Guild Wars 2

Here’s an idea for re-balancing venoms to make them useful by themselves while limiting their potential to be OP.

First of all, switch Revealed Training with Venomous Aura. The second would be to move Leeching Venoms into the DA master Tier, switching it for improvisation. The reasons for this is 2 fold. First of all, by making thief choose between venom traits it allows you to buff the base while limiting their potential to become exponentially more powerful. With these combinations, you could trait to either have an extra strike of venoms, or share them, and make a similar choice between quick and leeching venoms. Thus going into the power tree would allow for either a group build or a selfish build (and even some variety within those). The other reason for moving revealed training to the SA tree, is that it would help the brawling ability of SA thieves, especially since sic ’em is getting a buff in duration and analyse is getting the ability to reveal, the thief suddenly becoming more dangerous in combat when their defenses are locked out would go a long way towards helping those builds.

Now that the venoms only have the potential of taking 3 traits at a time instead of 5 traits, their base effects can be buffed slightly.

Across the board- Reduce Cooldowns to 30 seconds.

Spider Venom-Totally underwhelming right now. Add 1 (5sec) bleed per strike as well. Traiting into the power/condi-duration line, you would be able to get 7.5-10 seconds of bleeding from these depending on game mode. It’s now actually threatening offensively without just being a redundant skill (we have so many sources of poison).

Skale Venom-With the reduced CD, probably fine as is. Maybe make it transfer a condition per charge.

Ice Drake Venom-Add a stunbreak. This ability is far outclassed by devourer venom right now. Allow it to be a stunbreak that so that it lets you create room in between you and your target after you use it.

Devourer Venom-Would be fine as is, especially with the reduced cooldown

Basilisk Venom-Would be fine as is (a 1.5 second stun with a 1 second cast time on a 30 second CD)

Skelk Venom-Might finally be worth slotting with the reduced CD since it’s fairly high risk high reward.

Possible New Builds

6/2/0/0/6 Venom-Boon Share (a support build finally) (DeadlyArts:VS, QV, VA; CritStrikes: PT; Trick: TotC, BT, SoH)

6/2/0/0/6 Single Target Assassin (DeadlyArts:Mug, LV, RV; CritStrikes: FR; Trick: TotC,BT,SoH)

The above 2 show the ability to either go support or roaming with venoms after the change)

0/5/6/3/0 Might Stacking Brawler (CritStrikes: SoP,SU; ShadowArts:SE,CiS,RT; Acro:PoI) (similar to current builds, but you might be able to put on some cavalier gear with the power increase)

The point is, with the reduced CD’s and the stunbreak, venoms become useable by themselves while not becoming overwhelming when traited.

At best, this might put them into the range of the utility of mantras.

Feedback is welcome.

Idea for a Venom Rework: DELETE VENOMOUS AURA

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Idea for a Venom Rework: DELETE VENOMOUS AURA

Except that won’t happen (as you can see by all of our latest buffs), so we can keep throwing ideas at them until something sticks that makes venoms useful by themselves without being overwhelming with Venomous Aura.

Maugetarr.6823:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Idea for a Venom Rework: DELETE VENOMOUS AURA

Except that won’t happen (as you can see by all of our latest buffs), so we can keep throwing ideas at them until something sticks that makes venoms useful by themselves without being overwhelming with Venomous Aura.

The point is. To ever have any meaningful rework for venom, venomous aura needs to be deleted.

So instead of making suggestions to rework venoms, it is my belief that for every update they make for venom that we should respond with “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”. Basically, instead of throwing ideas, we should only throw one idea, that is “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Maugetarr.6823:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Idea for a Venom Rework: DELETE VENOMOUS AURA

Except that won’t happen (as you can see by all of our latest buffs), so we can keep throwing ideas at them until something sticks that makes venoms useful by themselves without being overwhelming with Venomous Aura.

The point is. To ever have any meaningful rework for venom, venomous aura needs to be deleted.

So instead of making suggestions to rework venoms, it is my belief that for every update they make for venom that we should respond with “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”. Basically, instead of throwing ideas, we should only throw one idea, that is “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”

Ok, here’s the thing: they won’t. So, assuming that it will be here for the duration of the existence of the game, how about commenting the other ideas here about the reduction in CD or the boosting of some effects. You know, addressing the ideas presented with constructive criticism (and you can even look at those as if venomous aura didn’t exist ).

Maugetarr.6823:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Maugetarr.6823:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Idea for a Venom Rework: DELETE VENOMOUS AURA

Except that won’t happen (as you can see by all of our latest buffs), so we can keep throwing ideas at them until something sticks that makes venoms useful by themselves without being overwhelming with Venomous Aura.

The point is. To ever have any meaningful rework for venom, venomous aura needs to be deleted.

So instead of making suggestions to rework venoms, it is my belief that for every update they make for venom that we should respond with “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”. Basically, instead of throwing ideas, we should only throw one idea, that is “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”

Ok, here’s the thing: they won’t. So, assuming that it will be here for the duration of the existence of the game, how about commenting the other ideas here about the reduction in CD or the boosting of some effects. You know, addressing the ideas presented with constructive criticism (and you can even look at those as if venomous aura didn’t exist ).

They’re obviously never going to delete Venomous Aura – why anyone would even ask them to do so is beyond me.

Here’s a suggestion that’s actually in the realm of possibilities – Disconnect the ability shared by Venomous Aura from the venom itself. Instead of Venomous aura directly copying a venom, it should instead trigger a unique ability based on the venom used.

Example – Slotted with venomous aura, I use Spider Venom – an ability called “Land Spider Venom” is copied to up to 5 players in a 360 radius around me – “Land spider Venom” does something similar to Spider venom, but is not an exact copy of the ability.

There you go – now venoms can be powerful on their own, because the venom itself is disconnected from the ability that is shared.

evilapprentice.6379:

Here’s a suggestion that’s actually in the realm of possibilities – Disconnect the ability shared by Venomous Aura from the venom itself. Instead of Venomous aura directly copying a venom, it should instead trigger a unique ability based on the venom used.

Was thinking about a similar thing. Say, our venoms apply 2 conditions each. Well, with Venomous Aura, our friends would only apply one of the two conditions, or a weaker version (immobilize => cripple etc…)

Another simple option would be to double the number of venom charges and make venomous aura halve them again.

stof.9341:

evilapprentice.6379:

Here’s a suggestion that’s actually in the realm of possibilities – Disconnect the ability shared by Venomous Aura from the venom itself. Instead of Venomous aura directly copying a venom, it should instead trigger a unique ability based on the venom used.

Was thinking about a similar thing. Say, our venoms apply 2 conditions each. Well, with Venomous Aura, our friends would only apply one of the two conditions, or a weaker version (immobilize => cripple etc…)

Another simple option would be to double the number of venom charges and make venomous aura halve them again.

Eh, doubling the charges doesn’t help – they need to be redesigned to be worth taking on their own, because they’re currently designed to not be OP when shared with venomous aura – doubling the charges doesn’t help some venoms (Spiders, Ice drake), and makes other venoms potentially OP (Devourers, Basilisk). Doubling the charges also doesn’t work well with Leeching venoms or Skelk venom (at least without some additional redesigning)

evilapprentice.6379:

Maugetarr.6823:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Maugetarr.6823:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Idea for a Venom Rework: DELETE VENOMOUS AURA

Except that won’t happen (as you can see by all of our latest buffs), so we can keep throwing ideas at them until something sticks that makes venoms useful by themselves without being overwhelming with Venomous Aura.

The point is. To ever have any meaningful rework for venom, venomous aura needs to be deleted.

So instead of making suggestions to rework venoms, it is my belief that for every update they make for venom that we should respond with “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”. Basically, instead of throwing ideas, we should only throw one idea, that is “DELETE VENOMOUS AURA”

Ok, here’s the thing: they won’t. So, assuming that it will be here for the duration of the existence of the game, how about commenting the other ideas here about the reduction in CD or the boosting of some effects. You know, addressing the ideas presented with constructive criticism (and you can even look at those as if venomous aura didn’t exist ).

They’re obviously never going to delete Venomous Aura – why anyone would even ask them to do so is beyond me.

Here’s a suggestion that’s actually in the realm of possibilities – Disconnect the ability shared by Venomous Aura from the venom itself. Instead of Venomous aura directly copying a venom, it should instead trigger a unique ability based on the venom used.

Example – Slotted with venomous aura, I use Spider Venom – an ability called “Land Spider Venom” is copied to up to 5 players in a 360 radius around me – “Land spider Venom” does something similar to Spider venom, but is not an exact copy of the ability.

There you go – now venoms can be powerful on their own, because the venom itself is disconnected from the ability that is shared.

If you believe that deleting Venomous Aura is never gonna happen, what you want to happen is even less likely since its not how aura works in GW2. They would have to rename VA probably to Venomous Essence to logically describe the effect your want to happen. Aura is what you have is what you share.

But you see, they really really want VA to work as an aura.

However, if they choose to rename and rebuild VA to what you have proposed, they the whole concept of VA will be lost.

For the purpose of this argument, I’ll call Spider Venom as venom and the effect through VA as essence.

The way you want the essence to work is to be a separate effect from the venom, thus it will have it’s own stats. Where you think this stats will derive from?

For example, if the Thief’s condition damage increases, thus the venom’s stats increases — does the essence’s stats also increase? Isn’t that exactly as it is now?

If the essence’s effect is weaker than the venom’s effect, then what’s the point of sharing a weaker version?

Regardless on what name you call the essence, it still tied to venom and the Thief’s stats. The Thief profession is better off if they stop sharing their poison.

Hey, at least we’re getting somewhere with discussion!

@evilapprentice: I like the general lines of your idea, but I have to agree a little with Sir Vincent. If we took something like spider venom, how exactly would we share a weaker version of poison? Maybe just not as long poison duration? Having venomous aura create an entirely different effect though could be the direction to go in though. Maybe upon activation you drop a combo field instead, say radius 240, 4-5 second duration.

Ice Drake-Ice combo field
Spider-poison combo field
Basilisk-ethereal
Skelk-smoke (or dark)
Scale-water

I’d still want to see the base buffed, but we’re moving in different directions at least.

I kinda like the idea of VA creating a sort of “supercombo well” rather than “copy all the venoms by magic” as well. We could even re-use the engi bottle toss animations for it, to shatter a bottle of stuff on the ground.

Alternately, what if they didn’t buff our teammates at all but created an actual persistant aoe well. Then the trait might actually combo with traps, give anet a good reason to finally look at traps, and not be a completely useless build if your fiends are all getting killed. Also, like necro wells and engi turrets it’s still a great support ability, creating zone denial coupled with CC or cover conditions.

In this manner you could still buff individual venoms and it would feel pretty logical, as breaking your venom vial is bound to disperse the effect and make it a bit weaker since it’s spread on the ground in stead of thickly coated on a knife or bullet or sword.

Maugetarr.6823:

Hey, at least we’re getting somewhere with discussion!

@evilapprentice: I like the general lines of your idea, but I have to agree a little with Sir Vincent. If we took something like spider venom, how exactly would we share a weaker version of poison? Maybe just not as long poison duration? Having venomous aura create an entirely different effect though could be the direction to go in though. Maybe upon activation you drop a combo field instead, say radius 240, 4-5 second duration.

With my change, Spider venom will be buffed. What’s holding back venoms at the moment is Venomous Aura – they can’t be very powerful as utilities on their own because they can be potentially shared with 5 people.

Assuming my suggestion was implemented, you could suddenly have Spider venom trigger 5 seconds of Poison, one 5s bleed and one 5s torment per application (I’m not suggesting this, just an example), and the shared “Land spider venom” could be 2 seconds of poison and torment (again, just an example).

The venom utilites would grow much more powerful because all of a sudden you’re not worried how OP they’d be when shared with 5 players.

One thing I’ve noticed that affects venoms as well as a lot of other thief traits, is that the “cooldown” trait and the “extra effect” trait are seperated, whereas for most other traits of most other classes, they’re both effects together in one trait.
Guardian’s “Master of Concentrations” – Reduced cooldown -and- increased duration.
Thief’s “Quick Venoms” – Reduced cooldown and nothing else.
Warrior’s “Physical Training” – Reduced cooldown -and- extra damage.
Theif’s “Master of Deception” – Reduced cooldown and nothing else.
And so on.

I know this effects other thief skills, not just venoms. But I’m sure venoms would be worth using more if ‘Quick Venoms’ was consolidated with one of the other venom traits, so that thieves didn’t have to devote as many traits to venoms just to make them worth using.

That, and as mentioned above, scrap Venomous Aura. But it’s some dev’s pet idea and likely won’t be getting scrapped anytime soon. So either way, venoms are still pretty much boned.

1. Replace Venomous Strength with Venomous Cruelty: venom-imbued attacks have a higher critical chance, and venom conditions treat your condition damage as being higher than it actually is. Why? Because might grants power, and venom-traited thieves already have more base power than they can utilize. Allies affected by Venomous Aura simply gain one stack of might instead of these bonuses.
2. All venoms apply two conditions. Allies affected by Venomous Aura only get to apply the first condition of the two. For example, change Drake Venom from chill to chill/burning.
3. Leeching Venoms should steal health via condition ticks, instead of the initial attack itself, (similar to Parasitic Contagion).
4. Quick Venoms should be changed so you have exceptionally short recharges, but only half as many stacks of venom at a time. This gives you more control to mete them out as needed. When combined with this, Residual Venoms will need a moderate internal cooldown.

I like this guy’s idea. It makes the venoms usable without having to rely on many traits.

You can’t just throw things onto venoms and say “here are thou holy grail”, venoms aren’t meant for condition builds and their meant to be played as a somewhat invested build and not an extra utility. Unless they plan to add more skills (prolly 2016) they are meant for utility atm.

Also ice drake doesn’t make sense stun breaking, it makes more sense to scrap this venom because it conflicts with devourer venom and is impossible to balance. There is no way to buff ice drake without making it OP because of how quickly condi duration + venomous aura would make it, and it sucks as it is now. Best they try something new for it.

There have been a number of great suggestions on venoms, but I don’t agree with these to the slightest.

Venomous Aura and the other traits are the problem. The first step to fixing venoms is to make every utility balanced without trait support. That should be the primary goal of any venom fix. Only once that is done should the traits be readjusted and toned down.

Basilisk venom also needs a big fix for PvE considering it is our only underwater elite. It’s not worth using on anything without defiant and it doesn’t work on anything with defiant.

NinjaEd.3946:

You can’t just throw things onto venoms and say “here are thou holy grail”, venoms aren’t meant for condition builds and their meant to be played as a somewhat invested build and not an extra utility. Unless they plan to add more skills (prolly 2016) they are meant for utility atm.

Well then they did a particularly terrible job at it. Considering how many traits you need to sink into Venoms to make them even halfway viable (which is a godawful return on all those traits you’re dedicating solely to venoms), and the things you have to sacrifice just to use a venom build (variety, stun breakers…or you know you could let your 5 major traits go to waste by taking a non venom utility), what we actually get when fully invested is absolute garbage.

Also ice drake doesn’t make sense stun breaking, it makes more sense to scrap this venom because it conflicts with devourer venom and is impossible to balance. There is no way to buff ice drake without making it OP because of how quickly condi duration + venomous aura would make it, and it sucks as it is now. Best they try something new for it.

There you go, you’ve found the issue; VENOMOUS AURA

It’s unfortunate that you don’t like the suggestions here, but there’s really no way around the fact that Venomous Aura is the culprit behind how worthless venoms currently are – however it’s changed, it is the thing that needs to be changed.

I’m actually fine with them being balanced around venomous aura, it’s our only real offensive support. They would have to basically remove the trait to make venoms viable for solo purposes (thought I’d argue the immobilize venom is pretty good for S/P builds).

My biggest problem with venoms is that THREE of them interfere with eachother- with the chill one, the immobilize one, and basilik venom, all of their major function is to inhibit movement. The main damage venom we have, applies torment, which deals more damage while moving. I think they should replace chill or immobilize (if they keep the chill one duration needs to be upped, that venom is trash even with Veomous aura) with a burning/bleeding some other kind of damage condi.

Come to think of it I think burning would be perfect- it doesn’t stack so it wouldn’t get out of control with VA,. And, since its a unique condition (one thief doesn’t already have) it’d be worth considering for solo builds even without VA traited.

Or maybe: Changed the trait to: "IF venom is not shared with anybody, durations/cooldown is increased/reduced by 20%. "

Thief gonna need more class mechanic around the venom like initiative . Trigger only when used anytime without venom utility and drain the resource. Venom utility use like refill and change the venom property.
And it will balance venomous Aura when you can only give a limited amount of players getting venom buff.

About the trait it would be nice to see trait that give weakness or extra torment when activated this might make covering condition for thief easier.

evilapprentice.6379:

NinjaEd.3946:

You can’t just throw things onto venoms and say “here are thou holy grail”, venoms aren’t meant for condition builds and their meant to be played as a somewhat invested build and not an extra utility. Unless they plan to add more skills (prolly 2016) they are meant for utility atm.

Well then they did a particularly terrible job at it. Considering how many traits you need to sink into Venoms to make them even halfway viable (which is a godawful return on all those traits you’re dedicating solely to venoms), and the things you have to sacrifice just to use a venom build (variety, stun breakers…or you know you could let your 5 major traits go to waste by taking a non venom utility), what we actually get when fully invested is absolute garbage.

Also ice drake doesn’t make sense stun breaking, it makes more sense to scrap this venom because it conflicts with devourer venom and is impossible to balance. There is no way to buff ice drake without making it OP because of how quickly condi duration + venomous aura would make it, and it sucks as it is now. Best they try something new for it.

There you go, you’ve found the issue; VENOMOUS AURA

It’s unfortunate that you don’t like the suggestions here, but there’s really no way around the fact that Venomous Aura is the culprit behind how worthless venoms currently are – however it’s changed, it is the thing that needs to be changed.

Venomous Aura is a major contributer to the problem, but it doesn’t just boil down to it. If VA were the only venom trait, I think it would be arguable that they could buff the base of venoms without needing to touch the trait at all. It would be similar to ele aura sharing or mantras at that point. The problem comes in though when you consider that 5 traits can be taken simultaneously including RV (a 25-66% boost to normal venom durations, 100% to BV if you don’t use both strikes instantly), QV, PV, and LV on top of the sharing. That’s just too much when all combined to give it a buff, which is why I thought moving 2 of them to exclude the taking of all 5 would be an effective way to ensure being able to buff the base of venoms without having to nerf any of the individual traits. Now instead of

Mediocre/UP utilies + 5 traits (12 trait points) + all utility slots = Marginal Utility at the expense of individual damage & Survivability

You get

Decent utilities + 3 (of 5) traits = Good Support + Individual survivability (stunbreaks) & Damage + 8 spare trait points.

IIRC they moved some mantra traits around to try to make more builda able to access their effects better. I think that could be done here.

PS: Not picking on you evilapprentice, just wanted to add to what you had.

But you’re still doing it all backwards, starting from the maximum effect from traits and and then working backwards to get what the venoms should look like. This will always fail as it leaves venoms weak in every other situation.

The venom utilities themselves need to work first as balanced utilities on their own merit. Venom traits then need balancing against other traits. It’s not complicated when you look at it like that.

Stooperdale.3560:

But you’re still doing it all backwards, starting from the maximum effect from traits and and then working backwards to get what the venoms should look like. This will always fail as it leaves venoms weak in every other situation.

The venom utilities themselves need to work first as balanced utilities on their own merit. Venom traits then need balancing against other traits. It’s not complicated when you look at it like that.

I did not think that the changes I proposed left venoms in a particularly weak state, even if you didn’t trait for them whatsoever. Where else do you think they could be buffed in addition to or instead of these suggestions?

Maugetarr.6823:

The problem comes in though when you consider that 5 traits can be taken simultaneously including RV (a 25-66% boost to normal venom durations, 100% to BV if you don’t use both strikes instantly), QV, PV, and LV on top of the sharing. That’s just too much when all combined to give it a buff, which is why I thought moving 2 of them to exclude the taking of all 5 would be an effective way to ensure being able to buff the base of venoms without having to nerf any of the individual traits.

There is no problem taking all venom related traits at the same time. The problem is when that trait’s effect leaks out of the Thief and on to their team mates through VA.

You can deny it all you want, but VA is the main reason why venom skills and their traits are horrible.

VA doesn’t need to be removed completely, just dumbed down a little. Give each venom and related trait two effects: one for both the thief and their allies, and one just for the thief. Boom. Suddenly you can make the thief’s own abilities stronger, with only appropriate components being spread to allies.

VA isn’t an issue, its the baseline of the venoms that really don’t have much going for them. BV with a cast time for a 1.5 second stun, DV is hard to buff because its a 4+ second immobilize already, ice drake just sucks and cannot be buffed either so it will remain as such, spider just adds more gravy to the mix of endless poison access (which only stacks duration), skale only lasts a few seconds for a very short uptime, skelk is easy to counter and has a horrible hps.

I agree venoms need a little too much investment just to make an appearance. Tone down that necessity by reworking the venoms and give a little attention towards the traits. For example,

-Spider venom’s only purpose is for on venom proc effects like leeching venoms. Increase the number of hits to say 8, reduce the poison duration to ~4 seconds, and lower the cooldown to 30 seconds.

-Skale venom is the only venom that gives something to a condition build. It should stand on its own but it should stay in check so that VA doesn’t overpower it. Increase the number of strikes to 4, increase the torment duration to 8 seconds, lower the vulnerability duration to 8 seconds, and lower the cooldown to 40 seconds. Reason is to give it a little punch if you spend it effectively without having to heavily invest into condi duration and venom recharge to give it an impressionable effect.

-Ice drake needs to just be removed. It cannot be increased in duration even without VA because of what chill does in high durations. Not only that, chill just seems out of place on thief despite what source a “venom” can be put under. Give some support so it doesn’t conflict with Devourer venom to a little thing I call Karka venom. Your next 3 attacks transfer a condition to your foe. Cooldown 45 seconds. This would be able to stand on its own for a non-venom build for the dirty fighter approach and give a nice support skill for VA.

- Devourer is pretty strong even on its own, traits just make it that much better. This is the only venom I think that VA holds back from receiving any buff because immobilization stacking is quite powerful. Still, I think its a great venom.

-Basilisk Venom is mainly used for its short cooldown effect and giving burst thieves that moment of opportunity they need to pull of some bursts. Really no reason to change it except I wish petrify acted differently from stun where it could be unblock able or ignore stability. Overall it’s still a good enough skill for any thief build.

-Skelk venom just doesn’t keep thief up. Thief isn’t the kind of class that takes a while to go from full to dead, a few mistakes or even 1 bad mistake and it hurts. So when you pop skelk venom and heal for 180% of your max health it just shows how unnecessary the heal per hit is. This venom I believe should get special attention to something with some sustain. Remove the flat heal at the start but keep the cast time. Increase the number of strikes from 4 to 15, and reduce the healing base from 645 to ~450. Lastly reduce the cooldown to 40 seconds. This gives a very stretched out healing especially with leeching venoms so that missing isn’t heavily punished. The actual healing total from this skill wouldn’t change much but it would be more dependable than healing to full in a split second and now you got X charges left with absolutely no gain. The hps does go slightly up because the cooldown reduction. Even without leeching venoms, this would still result in a fairly noticeable heal but for the most part fall into the same role as signet of malice where you have to specialize to use it best (number of hits for SoM, leeching venoms for skelk).

NinjaEd.3946:

VA isn’t an issue, its the baseline of the venoms that really don’t have much going for them.

Yes, the baseline venoms are the problem.

Why haven’t baseline venoms been buffed?

VENOMOUS AURA.

You do understand that the issue is this – It’s extremely hard (probably approaching impossible) to design a Venom utility that is strong enough to be worth taking on it’s own WITHOUT it becoming ridiculously OP when you have the option of spreading that skill onto 5 other players/AI’s.

That is the heart of the issue – Anet cannot design venoms worth taking on their own when they have to be balanced with the possibility of that effect being applied 5 more times in mind.

evilapprentice.6379:

NinjaEd.3946:

VA isn’t an issue, its the baseline of the venoms that really don’t have much going for them.

Yes, the baseline venoms are the problem.

Why haven’t baseline venoms been buffed?

VENOMOUS AURA.

You do understand that the issue is this – It’s extremely hard (probably approaching impossible) to design a Venom utility that is strong enough to be worth taking on it’s own WITHOUT it becoming ridiculously OP when you have the option of spreading that skill onto 5 other players/AI’s.

That is the heart of the issue – Anet cannot design venoms worth taking on their own when they have to be balanced with the possibility of that effect being applied 5 more times in mind.

They have to take sharing into consideration with mantras and Aura’s as well, the thing is though there aren’t nearly as many traits that can all be taken simultaneously which turns the sharing into an overwhelming force if they were to be buffed at all. That’s why I thought that moving the traits so they interfered with each other would allow them to address them better for both group and solo play.

Maugetarr.6823:

They have to take sharing into consideration with mantras and Aura’s as well, the thing is though there aren’t nearly as many traits that can all be taken simultaneously which turns the sharing into an overwhelming force if they were to be buffed at all. That’s why I thought that moving the traits so they interfered with each other would allow them to address them better for both group and solo play.

I’m not familiar with the exact mechanics in which mantra’s and Aura’s are shared. Could you explain please?

evilapprentice.6379:

NinjaEd.3946:

VA isn’t an issue, its the baseline of the venoms that really don’t have much going for them.

Yes, the baseline venoms are the problem.

Why haven’t baseline venoms been buffed?

VENOMOUS AURA.

You do understand that the issue is this – It’s extremely hard (probably approaching impossible) to design a Venom utility that is strong enough to be worth taking on it’s own WITHOUT it becoming ridiculously OP when you have the option of spreading that skill onto 5 other players/AI’s.

That is the heart of the issue – Anet cannot design venoms worth taking on their own when they have to be balanced with the possibility of that effect being applied 5 more times in mind.

It comes down to what those venoms do.

Take spider for example, is it op to share that X5 hits across 5 other people? Not really, poison doesn’t stack intensity and only stacks 9 times so you don’t get a whole lot for spreading it.

BV doesn’t stack period, it just resets and venoms are spent in an AoE fashion when applicable so you can just toss that out the door.

Ice drake venom lasts so short even with a group its like a little rubberbanding effect for the group and then its over. Disregarding VA, you cannot buff ice drake because we already have devouer venom. If you buff its effect to last longer than DV (4 seconds is quite a lot for chill) then its easily broken with a little condition duration. Ice drake doesn’t fit thief thematically and it conflicts with DV before even adding VA to the mix.

Skale venom lasts a few seconds, so does spreading that across a group help a lot? Yes, but how is it any different from epidemic? Have a bunch of people focus their conditions on target X and spread, sure its arguably too strong to some but its been with us for how long so it must be acceptably balanced if people are going to point fingers at VA before epidemic. Epidemic is actually much stronger because it spreads those conditions and stacks to enemies, VA helps skale venom get applied 3(4) x5 just for torment and vulnerability and that’s anywhere between 6 and 12 trait points so don’t tell me VA is the reason they can’t address this venom.

Skelk is just implemented wrong. Its a really strong burst heal almost like ether renewal and then its on a super long cooldown. They completely forgot that thief doesn’t have a very large health pool (lowest tier) so when you heal for over 100% of your max hp and are left with a 45(36) second cooldown you wonder whats the point. VA doesn’t make this any stronger than having classes like regen warrior or ranger or guardian or ele or engineer healing which is far more consistent and on a far more sturdy class who can take a hit at the frontline.

Lastly, devourer venom doesn’t need a buff. Whether its solo or in a group its a fairly strong skill that does its job well. So VA doesn’t matter in this venom’s case.

tl;dr

VA is not the reason for venoms to be unchanged, the lack of a thief sponsor at anet pushing for any actual changes towards thief is the problem. Have you seen our traps lately, or p/p, or the sept. balance changes? They just aren’t willing to help thief because either they don’t care, which I would hate to believe, or because they just don’t know how to handle it because there is no one giving proper feedback on the dev team in favor of thief diversity. The only time we’ve seen someone at anet play thief they were dead the majority of the video or they were giving tips that the thief community already knew like caltrops and choking gas proc’ing signet of malice.

NinjaEd.3946:

tl;dr

VA is not the reason for venoms to be unchanged, the lack of a thief sponsor at anet pushing for any actual changes towards thief is the problem.

It’s both. VA and lack of representation are the reason.

Have you seen our traps lately, or p/p, or the sept. balance changes?

They balanced traps, but not the traps that are decent. They also balanced P/P even more so in the upcoming patch today.

However, those are nothing but “straw man” just so they can say that they also buff Thief.

They just aren’t willing to help thief because either they don’t care, which I would hate to believe, or because they just don’t know how to handle it because there is no one giving proper feedback on the dev team in favor of thief diversity.

Well, start hating it because the former is true. In the first 6 months of GW2, proper and comprehensive feedback was provided — 2 years later, nothing. Instead, they make changes that is not even based on the feedback which is proof that they don’t understand what they read in the forum. They may read the forum, but they have no comprehension on what they are reading because they don’t play Thief.

The only time we’ve seen someone at anet play thief they were dead the majority of the video or they were giving tips that the thief community already knew like caltrops and choking gas proc’ing signet of malice.

Those are pro-tips…not!

That video is outright embarrassing to ArenaNet. Until they can show a video of a Dev playing a Thief and not sucking at it, then I will start believing again that they know what they are doing.