Guild Wars 2

Something I never understood at all: why is it that when you enter combat, your running speed is reduced by like 50% (or whatever the actual reduction is)? What is the purpose of slowing down a player’s movement in combat? Combat mechanics already have things like cripple and chill for movement impeding purposes, why further reduce it passively? It just seems like a very unnecessary and awkward game mechanic to me.

Would someone please explain the logic behind this? It just doesn’t make sense to me. Please note I’m not asking for it’s removal or anything (I don’t want this thread to become a Q_Q storm from the PvP community or whatever, and I know ArenaNet would never make such complicated change), I’m just hoping to understand why this feature exists at all.

Zera Allimatti.2541:

Something I never understood at all: why is it that when you enter combat, your running speed is reduced by like 50% (or whatever the actual reduction is)? What is the purpose of slowing down a player’s movement in combat? Combat mechanics already have things like cripple and chill for movement impeding purposes, why further reduce it passively? It just seems like a very unnecessary and awkward game mechanic to me.

Would someone please explain the logic behind this? It just doesn’t make sense to me. Please note I’m not asking for it’s removal or anything (I don’t want this thread to become a Q_Q storm from the PvP community or whatever, and I know ArenaNet would never make such complicated change), I’m just hoping to understand why this feature exists at all.

Well, I guess the glass half full way to look at it is that they give characters a speed boost when ooc to make travel less tedious.

Historically speaking in MMOs, things like this have been to dissuade players from just running past (effectively skipping) content. WoW had the (much-hated) “daze” mechanic to fulfill a similar end. Basically, if you don’t take the time to avoid aggro, the game penalises you and says “Fight!”

Dissuade players from skipping content… yeah people will do that no matter what, combat run be kitten ed. That’s like hoping to end gun violence by making it illegal to own a firearm: you only negatively impact the law abiding citizen. The criminals will still get guns (just like people still get drugs even though they are illegal).

If this is the only reason to have this feature, then maybe it SHOULD be removed.

Honestly? I think the reason it’s in is because:

• It’s a thing in other MMO’s.
• There is a constant struggle in all MMO’s between some players — who want to accomplish their goals as fast as possible — and the developer, who wants players to spend more time in the game.
• Speed reduction in combat limits a player’s ability to kite. I said limits, not removes. Mobs by and large only attack when stationary. If I could move at OoC speed in combat, I’d never be hit by a melee mob and could make most projectiles miss without using dodge.

See, that makes more sense; AI limitations.