Guild Wars 2

It’s not the number, some of the mechanics are NOT fun, they are clunky and a mess of contradicting ideas.

Case in point: Renegade’s Fs and the utilities; Weaver’s clunky and awkward mechanic, Mirage is arguably near these 2 as far as contradicting ideas goes.

It’s not just numbers…

Mike O Brien.4613:

Hi all,

Today we hit an internal milestone: we locked down all content and feature development for Path of Fire. We now move the game to our staging servers and start final preparations for launch.

This expansion is all about content, and today’s milestone marks the completion of eighteen months of content creation. It’s been a labor of love for the team. We hope we’ve brought each story chapter, each open-world zone, and each mount up to the level of what you experienced in the demos last month.

Thanks to everyone who joined the demos and the stress tests. We used those tests to inform our final balance tweaks, and to squash some bizarre bugs that we could only reproduce under heavy load, like the one where Raptors would randomly show up in non-demo maps.

We’re in the home stretch. Eleven days to launch! We can’t wait to play Path of Fire with you!

Mo

MO:

How is it possible that you’ve got everything “locked to go” (so to speak) and yet PoF still has horrendous new elites like Renegade, Weaver, arguably Mirage too.

Weaver is currently very lackluster, weak, clunky and just not fun to play with. Not talking about the traits but the actual mechanics, they are not fun. Please tell me you guys are not happy with it?

And Renegade is weak, a plain mess of conflicting ideas and lore-wise, how in hell did ANYONE think Kala would ever be considered a legend? Why didn’t you give them an actual GW legend, like Pire Fierceshot, etc etc…?

Restore some faith in me and please tell me you’re still trying to change classes that are not fun, they are working against ANET selling the expansion?

I was going to buy the expac but when I saw the lackluster Elites, I opted to wait and see if ANET would change. So far, nothing.
Why do Beta tests if you won’t take our overwhelming feedback about some of the new elites?

What do we care about mounts in the old maps anyway? We have waypoints.

But the new elite specs are still very lackluster and I don’t think there is enough time for the Devs to change some of the horrendous specs until launch….

looking at you Weaver and Renegade

I forgot to say, whoever thought of giving the Renegade a Legend that most players don’t even recognize, that’s not even worthy of the status of a mildly interesting NPC, clearly needs to go back to Dev school.

With so many interesting legendary NPCs in GW mythos, the Devs go and pick a legend that’s utterly non-important, is trully abysmal design.

“Revenants channel Legends, such as Mallyx, Jali, Shiro, VEntari, Glint….and…Kala?”
??? Really?

Weaver: 2/10

The idea might be interesting but the execution is very poor and lackluster.
Too long to change attunements, changing gets you only 1-3 skills and thus keeping you from the important 4-5 skills, traits all over the place (some will give you bonus for weaving atts, others for being fully attuned, conflicting dynamics).
Underpowered is also a factor but even if it weren’t underpowered, it wouldn’t be fun.
Fun is important, yes?

Mirage: 5/10
Has some potential, but it’s a mess and confusing to use. Too many skills do way too many different things with conflicting traits. Lacks focus.

Scourge: 8/10
Seems nice, seems a good idea well executed. INtersting playstyle.

Renegate: 2/10
Dear lord, what a mess. Poor skills, poor class mechanics, uninspired skills, boring, lacking “fun” factor, lacking focus and a clear idea.

Kreed.2768:

Bio Flame.4276:

Will mounts trully keep you playing more? Were they really necessary?

The main idea behind mounts is that they remove the need to compromise your build to include movement speed increases to get around faster. No more need to take swiftness utilities or weapons. No more need to take a movement speed signet or trait.

Wanna bet we’ll still take swiftness and stuff?
Mounts won’t change that.
GW2 didn’t need mounts, we needed better story writers…

Will mounts trully keep you playing more? Were they really necessary?

They won’t change our playstyle much, instead of waypointing, we’ll use a mount. Ok.
Combat and story make most people play a game or leave.

Now, ANET’s track record is abysmal, as far as story goes. It’s convuluted, it’s a mess, it doesn’t make much sense and lacks internal cohesion. So no selling points there.

THe new elites though…most of them are lackluster (exceptions would be Holosmith and maybe Firebrand). They weren’t well received by the community and with good reason.

Wouldn’t you be concerned if you were the lead dev for PoF, or if you were the head of the marketing dep?

I am not saying that we won’t have new story, I know we do.
But good story isn’t something ANET is known for, quite the opposite and thus we only have the new Elites and mounts as selling points for the new expansion.

Does anyone really argue for the new Elites being good and fun?
Shouldn’t that really concern ANET and Mike O’Brien?

MO wants us to spread around the good word for GW2 but we need something good to talk about.
I’d be concerned if I were the lead developer for PoF.

Hello all.
I am pretty sure what I am about to type is purely my own opinion, but I must give the feedback I think is deserved, concerning the new elites.

I was wondering whether to buy the Deluxe/Ultimate editions but with 2 weeks to go and the elite specs being in such a messy shape, I am considering not even buying PoF or just the normal edition.

PoF won’t have new mechanics other than the superfluous Mounts and the new elites.
The new elites haven’t had the, let’s say, best of receptions from the community (there are exceptions, such as the Holosmith). I’d say that there are quite a few that are especially bad at this moment, such as the Renegade, the Weaver (dear lord!) and probably the Mirage.
There are also serious problems with the other elites, too.

I don’t think it’s just my personal opinion when I say that both the Renegade and the Weaver are a mess, and just not fun to play with.
They feel clunky, underpowered and lack fun, interesting ideas and traits. Although some of this might also be said about the other new elites, too.

It seems as if the new elites didn’t get the time and dedication and development resources necessary to make them shine. And they should shine, since they are one of pillars of the new expansion (the other being unnecessary mounts).

Now, with 2 weeks until launch and the deafening silence and lack of communication from the Devs, it’s safe to assume that things will be launch not too diferent from what they are now. They will change some things I am sure but there’s not enough time (and skill?) for those Devs to improve the classes and make them more fun to play with AND to play against!
(which is vital for both PvE and PvP/WvW).

Don’t take this as a rant, but more as a concern. A very thoughtful, candid concern from a customer that was considering to spend more money but won’t do so now.
The new elite specs should be totally smashing, new and exciting. But they aren’t.
So, what is ANET selling us on the new expansion that’s worth our money?

Please don’t tell me it’s the story because ANET’s track record as far as story-telling goes is very, very lackluster.

Ben Phongluangtham.1065:

ImdA.4701:

500 golds per team or per player ?

Per player.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say again:

Why does ANET keep rewarding sPvP with PvE rewards?
That speaks loudly on how bad you think your PvP is, so that you must try to give PvE rewards to a PvP activity in order to artificially boost participation.

It doesn’t make any sense. PvP should be rewarded with PvP goodies, fame and notoriety.

Since you spoke about GW1 ATs, if the best reward for winning one would have been just gold in GW1, there would have been an outcry.
Make PvP good first and true competitive PvPers will battle it out for kitten.
But since it seems even you Developers believe sPvP is so bad that you need PvE rewards….what does that say about the ever downspiral trend of sPvP?

Dondarrion.2748:

“RArrrrrgh, I’m power hungry Elder Dragon, watch me consume and absorb all magic and spread my destruction over Tyria”
thump (sound of heroes killing dragon)
Heroes: “Would the next dragon get in line, please!”

Exactly!
How many Elder Dragons can a player/community kill, before settling into the feeling of “Next dragon, plz!”?

So, it seems Glint was evil afterall, since she wanted to kill Kralkatorik and wanted us to kill the other Elder Dragons.

lol

The fact that we as players are here discussing these issues means that the story-telling was poor.

@OP:

Yes, I tend to agree that the story is a mess. Complicated is one thing, complex is another, multi-layered is something else too….none of which applies to this story.
The story is just a mess and overly convoluted without being actually interesting.

I don’t know whose fault it is: the writers, or the quest designers, or the producers…what I know is that the story is poor.

It relies overly on cliffhangers; there’s also waaaaaaaaaay too many mysteries unsolved; too much “tell” and little “show, don’t tell”; chapters feel fragmented and disconnected without a true sense of purpose or guidance.
There’s clearly also way too much ambition and not enough skill to write and/or deliver this story, which having the issues I’ve stated above, only serves to make the story much worse.

The stupidity of trying to have 6 Dragons as opponents to kill, which only managed to “trivialize” the threat of a single Dragon.
There’s also the “story-fatigue” syndrome: maybe at the design meeting, having 6 ED seemed a good idea, but after almost 5 years and only 2 dragons killed, it’s obvious that players are fed up with the Dragon menace; and to make matters worse, the slow-as-snails pace of the story means that it would take roughly +10 years to kill the remaining 4 dragons. How long does it take until players want new stories? How long until players feel “oh, it’s ANOTHER dragon to kill…baah”?

Last but not the least, who thought it would be a good idea to come up with 6 antagonists that we have to kill as players, only to later inform us that we can’t actually kill them. So…why bother designing and conceptualizing threats in the form of 6 EDs?

Syncing only worked, or worked better with a lower population.
But you’re right, it did exist.

Still, I am pretty sure it could be solved if ANET had used as much resources and Dev work-hours as they do to this idiotic matchmaking system.

And what you didn’t mention was that the GvG scene had a better matching system than GW2 ever did.
As for balance, whether you agree or not, the fact remains that balance was A LOT faster and better in GW1.
Faster, quicker, happened more often.

GW1 managed to do it though…
Other MMOs can do it also. Maybe it’s not your fault, I can agree to that but still, the fact remains that other games can do it and we’re stuck here with bugs and faulty MMR.

Wouldn’t it be simpler to split into true Random Arena and Team-queue only instead of wasting resources, Dev time, programmer time into a match-making system that will never work?

Ok I Did It.2854:

I agree that they need to look into moving the ascended gear to WvW, the other rewards are nice though, 20g every repeat, and you can repeat that once a day if you can be bothered,

They should have made it for PvP that instead of ascended gear, it was exclusive PvP skins, this would have given PvP players a reward, and stopped the PvE players from afk farming for free ascended armor.

Crinn.7864:

Lets be honest and realize that technically you don’t need anything in sPvP. Therefore there should never be any rewards of any type and sPvP players should just be copperless toons in starter gear.

Sadly if anet made it that there was no reward at all in PvP, the playerbase would drop even lower than now, this game doesn’t have the numbers to handle that drop off, not for PvP anyway.

So, if you need to have PvE rewards, to attract PvE players to get enough numbers to play PvP…

…..what does that tell you about how good the PvP actually is?

I wouldn’t exagerate and say that the game takes no skill.

I’d argue instead that the game needs not enough skill to actually get good results;
or in other words, a player can get too much results for too little skill, since the game has too many passive, automatic procs and effects and too little player input.

The issue is that instead of Evan trying to fix and balance Pvp, he’s trying to fix a stupid matchmaking algorithm that won’t ever work because you can’t possibly balance randoms vs teams.

Try as he might, he will fail everytime. The sooner he realizes that and begins spliting true random queue from team-queue, the better.

It’s a nice dream to have such an algorithm but it ain’t gonna happen. Just admit it.

Yes, automatic-triggered passives are kitten that need to go. Players should play actively and proactively, not passively.

As for reducing the game’s speed, you’re overexagerating. I think that between the uber-fast mess that GW2 is now and turn-based play, there’s a whoooooole lot of middle ground in between.
There’s no need to exagerate, it doesn’t have to be full black or white, but instead a few shades of grey (not 50 shades, mind you!).

GW1 was/is as lot better as far as PvP is concerned and has more depth and strategy than GW2. One of the key factors (but not the only one) is that skills usually do 1 or 2 different effects, not the whole 1 skill= damage+teleport+heal+remove condis+burning or aura+heal+vigor+regeneration+condi_cleanse like we have at the moment in GW2.

Actually you got it all wrong.
We don’t want things to be reactionary, we want things to be proactive.

Spamming things is not proactive. Having lots of automatic skills/traits (such as automatic CC breaks, auto-immunities and so forth) is not reactionary nor is it “rotation based”. It’s passive gameplay.

And to be fair, it’s ugly to watch.
Some people post here as if GW2 was the pinnacle of PvP and as if GW2 has a healthy PvP population. Let me assure you, it has not.

Archon.6480:

It leads to unfair matches with people picking counter classes, instead of working to improve their own team composition.

This would increase quality of play as people would be forced to think more about the roles they are trying to fulfill on their own team.

True.

What I struggle with is that sometimes the matchmaking is so awful and terrible that even though I win, I still feel disgusted with it

Don’t tell me you’ve never felt like that.

Archon.6480:

Well, I can’t agree that there is no skill to the game. Clearly there is.

However, making it possible to target allies with support/defensive buffs would add another dimension of skill. I miss this from GW1.

I agree with you, there is skill in this game.
However, what the OP said is different, read the tittle: GW2 PvP doesn’t require enough skill to play .

Emphasis on enough.

duster.7013:

Here’s what you’re allowed to say:

Some skills invalidate other skills too much.

Lowering the spammability of skills WILL NOT change the skill floor. It will keep the meta the same but with less gameplay/skill.

IMO this has to do with boons. Boonstripping and boon guarding needs to be balanced so that it’s a calculated part of every matchup, not

>okay, we either run a necro or just deal with the boons.

For instance: increase the toughness damage reduction on elementalist but reduce its duration.

Actually, if you reduce the spamming of skills and effects, it would affect boons too.
Remember that since boons couldn’t be spammed neither, they would have to be used at the appropriate time and not mindlessly.
Again, the goal is to reduce the spamming of skills, promoting healthy, strategic plays and punishing bad plays, also rewarding good counterplay.

Currently, boon-strips and such are garbage since a player can with a single skill get so many boons that stripping is not rewarded.

The key here is that every skill is being spammed or “over-used” at the moment, including but not limited to boons. I’d say that boons are not the main culprit here, but damage, multi-effects on a single skill, CCs and CC-breakers.
Reduce the spamming of skills, and you also reduce the overuse/stacking of boons.

@OP:

I mostly agree with pretty much all you said.
Especially number 1 and 3.

I would rephrase #1 saying that the game is too rewarding of the spam-playstyle. Or, on the flip side, one could say that the game doesn’t punish mindless spamming.
Some people argue against this, saying that you can’t be number 1 in the world if you only spam.
That is 100% true. But that is not the issue. The issue is that a player that spams mindlessly can get pretty good results despite spamming / not playing well.

I’ll give an example of rewarding good play and punishing bad plays/spamming: the elementalist skills Ride the Lightning (RTL). It used to be spammed left and right by any Elementalist, until it got changed that if you don’t hit with RTL it has increased CD; if you hit it has lower CD.
That’s a skill that rewards strategic use, promoting good plays, punishing spam and bad plays. Also, it rewards good counter-play by the opponent.

Almost every skill should have the RTL treament: somehow promote good, strategic play/counter-play and punish facerolling on the keyboard.
I think currently no other skill in the entire game has the “increase CD is you don’t hit with the skill” clause like RTL does.
Off the top of my head, a lot of the thief skills should be like this, as well as most skills in other classes too.

As for 2# and #3 – Too many stun breaks + CC spam – they are different aspects of the same problem: there should exist a CC immunity after any CC.
If you take GW1 (a game done by ANET, there’s no need to go to other games from other companies), whenever you were under the animation of a CC (a knockdown), you couldn’t get KDed again until the animation would end. That’s a form of CC immunity. There was no need of a special effect, or diminishing returns. Just make it so that while you’re under the animation or effect of a CC, you can’t get CCed again.
Now, this would be a huge change, but one that would promote healthy, strategic plays, punishing mindless CC stacking and spamming (which goes to the #1 point previously discussed).
Good players would time their CCs, knowing that if they just spam, it would be a waste of CCs; bad players would be punished since they’d just keep using one CC after another (like they do now) and just waste their skills. It would also reward good counter-play from the opposing players.

Additionaly, players wouldn’t need so many CC-breakers, on such a short CDs, since now CCs couldn’t be effectively spammed.
So, it would make it so that ANET wouldn’t need to create so many CC-breakers for every class and every spec, and also wouldn’t need to make them with such a short CD. Again, this would reward good players that know when to pop a CC-breaker and punish bad players that just panic and use them randomly.

Last but not the least: most of these ideas have been repeated for years now. Also, they are not exactly rocket-science or a new thing; they are also not new for ANET, since their previous, still “alive” game, GW1, has this same ideas in it.

TL;DR:

1. Try to reward good plays/counter-plays, punish mindless spamming.
2. Make it so that while under the effect of any CC, players get CC immunity until it wears off; also change and reduce the number of CC breakers in the game since now CCs couldn’t be spammed effectively anymore.

Dude, I am not stating that Scrappers are OP! Jeeez! Relax and stop defending your lady!

I was pointing out automatic, passive procs and Scrapper has a few. It’s not the worst offender (again: looking at you Thieves, Eles – which is my main, but I am not blind to it – Necros, DHs) but it does have passive procs.
As do Wars, Rangers, Mesmers too.

Again: I am not attacking your Lady. I am not saying Scrappers are OP. I am saying Scrappers do have a few passive procs, like most classes do.
And when you gather 10 classes 5vs5, each with a few automatic procs (some with a lot more than “a few”) then the game becomes a complete mess to play and watch.

That is my point. Just that. Relax about Scrappers being OP, because I don’t think they are nor did I say they are.
Re-read my post and try to get the point I was making – there’s an over-abundance of passive, automatic procs, and way too many skills have too many effects per skill.

morrolan.9608:

I know trap dragon hunters aren’t a problem at high level but there is a plague of them in bronze and silver, something needs to be adjusted.

Yes I can handle them but its more the annoyance factor.

Well said.

Who says I am dying? Who says I don’t understand the game?
Stop making this personal. It’s not personal.

I have an opinion – there’s way too many automatic traits, effects, skills that have 4-5 different effects, passive procs,etc.
It seems quite a few posters just come here to defend “their lady”, be it Thief, Mesmer, Scrapper.
They usually say something like “My XYZ class is not spammy, but yes the other classes are”. In short: they are agreeing with my statements, except when it gets to their “lady” [class].

I am not “attacking” any specific class, I am not targeting any player individually.
I am making a point that the overall feel of the matches with all these post-HoT builds have way too many skills and effects that are either automatic passive procs or have too many effects on one single skill, thus making the matches feels spammy and thus not enjoyable to play or watch.

Stop with the ad hominem attacks. This is not about me, or you or “your ladies”. It’s about PvP and the feel of the matches.

Now, if you come here and say that the matches are not spammy, that you don’t ever see players spamming skills, that you don’t feel there’s way too many passive procs and automatic traits/skills, that bad plays are punished (as they should be) and good plays rewarded, that the game has increased in tactical and strategic depth post-HoT…
….well, just say so. And say why.

Ad hominens do nothing here. Discuss the ideas, not the person.

The last 2-3 posts seem to have one thing in common: “My XYZ class isn’t spammy, all the others are though” + “My class isn’t spammy, the OP is a bad player”

Fellow players, I am not saying anything concerning your individual skill. I am not saying that specifically you spam.
I am saying the players spam, with all classes. The meta is spammy, not only one specific class.

Some previous posters replied saying that “You can’t spam with thief, you must be bad” or “Mesmers shouldn’t spam unless you’re bad”.
Well, we’re not speaking about me or you or someone else in particular. I am talking about how the classes tend to play as, in this current meta, as spammy.
So again, it’s not about YOU, it’s about the classes in general, post-HOT.
The classes are not your mother, nor your GF, nor your Wife, so stop being so touchy and sensitive when someone says that there’s something badly designed with a specific trait or skill on your class.

The issue is that with so much spam, so much automatic procs and effects, skills that have 3-4-5 different effects, the meta promotes mindless spamming and luck instead of rewarding players for using their skills during windows of opportunity and punishing players with lost opportunity costs.

And I repeat: the issue with a spammy meta, spammy classes, full of automatic traits and procs and skills with 4-5 different effects is that it makes the game to loose depth, to become shallower, less enjoyable to play and a lot less enjoyable to watch.

Overwatch already does it.
But that is a true PVP game, unlike GW2.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Bio Flame.4276:

Engi: Invulnerability and block spam, waaaaay too much damage for its survivability; way too many automatic invulnerabilities.

The only “automatic invulnerability” engineer has is in Self-Regulating Defenses, a trait that engineers have had since launch, and one many of us love to hate because it kills us to condi damage just as often as it saves us from power damage.

The only difference to how this trait has always worked is that they changed the way HGH works so that it now extends the duration of Elixir S from 3 seconds to 4. A pretty big buff no doubt, but with a 60 second cooldown it’s hardly “too many,” and we used to have more invulnerability back when we ran Elixir S as a utility skill.

As for your “shield spam,” Shock Shield has the same cooldown as the Tool Kit’s Gear Shield does, so the amount of blocks an Inventions/Alchemy/Scrapper build has with the hammer isn’t really any different from how many block the FT/TK condi build has historically had (which now has less since they nerfed Gear Shield, actually).

So just to recap: engineer has pretty much the same amount of invuln it always has (arguably less), and pretty much the same block spam we’ve had (with the core build having less now than it used to).

The primary differences that Scrapper brings to the table is Rapid Regeneration and Rocket Charge, and unlike Gear Shield, Shock Shield actually does damage.

I agree that PvP builds are much spammier now than they used to be, but I think your criticism should at least be in the right place, and engineer is hardly in a state where it should be complained about in any remote sense unless it’s in response to the carpal tunnel symptoms that get induced when playing the condi build in raids.

Thank you for your reply.

My point is not that the Scrapper is too spammy though. My point is that the meta is too spammy, too filled with automatic effects, automatic traits, too many procs, too many instant cast skills/effects.

The Scrapper has a few of these issues although I admit he is not the worst offender (looking at you Mesmer, thief, DH, Necro and Ele). The issue is that the Scrapper also contributes to this problem.

If it was only one class to have these spammy, automatic effects then it would be bad enough. But almost every single class has this spammy gameplay and you get them together on a match, it adds up and the problem gets worse and worse.

Do you guys enjoy playing on a meta that is so full of spammy classes, filled with automatic effects and traits and procs?
I would argue that these non-player controled effects and overal spammy skills make PVP less enjoyable to play and even less enjoyable to watch.

However narrow your definition of “Spam” is, are you really inteligently arguing that GW2 doesn’t have too many multi-effects skills, too many automatic traits, too many procs, too much AI over player controlled actions and overall promotes, let’s call it “fast skill chains without failed oportunity costs”?

Is that what you’re arguing for?

Semantics. I would argue that “stringing together multi-ability combos” when done mindlessly and without a real strategy or oportunity costs is the very definition of spamming.

But all in all, whatever you want to call it, my point/idea stands – way to much stuff going on at the same time, some of which is completely automatic and procced, instead of player activated and/or controlled.

Don’t argue semantics, argue my ideas.

Crinn.7864:

kdaddy.5431:

GW2 was not spammy at launch, cant spam elite skills (moa) there are only a few cheesy builds since thief and DH mechanics are based around them.

On the flip side, at launch we had builds running around 1-shotting people. with other classes being totally useless.

Also for the record, nearly all auto-procs are core traits that have been around for years. The only “new” auto-procs, are the two on rev, and the trait in DH.

But the use they are seeing on the current meta is way too much, there’s way too many automatic effects and procs.

In the end, the player isn’t playing, the clones/minions/pets/procs/automatic traits are.
PvP should be player vs player, not proc vs proc…

I am not saying everything is bad, I am saying that the current PvP is way too much spammy, and also filled with too many automatic effects, procs and random boonshare.

It removes a lot of the strategic elements of a match and just makes it so who can spam better/faster/more efficiently.

Let’s see, off the top of my head (I am sure I’ll forget a bunch but you get the idea):

1. Eles (which I play the most): Boonshare, which has automatic triggers for healing, Vigor, Regen and condi removal.
   The auras can be a mess during intense team fights, it’s hard for an opponent to see when/if an aura is going to pop and avoid hitting someone with an aura
2. Mesmers (which I also play) : Clone and shatter spam, which triggers lots of condis; Double Moa, Double/tripple Shatter spam which also triggers the previously mentioned condis; AoE Dazes which during a team fight also get very difficult to predict/see/avoid; Double shield 5 with it’s 2xdouble stun, quickness and projectile denial.
3. Thief: daze spam, backstab spam, interrupt spam; Automatic/insta-stomps (who was the idiot that thought this would be a good idea?); generally a trollish and unfun build to play against due to the huge burst, excellent mobility and general running around the map. It might be fun playing with one, but it’s very unfun playing against one (which should absolutely be considered and avoided when designing a class for PvP).
4. Druid: Longbow spam from afar; lots of healing; Celestial Avatar spam, Pet swap and F2 when possible; too much mobility for the amount of heals and DPS it does.
5. Engi: Invulnerability and block spam, waaaaay too much damage for its survivability; way too many automatic invulnerabilities.
6. Necro: how to put it? Condi spam; GS attack spam, Shroud spam; automatic proc spam due to how the build was designed. One of the greatest offenders as far as automatic procs are concerned.
7. DH: trap spam on teamfights; trap spam on points; Lots of skills with 3-4-5 different effects at the same time

I am not in the mood to list every spammable class and skill in detail, I think this is enough to get a feeling that there’s waaaaaaaaaay too much stuff going on at the same time just by casting 1-2 skills, let alone if you start spamming.
Think about it: almost every skill or trait in GW2 does 2-3-4 sometimes 5 different effects. It’s insane.

Last but not the least, another point that I’ve made is that, at least for me, it’s not fun playing a meta with this huge clusterkitten of skills, effects, automatic-triggered traits and procs and also all visual clutter.
1vs1 and 2vs2 can be a bit fun, but 4vs4 and 5vs5 it’s such a spam fest and visual clutter that makes sPvP unatractive to play as player or watch as a spectator. Imo.

Hello guys.

I’ve been playing sPvP since the begining of the season and I feel that I’ve played quite some matches (~200ish) in order to get a grasp concerning the current season.
I am currently sitting in Gold T2, fyi.

I’ve always felt that GW2 was too spammy since launch, especially when compared to GW1 or other good PvP games.
After HoT the issue became worse but after the last balance patch it just got even worse. Although, to be fair, it was so long ago I can’t remember when it was. LOLz at ANET’s PvP balance speed…

Currently, sPvP is a a huge pile of messy skills, a clusterconfusion of insta-spells, procs, automatic skills, AI playing for the player (looking at you clones, minions and pets) and all in all skills that do 4-5 effects at the same time.
This is aggravated by the existance of powerful traps courtesy of the DH, traps that stack, that are cast “in your face”, on a PvP mode that is all about capping points.

The abundance of cheesy builds is over-the-top, but worst of all, are the builds that are simply unfun to play against (looking at trolling running thieves, double-Moa’ing / tripple shattering Mesmers).

How is it possible that any junior Dev looks at this mess of PvP and thinks things are balanced? How is it that any Dev worth his salt is happy with the state of this spammy meta?

The matches are so unfun to play due to the idiotic Conquest mode (idiotic design for a game like GW2) with all the spam and automatic skills, randomly shared auras, over-the-top clone cast, Moa-spam, trap stacking, trolling running thieves that sometimes even when I win, I feel disgusted and annoying with this mess and simply not having fun.

Sometimes I wonder if Evan plays any PvP or even if he watches any matches..other than looking at this travesty of his Match-making system of his and feeling undeservingly proud of a lousy system.

Dude…. this bug has been around waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay before Christmas. Common….get some better excuses.

OriOri.8724:

Bio Flame.4276:

To be fair, it’s not only Mesmers that need a serious nerf – almost all classes do.
But yes, double-Moa, double shield 5 (each with double stun, double quickness), double shield 4, double or triple shatters…it’s a no-no.

Can’t the balance team look at this spamming mess and think that maybe, just maybe, it’s not how PvP should be?

Even if you get hit by a double Moa (which should almost never happen anyway. There’s almost no point in using CS for Moa if you are just going to use it again right away and take the 3 min CD in the first place), you are still Moa’ed for less time than you used to be with the skill, and its harder for us to hit you with now because its more telling, and we can no longer hit people behind us. When will people grow the kitten up and quit whining about this skill? Its not overpowered, its been nerfed plenty.

Shield 4 can only be used again if it actually blocks an attack. So, make sure it doesn’t block any attack and suddenly they can only use it once, not to mention that you can dodge the phantasm summon regardless.

Are you trying to argue that it’s tougher to hit a non-Moa’ed player than a Moa’ed one?
I mean, if you do, you might as well say that Moa is a bad skill for the Mesmer to use

But my point was that CS allows for waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much spam for way too little investment.
It promotes and rewards spamming.
And spammy games usually are bad games and this is why you should care about this issue.

Aitadis.8269:

I think we were in the same match
http://imgur.com/a/qvQZT
If this was league of legends or any other competitive MMO, this kitten would be fixed day 1.

I don’t understand. If I were this lazy on my RL job and I didn’t fix this kind of mess, I would probably get fired rather fast.

I mean…it’s just so mindblowingly stupid that such a bug still exists that I am left speechless.

To be fair, it’s not only Mesmers that need a serious nerf – almost all classes do.
But yes, double-Moa, double shield 5 (each with double stun, double quickness), double shield 4, double or triple shatters…it’s a no-no.

Can’t the balance team look at this spamming mess and think that maybe, just maybe, it’s not how PvP should be?

How could it be balanced, when the system is trying to juggle individual players skill into a team and THEN rewards/punish the individual players for the performance of said random team?
It’s not possible. It’s a dream, a folly dream at that.

The sooner our PvP dev realizes that, the better.

Oh, I am not defending the OP. He seems to have…let’s say..exagerated his losses.
So not much sympathy for him there.

But that’s no excuse for an ANET Dev to reply in that condescending tone.
I repeat: if we could analyse Evan’s decisions and coding as thoroughly as he did and if we used the same tone as he did….it wouldn’t be a pretty post, would it?

I mean, it’s not like PvP is very good and balanced at the moment so maybe Evan should show a little me more…restraint.

Xanctus The Dragonslayer.2318:

Evan lawyerd the OP. kitten lmao. Gotta respect him for that atleast.

Actually, I don’t respect him for that.

See, if we could analyse Evan’s work, code and decisions in detail such as Evan did the OP’s, then I am 100% sure we’d also be able to trash his decisions.

So, using Evan’s power to access to the OP’s personal data in order to reply in such a…condescending/patronizing way is nothing to bask in. Imo.

I’d aplaud Evan if he analysed his own decisions like that or better yet, if he gave us all the data concerning his decisions, coding and stuff, so that we could be as….thorough as he was about the OP.

Or if Evan would admit there are (plenty of) issues with the MMR, the matchmaking and the classes.
Because from the way he posts, he comes across as a “better-than-thou” guy.

My alternative would be to make it into a true team PvP.
There should only be true random queue and 5vs5 queue.

That’s if you want a competitive PvP game, that is. If you don’t want it, then kitten it, you might as well keep the random vs 5 man team travesty that existed untill this season.

No, actually it isn’t.
You want teams to spread out evenly over time, you don’t need to artificially lower or higher their odds to win just so to achieve that idiotic 50% ratio.

Again, in any sports, do you see it happening? Do you see a team getting easier or tougher opponents to “even out” their win odds, in order to get a 50% win chance?
Think carefully.

Btw: GW1, you know, the original game in which PvP was so much better it seems funny if it weren’t tragic? GW1 didn’t do it neither.

I am in Silver.

Dragonhunter seems waaaay too OP (too much damage, at the same time with too much survivability with waaaaay too much mobility and too much team support).

I’d say DH trap stacking is the new cancer.

Thieves are a bit OP too. Mesmers…maybe.

" Class balance is still more or less in the toilet"

That’s putting it…mildly.
But hey, our PvP Dev is very happy about his new incoming icons! That’s what matters in pvp, amiright?

Yes, that idiotic 50% win ratio match-making system is….I mean….how come any Pvp dev keeps his job after such an idiocy is beyond me.

I wonder is Leah was in charge of soccer and rugby and the NBA..
“What, one team keeps winning? Give the other team one more player!”
“What, they still keep winning? Tilt the field against them! They must have a 50% win ratio, no matter what”.

kittened as kitten.

Wolfs Shadow.7234:

haha I have seen much much worst, trust me this is not the worst ever made. That isn’t to say it’s great, but no this is not the worst ever made

Yes, because saying that a system isn’t “the worst ever made” is really saying something, eh?
It’s not THAT bad…it’s just very bad. Not the worst…simply horrible.

I am pretty sure it is an exageration and yes, there are probably worse systems out there.
But this one is pretty kittenty, let’s face it. Our PvP dev did a bad job there.