Guild Wars 2

BadJas.5178:

Dredlord.8076:

BadJas.5178:

Wow. It takes a lot out of me not to try to have the Gods of Statistics smite you down for corrupting the beloved Central Limit Theorem into the childrens’-sample-size-rhime about the sample size of 30.
Thing is, according to my latest numbers, smiting has no effect (p > .05), so I probably won’t.
Maybe reread that wikipedia page. It’s surprisingly comprehensive.

I’m sure you are math genius but I think I will side with my award winning math professor on this one and the fact that every university around the world teaches this.

I was just saying that the sample size of 30 might not be appropriate in this scenario. In practice the sample size of 30 is appropriate when applying the central limit theorem to apply sample-based statistics. You use sample-based statistics to force a normal distribution where there is none, so you can draw conclusions about a population rather than an individual. The thing is, then you need a number of samples.

The sample Blaine Tog gave us could be falsified, but I could still very well imagine getting similar results. What we could now do with his sample, is write down the amount of Necromancers in that sample, collect a large number of samples, and make a sample distribution of the amount of Necromancers per sample.

That is how you apply Central Limit Theorem, and I’m sure your maths professor and his award agree. My maths professor also won an award. It was for best Department Santa Claus, and I gave it to him. Awards mean nothing without context.

his award was for teaching math but I bet he would make a better Santa than your teacher if it was a contest.

on the bolded part, just to add since your wording is carefully chosen to reflect negatively on using the smallest sample size.

I would say it is used when you expect there to be a normal distribution and really I don’t see why there wouldn’t be? Is there an unofficial necro server I don’t know about?

Dredlord.8076:

his award was for teaching math but I bet he would make a better Santa than your teacher if it was a contest.

Just to note spoiler for the kidsif Santa did exist he would be a genious at math physics biology and engineering, since you would need about the same amount of energy as the milky way probably transforms pre day (143591007 × 10*24 J) pre second of travel to just share gifts to every kid on earth in a house.

What I mean is, that in this case, the profession distribution approaches a uniform distribution rather than a normal one, because a normal distribution wouldn’t make sense. What is on the x-axis? ‘Profession’ doesn’t have a value.
What is normally distributed is the amount of Necromancers in a sample. So you can use the Central Limit Theorem to ascertain the amount of Necromancers in the total population, but one sample of 30 individuals isn’t enough to create this distribution. You would need more samples.
Do you agree that one sample of 30 individuals isn’t enough to conclude something about the amount of necro’s in the total population?

Dredlord.8076:

I would say it is used when you expect there to be a normal distribution and really I don’t see why there wouldn’t be? Is there an unofficial necro server I don’t know about?

If we take as a given that Necros are better in groups than they are alone, then one would expect to see more of them during high-traffic times and fewer of them during low-traffic times, like when I checked. Or perhaps player personalities could come into play: maybe Necro players tend to be night owls so they play more at night, or maybe players who have multiple characters have a slight tendency to play their Necros more at night because of the profession’s associations with darkness.

Or maybe all of that is counteracted by other forces or had a negligible impact to begin with. It’s hard to say without doing hard research.

also with word of necro buffs most of the necros im seeing now are lowbie bandwagon jumpers or people who quit necro out of frustration and are getting some levels on in anticipation of being the next OP class.

necros have been so few and far between in wvw I group and friend the 1 or 2 a week I run into on stormbluff.

Yeah, because no other class is influenced by FotM right? I bet there isn’t anyone who started playing Engi with the HGH build. Reality is “main” classes are going to fluctuate a bit all the time. If we get a nice buff, we’ll see a lot more Necromancers, and then it will likely die back a little when the newness wears off, or the FotM switches back to someone else. Right now a lot of people are playing Ranger and Engi that frankly really dislike it, but play it because its good. If someone else becomes desireable or they get nerfed, they’ll swap off to something else.

Dredlord.8076:

necros have been so few and far between in wvw I group and friend the 1 or 2 a week I run into on stormbluff.

Maybe if you guys had more Necros we wouldn’t have a 170,000+ point lead on you now.

(Just kidding. The reason Dragonbrand is winning is because our night crew is awesome and our day crew can still hold their ground.)

Bhawb.7408:

I bet there isn’t anyone who started playing Engi with the HGH build.

I agree with your overall point, but I kinda did. I ran turrets up until around level 40 solely because I liked the aesthetic, then decided to figure out a build that was more generally effective and happened upon Elixers. This was just a month or two after the game came out, way before HGH became a thing. I didn’t really go for HGH on purpose, you understand. All the Elixer traits are nicely laid out in Alchemy so putting together the spec is pretty straightforward.

Greetings and salutations. The Kin is a fellow Necromancer (Lv 80) and decided to put in his two copper here as well. (Started out on Sea of Sorrow and moved to Crystal Desert due to a friend requesting The Kin’s presence there.)

To start off, The Kin will acknowledge that coding a game is very difficult. Even a simplistic game has thousands, if not tens of thousands of lines of code. A game like this would be absolutely mind boggling in the code count department and The Kin, for one, acknowledges this. For bringing the game out, The Kin will give thanks.

With that being said however, The Kin also no longer plays GW2. The reason being is the slow rate of fixes. While content comes out at a good pace in this game, the number of builds for Necromancers are nauseating. Power or conditions. Axes, as people have said are horrible. It took them ages to get the minion AI even remotely fixed and even now from lurking and reading the posts it seems like it still glitches up at times.

There are many traits that are useless (Reanimator, lifesteal traits) and other such. While the devs do work hard, a lot of these things to go unfixed or tweaked is a bit of a let down, and honestly, it’s hard to be thankful for that.

While balancing a game may be incredibly hard, it’s easy to see that Necromancers had a problem in tpvp and spvp simply by watching the top ranked players and how many necromancers they ever incorporated into their team. That alone says something.

The Kin is by no means a professional player of GW2 but in the limited amount of time he had with the game, testing different builds in wvw and even spvp became tedious. Most would fail horribly with the exception of a few builds here and there that were already found out. It’s easy to see what works and what doesn’t work after only a couple of matches.

In conclusion, while the Devs do deserve a thank you for bringing the game out, their handling of the game after release hasn’t been all that promising. Please don’t take that the wrong way, devs. Most of the bug fixes and changes were things like underwater combat which rarely is seen and simply isn’t all that important or desired. Some bugs from beta weekends still remain which should have been quashed by now. That’s all for now.

Bhawb.7408:

Yeah, because no other class is influenced by FotM right? I bet there isn’t anyone who started playing Engi with the HGH build. Reality is “main” classes are going to fluctuate a bit all the time. If we get a nice buff, we’ll see a lot more Necromancers, and then it will likely die back a little when the newness wears off, or the FotM switches back to someone else. Right now a lot of people are playing Ranger and Engi that frankly really dislike it, but play it because its good. If someone else becomes desireable or they get nerfed, they’ll swap off to something else.

it’s nice to see you understood the point I was making for once and yet you said in such a condescending way it seems like you thought you were teaching me something.

Tbf blaine. WvW is the only part of the game where necro’s are actually semi decent and popular (mass aoe in zergs and whatnot). I see a much larger amount of necro’s in wvw but still doesnt compare to the severe lack of them in spvp and pve compared to every other class except maybe engineer.

spoj.9672:

Tbf blaine. WvW is the only part of the game where necro’s are actually semi decent and popular (mass aoe in zergs and whatnot). I see a much larger amount of necro’s in wvw but still doesnt compare to the severe lack of them in spvp and pve compared to every other class except maybe engineer.

MM necros make open-world PvE dead-easy, though granted PvE isn’t exactly hard in the first place. However, I’ve been running a lot of dungeons lately and find that we have a Necro every run or so, sometimes two or even three.

Blaine Tog.8304:

spoj.9672:

Tbf blaine. WvW is the only part of the game where necro’s are actually semi decent and popular (mass aoe in zergs and whatnot). I see a much larger amount of necro’s in wvw but still doesnt compare to the severe lack of them in spvp and pve compared to every other class except maybe engineer.

MM necros make open-world PvE dead-easy, though granted PvE isn’t exactly hard in the first place. However, I’ve been running a lot of dungeons lately and find that we have a Necro every run or so, sometimes two or even three.

What dungeons? Because I only ever see necro’s farming TA and occasionally arah. Anyway it could be that your server is very necro friendly. Most people from multiple servers (na and eu) seem to say necro’s are rare compared to other classes. Thats big enough proof for me. Especially seeing as its what i have witnessed.

Also looking on guild rosters, on my main guild there is one other necro i can see out of 100 members but hes been offline for months. The other guilds i have are very similar. Obviously it doesnt show all classes a player uses, but it shows the last they used. Which also indicates people dont use them as much as other classes even if they have a lvl 80 necro. I dont use my necro much anymore either, its just not good enough in dungeons.

Dredlord.8076:

it’s nice to see you understood the point I was making for once and yet you said in such a condescending way it seems like you thought you were teaching me something.

I had to just on principle.

spoj.9672:

Tbf blaine. WvW is the only part of the game where necro’s are actually semi decent and popular (mass aoe in zergs and whatnot). I see a much larger amount of necro’s in wvw but still doesnt compare to the severe lack of them in spvp and pve compared to every other class except maybe engineer.

Love my necro in WvW, I cry often in spvp

spoj.9672:

What dungeons? Because I only ever see necro’s farming TA and occasionally arah. Anyway it could be that your server is very necro friendly. Most people from multiple servers (na and eu) seem to say necro’s are rare compared to other classes. Thats big enough proof for me. Especially seeing as its what i have witnessed.

I’ve only really farmed Arah, HotW, and CoF, but I’ve been grouped with Necros in all three. This one time, I ran Arah with 3 Necros (I was one of them), though that ended up being unfortunate because one of the bosses had crazyhigh condition duration reduction and we were all speced for condi damage. Outside of that boss, however, we wiped mobs extremely quickly with double-Epidemics and tore apart anything that used boons.

KarlaGrey.5903:

If you think increasing DS charging is worthy of being called ‘unbelievable’, you ought doing some research on how proper DS should be like like (read: how prerelease DS, and necro as a whole, looked like before nerfed 10 feet under with a sledge hammer).

But since I’m nice, I’ll save you the work:

Lol whatever crawled up your butt….
I’m sorry but I can play the profession quite well and getting those buffs excites me You can go dig deep in the past and look for stories of the once OP necros if you want, but I won’t. I’m fine with what I have, tyvm And YES, I do play other professions and YES, yes, yes, no need to tell me how they can do this and that. I still love the Necro above them all. And any buffs along the way will only make me happier.

I don’t know, it’s hard to thank people for something that hasn’t actually been done yet. I’ll hold on to my gratitude until I see some tangible improvements. I actually think A.Net, overall, is one of the better companies when it comes to listening to the community (and let’s face it, we’re a fickle bunch), and I suppose that deserves some acknowledgement. So yeah, thank you for putting up with our occasionally overblown rhetoric. We do love you, and don’t worry, we’re not really going to come after you with torches and pitchforks. But that being said, we do have legitimate complaints. And we’ve had them for a long time.

In fact, when you look at the amount of time that has passed since the Necro got hit with the nerfhammer during the beta, I can’t really blame the community for being somewhat disgruntled. During that time we’ve seen very little improvement, save for some bug fixes. When I consider the policy that A.Net has applied to balancing other classes, I can’t help but think that the Necro stands out as the exception. The slow and steady approach that was taken to reign in the d/d Elementalist, for example, stands in stark contrast to the scale of the hit taken by Necromancers during the beta. And we’ve been dealing with the fallout ever since. A lack of stability, viable stunbreakers, functional life steal, and a class mechanic that feels mostly like a hastily tacked on facetank ability. But I digress. The list does not need repeating, we’ve had plenty of threads dealing with that already.

In any case, I suppose the fact that A.Net is now finally waking up and smelling the coffee is worth taking note of. And it’s good of them to take the time to appear on podcasts and whatnot. But I’m tired of being a pinball. Really, what I’m waiting for is for them to take meaningful action to address the issues laid out by the community time and time again. And since this will likely mean going through the sometimes overly cautious “avoid whack-a-mole” balancing machine, they might as well get started. But admittedly, there are signs that the process has now begun. That, at least, is something.

ManaCraft.5630:

When I consider the policy that A.Net has applied to balancing other classes, I can’t help but think that the Necro stands out as the exception. The slow and steady approach that was taken to reign in the d/d Elementalist, for example, stands in stark contrast to the scale of the hit taken by Necromancers during the beta. And we’ve been dealing with the fallout ever since.

this is precisely it so….

Thank you for making necros the exception to an otherwise great game.

Manacraft said exactly what I was feeling today. I am also tired of being a pinball… Its so harsh fighting classes as a CC oriented class. Battling the odds of blinds, confusion, burning and large burst from fast moving/kiting opponents. Its even harsher when they can dodge almost everything you do while you are limited, your only fast CC’s effectiveness is reduced significantly just from a rune set, and good amount your burst is on 60 second CDs. People just try and zip to the side of you when they see your easily telegraphed slow CDs start to cast.

I love necro, and I really enjoy the game as a whole as its probably the only one I play now because others can’t compare currently. I recommend it to all my friends who haven’t played whenever I get a chance

However, the game on the end of Necromancer always feels like a harsh upward battle with almost perfect coordination and timing needed on condi transfers, CCs, and Death shroud usage. In the same game I could play a mesmer and have a reprieve from a mistake every 8 seconds. Im sorry, maybe im just still riddled by the past week of failure in both solo and Duo WvW play, but the class feels punishing and not in the sense of me getting double damage for the the pain received.

edit: Im pretty sure if purely from the anger of play lately and maybe I should consider taking a break, but its just how I feel.

Dredlord.8076:

Bhawb.7408:

If you actually think that what we are seeing is bad customer service, I really start to wonder if you even thought about what you were saying. These devs take time out of their day to come on live streams as guests, they take time out to watch tournaments and podcasts, and talk with people during them. They are taking an intelligent approach to fixing the game, one that is shown to be effective by far more popular games, and an approach that in the end makes the game much more enjoyable to their customers: us.

If you want examples of bad customer service, or completely ignoring consumer base, then you don’t need to look far to find far more impressive examples of not caring at all for their customers.

its time to get some life experience kid, the necro class has received terrible customer service up till now.

The devs do these things because * it’s their kittening job*. I have many friends in the game industry all of whom have 10 plus years experience. They do these things because it is required of them as part of promoting the games they are working on.

The strategy they have used to balance the game has not been intelligent both from a business perspective and a customer service perspective.

Bawb your blatant fanboism is clouding your judgement and you have very little experience with mmo’s to back up your ridiculous opinions.

While I do not fully agree with that level of bashing he does have a point.
Anet shown no communication.
Anet failed to uphold most of the promises they have made.
Anet disregarded utterly obvious bugs and left things to rot since.

THIS IS NOT GOOD CUSTOMER SUPPORT. Period.
Even from marketing standpoint what they are doing at this point is unproductive at best. Alienating 1/8 of your customer base by spitting in their face and calling it a day is not good for making money. Worst thing to do is alienating actual “core” fanbase that sticks to you through thick and thin. That niche group does more to promote and keep things alive then any promotional campaign NCsoft could ever launch within reason and resources comparable to value of the IP.

As example I’m very uptight about cash shops. I utterly despise the concept. I’d rather pay monthly fee and have everyone in same boat. So no I have NEVER put even a cent towards expanding my bags/bank/character slots/boosts/crap for mystical toilet etc. I did however dump a large sum for buying town clothes and minis… Yeah I think there is absolutely nothing wrong with selling looks. However once my initial awe with the quality of level design wore off and I opened my eyes to see necro-anet situation. I firmly laid off idea of paying for anything. Even if situation changed I doublt I would ever pay for anything at this point. The damage is done. If you belive people like me are so few that it makes no difference you are wrong. There are people with principles and pride who dislike being treated poorly.
I still by this day play almost 20 year old text based mmo. A glorified chat. Why? There has not been a month with no changes. It evolved to a point where game is nothing like what it used to be. Engine that was used when it first started is gone and now its almost entirely handwritten and exclusive. People… the actual people that play it can make maps… add content. I don’t need to ask a nameless suit to fix something.
If I belive there is a bug I actually have access to test server and enough tools to fully test anything that doesn’t require messing with code or access to files. And getting that privilege required me —-— ASKING for it once.
The server and all costs of maintaining it for almost 2 decades have been payed by donations. No cash shops…
So let me ask you this. Do you see GW2 living that long? I doubt it would survive a decade in the best case scenario.

I get it that anet has no say and its all up to some clowns in korea but communication and the very least not lying outright would be a step in a right direction.

Also… come time for the anets new “selling line” and they roll out their HUGE fix to broken/bad stuff. I will be here most likely still laughing at people who belived that. Yeah I honestly think theres 99.999999999% chance that it wont do anything meaningful even if they do change something, which I doubt. And if they do change 1 or god forbid 2 traits… they will be broken, ontop of all new bugs introduced.

HiSaZuL.2843:

I still by this day play almost 20 year old text based mmo. A glorified chat. Why? There has not been a month with no changes. It evolved to a point where game is nothing like what it used to be. Engine that was used when it first started is gone and now its almost entirely handwritten and exclusive. People… the actual people that play it can make maps… add content. I don’t need to ask a nameless suit to fix something.
If I belive there is a bug I actually have access to test server and enough tools to fully test anything that doesn’t require messing with code or access to files. And getting that privilege required me —-— ASKING for it once.
The server and all costs of maintaining it for almost 2 decades have been payed by donations. No cash shops…

I’m curious, which text based MMO is this?

Oh come on i’m a kitten,

Thanks for doing the best game i ever played you motherkitteners !!!

Seriously, you did an awesome job and i love the necromancer,

Love you guys !

Kravick.4906:

HiSaZuL.2843:

I still by this day play almost 20 year old text based mmo. A glorified chat. Why? There has not been a month with no changes. It evolved to a point where game is nothing like what it used to be. Engine that was used when it first started is gone and now its almost entirely handwritten and exclusive. People… the actual people that play it can make maps… add content. I don’t need to ask a nameless suit to fix something.
If I belive there is a bug I actually have access to test server and enough tools to fully test anything that doesn’t require messing with code or access to files. And getting that privilege required me —-— ASKING for it once.
The server and all costs of maintaining it for almost 2 decades have been payed by donations. No cash shops…

I’m curious, which text based MMO is this?

AardWolf, its a mud. Which back in… 96 or so was based on diku. At this point there is nothing left from that code. Infinite leveling galore.

Thank you for the fix to Spectral Grasp that now permits targets to be pulled the full 1,200 range.

I couldn’t find a thread for this sort of thing in the general forums, but:

• Added a new combat/movement toggle option: “Right-Click to Attack/Interact”.

Thank you. Now I can stop accidentally selecting that mesmer clone / bone minion / allied dungeon runner in the middle of a fight, dropping my target and whiffing an ability.

More specific to necromancers, thank you for finally fixing Spiteful Talisman. It’s one of the oldest game play bugs for the necro, and it’s bothered me for a while.

Softspoken.2410:

I couldn’t find a thread for this sort of thing in the general forums, but:

• Added a new combat/movement toggle option: “Right-Click to Attack/Interact”.

Thank you. Now I can stop accidentally selecting that mesmer clone / bone minion / allied dungeon runner in the middle of a fight, dropping my target and whiffing an ability.

More specific to necromancers, thank you for finally fixing Spiteful Talisman. It’s one of the oldest game play bugs for the necro, and it’s bothered me for a while.

This. So happy about this change.