, people like the idea of having a lot of options and a lot of choices and some (many?) players enjoyed working through the variety to grow and build their character.

At the end of the day, balance is irrelevant to the discussion because all that’s being said is that some players desire more customization. That GW1 produced customization at the expense of balance doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with GW2, which has produced balance at the expense of customization.

Well the lack of balance may of what kept GW1 from an E-sport level game like they are trying to do with GW2. Yes GW1 had torments but they where healed by Anet not by the E-sport community. You will find that most games that are ran for e-sports are some what simplistic when they first get in but they become more complex as time goes on. This is to make sure that you do not have one class wining all the time or one build to make sure there is an ok level of balance to keep the game competitive.

I love that you think you know even the first thing about PvP in GW1. Did you ever even go into Heroe’s Ascent let alone hold halls?

Did your guild ever beat a top 100 guild in GvG?

Did you ever even go into GvG and win a match against anyone?

1) Yes
2) Yes
3) Yes

And what he says is true.

You do realize that the prophecies meta had very few builds that were actually utilized right?
Monks picked between about 9-10 skills and ran a Mesmer or Necro elite.

Sure there were a few gimmicks like FC air spike. The dominate build was a rainbowspike consisting of 2 warriors 2 mesmers 2 elementalists (one ran flags) and 2 monks with teams running nearly identical setups.
Sure there were other builds in the meta – not nearly as many as the op seemed to think were viable.

There are more viable builds in GW2 than there were in GW1 prophecies. (I’m not including factions onward because I want to keep the comparison apples to apples.)

Balance is completely relevant to the discussion of having more skills because that’s the trade off, more skills inherently means that the game gets harder to balance. When you keep things down to small subset of skills that can be brought its much easier to balance them.

For example, look at an e-sport game like League of Legends, each champion has FOUR skills and no flexibility.

GW1 had far less build diversity than you seem to be giving it.

I’ve been in my Guild Wars 2 off season for six months.
.

Guild Wars 2’s combat and skill system wasn’t good enough to keep me interested. I was still playing Guild Wars 1 even after I had my fill of new content, and that was becuase of its skill system alone.
.

The thing that’s lacking in Guild Wars 2’s combat and skill system for me, and possibly others, is that there aren’t a numerous viable ways to play in combat.
.

I’m not talking about builds, bcs technically builds are different by one trait, or one slot skill. I’m talking about things at a much higher level than that, because it’s higher level issues that lose people, not the low level small details.
.

Combat in Guild Wars 2 isn’t even limited because of the skill system, it’s limited because there are only a few ways to do combat and very little flexibility for blending the ways to play that are there.
.

Maybe it’s different now, but while I was playing… I observed the following ways to play…

• Bunker builds – Tanky with survival
• Pressure builds – Consistent DoT
• Roamer builds – Mobile spike damage

If there’s more than those three now, awesome. I played those three types of builds in their various incarnations on the professions. Theif was one of the better roamers. Guardian was one of the better Bunkers. Warrior was one of the better pressurers. And Elementalist is really the only Prof that can blend those three concepts together to be a jack of all trades and master of nothing
.

In Guild Wars 1 there was a high degree of flexibility for blending playstyles. The ways I observed a lot more ways to play where builds could completely revolve around a combat concept…

• Tank builds
• Healer builds
• Pressure builds
• Spike builds
• Shutdown builds
• Area Control builds
  .

Me personally looking at this comparison. I see GW2 with 3 ways to play and very little blending of those three ways. I see GW1 with 6 ways to play and a lot of flexibility to blend those styles. That’s 100% difference with a significant degree of flexibility.
.

That was what didn’t hold me to GW2, the thing that pushed me out, was the direction PvE seems to be going which is where it’s more about Stats from Gear than Builds, Combat, and Strategy to overcome challenges. Which started with the Lost Coast content.

Draygo.9473:

clay.7849:

Jski.6180:

Guns and Giblets.9308:

CakeGuy.4735:

one should consider if the game is truly balanced or not.

People keep talking about balance, but that is not what this thread was about. It was about customization—the amount of skill options a player has, build diversity.

I don’t think anyone here is arguing that GW1 had fantastic balance. The issue is not how the system was implemented, but what the system consisted of. It had a great deal of variety. Even if some are going to argue that this variety was largely (or completely?) an illusion and/or poorly implemented, people like the idea of having a lot of options and a lot of choices and some (many?) players enjoyed working through the variety to grow and build their character.

At the end of the day, balance is irrelevant to the discussion because all that’s being said is that some players desire more customization. That GW1 produced customization at the expense of balance doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with GW2, which has produced balance at the expense of customization.

Well the lack of balance may of what kept GW1 from an E-sport level game like they are trying to do with GW2. Yes GW1 had torments but they where healed by Anet not by the E-sport community. You will find that most games that are ran for e-sports are some what simplistic when they first get in but they become more complex as time goes on. This is to make sure that you do not have one class wining all the time or one build to make sure there is an ok level of balance to keep the game competitive.

I love that you think you know even the first thing about PvP in GW1. Did you ever even go into Heroe’s Ascent let alone hold halls?

Did your guild ever beat a top 100 guild in GvG?

Did you ever even go into GvG and win a match against anyone?

1) Yes
2) Yes
3) Yes

And what he says is true.

You do realize that the prophecies meta had very few builds that were actually utilized right?
Monks picked between about 9-10 skills and ran a Mesmer or Necro elite.

Sure there were a few gimmicks like FC air spike. The dominate build was a rainbowspike consisting of 2 warriors 2 mesmers 2 elementalists (one ran flags) and 2 monks with teams running nearly identical setups.
Sure there were other builds in the meta – not nearly as many as the op seemed to think were viable.

There are more viable builds in GW2 than there were in GW1 prophecies. (I’m not including factions onward because I want to keep the comparison apples to apples.)

Balance is completely relevant to the discussion of having more skills because that’s the trade off, more skills inherently means that the game gets harder to balance. When you keep things down to small subset of skills that can be brought its much easier to balance them.

For example, look at an e-sport game like League of Legends, each champion has FOUR skills and no flexibility.

GW1 had far less build diversity than you seem to be giving it.

Well, using monks, specifically boon/prot as the only example is a bit disingenuous, don’t you think?

In fact, I am pretty sure that the GWWC championship game was played by one team that utilized three monks. And the team that won was based around a splitting.

I mean, there was a spike element developed into a lot of builds, but that doesn’t make all builds like that a rainbow spike.

But, I think you glaze over a lot when you say “sure there were other builds in the meta.” I mean, that is what we are saying isn’t it?

And, yes, I agree 1000% that adding more skills makes balance harder. Although, I think it was the addition of classes that specifically screwed up balance more and more in GW1 – not necessarily the addition of new skills. To support this – look at how many OP builds (genuinely OP builds) were based around new classes.

I really disagree that there are more viable builds in GW2 PvP than there were in GW1 PvP.

your missing a little in your description.

You have to keep in mind that partially its the fault of the capture point meta though.

Bunker builds not only are highly survivable ‘tank’ builds they also have significant area control and denial.

The only 2 things I see missing out of gw2 are pure healers (which I don’t miss) and shutdown builds. Shutdown is only needed when healers exist in my opinion though because if you cant shut down healers then you wont get kills. Sounds like you just prefer the healer included system.

If you are talking gw:p vs gw2, there are far more viable builds right now in gw2 than gw1 had 6 months in. GW1 with everything included has far more viable builds today than gw2 has, but that’s not apple to apple.

Draygo.9473:

your missing a little in your description.

You have to keep in mind that partially its the fault of the capture point meta though.

Bunker builds not only are highly survivable ‘tank’ builds they also have significant area control and denial.

The only 2 things I see missing out of gw2 are pure healers (which I don’t miss) and shutdown builds. Shutdown is only needed when healers exist in my opinion though because if you cant shut down healers then you wont get kills. Sounds like you just prefer the healer included system.

If you are talking gw:p vs gw2, there are far more viable builds right now in gw2 than gw1 had 6 months in. GW1 with everything included has far more viable builds today than gw2 has, but that’s not apple to apple.

Well, yes, that is correct. And yes, I prefer a meta that is balanced around something other than damage, bunkers and capture points. I do prefer a healer/prot or some sort of more damage vs. prot vs. removal kind of system.

I guess using PvP is a bad example as GvG and HA are much different than GW2 conquest. Not to mention the fact that one of the designs of this game is to make all classes viable.

To be honest you can still run a pseudo-shutdown build in the form of control builds, they’re just not very popular because control is so inconsistent in PvE and sees limited use in large-scale combat in WvW. I think it has more of a place in PvP (1v1, kicking people off points), but it’s also more intensive to play managing a very mobile target/having to be familiar with using a largely variety of control types (including conditions such as blind) and what player skills look like to disrupt since you can’t just watch the UI.

Draygo.9473:

your missing a little in your description.

You have to keep in mind that partially its the fault of the capture point meta though.

Bunker builds not only are highly survivable ‘tank’ builds they also have significant area control and denial.

The only 2 things I see missing out of gw2 are pure healers (which I don’t miss) and shutdown builds. Shutdown is only needed when healers exist in my opinion though because if you cant shut down healers then you wont get kills. Sounds like you just prefer the healer included system.

If you are talking gw:p vs gw2, there are far more viable builds right now in gw2 than gw1 had 6 months in. GW1 with everything included has far more viable builds today than gw2 has, but that’s not apple to apple.

Bunkers have some area control (like the Guardian), but there aren’t builds that are centered around it like, spirit walls, minion walls, Wards + DoT AoEs. Guild Wars 2 has some of those concepts in the Bunker, Roamer, Pressure playstyles, but they aren’t a playstyle in and off itself like in Guild Wars.

I definitely like the healing playstyle, as my primary in GW1 was a monk. I miss it a lot. Shutdown was also something I liked playing, but I didn’t just utilitize it for healers, I would also use it to keep pressure off my party. There is a lot more depth and breadth to GW1 combat, which I prefer.

athuria.2751:

B) So compare GW1 Prophecy’s diversity when it came out to GW2 as it came out, don’t try and draw comparisons between them when one gets an extra few years of development the other one hasn’t had, that is the part that’s inequal.

This is an analogy I haven’t really understood. It would make sense if Guild Wars 2 was built by a completely different team or, really, was a completely different game. But Guild Wars 2 builds on Guild Wars 1, so part of the development time should apply to the ideas and refinement that was made in Guild Wars 1; it’s not a completely fresh start.

Obviously you have to give some measure of development “grace” (as it were) when a new iteration comes out. But to say that we can only compare the beginning of GW1 to the beginning of GW2 seems to leave out all the development that GW2 ostensibly built on.

Shockwave.1230:

Draygo.9473:

your missing a little in your description.

You have to keep in mind that partially its the fault of the capture point meta though.

Bunker builds not only are highly survivable ‘tank’ builds they also have significant area control and denial.

The only 2 things I see missing out of gw2 are pure healers (which I don’t miss) and shutdown builds. Shutdown is only needed when healers exist in my opinion though because if you cant shut down healers then you wont get kills. Sounds like you just prefer the healer included system.

If you are talking gw:p vs gw2, there are far more viable builds right now in gw2 than gw1 had 6 months in. GW1 with everything included has far more viable builds today than gw2 has, but that’s not apple to apple.

Bunkers have some area control (like the Guardian), but there aren’t builds that are centered around it like, spirit walls, minion walls, Wards + DoT AoEs. Guild Wars 2 has some of those concepts in the Bunker, Roamer, Pressure playstyles, but they aren’t a playstyle in and off itself like in Guild Wars.

I definitely like the healing playstyle, as my primary in GW1 was a monk. I miss it a lot. Shutdown was also something I liked playing, but I didn’t just utilitize it for healers, I would also use it to keep pressure off my party. There is a lot more depth and breadth to GW1 combat, which I prefer.

I don’t know about you but I called what you are calling shutdown as mitigation.

No matter how hard you tried in gw1, you couldn’t completely shut down someone especially if they knew what they were doing. I am running a physical shutdown build in gw2 right now that can lock an enemy player for quite a bit of time – if they let me.

If it was GW1 that build would be more powerful, but in GW2 you have a dodge button which can create gaps in my shutdown.

There are shutdown builds in gw2, the game doesn’t revolve around or allow hard shutdown builds – they arnt fun to play against.

Guns and Giblets.9308:

athuria.2751:

B) So compare GW1 Prophecy’s diversity when it came out to GW2 as it came out, don’t try and draw comparisons between them when one gets an extra few years of development the other one hasn’t had, that is the part that’s inequal.

This is an analogy I haven’t really understood. It would make sense if Guild Wars 2 was built by a completely different team or, really, was a completely different game. But Guild Wars 2 builds on Guild Wars 1, so part of the development time should apply to the ideas and refinement that was made in Guild Wars 1; it’s not a completely fresh start.

Obviously you have to give some measure of development “grace” (as it were) when a new iteration comes out. But to say that we can only compare the beginning of GW1 to the beginning of GW2 seems to leave out all the development that GW2 ostensibly built on.

I’m saying compare them both in their base iterations for quantity, because learning lessons through your development =/= you can pump out the same amount of content in half the time as you did before, even if that content takes a significant step in another direction where the mechanics aren’t the same. Being able to take the time it took to make Prophecies (idk if we have a timeframe for this like GW2 but ~3-5 years is pretty average for a game like that) + the 3-4 years expanding past it to create over 1000 skills does not mean you will be able to churn out over 1000 skills in the beginning of what is largely a new game that has had a lot of time and resources spent developing other things like the art, event system, storyline, maps, etc.

Hell, even the skill system between the two is totally different—GW1’s freeform mechanic against GW2’s weapon sets, which need some base synergy within themselves so that they’re actually strong and useless and not a sloppy hodgepodge of unrelated ideas. And a lot of GW1 skills/playstyles (the way a Mesmer shut things down) were cut out for not fitting into this new style of play, so the pool of existing skills (which they did draw from, and made up new skills alongside it) is more limited than that.