Guild Wars 2

Two costumes in Costume Brawl have stuck out to me as being exceptionally powerful, so powerful that my desire to play CB dries up immediately upon seeing anyone using them. These are the Mad King’s outfit and Boxing Gloves. The reason I can’t stand playing against these is because it is next to impossible to do anything to these players due to the skills they possess.

The Mad King’s Outfit gives a player a toy which has two skills in particular on it that cause trouble. One skill deals one point of damage and inflicts fear upon all other players near the user. The other skill dazes and deals a point of damage each second to nearby players for a few seconds. These skills on their own are probably not that lethal. However, my experience is that the cooldowns of these skills are so low that they can be chained together with little downtime. The result is that anybody close enough to the user will be prevented from doing anything. Other players will spend most of their time either being dazed or having fear, both cases not allowing the player to use skills. Fighting this costume at close range is near impossible. Fighting at range is not much easier either, because few (if any) costumes have good ranged attacks. If the Mad King player closes the gap between themselves and the ranged user, they chain their fear and daze skills and shut down the ranged user completely again. While not having a totally impenetrable defense, this costume offers a great deal of control and combines it with a lot of damage as well.

The Boxing Gloves take a slightly different approach of being impossible to defeat. Instead of controlling other players with fear and daze, the Boxing Gloves offer skills that allow the player to permanently maintain Brawler Protection. With this buff, others players are unable to do any damage to a player with that buff. Boxing Gloves allow this buff to be on the user all the time. While this buff is in place, the boxer can still use skills to damage other players, such as their knockdown ability or their rapid punches. Their protection skill alone makes them impossible to defeat, but having these great damage skills on top of it all makes every boxer a complete bully to every other brawler around them.

While Costume Brawl is likely intended to just be a casual and fun format, that doesn’t mean it should be devoid of balance. I can not imagine that there are many players in the game who would appreciate playing CB or find it fun if they understood just how much stronger these two costumes are than anything else in the game. For me, I can say that there is nothing fun about playing CB when I face these players against whom I can do nothing. Each of these costumes need to be toned down so that they at least offer some window of opportunity for players to attack them.

The daze and fear skills on the Mad King’s scepter need to have their recharges increased by about two to five seconds each. The daze skill in particular should be toned down in an additional way, such as only dealing daze on the initial hit.

The Boxing Gloves should not be able to maintain Brawler Protection indefinitely. Good ratios of protection to recharge would be anywhere between 1:2 and 1:3. Alternatively, use of this skill could daze the user for as long as the protection lasts, effectively preventing the user from both blocking all damage and dealing some damage at the same time.

In the future, I would hope that new costumes and toys do not offer the same levels of control, protection, and damage as demonstrated by these two costumes.

Shayne Hawke.9160:

Two costumes in Costume Brawl have stuck out to me as being exceptionally powerful, so powerful that my desire to play CB dries up immediately upon seeing anyone using them. These are the Mad King’s outfit and Boxing Gloves. The reason I can’t stand playing against these is because it is next to impossible to do anything to these players due to the skills they possess.

The Mad King’s Outfit gives a player a toy which has two skills in particular on it that cause trouble. One skill deals one point of damage and inflicts fear upon all other players near the user. The other skill dazes and deals a point of damage each second to nearby players for a few seconds. These skills on their own are probably not that lethal. However, my experience is that the cooldowns of these skills are so low that they can be chained together with little downtime. The result is that anybody close enough to the user will be prevented from doing anything. Other players will spend most of their time either being dazed or having fear, both cases not allowing the player to use skills. Fighting this costume at close range is near impossible. Fighting at range is not much easier either, because few (if any) costumes have good ranged attacks. If the Mad King player closes the gap between themselves and the ranged user, they chain their fear and daze skills and shut down the ranged user completely again. While not having a totally impenetrable defense, this costume offers a great deal of control and combines it with a lot of damage as well.

The Boxing Gloves take a slightly different approach of being impossible to defeat. Instead of controlling other players with fear and daze, the Boxing Gloves offer skills that allow the player to permanently maintain Brawler Protection. With this buff, others players are unable to do any damage to a player with that buff. Boxing Gloves allow this buff to be on the user all the time. While this buff is in place, the boxer can still use skills to damage other players, such as their knockdown ability or their rapid punches. Their protection skill alone makes them impossible to defeat, but having these great damage skills on top of it all makes every boxer a complete bully to every other brawler around them.

While Costume Brawl is likely intended to just be a casual and fun format, that doesn’t mean it should be devoid of balance. I can not imagine that there are many players in the game who would appreciate playing CB or find it fun if they understood just how much stronger these two costumes are than anything else in the game. For me, I can say that there is nothing fun about playing CB when I face these players against whom I can do nothing. Each of these costumes need to be toned down so that they at least offer some window of opportunity for players to attack them.

The daze and fear skills on the Mad King’s scepter need to have their recharges increased by about two to five seconds each. The daze skill in particular should be toned down in an additional way, such as only dealing daze on the initial hit.

The Boxing Gloves should not be able to maintain Brawler Protection indefinitely. Good ratios of protection to recharge would be anywhere between 1:2 and 1:3. Alternatively, use of this skill could daze the user for as long as the protection lasts, effectively preventing the user from both blocking all damage and dealing some damage at the same time.

In the future, I would hope that new costumes and toys do not offer the same levels of control, protection, and damage as demonstrated by these two costumes.

Yeah! disable the Mad Kings only attacks for 4 seconds! so he can be useless! and Screw boxing gloves! I suck at every costume I use so screw those other people!

Meanwhile most of the people I see with the champion crown above their heads are skeletons and zombies.

I think he’s absolutely right though, those two costume could definitely use some balancing. It would be better if you actually addressed his points.

I have defeated people in Mad King costumes, but if they know what they are doing it is really hard. Without a doubt it is unbalanced. And on top of that, the fear skill tends to fear people into the water, taking away their costume form. This just makes the brawl very frustrating.

And yes, it is quite possible for other forms to earn a crown. I have seen people in pig-form with a crown. Anyone can get a 25 victory streak. But that does not take away from a clear unbalance between the costumes.

“And on top of that, the fear skill tends to fear people into the water, taking away their costume form. "

I view this as total victory.

The broom is the worst though. Dropping down from invulnerability to deliver an invulnerable attack and then getting right back on the broom. Super cheese.

I’ve been playing a ton of costume brawl lately and I haven’t experienced many problems from the costumes paid for versus the costumes you earn from the cauldron. The mummy/zombie in particular is really easy to control and can take people on with ease. You just need to learn how to play other costumes.

If you really don’t want to learn and want an easy ‘I win’ button then go farm the gold and buy the costume.

Yep the fear is so annoying I don’t feel like playing when there is a Mad King spamming that skill. There is no other brawl skill as far as I know that does that much of an annoying effect on such a large group of players. Way too overpowered.

It’s costume brawl.. it’s a misc mini-event that give you achievments. Why do you have such a problem?

Yeah, I learned quickly that the Brawl was a waste of time. My tonics getting wasted almost instantly by the water/fear problem, getting chain-feared/knocked down/etc., 90% of the forms getting completely destroyed by 3-4 uber forms. Completely unfun, which I think is this year’s Halloween theme — Unfun.

Oh I wouldn’t go that far. On the whole this Halloween event is very entertaining. But the Brawl could use some balancing.

Its true, I tried to go toe to toe with the madking costume and he basically kitted me to death, cause of his skills I was in a pretty much constant daze, and if things got really heated for him he would just disappear? But usually I see them run into large groups and chain those two daze+fear skills together, can’t attack back during this time and when I finally get out of it he’s usually a good piece away from me or Im dead :/

I see so many people just standing there and taking the full brunt of the jokes. You can move while dazed you know.

Awesome.6120:

“And on top of that, the fear skill tends to fear people into the water, taking away their costume form. "

I view this as total victory.

The broom is the worst though. Dropping down from invulnerability to deliver an invulnerable attack and then getting right back on the broom. Super cheese.

I assume you have a Mad King outfit and spam fear often. There is no other skill that affects so many other players in such a negative way. Being feared into the water, what fun is that? I guess if being OPd and bullying a large group of players is fun then I guess so.

The brawl needs balancing and additional perks. I’m already starting to see fewer people want to brawl at this early stage. I would be ok with the fear if it was a little shorter and it didn’t force people out of the area into water which removes town clothes.

I do have a mad king costume but I also play with others. I have been feared into the water more than once. It’s usually pretty funny.

Awesome.6120:

I do have a mad king costume but I also play with others. I have been feared into the water more than once. It’s usually pretty funny.

Yeah it is funny the first couple of times, then you don’t bother anymore and leave.

The event is supposed to be fun. Losing your town clothes and having to find your way back to the area is not the same as being knocked down, which is pretty much all the others can do.

One more thing, I don’t mind so much if the player is doing it occassionally while actively participating. However, this fear mechanic is being abused. I was at LA where there was a Mad King standing in one spot (near the water) not moving just spamming the fear. It was obvious he didn’t care for any achievements, just to see people fall in the water repeatedly.

He might even have been AFK with a macro running since he was there not moving for a long time.

I fear people into the water by the forge, i mean why shouldn’t i? i get knocked down feared into the water my self, i would much rather have a knock down ability than the pumpkin throw and joke skill. There are a ton of transforms that will also need to be balanced if they are to change the mad king outfit due to people complaining.

I don’t agree. Knock downs are very easy to dodge and usually affect only one player.

Fear is an AOE that is as far as I know impossible to dodge. Like I said, the fear would not be so bad if it didn’t knock you out of the fighting area and make you lose your town clothes. As far as I know all brawl transforms only have 2 attack skills.

When i first mentioned knocked down I actually meant KO. Which is simply when the player has lost all his/her lives.

The annoying thing about this event is if your costume wears off you cannot then use the cauldron to get a new costume to leave the CB. You’re constantly feared before you can use it because of some hotshots spamming fear. I had a tough time trying to get a new costume to leave the CB, and when I gave up and decided to use the large cauldron instead some guy followed me and was constantly spamming hits on me, making it impossible for me to see where I was going and missing the platforms. Having your costume removed should make you evade or be invulnerable to their attacks.

@geekgirl
I wouldn’t say “hotshot” unless you are meaning it in a mjorly sarcastic way. I would say bully spamming fear.

But yeah, minor details like you mentioned take the event from amazingly fun to unpleasant for many players when it is supposed to be a blast for all.

Witch costume isn’t really all that. Yeah you can be immune on broom but that’s the best you got. The puddle has a delay at the beginning that makes you vulnerable to dmg/interuption, then you’re stationary and after the block/dmg part stops you’re still stuck sitting there, vulnerable, for like 2-3 seconds, not able to do a kitten thing.

Also Thieves can abuse the hell out of their swiftness on dodge trait so they can’t be outran.

Knote.2904:

Witch costume isn’t really all that. Yeah you can be immune on broom but that’s the best you got. The puddle has a delay at the beginning that makes you vulnerable to dmg/interuption, then you’re stationary and after the block/dmg part stops you’re still stuck sitting there, vulnerable, for like 2-3 seconds, not able to do a kitten thing.

I ran into someone last night who sat on a broom, swapped to mad king sceptor for joke/fear and then immediate hopped back on the broom. Constantly. I mean, if that’s fun for someone then cool I guess but it was pretty cheesy to fight against. They also had boxing gloves on but I haven’t used those so I’m not sure what they were doing.

Knote.2904:

Witch costume isn’t really all that. Yeah you can be immune on broom but that’s the best you got. The puddle has a delay at the beginning that makes you vulnerable to dmg/interuption, then you’re stationary and after the block/dmg part stops you’re still stuck sitting there, vulnerable, for like 2-3 seconds, not able to do a kitten thing.

Also Thieves can abuse the hell out of their swiftness on dodge trait so they can’t be outran.

yeah I have the Witch and the number of times I get interrupted rolleyes

The Mad King fear is what takes the fun out of the brawl. Getting knocked into the water 10+ times by a spammer who just stands there. What is the point?

At the very least put some kind of barrier that prevents the fear from knocking you out of the brawl area.

NinjaKnight.1340:

The Mad King fear is what takes the fun out of the brawl. Getting knocked into the water 10+ times by a spammer who just stands there. What is the point?

If someone is standing in one place spamming fear and you keep running into him whose fault is it?

Awesome.6120:

NinjaKnight.1340:

The Mad King fear is what takes the fun out of the brawl. Getting knocked into the water 10+ times by a spammer who just stands there. What is the point?

If someone is standing in one place spamming fear and you keep running into him whose fault is it?

if you haven’t noticed there are a few areas where the Mad king can stand and fear people into the water and make things unpleasant for others too. Also, unless you are a hard core PvP player you run around just having a blast until all of a sudden you end up in the water.

Anyways as you mentioned with the guy who switched between Broom, Mad king and Boxing Gloves, some bullies have taken this griefing to a whole new level.

The difference is I’m not calling them a bully or a griefer. Just someone who is putting more effort than me into brawling. If they want to sit there with their hero panel open and swapping weapons constantly then more power to them.

Awesome.6120:

The difference is I’m not calling them a bully or a griefer. Just someone who is putting more effort than me into brawling. If they want to sit there with their hero panel open and swapping weapons constantly then more power to them.

Well those people have reduced the fun factor for me. I have mostly avoided them but I see in general a decrease in interest in people wanting to brawl when i summon a Cauldron. Once things become unfun, people stop doing it. There aren’t any rewards of note other than the fun factor.