Guild Wars 2

Hello, this is a topic I feel strongly about, and I believe my point of view will be tragically underrepresented. I don’t like the new orange circles. Let me explain, from an artistic perspective…

If you do not believe video games are art, I direct your attention to Exhibit A and submit that anything modified or affected by humans may be considered art.

The question then is what do we consider good art and what do we consider toilet art?

The orange circles accomplish a clear goal in regards to gameplay functionality. Their utilitarian purpose (as I see it) is to give players a very clear, immediate heads up to incoming threats under circumstances where there is an excess of gameplay information for the player to process. Basically, with the players concentrating on the regulators (Marionette) and all of the adds and wurm mechanics (Triple Trouble), it is unreasonable to expect players to notice certain boss animations and avoid them without the orange circles as a warning. I understand the need for this on a functional level, and I support their use in large chaotic boss fights with an excess of gameplay mechanics going on.

I’m currently a student of game design and character animation. Animation is one of the most difficult artistic rolls in the industry to master. The work that goes in to animations can mean hundreds of man hours for something as simple kitten seconds of a single character moving. Add to that the hard work that went in to the modeling, texturing, rigging, scripting, etc. A lot of hard work and amazing talent goes in to bringing things to life in a game. Anet has some of the greatest artists in the industry.

What I’m getting at is that I feel that animation should be the key to anticipating mechanics. If a boss is going to punch you, it should pull it’s fist back and you should clearly be able to understand what is about to happen. If you slap a brightly colored aoe sticker on top of it, the players attention is shifted from all the hard work and talent that went in to creating that fist-pull. The attention is instantly redirected to this simplified orange sticker.

If you are going to boil everything down to simple brightly colored geometric shapes, why bother animating at all? Is it the goal in the industry right now to phase out animators and utilize gimmicky visual effects to save money on development? Is Anet really willing to sacrifice artistic quality just because some other game is doing it? I would be appalled if indeed Anet has decided to emulate other MMOs “just because.” Anet always talks about pushing the envelope and pioneering ground that no one else is covering. If that’s true, then Anet should be sticking to their guns and remain true to the quality of art they have been putting forth thus far.

I write all of this because I desperately don’t want to see Guild Wars 2 devolve into a clusterfrakk of brightly colored stickers which amount to a gross oversimplification of visual information. The orange circles are, at best, a functional compromise to the fact that the Marionette is literally kicking people from off-screen and way above their heads. At worst, they destroy the quality of video games as art, and vastly diminish the efforts of every artist that touched the character(s) involved. They have no place in small-scale content such as spvp and dungeons. Please, Anet, keep these orange circles to a minimum. Use them only in extreme circumstances when combat mechanics simply wont work without them in these large-scale battles. Allow your talented animator’s work to shine through!

Edit: Again, I understand the need for them on the Marionette and Wurm fights. What I’m advocating against is the idea of slapping these stickers across the entire game. We don’t need them everywhere. There are better ways of doing things.

I’m going to agree and disagree. I like the new circles for many of the same reasons. But if your primary concern is letting the animations shine, you’ve got the wrong target.

I can see animations above the red circles. I cannot see animations through the light show of particle effects.

When I’m fighting bosses, I find it nearly impossible to see what the boss is doing. Until they properly clean up the particle effects, the new red circles make it easier to avoid the hits.

I like the new orange circles. They show the danger perfectly. Better than the red circles.

timmyf.1490:

I’m going to agree and disagree. I like the new circles for many of the same reasons. But if your primary concern is letting the animations shine, you’ve got the wrong target.

I can see animations above the red circles. I cannot see animations through the light show of particle effects.

When I’m fighting bosses, I find it nearly impossible to see what the boss is doing. Until they properly clean up the particle effects, the new red circles make it easier to avoid the hits.

Yes they make it easier to avoid the hits, but one can not deny that the orange circle takes attention away from the animation, and places it on the circle. That’s the whole purpose of their design. I’m saying that’s an unfortunate compromise to the fact that there are so many particle effects and other mechanics going on. Yes, you can see the animation over the circle, if you look for it. I’m talking about the natural impulse. Your eye looks at the orange circle, unless you manually tell your eye to look elsewhere. I believe is it the better course of action to train your eye to look at the animation, and do things with that animation that make it easier to see that animation. Using larger character models for bosses helps. Culling particle effects on the character model to near-zero during a critical animation is something they haven’t tried. Developing better wind-up animations would help too.

Zoid.2568:

I like the new orange circles. They show the danger perfectly. Better than the red circles.

Yes they do, and that’s fine. That’s what they were designed for. But Anet can do better than that. It’s not the only solution.

Orange circles have nothing to do with whether or not a game is “art”, much less “good art” or “toilet art” (whatever that means). Art isn’t arbitrarily limited to imagery being naturalisticly rendered or animated any more than op-art or modern art or abstract art or any sort of more wildly experimental art is not art simply because it doesn’t involve an illustrative rendering of a subject. Using abstract shapes and colors in a non-representative format to lead the viewer’s eye has been a tool in art long before video games existed.

They should just give us the option of which rings we see on our side.

Xenon.4537:

Hello, this is a topic I feel strongly about, and I believe my point of view will be tragically underrepresented. I don’t like the new orange circles. Let me explain, from an artistic perspective…

If you do not believe video games are art, I direct your attention to Exhibit A and submit that anything modified or affected by humans may be considered art.

The question then is what do we consider good art and what do we consider toilet art?

The orange circles accomplish a clear goal in regards to gameplay functionality. Their utilitarian purpose (as I see it) is to give players a very clear, immediate heads up to incoming threats under circumstances where there is an excess of gameplay information for the player to process. Basically, with the players concentrating on the regulators (Marionette) and all of the adds and wurm mechanics (Triple Trouble), it is unreasonable to expect players to notice certain boss animations and avoid them without the orange circles as a warning. I understand the need for this on a functional level, and I support their use in large chaotic boss fights with an excess of gameplay mechanics going on.

I’m currently a student of game design and character animation. Animation is one of the most difficult artistic rolls in the industry to master. The work that goes in to animations can mean hundreds of man hours for something as simple kitten seconds of a single character moving. Add to that the hard work that went in to the modeling, texturing, rigging, scripting, etc. A lot of hard work and amazing talent goes in to bringing things to life in a game. Anet has some of the greatest artists in the industry.

What I’m getting at is that I feel that animation should be the key to anticipating mechanics. If a boss is going to punch you, it should pull it’s fist back and you should clearly be able to understand what is about to happen. If you slap a brightly colored aoe sticker on top of it, the players attention is shifted from all the hard work and talent that went in to creating that fist-pull. The attention is instantly redirected to this simplified orange sticker.

If you are going to boil everything down to simple brightly colored geometric shapes, why bother animating at all? Is it the goal in the industry right now to phase out animators and utilize gimmicky visual effects to save money on development? Is Anet really willing to sacrifice artistic quality just because some other game is doing it? I would be appalled if indeed Anet has decided to emulate other MMOs “just because.” Anet always talks about pushing the envelope and pioneering ground that no one else is covering. If that’s true, then Anet should be sticking to their guns and remain true to the quality of art they have been putting forth thus far.

I write all of this because I desperately don’t want to see Guild Wars 2 devolve into a clusterfrakk of brightly colored stickers which amount to a gross oversimplification of visual information. The orange circles are, at best, a functional compromise to the fact that the Marionette is literally kicking people from off-screen and way above their heads. At worst, they destroy the quality of video games as art, and vastly diminish the efforts of every artist that touched the character(s) involved. They have no place in small-scale content such as spvp and dungeons. Please, Anet, keep these orange circles to a minimum. Use them only in extreme circumstances when combat mechanics simply wont work without them in these large-scale battles. Allow your talented animator’s work to shine through!

Edit: Again, I understand the need for them on the Marionette and Wurm fights. What I’m advocating against is the idea of slapping these stickers across the entire game. We don’t need them everywhere. There are better ways of doing things.

ehhh, im an artist, i get what you are saying, but its a game, it has to consider usability and the players ability to recognize queues. Not everyone is going to memorize enemy animations, not everyone can process and react that fast. Also, technically, some players have weaker systems that cant display effects/frame rate drops, to some degree its probably necessary

panzer.6034:

Orange circles have nothing to do with whether or not a game is “art”, much less “good art” or “toilet art” (whatever that means). Art isn’t arbitrarily limited to imagery being naturalisticly rendered or animated any more than op-art or modern art or abstract art or any sort of more wildly experimental art is not art simply because it doesn’t involve an illustrative rendering of a subject. Using abstract shapes and colors in a non-representative format to lead the viewer’s eye has been a tool in art long before video games existed.

That is true, but I believe GW2 should look more like this and less like this.

I prefer the solid AoE rings because I’m colourblind and I’d infinitely rather see a warning for a one shot kill under a mass of lighting effects than struggle to see faint red rings on a brown/green/whatever surface or a vague animation and die for the sake of art. I’ve got no interest in watching the camera slowly pan around my dead body because of some fancy geometry or animations buried beneath Guardian fire and large Norn.

Considering colourblindness rarely gets addressed or any useful options towards it the priority should be making sure everyone has an enjoyable experience and no unfair disadvantages then worrying about impressing me with your artistic talent. Impress me with your game design and consideration first then I’ll stick around to appreciate anything else.

Either way there should be an option to toggle which rings you prefer and better colourblind/AoE support so everyone is happy and I’m disappointed we still don’t have one over a year after release. Functionality should always come first in a game.

MassDelusion.9130:

They should just give us the option of which rings we see on our side.

They did that for Wildstar, sort of. I watched my friend play the beta. You could either enable or disable the telegraphs. Turning them off was not very good. Due to the fact that encounters were designed around those telegraphs, the animations no longer suffice as a visual reference.

Hi Xenon,
I am a recent graduate in game design and art, and I agree that it is a disappointment that many of the animations in GW2 go unnoticed. They are brilliant and what makes this my favorite MMO out there. That said, as a frequenter of MMOs, for large scale battles involving tons of players and lots of blinding effects, something like these circles are necessary. Were it an encounter for a small number of people then yes, I’d say leave them out, but I’ve done a lot of raiding in my years of MMO experience. Without an obvious indicator, these great encounters would be impossible to complete. It is a shame that most people will fail to see the hard work and great design of the actual characters we are fighting, but I think it is a necessary evil in order to facilitate the large scale battles.

I agree with you, Xenon.
The orange circles are visual overkill, but they are necessary in large fights where the boss is a bazillion times bigger than you. My eyes automatically look down at them. I actually wrote on my GW2 blog that I wanted to look UP and see what was actually happening, but I didn’t want to die and let down my teammates. It was actually kinda nice to die and have a chance to really see what was going on in the Marionette fight.

On smaller mobs, the regular circle is fine. The behavior of the mob shows his next action.
For example, I’ll be fighting a cave troll, and he’ll do the “sniff, sniff, look around” animation. That means a rock is going to fall from the ceiling soon. So then I look for the circle to show me how far I need to dodge to get away. I like that.
However, I can see why some people would complain about AOE circles if their computer was slow or they were colorblind.

Xenon.4537:

…What I’m getting at is that I feel that animation should be the key to anticipating mechanics. If a boss is going to punch you, it should pull it’s fist back and you should clearly be able to understand what is about to happen. If you slap a brightly colored aoe sticker on top of it, the players attention is shifted from all the hard work and talent that went in to creating that fist-pull. The attention is instantly redirected to this simplified orange sticker…

The thing is, there are times you aren’t always looking at the boss, for example, with the marionette you could be kiting a champ into its own mines but can’t keep watching the marionette to see when its going to kick you, or with the new Wurm you may focusing on picking up the coloured smoke cloud things.

So unless we get a Boss with no secondary mechanics that require taking your eyes off it we are going to need the orange circles.

Thank you Tarrek and Spiral! I was beginning to feel like the odd man out.

In regards to colorblindness, I totally understand, and YES aoes need to be marked clearly. I suppose I didn’t clarify one thing that has me very concerned about the potential replacement of stickers over animations.

Go back to the punching example. This is a melee attack. The Marionette’s kick could be seen as a melee attack as well. Traditionally only Aoes need to be marked by circles and shapes. But in Wildstar, literally every single thing a character does is covered by a swatch of color. In GW2 this would potentially mean putting an orange triangle in front of every warrior that uses Hundred Blades. Every guardian staff auto attack would have a cone. Every mesmer using greatsword auto attack would have a giant orange bar painting the ground beneath that purple beam. Guys, the purple beam is enough is it not? Even for color blind people, you still see the physical shape of that beam, don’t you? Likewise if you are fighting Giganticus Lupicus, you can clearly see his arms waving up and down whether you see colors or not, correct? These are my concerns.

And for clarity, I’m okay with the Marionette kick and stomp etc having the orange telegraphs, because in this particular circumstance it is necessary. The marionette towers WAY overhead and it is too clunky to see her animations from down on the ground while focusing on the regulator.

The new circles don’t become invisible in shallow water like the old ones, so at least there’s that.

the puppet is above you, guards are in front of you…can’t look up and watch the guard at the same time…

i understand where you are comming from OP but all honestly there is so many animations going on, it is impossible to see even own character (if you play melee) in that colorful clusterkitten on the screen

i personally hate red circles, sometimes aoe is bigger than circle, they don’t show up under water (hello bloomhunger), they show up too late, they are hard to see sometimes…+ the new circles or rather ground animations have different shapes – instead of just circles you have a line, you have an arrow etc. i liked it a lot… whoever came up with idea, ty

The circles are necessary because the particle and light effects obscure animation tells even with 2 players against one boss.

Another color blind (red weak) player here. These new circles are the third major iteration of the AoE warning system, and the first one that doesn’t discriminate against players like me.

The original red circle was completely invisible to me in all circumstances, making many content types frustratingly hard or impossible to complete.

At some point a non-red component was added to the color of the circle, making it faintly visible under optimal conditions (yay, I can now complete Spider Scurry) but still invisible under others (e.g., the last part of Chicken Run with green grass) or indistinguishable from friendly AoE (in a ZvZ fight, the circles on the ground provide zero information to me because I can’t tell whether the effect is positive or negative).

These new markers are the first that I can see and recognize unambiguously, regardless of background, lighting conditions, or any spell effects, and thus the first that meet the minimal functionality requirements. Aesthetic considerations don’t even enter the question.

What I’m getting at is that I feel that animation should be the key to anticipating mechanics. If a boss is going to punch you, it should pull it’s fist back and you should clearly be able to understand what is about to happen. If you slap a brightly colored aoe sticker on top of it, the players attention is shifted from all the hard work and talent that went in to creating that fist-pull. The attention is instantly redirected to this simplified orange sticker.

Nope. I like the new circles. Animations can be good too, but the mob pulls back to punch, where is he going to hit? You can’t tell from the animation, on a big mob it could be anywhere. Check the Inquest Golem MKII boss for examples. He does three ground slams in a row, and they could hit anywhere. If you can dodge all three, you should, but if there were ground targets where he was going to hit, you could be much more efficient about it.

Or check the Marionette’s stomps. If you can pay attention to her movements while paying attention to the boss you’re fighting, then you can see her coming, but where in the stage is she going to put her foot down? It’s impossible to tell the position and size of the AoE she generates without the circles. You might see the attack coming, but could not accurately judge where you would need to be to avoid it. You might avoid it too narrowly and still get hit, or you might burn a lot of abilities to avoid it way wider than necessary.

The new orange circles are great, and if you’re genuinely trying to get into game design, learn why they are right and you are wrong on this one.

Yes they make it easier to avoid the hits, but one can not deny that the orange circle takes attention away from the animation, and places it on the circle.

Look, I’m an artist myself, more illustration than animation, but I’ve done that too in the past, so I’ll tell you, I can barely pay attention to animations in action combat. The only time I have any time to pay attention to animations is either A: when I’ve done this bit a million times and can defend myself in my sleep, B: when the game involves some sort of slo-mo, or C: when I’m watching a trailer or something else playing.

There are actually a few fights in GW2 where I’ve learned to follow the animation tells really well, like the Golem mentioned above, or Claw of Jormag, but most bosses are either too small on the screen to notice their moves, or there’s too much going on. The only way mob animations work as tells are when you’re one-on-one, or where they are really huge and really slow. And even then, I’m not paying attention to the quality of the animation, just that the animation exists.

Now I don’t think that they should reduce the quality or quantity of enemy animations, they do make the fights look so much more interesting in replay, and player character animations really add to the game, but animations should not be the primary method of conveying information to the player, at least not in a game that moves this fast.

Go back to the punching example. This is a melee attack. The Marionette’s kick could be seen as a melee attack as well. Traditionally only Aoes need to be marked by circles and shapes. But in Wildstar, literally every single thing a character does is covered by a swatch of color. In GW2 this would potentially mean putting an orange triangle in front of every warrior that uses Hundred Blades.

I don’t see any reason to believe that they intend to do this, but if they did, I would welcome it. It would be important, however, to differentiate between “weak” attacks and “strong” attacks, because some telegraphs are worth dodging, and others it’s better to take the hit and save the avoidance for something else. With the current boss circles, they’re pretty much all bad news.

Guys, the purple beam is enough is it not? Even for color blind people, you still see the physical shape of that beam, don’t you? Likewise if you are fighting Giganticus Lupicus, you can clearly see his arms waving up and down whether you see colors or not, correct? These are my concerns.

Well first, in most cases, telegraphs appear before the damaging attack, so it would be there before the beam, allowing you to dodge it before it hits you. Second, visual effects do not always give a clear indication of the full size of the attack. It’s possible to minutely sidestep a Mesmer beam that isn’t aimed at you, such that none of the purple stuff comes within 5ft of your model, and yet you still take damage. The telegraph of the beam would be about twice as wide as the graphic.

Also, boss telegraph animations don’t always indicate where its attack is going to land, only that it’s about to perform one. This is especially true for multi-area attacks.

Xenon.4537:

panzer.6034:

Orange circles have nothing to do with whether or not a game is “art”, much less “good art” or “toilet art” (whatever that means). Art isn’t arbitrarily limited to imagery being naturalisticly rendered or animated any more than op-art or modern art or abstract art or any sort of more wildly experimental art is not art simply because it doesn’t involve an illustrative rendering of a subject. Using abstract shapes and colors in a non-representative format to lead the viewer’s eye has been a tool in art long before video games existed.

That is true, but I believe GW2 should look more like this and less like this.

The latter is what i get on every major boss fight right now, thanks to the particle smog that every last guardian, elementalist and mesmer throws up (going flamethrower as an engineer likely do not help, but with its cone attack i at least know i will be hitting something, anything, in that epileptic fit of a fight).

Xenon.4537:

If you are going to boil everything down to simple brightly colored geometric shapes, why bother animating at all? Is it the goal in the industry right now to phase out animators and utilize gimmicky visual effects to save money on development? Is Anet really willing to sacrifice artistic quality just because some other game is doing it? I would be appalled if indeed Anet has decided to emulate other MMOs “just because.” Anet always talks about pushing the envelope and pioneering ground that no one else is covering. If that’s true, then Anet should be sticking to their guns and remain true to the quality of art they have been putting forth thus far.

Up & coming game devs and animators UNITE!

You’ve got a point about those circles. IMO, they also make the Marionette fight way too easy. If I had been involved in this project, I would have VFX in place of the orange circles. It would have to be beautiful, frightening, and related to the Clockwork.

Phasing out animators is never good for any projects. We Westerners have to have awesome games in order to compete with Asia.

I hate to say this, but there are games on the market that surpass GW2 in terms of beautiful art. Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII is one. Aura Kingdom (a Chinese MMO) is another.

If I were Anet, I’d work on content like animation, better quality stories, better story pacing, adding VFX to the game, and adding more variety to the gameplay (of course)! I would build on the available lore. I would also flesh out the races and the various Orders by creating quests and storylines for them.

Another thing I would add if I were a dev: Allow people to choose between being a good guy and a bad guy. After completing the Thermanova Reactor Fractal, I’m itching for a chance to play as an Inquest character! Being a Nightmare court member would be interesting too. Allowing people to RP baddies would add another interesting element to PVP and WvW. It would also make the game last longer, and it would complicate the heroes’ dragon hunting quest.

BTW, don’t worry about the WildStar MMO. Cartoony animation isn’t standard in the American industry. Every animation job in the US requires that animators have to show off their ability to do life drawing as well as render realistic stuff in Maya. Realistic fine art drawings are a standard. Anime & Cartoony stuff isn’t. Very few US companies look for artists who specialize in cartoony or anime art.

headdesk…

charr charr charr /15

As a commercial artist there is more to consider than just does it look pretty. On top of that your opinion has some to do with it but you will always have to make changes you don’t agree with because your boss or the person who hired you wants them.

As far as with the game design itself they have those Lupicus is a perfect example of this because you don’t watch anything but his arm for when to dodge. Most chaotic fights though if your waiting for a visual animation to show you what will happen it would need to be an overly dramatic and unrealistic approach. The game already has an option to turn aoe circles off and all bosses do have visual indicators but seriously if your standing around enjoying them your dead so the aoe indicators won’t bother you just aim up.

My partner is color blind and is constantly frustrated that he has to look for visual notes to move in a see of player aoe’s, legendary effects, and just general casting that I love the new change as it’s improved his game play and he can enjoy the game more. Last note after time of playing no one actually stares at the floor they are just things you spot and move.

We’re seriously discussing the damage orange circles do to the artistic integrity? In a game where every hit you make springs up a 70’s cartoon “POW” balloon with damage done? Plus a flashy effect, even when just chopping a worm with an axe?

After Liandri, I can get behind the ease of use of the orangeness.

The best games I ever played were devoid of animation.

This is a game we are talking about. How it looks should ALWAYS come after how it plays.

mtpelion.4562:

How it looks should ALWAYS come after how it plays.

Beauty is only skin-deep, but the Marionette cuts to the bone.

I like the new circles. Some of the older ones are hard to see for a number of people. These new ones are generally much easier to see. Simple as that for me.

I think they were added for colourblind people, and reading this thread, they seem to have worked quite well.

So that’s fine by me, still have to look at the animations to time dodges anyway.

I say there has to be a distinction. Red circles for damage, and the new in-your-face circles for “if you don’t dodge you’re a goner”-circles that are currently indistinguishable from each other.

I like the new orange danger area indicators. Been super great on my color blindness, but I only have issues seeing the red depending on the color of the ground its on. My color blindness is pretty bad so this orange is a huge help to me.

A toggle/check-mark for the color, could just keep red at default & orange the optional choice.

Xenon.4537:

What I’m getting at is that I feel that animation should be the key to anticipating mechanics. If a boss is going to punch you, it should pull it’s fist back and you should clearly be able to understand what is about to happen. If you slap a brightly colored aoe sticker on top of it, the players attention is shifted from all the hard work and talent that went in to creating that fist-pull. The attention is instantly redirected to this simplified orange sticker.

The orange circles are, at best, a functional compromise to the fact that the Marionette is literally kicking people from off-screen and way above their heads.

And therein lies the problem with the limitations of the in-game camera we currently have. The Marionette should be visible throughout the fight but it isn’t – Unless you point the very limited FOV of the camera up to it, you’re not even going to be aware that it is there.

Same applies to any encounters in confined spaces or where there are obstacles the camera can bump into. All the hours spent on the great animation are completely wasted when you’re fighting with the camera to keep the boss in your FOV.

I 100% agree with everything the OP wrote. I hate oversimplification, dumbing down, handholding, etc. in mmo’s (one of the many reasons i hated WoW) and hope that GW2 doesn’t start going down this path any more than it already has.

Well. From my point of view, an opaque or almost opaque circle is functionally identical to things such as a pile of rocks that is about to explode (Eruption) or an image of a guardian symbol, etc.

A red ring is different because it only indicates a boundry, which you could learn from experience, and after a while you would be able to avoid everything even with red circles turned off, because you learned that a pile of rocks is about to explode and the kind of radius it has.

Anet had to put something there though, how else would you know she is about to swing her heel there? A circle/rectangle with nothing inside of it kind of doesn’t do it justice, so they colored it a bit.

I see people are very happy about orange circles and wish that Anet use them more. I hate the idea though. Watching Wildstar combat is absolute horror, I think people just want to be told when to dodge and they don’t really care what it is that they are dodging.

I hope Anet sticks to their views against having intrusive UI and mechanics that don’t induce skillful play, and doesn’t go that route .

It’s a game, it needs to be playable and functional foremost. I’d actually wish they’d go the other direction and bring back enemy cast bars, having to watch for when a boss lifts his arm when there’s a ton of other things going on sucks.

“Form ever follows function” — Louis Sullivan

Most points have already been addressed by other posters, but I would like to comment on OP’s claim that ANet might be doing it “just because some other game is doing it”.

Decisions shouldn’t be made just for the sake of copying other games, as much as they shouldn’t be made just for the sake of being innovative and different, of which I believe ANet has been guilty in the past. I think ANet should be doing what they think is right for the game and not trying to imitate anything. If they believe a feature is necessary and fits in their game, it is not a shame if they are inspired by others in its implementation. It is pretty much the norm among games in the MMO genre.

On the actual topic, I also believe this feature was necessary and would encourage its use in other aspects of PvE combat. The argument that players should be watching the animations for survivability is weak at best. It is not supported at all as a design choice because of the ridiculous amount of particle effects that even the simplest of player abilities produce, not to mention animation and damage synchronization or other problems that have been discussed in previous posts. I have always disliked that idea and have seen it as either a dogmatic design choice or an excuse for lazy UI coding (example: absence of enemy cast bars), so I may be a little biased.

Regarding the appreciation of animations (and animators), is it a reasonable cause for developing in that direction, or is it a biased opinion (OP being an animator)? Also, should players be force-fed “art” while functionality is being compromised? I don’t think animations become useless if we don’t watch every little detail all the time. It is obvious that animation quality is very important for the artistic appeal of a game, and I believe it serves its purpose regardless of this, or similar, features.

Personally speaking, I like the new orange markers. It’s VERY visible and easy to see, which helps a lot in the chaos of a tense fight.

That said, I can also understand the OP’s point of view, so I propose a compromise. We get a new graphical toggle that lets us choose one of the following:

1. All hostile AoE markers use the old red circle style.
2. All hostile AoE markers use the new orange style.
3. Only certain boss attacks use the new orange style, distinguishing it between “This attack will hurt, but if you’re tough enough you can shrug it off” and “This attack will one-shot you. DODGE” attacks.

I’m on the fence about these circles…my primary complaint is that they don’t always render. On lower settings, during the large scale fight of Wurm I only saw the orange circles a handful of times, and never saw the blue one from amber-creeper.

I doubt they’re going to start throwing orange AoE indicators on every attack. There are plenty of attacks even within the Marrionette fight itself that don’t have them. Warden 3’s jump and mines (which don’t even have the traditional red AoE). Warden 2’s twirling. Warden 1 doesn’t have any besides the indicator that lets you know which way its facing.

Aside from Warden 4’s scream and Warden 2’s mines, they’re only in place for ambigious attacks that either come from off-screen or would otherwise be impossible to predict (you wouldn’t be able to tell whether Warden 4 was going to use the inner pools or the outer pools before it was too late, for instance).

The mines from Warden 2 are probably marked like that because they’re “mission critical” so to speak, if you don’t know where they are you can’t do the boss at all. Same reason Warden 1 gets the directional indicator.

The Warden 4 scream is sort of a strange choice since that one does have a very clear animation cue of where its going to go. But that’s one “bad” use of it out of all of them, so I’m not too worried.

Orange circles are better because of people with red/green color binldness.

Charak.9761:

Orange circles are better because of people with red/green color binldness.

This.

I have color blindness and I love the way the new AoE markers look like. If only these were used in Liadri and aetherblade retreat dungeon. :/

I like the new orange circles, and I’m usually a stickler for anything that HELPS with immersion.

I’m soft of glad that they aren’t absolutely everywhere, but I’m okay with them being used in boss fights. At least I can see what’s going on, for once.

One thing I don’t understand is how this got into an argument of “circle VS animation.” There’s no VS. It’s not either/orr. All the “orange circle” attacks have animations too. Mechanically there is zero difference between them and the existing red rings. The only difference is that they are easier for most people to see, and considerably easier for colorblind people to see. These aren’t a step towards firing animators, and they don’t make anything any easier than having traditional red rings, they just make them easier to see. The Marionette’s attack in which she fires a bunch of green lightning bolts (with orange circles) is no different than Mai Trin’s attack where she lobs a bunch of energy fields, it just uses orange circles as tells rather than red rings.