Guild Wars 2

Just me, or does anyone else fell like Gw2 starting, or have already gotten pretty over complicating?

This reminds me of the game “Bambozzle” in the show Friends. The idea is simple, if you are get enough into the game, like use a lot of time in it, the complicating factors get understandable, but the newcomers wont really want to get into a game like that, thats why they changed it to a more simple one.

Also with the whole 100 things popping up and random small chest out of nowhere, this game seems to have gotten different if you start again, and most new people that get into Gw2 from now, will usually dont like it at first “based on new youtubers and friends”……….

I mean, I get that the already existing players will not like it either if nothing is being changed, but overcomplicating some factors like the clean way of leveling up and enjoying the game to: “get this random chest and now you should do dungeons or you are missing out” ideology, simply seems wrong..

I dont know, what do you guys think? The experience have without a doubt changed based on how first people are experiencing the game, please write your thoughts

I really don’t know what you are referring to. “100 things popping up?” “Random small chest…”? Can you please provide some specifics?

GW2 is a huge game. There are a great many systems in place. It is now and has always been complicated. To keep players interested, Anet will keep adding to it. I don’t see a problem with that.

Perhaps, OP is referring to the tutorial pop-ups? I don’t know, but if so, those are there to help guide new players. They were added with the New Player Experience to try to lessen the steepness of the learning curve.

I started this game 2-3 months ago and i can assure you its really easy to get into.

I even found it quite fun and engaging right from the start. Within the first few hours i was running with a small event group through Metrica Province to help Rikkiti get his shinies back… i’ve ran that event over 50 times easy (and still do every now and again )

Coming from the sad remains that was once WoW and a bunch of failed attempts to replace my daily goto MMORPG it was quite refreshing and a very hope restoring.

So far I came across nothing i couldn’t figure out, with the help of youtube and the Wiki (great thanks to WoodenPotatoes, LordWafflez and a few others).

Considering i have had a small setback, a few years back, that hampered my info intake and response time i must say i didn’t experience any overly complicated situations.

You do need to ‘step outside’ for information (youtube, wiki) but i have yet to find a game where that isn’t the case. The thing that cost me the most effort was getting to grips with the stat system. But since i only play ‘outside’ and do no group content all my characters are clad in full Berseker gear and are doing great

You want a complicated game? Look at POE.

Exclamatory.8351:

You want a complicated game? Look at POE.

Also no popups since it doesn’t even bother with damage numbers.

i do agree.
did a post on similar post with focus on the combat mechanics complexity:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/wuv/In-combat-Information/first#post6677996

currently there are over 25 different buff/debuff icons to keep track of at a glimse. ton of instant use skills to lower your timeframe for descission. 36 different fields combo’s to track. and the complete removal of “class identification” and “class roles”.

i can’t help thinking “did we really need 25+ buff/debuff to cover the basics of hot,dot,hard cc, soft cc, dmg-mitigation or couldnt we have done it with just 5?”.

i mean did we really need a “torment” effect, or couldnt we just have created same effect on the gameplay by mixing a soft cc+a dot?.

in general if it can be done simpler with the same effect, adding complexity is rarely ever beneficial.

also when it comes to complexity it doesnt help much that you need to spend so much time on thirdparty sites just to get base information which doesnt exist ingame (or is very hard to find as a person who would actually need to gain the knowledge)

edit: forum keeps screwing up and have had to rewrited a few times now so this is the super shortened vs. with little logic in it, as i am tired of rewritting (and didnt use a text program to copy pasted from, as i expected the forum to be more reliable)

Nyx.6532:

i mean did we really need a “torment” effect, or couldnt we just have created same effect on the gameplay by mixing a soft cc+a dot?.

The problem with Confusion and Torment is that they originally were not DoT at all. Confusion only did damage when you used skills, and so you could just wait it out while not activating any skills. Torment did damage only if you moved, stay at one spot and you could avoid damage from it.

However, people complained, and complained, and complained. How these were useless in PvE. Or how confusion stack made AI not to use any skills. Both have gone over several iterations over the years, reducing their original mechanics, and with latest patch we got this:

“Confusion: Base damage has been increased to match bleed’s base damage; skill-activation damage has been reduced to compensate for this.

Torment: Base damage has been increased to match bleed’s base damage; movement damage has been reduced to compensate for this."

So now we have 5 exactly same Damage Over Time effects in the game:
- burn
- bleed
- poison, reduces healing slightly
- confusion, adds little damage when using skills
- torment, adds little damage when moving

They ALL do damage to you same way. You also counter them, clean them, avoid them exactly same way. Some have small additional effects, but there are no differences between them anymore. They are simply 5 different icons, and they should be combined into one icon.

It would be better to combine all these DoT effects into single damage, and split up the additional effects into separate non-damage effects:
- DoT, does damage over time
- poison, does no damage but each stack reduces healing, for example 10 stacks would reduce healing by 100%
- confusion, does damage ONLY if you use skills
- torment, does damage ONLY if you move

The only thing I find overcomplicated is the loot. Getting bags from bags from bags gets obnoxious.

I’ve legit quit for a period of time when I found myself having to spend almost 1/2 my time playing clearing out my inventory over and over again. And I have max inventory.

FogLeg.9354:

Nyx.6532:

i mean did we really need a “torment” effect, or couldnt we just have created same effect on the gameplay by mixing a soft cc+a dot?.

The problem with Confusion and Torment is that they originally were not DoT at all. Confusion only did damage when you used skills, and so you could just wait it out while not activating any skills. Torment did damage only if you moved, stay at one spot and you could avoid damage from it.

However, people complained, and complained, and complained. How these were useless in PvE. Or how confusion stack made AI not to use any skills. Both have gone over several iterations over the years, reducing their original mechanics, and with latest patch we got this:

“Confusion: Base damage has been increased to match bleed’s base damage; skill-activation damage has been reduced to compensate for this.

Torment: Base damage has been increased to match bleed’s base damage; movement damage has been reduced to compensate for this."

So now we have 5 exactly same Damage Over Time effects in the game:
- burn
- bleed
- poison, reduces healing slightly
- confusion, adds little damage when using skills
- torment, adds little damage when moving

They ALL do damage to you same way. You also counter them, clean them, avoid them exactly same way. Some have small additional effects, but there are no differences between them anymore. They are simply 5 different icons, and they should be combined into one icon.

It would be better to combine all these DoT effects into single damage, and split up the additional effects into separate non-damage effects:
- DoT, does damage over time
- poison, does no damage but each stack reduces healing, for example 10 stacks would reduce healing by 100%
- confusion, does damage ONLY if you use skills
- torment, does damage ONLY if you move

Well here is the issue with that. You really couldn’t/can’t just “wait out confusion”, you either must “cleanse it” or accept the damage you get by fighting with it on (as not using skills will get you killed VERY fast vs. an opponent that got half a clue).
If the purpose was to “shut down” your skill use, then the confusion dot doesn’t serve its purpose and it fails at doing this, as such a “silence” effect would have been Far more correct to use;
Little Rant:
(and silly OP due to how GW2 survival so heavily depends on skilluse. Which always makes me think “WHY does the little grimlings/asura get a RACE skill which got the Most OP skill effect in the game, by FAR and to my knowledge it’s the ONLY skill which completely shuts down ANY and ALL defence you could do, no matter your build, for X seconds.
seriously, they nerfed the AOE rooting ability of the sylvari to the ground, but they thought this was totally balanced as a RACE ability… so … sigh I can’t even consider the amount of Weed I would need to think that’s a good choice :P
ok rant over, now moving on )

Now to continue the point: as I hear you, and agree with, confusion didn’t Work for its purpose, it bugged out pve, it didn’t have the intended effect in pvp, and it added extra complexity. So here is the real question:
“as a dev, seeing that this new mechanic is not working in Any aspect of the game and is adding negative complexity to your system without solving anything. Why would you keep it in the game then? why not accept that it did not work as you hoped, remove it and replace it with existing mechanics (you already had so many to choose from, you had everything from Clear silence, could be added so “CC breakers removed it” for balance, to Dots bleed/burn/etc. and soft+hard CC. there was absolutely no need to “invent a NEW debuff”, especially when it didn’t solve anything and added extra clutter+issues).
____________________________
So here we come to the obvious solution (imho);
Remove ALL the clutter. Exactly as you suggest, take all the Dot skills and put them into 1, just call it “DOT” and in the describtion you can do all the (this is a fire, this is poisen, this is magic darkpower energy of doomgated terror, Mwuhahaha), and keep the skill effects so it looks cool.

The same goes for Buffs: will post it in its own reply as its getting to long now:

i find that most buffs seems very “gimmicky”. Let me explain what I mean;
might=dmg increase.
fury=dmg increase.
Quickness= dmg increase.
Aegis=Damage mitigation.
Protection=Damage mitigation.
Resistance=Damage mitigation (dot specific, which just seems like a gimmick on a gimmick to a gimmick imo).
Retaliation=damage mitigation+dot/dmg.
Vigor=indirect Damage mitigation.
regen=hot.
Stability=CC immunity.
Swiftness=Base Speed increase (game is balanced for you to have Perma swiftness).

So lets give it a look: fury, might and quickness could all just be clear “dmg buffs”, and it would have no real noticeable gameplay change (quickness might have a little bit as you use less skills, but it will be really minor and the decrease in skill use time also funks the balance of weapon switching and skill combination usages, so overall I would say it is a Huge improvement to the complexity lvl). So
you can bring Aegis, protection, resistance, vigor, into 1 skill which is simply Dmg mitigation (Aegis you might want to give an invuln effect instead as that is effectively what it does), I would put vigor here as dodging is WAY too powerfull to balance out when you can heavily buff it (as it is a 100% immunity from almost everything as well as a movement skill on top of it. I always disliked the 100% immunity thing, think it should be removed and simply be a movement skill to get you out of range or make skillshots miss).
retaliation would simply be a mix of applying dots and dmg mitigation (although I highly dislike this effect, as I find it silly that you kill yourself by hitting a target that doesn’t even know you are there).
Stability is a CC immunity (which both on paper and ingame is incredibly OP, should be changed to a “charge amount” or a “stunbar which could be broken” imho. But if not it would need to stay as an effect).
as swiftness simply removes soft CC and speed you to “normal movespeed, I would remove this completely, buff base speed by the increase it gives, and change the skills using this to something more wanted (maybe CC breaking, or something, not giving it thoughts to what the skills should do instead right now. But the swiftness is just clutter to click on imho)

1. Dmg increase.
2. Dmg mitigation
3. Regen.
4. Stability/CC immunity.
5. Retaliation. (if not changed)
6. Vigor. (if not changed)

So even in worse case we go from 11 buffs to 6 buffs, in best case we go to 4.
debuffs goes down to 3 (soft/hard CC, Dots)
*So we go from 25 buff/debuffs to 7, which is a Far more reasonable amount to have in a game and expect people to easily and quickly get an overview of the battlefield(you could even colour their icons if you want different strength of them, which would still allow for easily and fast overview of what is on/off in the middle of battle.
and with so few effects you could even allow some of them to sit over the HP-bar of the player, making it incredibly fast to see who needs cleansing, who needs buffs etc.))

Fractured.3928:

The only thing I find overcomplicated is the loot. Getting bags from bags from bags gets obnoxious.

I’ve legit quit for a period of time when I found myself having to spend almost 1/2 my time playing clearing out my inventory over and over again. And I have max inventory.

yer it is a bit annoying.
i just find the amount of clicking i need to do to open all bags, salvage them, sell sigils to vendor, use luck, disposit crafting mats, to be a bit of a noisance, but it is a very minor concern to me compared to other things (and its a way to push inventory space selling. my god i Hate limited inventory space, weight limits and other silly attempts to pester me into paying.. i dont mind paying so could we just have an “unlimited inv” once we unlucked all the inventory spaces? and be done with this bs harass. please)

I noticed most games are becoming over complicated. Multiple currencies, xp types, and a few other things that increase the learning curve and for me makes it difficult to return to a game as a lot has to be relearned, not counting catching up to current builds and skills effectiveness. Some games I just leave alone because it’s not worth it.

I don’t know, out of all the MMO’s I’ve played, GW2 is one of the least complicated.

Yes, it is getting overcomplicated, especially on the new maps where each one brings a set of skills that can only be used on that map and that often duplicate abilities we have already seen elsewhere. Do we really need so many different ways to jump higher?

It’s fine when you are focussing on the latest map but when you start dotting between them it’s hard to remember which skills you can get on which map. And why can’t I use those aerial combat skills on other similar maps?

You mean complicated in the same way that the puzzles in Episode 6 of the Living Story were complicated?

In other words…not all that complicated.

I think the general trend in gaming is simplification and is most easily seen by a screenshot of a WoW build in Wrath and a current one. The idea is that there are training wheels on so that it’s easier and more likely to arrive at a decent build while simultaneously making it difficult to arrive at a horribly bad one.

Still it is possible to erect barriers to entry in the form of game systems that grow ever more complex as they grow by accretion. GW2 was simpler and less complex than HoT in this regard and I’m talking game systems and not referencing the combat discussion above. Parsimony is a good design goal to maintain near the top of the list.

The only thing that I find overconplicated are the achievements. As I read the forums I find about stuff that I could have used. Like just now I read that I could have gotten some awesome weapon skins after completing HOT (I still can, but I have other goals now), or salvaging this weapon would have gotten you this item for that achievement. Or maybe it’s just and I should have payed more attention. But if it’s not, I doubt that the majority of players read the forum.

While I believe I get in principle what the OP is referring to, I may also be wrong. Let me take this from another perspective. In almost every game, this one included, the majority of players are casual gamers. Again in most games, about 2-5% of the total population posts in the forums, these usually turn out to be mostly your non-casual gamers. Early in this game, the learning curve can be a bit overwhelming when try to figure out weapons, builds, skills, ect. However, they do get much easier if you stay with the game and eventually you figure the basics out and get to the higher levels. Great, you’re feeling good and think your character is properly equipped, your build is good, you understand the game better and mostly importantly you feel successful and are dying much, much less. (this is called the learning curve and its takes some time, the OP was probably referring to this)

Now here are two examples of where people get frustrated. I make another character, have a level 80 boost and send my character into the silverwastes. This area is much harder but not still not on par with HOT. I struggle with the level 80, begin dying and /or barely surviving most fights, and think hmm.. I just don’t know how to use this class yet. Try another class and get similar results. This experience is in the back of my mind because…

I finally get my main character into HOT or story 2/3 and the same thing begins to happen. At this point, statistics tell us the following. About 20% quit the game, another 15-25% will ask in game or on the forums. After receiving answers, of those 15-25%, about half of them will quit, ironically many of them will eventually come back. The other 50% or so either stick it out, take a break or complain to the company per customer service, tech support ect.

My point here is we often forget the impact of these players and whether we like it or not, they do have a voice, just not as vocal as the non-casual gamer. What really needs to happen is HOT and the stories need either a very specific tutorial or warning about the content difficulty increase. I had a max level guild when HOT was introduced and while people come and go all the time, I can’t tell you how many times I heard the comments about difficulty and the frustration players. Keep in mind most of these players also want the ability to feel successful doing mostly solo content so as much as I/we tried to help, I/we were fighting an uphill battle.

Nyx.6532:

So here we come to the obvious solution (imho);
Remove ALL the clutter. Exactly as you suggest, take all the Dot skills and put them into 1, just call it “DOT” and in the describtion you can do all the (this is a fire, this is poisen, this is magic darkpower energy of doomgated terror, Mwuhahaha), and keep the skill effects so it looks cool.

I don’t see devs ever removing conditions or buffs. With HoT they added 6 more, none of which were asked for or have any real effect in the game:
- quickness
- resistance
- slow
- taunt
- alacrity
- superspeed

I mean if you were to remove all of them tomorrow, nobody would not even notice. Other then having less colorful icons on screen.

Not sure how many more will appear with PoF. There will be Barrier mechanics, another way to increase HP pool and make battles longer (as far I understand from only watching it in the videos).

FogLeg.9354:

Nyx.6532:

So here we come to the obvious solution (imho);
Remove ALL the clutter. Exactly as you suggest, take all the Dot skills and put them into 1, just call it “DOT” and in the describtion you can do all the (this is a fire, this is poisen, this is magic darkpower energy of doomgated terror, Mwuhahaha), and keep the skill effects so it looks cool.

I don’t see devs ever removing conditions or buffs. With HoT they added 6 more, none of which were asked for or have any real effect in the game:
- quickness
- resistance
- slow
- taunt
- alacrity
- superspeed

I mean if you were to remove all of them tomorrow, nobody would not even notice. Other then having less colorful icons on screen.

Not sure how many more will appear with PoF. There will be Barrier mechanics, another way to increase HP pool and make battles longer (as far I understand from only watching it in the videos).

-_-

Wat?

They have affected the game. Having Quickness up, or putting a slow on someone or putting Alacrity on allies or briefly taunting an enemy or a player, or throwing up Resistance when afflicted with heavy conditions, proccing superspeed…these all have a pretty drastic effect in the middle of a fight. What in the nine hells are some of you guys talking about? How much of this game have those complaining about the complexity and the “uselessness” of some boons/debuffs even played? I’m actually genuinely curious, not to be an kitten but to just get an assessment of your play experience.

Quickness and Alacrity are very different boons and having one and not the other can have a drastic effect on the dps balance in your group. For a Daredevil Alacrity is barely more damage, for an Elementalist it’s a massive dps boost…

Aegis and Protection are also extremely different in what they do, honestly tossing things on a heap like has been done by some people in this thread shows a clear lack of understanding of each (de)buff… One could argue that this is a failing of the game, but then again, there’s an official wiki for a reason…

zengara.8301:

Just me, or does anyone else fell like Gw2 starting, or have already gotten pretty over complicating?

This reminds me of the game “Bambozzle” in the show Friends. The idea is simple, if you are get enough into the game, like use a lot of time in it, the complicating factors get understandable, but the newcomers wont really want to get into a game like that, thats why they changed it to a more simple one.

I think that some of what you are see as complicating is to give new comers more of a chance. Example if new maps did not have new currencies than anything new that came out vets could insta buy on day one but newer players would have a while before they could acquire. That keeps the playing field a bit more level and prevents people from stock piling and having everything as soon as its released. This does mean a large amount of kizmo’s as we go. Not saying I am fan, I stockpile myself in case I can use something later, but I also understand that I will need to put the same time in as everyone else when new things are introduced and am good with that. And on top of that if new maps were just the same as old with nothing new, less people would be inclined to go there since they could continue in the areas they are in now.

You also have to remember that the new player experience was introduced a couple of years ago to assist new players with all the ingame nuances and systems. To vets it seemed overkill but listening to new players that needed it, it helped quite a bit. When I first start GW2 before that introduction it was a lot to take in, but as you played the patterns became more clear and figuring out what these things were was a game unto itself.

Just 2 cents.

Idk, i’m a brand new player and while i was a bit overwhelmed at first, a bit of reading and research cleared most of my questions.

I did make the choice to ignore the boosts i was given for purchasing the game and just to level my own character from scratch, which probably smooths the learning curve quite a bit.

Which is also why i believe giving these boosts to new players is a mistake.

Wide but not deep. GW2 has a lot of items, stats, etc especially in crafting. Unfortunately none of this has ever translated into a great depth of play.

GW2 grinds in all the wrong places making much of the more interesting elements locked behind hours and hours or mind numbing boredom. GW2 needs a real loot engine and more complex fighting outside of PvP.

GW1 is too wide with too many skills but its depth of play is substantially greater.

KryTiKaL.3125:

FogLeg.9354:

Nyx.6532:

So here we come to the obvious solution (imho);
Remove ALL the clutter. Exactly as you suggest, take all the Dot skills and put them into 1, just call it “DOT” and in the describtion you can do all the (this is a fire, this is poisen, this is magic darkpower energy of doomgated terror, Mwuhahaha), and keep the skill effects so it looks cool.

I don’t see devs ever removing conditions or buffs. With HoT they added 6 more, none of which were asked for or have any real effect in the game:
- quickness
- resistance
- slow
- taunt
- alacrity
- superspeed

I mean if you were to remove all of them tomorrow, nobody would not even notice. Other then having less colorful icons on screen.

Not sure how many more will appear with PoF. There will be Barrier mechanics, another way to increase HP pool and make battles longer (as far I understand from only watching it in the videos).

-_-

Wat?

They have affected the game. Having Quickness up, or putting a slow on someone or putting Alacrity on allies or briefly taunting an enemy or a player, or throwing up Resistance when afflicted with heavy conditions, proccing superspeed…these all have a pretty drastic effect in the middle of a fight. What in the nine hells are some of you guys talking about? How much of this game have those complaining about the complexity and the “uselessness” of some boons/debuffs even played? I’m actually genuinely curious, not to be an kitten but to just get an assessment of your play experience.

I agree with KryTiKaL and I’m curious to know what FogLeg does in the game to think that those 6 buffs have no effect in the game . . . they’ve had huge impacts in the game and I think most people would notice immediately if they were taken out (especially quickness, resistance and alacrity imo). I’ll gladly give examples of how these buffs have influenced the current state of the game if asked.

Nyx.6532:

1. Dmg increase.
2. Dmg mitigation
3. Regen.
4. Stability/CC immunity.
5. Retaliation. (if not changed)
6. Vigor. (if not changed)

So even in worse case we go from 11 buffs to 6 buffs, in best case we go to 4.
debuffs goes down to 3 (soft/hard CC, Dots)
*So we go from 25 buff/debuffs to 7, which is a Far more reasonable amount to have in a game and expect people to easily and quickly get an overview of the battlefield(you could even colour their icons if you want different strength of them, which would still allow for easily and fast overview of what is on/off in the middle of battle.
and with so few effects you could even allow some of them to sit over the HP-bar of the player, making it incredibly fast to see who needs cleansing, who needs buffs etc.))

I think what you suggest for boons and conditions would cause a lot of experienced players to leave the game if implemented and this oversimplification would have a difficult time retaining new players.

Here’s why I think that:

First about your proposal for conditions – if the DoTs were clumped into a single condition, this would kill condi builds everywhere. If all DoTs were turned into one condition, cleansing that single DoT would be extremely easy since your proposed soft cc condition is the only condi you could use to try and cover your DoT (I’m assuming your proposed hard cc condi would prevent skill activation so they wouldn’t be able to cleanse while hard cc’d). Since most condi cleanses in the game remove at least two condis, they would need to change all cleanses in the game so most of them remove only one so your DoT isn’t completely useless so that using soft cc condi as a cover would actually work. Power builds would be the only viable solution since there would literally be only 1 condi damage threat.

About your proposed solution for boons – This would be SUCH an oversimplification. You’re right that technically aegis, protection, resistance and vigor have some sort of effect on “damage mitigation” but they do so in completely different ways that you can’t actually group them together like that. Comparing any two of these boons would show that they can’t just be classified as “damage mitigation.” Aegis blocks the next single attack negating it to zero and then is gone. Protection lasts for a set amount of time and reduces direct damage by 33% (has no effect on condi damage at all). These boons serve completely different purposes. If I’m dueling someone and they give themselves aegis, I’ll make sure to waste aegis with a single AA and then use my abilities afterwards. If instead I see them proc protection, I can’t waste protection on a single AA and then continue my rotation. Let’s look at resistance – it’s arguably the complete opposite of protection. It negates all condi damage while having no effect on direct damage. But it’s not just a damage mitigator, it negates any negative effects from condis, so if I’m chilled but give myself resistance, my skill recharge rate will be normal (so resistance is much more than a damage mitigation tool). And then vigor is also completely different than the other three. Technically they all serve the same purpose in the end, but they do so in very different ways. It’s like the difference between modes of transport. An airplane, train, car and a bike all serve the same end goal (getting someone to a new location) but they do so in completely different ways so they aren’t the same thing.

Same thing can be said for the damage modifiers that you brought up. Power and fury technically just increase your damage, but they do it in completely different ways. It’s not unheard of for an rpg (not just an mmorpg but rpgs in general) to have a buff for direct damage, a separate one for crit chance, another one for crit damage, etc. If we did clump the damage modifiers together, how would they even increase your damage? You would need to expand on how the damage is increased before your damage increasing boon can do anything.

I just think that simplifying boons/conditions in this way would greatly decrease build diversity across the board and people already complain about build diversity as it is. This would cause experienced players to quit and new players may have an easier time learning the game, but they’ll get bored and won’t stay around.

Nyx.6532:

“as a dev, seeing that this new mechanic is not working in Any aspect of the game and is adding negative complexity to your system without solving anything. Why would you keep it in the game then? why not accept that it did not work as you hoped, remove it and replace it with existing mechanics (you already had so many to choose from, you had everything from Clear silence, could be added so “CC breakers removed it” for balance, to Dots bleed/burn/etc. and soft+hard CC. there was absolutely no need to “invent a NEW debuff”, especially when it didn’t solve anything and added extra clutter+issues).
____________________________
So here we come to the obvious solution (imho);
Remove ALL the clutter. Exactly as you suggest, take all the Dot skills and put them into 1, just call it “DOT” and in the describtion you can do all the (this is a fire, this is poisen, this is magic darkpower energy of doomgated terror, Mwuhahaha), and keep the skill effects so it looks cool.

The same goes for Buffs: will post it in its own reply as its getting to long now:

Removing something and replacing it with nothing still leaves the original problem. We don’t have anything that effectively shut down player actions, and PvE doesn’t benefit when the trigger is something NPC AI doesn’t do much of.

Both torment and confusion work on this really fine line where they could be devastating in PvP, but theres not a good way to control its application. PvE has the exact opposite problem where AI doesn’t do the things that trigger it enough to be dangerous…. but there is a huge demand for more DPS sources for Raid meta.

Them moving both over to a PvE slant for static DPS means they’re trying to side line it so they can reexplore it later without having to remove it. Reaper Chill ran into a similar issue, because there is a major lack of control on how condi cleanse prioritizes order… and incidentally chill triggering bleed stacks had a couple of advantages (cover condi, and intensity stacking). Therwon’t deprecate either, because nothing else in the game fills that functionality (no matter how inadequate it is at the time). They needed more damage types to differentiate Mesmer and Revenant, and add new strategic options to the game. If they’re triggered damage output was really high, then they’d definitely fill that function in PvP modes.

But if the problem is Condi cleanse being so effective, that the only conditions that are useful are ones that front load damage…. then the problem is pretty kitten obvious. In fact…. following this train of thought, it reveals a whole slew of other issues about there being no punishing aspect to suppress condi removal.

We Need a new game play vector built around the idea of Blighting support. Not just boon strip… but punishing heavy condi cleanse, while increasing the number of condi damage mitigation methods in Core. The stuff you can toy with in both PvP and PvE are pretty substantial, and finally add an element of strategy to condi play besides constantly reapplying and clearing. Even as just a start, a new condition called “Blight” that triggers damage when Bleed, Poison, Burning, or itself is removed; paired with a Boon called “Hearty” that reduces the damage of Bleed, Poison, Burning and Blight. With Blight damage being direct damage, it doesn’t get negated by Resistance; with “Hearty” adding a middle ground between the decisive impact of condi clearing, and the expansive (yet short) mitigation given by Resistance. There are even greater options if you factor in barrier as a Resistance alternative.

juicewilliams.3964:

I just think that simplifying boons/conditions in this way would greatly decrease build diversity across the board and people already complain about build diversity as it is.

Thing is, current overly complicated usage of condis has also negative effect on build diversity. You can not build any character without enough condi cleanse, so any current build must include certain skills or traits. People complain about lack of usable builds BECAUSE of huge amount of different condis you are being spammed at constantly, so you are required to have counterplay against those.

By reducing number of condis it would be easier to cleanse them, and that would free up potential skills and traits for more different builds. Plus, nobody expect this to happen simply by swapping every current damage condi into one new. Balance updates and skill changes are still required. You could for example increase base damage of that DOT effect to compensate for reduced number of condis.

Having 5 different condis that all have separate icons, separate stacks, separate duration, but still do same thing in the end is just a visual clutter that makes screen more busy. During the fight you have no time to study each of these anyway so they all meld into one generic “bad stuff on me”, which is what has been proposed.

FogLeg.9354:

By reducing number of condis it would be easier to cleanse them, and that would free up potential skills and traits for more different builds. Plus, nobody expect this to happen simply by swapping every current damage condi into one new. Balance updates and skill changes are still required. You could for example increase base damage of that DOT effect to compensate for reduced number of condis.

Whoever I responded to suggested that all DoTs be merged into a single condi, so your statement about nobody expecting that to be the fix is just false since I was responding to someone with that idea.

Also I don’t think increasing base damage of DoTs is a good idea. Imo DoTs shouldn’t be used for burst damage, it’s in their name that they deal damage over time. Power builds should be the “burst damage” option. If you increase base damage of condis and people can burst people down with condis, then why run power since condis would provide good burst like power builds, but then their damage remains and ramps up over time? Arguably, some already feel like condi is too much burst damage, so increasing their base damage further might not be a good option.

FogLeg.9354:

Having 5 different condis that all have separate icons, separate stacks, separate duration, but still do same thing in the end is just a visual clutter that makes screen more busy. During the fight you have no time to study each of these anyway so they all meld into one generic “bad stuff on me”, which is what has been proposed.

The only thing that adds to visual clutter are the icons. Duration doesn’t add anything else visually that’s taking up space and the stacks is just a tiny number on the icon. So out of the three things you listed, only one of them adds to visual clutter.

I think it’s safe to assume, that the more information I have when I’m in a fight, the better decisions I can make during that fight. If I’m dueling someone and they apply a few condis on me but not many stacks of those condis, then that tells me they may be trying to bait out my cleanses so I can’t cleanse after their rotation and I’m stuck with a ton of stacks of multiple condis because I made a bad decision and got baited/outplayed. I wouldn’t be able to make those decisions if they didn’t display the different condis on me and I couldn’t find out at least how many stacks there are of each.

Also, even for casual gamers, it’s not difficult to look at your condis and be able to differentiate between the condis on you if you’ve been playing the game for a while.

GW2 is a lot simpler than other popular mmos out there, so maybe that’s why I think there isn’t an issue with this because it’s already very clean for me having played more complicated games with useless visual clutter.