Guild Wars 2

Allie Murdock.8152:

It might not seem this way sometimes, but we definitely hear you. We just choose to ignore you and not monitor the current meta-game. And instead focus soley on our internal testing.

fixed that for ya, not to sound overly rude, but the same problems we have now, are the same problems we had at launch, and are still having…not to mention a plethora of new issues that have cropped up over each update. Sometimes it may feel like things are getting better…on paper. Then we go to actually play and it is simply the same old mess.

Will there ever be a shift in pvp to bring it closer to what gw1 players want?

Allie, then please read this thread as it has very good/constructive feedback regarding sPvP meta.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/Reasons-why-we-have-a-cond-meta

Allie Murdock.8152:

We talk to players of all skill levels. We closely monitor these forums, on top of what Jonathan said in SotG. As mentioned earlier, it’s not uncommon for devs to discuss these things in-game as well.

This may be surprising to some of you, but we’re capable of judging objective vs subjective feedback. It’s ingrained in our minds to analyze feedback this way (that is, after all, a huge part of a Quality Assurance testers job). It’s part of the process in game development.

It might not seem this way sometimes, but we definitely hear you.

steps back into the shadows

So … does anyone from Anet ever play from Australia or other such lag rich countries to see how they could improve certain skills. For example, Ride the Lightning (/D air 4 on elementalist). With the nerfs to this skill (40 sec cd if you miss) you hardly ever have a 20 sec cd on this skill due to it missing due to lag. There are many other examples of lag affecting the game and skills as well.

In the end, just wondering if any of you have personal experience with how the lag affects the game, or if you have “players” from Aus in you band of buddies.

Thanks in advanced, an Australian player who deals with the lag everyday.

Neare.9703:

Well, because no matter how much you may think they are above it they will be like everyone else, wanting their class buffed and all others nerfed. You really need a objective viewpoint to properly balance.

A good solution is to recruit players that play all classes. If you have every class and play each one practically equally in skill, your therefore are not biased based on class but play style. If you have enough players that play all classes discussing with each having various play styles, the discussion will even out. But it is hard to find serious players to coordinate this. We are also rare, as not many want to make a character for each class or can learn each one and become competent or masters within all the classes.

TGSlasher.1458:

Allie Murdock.8152:

We talk to players of all skill levels. We closely monitor these forums, on top of what Jonathan said in SotG. As mentioned earlier, it’s not uncommon for devs to discuss these things in-game as well.

This may be surprising to some of you, but we’re capable of judging objective vs subjective feedback. It’s ingrained in our minds to analyze feedback this way (that is, after all, a huge part of a Quality Assurance testers job). It’s part of the process in game development.

It might not seem this way sometimes, but we definitely hear you.

steps back into the shadows

So … does anyone from Anet ever play from Australia or other such lag rich countries to see how they could improve certain skills. For example, Ride the Lightning (/D air 4 on elementalist). With the nerfs to this skill (40 sec cd if you miss) you hardly ever have a 20 sec cd on this skill due to it missing due to lag. There are many other examples of lag affecting the game and skills as well.

In the end, just wondering if any of you have personal experience with how the lag affects the game, or if you have “players” from Aus in you band of buddies.

Thanks in advanced, an Australian player who deals with the lag everyday.

They get plenty of feedback from SEA players with high latency. Quite a lot of them play on the server that was the main korean server and also had/has quite a few players from hong kong and japan.

I’m aussie myself and the lag has definitely gotten worse over the last six months, to the point of unplayability at times, but there has been some improvement in the last month or so. I can actually pvp more often than not now.

BTW there are quite a lot of players in the top 100 from outside the US, so it’s not completely terminal to your pvp chances, just really kittening annoying.

How about an underwater finisher, or trait and weapon templates or a downed state toggle for custom arenas or other game modes

Brutal Arts.6307:

How about an underwater finisher, or trait and weapon templates or a downed state toggle for custom arenas or other game modes

How about a res on downed mode, for you know, duelling which they are insistent on not adding.

They wont add downstate toggle because no one will play on any server other then ones with downstate off.

TGSlasher.1458:

Brutal Arts.6307:

How about an underwater finisher, or trait and weapon templates or a downed state toggle for custom arenas or other game modes

How about a res on downed mode, for you know, duelling which they are insistent on not adding.

They wont add downstate toggle because no one will play on any server other then ones with downstate off.

This

Allie Murdock.8152:

Interesting idea, RoyHarmon.5398, but would that really satisfy the hope to have your suggestions implemented? Wouldn’t it then turn into “devs hit the check mark but they didn’t understand or implement” kind of thing? Maybe there is a middle ground, though.

Well then we could work on with the devs the reason why is that suggestion not implemented, and you guys could give us a brief explanation. All in all more transparent feedback between players and devs. We want to know what you are thinking aswell!

TGSlasher.1458:

Allie Murdock.8152:

We talk to players of all skill levels. We closely monitor these forums, on top of what Jonathan said in SotG. As mentioned earlier, it’s not uncommon for devs to discuss these things in-game as well.

This may be surprising to some of you, but we’re capable of judging objective vs subjective feedback. It’s ingrained in our minds to analyze feedback this way (that is, after all, a huge part of a Quality Assurance testers job). It’s part of the process in game development.

It might not seem this way sometimes, but we definitely hear you.

steps back into the shadows

So … does anyone from Anet ever play from Australia or other such lag rich countries to see how they could improve certain skills. For example, Ride the Lightning (/D air 4 on elementalist). With the nerfs to this skill (40 sec cd if you miss) you hardly ever have a 20 sec cd on this skill due to it missing due to lag. There are many other examples of lag affecting the game and skills as well.

In the end, just wondering if any of you have personal experience with how the lag affects the game, or if you have “players” from Aus in you band of buddies.

Thanks in advanced, an Australian player who deals with the lag everyday.

Thats an issue Australians suffer in EVERY game. It really isnt Anet’s fault.

aydenunited.5729:

Short answer:

Balance the game around fighting/tPvP is about map control.

You can’t balance “completely” around the two. Add in a refusal to separate PvE from PvP on a greater scale the difference gets even bigger.

That said, even with all that, it’s still ten times more balanced than WoW ever was, which is saying something considering how long the two have been around respectively.

I’m not sure about 10x more balanced than wow ever was. However, it’s definitely more balanced than wow is, and lightyears ahead of where WoW was when it was 1 year old.

I know people, myself included, like to bust ANet’s chops for some of the imbalances in the game (cough, cough WvW permastealth thieves), but I think we can all rationally admit this game’s PvP is very well balanced in both types of PvP gameplay.

Allie #1 !

Zoose.1640:

Allie #1 !

Shouldn’t you be COF1’ing ?

Quickfoot Katana.8642:

Zoose.1640:

Allie #1 !

Shouldn’t you be COF1’ing ?

I get too bored of PvE Q_Q

Quickfoot Katana.8642:

TGSlasher.1458:

So … does anyone from Anet ever play from Australia or other such lag rich countries to see how they could improve certain skills. For example, Ride the Lightning (/D air 4 on elementalist). With the nerfs to this skill (40 sec cd if you miss) you hardly ever have a 20 sec cd on this skill due to it missing due to lag. There are many other examples of lag affecting the game and skills as well.

In the end, just wondering if any of you have personal experience with how the lag affects the game, or if you have “players” from Aus in you band of buddies.

Thanks in advanced, an Australian player who deals with the lag everyday.

Thats an issue Australians suffer in EVERY game. It really isnt Anet’s fault.

That is very true, however there are some things they could add to help us out. Taken from my previous example, make RTL have 1 cooldown not this 1 if you live in America (/other lag free countries) and hit something and another if you live in Australia (/other countries with lag issues) or miss (if you live in America / other lag free countries)

I do know the issue is with lag and not with the skill itself but Anet could make some changes to make it a fair use lag or not.

Jae.5138:

…to balance the classes?

I don’t mean it to be a rhetoric nor am I being sarcastic. I am genuinely curious as to why ArenaNet doesn’t seek aid from top players of the community.

You may argue… under what sort of criteria would you pick out these ‘top player’s but that’s not really the point, is it? There’s plenty of players that represent the ‘top of the crop’ and it’s hardly difficult to find a trend among the things that they demand from their classes. I don’t mean simply give them what they want and buff the class. I mean have an open discussion with them as to what sort of changes should be made to find an overall equilibrium.

Please excuse me for saying so, but after so many failed attempts to balance the classes, I see ANet’s class development team’s further attempt to balance the classes purely based on their own speculations to be arrogance. I’m sure I don’t give them enough credit in many ways; they most likely gather they feedback from various channels of resources that I’m not citing – whether it’s streams, forums, or spectator mode.

“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

Albert Einstein

That said, I really do feel that ANet really has to take advantage of the opinion from the very small number of intense pvp players that our community has. Because simply, not everyone’s opinion weighs the same.

Because you don’t balance the game around the 1%, that’s why.

Oh, silly Grackleflint. IF arenanet didn’t listen to those top players, it would be balancing the game around the 0.000001% (themselves)

that being said, I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation with the devs and the players in this thread. This recent patch was excellent and it sure feels great to think that there’s more coming where this one came from…

Zoose.1640:

Allie #1 !

This ! Thank you Allie for being present on the forums and sharing ideas with the players.

Jae.5138:

Oh, silly Grackleflint. IF arenanet didn’t listen to those top players, it would be balancing the game around the 0.000001% (themselves)

that being said, I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation with the devs and the players in this thread. This recent patch was excellent and it sure feels great to think that there’s more coming where this one came from…

Well slappy, let me be less “silly” and more specific, then.

They need to cast a wider net. The top players are not representative of the average skill level and don’t represent a diverse player base. Their builds will always be degenerate and narrow, exploiting only the most powerful profession builds and mechanics, and they will use team comps tailor made to trivialize game modes and map layouts. The majority of players don’t fit into this mold and shouldn’t be beholden to a game built on it.

Clear enough?

Grackleflint.4956:

Because you don’t balance the game around the 1%, that’s why.

You actually balance a game based on classes used at their full potential by people with opposible thumbs.
Otherwise, warrior’s bull’s charge+frenzy+100b would have been removed from the game like 10 months ago with all the people whining. (just as an example.)

Shar.3402:

Grackleflint.4956:

Because you don’t balance the game around the 1%, that’s why.

You actually balance a game based on classes used at their full potential by people with opposible thumbs.
Otherwise, warrior’s bull’s charge+frenzy+100b would have been removed from the game like 10 months ago with all the people whining. (just as an example.)

I think you mean “should” here, as ArenaNets actions haven’t afforded them the philosophy to balance for fun (this affects players of all skill competencies), netting them this trust.
/Burn!

This is also important for the spectators, as even though they may not have the wealth of ability the competitors do, they help provide the money which helps promote the competition.

On an aside-note, this is another reason why it’s important to maximize depth vs complexity: so inexperienced people can still follow and appreciate the extended ability of the professionals

I got your back Grackleflint

Oh and FYI, I don’t think that’s a good example, but I’m still using it to purpose my point :P

aydenunited.5729:

Short answer:

Balance the game around fighting/tPvP is about map control.

You can’t balance “completely” around the two. Add in a refusal to separate PvE from PvP on a greater scale the difference gets even bigger.

That said, even with all that, it’s still ten times more balanced than WoW ever was, which is saying something considering how long the two have been around respectively.

WoW has never claimed to be a pvp game. It had a crapload more skills and abilities as well. Take that into account and the goal that ANET set for themselves in terms of build diversity and no, this game isnt really all that balanced. Its just that each class can spam (aoe) skills here, nobody feels left behind as much.

GankSinatra.2653:

aydenunited.5729:

Short answer:

Balance the game around fighting/tPvP is about map control.

You can’t balance “completely” around the two. Add in a refusal to separate PvE from PvP on a greater scale the difference gets even bigger.

That said, even with all that, it’s still ten times more balanced than WoW ever was, which is saying something considering how long the two have been around respectively.

WoW has never claimed to be a pvp game. It had a crapload more skills and abilities as well. Take that into account and the goal that ANET set for themselves in terms of build diversity and no, this game isnt really all that balanced. Its just that each class can spam (aoe) skills here, nobody feels left behind as much.

I have never played WoW, how balanced is the game? Are all classes represented almost equally? How much different builds does each class have that are viable in high level pvp?

anet doesnt bring in top players because top players are not professional grade employee material and stupid kitten like karlagrey’s thread happens.

As much as people criticize ANet, 95% of the playerbase can not distinguish between great, good and average players, so why would ANet be able to, even if they wanted to?

GW2 needs someone like what David Kim is to Starcraft 2.

Phantaram.1265:

GW2 needs someone like what David Kim is to Starcraft 2.

well, I guess we have Powerr.

having top players wouldn’t be any better then avg players. most likely they do have their cons as a top player when giving advice, so do avg players, better to listen to all.

I already explained the proper way to do this. Patchnotes are released in a dev started thread. Community discusses changes are made or things are scrapped based on feedback. Eventually testing days are scheduled on test server that are opened to everyone so everyone that wants to can test and give feedback. Based on this testing there are more revisions etc and then you have what ammounts to the patch notes ready to go live. It is not rocket science.

Allie Murdock.8152:

Posting patch notes is well and good except for the fact that any feedback on changes is just theorycrafting, and not supported by actual play.

edit: I didn’t add this because it was already mentioned in this thread, but I will say it again in case you forgot – we do have ways to get proper, supported feedback on changes.

That’s why you support patch notes with a release to a PTR so you can get appropriate feedback. Utilizing a live environment for testing is a recipe for disaster, as evidenced by several changes that have been implemented.

It will most likely either end up:

• PTR is a complete wasteland (I have seen my fair share of these types of PTR servers)
• or PTR is used, and the forum is flooded with non patch related stuff, useless discussion etc

And on another node, how should a PTR work, when we are getting content updates every 2 weeks?
Patching the PTR a week before release of that content?
Patching the PTR 2 weeks before release of that content? So bazaar of the four winds hits live and at the same time we can play Cuttthrout Politics on the PTR giving away all the secrets?
Ok not that bad in case of these 2 updates, but Dragon Bash hitting live, and at the same time throwing out that 2 weeks later one member of the Lion’s Arch council is dead and the Aetherblades attacked…
And how many changes can and will be done a week prior to a major update.
From the point of view of a computer science student… in such a big project with hundreds of people involved? Not alot if it is working at that moment. If it is broken in terms of program crashing… yeah then you might throw ressources at that problem.

GW2 has it even harder in that regard, as alot of the content updates so far build upon each other.
So postponing a content update is not a viable solution either, as it would postpone all the other content updates.
Stripping out new features (like balancing changes) has alot of potentional to break other things, so that needs time to test aswell.

With such a strong emphasize on storytelling etc. in mind, a PTR just doesn’t seem like something ANet will ever do.

Varonth.5830:

It will most likely either end up:

• PTR is a complete wasteland (I have seen my fair share of these types of PTR servers)
• or PTR is used, and the forum is flooded with non patch related stuff, useless discussion etc

And on another node, how should a PTR work, when we are getting content updates every 2 weeks?
Patching the PTR a week before release of that content?
Patching the PTR 2 weeks before release of that content? So bazaar of the four winds hits live and at the same time we can play Cuttthrout Politics on the PTR giving away all the secrets?
Ok not that bad in case of these 2 updates, but Dragon Bash hitting live, and at the same time throwing out that 2 weeks later one member of the Lion’s Arch council is dead and the Aetherblades attacked…
And how many changes can and will be done a week prior to a major update.
From the point of view of a computer science student… in such a big project with hundreds of people involved? Not alot if it is working at that moment. If it is broken in terms of program crashing… yeah then you might throw ressources at that problem.

GW2 has it even harder in that regard, as alot of the content updates so far build upon each other.
So postponing a content update is not a viable solution either, as it would postpone all the other content updates.
Stripping out new features (like balancing changes) has alot of potentional to break other things, so that needs time to test aswell.

With such a strong emphasize on storytelling etc. in mind, a PTR just doesn’t seem like something ANet will ever do.

So don’t include PvE and Living world content in PTR? Not ALL conetent has to be pubished to it. Simply include a portal to WvW, some tournaments, hot join, and a portal to popular PvE instances so BALANCE testing can be done for all areas of the game, not QA/Bug testing.

As I wrote, you cannot test skill changes in such a vacuum and thing that it will work the same way on the live system.

Think about Aetherblade mobs.
They used similar abilities as players do.
Let’s assume it is actually the same skill. You have no idea, the changing of the player abilities will affect those monster then. It might break alot more than you might believe.

Not to mention, that merging such stuff can always come with alot of unwanted side effects.

Far from a “vacuum” as you put it. A PTR as I suggested incompases all aspects of the game. If devs are worried about a particular PvE instance then swap it in. The point of it is to TEST balance changes, not for devs to get lazy and not consider all possible consequences before they push the patch to the PTR.

Concerns like you bring up have to already be thought of by the devs, adding a PTR does not add additional consequence to balance changes, rahter it keeps things from slipping through the cracks and allows devs to have a sandbox to test things in that they would not on live servers.

Your last statement makes no sense.