Guild Wars 2

Zerikin.1593:

Just make your own group in LFG, you’ll get people.

This or join the numerous LFG groups NOT doing swamp.

@Op, Have you done every fractal hundreds of times? Some people have and find little to no enjoyment from doing the same content over and over again just to fill out dailies.

If you want to actually do the content for enjoyment, there are plenty of other people who will join you so I don’t see where your problem lies.

Windshadow.4397:

I felt that HoT was lacking the soul, charm and passion of the core game or the entire franchise, GW1 xpacs included. It was so radically different that I didn’t feel like I was playing a Guild Wars game.

+1 also.

There are some bright spots in HoT where I still sense passion but those moments are few and completely overshadowed by this larger sense/feeling that Anet has been taken over by corporate greed/decision makers. I don’t mind changes to the game, even radical ones, but gamers can sense when a change is made in an attempt to make the game more enjoyable as opposed to making a change solely for the purpose of generating money. I no longer recognize this game that I played for 3 years with fondness… RIP Anet/GW2.

Wolfey.3407:

I was told that it would be a “bad presidence” if developers posted on threads that were demanding answers….

That’s all I was told on the matter….

Even though a lot of my frustration is/was directed at Irenio and the rest of the Ranger design team, its not really fair to them since the real culprits are the people in charge.

It was clear to me from the beginning that you can’t just add a healer to a game that has been designed from the ground up for 3 years around the basis that healers were unnecessary/undesired unless you made major changes to the entire infrastructure of the game. (The thought of not doing so would be like selling an electric vehicle with no network of charging batteries for the buyer to use.) You also need to have a clear vision as to how a healing Druid would fit in the game for PVP and PVE since it goes against the core philosophies GW2 started out with. Creating a healing specced Elite is trivial compared to the real work of laying a foundation for a healing spec to be introduced into GW2.

When Anet anounced that they would be adding a healer class to the game, I had serious doubts considering all of the work that needed to be implemented. It also didn’t make sense from a business perspective that they would spend so much development resources trying to add a healer spec for what I considered little returns. (Again, creating an infrastructure would have been a huge undertaking for the little it returned; they could have easily have gone with just a different elite concept.) I pushed away all of my doubts though and got caught up in the hype train and wanted to believe that Anet could pull it off because that is the type of confidence I had in Anet as a company. I thought they were passionate gamers who wanted to implement something awesome in HoT that they could proudly play. Its clear to me now though that the people pulling the strings at Anet are either incompetent/clueless at realizing the amount of work involved to add a healer or they realized it was impossible but decided to promote it anyways because it would generate excitement/revenue for them. Either way, my confidence in Anet has been shattered.

Its easy for us to target Irenio/Ranger design team because he is the face of Ranger/Druid but the more I think about it, the more I feel he is just a scapegoat. (Yes, he is over his head when it comes to designing a Druid elite spec but he was given an impossible task to begin with and probably none of the resources to undertake such a huge task.)

NCSoft is known for screwing their playerbase if it means that they make a profit and that’s what I feel has happened here (or whoever is making the decisions). Setting unrealistic expectations for the staff at Anet and abusing the hard-earned reputation Anet developed over the years to promote and cash in on things that were never going to see the light of day at HoT launch (e.g. a Druid elite that makes sense and a Fractals revamp being nothing but recycled levels/weapon skins).

NCSoft has gone down this road with other games and this silence is what I expected from them. They knew there would be outrage but they also know that the outrage will die out over time so long as they remain silent. (They are old pros at this and know how to play this game.) They can also use Irenio/Ranger design team as an easy scapegoat knowing fully well that it would come down to this. They stand to make all the money from their false advertising/promises and the blame for the fallout can easily be directed at someone else. The only thing I can do in the face of such disrespect towards its playerbase and the good people who still work at Anet is to vote with my wallet.

There are some passionate people at Anet still but the company as a whole though is no longer the company that I once looked fondly upon.

HoT is looking more like a scam every day; beautiful on the outside but shallow/hollow on the inside. Instead of a game created by passionate gamers, its turned into a corporate money machine designed to squeeze every last penny out of you.

It is no longer my refuge either.

Edit: I’m sorry to lump the good people who still work at Anet in with the people who make the business decisions but you know in your hearts that the game/company is not the same anymore. If you are a gamer at heart, you know exactly what we’re saying because you would feel it too.

NotOverlyCheesy.9427:

Not quite sure what OP is on…

I understand EXACTLY what the OP is saying because I’ve been having the same exact thoughts.

Not another penny from me either.

Staggs.9372:

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

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

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

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

I’m not sure what this thread is about. Can we get back to whining about Anet?

Tragic Positive.9356:

I suggested a 5% AF gain per attack and heal …

When I first saw Druid AF mechanics, I suggested that AF be tied more towards attack than healing so that weapons besides staff could be used. After thinking about it some more though, I realized my idea was flawed for one simple reason; you can never balance it.

Everyone’s perception of AF generation will be different depending on the weapons/abilities/runes/sigils/traits used in addition to the type of encounter they are in (WvW, PVE, PVP). AF generation will vary from one individual to the next and even within the same individual from one moment to the next. Its the reason I laughed out loud when Irenio commented that he was watching gameplay to determine if AF generation is undertuned/overtuned. What is he going to do? Look at everyone’s AF generation in every imaginable scenario to determine if AF generation is satisfactory? And even then, would you even be sure as a designer that you are on the same page as your audience so far as the perception of AF generation is concerned?

I also realized that there was no point trying to normalize each weapon/ability for AF generation if your goal was to have the average fall to a certain median; just set AF generation to that median and be done with it. This way everyones experience is the same (and quantifiable) and you don’t waste your time futilely trying to balance AF generation for every single weapon/ability/trait/sigil and for every type of encounter/game mode. This is NEVER going to happen.

Also, as a healer, you are often in situations where you are doing things that are important (dodging, moving out of aoes, cleansing, etc) but you will get punished for doing these things because AF generation is tied strictly to attack/heal only.

The above reasons were enough for me to realize that the current DPS/heal to gain AF design model was flawed inherently and will never work. (Yes, some people will still use it and happily do so but to me, the design is too amateurish/poorly thought out.)

Anet wants to capture eSports with design decisions like this? You haven’t demonstrated you can walk, yet you want to compete against companies that are lapping you in the PVP department? (Blade and Soul says hi.)

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

Some suggestions for AF generation and CAF gating:

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

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

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

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

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

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

Yes, I’m reminded on a daily basis of why John Smith was added to Anet. He seems to have played a larger impact in HoT than actual game designers. This seems to be the direction Anet is going though; make money without actually giving content/enjoyable gameplay.

Ragnarox.9601:

No. Why?

Bad:

Unfinished expansion (more like feature pack).
Grindy and bad content.
Rewards are crap.
No new dungeons and fractals. (nerfed dungeons & unrewarding fractals)
Nerfing of everything that gives players some gold. (casual unfriendly)
Few HoT armor and weapon skins from events and similar, many gem shop skins.
Story.
Only 3 legendaries (not available from the start).
Precursor crafting need events to fail.
Bugs.
Lags.
Everything is gold sink. (very bad for new players)

Good:

Elite spec gives something new and fresh.
Beautiful maps (wvw and HoT maps)
Good looking legendary skins.(so far)
Raids (yet to discover)
???

Same reasons why this will probably be my last expansion. I trusted Anet before Hot but they seem to have gone a different direction as a company; instead of making a game that THEY would actually play as fellow gamers they instead just added grindy/boring things designed to make them money.

Alot of the things they promoted before HoT turned out to be complete money grabs such as Fractals being recycled levels/weapon skin and a Druid Elite healer spec that was supposed to break the mold but is just a failed design experiment. How much money did Anet make hyping/pushing out this crap? If this is the best they can do, I don’t see a future for the game.

They are trying to tap into the WoW market (raids and trinity) and eSports without realizing that you can’t tap into those saturated markets unless you have a REALLY good system in place and they seem incapable of doing it. (Just look at the throw-crap-on-a-wall-and-see-what-sticks design approach of the Druid elite.)

Edit: My hunch is that they are desperately trying to secure some sort of eSports base before Blade and Soul launches in N/A. Anet’s 200k prize for tournaments when the game is basically the same as before means they are just throwing their money away in a desperate grab for a pvp audience.

I also experienced this bug after coming out of the water in Bloomhunger.

I paid $99.99…don’t think there was tax involved

Exos.3472:

DPS meters can and should be implemented in the only content where it is relevant (Raids).

The question is, can the raid content be cleared with subpar dps ?

The only information at our disposal is the gear. But sadly, this is not nearly enough to get a grasp on one’s true dps, wich involves traits, skill rotations and such.

In the same way that we have AR checks before fractals, having dps checks beforehand will only make a clear representation of one’s contribution, and I dare to think people will not be prone to dps check the tank or healer.

Will this shut down build diversity ? No. The requirements emerging from the content are already set up. You NEED dps in order to pass it.

Would it enforce the dps-meta (joke intended) ? I believe it will encourage decent players into becoming better, and prevent the non-hardcore ones from joining the dreaded elitists scumbags.

Though I generally disagree with having an Anet supported DPS meter, Anet is encouraging the use of one (knowingly or not) by implementing hard DPS checks like enrage timers. Maybe in the case of Raids, it is a necessary evil.

If DPS meters are implemented though, some people will be left out of raids that otherwise would have gotten in. If you are in favor of having an Anet supported DPS meter, you must also be willing to be left out of a raid so that you know how it feels to be on the opposite end and thus get a better understanding of both sides of the argument. (Since these people wouldn’t bother to come to these forums to read up on a DPS meter thread.)

Cletus Van Damme.2795:

Leodon.1564:

Cletus Van Damme.2795:

Most will probably just quit GW2 and find something else to do.
The special few will dig deep, make the necessary changes, improve their rotations and become a better player.

This the special kind of player everyone would want to have on their team.

you are an elitist.

I know I’m being elitist asking for dps meter and leader boards but I also advocate for difficulty modes and LFG seen in almost every other mmo. I’m not mumbling “bearbow” under my breath while greedily clutching content to my chest terrified that casuals will pollute it with their cooties.

Your reply is too sensible. I prefer the crazy Cletus so that we’re reminded of why DPS meters are a bad idea.

Edit: Actually I do mumble “bearbow” under my breath so I guess I’m the crazy one :P .

I normally would agree with the OP on issues like this if it wasn’t for the fact that I also want to bash Anet in frustration.

So many promises and boasting of things to be delivered in HoT, only for us to find that it was all just empty promises. A healing elite that breaks the mold? That got me excited to play Druid pre-HoT but it was apparent from day one that the elite was VERY raw/betaish in its core design (AF/CAF mechanics). Not to mention there was no hint of an infrastructure in place to support said healing build. How much money did Anet make by hyping things that were NEVER going to see the light of day at HoT release?

Yeah, I do feel like I was taken for a ride because I trusted Anet to deliver on their promises. Props to Anet’s visual design team because the game is visually gorgeous (for a 3 year old game) but the people in charge of Ranger mechanics are clueless.

Anet used to have a reputation similar to Blizzard before they turned all greedy/corporate. (They both used to be companies that gamers could trust to put out quality games.) Now it seems Anet is following Blizzard’s footsteps and just going for money grabs instead of focusing on quality releases. The game looks good on the surface but once you start digging, you see how rushed/unfinished lots of things are in the game. Anet is trying to bite off more than it can chew or their standards have gone down a lot.

Irenio cracks me up. . .

Sylvari for bioluminescence and personal story.

Cletus Van Damme.2795:

DPS meter is absolutely crucial, if someone isn’t putting the effort needed to beat the encounter they need to be gkicked and blacklisted from future runs.

Failure is not an option and can’t be ignored.

@ Dahkeus

Ask yourself, are all the pros you stated worth the cons? Do you really want scores of people like the above poster getting their hands on an Anet supported DPS meter? This is a game; not some black-ops mission to rescue a hostage.

@ Cletus, stay crazy.

Cletus Van Damme.2795:

Most will probably just quit GW2 and find something else to do.
The special few will dig deep, make the necessary changes, improve their rotations and become a better player.

This the special kind of player everyone would want to have on their team.

You basically seem to be providing your own counter-arguments.

This is not a hard-core game that requires DPS meters for people to beat content and that includes Raids. Anet balances content around this basic premise. I sincerely doubt that you want DPS meters because without it, you won’t be able to finish your raids. As you stated, you just want to weed out sub par players; i.e, you are an elitist.

That’s fine but don’t try to enforce your own values onto others. We need more things that bring people together in this game (I’m looking at you empty HoT maps), not things to isolate people further.

LughLongArm.5460:

I like the direction alot, but without some coffients for AF regen effectivness, it will un do some of desighn ideas they wanted to promote. For example, WHAO and and TU being almost the same AF regen wise. Dont forget WHAO got a huge buff to stand equal to TU insane AF regen. without modifications TU will not see play. Also staff heals will be less affective compared to LB damage in guilding AF(or the same) feels worng to me. Natrual healing trait that just found some play after a very long time, will return to being useless. Coffients could ofc solve all of this.

You’re buying into Anet’s crap. WHaO and TU should never have been balanced around the idea that they would have different AF generation values. You are setting yourself up for a balancing nightmare which is what we are going through right now and will continue to go through indefinitely.

You don’t tweak individual weapon/ability/traits for AF generation because there is no point to it and because it is so wildly inefficient/ineffective.

Professions are not created equally because different teams work on each profession. This was further highlighted to me when I compared the two Elites for the professions I played before HoT.

Mesmer Chrono feels like a spec made by a Mesmer player for other Mesmer players. (i.e., its a spec done right.)

Ranger Druid feels like a spec made by someone disconnected from Rangers and gaming in general. Even though I can take certain abilities/weapons/traits to make the Elite work, its so fundamentally wrong to me that I have absolutely no desire to make it work. (I feel like I was given crap with some sticks in it and asked to build a house out of it.)

Good luck Anet trying to balance every weapon/utility for AF generation; time well spent.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

If I had to guess he can make suggestions, but he has no say in what actually is put into the game. I’ll bet he’s as annoyed as we are. And doesn’t appreciate being made the whipping boy on these forums.

If I had to guess.

I wish this were the case.

Unfortunately, the Ranger class got stuck with a design team that is both incompetent and disconnected from the Ranger community. Their approach to coming up with proper AF/CAF mechanics is both comical and sad at the same time. (I sometimes wonder if these guys even play video games, let alone their own game.)

I switched to Rev as my PVE main because it was my opinion that Ranger/Druid was about 6 months to a year away from being polished enough for me to play. Unfortunately, my estimate may have been too optimistic considering how bad the Ranger design team is in implementing changes. (They are just as likely to screw something up as make a good change.)

jweez.7214:

Why is this talked about so much?

There are third party dps meters and from what I understand anet isn’t punishing people for for using them.

So basically what they are saying is. “We don’t support dps meters and don’t believe in the dynamic they cause but if your hellbent on it go ahead”

What more do u want?

This.

Mercurias.1826:

I agree with a lot that was said in this thread. Part of Revenant being so strong and streamlined is because it was made recently, with the Devs years of experience and knowledge of the current game. I believe that, if they had a chance to do some things over, a few of our game classes would be similarly streamlined and altered to suit the current game.

It’s also a very new class, and it’s being worked on alongside the release of raids, Wintersday, and a lot of other content.

I would give it some time and try to enjoy the class as it is while providing constructive feedback as you go. If you don’t like it, then don’t play it.,

It’s really about that simple.

My thoughts exactly.

Kaliny.8265:

Revenant is unfinished? Could you please link the thread where you got this info? I realy didn`t know that, so if you could be kind and point me a Dev saying that Rev is still on development phase I will remake this topic considering this.

I was referring to missing underwater skills and condi not being up to par to power builds.

I did not play Rev much during the betas but Mallyx condi was originally designed to work in a different way from the current iteration. (I believe it was some sort of condition transfer type of playstyle.) From what I heard, Roy decided the playstyle was not conducive to a fun grouping experience and scrapped the original implementation but did not rework the traits to make sense with the new system (current iteration) he put in place. This plus the fact we have no second condi weapon set makes condi Rev feel lacking and unfinished compared to power builds.

Azure.8670:

…but we got a condi rev and boy oh boy oh boy did that just not work.

Seeing as no explanation was given, how did you determine the condi Rev was the weak link in the group?

Kaliny.8265:

I maxed herald few weeks ago, but I have the same impression as I had on lvl 9 when I instakilled a centaur (lvl 9 also) with a single UA.

“Isn’t this too much?”

How is this different from insta killing a mob with Rapid Fire from 1500 ft with my Ranger? A level 9 mob will be one-shotted by just about any class so your comments/viewpoint feels biased.

Rev feels strong to me but it also has weak points and is still unfinished. Lets finish the class to see how it performs as a whole before we start talking about nerfing the strong points of the profession now.

Edit: Not to say that the class could not use a few more balance passes but nothing about it at the moment is brokenly OP to me.

Anet is going in the opposite direction when it comes to making Fractals challenging/enjoyable. Adding HP/Toughness to mobs to needlessly drag out encounters and adding instabilities that are just annoying to play with (no real strategy involved; just inconveniences) are the lazy attempts by Anet to make encounters artificially harder.

I feel weaker and more restricted in my gameplay as I get higher in Fractal levels which is just the wrong way to making Fractals an enjoyable experience.

Anet Fractal design team meeting:
Employee1: How can we make Fractals more fun and challenging?
Employee2: How bout we disable the left turn button so that players can only move right. That will make things difficult!
Employee1: Great idea! We’ll add it as an instability in the next patch.

I’d like to try out condi mace/axe but the lack of a second condi weaponset kills the spec for me.

CadeRG.4508:

Auto attack, other than looking cool as heck, drops little healing orbs on the ground. Although the healing from the orbs isn’t great, it’s still fun to play around with.

Fixed in bold.

I wish the healing orbs were more visible.

Off topic but having items be available through PVP only but tradeable seems like a good way for PVP only players to make some money.

I was concerned that I would need to make a condi ascended set to tackle 70+ fractals but with the proposed changes to toughness in December, I think I’ll hold off on crafting that set.

Does anyone have experience using condi for high level fractals (70+)? I’m getting close to lvl 70 now and have noticed a significant drop in power DPS (due to toughness scaling) and am wondering if it would be better to switch to condi for the last 30 fractal levels.

Please share any condi builds you found successful in high level fractals.

Majic.4801:

What Goes Around

Labjax.2465:

Anet is great at having visions and making things from those visions, but they don’t seem to be that great at sticking to a vision in the long-term.

Nailed it, and an excellent post overall.

I think a lot of what we see is a consequence of “iterating”, which is a development model that supersedes any single game element, or even the grand vision of the game itself. It’s a core philosophy of ArenaNet that is both a blessing and a curse for the company, the game, and the players.

The very nature of an iterative approach eschews long-term stability in favor of short-term agility. If an idea works, they run with it. If it doesn’t, they may commit to another pass to fix it, but they might just as well drop it altogether for something entirely different — and hopefully (but not necessarily) better.

Inevitably, what results is a patchwork of different ideas, each chosen for its own merits, that reflects a process of experimentation and evolution more than a faithful execution of a single coherent plan.

The Living World exemplifies this, both in terms of its delivery, which has changed with each season, and its narrative, which has become increasingly subordinate to the mechanics of the game.

They had to change course with the Living World, because they are still recovering from the lavishly disastrous decision to literally throw away tons of Season One content and leave players both old and new with little more than old memories and smoldering ruins to show for it all. In this case, iterating was necessary to save the game from an ignominious end, and that ability to abandon a bad strategy even after going all-in illustrates the strength of the iterative model.

The weaknesses appear in cases like Heart of Thorns which, though enjoyable in itself (my opinion) is somewhat unceremoniously grafted onto the core game in a way that has left a large percentage of players cold on a wide range of fronts. There are a lot of new directions encompassed in the expansion, but it’s a jarring arrival for the community overall and alienates enough paying customers to become a costly Faustian bargain if left as is.

The day can be saved, however, with a relatively modest pass or two to address some of the more glaring issues players have raised, but action must come quickly enough to smooth things over before attrition becomes critical.

Season Three of the Living World appears to embody a grand design that ran out of time. It does seem story hooks were created to allow for a more thematic introduction to elite specializations, but what materialized was effectively “here you go: get to work and start doing hero challenges.”

Many other threads are left dangling, but those may well be dealt with as Season Three continues.

The overall effect of the iterative model is something of a roller coaster ride for both developers and players, with highs and lows at every turn, and that’s not always an easy thing to deal with. But there is a silver lining.

With each iteration, ArenaNet does learn important lessons, does apply them to future endeavors, and they do seem to be getting better at it. As the process matures, the net result may well end up being better than any single grand vision could yield.

Or it may end up being a big, untenable mess.

Here’s hoping elegance eventually arises from the turbulence.

+1 Great thoughtful post.

Jasper Defthand.3018:

My over feeling about the expansion is how I feel about just about everything as a whole that arenanet does. They come up with a GREAT idea, they start working on it, then realize “OH kitten, this is gonna be so much work, and we are so under staffed cuz our business model doesn’t make kitten for money, and its all on me and my meager pay check that barely feeds my family and i gotta make this deadline. I guess I’ll cheese kitten this kitten, make it look pretty and cool to disguise the fact that theres no real depth and the underlying mechanics and engine are shoddily build and held together by bandaids.”

I’ve been feeling this way lately also after seeing how unfinished Druid was, Rev underwater skills still being missing, Fractals getting recycled levels and weapon skins, etc. I initially gave Anet high praise for HoT but the more I dig into the expansion, the more I’m noticing how hollow/unfinished it feels.

This is Anet’s first expansion so I’m hoping they can use this as a base to learn and build upon.

Demented Yak.6105:

Hammer auto is fine. It’s exactly as fast and as strong as it needs to be.

This guy gets it.

Some people just want buffs to their class regardless if it makes sense or not. . .

Roxtar.6487:

Just something I haven’t seen mentioned – the icd for Shared Empowerment (give 1 might to allies when you apply a boon) is 1sec. Your herald boons sync with the server and refresh every 3s so you are effectively getting 1/3rd of the potential from the trait. If you stagger your utilities a little you’ll get better might sharing. If you run sigil of strength you can get, on average, a sustained 4 extra might shared to allies (tested in the mists). While this is a loss in personal dps from an air sigil and you will easily cap at 25 might, it’s definitely worth noting you can get some insane might sharing for such a small price.

Here’s the breakdown if anyone is interested:

baseline (just facet of darkness and nature): 4-5 might
w/ Facet of Strength: 10-11

w/ Sigil of Strength: 9-10
w/ Sigil & Facet: 15-16

w/ Sigil & Runes of Strength: 11-12
w/ Sigil & Runes & Facet: 18-19

*all tests had 86.85% crit chance and had facet of darkness and nature maintained. Number range is the amount of maintained might applied to a nearby ally. This was against the indestructible golem in the mists. Note that more enemies will allow more sigil procs so the sigil might actually average 1 or 2 might higher in multiple enemy scenarios.

If you’re in a pve scenario where your party has little might or you are the sole might provider, definitely consider sigil of strength and maybe strength runes! Or if your war doesn’t want to run PS!

Thanks Obal for the guide.

Roxtar brings up a good point and I wish I had considered it before I switched out my Sigil of Strength for Sigil of Air. I pug 99% of the time and the vast majority of groups don’t bother to stack might. I’m assuming the extra 4 stacks of might on the group from Sigil of Strength is better overall DPS than Sigil of Air but can someone confirm before I switch back to Sigil of Strength? This would be in conjunction with Strength Runes.

Rev benefits from having all the latest design ideas/animations and since its a new profession does not carry any baggage with it (i.e., it was built on a clean slate with today’s game iteration/meta in mind.) Its still unfinished though (e.g. placeholder water skills) and the class could use another few passes to smooth out the rough edges.

Rev feels like a mixture of Thief (e.g., energy mechanics, high damage, mobility, evades/active defenses), Warrior (good hp, heavy armor) and Necro (looks and lore-wise). If this appeals to you then I’d suggest giving it a try.

It feels very much like a second generation profession rather than being on the same tier as the other professions I’ve played (Ranger/Mesmer). To illustratte, when you cast Swiftness on Rev, you don’t hear a horn playing like on Ranger, you hear a sonic boom .

Eve Oren – Revenant

Slotting gear for agony resistance is non-intuitive and very intimidating for a new player to grasp. You have to spend a great deal of time researching the mechanics outside of the game and the vast majority of casual players will not bother doing so.

Anet, please restructure/redesign agony resistance so that its easy and intuitive to understand or put in some very specific details in game please.

It appears to me the loot bag system is a way for Anet to manage/control loot tables in an easy way. The problem is that we have no easy way to clear our inventory.

Have only been playing Rev for a short while but the more I do, the more I wonder why Druid AF was not modeled after the Rev Energy/Cooldown mechanics. Many of the suggestions I made towards AF generation/CAF gating can be found already in Revenant.

Pros of Rev Energy/CD system:
- Automatically regen energy. No more wasting time trying to balance AF generation coefficients across multiple weapons/utilities/abilities. (Lets be real, this is never going to happen.) Also, you are not punished for using your time to do things besides DPS/Heal (e.g., dodging, moving out of aoe or moving to heal, kiting, staying alive, etc.).
- You have access to your energy immediately. No more having to “build” AF at the start of a fight which is just a dumb concept to have for a healing build.

Revenant is about managing short cooldown abilities with your energy. Druid already has the short cooldowns and would pair well with the Rev energy mechanics.

Have only been playing a few days but so far have been very impressed with Rev in general. (Not going to mention the underwater stuff because the core of the rev feels very solid to me and that’s where it counts.)

Character feels very adaptive to its environment and many of the basic design decisions that may look bad on paper, such as having a very boring attack rotation (i.e., quickness/auto1 sword), was actually very fun to play with. The quickness/auto1 combo feels more strategic and as a result more satisfying than remembering rotation sequences of other classes. Besides being mentally stimulating, it allows me to save the majority of my mental resources for reading and reacting to the situation at hand, which also feels very satisfying since the character is well equipped to do so. You feel empowered as the character (a feel similar to the console Batman) and don’t suffer from having to fight game mechanics at any time (e.g., pets).

Great start on a new profession.

I want to play the game casually to really take in the game but am worried that this slow approach will put me far behind in terms of time-gated items (ie., things that you can only do/craft once per day). I don’t want to start working on a legendary a month from now to only realize then that I needed a month’s worth of time-gated crafting materials.

I was not able to find much info on this so please share any new time-gated events/tasks you found in HoT.

It looks nice to me and if I was playing the game purely on a casual basis then I probably wouldn’t mind it. However, its a bit intrusive when you actually want to pay attention to things that are happening around you and I would like the option to turn it off for those moments.

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

Leodon.1564:

… It’s an indication that the company is unstable in some way (e.g., hurting on money so need to rush things out and/or more interested in the bottom line than a quality expansion…

Well, we know it is not that, you can look at the earnings yourself, they are available online. It’s making millions each week.

Anet’s motto used to be, “it will be ready when its ready”. (ie., don’t ask us when things will be released because we will release it when we feel it meets our standards.)

I feel they have somehow gone away from that motto and is releasing content half-finished with the intention of finishing/fixing it after release. I was just speculating on why things feel different now.

Just because they are profitable now does not mean they still don’t get pressure from NCSoft to release the game before its ready or that they feel they have the luxury to stretch out development time. Except for WoW, gaming companies generally face the pressure of going under at any given time and sacrifices to quality have to be made at times so that you can stay afloat/profitable.

I thought this too the other day while cleaning/organizing my bank space. However, its so small a convenience feature compared to so much in the game that is still unfinished/buggy that I would not want Anet spending time on this unless it was super quick to implement. Implementing a build/gear saving feature and the ability to open/use a stack of bags/items is much more wanted by the general public.

Edit: Everyone has their own way of organizing things but the following tip helped me to reclaim my bank space.

Put everything that requires visibility in the top rows so that you never have to view more than these top few rows. (No more searching through your bank space and finding items you forgot existed.) Everything else should fall in category/tab in your other bank slots.

Example layout:

Tab 1) High priority items that you should see/be reminded of on a frequent basis.
Tab 2) Lower priority items that you don’t want to forget about but don’t need to be reminded of that frequently.

I want to play the game casually to really take in the game but am worried that this slow approach will put me far behind in terms of time-gated items (ie., things that you can only do/craft once per day).

Does anyone have a list of time-gated events/tasks that were introduced with HoT? (I don’t want to start working on a legendary a month from now to only realize then that I needed a month’s worth of time-gated crafting materials.)