Guild Wars 2

With the introduction of Raids & the talk of the importance of Roles I started to think back to attributes & how they interacted with players builds. As well as the overall boon, condition & control system that enables the differing gameplay styles within GW2 which has lead to my redesign below.

tldr:

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

I think it might be more useful just to stick with the overall critique and suggestion:

• Offensive stats scale benefits quickly and are easy to stack. Thus direct damage is easy to buff.
• Non-offensive stats don’t scale benefits as easily and are harder to stack. Thus control & support is more difficult to buff.
• ANet should change that balance, for both stats and challenges (i.e. events, raids/instanced-combat, etc).

Redesign of the Attribute, Boon, Condition & Control systems to differentiate power levels of skills & effects for players that specialise towards a gameplay style (Offensive, Defensive, Supportive or Controlling) from the base default skills available to all gameplay styles.

Strengthen roles & empowering through attributes defensive, supportive & controlling styles to a similar level that attributes enhance offensive styles but still allowing offensive groups similar defensive, supportive & controlling power levels through skilled team play

Offensive, Defensive, Supportive, Controlling & Attributes
One area I feel GW2 doesn’t preform very well in is with regards to attributes & build customisation, enhancement. The reason I say this is because specing defensive, supportive or controlling through attributes doesn’t have the same improvement (level of power increase) to your builds that specing offensively provides. And what I believe this comes down to is that defensive, supportive & controlling aspects of skills & effects can not be improved or enhanced by attributes unlike offensive (damage).

Ironically the only supportive aspect that does scale & have improvement through attributes is Healing. So bar equipping more application options for defensive, supportive & controlling builds the power level of your defensive, supportive & controlling skills is the same as offensively speced players. I ask:

Why should attributes improve offensive builds power levels & strengths but not defensive, supportive or controlling builds?

Notes:

1. Added Illconceived Was Na clearer bullet points to tldr.
2. Removed Controlive & replaced with Controlling thanks Orpheal

The Redesign
One way I see is a redesign, adjustment to attributes, boons, conditions & controls is by linking boons, conditions & controls power level back to attributes. The way I see it is that there are four different styles of gameplay:

• Offensive – It’s all about those big damaging numbers.
• Defensive – Hit me I dare you, but can you take the consequences.
• Supportive – You just like to help everybody.
• Controlling – I’m the puppet master you dance to my tune.

In this way I see attributes as the mathematical enhancement for skills & effects power level’s to differentiate the base default skills & effects that all play style have access to. Offensive strongest Direct & Condition DPS from skills & effects, Defensive strongest Defensive & Counter Attacking skills & effects, Supportive strongest Healing & Boons and Controlling strongest Non Damaging Conditions & Control skills & effects.

New Attributes:

• Power - Increases direct (white) damage inflicted by the character.
• Malice - Increases condition damage inflicted by the character (Rename condition damage).
• Precision - Increases critical hit chance.
• Ferocity - Improves boon / condition duration multiplier or damage multiplier on critical strikes (Adjusted to include boon & condition duration critical gameplay).
• Compassion - Increases healing & boon skills & effects (Replaces healing power & now also effects boon strength).
• Cunning - Increases controls & non damaging condition skills & effects (New attribute that effects control strength & non damaging condition strength).
• Toughness - Increases defensive & counter attacking skills & effects as well as decreasing the amount of incoming direct (white) damage suffered (Now also effects defensive & counter attacking skills strengths).
• Vitality - Increases maximum health.

So how does this play out with equipment stat combinations? And the way I see it, is it’s best to look at the extremes. The styles offensive, defensive, supportive or controlling Glass Cannon’s as such:

Off/Sup/Con – Glass Cannon Stats.

• Power or Malice (Offensive) or Compassion (Supportive) or Cunning (Controlling)
• Precision
• Ferocity

Defensive – Glass Cannon Stats

• Toughness
• Vitality
• Compassion or Cunning

Note: Here glass cannon refer to 100% enhancement through attributes a play styles skills & effects to their maximum power level.

Offensive, Defensive Skill Classifications
Another aspect to note with this design change is the reclassification of skills & skill components. First of all with regard to skill damage all skills will either be classified Offensive or Defensive. What this means is for offensive skill their damage is improved by either Power or Malice & Defensive skill’s damage is improved by Toughness.

The objective here is to provide defensive builds a way to output some threatening damage through counter attacking skills (eg. you must be attacked / hit before you can counter attack). The way I see it is offensive builds are about burst, hit & run damaging gameplay & defensive builds are about sustain, stay and fight damaging gameplay. Objectively in a short fight offensive builds should win but a longer fight were an offensive build can’t break away & are constantly receiving damage the defensive build should win.

Another benefit of Toughness is that it also improves you defensive skills (eg. longer block, reflect duration or larger number of hits blocked, reflected). So a defensive shield warrior has a more powerful Shield Stance then other warriors, a defensive focus guardian blocks more attacks before Shield of Wrath is destroyed & causes more punishment damage if not destroyed then other guardians.

Critical Durations – Boon & Condition Critical Gameplay
One main change is the removal of boon & condition duration as attributes. Fixing all boons & conditions to either a base applied duration or duration improved by stacks. This provided a great opportunity to incorporate Critical Hits into boon & condition gameplay through Critical Durations.

Applied Duration = Base Duration x Ferocity’s Multiplier
Applied Duration Stacks = Duration Stacks x Ferocity’s Multiplier

Note: Duration stack results are rounded down to the closest whole stack.

Singular boons & conditions durations can still be enhanced through runes, sigils & traits but no longer through attributes & I would look at removing it from food & utility buffs but overall focusing on using Critical Durations as the method to increase durations in gamplay.

Supportive & Stackable Boons
One of the large adjustments with the rework to attributes is changing Healing Power to Compassion & allowing it to not only increase healing but also improve the strength of boons, so:

• Compassion has the same effect to Healing as Healing Power.
• For boons Compassion increases the number of applied stacks of a skill (A stack either increases skill effect or increases applied duration).

This way a supportive player provides stronger base boons & healing then non supportive players. There is 3 objectives here with this redesign:

1. Allow specing supportive with attributes to increase the power of your supportive abilities beyond the base level just like how specing offensively increases your damage beyond the base level.
2. Enhance multiply sources of boons & group play making it more rewarding instead of a liability.
3. Allow purely offensive speced groups through team work & multiply sources of boons to achieve similar supportive power levels although at a higher skill level.

Through traits professions can be designed to specialise in certain boons. Giving reasons for taking one profession’s supportive build over another’s.

Boon changes:

• Aegis (3 max stacks) – Aegis blocks 1 attack per stack (base duration 5 sec).
• Fury (3 max stacks) – +10% Crit Chance per stack (base duration 10 sec).
• Might (25 max stacks) – +30 power & condition damage per stack (base duration 10 sec).
• Protection (max stacks limit) – 33% incoming damage reduction (stack duration 3 sec).
• Quickness (3 max stacks) – Skills & actions are 20% faster per stack (base duration 5 sec).
• Regeneration (max stacks limit) – Regenerate heal per second. Healing scales with Supportive Power (stack duration 3 sec).
• Resistance (3 max stacks) – immune to non damaging condition effect & 33% incoming condition damage reduction per stack (base duration 3 sec).
• Retaliation (max stacks limit) – Deals damage back to attacking foe per each hit or blocked hit. Damage scales with Toughness (stack duration 3 sec).
• Stability (25 max stacks) – Stability blocks 1 control effect per stack (base duration 10 sec).
• Swiftness (max stack limit) – +33% movement speed increase (stack duration 3 sec).
• Vigor (max stack limit) – +50% endurance regeneration (stack duration 3 sec).

Controlling & Stackable Non Damaging Conditions
Another major change with the attribute rework is the introduction of Cunning. An attribute that preforms a similar function to Compassion but for control skills & effects and non damaging conditions.

• Increases in Malice improved base damaging condition’s damage per stack.
• With regards to non damaging conditions Cunning increases the number of applied stacks of a skill (A stack either increases skill effect or increases applied duration).
• Increases in Cunning increases applied control effect of a skill (Either increases control effect or increases control’s duration).

This way a controlling player provides stronger base non damage conditions & controls then non controlling players. Again the same 3 objectives:

1. Allow specing controlling with attributes to increase the power of your controlling abilities beyond the base level just like how specing offensively increases your damage beyond the base level.
2. Enhance multiply sources of non damaging conditions & group play making it more rewarding instead of a liability.
3. Allow purely offensive speced groups through team work & multiply sources of non damaging conditions to achieve similar controlling power levels although at a higher skill level.

Note: Control skills & effects already work well in group play & should have increase benefits in group play with breakbars.

Damaging Condition changes:

• Bleeding (max stacks limit) – Deals damage per second per 1 stack (base duration 10 sec). Designed around sustained condition damage average single stack damage with high number of stacks & high up time.
• Burning (max stacks limit) – Deals damage per second per 1 stack (base duration 3 sec). Designed around burst condition damage high single stack damage, very low number of stacks with very low up time.
• Confusion (max stacks limit) – Deals damage per second per 1 stack & deals damage per 1 stack on skill use (base duration 5 sec). Designed around low single stack damage, average number of stacks with high damaging punishment for skill use.
• Poison (max stacks limit) – Deals damage per second per 1 stack & reduces outgoing heals by 33% (dase duration 5 sec). Designed around average single stack damage, low number of stacks with weakening outgoing heals (doesn’t effect heals received from external sources).
• Torment (max stacks limit) – Deals damage per second per 1 stack & deals extra damage per second per 1 stack to moving foes (base duration 5 sec). Designed around low single stack damage, average number of stacks with high damaging punishment for moving.

Non Damaging Condition changes:

• Blind (3 max stacks) – Causes targets next hit to miss, 1 per stack (base duration 5 sec).
• Chill (3 max stack) – 22% movement speed reduction & 22% slower skill recharge per stack (base duration 5 sec).
• Cripple (max stacks limit) – Movement speed decreased by 50% (stack duration 3 sec).
• Immobilise (9 max stacks) – Immobilise & prevents dodge (stack duration 0.5 sec).
• Slow (3 max stacks) Skills & actions are slower by 20% per stack (base duration 5 sec).
• Vulnerable (25 max stacks) – Increase incoming damage & condition damage by 1% per stack (base duration 10 sec).
• Weakness (3 max stacks) – 50% of any attack are glancing (20% outgoing damage reduction per stack) & endurance regeneration is reduced by 20% per stack (base duration 5 sec).

Control changes:

• Daze (2 sec max)- Interrupts and prevents the target from using skills for a period of time. Daze duration increased by Cunning.
• Fear (3 sec max) – Causes an enemy to be interrupted and run directly away from the player for a short period of time. Fear duration increased by Cunning. Fear change to be a control effect only no longer removed by condition cleanses. Necromancer’s Terror changes fear to also be a condition causing damage which can now also be removed by condition cleanses (condition) & stun breaks (control).
• Float (3 sec max)- Forces the affected target(s) to rise up into the air if on land or move towards the surface if underwater. Float duration increased by Cunning. While on land travels upwards 200 distance each second. Designed around adding spike damage to controlling builds through fall damage (max fall damage 15%, range 600).
• Knockback (1 sec max) – Interrupts affected targets, briefly disables them, and moves them away from the effect’s source (doesn’t moves downed foes). Knockback duration increased by Cunning.
• Knockdown (3 sec max)- Interrupts and causes the foe to be unable to move or use skills for a short duration. Knocked down foes fall to the ground if on land or sink downwards if underwater. Knock downed duration increased by Cunning. While underwater travels 200 distance each second.
• Launch – Interrupts foe’s action & causes the affected target to be thrown backwards into air and remain stuck on the ground (moves downed foes). Launch distance increased by Cunning (stuck on ground duration 0.25 sec).
• Pull – Shortens the distance between the user and the foe by drawing one of them to another. If a foe is pulled, this can result in an interrupt. Pull distance increased by Cunning.
• Sink – Removed & replaced by modified knockdown.
• Stun (3 sec max) – Disables all skills and interrupts any current action. Stunned characters cannot move or activate skills. Stun duration increased by Cunning.
• Taunt (3 sec max) – Forces the affected target to run towards the source of taunt with all skills except stun breakers disabled while using their auto-attack skill. Taunt duration increased by Cunning.

Note: Control max seconds are per a single skill.

They will never redesign their game from the ground up. I applaud your attention to detail, but don’t look too deep into ‘roles’. 90% of the time it will be stacking might and burning something down. Roles will be runners who give swiftness and/or stealth, stripping defiance off a boss, or cleansing condis. Things that are somewhat helpful or situational now, but will become a must in the raids.

I think it might be more useful just to stick with the overall critique and suggestion:

• Offensive stats scale benefits quickly and are easy to stack. Thus direct damage is easy to buff.
• Non-offensive stats don’t scale benefits as easily and are harder to stack. Thus control & support is more difficult to buff.
• ANet should change that balance, for both stats and challenges (i.e. events, raids/instanced-combat, etc).

ANet is never going to redesign the system entirely and even if they were, they are going to need to determine their own set of numeric/non-numeric balances, so the details in the long post(s) are hiding the key points the OP is trying to make.

After the June Patch, GW2 is in a dire need of a Rebalancing of the Stats as like also Base Health and Class Specific Gameplay Mechanics..

Most of the Stuff is absolutely inappropiate balanced for the current Condition Setting of the Game, because all the Stats of the Game, all the Stat Calculations, all the Base Health Values of the Game and all the Effects of the Stats of this Game are STILL BALANCED around the State of the Game of 2012, where all this Condition Power Creep hasn’t existed before.

If anet wants to balance the current Game, they absolutely have to make fittign changes to the Stats, to the Calculations, the base Health Values and Class Mechanics accordign to the current Conditionas of the Game.

Why? The Answer is simple:

• The Base Health Values of the Game are currently way too low for the current Condition Powercreep of GW2
• The Stat Calculators for specific Stats are currently way too low, which is also a reason for why the Zerker Meta was so long omnipresent in GW2, because nothign else is practically viable in this game, other than DPS, now mainly only through Conditions, because DPS through Conditions is so brain dead easy and more rewarding, than playing a direct damage build, requiring absolutely no player skilsl at all, because an automatic mechanic does everythign for you and all you need to do is just to ensure, that the Conditions on your enemy don’t run out …
• Stats like Vitality, Toughness and Healing Power are way to inefficient to play any role in this game sadly, because Anet balanced the whole game only all about DPS andcared for absolutely nothign else at all.
  This is a result of the big fear, that having effective defensive Stats coult maybe lead to a return of Healers and Tanks rolleyes
• Stats need an overwork, all Stats should have Dual Effects, that makes it easier to give Stats valuable Effects and roles, that help Anet to make all Stats generally more viable.
  as long as all stats have only 1 Effect, this will always lead to Main Stats that will be used only for Min/Maxing of perfect DPS, especialy as long the defensive Stats are worhtless crap compared to the offensive ones, due to the defensive Stats havign no synergies, while the offensive ones have them -…. thats already since Game Release a huge problem of the overall Game Balance of GW2

The problem with Conditions is currently, that the Conmditions way too easily outperform right now the DPS from Direct Damage.
Where Direct Damage requires perfect play, perfect positioning,where direct damage can be mitigated via dodges, evades, blocks and is affected by the defense power of the enemy, all this doesn#t count for Conditions.
yes, Conditions can get instantly removed, but by all the spamming of conditions, especialyl in very crowded situations, all if this is absolutely void and regardles,s because you will never be able to remove all the conditions before you instantly have them back on you, practicalyl just wasting your skill for somethign, that you have immediately back on you and there helps also not really much the new boon Resistance, when that bon gets implemented then so extremely rarely into the game, that it practicalyl shows absolutely no affect agaisnt all this Condition Creep in the game.

Just 3 Classes have with very limited options currently the ability to gain by themself viably Resitance, this is ridiculous for such a condition spamfest, that is GW2!!!
Two others can gain it from turning conditions to boons, but thats not really a viable good way to get Ressistance when for example all a warriro needs to to is just usign his Healing Signet actively, to gain resistance compared to that and that for 6 seconds.
So unless remvoed 6 seconds immunity to all conditions.
Something that most other classes just can dream of!!1 When paired with a Herald in the future, even much longer..

All this shows to me, that the current game balanceof this game is made around all the new Elite Specializations and with the Herald back in mind, so its absolutely clear, that the current game Balance is totally out of control, as long the E-Specs and the revenant aren’t in the game. to get this condition spamfest more under control.

PS: Controlive is no word > Controlling is

As far as roles go, when you get rid of healer and tank, all that’s left is DPS. Skyforge did this very same thing, and the raids/hard dungeons there are all about focus fire dps, not a whole lot else. Yeah theres sort of tanks but with no heals its only a DPS race, you have to kill the enemies before your tank dies.

I get people hate the trinity system, but this is the end result. Balance issues where DPS is the only way to go. I think part of this issue is they never got rid of the trinity system, they only got rid of the roles within the system. You still need to heal when hurt, you still need someone to be the focus of the enemies (or else who are they attacking when you fight them?) those things still exist in this game with or without the role of healer or tank being feasible or possible.

So basically, the game never removed the trinity system, just the roles. Therefore the result is that DPS is the only tool you really have. Pending a total change in how mmorpgs work, all healer and tank do within the game is add dungeon/role diversity and depth, something that this game doesn’t really have when you boil it down to its basics, everyones a DPS of varying degrees, everyones able to take enemy focus to varying degrees, everyones able to do “damage mitigating heals” of varying degrees. The only sustainable and reliable aspect is DPS as such its the most important and the most influential in your build.

Condition damage might be out of control, but I think a few classes should have strong condition damage, When then only viable tool is DPS, people are going to die fast, be it by condition stacks or alpha damage…its not like you can have some healer keeping a tank up who distracts everyone (in pvp) and has a taunt forcing people to target him briefly. So its DPS and people die fast.

You would have to totally change how a mmorpg works to rid the trinity system, otherwise your just shifting role focus off healer and tank onto DPS, trinity will still exist…and it does exist in this game, only that you don’t have strong roles in the two “unfun” trinity roles.

First thanks to all who’ve taking the time to read through the massive post.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

I think it might be more useful just to stick with the overall critique and suggestion:

• Offensive stats scale benefits quickly and are easy to stack. Thus direct damage is easy to buff.
• Non-offensive stats don’t scale benefits as easily and are harder to stack. Thus control & support is more difficult to buff.
• ANet should change that balance, for both stats and challenges (i.e. events, raids/instanced-combat, etc).

Thanks Illconceived Was Na this is actually the core thoughts & critique behind the Long Winded Redesign which ran away on me. Arenanet talks about Damage, Support & Control but the current design enhances & benefits Damage more then Support & Control.

I also agree with you & DresdenAllblack that it’s very unlike that they would undertake a rework from the ground up like this, but hope some of the ideas & concepts could help them in improving their great combat system further.

This massive redesign actually started from just looking at Blocking as a survivability option & how I believe it’s becoming a weaker defensive option to dodges & evades due to the increase in availability of unblockable attacks guaranteeing damage & interrupts.

Note: Sorry forgot to mention Illconceived Was Na add your bullet points to tldr.

Orpheal I don’t believe it’s a condition power creep but a Damage Power Creep. As with the changes to stacking all damaging conditions Bleed, Burn, Confusion, Poison, Torment this has further enhanced the benefits when specing Damage as direct & condition damage are viable options now (was needed for condition group play).

The issues I see is they has been next to no improvements (Power Creep) to the pillars Support & Control as such their still basically the same as they were at release.

Control is seeing work for it Hard control component with the introduction of breakbars which should greatly improve their group play in PvE. Which was were it had problems & Support has see next to no changes. But the counter play against boons & non damaging conditions has been greatly improved.

For me the other half is:

• Building offensive I feel a great increase in my offensive powers but,
• Building defensive, supportive or controlling I feel my corresponding powers provide the same benefit bar maybe a little more application as offensive builds.

This makes playing Damage feel so much more rewarding & fun then playing Support or Control because your support & control is no stronger in base power level then what a Damage player can provide.

Again I ask:

• Why should a specialised shield warrior’s block have the same block strength as a non specialised warrior using a shield?
• Why should a necromancer that focuses on damaging condition have the same chill power level as a necromancer that focuses on non damaging conditions?
• Why should a supportive or controlling focused player provide the same support or control as a damage focused player?
• Again lastly why does Damage get to have stronger damage but Support or Control don’t get to have stronger support or control?

And this is why I agree & believe attributes & their interact with the pillars Support & Control & play styles defensive, supportive & controlling need a reassessment & adjustments as I feel they are what’s truly holding back GW2’s combat system.

StrangerDanger I’m not so sure, for me part of a Role is that you provide a stronger aspect of what that role focuses in then someone not of that role. At the moment it only feels like this applies to Damage in GW2. It’s like Arenanet didn’t want damage, healer, tank & decided on damage, support, control but were afraid of support & control:

Here have damage, there’s multiply ways to enhance & improve it but were locking support (bar healing) & control at this base level only allowing you to improve through having more access of applications.

I believe GW2 can have Roles & that a defensive, supportive & controlling player can provide stronger defence, support & control:

• Longer block duration.
• 3 stacks of Aegis apply instead of 1 stack.
• Chill at 66% (3 stacks) instead of 22% (1 stack).

The trick is designing the system in such a way that through skilled group play offensive groups without defensive, supportive & controlling players through their multiply sources can access similar if not the same defence, support & control. The goal is still to keep offensive groups at the apex of skill game play but make room for other group compositions that can achieve similar performances for the same content.

In this way I actually believe Arenanet’s boon & condition stacking system can actually achieve this goal without locking players into looking for Tank, Heals or Support, Control.

DresdenAllblack.1249:

They will never redesign their game from the ground up. I applaud your attention to detail, but don’t look too deep into ‘roles’. 90% of the time it will be stacking might and burning something down. Roles will be runners who give swiftness and/or stealth, stripping defiance off a boss, or cleansing condis. Things that are somewhat helpful or situational now, but will become a must in the raids.

True, but I think those roles are pretty limited. They could do a lot more.

I hope that they at least look into their combo system and readjust things and balance them better. Fire/Water fields and blast finishers shouldn’t be the meat of the combo system.

I disagree with making boon/condition duration affected with stats as that seems like something more tailored to traits and could get out of hand. Setting base durations for boons/conditions also doesn’t make sense because it means you can’t really set how powerful a skill is for it’s boon/conditions application. A powerful, high cooldown skill would apply a long duration of a condition, but a shorter cooldown skill shouldn’t apply as much. Should Reaper GS apply 5 seconds of chill base with the auto? No. How on Tyria are you supposed to immobilize anyone for any time with a 0.5 second duration? Even if the stats make stuff like immobilize better, it would mean it would be completely useless on builds not using those stats. Why should condition builds get extra benefits as opposed to power? And if you make the base better and reduce the scaling, why even make it affected by stats in the first place? Conditions don’t exist solely for condition builds to take advantage of. There are many different conditions that are useful outside of condition builds.

There’s also not much point to making defensive stats work as offensive stats, because that’s just giving them extra functionality over power. I think they should stay as what they are as is (something to help with surviving), they just need to be better at what they do in PvE. The main issue right now is that there’s absolutely no reason to ever take defensive stats due to the PvE content being easy. Defensive stats definitely have a purpose, as shown in PvP. People actually take defensive stats in PvP.

I have no idea what critical durations are supposed to be, so try making that more clear.

Bezagron.7352:

I believe GW2 can have Roles & that a defensive, supportive & controlling player can provide stronger defence, support & control:

• Longer block duration.
• 3 stacks of Aegis apply instead of 1 stack.
• Chill at 66% (3 stacks) instead of 22% (1 stack).

The trick is designing the system in such a way that through skilled group play offensive groups without defensive, supportive & controlling players through their multiply sources can access similar if not the same defence, support & control. The goal is still to keep offensive groups at the apex of skill game play but make room for other group compositions that can achieve similar performances for the same content.

In this way I actually believe Arenanet’s boon & condition stacking system can actually achieve this goal without locking players into looking for Tank, Heals or Support, Control.

I’m actually on a different plane of thought on this subject. It’d be difficult for me to explain, but I don’t agree that offense should be the apex of skilled gameplay. It’s just not viable to make one aspect “hardmode” and then introduce something that is relatively “easymode” right along side it. People will just find a middle ground and the game gets even easier.

To me, defensive, supportive and control type set-ups should require just as much skill to play well as glass-cannon DPS builds. The idea should be, as any of those build types you have varying skill tiers and each has a relatively high skill ceiling to accommodate skilled players.

Also, you should be able to accomplish some sort of combined effect that makes up for something you lack. Like if you don’t have any defensive/control players then combining DPS and support should overcome the lack of the 3rd; not having those dedicated skilled DPS players could still be made up by having the defensive/control and support guys making up the lack in DPS.

Leo G.4501:

I hope that they at least look into their combo system and readjust things and balance them better. Fire/Water fields and blast finishers shouldn’t be the meat of the combo system.

This is so true, when combos were first described & announced I was very excited for the option of combo-ing skills & creating new effects through cross profession combos but what we ended up with was a one size fits all bland system.

This is one area I believe arenanet could really improve skilled team play as well as add some new customisation through a combo rune, sigil, trait like system. It could be changed so profession have unique combo effects for example blasting water fields:

• A Necromancer or Elementalist blasting a water field produces small group heal keeping some of the base function) but also creating a large AoE chill that could hit more then 5 targets.
• A Engineer or Guardain blasting a water field heals & creates a large AoE condition removal, removing 1 condition from more then 5 targets.
• A Mesmeriser or Thief blasting heal & create a AoE dome that provides projectile protection that absords projectiles.
• A Warrior or Ranger blasting produces the strongest AoE heal to 5 or more targets.
• Revenant blasting doesn’t heals but provides 2 second of AoE resistance to 5 or more targets.

These are base effects which could then be expanded through customisation allow players to trait what combo effect they’ll produce. Generally it could be strengthening existing results, adding another benefit to changing the effect completely.

The Wizland.8435:

I disagree with making boon/condition duration affected with stats as that seems like something more tailored to traits and could get out of hand. Setting base durations for boons/conditions also doesn’t make sense because it means you can’t really set how powerful a skill is for it’s boon/conditions application. A powerful, high cooldown skill would apply a long duration of a condition, but a shorter cooldown skill shouldn’t apply as much. Should Reaper GS apply 5 seconds of chill base with the auto? No. How on Tyria are you supposed to immobilize anyone for any time with a 0.5 second duration? Even if the stats make stuff like immobilize better, it would mean it would be completely useless on builds not using those stats.

Actually what I was trying to do was remove overall duration increases through stats for most boons & conditions. Transferring & fixing them to the base duration of the skills. Using Critical Durations to extend durations through active gameplay allow boons & conditions to benefit from Critical’s.

The second option to extend durations was through traits, runes & sigils but instead of increasing all condition durations this option focused on individual conditions, providing this feeling of specialising into a condition.

What I’m aiming for is boon or condition skill power is still decided by the skill but through attributes players can also improve the boon, condition or control component of the skill beyond this base default strength just like how we can increase the damage or healing of a skill.

Leo G.4501:

‘m actually on a different plane of thought on this subject. It’d be difficult for me to explain, but I don’t agree that offense should be the apex of skilled gameplay. It’s just not viable to make one aspect “hardmode” and then introduce something that is relatively “easymode” right along side it. People will just find a middle ground and the game gets even easier.

Leo G I don’t think I explained it to well but when I refer to offensive as the apex this is the highest level of skill were one mistake means failure were members in the group take the bare minimum defence, support & control needed to successfully complete the content in the fastest time possible The Speed Runners.

To me, defensive, supportive and control type set-ups should require just as much skill to play well as glass-cannon DPS builds. The idea should be, as any of those build types you have varying skill tiers and each has a relatively high skill ceiling to accommodate skilled players.

And I agree totally with;

Also, you should be able to accomplish some sort of combined effect that makes up for something you lack. Like if you don’t have any defensive/control players then combining DPS and support should overcome the lack of the 3rd; not having those dedicated skilled DPS players could still be made up by having the defensive/control and support guys making up the lack in DPS.

And this is the overall goal of the system to allow through team work the covering of missing dedicated roles in the group allowing players to play the way their want.

• Don’t have a dedicated Healer or Support,
• Missing that required Control,
• No defence

Through good rotation & kiting with some minor changes to your currents builds you have it covered to match the requirements to complete the content.

The Wizland.8435:

There’s also not much point to making defensive stats work as offensive stats, because that’s just giving them extra functionality over power. I think they should stay as what they are as is (something to help with surviving), they just need to be better at what they do in PvE. The main issue right now is that there’s absolutely no reason to ever take defensive stats due to the PvE content being easy. Defensive stats definitely have a purpose, as shown in PvP. People actually take defensive stats in PvP.

It’s probable best to leave defensive attributes to defensive purposes. It would be nice to see defensive skill benefits to specing defensively. What I was looking at with adding the benefit to counter attacks was change defensive play for just being a punching bag into a game play of taking hits & then giving it back. But I think your right & it’s best to leave that out. This play style could be introduced through an elite specialisation.

I have no idea what critical durations are supposed to be, so try making that more clear.

Critical Durations are what I believe is a simple way in adding critical game play to boons & conditions without requiring major changes to the boons & conditions system. So:

A critical hit with a boon or condition extends the duration a target will be effected by the boon or condition.

I thought is was best to extend duration then increasing the effects strengths as it a reduced overall power creep. It also play quite nicely with the current boon / condition application & boon strip, condition removal / resistant game play tempo. Not requiring to much of a balance change overall bar some skills base duration adjustments.

The other benefit is precision & ferocity also become attributes you would want with support or controlling builds placing the same build challenges damage build have when balancing attribute choices not just receiving full benefit for only 1 stat.

Those new attributes would be quite a good idea in my opinion, perhaps with some changes, but still. I’ve always thought there should be a stat which influences the power of effects like boons and non-damage conditions.

I feel they could achieve a lot by moving Boon Duration and Condition Duration to the gear stats. Condition builds with high condition damage and duration would be the best controllers. Support builds would need gear with Boon Duration to support effectively.

Making Healing Power scale better would also help a lot. You shouldn’t need a dedicated healer to survive a dungeon if you’re able to negate all the damage through dodges and active defenses, but someone who focuses on healing support should be able to make a meaningful difference to their team. Since most heal skills in this game can’t be spammed there is no risk of people spending entire encounters spamming healing anyway.