Guild Wars 2

Has it ever been mentioned in a interview on what made Anet turn away from their new trinity mechanics?

They haven’t really turned away completly but alot of the concepts change based on player-suggestions and while the players absolutly don’t want to accept it, Anet listen alot to the playerbase which I think, in some cases, is just lame.

While listening is good, going by their own vision is important. The player-base will never be happy and they will never please everyone, re-working everything over and over is a cycle that will never end, since there will always be players complaining about how the system works.

to enable you to start your trinity threads every other week?

They explained their reasoning in two combat-themed blog posts that went up on the pre-release blog site. I’m not sure those are still accessible.

Trinity sux.First of all it takes you lots of time to find pt,some people dont have entire days to play games,they have jobs…and other things to do and cant spend 3h waithing for pt and then doing long raid dungeons like kids do in WOW.Second thing is that trinity promote 1 class wile degrade others.In every MMORPG i play i was always called “useless” cause i was playing assassins class and they are always less needed in raids.People dont want trinity back,thats all that there is.

Because the trinity is for lazy people, that’s why. Lazy because they depend on Tanks and Healers, while everyone else goes DPS. This system makes it so EVERYONE is part of the fight, and has to care for themselves. You CAN run support if you want, and there are healing skills. I should know, I used to Staff Guardian in the WvWvW.

If anything, it reminds me of Phantasy Star Online. Everyone’s DPS, but can support others if they need to, and everyone is reponsible for their own butts.

Eww….trinity…ugh x.x

The mechanics are there to build the character you want.

The encounter mechanics, however, either just deem them unnecessary or make bringing certain things along a hindrance.

One of them played monk in a game where losses were littered with “BLAME THE MONK”

Seems that most of this thread failed their reading comprehension test…

And i don’t think it has been a conscious decision, but instead a bunch of little unintended consequences that has snowballed since their initial concept stage.

for instance, Defiant is pretty much a “oh snap” addition to counteract stun locking on big mobs.

And a large part comes down to trying to balance PVE and PVP at the same time, while mobs pretty much ignore game mechanics.

All in all, i think GW2 has been 3 parts hype, 1 part substance so far. And most of that substance is focused around PVP. GW2 is in essence a MOBA with PVE bolted on in attempt at getting a larger recruitment ground, and perhaps appease some suits that didn’t see any money in the MOBA esports….

TheDaiBish.9735:

The mechanics are there to build the character you want.

The encounter mechanics, however, either just deem them unnecessary or make bringing certain things along a hindrance.

Pretty much. When dungeon runners can with full honesty claim that having any in the party run a defensive build ups the risk for everyone, you know something is badly messed up. Logic dictates that having someone in a defensive build should reduce risk, not increase it.

digiowl.9620:

Seems that most of this thread failed their reading comprehension test…

And i don’t think it has been a conscious decision, but instead a bunch of little unintended consequences that has snowballed since their initial concept stage.

for instance, Defiant is pretty much a “oh snap” addition to counteract stun locking on big mobs.

And a large part comes down to trying to balance PVE and PVP at the same time, while mobs pretty much ignore game mechanics.

All in all, i think GW2 has been 3 parts hype, 1 part substance so far. And most of that substance is focused around PVP. GW2 is in essence a MOBA with PVE bolted on in attempt at getting a larger recruitment ground, and perhaps appease some suits that didn’t see any money in the MOBA esports….

no, most just don´t have the opinion you would like to hear.

http://penny-arcade.com/comic/2012/01/06

digiowl.9620:

Seems that most of this thread failed their reading comprehension test…

And i don’t think it has been a conscious decision, but instead a bunch of little unintended consequences that has snowballed since their initial concept stage.

for instance, Defiant is pretty much a “oh snap” addition to counteract stun locking on big mobs.

And a large part comes down to trying to balance PVE and PVP at the same time, while mobs pretty much ignore game mechanics.

Defiant definitely needs to be changed. Whether it decays or only triggers if you don’t interrupt an attack.

Also, good point about the SPvP. As such, mobs I feel should be designed in the exact same way as players. Given the same tools and everything (weapon swap, traits, runes, ressing ect).

Heck, if mobs and bosses in Dungeons had about 3 – 4 builds, and they randomly spawned with one, I think that’d be pretty interesting.

digiowl.9620:

Pretty much. When dungeon runners can with full honesty claim that having any in the party run a defensive build ups the risk for everyone, you know something is badly messed up. Logic dictates that having someone in a defensive build should reduce risk, not increase it.

I feel it works when you’re doing content that is level appropriate and for the first few times while you’re trying to get the mechanics down, when you don’t have the raw power to burst through.

My hybrid Warrior worked quite well when doing the lower level dungeons for the first time. Tonnes of immobilize and CC, while others in the back took them down, or at least chunked their health.

Now? Not so much.

Algreg.3629:

digiowl.9620:

Seems that most of this thread failed their reading comprehension test…

And i don’t think it has been a conscious decision, but instead a bunch of little unintended consequences that has snowballed since their initial concept stage.

for instance, Defiant is pretty much a “oh snap” addition to counteract stun locking on big mobs.

And a large part comes down to trying to balance PVE and PVP at the same time, while mobs pretty much ignore game mechanics.

All in all, i think GW2 has been 3 parts hype, 1 part substance so far. And most of that substance is focused around PVP. GW2 is in essence a MOBA with PVE bolted on in attempt at getting a larger recruitment ground, and perhaps appease some suits that didn’t see any money in the MOBA esports….

no, most just don´t have the opinion you would like to hear.

http://penny-arcade.com/comic/2012/01/06

No, most just state their opinion on WoW’s trinity instead of Anet’s trinity which this thread is about…. bandwagon opinions ftw.

A reworked and improved pve would definetly bring me and many others back to the game. The depth of PvE ceased before I (and many others) even considered buying gems which is just too bad for anet and GW2’s future.
PvP, while not that greatly supported either, is definetly the more fun activity in GW2 -behind casual roaming. Can you imagine the game to run solely on 2-10hours per week casuals in 2 years from now? Maybe a very small but unsupported pvp community? I’d be surprised personally.

I guess the devs just didn’t have the time, resources or even a greenlight from management to conserve, fix and improve their PvE and trinity system. However, there is a chance this will change now that LS is over.

Until I see games without the trinity offering complex fights such as vashj, sunstrider, alar, hydross, gorefiend, Council, firefighter mimiron, etc I will conclude that the trinity offers far more opportunity for complex fight mechanics than a pure “everyone is dps” approach.

What would really help the tank/healer shortage would be allowing everyone to be a tank healer or Dps whenever they felt like it without rerolling or regearing.

Well i agree trinity is bad, but having instagib pvp mechanics and one gear towards pve that make other gear ignored is a bad design to.

I just dont know wich is worse…

ah, “their” trinity. Well, never seemed anything more than something tossed into a conversation casually. They never created classes that heavily leaned towards one role in that “trinity” as all classes can do somewhat of everything.

ANET’s trinity got lost mainly for these reasons:

1. PvE Mobs are designed badly.
Defiance makes control pretty much useless, no need to skill for control.
Very, very big HP Pools on bosses make anything hybrid a chore not worth the effort for what you get at the end.
Support builds can be build with max damage gear, making support gear meaningless.
Condition damage is capped hard.
Healing is a joke when you see that continues healing of 4 People in a 5 man dungeon is not enough when you have insta down skills on bosses.
Dodge (+vigor) makes everything avoidable if you are good enough.

Leading to a meta that encourages buff Support with max DPS equip. Leaving condition outside due to the cap.

2. In WvWvW there are mostly just zergs, but actually Support and CC is more on demand here. The trinity has not failed, is just feels meaningless with so many People around (but it isn’t).

3. PvP
In Groups, Support and Control could shine if not for reasons like traits, runes already improving builds so much, that there is no need for a complete specialization on support or control and therefore people go again, with as much damage as they can. But the trinity works here actually best. The conquest modes leads to bunker, roaming, but control and support are existing to round it up. Problem I see here is the 5 man cap, with bunker and roaming thief there are just 2-3 People left, which makes specializing for Group Support less interesting, as there are not that many group members around to profit.

Problem in the whole Balance of the game are the extremes. Classes have always extreme Access to selfsupport, damage, control or heal, which leads to a meta where Support classes are irrelevant and everybody brings everything for himself (and for a part for others on top of this).

Edit:
The general Problem we have here is the nature of the beast:

A Little bit into game design theories:

If you read up on game design, the first thing that should be covered is fun. There has yet to be a conclusive and correct definition of fun, but most people agree that fun in games at least includes the following: an incentive and an activity that needs to be mastered (winning) to get the incentive.

The incentive in MMO’s are difficult to set, most times it’s loot. You need to win an activity (killing a Boss for example) to get loot. This activity is fun (for some people).
In single player games that’s it, the user will progress to the next stage. in MMO’s you will want them to repeat the activity, as it is impossible to create endless activites, therefore we have random loot as an incentive.
Long Story short, to have fun you will want to kill stuff and get stuff from them to make yourself better, to kill more stuff and so on. This leads to the simple premise, that games are all about HP on enemies and DPS on yourself.

A dead player does not do any dps, thats the reason for healers. But if it’s just healing, it’s not tactical, so somebody thought of tanks. That’s the trinity we know, build around the premise of killing something.
Taking the trinity of tank and healer away, that just leaves us with dps. But over the time other meachnics were introduced like support through buffs or debuffing the enemy, as well as control through interrupts etc. This is actually more fun for some people, than the standard Tank/Healer/DPS Setup, as it leads to a more strategical fight than just tanking, healing, kill it.
Arenanet tried to use support (low heal, buff and debuff) and control as roles. But they also wanted every class to be able to fill these roles if demanded. Due to the nature of the game (killing enemies as the major incentive) dps is always king. Everybody wants as much dps as possible and just as many support as necessary. This leads to the Status quo: taking zerker gear and support utility, while control in PvE is neglectable due to defiance.

It would actually be possible to change this with a different Boss Setup. Instead of killing the Boss, one has to defend NPC’s etc, thus a greater need for Support, healing etc. Another Option in WvWvW for example would be increased points for defending keeps. This would lead to a new meta, where survival is top and support would become the actual most important Thing next to dps, while still having to kill and conquer. This kind of gameplay would just be terrible boring. Who wants to stand all day in a keep to defend it, if somebody Comes to capture it? So, here it’s the same: Killing enemies and capture keeps is more fun and therefore zerg meta was created.
PvP has actually the defensive System. Everybody needs to keep his spots to gain points. That is why in PvP there is an actual “Balance” of trinity with bunker and Support builds. Still, other problems apply like a too small group (5 man) to make it meaningfull and the sheer amount of support, control abilities every class can bring are pushing specialized Support/control builds into meaningless.

fadeaway.2807:

Until I see games without the trinity offering complex fights such as vashj, sunstrider, alar, hydross, gorefiend, Council, firefighter mimiron, etc I will conclude that the trinity offers far more opportunity for complex fight mechanics than a pure “everyone is dps” approach.

What would really help the tank/healer shortage would be allowing everyone to be a tank healer or Dps whenever they felt like it without rerolling or regearing.

Those fights aren’t actually complex. They’re like playing a new piece on a piano, it’s hard the first few times but once you done it, you can pretty much do it on auto drive. There’s actually relatively little thought process to them because you’re just following the fight script.

We don’t need more fights like those in my opinion. Do you actually feel like you’re fighting in those fights? I don’t, it’s not that they aren’t fun but I feel more like I’m playing a piano than actually fighting something.

sternenstaub.8763:

ANET’s trinity got lost mainly for two reasons:

1. PvE Mobs are designed badly.
Defiance makes control pretty much useless, no need to skill for control.
Very, very big HP Pools on bosses make anything hybrid a chore not worth the effort for what you get at the end.
Support builds can be build with max damage gear, making support gear meaningless.
Condition damage is capped hard.
Healing is a joke when you see that continues healing of 4 People in a 5 man dungeon is not enough when you have insta down skills on bosses.
Dodge (+vigor) makes everything avoidable if you are good enough.

Leading to a meta that encourages buff Support with max DPS equip. Leading condition outside due to the cap.

2. In WvWvW there are mostly just zergs, but actually Support and CC is more on demand here. The trinity has not failed, is just feels meaningless with so many People around (but it isn’t).

3. PvP
In Groups, Support and Control could shine if not for reasons like traits, runes already improving builds so much, that there is no need a complete specialization on support or control and therefore People go again, with as much damage as they can. But the trinity works here actually best. The conquest modes leads to bunker, roaming, but control and Support are existing to round it up.

Problem in the whole Balance of the game are the extremes. Classes have always extreme Access to selfsupport, damage, control or heal, which leads to a meta where Support classes are irrelevant and everybody brings everything for himself (and for a part for others on top of this).

This is a very good summary.

Xae Isareth.1364:

fadeaway.2807:

Until I see games without the trinity offering complex fights such as vashj, sunstrider, alar, hydross, gorefiend, Council, firefighter mimiron, etc I will conclude that the trinity offers far more opportunity for complex fight mechanics than a pure “everyone is dps” approach.

What would really help the tank/healer shortage would be allowing everyone to be a tank healer or Dps whenever they felt like it without rerolling or regearing.

Those fights aren’t actually complex. They’re like playing a new piece on a piano, it’s hard the first few times but once you done it, you can pretty much do it on auto drive. There’s actually relatively little thought process to them because you’re just following the fight script.

I want to see you playing a healer in ANY trinity game with your screen turned off.

Escadin.9482:

I want to see you playing a healer in ANY trinity game with your screen turned off.

I know at least some healers that preferred staring at the wall instead of looking to the mobs they fight in Everquest 2. So yeah .. you need to have your monitor on, but all you have to see are the life-bars of the players.

nGumball.1283:

While listening is good, going by their own vision is important. The player-base will never be happy and they will never please everyone, re-working everything over and over is a cycle that will never end, since there will always be players complaining about how the system works.

Anyone needing hard proof of this, can go to any battle.net game forum, and look at the general topics, or if you can find the archives for the suggestion forums of WoW.

You can try all you want to please your player base, but you will never do it fully. So with this I give both NCsoft and Arena net something to chew on. kitten suggestions. There is NOTHING I mean ABSOLUTELY NOTHING you can do to make each and everyone of us happy. You can balance the classes until the dying days of your companies, and NEVER satisfy all of us. So make your game. Make it how YOU want it to be, and let those of us who find enjoyment in it be happy with what you have given us. NEVER forget that this is YOUR game, and NOT ours.

Beldin.5498:

Escadin.9482:

I want to see you playing a healer in ANY trinity game with your screen turned off.

I know at least some healers that preferred staring at the wall instead of looking to the mobs they fight in Everquest 2. So yeah .. you need to have your monitor on, but all you have to see are the life-bars of the players.

Actually, you could just keep healing the MT with a black screen. Most damage in group exists due to errors made by people (Standing in voids and blubb). So, it is possible… and I have tanked bosses with a black screen…. Ok, having TS helps

The trinity of healer/Tank/dps is just as boring as pure dps and selfbuffing here. AI is the Problem. Scripted PvE will always become boring, no matter of the classes and roles.

Arrion.2185:

nGumball.1283:

While listening is good, going by their own vision is important. The player-base will never be happy and they will never please everyone, re-working everything over and over is a cycle that will never end, since there will always be players complaining about how the system works.

Anyone needing hard proof of this, can go to any battle.net game forum, and look at the general topics, or if you can find the archives for the suggestion forums of WoW.

You can try all you want to please your player base, but you will never do it fully. So with this I give both NCsoft and Arena net something to chew on. kitten suggestions. There is NOTHING I mean ABSOLUTELY NOTHING you can do to make each and everyone of us happy. You can balance the classes until the dying days of your companies, and NEVER satisfy all of us. So make your game. Make it how YOU want it to be, and let those of us who find enjoyment in it be happy with what you have given us. NEVER forget that this is YOUR game, and NOT ours.

Anet: “Got it! Can’t win, don’t try.”

Beldin.5498:

Escadin.9482:

I want to see you playing a healer in ANY trinity game with your screen turned off.

I know at least some healers that preferred staring at the wall instead of looking to the mobs they fight in Everquest 2. So yeah .. you need to have your monitor on, but all you have to see are the life-bars of the players.

many healers in MMORPG also use mods that turn the game into whack-a-mole on health bars without those pesky game graphics and stuff.

Trinity is not good. It’s a bad system.
The problem with GW2 is not the lack of trinity. Is that we don’t have something better.

lmperdigao.2567:

Trinity is not good. It’s a bad system.
The problem with GW2 is not the lack of trinity. Is that we don’t have something better.

It’s just old. Trinity systems had too much success over the past 10 years to be a bad system.

I miss pulling every last stupid pug with through hardcore dungeons as a healer. It’s ludicrous that people here seem to believe this is the opposite of teamplay, but either way it was fun. You are right though, there are probably way funnier teamplay actitivies for a person like me but anet didn’t implement any of them.

Going back to trinity would be the cheap way out.

I feel like it had something to do with…

GLF 1 monk to go!!
GLF 1 monk to go!!
GLF 1 monk to go!!
Your message has been suppressed due to excessive messaging.

“I want to see you playing a healer in ANY trinity game with your screen turned off.”

In Everquest I, raid healers only needed to count the time needed until they cast their big heal on the raid tank. Each one would cast their heal at timed intervals and this was the most effective way of keeping the tank alive. They would typically do this from behind a wall to avoid graphics lag and avoid damage. The best healing class (clerics) were needed to do this in large numbers in every raid and this caused the highest burnout of players I’ve seen in any MMO. That is the trinity in a nutshell. People being forced to take roles that they don’t enjoy for the good of the group , or nobody willing to take the role so nothing gets started.

Old Everquest I was a pioneering graphical MMO and it was copied by many later MMOs, even the bad bits. The bad bits included the massive raids, trinity, and gear treadmills.

Escadin.9482:

lmperdigao.2567:

Trinity is not good. It’s a bad system.
The problem with GW2 is not the lack of trinity. Is that we don’t have something better.

It’s just old. Trinity systems had too much success over the past 10 years to be a bad system.

I miss pulling every last stupid pug with through hardcore dungeons as a healer. It’s ludicrous that people here seem to believe this is the opposite of teamplay, but either way it was fun. You are right though, there are probably way funnier teamplay actitivies for a person like me but anet didn’t implement any of them.

Going back to trinity would be the cheap way out.

Yeah, you’re right. Most of the reason that the trinity system is (for me) a bad system is because it’s old. Do you remember when rpgs where about turns and random encounters? We had games with turns and random encounters for years and years too. The only game that survived from this trend to our days are the Pokémon series. And probably just because it’s Pokémon. It was a good system before, but because it was the only one that could be simple and tactical at the same time that we had. Most of the people in our days can’t stand rpg in turns (not strategy rpgs like FFT, but like FF4) because we got better systems.

GW2 had a better system in mind. It was good on paper, but in game is just shallow. Even with combo fields and such (mostly because they’re just a flavor thing, and not something strictly necessary). It’s simple enough to appeal people, but has no team tactical approach at all, because you only need to concern about yourself to be successful in the very most of the situations.

And I do believe that is possible to create a system without the holy trinity that is at the same time simple to understand but deep to work with. But well, not in GW2.

digiowl.9620:

TheDaiBish.9735:

The mechanics are there to build the character you want.

The encounter mechanics, however, either just deem them unnecessary or make bringing certain things along a hindrance.

Pretty much. When dungeon runners can with full honesty claim that having any in the party run a defensive build ups the risk for everyone, you know something is badly messed up. Logic dictates that having someone in a defensive build should reduce risk, not increase it.

You can do dungeons with non-meta builds. Running defensive builds is probably more optimal if you don’t know the dungeon well or are in a pug with people who don’t know the dungeon well. When the game first came out people were running all kinds of defensive builds. I did most dungeons using an alturistic healing guardian and had no problems.

What is true is that full dps will get you through a dungeon quicker and therefore make you more money. Full dps is also more optimal for high level fractals because healing, toughness, and vitality are pretty much worthless. Not true for regular dungeons or lower level fractals.

Oh, and I’m pretty sure that every CRPG ever created since the early 1980s has had builds that are more optimal than others. Just the nature of the beast.

saalle.4623:

Trinity sux.First of all it takes you lots of time to find pt,some people dont have entire days to play games,they have jobs…and other things to do and cant spend 3h waithing for pt and then doing long raid dungeons like kids do in WOW.Second thing is that trinity promote 1 class wile degrade others.In every MMORPG i play i was always called “useless” cause i was playing assassins class and they are always less needed in raids.People dont want trinity back,thats all that there is.

A lot of adults can manage their time to work during the day, spend time with their families and fit in an hour of gaming at night. It’s not unheard of. If you’re unable to, you’re doing something wrong or you’re just theorising of what it must be like to have a job.

lmperdigao.2567:

Escadin.9482:

lmperdigao.2567:

Trinity is not good. It’s a bad system.
The problem with GW2 is not the lack of trinity. Is that we don’t have something better.

It’s just old. Trinity systems had too much success over the past 10 years to be a bad system.

I miss pulling every last stupid pug with through hardcore dungeons as a healer. It’s ludicrous that people here seem to believe this is the opposite of teamplay, but either way it was fun. You are right though, there are probably way funnier teamplay actitivies for a person like me but anet didn’t implement any of them.

Going back to trinity would be the cheap way out.

Yeah, you’re right. Most of the reason that the trinity system is (for me) a bad system is because it’s old. Do you remember when rpgs where about turns and random encounters? We had games with turns and random encounters for years and years too. The only game that survived from this trend to our days are the Pokémon series. And probably just because it’s Pokémon. It was a good system before, but because it was the only one that could be simple and tactical at the same time that we had. Most of the people in our days can’t stand rpg in turns (not strategy rpgs like FFT, but like FF4) because we got better systems.

GW2 had a better system in mind. It was good on paper, but in game is just shallow. Even with combo fields and such (mostly because they’re just a flavor thing, and not something strictly necessary). It’s simple enough to appeal people, but has no team tactical approach at all, because you only need to concern about yourself to be successful in the very most of the situations.

And I do believe that is possible to create a system without the holy trinity that is at the same time simple to understand but deep to work with. But well, not in GW2.

The perfect is the enemy of the good. GW2 combat system is not perfect, but it is good — at least I like it.

lmperdigao.2567:

Most of the people in our days can’t stand rpg in turns (not strategy rpgs like FFT, but like FF4) because we got better systems.

Or its maybe just a problem in a multyplayer game. For a single player game i would always prefer a good old turnbased game where i can fight more tactically and think about what to do next instead of pressing the next button in panic, since there is not enough time.

My favorites were always games like Wizardry or Might & Magic in the regard

To be fair, back in the days where the roles emerged from, there weren’t 3, there were 6 of them. The last MMORPG I remember playing which specifically designated the roles of Buffer, Debugger and CCer was DAoC, however.

In EQ2 it were more like 4 roles, Tank, Healer, DD and Utility/Buffer like Bards. Bards were not needed in 6 player dungeon groups, but were really essential in raids.

Carighan.6758:

To be fair, back in the days where the roles emerged from, there weren’t 3, there were 6 of them. The last MMORPG I remember playing which specifically designated the roles of Buffer, Debugger and CCer was DAoC, however.

Rift actually……

I want a pentanity. Just because.

Naqaj.6219:

They explained their reasoning in two combat-themed blog posts that went up on the pre-release blog site. I’m not sure those are still accessible.

Is it this?
http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1078544-GW2-official-Blogpost-about-the-Holy-Trinity-must-read?p=15397283&viewfull=1

I would say the obvious answer is that there are multiple MMOs that require TRINITY type play and they didn’t want GW2 to be just another one of those? I for one and quite happy with that decision (and if you are not, those other MMOs DO (for the most part) still exist and you can go play them).

I’ve been thinking.
Every trinity MMO that comes to my mind (EQ, WoW, Rift, WAR, SWTOR…), is a theme park MMO. And every non-trinity MMO that comes to my mind (UO, Tibia, EVE, and most oldschools MMORPGs) is a sandbox MMO. With the sole exception of Guild Wars 2, that is a non-trinity theme park MMO.
There’s any other exception?

Seeing things this way says A LOT about the good things and the bad things that this combat sytem in GW2 has.

lmperdigao.2567:

Yeah, you’re right. Most of the reason that the trinity system is (for me) a bad system is because it’s old. Do you remember when rpgs where about turns and random encounters? We had games with turns and random encounters for years and years too. The only game that survived from this trend to our days are the Pokémon series. And probably just because it’s Pokémon. It was a good system before, but because it was the only one that could be simple and tactical at the same time that we had. Most of the people in our days can’t stand rpg in turns (not strategy rpgs like FFT, but like FF4) because we got better systems.

GW2 had a better system in mind. It was good on paper, but in game is just shallow. Even with combo fields and such (mostly because they’re just a flavor thing, and not something strictly necessary). It’s simple enough to appeal people, but has no team tactical approach at all, because you only need to concern about yourself to be successful in the very most of the situations.

And I do believe that is possible to create a system without the holy trinity that is at the same time simple to understand but deep to work with. But well, not in GW2.

There is definetly a similar trend. Tbh the best non-MMO RPG I have played was dragon age 1 (somewhat openly turn based) and the only thing that puts skyrim (fully real time) on almost the same level for me was it’s mod support and certainly not the depth in it’s combat.
So these things are probably just one factor.

Just think about league of legends. Anybody who claims this game isn’t about teamplay deserves a brick to face. Literally millions of people enjoy it everyday, even hype it and hence prove it has a good gamedesign concept.
However, it is based on a Tank-Dps-Healer/Support Trinity. Not strictly, but it has been (or still is) the meta for years.

Edit: I don’t mean to claim TDH trinity would totally work for GW2, but people in these forums seem to underrate it based on their bad experience with it’s implementation in 1 or 2 games and their miserable rip-offs.

nGumball.1283:

They haven’t really turned away completly but alot of the concepts change based on player-suggestions and while the players absolutly don’t want to accept it, Anet listen alot to the playerbase which I think, in some cases, is just lame.

While listening is good, going by their own vision is important. The player-base will never be happy and they will never please everyone, re-working everything over and over is a cycle that will never end, since there will always be players complaining about how the system works.

Correction, they did those things for the PVP playerbase NOT the PVE. the PVE playerbase has basically been ignored until recently with the first CDI and even then there’s alot that still needs worked on in the PVE side of things before it’s on par with what they’ve done for PVPers especially in the arena of class balance which has broken many a PVE skill.

Knighthonor.4061:

Has it ever been mentioned in a interview on what made Anet turn away from their new trinity mechanics?

They’re not trinity mechanics.

Svarty.8019:

Is it this?
http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1078544-GW2-official-Blogpost-about-the-Holy-Trinity-must-read?p=15397283&viewfull=1

That would be the second part. The first part is mentioned in there, but not included, the blog post about death& healing.

Because they wanted to have faceroll combat.

“I don’t mean to claim TDH trinity would totally work for GW2, but people in these forums seem to underrate it based on their bad experience with it’s implementation in 1 or 2 games and their miserable rip-offs.”

Those 1 or 2 games and all their miserable rip offs will amount to an astronomical amount of gameplay hours across the entirety of the MMO industry, nearly all of which used a trinity for the last 15 years. Most new MMOs are now trying to lessen the trinity by offering choice of roles, so a character can be dps or a healer depending upon what a group needs maybe. That’s a step forward, and it shows that the modern design teams know the problems of the trinity, but it isn’t as good as removing the trinity altogether.

good post.

I feel that if Anet uses the AI they use for the dualing NPCs in the mist for all mobs (they dodge and kite in addition to DPS), we’ll see more uses for all gear types.

sternenstaub.8763:

ANET’s trinity got lost mainly for these reasons:

1. PvE Mobs are designed badly.
Defiance makes control pretty much useless, no need to skill for control.
Very, very big HP Pools on bosses make anything hybrid a chore not worth the effort for what you get at the end.
Support builds can be build with max damage gear, making support gear meaningless.
Condition damage is capped hard.
Healing is a joke when you see that continues healing of 4 People in a 5 man dungeon is not enough when you have insta down skills on bosses.
Dodge (+vigor) makes everything avoidable if you are good enough.

Leading to a meta that encourages buff Support with max DPS equip. Leaving condition outside due to the cap.
<snip for length>
Long Story short, to have fun you will want to kill stuff and get stuff from them to make yourself better, to kill more stuff and so on. This leads to the simple premise, that games are all about HP on enemies and DPS on yourself.

A dead player does not do any dps, thats the reason for healers. But if it’s just healing, it’s not tactical, so somebody thought of tanks. That’s the trinity we know, build around the premise of killing something.
Taking the trinity of tank and healer away, that just leaves us with dps. But over the time other meachnics were introduced like support through buffs or debuffing the enemy, as well as control through interrupts etc. This is actually more fun for some people, than the standard Tank/Healer/DPS Setup, as it leads to a more strategical fight than just tanking, healing, kill it.
Arenanet tried to use support (low heal, buff and debuff) and control as roles. But they also wanted every class to be able to fill these roles if demanded. Due to the nature of the game (killing enemies as the major incentive) dps is always king. Everybody wants as much dps as possible and just as many support as necessary. This leads to the Status quo: taking zerker gear and support utility, while control in PvE is neglectable due to defiance.

It would actually be possible to change this with a different Boss Setup. Instead of killing the Boss, one has to defend NPC’s etc, thus a greater need for Support, healing etc. Another Option in WvWvW for example would be increased points for defending keeps. This would lead to a new meta, where survival is top and support would become the actual most important Thing next to dps, while still having to kill and conquer. This kind of gameplay would just be terrible boring. Who wants to stand all day in a keep to defend it, if somebody Comes to capture it? So, here it’s the same: Killing enemies and capture keeps is more fun and therefore zerg meta was created.
PvP has actually the defensive System. Everybody needs to keep his spots to gain points. That is why in PvP there is an actual “Balance” of trinity with bunker and Support builds. Still, other problems apply like a too small group (5 man) to make it meaningfull and the sheer amount of support, control abilities every class can bring are pushing specialized Support/control builds into meaningless.

Rho.1923:

good post.

I feel that if Anet uses the AI they use for the dualing NPCs in the mist for all mobs (they dodge and kite in addition to DPS), we’ll see more uses for all gear types.

sternenstaub.8763:

ANET’s trinity got lost mainly for these reasons:

1. PvE Mobs are designed badly.
Defiance makes control pretty much useless, no need to skill for control.
Very, very big HP Pools on bosses make anything hybrid a chore not worth the effort for what you get at the end.
Support builds can be build with max damage gear, making support gear meaningless.
Condition damage is capped hard.
Healing is a joke when you see that continues healing of 4 People in a 5 man dungeon is not enough when you have insta down skills on bosses.
Dodge (+vigor) makes everything avoidable if you are good enough.

Leading to a meta that encourages buff Support with max DPS equip. Leaving condition outside due to the cap.
<snip for length>
Long Story short, to have fun you will want to kill stuff and get stuff from them to make yourself better, to kill more stuff and so on. This leads to the simple premise, that games are all about HP on enemies and DPS on yourself.

A dead player does not do any dps, thats the reason for healers. But if it’s just healing, it’s not tactical, so somebody thought of tanks. That’s the trinity we know, build around the premise of killing something.
Taking the trinity of tank and healer away, that just leaves us with dps. But over the time other meachnics were introduced like support through buffs or debuffing the enemy, as well as control through interrupts etc. This is actually more fun for some people, than the standard Tank/Healer/DPS Setup, as it leads to a more strategical fight than just tanking, healing, kill it.
Arenanet tried to use support (low heal, buff and debuff) and control as roles. But they also wanted every class to be able to fill these roles if demanded. Due to the nature of the game (killing enemies as the major incentive) dps is always king. Everybody wants as much dps as possible and just as many support as necessary. This leads to the Status quo: taking zerker gear and support utility, while control in PvE is neglectable due to defiance.

It would actually be possible to change this with a different Boss Setup. Instead of killing the Boss, one has to defend NPC’s etc, thus a greater need for Support, healing etc. Another Option in WvWvW for example would be increased points for defending keeps. This would lead to a new meta, where survival is top and support would become the actual most important Thing next to dps, while still having to kill and conquer. This kind of gameplay would just be terrible boring. Who wants to stand all day in a keep to defend it, if somebody Comes to capture it? So, here it’s the same: Killing enemies and capture keeps is more fun and therefore zerg meta was created.
PvP has actually the defensive System. Everybody needs to keep his spots to gain points. That is why in PvP there is an actual “Balance” of trinity with bunker and Support builds. Still, other problems apply like a too small group (5 man) to make it meaningfull and the sheer amount of support, control abilities every class can bring are pushing specialized Support/control builds into meaningless.

Point 1. Every game does this – Rift bosses were the best example in Raid dungeons. They do not have poor mechanics but change based on level of area and dungeon. Also, at least open world bosses in GW2 scale for the amount of people around them.

Again the player attitude – the ‘zerker’ mentality. There is more than one way to skin a cat and in this game it is true – not so with the Trinity model – set roles and not good ones at that.

AHH – there are times when you have to defend NPC’s actually may of the around Tyria. I think you need to play the game.