Guild Wars 2

Master of Timespace.2548:

That’s a trivial statement with no value. No matter how badly a given mechanic would ruin an otherwise interesting game, the statement “it’s part of the game” would still be true. Thus it can’t work as an argument when debating whether if a given mechanic should exist in a game.

I did specifically acknowledge the validity of the complaint for a reason, you know.

I just think the whining about this is overdone, because people act like the presence of minions is some overwhelming issue that can’t be dealt with, and it simply isn’t. So I don’t see how this is any less a “L2P” issue than any of the others that get tossed around.

People complain about all game mechanics that are effective: summons, clones, stealth, burst damage, conditions, AOE spamming, high mobility, tankiness, etc. It’s all basically just whining because people somehow want things to be easy (though how they themselves would kill others isn’t thought out too well). Variations in ways of killing opponents are part of what makes the game interesting, for me at least, and I wouldn’t want to see it neutered.

So I simply find ways to deal with minion classes. I’m far from exceptional (63% in solo queue atm) and I don’t find it that big of an issue, so I find it hard to believe that better players do. Most of the complaining is based on some philosophical objection about “how things should be” – even though my understanding is that GW2 has always been like this.

As I said the main complaint about the petting zoo is the screen clutter which is made worse by the extremely rudimentary UI the game has. If it had enemy name plates that showed castbars we probably wouldn’t even have this discussion.

The minions aren’t the problem. Not being able to see what the enemy is casting and not being able to select him swiftly to interrupt him is a problem. Because it removes skill from the game.

The solution is easy:

1) AI and pets are all exempt from AoE caps
2) All players are set to a larger size in PvP (say, human-size)
3) All pets are set to a smaller size in PvP (say 50% human-size)

LelouchViBritannia.3607:

The minions aren’t the problem. Not being able to see what the enemy is casting and not being able to select him swiftly to interrupt him is a problem. Because it removes skill from the game.

You’re claiming that something being difficult means that skill is being removed from the game, when it’s pretty easy to argue the exact opposite: that it provides more of a reward for those who are skillful at dealing with the minions.

Qaelyn.7612:

LelouchViBritannia.3607:

The minions aren’t the problem. Not being able to see what the enemy is casting and not being able to select him swiftly to interrupt him is a problem. Because it removes skill from the game.

You’re claiming that something being difficult means that skill is being removed from the game, when it’s pretty easy to argue the exact opposite: that it provides more of a reward for those who are skillful at dealing with the minions.

That’s not what I claim at all. Arenanet said they don’t want castbars because they want you to watch the action and react accordingly. Then they made the petting zoo. Which actively hinders you from seeing what is going on.

Either the petting zoo needs to be gone or preferably the interface needs a complete overhaul, with enemy nameplates and castbars shown at all the time. That is what promotes skillful play.

Your argument still hinges on the idea that it doesn’t take skill to spot what a caster is doing when he has summons, which isn’t true.

Hindering you from seeing what they are doing is part of the point of having summons. Just like any other mechanism that hinders players.

With maps this tiny, is it any surprise that the game ends up like this?

Qaelyn.7612:

Your argument still hinges on the idea that it doesn’t take skill to spot what a caster is doing when he has summons, which isn’t true.

Hindering you from seeing what they are doing is part of the point of having summons. Just like any other mechanism that hinders players.

First of all I do agree that the ability to attack the right target at the right moment is a skill and getting better at it is getting more skillful. But let me clarify my point further:

A lot of the skill at play in competitive games (one might say, esports especially at high level is playing mind games, reading your opponent, doing something he didn’t expect, etc. That’s what gets you an advantage and wins you fights/games, and this becomes more important as classes get more balanced.

So while being able to react to the caster while he has minions is a desirable skill mechanic, this hinges upon the execution of the mechanic ingame.

The problem I have with minionmancers and especially spirit rangers is that they are entirely passive on the pet players side. So in essence the other player doesn’t play against the pet player but against the guildwars 2 game engine in this regard. Which makes this such a frustrating mechanic to me. And which is also why I don’t mind fighting mesmers, as they need to be much more active with their clone generation.

yeah MM necros do bring a lot of clutter to the field.

but to be honest 2 wars / 1 guard / 1 mesmer , against 3 MM necros with a war , should be more then doable.

- The aoe alone from longbow/hammer warriors and guard can kill those minion in around 10 secs => 3 useless necros ( without any screen clutter )

- Mesmer has moa morpf => USE it on the MM necro = byebye minions

You guys had so many ways to counter those MM necros, that i have to say the better players/team won.
Sure they used a build thats lame , but hey so are most warrior builds to atm

Wasnt that why you switched from ele to warrior in the first place? You saw 3 necros and all of a sudden you wanted to play warrior ( the hard counter of most necro builds ). To bad it failed

Hope you learned your lesson , do not switch to warrior for whatever reason .

cheerz

LelouchViBritannia.3607:

The problem I have with minionmancers and especially spirit rangers is that they are entirely passive on the pet players side. So in essence the other player doesn’t play against the pet player but against the guildwars 2 game engine in this regard. Which makes this such a frustrating mechanic to me. And which is also why I don’t mind fighting mesmers, as they need to be much more active with their clone generation.

Are they? I don’t know because I haven’t leveled a necro or ranger yet. And I do appreciate that you differentiate their minions from clones, because as a mesmer I know those are not passive. Yet I often see mesmers criticized in the same manner.

I’m sure the minions are passive to some extent. But lots of classes have passive abilities and traits.

Void.4239:

yeah MM necros do bring a lot of clutter to the field.

but to be honest 2 wars / 1 guard / 1 mesmer , against 3 MM necros with a war , should be more then doable.

- The aoe alone from longbow/hammer warriors and guard can kill those minion in around 10 secs => 3 useless necros ( without any screen clutter )

- Mesmer has moa morpf => USE it on the MM necro = byebye minions

You guys had so many ways to counter those MM necros, that i have to say the better players/team won.
Sure they used a build thats lame , but hey so are most warrior builds to atm

Wasnt that why you switched from ele to warrior in the first place? You saw 3 necros and all of a sudden you wanted to play warrior ( the hard counter of most necro builds ). To bad it failed

Hope you learned your lesson , do not switch to warrior for whatever reason .

cheerz

We have switched to that team comp just to counter them somehow.
Yes, we used the AoE from longbow and hammer, just to get wiped right after from Death Nova on that loads of minion dying. You can do the math from youself about how much damage you get from minions of at least 2 MM (they were 3 btw) dying all in a tiny time window from AoE, not to say the perma-poison it generates.
From that point on, we stopped using AoE and tried to focus on single necromancers, which didn’t worked too since we didn’t had enough time to kill one before minions killed one of us too.
The fight went with them winning all the nodefights they engaged with no issue whatsoever.

I assure you that they were ranging from r10-30 and none of them were that good, as I can clearly see on how they moved during the fight, how they barely dodged and how they used DS right before dying from full bar.
I’m not saying we are the best team ever, but I’m sure that the build made the difference and outplayed us, not the enemy players.
And yes, if we were better, we would have probably won that match, but that’s not the point anyway.

If I used Elementalist instead of Warrior, I’m sure the situation would have been much worse.

Fact is that these lame and imbalanced builds, relying only on the overabundance of a single spec, requires a whole lot of efforts to be played against while the other team can just enjoy relaxed the vision of enemy players downed on the ground one after another, while the minions do the work and generate a massive clutter on the screen, making the life of players who rely on timed dodges and situation awareness to win extremely hard.

Hell, I wasn’t even able to count how many they were on a node to inform the rest of the team and I’m pretty sure that no one at first glance is able to do so.

Thedenofsin.7340:

The solution is easy:

1) AI and pets are all exempt from AoE caps
2) All players are set to a larger size in PvP (say, human-size)
3) All pets are set to a smaller size in PvP (say 50% human-size)

doesnt help at all. just cuts the cancer, but not removes it.

gw1 had 2 sources of information: animation and interface..
gw2 has mainly 1 souce of information: animation and some basics in interface..

where u could fall back in gw1 to the interface for informationwinning u spended more time for informationgain but at least u got information what was happening. that was also a skillcap. players better in animationreading got rewarded more than players depending on interface.

Qaelyn.7612:

People complain about all game mechanics that are effective: summons, clones, stealth, burst damage, conditions, AOE spamming, high mobility, tankiness, etc. It’s all basically just whining because people somehow want things to be easy (though how they themselves would kill others isn’t thought out too well). Variations in ways of killing opponents are part of what makes the game interesting, for me at least, and I wouldn’t want to see it neutered.

So I simply find ways to deal with minion classes. I’m far from exceptional (63% in solo queue atm) and I don’t find it that big of an issue, so I find it hard to believe that better players do. Most of the complaining is based on some philosophical objection about “how things should be” – even though my understanding is that GW2 has always been like this.

You think exactly like these devs.
People ‘should respect and cherish what is there’, not ‘the game is made for people to enjoy’. One leads to trying to bend people to fit the game, the other bends the game to fit what people find entertaining.

And I play LoL.
Trust me, I don’t want things to be easy.

Qaelyn.7612:

Your argument still hinges on the idea that it doesn’t take skill to spot what a caster is doing when he has summons, which isn’t true.

Hindering you from seeing what they are doing is part of the point of having summons. Just like any other mechanism that hinders players.

Yeah, a mechanic that makes the game more confusing and less readable.

Its one of the reason Gw2 will NEVER become an esport this way: spectators can’t see what’s going on.

It’s just like giving a defensive mechanic that damages your internet connection.

I already think the way mesmers are built is annoying, but it makes more sense than minion necro.

I couldn’t care less about spectators, and if I never heard the ridiculous term “esport” again for the rest of my life, I’d consider it a blessing.

sorrow.2364:

just to get wiped right after from Death Nova on that loads of minion dying

hint: don’t stand on the point next to the aoe you just casted (or endurepain if you have it slotted)

permapoison

when you have 15 minions nova blasting the kitten out of you poison is the last of your problems lol

If I used Elementalist instead of Warrior, I’m sure the situation would have been much worse.

au contraire, go full aoe kamikaze and you will destroy all those minions in less than 8 seconds. (the total cast time of frost bow #4 + staff fire #5 + the signet whose name i don’t remember which triggers a storm).

a normal team would destroy you as soon as you get spotted, sure, but a team made of below average players playing classes with poor mobility won’t be able to get you before you unleash hell on the point.

Clutter shouldn’t be a factor in PvP. It’s not rewarding for the player creating the clutter, and it’s frustrating for everyone else.

Why not, in PvP only, do the following: (1) give pets 50% more health, (2) debuff pets to take 100% more AoE damage, and (3) make pets untargetable.

The goal would be eliminating clutter completely, while leaving pets killable. If you want to kill a pet, you can still do it using AoE skills. The health buff is to stop pets from becoming collateral damage. All of this would be restricted to PvP, so that it would not change PvE. (Just make it a permanent effect on pets as soon as they enter PvP or WvW.)

Lachanche.6859:

hint: don’t stand on the point next to the aoe you just casted (or endurepain if you have it slotted)

Point is that you need to stand in the point to get it contested and usually minions just rush on you most the time. You can do this trick if you don’t have any minion focus at all.

Lachanche.6859:

when you have 15 minions nova blasting the kitten out of you poison is the last of your problems lol

That is a problem, because if you manage to survive the blast, you’re going to die because of the lack of sustain.

Lachanche.6859:

au contraire, go full aoe kamikaze and you will destroy all those minions in less than 8 seconds. (the total cast time of frost bow #4 + staff fire #5 + the signet whose name i don’t remember which triggers a storm).

a normal team would destroy you as soon as you get spotted, sure, but a team made of below average players playing classes with poor mobility won’t be able to get you before you unleash hell on the point.

Yeah, but how was I supposed to know that they were MM?
As far I know, they could have been conditions or powermancer and in that situation, Elementalist would have died horribly.

When i tried the MM in tPvP, i didn’t pop ds only in my dying moments. When i reached a zone where my team mates where defending i pop’d DS and hit #4, gave them HP and help them with my minion’s stressing the opponents. Delivered’ some fears and toss’s. And to the run away guys i just hit torment, that gives a immobilize and fear again or hit the minion skill to hold them in the ground.

I guess it depends of the person that it is playing and i think that the rage that is going here its because all new pvp necros go for this MM solution so that they can manage to hold in tPvP.

Let’s be sincere, the management of the team composition in tPvP is broken…and you can see the +30 ranks destroying,for an example, new condition necros that don’t have any experience in this particularly type…so where’s the fun in that? So they try this “meta”.
I’m just guessing here.

Although i find this build kind of fun, i prefer my retaliation Guardian in PvP =D

Qaelyn.7612:

LelouchViBritannia.3607:

The problem I have with minionmancers and especially spirit rangers is that they are entirely passive on the pet players side. So in essence the other player doesn’t play against the pet player but against the guildwars 2 game engine in this regard. Which makes this such a frustrating mechanic to me. And which is also why I don’t mind fighting mesmers, as they need to be much more active with their clone generation.

Are they? I don’t know because I haven’t leveled a necro or ranger yet. And I do appreciate that you differentiate their minions from clones, because as a mesmer I know those are not passive. Yet I often see mesmers criticized in the same manner.

I’m sure the minions are passive to some extent. But lots of classes have passive abilities and traits.

Manipulating and using clones to ones advantage is not passive play, when people refer to passive play that is in regards to phantasms, and phantasm-centric builds.

MM necro and Spirit ranger are both considered quite a bit more passive than other playstyles, both my the community at large and many people who main those classes.

Enzo Kensei.9850:

Let’s be sincere, the management of the team composition in tPvP is broken…and you can see the +30 ranks destroying,for an example, new condition necros that don’t have any experience in this particularly type…so where’s the fun in that? So they try this “meta”.
I’m just guessing here.

Although i find this build kind of fun, i prefer my retaliation Guardian in PvP =D

MMR is there to avoid people getting matched with strong players. There is no reason to also give new players a build they can play succesfully without efforts so they have absolutely no reason to get better.

This will only frustrate people who don’t play those lame builds and eventually lead them to run them too. That’s pretty much how metas happen.

Yes… not broken at all

Enzo Kensei.9850:

Yes… not broken at all

MMR does not mean rank.
Most of the r50/r60+ players you see are most likely people who have farmed the rank through skyhammer pre-nerf, who aren’t necessarily good players.

I’ve seen r60 players having no clue on how to play whatsoever in SoloQ and it is far from uncommon.

Enzo Kensei.9850:

Yes… not broken at all

Oh don’t worry. Don’t you remember? They told us like 4 or 5 months ago they were working on it.

Thedenofsin.7340:

Enzo Kensei.9850:

Yes… not broken at all

Oh don’t worry. Don’t you remember? They told us like 4 or 5 months ago they were working on it.

considering how many things already are on the horizon, it must get really tight there

Sorrow, the 2 necros were MM so i couldn’t really tell if they were skilled or not =(. But the thing is that the team started with 4 and then 3