My concers on this patch are being mainly from a sPvP perspective. And also, I haven’t played a big deal, so I can’t tell anything further than a first impressions.
First of all, balance wise, I think this has been the biggest patch we have had (the 23rd June Core Specializations update doesn’t count!), which is a good thing and what’s better: the reiterate appareance of the word “rework”. I like to see the willingness to rework things and I’d love to see more of that in the future with unused trait lines or weapons/skills.
However, I have to agree with some of the claims that some changes were “lazy”, such as the Alacrity nerf to Chronomancer. I think, then, that this perspective of laziness is caused by the game type you play. While that change was “good” for PvE, in PvP the problem came from other sources of Chrono. I think that this highlights the need to split the balance from PvE and PvP.
On another note, I’d love if you could share some Stronghold info, of whatever kind soon™. But that’s secondary I think.
Anyways, from my perspective the changes were good. Not perfect, but a first really good shot. Expecting more changes soon.
I won’t racially slurr you. I’ll just tell that an expansion (with the new Elite Specialization, with its new skills and mechanics) launched 2 weeks ago and that is not enough time for a meta-game to settle down, nor for ANet to correctly balance the game.
I’d advice you to give it some more time and don’t give up playing (i.e. try to have fun). I can tell you Thief is not the most OP thing right now, you will see by yourself if you keep playing.
P.S.: QQMore.net is a helpful site for newer players.
That’s very boring to watch, boring to play, boring to play against (proof is people dance in matches like that). We need to start getting together and ask ourselves. Where is the fun?
If this is a community effort, I’d rather ask “What is fun?”. Some people might find different things fun. I’m not refering to certain specs but more general things such as support, damage, outplays, conditions, etc…
On the play part, I think that Conquest has a “flaw”: DPS and Sustain are and will be king, there are no “niche” builds. Less build variation and less identity players can feel when theorycrafting.
I agree, though, that matches are much fun to play if insane bunkers aren’t around, that can tank a 1vs2 for a long time, as well as a meta with more DPS is more enjoyable. However, that’s not too easy to balance, as if people feel that tank-y classes are not as efficient/fun to play as DPS ones, people might switch from a sustain meta to a totally oriented DPS meta. It doesn’t have to occur this way, of course, but it’s some random thoughts.
On the watch part, I think that what makes people have fun watching the game is not a 1vs1 in a point, but rather teamfights/skirmishies (3vs3 or so) and players +1ing a 1vs1. It’s not the fights, but the decisions teams take into the match to balance them into their favor.
There’s no fun in watching, for example, a Druid vs a bunker guard in a point. That is boring to play, boring to watch and possibly displays a lack of communication within one of those teams and this last one is not solved by balancing or anything that ANet can do. How a team wants to play the match might be boring and lose, but hey, they made it boring.
As a last note, if a meta evolves into heavy DPS (not what you suggested, I know) it can be equally bad and matches drag too long (because teams can’t cap points, because there are always fights/deaths, etc…) as it happens on a sustain meta. This is simply a matter of class balancing in the case of Conquest, sometimes we will have a sustain meta, other times it will be a pure DPS meta or it can be a perfect mix of both.
Anyways, sorry if I’m not exactly clear, I still don’t have my mind set in this topic, there are many things to take into account. It’s easy to propose, but the results may very well be completely different. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t suggest how to improve sPvP!
P.S.: Between a pure DPS meta and a sustain meta I prefer a sustain one. I’m a little baddie and I prefer not to stay in respawn half the match!
That was soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo sweet, dude. Incredible play!
I would play a Daredevil build with Acro/Trick/DrD, probably something like 2-3-3 or 2-3-1 in Acro. I just love the feeling Acrobatics gives to Thief, even though it’s not as good as it used to be.
In case you didn’t know Jackums, you can chose to queue only for Conquest, Stronghold or both. If you have selected Conquest only and you get Stronghold, that is probably a bug you should report! (The options are under the Ranked Match queue button, iirc).
On topic, I’d consider we are all still noobs on Stronghold. Some tips I’d love to share:
1. (Queueing Solo) If you don’t have CC or Boon Removal, go to the Trebuchet in most cases when a Mist Essence Spawns. Trebuchet removes every Stability stack and knocks down the one who is channeling (and it’s annoying and does damage, which is good).
2. Remember that you can put boons and heal Doorbreakers, Archers, Guards… anything! Support builds can feel awesome and you feel great joy watching how the enemy hopelessly tries to kill your minions.
3. If you don’t trust your teammates, in my experience, go to the defense lane and try to secure that the enemy team doesn’t break the door (Trebuchet, killing DBs/Archer near the spawn, crippling them, etc).
4. Try to always summon the Heroes. They are really important and they bring you a lot of points which helps inmensely if the match ends to time. Also, defend him, if a Hero arrives to the Lord Room and your team is with you it’s a secure win.
5. Supply management and push timing are impactful as well. Making sure you always maintain pressure with minions on the offensive lane will gain you positional advantage.
6. Look always at the time to know when will Mist Essence spawns, as well as memorize on which side will the Mist Essence spawn.
(First Mist Essence at 12:00, spawns on the team side that has lesser points. The one at 9:00 spawns on the other side always, 6:00 and 3:00 spawns always on both sides).
7. If you are being heavily pressured, try to sneak a couple of Archers on the offensive lane. It will kill their Guards alone (if there’s any guard on their base) or, hopefully, force someone off the pressure. You see someone defends, you attack the enemy team on the defensive lane.
I think that’s all I can say for now. Hope it helps anyone!
Matchmaking is always trying to make 50/50 matches. There is no active streak-prevention built into matchmaking other than the fact that your MMR adjusts each game. Since you’ve been playing so much, your MMR is ‘certain’ and changes slowly. It has certainly adjusted over the course of the weekend, though.
I suggest watching your game history via a site like http://gw2efficiency.com/account/pvp that uses our new PvP API. This way you know exactly what streaks you’re on.
Edit: Both your streaks were when you played Engineer, which has a lower profession MMR than your account and other professions. Looks like you win more often on Thief
The flaw in this is pinballing MMR/games.
MMR should never try to force a 50% winrate, that will happen in time as your MMR rises.Forcing? Uhm… If we assume two equal teams – or unequal for that matter – there is a 50% chance you will win and a 50% chance you will loose. Which means that the average over time will be just that, 50%.
Its hard to avoid basic math. People that doesnt approach this is doing things to avoid it. Like the pics above. Its not suspicious at all with 80% winrate in custom arenas and close to 50% in any normal matchup. Nope, not at all.
The intent of your comment is quite sinister. It seems to me that the current matchmaking is just fine with you and that you don’t give a care that experienced players are algorithmically being pulled down and prevented from progressing. That or
you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.More than anything, your comment is disrespectful to the OP and others who have experienced unfair matchmaking.
The devs admitted it’s not very fair and that “streaks” do happen depending on MMR. Yet, we have no idea what it is because it’s hidden from us. And all of that seems to be okay with you. That’s fine with me but you have no right to speak for us about the answers we seek.
I have maybe read wrong. Before saying anything more, I agree that we have a lot of information about the current system “hidden” from us: we don’t have numbers, statistics, etc…
That said, on one hand, Evan said the system always tries to do a 50/50 matches, which is natural. On top of that, the OP has been playing a lot recently as Evan has also said, which makes OP’s MMR to adjust more slowly. Id est, 50/50 matches with little MMR movement should mean he has been playing with his the same MMR players pool (ideally).
So… no losing streak should affect him I believe? Maybe I understood wrong. This is, not taking into account what Justin said (which is 5 months old and it could have been changed, who knows).
If we consider Justin information, then it might be not a “losing streak” effect but simply bad luck due to a bad matchmaking (and even this is uncertain given the information on Justin post, because he writes that MMR isn’t the only factor that affects matchmaking).
Then, all of these affirmations are based on the lack of information we have: Justin said matchmaking in the oversimplification seemed unfair, but there are other factors considered (that we don’t know); while Evan just told that, while there’s no streak-prevention system other than MMR, OP’s MMR wasn’t volatile, so he should have faced people of his same skill (ideally).
I have experienced losing streaks as well and it sucks. But I’ve had winning streaks and “normal(?)” streaks as well (50/50). We can just hope matchmaking gets better.
P.S.: It’s interesting how, at least in this case, the profession MMR (which doesn’t factor into matches as Evan clarified) was pretty “accurate”. It’s good to know that.
This wasn’t from 5 months ago, but I remember a thread where Justin said the matches you enter are pre-determined or at least has a percentage of your win ratio for that match. He made a comment telling someone that they had an x% of winning a certain match. And the number wasn’t 50.
That confirms that you are in literally an underdog team that matchmaking created in favor of your opponents.
And we’re not stupid, we didn’t need the confirmation that we were in the weaker team because we figured it out already. Don’t tell me you have never been deflated and wondered what in heavens name your team is doing and why you were teamed with them in the first place.
Oh yeah, they make the “odds of victory” thingie when the match is already made, or at least that’s what they tell officially? If you are referring to that, it’s team-wide even if you queue Solo, I believe.
I’ve wondered that many times, don’t worry, we all have felt like that I think.
Also, thank you for the clarification.
Matchmaking is always trying to make 50/50 matches. There is no active streak-prevention built into matchmaking other than the fact that your MMR adjusts each game. Since you’ve been playing so much, your MMR is ‘certain’ and changes slowly. It has certainly adjusted over the course of the weekend, though.
I suggest watching your game history via a site like http://gw2efficiency.com/account/pvp that uses our new PvP API. This way you know exactly what streaks you’re on.
Edit: Both your streaks were when you played Engineer, which has a lower profession MMR than your account and other professions. Looks like you win more often on Thief
The flaw in this is pinballing MMR/games.
MMR should never try to force a 50% winrate, that will happen in time as your MMR rises.Forcing? Uhm… If we assume two equal teams – or unequal for that matter – there is a 50% chance you will win and a 50% chance you will loose. Which means that the average over time will be just that, 50%.
Its hard to avoid basic math. People that doesnt approach this is doing things to avoid it. Like the pics above. Its not suspicious at all with 80% winrate in custom arenas and close to 50% in any normal matchup. Nope, not at all.
The intent of your comment is quite sinister. It seems to me that the current matchmaking is just fine with you and that you don’t give a care that experienced players are algorithmically being pulled down and prevented from progressing. That or
you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.More than anything, your comment is disrespectful to the OP and others who have experienced unfair matchmaking.
The devs admitted it’s not very fair and that “streaks” do happen depending on MMR. Yet, we have no idea what it is because it’s hidden from us. And all of that seems to be okay with you. That’s fine with me but you have no right to speak for us about the answers we seek.
I have maybe read wrong. Before saying anything more, I agree that we have a lot of information about the current system “hidden” from us: we don’t have numbers, statistics, etc…
That said, on one hand, Evan said the system always tries to do a 50/50 matches, which is natural. On top of that, the OP has been playing a lot recently as Evan has also said, which makes OP’s MMR to adjust more slowly. Id est, 50/50 matches with little MMR movement should mean he has been playing with his the same MMR players pool (ideally).
So… no losing streak should affect him I believe? Maybe I understood wrong. This is, not taking into account what Justin said (which is 5 months old and it could have been changed, who knows).
If we consider Justin information, then it might be not a “losing streak” effect but simply bad luck due to a bad matchmaking (and even this is uncertain given the information on Justin post, because he writes that MMR isn’t the only factor that affects matchmaking).
Then, all of these affirmations are based on the lack of information we have: Justin said matchmaking in the oversimplification seemed unfair, but there are other factors considered (that we don’t know); while Evan just told that, while there’s no streak-prevention system other than MMR, OP’s MMR wasn’t volatile, so he should have faced people of his same skill (ideally).
I have experienced losing streaks as well and it sucks. But I’ve had winning streaks and “normal(?)” streaks as well (50/50). We can just hope matchmaking gets better.
P.S.: It’s interesting how, at least in this case, the profession MMR (which doesn’t factor into matches as Evan clarified) was pretty “accurate”. It’s good to know that.
Guys, you can balance on two different ways: either buffing unused stuff or nerfing overused stuff. Guess what’s the best way to go? For me a mix of both. Nerfs to the overused spec while giving this same spec some buffs as well, along with buffs to unused stuff.
That said, I mostly agree with the OP, but I’d divide the changes into different parts. For example, right now with D/P SA Thieves, the buff to Shadow Refuge would be an overkill. However, if some changes goes through the SA specialization then it might make that change totally viable, recovering some SA identity while giving more utility to non-stealth (as a main mechanic) builds.
As for my own biases on Thief, I loved S/D and the build has been pretty much killed by full SA Access for D/P users and an overall classes’ increase of direct/condition damage, along with a nerf to the build’s evasion (Feline Grace “nerf”, Vigor nerf…)
So, I’d love if ANet totally reworked Acrobatics. Even the Daredevil elite specialization brings more to S/D than Acrobatics does at the moment. I still don’t know what I’d suggest, because as I see it, it’d need a complete new identity.
Aside from that, I think a nerf on Trickery is much needed, although as once Sizer told, Trickery is needed for newer Thief players to stay “safe” and “relevant” on matches. Low Steal CD, heal, damage, daze and vigor, it has many things.
But, as a whole, I agree with your changes to Trickery. The combo Bountiful Theft + Sleight of Hand is just so good to ignore, as well as Preparedness that, as you mentioned, would be nice if it went baseline.
Now that we talk about traits, your Improvisation suggestion is brilliant. It is both a nerf (you can’t get 3 utilities off CD randomly with one click) and a buff (you actually control the situation. “I have the buff, I’ll use Shadowstep for mobility, I’ll have it shortly”.)
I read here also a suggestion to improve the Tricks skill type and it was to make the Trickster trait to give those skills “new” functionality, such as “Caltrops now inflict Torment as well” or “Roll for Initiative now gives Super speed for X seconds”. I think this would compete with Bountiful Theft given some changes to utilities and other triats.
As for the Thief playstyle… it’s always tricky. S/D was all about mobility and getting in and out of the fights easily (thanks to Sword #2 power), constantly pressuring and not necessarily bursting. D/P, however, proves to be a burst-y, “vulnerable” build, relying on good stealth usage (SA traits simply messed up with this “balance”). So, as you implied, nerfing passive traits on SA would bring D/P to it’s original supposed role I feel it should have: "I can “burst” but I need my stealth. Do I use it to attack or defend and escape?"
Right now S/D Thief can’t sustain himself in fights long enough to justify the “reduced” damage compared to other builds. It has greater mobility but you can’t duel other classes equally anymore (it still can be done, though. S/D magicz!). On the other hand, D/P has lost some burst potential, but has gained more team support (Shadow Refuge ressing with other things) and, sadly, a very unhealthy passive playstyle for the game.
Finally, I agree with most of your weapon skill changes, but I’d change Shadow Shot (D/P #3). I only want that skill’s blind to be evadable. Maybe it was changed and I didn’t notice, but the skill’s blind goes, for example through dodges or Thieves’ S/D #3 Flanking Strike. Told you, I have my biases. :P
P.S.: Props to @blarghhrrkblah.3412 for bringing me here from the PvP Forums!
If I remember reading good, they are still improving the PvP stats API (or whatever, I don’t know exactly how it works) so I’d expect more stats and information for it in the next weeks or months. Maybe, I don’t really know.
Anyways, it’s a good start. Looks really neat!
I like how anet keeps refreshing the update date, but the leaderboards aren’t active for a few months now…
If you think they aren’t tracking their points system, match history, etc, while the Leaderboard is off-season then I believe you are inaccurate. They might not show it to us, but I’m sure they are keeping track of it. It sucks to not have the Leaderboard active but well, we have to wait until Leagues.¯\(?)/¯
Edit: omg the ascii doesn’t work here on the forums?
(edited by Poliator.7021)
@Grouch:
So… one thing that would be nice on the Introduction (aside from changing Team Arena to Ranked Arena + explaining only 4 maps will be there) is to explain how they can access Hot Joins now that the “Practice” Button has been deleted. It can be something a new player doesn’t know about.
Also, maybe it would be helpful to link Academy Gaming website. They usually provide good articles on various topics of sPvP, it can be helpful both for new players and some vets too.
Edit: I forgot, Denshee (SUPERCHEY on Twitch) streams more often now (or at least I see him usually on the Twitch list), it’d be nice to add him on the Streamers section.