Guild Wars 2

Windsagio.1340:

hybrid.5027:

Windsagio.1340:

In a perfect word they’d be as smart and act in a similar way to pvp opponents (and balanced appropriately). We’re not in a perfect world though, so we’re pretty limited in what our AI’s can do.

That would be a meta shift, but it would be an interesting one.

If only it were possible :p

I guess its time to explain how it would work…

1. Anet implements a radically new, realistic AI. Game gets 5x harder. Rewards are increased to compensate.
2. Elite dungeon guilds take a month or two to figure out optimal strategies. Begin speed running dungeons with relative ease again, and reap the increased rewards.
3. Pugs are unable to complete ACp1 in under an hour.
4. Rivers of tears flow.

Do you realize how insanely difficult it would be to do a truly reactive AI that matches the responsiveness of pvp players?

1) Is probably a compsci Ph.D at the very least.
2) If it were truly up to human reactions it would take more than a month. A new meta would emerge, I’d agree. It wouldnt’ be a speedrun meta though it would be a survival meta, similar to our current pvp with a greater emphasis on support (a major problem with the idea, even if it were possible, is that we’d go back to more groups demanding Guardians)
3) It depends on the target length. For it to work at all, enemies would not be able to have the kind of health numbers we’re used to.
4) No doubt. I agree on this, it would be a lot harder to loot-train them.

2) you realize the major reason PVP meta is bunkery is because it’s about holding nodes, IE “sit here and survive”. That’s not what dungeons are about in most cases, a few spots yes, but it’s generally about killing, not just not dying.

Windsagio.1340:

Jerus.4350:

Lendruil.9061:

Whats the problem of field damage? It just would require to use well timed interrupts, maybe blasting some water fields or using invul-skills, but i don’t see how it would stop a skilled party from meleeing.

If you scroll up (it got cut out of the quote, oops) it was in response to an idea that bosses would run away if people tried to melee them. That would cause field damage (things like Lava Font, Acid Bomb, Smite, etc) to become much less effective.

Not sure what you’re thinking we’re talking about, are you thinking about players being in damage fields?… that’s not what it was about.

And no, a boss walking wouldn’t stop meleeing, it’d just have us cripple/chilling and moving with it, and likely avoiding weaponry that is reliant on a static enemy (Ele Staff, Guard Scepter, Engi EG, Maybe even Ele Scepter w/dragons tooth and what not?)

Worth repeating that in GW1 the enemies did run out of fields. We should get some GW1 purists in here about how that was better ><

Edit: last part is meant as a joke.

They had that in GW2 too. They changed it. Guess why.

KSIBBQ.8123:

This Zerker meta has to end. It has killed the diversity too long. This game has such a unique build system, and you should truly be able to play how you want. However, unless you have a pre made, then people will kick you. Start building your toon the way you want to!

I do play however I want. Always. Which is also why I get kicked a lot.

I’m not gonna play the way other people want me to play just because they forced themselves to play that way.

It’s my game and I can do whatever I want.

Jerus.4350:

Windsagio.1340:

hybrid.5027:

Windsagio.1340:

In a perfect word they’d be as smart and act in a similar way to pvp opponents (and balanced appropriately). We’re not in a perfect world though, so we’re pretty limited in what our AI’s can do.

That would be a meta shift, but it would be an interesting one.

If only it were possible :p

I guess its time to explain how it would work…

1. Anet implements a radically new, realistic AI. Game gets 5x harder. Rewards are increased to compensate.
2. Elite dungeon guilds take a month or two to figure out optimal strategies. Begin speed running dungeons with relative ease again, and reap the increased rewards.
3. Pugs are unable to complete ACp1 in under an hour.
4. Rivers of tears flow.

Do you realize how insanely difficult it would be to do a truly reactive AI that matches the responsiveness of pvp players?

1) Is probably a compsci Ph.D at the very least.
2) If it were truly up to human reactions it would take more than a month. A new meta would emerge, I’d agree. It wouldnt’ be a speedrun meta though it would be a survival meta, similar to our current pvp with a greater emphasis on support (a major problem with the idea, even if it were possible, is that we’d go back to more groups demanding Guardians)
3) It depends on the target length. For it to work at all, enemies would not be able to have the kind of health numbers we’re used to.
4) No doubt. I agree on this, it would be a lot harder to loot-train them.

2) you realize the major reason PVP meta is bunkery is because it’s about holding nodes, IE “sit here and survive”. That’s not what dungeons are about in most cases, a few spots yes, but it’s generally about killing, not just not dying.

It’s more complex than that, specifically the WvW meta likes defense more too. In general survival is more valuable in unpredictable situations and where the enemy uses more control.

It would be more annoying for players at first, especially in the established game, but it’s all about setting expectations. That’s why it’s very risky to retroactively change the AI, players already have things they expect, and it’s all going to fall apart.

Harper.4173:

Survival meta?
Wow.

It would still be a speed meta – the fastest you can go. Even if it requires 5 x tanky chars. It’s still go as fast as you can to get the loot as effectively as you can so in that sense it is and always will be a speed meta as long as it’s the fastest viable way.

‘scuse my use of language, it’s vague sometimes. Specifically in this case, I mean that it would be a shift away from ‘the primary concern is damage’ setup we tend towards now. A more important part of maximising damage would be making sure players stayed up in semi-unpredictable situations.

~~~

If we can cut back on the combativeness for a second, there’s a legitimately interesting subquestion to this (deeply hypothetical) discussion, which is; “Would players accept behavior from something they know is an AI that they would from another player?”

Would they accept a computer controlled enemy with the skills, stats (including low for a monster health) and action patterns of a PU mesmer or (shudder the thought) a Carrion/Condition necro using corrupt boon and epidemic?

Windsagio.1340:

‘scuse my use of language, it’s vague sometimes. Specifically in this case, I mean that it would be a shift away from ‘the primary concern is damage’ setup we tend towards now. A more important part of maximising damage would be making sure players stayed up in semi-unpredictable situations.

~~~

If we can cut back on the combativeness for a second, there’s a legitimately interesting subquestion to this (deeply hypothetical) discussion, which is; “Would players accept behavior from something they know is an AI that they would from another player?”

Would they accept a computer controlled enemy with the skills, stats (including low for a monster health) and action patterns of a PU mesmer or (shudder the thought) a Carrion/Condition necro using corrupt boon and epidemic?

No problem:
PU Mesmer interrupts /shutdown with dazed (eg pistol whip thief, and many other skills I can think off)
Carrion/condi necro condi removal – eg purge flames (guard).

These are just two examples of using active defenses to solve this scenario – whilst being around the enemy.

In GW1 it was often players learnt from enemy mobs how to equip some fantastic skills as they mapped the skills/traits they used to be effective and carried them over into Hall of Heros or other zones in GW1.

Whatever you throw at the meta players they will get an answer for eventually using active defences. These are things players are currently doing in many zones apart from you may not be noticing it.

A good example is the champ wolf in CoE paths that has a lovely knockdown and leap which can maul pug groups if they don’t know how to handle it [eg dodge or other ]

TPMN.1483:

Windsagio.1340:

‘scuse my use of language, it’s vague sometimes. Specifically in this case, I mean that it would be a shift away from ‘the primary concern is damage’ setup we tend towards now. A more important part of maximising damage would be making sure players stayed up in semi-unpredictable situations.

~~~

If we can cut back on the combativeness for a second, there’s a legitimately interesting subquestion to this (deeply hypothetical) discussion, which is; “Would players accept behavior from something they know is an AI that they would from another player?”

Would they accept a computer controlled enemy with the skills, stats (including low for a monster health) and action patterns of a PU mesmer or (shudder the thought) a Carrion/Condition necro using corrupt boon and epidemic?

No problem:
PU Mesmer interrupts /shutdown with dazed (eg pistol whip thief, and many other skills I can think off)
Carrion/condi necro condi removal – eg purge flames (guard).

These are just two examples of using active defenses to solve this scenario – whilst being around the enemy.

In GW1 it was often players learnt from enemy mobs how to equip some fantastic skills as they mapped the skills/traits they used to be effective and carried them over into Hall of Heros or other zones in GW1.

Whatever you throw at the meta players they will get an answer for eventually using active defences. These are things players are currently doing in many zones apart from you may not be noticing it.

A good example is the champ wolf in CoE paths that has a lovely knockdown and leap which can maul pug groups if they don’t know how to handle it [eg dodge or other ]

The question wasn’t so much ‘could they deal with it?’ (they can in PvP and it would be easier in PvE because you can coordinate and share abilities better), but rather ‘would they accept it?’

Wind – the question seems off topic.

The meta would change accordingly to adapt – people adapt, animals adapt (to changing conditions) a new meta is born.

TPMN.1483:

Wind – the question seems off topic.

The meta would change accordingly to adapt – people adapt, animals adapt (to changing conditions) a new meta is born.

It is a bit off-topic, but it’s interesting to me

I guess it’s kind of relevant because someone above in essence said that people wouldn’t accept smarter AI’s, and it’s interesting to think if it’s true or not <>

~~~

To the point, we’re really just rambling now it seems like. We agree that for most content zerk is the most efficient, and we agree (I think) that anet is doing certain things to make other builds more attractive, but that basic calculation hasn’t changed.

See now, I would disagree with that. In the few times I’ve done open world boredo- I mean events, I just leave my standard dungeon build on and just do fine with it.

Unfamiliar content makes other builds attractive (I can’t survive in full glass so lets run this roleplay tank build).

Uninstanced content makes other builds attractive since no one is judging you and so your average open worlder can come to their own, usually incorrect conclusions that they can run inefficient build X.

I also really wish people would stop referring to “zerk builds”, I feel like I’m losing brain cells whenever people shorten the word like that, and referring to it as a build as if the stat combination has anything to do with it.

Windsagio.1340:

Jerus.4350:

Windsagio.1340:

hybrid.5027:

Windsagio.1340:

In a perfect word they’d be as smart and act in a similar way to pvp opponents (and balanced appropriately). We’re not in a perfect world though, so we’re pretty limited in what our AI’s can do.

That would be a meta shift, but it would be an interesting one.

If only it were possible :p

I guess its time to explain how it would work…

1. Anet implements a radically new, realistic AI. Game gets 5x harder. Rewards are increased to compensate.
2. Elite dungeon guilds take a month or two to figure out optimal strategies. Begin speed running dungeons with relative ease again, and reap the increased rewards.
3. Pugs are unable to complete ACp1 in under an hour.
4. Rivers of tears flow.

Do you realize how insanely difficult it would be to do a truly reactive AI that matches the responsiveness of pvp players?

1) Is probably a compsci Ph.D at the very least.
2) If it were truly up to human reactions it would take more than a month. A new meta would emerge, I’d agree. It wouldnt’ be a speedrun meta though it would be a survival meta, similar to our current pvp with a greater emphasis on support (a major problem with the idea, even if it were possible, is that we’d go back to more groups demanding Guardians)
3) It depends on the target length. For it to work at all, enemies would not be able to have the kind of health numbers we’re used to.
4) No doubt. I agree on this, it would be a lot harder to loot-train them.

2) you realize the major reason PVP meta is bunkery is because it’s about holding nodes, IE “sit here and survive”. That’s not what dungeons are about in most cases, a few spots yes, but it’s generally about killing, not just not dying.

It’s more complex than that, specifically the WvW meta likes defense more too. In general survival is more valuable in unpredictable situations and where the enemy uses more control.

It would be more annoying for players at first, especially in the established game, but it’s all about setting expectations. That’s why it’s very risky to retroactively change the AI, players already have things they expect, and it’s all going to fall apart.

Ehh, kinda, a lot of the reason in general WvW you’re running beefier is arrow carts, pain and simple. The unavoidable damage that you simply have to withstand to make it through a choke point.

As you move to GvG type content you’ll find a lot more glass with mainly just your guard/wars bulking up as it’s their job to run into the other team and as you said more likely to catch that immob (control effects are much less of an issue if you run Meta with 2 guards rotating stab correctly). With that interesting thing… still a meta in WvW

Jerus.4350:

Ehh, kinda, a lot of the reason in general WvW you’re running beefier is arrow carts, pain and simple. The unavoidable damage that you simply have to withstand to make it through a choke point.

As you move to GvG type content you’ll find a lot more glass with mainly just your guard/wars bulking up as it’s their job to run into the other team and as you said more likely to catch that immob (control effects are much less of an issue if you run Meta with 2 guards rotating stab correctly). With that interesting thing… still a meta in WvW

The ugly thing is that I know what the ‘meta’ mongers would do, and it’s probably worse than the current situation. I’d suspect it would be a bunch of 3 dps + 2 hard support setups (especially a bunch of LFGuardian requests).

That’s (to my pov) sad thing. People are always looking and will always look for the magic trick, regardless of how important it is or not, and people will always try to exclude people that don’t go with the accepted magic trick.

Even if there were an impossible world, where against all possibility everything was entirely even, I think people would decide on something and filter based on that. It’s something basic in human nature, especially in MMO’s where people end up being so much ease-and-reward centric on old content.

In the current situation, from my observation, fewer and fewer people care about ‘meta’ optimization, I think that’s due to content accessibility. Any AI improvements would surely make the content harder and could well make the situation worse (in the short run certainly).

So for all my talk, I guess I"m not really proposing a solution except ‘tough it out’/‘make your own group’/‘you might be happier if you didn’t fixate on meta’ (the last one being a little controversial :p)

Windsagio.1340:

So for all my talk, I guess I"m not really proposing a solution except ‘tough it out’/‘make your own group’/‘you might be happier if you didn’t fixate on meta’ (the last one being a little controversial :p)

The last one isn’t controversial.

If you aren’t following the meta, you don’t need to fixate on the meta. Just know roughly what it is so you don’t join a group that’s obviously one.

Windsagio.1340:

I guess I"m not really proposing a solution

It could also be that the only (arguable, of course) problem right now is people who can’t read/follow others’ LFG and people with expectations beyond what they put in LFG.

Seera.5916:

If you aren’t following the meta, you don’t need to fixate on the meta. Just know roughly what it is so you don’t join a group that’s obviously one.

But then how can I have my cake and eat it too? I want to benefit from players running meta builds while not having to play one myself.

Seera.5916:

Windsagio.1340:

So for all my talk, I guess I"m not really proposing a solution except ‘tough it out’/‘make your own group’/‘you might be happier if you didn’t fixate on meta’ (the last one being a little controversial :p)

The last one isn’t controversial.

If you aren’t following the meta, you don’t need to fixate on the meta. Just know roughly what it is so you don’t join a group that’s obviously one.

The controversial part is ‘the meta probably isn’t helping your run as much as you think it is, live a little’ :p

Windsagio.1340:

Seera.5916:

Windsagio.1340:

So for all my talk, I guess I"m not really proposing a solution except ‘tough it out’/‘make your own group’/‘you might be happier if you didn’t fixate on meta’ (the last one being a little controversial :p)

The last one isn’t controversial.

If you aren’t following the meta, you don’t need to fixate on the meta. Just know roughly what it is so you don’t join a group that’s obviously one.

The controversial part is ‘the meta probably isn’t helping your run as much as you think it is, live a little’ :p

Obviously its up to the player to execute the meta run well for it to help your run, its like picking top tier champions in league, you still have to know how to play them or you will get rekt.

Thread TL;DR:

A couple of people argue with many, many, many logical fallacies and far too much anecdotal support for their radicalized views about the current status of the effectiveness of certain gear types and diversity within fully-optimized PvE dungeon strategies, and whether the concept of optimization is toxic, interspersed so often by ignored, genuinely high-quality posts which actually address the real problems pertaining to the subject and prove said arguments futile.

This thread is seriously pointless as it’s gotten nowhere and will never get anywhere as mentioned by many of those previous intelligent posts.

Vote for thread closure.

DeceiverX.8361:

Vote for thread closure.

If people still have reason to post in this thread and they’re not being mean towards others, then this thread should remain open. Its been a very hot thread for a while now. Closing it down prematurely may just make others create new threads to keep making sure their voice is heard. What then would you do? Lock down all threads with a mention towards the Meta? No.

hybrid.5027:

Guess you never heard of Ghost Pepper Poppers. They are the true easy mode in this game, at least in nighttime instances.

Well but that’s fair enough, isn’kitten
Could have other mobs which reflect all non-damaging conditions back to the player, for example. But different mob, different approach.

The point is to make sure that you cannot simply /melee-snooze every single mob, by interspersing mobs which are very very dangerous to that approach.

Got another one:

Assassin
Upon aggro, this mob stealthes, then moves towards a target player slowly but being invulnerable (you can in theory predict where they are but it doesn’t help you much), then dealing a single from-stealth attack which will down a berserker-geared player, just barely (is based on class, so it always downs a berserker player).
A small~medium amount of extra defense or Aegis will avoid it, and they take 10-15 seconds to be able to re-stealth.

Ofc, these mobs could appear in packs, or add during a boss-fight or fight versus another group of mobs. If they come as a pack, they’ll always try to target different players.

And another one:

Knight
Heavily armoured, these enemies are not only virtually impervious to direct damage from the front, even when flanked direct attacks tend to bounce off.
From the front, 100% of weapon-based attacks are deflected (sword-hits, arrows, etc). From any other angle, 70% are.
Hits where the weapon isn’t actually attacking the target (Mesmer GS, Necro Axe, etc) are possible, though power attacks still face a rather high toughness stat.

Carighan.6758:

Assassin
Upon aggro, this mob stealthes, then moves towards a target player slowly but being invulnerable (you can in theory predict where they are but it doesn’t help you much), then dealing a single from-stealth attack which will down a berserker-geared player, just barely (is based on class, so it always downs a berserker player).
A small~medium amount of extra defense or Aegis will avoid it, and they take 10-15 seconds to be able to re-stealth.

Ofc, these mobs could appear in packs, or add during a boss-fight or fight versus another group of mobs. If they come as a pack, they’ll always try to target different players.

And another one:

Knight
Heavily armoured, these enemies are not only virtually impervious to direct damage from the front, even when flanked direct attacks tend to bounce off.
From the front, 100% of weapon-based attacks are deflected (sword-hits, arrows, etc). From any other angle, 70% are.
Hits where the weapon isn’t actually attacking the target (Mesmer GS, Necro Axe, etc) are possible, though power attacks still face a rather high toughness stat.

To the first, I have but one word of reply: Aegis.
GG.

To the second, this just sounds like those kournan rangers that drove everyone nuts, but were ultimately trivial.

If they added content which required some kind of brain activity most people wouldn’t be able to complete it. They would cry rivers regardless of how innovative, creative and awesome the content was.

So the word meta means post or add. Can someone give me some context here? Based on this definition of the word, I don’t follow this thread at all.

Draaconis.2574:

So the word meta means post or add. Can someone give me some context here? Based on this definition of the word, I don’t follow this thread at all.

No meta mean the best build the community can come up with. It used to be 1 build for every profession, but since you can switch trait anywhere, you can find a couple of meta depending on which content you are doing. The Meta change over time depending on what the community find outs about the game (happen a lot in the first year of the game, less now), and depending on update that balance stuff like trait, skill, etc.

The final definition can be blurry. For exemple : The guardian have the hammer build 3/5/0/4/2 for fractal, the 4/6/2/0/2 for dps, and 4/5/0/0/5 for a general purpose/utilities. I myself consider them all meta because they are best on their specific situation. Other consider 4/5/0/0/5 alone as meta because it work everywhere. Other consider only 4/6/2/0/2 as meta because its the best dps.

But you could also consider 6/6/2/0/0 as more dps if you can’t keep up aegis. Or 6/6/0/0/2 with scepter against large hitbox mobs. See the problem? Where is the line? Can we only consider 1 build per profession? Do we consider only first 3? Or we consider all the different build even if they are the best only in 3-4 fight in the game.

The exact definition will change depending on who you are talking too.

Windsagio.1340:

Harper.4173:

Survival meta?
Wow.

It would still be a speed meta – the fastest you can go. Even if it requires 5 x tanky chars. It’s still go as fast as you can to get the loot as effectively as you can so in that sense it is and always will be a speed meta as long as it’s the fastest viable way.

‘scuse my use of language, it’s vague sometimes. Specifically in this case, I mean that it would be a shift away from ‘the primary concern is damage’ setup we tend towards now. A more important part of maximising damage would be making sure players stayed up in semi-unpredictable situations.

~~~

If we can cut back on the combativeness for a second, there’s a legitimately interesting subquestion to this (deeply hypothetical) discussion, which is; “Would players accept behavior from something they know is an AI that they would from another player?”

Would they accept a computer controlled enemy with the skills, stats (including low for a monster health) and action patterns of a PU mesmer or (shudder the thought) a Carrion/Condition necro using corrupt boon and epidemic?

And how is it that in that situation the primary concern wouldn’t be damage?

It literally becomes : the most damage you can deal while alive. It’s still about the damage – because the damage determines how fast you clear – which is why it will always be the primary concern unless we don’t fight mobs/bosses anymore.

The answer to your question is this :

The small part of the players who do WvW and sPVP might accept it. Or might not – depending on their moods.
You see – if they want to go up against a difficult opponent they already have their PvP or WvW option of choice for that. So when they PVE they might do it just for the rewards – in which case making things more difficult for them might not be something they would like.

The rest of the players who do PVE only I assume would not like it. Why? Because it’s difficult.
If they wanted to get stomped on by good opponents they would have gone to WvW or sPVP already. The fact that they went and left or never went is indicative that they don’t really want to get worked too hard by their opponents.

A subset of the PVE community – the PVE for fast rewards crowd would hate it – I personally would.
The last thing I need is for my AC or CoF runs to now be the equivalent of an sPVP match. No thanks.

The bottom line is this : Video games fulfill a power fantasy – they give you the chance to be the hero. To win. To feel good about yourself.

If you take that away or make it too hard for players to obtain that feeling they’re going to be unhappy.

Example:

The new Call of Duty game – Advanced Warfare – uses a Skill based match making system where you’re put in games with people of the same skill level as yourself. This wasn’t such a big thing in previous games of the series.

The good and really good players in the community have expressed a dislike for this feature because they’re getting tired of having to constantly be challenged and try hard every game.

I get this too – every game almost you’re matched with people who are going all out try hard and if you want to perform you have to bring your best game.
Sometimes however you just want to blow steam off and pwn noobs and just win easily. You can hardly do that anymore and the community is upset.

Now I know GW2 is not COD but the idea remains the same. Most people like a challenge occasionally, some might even like to be frequently challenged but being made to try your best every time you play will burn people out fast.

Artemis Thuras.8795:

To the first, I have but one word of reply: Aegis.
GG.

To the second, this just sounds like those kournan rangers that drove everyone nuts, but were ultimately trivial.

Yes, but that’s the thing, you need Aegis now against this mob. Now imagine if all mobs had mechanics which were non-trivial. You would no longer be able to simply overstack a party and do nothing but power-spam, because you needed to worry about so many special effects to provide.

And voilá, more complex combat. Especially because if you don’t want to bother with all the effects you could simply spread out and let the targeted person kite the assassin away until the other enemies are dead.

Carighan.6758:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

To the first, I have but one word of reply: Aegis.
GG.

To the second, this just sounds like those kournan rangers that drove everyone nuts, but were ultimately trivial.

Yes, but that’s the thing, you need Aegis now against this mob. Now imagine if all mobs had mechanics which were non-trivial. You would no longer be able to simply overstack a party and do nothing but power-spam, because you needed to worry about so many special effects to provide.

And voilá, more complex combat. Especially because if you don’t want to bother with all the effects you could simply spread out and let the targeted person kite the assassin away until the other enemies are dead.

Guardian alone brings every available defensive ability in the game. More blinds can be provided by eles and thieves while hard CC comes from basically anyone. Your camp overglorifies your own ideas and this example proves you not even play the game. Mossman works this way and guess what, aegis and reflects works wonders.

As a side note, did you guys realize ANet try to imitate challange by simply throw a bunch of mechanics towards us? Liadri was the first attempt to this but the new centaur boss looks the same. Like they completely avoid our suggestion with more Lupi like (multiple phases, varried skillset, proximity based attacks, etc.) creatures, nope, throw a gazillion kittens at everybody, thats hardcore.

Carighan.6758:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

To the first, I have but one word of reply: Aegis.
GG.

To the second, this just sounds like those kournan rangers that drove everyone nuts, but were ultimately trivial.

Yes, but that’s the thing, you need Aegis now against this mob. Now imagine if all mobs had mechanics which were non-trivial. You would no longer be able to simply overstack a party and do nothing but power-spam, because you needed to worry about so many special effects to provide.

And voilá, more complex combat. Especially because if you don’t want to bother with all the effects you could simply spread out and let the targeted person kite the assassin away until the other enemies are dead.

So naive.
Look at FOTM – look at their attempt to do something along these lines by introducing mistlock instability modifiers.

Some of them give combat a very big twist.

Do you see people doing them ? No. Because people don’t really care about being challenged over and over again.

People do the easy ones – the ones that don’t change mostly anything – 38 and 49 or the ones that require agony checks – 40 and 50.

Your ideas look good on paper but that’s about it.

Harper.4173:

Your ideas look good on paper but that’s about it.

When the novelty wears off there is either fun from the challenge or rewards …

Harper.4173:

Your ideas look good on paper but that’s about it.

Well that’s the thing, isn’kitten
Players don’t want:

• Change
• Variety
• Challenge

Especially not in their MMOs. The repetitive grindy nature is basically what you sell your MMO with, and have ever since (they were never really any different). The players enjoying these games do so because they enjoy the repetition and the learned and as a result not difficult tasks. They do it to get a small but easy “Feeling good” moment as they reach their personal daily go, tick off that achievement or get to that level.
The key in designing these games is then not to provide challenging gameplay or adaptable difficulty (that’s the worst you can do), but rather to give players the illusion that their obstacle is meaningful, but actually have it feel easy from start to finish. The ideal balance makes players think it’s easy because of what they did, when they were never actually in any real danger to begin with, giving this endorphine rush without risking annoying them with wasted time.

It’d be trivial (though I admit my ideas would need lots of refinement) to create a game which doesn’t allow for “rote play”. Which randomizes and adapts so much that you need to actively be there, 100%, all the time. Only, most players don’t want that, and especially not constantly.

My point was rather, if you want to change “the meta”, it has to start with the mobs. But, as said, it might not be a sensible business decision to provide a meaningful challenge.

Carighan.6758:

My point was rather, if you want to change “the meta”, it has to start with the mobs. But, as said, it might not be a sensible business decision to provide a meaningful challenge.

Highly relevant video.

More on topic. How you (you in plural) want to change mobs? The overused examples usually can be abused even more than the current ones (moving out from aoes and such) so im eager to see some neat ideas finally.

Wethospu.6437:

If they added content which required some kind of brain activity most people wouldn’t be able to complete it. They would cry rivers regardless of how innovative, creative and awesome the content was.

It’s all expectations, plenty of people complete plenty of content in harder games.

That’s a pretty condescending if not contemptuous attitude towards the mass of players. You should really give them more credit.

Harper.4173:

And how is it that in that situation the primary concern wouldn’t be damage?

It literally becomes : the most damage you can deal while alive. It’s still about the damage – because the damage determines how fast you clear – which is why it will always be the primary concern unless we don’t fight mobs/bosses anymore.

The answer to your question is this :

The small part of the players who do WvW and sPVP might accept it. Or might not – depending on their moods.
You see – if they want to go up against a difficult opponent they already have their PvP or WvW option of choice for that. So when they PVE they might do it just for the rewards – in which case making things more difficult for them might not be something they would like.

The rest of the players who do PVE only I assume would not like it. Why? Because it’s difficult.
If they wanted to get stomped on by good opponents they would have gone to WvW or sPVP already. The fact that they went and left or never went is indicative that they don’t really want to get worked too hard by their opponents.

A subset of the PVE community – the PVE for fast rewards crowd would hate it – I personally would.
The last thing I need is for my AC or CoF runs to now be the equivalent of an sPVP match. No thanks.

The bottom line is this : Video games fulfill a power fantasy – they give you the chance to be the hero. To win. To feel good about yourself.

If you take that away or make it too hard for players to obtain that feeling they’re going to be unhappy.

Example:

The new Call of Duty game – Advanced Warfare – uses a Skill based match making system where you’re put in games with people of the same skill level as yourself. This wasn’t such a big thing in previous games of the series.

The good and really good players in the community have expressed a dislike for this feature because they’re getting tired of having to constantly be challenged and try hard every game.

I get this too – every game almost you’re matched with people who are going all out try hard and if you want to perform you have to bring your best game.
Sometimes however you just want to blow steam off and pwn noobs and just win easily. You can hardly do that anymore and the community is upset.

Now I know GW2 is not COD but the idea remains the same. Most people like a challenge occasionally, some might even like to be frequently challenged but being made to try your best every time you play will burn people out fast.

I don’t know if it’s me or you at this point, but the point I’m trying to make is as follows;

As the game gets harder, survival becomes more of a factor in maintaining your damage. If you choose to be reductionist about it yes, it is ultimately about being able to do enough damage to kill the enemy.

However, and this is what I’m trying to get at, the approach changes massively depending on the style of the fight.

On your other bit, this goes into the ever-so-popular “Type A” point above. Some people want to feel powerful and want the easy (but purporatedly difficult) content for that ego boost. Getting actual matchmaking can be a deeply shocking experience for the big fish in the small pond ><

Otherwise, everything has a level. Encounters could be harder without being must play perfectly harder. They just can’t be so faceroll easy that protective elements don’t matter. We don’t get anywhere by bouncing from one absolute to another.

The thing you don’t get is, if the challenge is coming in the form of unavoidable damage and the solution is using passive defensive stats, that is neither skill testing nor fun. If the damage is avoidable then people will continue to wear glassy gear.

If the damage can be avoided it will be. If it can’t be avoided people will use the bare minimum amount of passive defense they need to survive and maximize DPS.

Avoiding damage through active defense is objectively more skill/experience testing than soaking it with passive defense. Most would argue that in an active combat system using skill/experience to dodge a boss attack is more fun than soaking it with tanky gear.

Since these anti-meta proposals are less challenging and less fun, they are intrinsically bad proposals. The “buff AI” proposals are also shortsighted, because…

If I know a mob will flee from an AOE dropped on it, I can use this information to manipulate that mob into behaving in a way that that will result in me completely disabling it. At best such a change would result in certain skills being unusable, like Spiteful Spirit became in GW1 after aoe scatter was introduced; and guess what, nerfs tend not to be fun for people. At worst it would be simply another system to game and the new meta would be “Chill the boss and then drop a meteorshower on him, since he will try to escape it and take 10 seconds to run out of the AOE we can DPS him for 10 seconds with no threat.”

Assassin
Upon aggro, this mob stealthes, then moves towards a target player slowly but being invulnerable (you can in theory predict where they are but it doesn’t help you much), then dealing a single from-stealth attack which will down a berserker-geared player, just barely (is based on class, so it always downs a berserker player).
A small~medium amount of extra defense or Aegis will avoid it, and they take 10-15 seconds to be able to re-stealth.
Ofc, these mobs could appear in packs, or add during a boss-fight or fight versus another group of mobs. If they come as a pack, they’ll always try to target different players.
And another one:

I see. So rampager, assassin and sinister geared players all take collateral damage thanks to this fixation with downing berserker players. Yeah, that sounds like poor balancing to me. It also sounds extremely easy to mitigate through blocks, dodging or other invulnerabilities when players figure out the timing for it.

Knight
Heavily armoured, these enemies are not only virtually impervious to direct damage from the front, even when flanked direct attacks tend to bounce off.
From the front, 100% of weapon-based attacks are deflected (sword-hits, arrows, etc). From any other angle, 70% are.
Hits where the weapon isn’t actually attacking the target (Mesmer GS, Necro Axe, etc) are possible, though power attacks still face a rather high toughness stat.

So… husks 2.0? Bosses like Ginva and the COE golem have a mere 33% damage mitigation and they’re both extremely annoying and boring to fight against, what makes you think anyone wants to fight against a boss that either forces them to afk at range or stand in melee and do absolutely zero damage? Do you actually think the majority of people would enjoy that?

It’s all expectations, plenty of people complete plenty of content in harder games.
That’s a pretty condescending if not contemptuous attitude towards the mass of players. You should really give them more credit.

Except they don’t deserve more credit, because there are droves of people here who complain about mind numbing, brain dead easy living story content being too hard. If the LS is the maximum tolerance people have for difficulty, then yes of course they would cry rivers if ANet made content requiring brain activity.

Hybrid; the trick is that despite what people tell you, nobody is on 100% of the time, everyone makes mistakes.

The problem to me is that the slider is way off, so it’s far too low-risk for most people to play pure dps, even with relatively high error rates.

I’m fine with a person that’s say 95% on being able to run pure dps stats (although they need to fix balance between dps types still), but it should be extremely challenging for someone who’s say, 50% on to complete that content in pure dps stats, or else we end up in the situation we’re in now.

If we’re in a place where people look in askance at the person who gears zerker, but then someone says ‘no wait that guy’s awesome he can totally do it!’ and that guy helps the group’s speed, that’s a perfect scenario, as far as I’m concerned.

If the top-end groups are all in pure zerk, because all of the players are good enough to live, that’s great, but it should be a serious quesiton and consideration in mid-level groups and pugs.

Windsagio.1340:

Hybrid; the trick is that despite what people tell you, nobody is on 100% of the time, everyone makes mistakes.

The problem to me is that the slider is way off, so it’s far too low-risk for most people to play pure dps, even with relatively high error rates.

I’m fine with a person that’s say 95% on being able to run pure dps stats (although they need to fix balance between dps types still), but it should be extremely challenging for someone who’s say, 50% on to complete that content in pure dps stats, or else we end up in the situation we’re in now.

If we’re in a place where people look in askance at the person who gears zerker, but then someone says ‘no wait that guy’s awesome he can totally do it!’ and that guy helps the group’s speed, that’s a perfect scenario, as far as I’m concerned.

If the top-end groups are all in pure zerk, because all of the players are good enough to live, that’s great, but it should be a serious quesiton and consideration in mid-level groups and pugs.

But that’s how the game already is. People that can survive in full zerk play full zerk, but a lot of ppl can’t so they use a mix of piece. That’s not ideal, but even when you check guide on the meta, there is often a small portion explaining what you can do if you can’t survive in full zerk, like adding more knight gear or things like that.

I got ppl in my guild of all level of skills. Some go zerker, melee, meta. Other use meta trait with some knight or valkyrie gear, other use ranged weapons.

Thaddeus.4891:

Windsagio.1340:

Hybrid; the trick is that despite what people tell you, nobody is on 100% of the time, everyone makes mistakes.

The problem to me is that the slider is way off, so it’s far too low-risk for most people to play pure dps, even with relatively high error rates.

I’m fine with a person that’s say 95% on being able to run pure dps stats (although they need to fix balance between dps types still), but it should be extremely challenging for someone who’s say, 50% on to complete that content in pure dps stats, or else we end up in the situation we’re in now.

If we’re in a place where people look in askance at the person who gears zerker, but then someone says ‘no wait that guy’s awesome he can totally do it!’ and that guy helps the group’s speed, that’s a perfect scenario, as far as I’m concerned.

If the top-end groups are all in pure zerk, because all of the players are good enough to live, that’s great, but it should be a serious quesiton and consideration in mid-level groups and pugs.

But that’s how the game already is. People that can survive in full zerk play full zerk, but a lot of ppl can’t so they use a mix of piece. That’s not ideal, but even when you check guide on the meta, there is often a small portion explaining what you can do if you can’t survive in full zerk, like adding more knight gear or things like that.

I got ppl in my guild of all level of skills. Some go zerker, melee, meta. Other use meta trait with some knight or valkyrie gear, other use ranged weapons.

The slider is far off, that’s why we’re even talking about ‘meta’.

Zerk is far safer than it should be (in most content), which is why we have ‘meta pugs’ demanding zerk rather than knight.

Glassy gear is only safer because the content is so old that even bads have mastered it.

Remember when silverwastes came out and people were praising anet for release really challenging anti-berserker content? It wasn’t actually challenging or anti-berserker, it was simply that the bads hadn’t learned the enemy movesets and got dumpstered.

Carighan.6758:

Harper.4173:

Your ideas look good on paper but that’s about it.

Well that’s the thing, isn’kitten
Players don’t want:

• Change
• Variety
• Challenge

Especially not in their MMOs. The repetitive grindy nature is basically what you sell your MMO with, and have ever since (they were never really any different). The players enjoying these games do so because they enjoy the repetition and the learned and as a result not difficult tasks. They do it to get a small but easy “Feeling good” moment as they reach their personal daily go, tick off that achievement or get to that level.
The key in designing these games is then not to provide challenging gameplay or adaptable difficulty (that’s the worst you can do), but rather to give players the illusion that their obstacle is meaningful, but actually have it feel easy from start to finish. The ideal balance makes players think it’s easy because of what they did, when they were never actually in any real danger to begin with, giving this endorphine rush without risking annoying them with wasted time.

It’d be trivial (though I admit my ideas would need lots of refinement) to create a game which doesn’t allow for “rote play”. Which randomizes and adapts so much that you need to actively be there, 100%, all the time. Only, most players don’t want that, and especially not constantly.

My point was rather, if you want to change “the meta”, it has to start with the mobs. But, as said, it might not be a sensible business decision to provide a meaningful challenge.

I agree with your commentary on MMO gaming 100%.
That’s exactly it.

I would love randomized hard content that forces me to adapt and wouldn’t mind doing it every day if the rewards were good.
If they weren’t ( and let’s remind ourselves MMOs are reward-driven games) I would do it a few times for the bragging rights and probably only do it whenever i feel like it ( which given my daily RL schedule would be rare at best).

On another note – alienating their player base is something they definitely don’t want to do. It’s a casual MMO for casual people and sadly casual also usually means put off by great difficulty or a steep difficulty curve.

Windsagio.1340:

Harper.4173:

And how is it that in that situation the primary concern wouldn’t be damage?

It literally becomes : the most damage you can deal while alive. It’s still about the damage – because the damage determines how fast you clear – which is why it will always be the primary concern unless we don’t fight mobs/bosses anymore.

The answer to your question is this :

The small part of the players who do WvW and sPVP might accept it. Or might not – depending on their moods.
You see – if they want to go up against a difficult opponent they already have their PvP or WvW option of choice for that. So when they PVE they might do it just for the rewards – in which case making things more difficult for them might not be something they would like.

The rest of the players who do PVE only I assume would not like it. Why? Because it’s difficult.
If they wanted to get stomped on by good opponents they would have gone to WvW or sPVP already. The fact that they went and left or never went is indicative that they don’t really want to get worked too hard by their opponents.

A subset of the PVE community – the PVE for fast rewards crowd would hate it – I personally would.
The last thing I need is for my AC or CoF runs to now be the equivalent of an sPVP match. No thanks.

The bottom line is this : Video games fulfill a power fantasy – they give you the chance to be the hero. To win. To feel good about yourself.

If you take that away or make it too hard for players to obtain that feeling they’re going to be unhappy.

Example:

The new Call of Duty game – Advanced Warfare – uses a Skill based match making system where you’re put in games with people of the same skill level as yourself. This wasn’t such a big thing in previous games of the series.

The good and really good players in the community have expressed a dislike for this feature because they’re getting tired of having to constantly be challenged and try hard every game.

I get this too – every game almost you’re matched with people who are going all out try hard and if you want to perform you have to bring your best game.
Sometimes however you just want to blow steam off and pwn noobs and just win easily. You can hardly do that anymore and the community is upset.

Now I know GW2 is not COD but the idea remains the same. Most people like a challenge occasionally, some might even like to be frequently challenged but being made to try your best every time you play will burn people out fast.

I don’t know if it’s me or you at this point, but the point I’m trying to make is as follows;

As the game gets harder, survival becomes more of a factor in maintaining your damage. If you choose to be reductionist about it yes, it is ultimately about being able to do enough damage to kill the enemy.

However, and this is what I’m trying to get at, the approach changes massively depending on the style of the fight.

On your other bit, this goes into the ever-so-popular “Type A” point above. Some people want to feel powerful and want the easy (but purporatedly difficult) content for that ego boost. Getting actual matchmaking can be a deeply shocking experience for the big fish in the small pond ><

Otherwise, everything has a level. Encounters could be harder without being must play perfectly harder. They just can’t be so faceroll easy that protective elements don’t matter. We don’t get anywhere by bouncing from one absolute to another.

Read Carighan’s post above.

hybrid.5027:

Glassy gear is only safer because the content is so old that even bads have mastered it.

Remember when silverwastes came out and people were praising anet for release really challenging anti-berserker content? It wasn’t actually challenging or anti-berserker, it was simply that the bads hadn’t learned the enemy movesets and got dumpstered.

Man that was productive :p

Silverwastes is better anti-zerk content, it’s also free open-world content.

You’re having a basic misunderstanding about the intent though, it’s not to make zerk impossible, it’s to make it harder — to move the slider.

And they did move the slider, it’s a gradual process, they can’t just change it entirely overnight or else players will (rightly) lose their minds.

So now we have harder, more complex encounters with almost entirely base enemies (not things like dungeon pulls with 3+ elites) and setpiece boss encounters. Given that it’s non-veteran content mostly, it can’t be TOO hard. If they were still developing dungeons, we’d see that encounter style slipping into actual group content, that’s a different scenario.

Harper.4173:

Read Carighan’s post above.

I did and I don’t agree with the point you’re referring to? “You can’t fool all the people all the time”

Windsagio.1340:

Hybrid; the trick is that despite what people tell you, nobody is on 100% of the time, everyone makes mistakes.

The problem to me is that the slider is way off, so it’s far too low-risk for most people to play pure dps, even with relatively high error rates.

I’m fine with a person that’s say 95% on being able to run pure dps stats (although they need to fix balance between dps types still), but it should be extremely challenging for someone who’s say, 50% on to complete that content in pure dps stats, or else we end up in the situation we’re in now.

If we’re in a place where people look in askance at the person who gears zerker, but then someone says ‘no wait that guy’s awesome he can totally do it!’ and that guy helps the group’s speed, that’s a perfect scenario, as far as I’m concerned.

If the top-end groups are all in pure zerk, because all of the players are good enough to live, that’s great, but it should be a serious quesiton and consideration in mid-level groups and pugs.

Trust me – once you do the content hundreds of times you will be 100% on point.

The issue here is that you fail to realize that there are always people here who :

1)Are knowledgeable in game mechanics and its inner workings
2)Have good reflexes
3)Have thousands of hours to dump at the game effectively learning it by heart and getting a near perfect feel for it.

I know this because I did this in other games. Sadly it’s not the case anymore ( not enough time) but back in the day it was.

So you’re always going to have people overperforming in glass gear making the others angry.

That won’t go away. They’ll still be the meta and the target of all sorts of hate.

The problem with your approach is that it forces the low and medium skilled players to struggle even more and I don’t think they’ll like that.

Also how do you measure what 100% perfect is?

Is it by comparing to the players i mention above? Because in that case I fear even 50% sets the bar too high for most GW2 players.

Windsagio.1340:

hybrid.5027:

Glassy gear is only safer because the content is so old that even bads have mastered it.

Remember when silverwastes came out and people were praising anet for release really challenging anti-berserker content? It wasn’t actually challenging or anti-berserker, it was simply that the bads hadn’t learned the enemy movesets and got dumpstered.

Man that was productive :p

Silverwastes is better anti-zerk content, it’s also free open-world content.

You’re having a basic misunderstanding about the intent though, it’s not to make zerk impossible, it’s to make it harder — to move the slider.

And they did move the slider, it’s a gradual process, they can’t just change it entirely overnight or else players will (rightly) lose their minds.

So now we have harder, more complex encounters with almost entirely base enemies (not things like dungeon pulls with 3+ elites) and setpiece boss encounters. Given that it’s non-veteran content mostly, it can’t be TOO hard. If they were still developing dungeons, we’d see that encounter style slipping into actual group content, that’s a different scenario.

Except that they did not move the slider. When I wear zerker gear and move up to a boss I don’t fight often I will get hit a lot, maybe dodge some insignificent attacks and get hit by harder ones because I don’t know the attacks and how to deal with them. Let me fight this mob once or twice then I know the harder hitting attacks, how to react and the fight is easy again. Silverwastes didn’t do much different than your ez pz dungeons.

Simple question for you then; Presuming you’re not a top 1% or even a top 50% player, do you think silverwastes content is easier, harder, or the same for people in glass melee?

@Hybrid; I really don’t have anything to say to that except ’you’re wrong’. You’re confusing a relatively lenient Margin of error in even the hardest content with no errors.

That’s more of a conceptual point though. Directly, the perfect people don’t matter. Saying they exist, they’re not the standard for the design, and they’re certainly not the standard for PUGs.

If you look up the guild in my signature and/or click the link in my signature I think you can guess that I count myself amongst the best PvE players. I am surely not on a perfect level, I make a lot of mistakes especially after a long day.

For people in glass gear I’d say it’s the same if they spent equal time in the content. At the start it’s harder and if they aren’t (for example) experienced in Arah or HotW then I’d say Silverwastes is harder for them in comparison to these dungeons.
In my opinion most hard hitting animations are obvious enough that you can dodge them with mediocre reflexes. And due to that it becomes mainly a matter of experience instead of pure skill.
Exceptions are bosses that are really small where you can’t see anything due to skill effects.

Windsagio.1340:

Thaddeus.4891:

Windsagio.1340:

Hybrid; the trick is that despite what people tell you, nobody is on 100% of the time, everyone makes mistakes.

The problem to me is that the slider is way off, so it’s far too low-risk for most people to play pure dps, even with relatively high error rates.

I’m fine with a person that’s say 95% on being able to run pure dps stats (although they need to fix balance between dps types still), but it should be extremely challenging for someone who’s say, 50% on to complete that content in pure dps stats, or else we end up in the situation we’re in now.

If we’re in a place where people look in askance at the person who gears zerker, but then someone says ‘no wait that guy’s awesome he can totally do it!’ and that guy helps the group’s speed, that’s a perfect scenario, as far as I’m concerned.

If the top-end groups are all in pure zerk, because all of the players are good enough to live, that’s great, but it should be a serious quesiton and consideration in mid-level groups and pugs.

But that’s how the game already is. People that can survive in full zerk play full zerk, but a lot of ppl can’t so they use a mix of piece. That’s not ideal, but even when you check guide on the meta, there is often a small portion explaining what you can do if you can’t survive in full zerk, like adding more knight gear or things like that.

I got ppl in my guild of all level of skills. Some go zerker, melee, meta. Other use meta trait with some knight or valkyrie gear, other use ranged weapons.

The slider is far off, that’s why we’re even talking about ‘meta’.

Zerk is far safer than it should be (in most content), which is why we have ‘meta pugs’ demanding zerk rather than knight.

So how is better? How is having a knight meta better than a zerk meta?

How is eating a portion of the damage better than avoiding all of it?

How is having pug runs take longer any fun or good for anyone?

Do you honestly believe people would love it if their 10 minutes pug run would take 20 and also include a few wipes?
Do you think this would make the content more enjoyable and people more likely to return and do it over?

Windsagio.1340:

Simple question for you then; Presuming you’re not a top 1% or even a top 50% player, do you think silverwastes content is easier, harder, or the same for people in glass melee?

@Hybrid; I really don’t have anything to say to that except ’you’re wrong’. You’re confusing a relatively lenient Margin of error in even the hardest content with no errors.

That’s more of a conceptual point though. Directly, the perfect people don’t matter. Saying they exist, they’re not the standard for the design, and they’re certainly not the standard for PUGs.

SW is the same once you’ve played it enough.

The original dungeons were just as or more difficult to what SW is now – just that people have done them over and over hundreds of times.

Now that people have spent hundreds of hours farming SW they have assimilated the know-how the content provides and are having an easy go.

Also – teach a player GW2’s mechanics in sPVP only and then toss them out in full zerker gear in SW and then some of the dungeons. Where do you think he’ll die the most?

I’m pretty sure the dungeons ( at least most paths) would wreck him more.

Harper.4173:

Windsagio.1340:

Thaddeus.4891:

Windsagio.1340:

Hybrid; the trick is that despite what people tell you, nobody is on 100% of the time, everyone makes mistakes.

The problem to me is that the slider is way off, so it’s far too low-risk for most people to play pure dps, even with relatively high error rates.

I’m fine with a person that’s say 95% on being able to run pure dps stats (although they need to fix balance between dps types still), but it should be extremely challenging for someone who’s say, 50% on to complete that content in pure dps stats, or else we end up in the situation we’re in now.

If we’re in a place where people look in askance at the person who gears zerker, but then someone says ‘no wait that guy’s awesome he can totally do it!’ and that guy helps the group’s speed, that’s a perfect scenario, as far as I’m concerned.

If the top-end groups are all in pure zerk, because all of the players are good enough to live, that’s great, but it should be a serious quesiton and consideration in mid-level groups and pugs.

But that’s how the game already is. People that can survive in full zerk play full zerk, but a lot of ppl can’t so they use a mix of piece. That’s not ideal, but even when you check guide on the meta, there is often a small portion explaining what you can do if you can’t survive in full zerk, like adding more knight gear or things like that.

I got ppl in my guild of all level of skills. Some go zerker, melee, meta. Other use meta trait with some knight or valkyrie gear, other use ranged weapons.

The slider is far off, that’s why we’re even talking about ‘meta’.

Zerk is far safer than it should be (in most content), which is why we have ‘meta pugs’ demanding zerk rather than knight.

So how is better? How is having a knight meta better than a zerk meta?

How is eating a portion of the damage better than avoiding all of it?

How is having pug runs take longer any fun or good for anyone?

Do you honestly believe people would love it if their 10 minutes pug run would take 20 and also include a few wipes?
Do you think this would make the content more enjoyable and people more likely to return and do it over?

Forget the word ‘meta’ for a second.

I would like all gear to be a decision and a question.

The decision for pure DPS gear could be “I am confident I can keep myself alive and in combat in this gear”. The question could be ""s this person good enough to not waste our time by constantly eating dirt?

The decision is “I value speed and/or seeing big numbers over anything else” and the question is “Is the speed difference big enough for me to want to keep someone out of this group?”

The first set is harder to decide, true, but it’s also more meaningful and puts the pressure on a different track.

~~~

I’m sure people would try to enforce a different ‘meta’, but that’s back to the basic mindset problem, and the fact that the highly skilled groups would still be able (in theory) to run these crazy speed runs in pure dps would mitigate the ‘meta’ pressure on the midtier.