Guild Wars 2

Quickness is just too powerful. 100% increase in DPS is too much.
PvP currently boils down to avoiding and when to use quickness and above all decides the outcome of PvP.

I wouldn’t say PvP is decided on it, but I do think all forms of quickness should be removed, and this is coming from someone who mains a Thief and has a Ranger alt.

I don’t think it should be removed, but I agree that it’s much too powerful and needs to be toned down (this coming from someone who plays both classes with and without Quickness).

Possibly something like a 50% speed increase and doubled duration (except Time Warp, which should be 50% increase, same duration), but with the same drawbacks. Enough to make a difference, but requiring more thought to using it than what is currently needed.

Please be specific about class and skill you are talking about, so any dev can actually start something with it. Overall there are some deadly skills/builds and in order for quickness to be effective you need a “glasscannon build”, which is overall part of the normal trade off in the game.
As far as I know quickness doesn’t feel overpowered in the sense that people don’t need it to win a tournament / be in the first places in a spvp match.

If going to nerf quickness, conditions and CC needs nerf too. Otherwise warriors wont have a chance with so many infinite knock downs, snares, immobilize, invisibility, copies, blinds, double evade jumps, stun breakers, etc etc etc…

Many times we warriors only have few splits seconds near the target before all those things come in and make our character completely useless. So it’s a must for us.

Isn’t the real issue the usual combo of having too much cc while also being able to unleash that ammount of burst?

Not saying warriors (as example) have that cc. But if another player does the cc’ing, and than the glass canon does the bursting (quickness here) than it doesn’t matter if the opponents have 2 as well. Something is bound to drop apparantly.

And if one class has both the cc and the burst ready… than it’s defenitely going to be a problem.

my own view on this is: remove the burst.
But as a consequence a lot of the melee needs to be revamped somewhat I guess. They do have limited uptime.
This said: this game at least offers every melee to have viable ranged options, kiting only works so far in pvp here.

In my fresh look on GW2, I’m very very new to the game, I think pvp is already fast paced and chaotic enough. it doesn’t need speed burst like quickness added to it.

But yes: that would ask for some rebalancing of those relying on short uptime.

It should be 40%.

As a warrior, I don’t even run quickness. It’s rather effective to counter once you can recognize whose using it or not.

i agree with the sentiment. quickness is the most out of balance mechanic in the game right now and just about every complaint about unfairness of burst damage is really a complaint about quickness.

thiefs that kill 1,8k thoughness 20+k hp targets under a second is the reason why quickness should be removed.

Quickness is flat out unreliable against players that know what they are doing.

Ayestes.1273:

Quickness is flat out unreliable against players that know what they are doing.

this could well be true, not experienced enough to tell.

but if it IS true, than clearly there is no harm in nerfing it.
Still useless for the players that know what they’re doing, and no longer too strong for the rest of us.

^Unreliable is to nice of a word. I would categorize it as ‘a hindrance to ones ability to defeat an enemy whose awake’.

Thank you Ayestes, that is exakittenhe point. Quickness has a high cooldown and all you need a one CC or something as simple as a right dogde (of course the CC will be much more easy to avoid the whole combo).
Don’t see any problem with the warrior here, as he has to use Frenzy for quickness AND endure pain (otherwise he will drop soo easly). The shortest cooldown here is from frenzy which is about a min.
That sounds fair to me. It is so good that people will use it, but you have fair options to counter it.

I relate to the sentiment of being melted in battle, but melting him with retaliation/breaking his quickness is pretty good as well.

I’d say the bigger problem are the debuffs.

The only one that provides a true negative debuff when using Quickness is Frenzy, making the warrior take 50% more damage.

If all quickness effects had this, it would be fine. But atm, the ranger debuff isn’t even noticeable and the thief debuff is countered by having Vigor and stealthing.

Frenzy is op if you don’t know what you are doing. If you do know what you are doing and you see someone (especially a warrior) using frenzy they are dead.

Once you are at the point where both players understand each other capabilities, the ability to take advantage of Quickness is akin to a game of cat and mouse. That part is what we would call skill, and creating opportunities to use Quickness in this is method is in my opinion extremely fun. A build in this case can either choose to keep Quickness to see if they can trick an opponent into it and create an advantage for themselves, or slot another utility skill that would probably be more reliable.

Nerfing Quickness in this case makes it so that it’s entirely unusable. You don’t nerf things that are already questionable in value unless the reward is way beyond the risk and cost. The reward for successfully pulling off a Quickness burst needs to be high, or else the cost of taking it and possible risk of using it outscales the reward. In this case, the cost and risk are rather high. Additionally, it will always be unreliable. The only situation in which it is reliable is when you intimately know your opponents build, which is rare. The reward needs to be high, and I’ll agree that it is effective when pulled off.

I have no problems countering Quickness in the vast majority of situations as my Engi or Mesmer. If I make a horrible mistake though and get caught, I think it’s thrilling. I died because I screwed up, not because of the game. I need to get better. It creates a unique mechanic in these PvP fights where dodging at specific moments are much, much more effective then random dodging. Your dodging skill is exponentially more valuable against a Quickness burst utility.

The skill which enables you to kill someone in 3sec even if they are not pure glass cannon is not fine in any context (e.g. "it’s useless vs players who know what they are doing). This just shouldn’t happen, it’s ridiculous.

IMO. Games like this need that speckle of ‘Impending death is near’ otherwise people wouldn’t use a variety of builds or actively try to learn to dodge / interpret boons and conditions.

Quickness has its place. However, I think it would be fair to apply the 50% damage taken condition AFTER the 50% increase in damage buff has occurred. Lets be realistic you don’t want to try attacking a Warrior when they are burning through a Quickness attack. But you’d love to afterwards!

you dont get it obviously. quickness is not a problem on the warrior, engineer or mesmer. you see them coming and their big hit abilities can be dodged.

it is broken in spvp on thiefs, thiefs that can stealth outside of your vision, walk up to you and blink into range. my current build has almost 1,9k thoughness and over 20k hp. I am defending a point. thiefs attacks me out of stealth opens with backstabs and follows with spamming any other ability he has. I am dead before I can even react or press a button because in the first splint second he puts out over 20k worth of dps due to the backstab and quickness which allows him to quickly follow up with alot of abilities. if the thief player is not kitten then he will win any 1vs1 in a second when his quickness is up and the cooldown is not exactly huge. to make it even worse, coming out of stealth starts with the stealth reappear animation and it just takes too long which makes the thief not visible for a splint of a second. the thief should appear instantly and sometimes the player model does not load at all because of the bug that exists since the beginning of the beta…

I rolled a thief 2 weeks ago and it is amazing how easy it is to put out such huge damage numbers. sorry but if you are unable to kill the target with quickness fast enough before they can react then it is not the l2p issues of others but yours. quickness on the thief is broken and I abuse it everyday now.

Isabis.9561:

The skill which enables you to kill someone in 3sec even if they are not pure glass cannon is not fine in any context (e.g. "it’s useless vs players who know what they are doing). This just shouldn’t happen, it’s ridiculous.

Except they don’t even kill you. They merely down you. With a tiny amount of teamwork you can get back up (this does not exist in open sPvP), and they have exhausted their cooldowns.

Not to mention, they shouldn’t kill you. If you are running your own glass cannon build with no extra active mitigation, then you still have two dodges to deal with. At that point as well, you are risking your own defenses to deal more damage. Do you not want to die in 3 seconds? Then you need to dodge the control and/or burst. Or slot a defensive utility and use that. Or use one from your weapon slots. Or use control back at them. Or use a blind. Or kite and line of sight them properly. Or pick up an attribute combination that has higher vitality and/or toughness. Or pick up a rune combination that increases your defense rather then offense. There are many more ways to deal with it as well, such as picking up a trait that helps you survive as well.

To be frank, in the two builds I play the most right now, I easily avoid their control into a burst combo and at that point they are loaded up with Confusion. They often kill themselves before the Quickness ends. Rangers, Thieves, Warriors, and even other Engineers. The typical user of Quickness in open sPvP is awful, and it can be exploited to make them punished beyond belief for it. Even in good tPvP matches, Quickness bursts are rarely successful. I used to think Quickness was overpowered… in BWE1. Since then I’ve learned to deal with it. If I can figure it out in one weekend, I’m thinking the vast majority can figure it out during the lifetime of this game.

CptCosmic.3156:

you dont get it obviously. quickness is not a problem on the warrior, engineer or mesmer. you see them coming and their big hit abilities can be dodged.

it is broken in spvp on thiefs, thiefs that can stealth outside of your vision, walk up to you and blink into range. my current build has almost 1,9k thoughness and over 20k hp. I am defending a point. thiefs attacks me out of stealth opens with backstabs and follows with spamming any other ability he has. I am dead before I can even react or press a button because in the first splint second he puts out over 20k worth of dps due to the backstab and quickness which allows him to quickly follow up with alot of abilities. if the thief player is not kitten then he will win any 1vs1 in a second when his quickness is up and the cooldown is not exactly huge. to make it even worse, coming out of stealth starts with the stealth reappear animation and it just takes too long which makes the thief not visible for a splint of a second. the thief should appear instantly and sometimes the player model does not load at all because of the bug that exists since the beginning of the beta…

I rolled a thief 2 weeks ago and it is amazing how easy it is to put out such huge damage numbers. sorry but if you are unable to kill the target with quickness fast enough before they can react then it is not the l2p issues of others but yours. quickness on the thief is broken and I abuse it everyday.

My response:
http://www.twitch.tv/defektive/b/333898008

Just give it the Stability treatment.

Becomes a boon, 33% increase only.

Change Chill to be the counter condition (-33% action speed) and adjust durations accordingly.

I would love to see that. =p

Ayestes.1273:

Except they don’t even kill you. They merely down you. With a tiny amount of teamwork you can get back up (this does not exist in open sPvP), and they have exhausted their cooldowns.

Except when I’m downed by a quickness face-melter, it usually includes a quickness finisher..

Knote.2904:

Just give it the Stability treatment.

Becomes a boon, 33% increase only.

Change Chill to be the counter condition (-33% action speed) and adjust durations accordingly.

I would love to see that. =p

Chill would be incredibly broken, and Quickness would be terrible. Quickness could be a boon possibly, but 33% increase is nothing over the course of 4 seconds. Chill is already one of the most powerful conditions in the game.

Defektive.7283:

My response:
http://www.twitch.tv/defektive/b/333898008

troll.
he does not use a backstab build, he did not backstabbed you at all and he did not even used quickness in the video you posted.

But he sure did spam his abilities didn’t he?

Backstab crits on me for an average of 4.5k (sPvP gear). That would have been the same opener.

Ayestes.1273:

Knote.2904:

Just give it the Stability treatment.

Becomes a boon, 33% increase only.

Change Chill to be the counter condition (-33% action speed) and adjust durations accordingly.

I would love to see that. =p

Chill would be incredibly broken, and Quickness would be terrible. Quickness could be a boon possibly, but 33% increase is nothing over the course of 4 seconds. Chill is already one of the most powerful conditions in the game.

Making Quickness a boon doesn’t imply it’s still only going to be 4 seconds, and applied from a single skill.

Same with chill, as I said, adjust durations accordingly. smh

Knote.2904:

Ayestes.1273:

Knote.2904:

Just give it the Stability treatment.

Becomes a boon, 33% increase only.

Change Chill to be the counter condition (-33% action speed) and adjust durations accordingly.

I would love to see that. =p

Chill would be incredibly broken, and Quickness would be terrible. Quickness could be a boon possibly, but 33% increase is nothing over the course of 4 seconds. Chill is already one of the most powerful conditions in the game.

Making Quickness a boon doesn’t imply it’s still only going to be 4 seconds, and applied from a single skill.

Same with chill, as I said, adjust durations accordingly. smh

Ah, I didn’t connect the adjust durations piece to Quickness. Sorry about that. It’s possible, but I don’t think it needs to be fixed when I don’t really find it broken in the first place.

Even with incredibly short durations, I think that would be incredibly overpowered on Chill. This is coming from a user of Freeze Grenades, where I already find it incredibly powerful. Again though, it’s more of a why fix what isn’t broken aspect to me.

Defektive.7283:

But he sure did spam his abilities didn’t he?

Backstab crits on me for an average of 4.5k (sPvP gear). That would have been the same opener.

backstab builds crit up to 8 on targets with 1,8 toughness. 4,5k is not a backstab build. there is a big difference in having quickness up on a proper build and having no quickness on a bad build. problem is thoughness is less effective on big hits as it is on many small ones. a backstab thief with quickness can open with a big crit and in a split second follow with anything else. the guy in the video you posted did not even came from stealth, he just charged you headlong and landed a few autoattacks.

using bad gameplay as example is not a valid argument.

Firstly, he blinked in with full buffs up and did almost 9k damage to me in 2.8 seconds (pause and start the video for yourself to look at it, 06 -> 09).

Secondly, If you watch, he applied a stun and was about to use his spammy abilities. Instead I broke the stun and CC’d him.

I think you’re making a mountain out of a mound. Thieves aren’t difficult to beat. Especially when they are a glass cannon build. You just need to apply your utilities and counter them at the appropriate time.

By the way for stats:
2010 toughness
29,600 HP

Quickness is too powerful to just be available to half the Professions (Thief, Warrior, Engineer, Ranger). I’m not counting Mesmer and Guardian because its only avalaible through a really long cooldown to them. While it is possible to predict and avoid the first 4 seconds of quickness (in a 1vs1), the bigger problem are the secondary sources for quickness

• http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Superior_Sigil_of_Rage
• http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Critical_Haste
• http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Last_Chance

Especially Thieves can get a long buff of Quickness with some luck, which turns a duel into a dice roll.
I don’t consider it fun to have combat be determined by a single buff and dice rolls. Reducing Quickness to +50% attack speed seems to be the most obvious choice, although I wouldn’t mind to see it removed at all.
To clarify things, I’m talking about the buff Quickness and not about the Thiev skill: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Quickness

CptCosmic.3156:

Defektive.7283:

My response:
http://www.twitch.tv/defektive/b/333898008

troll.
he does not use a backstab build, he did not backstabbed you at all and he did not even used quickness in the video you posted.

you do know that Backstab builds don’t use Haste, right? its Sword+Pistol that uses Haste combined with Devourer Venom (immoblize) and Pistol Whip (high damage channeled melee attack).

Backstab Thieves use Assassin’s Signet (next attack deals 150% damage), Cloak and Dagger + Steal (to shadowstep to you and then immediately stealth), and traits to support this combo (Mug, to make steal deal damage, Hidden Killer, to make backstab and Mug automatically crit).

you should learn the actual builds before you comment. ignorance is not a very strong position to argue from.

I’d say the bigger problem are the debuffs.
The only one that provides a true negative debuff when using Quickness is Frenzy, making the warrior take 50% more damage.
If all quickness effects had this, it would be fine. But atm, the ranger debuff isn’t even noticeable and the thief debuff is countered by having Vigor and stealthing.

I just feel like this deserves more emphasis.

Frenzy on a warrior is basically pure suicide if anyone’s paying any attention at all, and it is COMPLETELY USELESS in any 1v1 situation. That’s in stark contrast to the ranger or thief versions (no healing for the former, sapped endurance for the latter), where the downsides are easily mitigated. There needs to be balance here.

I definitely think quickness should stay in the game for warriors as is.

100 blades is easy to counter. I got killed by it plenty of times. Now I make sure every build I play has enough stability to counter the initial stun and get away.

The main issue with thieves isn’t necessarily a thief issue. I can get away from the stun just like I can against warriors. The problem is when it takes too long for them to appear out of stealth after they attack, and all you see are a bunch of red numbers and you don’t see the thief. That’s a server problem. See “player culling.”

Also, the penalty for Haste and Quickening Zephyr should be the same as Frenzy. The QZ “penalty” of not being able to heal is not even a penalty. Since you can determine to use it when you do not need a heal. Haste depletes endurance, but thieves have an even better survivability mechanic in stealth.

As of now, warriors are the only class properly punished for using Frenzy. Engineers are properly punished 1/3 of the time.

I tend to agree that some skills are maybe a bit op … But I dont like hasted nerfing too and im not sure quickness is the top priority.

Yes its frustrating to be literally oneshot when u get caught by surprise.
Hence its NOT guaranteed win, i need to be caught by surprise and ideally while im not full health too, so i wont have time to react before being downed.

But by nature quickness or more generally glass cannon builds purely rely on this. Remove their ability to dispatch 1 opponent in a blink and they become useless subpar dps that die or disappear at the first sustained aoe fight.

Maybe, like retaliation, the problem is people can stack quickness from multiple sources without any real side effect to balance it. To avoid this maybe there should be an “exhausted” debuff after using any sort of quickness so you are weakened or cant benefit from another quickness for a while.

Maybe also the real “quickness frustration” is because it should only work on combat skills, not fiinshing a downed opponent. I always feel lame when finishing people in 1.5 seconds. it just goes : quickness -> burst -> finish downed .. U can press the F key while finishing your burst so it goes all in a chain. That is wrong, imho.

Unfortunately it probably does need to be addressed. I say unfortunately because I shudder to think of Ranger without it

Just reduce the speed increase. All versions of a quickness utility have costs to them meant to offset the benefit. Manage the benefit to match the costs and you’re set. Or inverse that even.

You my friend, are probably a glass canon with a horrible spec, respec, learn to avoid the gimmick specs with quickness, learn to kite, and stop complaining.

People who complain that burst takes no skill are the same people who don’t take stunbreaks and CC to pvp…

Spike plays a role in a team comp- and currently thief and warrior make excellent gankers because of it but taking that away from them would hurt pvp synergy more then help it.

Fiesbert.9816:

So far only people with poor reading comprehension disagree

When you phrase it like that, it doesn’t really make you seem like someone people want to agree with. Certain’y makes me regret implicitly doing so. I think the general feel is that it is fairly powerful as it (when use with certain builds), requires minor tweaks, but shouldn’t be removed or overnerfed.

I’d go as far to say that anyone who believes it should be removed or anything like that isn’t thinking things through. Because it’s really only something dangerous against really glassy or unaware individuals as is and even with a slight nerf, this will remain the case. It would just properly balance the risk vs. reward of it’s usage, which is aligning quite the way it should.

I’d go as far to say that anyone who believes it should be removed or anything like that isn’t thinking things through. Because it’s really only something dangerous against really glassy or unaware individuals as is and even with a slight nerf, this will remain the case. It would just properly balance the risk vs. reward of it’s usage, which is aligning quite the way it should.

Really? I am pretty sure when the melee assist train gets on you and pops their quickness/haste/frenzy/whatever it is pretty much an insta gib. Maybe this doesn’t happen so much in tPvP, but in sPvP the melee assist zerg rules all. There is also the fact that too many builds are relying on it to compensate for problems in the class. For instance, without quickness, where would Pistol Whip be? It would be trash, that is what it would be. How about we take out these bandaid haste effects and work on making skills that rely on them viable without them. I mean, look at Ranger. Taking haste is practically required to be competitive in a dps spec.

Remove it. It is not and will not ever be balanced, frankly. 90% of the complaints about burst damage are directly related to haste. Dying in 1-2s in an MMO has kitten people off since the dawn of the Internet. Don’t try to incorporate it into yet another game. You’ll never balance it and never justify it.

If something is balanced and increased by 100% its vastly overpowered. If something is fine while increased by 100% its vastly underpowered when not increased.
Its that simple. Quickness is bad.

Yes, I agree Quickness is an issue.

1. For one, stuff like Assassins Singet “only” add 50% more damage to the next ability. Obviously somebody thought 200% damage was too much.

2. Quickness increases your DPS by 100%, which considering the nature of PvP, can be far more important than simply high damage. After all, a quick attack is much easier to get off than a slow, lengthy animation.

3. The downsides of Quickness…aka the loss of all Endurance…aren’t really an effective counter-mechanism.
______________________________________

Solution: sPvP is already bursty enough. capping Haste at a 50% speed bonus while limiting the downsides would probably do overall balancing some good.

Ashanor.5319:

Maybe this doesn’t happen so much in tPvP, but in sPvP the melee assist zerg rules all.

This sentence sort of explains the parts before. But sPvP isn’t really what you balance around necessarily. Team composition is going to be nuts all across the board, which means that there are going to be situations in it that won’t happen in tournaments, especially in paid tourneys when they’re all set and ready to go. Situations that are hard to account for.

Perhaps I’m going to speak out of line but if Quickness was removed, I’m going to question if, even then, you’d still be able to deal with the three hypothetical opponents.

There is also the fact that too many builds are relying on it to compensate for problems in the class.

I’d partially argue that this might be a problem with the build. I have, for instance, a S/P thief with the familiar utilities that come with that but the build isn’t built around Hate or Pistol Whip but around Dodge and positional benefits. Noting this, I can say to the following:

For instance, without quickness, where would Pistol Whip be?

It would still be useful, even if they potentially kept the self root. Provided you have a strong understanding of how to pick and position your targets. Of course, a smart enemy might be able to dodge some of the hits but you’d still get them in if you were playing well. To say nothing of if your enemy is playing poor. Which of the two do you think you’re going to run into more in sPvP?

How about we take out these bandaid haste effects and work on making skills that rely on them viable without them.

Why not adjust the skills as needed and merely reduce the increase from Haste? The skills become more useful, people can retain the risk v. reward CD that they want in exchange for a more properly managed DPS boost (see the poster above me, even, for a means of doing this) if they so choose, and even someone like you would probably be happy, I’d wager.

Or does that seem too elegant a solution?

Quickness is obviously a bad mechanism. What is amazing is that it made it this far. A 100% damage increase from one ability is never going to be good for balance.

I’d partially argue that this might be a problem with the build. I have, for instance, a S/P thief with the familiar utilities that come with that but the build isn’t built around Hate or Pistol Whip but around Dodge and positional benefits. Noting this, I can say to the following:

While I agree you could make a build without it, adding it just makes PW that much more powerful in times when you need burst. Personally, I play D/P P/P and I don’t use haste in my builds. I use Shadowstep, Shadow Refuge, and alternate between Ambush Trap, and a few others for my third slot.

This sentence sort of explains the parts before. But sPvP isn’t really what you balance around necessarily. Team composition is going to be nuts all across the board, which means that there are going to be situations in it that won’t happen in tournaments, especially in paid tourneys when they’re all set and ready to go. Situations that are hard to account for.

Perhaps I’m going to speak out of line but if Quickness was removed, I’m going to question if, even then, you’d still be able to deal with the three hypothetical opponents.

I’m sorry but I really can’t agree with PvP not being balanced around sPvP as well as tPvP. The reason you don’t see that problem as much in tPvP is because people are less likely to be zerging around in a melee assist train. It doesn’t mean sPvP should be entirely left out of any balance decisions. Especially considering that is what the majority do, sPvP and WvW. You need to balance around all types of PvP, and if necessary do what they did in GW1 with skills working differently for PvE.

I deal with quickness just fine, I just don’t think it is balanced in the current form. I think it is detrimental to the game and unnecessary. I would rather see it removed completely than toned down. I’d rather my class not be balanced around this mechanic, nor do I want to see Ranger, Warrior, or Engineer balanced with this mechanic in mind. It will severely hinder the classes in the future because they will always have to consider what haste can do.

Get rid of it as an on-use ability from everyone. Leave in the 10% sigils if you want, that’s too random and low % to be abused but currently too many abilities become instantly overpowered and ‘the best’ as soon as you factor in Quickness.

Drop it like a vegan holding a steak.

You underpower yourself when you seek to depower a skill instead of figuring out how to beat it.

Sure, Quickness has one of the best rewards in sPvP. It therefore is also one of the riskiest skills to use. That’s how it should be, and if you learn to avoid it, those people that rely on it will lose to you.

That said, I don’t disagree that the negative effects should linger. A Thief popping Quickness during a Pistol Whip spam can’t take damage while evading and so is less likely to worry about having to dodge. There’s room for minor tweaking there.