Low Damage != Fun
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
It may be because nerfing might as a whole also nerfs total dps, and they view overloading targets with damage to kill them before their mechanics can discharge as ‘unintended’. Remember how the Ferocity patch was claimed to be undertaken for the sake of normalising berserker accessories, but the critdmg%-Ferocity ratio was also set at a level such that total DPS would be nerfed?
This isn’t the first time.
There are probably more intentions than one in the might change.
If the explanation does not seem to logically fit the result, it may be the case that the explanation is incomplete or wrong.
[Shinigami, NEC, WvW Condinuke] [Rekka, ELE, Fracs] [Tora, PS WAR] [Kageoni, THI] [Hayako, ENG]
(edited by Hayashi.3416)
There are pve related issues to might, namely might stacking is very powerful and in some cases greatly effects the intended difficulty of encounters.
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
I don’t care about that either.
Now, would you mind not posting unless you actually have anything relevant to contribute to the discussion?
Thanks in advance.
The damage must be even lower .. if we believe all those people that constantly post
how easy this game is. To make them happy they should maybe remove might at all
or at least that stacking might works on other players.
And maybe reduce all damage generally by 50% …
But even then people would still cry thats all too easy .. so maybe they should remove
leveling up .. so you are level 1 forever .. and already have challenges in the starterzones
and only the best players ever would make it out of the starterzones.
And who is talking about fun here ? MMOs are “hard work” .. there is no room for fun.
Best MMOs are the ones that never make it. Therefore Stargate Online wins.
There are pve related issues to might, namely might stacking is very powerful and in some cases greatly effects the intended difficulty of encounters.
“intended difficulty” is the key phrase here. Not being bad can effect the “intended difficulty” so how are they going to nerf good players? Well, they tried by the universal vigor nerf and whatnot. It’s changes like this that just widen the gap between the goods and the bads.
It may be because nerfing might as a whole also nerfs total dps, and they view overloading targets with damage to kill them before their mechanics can discharge as ‘unintended’. Remember how the Ferocity patch was claimed to be undertaken for the sake of normalising berserker accessories, but the critdmg%-Ferocity ratio was also set at a level such that total DPS would be nerfed?
This isn’t the first time.
There are probably more intentions than one in the might change.
If the explanation does not seem to logically fit the result, it may be the case that the explanation is incomplete or wrong.
It doesn’t seem to fit the result. What you said basically can be summarized to the fact that you trust that they have underlying intentions behind making other builds in PvE better, similarly to what some people expected when they announced ferocity implementation a year ago.
The thing is, this kind of a change doesn’t really encourage people to expand their horizons much to try something new. At the moment, some classes have the option of using more than just scholar runes for optimizing their efficacy in PvE (strength runes) and now with the might boon getting nerfed it’s going to result in strength being much less effective than before, making scholar king again. I like scholar, I do, but I’m trying to explain that this isn’t really doing anything positive for opening up anymore options.
The past several months have been littered with people whining on the forums about how celestial D/D eles are overpowered in WvW and PvP, and Arenanet finally decided to adhere to the complaints.
Just like in the past the people responsible for changes like this don’t really concern themselves with their decisions and how they impact PvE as well as WvW and PvP.
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
I don’t care about that either.
Now, would you mind not posting unless you actually have anything relevant to contribute to the discussion?
Thanks in advance.
Seeing as that’s the only real reason to be dealing more damage and stacking 25 might in PvE… how is that not relevant?
It shouldn’t really matter in all honesty. Nothing about the meta changes, and dungeons were/are being cleared too quickly. It may also just be about general PvE allowing for might to be too rewarding. It certainly is in the open world.
Yea, they could have not nerfed might, but they could have also just increased boss HP by say, 25% to compensate.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/ES-Suggestion-The-Deadeye-FORMAL/
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
I don’t care about that either.
Now, would you mind not posting unless you actually have anything relevant to contribute to the discussion?
Thanks in advance.
Hostile much?
The damage must be even lower .. if we believe all those people that constantly post
how easy this game is. To make them happy they should maybe remove might at all
or at least that stacking might works on other players.And maybe reduce all damage generally by 50% …
But even then people would still cry thats all too easy .. so maybe they should remove
leveling up .. so you are level 1 forever .. and already have challenges in the starterzones
and only the best players ever would make it out of the starterzones.And who is talking about fun here ? MMOs are “hard work” .. there is no room for fun.
Hitting high damage doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with difficulty.
It’s the fact that the encounters in this game are designed so that literally any build and class composition can succeed.
This is a themepark MMO.
“The term “themepark” brings to mind the idea of a setting with attractions to ride over and over. But no matter how many times you ride the attractions, the details just never change. If you wait several years and go back, they are right there, waiting for you…just as you left them. While this could be fun the first few times, it gets boring quick and you could find yourself looking at other themeparks for new and more exciting rides.”
This is why the content is easy.
It doesn’t have much of anything to do with the fact that we’re able to hit X amount of damage.
In terms of ‘making other builds’ relatively ‘better’ that may be the case for PvP, but as you have also detailed it does not apply for PvE, as survivability is irrelevant once you are never downed (if downed, by all means add survivability stats to the build), and not being downed isn’t exactly difficult for a lot of PvE content – especially for hardier classes like the warrior.
Rather, the PvE effect is not ‘relative to other builds’ or increasing build diversity, but a flat effect of reducing the rate at which content can be completed, which increases the total timeframe of the grind-treadmill – which may increase the amount of time the more hardcore players would spend on the game before ‘maxing out’ on skins, ascended gear and whatnot.
The ascended patch in itself already did this, since prior to its inception players were essentially ‘maxed’ with a full set of berserker exotic scholar – which was not anywhere as time-consuming to achieve as a current full set of berserker ascended scholar/strength. The ninja nerf to the strength rune a while back that converted its initial 7% damage boost to 5% is in the same direction as all of these.
They don’t balance for WvW — at all… so that’s not it.
My guess: they’re embarrassed their dungeons get breezed through. But that’s because of how many times they’ve been run, which is a result of how old the dungeons are combined with the lack of new dungeon content.
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
Ya but now my solo tequatil runs will take me 7 hrs. WTF brah?
There’s ‘new’ (year old) dungeon content, but the rewards per unit time for those are so dismal that few people run those either. Ditto for world bosses and whatnot – Tequatl and Triple Trouble runs are going to feel this nerf the hardest, as failing to chainburn Tequatl is proportionately far more of a time drag than the effect in a dungeon, and Triple Trouble may even fail to reach decap-phase if players do not consistently run full 25 might plus timewarp plus frost spirit plus food.
They could also raise HP for the same effect, but editing the HP value of all the mobs in the game (which aren’t even static values, but formula-based due to scaling) is considerably more time-consuming than reducing the amount of power and condition a single might stack will give, which in best circumstances is achieved by changing a single line of code.
[Shinigami, NEC, WvW Condinuke] [Rekka, ELE, Fracs] [Tora, PS WAR] [Kageoni, THI] [Hayako, ENG]
(edited by Hayashi.3416)
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
I don’t care about that either.
Now, would you mind not posting unless you actually have anything relevant to contribute to the discussion?
Thanks in advance.
Seeing as that’s the only real reason to be dealing more damage and stacking 25 might in PvE… how is that not relevant?
It shouldn’t really matter in all honesty. Nothing about the meta changes, and dungeons were/are being cleared too quickly. It may also just be about general PvE allowing for might to be too rewarding. It certainly is in the open world.
Yea, they could have not nerfed might, but they could have also just increased boss HP by say, 25% to compensate.
What…?
So you don’t find there to be any reason to stack might in groups? I’m hoping that’s not what you meant but based off of what you said that’s kind of all I can really infer.
Also the time in which dungeons can be completed isn’t really changing by much in order for the nerf to might being tied to dungeons.
If Arenanet was focused on improving dungeons, they would put forth effort into fixing long-standing bugs.
In terms of ‘making other builds’ relatively ‘better’ that may be the case for PvP, but as you have also detailed it does not apply for PvE, as survivability is irrelevant once you are never downed (if downed, by all means add survivability stats to the build), and not being downed isn’t exactly difficult for a lot of PvE content – especially for hardier classes like the warrior.
Rather, the PvE effect is not ‘relative to other builds’ or increasing build diversity, but a flat effect of reducing the rate at which content can be completed, which increases the total timeframe of the grind-treadmill – which may increase the amount of time the more hardcore players would spend on the game before ‘maxing out’ on skins, ascended gear and whatnot.
The ascended patch in itself already did this, since prior to its inception players were essentially ‘maxed’ with a full set of berserker exotic scholar – which was not anywhere as time-consuming to achieve as a current full set of berserker ascended scholar/strength. The ninja nerf to the strength rune a while back that converted its initial 7% damage boost to 5% is in the same direction as all of these.
This isnt sarcasm but a genuine question: Are you saying that they are trying to increase play time with a nerf to damage? If thats the case, i could run around with a broom and spank monsters on the butt till they die if thats Anets goal lol.
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
I don’t care about that either.
Now, would you mind not posting unless you actually have anything relevant to contribute to the discussion?
Thanks in advance.
Seeing as that’s the only real reason to be dealing more damage and stacking 25 might in PvE… how is that not relevant?
It shouldn’t really matter in all honesty. Nothing about the meta changes, and dungeons were/are being cleared too quickly. It may also just be about general PvE allowing for might to be too rewarding. It certainly is in the open world.
Yea, they could have not nerfed might, but they could have also just increased boss HP by say, 25% to compensate.
What…?
So you don’t find there to be any reason to stack might in groups? I’m hoping that’s not what you meant but based off of what you said that’s kind of all I can really infer.
Also the time in which dungeons can be completed isn’t really changing by much in order for the nerf to might being tied to dungeons.
If Arenanet was focused on improving dungeons, they would put forth effort into fixing long-standing bugs.
Cough…..NPCs…..Cough…..Mag
Changes like this only further alienate the people who enjoy optimizing their gameplay. While I have no problem with changes, it’s just annoying to constantly see combat efficacy in PvE repeatedly decreased as a consequence of something completely irrelevant in another game mode.
Optimizing? So now these people can optimize using the new numbers. By your definition these people should have never been happy, since the numbers could have always been increased which would let them gain even more power. This really makes no sense, they are decreasing the numbers. The max numbers will not exist anymore so there is no difference to optimizing off the new numbers compared to optimizing off the old numbers. The amount of damage will change but again by that logic they should have never been happy, since the numbers could have been increased which would give them a new number to optimize off from.
They don’t balance for WvW — at all… so that’s not it.
My guess: they’re embarrassed their dungeons get breezed through. But that’s because of how many times they’ve been run, which is a result of how old the dungeons are combined with the lack of new dungeon content.
Haven’t you seen the loads of threads demanding nerfs to celestial d/d eles?
Prior to the removal of the professions balance forum there’d be a new thread about it popping up nearly every day, sometimes with hundreds of posts. I am certain this was the primary reason for them to look into toning down might/battle sigils because these were what were arguably the reasons for them being so good, based off of most of the threads.
In PvP-related situations they were (and currently are) able to use completely defensive traits yet still deal average to decent damage due to being able to stack might effectively.
It seems abundantly clear to me that this is the primary reason for the upcoming changes. While it is in the end just speculation I still haven’t really seen any other convincing arguments to lead me to believe otherwise.
:O im hyped, just becouse:
-Shield of Judgment: The cooldown on this skill has been reduced from 30 seconds to 25 seconds.
-Shield of Absorption: The cooldown on this skill has been reduced from 40 seconds to 30 seconds.
As far as patches in recent trends have been concerned, in cases where there were options both to ‘nerf multiple classes’ higher damage builds’ or to ‘buff multiple classes’ lower damage builds’, the result tends to fall in the former category. Whenever any farm got too efficient, it tended to be nerfed shortly after.
Aside from the engineer toolkit and flamethrower and the longbow ranger’s skills, I don’t exactly recall any other class’ skills having their damage increased, either.
Thieves and elementalists in particular felt the chain-nerf trend the most.
P.S. @ Zypher Re: optimisation, the more changes there are, the more fun those of us who do these things have with reassigning builds in response to changes. It’s a bit different from those who prefer higher reward/time ratios on the whole. While I have issues with the unbalanced way the highest reward/time ratios belong to relatively easy content, I actually like every balance change because it gives me something to do.
It’s a different meaning from what Miku meant however, you might not be getting his position.
I’m just stating what Anet’s plans appear to indicate about their motivations from my point of view, but I’m not actually personally against this update.
And yes, my elementalist does run full celestial strength at the moment with battle runes, and it is going to be nerfed extra-hard in staff mode in PvE.
[Shinigami, NEC, WvW Condinuke] [Rekka, ELE, Fracs] [Tora, PS WAR] [Kageoni, THI] [Hayako, ENG]
(edited by Hayashi.3416)
Changes like this only further alienate the people who enjoy optimizing their gameplay. While I have no problem with changes, it’s just annoying to constantly see combat efficacy in PvE repeatedly decreased as a consequence of something completely irrelevant in another game mode.
Optimizing? So now these people can optimize using the new numbers. By your definition these people should have never been happy, since the numbers could have always been increased which would let them gain even more power. This really makes no sense, they are decreasing the numbers. The max numbers will not exist anymore so there is no difference to optimizing off the new numbers compared to optimizing off the old numbers. The amount of damage will change but again by that logic they should have never been happy, since the numbers could have been increased which would give them a new number to optimize off from.
How does it not make sense to you?
The content itself doesn’t change, but your efficacy in it does. You are still doing the exact same activities but your potential is reduced. Despite your best efforts, you will never be able to outperform your former self.
This is annoying to me and many others.
Hope that helps make sense what I was trying to say.
Less Damage in the game
> less spongbob HP bosses
> non-zerkers people = dont need huge dps to kill fast the boss
Less Damage in the game
> less spongbob HP bosses
> non-zerkers people , dont need to stack full dps
Lolwut.
That doesn’t even make any sense.
They don’t care about your solo dungeon runs taking 15 seconds longer
I don’t care about that either.
Now, would you mind not posting unless you actually have anything relevant to contribute to the discussion?
Thanks in advance.
Hostile much?
Yes, he is hostile. He hates me, I remember his name from another thread.
I don’t hate you I think you have good choice in music
Bottom line is you think that somehow PvE balance is considered in this game when it isn’t
Solo dungeon runners and your super optimal rotations min maxing
None of that is considered or ever will be considered
Balance is done with PvP in mind
Accept it
There’s been many suggestions to fix the zerker meta, and balancing might for pvp, but i guess they were just ignored. Whoever did this balancing just did it the lazy way.
Actually Nardodx, you’re wrong. I’ve stated several times by now that they only balance with PvP in mind, and I disagree with it and feel that it is best for them to separate the two.
I accept that it’s the case, but don’t accept it in the sense that I won’t speak my opinion of it. If you don’t care about what I have to say then so be it.
The ferocity change affected non-zerker stats with crit damage more than it did zerker. Before the change I was barely able to argue a few cases with mixed stuff in it but afterwards the damage gap made all of that a moot point. Basically, a change to make people do stuff other than zerk just made it more important to go all zerk.
This is more of the same I think. Might nerf will just make having optimal might stacks more important to groups that were only able to stack like ~10 and people will be harsher critics than before. By contrast in speed runs it’ll just make the gap between scholar and strength even larger and harder to justify.
I dunno.. just feels like more changes made with little consideration to PVE.
Changes like this only further alienate the people who enjoy optimizing their gameplay. While I have no problem with changes, it’s just annoying to constantly see combat efficacy in PvE repeatedly decreased as a consequence of something completely irrelevant in another game mode.
Optimizing? So now these people can optimize using the new numbers. By your definition these people should have never been happy, since the numbers could have always been increased which would let them gain even more power. This really makes no sense, they are decreasing the numbers. The max numbers will not exist anymore so there is no difference to optimizing off the new numbers compared to optimizing off the old numbers. The amount of damage will change but again by that logic they should have never been happy, since the numbers could have been increased which would give them a new number to optimize off from.
How does it not make sense to you?
The content itself doesn’t change, but your efficacy in it does. You are still doing the exact same activities but your potential is reduced. Despite your best efforts, you will never be able to outperform your former self.
This is annoying to me and many others.
Hope that helps make sense what I was trying to say.
Then really you should have always been annoyed, since the numbers could have been increased from the start. Going by the “i will not be as good as my former self” moto, then you should most likely not play games that are constantly changing. Because by your moto you will always be upset with the game. If you are looking for something for you to optimize in that never changes, there are games out there that would suit you. GW2 will keep changing, nothing more to say besides that.
Yup, feroc also narrowed the meta further towards zerker, when it previously contained a few mixed Valkyrie-Cavalier builds. Celestial in PvE was hit the hardest by the change. That’s ancient history by now though. And it did nerf overall damage potential.
This change nerfs a different set of stat combinations, but also nerfs damage values overall. I believe that their consideration with PvE was just ‘reduce completion time’ with no regard for relative effectiveness between builds though, while their consideration with PvP was celestial effectiveness (not just eles frankly, engis also ran with an identical concept), and this was just the simplest way to settle both with the least amount of coding effort.
SPvP is certainly a big part of it, but very much so is the fact that boon stacking is more efficient than they expected, especially in the case of might.
People keep looking to these nerfs as if they are a sum total of balance changes intended to effect a certain goal. It’s pretty clear that the nerfs to might and the ferocity change are piecemeal changes so that they can see how the changes are actually affecting things. Again, they’ve said as much when they started with the ferocity change. We’ve only proven with this discussion that we are only capable of thinking short term. I still agree that it’s an onerous process for us to wait for additional changes that may or may not come. But, at least for now, it is what it is. The might change, along with ferocity doesn’t address core issues that people have identified with the “zerker meta.” I don’t think anyone, even anet, claimed otherwise.
Nerfing might in PvE makes 0 sense to me when all you have to do to for some of the most difficult things is bring a mesmer who knows when to put a reflect bubble up. Might or no might, Lupi loses 1/3rd of his health from his own damage lol.
If they worried about intended mechanics not triggering/getting fought thru due to excessive damage, I don’t see how nerfing might 35 to 30 fixes it. If they bothered to explain the reasons why they doing it – that’d be nicer.
Meh. I’m happy it’s not 35 to 15 tbh.
Then really you should have always been annoyed, since the numbers could have been increased from the start. Going by the “i will not be as good as my former self” moto, then you should most likely not play games that are constantly changing. Because by your moto you will always be upset with the game. If you are looking for something for you to optimize in that never changes, there are games out there that would suit you. GW2 will keep changing, nothing more to say besides that.
I don’t think that was the point. The changes to might, im no expert but from my experience and the reactions of others, may reduce the speed of killing bosses and clearing dungeons in general. Meaning that people may never be able to get better at repeating the same content. For people who have played this game a long time and know basically all there is to know about the game, theres really nothing left to do but try and get record times. This isn’t the fault of the players that this is the only remaining goal, its the fault of the devs for not introducing any new content, or anything challenging for that matter. This nerf isnt an example of gw2 changing, its basically gw2 staying the same just annoying players.
Im not sure why there is hostility towards the OP on this. Doesn’t make sense since being able to stack might is helpful for every group. I love pugging on my ele because i know regardless of what everyone else’s stats are I can at least help make dungeons and fractals go at a reasonable speed thanks to might.
They might as well just add Superior Rune of the Aristocrat to sPvP and run this bad boy into the ground!
Changes like this only further alienate the people who enjoy optimizing their gameplay.
They’ve been alienating people who don’t want to optimize their gameplay for whatever reason (sake of fun-to-use skills, weapons, etc.) in PvE for every release in Season 2. Now that a change might actually effect the dungeon speedclear crowd the DPS enthusiasts are upset about alienation?
This thread is a joke and should be locked.
Changes like this only further alienate the people who enjoy optimizing their gameplay.
They’ve been alienating people who don’t want to optimize their gameplay for whatever reason (sake of fun-to-use skills, weapons, etc.) in PvE for every release in Season 2. Now that a change might actually effect the dungeon speedclear crowd the DPS enthusiasts are upset about alienation?
This thread is a joke and should be locked.
You must not have been paying attention to the last few balance patches. It’s understandable, but not acceptable, to have such a myopic viewpoint.
Feature patch 1: FGS nerf, ferocity nerf, stacking sigil nerf
Feature patch 2: specific skill nerfs, strength rune nerfs
None of these things affected Johnny Staff Guard. In fact, casual staff guardians in clerics gear have received nothing but buffs for the last several balance patches.
Reflects aren’t affected by the user’s power anyway, but by critdmg% and critrate% – part of the reason why mesmers specced for this tend to run a lot of assassin.
It’s possible to run lupi to zero under perfect conditions from 75% from his own attack, either with Feedback or with WoR if he is pushed against a wall before the 75% mark.
Might affects other bosses you actually need to damage, opposed to watch kill themselves.
P.S. The might change does actually nerf staff guards since Empower is less effective. We’re going from bad to slightly worse than bad, though.
Less Damage in the game
> less spongbob HP bosses
> non-zerkers people = dont need huge dps to kill fast the boss
Spoken like somone who get carried by people using meta builds.
You can just forget about getting carried now though people can’t compensate for the dead weight if this is the direction they are taking.
i guess high damage is just too confusing… oh well there goes 100 gold in runes…
i guess high damage is just too confusing… oh well there goes 100 gold in runes…
Oh the hyperbole.
Might isn’t destroyed, it’s 15% less effective (give or take). Having a complete might stack is still massively valuable to any group content.
i guess high damage is just too confusing… oh well there goes 100 gold in runes…
Oh the hyperbole.
Might isn’t destroyed, it’s 15% less effective (give or take). Having a complete might stack is still massively valuable to any group content.
its still my 15%… but whatever.. isnt like talking bout it will change anything
Less Damage in the game
> less spongbob HP bosses
> non-zerkers people = dont need huge dps to kill fast the bossSpoken like somone who get carried by people using meta builds.
You can just forget about getting carried now though people can’t compensate for the dead weight if this is the direction they are taking.
I’m just repeating myself, but everyone is going waaay out of scale and making all kinds of crazy assumptions about the intent and effects of this change.
i guess high damage is just too confusing… oh well there goes 100 gold in runes…
Oh the hyperbole.
Might isn’t destroyed, it’s 15% less effective (give or take). Having a complete might stack is still massively valuable to any group content.
And given how much Might contributes to the typical ‘zerk set-up, it’s maybe a 3-5% loss on high-end damage. Some of the above comments are right; the Might shift hurts defense/healing (and condi in that regard) builds more than damage-optimized builds.
Still, that’s some hefty qq for what amounts to a little damage loss.
“I’m finding companies should sell access to forums,
it seems many like them better than the games they comment on.” -Horrorscope.7632
i guess high damage is just too confusing… oh well there goes 100 gold in runes…
Oh the hyperbole.
Might isn’t destroyed, it’s 15% less effective (give or take). Having a complete might stack is still massively valuable to any group content.
And given how much Might contributes to the typical ‘zerk set-up, it’s maybe a 3-5% loss on high-end damage. Some of the above comments are right; the Might shift hurts defense/healing (and condi in that regard) builds more than damage-optimized builds.
Still, that’s some hefty qq for what amounts to a little damage loss.
thats exactly my issue…
i guess high damage is just too confusing… oh well there goes 100 gold in runes…
Oh the hyperbole.
Might isn’t destroyed, it’s 15% less effective (give or take). Having a complete might stack is still massively valuable to any group content.
And given how much Might contributes to the typical ‘zerk set-up, it’s maybe a 3-5% loss on high-end damage. Some of the above comments are right; the Might shift hurts defense/healing (and condi in that regard) builds more than damage-optimized builds.
Still, that’s some hefty qq for what amounts to a little damage loss.
That’s a pretty big stretch, I’m prone to think that you’re at the point where any change will be interpreted by you to support your position in the all-important (actually utterly insgnificant and silly) meta argument.
15% nerf to might is more than the 10% damage trait buffs.
It’s not a small nerf, strength runes will probably no longer provide the best damage output.
Just like we had to scrap all our divinity runes, same thing will happen here when guilds make their new WvW/GvG meta.
Changes like this only further alienate the people who enjoy optimizing their gameplay.
They’ve been alienating people who don’t want to optimize their gameplay for whatever reason (sake of fun-to-use skills, weapons, etc.) in PvE for every release in Season 2. Now that a change might actually effect the dungeon speedclear crowd the DPS enthusiasts are upset about alienation?
This thread is a joke and should be locked.
This change only makes it worse tbh, exactly like the ferocity change did. Groups will have less wiggle room for all that ‘fun’ stuff you’re talking about because optimized groups will have an even larger impact compared to non-optimized.
For you specifically though, I’ve felt more hostility from elitist ‘casuals’ (for lack of a better word) than those of various stages of speedrunning or dungeon train crowds. I think your response pretty well demonstrates that.
‘Less wiggle room?’
Again, I know this is about mutual reinforcement, but you’re acting like 90% of the content isn’t monstrously easy.
People do naked runs of some of these things.
The only pve effect is that fully optimized groups lose 250 power off of the top during fights, and less optimized groups lose a correspondingly smaller amount.
This is not a significant completion barrier for completion of any content, up to and including level 49 and 50 fractals.