Guild Wars 2

So, my post above is hardly news to anyone. The current Meta is an absolute kittenshow. This is a cautionary warning and tale to the Devs about where this is going.

Back in 2004, Magic: The Gathering released the Mirrodin card set. When this happened, a deck known as Ravager Affinity utilized a unique set of synergies, rose to the top of the scene and absolutely devoured the Meta. It was unstoppable, and smashed even decks designed specifically to counter it at about a 60:40 win rate. Player participation in tournaments cratered and an outflux of players began.

To quote:
“And so began an exodus of players and casual support for Magic because no casual, innovative or “fun” deck could survive in the world of Ravager Affinity. It was faster than the fastest aggro deck, had a continuous stream of gas and answers in response to any form of control or hate cards and had a relatively low learning curve for most beginners while guaranteeing success. Worse still, unlike today with formats like Commander to satisfy people who decide to wait out the storm, 2004 Magic did not have such a luxury.”

Guild Wars 2 does not have anything for PvP players to wait out the storm until February with. The only other PvP type (Stronghold, which I love), is limited to a single map, and even that is currently gone. This is an emergency situation. The Pro scene is dull to watch and even the competitors find it detestable. Viewership is cratering. Casual PvP is a nightmare thanks to the combination of MMR and Leagues. The worst thing that can be said about a game is now the buzzphrase that everyone is using. It’s not fun.

Take a look at this article, written by Wizards itself: http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/eight-plus-one-2005-03-04
You can replace nearly every word in it with the appropriate Guild Wars analog and it will still ring true. Here is an altered version of the most telling paragraph:

One of the most kitten ing statements that can be made about a game is that it is not fun, and that’s exactly what we’ve been hearing lately about the meta. Sure, ever since elite builds first showed up after the release of HoT,… people complained about it. I have plenty of anecdotal evidence in my inbox of people quitting GW2, threatening to quit, or stepping away from PvP for some amount of time because of the dark cloud of the current meta—and believe me, each of those emails made me unhappy—but recently the evidence of the general public’s disdain for what the format looks like has gone from anecdotal to measurable. With some of the biggest PvP events of the year—Regionals, Nationals, and Worlds—on the horizon, how many more players could we continue to frustrate and alienate?

This is what’s happening to you. Fix the meta, and swifty, or you’ll suffer the same if not worse. I understand it takes time to balance things. PvE and knockoff effects must be considered. If you want to save the ESL scene, take a drastic step. Something like limiting teams to one of each class or banning certain amulets/runes may seem drastic, but at this point you desperately need a fix and don’t have the luxury of time.

I write this because I love this game, and I really enjoy the PvP. I had an absolute blast at PAX East last year watching the ESL World Championships. The Shatterer statue and Rytlock plushy I won reside on my desk and couch respectively. I want the scene to thrive and for my friend and I to share drinks and laughs/shouts as we wreck face/enjoy the tournaments. Please listen to your fans and communicate with them. We don’t make this noise because we hate you. We genuinely want this game to thrive, and your silence makes us feel more and more alienated now than ever before.

I don’t think the Dev’s truly read the forums. Much as this is a handy post, odds are low you will make an impact much less get a read/response. I hate to be that person to crush your hopes, but it has to be said. I wish you luck, I’m waiting for Thief to be viable. It died around half a year ago.

I’m pretty aware they don’t give two kittens about the forums, but you do see a post once in a blue moon. I felt like the comparison had to be drawn, just because of how bad it got the last time around. At least posting this, I can feel like I’ve said my piece, and swap over to playing FF14 without feeling too bad. Just from personal experience, I’m willing to bet a good deal of the Anet team is sympathetic and there’s just one stubborn kitten in a place of power who’s blocking any actual progress or communication.

A thing to note is that Magic: The Gathering is basically all PvP. GW2 is far from that, so you will not have such drastic effects as people flooding from the game due to a bad meta, because there are not a whole lot of players that solely play PvP. What would happen is people would flood away from PvP, but not necessarily the game. And then (in the ideal scenario), people would come back once a balance patch arrives.

10/10. I’m only posting this because I care, too.

Whether or not they read it, thank you for taking the time to write this, Sajuuk.

Couldn’t agree more. I’ve already noticed players leaving (friends, guildmates, and today..myself), something needs to be done quickly or PvP in this game will fall further into the grave it is already in.

Thanks for writing this up man, here’s to hoping at least someone at ANet reads this.

Very interesting read, and I found myself nodding along. +1ing in the hope of getting this attention.

It isn’t bunker classes that ruin the game. What’s ruining the game is conquest. Too much emphasis on point control and not enough on actual combat. Remove conquest or give it a maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaajor overhaul. Theyre competing with games like League and DOTA that have beautiful level design.

Great example for those who haven’t played either if these games:

The enemy team is beating your doors down and your team is on the defense. You’re the jungler (player responsible for securing minibosses, among other things). You see Baron (a boss that grants your team a super powerful buff for a few minutes) is up and your team is holding the defensive line down just enough to stall the enemy’s advance. You grab your oracle’s alteration (to whiff any hidden “radars” placed by the enemy) and manage to remove the wards. Of course, the enemy has noticed you removing their vision of Baron and know you can solo him fairly quickly. Now, they’ve got a choice. They either continue down your base and hope to best your team and the defensive turrets or intercept your taking of Baron.

Case A: they take their chances and keep trying to bash your allies heads in. You take baron and now your allies and allied minions deal a ton more damage and manage to crush the enemy entirely (thus keeping them on a rather lengthy 50s+ respawn) giving your team a chance to gain enough ground and even win the game.

Case B: the enemy gives up and goes in to intercept Baron. You see that they’ve left the base which can only mean they’re headed your way to intercept Baron. Knowing this, you back off and allow Baron to reset. While the enemy decides to take Baron (since they’re all there, most likely), you have your smite ready and your team is moving in to disrupt. During the commotion, they either take Baron and get wiped because they’re low (and lose the buff), or you steal the buff with your smite and your team manages to ace the enemy with their added damage from Baron.

Case C (lolswtfscenario): everybody was so engrossed in the fight over Baron that nobody noticed the enemy jungler slip away and take their fifth dragon buff. Both teams escape losing an equal amount of members, but the fifth dragon buff mostly mirrors the baron buff, keeping the game stalemated until both sides have all of their members back up. At this point, the surviving players with the baron and fifth dragon buff are the keys for both sides winning and proper plays from them at such a late stage of the game would decide the outcome of the game.

What happens when one team is beating another down in GW2? Can you knock them off point and decap/cap?

If yes, enjoy stalling the game until the time limit.

If no, may as well call it in then.

If you want to draw any parallels with League or DOTA, thief is the jungler. Imagine my previous example without dragon or baron. The enemy team would have no reason to stop hammering the enemy in their base, would they?

Before this becomes a “THEY RUINED THIEF” post, my point is that there simply isn’t enough complexity in conquest for anything but this brain dead bunker meta to flourish. I use thief as an example here because it used to be that you actually needed to manage your allies and their healing/DPS resources appropriately across all the points while keeping tabs on the enemy thief who would sneak behind you all, steal a point, potentially circle around and gank some weaker enemies, or continue capping while doing battle with the enemy thief or cutting off any enemy reinforcements. Before HoT, we had cele ele dominate. Before 6/23, we had cele ele, engi, and warrior. If we look even before that (pre cele), we had a different slew of problems, but it almost seemed like the game was more entertaining back then. I don’t know, it seems like there have been too many design mistakes for them to fix things gradually. They can either exert a herculean effort and attempt to balance EVERYTHING in one huuuuuge push or simply scrap this mess and start from scratch. Anyways, I’d stop hoping for minor fixes (I call “balancing” bunkers minor) because the issue runs faaaaar deeper than that.