Guild Wars 2

Since this is a controversial topic, please don’t respond without reading this ENTIRE post, because there’s a good chance that your response will be addressed within the following. If it’s not, comment away – I’m all ears.

This topic has been discussed a number of times, and in my experience the community has actually been pretty split on the subject. It may not seem that way because most of the people who really hate the downed state have long ago walked away from these forums (and likely SPvP entirely) but I’m bringing it up again. Hoping for sincere, reasonably mature discussion on this topic.

The best way to look at the downed state objectively is to consider the pros and cons. I’ll start with the cons, and you guys can cover the pros, as none come to mind for me.

1) It makes 1 versus X fights impossible for the already disadvantaged party
If you are fighting two players on your own, chances of you winning are very slim, even if you outplay them considerably. You will not find time to execute a player when another player is focusing you, unless you’re fighting a pair of blind quadriplegics. Furthermore, the player you down will have numerous escapes or crowd controls you need to avoid in order to actually complete that execute. It’s just not going to happen. This removes variability in combat. If you’re outnumbered, more often than not your only option is to run.

2) It encourages (demands?) zerging
Might sound like the same point, but I want to further advance this by saying it actually affects the entire flow of the battle. Because of the revive system, the control your allies offer to protect you while you’re down, and the fact that some classes are exceedingly difficult to execute for one person…the best strategy is almost invariably to move as one big unit. This gets very stale, very fast and is a huge factor in that, “Wow, what a mess of entities and particle effects.” feeling that so many players express when they’re new to PvP (aside from the swarms of AI, but that’s another topic for another day).

3) It greatly limits build diversity
Long ago, before warriors were the monsters they are now, I played a glass cannon greatsword warrior. Using a well-placed knockdown, as much of hundred blades as could be channeled, and then a whirlwind, I could often drop a given target who wasn’t particularly using his dodges/cc/kiting options well. It was impossible for me to then execute them in a teamfight. If you are made of paper, standing still for that 1.5s cast is much harder than it is for a tank.
Currently, as I’m playing a much tankier build (like nearly every non-thief/mesmer in SPvP), I just sit in a teamfight all day and roll in points and glory. As a tank, getting those executes off is much easier. Sure, they teleport away, have friends to control me, or CC me themselves…but I can survive through these effects. For many classes, the downed state makes toughness/vitality in large quantities mandatory.

4) It slows the game down
Zybak mentioned this in a video on the subject from 2012 and the issue is still true, though he didn’t really give the needed details. The gameplay is very clunky with the downed state, and makes certain cooldowns mandatory for getting a kill in a teamfight situation. Often in a direct teamfight, you must activate a stability cooldown to make a kill happen. This makes kills overly dependent on these CDs because the downed state just requires you to commit too much to make a kill happen

5) It can last absurdly long, despite being a lot less fun than the actual gameplay
This is opinion based, as some of you might be just like, “Oh yeah, throwing rocks! Woo! Yeah rocks!” but I’m not the first to feel this way. Often times, because of how hard you can be to execute, you get stuck in the downed state for a long, long time. You just sit there, violently throwing rocks. You wish you could just die and get back into the game – playing your class and build as you designed and enjoy it. Alas, you get to sit on the ground throwing rocks.
It’s also not fun to fight against. For me, it robs me of the dramatic moment of the play that actually landed the kill. Maybe a clutch last-minute attack wins you a fight, but now you’re probably going to be downed as well, if you’re low, and you can just sit there and throw rocks at each other. Didn’t FFXIV get completely remade because their game had too much rock throwing?

6) It looks kind of stupid
I won’t go into a lot of detail here, but when you have a rifle, a giant sword, flaming waves of magical death, or a horde of undead abominations…looks pretty dumb when you have to run over and slowly perform a single punch to kill your opponent.

Pros – The ball is in your court, downed state lovers.

Final Thoughts and Proposal:
Honestly, I feel like more could be said than this about the downsides of the downed state (Ooh, I’m clever), as this feature sincerely ruins the SPvP for me and several of the people I play with. Part of me wants to commend the devs for this interesting idea, and I think it’s great for PvE, but PvP balance is a very finite thing and there’s a reason no other PvP system has something like this. It’s difficult to balance, and frankly just a pretty unfun mechanic.

Now, I’m certain that most of the people who see this are people who still play the SPvP, and therefore are people who must tolerate/like the downed state. There are a voiceless thousands of people who have disliked the downed state enough that it’s more or less the reason they’re not here, reading about GW2 or playing Spvp. For instance, I recently got a small group of friends (3-6) to join me in Spvp, and overwhelmingly they all agreed it was a terrible mechanic, without any motivation from me to feel that way.

TLDR -
So, here’s my suggestion to everyone who loves the downed state and hates posts like this: Give us temporary, optional access to a form of SPvP without downed state. Don’t even balance anything for this new game mode, just briefly introduce the option as a test. Let the downed state speak for itself if it’s so great, and this new gametype will fail. If a great many people don’t have considerably more fun with this new downed-state-free game mode, I will boil my socks and eat them. Take that to the bank.

I think the game is more exciting with downed state. It premotes build diversity if anything, now instead of picking up nothing but damage oriented utilities you’ll be more inclined to pick up one or two stability or immunity granting utilities to help out with those stomps. It also forces you to play smart and save your blinds/immunities/stabilities for a stomp. As a bunker Engineer, the Elixir R toolbelt has granted me countless clutch (and very hard to time if I might add) self-revives. Not to mention those epic moments where you revive a teammate in the heat of the battle.

Without down state everybody would have the mentality of “kitten everything, I’m going to build as glassy as possible to burst down whoever I’m fighting as quick as possible”. And then every fight lasts < 20 seconds. Where’s the build diversity/fun in that?

Ameno.6813:

I think the game is more exciting with downed state. It premotes build diversity if anything, now instead of picking up nothing but damage oriented utilities you’ll be more inclined to pick up one or two stability or immunity granting utilities to help out with those stomps. It also forces you to play smart and save your blinds/immunities/stabilities for a stomp. As a bunker Engineer, the Elixir R toolbelt has granted me countless clutch (and very hard to time if I might add) self-revives. Not to mention those epic moments where you revive a teammate in the heat of the battle.

Without down state everybody would have the mentality of “kitten everything, I’m going to build as glassy as possible to down whoever I’m fighting”. Where’s the build diversity in that?

Currently I down glass cannons quite easily as a tank. I don’t think this would be the case at all. You don’t see glass cannons constantly putting everyone in downed state now.

Also those neat things you “add to a build to make it diverse” are things that everyone has to have or they do very poorly. Opposite of diversity.

I agree with OP about the issues with Downed State in general, and I love the suggestion just to test it and see. Anet should let us try it out as a form of faster paced PvP.

That said I like DS in PvE and to a lesser extent in WvW. A second chance is nice on larger maps.

Jackalrat.5493:

You don’t see glass cannons constantly putting everyone in downed state now

That’s because not everyone is running full glass nowadays, taking away downed state basically incentivizes more reckless play-style because when the opponent runs out of health they’re dead, nothing else too it so you don’t need to leave anything in your arrrrrsenal (censor lol….) in reserve. Basically promotes spamming all your skills/cooldowns as fast as possible.

The other really annoying thing would be conditions. Imagine having a really close fight with a necro, and ultimately winning but using all your condi removal in the process. The necro is dead, but now you’re down to < 5K health and you have 10 stacks of bleed on you. That would be kind of like cooking nades in older FPS games, e.g., using a grenade just as you die. You were outplayed, but just by virtue of hitting that grenade key just as you die (or running conditions) you’ve eliminated the other player from beyond the grave. It might not happen that often, but it would be annoying as hell the odd time that it did. I’m pretty sure conditions are removed upon down-state so condition specs don’t have a complete advantage when those scenarios do happen.

They could fix nr 5 by giving players the option to instantly kill themselves when they’re downed. If you know no one is going to be able to ress you, might as well just throw in the white flag and start that respawn timer asap.

Ameno, I think that circumstance, which exists as a potential in nearly every PvP type MMO already, would be a small price to pay for the plethora of benefits. Furthermore, many builds can cleanse those conditions, but I’ll consider that one pro of the downed state.

I’d also add that currently that same situation can happen just a little differently. You kill a necro by executing him, then the wall of conditions downs you. It’s gonna take you a few seconds to get up, giving plenty of time for you to get royally screwed by whatever may happen. It’s just the nature of fighting high, sustained DoT classes/builds.

Ameno.6813:

The other really annoying thing would be conditions. Imagine having a really close fight with a necro, and ultimately winning but using all your condi removal in the process.

Ameno.6813:

It also forces you to play smart and save your blinds/immunities/stabilities for a stomp.

The same could be said for managing condition removals/healing. ;-P

Ameno.6813:

Without down state everybody would have the mentality of “kitten everything, I’m going to build as glassy as possible to burst down whoever I’m fighting as quick as possible”.

Ameno.6813:

Jackalrat.5493:

You don’t see glass cannons constantly putting everyone in downed state now

That’s because not everyone is running full glass nowadays, taking away downed state basically incentivizes more reckless play-style because when the opponent runs out of health they’re dead

You assume people would optimize burst because players become easier to kill. You conclude this effective because most people will build burst/glass cannon specs.

This is circular logic/illogical; the basis for your premise exists in the conclusion.

Jackalrat.5493:

4) It slows the game down

Assuming a faster pace is better.

What is the ideal pace of play?

Dragon Bash Arena had no downed state and it was awesome.

Erebos.6741:

Ameno.6813:

Without down state everybody would have the mentality of “kitten everything, I’m going to build as glassy as possible to burst down whoever I’m fighting as quick as possible”.

Ameno.6813:

Jackalrat.5493:

You don’t see glass cannons constantly putting everyone in downed state now

That’s because not everyone is running full glass nowadays, taking away downed state basically incentivizes more reckless play-style because when the opponent runs out of health they’re dead

You assume people would optimize burst because players become easier to kill. You conclude this effective because most people will build burst/glass cannon specs.

This is circular logic/illogical; the basis for your premise exists in the conclusion.

You’re misconstruing my words a bit there. I’m not saying people are going to run burst specs because everyone is glassy. I’m suggesting that people have more incentive for running burst/glassy specs because there’s no downed-state. I fail to see how that’s illogical.

I vote No. Downed state is awesome and I love the extra element it adds to gameplay. I mean, I love that a fight against a good ranger using the elite spirit can be made or broken on how good the timing of the ranger is on activating the rez as well as how good the attacker is at stunning/dazing the spirit at the right time to prevent the rez.

Jackalrat.5493:

Furthermore, many builds can cleanse those conditions

This might just be an Engineer’s perspective, but it’s just so easy to proc conditions in this game and the means to cleanse them reliably is severely lacking. This is the exact same problem I have with stun breaks.

Erebos.6741:

The same could be said for managing condition removals/healing. ;-P

This is true! Granted, it’s much easier to save, for instance, a mist form in reserve compared to being frugal with one of your (and possibly only) condition cleansing utilities in the heat of a battle with a necromancer spamming conditions like it’s going out of style.

Dahkeus.8243:

I vote No. Downed state is awesome and I love the extra element it adds to gameplay. I mean, I love that a fight against a good ranger using the elite spirit can be made or broken on how good the timing of the ranger is on activating the rez as well as how good the attacker is at stunning/dazing the spirit at the right time to prevent the rez.

A smart player would actually just focus the elite spirit first and then the ranger. I would actually vote yes in the case of spirit rangers, it’s simply wayy too easy for them to rez themselves with their insta-cast, low-cooldown, insta-rez.

I don’t think a downed-state free game mode would make glass cannon builds OP. I constantly find myelf, as a toughness hoarder, knocking down these builds long before they knock me down.

However, it would make them viable. As it stands, many glass cannon builds are absolutely worthless in SPvP. Is that a better state for them? To just be totally non-viable?

I just sort of find the mass of tanky jack-of-all-trades builds to be a bit dull when it’s all you ever see.

I vote yes, mostly because of the complete imbalance of the current downstates (underwater rangers, for example). In fact, when I run glassier I can find classes that can not only take the last sliver of my health from downstate, but can then win simply because theirs is much more powerful than mine, or because they have a ton of AI hitting me.

How does downed state foster build diversity? Everyone just builds for survivability to land executes/revives. People keep saying that, but it makes no sense.

It would even work if glass cannons had some advantage for bringing down a player in downed state, but they don’t. If you build for heavy damage, the moment your opponent is in downed state, it’s like your traits no longer exist because the kill is that same 1.5s cast time for everyone. Giving everyone different builds but the same requisite for a kill (stationary in a clusterkitten AoE minefield for 1.5s) does not at all encourage build diversity. All people complain about on these forums are cooker cutter builds, and I think downed state is a huge part of that.

Oh I agree absolutely with the OP. Downed-State is the worst feature of any MMO I’ve ever played (beating WoW’s dungeon finder).

Ironically I find it far less frustrating in sPvP than WvW for example, where it is really detrimental to game-play.

In sPvP, yes it’s boring, unfun, unbalanced and slows the game down but it’s not game-breaking. It is however in WvW where it’s just a huge snowballing mechanic encouraging you to zerg with larger numbers.

As for the effects on the meta. Yes, glass-cannons are currently the ones who struggle most with finishers. So it stands to reason that removing downed-state would encourage burstier builds.

But then I ask if that’s really a band thing? The current meta is dominated by tanky classes. Encouraging a little more burst wouldn’t be a bad thing.

First let me say that my opinion of downstate is based entirely around team q. That being said, I think the downstate is an incredibly key part of what makes this game play as well as it does. I love how team oriented tPvP is and downstate adds a lot of team play and depth. Whether or not you can revive your allies and finish your enemies often decides a match. This isn’t a bad thing however, it merely requires players to know how to work with downstate to play at a high level. This is a team game, so know your strengths and those of your teammates. If you are bursty, down an enemy and cleave the body while a tankier teammate stomps. If it’s a thief, mesmer, or ele just cleave. If you are getting low, get near a bunker or someone else able to rez you. Stomping and rezzing are part of the game, and should stay. They add team play, depth, and excitement.

I think it could be tweaked, perhaps remove the self heal abilities. So any downed player will eventually bleed out if someone else doesn’t heal them.

Lopez.7369:

The game would risk being genuinely boring without downed state. It adds a layer of support-based gameplay that’s sorely missing from a game without healers.

Why would it be boring? Granted I acknowledge downed mechanics adds depth and influences strategy.

What do dedicated healers and down state have in common?
- They both offer healing-esque support.
Not saying that’s a bad thing, but how is it a good thing (for the game, not game-specific scenarios)?

Melding the supportive role into every profession means everyone has increased proficiency and supportive responsibility, but how does that cater for a larger demographic?

Could a game exist with dedicated and blended roles? Yes. Would it appeal to a larger audience? Yes.

So you can’t say it’s more enjoyable for everyone in this regard.

As an Elementalist I approve of this.

Since it’s so common for Ele’s to get insta-killed, it would save me wasting time in downed state waiting for someone to finish me off. Those extra seconds could be spent running back to the fight instead

Wintel.4873:

As an Elementalist I approve of this.

Since it’s so common for Ele’s to get insta-killed, it would save me wasting time in downed state waiting for someone to finish me off. Those extra seconds could be spent running back to the fight instead

And cut into my precious trash talking time? Never!

Ameno.6813:

Dahkeus.8243:

I vote No. Downed state is awesome and I love the extra element it adds to gameplay. I mean, I love that a fight against a good ranger using the elite spirit can be made or broken on how good the timing of the ranger is on activating the rez as well as how good the attacker is at stunning/dazing the spirit at the right time to prevent the rez.

A smart player would actually just focus the elite spirit first and then the ranger. I would actually vote yes in the case of spirit rangers, it’s simply wayy too easy for them to rez themselves with their insta-cast, low-cooldown, insta-rez.

The rez takes about a second to cast, which is why the ranger can use it to rez themselves (they trigger the cast right before they go down since it can’t be triggered from downed state)…so there’s no insta-cast involved. Also, the spirit is on a 180 cooldown and the rez has a 30 sec cooldown, meaning that they can self rez once, maybe twice in the perfect situation before the spirit dies.

And killing the spirit will take you a lot longer than throwing out a single stun on the spirit.

I would suggest you take a bit more time to understand class mechanics you have trouble with rather than hastily blaming them.

Lopez.7369:

It would be boring because players would have very little to think about beyond just spamming damage and trading off the point. Downed state adds a layer of gameplay that forces everyone to rethink “turns” — as in the time necessary to use certain abilities — and positioning just when a fight might be reaching its climax.

I think most high-level players likely feel the same way. While just mastering a rotation or positioning might be enough for most players, after a certain level the game needs extra layers of depth to remain interesting and raise the skill cap.

I somewhat agree. It’s hard not to increase the skill ceiling of games with added complexity.

Challenge establishes reward. It’s no surprise top-end players like yourself welcome difficult challenge.

Success reflects competency and competence is possession of required skill, but how does skill determine the success of combat if down state triggers passively, lowers the capability/skills influence of the afflicted and presents unfair vantage by rewarding the falling side with reviving capability?

Thank you Lopez — I appreciate your feedback!

I’ll take time to think about your views and might post back tomorrow.

If we ever see Public Test Servers, they could try that option. However, as someone said, you shouldn’t build up straight to score kills, getting some stealth, blind or stability is a thing.

Sadly, Necromancer, especially Power, lack every one of them

I think it would be cool to have it as a mode, at the very least let people test it as an option in the hotjoin servers see if the community responds and it catches on.

Think of it like SWAT in halo where it wasn’t the base rules but a game was made out of alterations…

“Coup De Grace”, aka “Finisher” – good idea, beautifully executed, allows you to show your level in PVP) – but the process of “finishing” in my opinion somewhat tightened) Perhaps it makes sense to make it somewhat shorter)

I think they should get rid of all the stupid dowed skills, such as the thief and mesmer ones that makes it very hard to stomp them quickly.

But then I can’t play my jihad lava tomb ele!

Erebos.6741:

I’ll take time to think about your views and might post back tomorrow.

It turns out I had enough time tonight, so I’ll post this now.

Lopez.7369:

I think that’s when the passive vs. active argument gets a bit carried away. There are going to be major mechanics in the game that are passive. Health is passive. Armor is passive. Downed state is part of that framework.

Yes, they are all passive defenses, so how come competitive games include passivity if it isn’t a fair derivative of skill?
I believe the reason is to help inexperienced players learn by increasing their exposure time.

I have two problems with down state in this regard:

1. Switching skill sets nullifies the point of passive defense, because players can’t apply their knowledge and it further expands the learning curve.
2. Passive influence should be demoted with increasing levels of competitive play to promote skill.

Lopez.7369:

I really don’t see it as too much of an unfair mechanic, even in outnumbered fights, because both sides have to deal with it and build for it.

Anything is considered balanced if all sides of the equation are equal, but respective to combat down state breaks this rule intermediately with varying player capability.

The same could be said for chess, however that’s not a fair comparison because fruitlessly losing a chess piece could have been prevented, whereas disabled capability in GW2 via down state can not.

Lopez.7369:

It’s also a matter of balancing the good and bad. In general, healing and support mechanics — and I count downed state in this category — are going to favor the side with the bigger numbers. That’s just the slight drawback involved with all of these kinds of abilities.

You hit the nail on the head!
- Nothing to add here that I haven’t covered already.

I think creating a gamemode without the downed state would be cool to see but, without healers (like many have pointed out) it would just be a fastest DPS race and would quickly change to a game of bunkers once again, like you claim the game is now (which I disagree that it is).

But hey, let’s see how it works out. If there’s anything I’d fight for or agree to be implemented though, it’s equal downed states for every one. Removing the fact that Eles, Mesmers and Thieves can’t be stomped on the first try.

I think the whole risk-reward concept is broken with downed-state.

It might take a tram 10 seconds to down an enemy player but their team-mates can revive them with a 1 second click.

That totally ruins the scale of a fight. Reviving is just too easy, especially for Guardians who can do it while fully immune.

Make reviving harder and take more time (especially with multiple players) and the problem becomes less of an issue.

Bsgapollo.5364:

They could fix nr 5 by giving players the option to instantly kill themselves when they’re downed. If you know no one is going to be able to ress you, might as well just throw in the white flag and start that respawn timer asap.

This is the same idea I had and I think, this might be a good idea.

In addition, ANet might add:

A “Disable Downed State”-Option for private Arenas.

By the amount of “instant suicieds” in downedstate and the use of this option, It might be possible to see if the majority of palyers likes/uses downedstate or doesnt like it.

In addition, we have still a huge imbalance in the effectiveness of downedstate, which is another thing to consider.
The #1 skills of the classes have big differences in the damage they deal, also some classes have abilities to heal / rezz themselves.
e.g.:
Ranger #3 (most OP downedstate ability i know)
Guard #3 Heal
Necro and Guard #1 heal
Furthermore,
The #2 skills of all classes have huge differences when it comes to its efficiency and as long as the only game mode is Conquest, it also doesnt seem fair, that some classes can “move” in downedstate (Ele, thief, mesmer with a big random factor).
Regarding this, it also doesnt seem fair that lanches move downed enemies, while other CC does not. I’d prefer if downed players could not be moved by any skill.

So there are a lot of problems with downed state which should get fixed, but in general, I actually like it, so I m for a fix or mandatory disable of it.

Ameno.6813:

You’re misconstruing my words a bit there.

How? You basically implied glass cannon isn’t effective against non glassy opponents in reply to Jackalrat claiming glass isn’t effective against tanks now, which means the only way it would become effective is if no one built for durability.

Jackalrat.5493:

1) It makes 1 versus X fights impossible for the already disadvantaged party
If you are fighting two players on your own, chances of you winning are very slim, even if you outplay them considerably. You will not find time to execute a player when another player is focusing you, unless you’re fighting a pair of blind quadriplegics. Furthermore, the player you down will have numerous escapes or crowd controls you need to avoid in order to actually complete that execute. It’s just not going to happen. This removes variability in combat. If you’re outnumbered, more often than not your only option is to run.

Most Players that fight 1vX, do not stomp. Instead, they know that enemies will res each other. This gives the player free hits and pressure, your utility skills will be off cooldown and your enemies will be using utility skills to secure the resurrection. Yes, this will let the enemy res up, but you will get two enemies at half hp. You can also secure your stomp with blind, invulnerability, stealth, stability. So no, escaping is the worst option.

2) It encourages (demands?) zerging

*The downed system is partly the reason, but isn’t the sole reason. Boon range is one of them. AoE limits is another. Even if you remove the downed system, zerging won’t go away. *

3) It greatly limits build diversity
Long ago, before warriors were the monsters they are now, I played a glass cannon greatsword warrior. Using a well-placed knockdown, as much of hundred blades as could be channeled, and then a whirlwind, I could often drop a given target who wasn’t particularly using his dodges/cc/kiting options well. It was impossible for me to then execute them in a teamfight. If you are made of paper, standing still for that 1.5s cast is much harder than it is for a tank.

What does this have to do with down state?

4) It slows the game down
Zybak mentioned this in a video on the subject from 2012 and the issue is still true, though he didn’t really give the needed details. The gameplay is very clunky with the downed state, and makes certain cooldowns mandatory for getting a kill in a teamfight situation. Often in a direct teamfight, you must activate a stability cooldown to make a kill happen. This makes kills overly dependent on these CDs because the downed state just requires you to commit too much to make a kill happen

I agree, but the game is too fast and spammy in team fights in the current state. However, in 1v1, Bunkers are the reason why gameplay is slow. Not downed state.

5) It can last absurdly long, despite being a lot less fun than the actual gameplay
This is opinion based, as some of you might be just like, “Oh yeah, throwing rocks! Woo! Yeah rocks!” but I’m not the first to feel this way. Often times, because of how hard you can be to execute, you get stuck in the downed state for a long, long time. You just sit there, violently throwing rocks. You wish you could just die and get back into the game – playing your class and build as you designed and enjoy it. Alas, you get to sit on the ground throwing rocks.

*Maybe you see it as that way, but to me it is like a scene out of Saving Private Ryan. The enemy is about to finish you off on the ground then, reinforcement comes out of where and saves the day. I used to hate stomping as well. But the stomp finishers changed my opinion completely. *

6) It looks kind of stupid
I won’t go into a lot of detail here, but when you have a rifle, a giant sword, flaming waves of magical death, or a horde of undead abominations…looks pretty dumb when you have to run over and slowly perform a single punch to kill your opponent.

You are injured enough to go down. How can you have enough strength to wield your giant sword? How can you have enough power to use your flaming waves?

I hate down state and wished it was removed, but I doubt that’s ever going to happen. What bothers me more about DS is that finishing a downed player can rez multiple players. It’s great if you’re the one stomping with several teammates that are down, but being on the flip side sucks. It also makes 1v2’s impossible. I would think that if I outplayed 2 or maybe even 3 players, that I would be the only one standing, but downing a player who’s throwing rocks at you, or better yet a mesmer getting a rogue out that hits like a truck while you’re trying to take on his teammate, is what’s wrong with downstate.

Basically, you’ll never win a 1vX because of downstate.

I too do not like the down state. Especially in pvp.

Here are some ideas
1) when you are down you do not have any skills. Your team can rez you. Something like this
2) when you are down you only have 2 skills: throw that silly rock or the basic heal one. So all professions have the same skills.
3) Make finishing a downed player much faster.

In general I love the concept of the downed state. I think it’s the one thing that makes a game without healers (and tanks in pve) work. So no, I would not have it removed.

In a Teamfight downed state really shines. I do recon that there is a problem in 1v2s though, seeing as if you outfight 2 opponents and down one you will still lose generally. Maybe starting the “finish him” move should give a short aoe interrupt? So you could interrupt the rezzing enemy and then stomp the downed player? In a teamfight you usually have stability so it wouln’t matter but it could help 1v2s.

Also all classes downed state abilities need looking at. IMHO thieves do too much damage, a lot of #2 abilities suck, ranger healing is insane, etc.

LelouchViBritannia.3607:

In general I love the concept of the downed state. I think it’s the one thing that makes a game without healers (and tanks in pve) work. So no, I would not have it removed.

In a Teamfight downed state really shines. I do recon that there is a problem in 1v2s though, seeing as if you outfight 2 opponents and down one you will still lose generally. Maybe starting the “finish him” move should give a short aoe interrupt? So you could interrupt the rezzing enemy and then stomp the downed player? In a teamfight you usually have stability so it wouln’t matter but it could help 1v2s.

Also all classes downed state abilities need looking at. IMHO thieves do too much damage, a lot of #2 abilities suck, ranger healing is insane, etc.

The thing is that you might stomp one of the downed enemies with stability (although not every class has easy access to it), but in that 1.5 secs, you’re just a sitting duck face tanking damage just to stomp someone you beat. When you do successfully stomp them, you’re pretty much guaranteed to lose to the second player.

I would test the heck out of this.

SuperHaze.4210:

LelouchViBritannia.3607:

In general I love the concept of the downed state. I think it’s the one thing that makes a game without healers (and tanks in pve) work. So no, I would not have it removed.

In a Teamfight downed state really shines. I do recon that there is a problem in 1v2s though, seeing as if you outfight 2 opponents and down one you will still lose generally. Maybe starting the “finish him” move should give a short aoe interrupt? So you could interrupt the rezzing enemy and then stomp the downed player? In a teamfight you usually have stability so it wouln’t matter but it could help 1v2s.

Also all classes downed state abilities need looking at. IMHO thieves do too much damage, a lot of #2 abilities suck, ranger healing is insane, etc.

The thing is that you might stomp one of the downed enemies with stability (although not every class has easy access to it), but in that 1.5 secs, you’re just a sitting duck face tanking damage just to stomp someone you beat. When you do successfully stomp them, you’re pretty much guaranteed to lose to the second player.

Well it depends on the classes involved really, but I think most of the time the problem is that the enemy can be rezzed faster than you can stomp. For your own protection, thieves can stealth, eles mistform, warriors endure pain/berserker stance, guards aegis, etc.