Guild Wars 2

Let’s face it: You don’t know how to balance this elite specialization which you brought into the game even though it had had very little testing. I’m guessing that you knew it was crap in its state at launch, but you couldn’t delay your launch because 1 elite spec was crap, right?

Here’s a simple solution: Make us generate AF over time, and instead of making it degenerate on its own while we are in CA, give our abilities while in CA an AF cost. If you do this, it will take away the problem of not being able to land things properly within the 15seconds we have in CA because of people’s need to move, in the way that we often miss a lot of our heals because our target simply needs to move and our heals are ground targeted and not player targeted.

I believe the reason why you made your most recent terrible alteration to AF generation was because you thought we were going into CA too often. Then simply make it so you decide how often we can enter it by giving it a fixed amount of time to generate. However, don’t back stab us by making it so we can’t leave CA and keep our remaining AF because we didn’t need to be in CA any longer, or needed to swap back to our weapon skills. What I mean by this is that we need to have the possibility to make decisions too. If you are going to set a fix time for AF to go from 0% to 100% then you must give us the choice on whether we want to fully consume it at once, or use part of it on skills, and then wait for cool downs from the form to be back up before entering it again. We need to be able to make decisions for our class to remain interesting, but I understand that you also need to have some form of control over the accessibility of some things. You have that accessibility through the cool downs of the CA skills, and their cost, in addition to control over how much time it takes to go from 0 to 100, thus time gating stuff.

I think that the reason why you are failing at balancing this right now is because you are just slightly iterating on the way things currently work instead of seeing how broken your current system truly is and the fact that it needs an overhaul.

Regards, Peter Steel.

absolutely in agreement

Id go as dar to say removal all cooldowns in CA form and adjust the abilities slightly so that each has an optimal use.

Ability one, increase area and reduce delay, this would be our targeted range heal option, consuming 10% AF per use, default best range heal.

Ability 2, reduce delay on activation and increase area. Removes condis and increases healing based on conditions removed. Terrible base heal compared to 1 but stronger by far when removing conditions. 20% of bar per use.

3rd ability would be the daze and a burst heal, and would also receive a good damage coefficient. Daze would still be 2 seconds, heal would be similat to 1.5x ability 1, but cost would be high at 30% of bar.

4 would be the most efficient healing option but would require a channel and melee range, so plenty of counterplay in pvp. It would consume 40% of the bar but would be our best burst healing and efficient healing option due to its limitations.

5 would now work while moving and would be our best offensive tool while in CAF. It would receive a damage increase and it would also cost 40% of the bar, but like ability 4 it would have a channel and only work in melee.

As far the rate of gain, i would set the default to 20 seconds to go from 0 to full, with healing and damage increasing the rate of gain. Some how it would need to be balanced to reward constant and significant healing, so that it could be useful for multiple builds, rewarsing dps buils or heavy healing power builds.

CAF would not need a time gated duration for staying in it, and it would not need a cooldown either, as the recharge is now effectively doubled to 20 seconds, but could theoretically be lowered to below 10 seconds if the druid is successfully healing or dpsing effectively.

Swiftwynd.1685:

Id go as dar to say removal all cooldowns in CA form and adjust the abilities slightly so that each has an optimal use.

Ability one, increase area and reduce delay, this would be our targeted range heal option, consuming 10% AF per use, default best range heal.

Ability 2, reduce delay on activation and increase area. Removes condis and increases healing based on conditions removed. Terrible base heal compared to 1 but stronger by far when removing conditions. 20% of bar per use.

3rd ability would be the daze and a burst heal, and would also receive a good damage coefficient. Daze would still be 2 seconds, heal would be similat to 1.5x ability 1, but cost would be high at 30% of bar.

4 would be the most efficient healing option but would require a channel and melee range, so plenty of counterplay in pvp. It would consume 40% of the bar but would be our best burst healing and efficient healing option due to its limitations.

5 would now work while moving and would be our best offensive tool while in CAF. It would receive a damage increase and it would also cost 40% of the bar, but like ability 4 it would have a channel and only work in melee.

As far the rate of gain, i would set the default to 20 seconds to go from 0 to full, with healing and damage increasing the rate of gain. Some how it would need to be balanced to reward constant and significant healing, so that it could be useful for multiple builds, rewarsing dps buils or heavy healing power builds.

CAF would not need a time gated duration for staying in it, and it would not need a cooldown either, as the recharge is now effectively doubled to 20 seconds, but could theoretically be lowered to below 10 seconds if the druid is successfully healing or dpsing effectively.

Gotta disagree here.

My whole point is that they’ve been going at tit wrong with the whole hit/heal to generate AF. That is the one thing they don’t seem to be able to balance. If they go with natural generation, then they shouldn’t put in damage and heal generation too. If That had been a good idea, and not a nightmare to balance, then I’d have suggested to simply scale the amount of AF generated with the amount of healing done. That would solve the issue of healers, but it would also be hard to implement because of the whole calculations it would require. Also, 20s would probably be too long since we can’t go in and out of it ad lib. With that being said, this would pretty much be the only thing they’d need to balance: how long to go from none to full instead of how to generate AF to go from none to full. In other words, the whole point of my suggestion is that clearly they know approximately how often they want us to be able to go in CA, so they could just fix it according to that, and then see how it works.

Also, taking away the cool downs of skills in CA, while it might make sense if you look at revenants and thieves who use an alternative ressource instead of cool downs, it doesn’t work with the way rangers work at this time, and it would confuse more than a few players to go from a class with cool downs to a class without them when entering CA. This would make a lot of them spam 1 skill, and not necessarily the right one too. part of the reasons for AF conservation through leaving CA before it ends is to have the ability to keep that AF to go back into CA when you know you can use a specific skill, instead of having to fill up the bar again. I understand that you would rather have it without cool downs because on paper it makes it more accessible and thus more useful, but in practice it makes it more optimal to spend as much time spamming 1 skill as possible, and Arenanet don’t seem to want us to do that in order to heal.

Last thing I have to disagree with are your costs. Rounding it all to the closest 10% is poor design and would result in the use of very little skills during CA, and would badly nerf it. As of right now, during 1 CA without quickness, you can execute this combo: 4,3,2,1,2,1,3,4 or 4,3,5,2,3,4. If we used your percenatages for these, we’d be using 200% both times. Let’s say that since we don’t have to rush them out and can actually target them, we shouldn’t be able to get so many out, thus reducing it by a quarter. this would give us something like 1=7 2=13 3=20 4=27 5=30. If they go with numbers like this, they’d also have to make it so it automatically takes you out of CA when you cannot use anymore skills because of a lack of AF unless they leave the natural AF generation while in CA.

Once again these are all just suggestions and ideas, but let’s try to stay neutral and not try to get it to be particularly good for a particular play style that fits our own as you seemed to be hinting at with your opinion on the 5th skill which according to what they have done is more of a support through CC and moderate damage than a damage burst. Also, trying to change the skills themselves at this point is probably not going to happen. The best we can hope for are minor tweaks in that regard. The only thing they are truly messing up right now is the AF generation, and the lack of time to use it properly once we finally get into CA.

10/10 would hire to clean up my messes

Yes, the system of generating AF through hits/heals is just pointless and bad design. Its been said numerous times starting from the first day we got to test Druid, yet Anet is doggedly/stubbornly going down this road even though many of us know how this will end (or not end since we’ll be in a continual state of balancing.) There are so many cons to the current system and no real pros that you would think a 12 year old created the current system on a napkin during his lunch break after reading a book on game design. I heard the original Druid mechanics were scrapped and if that is so, I’d hate to see what the original design was if this is what we got instead.

Ranger design team has made it very clear to me that they don’t know what they are doing which is compounded worse because they don’t listen to us and thus I see no future for the class.

Edit: I may be doing a disservice to the 12 year old comparing him to Anet. At this point, I’d trust the 12 year old more than the Ranger design team.

+1 to the OP.

But they’re not listening.

oshilator.4681:

+1 to the OP.

But they’re not listening.

Nop they are not.
Irenio doesn’t like to hear he is wrong, apparently.

Since I’m tired of writing feedback and getting continuously ignored, I’m just going to paste below what I wrote a month ago in regards to AF/CAF that is in line with the OP’s thoughts and many others who brought up similar ideas.

Some suggestions for AF generation and CAF gating:

1. Have AF generate by a certain percentage in normal (non-CAF) mode; degenerate when in CAF mode. Wielding staff provides bonus AF generation in normal mode; decreases rate of degeneration in CAF mode. You can use this method to quantifiably set and normalize AF generation across players, instead of trying to tweak individual AF generation numbers on weapons/heals to reach desired target levels based on observation of gameplay.
2. Start AF at a full globe (tied in with the proposed change from 1 above).
   Unlike a DPS model, healers should not have to “build up” to enter into a pure defensive mode. You should be able to enter a fight between others and immediately go into CAF for some clutch healing; instead of joining the fight, DPS to build enough AF, and then go for some “clutch” healing. When a person comes at you in a 1v1 situation, he’s coming at you with all he has in the first 5 seconds of the fight. You need access to your full defensive kit to deal with that.
3. To create the “bursty” healing gameplay, use soft gating methods to encourage players to fill the AF bar instead of using hard gates, such as a 10 CD/max AF restriction. Hard gating methods, taken from DPS oriented models, are not flexible enough to deal with the time-sensitive and situational nature of a healing class. Some soft gating methods you can use instead to create a bursty healing druid are:

• Add AF cost for entering CAF to discourage players from going in and out of CAF form unnecessarily.
• Tie heal strength with how full the AF bar is when you entered CAF (e.g., 50% AF bar = 50% heals). This will encourage players to reach max AF before entering CAF to mimic a bursty healing spec but without imposing a hard gate.
• Add percentage bonus to DPS for every level of AF bar generated (e.g., 1% increase in DPS for every 20% AF bar generated) to relieve some of the anxiety players feel from having a full bar of AF but without having a reason to change to CAF. This will also help to alleviate some of the DPS loss perceived by Rangers when taking the Druid line (i.e., at least you’re getting a DPS bonus if you are not using CAF much).
• While in CAF, have total healing done feedback into refilling AF bar for increased CAF duration. This will reward players who invest heavily into healing power which is traditionally viewed as an unfavorable stat.

With the above changes, a player can be the type of bursty player you envision Druid healing to be but you leave the choice in the hands of the player. They can choose to be suboptimal healers (balanced with other healing/support classes in mind) for more constant healing, if the need arises. The above changes should also be alot easier to implement/balance from Anet’s side, as opposed to trying to normalize every combination of weapon/heal/ability for AF generation.

Leodon.1564:

Since I’m tired of writing feedback and getting continuously ignored, I’m just going to paste below what I wrote a month ago in regards to AF/CAF that is in line with the OP’s thoughts and many others who brought up similar ideas.

Some suggestions for AF generation and CAF gating:

1. Have AF generate by a certain percentage in normal (non-CAF) mode; degenerate when in CAF mode. Wielding staff provides bonus AF generation in normal mode; decreases rate of degeneration in CAF mode. You can use this method to quantifiably set and normalize AF generation across players, instead of trying to tweak individual AF generation numbers on weapons/heals to reach desired target levels based on observation of gameplay.
2. Start AF at a full globe (tied in with the proposed change from 1 above).
   Unlike a DPS model, healers should not have to “build up” to enter into a pure defensive mode. You should be able to enter a fight between others and immediately go into CAF for some clutch healing; instead of joining the fight, DPS to build enough AF, and then go for some “clutch” healing. When a person comes at you in a 1v1 situation, he’s coming at you with all he has in the first 5 seconds of the fight. You need access to your full defensive kit to deal with that.
3. To create the “bursty” healing gameplay, use soft gating methods to encourage players to fill the AF bar instead of using hard gates, such as a 10 CD/max AF restriction. Hard gating methods, taken from DPS oriented models, are not flexible enough to deal with the time-sensitive and situational nature of a healing class. Some soft gating methods you can use instead to create a bursty healing druid are:

• Add AF cost for entering CAF to discourage players from going in and out of CAF form unnecessarily.
• Tie heal strength with how full the AF bar is when you entered CAF (e.g., 50% AF bar = 50% heals). This will encourage players to reach max AF before entering CAF to mimic a bursty healing spec but without imposing a hard gate.
• Add percentage bonus to DPS for every level of AF bar generated (e.g., 1% increase in DPS for every 20% AF bar generated) to relieve some of the anxiety players feel from having a full bar of AF but without having a reason to change to CAF. This will also help to alleviate some of the DPS loss perceived by Rangers when taking the Druid line (i.e., at least you’re getting a DPS bonus if you are not using CAF much).
• While in CAF, have total healing done feedback into refilling AF bar for increased CAF duration. This will reward players who invest heavily into healing power which is traditionally viewed as an unfavorable stat.

With the above changes, a player can be the type of bursty player you envision Druid healing to be but you leave the choice in the hands of the player. They can choose to be suboptimal healers (balanced with other healing/support classes in mind) for more constant healing, if the need arises. The above changes should also be alot easier to implement/balance from Anet’s side, as opposed to trying to normalize every combination of weapon/heal/ability for AF generation.

That isn’t entirely in agreement with what I’m saying since you skip 50% of the point.
The second biggest issue with CA is how skills must be used in a set time frame, leaving no time for targeting or strategical use. This is caused by the fact that we are forced to do as much as we can in the 15s of CA we get to avoid wasting heals, but it actually makes us waste heals because we can’t take the time to target properly with the consideration of where people are going to move and thus be when our healing skill lands. We are also extremely nerfed by any form of CC during CA because while CCd we can’t cast anything, but our AF is still degenerating… One could argue that in that case you should exit CA on CC, but with the time it takes to get into CA in the first place, you wouldn’t be able to get back into it before quite some time, so more often then not, you’ll opt to sit through the CC in CA, and then use whatever time is left to do as much healing as you can.

Staggs.9372:

That isn’t entirely in agreement with what I’m saying since you skip 50% of the point.

I realized when I copy/pasted my post that it was not covering all the points you brought up. My post was written a month ago and I would probably make changes to it now but why bother when we end up just getting ignored anyways?

You bring up valid points and even though I have some questions on it, I feel like again whats the point? There have been hundreds of threads on this subject for weeks now and we’ve gotten no responses from Anet on it and they are doggedly/stubbornly going down the road they chose.

Edit: This is just me personally giving up on the fight. Don’t let my dejected attitude stop others from continuing the fight/discussion.

Leodon.1564:

Staggs.9372:

That isn’t entirely in agreement with what I’m saying since you skip 50% of the point.

I realized when I copy/pasted my post that it was not covering all the points you brought up. My post was written a month ago and I would probably make changes to it now but why bother when we end up just getting ignored anyways?

You bring up valid points and even though I have some questions on it, I feel like again whats the point? There have been hundreds of threads on this subject for weeks now and we’ve gotten no responses from Anet on it and they are doggedly/stubbornly going down the road they chose.

Edit: This is just me personally giving up on the fight. Don’t let my dejected attitude stop others from continuing the fight/discussion.

That’s the thing: there is no fight to be held. If you consider there is then of course you’re going to give up because you’re losing. It’s about stating that we still care and sharing options. Even if they aren’t talking to us, that doesn’t mean that they aren’t reading. If we give up on giving them good ideas, then the few who give bad ideas will be the only ones who are heard, and thus we’ll continue to have bad modifications brought to our class.

The reason why I posted this was not to get a dev’s response, but to confirm that we care, and if they don’t have solutions, we do.