DPS Tests need to Stop.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Arnon.1563

Arnon.1563

I’m not sure about why people whine about DPS on this. Killed one with 38 people. Thing is people weren’t just laying dead everywhere and avoided the pull.

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Posted by: haviz.1340

haviz.1340

All except for the 300-range 360-degree non-capped aoe attack of the knight’s hammer that takes 95% of my berserker/soldier warrior’s health away in one hit.

I’ve been hit by that from simply moving up and trying to blast the knight with my engineer’s rifle 3 attack, just within range of it.

But nah, there’s no anti-melee death zone, right?

That’s why there’s always a pile of dead people sitting at the knight’s feet? It’s not always because they didn’t dodge the big aoes.

I’d been meleeing the green knight solo for 5 minutes before the zerg came with your typical zerker warrior. It’s hard but no one asks you to solo them.

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Posted by: dcypher.2590

dcypher.2590

Honestly tho…. what do you expect from developers that are openly against raiding? Instead they create half kitten ’ed versions and put a different name on it. They only have one or two mechanics they can even work with. My point is there will always be the kill timers making it a dps race because that’s their only option to make anything difficult.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

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Posted by: Diabolus Anur Kaya.8379

Diabolus Anur Kaya.8379

You gotta love so you don’t end up breaking something in frustration. Anet is changing zerk stats because they are op, yet they release a ls end that is nothing but a huge circle kitten of zerker dps bs that does even more to push people away from condition builds or even a balanced build.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

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Posted by: Flissy.4093

Flissy.4093

These quests are saying:
If you are not using berserker gear, go home.

Only bads use defensive stats in PVE.

Light Up the Darkness
“Dear ANet, nerf Paper, Scissors is fine. Sincerely, Rock”
Elysaurus | Warrior | [LOL] | League of the Legendary | Gandara (EU)

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Posted by: ShibVicious.9681

ShibVicious.9681

Here’s how I see most the knights battles go down that I’ve partaken in.

Large group of people rush the knight. All those wonderful zerker characters that do tons of damage run in, get swinging there swords and sure, they’re putting up some big numbers. Good job. Problem. 20 seconds later. Half of them are dead. One attack and poof, all lying on their backs, perma’d and begging for a res, instead of wp and running back.
In contrast, I’m running knights gear. Sure I don’t hit as hard, but I don’t die as soon as I’m hit. My increased survivability means that ultimately I’m out damaging a large number of these zerker characters because I’m constantly damaging the knight throughout the encounter, as opposed to throwing down some mad spike damage at the start and then nothing else for the remainder.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Enaretos.8079

Enaretos.8079

The zerkers who die are non skilled zerkers who just equipped the gear without thinking about it…

Yesterday I fought the knights in zerker gear without downing, you just need to pay attention :/

Snow Crows member since January 2014
My Twitch

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Posted by: Manuhell.2759

Manuhell.2759

Edit : for Groonz, yes there is a timer to encourage you to be active and not just watch the mobs while pressing AA…

Yeah, tell that to an engineer. The condition reflect phase makes many of the skills apart the autoattacks outright useless, if not harming the user directly. And that’s assuming the autoattack isn’t dealing conditions itself (and often it does).

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Posted by: RyuDragnier.9476

RyuDragnier.9476

The zerkers who die are non skilled zerkers who just equipped the gear without thinking about it…

Yesterday I fought the knights in zerker gear without downing, you just need to pay attention :/

This. Staying ranged also helps if you’re one of the squishier classes as well (thief).

[hS]
PvE Main – Zar Poisonclaw – Daredevil
WvW Main – Ghost Mistcaller – Herald

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Posted by: Zanshin.5379

Zanshin.5379

The condition reflect is stupid. Period.
A lot of people play full condition builds. What are they supposed to do?

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Linnea.5146

Linnea.5146

I think that they need to start thinking differently. Instead of only max-damage-output, they should think of what each class does best, or should do best, and model both the class balances and the events after that. Thinking back to GW1, for example when doing dungeons with heroes, I chose the classes based on what they could do and what kind of enemies there were . Of course, there you had to choose because the party size and the variety of heroes were limited, and that game was based on the trinity, but the class really mattered, and the build varieties were the core of the game. Minion bombers, mesmers for interrupts or hex removal, etc.. That’s lacking in GW2. There are husks in the great wurm events which are more vulnerable to conditions, which is an improvement, but other than that interrupts, crowd control, health degen, confusion, blindness are often useless, because champions are immune to controls and have huge health pools.

In short, it’s plain useless to bring anything but pure damage, because the champs are immune to everything else. What I’d like to see instead is more variation in each fight of group event scale, to make all classes unique yet viable, for example with bosses and boss minions which have some of the following attributes (these are all suggestions which I came up with just now, so they’re not really thought through, it’s just food for thought):

- more vulnerable to conditions
- need to be controlled with cripples or blinds
- dish out loads of conditions
- target minions and phantasms first
- make a vital point inaccessible without stealth (maybe the enemy knocks away any intruders it sees, so you have to use shadow refuge or mass invisibility to bring in a group instead)
- different vulnerability levels to elemental attributes (such as vulnerable to water, it would be interesting with a skill that makes other players deal cold or earth damage for example)
- vulnerable to machinery (turrets, non-magic guns)
- high attack rates to make confusion viable
- have healing skills with clear animations which can and need to be interrupted

As I said, just suggestions, but I think that this would make each profession more fun and rewarding, and it would take away the focus from pure dps and make use of your class’ specialities more important. To make this work in-game, it would maybe be wise to have npcs shouting things that draw attention to this and encourage the “right” gameplay, at least until the general player community realizes that there are changes to the “dps” system.

(This got a bit longer than I originally intended… Ups.)

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Arnon.1563

Arnon.1563

If your die in melee get out of melee and range. Constant range DPS is gonna beat someone who is downed 6 times. Just like pvt is gonna beat zerk who is constantly downed.

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Bunmaster.9734

Bunmaster.9734

While this ain’t Anet’s finest hour. But this can still be done with non-zerkers and uplvls. They need to split up accordingly, wp when dead, dodge stuff and use a semi-decent build.

I do need to ask this though. The event had been out for days. Yet i still see ppl insisting on bringing condi setups. And as of last nite, uber bunker are out as well.
How much would it be to adapt to the situation?
A full set of rare zerk (or knight if you must) would cost at most 5g. Even ranging in rare zerk, you are doing more dmg than uber bunkers and condis. If you want the achieves and loot, start with yourself.

For those who believe zerkers are OP, it takes a bit more skill than you may think. Just ask all those dead zerkers under the Knight (though half of them are just tanks who don’t know the dodge button).

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: CptAurellian.9537

CptAurellian.9537

The condition reflect is stupid. Period.
A lot of people play full condition builds. What are they supposed to do?

Start playing with a useful build?

Warning! This post may contain traces of irony, sarcasm and peanuts.

There is no loyalty without betrayal. -Ann Smiley

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Posted by: RyuDragnier.9476

RyuDragnier.9476

The condition reflect is stupid. Period.
A lot of people play full condition builds. What are they supposed to do?

Start playing with a useful build?

Watch it, Anet may start putting in bosses that reflect the entirety of direct damage. What’ll you do then?

[hS]
PvE Main – Zar Poisonclaw – Daredevil
WvW Main – Ghost Mistcaller – Herald

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: gimrob.9071

gimrob.9071

Yes looks like anets love for guards and warrior. Why do I even play my engineer? No love.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

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Posted by: SirMoogie.9263

SirMoogie.9263

So I just tried that “Kill 3 Legendary Clockworks” quest. It is nothing but a DPS test. Can we please stop having quests like these?

These quests are saying:
If you are not using berserker gear, go home.

I agree that timers are a bit much on all the bosses, (1) but they aren’t purely DPS checks. A DPS check would have it so you had to do nothing but damage to finish the encounter within a time limit, these require you to avoid attacks while having a buff that makes you more susceptible to those attacks in order to burn the mob down. It’s a DPS check with skill. Those with the skills required to dodge the attacks and grab the buffs win the day as they live longer to damage the boss.

Having an individual that can take a few hits is very helpful in controlling the knights and keeping it in the same spot. I happen to run a bit tanky, and while I think the main attacks are too strong considering you have to save your dodges for the much stronger AOEs, I can survive for quite sometime in roughly the same spot allowing players an easier time in maintaining their DPS. If they don’t have to avoid the melee attacks on the knight then they can spend that time damaging them and collecting buffs.

Many people liked the Marionette because it didn’t have a timer, but it was also a DPS check, just disguised behind a meter. Those who killed minion waves fast enough (DPS check) got to have more cracks at removing a chain. True the champions were a timed DPS plus skill check, but it wasn’t the DPS that was the factor in most failures there. Most of the time, in my experience, it was wiped player platforms that cause failure, which is evidence for lack of skill and not having enough DPS. The same can be said for the assault knights. Is the ground littered with corpses? Then skill is more to blame, not time.

What mechanic would you propose to replace the timers in this fight that would still allow it to be challenging/capable of being failed?

1 – Mostly because they don’t make sense from a lore perspective. Does Tequatl have a pedicure appointment to make?

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Arkholeon.7163

Arkholeon.7163

And about condition damage not working, I find it quite logical : I’ve never seen metal bleed, nor even burn to a small fire. Think about the immersion :>

neither the undead nor the golem should bleed or be poisoned but they can… that’s not a good point

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Posted by: Max Gladius.6930

Max Gladius.6930

I am confused….

The team does a video presentation talking about “addressing damage” and making damage other than “critical damage / zerker” more usefull..

Then we get told “you have to do massive direct dps to the knights to kill them in 6 minutes for achievement”

Does the Right hand have no clue what the Left hand is doing?

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: CptAurellian.9537

CptAurellian.9537

Watch it, Anet may start putting in bosses that reflect the entirety of direct damage. What’ll you do then?

Not care, simple as that. I’ve pretty much given up on GW2 anyway.

Warning! This post may contain traces of irony, sarcasm and peanuts.

There is no loyalty without betrayal. -Ann Smiley

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Vargamonth.2047

Vargamonth.2047

Yes looks like anets love for guards and warrior. Why do I even play my engineer? No love.

That warrior and guardian thing is getting pretty old.
If you’re playing this content at range, like the majority of the playerbase, what do warriors and guardians bring to the table?

Warrior has a fairly awful sustained ranged direct damage (you probably need to rotate between Rifle and Longbow with Fast Hands to make it somehow decent). Unless going in and out (which requires far more skill than staying all the time at range), the main reason for using a warrior is about the support capabilities through banners and Empower allies.

Guardian, on the other hand, deals nice ranged damage but lacks support. Aegis is removed almost automatically (by the condition reflect effect I guess), so no point on it (neither on Unscatched Contender) and the only blast finisher the build offers is on 40 sec CD.
It’s possible to improve the support through Empowering Might, but that’s at the cost of points in Virtues, which means losing a final damage multiplier, the ability to use Unscatched Contender when fighting Prime and the boon duration for the might EM applies.

Why play Engineer?
I’m not going to say it’s the best class out there, but it couples a decent ranged damage with a fairly good upkeep of AoE might stacks. I can’t really see any issues with the class for this encounter.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Ayrilana.1396

Ayrilana.1396

Can you even crit the knights?

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Vargamonth.2047

Vargamonth.2047

Can you even crit the knights?

Yes, they can be critted normally.

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Posted by: Anchoku.8142

Anchoku.8142

A dps event test is boring. There is no creativity and limited problem-solving. At the very least, I would like the data gathered on professions and builds posted.

Why not have similar tests for condition damage where the boss is immune to direct damage and conditions allowed are varied? Then check damage taken, avoidance, and healing. I would really like to see the data.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Ayrilana.1396

Ayrilana.1396

So there was no creativity and limited problem solving used when trying to figure out how to beat Teq and Great Jungle Wurm?

DPS Tests need to Stop.

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Posted by: Rennoko.5731

Rennoko.5731

A dps event test is boring. There is no creativity and limited problem-solving. At the very least, I would like the data gathered on professions and builds posted.

Why not have similar tests for condition damage where the boss is immune to direct damage and conditions allowed are varied? Then check damage taken, avoidance, and healing. I would really like to see the data.

You see they can’t do this, because their condition damage system is broken in large scale to medium scale. The bosses just wouldn’t take any damage… Nothing like 25 bleeds ticking for 50-150 depending on who owns the bleed.

They had to scale the “condition” part of the fight with a new extra condition related to rate-of-application, because it wouldn’t have worked any other way.

Nevermind that this broken large scale condition system is something they said they were looking into over a year ago…. but who’s counting.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: mtpelion.4562

mtpelion.4562

Anything that has a timer attached to it will always be a DPS check. That isn’t the question here.

The question is this: Is the DPS check so onerous as to require specific gear sets and builds? The answer, for the most part, is “No”. Granted, a full group of Settler’s-geared players probably won’t stand a chance, but it certainly appears that it is nearly impossible to fail the Assault Knights (pre-patch anway, haven’t tested it since).

Server: Devona’s Rest

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Posted by: Coldin.2840

Coldin.2840

This is actually even more annoying in the battle versus the Prime Hologram.

Basically, if any platform only has 20-30 people, they have a very low chance of defeating the hologram. There’s frankly no downward scaling, meaning that a smaller groups get screwed. And the teleporters don’t have any concern for how many are on a platform, so won’t split players up evenly. 30 minutes fighting against Scarlet and knowing you simply have no chance is just an exercise in frustration.

For as much as Anet wants us to “split up” and not zerg, they certainly don’t make events that actually reward that behavior. Only punish when you don’t bring enough people to the table.

Coldin – Thief – Sanctum of Rall

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Coldin.2840

Coldin.2840

it certainly appears that it is nearly impossible to fail the Assault Knights (pre-patch anway, haven’t tested it since).

Test it.

Coldin – Thief – Sanctum of Rall

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Posted by: mtpelion.4562

mtpelion.4562

it certainly appears that it is nearly impossible to fail the Assault Knights (pre-patch anway, haven’t tested it since).

Test it.

At work. Will test when possible.

Server: Devona’s Rest

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Posted by: Azreell.1568

Azreell.1568

The funny part is Anet wants to have build and gear diversity.

Or so they told us that is the reason for the zerker meta dps nerf which basically lowers the dps of all players in game via crit damage.

Then they design new content with nothing more then one huge glorified DPS check.

They really need to make up their minds because it’s starting to frustrate far to many people.

Azreell – Mesmer
Loyalty To None

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Posted by: Iarkrad.8415

Iarkrad.8415

We need this trend of unjustly rewarding warriors and zerkers to end…

No more non cosmetic world event rewards. We haven’t forgotten the Ancient Karka.

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Posted by: SirMoogie.9263

SirMoogie.9263

Then they design new content with nothing more then one huge glorified DPS check.

It’s not just a DPS check, but a DPS plus skill check. How would you change the encounter to still allow it to be challenging and failable, but have no timer?

DPS Tests need to Stop.

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Posted by: Anchoku.8142

Anchoku.8142

Arenanet could make the blue knight direct damage only, the green knight conditions only (lifting the caps), and tie red knight health to damage absorbed by players.

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Posted by: SirMoogie.9263

SirMoogie.9263

Arenanet could make the blue knight direct damage only, the green knight conditions only (lifting the caps), and tie red knight health to damage absorbed by players.

I’m not sure if that is a response to my question. This is an interesting proposal for a mechanic that changes up the damage meta, but without a timer players could just revive endlessly and eventually win the fight, even if it took an hour. What mechanic in your proposal makes it fail-able and not an inevitability?

DPS Tests need to Stop.

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Posted by: Run Away PLZ.7639

Run Away PLZ.7639

Anchoku you know the holograms are kinda like that the ones after the prime hologram splits. Blue is weak to condi, green reflects, and well red is nothing special at all but if they gave red a constant burning aura or periodic close range burst they could try to force people to target certain ones but that is still nothing more than having 3 different dps checks just 1 would be condi dps check.

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Posted by: CptAurellian.9537

CptAurellian.9537

You see they can’t do this, because their condition damage system is broken in large scale to medium scale.

If, by “medium scale”, you mean anything more than a single player …

Warning! This post may contain traces of irony, sarcasm and peanuts.

There is no loyalty without betrayal. -Ann Smiley

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Posted by: CHIPS.6018

CHIPS.6018

Hey now, don’t be lke this my friends and don’t talk about DPS race.

Take a second and think about this :
- the goal of the event is to kill 3 bosses.
- people are bringing their defensive gear in the event.
- they complain that they can’t complete the event.

??? I fail to understand…

And about condition damage not working, I find it quite logical : I’ve never seen metal bleed, nor even burn to a small fire. Think about the immersion :>

The thing is:

The goal of world events are always to kill something.

This isn’t even the cause of the problem.

The cause of the problem is that all the world bosses we seen so far is huge hp pool and count down timer.

These two things means that it is all about the berserker gear. All other gears are underpowered, if not flat out useless.

The game should be designed so all different gears have their own benefits and flaws. DPS and berserker should not be the only way. If not, why bother to have other gears at all? Just have everyone use berserker gear and be done with it.

Chipsy Chips(Necromancer) & Char Ashnoble(Thief)
The Order of Dii[Dii]-SBI→Kaineng→TC→JQ
Necro Encyclopedia-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BrAjJ1N6hxs

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Posted by: Mirta.5029

Mirta.5029

But still there are 50 people attacking one mob, if everyone would come with his best geared character and at least informs himself abuot the event, uses buff food, the lions arch damage buff and skills that support group damage, the fight would go wayyy smoother than it does now.

But like I said the main problem is the “me” mentality in MMOs these days, when it used to be a “we” mentality.

Sure A.Net said a lot times “play how you want” but I am pretty sure they meant “play however you want, but try to be reasonable” and not “well yeah just don’t try at all, just press autoattack everything will be fine other people will piggyback you through this”

1. I run a level 80 ele with exotics and some ascended trinkets.
My stats are these (from highest to lowest)
power
vitality
precision
critical
Now people like you would send me home, because a) I don’t have enough cash or time to grind a full ascended set b) I have a stat that makes sure that my but is never on the floor. Now being in what I feel comfortable being in I’m dashing out as much damage as I can, but it won’t be as much as a berserker. Why would I need to be thrown out from an event?

2. I have a well geared level 80 condition/power necro that I love using. IF this was my only character I would be really kittened. Mostly because Anet made sure that my character could not participate at all. What should people that only have one character and its in condition build do? Why should they be excluded?

3. I have seen pure berserkers with 600AP that couldn’t even budge the health of P1 CoF end boss. Because every 2 seconds they were on the floor. I recommended them to get vitality and toughness gear. It’s not the best but if a person really is this bad at surviving they need it. Why should they be not allowed to participate?

4. I have friends that enjoy playing toughness/ healing elementalists, guardians and warriors. They enjoy buffing, giving might, blocks to everyone, getting people up and filling their health back up to full. Why should they be excluded?

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Posted by: Darkobra.6439

Darkobra.6439

If you play pve without full zerk gear you SHOULD go home really pve content is so easy thats why everyone runs full zerk and if you are a movement cripple try to press [V] randomly LOL

No, but seriously what armor are you using for pve then? theres no sense of other armor because why you need to be tanky if you can kill the boss just in a few seconds.

GW2 Pve is all about zerk gear if ppl dont get this then im not sorry for them.

Please, please tell us all what build you’re using to kill the knights in a few seconds. Oh and stop bringing berserker to world bosses. You’re dead weight. Sometimes literally.

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Posted by: Gatvin.6510

Gatvin.6510

Look, I like playing a tank. I like being a pile of HP that takes hits and defends my allies so they can enjoy the pretty 4 and 5 digit numbers floating over the boss’s head. This is for the most part impossible outside of MAYBE WvW.

Also, this fight stinks now. At least when we lost marionette EVERY TIME we got loot. Just switch it back to last patch. Please.

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Posted by: Anchoku.8142

Anchoku.8142

SirMoogie and RunAwayPLZ, of course the three knights would still be dps tests but they would test different player builds, one direct damage, another condition damage, and a third heal rate. At least there would be substantial variety and players could “attune” their build to the knight they intend to face allowing build variety.

Because no berserker build can get away with zero condition damage the three knights all play nearly the same. That is boring. Just dodge around and keep up the dps without even worrying about radically different mechanics and strategy for winning. Does the strategy for blue, green, or red actually affect your play style or your build? It does not for me. A power build works best for all three knights. If Arenanet wanted to split up the zerg, they would define a radically different build as optimum for each knight.

Still, I want to see the performance data for builds and professions. At least reward us with data along with the sacks of carp for playing along.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

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Posted by: Killface.1896

Killface.1896

If there is no ´DPS test´ it would be way to easy….

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Posted by: RemiRome.8495

RemiRome.8495

Oh and stop bringing berserker to world bosses. You’re dead weight. Sometimes literally.

This only applies if you’re terrible though.

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in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Mirta.5029

Mirta.5029

This only applies if you’re terrible though.

And most berserkers in the open world are. Because they’re told everywhere that berserker is the meta and refuse to get any supporting stat because they don’t want to lose a bit of damage, because they were told that it’s “uncool”.

If there is no ´DPS test´ it would be way to easy….

Or you know… There could be some more specific mechanics in the fight.

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: SD ParagonVhailor.9160

SD ParagonVhailor.9160

The biggest problem right now is, that there are way to many “unique snowflakes” around that keep shouting “I PLAY HOW I WANT AND YOU PLAY HOW YOU WANT” which is something that just doesn’t work in a genre that is all about playing together.

Oh wow. It’s so clear to me now. Why didn’t I see it before? The problem is individuality and fun! If only we were all mindless cookie cutter automatons who were identically equipped and reacted exactly the same, then we wouldn’t have all these problems!

All that time spent learning the classes, leveling up characters, acquiring gear, developing skills and a playstyle… How foolish I was to waste all that time trying to create something that was my own in this world, when what I was actually supposed to be doing was determining what the greatest number of people believed to be the most statistically successful style of play and then patterning my entire existence around that!

Truly, sir. Your words have moved me. They have opened my eyes! No more shall I foul these events with my “Uniqueness” or my “Individuality!” No sir. It’s unthinking obedience to the popularly accepted conception of perfection from now on!

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Posted by: Vargamonth.2047

Vargamonth.2047

The thing is:

The goal of world events are always to kill something.

This isn’t even the cause of the problem.

The cause of the problem is that all the world bosses we seen so far is huge hp pool and count down timer.

These two things means that it is all about the berserker gear. All other gears are underpowered, if not flat out useless.

The game should be designed so all different gears have their own benefits and flaws. DPS and berserker should not be the only way. If not, why bother to have other gears at all? Just have everyone use berserker gear and be done with it.

Why bother on having different gears? That’s a really good question with a quite simple answer: GW2 Itemization sucks for PvE.
Every available stat increases either damage or passive survival, which doesn’t make any sense for an action based game.
Things like boon power, control power or endurance regeneration could have worked as stats. What we have? Too classic for a game that doesn’t have classic combat. Passive defensive stats can hardly be seen as anything but the always suboptimal training wheels.

Now, let’s go deeper in the DPS check matter:

During the early days of the game there was a problem with dungeon where, even if a boss was causing havoc, dead players could respawn in the closest waypoint and endlessly return to the fight as long as one player remained alive. This was addressed as an “issue” and “fixed” (the player can still res by reloging and join the fight by walking all the way to the boss).
This is even worse for a massive open world event. There are so many players involved that there’s usually no problem at all on ressing completely downed people in the middle of the battleground.
On top of that, ressing at some WP and returning to the fight will always be a viable option without worrying on everybody dying. Not even a fix like the one made for dungeons could prevent this.

If you want to make failure a possibility for these massive open world battles, there aren’t exactly a lot of things you can do.

1) Add a timer.

This obviously encourages building for as much damage output as the player can handle.
Even if a dead player will always be able to respawn and return to the fight (or, usually, even to be ressed directly where he died), every second lost means a loss in DPS that can make the whole event fail, so this method actually punishes deaths, which are harder to avoid the more DPS you slot.

2) Wipe everybody if some “combat phase” fails.

Let’s think, for example, that the Knights are invulnerable and can be damaged not because players get a buff from some weird circle on the floor, but because there are some Priory mages channeling a ritual.
From time to time, enemy waves could attack and try to kill those scholars and, if any of them died, the Knight will regain its power and oneshot everybody around.

In this case, everything is in the details. For example, if these enemies would ignore players and directly attack the priory members, then defensive stats would be useless.
If enemy waves would spawn on a timer basis, then a lack of damage could end on an overwhelming enemy force. If not (waves spawn when the previosu one is defeated), then the event would probably be easily “exploitable” (keeping a few monsters alive).

Some kind of even ground between attack and defense can be achieved.
For example, the Knight itself could be opening the portal that spawns the waves, which would remain opened and summoning enemies until some amount of damage is dealt to the boss.
This way, damage oriented players should focus the boss while the tankier ones contain and finish the adds (which are probably too many for pure active defenses to be the best choice).

In any case, when player gear (even trait/weapon) choices are mostly about a balance between damage output and passive survivability, there’ll always be some kind of DPS check. Without them, designing a content to be challenging for tanky builds but still doable by more aggresive specs is extremely complicated.
The only downside on tanky gear is that it kills way slower and, when you’re going to have a limited amount of tries (temporary content taking place at fixed hours), maximizing the success rate becomes way more important than completion speed.
Without DPS checks, there’ll be no use for anything but the most defensive armor sets (currently, while suboptimal, you can use them as a cover for possible mistakes; the opposite can’t ever be true).

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: CHIPS.6018

CHIPS.6018

What mechanic would you propose to replace the timers in this fight that would still allow it to be challenging/capable of being failed?

At the end of the day, there are only 2 options.

1) Anet should change the game so more gear types and builds are useful.

2) All players should go buy Berserker gear.

If Anet wants option 1, there are many things they can do . For example:

1) Replace one-hit-kills with Duration of Time attacks. These DoT attacks will happen so often that it is physically impossible to avoid them all. Berserkers, unless supported by healers, will certainly need to retreat from the fight to rest up. This way there is an active role for healers and tanks.

2) This boss deals 10 times the damage when affected by Might. Another boss takes 1/10th the damage when affected by Protection. This make it mandatory to remove this boss’s Might. So boon removal have an active role.

3) This boss takes 10 times the damage and condition damage when the players have Might on them. This makes having fire field+blast very important.

4) This boss is totally immune to any damage, unless it is inside one of the three specific areas. So the players need to lure the boss into these spots to hurt it. This add a tactical side to the fight.

5) Increase the bleed cap from 25 to 100.

etc etc

There are a million thing Anet can do to change these fights. And they will all be better than these DPS tests that we have been seeing.

Chipsy Chips(Necromancer) & Char Ashnoble(Thief)
The Order of Dii[Dii]-SBI→Kaineng→TC→JQ
Necro Encyclopedia-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BrAjJ1N6hxs

(edited by CHIPS.6018)

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Azreell.1568

Azreell.1568

What mechanic would you propose to replace the timers in this fight that would still allow it to be challenging/capable of being failed?

At the end of the day, there are only 2 options.

1) Anet should change the game so more gear types and builds are useful.

2) All players should go buy Berserker gear.

If Anet wants option 1, there are many things they can do . For example:

1) Replace one-hit-kills with Duration of Time attacks. These DoT attacks will happen so often that it is physically impossible to avoid them all. Berserkers, unless supported by healers, will certainly need to retreat from the fight to rest up. This way there is an active role for healers and tanks.

2) This boss deals 10 times the damage when affected by Might. Another boss takes 1/10th the damage when affected by Protection. This make it mandatory to remove this boss’s Might. So boon removal have an active role.

3) This boss is totally immune to any damage, unless it is inside one of the three specific areas. So the players need to lure the boss into these spots to hurt it. This add a tactical side to the fight.

4) Increase the bleed cap from 25 to 100.

etc etc

There are a million thing Anet can do to change these fights. And they will all be better than these DPS tests that we have been seeing.

Quite frankly Anet has last all credibility with me.

They go on this ridiculous rant which states how they are nerfing the zerker meta to force more build diversity and gear choices (which btw was a complete lie) and then they design content that is nothing more then a DPS check.

It has never been more obvious that Anet borders on the most clueless developers I have ever seen in action.

They are so out of touch with the player base these days it isn’t even funny anymore.

Azreell – Mesmer
Loyalty To None

DPS Tests need to Stop.

in Battle for Lion’s Arch - Aftermath

Posted by: Vargamonth.2047

Vargamonth.2047

They go on this ridiculous rant which states how they are nerfing the zerker meta to force more build diversity and gear choices (which btw was a complete lie) and then they design content that is nothing more then a DPS check.

I don’t think they’ve really said THAT. It was more on the line of toning down the DPS because the reachable damage output was just too high.
Triple offensive sets will always be the optimal choices for PvE, and that’s probably working as intended.