Guild Wars 2

Actually there’s, in sPvP, only class that use conditions. That’s why condition damage is better than direct damage.

__Condition damage:

-Condition’s not affected by defensive skills that reduces damage (trait, sigils and protection) but only afflicted by a low number of rune or a warrior utility.
-You don’t need to use a full offensive equipment. You’ve the Best condition damage and a very high defence (vitality or toughnes) and attack (power or precision)
-High perform of Fields and Combos
-You can spam conditions whit attacks, trait and sigil
-You can flee, use healing skills, defensive skills, dodge, while the enemy die slowly
-There’s a large numer of conditions whit ever better ability. (poison decrease enemy hp heal, cripple decrease speed and movement skill range, chill decrease movement and increase skil lrecharge rate, burning give very high damage, bleed can stack ‘till 25 and give very high damage, confusion make you hit yourself)
-If your stunned, dazed or feared you conditions give damage to the enemy
-You can apply conditions fast and deal high damage, even if the enemy clean it away
-Many skills grant you to convert enemy boons in conditions
-You can use a skill that don’t give condition on a field to give condition damage
-The most powerfull weapon to give condition damage is always a ranged weapon.

-But yes, conditions can be cleaned, sometimes

__Direct Damage:

-You can give high burst damage
-You can use direct damage whit every class
-You can focuse your ability to increase critical damage
-A large number of direct damage skills grant movement ability
-You can use a field to obtain a combo
-Some skills grant to convert conditions in boons

-You need a full offensive build to reach the top damage and drop your defensive stats to use berserker
-You need to hit the enemy to deal damage
-You can’t defend and give damage at the same time (some skills make you block and stryke back but isn’t the same thing)
-If you’re stunned, dazed or feared, you don’t deal damage to your enemy
-Trait, utility and boons can highly reduce your damage (till 45% in passive+boon like guardians or mesmer)
-The best weapon to give direct damage is always a melee weapon (except for Ranger)

Now… what do you chose to kill your enemy? Condition Damage or Direct Damage?

(p.s. sorry for my bad english)

Direct because conditions is for nubs. Honestly though as someone mentioned in another thread, conditions should be an added effect not a real source of damage.

ArcTheFallen.7682:

Direct because conditions is for nubs. Honestly though as someone mentioned in another thread, conditions should be an added effect not a real source of damage.

They were a real source of damage in gw1, issue with that is gw1 was actually a more balanced game than gw2. There were plenty of anti condition skills and counters in the game. Where as in gw2 there is only condition removal and convert.

The balance issues are a result of dumbing down the original system.

In gw1 condi comps were meant to win long battles of attrition and to punish teams that didn’t bring sufficient removal.

That’s not the case in gw2. No amount of condi removal currently available will stop these condi builds. Condi builds are essentially acting as burst builds downing the average non-bunker in 15-30 seconds if they don’t disengage. The amount of survivability that the 2 dominating classes have coupled with their point control is what makes these builds OPin the current meta.

Guild Wars also didn’t have the kind of messed up stat system Guild Wars 2 has.

Aza.2105:

ArcTheFallen.7682:

Direct because conditions is for nubs. Honestly though as someone mentioned in another thread, conditions should be an added effect not a real source of damage.

They were a real source of damage in gw1, issue with that is gw1 was actually a more balanced game than gw2. There were plenty of anti condition skills and counters in the game. Where as in gw2 there is only condition removal and convert.

The balance issues are a result of dumbing down the original system.

The best way to put it was that they were a source of long-term damage/debuff. Even with every condition/punishing hex possible on a player, they could cease action and severely limit incoming damage enough so that their backline could attempt to cleanse them, because degeneration and regeneration were separate from regular damage and healing and had set caps. GW2 has completely run askew with this concept; some condition builds put out more dps over both short and long-term fights than the vast majority of power builds, and they don’t sacrifice much defense to do so.

“Solution”: Severely reduce the damage from conditions, but take away condition removal from the game. Burst condition damage solved.

Now conditions will be slow and deadly after a long period of time, rather than a form of burst. The downside is that now conditions cannot be removed, which leads to a whole new set of problems.

the problem is that condi builds get defense and offense at the same time, when a guard sacrifices all his damage to run bunker and burst classes sacrifice defense.

That’s just stupid

jmatb.6307:

the problem is that condi builds get defense and offense at the same time, when a guard sacrifices all his damage to run bunker and burst classes sacrifice defense.

That’s just stupid

Guard could go condition with defense and offense, but the problem is, they only have access to one condition! lol

Aza.2105:

jmatb.6307:

the problem is that condi builds get defense and offense at the same time, when a guard sacrifices all his damage to run bunker and burst classes sacrifice defense.

That’s just stupid

Guard could go condition with defense and offense, but the problem is, they only have access to one condition! lol

Which is what shows the issue.
Conditions aren’t much of a problem until you throw a significant mix of them on a profession. Condi application is too frequent for something “attrition based”.

jmatb.6307:

the problem is that condi builds get defense and offense at the same time, when a guard sacrifices all his damage to run bunker and burst classes sacrifice defense.

That’s just stupid

There is an itemization problem preventing me from proving my point, but the bottom line is this: primary power + precision + any defensive stat, with a ranged weapon, will put out greater up-front damage and have tankiness comparable to a condinecro or a spirit ranger.
Mathemathically, that is. In practice, the necro’s burning (which necros should not have gotten in the first place) and the ranger’s cooldown issue (which works different than most other cooldowns of a similar type) can put these two slightly ahead.
This, however, is not a reflection on condition damage as a whole, but on two concrete examples of very defined condition builds.

GW1 conditions were balanced most of the time simply because to get anything truly oppressive out of them, almost the entire team needed to be built around the concept. You needed to coordinate to get those condi’s to stick (divert the Draw/Foul Feast, D Shot the LoD keeping everyone up etc.). Especially since Energy as a resource meant that if you just spammed away, you’d eventually run out of juice and lose. Another layer finesse.

When people pulled off those delta force coordination condi’ builds, they worked incredibly well (crip slash War condi meta was really strong). However most of the time, it could ‘still’ be beaten by a solid balanced build, as most maps allowed you to simply split on them (reducing the team condi synergy) and kill their lord, winning the match.

This is kinda’ what GW2 lacks and why GW1 PvP was so good… Most of the time when some FoTM, bs gimmick build was flying around, unless it was insanely broken, a well played balanced team still had strong options to beat it. They just needed to work out ‘how’. Since the damage wasn’t ridiculous and the pace was chess-like considerate, the best teams could even suss a build-counter, same game.

If we can get to a place where there are always viable counters for a ‘typical balanced team’ to use, the game will be in a very good place.

Two ways to balance :

- Make a “circle” : Condi damages kill bunkers > Bunkers kill glasscanon > Glasscanon kill condi damages. It’s not working actually because condi damages specs got a lot of armor, toughness, etc, wich make them only vulnerable to … other condis. Same for GC specs, more vulnerable to … other GC specs.

- Everybody at the same level : Everybody can kill everybody, no matter conditions or direct damages. A lot harder to balance IMO (maybe impossible ?), and again 2 ways to do it :
_ Conditions and Direct damages can both be sustained OR burst.
_ Conditions deals only damages on a long amount of time (no burst possible, event when max stack condi up). Direct damages specs can’t really win a fight during too long (so mainly burst).

In all of these, I see only 1 possible scenario when conditions can burst (like they actually do). And I feel like it’s the harder to balance, maybe impossible. So unless they change their mind, we’re gonna have condi meta OR direct damage meta, but both seems hardly possible if they don’t tone down conditions.

The circle you describe is too simplistic, too few components. But I agree, an “everyone can have a fair shot at anyone else” meta is not realistic.

Actually it was way easier with the holy triade they destroyed (Bunker, Damager, Healer). They created something more complicated, it’s interesting, but in 7 years of development I think they had their idea about how to get the things right. Maybe if we knew their position on this we could help.

Rock, paper, scissors never works in any pvp game.

What Red is saying is certainly true. When you look at the core of gw2, there is no counter anything really. Its impossible for me to make a character that is anti condition damage, that shuts condition characters down. This doesn’t exist!

When balance issues come up, people tend to look at the active effect, that is to say what the balance issue is. Most of the time they don’t look at what causes it. In regards to gw2, imbalances exist because its opposite polarity is either missing or not on par with it.

Examples:

Poison counters Healing
Toughness counters damage
Weakness counters damage

Then we start to see a problem

Nothing counters evade skills
Condition removal counters conditions, but can’t keep up with the pace its reapplied. Also, condition removals tend to have long cds, if the cd is short then they generally remove 1-3 conditions. Problem is, in the current state of the game you are loaded with max conditions from more than one source.

The change to berserker stance for warrior is a step in the right direction. But all defensive oriented classes need this.

Funny how you are content with saying “poison counters healing” and “toughness counters damage”, but feel the need to qualify “condition removal counters conditions” with a special and unique downside.

The Boz.2038:

Funny how you are content with saying “poison counters healing” and “toughness counters damage”, but feel the need to qualify “condition removal counters conditions” with a special and unique downside.

lol well its true.

It is also true that poison simply lowers the efficiency of healing and toughness simply lowers the efficiency of damage, and neither can “keep up with the healing/damage”.

Solution:

-A stat that reduces condition damage.
-A boon that reduces condition damage
-Adjust condition damage for the new buff:
-Conditions can crit now

Now if you want to do a lot of condition damage you are going to need to go glass like everyone else, also there is a stat and a boon that can reduce your damage, so there is no ultimate build for every situation.

Also this stat and boon wouldnt be available for bunkers, maybe the stat yes but in a very moderate way because we cant deny a stat from a character, but with boons they can be denied.

So bunkers cant bunker everything and they will need to be very carefull because conditions are going to be their weakness.

So the food chain is Power>Conditions>Bunker>Power

This way we have more deph in the game because right now its all about Conditions…

If this weye rock/scissors/paper… well this right now is a game only of scissors…

Of course this is just the overall view, but a condition build beign more powerfull than bunkers dosent mean they always going to win or there is a guaranteed loose of a bunker that meets a condition build, same if a condition meets a power build, its just the general theory, but in practice a well played bunker I MEAN WELL PLAYED can be able to still survive to conditions or a condition beign able to kill a power character, just how right now some power characters are able to kll bunkers because they know how to.

The thing is… Before they can truly fix anything, Arena Net needs to decide once and for all what GW2 PvP ‘is’…

Is it a free for all, solo commando type PvP game (old school FPS for example) or is it a ‘team’ game, where you balance collective weaknesses… Okay that probably sounds weird “Of course it’s a team game” right? Well that’s the thing, I don’t think it’s so simple.

Example, Rock Paper Scissors (RPS) is a very good system for what it does. It offers balance by way of “the enemy of my enemy is my b****”. Starcraft, Total War etc…

It’s easy to apply RPS to GW2 if you do so by way of build vs build as that’s the level where it works, but as soon as you throw people together and look at possible team synergies, of varying sizes to make it worse, it starts to break down.

What can a Stun lock War + an SD thief do? How about a Stun Lock War with a bunker Guard? Necro? How do you even begin to quantify data like that? Do you even try it with RPS? Do you even bother at all in the first place?

I don’t know how best to look at the situation on a core level but simplification may be where it’s at. For example simply balancing around what/how many options a team has at any given moment to help them win a fight, might indeed work.

Or it could be something else. Like Aza’s breakdown is a good example of a simplification that functions at a higher level. A pillar of balance centred around core combat themes.

Either way, that primary question needs to be answered first. What is your balance target?

The only way condis are “bursting people” is because of bleed and burning. Nerf burnings overall damage and how condi power effects it. Nerf bleeding’s overall damage, how condi power effects it and nerf how it stacks in intensity. 6 stacks of bleeding on a target shouldnt be doing the insane amount of damage it is doing now. These 2 condis are the reason condi classes are destroying. Nerf them and balanced game.

Derps.7421:

The only way condis are “bursting people” is because of bleed and burning. Nerf burnings overall damage and how condi power effects it. Nerf bleeding’s overall damage, how condi power effects it and nerf how it stacks in intensity. 6 stacks of bleeding on a target shouldnt be doing the insane amount of damage it is doing now. These 2 condis are the reason condi classes are destroying. Nerf them and balanced game.

Burning itself isn’t the issue. If it was, then a guardian traited for burning would be awesome in pvp. Unfortunately they aren’t. I think its better to say, conditions become op when a class has access to all of them.

Derps.7421:

The only way condis are “bursting people” is because of bleed and burning. Nerf burnings overall damage and how condi power effects it. Nerf bleeding’s overall damage, how condi power effects it and nerf how it stacks in intensity. 6 stacks of bleeding on a target shouldnt be doing the insane amount of damage it is doing now. These 2 condis are the reason condi classes are destroying. Nerf them and balanced game.

Today i was beign nuked by a necro pretty bad, i think i have never seen that amount of damage not even on a backstab, its hard to believe that conditions are “bursting” instead of doing damge in time…and bursting better than a burst build and in less time.

Fenrir.5493:

kitten s.7421:

The only way condis are “bursting people” is because of bleed and burning. Nerf burnings overall damage and how condi power effects it. Nerf bleeding’s overall damage, how condi power effects it and nerf how it stacks in intensity. 6 stacks of bleeding on a target shouldnt be doing the insane amount of damage it is doing now. These 2 condis are the reason condi classes are destroying. Nerf them and balanced game.

Today i was beign nuked by a necro pretty bad, i think i have never seen that amount of damage not even on a backstab, its hard to believe that conditions are “bursting” instead of doing damge in time…and bursting better than a burst build and in less time.

I think its a combination of fear, bleeds, poison, burning and direct damage all at once. Yes, its quite ridiculous.

Fenrir.5493:

kitten s.7421:

The only way condis are “bursting people” is because of bleed and burning. Nerf burnings overall damage and how condi power effects it. Nerf bleeding’s overall damage, how condi power effects it and nerf how it stacks in intensity. 6 stacks of bleeding on a target shouldnt be doing the insane amount of damage it is doing now. These 2 condis are the reason condi classes are destroying. Nerf them and balanced game.

Today i was beign nuked by a necro pretty bad, i think i have never seen that amount of damage not even on a backstab, its hard to believe that conditions are “bursting” instead of doing damge in time…and bursting better than a burst build and in less time.

Exactly. I thought people would yell at me for saying that necros can essentially BURST with their conditions, but there’s no other way I see fit to describe it.

Hawatak.8049:

Two ways to balance :

- Make a “circle” : Condi damages kill bunkers > Bunkers kill glasscanon > Glasscanon kill condi damages. It’s not working actually because condi damages specs got a lot of armor, toughness, etc, wich make them only vulnerable to … other condis. Same for GC specs, more vulnerable to … other GC specs.

- Everybody at the same level : Everybody can kill everybody, no matter conditions or direct damages. A lot harder to balance IMO (maybe impossible ?), and again 2 ways to do it :
_ Conditions and Direct damages can both be sustained OR burst.
_ Conditions deals only damages on a long amount of time (no burst possible, event when max stack condi up). Direct damages specs can’t really win a fight during too long (so mainly burst).

In all of these, I see only 1 possible scenario when conditions can burst (like they actually do). And I feel like it’s the harder to balance, maybe impossible. So unless they change their mind, we’re gonna have condi meta OR direct damage meta, but both seems hardly possible if they don’t tone down conditions.

Slight correction to that, a bunker should not just outlast a glass cannon for days, if you invest in damage a sturdy wall should be able to hold you off, but not just outlast and kill. (this is all under the pretense of outplaying aside)

Glass Cannons kill Bunkers > Bunkers out last and kill condi > Condi Kills Glass Cannon.

Glass cannons should go pew pew pew and break bunkers, but if playerd right a bunker would obviously be able to time his skills well and survive vs a glass cannon and chip off his squishy health pool over time.

The Bunker being defensive should be able to clear or out live the condis enough to put up an offensive, however being out played by baited condis into forced removal will doom him.

And

Condi should preassure a glass cannon early so that their low health bar works against them, however if a glass cannon can get a clean set up and hard preassure the fight can be won on his end.

This is fairly fair balance.

What we currently have is useless glass because they can’t out burst the current sustain, condi breaks bunkers easy and melts glass, and pure bunkers are sudo support that can’t really hold off much.

Why would condi be the counter to glass cannon.
The whole idea of conditions is to bypass defenses which Glass cannons don’t have in the first place.

[X] Vote for nerf the hole Condi dmg by 30%, than it is where it should be. If you still want more dps, you have to spec fully into +cond dmg and lack of surviva.

Rebuild amullets, there is not one out which gives you toughness, power, precision and %krit dmg. Otherwise there shouldnt be one which gives you toughness precision and cond dmg. (cause cond dmg = power + krit ed)

Hawatak.8049:

- Everybody at the same level : Everybody can kill everybody, no matter conditions or direct damages. A lot harder to balance IMO (maybe impossible ?), and again 2 ways to do it :
_ Conditions and Direct damages can both be sustained OR burst.

We can try this for the next 4-5 moonths (till the game realease in China and Korea) . Then ask the 4 representants from US+Eu+China+Korea in the Sotg , if we would like to keep going with the action pvp , or the new traits should focus more on balanced gameplay
If Madlife from LoL start playing the game , i will run naked in the streets :P

Fenrir.5493:

Solution:

-A stat that reduces condition damage.
-A boon that reduces condition damage
-Adjust condition damage for the new buff:
-Conditions can crit now

Now if you want to do a lot of condition damage you are going to need to go glass like everyone else

Destroys the entire point of conditions. But then again, you already said this before, and you got the same reply from several people, and you still persist, so I’m not holding my breath…

prozon.3561:

[X] Vote for nerf the hole Condi dmg by 30%, than it is where it should be. If you still want more dps, you have to spec fully into +cond dmg and lack of surviva.

Rebuild amullets, there is not one out which gives you toughness, power, precision and %krit dmg. Otherwise there shouldnt be one which gives you toughness precision and cond dmg. (cause cond dmg = power + krit ed)

They could redo how condition damage scales, currently it starts to become less and less potent the more condition damage you get. Making it so having a high amount of condition damage a waste.

When power, crit chance and damage are low, one can feel the results. With condition damage not so. And I’m totally against a rock paper scissors system of balance, it will only make things far worse. Since it basically sets a person up for a win or lose by their archetype.

What they need to do is introduce more counter skills, to put into balance those that do not have a hard counter. GW1 did this and this is the reason why there wasn’t extremes, because it was always possible to design a way to counter a build that someone is using to dominate.

In gw2 we do not have this and are left waiting for the devs to fix stuff.

ensoriki.5789:

Why would condi be the counter to glass cannon.
The whole idea of conditions is to bypass defenses which Glass cannons don’t have in the first place.

Glass cannons still have defensive abilities, Mesmers little bit of invuln little bit of stealth, both which condis tick through, and if squishy /gg same goes for glass thief, and wars.

If you building for what you suggest balance would be virtually impossible unless you go strait and pure Rock, Paper, Scissors with little play in between which if the game compensates for will be the end result over time. The process we end up with is our current situation where if we buff burst to much they over power the other two, and if condi is to strong it over powers the other two. And considering a lot of the condi stuff is survivability based it ends up making burst the odd man out where it’s either just to strong or useless.

The Boz.2038:

Fenrir.5493:

Solution:

-A stat that reduces condition damage.
-A boon that reduces condition damage
-Adjust condition damage for the new buff:
-Conditions can crit now

Now if you want to do a lot of condition damage you are going to need to go glass like everyone else

Destroys the entire point of conditions. But then again, you already said this before, and you got the same reply from several people, and you still persist, so I’m not holding my breath…

So the point of conditions is to be OP you say???

And also, several people its not you and your condimancers club… sorry but there are other classes that play this game too… too bad for you i guess, we are more.

I’d reduce the damage + duration on conditions + their application rate (cooldowns) (bleed/burning in particular). They currently eat through health way too quickly.

Physical:

• Toughness
• Vitality
• Power
• Precision
• Critical Damage
• Aegis
• Protection
• Evade

Conditions (at current):

• Vitality
• Condition Duration Reduction (hard to achieve in sPvP, WvW conversely allows many ways of stacking this)
• Condition Removal (limited and on long cooldowns while the sources are spamspamspam)
• Condition Damage
• Condition Duration

In a balanced wonderland, over-stacking conditions that then get cleansed should be a punishment not a “Oh, oops… let’s just reapply them all!”. Make their cooldowns longer (or lower the cooldowns on condition removal and/or add secondary effects if you cleanse a kittenton of conditions in one go) and less auto-applied with already burst-y skills.

Conditions work outside of defensive stats aside from Vitality since you have no trait-way of stacking duration reduction and traits affecting condition removal is limited, and they need only one (sometimes two) offensive stats to make potent. Cut their damage such that you’d need close to two to three times the investment in condition damage to match a physical spec since those require three stats to actually function to any great degree.

Also add a boon that does the same as protection but for conditions, whether that’s to damage or duration.

What im still amazed is the crazy amout of condition damage a tank can do… it really is impressive, i would love to do that on a tanky power build… but guess who has to invest in other two stats to get decent damage aside from power.

The real issue with. Conditions is the other not so damaging perks you get in addition to your main damage. That means CC with chill, cripple, immob or reduced defended with poison and weakness. No power build can remotely match these utilities that going condition heavy provides.

Fenrir.5493:

So the point of conditions is to be OP you say???

And also, several people its not you and your condimancers club… sorry but there are other classes that play this game too… too bad for you i guess, we are more.

I never said that, why would you think so? Condition damage has a place, just like power damage has a place. Changing it to a slower variation of power damage will effectively remove it from the game.
And please stop accusing people that disagree with you of being in some sort of “condimancers club”. Accept the fact that you are not always right, and that sometimes in life people will disagree with you.

They don’t need to nerf damage. They don’t need to add tons of new boons and stats. All they need to do is lengthen CDs and durations on condi skills and make condi cleansers remove more conditions (maybe on a little higher CD too).
That way if condi throws all his CDs on you, you can remove it and he is a sitting duck. If condi actually thinks when to use his abilities, you can still mitigate part of his damage. And if you don’t bring any cleanses, it’s solely your own fault.

The Boz.2038:

Fenrir.5493:

So the point of conditions is to be OP you say???

And also, several people its not you and your condimancers club… sorry but there are other classes that play this game too… too bad for you i guess, we are more.

I never said that, why would you think so? Condition damage has a place, just like power damage has a place. Changing it to a slower variation of power damage will effectively remove it from the game.
And please stop accusing people that disagree with you of being in some sort of “condimancers club”. Accept the fact that you are not always right, and that sometimes in life people will disagree with you.

No it will not. It will however, remove retarted specs that can both deal massive armor ignoring damage through condis while having 3.1k armor and perma protection.

Toughness/Armor should reduce condition damage, problem solved.

Increase the power of condition cleanses by either making them remove more conditions, introducing more ways to remove conditions, or lessen the cooldown on condition removal skills.

Change it so these same cleanses will remove an equal number of boons as conditions if enough boons exist.

This was how Shadowbane’s dispell system worked in effect and Shadowbane probably had the best group pvp system for an MMO at the time.

Answer:

- Give toughness trait line passive condition defense.

Players with High HP do not feel the damage that much.
Players with Low HP get destroyed in seconds.

High HP should not qualify bunker/sustainment, not in any game. Currently, Toughness means just about nothing in PvP.

Daecollo.9578:

Toughness/Armor should reduce condition damage, problem solved.

Littlefeather.8623:

Answer:

- Give toughness trait line passive condition defense.

Players with High HP do not feel the damage that much.
Players with Low HP get destroyed in seconds.

High HP should not qualify bunker/sustainment, not in any game. Currently, Toughness means just about nothing in PvP.

As I said before, that would kill the entire point of conditions. Why do damage over a long period of time if you can do more damage NOW and kill the enemy NOW?

The Boz.2038:

Daecollo.9578:

Toughness/Armor should reduce condition damage, problem solved.

Littlefeather.8623:

Answer:

- Give toughness trait line passive condition defense.

Players with High HP do not feel the damage that much.
Players with Low HP get destroyed in seconds.

High HP should not qualify bunker/sustainment, not in any game. Currently, Toughness means just about nothing in PvP.

As I said before, that would kill the entire point of conditions. Why do damage over a long period of time if you can do more damage NOW and kill the enemy NOW?

Ask the people who ran condition builds in gw1. Damage of conditions had a cap there and they did not stack, yet they were still very useful. It’s called pressure, but perhaps that can’t exist in this much simpler game, mainly due to lack of healers.

Master of Timespace.2548:

The Boz.2038:

Daecollo.9578:

Toughness/Armor should reduce condition damage, problem solved.

Littlefeather.8623:

Answer:

- Give toughness trait line passive condition defense.

Players with High HP do not feel the damage that much.
Players with Low HP get destroyed in seconds.

High HP should not qualify bunker/sustainment, not in any game. Currently, Toughness means just about nothing in PvP.

As I said before, that would kill the entire point of conditions. Why do damage over a long period of time if you can do more damage NOW and kill the enemy NOW?

Ask the people who ran condition builds in gw1. Damage of conditions had a cap there and they did not stack, yet they were still very useful. It’s called pressure, but perhaps that can’t exist in this much simpler game, mainly due to lack of healers.

Well I don’t need to remind you that health degeneration ignored armor rating in gw1.
There was way more armor ignoring damage in gw1. Consistent damage output is important for pressure.

A possible solution to conditions can be:

- Remove the stacking in intensity mechanic: making conditions not stacking in intensity will make full condition spec more pressure-oriented than burst-oriented.
- Allow stack in intensity only between two different casters: this will help specifically in PvE, when condition stacking is Always at top and condition spec are in most cases useless. That means that if two professions apply bleed, the single bleed effect is added on each other.
- Change Condition Damage with Condition Effectiveness: this makes all conditions stronger, also non-damaging ones. For instance (numbers can be tweaked), Weakness with 0 condition effectiveness give 20% glancing chance and 20% less endurance regen, while with 1500 condition effectiveness it gives 70% glancing chance and 70% less endurance regen.
- Reduce the damage scaling with Condition Effectiveness: make conditions good also with 0 investment into Condition Effectiveness, but giving a good margin of effectiveness to full-condition specs. For instance, bleeding (non stacking) will have long duration and deal 120 dmg per second with 0 condition effectiveness and 200 with 1500 condition effectiveness (numbers can be tweaked).
- Tone down the condition removals of some professions: since conditions are not that bursty anymore, in order to not make them useless condition removals should be toned down.
- Make Condition Effectiveness and Power not mutually exclusive: that means tweaking gear stat spread, because right now they makes hybrid builds not that viable.

“Condition Damage > Direct Damage”

Talk this to Mesmers and his illusions.

And about conditions… I think conditions are a good way to couter some buker dps classes. Forces they to sacrifice dps or sustain to carry some cleanses (i actually carry 4 cleanses to deal with conditions. Then, condition aren’t problem to me)