Guild Wars 2

This is to some degree a response to people asking for nerfs, but as I play different builds and classes I’m noticing that there’s a definite rock-paper-scissors relationship. I expect that a lot of the skills people want to nerf are skills used by the build that is good against their favored build.

Some examples:
1. Shatter mesmer
Strong against: burst thieves, condition-based necromancers
Weak against: perma-stealth thieves, D/D elementalists
This build is notably almost helpless against certain thief builds just because almost every skill requires a target and is interrupted (and put on cooldown) if your target goes stealth. Several skills can’t even be used because their cast time is longer than the amount of time the thief is visible. It also has trouble doing long-term pressure, which gives high-defense D/D elementalists an advantage.

2. Ritualist-style mesmer (staff/GS, drops iserkers and warlocks, then hides)
Strong against:perma-stealth thieves (because the illusions somehow know where you are)
Weak against: everything else

I’m curious if people agree with this, and what other relationships you’ve seen. I’ve only played about 50-60 matches in SPVP at this point, but I feel like the game is much more balanced than people on this board seem to claim.

Permastealth with thief? Please tell me how someone can actually permastealth in spvp…..we all want to know..

Rock/Paper/Scissors is, and always has been, a poor pvp model. If you can win a fight at the character select screen you’re playing a really bad pvp game.

P/D + D/P
Black powder + heart seeker, cloak and dagger. I’ve seen this played a fair bit, and with the right build you can never leave stealth. Not that this is a good build, but people who use it in WvW seem to use it in SPVP for some reason too.

Yea, a cnd dmg heavy invis thief can certainly be very hard to deal with in a typical Shantasm loadout.

However, as with pretty much anything when you are a mesmer, you can alter your build a bit to mitigate their advantage during a match if they become a major problem.

D/D tank eles are a bit harder since the really good ones can plan for your boon mitigation abilities and then just pop them all back up, making for a near impossible 1-on-1

btw: shatter mesmer is weak against burst thiefs xD

Maladon.5760:

Rock/Paper/Scissors is, and always has been, a poor pvp model. If you can win a fight at the character select screen you’re playing a really bad pvp game.

^
Exactly right. Rock paper scissors is one of the most terribad balance models ever for pvp games. Basically equates to: L2CharacterScreen

Braxxus.2904:

^
Exactly right. Rock paper scissors is one of the most terribad balance models ever for pvp games. Basically equates to: L2CharacterScreen

Yes, there are no amazing e-sports using R/P/S classes (a.k.a synergy).

ahem

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_Fortress_2

Some examples: …..

Oooh Oooh! Lemme try!
Thieves-
Strong against: Other Thieves
Weak against: Warriors and anything with more than 14k HP/900 Toughness
Warriors-
Strong against: Thieves
Weak against: Everything else.

Lol. Seriously though, there is no 1v1 in this game its 90% teamfight. And yeah, OP its pretty balanced except for ele downstate and sig res.

Jumper.9482:

Some examples: …..

Lol. Seriously though, there is no 1v1 in this game its 90% teamfight. And yeah, OP its pretty balanced except for ele downstate and sig res.

Yeah, and that’s the reason why tPvP has a huge and dedicated fanbase, and streamers have tons of viewers all day long.

/endfacepalm

Jumper.9482:

Lol. Seriously though, there is no 1v1 in this game its 90% teamfight. And yeah, OP its pretty balanced except for ele downstate and sig res.

That’s why the team tourney/competitive/esport scene is huge and thriving with thousands of viewers and dedicated fans following it….

BTW these apply to thieves in GW2 just as much as the game they were made about back in the day:
http://youtu.be/Vnvn0swfviw

Mrbig.8019:

Yeah, and that’s the reason why tPvP has a huge and dedicated fanbase, and streamers have tons of viewers all day long.

/endfacepalm

i would like to know how many viewers had league of legends when he was just released… and look !!! it is a moba!!!
gw1 should have had no viewers at all because except few offline tourneys, every other MAT & co. was in observer mode.

Shukran.4851:

Mrbig.8019:

Yeah, and that’s the reason why tPvP has a huge and dedicated fanbase, and streamers have tons of viewers all day long.

/endfacepalm

i would like to know how many viewers had league of legends when he was just released… and look !!! it is a moba!!!
gw1 should have had no viewers at all because except few offline tourneys, every other MAT & co. was in observer mode.

Above all, because it is INTERESTING TO WATCH.

Conquest is no fun, because it 90% of the time ends in a boring bunkering-roaming meta ( guess what meta we have now) and it was aNet duty to AVOID it ( like they keep on saying in their “balance phylosophy”, saying they don’t want bunker and burst to rule supreme, because it literally KILLS build diversity), and they’re currently miserably failing on that.

People saying the meta is fine are simply bunkering/bursting fanboyz, having no real interest in a balanced/competitive metagame.

Fine with me, i really don’t care: after all, the ones streaming ( and having no views) are them, not me.