Guild Wars 2

Nice! finally some update

Thanks for the update, nice to know you’re listening to the community. Hopefully I’ll get to sPvP with my wife!

Arenanet, never change. I beg you, never change this attitude. Decide the balance yourself by playing the game, don’t make the epic mistake Blizzard did with catering to forum cry babies. Read the forums and keep in touch with your player base.

We true gamers who value quality will wait patiently. I will always support you guys and have your back, to me you are the best MMO company I have ever seen! serious respect and gratitude! Thank you <3

Pretty much exactly what I like to hear from design developers.

Thank you for keeping us in the loop Jonathan. I really appreciate the hard work of everyone at Arenanet, and thank you for sticking to your guns on game balance. Don’t let the memes and nownows push you guys to hasty decisions. So refreshing to hear logic and reason prevail for once.

thanks for update Jon, nice to hear it

Good stuff. I’m guessing they’re still keeping a close eye on bunker builds and portals, but glad to hear they’re not outsourcing game design to the forums like some other games have.

So the first 2.5 weeks can be explained with the whole collaborative process of writing I suppose, even though it was supposedly a few days away when it was originally mentioned, but I believe its been a week or more since while streaming you said it was finished and being translated.

In another post you stated that the reason the translation has taken so long was because the localization team was busy with other things as well. This last piece of information is what I find the most disconcerting. It seems that everything in PvP has taken a back seat to PvE in this game. I believe it was you, who in beta told the players that up until 1month before release, only 1 person had been working on PvP balance. If you glance over the patch notes since release, the vast majority of fixes are specifically for PvE things. There are just so many clear examples that PvP is taking a backseat to everything else in this game.

Pretty much everyone hates 8v8, there is no dueling, and teams can’t face teams on their own competitive level reliably even with the upcoming paid tournaments. Also, there is currently nothing worthwhile for SPvP players to buy with real money. You can please all of these groups and print money by putting out rent-able private servers. The fact that this game launched without rent-able private servers is a head-scratcher as a player and pretty mind blowing from a business perspective.

not sure what point of this “update” is? It’s basically just a post saying these are our excuses as to why we haven’t done anything with pvp since release… awesome.

blog post in a few days turned into, it’s getting translated, which turned into oh well there was a long editing process even though we said it was already at the translation process a week ago.

getting tired of same old boringness. And come on, posting on forums all day = no work? Because taking 30 mins a day to address the hottest topics is a bad thing?

You may want to rethink telling a game dev that their world seems to lack deadlines

I love that you started the post with ‘Sup’.

Love it.

Love Love Love

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

THANK YOU. Those are the ones that definitely need the most observation.

Thanks very much for this info.

One thing I would to mention is that your team needs to put more effort into fixing bugs. I play a necro and the rate at which the bugs for this profession are fixed is really disheartening. If you do not speed this up, it might take another two or three month until the most crucial bugs are fixed and we finally can play this class as intended and judge about balancing. These are really bleak expectations.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Don’t forget to keep an eye on all of the other viable elementalist builds.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Sup.

K bye

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Nvm that lets stay together forever.

Thanks for the update, communication has been pretty dismal since you guys stopped posting on reddit last month.

Your points on balance are solid, but there is no mention of bug fixes. Bugs obviously affect balance, and fixing them will shift power one way or the other. I would like more information about bug fixes, specifically broken traits.

Thanks.

I wanted to know if the 5minutes of waiting time in free tournament is being look at?! Cuz TBH, we wait more than we play with that ridiculous wait time.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Before you do anything to Bunker Guardian, please have the decency of having a couple good devs play with Necro or Mesmer boon/condition manipulation builds and see how easy it is to shut down the Guardian.

People are just unwilling to adapt in my opinion.

“Really, balance is pretty good”
Do you, guys, really think that? Everybody knows how WoW idiotic unbalance crap is, but i play WoW battlegrounds hours and hours, hours and hours. Why? Cos you have chance survive even against 2 permanently bugged rogues in that game. But here, in situation 1vs2, wich always happened in spvp, you dead in 1.5-2 seconds if one of them thief.
Topics full of messages about that, but u think “balance is pretty good”.
This is absolutely abnormal, when in pvp games happens situations with instant dead with full hp for 2 seconds against 1-2 players. I classify it as bug.

“We don’t want to nerf X, then realize no one uses it”
And what you have now? Games full of thiefs and ruined pvp gameplay…

How many people say “remove quickness, it may help for a while, until next decision”? A lot. You not listen…

Nobody like insta-dead, nobody enjoy it, but game full of zerg.

Just remove (nerf) burst abilities, lower overall damage multiplier about 50% in pvp and game become a legend. So close to heaven..

I’m hoping that ‘watching’ is a good thing, rather than a we’re-considering-a-nerf thing… :/

Meh, make an condition build engineer.. The guardian and ele wont smile that much anymore…
But this is ofcourse no discussion thread, yust want to say i really like this post and think its the best attitude developers could have. Even though there are slightly more bugs then i hoped (they seem not that hard to fix, but i know how bad it can become ), i still think arenanet is following the right path… And even though they listen to the players yust like all other MMOs.. At the same time they also store and ignore it. And im NOT saying thats bad.. No its the opposite. At the start of an online game it is best to not be carried away by player reports because with a new game these usually are based on opinion, inexperience etc. And dont forget that 1 change to 1 proffesion can change the balance of all others. Therefor i am quite happy arenanet is carefull and thinks before pushing changes into the game.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Ouch, tank ele is the only worthwhile spec they have. I hope you look at improving them elsewhere before nerfing it.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Noooooo, you could have forgotten to say that. In your team’s opinion, what is wrong with the tank heal ele? It really doesn’t do much damage, it just survives, but not as well as the guardian it seems. I assume most issue with the mesmer is shatter effects (damage included) and the ability to carry the repair kit through portal :P?)

Appreciate the update, I’m sure many are saying “this could have been done months ago”, I don’t disagree with them (as I think I’ve stated in another thread) but you’ve explained all this elsewhere, it’s good to see this info on the official forums now!

Thanks again.

kabaal.1832:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Ouch, tank ele is the only worthwhile spec they have. I hope you look at improving them elsewhere before nerfing it.

All eles could stand to do a little more damage, and holy crap is the tank heal ele one of them. They also arent that much different from the Holy Trinity Healer which Anet doesnt want in their game.

kabaal.1832:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Ouch, tank ele is the only worthwhile spec they have. I hope you look at improving them elsewhere before nerfing it.

Correction-

Tank ele is the only viable build for newbs, take a decent power/balance ele and they’ll rip you another hole by the end of the fight…regardless of the profession you play

I’m really not looking forward to the next update for guardians, a 70% nerf on a skill this time (almost making it wothless to even take now), so i wonder how much of a hit preotection is going to get.

You say you don’t want to play wackamole with balance and nerf skills so no one uses them, but you took a trait in the last update from 10 seconds to 3 seconds, that to me sounds exactly like what you said you aren’t going to do.

Actually, I’m glad they’re watching Mesmer closely. That means if they do some sort of adjustment, it’ll be an intelligent one, and not the knee-jerk nerf recommendations they’re claiming.

Hopefully, it also means they’ll see some aspects of Mesmer that’s not working properly, and funneling builds into the same areas. Mesmers should be a bit more varied than they are now.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Thank you Jon! +1 for keeping an eye on overly defensive builds and too to easy to use specs:

1) Bunker Guardian= the game mode simply can’t support a profession which can sit indefinetely on a cap point and require team coordination to be overcome or even the specific of specific professions and skills.

Unfortunately this kind of playstyle is favoured by your typical “tank” player from other MMO, hence it attracts far too many people.

But as Anet stated, in GW2 offense>defense therefore any profession should be able to take out ( based on personal skills) a guardian defending a node, when a team is forced to use certan professions to counter a guardian, then we go against the marketing principle used by Anet :" the player make the class"

2) Mesmer= Unfortunately at the moment there is no way to distinguish a pro mesmer from a bad mesmer, because the automatic pets do 80% of the job and this is bad because those phantasms do a much better job compared to what the majority of mesmer players would be able to do on their own.

I believe the power balance should be switched from phantasm and given to mesmer themself, by reducing the power of the illusion and giving this power to the mesmer skill, we won’t have a situation where every newb can use the same OP build over and over without fail

3) Tank ele= passive healing builds are always the favourite of new players who can’t adapt to the new system, the removal of this gimmick will force people to look over their shoulders…hopefully

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Please don’t destroy my healing as Ele.

It’s all I have and all I’ve ever wanted to do.

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

WHAT? Does this mean you’re going to nerf the only viable spec that eles have? Because if you don’t go high toughness and heal on an ele you simply aren’t viable.
Ele damage output is extremely subpar, even more so in tank spec. Burst specs simply are not viable at all. And you’re “watching” (by what I get “waiting to nerf”) our only viable spec? So should I simply reroll right now?

Also, no mention of ele downed state?

Ryld.1340:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Please don’t destroy my healing as Ele.

It’s all I have and all I’ve ever wanted to do.

I feel your pain. I used to have a D/D ele back in BWE 1 that did damage.

MajorMelchett.6042:

I’m really not looking forward to the next update for guardians, a 70% nerf on a skill this time (almost making it wothless to even take now), so i wonder how much of a hit preotection is going to get.

You say you don’t want to play wackamole with balance and nerf skills so no one uses them, but you took a trait in the last update from 10 seconds to 3 seconds, that to me sounds exactly like what you said you aren’t going to do.

Funny how even ele got 3s duration traits giving protection..and I’m doing just great with it! I believe that Anet never wanted a profession to sit idle on a point while defending against 3 people while calling them “noob l2p”….time to adapt

Well most MMOs have test servers to test builds or patches, but I think they should be exponentially more liberal, just with a disclaimer (like don’t ever expect ANY of this to reach live). Like a test server where there are devs dedicated to just doing knee-jerk changes; Doesn’t matter if it is a buff, nerf, or just to test out a bug fix.

With that said, I think any next generation MMO that wants to advertise highest balance possible will do something like the following:

Introduce a downloadable “test” server package. It will open the game but the area you play in might only be like the size and scope of The Mists. It will also have it’s own specialized admin console, and screen recorder built in (like fraps). It may also come with an editable database file where people can make changes like " Let me take this self root off Pistol Whip", save the build, then load it into the “test” server on the customer’s machine. From there they can test the build, and all changes at different angles, spawning mobs or having multiple clients on their machine logged into the server to test the effectiveness on certain/all classes and builds. At the same they can record their testing and publish their findings with the video and the database changes on a website or specialized forum. From there the devs can view and critique ideas from the community as a whole, a community that would know have an exponentially better understanding of the game, the work that gos into it, and show that they care about the health of the game itself. This will in turn will actually help developers do their job, cut a huge chunk out of the “OMG NERF X and BUff Y” threads that spam every MMOs forums.

Just my idea for the future

Aether McLoud.1975:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

WHAT? Does this mean you’re going to nerf the only viable spec that eles have? Because if you don’t go high toughness and heal on an ele you simply aren’t viable.
Ele damage output is extremely subpar, even more so in tank spec. Burst specs simply are not viable at all. And you’re “watching” (by what I get “waiting to nerf”) our only viable spec? So should I simply reroll right now?

Also, no mention of ele downed state?

Who ever said the healing build is the only viable one?..

Arheundel.6451:

Who ever said the healing build is the only viable one?..

Pretty much everyone who plays ele in tournaments.

In regard to Mesmers, Phantasm builds aren’t even an issue. That’s something that people are overreacting to. Losing to a Phantasm Mesmer is like losing to a 100B Warrior or Pistol Whip Thief. The problem is the Shatter Mesmer build, which is a little too powerful due to it’s damage combined with massive boon removal. Mostly due to the low, low cooldown of Mind Wrack and what it can do with Illusionary Persona. Portals are also a problem on with Trebuchet repairs, in my opinion.

Aether McLoud.1975:

Arheundel.6451:

Who ever said the healing build is the only viable one?..

Pretty much everyone who plays ele in tournaments.

So…it’s just you then…I play d/d or s/f in tournament and do great with both of them, the d/d is the best roamer/assaulter in the game while s/f is just a little different

“When did they say that there is a deadline for that blog -_-” ?

Stop being so disrespectful, you are not that important. You are one amongst many and for every hater there is out there, 10 lovers of Arenanet stand ready to support Arenanet."

I’m afraid Sprawl is 110% correct. I’ve worked for big companies, and small ones, and the Reality of the situation is always the same: you make a commitment to finish something by xyz date, and if it isn’t done, corrective action is taken. All the while, you have several other projects you made commitments on. THAT is reality. Some things are done by committee and signed off by various depts, other times you are expected to produce mind-blowing, award-winning results all by yourself. The fact that there’s this delay on a blog post, of all things, is disappointing. It speaks to a paranoia that somehow your executive leadership is somehow fearful of misrepresentation and an online reprisal from a bunch of rabid gaming nerds. Well here’s more reality: every other company, big and small, is guilty of the same thing. This leads to one logical conclusion: priorities change, plans change, mmo gaming development timelines change. Everyone who has had a professional job and modicum of maturity will not hold your feet to the fire if just one of your lines of blog text happens to be less than 100% accurate. This “update” is, frankly, empty excuses imo, the kind of thing I would say if I was weeks late on a project and had to answer to someone.

All people want is a written commitment to the improvements in pvp that are sorely needed, and a general timeframe on when we might see those implemented. Dancing around this with some “update” on when we’re getting an update is just more blatant marketing brinksmanship (I’m in marketing, and have developed collateral much to the same effect, so this kind of thing is transparent to me). You’re going to lose players and profits by waiting, regardless if your blog post is pristine or not. Communication, communication of substance, is key here.

I will get hate for this post, I don’t care. This kind of tough love is necessary; people are passionate about the game, myself included, and desire a greater transparency into what we can look forward to. Game development is not a matter of national security, and the corporate veil of secrecy is getting tiresome. Patience will wear thin, and people will move on to other games (your competitors). Holding onto some notion that fanboys will keep your franchise afloat is highly dubious. Please see the massive graveyard of other mmo games for reference. People want to see some confirmation that things are getting fixed, implemented and adjusted. Otherwise, it’s failure and layoffs, and the gaming universe sadly watches another game not reach it’s full potential. This game’s pvp is excellent, much more highly evolved than what currently exists. Don’t waste this potential, please, with corporate processes and paranoia.

Arheundel.6451:

Aether McLoud.1975:

Arheundel.6451:

Who ever said the healing build is the only viable one?..

Pretty much everyone who plays ele in tournaments.

So…it’s just you then…I play d/d or s/f in tournament and do great with both of them, the d/d is the best roamer/assaulter in the game while s/f is just a little different

Weapon selection has pretty much nothing to do with spec on ele. You can play tank with all the weapons, it’s still one and the only viable spec.

Also, if you really think D/D ele right now is the best roamer in the game you should seriously try to play another class too. Everything eles can do (besides being tanky/healy) any other class can do better. Engineers for example, or thieves.

Blazer Hellsing.9184:

Sprawl.3891:

JonathanSharp.7094:

Sup. I wanted to give you guys some quick updates and talk about a few things:

This takes a while, and usually means I sit with an editor going line by line making sure that my intention is preserved through the editing process. If any of you have written dissertations or college papers for a strict professor, you know that the editing process can take a while to get correct. That’s just how it is in the real world.

I work in the real world too, but in my “real world” we have deadlines, so if I tell a Client we will have the report issued, including all edits, revisions, etc. by a certain date it is our obligation to meet that date at all costs. Your real world seems to lack deadlines.

When did they say that there is a deadline for that blog -_-" ?

Stop being so disrespectful, you are not that important. You are one amongst many and for every hater there is out there, 10 lovers of Arenanet stand ready to support Arenanet.

that’s my point. there isn’t one. yet in the real world there are deadlines. instead we were told a few days which turned into a few weeks.

@Arheundel.6451 (can’t quote), true the ele has traits that last 3 seconds, but that really isn’t the point. The point was they took a trait that was being abused on a specific build and hit it with a 70% nerf on duration that affected all builds uisng it.

In essence they took the trait from 1 extreme to the other, from being way to long (it really was), to being way to short (for how often it can be used) – this is something the 1st post states they aren’t going to do (wackamole balance changes).

Ayestes.1273:

In regard to Mesmers, Phantasm builds aren’t even an issue. That’s something that people are overreacting to. Losing to a Phantasm Mesmer is like losing to a 100B Warrior or Pistol Whip Thief. The problem is the Shatter Mesmer build, which is a little too powerful due to it’s damage combined with massive boon removal. Mostly due to the low, low cooldown of Mind Wrack and what it can do with Illusionary Persona. Portals are also a problem on with Trebuchet repairs, in my opinion.

Pretty much this!
The shatter build does far too much dmg combined with the 2-3 sequential daze with keep you in place for the whole shatter duration…

…maybe you can tell me how to be bad with a power based phantasm build which doesn’t use moa form if ..eventually losing, in case you forget bad or good mesmer…the phantasm still deal the same uber dmg and still have a -10s CD

And if you’re getting hit by the predictable damage from Phantasms, and not properly clearning them, you’re bad yourself.

Every phantasm summon, without exception, has a cast time, has a motion.

A glass cannon Built mesmer will have Phantasms that hit hard, and little else. In which case, you’re foolish not to have your roamer pursue and kill said mesmer as their survivability is limited, and you’re playing into their hands by giving them breathing room.

Let me make this clear.

A bad mesmer throws his illusions at you in hopes they do the job for him. A good mesmer insures the illusions preform their function. They save their cooldowns so that the illusions come up at the correct time instead of chasing you until they shatter on the invisible wall of their maximum range.

You’ll fight a bad mesmer and be frustrated. You’ll fight a good mesmer and wonder wtf hit you.

How about Frenzy / haste / etc ruinning gameplay ?

I mean, killing someone in 3 sec is not what I call gameplay. That is uninterresting, and the only viable way to play thief (for instance) atm with no condition build is to play with haste… Because haste is really stronger than any crit based build.

If you find this normal, then forget that. But I just hate the “I win button” builds like 100B and Pistolwhip builds, because they have very, very, very, very, very low skillcaps.

Guild Wars 2 is the first MMO in which I see a buff such as 100% attack speed for only 150% damage taken (frenzy for instance) while is was 33% attack speed in GW1 with 200% damage taken.

Do you really plan to build any E-sport or skill-based gameplay with such broken mechanic ?

Alzzary.4102:

How about Frenzy / haste / etc ruinning gameplay ?

I mean, killing someone in 3 sec is not what I call gameplay. That is uninterresting, and the only viable way to play thief (for instance) atm with no condition build is to play with haste… Because haste is really stronger than any crit based build.

If you find this normal, then forget that. But I just hate the “I win button” builds like 100B and Pistolwhip builds, because they have very, very, very, very, very low skillcaps.

Guild Wars 2 is the first MMO in which I see a buff such as 100% attack speed for only 150% damage taken (frenzy for instance) while is was 33% attack speed in GW1 with 200% damage taken.

Do you really plan to build any E-sport or skill-based gameplay with such broken mechanic ?

venom share is viable

On Shatter Builds.

Shatter builds end up being heavy burst damage, and looks good on paper, but it’s not sustainable.

Shatters can be evaded, Clones, the essential fuel of shatter builds, and be destroyed before they get to you if you maintain your AoEs.

As far kittenter cooldowns. The reason why cooldowns seem like such a problem with Illusionary Persona is because it’s 30 points down the Illusions line, which, as it’s passive stat increase, lowers the cooldown of shatters by 30%. (down to 12 seconds on mind wrack) without other skills/traits that colors.

Problem is, hitting the recast on Shatter would hurt shatters further on every other build.

It also takes a 30 0 0 0 30 build (10 randomly) to really do. Push the most out of shatters, which leaves a Mesmer lacking in defensive measures many mesmers take advatnage of.

Easier to kill a shatter based mesmer.

Thanks for the update!

Personally, I think getting the tools to better help form a competitive community will be the single biggest boost in helping the meta shake itself out.

If there was a great avenue to see high-end players participate in tournaments, it would help quell a bunch of the “OMG NERF X!” “X is lame and you are bad” “…..”.

Simply the main issue is ignorance, but it is an extremely reasonable issue because the community is at its very infancy along with the PvP esport support.

I think the ideas and the framework are all in place making it just a matter of time really. I would just encourage the devs to really look at strong promotion for winning major high-end events and providing avenues and promotion for the viewing of high-quality streams (really just developing a great community, I’m not saying anything they don’t know here). It seems like there is really a community out there just chomping at the bit for the opportunity to invest themselves in the competitive atmosphere of this game.

Right now its like we are all playing in a dark room with no windows but with a bunch of confusing shouting echoing off the walls. Playing in the light of day with a gold carrot on the horizon will be glorious =).

JonathanSharp.7094:

Oh ya, wanted to add: yes, we’re watching Mesmers, bunker Guardians and tank heal Ele’s. Forgot to add that.

Another one here, you made my day!
Don’t forget Thieves, they are pretty rampant in tournaments right now, and that’s for a reason.