Guild Wars 2

Feels pretty fun and has some potential but I think most of the beast skills need to be instant cast or have much shorter cast times, particularly the straight damage ones. There’s no point in using these skills that do very little except dmg and have a high cast time unless it’s a giant bomb like maul. We don’t need that many mauls either…

The game has become too spammy with power creep. I think the fact that most classes dont have to manage a secondary resource like in many other mmos has since the games release gotten some criticism for making the game spammy (minimal incentive to not use most good skills on cd). At the very least, cc and stun breaks, evades and invulns were carefully considered in pvp. with across the board cd reductions on very powerful defensive skills, even these elements require minimal consideration these days.

The game needs to slow down and become more deliberate. dmg has to be rebalanced so that it is more bursty with significantly lower dps. sustain in the form of heals, invulns and blocks need to be nerfed very hard. timing these defensive skills to counter an opponents burst should be much more important than it currently is.

Please bring back clerics amulet and cele amulet. The game needs to be balanced around DIFFERENT roles… right now everyone is pushed to be more or less a bruiser with good sustain and good damage. Sustain should be nerfed across the board on offensive builds (signet of stone on ranger, endure pain, etc need cds increased and duration decreased), defensive builds like sw/d druid or hammer scrapper should have their dmg reduced.

PvP isnt horribly balanced but this FFA arena feel is getting a little dry. Everyone does good dmg and no one is glassy.

Topic…just wondering…

I noticed that decay doesn’t affect your leader board standing until you play another match, pretty weird.

Dishonor is fairly easy to wait out. I think a better system would be a ranked lock out until 2 matches of unranked are complete. The player with dishonor should get no reward track progress for these matches.

During off-season time the elimination of the rewards should be enough.

Azukas.1426:

Paprikaspice.8462:

I dont get why ppl still think DHs are OP. They’re good in team fights and the symbolic version has good 1v1 ability but they’re slow and do mediocre damage unless you’re forced onto a small point. I used to keep my dh ready as an alt to ranger but its not as important to a team as the 1st ele, druid, and thief. I think its also less important than a necro, but not totally sure.

Low skill floor/ceiling that over rewards players is the problem. Multiple DH’s throwing down traps on a point is absolutely broken at times.

The system is currently balanced at high levels of play where only 1 per each class can be on each team. Now regular seasons do not have the no stack clause and since you can’t 5 man queue anymore you also remove the highly organized factor.

You start to see the problem?

There is no problem as far as DHs are concerned because stacking them is a bad idea. They cant rotate and they do less damage than necros. Their dmg is also easily countered. If youre facing a dh that runs more than 2 traps, just pop your invuln, block, or stab. Get off point if you have to, you can wait out the trap and still prevent a decap. If theyre running only test of faith, they do solid but not great damage. They have significantly more survivability than necros with this set up but significantly less dmg.

DHs are still in the same place as last season. They dont do top dmg, cant beat the true 1v1 champs like druids, and cant rotate. Theyre just pretty good at dmg, and can beat non 1v1 champs in 1v1.

I think removing the daze on traps has changed dragons maw significantly. I have to test more but i think it can be dodged on reaction. Most dhs dont run this anyway.

I dont get why ppl still think DHs are OP. They’re good in team fights and the symbolic version has good 1v1 ability but they’re slow and do mediocre damage unless you’re forced onto a small point. I used to keep my dh ready as an alt to ranger but its not as important to a team as the 1st ele, druid, and thief. I think its also less important than a necro, but not totally sure.

Gwaihir.1745:

Most people have 560 vit in pvp or 0 if they’re above the lowest hp pool. This is 17250 hp. Maul from pet can top 17k. Need more be said.

What are you talking about…what maul? In what real scenario would the pet do 17k dmg? Please let me know cuz I want a pet that can one shot pretty much everyone.

rank 1509, placed in silver, high 1200’s. Played ~40 games.

I think the classes are more balanced than they have been since HoT released. No classes are garbage, though way too many builds are still garbage. I play druid, ele, DH but haven’t touched DH this season. Ele is more or less necessary again and I think this goes back to its flawed design that has far too much group support. This should be nerfed a good bit for pvp only with compensations by buffing other builds.

Druid seems fine. DH seems fine.

I think the approach to balance should change after this season. The game has added too much of everything. Skills have slowly had way too many effects added (like stun breaks) and this has resulted in a spam-y game. Invulns have had their cooldowns slashed across the board over the years, everyone has way more cc’s with much longer durations and condi applications are just insane. The game has compensated more defensive options with more offensive options, or vice-versa, and everyone suddenly has far more access to what used to be critical skills, to the point where very few skills are critical anymore. It’s not NEARLY as significant when interrupting a heal for instance…since the druid can just pop an invuln, stealth, or drop ALL condis by going into avatar.

The fights are about attrition, and individual skill in the fights matters less and less (though awareness of the map is as important as ever.)

Some of the biggest problems with the game right now is poor build diversity within classes, and too many skills that are way too good on cooldowns that are too short. The build diversity problem is probably due to fact that many runes and amulets have been removed, and they needed to be removed because of those amazing skills that everyone suddenly has. I think by toning down all the CC’s, increasing CD’s of critical skills like ele/warr invulns, toning down the number of condi clears as well as the condi application, and then adding back some more defensive amulets, we might get some better diversity.

Here is what I have been using

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vNAQJATWnUqA9rgNsA2CCctgFCBDurOWbrLluAQV75LMt6ZlI9zA-TJBGABes/QCHCg+LDAwXAAA

Camp LB most of the time, abuse stealth, pew away.

It’s close to what I ran before HoT, but the ele and engi spam really made projectiles difficult to use.

Since I enjoy this more than bunker and it seems to work again now that reflects aren’t quite as abundant, I haven’t gotten a chance to try the old bunker build. How does that compare after the CA nerf?

The rev example is pretty strange. You upkeep entirely different facets and use totally different rotations in pvp and pve… Why cant energy costs be different? You basically relearn the rotations and upkeeps. Nothing abt the skill is fundamentally changed except how you rotate it in, which is already different between game modes

I dont really wvw so im not sure abt that.

Its pretty good; better than WoW when I played years ago. New and interesting maps are FINALLY being introduced, after years of either nothing new or fairly lazy additions. The que and matchmaking are really good, usually no more than a 5 min wait.

The general combat has become very monotonous though. Class balance is not bad in the sense that all classes have at least one very good build but very few classes have more than one decent build, though you can make multiple minor adjustments to the same basic build. Worse than that is that all meta builds are basically the same. They all have excellent sustain, at least one great burst combo, lots of cc access and some cc immunity. Theres no benefit to more specialized builds, leading to games that just play out in the same ways over and over.

Overall spam needs to be reduced, HARD. Part of this may come from bringing DH back down a little but stability and CC’s are just so rampant…CC’s need to be tuned hard. Does anyone remember the original vision of CC’s and why they didn’t have diminishing returns? Because CC’s were supposed to be short duration, and not easy to access. They shouldn’t be spammed.

Every guardian trap dazes with a trait…how is that not a complete distortion of how cc’s should look in GW2? Guards obviously aren’t the only offenders, pretty much everyone is. I don’t mind making a class like the berserker very CC heavy, but please, not everyone…

This was never a big deal when the DH was bottom tier. Please do not change this unique skill…it’s obviously not the mechanics of the pull that needs tuning.

You just have to avoid the first part. If it lands, the guard can get a cc off at a later time. This is both an advantage and disadvantage. An immediate CC like druid glyph or guard shield 5 can’t be reacted to. Even though it’s “unevadeable,” you can pop stab AFTER the chain lands. sure the guard has a little bit of time to decide on the pull time…the opponent also has some time to react.

Zenith.7301:

Archon.6480:

Zenith.7301:

Archon.6480:

Zenith.7301:

Archon.6480:

Zenith.7301:

Archon.6480:

Zenith.7301:

I also don’t know what he means by burst, rangers have none of it outside rapidfire lol.

Max out might on you and your pet, swing away with sword, hit f2 on bb.

That’s not remotely burst. BB’s a godkitten long channel with obvious telegraph in a a meta full of reflects.

I consider burst windows to be no longer than 3 seconds and to be from skills that are hard to respond to.

BB’s channel finishes in the time it takes to complete a dodge roll. Same with smoke assualt.

Not really lol.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Smoke_Assault

2 seconds.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Spike_Barrage

2 seconds.

Where do you people pull this bullcrap from?

You are confusing cast time with channel time. What I said is true, you can completely dodge both of those skills.

These are channeled damage abilities! They don’t do the entirety of their damage until the channel is complete.

A single dodge won’t take up even half of the time this channel goes through.

You do realize that you can keep attacking while you command your pet and it acts in concurrence with you, right? You don’t have to stop attacking when you command your pet… You can even pre-cast your pet abilities while you swing at your foe.

I only ask because, if you know this, you should realize the pet cast time is irrelevant, while the channel time is very relevant. The channel for both of those skills to complete is around 1-1.5s. They are designed so a single dodge roll can completely avoid them, and likewise, deal all their damage in a short timeframe.

It’s pointless to argue with you people. You keep resorting to tangents to distract from the fact that the activation+ completion time of a skill is exactly as the tooltip says.

Who the hell cares if you can keep attacking. You can attack whether that skill is casting or not, how is that remotely relevant.

And the BM quickness trait is terrible since pets always pause for a while as soon as they’re swapped in so part of the quickness effect is lost before the pet reacts.

The bristle channel isnt 2 seconds. I dont think it shows on the tooltip but its shorter. Play with it more and youll see. It stands there for 2 seconds ACTIVATING the attack, then channels for 1 or so seconds. This is why you can dodge the bristle attack. You wait out the activation, dodge the channel.

On the other hand, the smokescale attack has 0 activation, which you can see on the tooltip (this is totally different from the bristle tool tip which says it has a 2 sec activation) but has a 2 second channel. You definitely cant dodge the whole thing in 1 dodge roll.

You can see the tooltips are totally different for these 2 attacks

Druids are one of the best pve classes in raids; the only content where your build/class matters significantly. 1 druid is as necessary as any 1 class. A second druid is frequently preferred. Druids also have 3 viable major builds with minor variations.

Druids are bad in pvp, but not terrible. When compared to similar roles that other classes fill, druids are inferior in the most important ways, but superior in others. Overall, you’ll mainly be a crappier but more mobile ele; but the meta is such that the inferiority of the druid in a teamfight is a glaring weakness whereas the slightly better mobility doesn’t help a ton. It’s probably just above the guardian in terms of viability. I’d rather have any of the other classes.

My main issue with how gw2 plays currently is that almost all skills are low risk, even though some are extremely high reward. You have huge incentives to just use these skills on CD. I cant remember the last time I held off on using lunar impact in pvp or CA4 in pve. It makes the game play in a more mindless way than other mmos. It feels like a spam fest.

Druid is the worst offender due to CAF generation REQUIRING spamming of heals without much thought. I wish the game was at least a little more measured. Guild wars has always been a little bit spammy but at least burst combos came with some risk in the past, like the old quickness skills having a penalty. I think giant heals should not be as easy to pull off.

Currently, druid is far too forgiving to play and not very fun in both PVE and PVP. It relies far too much on a small number of skills, which are amazing, give up very little.

1.) make CAF generation passive. Why encourage heal spamming on staff? It doesn’t really encourage thoughtful use of healing skills.
2.) make staff better. To balance #1, staff needs to get better. Change staff 2 to release a large orb that heals in a line towards any direction and have it be ground targeted like ele air wh5. Make it a projectile that can be reflected, except if it is reflected, it just heals a second time (there is way too much reflect and it’s time some counter play to reflects be put in). Make this a larger heal than the autoattack. The current staff 2 doesn’t seem to have much use or play other than building up CAF. It’s a set it and forget it skill.
3.) Change CA1 to make it instant (currently there’s still a short delay between casting and the heal dropping), and slightly increase its area of effect. CA skills are currently way too forgiving, with 3 and 4 being both easy to use and huge heals. CA1 and 2 should be the primary heals in this form. In order for this to happen, CA1 and 2 need to be less cumbersome.
4.) Change CA2 so the seed pops in 1/2 the time it currently does.
5.) Increase the cast time of lunar impact by 2x and make it a rooted skill. Lunar impact has a strong daze and a huge heal, there’s no reason the cast time should be as short as it is. The targeted area should function like ele earth dagger 5, pulsing cripple to enemies and retaliation to allies while the cast happens.
6.) Reduce the healing of CA4 by 60%. To make up for this, have it drop the waterfield when it completes, similar to an ele overload, and have it pulse a little protection and vigor even after the skill has completed. CA4 should build the same amount of GotL.

Not considering balance with other classes (many of which need to have similar spam-reducing changes made), I think this will make druids and healing in general much more interesting to play.

I haven’t played ranger a ton since the patch but going off of last seasoned in which I played a slightly glassier version of the normal bunker build, I can offer a tip against mesmers.

If you are at alone at a point and a mesmer is headed towards you, you have to prepare to at minimum give the mesmer a decap. If you are greedy and try to prevent the decap, you will just die instead. If the mesmer focuses on decapping/capping the point, you can use los while you are moaed to not die. If you get through moa without taking tons of damage you have a good shot at winning the fight.

Last season I struggled with the bunker build since it seemed to just be worse than an ele in team support. I generally tried running the same traits but with marauder/zerker amulet instead of menders. I found that I could put more pressure on enemy eles this way.

The issue with that is that specializations already encourage themes of play. The fact that the gs trait is somewhere while the sword trait is somewhere else though they both fit the same theme, it really limits your specialization and weapon choices. If the gs trait also boosted the sword, I think that would greatly boost build diversity.

creating 2 traits to improve some weapons, perhaps making them mutually exclusive, and relying less on generic cd reductions for weapon improvement traits would also increase build diversity.

Looking around, build diversity isn’t very high. One of the reasons for this may be some extremely specific weapon traits. For rangers, something like Light on Your Feet. These weapon traits only apply to 1 specific weapon. Some traits for instance, only affect 1 or 2 conditions, which in turn kind of dictates your rune choice and skill selection. I would suggest a more thematic design that is less specific. Maybe dividing ranger weapons into subcategories like ranged offensive/melee offensive/melee defensive then having 1 trait that greatly improves every weapon that fits into each of these categories. For instance, a trait that increases sword, axe OH, and GS auto-attack (+ whirling defense for OH axe) speed by x%. Another trait that makes sword 2 evade during the whole cast, makes GS 4’s block last longer and dagger 4’s evade go further and last longer. Maybe make some of these traits mutually exclusive to each other.

Although you will force classes to play in a few number of specific ways, it will be easier to balance playstyles and make more meta builds viable.

I havent played a ton with that build. The major condi bomb is shroud 4 within a chill or poison field. Stay at long, long range as long as possible. Reaper stab is predictable so use lb4 to out range him for as long as possible and unload all the lb dmg you have. He will use shroud 2 to gap close. if you see this, swap to your alt weapon and use the movement skill to run away. GS and staff are better than sw/d for this since theres no delay on the movement. Continue to kite. This works best with a build with higher dmg.

No matter who opens or at what range you start, you want to stay at range unless youre playing a weird maul build. If you have to fight on point this will be harder. For this situation, try to stay JUST out of range of shroud 4 when he enters shroud. Avoid the bolts that shoot out with the gs block or the staff 5. If you are just out of melee range your block wont proc the kick. You must dodge shroud 5 if he uses it, it’s pretty easy to see. Remember that entering ca clears condis. cast a few ca 2s even when you have very few condis as it procs a few seconds later.

I tested the air sigil with hunters shot. the air proc doesnt reveal you or fail to put you in stealth the way lb5 would. I havent tested fire yet but when i run air/blood i havent had issues.

I also prefer staff over sw/d. The build is a bit squishy so i prefer range. staff is great at kiting engis and necros in shroud. the movement skill is instant and targetable unlike gs3 or sw2. that can be handy. since arrows dont pierce, staff is great for bigger group fights in smaller areas where your arrows might get blocked by minions.

I also prefer snr with protect me, dropping the glyph. i usually dont need a 3rd stunbreak and although aoe daze isnt bad, snr is just amazing, especially as a non-bunker generally a bit away from the action. you will always pull teammates to safety.

If you are going to both tank and heal, you really have to drop your damage focus, especially if you’re with a pretty casual group.

I agree with slotting monk runes for the +% to outgoing healing. I think you should stay in staff a lot, but if you are to use any secondary set, you should probably use warhorn and take windborne notes. If you play with the build and find you’re forced to stay in staff like, all the time, you can ditch windborne notes. The reason to take warhorn with windborne notes is that it lets you provide regen and build CAF on a non-staff weapon set. The loss of vigorous training is not huge. Also the fact that it’s a blast finisher will allow you to heal in other players water fields or your own. Torch is just more damage, which as the tank/healer you should not prioritize. Dagger gives an evade but you probably don’t need it since you will be healing so much.

CAF is crucial if you are the healer and your group is still progressing. Getting it filled before its 10 sec CD is a priority.

I would also ditch stone spirit for sun spirit. The bosses don’t do a TON of damage that some protection would help against (except sab maybe). Definitely do this for gorseval, not a big deal with VG.

Consider what your group needs for pets. Only have 1 herald? You should bring a Tiger for extra fury so everyone in the raid has 100% uptime on fury. Not enough CC on VG’s annoying breakbar? Bring an electric wyvern for instant CC on pet swap. Fern hound and jungle stalker are decent choices too, though I think might and regen on that super long CD aren’t as important as perma fury for 5 ppl and the cc. Bring jungle spider for Gors if you are going to lock down a spirit.

I was dying to play sb again and tried this out to good effect. I had a lot of trouble with engis though.

Haven’t tried the new guard but WHaO is much more reliable than trying to get might on yourself with SotP and bristle f2. I almost never land the whole attack. Its telegraphed and easily avoidable. Any player that has played druids frequently will be looking out for it. Especially considering the WH, you can get a lot more might with WHaO and BM. SotP is on a shorter cd with bm, when it is down, you can might stack with WHaO after smokescale assault and/or after horn 5.

Not sure if that makes it better overall than NM but i dont think the might stacking abilities are comparable. BM beats it out by a lot (excluding guard since a bm build could make use of guard also).

I think thats only if you did certain chapters of the living story?

Is the only current way to get sinister trinkets through old living world episodes? Are there new ways of getting those? what about sinister armors and weapons? looking through the wiki ascended chests from fractals dont drop sinister stuff. Seems weird to put this specific stat set through more of a P in the A than others.

I dont get why people are so saltyabout this… WHaO didnt even need fixing in the first place. It gave great swiftness uptime traited and the short cd allows it to be used for the swiftness alone without too much worry that it wont be up when you need a heal.

Also, there was no way a loop of boonsharing would ever work. No other skill gives AND takes boons to/from another player or npc. This is ripe for abuse and obviously needs duration limits; not just on quickness or prot either. Without limits, it opens the potential for infinite duration. No bigs for regen but you probably shouldnt be able to maintain infinite anything else with as little work as popping WHaO on cd.

How is the ranger in pvp meta these days? been gone for 2-3 months. Looks like bw took a hit, but WHaO and pets got some nice buffs.

Seera.5916:

Paprikaspice.8462:

NoTrigger.8396:

Paprikaspice.8462:

the game needs to expect an excellent comp to balance accordingly.

i agree that instanced PvE content needs to be balanced around an excellent comp (meta builds), because if you balance for 20 different stat combinations and include stuff like nomads, the instanced PvE content will always be a joke for the above average player. but i dont agree that the excellent comp is a trinity comp.

you dont need a trinity to design complex encounters and everything you do in a trinity game can be done in gw2 without a trinity, because each player in the party contributes to everything, instead of having dedicated roles.

you dont really have to be a genius to understand how gw2 works, why its great that way and why a trinity or hard roles or w/e you call it will not make it more interesting at all. if anything, it will make things less complex, easier and take away depth.

agreed on the instanced part, thats what i meant to specify.

but you are wrong that hard roles arent in gw2 they are. you can find them in wvw and spvp. its not always 3 roles, but they are there and distinct. those roles make these game modes more complex. no specific team comp is required but a certain outline is encouraged. the developers even mention that this specialization could work great as a bunker or dps or roamer.. clearly defined roles are on their minds. they just havent been able to make it work in dungeons.

Then that’s not a hard role. A hard role is one that is required by the game, not by players.

And defined roles also do not equal hard roles either.

Thats just semantics…yeah you can get a couple of wins in low lvl spvp if you dont get matched with a real team with 5 glassy roamers but you will lose 97% of the time against a composed premade.

that equivalent should exist in pve. the easier content like cof can be done with 5 zerkers and sure you can walk into the toughest content with 5 zerkers. the game wont stop you, but you will fail most of the time.

yeah, the new skill and trait system is quite bad. its so linear that it allows for minimal experimentation with skills. traits and skills also share points which wasnt a good change. also why the heck do the tiers not unkock all at once? it kills your feeling of choice a lot of the time.

mistsim.2748:

UmbraNoctis.1907:

mistsim.2748:

because everyone is spamming blocks and invulns. cant really touch mesmers unless I get lucky with at taunt in between their blocks. this is why I was saying that BW should still go through blocks at least. but nope, dev morons continue to kneejerk nerf kitten into uselessness. everything except the stuff that matters like Mesmer and cele ele cancer.

BW is still unblockable.

not true, playing all day, it’s blockable. in fact, it hardly ever works.

I havent tested it in a controlled situation but im pretty sure i taunted an engi out of block.

it was completely broken before in a way that was breaking play. it could taunt out of invulns which was pretty crazy. it had to be fixed but its still one of the best traits the ranger has and a lot better than the other choices. i think the real nerf here was for zephyrs speed

NoTrigger.8396:

Paprikaspice.8462:

the game needs to expect an excellent comp to balance accordingly.

i agree that instanced PvE content needs to be balanced around an excellent comp (meta builds), because if you balance for 20 different stat combinations and include stuff like nomads, the instanced PvE content will always be a joke for the above average player. but i dont agree that the excellent comp is a trinity comp.

you dont need a trinity to design complex encounters and everything you do in a trinity game can be done in gw2 without a trinity, because each player in the party contributes to everything, instead of having dedicated roles.

you dont really have to be a genius to understand how gw2 works, why its great that way and why a trinity or hard roles or w/e you call it will not make it more interesting at all. if anything, it will make things less complex, easier and take away depth.

agreed on the instanced part, thats what i meant to specify.

but you are wrong that hard roles arent in gw2 they are. you can find them in wvw and spvp. its not always 3 roles, but they are there and distinct. those roles make these game modes more complex. no specific team comp is required but a certain outline is encouraged. the developers even mention that this specialization could work great as a bunker or dps or roamer.. clearly defined roles are on their minds. they just havent been able to make it work in dungeons.

GummiBear.2756:

Beast Sos.1457:

The thing was the dungeon wasnt hard anymore but it wasnt close to easy. Even after you learned everything you could die in a dungeon if you didnt focus and have fast reactions. It stayed fun because of that. I wouldnt claim that the difficulty was the reason for its failure but like you said thats a topic for another time.

I will respectfully disagree with that, if you had a good group that knew what they were doing most fights became pretty easy with time, as long as you didnt try to meet the actual time other optional challenges (which btw would fit nicely in under the artificial difficulty funny enough, right? ), sure some fights took longer, and did allow for less mistakes than others, but still in the end with enough practise you could make it near 100% sucessrate, if all you were going for were pure completing them. Ofc if you factor in the optional and time challenges again (you know those artificial difficulty things they had), we had a different thing, but even with those and even more practice you could get near 100% success rate for at least silver, probably even gold

I dont think most people could complete veteran dungeons with a 100% no wipe rate. with practice they could totally get it done but its real easy to wipe with a stupid mistake or two. not at launch anyway. dont know what its like now, and im sure the top 10% of players may come close to being able to do that.

agreed on its downfall being artificial difficulty so it makes perfect sense that gw2 shouldnt follow in its footsteps.

i think the encounters in ws are better designed overall. they have many phases all of which put pressure on certain members of the party. if you finish a phase but inefficiently, it will make the rest of the fight harder. the phases also take more concentration to deal with whereas a lot of phases in gw2just makes you dodge stuff till its over or stack. i think encouraging specialized roles would help with this since the boss fight could then punish poor teamplay and reward excellent team play. lets say a boss takes double dmg from condis but cleanses them frequently. someone has to interrupt the boss on a cleanse to put it on cd.

finally a key component gw2 is missing is a resource that needs to be managed like mana. i think that will make designing fun and difficult content a little tougher. im interested in what comes out of this but i really am hoping against a gambit system.

IndigoSundown.5419:

As to your last point, see my second response, above. Also, what I find interesting in trinity games can be done in GW2 without putting hard roles in. The roles themselves, though, are boring.

Who knows. ANet just buffed healing. Maybe they’ll provide mobs in the mentioned “challenging content” that require people to use every tool the game provides. I’d rather see that than a return to an older paradigm. I also think that if dungeons had seen development, and were as hard now as they were at launch, we’d see a lot less of these “meta is boring” arguments. The fact is that the meta is boring because it’s the easiest way to do the dungeon.

how do you define every tool? force everyone to take defensive skills? how? if you take all offensive skills and use them all, is t that still using “every tool?” if you force people to play more defensively, isnt that taking some degree of freedom away also?

meta is boring is because the easiest way to do a dungeon is too easy. thats a problem. if you are a player looking forma challenge every now and then, do you want a game thats only challenging if you handicap yourself?

even at launch when not everyone wore zerk and the dungeons were still difficult, i think they were still quite boring. the extent of team coordination was moving together and stacking. otherwise everyone just ran around attacking the boss. i just dont see a way around this type of tedium without mechanics around specific roles. i dont think tanks will ever work well in gw2 since there isnt a traditional aggro system. healers will never be as important since everyone has a heal and no one tanks. at the very least, control should be emphasized, along with the 2 different types of damage. small ai elements and mechanics would strongly encourage some specialization in a party. lets say a boss needs to be cced but aggroes on the ccer and enrages. this boss also has burst phases. this would strongly encourage defensive ccers and glassy dps.

none of this needs to be fundamentally change the game, rather, i think every facet of the game other than pve already has defined roles. the outlier here is the dungeons where everyone runs zerk.

Seera.5916:

DiogoSilva.7089:

Seera.5916:

I just don’t want the method chosen to be adding hard roles to the game.

Hard roles is a wonderful thing, if done right. They are usually thematically tight and easy to grasp, unlike soft roles, which, at first glance, all look “same-y”. There’s a reason for why a game like GW2 is criticized for being “all dps” or having “no build diversity”: because soft roles contribute to that perception.

To be honest, hard roles are, to me, one of the key pillars of the entire RPG genre, much like how loot or stats are. A RPG is all about, as the name of the genre implies, choosing a role (Role Playing Game), a theme, a specific style or attitude. When everything feels same-y, the fantasy appeal and the charm of playing with a role is lost. Of course, that’s my opinion. You may not value that as much as I do.

However, will all being said, I don’t mean that I wish to see the “holy trinity”. There’s plenty of different roles you can make beyond healer or tank. GW1, for example, did not have a tank role, but the heal role was divided into two (healing and protection), and there was crowd controler/ disrupter (mesmers in general), minion masters or spirit turrets (great to prevent enemies from getting close to the back line, or to provoke aggro), general support (paragons especially), and a distinction between aoe nukers and single target burst builds (so it wasn’t all “dps”).

If the new content is done right, anet can potentially add plenty of new, distinct, fun roles to the game. Ventari offers an unique and different healing playstyle. Chronomancer offers time-based support for bursting, defense and general cooldown utility. Revenant’s Mallyx will be able to turn the enemy’s conditions against themselves. Etc. And all those “hard roles” are more interesting that way. They wouldn’t be half as interesting if they were just “stack might, vulnerability and fury, dps, use the occasional block or reflect” that current builds seem to generally fall to.

As long as five players who are friends and want to play together and all want to do the same role have the chance to complete the content without changing to a different role, then I don’t care how they change it up. Be it they all want to play DPS or they all want to play Support or Control or whatever.

I don’t want to have to wait for someone in a particular build to show up in order to be able to do content.

Some people really enjoy soloing content. Add hard roles to the game and you destroy their fun. Because they can no longer do it alone. They have to bring others.

you end up sacrificing build diversity and encounter complexity, a ton of what makes a an instance fun, so that any composition of builds can complete it. its just not worth it. gw2 already has plenty of qol stuff that easily lets you change builds. beating this kind of content is like a consolation prize. anyone could have done it and if you actually ran with an exellent comp, it would be brainless to complete.

the game needs to expect an excellent comp to balance accordingly.

Seera.5916:

Paprikaspice.8462:

@ indigosundown

Whats wrong with a special snowflake feel? The differences between roles are real. Failures and successes in well defined roles are absolutely clear. You continue to cite the worst of the traditional trinity design where defined roles can be so much more than tank, healer, dps. Even in the traditional trinity, any game with half decent fundamental design can make each role realisitically different and fun. Agro doesnt have to be passive for a tank. defense doesnt have to be passive.

This is important in making group content actually engaging. I dont want a boss fight to just be dodge everything and do whatever damage you can.

Laissez faire players already loose out as theyre not part of the meta unless they are zerk. making encounters tougher, slower but still doable is a matter of tweaking even when specialized roles are included. the only difference is the meta requires a doverse group rather than all zerk

the current situation is both monotone and exclusionary. roles wont fix the exclusionary part but hard to argue that it can be worse than the current meta in terms of how boring it will be.

So if Laissez faire players group together, they are suddenly forced to wear zerk?

Hard roles are not the solution. They will only add new problems where old ones were. People will have to spend ages in LFG looking for a tank or a healer or whatever that meshes with the other builds that they have. I’d personally rather have a small variety of meta builds and no unnecessary waiting in LFG than having to wait in LFG to get a specific player filling a specific role.

no, but they sure as heck wont be accepted by every group. thats what im saying. making content still doable but much slower or difficult in other ways is a matter of tweaking. its conceivable that encounters that strongly encourage specific roles in a party can be completed without them.

also the game is already moving in this direction by its core design, even if instances havent yet. GW2 has 2 main roles at the moment, dmg and sponge. The current dungeon meta doesnt encourage the sponge role. Support and speed are important but generally secondary to one of these roles. Even hugely important support abilities like portal dont consume an entire build. HoT looks to really make support a primary role.

why design ventari for the revenant if its just going to be useless in an entire facet of the game? why make condis more powerful in pve? just for qol sake?

@ indigosundown

Whats wrong with a special snowflake feel? The differences between roles are real. Failures and successes in well defined roles are absolutely clear. You continue to cite the worst of the traditional trinity design where defined roles can be so much more than tank, healer, dps. Even in the traditional trinity, any game with half decent fundamental design can make each role realisitically different and fun. Agro doesnt have to be passive for a tank. defense doesnt have to be passive.

This is important in making group content actually engaging. I dont want a boss fight to just be dodge everything and do whatever damage you can.

Laissez faire players already loose out as theyre not part of the meta unless they are zerk. making encounters tougher, slower but still doable is a matter of tweaking even when specialized roles are included. the only difference is the meta requires a doverse group rather than all zerk

the current situation is both monotone and exclusionary. roles wont fix the exclusionary part but hard to argue that it can be worse than the current meta in terms of how boring it will be.

IndigoSundown.5419:

What stops you from playing as you want now? All it would take would be for the people who post in these threads to put each other on their kitten friends list. Oh, wait, you want your way to be the default way on PuG’s so you don’t have to lift a bloody finger.

So, you want ANet to return their attention to dungeons — which they’ve not touched in a long time and to completely redesign the game. You want everyone to have to play your way — because in order for dedicated roles to be the accepted way in the stinking PuG meta, Anet would have to make them required. You want to ruin the game for anyone who prefers it the way it is because you cba to make your own groups.

What we have now: Group comps can include any builds, any gear, and profession and succeed. This is the ultimate in build diversity.

What you want: Group comps will be just like in other games, a tank, a healer, and some DPS. Casual groups, guild groups, PuG’s, everyone will have to use the same comps to succeed. The only variations might be on which professions play DPS. Much less diversity.

What the result will be: PuG’s will still exclude, only they’ll be kicking because they need a tank or healer. Or because your tank build is not the accepted tank build. Or because your heal build is not the accepted heal build. Or for whatever other reason they come up with. Exclusion is not a mechanics issue — it’s a people issue.

Sorry, no thanks.

agreed on the root of exclusion. this is a problem with mmos in general. but at least with multiple required or heavily encouraged roles, you can play a greater doversity of builds without being excluded based on build. still am upgrade.

also the current meta is all dmg. if youre not zerk, youre not optimal. maybe you could make content possible but take much longer without diverse roles. thats basically how the dungeons are now except instead of multiple roles theres just 1

Seera.5916:

Paprikaspice.8462:

Seera.5916:

No to required roles. I do not want to have to wait for a player who has a specific build and is skilled in their role in order to play the game.

I want to be able to group with my friends and we all play the characters and builds we want to play. Not have to worry about finding the content in the game that does require our gear set up or having to have someone play a character or change build to something they’re not wanting to play.

you can change builds at any time. all you would potentially need is 1 more set of gear. and i honestly see no way around the current dungeons which are faceroll at worst and moderately difficult with randos at best which allows for any team comp to clear. if you dont require roles, theres not much you can do to make bosses interesting.

You did not get what I said. I’m fully aware that I can change builds when I want to.

And that’s the thing. I should only have to change my build when I WANT to.

If content my friends and I want to play requires Builds X, Y, and Z to be able to be done with no exceptions and none of us have Build Y, I do not want to be forced to have to wait to find someone with Build Y who knows what they are doing or have to have someone switch into Build Y to do the content.

And having to carry another set of gear around should not be a consequence of making the game more diverse in builds.

you dont have to change builds or carry a second set of gear. at worst a few people in a geoup would need to switch. if you did have a second set of gear, youd basically fit with any group.

i think its a small price to pay for having meaningful instances. also, old dungeons would still be clearable with any comp.

whats the alternative? more of the same? no more dungeons? both sound terrible to me.

Silhouette.5631:

Healers will become popular when you have to be super kitten good to go glass cannon. Like those people that solo Arah. THOSE should be the only people running glass cannon without worrying. Content should be hard enough that everybody else tosses in a bit of toughness and Vitality, or instead brings a healer and CC specialist along for the ride.

P.S. Telegraphed attacks and mechanics that’s heavily support DPS or put ridiculous focus on dodging (I’m looking at you Lupi) are the culprit. Dodging should be as important in pve as it is in pvp. Not the be all end all

this just sounds like ramping up boss dmg or attack frequency. i think the core of the encounters are still quite boring compared to trinity mmos. couldnt you still clear with 5 knights? everyone could be doing the same thing, avoiding attacks and doing some dmg inbetween.

I absolutely hate the traditional trinity, but its pretty satisfying as the healer, tank, or that one dps that needed to get something done and succeded.

Seera.5916:

No to required roles. I do not want to have to wait for a player who has a specific build and is skilled in their role in order to play the game.

I want to be able to group with my friends and we all play the characters and builds we want to play. Not have to worry about finding the content in the game that does require our gear set up or having to have someone play a character or change build to something they’re not wanting to play.

you can change builds at any time. all you would potentially need is 1 more set of gear. and i honestly see no way around the current dungeons which are faceroll at worst and moderately difficult with randos at best which allows for any team comp to clear. if you dont require roles, theres not much you can do to make bosses interesting.

i think that will end up resulting in an optimal clear where every does damage and trades aggro. i dont think a dedicated healer would ever have a role unless it was somehow mechanically required. I would love to see encounters that force multiple build types in a team.

I think designing instances by allowing content to be clearable by any group comp has lead to less build variety as one piece of the holy trinity far outclasses the others.

I think its time to divide the roles once again in instances. I would be interested in fights that require both heavy condi and heavy physical dmg along with support and control. maybe a boss that has loads of toughness and physical dmg is not very effective. this boss is immune to all damaging conditions and requires 3 ccs to land in a short window. the boss reacts to the first cc by ccing the person who threw it, or hunkering down and blocking attacks for a bit or leaping away. After the ccs land the boss will be stunned and a significant amnt of physical dmg in a short window will then remove his immunity from condis which do a crapton of dmg to him.

I really think its time to provide roles for individuals rather than simple positioning mechanics and dps whenever. this increases accountability and in turn rewards. for instance if your job was to burst hard in a specific moment and you failed, you would be the one that let your team down. conversely if you succeede in a really hard fight, you get the credit. you feel like the team actually couldnt have done it without you.

I really hope theres a future with new and much more difficult/rewarding instanced content. I also think its time to return to well defined roles and required team comps to complete content. I totally support the omission of a healer though. thoughts?

I have only dabbled a bit with the traps but I’m having a tough time justifying them over the amazing survival skills that cleanse 2 condis and provide fury. Which 2 do you use? Burning and spike?

I think that would make spirits really boring..since it would never be worth it to kill them yourself. I like that your opponents are rewarded for killing them rather than punished, but I agree they should be more difficult to kill, either by increasing their range so they can be placed in a different location or by giving them more health.

I like the idea of spirits having mediocre boons but they really need to buff the actives a bit more, particularly the range. I think it’s too much like how signets used to be, the actives aren’t good enough to sacrifice the spirit. So a vast majority of the time, the best way to use the spirit will probably be just use the active at the last second (if at all). I think these things need to be given the signet treatment now where you may actually be motivated to blow up the spirits earlier.

My suggestion would be to make a trait that makes spirits heal on death, something small but significant. Maybe 2 spirits = 1 virtue of resolve activation or something. This will give ranger incentive to use the active a little more.

what skills do you try to get the quickdraw reduction on?