Guild Wars 2

Einlanzer.1627:

Gaile Gray.6029:

Andraus.3874:

My feedback is about how feedback actually works.

It’s great you guys ask for feedback. I really do appreciate that. However if you hang out in the forums long enough you start to feel that the feedback isn’t going anywhere. This needs to be more of an ongoing and reciprocal conversation. Out of our feedback I would expect a post addressed to the player base saying " We heard you on the following points, we will be looking into them as resources allow. [followed by a list of points]." Then perhaps later or with the same post: “Points 3,7,12, and 15 are going to be a higher priority for us. Points 5,8, and 9 may not be something that is possible. Again this information is tentative and subject to change.”

I understand the player base takes things literally so you have to be carful what you say. But it feels like we have all these threads about good feedback and very little comes out of them. I’m not sure what this disconnect is but it has become apparent to anyone that frequents the forums.

If you read this I genuinely thank you for your time and thank you for making a great game. I hope we can work together to keep it that way.

I understand your thoughts, and perhaps we will be able to do that for some topics in the future; I agree it would be great! But what’s important to note is that we all — as forum members — have a certain level of visibility into our how feedback is handled simply by our participation here on the forums and our involvement in the game.

Here’s what I mean: I’ve seen the request for “gliding in central Tyria” hundreds of times on the forums. I’ve heard it in the game a hundred times, too! So when I see it come to the game, as a player and a forum member I know that ArenaNet listened to player/forum member feedback. I don’t need someone to come and tell me that, I can actually see it in the update notes and in the game.

So while I’m not discounting — believe me, I would be absolutely the last person to discount the potential or the value of further communication; trust me on that! — I like to think of an old expression that my granny said, “The proof is in the pudding.” In this case, take that odd expression to mean that we, as players and forum members, can see through actual game development that the feedback that we give is being read, reviewed, analyzed, and often implemented!

Again I do love communication, and I positively adore when devs post, or when they ask me to post on their or their team’s behalf. But I’m also aware that communication comes through many forms, including that demonstration through actual game changes. And because of that, I like the idea of productive threads like this, which you should know will be shared with every single member of the ArenaNet team as highly-suggested reading.

Anyway, I hope that makes sense. It’s just a personal opinion, but I like to think it has a certain logic.

I agree with his post. The main reason there’s so much angst on the forums is not so much that Anet doesn’t communicate enough, it’s that Anet doesn’t interact enough. Giant blogposts and requests for feedback do not carry the same weight that just being active on the forums and responding to peoples’ questions, thoughts, and concerns does. Half the time nobody understands the rationale behind balance changes that are made because the game designers in charge of profession balance are never on the class boards discussing them with people the way they should be.

I’m not sure why that message seems to be so lost in Anet’s culture.

anet seems to operate in a push mode only, they develop stuff, usually in secret and then push it to us. Same with information, very little of that is open directly to discussion.

It really is something like the Monty Python spam sketch, no matter what you ask for you get more spam. That might be OK in PvE but is still bad even there.

It is especially true in WvW. When the Golem Rush week happened they could have listened and stopped it dead, they didn’t. Since the new WvW maps have come out there has been very little if any response from anet to issues.

So people are very pessimistic about anet and it’s listening capability.

Mostly what I have noticed in HoT is that most classes, if built and used correctly, are massively OP. My ranger, a design I produced for camp capping in WvW is one of those. I can take on a group of Mordrem without any real problem. I beat Potoni the Massive, a champion, fairly easily last night. OK, the ele who arrived during the fight died fairly quickly but they went right up against the champ and just stood there.

Considering that ele, raids are too tough for that kind of person. They were built for the elite players and maxed out builds – not the average player. anet needs to take both into account when designing raid instances, perhaps by putting in a ‘challenge mote’ for elites and a lesser option for everyone else. A couple of minutes longer and making those green circles always appear in a clear zone would be a great help, preferably not spawning just before a zone transition.

Really that is the failure of the first raid wing, against the plan to destroy the DPS meta, they have just reinforced it. Everything is more DPS, more condi damage, more dps. With that time limit a team with more defense simply can’t make it. Personally there is very little reason to have the time limit at all.

If I find this very difficult to impossible you can guarantee most of the other players do too.

While you are at it check out the adventures, some of them are a bit too tough and losing access from them just because night comes or the Chak Gherent appears or the dev’s granny’s washing is stuck in the machine is silly.

Serious.6940:

Einlanzer.1627:

Gaile Gray.6029:

Andraus.3874:

My feedback is about how feedback actually works.

It’s great you guys ask for feedback. I really do appreciate that. However if you hang out in the forums long enough you start to feel that the feedback isn’t going anywhere. This needs to be more of an ongoing and reciprocal conversation. Out of our feedback I would expect a post addressed to the player base saying " We heard you on the following points, we will be looking into them as resources allow. [followed by a list of points]." Then perhaps later or with the same post: “Points 3,7,12, and 15 are going to be a higher priority for us. Points 5,8, and 9 may not be something that is possible. Again this information is tentative and subject to change.”

I understand the player base takes things literally so you have to be carful what you say. But it feels like we have all these threads about good feedback and very little comes out of them. I’m not sure what this disconnect is but it has become apparent to anyone that frequents the forums.

If you read this I genuinely thank you for your time and thank you for making a great game. I hope we can work together to keep it that way.

I understand your thoughts, and perhaps we will be able to do that for some topics in the future; I agree it would be great! But what’s important to note is that we all — as forum members — have a certain level of visibility into our how feedback is handled simply by our participation here on the forums and our involvement in the game.

Here’s what I mean: I’ve seen the request for “gliding in central Tyria” hundreds of times on the forums. I’ve heard it in the game a hundred times, too! So when I see it come to the game, as a player and a forum member I know that ArenaNet listened to player/forum member feedback. I don’t need someone to come and tell me that, I can actually see it in the update notes and in the game.

So while I’m not discounting — believe me, I would be absolutely the last person to discount the potential or the value of further communication; trust me on that! — I like to think of an old expression that my granny said, “The proof is in the pudding.” In this case, take that odd expression to mean that we, as players and forum members, can see through actual game development that the feedback that we give is being read, reviewed, analyzed, and often implemented!

Again I do love communication, and I positively adore when devs post, or when they ask me to post on their or their team’s behalf. But I’m also aware that communication comes through many forms, including that demonstration through actual game changes. And because of that, I like the idea of productive threads like this, which you should know will be shared with every single member of the ArenaNet team as highly-suggested reading.

Anyway, I hope that makes sense. It’s just a personal opinion, but I like to think it has a certain logic.

I agree with his post. The main reason there’s so much angst on the forums is not so much that Anet doesn’t communicate enough, it’s that Anet doesn’t interact enough. Giant blogposts and requests for feedback do not carry the same weight that just being active on the forums and responding to peoples’ questions, thoughts, and concerns does. Half the time nobody understands the rationale behind balance changes that are made because the game designers in charge of profession balance are never on the class boards discussing them with people the way they should be.

I’m not sure why that message seems to be so lost in Anet’s culture.

anet seems to operate in a push mode only, they develop stuff, usually in secret and then push it to us. Same with information, very little of that is open directly to discussion.

It really is something like the Monty Python spam sketch, no matter what you ask for you get more spam. That might be OK in PvE but is still bad even there.

It is especially true in WvW. When the Golem Rush week happened they could have listened and stopped it dead, they didn’t. Since the new WvW maps have come out there has been very little if any response from anet to issues.

So people are very pessimistic about anet and it’s listening capability.

Mostly what I have noticed in HoT is that most classes, if built and used correctly, are massively OP. My ranger, a design I produced for camp capping in WvW is one of those. I can take on a group of Mordrem without any real problem. I beat Potoni the Massive, a champion, fairly easily last night. OK, the ele who arrived during the fight died fairly quickly but they went right up against the champ and just stood there.

Considering that ele, raids are too tough for that kind of person. They were built for the elite players and maxed out builds – not the average player. anet needs to take both into account when designing raid instances, perhaps by putting in a ‘challenge mote’ for elites and a lesser option for everyone else. A couple of minutes longer and making those green circles always appear in a clear zone would be a great help, preferably not spawning just before a zone transition.

Really that is the failure of the first raid wing, against the plan to destroy the DPS meta, they have just reinforced it. Everything is more DPS, more condi damage, more dps. With that time limit a team with more defense simply can’t make it. Personally there is very little reason to have the time limit at all.

If I find this very difficult to impossible you can guarantee most of the other players do too.

While you are at it check out the adventures, some of them are a bit too tough and losing access from them just because night comes or the Chak Gherent appears or the dev’s granny’s washing is stuck in the machine is silly.

This guy really gets it.

It shows no respect those who bought the core game when it 1st came out and continued to support with gem purchases, but for one reason or another didn’t or can’t purchase HoT at this time. Adding achievements /rewards / gliding to core game that are useless or can’t be done unless you have HoT (shat for example) is just a kick in the face and the salute. Maybe one day I will be able to get it, but then again I may not want to.

Just one more vote against the mesmer nerfs. Yes chrono-bunker had to go. Yes raid buffs might have been a little too much. No, that does not mean you can essentially cut an Elite spec by half.

You didn’t fix any of the previous over-nerfs (“conditional recharge” traits being weaker than flat 20% ones even when fully exploited???), you didn’t fix things that never worked properly (sustained dps in PvE, lack of reliable AoE for WvW) and instead you pushed out a set of random changes with no real impact.

And while not directly related to this patch, the new breakbar system has utterly destroyed any and all hope for interrupts seeing play in PvE. Can’t you at least make the traits and other “on interrupt” effects activate on breakbar mobs if they’re using a skill while you hard-CC them? Leave out the cooldown increase of Power Block and Distracting Daggers, but it’s heartbreaking to see all those shiny new “on interrupt” sigils as map and story rewards and knowing they will never see any relevant use.

Some changes on the Elementalist Air Traits were given. A Lightning Rod bug fix so it may be affected by Tempest Defense which increases the damage dealt to Stunned and Knocked Down foes.

Skills that are not affected by Tempest Defense: Gust, Unsteady Ground, Updraft, Magnetic Shield, Leap Finisher inside Air Fields, Cyclone, Tornado, Tidal Surge, Air Bubble, Undercurrent, Rock Anchor.

However, there is one big issue we’re talking about in the Elementalist Forums and community. Elementalists have a wide variety of Crowd Control sources (Sink, Float, Pull, Lauch, Daze, Knockback, Knockdown, Stuns..). Why isn’t Tempest Defense increasing the damage from every sources of CC (On disabled foes) instead of only stunned foes? On subject, the Warhorn, which has two high damaging skills doing a disable (not a stun or a knockdown). Unfortunately, those skill do not work with Tempest Defense’s damage increase.

Elementalists were thrilled to know that their damaging options (in PvP) would be looked at. But sadly, it was an half-measure.

Thank you.

Overall, the PvE additions were pretty good. Not much wrong there.

Where I’ll complain is the Balance portion:

- Changing Revenant Sword to focus less on Autos is a great idea, but the execution was bad, or rather, unfinished. If the Sword is to take a role of “singling out” targets, it simply can’t have two skills that target different things uncontrollably. Precision Strike and Unrelenting Assault need to be made into single-target skills for this to work properly. Currently, Sword loses a lot of damage if we get a single extra target. That includes Ranger pets, Mesmer illusions, Necro minions, another player, or even boxes, houses, and other objects!
While on the topic of Sword, Shackling Wave is too expensive to be useful. It needs to be dropped to at least 10.
Grasping Shadow is an interesting idea, but its range is way too small and it just isn’t terribly useful in any realistic scenario. Consider making it teleport a target with you at range.
I.E. Revenant uses Grasping Shadow from say 600 units away, teleports to their target, pulls them down, and then teleports back to the original location.
It would be far more useful for picking off targets.

- You nerfed Infuse Light again and Crystal Hibernation/Soothing Bastion, which is fine, but our other Heal skills are really lacking. Soothing Stone cleanses AFTER healing, which makes it super weak against Poison even though it’s one of our only cleanses. Ventari has trouble keeping the player alive because all the bonuses only affect allies, all the skills cost a ton of energy, and he has no Stun Breaker. Enchanted Daggers can be reflected and are only good if you’ve got good offensive pressure; more of a DPS increase than a heal, which I understand is intended, but Empowering Misery is just a worse Consume Conditions in almost every single way possible and is the only “decent” heal after Infuse Light.
We have such a big over-reliance on Infuse Light and Shield (aka Herald) because of this. Core Revenant has really bad healing options.

- Jalis, Ventari, and Mallyx issues were never addressed or even acknowledged (so many issues that I think it’s better to just go read the Revenant section).
Jalis has like one good skill (which breaks on terrain), Ventari is way too expensive, and Mallyx (and the Corruption line) doesn’t know if he wants to hoard conditions or not.

- Hammer is terrible at kiting or keeping enemies at range. All it really has going for it is CoR spam. I suggest you move the damage from the third hit of CoR and give it to Phase Smash and Drop the Hammer. Along with that, Phase Smash should be an attack and then a backwards roll (like Withdraw) while Drop the Hammer should have its cast time reduced to ~3/4s or 1s and could potentially cause a knock*back* instead.
Field of the Mists should also be just a tad faster.
This will make Hammer much better as a ranged weapon and not so dependent on CoR, which also wont be hitting for so much.

- Unwavering Avoidance didn’t really deserve the ICD since Enhanced Bulwark is what makes it so powerful. The latter also doesn’t really “fit” with the Herald line anyway. Glint doesn’t have any Stability which means that taking Enhanced Bulwark forces the Revenant to take either Retribution or Jalis (and Inspiring Reinforcements is AWFUL) to have the trait actually do anything useful.

About the Autotargeting, it should show somewhere when its on or off, maybe in the combat dialog. And I must say, I’m in love with that.

Also in love with the object names, I finally can release my Ctrl key =O. How something so simple can be a such life change?

This is strictly from a PVP perspective.

This is going to be pretty long and I don’t want to start a comparison war between the classes. I know all the classes have their issues somewhere but I am just here to add to the class I know most about. I’m no expert and I can be wrong. Please let’s constructively add to the conversation. Here goes:

What are the Elementalist meant to do? The way Ele offensive skills are designed suggests that they are meant to function as a power condi hybrid class. This is more evident if you use the new power condi amulets that were introduced. You may apply pressure with attack power and conditions mainly burning and bleeding (Drake’s breath and warhorn 5 skill for example). Air would be the main source of damage if built glass cannon or with crusader’s or paladin’s etc. The main problem comes from the fact that Eles can barely do any of both effectively (especially to a moving target). In trying to cover so many forms of damage, they end up not really being effective at any form of damage. Who is going to stand in place for the entire duration of drake’s breath, or any of the slow and telegraphed scepter and staff auto attacks (Air could or could not be useful depends on preference I guess), the slow animation of Dragon’s tooth, most damaging fields that you can walk out of, ice spike, lightning surge (I hope you get the point).

Everything or at least almost everything that allows the Ele to do damage is slow or hard to land and does less damage than pretty much every class for much more effort, precision and timing (with the exception of overloads which felt like a distracting way of answering the problem core eles face). Anyone just looking and taking their time with an interrupt equipped (which pretty much every class is bound to have) can just interrupt the overload before anything meaningful happens. Stability can be stripped or even converted into a condition with more ease now, thanks to the necro buff. Also, why make the squishy mage class have to go into melee range to be effective with these overloads? Sure we have protection but it suffers from the same issue. An Ele has at least one chance to do anything offensive (more chances if positioned right or goes in at the right time, which can be said for any class), after that they are likely burst down or now, condi bombed down, or at least dealt with enough to keep them out of the fight (which again can be said for all classes).

The reason that this is truly a problem however, is because those chances where we are on the offensive are barely noticeable. The most effective thing an ele can do right now, at least in my opinion, is land a crucial CC to aid the team. After that is wait 30-50 seconds for the chance to land another CC. The reason bunker Ele/ cele Ele was so effective was because it had the sustain for these skills to actually matter. They had enough sustain to return to fire/air and deal damage, they could just out sustain everything (the best offense is defense?). I hated the bunker meta, it was boring, slow and it was too easy to be an Ele, but with the removal of these amulets the problems of the Eles are all too clear. A buff to fresh air is not only, in my opinion, useless but also counterproductive.

The Elementalist was introduced around its four attunements and the proper rotation of those attunements. Why would I want a trait that allows me to do most of my damage in one attunement while sacrificing my other offensive and defensive attunements? For what? To still do less damage than almost any class ? It seems like almost every class, if not every class, can do anything better offensively than an Elementalist. Again, it seemed like the overload was meant to be the solution for the problems I mentioned above but they also suffer from the long period of time before they can actually be effective. To be fair, it was mentioned that an overload would have to be properly timed I’m not here to argue overloads, I’m just here to highlight some of the issues with a class that definitely needs some serious looking into and not just some number tweaks and shatterstone buffs.

All of these factors add up to the fact that it takes an Elementalist nearly 3 times the effort to be as effective as another class. Even if you are a good Ele, which there are and can do amazing things, it’s still not worth it to your team to be an Ele currently simply because you can be so much more effective with almost any other class for less effort. I’m sorry for this long essay and what seems like a rant, but I would really like to see some actual positive changes to the Elementalist that don’t make it absolutely broken and then nerfed to oblivion not long after.

Suggestion
Go back to the initial idea of the Elementalist (centered around proper attunement rotation, really look at the non-synergized trait lines and under used utilities (which I will admit pretty much every class suffers from) and allow the Elementalist to truly feel rewarded for proper attunement rotation. Make rotations feel more active and impactful by improving/reworking the offensive attunements or even allow each attunement to have a meaningful offensive skill/ meaningful synergized skills. As opposed to, if traited for it, you get a boon or some effect based on the attunement. The healing wave and even Electric discharge on switching attunements are on the right track but the others are pretty negligible, especially considering you have to have the traitlines for these effects to take place. (And please try to get some ideas from the Elementalist thread, some people have much better suggestions than I do).

Hopefully this gets read, thank you.

From a perspective of a mesmer you could best read:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Mesmer-Balance-Changes

Pretty good conclusions in there … but nobody seems to be interrested in or to read the profession sub forums. Anyway … gliding is nice … balance patch assasinated chronomancer.

Some additional comments based on further experience:

I still haven’t tried it in PvP yet, but the adjustments to revenant sword do make it more interesting to play in a PvE setting. I can’t speak for where the numbers sit as yet, but I think it is better when Precision Strike is something that’s generally useful rather than only useful if facing three or more opponents. It does seem like it should be set not to target objects, though.

I’ve found my PvP winrate has gone up markedly since the patch. I don’t think this is because I’m playing overpowered professions (not more than my opponents, anyway) or that I’ve suddenly became a better player – instead, I suspect it’s because of the changes to matchmaking to make PUG-versus-team matchups less likely. Almost all of my games are solo queue, which put me on the receiving end of a kerbstomping of a PUG by an organised team on a regular basis… which I think has depressed my winrate and therefore my MMR. So it’ll probably resettle to ~50% over time, but I definitely appreciate that it looks more like it’ll be because I’m playing against equally-skilled opponents rather than swinging between PUG-versus-team matches on the one hand and easy victories against weaker opponents due to having an artificially low MMR on the other.

Maybe it’s just been a fluke, but if it isn’t, it does seem like the changes to matchmaking have made things a lot more comfortable in solo queue (albeit with longer queues, but I’d rather wait longer for an enjoyable game than have a one minute shorter wait for a game that was pretty much decided by uneven matchmaking).

I have just one word of feedback: Fireball.
Let me say it again. Fireball.
Fireball.
Fireball.
Fireball.
People (including myself) are quitting the game over this change. It’s seen overwhelming criticism since its introduction but it’s never even been MENTIONED.

Why bother making these feedback posts if noone actually listens to feedback that’s given?

More feedback: the balance changes seem rather inadequate considering how many issues in class balance exist and how many weapons are unable to be used because they are so poor. The player perception is the balance team has shrunk to an unacceptable level.

Positives:

Gliding in central Tyria is nice.
The ability to change fractal levels in the observatory is great.

Negatives:

Balance changes were incoherent and just missed the mark in general. Its like there is a complete lack of internal communication with your balance team. Its like you have separate people all ignoring each other and just randomly implementing their own separate ideas…all at the same time…and no review before going live. I see this with the necro changes…with the overload of so much boon corruption…in so many ways…simultaneously. I see this with the chrono changes…nerfing personal alacrity, nerfing group alacrity, nerfing echo/deja in such a way as to be both a nerf to duration of echo and the likelihood of even getting deja, completely destroying any chance of precog even making it onto a utility bar ever again, and still leaving out any competitive sustained damage. I see this with the revenant changes…over nerfing the sword auto while simultaneously buffing thief auto through the roof. Gutting unrelenting assault while over nerfing the sword auto. There’s just too much double and tripple dipping in the nerf department…while ignoring the side effects of these nerfs. Its like everyone just has their own ideas of what to do and just ends up all implementing their random ideas all at once…with no communication/consensus. They can’t even agree on the idea of too much auto attack damage…across different classes in the same patch. I knew ahead of time, that any nerfs would be all one sided…no net give with the take. This is all just shuffling classes in and out of the meta…instead of actually balancing. Revenants have a lot to offer, but the sword nerf was just a little over the top. Thieves still didn’t get the thing that will keep them in the meta….after the inevitable nerf to this auto attack buff…which would be group utility. Necros are just as selfish as ever….and will likely get a nerf just like burnzerkers did. Chrono is probably watching the game from the nose bleed seats…while core mesmers are still watching the game from home. Guards are still laid off looking for work. Ranger main hand sword is still the absolute worst melee weapon ever…due to the terrible self roots and animations…maybe the off hand ranger dagger is equally bad. For a quarterly balance patch….there sure is a lack of positive change and a lot of poorly thought out change.

Mastery points are still an onerous chore. I feel a sense of dread and lethargy even thinking about working on the content that awards mastery points (adventures and story achievements). Please spread mastery points around more and add some more…both HoT and core Tyria.

Honestly, for a quarterly balance patch, not enough balance changes were made to class skills. A lot of skills and traits remain underwhelming.

Guardians in particular are still underwhelming in PvE, because:

- They’re being balanced solely for PvP and it just hurts their performance in PvE more and more.
- Hammer and Sword are still underwhelming and broken in some areas. Zealots defense still remains completely useless.
- Scepters are hardly used because bows exist, and they need a rework so their roles don’t overlap (scepter could become a condition focused weapon).
- Shouts are underwhelming.

PVP perspective:

Before the patch, there was consensus that with chrono-bunker it was too easy to sustain against multiple opponents longer than is reasonable. On top of this, the alacrity share was an incredibly powerful team-wide buff to provide. Thus most matches consisted of teams with two chrono-bunkers. As such, it was necessary to address these two points.

Instead, the implemented changes completely diminished the performance of chronomancers altogether. Shatter chronomancers were a rare sight before this patch. They were absolutely dependant on the 66% personal alacrity buff to provide their teams with mobility, damage and utility. 66% personal recharge rate was not an issue from a balance pov. It was a necessity for chronomancers in general to be viable. In an effort to address the two above-mentioned issues with chrono-bunkers, you decided to carry out a blanket nerf to alacrity. This blanket nerf to alacrity also means that all the alacrity-associated traits become less useful, as they all depend on the efficiency of alacrity.

Please revert this general alacrity nerf, and instead nerf the specific traits and abilities that provide alacrity to the team instead.

Gliding is fun!
PPK is great!
New dolyaks-for-upgrades is a terrific change! – but the guild event to claim-and-hold a tower is now impossible (iirc – read it on reddit a week ago, so might be fixed) because it takes longer than the duration of the mission to upgrade the tower.

Yes, the gliding is more fun than I thought it would be.
Great changes on the Shatterer, but where’s the loot? Isn’t the difficulty of this somewhat in the ballpark with Tequatl, which has a chance at ascended loot versus 2 rares from the Shatterer?

One thing that was accomplished with the balance pass is now there are a whole lot more of us that are convinced balance across PvP, WvW and PvE is NOT POSSIBLE!

I also have to say that since Bunker is frequently mentioned as a problem independent of class, either of the following two should happen:

• Accept that if you offer us defensive traits, defensive gear and defensive skills, we just might get really really really difficult to kill. Isn’t that the whole point of offering us all this? To give us this option?
• Nerf defensive as a whole, across the board. Both active and passive one, to compensate relative strengths.

Based on what I’ve seen I believe that one or more developers at anet dislike Mesmer intensely.

I came in just after the huge confusion nerf and suffered quite literally years of not being able to even engage a Warrior. They would laugh at my damage then one shot me with stun + 100 blades. Thieves and Necros were a similar scenario as were ele’s.

Josh Davis complained on stream about being beaten by a clone death Mesmer. That build was not only nerfed but completely removed from the game a short time later.

Illusionary Elasticity and other traits were left broken, literally for years. PU Mesmer was nerfed under the pavement when it was successful in pvp.

I bought HoT specifically to have a competitive mesmer. I splurged and bought two deluxe versions, one for each of my accounts.

Now… Chrono has been crushed so hard that PU is actually a more effective choice. So my investment in HoT yields nothing.

On every occasion over the past 3+ years that Mesmer has gotten a significant boost, it has been either broken and left that way or severely nerfed within a short time.

I think that the decision making process at the balance team is not working properly. My suspicion is that it has to do with office politics and/or the isolation of the devs. Is most or all of the testing done on internal servers rather than actually in game?

Narrrz.7532:

I have just one word of feedback: Fireball.
Let me say it again. Fireball.
Fireball.
Fireball.
Fireball.
People (including myself) are quitting the game over this change. It’s seen overwhelming criticism since its introduction but it’s never even been MENTIONED.

Why bother making these feedback posts if noone actually listens to feedback that’s given?

There were no fireball changes in the notes. What are you referring to?

I believe Narrrz is referring to the fact that there were no fireball changes in the notes, in fact. Some time ago, to reduce the effects glare in combat, fireball was turned into a little mote you fling at the foe. After much feedback as to players not liking it, it remains small even after this big patch. Hence some cynicism as to the point in offering feedback.

I have no strong opinion on the matter myself, though I agree it’s hardly impressive to cast now. I’m simply helping clarify it for you, Daddicus.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Andraus.3874:

My feedback is about how feedback actually works.

It’s great you guys ask for feedback. I really do appreciate that. However if you hang out in the forums long enough you start to feel that the feedback isn’t going anywhere. This needs to be more of an ongoing and reciprocal conversation. Out of our feedback I would expect a post addressed to the player base saying " We heard you on the following points, we will be looking into them as resources allow. [followed by a list of points]." Then perhaps later or with the same post: “Points 3,7,12, and 15 are going to be a higher priority for us. Points 5,8, and 9 may not be something that is possible. Again this information is tentative and subject to change.”

I understand the player base takes things literally so you have to be carful what you say. But it feels like we have all these threads about good feedback and very little comes out of them. I’m not sure what this disconnect is but it has become apparent to anyone that frequents the forums.

If you read this I genuinely thank you for your time and thank you for making a great game. I hope we can work together to keep it that way.

I understand your thoughts, and perhaps we will be able to do that for some topics in the future; I agree it would be great! But what’s important to note is that we all — as forum members — have a certain level of visibility into our how feedback is handled simply by our participation here on the forums and our involvement in the game.

Here’s what I mean: I’ve seen the request for “gliding in central Tyria” hundreds of times on the forums. I’ve heard it in the game a hundred times, too! So when I see it come to the game, as a player and a forum member I know that ArenaNet listened to player/forum member feedback. I don’t need someone to come and tell me that, I can actually see it in the update notes and in the game.

So while I’m not discounting — believe me, I would be absolutely the last person to discount the potential or the value of further communication; trust me on that! — I like to think of an old expression that my granny said, “The proof is in the pudding.” In this case, take that odd expression to mean that we, as players and forum members, can see through actual game development that the feedback that we give is being read, reviewed, analyzed, and often implemented!

Again I do love communication, and I positively adore when devs post, or when they ask me to post on their or their team’s behalf. But I’m also aware that communication comes through many forms, including that demonstration through actual game changes. And because of that, I like the idea of productive threads like this, which you should know will be shared with every single member of the ArenaNet team as highly-suggested reading.

Anyway, I hope that makes sense. It’s just a personal opinion, but I like to think it has a certain logic.

But the fact that the game’s design decisions is questionable on certain aspects, especially on the class balancing and the lack on feedback from the devs makes it even worst. It would only result in a witch hunt.

Especially when we players actually do spend quite a fair bit of cash on this game.

Don’t get me wrong, when you guys do things right, we all do appreciate it. Gliding in Tyria, Shatterer etc.

I always thought of GW2 as a game where every class and every build should be viable, picking a thief should be just as accepted as picking a elementalist.

However, it doesn’t seemed to be the case. I’m a PvE mesmer main. I used to have fun with whatever build I churn up with (staff, sword + focus support mesmer build) despite the demand for zerkers back then. But now with raids and other high end stuff. I got to stick to the demands of alacrity up keep (which by the way I am still having fun with). Then it gets nerfed.

So. What is it that the devs are aiming for? Mesmer to be a pure support class which provides so much utility that it does no damage? Because I can live with that. But now it more like I neither do damage nor provide as much utility in PvE.

Tenrai Senshi.2017:

- Scepters are hardly used because bows exist, and they need a rework so their roles don’t overlap (scepter could become a condition focused weapon).

The balance between scepter and longbow is probably based in part on longbows requiring an elite specialisation, while scepter can be added to any build.

Granted, currently that translates to scepters hardly being used because bows exist, but that’s because the meta currently is basically elite specialisation or go home. When new elite specialisations come out, or if ArenaNet makes the core professions competitive again, the scepter will probably come back. I’d rather it keep its current role than being rebalanced on the assumption that it’s in direct competition with the longbow, when that may not be the case in the future.

my comments are negative, warr cond this horrible, I crafting have armor that does not have utility in other class, I play warr more than 3 years and up today and did not see a build of variation in addition to GS / DPS or Phalanx am discouraged from playing with the same build with my main

Not sure if every thread will get read, won’t be shocked if mine doesn’t (there are 400 replies after all)

However asking for community feedback AFTER you made these balance changes is the first mistake. You should be asking before it.

Before the patch was released people were posting their concerns many of which went addressed. I responded to josh on numerous occasions in the pvp forum about the necro buffs not once did myself or players who did have concerns get responses. I checked daily and said that a balance patch of this size on top off a amulet, rune re-vamp is a bad idea because to much change to quickly will cause in balance even with good intentions.

It has grown more and more apparent that pvp is an afterthought to the development team. The power creep was so blatantly obvious that even NECRO mains were calling it out.

I am not saying this as angry player, but as a disappointed one. I do not understand what fuels the decisions at ANET, I won’t make assumptions. I can only guess PVP is often a low priority because it doesn’t generate the income that PVE players bring in with Fashion Wars or Raids and Boss fights. But PVP should of been viewed as an investment not as a quick win. Which is exactly what leagues looked like from the MMR issues, to league manipulation, to straight up continual balance flaws. You have to BALANCE the game before you release a mass marketing pvp campaign and invest $400,000 to it.

I know this post is in reference to 12/26 patch, but I have to go further since I dedicated myself to PVP both in GW1 & 2.

There needs to be someone at ANET who is neck deep into the pvp community, understands every class and has a neutral opinion to everyone and understands stats. If there is one, I haven’t seen it.

I spent thousands supporting this game. Not because I had to, but because I wanted to support ANET and the DEV team. I was so pumped for leagues, but to have a balance patch like this followed by the disaster leagues turned out to be. I quit…. again.

Guild Wars 2 pvp is an embarrassment to what GW1 pvp was. Look at what made that a success and repeat it . I am just so kitten disappointed. I want this game to succeed in all levels WvW, PVE, PVP. Everyone will have complaints, but there comes a point where you have to cut your losses and move on. In this case I have. I saw the preview to this patch notes and my jaw dropped. A player can only take so many bad decisions.

Anyways so ends the pitty party.

TL:DR. Was fun while it lasted.

Lag is horrible for the Herald’s Facet of Light/Infuse Light. With the new cast time you often have to hammer it repeatedly before it will go off, and I -frequently- see the skill blinking on the cast bar.

Revert the cast time change and do something else to it, please. It often feels unusable, because it doesnt respond timely anymore. Especially when combined with the low duration of the infuse light.

Revenant selfhealing feels super weak now for the main spec of Glint+Shiro. And Crystal Hibernation is a joke. You said you had to nerf the heal if we had to give up the selfroot, and then you go and nerf the heal and still forcing the selfroot? Useless now.

Donari.5237:

I believe Narrrz is referring to the fact that there were no fireball changes in the notes, in fact. Some time ago, to reduce the effects glare in combat, fireball was turned into a little mote you fling at the foe. After much feedback as to players not liking it, it remains small even after this big patch. Hence some cynicism as to the point in offering feedback.

I have no strong opinion on the matter myself, though I agree it’s hardly impressive to cast now. I’m simply helping clarify it for you, Daddicus.

Yes, sorry, Donari is entirely right. On rereading my post i realize i could have made it more clear.

In itself it’s not that major a change but for me it’s just served as the straw that broke the camel’s back, because to me it reveals a couple of things i find intolerable:
-The devs are happy to arbitrarily impose non-bugfix, non balance related changes without any call for such changes from the community
-They have no issue with completely ignoring community outcry against changes which are universally or near-universally disliked, and feel no compulsion to address such things or even comment on the subject

To my knowledge, no explanation was ever given for why the change was considered necessary, it was just foisted upon us unasked. In the beginning days of This Thread the posts were quite reasonable, asking for us to at least get an option to adjust particles/ground effects to our individual tastes (and hardware specs) but as you can see, despite its lifetime and multiple hundreds of unique posters, it has failed to attract a single dev post addressing the complaint.

So yeah. Though the change personally ruined fireball to me, what actually drove me to give up this once-great game is that i simply don’t want to be a part of anything which shows such blithe disregard for its playerbase.

This is my opinion.

Feedback: this is one of the worst updates in this game because the game is still not balanced, for many reasons. I can’t even dare to think what is wrong in mechanics, concepts, CC, and so on.

Solution: give balance to players. There are competitions with prizes (such as ESL). Get those players to provide you suggestions for balancing, and implement these. Winners clearly love PvP, and would be able to provide feedback for you, especially if you pay them for it (gems, gold, money, products, whatever).

Donari.5237:

I believe Narrrz is referring to the fact that there were no fireball changes in the notes, in fact. Some time ago, to reduce the effects glare in combat, fireball was turned into a little mote you fling at the foe. After much feedback as to players not liking it, it remains small even after this big patch. Hence some cynicism as to the point in offering feedback.

I have no strong opinion on the matter myself, though I agree it’s hardly impressive to cast now. I’m simply helping clarify it for you, Daddicus.

Thanks, Donari!

‘Show usable objects’ in the game options is very handy and I keep it turned on.

removed some amulets in pvp.
celestial-soldier-settler-Sentinel

comes to mind:

can’t manage to balance and sort out some utility skills-weapons skill- traits-sigils-armor, how much damages been dealt of some classes (or damage-conditions-healing at the same time)

so the best option is to remove some amulets from pvp?

comes to mind:

next step will be what? remove zerk gear from wvw? remove pistol from engi? remove rabid armor from dungeons?

remove berserk stance of warrior in wvw because its op?

regards.

(once upon a time engineer has an alchemy trait “immune to condition damage under 25% health” – got removed because it was OP! and why still elementalist has “diamond skin” then?)

balance balance balance

I have actually been amazed that all the so called “balancing” of professions is applied with only one aspect in mind…either pvp or pve. Why do they have to have a balance work in one and destroyed in another with the same profession?

Why can’t they just have pvp work differently than pve when balancing occurs, have it affect one or the other but not both? I find it odd that they can limit gear stats between pvp or pve, but can’t do the same for professions and skill applications.