Guild Wars 2

It isn’t gameplay imbalances for the love of all. It is yet another (not so carefully) crafted way to nerf advancement, increase the grind (which is all this game is), and all but force people into purchasing gems with RL money.

You do also realize they’re “changing ORR” at the end of this month also right? You honestly think these changes will keep the only reliable and soloable way to farm money intact? HAH!

I honestly don’t know what their logic is. Do they think people will stick around? Do they think other games won’t have more to offer if all they do is nerf GAME MECHANICS for PROFIT instead of for BALANCE?

My prediction, which sadly won’t be disprovable until the end of 2013, is that this game’s population decreases by a little more than 50% by years end and NEVER recovers. It will most likely hover around those numbers and slowly decay over the next year or two. I can only pray that future game devs will look back at GW2 and say “Wow, I should learn that greed can easily destroy great game mechanics if allowed to run rampant and that ignoring the purpose of the game, FUN, is a recipe for disaster.”

youre nuts. the real reason is that aoe is bad for most aspects of the game, especially conquest spvp. it dumbs everything down.

you dont know what theyre gonna nerf exactly. but i will enjoy watching the d/d ele fall from top. im sure good eles will still do fine.

I will never ever buy gems simply becuase of these underhanded tactics. When the game first came out I bought $50 worth and was eager to spend them…but now I see Anet forcing us to go down this route simply because earning any kind of gold is so incredibly time consuming…They should be very very wary. Once a player leaves a game..it takes an enormous amount of persuasion so ever bring them back and the fact is there are lots of chocies out there with even more due on the horizon. I relaise they have to make money, but it should not be done in such an underhanded way.

This was my first impression too. AOE damage was a concern I never saw mentioned on the forums, yet now it’s some “pressing issue” they hear a lot of complaints about?

If 100 people on here made a top ten list yesterday of “things most complained about on the forums” I don’t think AOE damage would make the list on ANY of them.

Really not happy with what they’re up to here. They need to consider just saying “We were wrong, we’re not going to do this at all”. Not do what they want to do, which is force it through then say “We’ve considered all of your feedback and will keep an eye on the developments”

Better strap those tin hats on tight. . .

nerva.7940:

youre nuts. the real reason is that aoe is bad for most aspects of the game, especially conquest spvp. it dumbs everything down.

you dont know what theyre gonna nerf exactly. but i will enjoy watching the d/d ele fall from top. im sure good eles will still do fine.

Without AOE this might as well be a FPS.

Mitch.4781:

I will never ever buy gems simply becuase of these underhanded tactics. When the game first came out I bought $50 worth and was eager to spend them…but now I see Anet forcing us to go down this route simply because earning any kind of gold is so incredibly time consuming…They should be very very wary. Once a player leaves a game..it takes an enormous amount of persuasion so ever bring them back and the fact is there are lots of chocies out there with even more due on the horizon. I relaise they have to make money, but it should not be done in such an underhanded way.

I see no changes made to the game that could force anyone to buy gems. I don’t see any reason why buying gems would solve ANY problem you could possibly face in the game. In fact it’s for this very reason that I am doubtful that you ever bought gems in the first place.

Learn to sell valuables, gather, craft and sell for profit before you complain that making money is impossible. When you actually learn how to play, then you can criticize the mechanics of the game, before that day however – you should stop with the conspiracy theories.

Show of hands, who has a problem with (player) AOE?

Not me.

critickitten.1498:

nerva.7940:

youre nuts. the real reason is that aoe is bad for most aspects of the game, especially conquest spvp. it dumbs everything down.

There’s nothing wrong with AoE. In fact it’s better “balanced” in this game than in most because it has to be placed, it’s telegraphed and thus more easily dodged,

AOE is actually better because it is a example of “Perfect Imbalance”. See the video in my signature.

Please be respectful as I do not want this thread to be locked. For those that disagree, I saw flames and denial, but little to no counter-arguments. Please be specific in your disagreements and also try and discuss how the game would be better impacted by everyone running around doing single-target damage all day. Really, I’d like you to outline it for me.

Wont buy gems until i have fun playing this game.

Not looking too good.

I have seen these tactics take place right before my eyes, Allods Online, a p2w game that made you grind until you gave up and bought gems..£10 for 1 item, £500+ for a combat mount which was 0.0000001% RNG of dropping.

Either way I am not enjoying the game and not liking the direction of the game.

I already feel as though i paid £49.99 for a beta.

I don’t think they would do it to increase the grind. That’s not what would make people stay and i think they know that. If it is then it’s still stupid because they could just reduce the damage aoes do to mobs or something like that. This would still seriously kitten over some classes/builds but at least they’ve got that out of the way.

But no according to them they’r too effective in pvp too…. meanwhile many in the community state the opposite… why? Because zergs are OP not AOE’s. Zergs. AOE’s are the direct counter to this zerg mentality and the direct counter to people in the backline spamming aoes is …not zerging. But it seems as if Arenanet likes it that way. One big pile of people vs another huge pile of people. Discouraging skillful play and also causing their own invisible character problems.

Meanwhile there are much bigger balancing problems. Builds with a decent amount of conditions being useless in some situations because of the cap.

Engineers being even more useless. (They’r at their best when they spam their nades with ….yeh conditions and aoe.)

Honestly if they keep it up like this then my answer to it is simple and I stop when the next expansion comes out.

When the community comes up with a strategy to beat the zerg meta (Hell it’s not even a strategy a child would’ve known what to do) Then that shoudn’t be punished.

Minion of Vey.4398:

This was my first impression too. AOE damage was a concern I never saw mentioned on the forums, yet now it’s some “pressing issue” they hear a lot of complaints about?

This …

I’ve never ever seen someone complain about AoE in game and on the forums. This is just a smoke screen to avoid looking at the real issues, one being the thieves as they are. A lot of classes actually rely heavily on AoE, tread wisey….

Minion of Vey.4398:

This was my first impression too. AOE damage was a concern I never saw mentioned on the forums, yet now it’s some “pressing issue” they hear a lot of complaints about?

If 100 people on here made a top ten list yesterday of “things most complained about on the forums” I don’t think AOE damage would make the list on ANY of them.

Really not happy with what they’re up to here. They need to consider just saying “We were wrong, we’re not going to do this at all”. Not do what they want to do, which is force it through then say “We’ve considered all of your feedback and will keep an eye on the developments”

Would have to totally agree with you there, Minion of Vey.
Where have all these complaints about AoE been lurking?
And as others have pointed out, when they design so many events and encounters around player’s being attacked by hordes of beasties at once, should the new solution really be to focus on single-target damage?
Perhaps single-target will be buffed enough to compensate, but surely, due to the refusal to split PvP/PvE player skills, thus abandoning the system they used in Guild Wars, this will only create a new cycle of nerfs when people are finding single-target damage too high in PvP to counter, due to a lack of dedicated healers.
Seems like they are spinning the PvP-centric balance roundabout that games like World of Warcraft have been on for the better part of a decade, but for their own stated reasons of keeping skill-sets and ‘learning curves’ short, and theoretically easier to understand for all.
I really do not recall people complaining about the skill-split system in Guild Wars. Designing this iteration of their franchise with all the combat depth of a puddle in order to maintain ‘accessibility’, coupled with the inevitable rounds of nerfs from complaints stemming out of PvP, will leave the game-world starved for the dynamics they so professed to be including, and the constant re-invention of play-styles that has driven the original Guild Wars for so long will be nowhere to be found.
There is a veritable boatload of skills in Guild Wars, the vast majority of which contain different versions of themselves dependent upon what aspect of the game you are involved in.
And the game benefited hugely from the diversity.
But I really do not recall reading anyone complaining at all about AoE in the PvE world, despite the fact that these changes will affect it enormously.
Deja vu.

puffintoast.6501:

Minion of Vey.4398:

This was my first impression too. AOE damage was a concern I never saw mentioned on the forums, yet now it’s some “pressing issue” they hear a lot of complaints about?

If 100 people on here made a top ten list yesterday of “things most complained about on the forums” I don’t think AOE damage would make the list on ANY of them.

Really not happy with what they’re up to here. They need to consider just saying “We were wrong, we’re not going to do this at all”. Not do what they want to do, which is force it through then say “We’ve considered all of your feedback and will keep an eye on the developments”

Would have to totally agree with you there, Minion of Vey.
Where have all these complaints about AoE been lurking?
And as others have pointed out, when they design so many events and encounters around player’s being attacked by hordes of beasties at once, should the new solution really be to focus on single-target damage?
Perhaps single-target will be buffed enough to compensate, but surely, due to the refusal to split PvP/PvE player skills, thus abandoning the system they used in Guild Wars, this will only create a new cycle of nerfs when people are finding single-target damage too high in PvP to counter, due to a lack of dedicated healers.
Seems like they are spinning the PvP-centric balance roundabout that games like World of Warcraft have been on for the better part of a decade, but for their own stated reasons of keeping skill-sets and ‘learning curves’ short, and theoretically easier to understand for all.
I really do not recall people complaining about the skill-split system in Guild Wars. Designing this iteration of their franchise with all the combat depth of a puddle in order to maintain ‘accessibility’, coupled with the inevitable rounds of nerfs from complaints stemming out of PvP, will leave the game-world starved for the dynamics they so professed to be including, and the constant re-invention of play-styles that has driven the original Guild Wars for so long will be nowhere to be found.
There is a veritable boatload of skills in Guild Wars, the vast majority of which contain different versions of themselves dependent upon what aspect of the game you are involved in.
And the game benefited hugely from the diversity.
But I really do not recall reading anyone complaining at all about AoE in the PvE world, despite the fact that these changes will affect it enormously.
Deja vu.

Perfect.

I REALLY can’t see them going through with this…it just seems…uncalled for?

Mirta.5029:

Mitch.4781:

I will never ever buy gems simply becuase of these underhanded tactics. When the game first came out I bought $50 worth and was eager to spend them…but now I see Anet forcing us to go down this route simply because earning any kind of gold is so incredibly time consuming…They should be very very wary. Once a player leaves a game..it takes an enormous amount of persuasion so ever bring them back and the fact is there are lots of chocies out there with even more due on the horizon. I relaise they have to make money, but it should not be done in such an underhanded way.

I see no changes made to the game that could force anyone to buy gems. I don’t see any reason why buying gems would solve ANY problem you could possibly face in the game. In fact it’s for this very reason that I am doubtful that you ever bought gems in the first place.

Learn to sell valuables, gather, craft and sell for profit before you complain that making money is impossible. When you actually learn how to play, then you can criticize the mechanics of the game, before that day however – you should stop with the conspiracy theories.

Mitch.4781:

Mirta.5029:

Also. spend money on gems and orr being the only way to get money?? I hope you’re joking… Otherwise I wonder how stupid your parents had to be to pass on the stupid gene.

What in your divine experience are good ways to make money in a way that does not require ridiculous amounts of time consuming farming? The floor is yours.

Exploring, dungeons, fractals, crafting, gathering, buying with intent to make profit.

You don’t have to be a genius to realize that you’re incompetent at money making. How do you think people earn the money to buy the tier 3 cultural gear. Stop complaining about things you have no knowledge of.

I’m sure we should all bow down to your exalted genius, and your so competent and ingenious, highly experienced ability to play a GAME.
In sure you’re not so stupid enough to pass of your GAME-play ability as making you a towering paragon of virtue in real-life.
But as for the OPs point of ANET getting people to use the gem store more. I am actually in agreement. I use AOE alot in Orr and in dungeons so I can tag more mobs and farm mats/gold/etc. In the limited gameplay time that I have. Even running fractals I do use AOE. In fact one of my ele’s defensive protection spells is my Meteor storm.
Unless you are willingly blind, there are alot of things that are going on that are pointing more and more to the gem store (no more free world transfers, for 1.)
Nearly all conspiracy have at least a small grain of truth hidden somewhere. Those with at least half-a brain would take sometime to see if it is there before offhandedly discounting everything and calling the theorist stupid.

Mirta.5029:

…

Exploring, dungeons, fractals, crafting, gathering, buying with intent to make profit.

You don’t have to be a genius to realize that you’re incompetent at money making. How do you think people earn the money to buy the tier 3 cultural gear. Stop complaining about things you have no knowledge of.

To be fair, its pretty easy to lose quite a bit of money in GW2 if you simply romp around the maps at high levels, do random events and make alts. Not everybody can or even wants to play the TP. I’d say FotM falls under dungeons and not everybody is into grinding those, crafting requires a significant investment and maybe some of the top level stuff pay off, Mitch, you’re probably better off selling the mats. If you’re selling gatherables from you’re explorations then o.k you can make some money but apart from some rarer stuff like chili peppers, sesame seeds, ori ore etc, gathering for income can be a problem, especially when you’re contending with teleporting gatherers. And I know people buy gold (legit and otherwise), I know some who have outright quit because it killed the fun for them when they realized how much of the game hangs on it. Some even get help from their guilds. Many people have problems finding a “sweet spot” so cut the guy some slack lol.

I just realized…what does this have to do with AoE nerfs? ><

gennyt.3428:

Mirta.5029:

…

Exploring, dungeons, fractals, crafting, gathering, buying with intent to make profit.

You don’t have to be a genius to realize that you’re incompetent at money making. How do you think people earn the money to buy the tier 3 cultural gear. Stop complaining about things you have no knowledge of.

To be fair, its pretty easy to lose quite a bit of money in GW2 if you simply romp around the maps at high levels, do random events and make alts. Not everybody can or even wants to play the TP. I’d say FotM falls under dungeons and not everybody is into grinding those, crafting requires a significant investment and maybe some of the top level stuff pay off, Mitch, you’re probably better off selling the mats. If you’re selling gatherables from you’re explorations then o.k you can make some money but apart from some rarer stuff like chili peppers, sesame seeds, ori ore etc, gathering for income can be a problem, especially when you’re contending with teleporting gatherers. And I know people buy gold (legit and otherwise), I know some who have outright quit because it killed the fun for them when they realized how much of the game hangs on it. Some even get help from their guilds. Many people have problems finding a “sweet spot” so cut the guy some slack lol.

I just realized…what does this have to do with AoE nerfs? ><

In all fairness, you can make money in dungeons extremely easily…at least 2g in an hour at minimum from AC speed or money runs.

Just read Falcon Night’s comment about tagging for farming. Wasn’t even thinking about that. Good point!

Vorch.2985:

gennyt.3428:

Mirta.5029:

…

Exploring, dungeons, fractals, crafting, gathering, buying with intent to make profit.

You don’t have to be a genius to realize that you’re incompetent at money making. How do you think people earn the money to buy the tier 3 cultural gear. Stop complaining about things you have no knowledge of.

To be fair, its pretty easy to lose quite a bit of money in GW2 if you simply romp around the maps at high levels, do random events and make alts. Not everybody can or even wants to play the TP. I’d say FotM falls under dungeons and not everybody is into grinding those, crafting requires a significant investment and maybe some of the top level stuff pay off, Mitch, you’re probably better off selling the mats. If you’re selling gatherables from you’re explorations then o.k you can make some money but apart from some rarer stuff like chili peppers, sesame seeds, ori ore etc, gathering for income can be a problem, especially when you’re contending with teleporting gatherers. And I know people buy gold (legit and otherwise), I know some who have outright quit because it killed the fun for them when they realized how much of the game hangs on it. Some even get help from their guilds. Many people have problems finding a “sweet spot” so cut the guy some slack lol.

I just realized…what does this have to do with AoE nerfs? ><

In all fairness, you can make money in dungeons extremely easily…at least 2g in an hour at minimum from AC speed or money runs.

And I also said, not everybody is into grinding dungeons…>.>

Scenario was probably, Anet employee was resurrecting a downed enemy, then got AoE’d, decided he took too much damage when standing still, reported it and now it gets nerf.

roostapro.9827:

Wont buy gems until i have fun playing this game.

Not looking too good.

I have seen these tactics take place right before my eyes, Allods Online, a p2w game that made you grind until you gave up and bought gems..£10 for 1 item, £500+ for a combat mount which was 0.0000001% RNG of dropping.

Either way I am not enjoying the game and not liking the direction of the game.

I already feel as though i paid £49.99 for a beta.

At least Allods was completely transparent that they were p2w, and they didn’t charge you for the box. In retrospect, it’s kind of sad that I left a cheaply-made p2w Asian grindfest with more goodwill than it seems like I’ll be leaving what was supposed to be a AAA Western MMO with a solid IP behind it.

I don’t think the AOE nerfs were motivated solely, or even mainly to reduce farming. I have little doubt, however, that they plan to nerf Orr into the ground. I’m hoping they surprise me. Really. There is so much promising stuff in this game that I wish I could continue to fund. But their business model (and their deception regarding its true nature) isn’t something I can support any more.

Is it really that hard to just move out of AOE? Does ANet really think its OP? I don’t buy the AOE is for a pvp reason. I see being able to stealth 90% of a fight and kill people a much bigger problem in pvp than AOE. I kinda agree that this is another attempt by ANet to pigeon hole people into having to buy gems with RL money. I mean look at DR, the bots are all but gone yet DR is still ingame. Drops as well have all but dried up, either i got really kittenty luck on 3 80s or something has happened to drops….

can someone post the link to the nerfing of the aoe and stuff? can’t find it in announcements

puffintoast.6501:

Minion of Vey.4398:

This was my first impression too. AOE damage was a concern I never saw mentioned on the forums, yet now it’s some “pressing issue” they hear a lot of complaints about?

If 100 people on here made a top ten list yesterday of “things most complained about on the forums” I don’t think AOE damage would make the list on ANY of them.

Really not happy with what they’re up to here. They need to consider just saying “We were wrong, we’re not going to do this at all”. Not do what they want to do, which is force it through then say “We’ve considered all of your feedback and will keep an eye on the developments”

Would have to totally agree with you there, Minion of Vey.
Where have all these complaints about AoE been lurking?
And as others have pointed out, when they design so many events and encounters around player’s being attacked by hordes of beasties at once, should the new solution really be to focus on single-target damage?
Perhaps single-target will be buffed enough to compensate, but surely, due to the refusal to split PvP/PvE player skills, thus abandoning the system they used in Guild Wars, this will only create a new cycle of nerfs when people are finding single-target damage too high in PvP to counter, due to a lack of dedicated healers.

I too am baffled about this allegation of AoE being an issue brought up a lot in connection to WvW. I’ve never read a single player complaint/critique/suggestion that AoE’s are “too effective” in WvW. It’s possible that it’s a heated issue among SPvPers, I certainly would not have been exposed to complaints from them.

It seems extraordinarily uncalled for to “reduc[e] AoE effectiveness to bring them in line with the single target damage skills,” as the GW2Dulfy transcript states from the Jan. 17 livestream. They’re certainly not abusably powerful in WvW – hitting 5 players at once simply cannot be considered overpowered when players commonly find themselves up against several dozen.

Single target combat is laughably useless in WvW and will remain laughably useless after AoEs are nerfed. Killing one player in a zerg of dozens is simply not effective. That said, if ANet feels strongly that this is an issue which needs addressing, it seems that a better approach would be to slightly enhance single target skills, and leave AoEs where they’re at.

Something that the devs seem to be ignoring with regard to this issue is the fact that AoEs commonly do not deal damage to five targets at a time. From the transcript:
“If your skil [sic] does 10 damage to a single target, if you have another skill that have the same opportunity cost but deals 8 damage to 5 targets, the AoE skill is better – we don’t want you to use AoE skills on single target mobs.”
This makes no sense whatsoever in a game that has no threat mechanics (i.e., taunting/aggro acquisition). There are precious few viable ways to round up large groups into a concentrated area, and yet many situations where you need to be DPSing multiple targets at once – consider, for example, the adds during Volcanic Fractal’s boss fight.

Penalizing AoE users because they were unable to line up an AoE with five targets in range is frankly a stupid design move. It is a given that even in multiple target scenarios, AoE’s won’t hit 5 targets 100% of the time; and AoEs are already less effective than single target skills against single targets, commonly weighing in at between 60-80% the damage output of single target skills.

Yeah, I don’t get the aoe concerns. Thieves have no problems one shotting people in WvWvW though, yet they remain god mode. I don’t get it.

Sauzo.6821:

Is it really that hard to just move out of AOE? Does ANet really think its OP? I don’t buy the AOE is for a pvp reason. I see being able to stealth 90% of a fight and kill people a much bigger problem in pvp than AOE. I kinda agree that this is another attempt by ANet to pigeon hole people into having to buy gems with RL money. I mean look at DR, the bots are all but gone yet DR is still ingame. Drops as well have all but dried up, either i got really kittenty luck on 3 80s or something has happened to drops….

A far simpler solution would have been the one they employed in Guild Wars, eventually.
The monsties simply MOVE out of the Aoe. They scatter, making the AoE far less effective, unless it is used as a circuitous form of crowd control.
This was a solution they hit upon, and have stuck with, for some time.
Rather odd that they have not simply applied it here, which I suppose leads to people wondering what the real aim is.

Edited to say thanks to Blueshield for that post above – much obliged for the insights there, especially into the PvP aspects.

I’d much rather pay a sub. and have more fun stuff/mechanics etc..

It all sounded so wonderful before it came out. We will never be free from their unspoken “mission” to drive us to the gem store. They are a company and they have to turn a profit, unfortunately it feels very dirty, they way it’s being done.

WTB sub. and more fun.

The funniest thing was them mentioning people getting AOE’d while ressing people, like that was some problem with the game that needed to be fixed.

“We’ve received reports that when players clump in one place and stay stationary, players like to use attacks that can hit all of them. We’re hard at work on a solution”

Columba.9730:

Yeah, I don’t get the aoe concerns. Thieves have no problems one shotting people in WvWvW though, yet they remain god mode. I don’t get it.

That’s a good point which I hadn’t thought of. Single target combat in WvW is not only absurdly useless against a zerg, but it’s further complicated by specific abilities utilized by some classes. The heavy armor classes have total invulnerability, thieves and mesmers have stealth. The impact of those in WvW is lessened due to AoE – you might not do damage to that Endure Pain’ed warrior, but you’ll hit the players around him.

AoEs are currently the only viable counter to stealthed players. AoEs can hit them, single-target skills can’t unless the stealthed player is foolish enough to stand right in front of you. Given that it’s very easy for a thief to stack stealth duration past 30s (I’ve done it) – long enough to disengage from any combat situation – nerfing AoEs to 1/5 the damage effectiveness of single target from the 3/5-4/5 effectiveness at which it currently rests (which seems to be indicated in the livestream – they brought up the math) will essentially render many thieves immortal.

puffintoast.6501:

A far simpler solution would have been the one they employed in Guild Wars, eventually.
The monsties simply MOVE out of the Aoe. They scatter, making the AoE far less effective, unless it is used as a circuitous form of crowd control.
This was a solution they hit upon, and have stuck with, for some time.
Rather odd that they have not simply applied it here, which I suppose leads to people wondering what the real aim is.

Edited to say thanks to Blueshield for that post above – much obliged for the insights there, especially into the PvP aspects.

That does seem much more intuitive, if their concerns were purely rooted in PvE combat mechanics. The transcript of the livestream seems to indicate that AoEs got onto the radar because of WvW and SPvP mechanics, and any mention of PvE was an affirming afterthought.

Amusingly enough, since the livestream I’ve now found several threads full of posters complaining about AoEs being overly effective in WvW. I was still unable to find any predating the livestream.

Minion of Vey.4398:

The funniest thing was them mentioning people getting AOE’d while ressing people, like that was some problem with the game that needed to be fixed.

“We’ve received reports that when players clump in one place and stay stationary, players like to use attacks that can hit all of them. We’re hard at work on a solution”

I lol’d at this so hard.

Minion of Vey.4398:

The funniest thing was them mentioning people getting AOE’d while ressing people, like that was some problem with the game that needed to be fixed.

“We’ve received reports that when players clump in one place and stay stationary, players like to use attacks that can hit all of them. We’re hard at work on a solution”

I hope this isn’t true lol. We already have a solution, get the kitten out the way, even GW1 mobs scattered. GW2 combat is designed to be active and even chaotic, if you’re not on the move then you deserve to get hit, and what opponent would sit there and let you res your ally? The downed state works is a big boost as well, the person downed can work with you to get him/her back in the fight in seconds, so I don’t know about that complaint. Funny indeed!

Blueshield.6291:

…Amusingly enough, since the livestream I’ve now found several threads full of posters complaining about AoEs being overly effective in WvW. I was still unable to find any predating the livestream.

Geez, that is woeful.
You’d think they would have had the foresight to at least plant some threads over the last month or so before going public.
Under New Management indeed.

Why hasnt someone that thinks AoE is too damaging posted in this thread?

MANY people have posted about disabling Waypoints in Dungeons during combat both for and against. Yet not one person has posted in this or any other anti-nerf-AoE thread??? SOMEONE must be out there reading these threads!

If they only nerf it in WvWvW it’s ok, in PvE we need AoE in dungeons. I know they are revamping the dungeons, so we will see.

What some peoplee perhaps forget, in terms of W3, is the number of AoE players vs. CC. I hardly doubt that several AoE players overpower a zerg rush, in the general case.

Nerfing AoE will just make players reasses their gamestyle and focus towards CC.

Death Reincarnated.3570:

What some peoplee perhaps forget, in terms of W3, is the number of AoE players vs. CC. I hardly doubt that several AoE players overpower a zerg rush, in the general case.

Nerfing AoE will just make players reasses their gamestyle and focus towards CC.

Unless CC starts lasting 10 seconds, you’re not going to see CC counter a zerg.

AOE counters a zerg by punishing them severely for grouping up and charging a defended position with no other plan than to shout “BRAINS” as they push the barricades.

people who put a few aoe-ers on a choke point deserve their wins against idiots who don’t bypass them or put in some stealthies to act as “sappers” behind the lines.

I’m going to make a wild guess here and say you guys are misinterpreting their idea of nerfing the AoE. I think what they mean is, they want to make make single target skills have a place as a skill when compared with AOE skills when it comes to facing 1 monster. So in terms of AOE, if there is more than 1 mob, I don’t think the nerf will be regarding that aspect but if its versing one more, then the damage is reduced (is the idea they’re hoping to achieve?). Hopefully if it’s something along this line I wouldn’t really mind, though these kind of chances are rather controversial given that staff ele and necros pretty mcuh are ALL aoes. Why make a weapon which is all AOE then nerf the damage against solo mob. In general, I too agree that I’ve never seen a problem with “aoes” and that it is a mechanic that is working fine. An official response to clarify the exact nerf and reason would be nice.

“We felt the spamming of 1… I mean AOE wasn’t fun gameplay”

Will be something like that.

Probably another “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” policy to combat bots.

Wow, they really said this in the live stream?
I’ve never even contemplated AoE being too powerful. If anything, it’s underpowered.
There’s so many trait lines that help you negate the already low damage from AoE, especially when ressing.
To nerf AoE is insane.

I mean, come on, Meteor Shower is a shadow of the skill it was in the original game already. It no longer knocks down anyone standing in its AoE.

And yeah, I’ve never seen ANYONE complain about AoE except for incredibly new players who haven’t got used to seeing the red ring yet.

Can I get an exact quote so I can be sure I’m not misconstruing their intent?
I’d watch the stream, but I’m at work.

Lafiel.9372:

I’m going to make a wild guess here and say you guys are misinterpreting their idea of nerfing the AoE. I think what they mean is, they want to make make single target skills have a place as a skill when compared with AOE skills when it comes to facing 1 monster. So in terms of AOE, if there is more than 1 mob, I don’t think the nerf will be regarding that aspect but if its versing one more, then the damage is reduced (is the idea they’re hoping to achieve?). Hopefully if it’s something along this line I wouldn’t really mind, though these kind of chances are rather controversial given that staff ele and necros pretty mcuh are ALL aoes. Why make a weapon which is all AOE then nerf the damage against solo mob. In general, I too agree that I’ve never seen a problem with “aoes” and that it is a mechanic that is working fine. An official response to clarify the exact nerf and reason would be nice.

Frankly I wouldn’t mind it so much if the plan was what you spelled out – overall distribution of damage across targets. That isn’t what they implied in the livestream – they specifically pointed out that they don’t want AoEs to be used against single targets. Unfortunately I don’t think this is a case where clarification is really needed.

Mungrul.9358:

Wow, they really said this in the live stream?
I’ve never even contemplated AoE being too powerful. If anything, it’s underpowered.
There’s so many trait lines that help you negate the already low damage from AoE, especially when ressing.
To nerf AoE is insane.

I mean, come on, Meteor Shower is a shadow of the skill it was in the original game already. It no longer knocks down anyone standing in its AoE.

And yeah, I’ve never seen ANYONE complain about AoE except for incredibly new players who haven’t got used to seeing the red ring yet.

Can I get an exact quote so I can be sure I’m not misconstruing their intent?
I’d watch the stream, but I’m at work.

http://dulfy.net/2013/01/17/gw2-dev-livestream-jan-17-transcript/

Cheers Blueshield.

Edit: Yup, just read that.
That is indeed insane.

ArenaNet, this is the second time you’ve stated you’ve received complaints about something when evidence of such complaints on the forums is incredibly lacking. Please provide sources, otherwise the conspiracy theories will gain ground and further damage your reputation.

Thiefs quited the game coz of the nerfs , now eles will quit the game ( hope to got aoe nerf will only affect them , as it should ) ! The game gets better , mi liky ! I know the the ele got alot more fans and as you all can see the Q.q on the forums are more than when the thief got the nerf ! Enjoy the last month of your OP’ness eles ! TC BB !

dani.1956:

Thiefs quited the game coz of the nerfs , now eles will quit the game ( hope to got aoe nerf will only affect them , as it should ) ! The game gets better , mi liky ! I know the the ele got alot more fans and as you all can see the Q.q on the forums are more than when the thief got the nerf ! Enjoy the last month of your OP’ness eles ! TC BB !

Let me know what the game is like when you’re the only person playing it.

They keep at it and there is no surprise to it. They have lost over 3/4s of the original people who purchased the game and they seem content on driving the rest out of it too.
Play their way or dont play at all or increase the grind exponentially. I have never heard of AOE issue.
Here is an Idea:Make the game we want to play and we will support you ie buy gems. Force us to buy gems = bad press.
Hopefully NCSOFT will see that the money is drying up and do what they did to city of heroes.

TS, your post is so full of bias, presumption and lack of understanding that I’m not going to respond to it, except to say that you’re wrong on all points.

Goettel.4389:

TS, your post is so full of bias, presumption and lack of understanding that I’m not going to respond to it, except to say that you’re wrong on all points.

I think he’s the kind of poster who could turn an innocent text on a gravestone in queensdale into a conspiracy for moneyz.

I facepalmed so hard, my head is still ringing.

Narkosys.5173:

They keep at it and there is no surprise to it. They have lost over 3/4s of the original people who purchased the game and they seem content on driving the rest out of it too.

Do you have any sort of data to back up that claim? I get kind of tired of people talking about how GW2 is oh so dead again and again without any reliable proof…