Guild Wars 2

Hi. Im posting this in response to alot of the replies I see on here. One of hte main nay says against change that ive seen has been people somehow believe that others want support and control builds to do as much damage as damage builds. Im here to say as a control style player who plays with other control style players that this isnt the case.
We DONT expect to do as much damage as someone in full zerker.
We DONT expect to suddenly be the new meta either.
What we want and expect is the ability to feel USEFULL. Which in the current stack and burn full zerker playstyle is NEVER going to happen.
I play a longbow ranger who utilizies aoe cripples and immobolize to control entire groups of enemies. However this is useless due to the fact that the current fight style does not infact involve movement of enemy mobs at all.
The idea behind my play style is to give opportunities to my allies to either back off and recover from damage or position themselves for maximum dps.
But seeing as how 99% of the time no one ever has to back off from damage or even rearrange themselves since there all stacked anyway most of the time I end up switching my traits around putting on a sword and MINDLESSLY dpsing. Because there is NO tangible risk in doing so.
>.< somehow this turned into half rant but hopefully SOME people will see where im coming from with this.

and the only solution to make your playstyle very good is to create the PvE content for it.
nerfing gear and stats will not change anything.

Malevil.2104:

Another essay about how is berserker gear bad for game but still not a single valid argument how passive stats combination and defenses would make game more challeging compared to active defenses which berserker setup uses.

Face the harsh facts, timing you dodges, reflects, aegis require you to watch whats happening around you. Toughness and vitality adds only more margin for your error . Passive defenses dont add anything it term of required skill from player.

What game needs in terms of diversity is imo reworking how conditions work, not making passive defense stats more required.

You got it backwards.
It’s not about passive defense making the game more challenging, it’s about more challenging content(and challenging in the right way, not hit or miss one frame dodges of instagib setups) making passive defense more valuable.

And by this u create a new meta, Let it be Warrior 3 PVT rest Zerk, Thief 6 PVT rest Zerk.

What does it change? Still the same boring content? Same mechanics/los/stacking only with less pew pew?

Whats with the class balance, if a thief can´t play max dps but a warrior/necromancer/ranger can they will get useless. Because they do less dps then.
Imo all classes are able to play max dps builds, and all are “viable” (yes necros less they lack support/cleave dmg).
How do u want to balance a need of defense?

If u need for example at least 19k life and 2,3k armor do survive..u will destroy everything. It´s impossibel to do.

Imo only 1 thing isn´t balanced. And that´s rampager gear. It should do the same dps as berserker does.

Ahlen.7591:

Because DPS IS everything.

Support does not win fights.

Control does not win fights.

Reducing the enemy HP to zero is the entire goal of a fight, and the most important thing in doing that is damage. Everything else is just a vehicle to deliver as much damage as possible while not dying.

I think this is, and forever will be, the main reason why Berserker’s and raw DPS is king. If ANET want to make defensive stats more viable, they need to create encounters where you don’t necessarily win by damage. The control chamber in the Molten Facility is the most recent example of this – yes, you still need damage, but most importantly, you need to not die to the random crap that occasionally flies at you.
If we had more bosses/encounters/events where the goal was to outlast an attack (Detha vs Gravelings/Magg vs Assassins), or you only had given periods to strike the boss (King Toad), or you needed to withstand damage to create opportunities (Iron Forgeman), defensive stats would actually be useful. However, those types of events are typically time gated, which people seem to dislike since they enjoy rushing dungeons/events for profit.

A well-reasoned analysis, but I disagree that player skill has no part of this discussion. Objectively, the “zerker” playstyle has a higher skillcap because the active defenses must be deployed correctly (type, timing, placement) to gain the benefits of front-loaded DPS. Failure to correctly use the active defense in a highly skillful manner typically results in the defeat of the player and/or team (and corresponding loss of money and time).

By contrast, more defensive playstyles have a lower skill requirement because there is greater room for error in the execution of the available active defenses. This is not an elitist statement, or an insult to lower skilled players. It is an objective fact, and frankly a positive testament to the game’s design that all content can be completed by players of varying skill levels.

But it is a basic tenant of game design that higher skill should be rewarded. Lowering the skillcap — or raising the skill floor — eliminates the fun of getting better at the game.

This is why I disagree with your premise that there is a problem with the Berserker meta. Nerfing Berserker gear or raising the effectiveness of defensive playstyles lowers the skillcap, making the game less rewarding for skillful play. Currently there is positive correlation between higher skilled play and player reward (measured in any number of metrics, including gold/hr and time to complete content). To reduce or eliminate that correlation by lowering the skillcap would be a significant mistake, in my opinion.

Berner.7289:

A well-reasoned analysis, but I disagree that player skill has no part of this discussion. Objectively, the “zerker” playstyle has a higher skillcap because the active defenses must be deployed correctly (type, timing, placement) to gain the benefits of front-loaded DPS. Failure to correctly use the active defense in a highly skillful manner typically results in the defeat of the player and/or team (and corresponding loss of money and time).

By contrast, more defensive playstyles have a lower skill requirement because there is greater room for error in the execution of the available active defenses. This is not an elitist statement, or an insult to lower skilled players. It is an objective fact, and frankly a positive testament to the game’s design that all content can be completed by players of varying skill levels.

But it is a basic tenant of game design that higher skill should be rewarded. Lowering the skillcap — or raising the skill floor — eliminates the fun of getting better at the game.

This is why I disagree with your premise that there is a problem with the Berserker meta. Nerfing Berserker gear or raising the effectiveness of defensive playstyles lowers the skillcap, making the game less rewarding for skillful play. Currently there is positive correlation between higher skilled play and player reward (measured in any number of metrics, including gold/hr and time to complete content). To reduce or eliminate that correlation by lowering the skillcap would be a significant mistake, in my opinion.

This doesn’t make sense really. With zerker runs you bypass and negate enemy mechanics through active defenses. So you do not have to deal with what the mob ai may do. With a more defensive build you are responding accordingly to enemy attacks. That is the mob actually has a opportunity to react to you.

So how is it possible to have a higher skill cap when in most cases mobs do not have a chance to fully carry out their attacks against zerker builds? To quote the OP:

“Active defense: Enemies need to make so many moves before they get through active defense. The faster an enemy dies, the less moves they make. The less moves they make, the less likely they are to go through your active defense. With this in mind, it is very easy to do so much damage that an enemy dies before they can go through your active defense.”

In essence zerker builds would have a lower skill cap since the mobs aren’t even fighting back. Its more so player vs a target that doesn’t get a chance to damage you.

Aza.2105:

So how is it possible to have a higher skill cap when in most cases mobs do not have a chance to fully carry out their attacks against zerker builds?

The mobs do carry out their attacks, but they can be mitigated by skillful play. Dodges, aegis, blinds, blocks, invulns, and reflections don’t stop the mobs from attacking. And to be effective, the player has to choose the right skill for the right situation and deploy it at the right time. These are high-skill defenses (at least as high as the GW2 skillcap goes).

Further, your post illustrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the “zerker” meta. The meta isn’t about 100% damage. Every meta build for every class calls for team support elements, even at the cost of personal damage output.

What meta excludes is passive defensive traits. Passive, as in “does not require the player to execute a skill to be effective.” Toughness, vitality, regeneration, auto-proc’ing defenses: these are low-skill defensive traits. Not an insult; a fact.

Berner.7289:

Aza.2105:

So how is it possible to have a higher skill cap when in most cases mobs do not have a chance to fully carry out their attacks against zerker builds?

The mobs do carry out their attacks, but they can be mitigated by skillful play. Dodges, aegis, blinds, blocks, invulns, and reflections don’t stop the mobs from attacking. And to be effective, the player has to choose the right skill for the right situation and deploy it at the right time. These are high-skill defenses (at least as high as the GW2 skillcap goes).

Further, your post illustrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the “zerker” meta. The meta isn’t about 100% damage. Every meta build for every class calls for team support elements, even at the cost of personal damage output.

What meta excludes is passive defensive traits. Passive, as in “does not require the player to execute a skill to be effective.” Toughness, vitality, regeneration, auto-proc’ing defenses: these are low-skill defensive traits. Not an insult; a fact.

You are putting words into my post that aren’t there. I’ve never said it the zerker meta is 100% about damage. So there is no misunderstanding on my part.

A zerker meta does not exist any where but pve. Its really not a problem with zerker itself but the enemy AI. Its true that the objective is to kill the mob, but that is true in any mmorpg. In gw1 this was handled much better since enemy ai mimicked that of a live player.

While I can understand the element of skill you are trying to illustrate, its hard to justify that as being skill when the enemies can not adequately fight back. If they could then zerkers would find themselves downed often, just like they do in pvp and wvw.

After watching the TA Aetherpath dev livestream with the staff guard spamming all utilities only right before dying and the 25k+ hp scepter/torch confusion based mesmer ranging easy melee boss this shouldn’t be surprising.

Aza.2105:

While I can understand the element of skill you are trying to illustrate, its hard to justify that as being skill when the enemies can not adequately fight back. If they could then zerkers would find themselves downed often, just like they do in pvp and wvw.

Why? Why should skillful play be punished? Why should smart and timely execution of the players skills not result in more rewarding gameplay?

Lowering a game’s skillcap — especially one that is already relatively low to begin with — is bad design. Until people take this into consideration, they are just arguing around the issue.

Good post BRA. I can’t help thinking that the root of the problem is the abandonment of the trinity. If everyone’s role is now dps, then the highest dps configuration will be best eg berserker. The problem seems to be that Anet removed tanking and healing, but left tanking and healing gear in the game (from a pve standpoint).

No one is seriously suggesting that non-zerker specs do as much damage as full zerker. What they want is for control and support specs and gear to be equally useful. Some people have said it is crazy for anything other than zerker to be the most efficient. I say it is crazy for a game to provide a large variety of gear and build options, only to render all but one “garbage” (as per the dungeons subforum) by poor encounter design.

However I can’t see how this can be fixed without reintroducing some form of role. Full zerker will be optimal unless someone has to tank and someone has to heal/support, but then we are into a trinity. Which raises the question of whether the removal of the trinity was a good idea in the first place.

I have a question for the pro-zerker people on this thread. Are you happy with the current state of gw2 gameplay? What kind of changes would you like to see to it, if any.

Berner.7289:

Aza.2105:

While I can understand the element of skill you are trying to illustrate, its hard to justify that as being skill when the enemies can not adequately fight back. If they could then zerkers would find themselves downed often, just like they do in pvp and wvw.

Why? Why should skillful play be punished? Why should smart and timely execution of the players skills not result in more rewarding gameplay?

Lowering a game’s skillcap — especially one that is already relatively low to begin with — is bad design. Until people take this into consideration, they are just arguing around the issue.

The skill cap was higher in gw1 and it intelligently incorporated damage, support and control.

I’m not sure how you are using timed execution as a display of skill. When the mobs attacks are completely predictable and slow. It would be much more understandable if the mobs were quick and unpredictable similar to players in pvp then your use of timing skills would be justified.

Abramelin.7356:

I have a question for the pro-zerker people on this thread. Are you happy with the current state of gw2 gameplay? What kind of changes would you like to see to it, if any.

For the most part they have created a self imposed hierarchy in regards to what gear a person has. With zerker being the good player and most skillful and all else being bad players. But like I said, this is self imposed. No were did Anet ever say zerker is the experienced players gear and everything else is for bad players seeking to get better.

Aza.2105:

For the most part they have created a self imposed hierarchy in regards to what gear a person has. With zerker being the good player and most skillful and all else being bad players. But like I said, this is self imposed.

You don’t make the meta. The meta makes you.

Great post OP. I fully agree with your assessment and solutions.

The “berserker meta” and so many more balance issues come from the behavior and capabilities of the AI and the best thing ArenaNet could do to address this is essentially bridge the gap between players and monsters.

Aza.2105:

Berner.7289:

Aza.2105:

While I can understand the element of skill you are trying to illustrate, its hard to justify that as being skill when the enemies can not adequately fight back. If they could then zerkers would find themselves downed often, just like they do in pvp and wvw.

Why? Why should skillful play be punished? Why should smart and timely execution of the players skills not result in more rewarding gameplay?

Lowering a game’s skillcap — especially one that is already relatively low to begin with — is bad design. Until people take this into consideration, they are just arguing around the issue.

The skill cap was higher in gw1 and it intelligently incorporated damage, support and control.

I’m not sure how you are using timed execution as a display of skill. When the mobs attacks are completely predictable and slow. It would be much more understandable if the mobs were quick and unpredictable similar to players in pvp then your use of timing skills would be justified.

I hope you’re talking pre GW:EN GW1 or not about GW1 PvE after that point, because it was afk easy. Just random idea that occurred to me, make certain boss attacks unavoidable but able to be interrupted(not a 1 shot skill, but if it hits, still hits for like 40% health and reduces healing received significantly for close to the cooldown of that skill), but in order to interrupt need certain amount of toughness(have a weapon skill on certain weapon sets for each class scale % chance to interrupt with toughness)? Giving the “tank” stat value, and just leaving the vitality stat as the in case i mess up cushion. Remove active defense, guardians are gonna basically be required everywhere for protection spam and aegis spam(possible blinds) as well as thieves for blinds. Or cause a trinity which once again guardian will be on the better side for tanks due to easy protection access, blinds, and aegis.

For the most part if I’m pugging I advertise prefer zerker, as long as I only get 1 or 2 non zerkers its fine, hell even if theyre spec’d zerker but geared elsewise its still decent enough, the damage modifiers are huge in the zerker specs. All I ask is if you’re not running full zerker spec, don’t have it be a selfish spec(guardians AH/meditation, sadly most don’t realize quite how selfish the valor line is(and I’m using guardian as example purely because I know it best)). If they say something when they join its cool but if they hide it and expect to go unnoticed/carried(if they’re a selfish spec) I’ll be booting them right at the end.

Thing is unless you try and bring in a trinity, you’re going to end up with 4dps’ers and whatever else you need. Games with trinities you don’t complain that 5-man dungeons are always 1 healers 1 tank and 3 dps, why isnt it 1 healer 2 tanks 2 dps?

I’m a bit late to the party, but I just wanted to say this was a great post, Blood.
I think you really summarized the meat of the issue in a very clear and concise way.

CC, Support AND DPS, thats what GW2 should be about.

I could make a long post here how a big part of the problem lies in the fact, that in order to make Support or CC work, your group will have to commit heavily to it and therefore lose out on the DPS, while DPS can utilize some skills of the support/cc kitten nal to guarantee their surival without having to commit to certain gear or compostions.
However since these posts generally just get overheard or trolled by some persons in this forum I will just put out the following:
Support builds can be made more relevant by removing the need to commit to certain stats.
CC can be made viable by adding skills that can and must be interrupted even with defiant aswell as adding more non bossy mobs to bosses. In WoW bosses were not cc’d, the adds the boss spawned however needed to be cc’d sometimes.
Condition damage can be made viable by reworking how much damage conditions deal and how they are applied. 1 phantasm mesmer = full bleeds unless he cripples himself, that really is bad design.

DHK.8406:

The problem is simple, it is not complicated, it does not take pages to explain. It can be summed up in once sentance.

In PvE if you learn to dodge, you can survive any encounter in the entire game regardless of gear and/or traits.

So if you dont need toughness, or vitality, or healing to survive they instantly become useless stats and you are left with only berserker.

Which is why I keep saying that non zerker gear sets should never have been a part of pve. The game/combat system simply wasn’t designed around them in pve. Pvp is an entirely different matter though. The simple solution…reduce pve to one gear set. Add training wheels for our current trinity huggers by increasing base survival stats as needed per class. Make all other gear sets only equippable in pvp. Problem solved.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

By doing this, bulkier builds can stay engaged longer (thus doing more damage) and draw enemy aggro for longer (thus letting others do more damage). Support builds that use heals will be more valuable since they recover the damage others have suffered, allowing them to stay engaged and do more damage. Protection is more important since the long-term mitigation actually mean something, weakness will be better for the same reason, regen will be better since the heal to damage ratio will be much higher, retaliation will worthwhile since enemies will suffer greater damage, confusion will also do more damage, and to help with disengage against melee enemies the soft CC from cripple/chill/immobilize will also be more useful.

I saw trinity written all over this excerpt…bulkier builds (tanks)…draw enemy aggro (tanks)…support builds that use heals (healers).

ODB.6891:

DHK.8406:

The problem is simple, it is not complicated, it does not take pages to explain. It can be summed up in once sentance.

In PvE if you learn to dodge, you can survive any encounter in the entire game regardless of gear and/or traits.

So if you dont need toughness, or vitality, or healing to survive they instantly become useless stats and you are left with only berserker.

Which is why I keep saying that non zerker gear sets should never have been a part of pve. The game/combat system simply wasn’t designed around them in pve. Pvp is an entirely different matter though. The simple solution…reduce pve to one gear set. Add training wheels for our current trinity huggers by increasing base survival stats as needed per class. Make all other gear sets only equippable in pvp. Problem solved.

I agree with you conceptually – my first character was an Elementalist and I gave up after a few months of trying condition stat items and being frustrated at my killing ability and survivability (especially compared to the impressively flexible range of the Ele in GW1)

I the rolled a Guardian and focused on a more bunker build (as many did and some still do). I got my PVT Armor but had trouble tagging mobs and in Orr, I could not always kill things fast enough for comfort.

It was almost unthinkable to go full Berserker, but I did it and like almost everyone else, I never looked back.

I don’t understand why it took me 3 months to do that and why it wasn’t more obvious. Even now, I talk to leveling Guardians in my guild and they really don’t believe me that a Guardian will PVE best in DPS gear – it just goes against every RPG trope you’ve ever learned but once the light comes on and you understand that the meta is not Attrition Warfare but something more like Shock and Awe – pushing the attack and getting inside the enemy’s OODA loop (look it up) – as frail a thing as that is in an AI creature.

I think builds and maybe gear should focus more on the type and style of DPS – condition, sustained, spike, etc. We should be able to shift toward a more dodge based style or a more block/reflect style – perhaps choosing slower, more powerful attacks, or rapid strikes.

Do all greatswords really need to hit the same way? Why not have a weapon meta where we we can either choose a more heavy/light weapon in a class or shift the way we use it?

The DPS/zerker meta is an enjoyable play style, but I think it needs more options and specializations.

@ODB
You’ve got it backwards. People aren’t against useless stats and they’re taking it out on the DPS meta, they’re against the DPS meta and they’re taking it out on useless stats. (Justifiably, as they’re one of the causes of it.)

Less build and role options is prettymuch the exact opposite of what an iteration should be aiming for.

Aza.2105:

This doesn’t make sense really. With zerker runs you bypass and negate enemy mechanics through active defenses. So you do not have to deal with what the mob ai may do. With a more defensive build you are responding accordingly to enemy attacks. That is the mob actually has a opportunity to react to you.

So how is it possible to have a higher skill cap when in most cases mobs do not have a chance to fully carry out their attacks against zerker builds? To quote the OP:

“Active defense: Enemies need to make so many moves before they get through active defense. The faster an enemy dies, the less moves they make. The less moves they make, the less likely they are to go through your active defense. With this in mind, it is very easy to do so much damage that an enemy dies before they can go through your active defense.”

In essence zerker builds would have a lower skill cap since the mobs aren’t even fighting back. Its more so player vs a target that doesn’t get a chance to damage you.

Ye, because tanking all arah p2 bosses with 0 dodges doesn’t mean you negate their mechanics. First timers could do it without any prior knowledge.

This whole thread is full of misinformation, including OP and everyone pats each others backs.

We don’t always seen eye to eye, OP, but this is one of the finest posts I’ve ever read. Kudos to you.

that vids just show how some active defence are totally unbalanced….

Also the reason why any content with a guard and a warrior is significantly easier…

Active defense is the number 1 reason to the stacking meta……
A Dps party can just kill most bosses before they can go through Aegis, protection, blocks etc…

Many people says often L2 evade…reality is you don t even need to.
There is a reason why after someone post a vid of a difficult task, suddenly almost everyone is able to repeat it.

Skill balance is lacking and some professions can easily go full dps and keep their best active defense.

Anet also makes it worse with dps barriers and unreasonable damage…
Why should i use vitality and thoughness in fractal for example when a normal mob can hit for 11.000 per tick and they are in packs of dozens…

My only chance is to kill them before i run out of active defenses….

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

The problem is not in the stats themselves!

I love how this discussions seems to have drifted once again towards gear and their stats. OP clearly states the problem is NOT stat related.

One of the things that really peeves me personally about the current meta, is that anything outside of pure DPS is just not optimal, which not only makes builds redundant, but entire classes too. I main a necro, and I’ve seen it time and time again:

“I can’t believe im involved in a debate with someone who thinks necros are more useful than any other class.”

That quote sums it up. I love my condition necro to bits, and have put countless hours into gearing her, even to the point that she is now completely ascended…but she is almost completely useless in PvE.

So while improving PvE mob AI may bring forward some sort of solution to the DPS meta, I still feel like individual classes still need to be looked at and brought in line with other, more useful classes. Now that doesn’t mean that classes need to be nerfed, I mean certain classes need to be buffed, or traits and skills need to be looked at. There are far too many useless traits and skills in this game.

fadeaway.2807:

You play a sword focus reflect mesmer and don’t already consider yourself bringing the control and support you want so badly? To me that’s precisely what control and support is. You control the mobs into a corner/wall using focus, and you support your team with reflections. Why do you feel you need tank stats to be viable to accomplish this?

Because what he really means by “support” is “healer”. That is the only sense I can make out of what they are saying since all characters of every build offer support via baseline function of utilities and weapons.

Vox Hollow.2736:

@ODB
You’ve got it backwards. People aren’t against useless stats and they’re taking it out on the DPS meta, they’re against the DPS meta and they’re taking it out on useless stats. (Justifiably, as they’re one of the causes of it.)

Less build and role options is prettymuch the exact opposite of what an iteration should be aiming for.

I’ve been trying to see what you are saying in this post and I just can’t. This isn’t just a dps META…this is a dps game mode. The point of this game mode is dps. What other point could there be when the objective is to kill stuff? The trinity is purposely absent in this game to prevent anyone from being forced into following some “tank’s” orders or depending on some “healer” to keep you alive. This game is designed for individual accountability. There is no iteration that can or should correct this and have it be the same game that was advertised/sold/purchased. Re-read the pre-release description of this game. This game advertised that every class could fulfill all three roles…it specifically worded that phrase with AND instead of OR, which means that trying to make a dedicated tank or dedicated healer is doing it wrong. You should be doing all three at the same time. That’s why utilities are not affected by stats. That’s why dps is required to be efficient. That’s why there is no tank aggro system. That’s why healers are not required. Please stop trying to make this into a trinity game. There are no “roles” and there should not be any. Everyone should be fulfilling all three roles.

There is another frequent post I keep seeing about nerfing critical damage…all I can think about when I see that repeatedly mentioned is..

You will see a new item in the gem store after zerker is nerfed : stat switcher : switches stats on gear (1 time use, 1000 gems).

Ahlen.7591:

haviz.1340:

Finnway.2183:

Right now every class in PvE specs for DPS and support and the only valid stat combo is Berserkers.

That’s not the system I expected based on advertisements* and it’s not the way I believe ArenaNet intended it. The game is skill based and hence Berserker will always be the most effective combo, but I do not think they intended running Berserker to be as easy as it is now courtesy of stacking. This ultimately kills build diversity because there is currently a low skill-cap needed to run Berserker so that any average Joe can use it instead of only the top 15% of players.

I’m not asking them to kill Berserkers. I run Berserkers. I understand it is the most effective stat combo and the builds you and your co-members of DnT put out are fantastic. But the low-skill cap needed to use it right now will ultimately kill the PvE side game.

*sources: http://youtu.be/aDyKPXjA9eU?t=1m7s

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/valid
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/optimal

I would have thought you had been told that already.

Gear is only the part of the build diversity. Instead of fixing something that’s not broken anet should improve less used traits, weapons, utilities and revamp few mechanics like reflects, unshakeable and facetanking by pvt elitists because they are very toxic community.

Skill cap isn’t lower when you run berserker’s instead of suboptimal yet still valid gears. The game has innate extremely low skill cap.

I definitely agree with anet improving traits.

Fully half of the traits on my Warrior and on my Engi are completely and utterly useless. For every single build.

There are so many flaws in this game’s combat:
1- Stats bound to traits… come on let us choose traits and stats apart…
2- Stats bound to armour and weapons: goodbye variety
3- No interchangeable weapon skills.
4- Mage classes have long range attack, but at the cost of armour, health and damage, but the game has huge gap closers making long range nearly useless, because you’ll get cut to pieces by a cookiecutter warrior.
5- Health & armour are inequal between classes… without any good reason and with real benefits for the heavy armour classes: warrior/guardian are the most played classes for both PvE as PvP.
6- DPS is the only way to go, though toughness/vit are the secundary stats for everyone who doesn’t run full dps glass cannon.

This creates the situation that people run:

• In PvE: PPr% [Berserker] and in a lesser degree CdPV [Carrion]
• In PvP: PVT [Soldier] or CdVT [Dire], though there are “support” classes such as engi, guardian, ele that do run HPT [Cleric], but they are incredibly weak against any of the aforementioned.

7- PvE bosses require no tactics, making them health bags you want to empty as fast as possible. Defiant and Unshakeable are a part of this. Condi is also less effective.
8- Damage mitigation in the game is passive, making armour redundant above a certain level.
I noticed that if I try to go anywhere above 3,2k armour and 1,4k healing power, the damage on my non-healer who still has easily 2,5k armour is 300% (read 3 times) higher, while my healer has around 20% (read 1/5 times) damage reduction compared to the non-healer.

I could go on rambling like this for hours I guess, but I think the above list takes into account some of the biggest flaws in the combat.

Good to know this thread asploded while I was asleep.

theundivine.4318:

While I think your (the OP) analysis is good, it ignores the biggest advantage a soldier’s geared character has over a glass cannon: it survives a lot better in a multiple-enemy environment. There’s a good reason people go high defence in World vs. World. Soldiers can wade deep into a zerg that’s dealing lots of AoEs and come out the other end intact.

There are two sides to this. While soldiers is more capable of taking damage, the enemies that are being fought last longer still, so they end up doing more damage overall. With zerker gear, although you take more damage, you kill enemies much faster, which means that you’ll be suffering less damage overall.

A multi-enemy scenario does invoke some of what I am trying to accomplish. In that circumstance, while zerker gear isn’t useless or ineffective, it does have more risks associated with its use. This makes it so more durable sets can perform on more equal footing that zerker gear.

The goal of my suggestion isn’t to make zerker gear ineffective or useless. That just changes one dominance issue into another one. My goal is to make zerker higher risk, so that having different specs and multiple specs has tangible benefits over running just zerker.

Faux.1937:

You forgot some important Issues

A fast list of things he forgot and they DO matter alot, Im not going to discus them or go into big detail, just list some things OP missed.

1) Condition builds in group play and against Objects
2) CC/support against bosses (there almost isnt any)
3) Some parts of the Game (high level fractals, some dungeon paths etc..) things hit so hard so fast, its BETTER to be full DPS than tank.
4) Heals and Conditions cant Crit and also they have no stat synergy to make them more desirable like Zerk does (The combo of Power/Prec/Crit damage all helps each other and multiplies), Toughness and Heal power do have some synergy, but no multipliers.
5) Longer fights doesnt make them more fun.

I didn’t forget them. Most of this is included in the solution post in another thread, if not listed here. Many things I didn’t list here are because they aren’t pertinent.

When you go into conditions, this is adding another dimension to combat other than damage and durability. Conditions inflict a different kind of damage that follows different rules, so they behave differently. Regarding their damage output and their durability, it follows the a similar exchange. However, to give conditions full depth, you have to delve into enemy toughness, enemy cleanses, enemy boons, the effectiveness of debuffs, etc. As for the condition cap, that is another issue with software design, and everyone (including anet) knows that conditions can’t be balanced with the cap as it is currently.

The thing with CC and support is that they function outside of gear specifics. A zerker can stack might just as well as a rapid set, and their stuns work just the same.

While not related, heals and conditions do have stat synergy. Healing becomes more efficient with higher toughness, and they have higher capacitance with vitality. Toughness and vitality also react together, making each additional hitpoint more difficult to take away. Though the multipliers aren’t readily seen, they do exist.

I agree that longer fights aren’t more fun. In my suggestion thread, I proposed reducing enemy HP and giving them a heal on a long cooldown, which will make stuns more useful as well as giving poison a role in PVE.

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

Still waiting to hear what the “problem” is. In a good player’s hands, pve dps builds are objectively superior.

SO WHAT? Please explain why and how this is a “problem” that requires “fixing.”

This is a fine example of the wrong line of thinking I was talking about. You can see here that the subject isn’t about the gear, but about “good players”. The zerker issue exists outside of player skill, but the inability to look past player skill has left Nike blinded.

This failure in logic follows through nearly every thread on the zerker issue, this one included. A nice shorthand for recognizing this error is to look at a few key phrases:

“What they want”
“They use this as”
“Good player”
“What you are doing”
“What they say”

and such. This is ultimately an act of hostility and not reasoning. As such it accomplishes nothing.

It is my advice to not respond to these kinds of comments. Yes, I realize the irony of this post, but I do need an example.

runeblade.7514:

Would this solution destroy stacking? I don’t care if berserker meta gets buffed or nerfed. The OP does not address stacking as an issue or if the side-effects of berserker meta does anything to stacking.

Stacking is, in itself, a different issue that isn’t dependent on berserker gear. It’s not even a subject of this thread, really.

Malevil.2104:

Another essay about how is berserker gear bad for game but still not a single valid argument how passive stats combination and defenses would make game more challeging compared to active defenses which berserker setup uses.

…skill and challenge? That isn’t really the subject here. The subject is equality in performance through calculated exchange of durability for damage.

I feel I have to restate this: my goal isn’t to make zerker obsolete. My goal is to make zerker have drawbacks to it use, and make the exchange of durability for damage have a meaningful impact.

ODB.6891:

Vox Hollow.2736:

@ODB
You’ve got it backwards. People aren’t against useless stats and they’re taking it out on the DPS meta, they’re against the DPS meta and they’re taking it out on useless stats. (Justifiably, as they’re one of the causes of it.)

Less build and role options is prettymuch the exact opposite of what an iteration should be aiming for.

I’ve been trying to see what you are saying in this post and I just can’t. This isn’t just a dps META…this is a dps game mode. The point of this game mode is dps. What other point could there be when the objective is to kill stuff? The trinity is purposely absent in this game to prevent anyone from being forced into following some “tank’s” orders or depending on some “healer” to keep you alive. This game is designed for individual accountability. There is no iteration that can or should correct this and have it be the same game that was advertised/sold/purchased. Re-read the pre-release description of this game. This game advertised that every class could fulfill all three roles…it specifically worded that phrase with AND instead of OR, which means that trying to make a dedicated tank or dedicated healer is doing it wrong. You should be doing all three at the same time. That’s why utilities are not affected by stats. That’s why dps is required to be efficient. That’s why there is no tank aggro system. That’s why healers are not required. Please stop trying to make this into a trinity game. There are no “roles” and there should not be any. Everyone should be fulfilling all three roles.

There is another frequent post I keep seeing about nerfing critical damage…all I can think about when I see that repeatedly mentioned is..

Except there is healing gear in the game, there are healing traits, healing abilities and healing utilities. The same goes for tanking. The fact they are in the game shows anet intended them to have a use. In addition anet has said they plan on addressing the zerker dominance, which shows they consider it to be a problem. The current pure dps meta is is a design flaw, not a design feature.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

This is a fine example of the wrong line of thinking I was talking about. You can see here that the subject isn’t about the gear, but about “good players”. The zerker issue exists outside of player skill, but the inability to look past player skill has left Nike blinded.

This failure in logic follows through nearly every thread on the zerker issue, this one included. A nice shorthand for recognizing this error is to look at a few key phrases:

“What they want”
“They use this as”
“Good player”
“What you are doing”
“What they say”

and such. This is ultimately an act of hostility and not reasoning. As such it accomplishes nothing.

It is my advice to not respond to these kinds of comments. Yes, I realize the irony of this post, but I do need an example.

Failure in reasoning is when someone forgets about something called sustain while focusing only on active and passive defense.

Berner.7289:

A well-reasoned analysis, but I disagree that player skill has no part of this discussion. Objectively, the “zerker” playstyle has a higher skillcap because the active defenses must be deployed correctly (type, timing, placement) to gain the benefits of front-loaded DPS. Failure to correctly use the active defense in a highly skillful manner typically results in the defeat of the player and/or team (and corresponding loss of money and time).

By contrast, more defensive playstyles have a lower skill requirement because there is greater room for error in the execution of the available active defenses. This is not an elitist statement, or an insult to lower skilled players. It is an objective fact, and frankly a positive testament to the game’s design that all content can be completed by players of varying skill levels.

But it is a basic tenant of game design that higher skill should be rewarded. Lowering the skillcap — or raising the skill floor — eliminates the fun of getting better at the game.

This is why I disagree with your premise that there is a problem with the Berserker meta. Nerfing Berserker gear or raising the effectiveness of defensive playstyles lowers the skillcap, making the game less rewarding for skillful play. Currently there is positive correlation between higher skilled play and player reward (measured in any number of metrics, including gold/hr and time to complete content). To reduce or eliminate that correlation by lowering the skillcap would be a significant mistake, in my opinion.

The problem with player skill is that it can’t be quantified, and is in the eye of the judge. What is “good”? Does someone who knows to press dodge when they see the windup “good” or just more informed? More experienced? Did they research the boss and read what someone else said to do? Did they come up with it on their own? How often do they need to dodge to be considered “good”? Likewise, what constitutes “skillful” use versus “obvious” use? I can lay down a wall of reflection in front of a golem before it spits lasers at me. Is that good?

I honestly don’t know. I wrote this analysis predicating one condition with active defenses: players use active defenses. It is a really simple requirement, and if you don’t go with this requirement you enter into another conundrum: For any leeway that a more durable set gives, this can be accommodated for by assuming more incompetence on the player’s part. If soldier’s lets you take twice as much damage, it is no good if they fail to dodge twice as often. If clerics gear gives you more heals, it is useless if they fail to use their heals when appropriate.

The end result is nothing gets done. Every assumption of “skill” can be counterbalanced by an equal assumption of “lack of skill”. So, I went with the math on the issue, and mathematically berserkers is the same as soldiers as far as combat effectiveness goes, not factoring active defenses.

If you are talking about my solution to the problem in the other thread, this also comes predicated off of the idea that everyone has active defenses. Sustained damage by PVE enemies hits everyone, and someone in more durable gear that doesn’t use active defenses will find themselves in more trouble. The sustained damage will accumulate along with the burst damage, and without avoiding it, reducing it, or healing it away, the more durable set will find themselves kissing pavement.

Higher skill will still be rewarded.

ODB.6891:

Vox Hollow.2736:

@ODB
You’ve got it backwards. People aren’t against useless stats and they’re taking it out on the DPS meta, they’re against the DPS meta and they’re taking it out on useless stats. (Justifiably, as they’re one of the causes of it.)

Less build and role options is prettymuch the exact opposite of what an iteration should be aiming for.

I’ve been trying to see what you are saying in this post and I just can’t. This isn’t just a dps META…this is a dps game mode. The point of this game mode is dps. What other point could there be when the objective is to kill stuff? The trinity is purposely absent in this game to prevent anyone from being forced into following some “tank’s” orders or depending on some “healer” to keep you alive. This game is designed for individual accountability. There is no iteration that can or should correct this and have it be the same game that was advertised/sold/purchased. Re-read the pre-release description of this game. This game advertised that every class could fulfill all three roles…it specifically worded that phrase with AND instead of OR, which means that trying to make a dedicated tank or dedicated healer is doing it wrong. You should be doing all three at the same time. That’s why utilities are not affected by stats. That’s why dps is required to be efficient. That’s why there is no tank aggro system. That’s why healers are not required. Please stop trying to make this into a trinity game. There are no “roles” and there should not be any. Everyone should be fulfilling all three roles.

Given ANet’s official stance on this issue, I doubt they agree with the way you interpret their game. It’s partly their problem, though, for letting it devolve into such huge DPS races, but the developers do believe that not having trinity=/=only DPS matters for PvE. That’s why they are looking it over as a genuine problem (one gear stat trumping all other permutations for PvE.)

I don’t want the Trinity either, BTW, but it’s too bad that all that rich gear choice available in this game is worth almost nothing vs one combo-at least the other options should be WAY more attractive than they currently are (and I agree it all boils down to improving the encounters, more than JUST hard-nerfing Berserker’s gear itself.)

In short, I disagree ANet designed GW2 as a “DPS mode” game-otherwise they wouldn’t give players so many choices. I just believe their non-trinity system is too new even for them, and they need to fine-tune it (no offense to ANet.)

While I agree with your op bra I don’t think ignoring the concerns of Nike and co is the way to go. It’s pretty divisive to just say “these guys are hostile and unreasonable, ignore them”. I don’t agree with many of their comments so far but they are not trolls and I’d like to understand where they are coming from better.

It seems like this zerker debate has become so poisoned over time that some people reflexively see any attempt to change the meta as either an attack on them personally (along the lines of the “stacking is exploiting” fallacy) or a dumbing down of the game for “bads”.

Sirendor.1394:

4- Mage classes have long range attack, but at the cost of armour, health and damage, but the game has huge gap closers making long range nearly useless, because you’ll get cut to pieces by a cookiecutter warrior.

This isn’t correct btw.
Of the three clothies, one has low health, one has medium health and one has high health. In fact the Necro is the only class with the same base health as Warriors.

Of the two heavy classes, one (the Guardian) has the lowest base health, tiered with the Thief and the Ele.

Lovely post, OP.

Abramelin.7356:

While I agree with your op bra I don’t think ignoring the concerns of Nike and co is the way to go. It’s pretty divisive to just say “these guys are hostile and unreasonable, ignore them”. I don’t agree with many of their comments so far but they are not trolls and I’d like to understand where they are coming from better.

It seems like this zerker debate has become so poisoned over time that some people reflexively see any attempt to change the meta as either an attack on them personally (along the lines of the “stacking is exploiting” fallacy) or a dumbing down of the game for “bads”.

I agree, but that’s their problem now, wouldn’kitten They are taking it as a personal attack on their favorite playstyle, so they fail to open their mind and instead attack what they must call “the bads” for wanting a change. I think that even if it isn’t meant to troll, it’s actually effectually trolling the whole purpose of the thread.

I didn’t mean to offend you, but I totally get why BRA posted that comment. If they are taking it all personal and attacking others, they ARE being unreasonable, and not genuinely wanting to discuss anything other than to enforce their views-even by bullying others who don’t agree with them.

Star Ace.5207:

I agree, but that’s their problem now, wouldn’kitten They are taking it as a personal attack on their favorite playstyle, so they fail to open their mind and instead attack what they must call “the bads” for wanting a change. I think that even if it isn’t meant to troll, it’s actually effectually trolling the whole purpose of the thread.

I didn’t mean to offend you, but I totally get why BRA posted that comment. If they are taking it all personal and attacking others, they ARE being unreasonable, and not genuinely wanting to discuss anything other than to enforce their views-even by bullying others who don’t agree with them.

How can you discuss something with someone who makes many misconceptions and after pointing that out choses to ignore them saying it’s an offtopic?

I’m puzzled how this community can say things like you do with a straight face.

Berner.7289:

A well-reasoned analysis, but I disagree that player skill has no part of this discussion. Objectively, the “zerker” playstyle has a higher skillcap because the active defenses must be deployed correctly (type, timing, placement) to gain the benefits of front-loaded DPS. Failure to correctly use the active defense in a highly skillful manner typically results in the defeat of the player and/or team (and corresponding loss of money and time).

By contrast, more defensive playstyles have a lower skill requirement because there is greater room for error in the execution of the available active defenses. This is not an elitist statement, or an insult to lower skilled players. It is an objective fact, and frankly a positive testament to the game’s design that all content can be completed by players of varying skill levels.

But it is a basic tenant of game design that higher skill should be rewarded. Lowering the skillcap — or raising the skill floor — eliminates the fun of getting better at the game.

This is why I disagree with your premise that there is a problem with the Berserker meta. Nerfing Berserker gear or raising the effectiveness of defensive playstyles lowers the skillcap, making the game less rewarding for skillful play. Currently there is positive correlation between higher skilled play and player reward (measured in any number of metrics, including gold/hr and time to complete content). To reduce or eliminate that correlation by lowering the skillcap would be a significant mistake, in my opinion.

You seem to be stating for a fact that the zerk meta fix will lower the needed skillcap, while most suggestions I’ve seen are based around increasing the skill needed to play zerker well.

Let me do a simple mechanic example. What if some bosses had a reflection shield, that would reflect a certain percent of the damage done back to whoever did the attack, and the shield would be down for a period if the boss was successfully interrupted.

You’d either have to take pauses to avoid lethal damage, gear/spec for handling more incoming damage, have support to keep you alive, or use CC properly. Now my question is, in that example, how would it make things easier than it is now?

Edit: Another thing, if you made the shield only for direct damage / initial attack, conditions becomes more interesting too. Giving you another option, and add another viable role to the mix.

Abramelin.7356:

While I agree with your op bra I don’t think ignoring the concerns of Nike and co is the way to go. It’s pretty divisive to just say “these guys are hostile and unreasonable, ignore them”. I don’t agree with many of their comments so far but they are not trolls and I’d like to understand where they are coming from better.

It seems like this zerker debate has become so poisoned over time that some people reflexively see any attempt to change the meta as either an attack on them personally (along the lines of the “stacking is exploiting” fallacy) or a dumbing down of the game for “bads”.

The thing is that, when the discussion becomes about the person more than the idea, it is then that the discussion ends. The formal term for it is Genetic Fallacy.

As for the source of this conflict, this comes down to a rather old debate: elitism. The whole concept is actually really old, since in its foundations it is about entitlements: Who deserves something, why they deserve it, why others don’t deserve it, etc. This is important, since given the scarcity of any commodity, there will be people fighting over that commodity and its uses.

For a particular example, the “1337” and the “bads” are vying for developmental time and money from Anet. The devs have limited work time and funds to get things done, and being a successful business is about giving people what they want. The people, of course, are divided and want different things. The “1337” want things that are harder, want things to be balanced around specific skill use as well as optimum builds and conditions. The “bads” want things to be balanced around casual encounters and ease of play, preferring not to be challenged. These two concepts are opposites, and so the two groups war with each other. Every suggestion or attempt to change the game that favors one group can be seen as an attack on the developmental time by another group.

This is one of the reasons why zerkers being objectively best everywhere is bad for the game. Anet has 3 choices when making new game content: balance it for elitists, balance it for casuals, or try to compromise. When it is balanced for elitists, we see nerfs to rewards, and harder content that players can’t get through. When balanced for casuals, we see unsatisfying content and no reward for building for optimization. When we see compromise, we see a mixture of boring and rewardless that satisfies no one.

If things were more balanced around the performance of gear sets, we can see content that is challenging and rewarding on average, instead of boring and rewardless.

So, reading this thread as an outsider who never pve’s, if all this is true, then you would think that bringing one tanky player into a group of zerkers will make the zerkers job harder. Makes you wonder if it’s really the zerkers who are ‘leet’.

Frye.4608:

So, reading this thread as an outsider who never pve’s, if all this is true, then you would think that bringing one tanky player into a group of zerkers will make the zerkers job harder. Makes you wonder if it’s really the zerkers who are ‘leet’.

Nope. Zerker is not the one to blame. It’s the pve mechanics. I see some people are nervous about the change and trying to call anyone supporting anet’s decision by calling them “zerkernerfer”. But the fact is we are trying to make other builds more useful (or less a dead weight if you want to call it that way), not nerfing zerker.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

Still waiting to hear what the “problem” is. In a good player’s hands, pve dps builds are objectively superior.

SO WHAT? Please explain why and how this is a “problem” that requires “fixing.”

This is a fine example of the wrong line of thinking I was talking about. You can see here that the subject isn’t about the gear, but about “good players”. The zerker issue exists outside of player skill, but the inability to look past player skill has left Nike blinded.

This failure in logic follows through nearly every thread on the zerker issue, this one included. A nice shorthand for recognizing this error is to look at a few key phrases:

“What they want”
“They use this as”
“Good player”
“What you are doing”
“What they say”

and such. This is ultimately an act of hostility and not reasoning. As such it accomplishes nothing.

It is my advice to not respond to these kinds of comments. Yes, I realize the irony of this post, but I do need an example.

Ah, some unsolicited amateur psychoanalysis, but no answer to my question. I figured I wouldn’t get a legitimate response, but it was worth asking.

Your whole analysis is flawed because you start with the presumption there is a “problem” without justifying that statement, and accept it as fait accompli. As I have demonstrated in other threads on the same, tired topic, it is entirely reasonable to conclude exactly the opposite: that the system of trading away defense for offense as you become more comfortable with content is working exactly as intended. When you start with that as your pretense, you will conclude that the only gear set in the game with a true balance problem is Rampagers, since it trades away all its defense but does not equal Berserker/Assassins in dps.

#FixRampager2014

Agreed. Fix rampagers and give us Power, prec, condi dmg gear aswell. Or condi, power, prec.

Nike Porphyrogenita.8137:

#FixRampager2014

Gotta agree with this.

Rampager 2014 yolo swag

Pretty much what Nike said. You cannot accurately administer a solution if you cannot accurately diagnose the problem. You cannot accurately diagnose the problem if you cannot accurately articulate what “should be.”

Play how you want is not what should be meta.