Guild Wars 2

Orodret.8230:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

• Glyph of Alignment: Increased the weakness and cripple duration on this skill from 3s to 5s. Reduced the cast damage by 66%. This skill now applies 3 stacks of poison._

This is just wrong. Ranger was lacking AoE direct dmg since day 1, and when you finaly gave us option to play AoE direct dmg burst with this specialisation, now you are nerffing it. Why? We dont need more condies. Beside, skill was criting for 1900-2200, now it will be like 600-700 on crit. Realy?

They’re really fond of garbage hybrid skills that scale poorly with both power and condition damage.

It’s almost like they don’t realize that their game forces people to choose between power or condition investment and either way one half of the skill gets screwed.

It’s the shortbow with its mix of power and conditions. It’s the axe with its mix of power and condition. Neither excel at anything (power autoattack on axe, which is used as a condition weapon because the power coefficients of the auto and splitblade are garbage).

It’s the same mistake they did with Maul initially where it applied a bleed instead of vulnerability.

And they don’t learn. Meanwhile warrior and thief serve as examples of classes with weapons each dedicated to a particular stat and that’s why they work well.

None of that hybrid crap. They have to choose whether druid will be a power or condi spec (and the staff is a power weapon so far, even though a weak one). And apply the glyphs accordingly.

But I doubt it will happen.

A glyph that hits AoE 300 range for less than one autoattack worth of damage is being nerfed by 66%.

This class was most certainly not designed with PvE in mind because the poison is worthless in PvE.

Zenith.7301:

Orodret.8230:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

• Glyph of Alignment: Increased the weakness and cripple duration on this skill from 3s to 5s. Reduced the cast damage by 66%. This skill now applies 3 stacks of poison._

This is just wrong. Ranger was lacking AoE direct dmg since day 1, and when you finaly gave us option to play AoE direct dmg burst with this specialisation, now you are nerffing it. Why? We dont need more condies. Beside, skill was criting for 1900-2200, now it will be like 600-700 on crit. Realy?

They’re really fond of garbage hybrid skills that scale poorly with both power and condition damage.

It’s almost like they don’t realize that their game forces people to choose between power or condition investment and either way one half of the skill gets screwed.

It’s the shortbow with its mix of power and conditions. It’s the axe with its mix of power and condition. Neither excel at anything (power autoattack on axe, which is used as a condition weapon because the power coefficients of the auto and splitblade are garbage).

It’s the same mistake they did with Maul initially where it applied a bleed instead of vulnerability.

And they don’t learn. Meanwhile warrior and thief serve as examples of classes with weapons each dedicated to a particular stat and that’s why they work well.

None of that hybrid crap. They have to choose whether druid will be a power or condi spec (and the staff is a power weapon so far, even though a weak one). And apply the glyphs accordingly.

But I doubt it will happen.

A glyph that hits AoE 300 range for less than one autoattack worth of damage is being nerfed by 66%.

This class was most certainly not designed with PvE in mind because the poison is worthless in PvE.

Exactly this. And Glyphs wont be taken anyway because the effects they have are extremely weak and or boring compared to the cooldowns. The only one I’d see being used is the damage modifier one in PvE.

I don’t think the staff or the glyphs have been designed to work as either direct damage or condition tools. That is why they fail in both regards.

The staff and the glyphs have been designed to be healing tools in the first place, the damage is just there to make them look less crappy if you are not healing.

Let’s face it, the druid is there to be the dedicated healer in raids. In every other disciple you will find a profession that can do the other stuff better or offers more.

People try to ship around the limitations, but whatever you try, the druid is about healing, not damage.

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

• Celestial Avatar Form: Entering this form now has a 10s CD… You now retain half your current astral force if you decide to break form early.

Positive changes overall but adding the 10 second cooldown concerns me because this a core design choice that probably won’t ever be changed (once implemented) but looks to be a poor long-term solution to properly gating CAF. It seems the logic behind making this change was to have it match deathshroud but if that is the case, it does not really make sense since the two transforms (Death Shroud and CAF) function too differently.

• Time gated CDs work for abilities like DS because the focus of DS is damage. Damage is something that is always desired/needed and is not time sensitive as to when you do the damage.

• Time gated CDs don’t work elegantly for situational abilities like healing. You don’t always need healing but when you do, you generally have a finite window to apply the healing (i.e., its situational and very time-sensitive).

Anet realized that CAF should be gated but applying a 10 second cooldown seems like a poor fix to the situation and has long-lasting implications. For example, if content is developed where mobs apply great amounts of damage in 10 second intervals, then Druids will remain strong since it can work around the 10 second CD of CAF. If content is developed where mobs do chunks of damage every few seconds, then Druid will have a poor time keeping the party sustained due to the 10 second cooldown. (I am assuming the total damage done by mobs is the same in both scenarios but the relative power of Druid is drastically different due to the frequency in which heals need to be applied.) This is a rather clumsy and arbitrary way to do things, and you are laying the foundation for poor game design imo.

From a player’s perspective, the following changes seem to just make more sense and fun to play with while providing a more robust/flexible time-gate on CAF.

1. Remove limitation of being at max AF to enter CAF
   Reason for change: Currently as a healing focused druid, your focus is to get to max AF asap so that you can heal in CAF on a moments notice. This is clumsy gameplay because it introduces a race to max CAF and then often sitting with max CAF for an indefinite amount of time, just waiting for an opportune time to change into CAF. (Again this goes back to why CAF should not be hard time gated since healing is a situational activity.) I believe this design choice was Anet’s first attempt to gate CAF but it was found lacking in BWE3. I believe this is just a poor design choice overall from a player’s perspective because its not fun to play with and there are better ways to time gate CAF.
2. Add AF cost to enter CAF but keep all AF upon exiting
   Reason for change: Adding an AF cost encourages players to build up a healthy amount of AF before entering CAF (i.e., this is a"soft time gate") in order to get the most out of every CAF transformation but keeps the power of making that choice in the player’s hands. (i.e., You can go in and out of CAF more frequently but with the understanding that you won’t be able to heal as much due to the AF cost each time you transform.) A penalty should not be given to the player (“You now retain half your current astral force if you decide to break form early”) to come out of CAF, to minimize the amount of “dead time” experienced by the player once everyone has been healed up to full. (Dead time is when a player will remain in CAF longer than he should just to “make sure” that no more incoming damage is going to be received.) This change will improve the player’s experience/enjoyment along with a faster/smoother gameplay.

These two changes will make Druid healing more compatible with a wider range of content since you can pace your heals better, and feel more strategic (i.e. more fun) since you have to determine if its worth going into CAF at any given moment.

Balancing can be done by adjusting AF costs, heal costs, AF generation, etc so that accessing CAF form is on the level desired by Anet.

Other examples of soft gating techniques (besides adding an AF cost mentioned above):

• Provide players with a x% boost for every level of AF bar generated (e.g., 1% damage boost for every 20% of AF bar filled).
• Tie CAF heal strength to the amount of the AF bar that was filled before entering CAF (e.g., entering CAF at half an AF bar causes your heals to heal for half the amount you would get from entering CAF at a full AF bar). Note: This proposed change is interesting to me because it mimics other games, like WoW, where the strength of a healing spell is generally tied to its casting duration (i.e., longer spell cast = stronger heal) but with a GW2 twist.

TLDR: Hard time gates like a 10 second cooldown are bad because it is too rigid/inflexible for the needs of a healing class which require access to time-sensitive spells. CAF gating can instead be achieved by encouraging players to fill up the AF bar as much as possible before activating CAF (i.e., soft time gates; see examples above).

can we get a bit of an update on more changes before we go live tomorrow?

No.

Zatoichi.1049:

can we get a bit of an update on more changes before we go live tomorrow?

You will get a complete update on all changes in a few hours, why would you ask for a bit of an update of information now?

It is not like the expansion is weeks away…

Zatoichi.1049:

ok, so you are saying they will do what I just asked in a few hours? I wasn’t asking for “now,” I was just hoping they would give us an update today before tomorrow to prepare

The update will be in 10 hours (from this post) so yeah … take your conclusions.

Belzebu.3912:

Zatoichi.1049:

ok, so you are saying they will do what I just asked in a few hours? I wasn’t asking for “now,” I was just hoping they would give us an update today before tomorrow to prepare

The update will be in 10 hours (from this post) so yeah … take your conclusions.

ah, I se the release note now, 12 am tonight. Wasn’t aware of that, was thinking tomorrow, thanks for clearing that up

So…. why was there no mention here of CF dissipating out of combat? Everyone would have told you that was a terrible idea.

you left AF decay out of combat off your list…..on purpose.

you have destroyed any excitement or desire for a ranger player to make a druid by ONCE AGAIN surprising them with a monumental nerf..

thanks again.

LegallyBinding.4937:

So…. why was there no mention here of CF dissipating out of combat? Everyone would have told you that was a terrible idea.

in conjuction with all the other gates to celestial form, this change is so bad it should have never made it out of internal testing. we should never have had to tell them it was a stupidly terrible idea.

Not if it is a nerf, im not asuming it yet, but it certainly bumped me out alot. been waiting for this moment of release so long, and what do i get, a druid that i cant on day 1. hoping it can get fixed soon. If it was intented i wont be using druid traitline for sure

Well, Druid has no Celestial Avatar in PvP now, for all practical purposes. I really hope that Irenio will see all of the feedback and fix this soon. For now, I’ll be on my engineer…

CA in PvP is rare opportunity to use.
and all this idea slow not targeted heal before real Heal for Heavy support Healer is bad Design.
2nd bad design is – I can’t check my CA skills if I’m not in a fight with full CF. so I can’t even learn my class

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

• Celestial Avatar Form: Skills that heal have had their base heals reduced by 15-25% and increased their healing coefficients from 100-145%. This should leave base heals solid while really rewarding players who elect to use healing power stats.

This is a lie…

New pets (both dragons and smockscale) start their F2 ability on a spot where they R not on a target. I think this is the way you design it – but it may be improved to make it more functional. Please make them to start F2 ability on a target and if there are no target chosen, then on a spot where they are.

Please give the community an explanation of the stealth druid changes. If these are for real (AF dissipating, shorter CAF) I don’t want to waste time playing on my ranger.

Saigun.4568:

Irenio CalmonHuang.2048:

• Celestial Avatar Form: Skills that heal have had their base heals reduced by 15-25% and increased their healing coefficients from 100-145%. This should leave base heals solid while really rewarding players who elect to use healing power stats.

This is a lie…

And it’s far from the only one.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Kitty.1502:

Gail why do the devs dislike ranger? Is there a way we can get a dev to have more interaction with the community so that we can get this class fixed?

Kitty — you can’t believe that! If there’s a dev who provably “hates” Rangers, I’ll hunt him down and TP his desk! I’ll put Honey Nut Cheerios in his burrito! I’ll wreak havoc every way from Sunday!

I have talked to Irenio a lot, and I’ll continue to talk to him. And I’ll talk to, wave my hands in the air, and natter with any other dev who wants to get the feedback of a not-very-good-but-absolutely-passionate Ranger.

I’m sorry to dredge this up like this, but I can’t help but comment on it. I want to believe this. The problem is that the Druid, in its HoT launch state, is a crushing disappointment. I have yet to be able to use the Celestial Avatar Form even twice during a single PvP match. Not only is the Druid’s performance far below its BWE3 level (which was already far below such heavy hitters as the Reaper, Chronomancer, and Herald), our best new pet is being gutted. Not nerfed, gutted. 50% damage reduction is bad, too heavy handed in fact, but I can see the point. Removing our control of its smoke field is appalling. That is already one of the major issues with the ranger: we have little control over our own fields, finishers, and cc. All of this came without a discussion, and without an explanation. Not to sound like a broken record, but Roy keeps his Revenant players appraised of changes to the profession, and has ensured that the profession itself is strong (overpowered, if we’re being frank). Meanwhile, the Druid’s entire mechanic has become all but useless in 95% of the game, and is both nearly inaccessible and underperforming (due to the lack of stability which was brought up repeatedly over Beta Weekend) in sPvP.

Basically, we really, really need an explanation and a constructive discussion about how to salvage this train wreck.

Unholy Pillager.3791:

Gaile Gray.6029:

Kitty.1502:

Gail why do the devs dislike ranger? Is there a way we can get a dev to have more interaction with the community so that we can get this class fixed?

Kitty — you can’t believe that! If there’s a dev who provably “hates” Rangers, I’ll hunt him down and TP his desk! I’ll put Honey Nut Cheerios in his burrito! I’ll wreak havoc every way from Sunday!

I have talked to Irenio a lot, and I’ll continue to talk to him. And I’ll talk to, wave my hands in the air, and natter with any other dev who wants to get the feedback of a not-very-good-but-absolutely-passionate Ranger.

I’m sorry to dredge this up like this, but I can’t help but comment on it. I want to believe this. The problem is that the Druid, in its HoT launch state, is a crushing disappointment. I have yet to be able to use the Celestial Avatar Form even twice during a single PvP match. Not only is the Druid’s performance far below its BWE3 level (which was already far below such heavy hitters as the Reaper, Chronomancer, and Herald), our best new pet is being gutted. Not nerfed, gutted. 50% damage reduction is bad, too heavy handed in fact, but I can see the point. Removing our control of its smoke field is appalling. That is already one of the major issues with the ranger: we have little control over our own fields, finishers, and cc. All of this came without a discussion, and without an explanation. Not to sound like a broken record, but Roy keeps his Revenant players appraised of changes to the profession, and has ensured that the profession itself is strong (overpowered, if we’re being frank). Meanwhile, the Druid’s entire mechanic has become all but useless in 95% of the game, and is both nearly inaccessible and underperforming (due to the lack of stability which was brought up repeatedly over Beta Weekend) in sPvP.

Basically, we really, really need an explanation and a constructive discussion about how to salvage this train wreck.

This. All of this.

Unholy Pillager.3791:

Gaile Gray.6029:

Kitty.1502:

Gail why do the devs dislike ranger? Is there a way we can get a dev to have more interaction with the community so that we can get this class fixed?

Kitty — you can’t believe that! If there’s a dev who provably “hates” Rangers, I’ll hunt him down and TP his desk! I’ll put Honey Nut Cheerios in his burrito! I’ll wreak havoc every way from Sunday!

I have talked to Irenio a lot, and I’ll continue to talk to him. And I’ll talk to, wave my hands in the air, and natter with any other dev who wants to get the feedback of a not-very-good-but-absolutely-passionate Ranger.

I’m sorry to dredge this up like this, but I can’t help but comment on it. I want to believe this. The problem is that the Druid, in its HoT launch state, is a crushing disappointment. I have yet to be able to use the Celestial Avatar Form even twice during a single PvP match. Not only is the Druid’s performance far below its BWE3 level (which was already far below such heavy hitters as the Reaper, Chronomancer, and Herald), our best new pet is being gutted. Not nerfed, gutted. 50% damage reduction is bad, too heavy handed in fact, but I can see the point. Removing our control of its smoke field is appalling. That is already one of the major issues with the ranger: we have little control over our own fields, finishers, and cc. All of this came without a discussion, and without an explanation. Not to sound like a broken record, but Roy keeps his Revenant players appraised of changes to the profession, and has ensured that the profession itself is strong (overpowered, if we’re being frank). Meanwhile, the Druid’s entire mechanic has become all but useless in 95% of the game, and is both nearly inaccessible and underperforming (due to the lack of stability which was brought up repeatedly over Beta Weekend) in sPvP.

Basically, we really, really need an explanation and a constructive discussion about how to salvage this train wreck.

Aye, +1, eager to hear at least some type of reply rather than being left in the dark as usual…

History has repeated itself. Ranger during the original game’s beta used to be great… ANET nerfed to the ground due to knee jerk reaction… now the druid is getting the exact same treatement… This makes me sad

I hate to say it.. but you see all the professions running around with their new elite specialization. unfortunately, almost every ranger I have seen in the jungle still has the ranger Icon… which means that druid isn’t even equipped.

I hate complaining. but the druid isn’t fitting with the ranger.

Its like organ transplant, sometimes the body is unable to accept the new organ.

Irenio, can you please provide some explanation?

The class was working almost fine during beta, you just managed to destroy it. It’s unplayable.

Every Druid enthusiast has been complaining since release. The only modification to ranger since this fiasco: switching smokescale’s F2 (wtf?).

How did you manage to have druid working okay in beta which it needed some tinkering to work well to gutting it to utterly useless?

There is absolutely no reason to play druid which is a useless class which has no standing in any game mode unless you want to have a class where you have to slowly drag around.

What is the point of asking for feed back when you dont actually listen to what players give?

Change grace of the land back to less condi dammage please. Thanks

It is just bait and switch, I am surprised that people are surprised.

1) Druid was not ready for release nor have the pets been.
2) BWE3 druid version was a fake version to make the druid appealing so that rangers would buy the expansion. New pets were overpowered and actually useful.
3) After release, nerf everything to the ground, because people got the expansion out of hype already.

This has happened a hundred times before in MMO releases. ANet just adapted to the common standards.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

It is just bait and switch, I am surprised that people are surprised.

1) Druid was not ready for release nor have the pets been.
2) BWE3 druid version was a fake version to make the druid appealing so that rangers would buy the expansion. New pets were overpowered and actually useful.
3) After release, nerf everything to the ground, because people got the expansion out of hype already.

This has happened a hundred times before in MMO releases. ANet just adapted to the common standards.

Logic fail. If that’s the case, then why was Ranger the only class that this happened to?

And how does only doing it to one class benefit them?

oshilator.4681:

Kaiyanwan.8521:

It is just bait and switch, I am surprised that people are surprised.

1) Druid was not ready for release nor have the pets been.
2) BWE3 druid version was a fake version to make the druid appealing so that rangers would buy the expansion. New pets were overpowered and actually useful.
3) After release, nerf everything to the ground, because people got the expansion out of hype already.

This has happened a hundred times before in MMO releases. ANet just adapted to the common standards.

Logic fail. If that’s the case, then why was Ranger the only class that this happened to?

And how does only doing it to one class benefit them?

Logic 101 for absolute beginners:

All classes but ranger had a working concept.

Druid concept was alien to the game, didn’t work and was pushed back.
The concept of a dedicated healer still didn’t work at BWE3, but was implemented way overpowered (in a way that would trivialize nearly all content for the druid player as he was nearly immortal). But it was better to do so than to show-cast a totally broken concept.

After release, druid is nerfed so that it is more or less useless, because the DEV’s are back to the drawing board and have to start over.

Knowing ANet and the ranger history though, they will probably just put some band-aids around the druid which will still fail, the ranger as profession will get mainly ignored by the DEV’s and the players and we are back to the same ol’ same treatment we had over the last three years.

I bet you Irenio had a day off from work due to of his hard work load over the last few months on HoT + ranger reviewing and someone else Went ahead , did the stealth changes without discussion with Irenio or even wait for him to Review the alterations.

going over each others heads is now how Balance is done.

take a leaf out of the Most dangerous game changes , do what you think is right Nurf stuff what ever than Add a little more back ontop stopping with these Over nurfing of Abilities .

a clear example is how much damage test of faith does on a trigger vs Spike Traps Trigger damage ya 45 vs 965 is not Fair at all , don’t care if it has a KD thats hard counter by Stability and Normal condi removals but Test of faith ya you can stun break with instants but because of the daze you will always take any follow up attack and can not do anything about it.

atleast with spike trap you can have stability stop its KD and avoid the follow up without having to kill yourself by leaving the ring just to avoid a hammer or all the Aoes from opposing team mates as leaving the ring again would kill you much much faster.

rock and a hard place really , the druid has had one Beta test it doesn not need Nurfing ! it was clearly underpower from the get go.

you gave DH’s too much of a Rangers abilities , last thing that grinds my gears DO guardians even need more protection by using faith! no they don’t.

Don’t be foolish. All the balance devs work together on all the classes. They all knew what was going on, the only differences is you have leads that just manage specific profession balance so it’s not a cluster and there’s a point of contact for that specific profession. Don’t think Irenio is innocent here. Irenio knew good and well what was happening, and IMO most likely, agreed with some degree to the changes.

Please Please Please change the sound of the Druid staff/submarine/sonar noise.
It is annoying to the point that I will not play on my druid anymore.
I dont think im alone, my missus also finds it aggravating when I play :/