Guild Wars 2

If there are customizeable build templates, i would be in favor of profession locking, but since there isn’t, i voted no.

You would get a personal rating for each profession.

Right now say if you queue and you’re in the gold tier range because you play guardian for several years. You have the ability to swap, say you wanted to be a druid instead.

But this person in gold does not have anywhere near as much experience playing druid than someone who is in the same rating they are in that mains a druid instead. So effectively, they would likely harm the team by swapping off guardian because they’re not experienced in playing another class.

This is why people do not swap even when it makes more sense to do so. If they’re going to play like a bronze player in gold you might as well call it a 4v5; do not swap unless you are confident you can perform as someone else with years of experience in the class.

So now you’re trapped into only playing one class, the moment you try to play druid you face against players and they destroy you. You’ve effectively made it unfair for the other 4 players in your team.

New system would fix this issue by giving each profession a seperate rating, therefore you can practise how to play druid without harming the other gold tier players until you actually earn gold yourself, or maybe you can only be silver as a druid.

I agree,

Im actually surprised by the voting.

I mean lets cut straight to the point, if you were locked into the the profession you started que with you get a rating for it.

Lets say match is terrible comp wise, the next step is for Anet to fix the balance issues of classes.

Lets all be honest, this community in GW2 is shrinking with the Pro Players moving to more competitive scenes, some of us with 5k /10k + games players are simply growing bored with the lack of build diversity and now the inability to play with friends.

We are truly split between the above average players moaning about certain things and the below average players arguing the exact opposite things.

The polls are not a good decision IMO, Anet can not cater to each group.

Who cares. There is no solo queue so all you see is who is good at duo queueing.

Reducing sample size doesn’t increase accuracy. Especially for classes that somebody doesn’t play regulary, class MMR would be most likely less accurate than account MMR.

And how good or bad somebody is at playing a class is only one factor among multiple other factors when determining how good or bad he is at winning games. A class based leaderboard would maybe make sense in a 1vs1 game mode, but not really in 5vs5 conquest.

The bandwagon of DHs want their 5v4 DHs matches.

well, you obviously vote no because you’d rather not play games with 3 thieves on your team if you don’t have to.

vote yes because of rose tinted glasses & enormous faith in anets perfect matchmaking, or just paranoid delusions.

Emdrix.6124:

Idk why most people voted no, if classes were locked it would be possible to see the best players of each respective class and the matchmaking would have been more accrurate.

I don’t know why so many people voted “yes”.

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

To counter the luck element, more players would play strong 1v1 builds which can survive in team fights like warrior and dragonhunter. Playing something which has clear weaknesses like support ele (can’t win if DPS is weak) or thief (not good against lost of DHs) is too much of a liability.

And this truth is hilarious considering most people voting “yes” probably thought this change would reduce class stacking.

the game doesnt have a big enough population for it if it was better then maybe and also do you expect anet to have you a balanced teamcomp against the enemys?

Exedore.6320:

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

This

My main is a necromancer. Necromancers require certain comps to work. The only reason I can play necro now is because I can swap off to another class if the comp isn’t necro friendly. If it gets locked I won’t be able to play necro because I won’t have agency in my team’s comp.

If we get profession locking I will be playing more warrior because warrior isn’t comp sensitive.

Crinn.7864:

Exedore.6320:

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

This

My main is a necromancer. Necromancers require certain comps to work. The only reason I can play necro now is because I can swap off to another class if the comp isn’t necro friendly. If it gets locked I won’t be able to play necro because I won’t have agency in my team’s comp.

If we get profession locking I will be playing more warrior because warrior isn’t comp sensitive.

yeah but i believe that the spec lock after the match starts is a good thing

zealex.9410:

Crinn.7864:

Exedore.6320:

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

This

My main is a necromancer. Necromancers require certain comps to work. The only reason I can play necro now is because I can swap off to another class if the comp isn’t necro friendly. If it gets locked I won’t be able to play necro because I won’t have agency in my team’s comp.

If we get profession locking I will be playing more warrior because warrior isn’t comp sensitive.

yeah but i believe that the spec lock after the match starts is a good thing

Which is exactly what a vote for no will give.

No one needs this masculine kitten length comparison. All need good PVP.^^

After start is a fix. On Q is progress….

ArthurDent.9538:

zealex.9410:

Crinn.7864:

Exedore.6320:

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

This

My main is a necromancer. Necromancers require certain comps to work. The only reason I can play necro now is because I can swap off to another class if the comp isn’t necro friendly. If it gets locked I won’t be able to play necro because I won’t have agency in my team’s comp.

If we get profession locking I will be playing more warrior because warrior isn’t comp sensitive.

yeah but i believe that the spec lock after the match starts is a good thing

Which is exactly what a vote for no will give.

^^ aye

Exedore.6320:

Emdrix.6124:

Idk why most people voted no, if classes were locked it would be possible to see the best players of each respective class and the matchmaking would have been more accrurate.

I don’t know why so many people voted “yes”.

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

To counter the luck element, more players would play strong 1v1 builds which can survive in team fights like warrior and dragonhunter. Playing something which has clear weaknesses like support ele (can’t win if DPS is weak) or thief (not good against lost of DHs) is too much of a liability.

And this truth is hilarious considering most people voting “yes” probably thought this change would reduce class stacking.

It could, to a degree, reduce class stacking just on the simple assumption that profession-specific MMR and leaderboards would create more incentive to play the classes you actually enjoy versus what’s actually best. I think claiming a top 10 title for a given profession also carries with it far more prestige than having a top 250 title—but maybe that’s just me.

And even if it wouldn’t eliminate it entirely, if leaderboards were profession-specific rather than a general top 250, there’d be substantially less incentive to cheese and would actually make flavor-of-the-month classes much harder to obtain titles with.

In games like Diablo III with its class-specific Solo Greater Rift leaderboards, it’s quite evident.

Crinn.7864:

Exedore.6320:

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

This

My main is a necromancer. Necromancers require certain comps to work.

What you’re complaining about isn’t a matchmaking issue but a balance one. I think most would agree that with the game’s direction pushing solo/duo queue it’s in the best interest of everyone to run builds that are self-sufficient. While not exactly “meta” classes, druid and engineer were very favorable solo professions for this reason last season.

If you want to play a build that’s reliant on support players being on your team, it may be also a good idea to just duo with an elementalist.

At the end of the day, forcing class-locking gives a much stronger signal to ArenaNet the strength of each profession and better identifies which situations they consistently struggle/succeed in. And if everyone suddenly stops queuing with their necromancers, that also will easily signal to ANet just how serious the problem is.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Crinn.7864:

Exedore.6320:

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

This

My main is a necromancer. Necromancers require certain comps to work.

What you’re complaining about isn’t a matchmaking issue but a balance one. I think most would agree that with the game’s direction pushing solo/duo queue it’s in the best interest of everyone to run builds that are self-sufficient. While not exactly “meta” classes, druid and engineer were very favorable solo professions for this reason last season.

If you want to play a build that’s reliant on support players being on your team, it may be also a good idea to just duo with an elementalist.

At the end of the day, forcing class-locking gives a much stronger signal to ArenaNet the strength of each profession and better identifies which situations they consistently struggle/succeed in. And if everyone suddenly stops queuing with their necromancers, that also will easily signal to ANet just how serious the problem is.

Thing is its a team based mode and not a solo experience which will happen if that change goes through. In every game there are classes/builds that work really well with other classes and the sinergy outweights the performance of each class if it was self sufficient, that creates further depth and also stresses the gamemore and anet far less. Since you live it to the players to make a comp for the specific team they are up against and the map. Im still in favour of that over having anet trying t find me a good comp any day of the week

Its too bad ANet does not explain clearly the consequences of the vote, in terms of balance and matchmaking, so people are a bit lost about what they want. I think there’ll be some mighty disappointment later, whatever it is you voted for.

I voted for profession locking, because in my understanding:

• This will allow people to play classes at a different level, instead of the level of their stronger class. As a result, it will lead to a more accurate matchmaking. Most players do not play at the same level on different classes – and the role/composition expected improvement when switching classes is often unknowingly counterbalanced by the lack of mechanical skills on the new class.
• This will allow to better tackle the class-stacking issue by including it from the matchmaking algorithm on – something which is not really possible to do if you allow players to change before the game start. Although I’m not convinced that class-stacking is such a bad thing, as long as concurrent builds exist for a given class… I’d rather have ANet introduce the notion of “role” when queuing, and match teams around it.

The duoQ hate is a bit strange. ANet has already acknowledged that there’s a bug in the matckmaking, which lead to 2+2+1 vs 1+1+1+1+1 in the last season – something they said they’ll fix in the next one. I think people also overestimate the impact of duoQ – two bad players communicating together will not magically make better decisions. And people concerned with cheating should be concerned about how to punish effectively, rather than removing a whole feature.

i saw the “longer queue times” and im like nope

No, I voted with No for the matchmaking deciding which team’s going to to win before the game even starts. Not a big fan of that.

I voted No because they are still going to stop class switching during game… It’s just the window before the round begins and a lot of skill to this game comes from knowledge… If you’re not experienced enough or have enough initiative to counter comp or help your own team comp then you deserve to lose to those who do.

With this change, if yes, I’ll just queue Warrior too for the simple reason that it doesn’t need certain comps unlike being the Nec or Support/Tank.

( I don’t get this queue for ranked on my weaker class either and needing profession rankings, I think like most normal people I leave my weaker classes to unranked until I feel confident enough to take on ranked with it)

sephiroth.4217:

I voted No because they are still going to stop class switching during game… It’s just the window before the round begins and a lot of skill to this game comes from knowledge… If you’re not experienced enough or have enough initiative to counter comp or help your own team comp then you deserve to lose to those who do.

With this change, if yes, I’ll just queue Warrior too for the simple reason that it doesn’t need certain comps unlike being the Nec or Support/Tank.

( I don’t get this queue for ranked on my weaker class either and needing profession rankings, I think like most normal people I leave my weaker classes to unranked until I feel confident enough to take on ranked with it)

So you like getting put in teams stacked with 3 necros, and noone rerolls?

Xca.9721:

sephiroth.4217:

I voted No because they are still going to stop class switching during game… It’s just the window before the round begins and a lot of skill to this game comes from knowledge… If you’re not experienced enough or have enough initiative to counter comp or help your own team comp then you deserve to lose to those who do.

With this change, if yes, I’ll just queue Warrior too for the simple reason that it doesn’t need certain comps unlike being the Nec or Support/Tank.

( I don’t get this queue for ranked on my weaker class either and needing profession rankings, I think like most normal people I leave my weaker classes to unranked until I feel confident enough to take on ranked with it)

So you like getting put in teams stacked with 3 necros, and noone rerolls?

Sorry it took so long to reply, Anet has put a 15 minute posting gap on my account for now….

You obviously misread what was said, I don’t like that at all. We need class switching before the round begins to have control over own games, the current match making combined with this change will kill the game further when it starts putting DH’s on one team, thieves on the other but no one can swap. Players need that control to fix what the system can not do. There’s also other variables that come into play, the system might get fixed and it might be predefined that all Druids are healers so the system gives you a Berserker Druid in place of the team healer.

zealex.9410:

Phineas Poe.3018:

Crinn.7864:

Exedore.6320:

If professions were locked, winning or losing would be largely based on luck with getting a better team comp. Get 3 support or 5 DPS? Oh well, bend over and take it! That makes rating less accurate, not more accurate.

This

My main is a necromancer. Necromancers require certain comps to work.

What you’re complaining about isn’t a matchmaking issue but a balance one. I think most would agree that with the game’s direction pushing solo/duo queue it’s in the best interest of everyone to run builds that are self-sufficient. While not exactly “meta” classes, druid and engineer were very favorable solo professions for this reason last season.

If you want to play a build that’s reliant on support players being on your team, it may be also a good idea to just duo with an elementalist.

At the end of the day, forcing class-locking gives a much stronger signal to ArenaNet the strength of each profession and better identifies which situations they consistently struggle/succeed in. And if everyone suddenly stops queuing with their necromancers, that also will easily signal to ANet just how serious the problem is.

Thing is its a team based mode and not a solo experience which will happen if that change goes through. In every game there are classes/builds that work really well with other classes and the sinergy outweights the performance of each class if it was self sufficient, that creates further depth and also stresses the gamemore and anet far less. Since you live it to the players to make a comp for the specific team they are up against and the map. Im still in favour of that over having anet trying t find me a good comp any day of the week

Team-based or not, you can’t intentionally run a build that depends on a designated composition and think you’re going to be successful in a solo-queue environment. Duo with an elementalist or change your build.

And just to reiterate a statement made in the poll: “The Guild Wars 2 PvP team is exploring the idea of locking profession during queue for Arenas. Locking profession would allow player profession to be accounted for to increase matchmaking accuracy, but may increase matchmaking times.”

The truth is that very few players are equally skilled at multiple professions. The system is far better off trying to find a player equal to your skill level (e.g., platinum) than having a platinum player swap to an alternate class that is gold-tier at best with it. And with players locked to a profession they can more easily account for and prevent class-stacking.

Class locking was needed because it was the first step to other good changes. Keep telling yourself you are saving the day switching to some class you play at about 70-80% of your best classes level though whatever it takes to keep living in delusional land. There is no evidence that allowing class swapping during the warm up leads to noticeably less duplication. Most kitten s just roll with what they have regardless of there being 2 or 3 of them.

Kuya.6495:

If there are customizeable build templates, i would be in favor of profession locking, but since there isn’t, i voted no.

This is a large part of my reasoning as well. It’s often impossible to adapt to an enemy team without swapping class. For now, it maintains as an important skill to succeed in gw2 pvp. I tend to get focused on one class, but having a few alternate roles on other characters can help a lot.

The other big reason is shown in my picture. Class stacking is too big of a problem without people being able to swap class. Team composition matters. And not allowing players input towards that removes their ability to define their successes. You either win or lose based on matchmaking, or you swap class and counter your enemy team. (which sometimes goes south when people play non-meta builds, which again adds to the complexity of build and class swapping)

I can still see some of your points, but they are from the perspective of not wanting to feel pressure to swap to compete. This is fair, but the current system is imbalanced as it ignores team composition. You cannot get what you want until the majority of the games playerbase (forum goers specifically) feel the system is balanced without needing to rely on their skill in role swapping.

Emdrix.6124:

Its like seeing 3 thieves on enemy team then the whole team swaps to DH/engi , it dosent mean they are better players, they just counter comped you.

I’m still trying to understand what you meant to say?

Loboling.5293:

The other big reason is shown in my picture. Class stacking is too big of a problem without people being able to swap class. Team composition matters. And not allowing players input towards that removes their ability to define their successes. You either win or lose based on matchmaking, or you swap class and counter your enemy team. (which sometimes goes south when people play non-meta builds, which again adds to the complexity of build and class swapping)

I read posts like these and I just shake my head.

Until profession locking is a thing, class-stacking will persist. There’s literally zero purpose behind designing a matchmaking algorithm that prevents class-stacking when players can just stack teams on the other side of the loading screen. This is also not taking into consideration how such a system could be gamed or manipulated (e.g., pro league players all queue on the same profession to avoid one another, and then swap on the other side to their main).

You guys are also complaining about the lack of build variety, but you also fail to recognize that with class-swapping being a thing, there’s very little incentive for ArenaNet to change anything with that. Why balance every profession to 1v1 everyone when the system allows you to just swap to an alternate profession—and when pro league players claim that multi-classing is desired in platinum? Season six might be a bit of a kitten show to start with regard to class balance, but it will at least hold ArenaNet’s feet to the fire and pressure them to improve build variety. Simple fact is: we’ll never have one without the other.

Until we have profession locking, we’ll always have class stacking as a factor. And until we get rid of class stacking, we won’t ever have a better PvP scene.

I am just fed up with this PvP community thinking they know better than ArenaNet when time after time it continues to shoot itself in the foot. Season five was an effing travesty and the implication that this community knows how to police itself or knows what’s best for this game is an effing joke.

So many people that write in this forum have zero foresight, and care only for the short term, or what only benefits them.

+1 Phineas …
I myself only swap if i see my warrior will counter oposing team composition, especially when its stacked and i wait out what oposing team does till a few seconds before start to hit the mark … I will swap even if i stack on our side. I do it rarley but this is bad stuff ….

I guarantee you that the usual suspects will be up to their usual shenanigans. If you can’t swap after the countdown, you’re just going to see people swap classes at the final seconds of match prep, before the other team has the opportunity to react.

It has to be all or nothing.

Sadly some of the You tubers that are agaisnt this initiative put up posts blindly telling followers to go vote. There are also numerous reddit threads and I suspect even people that don’t understand what they are voting for voted based on what others told them to do.

People don’t seem to understand that no matter what they do they arent switching to another class during a match they can only switch classes prior to the match starting, I think at that 10 second timer that pulls everyone back into home base.

In any case, profession leaderboards would of been awesome!

choovanski.5462:

well, you obviously vote no because you’d rather not play games with 3 thieves on your team if you don’t have to.
.

I bet you class stacking is the only argument have people to vote no, but i can’t believe people fail to see one thing.

Everyone is concerned about yes because the possibility of getting a sucky team comp.

BUT MAN, you fail to see your enemies will have to deal with this too, people say, kitten , too many support… wait, the enemy team comp sucks too! how this match would be!?

I voted yes for this fact, increasing the chances of non-perfect team comp for both sides could make the match more different.

Who will win with the worst team comp?, and assembling a perfect team comp its not possible due to solo-duo, gl with having your perfect team.

Ivantreil.3092:

BUT MAN, you fail to see your enemies will have to deal with this too, people say, kitten , too many support… wait, the enemy team comp sucks too! how this match would be!?.

Except certain crappy team comps will still counter other crappy team comps. A Mesmer, Thief, LB Druid, Warrior, Guardian comp is not exactly optimal but if your a necro on the other team you’re going to have kittenous experience.

Also it’s not just balance it’s just quality of life. Fighting some comps on some class is cancer in terms of play even if it’s winnable cancer.

And the end of the day, “Yes” takes away player’s agency, and players do not like having agency taken away. What makes videogames great is that you have agency in the outcome, taking away part of that agency is a turn off for some of us.

Nightshade.2570:

In any case, profession leaderboards would of been awesome!

Profession leaderboards can still be a possibility, even without profession locking. Just track the MMR players have when winning games on their engineer, for example, and only have that number change when they win/lose their next game on it.

Could still be manipulated to some degree, but I’d rather they have it than not.