Guild Wars 2

I’ve been reading thread after thread about how ‘my build is ruined…qq’ and ‘i hate change…qq’.

But frankly until the patch is live and everyone has change to experiment with these changes, there is no reason to complain. From my point of view, every single class has been improved. Yes, some obviously broken but fun skills (ice bow) were lowered, but until the patch is live, we just don’t know. Their goal is to make everything viable and fun and not to just faceroll everything.

I, if you didn’t know, only play ranger; so I’ve been paying close attention to the ranger thread. Sure, there are a lot of great changes coming, but it seems all the ‘experts’ are finding every single thing they don’t like and blowing it out of proportion. Like they said, this is not the final product, it is a work in progress.

I would assume since they are redoing the trait system that many, if not all, skills will be updated and adjusted to work/function better.

tl;dr Calm down. You are not an ‘expert’. Until the changes are live, we just don’t know what will come to fruition.

Well said

Random, mindless complaining – that we can do without. But if there is a clear flaw in something upcoming, it makes more sense to tell Anet now instead of waiting for it to be completed and added to the live game.

why complain about complaining

Consider the possibility some of us are experts .

This thread is so naive.

They showed us the traits so we obviously know whether or not our builds can/cannot work after it goes live unless they drastically change things. This patch also greatly hinders build diversity because it forces you to use only 3 traitlines, as opposed to putting the exact amount of points you want in whatever lines you wish for.

So you are wrong.

Also they specifically said to post on the forums and reddit about our feedback and to let them know if their changes killed off any of the builds we play with, so you are encouraging people to do the complete opposite? Seriously?

People complain because they are scared of changes, especially when their overpowered builds are going to be basically equalized with the others. What they fail to realized is that this is a opportunity to create new builds and explore a variety of new options, if things stayed the same in a game it would not be interesting to play and people need to see that.

UnitedChaos.8364:

I’ve been reading thread after thread about how ‘my build is ruined…qq’ and ‘i hate change…qq’.

But frankly until the patch is live and everyone has change to experiment with these changes, there is no reason to complain. From my point of view, every single class has been improved. Yes, some obviously broken but fun skills (ice bow) were lowered, but until the patch is live, we just don’t know. Their goal is to make everything viable and fun and not to just faceroll everything.

I, if you didn’t know, only play ranger; so I’ve been paying close attention to the ranger thread. Sure, there are a lot of great changes coming, but it seems all the ‘experts’ are finding every single thing they don’t like and blowing it out of proportion. Like they said, this is not the final product, it is a work in progress.

I would assume since they are redoing the trait system that many, if not all, skills will be updated and adjusted to work/function better.

tl;dr Calm down. You are not an ‘expert’. Until the changes are live, we just don’t know what will come to fruition.

because they told people to talk about the builds that dont work, and to theorycraft.

some people are good at looking at the data and figuring out things.

Its to the benefit of the team.

biggest problem i would say is the information is not that well organized, many different forums, many different threads.

this is a WIP and feedback is still useful

Chameleon Dude.1564:

Random, mindless complaining – that we can do without. But if there is a clear flaw in something upcoming, it makes more sense to tell Anet now instead of waiting for it to be completed and added to the live game.

Not really. Yes, some voicing of concerns makes sense, but you cannot see a flaw yet (or at least, not really) because you’re only seeing 10% of the picture right now.

For example for HoT, we don’t know the power baseline. We have 0 way to judge traits because we don’t know skills and don’t know the intended DPS.

Why complain? Did you even watch the Necro part of the video?

Did they even mention about pet ai being fixed?
Did they even talk about DS and how it kinda breaks the builds of blood?
Did they talk about how “weak” the second life bar really is, and what the class loses for it?

Rugged D Ripper.1243:

People complain because they are scared of changes, especially when their overpowered builds are going to be basically equalized with the others. What they fail to realized is that this is a opportunity to create new builds and explore a variety of new options, if things stayed the same in a game it would not be interesting to play and people need to see that.

Like when people complain about complainers?
People also complain when there is valid reason to. In this case, from the very detailed show they gave on the changes, there are many valid points to be made against this new system. The equalization of classes doesn’t even seem to be the main concern of those complaining. Its how the new system looks to severely limit the build variety, by forcing an all-or-nothing approach to trait lines while limiting the line choices to 3 (only 2 original lines, if you go with the 3rd being elite). What they’ve shown looks to limit the builds possible even moreso than what it was before. Not everyone likes to play meta, after all.

Besides the fact that ANet has asked for people to post any and all feedback on what they showed…….why wouldn’t people give their feedback? There’s been positive and negative feedback both, much of it on valid points.

Carighan.6758:

Chameleon Dude.1564:

Random, mindless complaining – that we can do without. But if there is a clear flaw in something upcoming, it makes more sense to tell Anet now instead of waiting for it to be completed and added to the live game.

Not really. Yes, some voicing of concerns makes sense, but you cannot see a flaw yet (or at least, not really) because you’re only seeing 10% of the picture right now.

For example for HoT, we don’t know the power baseline. We have 0 way to judge traits because we don’t know skills and don’t know the intended DPS.

power baseline is irrelevant. The trait balance/design isnt about power versus content(which they easily adjust), its about builds, and power versus other builds. How do you think designers come up with this stuff if its impossible to tell anything until it already exists?

Personally, my complaints are not based on the traits themselves, as a lot of the previous ones have been merged and new ones have been added, and I don’t mind having only 3 traits per tier either, if they are meaningful.
What I’m REALLY mad about is how they plan to cut out SO MANY options for character customization with the new system.

Example: if they would just reduce the number of traits to 3 per tier in the current system, the possible combinations for each specialization would be 105.
JUST by locking the tier of traits (can only choose 1 adept/1 master/1 grandmaster) the combinations fall down to 18 for each specialization.

From 105 to 18 options.
For each specialization.
And without counting all the choices that will get cut off by the new limit of 3 active specializations (down from the current 5).

Seems a pretty legit reason to complain to me.

But frankly until the patch is live and everyone has change to experiment with these changes, there is no reason to complain.

No, this is foolish.

Yes, once the patch goes live we will have a more complete view of how it feels, but this will also be several months down the road (presumably at least two months if they intend to roll out class previews one a week). That’s several months of time they would be wasting in not fixing the problems we have with the proposed changes.

If we wait until it comes out to voice our concerns, then it would take several months after that to do anything about it. Given the pace of development in this game, that means it might be almost a year before the game gets back on the right track. If, on the other hand, we give our feedback now, and they actually pay attention, they can get to work on the fixes today, and perhaps not even launch some of the worst changes, or at least fix them that many months sooner than if we waited.

Now of course this means that some of our opinions will be off base, that we are reacting to what we see as a problem, but that actually gets resolved by something else of which we aren’t aware, but ANet understands this. They know when they already have something covered (or think they do) and can react accordingly, but it still helps to let them know that this is something that bothers us in its currently suggested form, and that we would not be happy if it turns out how we assume it will.

On balance, I do not like the current changes. I hope they revert a lot of it, like restoring some missing traits, returning the ability to spec into four or more tracks if you want, and moving certain traits back to where they were. I may be making assumptions that will not prove valid, but honestly I don’t see how that would be the case with most of my issues, they seem pretty clear to me.

phys.7689:

How do you think designers come up with this stuff if its impossible to tell anything until it already exists?

Eh… from past experiences with virtually any game development, by basing their ideas on what’d be “cool”. Or “interesting”. Numbers and balance are stuff to do later, once overall design is bolted down.

Carighan.6758:

phys.7689:

How do you think designers come up with this stuff if its impossible to tell anything until it already exists?

Eh… from past experiences with virtually any game development, by basing their ideas on what’d be “cool”. Or “interesting”. Numbers and balance are stuff to do later, once overall design is bolted down.

you start of with whats cool
then you come up with logical systems/math
then you test it, then you adjust it.

you can skip the logic/math, but that usually ends up taking longer to solve, much like trying to solve a math problem by trial and error.

rager.4963:

Why complain? Did you even watch the Necro part of the video?

Did they even mention about pet ai being fixed?
Did they even talk about DS and how it kinda breaks the builds of blood?
Did they talk about how “weak” the second life bar really is, and what the class loses for it?

What would a pet ai fix have to do with traits though?

Nike.2631:

Consider the possibility some of us are experts .

:)

I can’t believe so many of you bit at this trolls OP and actually responded.

One thing that you discover very, very quickly in game development:

SOMEONE is going to be complaining at some point. It is entirely inevitable. Someone (and usually many someones) is going to kittened off at you no matter what you do, what you change, or what you fix, and chances are they will voice that displeasure very, very loudly and in the most obnoxious and combative way possible.

You accept it, filter out the noise, and keep working (to varying degrees of success). Players could do with learning how to do that themselves.

UnitedChaos.8364:

I’ve been reading thread after thread about how ‘my build is ruined…qq’ and ‘i hate change…qq’.

But frankly until the patch is live and everyone has change to experiment with these changes, there is no reason to complain. From my point of view, every single class has been improved. Yes, some obviously broken but fun skills (ice bow) were lowered, but until the patch is live, we just don’t know. Their goal is to make everything viable and fun and not to just faceroll everything.

I, if you didn’t know, only play ranger; so I’ve been paying close attention to the ranger thread. Sure, there are a lot of great changes coming, but it seems all the ‘experts’ are finding every single thing they don’t like and blowing it out of proportion. Like they said, this is not the final product, it is a work in progress.

I would assume since they are redoing the trait system that many, if not all, skills will be updated and adjusted to work/function better.

tl;dr Calm down. You are not an ‘expert’. Until the changes are live, we just don’t know what will come to fruition.

I’m just doing what they asked. “if you have any feedback please let us know” is what I just heard rewatching part of the twitch

Now, of course constructive criticism goes a lot further than whining, but yeah. There are issues with the current incarnation we were shown for many situations. Cutting out weapon viability is no fun, having lines of traits where one trait is the clear winner in almost every situation is also not good. I can’t help but feel that pointing these out will help the devs assuming they actually see it. I mean 3.5s of retal on aegis destruction or a 10% boost while things are burning… in what situation is that retal better? I honestly can’t even think of one.

lordkrall.7241:

rager.4963:

Why complain? Did you even watch the Necro part of the video?

Did they even mention about pet ai being fixed?
Did they even talk about DS and how it kinda breaks the builds of blood?
Did they talk about how “weak” the second life bar really is, and what the class loses for it?

What would a pet ai fix have to do with traits though?

What?

How hard would it have been to say. “Here is some new death talents we wanted to make pets more useful, and yes we tweaked ai after years.”

They talked about stuff like meser clones and how people used them, and gave more feedback on traits but necromancer they was all like ho hum get this over with so we can get to next class.

Also, pet AI has everything to do with traits. If the AI is bugged people don’t want to spec for it.

Every single class has been improved

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Except Necromancer

This needs to be viewed as a good change (up until it happens and it is found NOT to be). All this Chicken Little posts with players running about yelling about the sky falling is to be expected around here….

Frankly, the Trait system needs a full overhaul (I just wish I had any hopes of getting back all the gold & SP I spent on the CURRENT Trait system…but I’ll survive).

One thing people are seeming to forget is the specialization traitline is coming out, adding a new set of traits. With 6 lines, there are 18 possible combinations, but that doesnt include the 9 traits per line. How it is now, many traits are used just to get to the Grandmaster despite being worthless. With this new system, most (NOTE: most), lines have a trait in each tier to cover what you want. If a line doesn’t, you don’t use that line.

Also, with each new specialization added as the game ages, it will have MORE combinations. We should go into this with an open mind, I for one, as a necro player, am excited for whats to come.

I’m bummed about a few of the changes (and I’ve said as such in a few threads), especially with ele, but it happens. Happened a lot in GW1, so you’d think I’d be used to it. I’m hoping they might change a bit more before the final stages (like mes greatword as a grandmater…ugh, please no), but yes I’m not going to start screeching bloody murder until the “final” (loose term, since it could always be retuned) versions go live, and I can actually play with them.

I do look forward to playing with the new options though. Already building some options out on paper to try.

Warcry.1596:

One thing people are seeming to forget is the specialization traitline is coming out, adding a new set of traits. With 6 lines, there are 18 possible combinations, but that doesnt include the 9 traits per line. How it is now, many traits are used just to get to the Grandmaster despite being worthless. With this new system, most (NOTE: most), lines have a trait in each tier to cover what you want. If a line doesn’t, you don’t use that line.

Also, with each new specialization added as the game ages, it will have MORE combinations. We should go into this with an open mind, I for one, as a necro player, am excited for whats to come.

each spec will add 270 posibilities.
right now its 270

however that is expansion material, sooooo …..

as far as the ones after that, that is a long ways off, heck it may never happen.
like that 2 handed great axe they wanted to do way back when.

It depends what people are complaining about.

What really matters, in a multi-player game, is that all the classes, specs, traitlines, individual traits, skills, utilities and weapon type choices are as fair and equal as it is humanly possible to make them.

The last thing you want is for any one of those things to be viewed the “meta” (or as virtually useless), as that is not real choice.

So, if people are complaining that a certain class, or spec, or traitline, or trait, looks as though it will be OP, or virtually useless, compared with the other equivalent choices, then that is a very good thing.

If, however, they are just insisting that people should be allowed to make sub-par choices and/or that their OP choice should continue to exist as the optimum (so they can continue to have an unfair advantage over everyone else), then those complaints are obviously not fair, or valid and should, therefore, be ignored.

New is the internet rage cycle’s fuel.

You can get people to debate you over just a few words. When a game is updating… oh boy look at all the words to argue about! It’s predictably a feeding frenzy for commenters.

That said, people aren’t going to like some changes, and they’ll like others… that’s life… but it’s too early to get the picture yet.

Purple Miku.7032:

This thread is so naive.

They showed us the traits so we obviously know whether or not our builds can/cannot work after it goes live unless they drastically change things. This patch also greatly hinders build diversity because it forces you to use only 3 traitlines, as opposed to putting the exact amount of points you want in whatever lines you wish for.

So you are wrong.

Also they specifically said to post on the forums and reddit about our feedback and to let them know if their changes killed off any of the builds we play with, so you are encouraging people to do the complete opposite? Seriously?

This.

I’m also of the camp that says ‘Wait and see,’ but this isn’t our first time at the rodeo. We seen this before with other MMO and know what it does to the game overall . . . given the information released.

Plus, if they’re asking for our initial impressions or feedback, it makes this thread moot.

Just something to consider.

Jkar.5329:

Personally, my complaints are not based on the traits themselves, as a lot of the previous ones have been merged and new ones have been added, and I don’t mind having only 3 traits per tier either, if they are meaningful.
What I’m REALLY mad about is how they plan to cut out SO MANY options for character customization with the new system.

Example: if they would just reduce the number of traits to 3 per tier in the current system, the possible combinations for each specialization would be 105.
JUST by locking the tier of traits (can only choose 1 adept/1 master/1 grandmaster) the combinations fall down to 18 for each specialization.

From 105 to 18 options.
For each specialization.
And without counting all the choices that will get cut off by the new limit of 3 active specializations (down from the current 5).

Seems a pretty legit reason to complain to me.

I get what you’re saying, but if they’re not able to properly balance a large number of options/combinations of options, then surely it would be better to have fewer, more balanced, ones?

Remember, they not only have to try to balance these options/combinations with each other, but also with all the other options/combinations the other specs and classes have.

I mean, how many possible combinations is that? A lot…

I haven’t watched the video of them discussing it and I am certainly no expert in how all this works (far from it), but I am slightly concerned (from what other people have said) that people will, basically, be forced to use certain weapon types to get the full use out of any traitline.

I hate that idea.

I don’t think you should have to choose a traitline based on your weapon choice (or vice/versa).

I think all weapon choices should, ideally, be equally valid in all traitlines.

I may have misunderstood what people were saying (or they may have misunderstood, I guess), but still.

The problem is that it is clear that some people view the main skill, in a game like this, as being in the choices you make before you even actually start (physically) playing.

So, of course, some of these type of people will try to cling-on to the advantages they have from the existing imbalances, even though other people can just look up the metas and copy, if they want to, anyway.

Offering feedback on upcoming changes (or “complaining” if said feedback is negative) is something that the community has done with so many updates before now.

Complaining purely for the sake of complaining, certainly is not useful, but pointing out particular flaws or concerns based on the information available potentially allows issues to be resolved before they are live. The idea of waiting and seeing how it turns out is naive. The concerns being raised beforehand is part of the way we as players can try to make sure that when a change is implemented, it is without the concerns we raise. If we don’t raise concerns, can we be sure Anet will know of them first?

If Anet listen to the feedback and make any adjustments, or give certain assurances, then the feedback, both positive and negative helps to make the system better.

Of course, this isn’t everyone’s first walk down this particular path, and it hasn’t always been paved well. So many time players have given feedback on an upcoming feature, been told by other players that there is nothing to worry about and then by the time it becomes live, those concerns became a reality. To take one example in my mind, I remember in the run up to Megaserver implementation a lot of the RP community were talking about how this might adversely affect the EU and NA communities, with it becoming more difficult to co-ordinate larger events, a general dilution of the RP community, and because they would be mixed into world communities not used to RPers, perhaps a greater potential to being harrassed. As it turns out, despite certain players assurances, the RP community did indeed take a great hit from it. It adapted, changed, and carried on, but it became evident that a game where you struggle to maintain such a community is one that is at best unwelcoming.

The point is many of the issues were anticipated by the players. Indeed, with the majority of issues I’ve seen players having had over the years with updates, the majority I would suggest had some level of anticipation from reading details of updates.

Players can see the faults and concerns from a gameplay perspective, and it is right that they do so. it’s much better to fix those issues before implementation than to wait until its live and it damages developer-community trust. The change to the gem/gold conversion systema nd interface is an example there. it was foisted upon the players without prior announcement, and caused so much fury it caught the attention of gaming sites. If knowledge of it was prior to release, so much of the feedback could have been given without the anger and perhaps a change could have been made. A change was made to commander tag change before it went live – having all colours bought at same time instead of individually for full price each. It was a much happier addition in light of the change prior to release.

When players point out concerns and flaws, and Anet respond well to them, then everything seems to work much better and everyone seems happier. And thats why negative feedback should be given, even before the release of an update. Better to receive it before and make good changes before release. its smoother, and shows Anet really do listen.

Why complain about incoming changes? I thought, the answer was obvious – so the bad parts of those changes get fixed.
And yes, there are bad parts, and we don’t need to see them live to realize this.

UnitedChaos.8364:

tl;dr Calm down. You are not an ‘expert’. Until the changes are live, we just don’t know what will come to fruition.

So what you’re saying is that people are not “experts”, so we don’t know what is going to happen… However, you:

UnitedChaos.8364:

From my point of view, every single class has been improved.

…Think you know enough to say what is going to happen.

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

Tigaseye.2047:

I get what you’re saying, but if they’re not able to properly balance a large number of options/combinations of options, then surely it would be better to have fewer, more balanced, ones?

Remember, they not only have to try to balance these options/combinations with each other, but also with all the other options/combinations the other specs and classes have.

I mean, how many possible combinations is that? A lot…

I haven’t watched the video of them discussing it and I am certainly no expert in how all this works (far from it), but I am slightly concerned (from what other people have said) that people will, basically, be forced to use certain weapon types to get the full use out of any traitline.

I hate that idea.

I don’t think you should have to choose a traitline based on your weapon choice (or vice/versa).

I think all weapon choices should, ideally, be equally valid in all traitlines.

I may have misunderstood what people were saying (or they may have misunderstood, I guess), but still.

The problem is that it is clear that some people view the main skill, in a game like this, as being in the choices you make before you even actually start (physically) playing.

So, of course, some of these type of people will try to cling-on to the advantages they have from the existing imbalances, even though other people can just look up the metas and copy, if they want to, anyway.

To be perfectly honest, that isn’t even the way it is NOW. Your weapon choice is pretty much inexorably tied to the traits you choose for that weapon, if for no reason that your weapon choice is inexorably tied to the skills you have available to you.

For example, as a Ranger, if you have a longbow, there’s little point going down the Wilderness Survival line (there’s pretty much nothing you’d do with that weapon that would get any benefit from increased condition damage). You’d go further into Nature Magic as a Greatsword user than if you were sword/offhand. You’d be less inclined to use Skirmishing with a Warhorn than an Axe or Shortbow.

You’re kinda worrying about the game drifting away from a system that really doesn’t exist as it is.

Tigaseye.2047:

I get what you’re saying, but if they’re not able to properly balance a large number of options/combinations of options, then surely it would be better to have fewer, more balanced, ones?

Except that this change brings a few of the more powerful builds into line with not-so-powerful ones, but still leaves a ton of other builds in the dust and still nearly useless in comparison? And better yet, a ton of them have just been removed instead of being balanced. Might as well just have one build per class, it’d be easier to balance, after all.