Guild Wars 2

I am talking about roles.
It might be tricky to talk about because the games are structured a bit differently.

For example; it’s not unusual for an FPS to only offer one character to fill each role. So a Medic is considered a role, and not one of the classes with that role, because he’s the only healer in the whole game.

Or; MOBAs have classes in the sense that it describes similar gameplay across multiple characters (Tank, Support). But, Roles are community-driven slang words for broad strategy and positions on the map. So classes aren’t necessarily defined by a role and roles aren’t necessarily filled by all the same type of class. The words Carry and Jungle I used are older terms for roles that were being used around the time I played.

Even if that’s still confusing. All you really need to know is that when other games put forward different roles, it really feels like it’s changing the way I play. GW2 just doesn’t get that feeling across.

Vox Hollow.2736:

Even if that’s still confusing. All you really need to know is that when other games put forward different roles, it really feels like it’s changing the way I play. GW2 just doesn’t get that feeling across.

I don’t know, ranger feels different if you put down your longbow and go into melee and the way you support others is completely different than other classes.
Do you have anything else or just a ranger?

Once again for the slow, there is nothing wrong with GW2’s combat system, for evidence see both forms of PvP. The problem is an excellent PvP combat system got tied to a PVE system that utterly fails to challenge the combat system in most instances.

It’s literally pitting a Bugati Veyron against an original VW beetle.

Since launch ArenaNet has done a much better job at pushing the PvE systems to better places, but it is still ultimately PVE. AKA easy mode. I don’t know that anyone can program PVE to be or stay challenging. But it has zero to do with the presence of a traditional trinity.

Dark Catalyst.1028:

Draknar.5748:

Deamhan.9538:

SkyShroud.2865:

I don’t understand the idea of trinity balance.

Does that means that healer can defeat a fighter? That’s not balance, that’s making healer OP.

Your right, it would. Balance would be each not being able to kill the other. A tank is suppose to be good at taking damage without dying and not dish it out (that’s the dps job). A healer is suppose to heal damage and not dish it out. A tank vs healer, if balanced and all variables equal (eg. player skill), should result in a stalemate. The healer doesn’t do enough damage to break a tank’s…well…tank and the tank can’t out damage the healer’s healing.

And the third leg of the trinity? The DPSer? Can’t out-DPS heals or tankiness either? Or DPS can kill both. That sounds OP to me. And probably why the DPS:tank:healer ratio in trinity games is always terrible, causing groups to wait around forever just to get a group together.

That’s funny , because in WoW my dungeon wait times are less than 10 minutes as a dps and I don’t need to wait for raids because of guild/flex/Oqueue/open raid, etc.

I don’t know you must be blessed or only running the absolute newest content, because people I know tell me otherwise.

Fext.3614:

The problem we may have here is that the enemies are still very much trinity like. Trinity typicaly works with a big and mighty boss which the tanks keeps busy while the dps kills it and healers keeps tank alive.
A no trinity game should rather support something like a numerous enemies of rather normal strength against a warband of players.

So glad you said this. It’s okay to have a central figure (boss), but in a GW2 setting, a singular boss just doesn’t make for interesting combat. We need minions (trash mobs) that add complexity to the fights or some other reason to allow more CC (like the Lovers fight).

Draknar.5748:

Deamhan.9538:

SkyShroud.2865:

I don’t understand the idea of trinity balance.

Does that means that healer can defeat a fighter? That’s not balance, that’s making healer OP.

Your right, it would. Balance would be each not being able to kill the other. A tank is suppose to be good at taking damage without dying and not dish it out (that’s the dps job). A healer is suppose to heal damage and not dish it out. A tank vs healer, if balanced and all variables equal (eg. player skill), should result in a stalemate. The healer doesn’t do enough damage to break a tank’s…well…tank and the tank can’t out damage the healer’s healing.

And the third leg of the trinity? The DPSer? Can’t out-DPS heals or tankiness either? Or DPS can kill both. That sounds OP to me. And probably why the DPS:tank:healer ratio in trinity games is always terrible, causing groups to wait around forever just to get a group together.

I thought that would be obvious….

DPS vs Tank. The Tank can take a beating but not very good at giving one. The DPS is good at giving one but not very good at receiving it. So even though the DPS will put out more damage than the Tank, the Tank can take more of a beating than the DPS. All things equal, out of 100 fights, the win/loss should be 50/50 and each fight should be a fairly close match.

DPS vs Healing. This can go one of two ways. Either the Healer’s healing can out heal the damage done by the DPS, in which case the Healer should not be able to dish out enough damage to kill the DPS resulting in a stalemate. Or the Healer can’t heal back all the damage being done resulting in their loss but should be able to deal enough damage to the DPS to take them out. So out of 100 fights, the win loss should be 50/50 with each fight being a close match.

I don’t miss the Holy Trinity but what I do miss is smarter mobs with a more diverse skillset. Also more viable roles in pvE , sure… which might happen if the mobs did more than auto attack every 5-10 secs dealing big chunks of damage ( and stuff like defiant and unshakable being used far too often on bosses … and condition caps etc)

IndigoSundown.5419:

I see that people still don’t get that:

1. Roles do not have be something you practice all the time, in every fight.
2. Roles don’t have to be exclusive to a given player/character.
3. Roles don’t have to be bound to professions.
4. Roles don’t have to be bound to gear.

That is what Rift just did and you know what? It totally confused the players used to the Trinity paradigm. Read the forums on Rift – people still only want Warrior = Tank, Cleric = Healers, the rest = DPS. It is the players that are rigid not the game and Rift proved that.

Deim Hunir.8503:

I don’t miss the Holy Trinity but what I do miss is smarter mobs with a more diverse skillset. Also more viable roles in pvE , sure… which might happen if the mobs did more than auto attack every 5-10 secs dealing big chunks of damage ( and stuff like defiant and unshakable being used far too often on bosses … and condition caps etc)

Yeah, it does not have to be a Holy Trinity.
But different roles that have a greater impact on the party would be nice.

Mostly there is no point in having a player with a cc role in the party.
That is just “wasted dps”

Bosses without defiant but with stunbreakers would give way more possibilities for interesting boss fights.

Add more unique support roles to each profession and win.

Deim Hunir.8503:

I don’t miss the Holy Trinity but what I do miss is smarter mobs with a more diverse skillset. Also more viable roles in pvE , sure… which might happen if the mobs did more than auto attack every 5-10 secs dealing big chunks of damage ( and stuff like defiant and unshakable being used far too often on bosses … and condition caps etc)

The bosses do get smarter in GW2, in the higher level areas. Players who are doing MAW, for example, may be lover level and not have all the skills, so the boss is less complicated. Compare that to Grenth, who has many different attacks (including teleporting you to drop you from the ceiling height).

crouze.3078:

Deim Hunir.8503:

I don’t miss the Holy Trinity but what I do miss is smarter mobs with a more diverse skillset. Also more viable roles in pvE , sure… which might happen if the mobs did more than auto attack every 5-10 secs dealing big chunks of damage ( and stuff like defiant and unshakable being used far too often on bosses … and condition caps etc)

Yeah, it does not have to be a Holy Trinity.
But different roles that have a greater impact on the party would be nice.

Mostly there is no point in having a player with a cc role in the party.
That is just “wasted dps”

Bosses without defiant but with stunbreakers would give way more possibilities for interesting boss fights.

Add more unique support roles to each profession and win.

@Deim
So you want to be forced to wear PVT gear? You can do that now too and it’s absolutely viable, don’t wish to ruin others gameplay for your own sake.

@crouze
Or just play the game and realize that is already there.

Xae Isareth.1364:

This is actually the main problem I had on FF14. They have dynamic event ‘bosses’ as well (although their dynamic events are a bit of a joke compared to GW2’s).

At the start of the game, it was okay because people are everywhere and you’ll always find a tank and a healer. But after a while, you get a lot of events where there’s just no tanks or no healers around, meaning that if the event has a boss, it’ll just be impossible.

Um what? you can cross-class skills if you don’t have a job equipped. There’s no reason that a DPS should ONLY be DPSing or a healer should only be healing. Even with a job equipped, my white mage is doing DPS probably 50% of the time.

I feel like most of the people complaining about the trinity are just bads. I’ve never played a game where healers didn’t have dps/support skills and dps didn’t have support/heals. If you’re a healer and you’re literally just spamming heals when people are at 90-100% hp already you’re just bad. And how are the events a joke? They’re literally the exact same thing as GW2 events, and a couple are far more interesting than any in this game (odin, behemoth). Not to mention the fact that a single FFXIV dungeon is better designed than the entirety of GW2

The lack of a trinity system in this game has simply resulted in a unity: warriors.

Warriors warriors warriors.

Best class in PvP: warriors
Best class in WvW: warriors
Best class in dungeons: warriors
Best class in World Events: warriors

Guild Warriors, not Guild Wars.

The problem with the holy trinity is that only a few classes could be healer or tank, and that there were many more dps classes. This creates a shortage, which is a big problem.

IMO, Rift took the correct approach: Make every profession capable of speccing into each role. Rift has 4 ‘callings’: mage, warrior, rogue and mage, and 4 roles: tank, dps, healer, support. Each calling has 9 (and soon to be 10) souls that allow each calling to perform any given role.

Much better approach.

Dusty Moon.4382:

IndigoSundown.5419:

I see that people still don’t get that:

1. Roles do not have be something you practice all the time, in every fight.
2. Roles don’t have to be exclusive to a given player/character.
3. Roles don’t have to be bound to professions.
4. Roles don’t have to be bound to gear.

That is what Rift just did and you know what? It totally confused the players used to the Trinity paradigm. Read the forums on Rift – people still only want Warrior = Tank, Cleric = Healers, the rest = DPS. It is the players that want the trinity that are rigid not the game and Rift proved that.

Fixed that for you.

Deamhan.9538:

Draknar.5748:

Deamhan.9538:

SkyShroud.2865:

I don’t understand the idea of trinity balance.

Does that means that healer can defeat a fighter? That’s not balance, that’s making healer OP.

Your right, it would. Balance would be each not being able to kill the other. A tank is suppose to be good at taking damage without dying and not dish it out (that’s the dps job). A healer is suppose to heal damage and not dish it out. A tank vs healer, if balanced and all variables equal (eg. player skill), should result in a stalemate. The healer doesn’t do enough damage to break a tank’s…well…tank and the tank can’t out damage the healer’s healing.

And the third leg of the trinity? The DPSer? Can’t out-DPS heals or tankiness either? Or DPS can kill both. That sounds OP to me. And probably why the DPS:tank:healer ratio in trinity games is always terrible, causing groups to wait around forever just to get a group together.

I thought that would be obvious….

DPS vs Tank. The Tank can take a beating but not very good at giving one. The DPS is good at giving one but not very good at receiving it. So even though the DPS will put out more damage than the Tank, the Tank can take more of a beating than the DPS. All things equal, out of 100 fights, the win/loss should be 50/50 and each fight should be a fairly close match.

DPS vs Healing. This can go one of two ways. Either the Healer’s healing can out heal the damage done by the DPS, in which case the Healer should not be able to dish out enough damage to kill the DPS resulting in a stalemate. Or the Healer can’t heal back all the damage being done resulting in their loss but should be able to deal enough damage to the DPS to take them out. So out of 100 fights, the win loss should be 50/50 with each fight being a close match.

I’m pretty sure a min/max DPSer would be pretty upset he could only kill a healer 50% of the time…

I can see the forum posts now about how OP healers are that high DPS builds can’t beat them regularly. Would be druid healer fiasco all over again.

Tank should lose to healer (low DPS cannot compete with heals), healer should lose to DPS (heals can’t compete with DPS), DPS should lose to tank (DPS can’t compete with HP pool/damage mitigation). That is the proper order of the Almighty Trinity.

What’s the point of a healer if he can’t out heal one dpser’s damage?

Diablo III is really fun now, and there’s no “holy trinity” either. Some classes are more tanky than others, but all have options to take a beating, and all have options to control enemies and support players.

That is the future. Going back to “Rock, paper scissors” would be a mistake.

The holy trinity makes things too simple. The better healer is the one that heals more. The better tank is the one that endures more. The better nuke is the one that deals more damage. And people can only really improve by increasing numbers.

Incomparables are always more fun in games.

Same things done differently.

I find this topic interesting. Mainly because I’ve been playing WoW for several years and only got into GW2 a week ago because of the 50% off offer.

I’m having quite a bit of trouble getting into the comabt system as it is, to be honest. I’m not going to discount that my feelings have been tempered by years of WoW, but quite a bit of the frustration comes from the lack of role. Doesn’t have to be tank/healer/dps, mind you, but “job” might be more appropriate?

If you go back to RPG game formation, role has always been the cornerstone. It’s kind of the R in RPG. You may take that as just meaning strictly character, but it’s not. It’s also your place in the greater scheme and things that define your character.

I guess it’s easier to do that and have fun for a one player traditional RPG. I’m thinking of something like the original FF, where you picked your party, or a game like Final Fantasy Tactics where there is a whole host of jobs. The single player, there, plays ALL of the roles, so he gets the whole experience. If every character was played by a single player, however, it might not be as fun for some. The spear wielding Dragoon gets to jump around and stab things, while the Time Mage…makes him go faster…

I digress. Just one of the many things I need to get used to about this game.

theo.5214:

I find this topic interesting. Mainly because I’ve been playing WoW for several years and only got into GW2 a week ago because of the 50% off offer.

Welcome aboard.

I encourage you to get into either sPvP or WvW.

PvP is designed to be beaten, and for the most part beaten easily by packs of entirely self-reliant lone wolves. In the other two mode you get much more dangerous opponents. In sPvP you have an environment build around a 50/50 chance for victory and enemies that hit HARD. In WvW you can find yourself in grossly uneven encounters where resilience or healing can dramatically shift the outcome.

Hope you find your niche – it’s a fun game (just a little simplistic in the default mode).

I like holy trinity better, I know gw2 is trying to do something different but this is just stupid since everyone and their mom has to play DPS to actually get somewhere. -_-

Dark Catalyst.1028:

What’s the point of a healer if he can’t out heal one dpser’s damage?

To heal other people? That’s what healers do…they heal other people…The trinity requires multiple classes to work. It isn’t the trinity if player is on their own. The trinity implies group play with roles. Healer can out-heal DPS unless it is on them. That’s the point. How would it be fair if healers and tanks can kill DPS, but DPS can’t kill either of them?

If a healer is attacked by a DPS, they need to focus heal themselves long enough for someone to pull the DPS off of them and/or a secondary healer spot healing. That’s the trinity. Healers shouldn’t be able to sit there mashing heal skills loling while being full DPS’d by a max DPS class build. That would be so OP.

In a 1v1 DPS v Healer, if both players are exactly the same skill level (somehow that being measurable) and they have the exact same level of gear, the DPSer should always come out on top. Always. Otherwise everyone should roll healer because you can kill pretty much everyone…(if you can out-heal DPS classes, you sure as heck can out heal tank DPS, you would be unstoppable).

Nike.2631:

theo.5214:

I find this topic interesting. Mainly because I’ve been playing WoW for several years and only got into GW2 a week ago because of the 50% off offer.

Welcome aboard.

I encourage you to get into either sPvP or WvW.

PvP is designed to be beaten, and for the most part beaten easily by packs of entirely self-reliant lone wolves. In the other two mode you get much more dangerous opponents. In sPvP you have an environment build around a 50/50 chance for victory and enemies that hit HARD. In WvW you can find yourself in grossly uneven encounters where resilience or healing can dramatically shift the outcome.

Hope you find your niche – it’s a fun game (just a little simplistic in the default mode).

Well, to be frank, my guild in WoW was made up of IRL friends, and it fell apart when a few people got a little frustrated. Some people had tried to convince everyone to play this for a long time, and they are finally getting their wish. So my motives were more to satisfy and hang out with my friends than the actual game.

That being said, PvP is not my bread and butter. I don’t mind it I guess. I dabbled in it in WoW. Still kind of worried at times when people constantly throw that out as end game content because it doesn’t interest me. That’s not the game’s fault, mind you, I just hope I have enough to keep me interested (which is a different discussion entirely and I don’t want to derail this thread).

Draknar.5748:

Dark Catalyst.1028:

What’s the point of a healer if he can’t out heal one dpser’s damage?

To heal other people? That’s what healers do…they heal other people…The trinity requires multiple classes to work. It isn’t the trinity if player is on their own. The trinity implies group play with roles. Healer can out-heal DPS unless it is on them. That’s the point. How would it be fair if healers and tanks can kill DPS, but DPS can’t kill either of them?

If a healer is attacked by a DPS, they need to focus heal themselves long enough for someone to pull the DPS off of them and/or a secondary healer spot healing. That’s the trinity. Healers shouldn’t be able to sit there mashing heal skills loling while being full DPS’d by a max DPS class build. That would be so OP.

In a 1v1 DPS v Healer, if both players are exactly the same skill level (somehow that being measurable) and they have the exact same level of gear, the DPSer should always come out on top. Always. Otherwise everyone should roll healer because you can kill pretty much everyone…(if you can out-heal DPS classes, you sure as heck can out heal tank DPS, you would be unstoppable).

What game are you playing where healers kill dps?

Healers/Tanks/DPS can’t really be balanced in 1v1 PvP, and never should be.

A good standard Healer toolbox should probably, at a basic level, contain skills that allow direct healing (obviously) and short term survival if and when they get forced into combat. It should be able to last for a bit, but certainly not indefinitely.

I think ideally they should have a set of self protection skills to be able to run or give them some time for help to arrive and at least some kind of DPS cooldown where they can provide viable DPS for a very short burst amount of time to defend themselves. But they should never be able to slug it out over the duration of an extended fight.

Although that would require a structure where there are actual roles.

Skill factor ,as you like to call it, at least in this game has been blatantly obvious by many of us who’ve watched the march of the zerkers since launch, has been nothing more than a bunch of people who have 0 time for anything so they cookie cutter their builds at least in PVE, to rush through the content as fast as possible.

Now while this is a problem for many games, it’s my belief that it’s due to the trinity being destroyed, and subsequently Arenanet’s own version of the trinity being destroyed by poor PVE balance choices that the combat is the way it is in this title. They basically don’t even have their own trinity in this title which makes for an even worse situation that not having the holy trinity at all.

Trinity lite has been mentioned in these threads as a solution. It’s worked very well in other titles that typically don’t require that you have specific classes but oh when you do the harmony and roles are very prominent and very helpful in all of the combat situations. Trinity lite gives the players the option to actually use the tools at hand in the game to help each other succeed instead of the every-man-for-himself attitude.

I vote for trinity lite if ever there were a CDI that brought this subject up in the future.

Bryzy.2719:

TL;DR:

This is NOT a thread requesting the return of the trinity. It well never happen. Read the post before you decide to comment something along those lines. This is a thread to discuss how lack of trinity is affecting GW2.

- Bad balancing + communist style gameplay = boring = loss of players
- If trinity was in place, player skill is still a key factor in winning pvp/wvw

This is a speculative thread and is open to all opinions, not one in which I’m am forcing forward my own – though I do state it.

Note: for newer players, ‘holy trinity’ refers to the profession-specific roles of tank, DPS and healer.

I’ve noticed more players recently giving up this game/logging far fewer hours to pursue real life or other gaming ventures. I’ve no idea if this is a legitimate trend (it most likely isn’t in the scheme of things) as I don’t have access to Anet’s playerbase statistics.

From what I’ve witnessed amongst players, GW2 appears to be a kind of ‘fleeting fancy’ when it comes to gameplay. That is, people will get the game, play for a couple of months, then get bored.

It’s my opinion that the poor profession-balancing skills of the devs [read: Rangers are due for another shafting], combined with the rather communist-esque design of the gameplay [read: no holy-trinity] are completely detrimental to the ‘addictiveness’ of the game. Simply put, comparatively, GW2 just isn’t that addictive meaning it isn’t as fun as other games.

I realise that some are advocates of the “skill factor” (i.e. removing the holy trinity means player skill plays a larger role in pvp/wvw), however I don’t believe this is necessarily the case. If we had the classic DPS/Tank/Healer roles, players’ individual skill would still determine the outcome of a fight. A really good tank would wear down DPS players, a really good DPS player might out-damage a healer’s healing power etc etc.

I have no expectation that Anet will ever incorporate the trinity into the game. The removal of it is, afterall, one of the game’s foundational ideals. It’s just my view that this makes for a weaker game in the long run.

Thoughts?

Dusty Moon.4382:

IndigoSundown.5419:

I see that people still don’t get that:

1. Roles do not have be something you practice all the time, in every fight.
2. Roles don’t have to be exclusive to a given player/character.
3. Roles don’t have to be bound to professions.
4. Roles don’t have to be bound to gear.

That is what Rift just did and you know what? It totally confused the players used to the Trinity paradigm. Read the forums on Rift – people still only want Warrior = Tank, Cleric = Healers, the rest = DPS. It is the players that are rigid not the game and Rift proved that.

I played Rift from beta up to GW2 BWE and was on the forums all the time. Never once did I read a post where someone complained that they could not understand how multiple callings could perform multiple roles. Never. People did complain that some professions were apex in more than one profession (e.g. best dps and best tank), but that’s a different topic.

I personally love the style this game has created. I have run so many dungeons with subpar groups only to finish the boss off solo because of their lack of skill. In any other mmo i would have payed for their shortcomings.

Keep the game the way it is and let people control their fate instead of the lame handicapped crap in almost every other mmo.

Aarean.5398:

I personally love the style this game has created. I have run so many dungeons with subpar groups only to finish the boss off solo because of their lack of skill. In any other mmo i would have payed for their shortcomings.

Keep the game the way it is and let people control their fate instead of the lame handicapped crap in almost every other mmo.

That depends on the game, although perhaps not going “solo.” I frequently carried sub-par groups in WoW as a healer by covering for their mistakes and keeping them alive long enough to off something. Gear could have something to do with that too. An overgeared player can definitely carry an undergeared group from any role or position.

I’d be more worried that you could solo current content that’s not meant to be done solo. That’s a problem with the game. Not sure how you foster teamwork in an environment where a team isn’t required to rely on it.

You get to build what you want in this game. In wow i could never build a prot warrior to fill dps because tanking is just so boring to me. In gw i just put all my points into dps stats and equip a sword and shield and ZIM ZALLA BIM… Dps prot warrior i always wanted with the added benefit of a ranged weapon to swap to… Amazing

Thedenofsin.7340:

Dusty Moon.4382:

IndigoSundown.5419:

I see that people still don’t get that:

1. Roles do not have be something you practice all the time, in every fight.
2. Roles don’t have to be exclusive to a given player/character.
3. Roles don’t have to be bound to professions.
4. Roles don’t have to be bound to gear.

That is what Rift just did and you know what? It totally confused the players used to the Trinity paradigm. Read the forums on Rift – people still only want Warrior = Tank, Cleric = Healers, the rest = DPS. It is the players that are rigid not the game and Rift proved that.

I played Rift from beta up to GW2 BWE and was on the forums all the time. Never once did I read a post where someone complained that they could not understand how multiple callings could perform multiple roles. Never. People did complain that some professions were apex in more than one profession (e.g. best dps and best tank), but that’s a different topic.

They did actually. Just really need to read the posts very carefully and that is what they were doing. I played the same length of time.

Dark Catalyst.1028:

Draknar.5748:

Dark Catalyst.1028:

What’s the point of a healer if he can’t out heal one dpser’s damage?

To heal other people? That’s what healers do…they heal other people…The trinity requires multiple classes to work. It isn’t the trinity if player is on their own. The trinity implies group play with roles. Healer can out-heal DPS unless it is on them. That’s the point. How would it be fair if healers and tanks can kill DPS, but DPS can’t kill either of them?

If a healer is attacked by a DPS, they need to focus heal themselves long enough for someone to pull the DPS off of them and/or a secondary healer spot healing. That’s the trinity. Healers shouldn’t be able to sit there mashing heal skills loling while being full DPS’d by a max DPS class build. That would be so OP.

In a 1v1 DPS v Healer, if both players are exactly the same skill level (somehow that being measurable) and they have the exact same level of gear, the DPSer should always come out on top. Always. Otherwise everyone should roll healer because you can kill pretty much everyone…(if you can out-heal DPS classes, you sure as heck can out heal tank DPS, you would be unstoppable).

What game are you playing where healers kill dps?

Huh? No game, you’re the one who said “what’s the point of a healer if he can’t out heal one DPSers damage”

That clearly implies you think healers should be able to out-heal one DPSer DPSing them. Which I’m saying wouldn’t be fair for that DPSer (assuming same skill level and gear).

Draknar.5748:

Dark Catalyst.1028:

Draknar.5748:

Dark Catalyst.1028:

What’s the point of a healer if he can’t out heal one dpser’s damage?

To heal other people? That’s what healers do…they heal other people…The trinity requires multiple classes to work. It isn’t the trinity if player is on their own. The trinity implies group play with roles. Healer can out-heal DPS unless it is on them. That’s the point. How would it be fair if healers and tanks can kill DPS, but DPS can’t kill either of them?

If a healer is attacked by a DPS, they need to focus heal themselves long enough for someone to pull the DPS off of them and/or a secondary healer spot healing. That’s the trinity. Healers shouldn’t be able to sit there mashing heal skills loling while being full DPS’d by a max DPS class build. That would be so OP.

In a 1v1 DPS v Healer, if both players are exactly the same skill level (somehow that being measurable) and they have the exact same level of gear, the DPSer should always come out on top. Always. Otherwise everyone should roll healer because you can kill pretty much everyone…(if you can out-heal DPS classes, you sure as heck can out heal tank DPS, you would be unstoppable).

What game are you playing where healers kill dps?

Huh? No game, you’re the one who said “what’s the point of a healer if he can’t out heal one DPSers damage”

That clearly implies you think healers should be able to out-heal one DPSer DPSing them. Which I’m saying wouldn’t be fair for that DPSer (assuming same skill level and gear).

A healer can’t kill a dps and a dps can’t kill a healer (at least until the healer runs out of resources). Seems fair to me. If I can’t out heal the damage I’m taking then I can’t out heal the damage someone else is taking. Much less so if a healer has to deal with other dps while healing. At this point it’s better to bring another dps and try to take someone out super fast.

Stop bantering back and forth about lesser mmo problems. These dont exist in the superior gw world.

Bryzy.2719:

Bad balancing + communist style gameplay = boring = loss of players

I lol’d at describing GW2 as “communist.” GW2 is basically the game saying: “play how you want, create your own build, combine skills/traits how you wish, perform any role you can manage.” It’s a “free market” of ideas and skill sets. You can quibble about game balance and whether or not X build is as viable as Y build, but the fact is people are free to make those mistakes and experiment.
By contrast, a traditional “holy trinity” MMO says: “This is your role, this is what skills you must use for that role, this is what you are allowed to wear, and any deviation is punished.”

Bryzy.2719:

I’ve noticed more players recently giving up this game/logging far fewer hours to pursue real life or other gaming ventures. I’ve no idea if this is a legitimate trend (it most likely isn’t in the scheme of things) as I don’t have access to Anet’s playerbase statistics.

/sigh
Why even bother saying something like this? I see this tired cliché all the time. “I want X in GW2. In my opinion, people are leaving the game because we don’t have X. Therefore, I am right.”
You said it yourself, you don’t have access to ANet’s playerbase statistics. Of course some people do leave the game, especially if they’ve already played for hundreds of hours. It happens all the time, in every game. But new people come in all the time, and some other players do come back after a break (myself included). I didn’t quit because there was no “holy trinity.” In fact, I’d probably quit if there was.

The fact is, we don’t know if more people are leaving than staying, at what rate people leave, or why. It’s not data you can factor into your argument, and is a non-sequitur best left unmentioned.

Anyhow, my take on the “holy trinity” is:

- it was a necessary evil for a long time, providing the nearest semblance of a “game” that massively multiplayer online infrastructures could manage, given the technology at the time

- MMO devs still fall back on the trinity today mainly out of laziness, familiarity, and lack of imagination

- It consistently results in 3/5 players waiting around for upwards of 40 minutes or more to get into a dungeon. To this day, I’ve yet to see any trinity-based game provide an adequate solution to this colossal waste of player time — despite the fact that these games are incredibly focused on dungeons as the delivery method for all endgame PvE content.

- 2/3 roles in the trinity have no place at all in leveling & soloing, and if you want to do them effectively you have to take gear & skills that utterly dismantle your ability to be efficient while solo or in the open world.

- In abandoning the “holy trinity” GW2 did leave some good mechanics behind, and created some new dilemmas that have yet to be solved perfectly. Still, I would take the worst aspects of GW2’s combat over the best aspects of the trinity model, any day.

Fyrebrand.4859:

Bryzy.2719:

Bad balancing + communist style gameplay = boring = loss of players

I lol’d at describing GW2 as “communist.” GW2 is basically the game saying: “play how you want, create your own build, combine skills/traits how you wish, perform any role you can manage.” It’s a “free market” of ideas and skill sets. You can quibble about game balance and whether or not X build is as viable as Y build, but the fact is people are free to make those mistakes and experiment.
By contrast, a traditional “holy trinity” MMO says: “This is your role, this is what skills you must use for that role, this is what you are allowed to wear, and any deviation is punished.”

Bryzy.2719:

I’ve noticed more players recently giving up this game/logging far fewer hours to pursue real life or other gaming ventures. I’ve no idea if this is a legitimate trend (it most likely isn’t in the scheme of things) as I don’t have access to Anet’s playerbase statistics.

/sigh
Why even bother saying something like this? I see this tired cliché all the time. “I want X in GW2. In my opinion, people are leaving the game because we don’t have X. Therefore, I am right.”
You said it yourself, you don’t have access to ANet’s playerbase statistics. Of course some people do leave the game, especially if they’ve already played for hundreds of hours. It happens all the time, in every game. But new people come in all the time, and some other players do come back after a break (myself included). I didn’t quit because there was no “holy trinity.” In fact, I’d probably quit if there was.

The fact is, we don’t know if more people are leaving than staying, at what rate people leave, or why. It’s not data you can factor into your argument, and is a non-sequitur best left unmentioned.

Anyhow, my take on the “holy trinity” is:

- it was a necessary evil for a long time, providing the nearest semblance of a “game” that massively multiplayer online infrastructures could manage, given the technology at the time

- MMO devs still fall back on the trinity today mainly out of laziness, familiarity, and lack of imagination

- It consistently results in 3/5 players waiting around for upwards of 40 minutes or more to get into a dungeon. To this day, I’ve yet to see any trinity-based game provide an adequate solution to this colossal waste of player time — despite the fact that these games are incredibly focused on dungeons as the delivery method for all endgame PvE content.

- 2/3 roles in the trinity have no place at all in leveling & soloing, and if you want to do them effectively you have to take gear & skills that utterly dismantle your ability to be efficient while solo or in the open world.

- In abandoning the “holy trinity” GW2 did leave some good mechanics behind, and created some new dilemmas that have yet to be solved perfectly. Still, I would take the worst aspects of GW2’s combat over the best aspects of the trinity model, any day.

1. My wait times are on average 10 minutes for a random during which I can do other things to occupy myself.

2. Remedied with allowing people to switch specs on the fly. I have both a healer and a dps spec.

Any other criticisms which aren’t mired in 2005?

Dark Catalyst.1028:

Fyrebrand.4859:

Bryzy.2719:

Bad balancing + communist style gameplay = boring = loss of players

I lol’d at describing GW2 as “communist.” GW2 is basically the game saying: “play how you want, create your own build, combine skills/traits how you wish, perform any role you can manage.” It’s a “free market” of ideas and skill sets. You can quibble about game balance and whether or not X build is as viable as Y build, but the fact is people are free to make those mistakes and experiment.
By contrast, a traditional “holy trinity” MMO says: “This is your role, this is what skills you must use for that role, this is what you are allowed to wear, and any deviation is punished.”

Bryzy.2719:

I’ve noticed more players recently giving up this game/logging far fewer hours to pursue real life or other gaming ventures. I’ve no idea if this is a legitimate trend (it most likely isn’t in the scheme of things) as I don’t have access to Anet’s playerbase statistics.

/sigh
Why even bother saying something like this? I see this tired cliché all the time. “I want X in GW2. In my opinion, people are leaving the game because we don’t have X. Therefore, I am right.”
You said it yourself, you don’t have access to ANet’s playerbase statistics. Of course some people do leave the game, especially if they’ve already played for hundreds of hours. It happens all the time, in every game. But new people come in all the time, and some other players do come back after a break (myself included). I didn’t quit because there was no “holy trinity.” In fact, I’d probably quit if there was.

The fact is, we don’t know if more people are leaving than staying, at what rate people leave, or why. It’s not data you can factor into your argument, and is a non-sequitur best left unmentioned.

Anyhow, my take on the “holy trinity” is:

- it was a necessary evil for a long time, providing the nearest semblance of a “game” that massively multiplayer online infrastructures could manage, given the technology at the time

- MMO devs still fall back on the trinity today mainly out of laziness, familiarity, and lack of imagination

- It consistently results in 3/5 players waiting around for upwards of 40 minutes or more to get into a dungeon. To this day, I’ve yet to see any trinity-based game provide an adequate solution to this colossal waste of player time — despite the fact that these games are incredibly focused on dungeons as the delivery method for all endgame PvE content.

- 2/3 roles in the trinity have no place at all in leveling & soloing, and if you want to do them effectively you have to take gear & skills that utterly dismantle your ability to be efficient while solo or in the open world.

- In abandoning the “holy trinity” GW2 did leave some good mechanics behind, and created some new dilemmas that have yet to be solved perfectly. Still, I would take the worst aspects of GW2’s combat over the best aspects of the trinity model, any day.

1. My wait times are on average 10 minutes for a random during which I can do other things to occupy myself.

2. Remedied with allowing people to switch specs on the fly. I have both a healer and a dps spec.

Any other criticisms which aren’t mired in 2005?

its boring, not fun, and not for me. but thats probably why i play GW2 and hope it keeps improving over all the trinity games.

But roleplaying a zergling and being forced into one gear set and a small handful of trait builds is apparently fun?

The whole problem is actually that armor absolutely doesn’t matter in this game.

If they change the damage model and behaviors on armors you get your different build back.
I mean a heavy armor guys dodging at same rate like someone without armor is ridiculous….. dodging with heavy armor in general is a joke.

Dark Catalyst.1028:

But roleplaying a zergling and being forced into one gear set and a small handful of trait builds is apparently fun?

As opposed to being forced into one of 3 roles and gear sets?

The main problem with the game isn’t the core system; it’s the encounters not fully utilising the system.

Dark Catalyst.1028:

But roleplaying a zergling and being forced into one gear set and a small handful of trait builds is apparently fun?

Being forced? Who’s forcing who?
If you’re joining a party that imposes gear restrictions you are forcing yourself.

There will always be an optimal way to speed through the content – and players that are of that mindset will always try to group up with similar individuals in order to clear the content faster.

That does not force you into anything. You can still complete the content in ANY gear with your friends/ guildies/ pugs without having anything to do with the speed clear min max group.

Who’s forcing what again?

Dark Catalyst.1028:

But roleplaying a zergling and being forced into one gear set and a small handful of trait builds is apparently fun?

There is no game out there with 100% viability for all play styles and builds for all game modes. It is impossible, some things will be better than other.

I rather run something that contributes to a team then get the feeling that other people are carrying me. I mean is it fun that I’m weighing down the team and not contributing in a team based game. You tell me

Dark Catalyst.1028:

But roleplaying a zergling and being forced into one gear set and a small handful of trait builds is apparently fun?

actively managing and dealing with damage done to me, damage i do to the enemies, my own recovery, and playing in ways that synergize with those around me without debilitating my playstyle is fun.

your zergling comment is irrelevant to trinity, that more about what type of numbers you prefer to do content with. And really other than living world, most content can be done with 2-10 players. There is also tequatl and wurm, but wurm requires roles and organisation to succeed, and tequatl is mostly about organizing people to do what they are supposed to do.

I played the game from release, to this day, my biggest desires at this point are new experiences, and new mechanics/playstyles and new challenges. I have at no time wished i could be back in a trinity.
Thats why i play this game.