Guild Wars 2

In this article by Sirlin, found here: http://www.sirlin.net/articles/fail-safes-in-competitive-game-design-a-detailed-example.html, he discusses how fail-safes can allow a competitive game to have good balance between characters with very different capabilities and mechanics (class mechanics and different builds in GW2). He argues that this promotes diversity in the game, and as discussed in another one of his articles (http://www.sirlin.net/articles/balancing-multiplayer-games-part-1-definitions.html), a game with many viable options (in this game, using different classes with different builds) is better balanced and has more depth. A balanced game being one where I can choose to be any class and be competitive, and a deep game being one that is strategically interesting to play even after players have had time to “figure it out”, which doesn’t occur if there are very few viable options.

The concept that promotes this diversity is a fail-safe: a game system that gives all characters equal access to an unusually large number of safeguards and shared defensive abilities.

How does this apply to GW2’s pvp?

I would argue that Arenanet have already implemented fail-safe systems within the game. All classes currently have access to dodging, which allows you to avoid any incoming damage. Many classes also have utility skills that give invulnerability or stun breaks.

The flaw I see in these fail-safes is that in the context of the game, they can be easily removed or in the case of utility slots – hurt build diversity. Let me explain, by applying it to a perceived annoyance in hot-join: unavoidable burst damage by certain classes, namely backstab Thieves and shatter Mesmers.

In theory, the dodge ability should make these high damaging abilities less of a big deal, since any ability you don’t like to get hit by, you dodge. In practice, classes have found it easy to remove the ability to dodge, namely through CC, have multiple abilities that you must dodge, or have abilities that are instant cast or cast out of stealth, removing the player’s ability to know what to dodge.

Currently, the highest damaging bursts are done when you are CC’ed. A thief may use venoms to keep you in place. A shatter mesmer will stun you with pistol 5, and use sword 3 to immobilize you.

Since Arenanet have already put the dodge mechanic in place, perhaps we can use it to mitigate the annoying burst, instead of having to tweak numbers constantly. For instance, allowing a full bar of stamina to dodge out of a stun could be a way to mitigate low risk – high reward combos. They would require players to set targets up for the combo, and give players an opportunity to interact with their opponent, as opposed to simply bending over and taking it, something most players do not consider enjoyable.

Alternatively, instead of dodging, players have the option to take defensive abilities on their 7,8,9 slots. This is also a very good solution, you could argue that high burst builds are no threat with the proper skills. The only problem with this solution is that it hampers build diversity. When running into hot-join, the first concern I have with the viability of any new build I make is “can I survive a backstab thief, shatter mesmer or GS warrior?” This means that, if I’m an Ele, I will always take Mist Form, Lightning Flash or Armor of Earth, instead of trying other skills. This limits my viable options, making a rather shallow game experience.

How can we apply this to bunkers? Recently, Arenanet nerfed certain abilities, both to handle burst and to weaken bunkers. They took the number tweaking approach. I currently do not know whether these number nerfs have altered the viability of bunkers in Tpvp, as I’ve not had the opportunity to experience the effects of these nerfs first hand, but another solution might have been to expand on the stamina bar.

For instance, we can use the stamina bar defensively… but what if we could use it offensively as well? Currently, not all classes have reliable boon stripping. Perhaps boon duration might be less of a concern, if all classes have some way to remove boons reliably. The classes that do have boon management, often rely on utility slots to do so.

Most discussions I’ve read on these issues advocate a number and ability changing approach. Could there be another solution? Can we apply these fail-safes in other areas of the game, in order to promote more viable build options between the classes? What do other players think?

I like the idea of a full bar of stamina being able to break a stun/immobilize (like an unstoppable dodge – similar to the system in fighting games where you can sacrifice 1 bubble out of 5 to break a combo (bubbles are used to block and dash/special attack and regenerate at a set rate; broken = unusable until it fully regens at a slower rate).

Another fail safe might be something like, for instance, something to do with ability effectiveness reduction over several uses. A good example would be heartseeker; first use is full damage, second use is 50% damage, fourth is 25% damage, etc. Once again, fighting games use this to scale combo damage. When catching an enemy in a combo, two limiting factors occur: the first is that each subsequent hit does less damage. so a 40 hit combo will have the later hits doing a very low percentage of their normal damage – combos effectively lock the enemy into ‘unavoidable’ damage, as each hit of the combo is a mini-stun; the second is that combos are maxed at 100% of a said combo, and each move adds a certain percent. Sure abilities can be timed to add 40% to a combo already at 95% completion, but it will obviously suffer severely reduced damage (higher combo % is higher damage reduction as mentioned just before). After that 100% is reached, the victim will go through a ‘knockdown’ phase where the fight will effectively restart minus whatever energy bubbles etc they have yet to regenerate/repair.

While this will not apply directly to a game like gw2, in the case of something like heartseeker (low skill high reward offensive ability), perhaps a limiter or a debuff added to victim reducing further heartseeker hits by a scaling percentage as mentioned earlier may work as a fail-safe implementable by gw2.

The same goes for defensive abilities. Stealth is a great example with the ‘revealed’ debuff not allowing a player to restealth for 3 seconds. etc.