Guild Wars 2

Proven.2854:

Alekt.5803:

Proven.2854:

Let me be Devil’s Advocate for a moment.

The last argument I’ve seen most used is that it makes underpowered builds out of the realm of completely impossible. I don’t like the WvW argument because much of the time you don’t know exactly what your opponent is running. They could be running an experimental build as well, and if they’re not you could just be more experienced fighting their meta build than they are at fighting your experimental build.

My build is totally viable. Theorycrafter try to find viable build, and even defy the current best builds. It might probably be the best build available for staff right now. It has every signs of great potential. I have been perfecting it for months and even yet, I am not using it to its full potential. Now, by limiting theorycrafting, it seems to be pigeonholding builds.

It might be a small portion of the stats, but it’s big enough to make the difference. And now, I ask again, is its removal a small thing?

But again, a build is only declared viable when stacked up against other builds. As I said with the rest of my post, does the loss of efficiency through the amulet+jewel affect you so much more than other viable builds that your build is destroyed?

Also, could you link the build or would you rather keep it to yourself longer? I’m curious, but don’t feel pressured to post it.

Here’s the thing.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vEUQFAWhcM6Z2ywuBd0ACRBKYCiHXAEwhFF7wMA-zUCBYjBhwAgQAJRViNdVIr4qIasabYaXKqqYBOAACwNvZAYoDdoDdoDtbezbezbezA-w

It’s currently set for WvW. I abandon Signet of Restoration for Either Renewal in SPvP, get armor of earth instead of signet of air. Valkyrie with zerker gem and Divinity runes.

Swap atunements in-between cast time or travel time of lighning attacks to proc fresh-air. Don’t forget to move while casting to use One with Air properly as it is the equivalent of out-of-combat-swiftness speed.

Keep health above threshold for 20% damage inscrease due to the self-heal mechanics. Fast cast means more heal (see fresh-air and attunement swaps). Keep pressure on target while moving away (done with One with Air). If health Threshold is kept, the damage should be overwhelming.

I tell you, it’s not easy to do at all. The build is not focused on creativity above all, it’s made to compliment every extra stats the Celestial can provide. It focuses on efficiency with style points. It will also be buffed next patch with Celestial gear update.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Justin had the crux of the reasoning correct – it’s a small tweak to your build that a lot of players could do without. It’s a very small stat change in exchange for another aspect of a PvP build. By removing it, it’s one less thing a new player needs to learn. With runes, sigils, amulets, weapon skills, slotted skills, minor traits and major traits, making a build is a pretty hefty process. Jewels were a very, VERY small % of that overall build.

Trust me, doing focus tests and watching new players play the game, our builds can be very overwhelming. You guys are experts by now, but you have to keep in mind that other players are not as advanced as you are, and removing pieces to the builds allows us to slightly lower the barrier to entry.

Heres the thing about new players, and option shock, its new. they dont know stuff. Thats fine. I understand you guys love of simplification, but its highly overated. Interesting things are complex. If you want to gate newbs, gate newbs, but dont remove options. Now of course, you could say, hey no good players really used these builds, but its not all about the top end meta, thats what some people missed in the thread. Top end players only care about the top end meta, they run fairly similar stat and build combos. But this is not all of your players.

Simplification is old hat, the future lies in creating highly adaptable systems. While you guys are making it easier for new guys, you are making it less free for old hats.

Most people would create a standard system for newbs, and and deeper customization for those who are more experienced, or enjoy that type of thing. Its a bad trend to shove simplification down everyones throat.

Thats why people jail break their iphones, and buy PCs, not everyone want simple options. And it is often these guys who investigate options who evolve games metas/techniques.

MarkPhilips.5169:

Templates can save the world Chap

A Template System, with suggested build (the op build of the month! ) and a chance to save builds, can be incredibly usefull for pvp/pve/www, everything

We want this in the next feature patch, let’s go with the CDI

They have been aware of templates as a community top priority for a very long time now, also since it is an original gw1 system a lot of people expected it to be in gw2 from the get go or at least a few months down the line, now it’s 2014 and we still don’t have it.

one word comes to mind: frustrating

JonathanSharp.7094:

Justin had the crux of the reasoning correct – it’s a small tweak to your build that a lot of players could do without. It’s a very small stat change in exchange for another aspect of a PvP build. By removing it, it’s one less thing a new player needs to learn. With runes, sigils, amulets, weapon skills, slotted skills, minor traits and major traits, making a build is a pretty hefty process. Jewels were a very, VERY small % of that overall build.

Trust me, doing focus tests and watching new players play the game, our builds can be very overwhelming. You guys are experts by now, but you have to keep in mind that other players are not as advanced as you are, and removing pieces to the builds allows us to slightly lower the barrier to entry.

If getting overwhelmed, and eventually frustrated, is such a big issue, then why are HS warriors and thieves in such a broken place? Surely anyone playing some other profession will get very frustrated playing against a HS warrior or thief.

Or is it that thieves and warriors constitute the vast majority of players, and you’re just catering to the majority, offering up the minority as fodder so others can feel like they’re doing really well?

Alekt.5803:

Proven.2854:

Alekt.5803:

Proven.2854:

Let me be Devil’s Advocate for a moment.

The last argument I’ve seen most used is that it makes underpowered builds out of the realm of completely impossible. I don’t like the WvW argument because much of the time you don’t know exactly what your opponent is running. They could be running an experimental build as well, and if they’re not you could just be more experienced fighting their meta build than they are at fighting your experimental build.

My build is totally viable. Theorycrafter try to find viable build, and even defy the current best builds. It might probably be the best build available for staff right now. It has every signs of great potential. I have been perfecting it for months and even yet, I am not using it to its full potential. Now, by limiting theorycrafting, it seems to be pigeonholding builds.

It might be a small portion of the stats, but it’s big enough to make the difference. And now, I ask again, is its removal a small thing?

But again, a build is only declared viable when stacked up against other builds. As I said with the rest of my post, does the loss of efficiency through the amulet+jewel affect you so much more than other viable builds that your build is destroyed?

Also, could you link the build or would you rather keep it to yourself longer? I’m curious, but don’t feel pressured to post it.

Here’s the thing.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vEUQFAWhcM6Z2ywuBd0ACRBKYCiHXAEwhFF7wMA-zUCBYjBhwAgQAJRViNdVIr4qIasabYaXKqqYBOAACwNvZAYoDdoDdoDtbezbezbezA-w

It’s currently set for WvW. I abandon Signet of Restoration for Either Renewal in SPvP, get armor of earth instead of signet of air. Valkyrie with zerker gem and Divinity runes.

Swap atunements in-between cast time or travel time of lighning attacks to proc fresh-air. Don’t forget to move while casting to use One with Air properly as it is the equivalent of out-of-combat-swiftness speed.

Keep health above threshold for 20% damage inscrease due to the self-heal mechanics. Fast cast means more heal (see fresh-air and attunement swaps). Keep pressure on target while moving away (done with One with Air). If health Threshold is kept, the damage should be overwhelming.

I tell you, it’s not easy to do at all. The build is not focused on creativity above all, it’s made to compliment every extra stats the Celestial can provide. It focuses on efficiency with style points. It will also be buffed next patch with Celestial gear update.

It looks like your build is going to depend on whatever change they do to Divinity Runes more than the jewel change. Assuming that they’re going to keep the “equal number of stats given to each attribute” theme, either you’ll lose a lot of crit damage and be better served by switching to runes that give Precision + Ferocity anyway, or you’ll lose net ~2% crit chance if they buff it instead. Signet of Restoration is also being unsplit from PvE/PvP so you may get more survivability out of that.

somsom.5201:

@ Allie:

You wanted build specifics?

There are PLENTY of builds that rely upon swapping the jewel to get that little bit of something extra that is lacking overall(be it toughness, prec, healing power, condi, vit, whatever).

On the build I’ve been running on my Ranger for the past 6+ months, I’ve been using a combo and it allows me to gain some NEEDED prec(~8%). Without it…the procs I was hoping on are already small, once you deduct 8% from them…yea the build is dead.

Could you link the build?

Viking Jorun.5413:

You players are awful people, I’ll just start there.

Allie — I’m glad you stood up for yourself under heavy assault, and I’m pretty up hauled over the state of the official forums after news of getting a massive update for free, and the amount of entitlement that goes on specifically in the PvP forums is a horrifying display of this game’s generally kind and helpful population.

Now, as for removing jewels, it’s not a massive hit to anyone’s build, but for example, in my turret death build I use a Barbarian’s Amulet and a Valkyrie jewel, which gives that ever-so-slight DPS boost that makes me an actual threat while still letting me take a hit or fifteen. I’m not going to whine over it, but I did want to show you that some builds are affected ever so slightly. I suppose gaining extra health and crit chance won’t be so bad, though, so I may need to adjust my build when the patch hits live (aside from the AR nerf).

Yeah, you’ll lose out on 50 power, but also about 2% crit damage from the Ferocity changes if you were allowed to keep the same amulet + jewel setup. You’re also losing out on crit damage from traits, again thanks to the Ferocity change.

Thedenofsin.7340:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Justin had the crux of the reasoning correct – it’s a small tweak to your build that a lot of players could do without. It’s a very small stat change in exchange for another aspect of a PvP build. By removing it, it’s one less thing a new player needs to learn. With runes, sigils, amulets, weapon skills, slotted skills, minor traits and major traits, making a build is a pretty hefty process. Jewels were a very, VERY small % of that overall build.

Trust me, doing focus tests and watching new players play the game, our builds can be very overwhelming. You guys are experts by now, but you have to keep in mind that other players are not as advanced as you are, and removing pieces to the builds allows us to slightly lower the barrier to entry.

If getting overwhelmed, and eventually frustrated, is such a big issue, then why are HS warriors and thieves in such a broken place? Surely anyone playing some other profession will get very frustrated playing against a HS warrior or thief.

Or is it that thieves and warriors constitute the vast majority of players, and you’re just catering to the majority, offering up the minority as fodder so others can feel like they’re doing really well?

Sigh. You still haven’t learned. You need to specify which specs are the problem. No class is completely bad, but all classes have broken specs. You need to spell those out or the rest of your post won’t get any credibility.

Alasteir.7031

You literally just suggested that ArenaNet should listen to testimony and anecdotes over actual data, which in any problem solving environment, is just stupid. Data > Player feedback. That being said, Anet should take into account player feedback, because if what players say is true, then Anet’s data should confirm that.

The problem with trusting only data is that statistics are often constructed to tell you what you want them to tell you. Further, the root cause of problems can’t be identified or fixed with data alone. And data can’t tell you about things for which you can’t generate data.

If you would increase the scope of this thread slightly, it would be about build diversity and how stats influence it. In doing so, you will quickly see an incomplete data set. Yes, we can provide examples, such as bunker guardian with cleric/barbarian to increase HP and get some crit to power the vigor on crit trait. Elementalists using Valkyrie/Berserker to survive yet maintain offensie. And you’d see many barbarian amulets with soldier jewels for a little bit of armor. But maybe that only happens at top tiers of play. Maybe the majority of PvP players use full cleric or full berserker. If you looked only at the whole data set, it would say only a fraction uses different jewels. What that analysis misses is that the people using the jewels are the people that know the most about the game and are the most skilled. Should that small group be discounted? I would hope not.

Further, what about things for which we have no data? Myself and others have asked for more stat customization than what the jewel provided. But because you can’t do that in-game right now, how do we make a case for it with data? We could make some trait combinations and say “it should work if you had these stats” but how do we prove it?

The point is that you can’t always trust your data. Player feedback needs to be considered, but it also needs to be filtered, which is a difficult task.

There was some miscommunication it seems. You took away that too many build options =‘s harder to balance… when people were trying to communicate… too many stats =’s harder to balance. While the pure number of build options does make things a little harder to balance, it’s the large bonuses given by items and traits that are main problem.

Or as that thread put it…

Sunshine.5014:

TL;DR: The customizable zone is too large. Other games allow only 10-15% difference between builds, while GW2 allows a big range between bunker and zerker builds; that makes balancing very hard. I suggest we significantly reduce the stats point given by traits and gears, while significantly increase the base stats for each professions. The goal is to keep the customizable range small, and that comes with many benefits.

There is far greater difference dps and bunker in GW2 (way more than 15%). Meaning the damage that a dps does compaired to a bunker is far more than 15% and the amount that a bunker can take compaired to a dps is far more than 15%.

Hybrid builds tend to be the more balanced builds (lower stat differences overall) yet this is exactly what you’ll be destroying.

This change would push people more to the extreme bunker/extreme dps sides which are the current problem. You’re making the problem you’re trying to solve worse, not better with this proposed change.

If you agreed with the OP of that thread, then you would lower the stat values (less +power/vit/critdmg/cond dmg/etc. on jewelry and possibly fewer stats given from traits as well), not the number of stat options.

RIP jewels/balanced stats I’ll miss you :’(

I would like to point out that the pre-set amulet stat combinations are designed specifically for traited builds in each class. The developers design the traits around the amulet stat combinations for certain roles each class can fill. I suspect this change is because many players are accidentally weakening themselves by switching out the jewel. It is very enticing, but a pitfall I believe. ANet can see this by analyzing match results.

I am thankful they did this. It confirms my suspicion that swapping out the Jewel is a mistake.

It is also a mistake to assume the developers are clueless about the game mechanics they designed. A careful analysis of the balance added to PvP can help you make incredibly powerful WvW/PvE builds. Knights and Celestial* combinations are excluded from PvP because they are unbalanced. I won’t tell you in which direction, but if you experiment you will see.

The same is true for rune sets as well. Find the ones that are PvP excluded and ask. Is it too strong or too weak. I hope this post helps someone. Just try and see.

*Celestial in PvP is very different.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/What-new-stat-combination-would-you-like/3518753

We definitely had this convo about what stat combos we would like and changing the stat distribution between amulets and jewels. I meant to post this in reply to Allie a while ago ( Been Busy celebrating UDs loss) since she brought up a random thread to support her claims.

clint.5681:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/What-new-stat-combination-would-you-like/3518753

We definitely had this convo about what stat combos we would like and changing the stat distribution between amulets and jewels. I meant to post this in reply to Allie a while ago ( Been Busy celebrating UDs loss) since she brought up a random thread to support her claims.

And that made me sad because my thread was not supporting removing jewels at all. Instead, it was supporting reducing customization range (the big stats gap between bunkers and zerkers) .

You could say that simplifying SPvP and removing build options hinder the game, as it will look less and less like the most popular PvE/WvW format.

We need more options, not less. Shoehorning people into builds isn’t the way to go.

Sunshine.5014:

clint.5681:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/What-new-stat-combination-would-you-like/3518753

We definitely had this convo about what stat combos we would like and changing the stat distribution between amulets and jewels. I meant to post this in reply to Allie a while ago ( Been Busy celebrating UDs loss) since she brought up a random thread to support her claims.

And that made me sad because my thread was not supporting removing jewels at all. Instead, it was supporting reducing customization range (the big stats gap between bunkers and zerkers) .

Indeed. L2R plz A-net.

Agreed with Sunshine and Malcastus over here.

If anything, reduce the stats given by the amulets but please keep the jewels in. We need more options…

Since Allie asked for examples:

My Guardian is 0/5/30/30/5 90% of the time. Which means I get 300 tough, 300 vita, 300 healing and 30% crit dmg permanently, no matter what build I use.

Often, I will simply switch weapons and amulets depending on what I want to play. If I want to play a more bunkery build, I will use Barbarian with Cleric’s jewel. It gives me 425 healing (675 with mace), 24k hp and a good chunk of armor. If I want to go full healing, I will use Cleric’s with Barbarian, to gain a little bit more precision for Vigor. However, my main build is Berserker’s with Barbarian jewel to get that extra hp. It’s not much, but it helps (I get 19500 instead of 18700). The advantage of this build is that it is NOT a glass cannon build. It’s a very jack-of-all-trades build, allowing me to do decent dps, have great surv (through 550 heal + dodge heal, etc.) and great support / condi cleanse with shouts.

Without jewels, you can clearly see that I lose many options. My healing build has less surviability, my dps build is more vulnerable and my bunker build has less healing, hindering my support as well as my surviability (since 1k hp isn’t much, but being able to regen it faster helps a ton).

I hope my example will give an idea of just how removing jewels limits choices…

Archon.6480:

I would like to point out that the pre-set amulet stat combinations are designed specifically for traited builds in each class. The developers design the traits around the amulet stat combinations for certain roles each class can fill. I suspect this change is because many players are accidentally weakening themselves by switching out the jewel. It is very enticing, but a pitfall I believe. ANet can see this by analyzing match results.

Please explain how you arrive at that conclusion. In competitive play, Who uses the Barbarian amulet? Rampager? Celestial (though this was because the stats were too low)? So what if players come up with a combination of traits that wasn’t blessed by the amulets that currently exist; is it not allowed? Designing a system with so much customization in skills and traits but then disallowing stat customization to back it up is part of kills build diversity. Not to mention, the amulet combinations aren’t that great for half the roles with which they could conceivably be matched.

It is also a mistake to assume the developers are clueless about the game mechanics they designed. A careful analysis of the balance added to PvP can help you make incredibly powerful WvW/PvE builds. Knights and Celestial* combinations are excluded from PvP because they are unbalanced. I won’t tell you in which direction, but if you experiment you will see.

I like to give developers the benefit of the doubt when it comes to knowing what they’re doing, but their track record leaves much to be desired. What’s really frustrating players is that there’s little discussion between developers and players ahead of time for big changes. When there’s a problem with changes that are made, they often aren’t addressed for 3 to 6 months with the next mechanics update.

Allie Murdock.8152:

Pyriall.5027:

I find it a bit curious that NOW you quote a forum post, being that is supports your position (even moderately at best). Yet, all the other posts (hello skyhammer and skyhammer farming threads) were thought of as not valid enough.

Pyriall, I don’t HAVE a position. If anything, my position tends to stand with the community. Sometimes, you guys send mixed messaging, which is what I am trying to understand. If I go back to the devs and tell them the feedback you give in this thread, then what should I say when they bring up the point I made?

I’m not going to get into detail on the Skyhammer point because I don’t want to derail this thread, but I will say that using Skyhammer to argue your point is backwards. The only reason I commented on that thread is because I needed to know what I was going to say when I went to the team and explained how the community feels it should be removed. It was literally the first issue I raised to the team the day I came back.

You act like it is ArenaNet vs. the community, and that is just wrong on so many levels. When you see me picking apart your arguments and pointing things out, it’s because I want to make sure you have thought everything through before I raise it to the team.

We all want the same thing. For GW2 to be the best it can be.

Now, back on topic. OE, I think your points are valid. I feel like your thread has mixed messaging in it, though. Correct me if I’m wrong, but you started this thread with the concern that we are removing a piece that you feel is tantamount to build diversity. Can you explain which builds you feel this will affect? I’m asking this because I am seeing posts from others that say it’s not really going to change much.

Everyone kept asking me “Is this patch going to shake up the meta?” and it always made me chuckle knowing what was coming. Given that we are changing so much, it will be a major shake-up for those of you that have known our game through it’s ups and downs. In that sense, it will be a big adjustment.

This is why I ask that you guys try things out before assuming this will hurt build diversity or the game in general. We are shaking things up and changing systems that we have not liked for a long time. Yes, it’s going to be a renaissance of GW2 PvP.

I’m just asking you guys to be open to it. If this goes out and it didn’t work out as we had planned, then we are open to change too.

Now, I won’t post for the rest of the weekend, but I had to get that off my chest. The movers are going to be here in 30 minutes so I need to go scramble to get things ready.

The problems is ANet extremely slow Allie.

It takes for 3 months you to decide something is broken or not and another 3 months to fix and if you make a mistake another 6 months to fix it again.

Lets say if you later decide removing the jewels is a mistake it would take 6 months introduce a new solution.

All the PVPer I respected like Phantaram, Teldo, Xeph they were telling we need a Cavalier type amulet in PVP or Celestial stats must be buffed for 2 years and it took you 2 years to introduce or modifiy them.

But Grouch tells in the stream that Celestial stats was a running gag in ANet for the last 2 years. Really quality players I followed and come to this game 2 years ago left this game long ago and they will never return.

We have no patience anymore to wait 6 months to see the broken things are fixed.

To be honest while I enjoy using weird combinations in my builds I think that this change is for the better. IF they can actually follow up with GOOD balance changes. If they only have to fix balance on 12 amulets it’s a lot easier.

Allie Murdock.8152:

I’m just asking you guys to be open to it. If this goes out and it didn’t work out as we had planned, then we are open to change too.

Now, I won’t post for the rest of the weekend, but I had to get that off my chest. The movers are going to be here in 30 minutes so I need to go scramble to get things ready.

“We wants it, we needs it. Must have the precious. They stole it from us. Sneaky little hobbitses.”
ok so if it doesnt work out as you planned then please promise us that you try hard to bring back our precious jewels asap!

i think most of us complaining here are open for some changes
however some just seem quite drastic and the fact that you announce SO MANY changes all at once doesnt really help on top of that : D

i could also imagine that some dislike the fact of pvp being simplified to a point where it is just sad to make it even simplier since it is already so much easier than pve
i do like complexity like playing with a cooldown of 15seconds and a weapon swap of 5 (it would be nice if cooldowns would always be on the sigils)

(however sigill remake and cooldown not interfering with each other will bring a lot of these small changes and complexity like one weapon set fire + air on the other energy and bloodlust —-these combinations allow quite a lot actually)

well.. then i hope for the best..
and wish you the best

(btw thx for replying to this topic so quickly)

What if you would only have celestial amulet and what you’re choosing is only the gem?

so PvP will be the "streamlined" (aka easy mode) while pve/WvW will have full customization (aka too hard for pvp players?)

I know if this patch was a way to insult the pvp player base or to make their job easier because of less "variables" to work with.

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

so will pvp be endgame or more tailored to newer players?
I ask because with limited stats/build they will become bored with the set roles of GC or midpoint tank and I predict they will move to the more customization friendly WvW which also has fights while not limited to a circle.

I guess my question is, will this update just bring new players into pvp or will it also keep them interested a month later?

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

On the surface, these appear to be valid. However, they become invalid when I remember that pvp does not exist in a vacuum.

For anyone else familiar with the game, how does reducing the complexity of an already simplified gearing system make it less intimidating? They are already familiar with a far more complex system. For brand new players, it has that potential. However, they will either end up learning a good chunk of it through PvE (its not exactly obvious on how to get to pvp from pve) or they will be so avid about PvP that they’ll look it up (and won’t be intimidated regardless). PvP tends to be intimidating because you are up against players and you will die. I really believe that the “gearing intimidation barrier” is next to non-existent.

The second reason holds even less weight when we remember that the game also has the PvE (and WvW) elements. So, in a game where PvE and WvW should also be balanced; how does simplifying PvP help? It’s not like those other options were actually removed from the game. They were simply removed from PvP. In order to balance PvP, you have to do it based on full stat allotments. In order to balance WvW, you have to do it based on a large range of allotments. By keeping one and not the other, it appears to be more difficult because you can’t even use the WvW options as a balanced middle ground for PvP.

I understand compartmentalization, but I really think the three departments need to get together when decisions are made. The choice to reward the most structured PvP based on effort while rewarding WvW based on quantity (or whatever you want to call it) is so backwards that it’s ludicrous. The decision to simplify pvp gear for balance when you still have to do it for another form of pvp and pve seems equally nonsensical. The list goes on. You guys really need to consolidate your viewpoints.

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

I think he is giving the real answer here about the change. It is because the balance team is obviously struggling to balance this game, and they are looking for any way they can to make it easier on themselves.

Although this does beg the question: You said it isn’t a big deal that they are getting rid of jewls because they have little influence on your overall stats and build. But now you are saying that they are screwing up balance because of all of the possiblities they introduce….. So which is it? Do they add nothing therefore need to be removed, or are they adding too much variety and you guys can’t keep it straight?

In my personal opinion, the new players argument is a straw man. A new player will get an amulet and not even realize they can change the jewl until later. Which means that the only players that are actually changing things around are those that can handle the increased complexity. I think you hit the nail on the head when you said the balance team can’t handle the variables and still balance this game. We all know they are struggling (we see it in game every day) but is the solution to simplify the game as opposed to examining what on the balance team is going wrong? Seems like the easy way out to me. I’ve developed very complex applications with many complex functions and variables in it before. The answer when it gets above a few people’s head isn’t to reduce the application’s functionality, the answer is to get more people and a new perspective on it to solve the problems without cutting the functionality of the program.

But does this change make the game easier to balance in any meaningful sense? How many balance problems have there been due to the jewels?
In a way a simple game is less stable when it comes to changes in the rule set (nerfs, buffs, new content). If there is room for micromanagement, then builds can more easily adapt to the changes.

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

Yeah I agree Justin, it’s an unnecessary level of complexity when complexity should be focused around traits and the game style they create..

Phaeton.9582:

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

Yeah I agree Justin, it’s an unnecessary level of complexity when complexity should be focused around traits and the game style they create..

what game style would that be?
pure bunker and pure glass without a balanced middle ground?

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

problem is, by simplifying the solution, you lessen your ability to solve problems, and accentuate the weaknesses of whatever solution you chose. you lose adaptability.

Essentially you are now requiring even tighter balance by the devs, since there are less options, all of them must be better. Also if there is something wrong/missing the devs now have to add it.
Say it turns out berserker is too glassy due to the new meta, no one uses it at all. its completely wasted till the team can go in there and fix berserker, not to mention since you have already formalized minor/major stat distribution. You really can only change the meta, or create a totally new necklace with more diverse stats.

So in the short term you have bad stat combos that trap unknowing players, less options for players who are familiar with the bad options, and no one can adapt the system until the Devs fix either the meta, or add new necklaces.
In the long term you have devs having to work really hard to balance the meta around available stat combos or having to introduce new necklaces all the time, which creates further option shock, and bad options.

Sometimes making something simpler makes it more complex in the long term, because it isnt very adaptable. It remains to be seen how much of an effect this will have, but i think its a bad idea/trend to try to simplify things all the time, sometimes its great, but sometimes you end up creating more problems that are harder to solve because you have more unchangeable parts.

Justin ODell.9517:

Master of Timespace.2548:

But does this change make the game easier to balance in any meaningful sense? How many balance problems have there been due to the jewels?

It isn’t just about jewels, it’s about stats in general. I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

does this mean that this type of "balance" will eventually come to pve/wvw? I mean you want to balance the whole game eventually. will that be the next step?

Brando.1374:

Justin ODell.9517:

Master of Timespace.2548:

But does this change make the game easier to balance in any meaningful sense? How many balance problems have there been due to the jewels?

It isn’t just about jewels, it’s about stats in general. I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

does this mean that this type of “balance” will eventually come to pve/wvw? I mean you want to balance the whole game eventually. will that be the next step?

Lol of course not, they wouldn’t want to make the pve players mad and the wvwer players are never given any thought.

Justin ODell.9517:

I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

I can understand that.

However, I also hope that the designers are carefully considering the risks that this change brings/ the problems that this change puts to a clearer light, and are carefully considering a solution for the future.

I don’t mind the lack of jewels, I understand the importance of streamlining, but I don’t want build diversity to decrease due to some stats being in excess/ wasted, while lacking some much-needed others.

This game’s pvp has four means to build stats: traits, runes, amulets and jewels. With this new change, thar number will be reduced to three. Does GW2 needs that many (four) sources for stat building? I agree that it doesn’t. So are jewels really needed? I agree that they aren’t really needed. However, the game should make better use of the three other means for stat building. Because with so many means still remaining, the stat customisation could potentially be higher than what in practice it really is currently.

Justin ODell.9517:

It isn’t just about jewels, it’s about stats in general. I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

I don’t know, to be honest.

There are some professions, like Elementalists, who are extremely tied to stats for survival and not having the proper stat distribution available completely kills the variety.

For instance, any elementalists needs at least 16k HP to survive to conditions, which means about 400-500 vitality. So any elementalist is pidgeon-holed to take either 30 water or run soldier+Air or barbarian.

In WvW/PvE, people can easily mix pieces of Valkirye to compensate the lack of vitality while not losing damage output and having more freedom on the trait picking phase, which is something you can’t do in PvP.

Now choosing to not make amulets customizable means that Elementalists are forced to compensate the stats lacking from the amulets via traits, which makes the trait picking tailored around available stat distribution of amulets.

This is something I don’t personally like and I don’t think that neither most of the WvW/PvE playerbase do.

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

I’d definitely agree with this! Myself and my friends have wanted to get into PvP for quite some time now but it just seems so complex and the few times we’ve tried we’ve been met with anger/derision for not immediately knowing the best builds and how to use them! The idea of slightly simplified choices will certainly be prompting us to try again!

That said I do think a lot of other options put forth in this thread certainly sound helpful as well!

Brando.1374:

Phaeton.9582:

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

Also, I can’t undersell the benefits of reducing conceptual complexity for assisting designers achieve balance. We are finite creatures, us humans, and can only hold so many things in our mind at one time. We can create tools to help work around this, but anything that helps make balance easier gets my vote.

Yeah I agree Justin, it’s an unnecessary level of complexity when complexity should be focused around traits and the game style they create..

what game style would that be?
pure bunker and pure glass without a balanced middle ground?

I’m talking about combat zones, the interplay of weapon skills and how cooldowns are approached by the player (if they need to be spread out and maintained or burned in succession).

The whole bunker or burst thing doesn’t make much sense to me, it only made sense at the games release when players were new and guardian was OP. Now it should just be the management of cooldowns and traits/weapons should complement your play style and rotations.

For instance when I’m dueling a necro on my dps guard I know my condi removal is very limited. So I have to block and blind in succession every attack while I burst them down. The rate I tear through cooldowns is much faster than a duel vs hambow, where I know I need to spend more time evading and maintain defensive cooldown, whilst shifting my dps toward symbols and scepter 2.

This is an example of varying game style within the same build. Traits should complement and create new ways to play, and while amulets are a necessary layer of complexity they shouldn’t make fine tuning balance impossible due to stat ambiguity.

But that said, none of this matters if balance isn’t addressed regularly by hot fixes (healing sig should of been picked up on in the autumn).

Justin ODell.9517:

Master of Timespace.2548:

But does this change make the game easier to balance in any meaningful sense? How many balance problems have there been due to the jewels?

It isn’t just about jewels, it’s about stats in general. I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

This would make sense if the stats were balanced to begin with. Looking over the landscape of the professions; the base health differential is just too large given the ability of most professions to fill similar roles. I still do not understand why, given such a large build, you guys have not looked into increasing the base health pools of some professions. Does it make sense, in a pure berserker build, to have such large discrepancies in health?

so in future we dont have a couple amuletts and jewel to mix max we have

10000000000000000000000000 different amuletts with different statcombinations the developers think its usefull. how not overwhelming for a new player.

also i think u havent understand your own system. atm all you do is spread the gap between builds. meaning more min max. seems u dont understand that skill x or trait y that is powerfull on build z is even more powerfull on build a.

a good example is vigor. for glass canons its crucial to get that little extra dodges. but on an already strong bunker build vigor is to powerfull for the costs. the same goes for skills with in-bound evade. to little for build x and to strong for build z. and all u do is spread the gap to disbalance them more.

the unbalance in this game doesnt come from mixing stats. it comes from the extrem ends you could archive and the bad traitssystem that is only working additive. the best example is the famous hambow build. a sum of little but not overpowered things in 1 build. your only way to balance this is destroying every piece of the problem but not the problem and just creating the problem somewhere else. until traits can suspend other traits your game will never be balanced regardless how many stats you remove or provide.

So it all boils down to ‘’Making it easier for new players’’

DiogoSilva.7089:

Justin ODell.9517:

I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

I can understand that.

However, I also hope that the designers are carefully considering the risks that this change brings/ the problems that this change puts to a clearer light, and are carefully considering a solution for the future.

I don’t mind the lack of jewels, I understand the importance of streamlining, but I don’t want build diversity to decrease due to some stats being in excess/ wasted, while lacking some much-needed others.

This game’s pvp has four means to build stats: traits, runes, amulets and jewels. With this new change, thar number will be reduced to three. Does GW2 needs that many (four) sources for stat building? I agree that it doesn’t. So are jewels really needed? I agree that they aren’t really needed. However, the game should make better use of the three other means for stat building. Because with so many means still remaining, the stat customisation could potentially be higher than what in practice it really is currently.

this patch also lowered the stat distribution from runes. Now there is no stat mixing in runes, you always use all 6 runes. so really they reduced it quite a bit. I also feel the system is still kind of overly complex, in that now when you want to mix stats, you have to do it with your gear selection, but that comes in threes, so for a lot of people its hard to deal with.

If they really wanted to simplify complexity for new users, they would just have stats options be selectable, with some preselected options for you that you can choose to customize. However that would be a totally new system, and not be similar to what people are used to in the game. Also they would probably fear the level of customization from a balance perspective.

Maybe this is what spvp people want so they can get a tighter balance. I really hope none of this type of simplification ever comes anywhere near pve though. I really find it oppressive.

Justin ODell.9517:

Master of Timespace.2548:

But does this change make the game easier to balance in any meaningful sense? How many balance problems have there been due to the jewels?

It isn’t just about jewels, it’s about stats in general. I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

Solution: reduce the amount of stats on amulets. But PLEASE keep those jewels in….

Also: I still think forcing everyone to play full dps, full bunker, full heal, full condi is extremely bad for the meta. Balanced builds are usually superior and much less frustrating to play with / against.

Justin ODell.9517:

I think the big reason we need to streamline things and make it easy to pickup is NOT because newbies are dumb or incapable of figuring it out, but rather because PvP is very, very intimidating. Reduction in apparent complexity helps PvP be more approachable and less intimidating.

…WvW and PvE already have far more stat options than PvP… this makes no sense.

Thoth Divine.8642:

Justin ODell.9517:

Master of Timespace.2548:

But does this change make the game easier to balance in any meaningful sense? How many balance problems have there been due to the jewels?

It isn’t just about jewels, it’s about stats in general. I can totally see why our designers would want the most influential thing (stats) to be locked down.

Solution: reduce the amount of stats on amulets. But PLEASE keep those jewels in….

Also: I still think forcing everyone to play full dps, full bunker, full heal, full condi is extremely bad for the meta. Balanced builds are usually superior and much less frustrating to play with / against.

Indeed, pushing people to the extremes of full bunker/full dps sounds horrid. You usually hear complaints about people being ganked in a few seconds or being very very hard to kill. It’s rare to hear a complaint about a hybrid.

People should not assume that more stat combinations provide ‘more variety’ or ‘more balance’.

You have variety if more than one stat combination is viable. If ANET were to add Dire to PvP then guess what, there are more combinations available but now only one combo is actually viable = everyone would run Dire.

WvW is no where near as balanced as PvP either. People think that they have different, ‘viable’ builds in WvW due to the additional stats and food but in reality there is still only one optimal build for each class. And that is because you can max it with food.

Sube Dai.8496:

People should not assume that more stat combinations provide ‘more variety’ or ‘more balance’.

You have variety if more than one stat combination is viable. If ANET were to add Dire to PvP then guess what, there are more combinations available but now only one combo is actually viable = everyone would run Dire.

WvW is no where near as balanced as PvP either. People think that they have different, ‘viable’ builds in WvW due to the additional stats and food but in reality there is still only one optimal build for each class. And that is because you can max it with food.

Full dire is another extreme. It’s the extremes that are the problem. Food further increases these extremes, agreed. Still not sure how hybrids are bad… which are the main thing this will kill off.

Justin ODell.9517:

Reducing perceptual complexity will help us attract additional players, and rewards will give them reason to stay.

And here is everything wrong with Guild Wars 2 in a nutshell:

You’re chasing player longevity through rewards instead of rich gameplay.

I want a game that’s interesting to play every time I play it, not one I have to play 600 times to get Shiny X.

If you want to reduce “perceptual complexity”, add better tutorials instead of castrating player choices/build variety.

Justin ODell.9517:

You aren’t alone in that. Just because we’re trying to appeal to one type of player does not mean we will ignore the others.

To put a more positive spin on it, it would be nice if there were a “novice tier” of amulet that are all one stat combo, and after you’ve played a while with those you unlock the option to use Amulet + jewel combos that have the same stat total, but allow you to flex that last 10-15% as we see now.

Since you’re already shifting to a starter set of traits and skills with earning additional options later through play (after the player is more versed in the “basics”) perhaps the same philosophy can be applied consistently so it includes gear too?

I don’t want to seem completely unsympathetic – even with all or nothing one-combo amulets, the initial option paralysis must be terrifying for new competitors. Understanding what all the stats do/mean is not something the game introduces well in ANY mode of play.

Its just a shame to see depth being sacrificed to solve a problem that’s actually much more widespread and needs to be better illustrated to all new players, not just in sPvP.

One from column A (amulet) one from column B (jewel) combinational systems are really powerful. If you have 15 in each column you end up with 225 possibilities to explore. Chopping column B out of the system means you’ve just lost 210 of them. There has to be a better way of overcoming option paralysis that nuking diversity .

Justin ODell.9517

Reducing perceptual complexity will help us attract additional players, and rewards will give them reason to stay.

I guess this is true. After googling “most OP GW2 build” they’ll be running Hambow or Condimancer with no need for jewels on their berserker or rabid amulets.