Guild Wars 2

It doesn’t take long when playing something such as thief or warrior to realize that you are simply ineffective, and a drag for your team. While coordination could make them not as much as a drag, simply playing a meta with the same coordination would still be much more effective. Thus, we have the question. Buff the weak, or nerf the strong? The simplest answer seems to buff the weak, as there are technically a fewer number of sub par classes than there are average classes or OP classes. But, if we did buff them, they may end up being the next Dragon Hunter, opening a new can of worms. If we took the time to nerf the stronger classes, the numbers would become smaller and easier to manage in the long run leading to a higher quality of play. However, since Anet doesn’t usually balance their gameplay in any timely manner, especially in the middle of any leagues, this method would take much much more time. So, any thoughts or preferences?

damage and cc is just too high and the bunker specs are just way too strong. Really damage and sustain needs to be shaved. no one needs buffed.

HoT brought too much power creep. More nerfs than buffs are needed IMO.

Nerfs. Many classes currently have insane sustain to the point that nothing short of a glass cannon can kill them. Its ridiculous. The sustain is real

Also as usual the classes with stupid ez button power moves probably need a good balancing. Ya Dragonhunters I’m looking at you.

Buffs at this point are a bad idea. That would just lead to more builds getting outa hand. I mean, medi guard isn’t meta but could you imagine us getting a buff? HAH

shave the op professions a bit.
buff the weaker professions a lot.

everyone’s happy.

power creep is good when everyone has bigger toys to play with.

A balance of nerfing and buffing. Unfortunately, Anet can’t seem to do either right.

Finally a good thread about class balance that contemplates the whole picture (that you cannot nerf the bunking without also nerfing the damaging, and the other way round).

Anyways I don’t think Anet is going to alter the class balance very much while there’s a league going on. They will possibly wait till season is off, not to alter the competition too much.

Vague Memory.2817
Anet trys to balance using self-interested views from the forum rather than being more objective, that is why after a balance patch things just get worse. There are blatant changes that need to be made that focuses PvP on player skill rather than passive or op effects, but they don’t have the courage to make these changes because of the outrage from people who will lose their advantage over others. Anet’s response is to even things out by giving everyone OPness which unbalances things even more.

Have put a lot of time into playing zerker berserker, know how to play it properly, know its strengths and weaknesses.

Played today with guild group, a mix of strong meta players and pve’rs. Organized strategy, 1 home, rest mid, PvE pro class to nix beast on way just for kittenz and giggles.

Arrive 10 seconds late to mid fight to no real detrament. Bunkers and bruisers climbing all over eachother as they like to do at mid.

Pick out targets, berserk, dump high DPS into kitten first at range (rifle), then with melee (GS). Time taken to wipe enemy team at mid fight after arriving? 10 or so seconds.

Rolled around like thunder there’after, rotating and destroying where needed.

Yeah war and thief are weak in the meta, yeah forging out reliable builds and rolls in an all in bunk meta is troublesome, but there are a couple of ways which the classes can shine IF you roll a half decent team comp. And that’s the problem.

Yes, we all know neither will work in top tier grand torny play. But so what, only 3 classes with 3 builds exist there, which has nothing to do with war or thief -_-u

In conclusion: Nerf revs, buff war sustain, give thieves a purple heart.

There has been a power creep so nerf.

Let’s look at it this way. Right now a bunker mesmer is the best point holder in the game. What? A light armored class is the best point holder? It is obviously broken.

style.6173:

Let’s look at it this way. Right now a bunker mesmer is the best point holder in the game. What? A light armored class is the best point holder? It is obviously broken.

wait wait wait, have we forgotten the cele ele meta? Light armor AND lowest hp pool -_-u

For some reason I don’t feel your logic applies.

Nerf the OP classes, they are WAY overtoned.

It’s never as simple as buffing or nerfing a whole class or build. You have to look at it on a skill-by-skill/trait-by-trait basis, which is what the design team usually does.

The design team is also good at looking at the bigger picture in terms of increasing the viability of builds that currently don’t see much play.

Technically speaking, nerfing is generally easier to do from a design perspective because overpowered things tend to be more obvious. It requires a little more effort to buff something that is weak.

Ultimately we’ll see a mixture of both buffing and nerfing like most balance patches. The only question is when.

style.6173:

Let’s look at it this way. Right now a bunker mesmer is the best point holder in the game. What? A light armored class is the best point holder? It is obviously broken.

I’d argue that rev is the best point holder in the game.

But then again, portal.

Now, on topic.
I actually argue that quite a few classes need a total rework.
Revenant’s kit, for instance, is a tough one to balance.
We’re talking about a class that has massive heals, looong blocks, an attacking skill that makes him unhittable for 5 seconds (on a 12 second cooldown). Oh, and a heal with no noticeable visual effect, and no delay, that makes it so attacks heal him for the next 3 seconds rather than do damage.

That kit is going to be hard to balance. It’s going to be easy to make him too weak/too strong.
And that’s not even getting into everything the rev does.

On top of that, a lot of classes just have dead weapons.
Off hand sword on mes? When do you use this thing? A fractal? Maybe?

I feel like nerfs, and refining the kits, is going to be the answer.

The thing that I like most about my mesmer, is that a lot of traits feel like I’m taking them over something close to/equal in power.

Now that’s not saying Bunker mes isn’t OP right now. It is.

Not because it’s a light armored class, and it’s tanking.
I actually really like the fact that the class can do more roles than just “Oh, I shattered on you”.

But it does deserve a look at its kit, and its numbers.

Buff theif and warrior i love power creep and burst builds
also buff mantras and izerker then mirrorblade back to 4 bounces.

how about both?

nerf elite specs and rev. rework warrior and buff theif.

Nerfs are in order. Thief and warrior are actually balanced, for the most part. Buffing them to bring them more in line with this ridiculous bunker meta is pointless, since that would do nothing to change the state of stale PvP.

SlayerSixx.5763:

Nerfs are in order. Thief and warrior are actually balanced, for the most part. Buffing them to bring them more in line with this ridiculous bunker meta is pointless, since that would do nothing to change the state of stale PvP.

warrior needs buff and a rework tbh. it’s so ruined after nerfs, neglect and how the game has evolved.

I’ve tried to theory craft some sort of rework for warrior, but how do you let them maintain their speedy burst in-your-face play style without encroaching upon thief’s territory?

Now that I think about it, placing emphasis on a speedier, more bursty play style for warrior would actually be a step in the right direction. I was always somewhat disappointed that GS war didn’t have that samurai sort of feel. Precise, methodical, and honed strikes worthy of a battle hardened soldier.

If something like this were to be done, then a thief rework would be in order as well. Something along the lines of total 1v1 domination through timed interrupts, dodges and disables all culminating in a single death blow. I feel daredevil was meant to do this, but all we’ve gotten is pogosticks.

Of course, this would then step on vanilla mesmer’s toes, but then you could allow them to adopt a more manipulative play style, placing more emphasis on the flow of the fight as a whole. I feel chronomancer was meant to do this, but conquest just promotes so much bunker BS, skillful and entertaining to watch fights are so far and in between that it almost makes you feel like anet honestly believes this is what good PvP looks like.

I’m scared to ask this, but did Nexon actually succeed in buying Anet behind the scenes?

SlayerSixx.5763:

I’ve tried to theory craft some sort of rework for warrior, but how do you let them maintain their speedy burst in-your-face play style without encroaching upon thief’s territory?

Now that I think about it, placing emphasis on a speedier, more bursty play style for warrior would actually be a step in the right direction. I was always somewhat disappointed that GS war didn’t have that samurai sort of feel. Precise, methodical, and honed strikes worthy of a battle hardened soldier.

If something like this were to be done, then a thief rework would be in order as well. Something along the lines of total 1v1 domination through timed interrupts, dodges and disables all culminating in a single death blow.

Of course, this would then step on vanilla mesmer’s toes, but then you could allow them to adopt a more manipulative play style, placing more emphasis on the flow of the fight as a whole. I feel chronomancer was meant to do this, but conquest just promotes so much bunker BS, skillful and entertaining to watch fights are so far and in between that it almost makes you feel like anet honestly believes this is what good PvP looks like.

I’m scared to ask this, but did Nexon actually succeed in buying Anet behind the scenes?

it’s needs some ways to refill its health bar.

mending becoming a physical skill, so its effected by peak performance would rock. +10% healing per bar of adrenaline and 16sec CD would be great. adrenaline when attacked should be baseline too ofc. reverting the adrenaline nerf would be nice too, nice druids can keep AF out of combat.

fast hands is needs to be baseline.

a lot of warrior weapon skills need to be revamped. warrior needs more boons and debuffs. leaps need to be speed up. lots of utilutes need changes too.

there is a lot to do, and over at the warriors forum we have had a lot of gret suggestions.

We have had too much power creep, so please do targeted nerfs.

Some traits since the June 2015 trait rework are still overpowered and some are underpowered, but the biggest offenders are the HoT elite specifications and revenants. Tone them down. If one weapon/skill does a lot of damage, it shouldn’t do lots of CC or utility at same time. At the same time some underused skills and traits could use a small buff (easiest is reduction of CD/ICD).

Warrior needs some added sustain, which could be easily done by reverting warhorn nerfs, adding 200 to shout base heal or reducing “To the Limit!” untraited cooldown to 25 seconds, giving warriors a sorely needed burst heal.

choovanski.5462:

SlayerSixx.5763:

I’ve tried to theory craft some sort of rework for warrior, but how do you let them maintain their speedy burst in-your-face play style without encroaching upon thief’s territory?

Now that I think about it, placing emphasis on a speedier, more bursty play style for warrior would actually be a step in the right direction. I was always somewhat disappointed that GS war didn’t have that samurai sort of feel. Precise, methodical, and honed strikes worthy of a battle hardened soldier.

If something like this were to be done, then a thief rework would be in order as well. Something along the lines of total 1v1 domination through timed interrupts, dodges and disables all culminating in a single death blow.

Of course, this would then step on vanilla mesmer’s toes, but then you could allow them to adopt a more manipulative play style, placing more emphasis on the flow of the fight as a whole. I feel chronomancer was meant to do this, but conquest just promotes so much bunker BS, skillful and entertaining to watch fights are so far and in between that it almost makes you feel like anet honestly believes this is what good PvP looks like.

I’m scared to ask this, but did Nexon actually succeed in buying Anet behind the scenes?

it’s needs some ways to refill its health bar.

mending becoming a physical skill, so its effected by peak performance would rock. +10% healing per bar of adrenaline and 16sec CD would be great. adrenaline when attacked should be baseline too ofc. reverting the adrenaline nerf would be nice too, nice druids can keep AF out of combat.

fast hands is needs to be baseline.

a lot of warrior weapon skills need to be revamped. warrior needs more boons and debuffs. leaps need to be speed up. lots of utilutes need changes too.

there is a lot to do, and over at the warriors forum we have had a lot of gret suggestions.

I honestly believe sustain as a whole needs to take a huuuuuuuge hit. You need to build for heal and only heal for you to be able to heal yourself/allies in an efficient manner.

For instance, in LoL, there’s a support champion named Soraka. She just dumps out the healing by the crapload. Naturally, if you ignore her, her team stays alive and slaughters yours. If you focus her, you ignore the tank who’s CCing you into kingdom come and the adc/ap caster who’s melting your face instantly. Before the tank related buffs, assassins (when done right), were a ridiculously valuable asset to the team, being able to all in (and sometimes escape) a key target. By removing the Soraka, simply evading the tank’s hard engage leaves the damage dealer ripe for the reking.

As you can see, there’s a ton of things to look out for in a team fight in better balanced games. Of course, that isn’t everything, but that’s a good bit of what is involved during actual head on encounters.

What about GW2? The best teams (before cele tbh) just focus fired whoever they could catch out of position and then proceed to destroying the now outnumbered enemy. There was no key target. There was no actual depth to team fights aside from who unleashed their wombo combo first. We are in desperate need of specialization here, like actual specialization.

Warriors will deserve heal burst/boons when they lose 8k from their base HP

But wait inb4 people jump at my throat saying “HP means nothing”..I say excellent, np then reducing war base HP by 8k, but you can keep the armor bonus as a ‘gift’

Also some more thing to add before asking for heal burst on war:

-Reduce base healing of Healing Signet so “that you must have now healing power”
-Reduce base damage of skills ( so that you can’t walk around with soldier amulet dealing zerker damage)

I mean…thieves and warriors want sustain..that’s cool but be ready to give up a big chunk of your damage if you want sustain; if you think that sustain in GW2 comes like a christmas gift..think again

I’d like to refer you to DH and power shiro/glint rev, kind sir.

SlayerSixx.5763:

choovanski.5462:

SlayerSixx.5763:

I’ve tried to theory craft some sort of rework for warrior, but how do you let them maintain their speedy burst in-your-face play style without encroaching upon thief’s territory?

Now that I think about it, placing emphasis on a speedier, more bursty play style for warrior would actually be a step in the right direction. I was always somewhat disappointed that GS war didn’t have that samurai sort of feel. Precise, methodical, and honed strikes worthy of a battle hardened soldier.

If something like this were to be done, then a thief rework would be in order as well. Something along the lines of total 1v1 domination through timed interrupts, dodges and disables all culminating in a single death blow.

Of course, this would then step on vanilla mesmer’s toes, but then you could allow them to adopt a more manipulative play style, placing more emphasis on the flow of the fight as a whole. I feel chronomancer was meant to do this, but conquest just promotes so much bunker BS, skillful and entertaining to watch fights are so far and in between that it almost makes you feel like anet honestly believes this is what good PvP looks like.

I’m scared to ask this, but did Nexon actually succeed in buying Anet behind the scenes?

it’s needs some ways to refill its health bar.

mending becoming a physical skill, so its effected by peak performance would rock. +10% healing per bar of adrenaline and 16sec CD would be great. adrenaline when attacked should be baseline too ofc. reverting the adrenaline nerf would be nice too, nice druids can keep AF out of combat.

fast hands is needs to be baseline.

a lot of warrior weapon skills need to be revamped. warrior needs more boons and debuffs. leaps need to be speed up. lots of utilutes need changes too.

there is a lot to do, and over at the warriors forum we have had a lot of gret suggestions.

I honestly believe sustain as a whole needs to take a huuuuuuuge hit. You need to build for heal and only heal for you to be able to heal yourself/allies in an efficient manner.

For instance, in LoL, there’s a support champion named Soraka. She just dumps out the healing by the crapload. Naturally, if you ignore her, her team stays alive and slaughters yours. If you focus her, you ignore the tank who’s CCing you into kingdom come and the adc/ap caster who’s melting your face instantly. Before the tank related buffs, assassins (when done right), were a ridiculously valuable asset to the team, being able to all in (and sometimes escape) a key target. By removing the Soraka, simply evading the tank’s hard engage leaves the damage dealer ripe for the reking.

As you can see, there’s a ton of things to look out for in a team fight in better balanced games. Of course, that isn’t everything, but that’s a good bit of what is involved during actual head on encounters.

What about GW2? The best teams (before cele tbh) just focus fired whoever they could catch out of position and then proceed to destroying the now outnumbered enemy. There was no key target. There was no actual depth to team fights aside from who unleashed their wombo combo first. We are in desperate need of specialization here, like actual specialization.

GW2 is a MMO..not a MOBA..comparing GW2 to LoL is like comparing an apple to a ..tuna

Except team fights are team fights and its obvious that GW2 is trying to emulate the big names in e-sports (DOTA and LoL).

Hell, you even say it in your signature :P.

Too much cc, and AoE Conditions are insane right now 5 AoE kiss your dodge goodbye or you have to use extra mobility to avoid it. I’m not sure why anet are so fond of it and saying gw2 and dota are 2 different genre yes but aren’t they trying to make the pvp e-sport so if that’s what they want they better rethink how they design the skills because right now the skill effect are all over my screen and i cant see whats going on.

I agree that some balance need to be done. The actual meta were bunker just sits on points tanking forever is just soooo boring.
The Rev kit is just way too strong. It feels like Anet decided to bring all sort of super strong mechanics from the game and put it on one character : Damages, evade, block, resist, high mobility, unblockable attacks, HUGE condi damages… I mean one character can’t get it all.
Bunker mesmer is just so boring right now. I mean I wouldn’t mind having some more tanky character and take time to get them down, but bunker mesmer isn’t even this. It’s just that you can’t hit him… So that feels really BS.

On the counterpart, buffs and nerfs must be seen really carefully.
I am actually really scared that because of all the crying they overbuff thief and it gets the new meta.
I mean, I hate bunker meta, but a meta where thief would be OP is even worst.
You wouldn’t be able to do kitten because everywhere you walk a kitten thief would come out of the shadow, one shot you, run away and cap the points.
I mean, thiefs totaly need to get some buffs, but be carefull how you do it.
I don’t want thiefs to become the master of the game.
I feel like a really simple burst that maybe could get them back in the game would be to give them a little of unblockable. They could actually kill those bunkers and it would change the meta.

Of course it’s just some hypothesis, and we’ll have to see how it goes.

I’ll throw in some of my experiences.
People claim for engineer to require skill to be efficient, I say it’s a load of lies.
Just roll marauder scrapper and randomly push buttons to be at least decent in every fight. The 24/7 boons and passives will carry you anyway (same with elementalists and revenants)
Nah, I played enough matches as an engineer to meet all sorts of players so I didn’t fight nabs as you might understand it that way.
The problem is Cele stats but those won’t be removed. Even though it is a hybrid stat mix, with certain traits that boost professions with a wide variety of combat abilities, the sustain/damage is really on par with each other which should be strictly forbidden to happen.
Since the dawn of RPG’s it was known to all of us that if you rolled a good ol’ fighter, you could hit hard and be reasonably durable but you couldn’t heal much or at all. If you picked a mage based class, you could control your enemies from distance with spells and heal yourself or your allies, but just a one good poke with a stick could break you.
Why cele bunkers have to get it all ? It doesn’t matter if it requires skill or not, if someone experienced gets their hands on such a build that has so much capabilities, then it gets annoying and tiresome to fight anyway.

Although – or more precisely because – my favourite profession is one of the top offenders I want nerfs. A lot of nerfs all over the board.

The June patch was a catastrophe, HoT a complete disaster. While I managed to adjust after the June patch, HoT totally screwed me over. The alternative way to play became the only way. I despise the power creep. The erosion of profession identity and mechanics makes it worse.

SlayerSixx.5763:

Except team fights are team fights and its obvious that GW2 is trying to emulate the big names in e-sports (DOTA and LoL).

Hell, you even say it in your signature :P.

I made a thread asking for buffs on war and thief, but didn’t specify what kind of changes.

People must be careful with what they ask, every class got strengths and weaknesses, yes including thief and warrior, simply buffing war and thief to stratosphere won’t do anything for the game..you’d just change the subject of complaints.

When asking for heal burst on war…don’t forget that war can chain 2x invulnerability that doesn’t stop him from keeping the point + shield block now on reduced CD, short CD dash , berseker stancer and more. On top of this all, war can still have 18k base HP by default, add the right amulet..and you have a monster..just another one

Thief is still able to chain stealth from morning till dawn and back again

My rule of thumb is that high sustain should be available only to those who spend months on the same profession..if not years of practice, nobody should become an unkillable rambo after watching a youtube video and copy/paste a build from metabattle

Re-invent the weak.
The current strong you speak about are slowly ticking down until even they just cant have fun anymore running a bunker or indefinite sustain. Eventually the search for something new comes about.
However the weak (Thief+warrior) are the 2 professions that were originally designed to be melee focused. To simply buff them isn’t enough anymore. Even large buffs wouldn’t be enough because they are still 2 professions filled with bugs. The creative well for melee play is dead empty it seems. Even the intro of revenant is a quasi mix of warrior+thief loosely tied together in a one dimensional form and given the thematic of the previous profession ritualist.

necro evolved to have shroud
ritualist evolved into engineer
Paragon evolved in guardian
Mesmer evolved into clones
Ele evolved into using all the elements.
Monk disappeared
Dervish disappeared
Assassin got a simple steal and stealth that is now ever present by multiple professions
Ranger evolved into druid
Warrior remained un-evolved

The melee focused profession need to be over hauled, re-imagined and need a new lease on life. Buffs ain’t enough to fix their woes.

Supreme.3164:

My rule of thumb is that high sustain should be available only to those who spend months on the same profession..if not years of practice, nobody should become an unkillable rambo after watching a youtube video and copy/paste a build from metabattle

And guess what? I agree with you. I don’t believe warrior and thief should just get straight DPS and healing added to their kit, since that would cause a whole slew of problems. I believe that the whole design needs a thorough looking at. Also, the 18k base means nothing in the current meta. Hell, reapers technically can wrack up 40k+ if they wanted to if they didn’t attack and ran in circles while managing their LF. DPS isn’t a major issue since thief can still (more or less) burst for around 10k+ out of stealth. The issue is the design overall.

Idk man, I feel compelled to comment because I love the game and what it used to be/couldve continued being, but its been ruined.

Buffs to anything would ruin the game.
We need blanket nerfs across all the elite specializations.

Nerfs. Elite specs were supposed to be an alternate way of playing the professions, not stronger, nor weaker. Wich warrior and thief is (not 100% sure about thief tho) but far more close than the op ones. Wich means warrior and thieves are actually balanced in the sense they are the strength they “should” be, while the op ones have broken elite specs where u essentially have to play them. Thusly the strong ones should be nerfed to put them in line with other trait lines and warrior and thief.

Obindo.6802:

Nerfs. Elite specs were supposed to be an alternate way of playing the professions, not stronger, nor weaker. Wich warrior and thief is (not 100% sure about thief tho) but far more close than the op ones. Wich means warrior and thieves are actually balanced in the sense they are the strength they “should” be, while the op ones have broken elite specs where u essentially have to play them. Thusly the strong ones should be nerfed to put them in line with other trait lines and warrior and thief.

+1

You are pretty much spot on.

I really think nerfs have higher priority. Everything should be nerfed to the point where the core builds like bunker guard, shatter mesmer, D/P thief, D/D ele etc… are strong enough compared to the elite specs (This will already make warrior viable).

Of course, there are still many things which need buffs: weapons, utilities and traits that have never seen use or have been overnerfed to oblivion.

Then, there are also things which are not just nerfs or buffs. The problem of warrior is that it has lost any niche. Pre-HoT, we had rampage warrior, carried by “rampage” which is bad design, and shoutbow, which I don’t think can reasonably compete with ele/guard for team support. There needs to be something that makes warrior unique.

And outside of warriors, there is the lack of build diversity. After the nerfs to elite specs, we will have classes like mesmers and guardians, who can work as well in offensive (medi-guard/DH, shatter mesmer) and support/bunker (shout guard, well chrono), but we have some which ware still locked into specific roles (thieves, elementalists, etc…). Here again, this is related to the problem of niche: currently, you can already make a bunker/support thief or necro, or a marauder elementalist, but you also know that another profession would do it better. What they did very well with bunker chrono is to create a new type of bunker which supports a team in a totally unique way. It is too strong, but the concept is cool.

So in order:

1. nerf elite specs to be competitive with but not overshadow core builds
2. create a niche for warrior
3. buff bad skills/traits so that you could imagine using each skill/trait in at least one specific context. At the same time (since this is related) make sure all professions can play at least 2 or 3 different roles efficiently, which is partly done by creating a niche on how to play this role differently.

Nerf.

Just looking at MetaBattle, you’re either nerfing 5 builds into the “great” category, or buffing at least 16 builds into the “meta” category.

It’s simple math.

Elmo Benchwarmer.3025:

The June patch was a catastrophe, HoT a complete disaster.

Pretty much this. The elite specializations deserve aggressive nerfs, but I also want to see the core trait lines toned down to put builds more in line with the pre-June versions.
Hey, I can dream, right?

As i have said in many more threads this is my opinion on how to balance the current meta:

Classes can multitask too much at the moment. It is unbelievable how many surviability herald, scrapper and reaper has for example, but also how much CC, damage and support a bunker mesmer, druid or ele can put out. So here is my solution:

• Heavy damage builds : Nerf their survivability. Don’t get me wrong, sure revenant in vipers can have a blocking/healing on shield etc. But it is combined with huge resistance uptime, alot of other boons etc making it unbalanced. Playing Soldiers currently gives almost same survivability as marauders. There should be more risk to squishy amulets!
• Bunker builds : I am fine with pushing out huge healing, however they should either have less other group support (alacrity/boons etc) or less damage/CC (ranger pets/Dazes). Look at the old Tank Guardian MetaBuild. It has very good tanking, but its the only thing it can do.

Obindo.6802:

Elite specs were supposed to be an alternate way of playing the professions, not stronger, nor weaker.

Not really. Elite specs were there to make players buy the HoT expansion. And so they had to offer something better than the current specs. Remember this is a business after all.

venusiano.8246:

Obindo.6802:

Elite specs were supposed to be an alternate way of playing the professions, not stronger, nor weaker.

Not really. Elite specs were there to make players buy the HoT expansion. And so they had to offer something better than the current specs. Remember this is a business after all.

Thought this was a balancing topic? Also, they stated it was gonna be alternate not stronger.

Obindo.6802:

venusiano.8246:

Obindo.6802:

Elite specs were supposed to be an alternate way of playing the professions, not stronger, nor weaker.

Not really. Elite specs were there to make players buy the HoT expansion. And so they had to offer something better than the current specs. Remember this is a business after all.

Thought this was a balancing topic? Also, they stated it was gonna be alternate not stronger.

Eh the problem is some of the alternatives go against the classes orginal weaknesses. The reason DD and Berserker aren’t really picked is because they both didn’t really do anything to provide said alternative playstyle, try just slightly reinforced the classes strengths but didn’t cover any of their weaknesses. Thieves are still squishy and can’t really stay on point that much, and warriors who rely a lot on passive effects for their defenses, received nothing in regards to that.

A middle ground needs to be reached among all professions and specs, but even then the problem with conquest is who can stay on point and survive the longest, so unless something changes with that, bunkers and tanks will always be the preferred builds of choice.

Silverkey.2078:

I really think nerfs have higher priority. Everything should be nerfed to the point where the core builds like bunker guard, shatter mesmer, D/P thief, D/D ele etc… are strong enough compared to the elite specs (This will already make warrior viable).

Of course, there are still many things which need buffs: weapons, utilities and traits that have never seen use or have been overnerfed to oblivion.

Then, there are also things which are not just nerfs or buffs. The problem of warrior is that it has lost any niche. Pre-HoT, we had rampage warrior, carried by “rampage” which is bad design, and shoutbow, which I don’t think can reasonably compete with ele/guard for team support. There needs to be something that makes warrior unique.

And outside of warriors, there is the lack of build diversity. After the nerfs to elite specs, we will have classes like mesmers and guardians, who can work as well in offensive (medi-guard/DH, shatter mesmer) and support/bunker (shout guard, well chrono), but we have some which ware still locked into specific roles (thieves, elementalists, etc…). Here again, this is related to the problem of niche: currently, you can already make a bunker/support thief or necro, or a marauder elementalist, but you also know that another profession would do it better. What they did very well with bunker chrono is to create a new type of bunker which supports a team in a totally unique way. It is too strong, but the concept is cool.

So in order:

1. nerf elite specs to be competitive with but not overshadow core builds
2. create a niche for warrior
3. buff bad skills/traits so that you could imagine using each skill/trait in at least one specific context. At the same time (since this is related) make sure all professions can play at least 2 or 3 different roles efficiently, which is partly done by creating a niche on how to play this role differently.

For warrior what about single target interrupts? sword/shield + hammer has great potential. Soldier or even crusader gear could be meta for serious tanking on points. The idea is to last long enough for the +1 to arrive and outlast the other guy. Shield bash being the fastest interrupt could be saved for the heal, but if you’re on hammer it might be more practical to use the faster interrupt.

There’s way too much stability floating around though so maybe an interrupt steals stability trait and give stability an internal cooldown? As a part time revenant I’ll dodge just for the stability so something’s broken there. However, all that stability is within the context of classes having lots of AoE CC. A solution would be a resolve bar to avoid CC abuse and for a few seconds you’ll get a status (not boon) like stability (boons can be stolen or converted to conditions) that avoids CC. This would be tuned so you can still do some stunlocking but avoid continuous CC spam on focus target until death.

Creating a niche for warrior did happen 2 years ago. They buffed warrior so they could hard counter the Necro that was poisoning PvP and WvW at the time.

TheLastNobody.8319:

Thieves are still squishy and can’t really stay on point that much, and warriors who rely a lot on passive effects for their defenses, received nothing in regards to that.

I’d argue that DD gives thieves a lot of sustain (of the kind mitigation, not plain heal over every dps). More evades, more dodges, more weakness, protection against movement impairing conditions, easy root removal.

The problem was that at the same time, a huge powercreep on pressure happened that outpaced the improvements DD give.

As it stands, I feel like DD is the only elite class that was correctly designed, with maybe Berserker too. Correctly designed in the sense of not going overboard on powercreep while still maintaining a little edge compared to non elites for HoT selling purposes.

stof.9341:

As it stands, I feel like DD is the only elite class that was correctly designed, with maybe Berserker too. Correctly designed in the sense of not going overboard on powercreep while still maintaining a little edge compared to non elites for HoT selling purposes.

I agree with the first part (not a lot of powercreep), but strongly disagree with the latter: a staff/dp DD is way, way better than any other basic traits spec hands down.

Definitely nerfs.

It’s a kind of strange state of meta right now. While it’s incredibly slow and boring, everyone is tanky, there’s also way too much damage, cc and half of this is passive.

Do you think it’s a coincidence that revenants are dominating the meta? They’re the only class that can put on viper/zerker amulet and have ridiculous amounts of sustain. Do you think it’s a coincidence that neither of the lowest hp pool classes have a meta dps build? Not really. Maybe it has something to do with the ridiculous condition pressure?

The amount of CC is quite crazy, too. It used to take a skilled player to interrupt things like Burning speed, Blurred frenzy etc. Now? It will get randomly interrupted during a teamfight, because everyone got some low cooldown cc that can just be spammed off cd.

And now all the sustain these elite spec brought to the game. It’s really insane they didn’t think it would break the game. If you got the right comp, you can just keep everything uncapped if you like. Your viper rev downed? Fear no more, there is a mesmer with quickness and Well of Precog to ress them up and there’s nothing you can do about it. Don’t worry, they won’t even lose the point if they managed to cap it.

I believe that moving stats from trait lines and buffing amulets wasn’t the right decision. First, it resulted in everyone one shotting everyone. Now we have 15 minute games that don’t even go up to 500. People are forced to build defensively, can’t blame them for it, but I think the devs failed to see the bigger picture when bringing in these new elite specs.

It seems like with every meta the game just gets dumbed down and I honestly don’t get how anyone can like this. Two months in and we only get a tiny balance patch and for bigger changes we need to wait another month of two? A complete joke.

Embolism.8106:

HoT brought too much power creep. More nerfs than buffs are needed IMO.

^^this