Balance - better or worse in this patch?

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Posted by: Cribbage.2056

Cribbage.2056

Q:

Looking for a simple response from people – do you think this latest patch will improve balance or make it worse?

Try to ignore the bugs. I know they are significant at this point, but they are not intended.

I’m asking this question because I want people to show whether they think Anet are going in the right direction or not with balance issues.

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Posted by: Wanko.8103

Wanko.8103

A:

Thiefs, mesmers, eles OP.
Rangers, warriors, engies UP.
Necros and guardians are fine, I think.

This “balance” patch is horrible, it mostly buffs classes that were already OP.

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Posted by: nerva.7940

nerva.7940

thief faceroll unaddressed, mesmers OP now (might stacking put em over the top), warriors UP. other than that, we’re good

Ikiro – 80 Ranger
Umie – 80 Guardian
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgLbWtvtzdU0Ho0zto6VnTQ

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Posted by: Chakuna.6325

Chakuna.6325

thief faceroll unaddressed, mesmers OP now (might stacking put em over the top), warriors UP. other than that, we’re good

I might have to make that Faceroll video I was thinking about doing: Standard GC Thief-Nub build, with every key on my keyboard bound to #1 – Auto Attack. #2 – Steal(mug). #3 – Haste. And #4 – Heartseeker. And literally FACEROLL. I might bind Ballistic Venom to ctrl + alt + 9 or something, because you know, that kitten takes ssssshhkkkeeel.

I could teabag my keyboard also, or play it like a guitar. Then maybe it might get some attention.

I’m trying to go back, but I’m still here.

(edited by Chakuna.6325)

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Posted by: Recently.1043

Recently.1043

Feels roughly the same except rangers are now better than warriors. In general, every class got slightly buffed and/or bug fixed this patch (rangers probably got the biggest buff based on just this patch relative the others)

I think we got our hopes up when this whole big “dec 14 balance patch” was announced. It ended up being some relatively small things; nothing that changed any core mechanics / builds too much.

The clarification on the class roles was enlightening though. I like how anet admitted that warriors are supposed to be weak to conditions and are supposed to bring someone in their pocket to cleanse conditions for them. Now i won’t waste my time wondering before each balance patch if they will ever address this by buffing our passive condition removal or something, cause it won’t happen.

Call me when this game gets fixed…. if it ever does….

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Posted by: Choops.3710

Choops.3710

Feels roughly the same except rangers are now better than warriors. In general, every class got slightly buffed and/or bug fixed this patch (rangers probably got the biggest buff based on just this patch relative the others)

I think we got our hopes up when this whole big “dec 14 balance patch” was announced. It ended up being some relatively small things; nothing that changed any core mechanics / builds too much.

The clarification on the class roles was enlightening though. I like how anet admitted that warriors are supposed to be weak to conditions and are supposed to bring someone in their pocket to cleanse conditions for them. Now i won’t waste my time wondering before each balance patch if they will ever address this by buffing our passive condition removal or something, cause it won’t happen.

The clarification on class roles certainly was enlightening.
“The Engineer is a highly versatile class. While it doesn’t have the long range capabilities of the Ranger, or the melee capabilities of the Warrior or Guardian, they are comfortable at medium ranges in most fights. They have a lot of control, and use their boons to keep themselves (and allies) alive in a fight. They can use different kits based on the situation, but this extreme versatility comes at a cost in damage on their main hand weapons.”
“We see the elementalist as the king of versatility. The skill ceiling for the Ele is exceptional, as the ability to leverage all four attunements at the right time is crucial for understanding the elemetnalist. The Ele boasts some of the best team support and control abilities in the game, as well as some great area of effect damage.”

With these two statements right next to each other, every Engineer player that has mained them for the past few months felt a good kick to the junk. Laughable.

Pikachoops – Engineer, Fort Aspenwood

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Posted by: Dee Jay.2460

Dee Jay.2460

I skimmed the patch notes for every profession and really didn’t register any drastic balance changes.

Ergo I don’t think anything significant really changed.

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Posted by: Malicious.6742

Malicious.6742

Class balance itself is more or less the same but build balance got worse. The recent patch buffed burst builds way too much in various aspects.

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Posted by: Elloni.2473

Elloni.2473

A: It’s made it worse.

I had high hopes they’d fix the two uber classes but based on the changes it’s clear they will never balance Thieves and Mezmers. It will never happen. The concept of small adjustments, no big changes, is fine IF the game is close to blanced. It’s not.

The ‘stealth’ classes (counting the mezmer) are broken because stealth is broken. Both class have high dps and burst AND stealth provides the best defense in the game. Toughness and armor are pointless. I was expecting the restealth time to be increased by a second but that didn’t happen.

The formulas in this game seem off as well. Crit rates need to be capped. Toughness needs to do more like lower crit chance. I’m not sure armor does anything. WHERE IS DIMINISHING RETURNS ON CC? WHERE?

I don’t play any of the uber class (started the game as a thief but it was too damn easy) so I’m stuck getting kitten on by bad game design and glacial balance changes.

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Posted by: Knote.2904

Knote.2904

No worries, only good thing necro’s do will be nerfed next patch. Chill.

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Posted by: Malanaki.5873

Malanaki.5873

A: It’s made it worse.

I had high hopes they’d fix the two uber classes but based on the changes it’s clear they will never balance Thieves and Mezmers. It will never happen. The concept of small adjustments, no big changes, is fine IF the game is close to blanced. It’s not.

The ‘stealth’ classes (counting the mezmer) are broken because stealth is broken. Both class have high dps and burst AND stealth provides the best defense in the game. Toughness and armor are pointless. I was expecting the restealth time to be increased by a second but that didn’t happen.

The formulas in this game seem off as well. Crit rates need to be capped. Toughness needs to do more like lower crit chance. I’m not sure armor does anything. WHERE IS DIMINISHING RETURNS ON CC? WHERE?

I don’t play any of the uber class (started the game as a thief but it was too damn easy) so I’m stuck getting kitten on by bad game design and glacial balance changes.

All I read is whining about burst builds, have you ever fought a burst build vs burst build? Have you ever played paid tourneys (where bunkers rule) ? Have you even ever tried going 5 minutes in a hotjoin without gear before complaining if armor does anything ? Lol, try it , then come talk again.

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Posted by: Fourth.1567

Fourth.1567

I would also say the slow and steady method isn’t going to work in this case. Based on the post about class identities, there needs to be more work from the ground up. Frankly just looking at the identities of each profession there are already major imbalances. So without really taking a step back to look at the fundamentals of the game its not going to get much better. That would obviously come with some pretty radical changes which is probably necessary.

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Posted by: Mrbig.8019

Mrbig.8019

A: It’s made it worse.

I had high hopes they’d fix the two uber classes but based on the changes it’s clear they will never balance Thieves and Mezmers. It will never happen. The concept of small adjustments, no big changes, is fine IF the game is close to blanced. It’s not.

The ‘stealth’ classes (counting the mezmer) are broken because stealth is broken. Both class have high dps and burst AND stealth provides the best defense in the game. Toughness and armor are pointless. I was expecting the restealth time to be increased by a second but that didn’t happen.

The formulas in this game seem off as well. Crit rates need to be capped. Toughness needs to do more like lower crit chance. I’m not sure armor does anything. WHERE IS DIMINISHING RETURNS ON CC? WHERE?

I don’t play any of the uber class (started the game as a thief but it was too damn easy) so I’m stuck getting kitten on by bad game design and glacial balance changes.

All I read is whining about burst builds, have you ever fought a burst build vs burst build? Have you ever played paid tourneys (where bunkers rule) ? Have you even ever tried going 5 minutes in a hotjoin without gear before complaining if armor does anything ? Lol, try it , then come talk again.

Maybe burst builds go all the way EXACTLY because bunkers rule supreme.

Maybe the only way to handle them is to go with burst+ random necro.

Maybe the balance is so terrible because you need to go either way to be effective, and not every class is good at doing so.

Just maybe.

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Posted by: Cribbage.2056

Cribbage.2056

Thanks for your answers ppl. I reckon kitteno hit the nail on the head.

PvP balance got a bit worse. That might not sound too bad until you consider the massive lost opportunity. They could have used this patch to improve balance and didn’t.

As an engineer, I am particularly disappointed. They built this patch up like it was going to put us right there in the mainstream. But all they did was buff an ability that doesn’t fit into any realistic builds and nerf one of the WvW mainstays.

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Posted by: MindlessRuff.1948

MindlessRuff.1948

Thanks for your answers ppl. I reckon kitteno hit the nail on the head.

PvP balance got a bit worse. That might not sound too bad until you consider the massive lost opportunity. They could have used this patch to improve balance and didn’t.

As an engineer, I am particularly disappointed. They built this patch up like it was going to put us right there in the mainstream. But all they did was buff an ability that doesn’t fit into any realistic builds and nerf one of the WvW mainstays.

Are you kidding me? They added sigils effects to kits, that is a huge improvement when you think of the possibilities it could bring (I’m not an engineer so I’m not sure how the sigils function kits yet but I am very interested).

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Posted by: Cribbage.2056

Cribbage.2056

They added sigils to kits and nerfed Grenade damage by 30%. Find me a build where the sigil portion of the damage you are getting from kits is worth 30%.

For obvious reasons, the benchmark impact of sigils can be taken to be a 5% damage increase. That means that the portion of your damage coming from kits has been boosted by 5% (or equivalent cond/utility). How many viable tPvP specs use kits for a large amount of their damage?

Add in the HGH changes and you might want to say “WoW maybe I can play a jug build on my FT now.” To which I say, good luck – you’ll need it.

However, that is a discussion better left to the Engi forum.

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Posted by: MindlessRuff.1948

MindlessRuff.1948

They added sigils to kits and nerfed Grenade damage by 30%. Find me a build where the sigil portion of the damage you are getting from kits is worth 30%.

For obvious reasons, the benchmark impact of sigils can be taken to be a 5% damage increase. That means that the portion of your damage coming from kits has been boosted by 5% (or equivalent cond/utility). How many viable tPvP specs use kits for a large amount of their damage?

Add in the HGH changes and you might want to say “WoW maybe I can play a jug build on my FT now.” To which I say, good luck – you’ll need it.

However, that is a discussion better left to the Engi forum.

Ok, we don’t really need to discuss it further after this , but I would just like to add one example since I don’t think 5% is a fair number to say is added by sigils.

The Sigil of Fire gives a 30% chance on critical to proc an AOE fire blast.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sigil_of_Fire

Imagine using this while spamming grenades, now that the poison and blinding grenades deal damage now, they also have a chance to proc this effect, in addition to the fact that you are throwing multiple grenades with each ability it is not unreasonable to say you will activating this sigil every time it is off cooldown (5 seconds). This creates the effect of an additional blast of AOE damage (it hits pretty hard too, I’m not sure of exact numbers with a grenade build, but I don’t play Engineer either).

If they kept the Grenade damage the same combos like this with sigils would be dealing too much AOE damage, and would probably make them OP.

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Posted by: Taym.8326

Taym.8326

They added sigils to kits and nerfed Grenade damage by 30%. Find me a build where the sigil portion of the damage you are getting from kits is worth 30%.

For obvious reasons, the benchmark impact of sigils can be taken to be a 5% damage increase. That means that the portion of your damage coming from kits has been boosted by 5% (or equivalent cond/utility). How many viable tPvP specs use kits for a large amount of their damage?

Add in the HGH changes and you might want to say “WoW maybe I can play a jug build on my FT now.” To which I say, good luck – you’ll need it.

However, that is a discussion better left to the Engi forum.

also, there is no downside to using a “weapon swap sigils” whereas other classes need to weigh “is now an okay time to swap from melee to ranged”. on geomancy with any condi duration it gives you pretty much a perma uptime of 3 additional bleeds.

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Posted by: Kaizer.7135

Kaizer.7135

Backstab Thieves OP? In sPvP? LOL

You guys are honestly just BAD, my Warrior stomps thieves. When you seem em comin’ just let em get within mug range and dodge, they will try C&D>Mug>Backstab as soon as they’re in range. Once you dodge, use a stun and hammer them down. So easy…

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Posted by: Boogiepophantom.3041

Boogiepophantom.3041

knockdowns that chew your global cooldown is zzz
thieves and ele and mesmers continue to run rampant
same bs as usual move along nothing to see here

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Posted by: Lord Aargadon.4135

Lord Aargadon.4135

Currently sigils are suffering bugs(not always activating or at all) when you use a bundle, and the dmg nerf was 35%, either the post is a lie, typo, or bug(another one, yes) in the system.

It was also stated that:“….This means we had to tone down some of the kits accordingly….”

Elixer gun Super Elixer healing was fixed back to normal heal, which makes it very weak for having to sit inside the aoe for the effect, but saw this coming.

Bombs still do supbar melee with delayed hits, flamethrower still misses and has terrible scaling, toolkit still has way subpar melee damage and is only useful for block, grenades still suck in anything besides PvE against stationary mobs and PvWall(where a single elementalist skill beats them in damage and usefulness, and several others are on par or better than grenades)

The other kits I have no idea how they were altered, I don’t even know if they were yet the post makes it seem like it.

Necros- fear got nerfed/fixed, but this was also seen coming, made a lot of people upset

Gardians: AH nerfed, also seen coming since it was OP if used in the right situation

Ele: Shocking aura fixed and related exploits removed, seen coming. Slight damage buff otherwise

Sin: buffed again.

I know of no other changes in balance n’ the sorts.

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Posted by: PowerBottom.5796

PowerBottom.5796

Until now, I was actually praising ANet for their Patches – they weren’t too huge, but they all were in the right direction. With this recent Patch, there were 2 Patchnotes in particular that were both huge buffs and both in the wrong direction in every way possible.

1) Critical Infusion: Vigor duration increased to five seconds. This can only trigger once every five seconds.

WHY? This basically means, that 99% of all the Mesmer-builds get perma-vigor… It doesn’t require Skill to use this and it doesn’t even force you to make any decisions when choosing your traits, because you get this Trait anyways!
There was another skill like that on the Guardian, which isn’t as bad as the one on the Mesmer, because most Bunker-builds don’t have that much crit-chance, but with an off-tank with 1-Handed-Weapons and tons of crit-chance from 1-Hand-Strength, this trait is just ridiculous as well.

2) Shattered Strength: Increased to three stacks of might and ten second duration.

How in the hell do shatter-mesmers need another buff?

-> I was actually proud of myself not running a standard shatter-build in tournaments: I used Valk Amu and a 20/20/0/30/0 build where I got Condi-Remove and lots of Vigor when I shattered the Illusions and was just much more durable than other Shatter-Mesmers and had decent team-support (of course my damage-output was lower). But with the 2 changes above, I don’t need the Vigor anymore and I would be stupid to pass on the huge amounts of might I get from shattered strength.

So, the changes are dramatic, they buff a build that was actually too strong anyways, they don’t require you to do any choices while speccing, cuz’ you get those traits anyways, it doesn’t require any skill to use these new buffs and it actually diminishes the chance of anyone running a different mesmer-build, than the Vanilla 20/20/0/0/30 Shatter-Spec. There is absolutely no reason for this and I just can’t wrap my head around why they made those changes.

(edited by PowerBottom.5796)

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Posted by: nerva.7940

nerva.7940

we can only hope that the might stacking is a huge bug or something. otherwise, theyre just nuts.

Ikiro – 80 Ranger
Umie – 80 Guardian
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgLbWtvtzdU0Ho0zto6VnTQ

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Posted by: Raijinn.9065

Raijinn.9065

We took a big step backwards in my opinion with the laTest patch

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Posted by: Psikerlord.2569

Psikerlord.2569

@Powerbottom – if youre right then those are dumb changes indeed.

I have a similar feeling with thieves, that the patch changes (most notably 50% speed in stealth) will mostly benefit already popular and effective builds such as P/D condition and BS burst combo. I feel like Anet is further narrowing the viable builds, not making more of them. but then i havent played much lately, so hard to say just looking at notes. I hope im wrong
PS -yes i know there was a quasi pistol buff, but not exactly – you have to trait for it, so you are losing out on other traits. A straight change to the pistol 1-3 skills would have been more potent. I tried the new PP and still UP for direct damage seems to me

(edited by Psikerlord.2569)

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Posted by: Levetty.1279

Levetty.1279

Mesmers OP? Warriors UP? Necros Fine? What?

This is incredibly funny. The whining killed Phantasms long ago and now Mesmers can actually stack might like every other class they are OP again?

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Posted by: PowerBottom.5796

PowerBottom.5796

Mesmers OP? Warriors UP? Necros Fine? What?

This is incredibly funny. The whining killed Phantasms long ago and now Mesmers can actually stack might like every other class they are OP again?

If you are referring to my post, I don’t think Mesmers are inherently OP and I chose not to comment on other balance-issues, because Anet just takes it’s time. I just commented about the changes that go in the wrong direction and that concern the most common builds.

So Shatter-Mesmers where always very strong and now they get two of the biggest buffs and no real nerf besides Bugs – that’s what upset me.

On another Note, the amount of Might a Shatter-Mesmer can stack is just too high and requires you no different traits or playstyle or anything – you just get them by doing what a shatter-mesmer does.

Those skills don’t create any tension while coming up with a build, nor while you are playing it, it’s just a needless buff – you might as well give Shatter-Mesmers double endurance reg and a buttload more Power/Condition-DMG, because the might-stacks and the vigor lasts forever anyways.

There is only one thing I like about those Buffs and that is that Removing Boons will get more important and knowing which class plays which builds and when to remove the boons requires a lot of skill and timing.

Besides: Few other classes/specs get Might-Stacks as easy as the Shatter-Mesmer now and certainly not ones that are as often played and as strong kittenter-Mesmer in sPvP.

(edited by PowerBottom.5796)

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Posted by: Levetty.1279

Levetty.1279

On another Note, the amount of Might a Shatter-Mesmer can stack is just too high

Besides: Few other classes/specs get Might-Stacks as easy as the Shatter-Mesmer now and certainly not ones that are as often played and as strong kittenter-Mesmer in sPvP.

If you honestly think that then quite frankly you just do not know anything about the game. Go explore what the other classes can do and their builds, it will make you a better player as well.

On another Note, the amount of Might a Shatter-Mesmer can stack is just too high and requires you no different traits or playstyle or anything – you just get them by doing what a shatter-mesmer does.

Those skills don’t create any tension while coming up with a build, nor while you are playing it, it’s just a needless buff – you might as well give Shatter-Mesmers double endurance reg and a buttload more Power/Condition-DMG, because the might-stacks and the vigor lasts forever anyways.

What does that even mean?

Any other classes might stacking build doesn’t require a different trait or playstyle. You choose the one that gives it to you and then you go use it.

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Posted by: DiogoSilva.7089

DiogoSilva.7089

Any other classes might stacking build doesn’t require a different trait or playstyle. You choose the one that gives it to you and then you go use it.

I don’t know how many might-stacking builds exist in this game, but for the elementalist, you need specific weapon sets, 2-3 specific traits and 3 utility of a specific type to stack might to high numbers.

One of those traits is in the major grandmaster tier, and it’s about 2/3s as effective at might-stacking than Shattered Strength. SS gives you as much as 9 stacks per shatter, so overtime you easily get up to 18+ with two or three shatters. The ele’s grandmaster trait gives you 1 stack per skill while in fire attunement, which translates to about 4-6 stacks when and only when you’re in one of the four attunements, 8-12 when you come back to that attunement.

So in addition to giving less, you must restrict your playstyle if you want to benefit from it. And it’s a decent 30 points trait.

(edited by DiogoSilva.7089)

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Posted by: Levetty.1279

Levetty.1279

Any other classes might stacking build doesn’t require a different trait or playstyle. You choose the one that gives it to you and then you go use it.

I don’t know how many might-stacking builds exist in this game, but for the elementalist, you need specific weapon sets, 2-3 specific traits and 3 utility of a specific type to stack might to high numbers.

One of those traits is in the major grandmaster tier, and it’s about 2/3s as effective at might-stacking than Shattered Strength. SS gives you as much as 9 stacks per shatter, so overtime you easily get up to 18+ with two or three shatters. The ele’s grandmaster trait gives you 1 stack per skill while in fire attunement, which translates to about 4-6 stacks when and only when you’re in one of the four attunements, 8-12 when you come back to that attunement.

So in addition to giving less, you must restrict your playstyle if you want to benefit from it. And it’s a decent 30 points trait.

That is one class. The others?

You are also presuming that Mesmers can just get this massive stack from nowhere and then shatter you to death. They either have to use their F3 or F4 which are both on long cooldowns and are better served for their non might purposes, or use F1 and F2 which are their damage dealing shatters, one is power the other is condition and when they are on cooldown what are you going to use those might stacks for?

On top of this you also have to tailor the rest of your build to get enough clones out for the shatters and then hope they don’t get sneezed on while running to the target. So other classes might stacking being restrictive isn’t a valid complaint because so is Mesmer’s.

Although judging from the sPvP players posts about Rangers and Mesmers it seems the idea of attacking or avoiding pets is too complicated for them to understand.

(edited by Levetty.1279)

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Posted by: Mrbig.8019

Mrbig.8019

Any other classes might stacking build doesn’t require a different trait or playstyle. You choose the one that gives it to you and then you go use it.

I don’t know how many might-stacking builds exist in this game, but for the elementalist, you need specific weapon sets, 2-3 specific traits and 3 utility of a specific type to stack might to high numbers.

One of those traits is in the major grandmaster tier, and it’s about 2/3s as effective at might-stacking than Shattered Strength. SS gives you as much as 9 stacks per shatter, so overtime you easily get up to 18+ with two or three shatters. The ele’s grandmaster trait gives you 1 stack per skill while in fire attunement, which translates to about 4-6 stacks when and only when you’re in one of the four attunements, 8-12 when you come back to that attunement.

So in addition to giving less, you must restrict your playstyle if you want to benefit from it. And it’s a decent 30 points trait.

That is one class. The others?

You are also presuming that Mesmers can just get this massive stack from nowhere and then shatter you to death. They either have to use their F3 or F4 which are both on long cooldowns and are better served for their non might purposes, or use F1 and F2 which are their damage dealing shatters, one is power the other is condition and when they are on cooldown what are you going to use those might stacks for?

On top of this you also have to tailor the rest of your build to get enough clones out for the shatters and then hope they don’t get sneezed on while running to the target. So other classes might stacking being restrictive isn’t a valid complaint because so is Mesmer’s.

Although judging from the sPvP players posts about Rangers and Mesmers it seems the idea of attacking or avoiding pets is too complicated for them to understand.

Yeah, like the almighty useful Cry of frustration ( aka: 12 free stacks of might on a 24 secs CD with full Illusions investment).

Dude, stop this stuff, shattercrap was already over the top ( and the mesmer overall, is just too strong against almost every other class aside non-burst thieves, EXTREMELY capable rangers and eles) and now mesmers are BS.

Totally BS.

If they really want to improve this game, they should change A LOT how some classes work ( mesmer and thieves on top) change the damage ratio and this horrible bunker/burst meta.

ASAP.

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Posted by: Stiv.1820

Stiv.1820

Anyone who complains about GC thieves is just bad. I’m not saying that playing one is hard. Bads can prey on bads pretty easy on a GC Thief. Dying to one outside of extenuating circumstances? 100% bads.

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Posted by: Levetty.1279

Levetty.1279

Yeah, like the almighty useful Cry of frustration ( aka: 12 free stacks of might on a 24 secs CD with full Illusions investment).

Well I suppose if you want to argue something that is wrong you might as well use false information.

All I am getting from these desperate arguments is that if Mesmer wants to go full glass cannon 20/20/0/0/30 builds then it shouldn’t be able to do damage. All other classes glass cannon builds can do damage and get 20+ might stacks and that is alright but for some reason Mesmers aren’t allowed to.

The PvP players are going to be the death of this game, just like they were to GW1s PvP.

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Posted by: Mrbig.8019

Mrbig.8019

Yeah, like the almighty useful Cry of frustration ( aka: 12 free stacks of might on a 24 secs CD with full Illusions investment).

Well I suppose if you want to argue something that is wrong you might as well use false information.

All I am getting from these desperate arguments is that if Mesmer wants to go full glass cannon 20/20/0/0/30 builds then it shouldn’t be able to do damage. All other classes glass cannon builds can do damage and get 20+ might stacks and that is alright but for some reason Mesmers aren’t allowed to.

The PvP players are going to be the death of this game, just like they were to GW1s PvP.

But do we AT LEAST play the same game ?

Can you understand how different is an ele, a class always on the fire of its enemies that needs to soak up damage into prot boons, healing and smart play, from a mesmer which simply calls the I-wtfuwant x2 on its 16 secs CDs, uses decoy and then is already full to shatter a 12k + damage combo ?

Can you understand that the mesmer, thanks to the great tool of avoidance skills like decoy ( 32 secs CD with a 5 point investment), blink ( 30 secs CD untraited) and OH sword+ scepter 2nd skill ( double block, doing 4k + damage on squishies and TOTALLY VANQUISHING a warrior attempting to bullrush you, for istance) and its ILLUSIONS hitting for 1.5 – 4 k damage, doesn’t need ( ehy , pro-tip) all this might stacking in order to be effective, becase it was already effective.

Huge might stacking is for those classes there are ALWAYS on the field, with no avoidance tool ( like eles, warriors and the totally unviable burst engeneer), not for “avoidance, hit and run” classes like the mesmer.

Hell, the only way for a thief to get huge might stacking is to go at least 35 points into Shadow arts, and only very, VERY few builds do so: if you’re power based ( most probably S/D) than you need it, because your damage output is high but you don’t have any burst at all; if you’re P/D, then you’re doing it only as a side effect, and the hughe might stacking doesn’t really affect your damage so bad like in power builds.

Dude, you’re either a bad mesmer, or simply a bad player, or simply have no idea what you’re talking about.

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Posted by: Choops.3710

Choops.3710

Any other classes might stacking build doesn’t require a different trait or playstyle. You choose the one that gives it to you and then you go use it.

I don’t know how many might-stacking builds exist in this game, but for the elementalist, you need specific weapon sets, 2-3 specific traits and 3 utility of a specific type to stack might to high numbers.

One of those traits is in the major grandmaster tier, and it’s about 2/3s as effective at might-stacking than Shattered Strength. SS gives you as much as 9 stacks per shatter, so overtime you easily get up to 18+ with two or three shatters. The ele’s grandmaster trait gives you 1 stack per skill while in fire attunement, which translates to about 4-6 stacks when and only when you’re in one of the four attunements, 8-12 when you come back to that attunement.

So in addition to giving less, you must restrict your playstyle if you want to benefit from it. And it’s a decent 30 points trait.

That is one class. The others?

You are also presuming that Mesmers can just get this massive stack from nowhere and then shatter you to death. They either have to use their F3 or F4 which are both on long cooldowns and are better served for their non might purposes, or use F1 and F2 which are their damage dealing shatters, one is power the other is condition and when they are on cooldown what are you going to use those might stacks for?

On top of this you also have to tailor the rest of your build to get enough clones out for the shatters and then hope they don’t get sneezed on while running to the target. So other classes might stacking being restrictive isn’t a valid complaint because so is Mesmer’s.

Although judging from the sPvP players posts about Rangers and Mesmers it seems the idea of attacking or avoiding pets is too complicated for them to understand.

with my Engineer, I can choose to have the vigor whenever I have quickness and increase it’s regen rate, but I have to actually trait for it. That’s child’s play, 10 in tools and 10 in alchemy, no big deal for almost perma-vigor. Now might, with the new buff to the HGH trait (which I still have to invest 30 points in Alchemy to get), we have to rely on remaining in Flamethrower kit to stack up might (also 30 points into Firearms to get), combined with one of our elixirs. If you want that might to last a while and go over 12 stacks or so, then you need to start using armor runes to increase might duration. And even then, you’re not going to use that might with your Flamethrower, because it’s so broken, so you have to switch to rifle and hope you can pull off some awesome burst, though it sucks that arguably your biggest damage dealer on the rifle has a terribad animation that seems to go on forever lol. So to do arguably the same thing as a shatter mesmer, I need 60 points in 2 separate trees to pick up traits that need to go in hand with 2 utility slot skills (FT and a potion, which you’re prolly already carrying anyway, but I’m trying to exaggerate here because I’m kitten my class is so broken and yours isn’t) and then play a weapon I don’t really care for to do something with all that might, because honestly, what’s the alternative? Pistol/Pistol/Shield, nade kit, tool kit? lolololololol.

TL;DR I am sad that I mained Eng and I take out my anger on Mesmers that act like they’ve been screwed over since day one when they’ve been right at the top the whole time.

You didn’t need fixes. Stop acting like you were at the bottom the whole time, because damn it, I’ve been at the bottom my whole time and we can smell our own.

Except bunker Engi’s, they’re doing all right, though not as good with the Super Elixir fix, but ehhhhhh, I’ve complained enough. Enjoy your day, guys!

Pikachoops – Engineer, Fort Aspenwood

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Posted by: Xae.7204

Xae.7204

Thanks for your answers ppl. I reckon kitteno hit the nail on the head.

PvP balance got a bit worse. That might not sound too bad until you consider the massive lost opportunity. They could have used this patch to improve balance and didn’t.

As an engineer, I am particularly disappointed. They built this patch up like it was going to put us right there in the mainstream. But all they did was buff an ability that doesn’t fit into any realistic builds and nerf one of the WvW mainstays.

Are you kidding me? They added sigils effects to kits, that is a huge improvement when you think of the possibilities it could bring (I’m not an engineer so I’m not sure how the sigils function kits yet but I am very interested).

It wasn’t just grenades. All abilities on all kits had their damage reduced by between 30% and 75%

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Posted by: Levetty.1279

Levetty.1279

If a Mesmer is using Scepter/OH Sword then he isn’t running a shatter build.

Or he is running a very bad one.

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Posted by: jkough.7316

jkough.7316

Dear -ArenaNet-,

Paper is over powered, Scissors are ok.

Sincerely,
Rock

Pancake Boy

(edited by jkough.7316)

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Posted by: Mrbig.8019

Mrbig.8019

If a Mesmer is using Scepter/OH Sword then he isn’t running a shatter build.

Or he is running a very bad one.

How does this affect what i’m saying ?

I said SPECIFICALLY OH sword and scepter to avoid talking about how ridicolously Phase Retreat is on staff.

And anyway, shatterbuilds are based on shatters, not phantasms: you can pick any weapon you want and be effective as long as you know how to shatter them, the only thing you need is a MH sword in order to do the combo.

I play the mesmer myself, and i know perfectly how RIDICOLOUS this class is right now, and it was already very, VERY powerful before ( on the edge of OP, but still counterable by some very few classes that needed to play A LOT BETTER than the mesmer one) and didn’t need any buff, if not huge nerfs to phantasm damage and big boosts to mesmer damage itself, maybe becoming less easymode than it is actually.

in tPvP the mesmer is the most powerful and gamebreaking class, any team without a mesmer is severely hampering its viability: a single timewarp can totally change the outcome of a fight, especially on Khylo.

Learn to play before complaining about stuff.

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Posted by: KansasFF.9410

KansasFF.9410

So I disagree with selected answer. I think ELE is UP if you consider the ‘skill’ to play the class (maybe a bit OP on some D/D specs). I think Ranger is now very powerful, but haven’t seen enough to call them OP. All I know is in paids I sure see a lot of rangers now. I also think Necro is pretty insane because of DS regen being so damn high.

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Posted by: Levetty.1279

Levetty.1279

If a Mesmer is using Scepter/OH Sword then he isn’t running a shatter build.

Or he is running a very bad one.

How does this affect what i’m saying ?

I said SPECIFICALLY OH sword and scepter to avoid talking about how ridicolously Phase Retreat is on staff.

And anyway, shatterbuilds are based on shatters, not phantasms: you can pick any weapon you want and be effective as long as you know how to shatter them, the only thing you need is a MH sword in order to do the combo.

I play the mesmer myself, and i know perfectly how RIDICOLOUS this class is right now, and it was already very, VERY powerful before ( on the edge of OP, but still counterable by some very few classes that needed to play A LOT BETTER than the mesmer one) and didn’t need any buff, if not huge nerfs to phantasm damage and big boosts to mesmer damage itself, maybe becoming less easymode than it is actually.

in tPvP the mesmer is the most powerful and gamebreaking class, any team without a mesmer is severely hampering its viability: a single timewarp can totally change the outcome of a fight, especially on Khylo.

Learn to play before complaining about stuff.

Well thanks for writing my response to you for me. So erm yeah, do that.

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Posted by: Archaon.6245

Archaon.6245

Dear -ArenaNet-,

Paper is over powered, Scissors are ok.

Sincerely,
Rock

You made my day. +1

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Posted by: PowerBottom.5796

PowerBottom.5796

If a Mesmer is using Scepter/OH Sword then he isn’t running a shatter build.

Or he is running a very bad one.

Have you ever tried a shatter/condition Hybrid with Celestial Amu?…. You do very similar DPS with your spikes, but get tons of confusion and it’s actually better than standard vanilla-shatter in certain MU’s or situations (vs. engis, other Mesmers, bunker-guardians and in every teamfight-oriented setup with necro and epidemic). Overall, I still think vanilla-shatter is better, but it’s definitely a viable Option to use Scepter/X and Sword/Pistol in your shatter-builds with celestial Amu.

In fact, I’ve been running it yesterday in free’s and we got 3x gold in a row against decent teams and my illusions were naked (I actually had no big problem with the naked illusions and I thought that Shatter-Mesmer was pretty balanced that way ^^’).

To summarize: There are tons of builds out there no1 uses that are pretty good if you know what situations and MU’s you have to seek out or avoid in order for the build to be effective.

(edited by PowerBottom.5796)

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Posted by: nerva.7940

nerva.7940

So I disagree with selected answer. I think ELE is UP if you consider the ‘skill’ to play the class (maybe a bit OP on some D/D specs). I think Ranger is now very powerful, but haven’t seen enough to call them OP. All I know is in paids I sure see a lot of rangers now. I also think Necro is pretty insane because of DS regen being so damn high.

tanky condi ranger can easily be added to any tpvp comp now, as either a roamer or bunker. this patch has made bleed stacking a lot more effective without relying on utilities. pets are overall significantly more reliable.

the one mistake they keep on making is keeping some builds too strong relative to others of the same prof. condi wellmancer, d/d thief/ele and shatter mesmer are kept status quo. for the 4 profs, these builds so effective that other builds are simply dismissed. the margin musnt be so large that people notice one build totally overpowering others. id like to see other builds brought up to the same level, without nerfing these necessarily.

imagine…banner warriors, dagger power/siphon necros, sword/sword mesmers, etc., all being viable in tpvp. when i see a ranger in tpvp, i know hes gonna be condi. when i see a necro, i know he’s gonna be wellmancer/staff. when i see mesmer i know hes gonna be shatter. we need more to play with, and these changes are just taking so long. luckily, my ranger (originally main) will be keeping me occupied indefinitely.

Ikiro – 80 Ranger
Umie – 80 Guardian
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgLbWtvtzdU0Ho0zto6VnTQ

(edited by nerva.7940)