Guild Wars 2

Windsagio.1340:

Jerus.4350:

It’s not a matter of “ohh you’re in defensive gear, you must suck” while it may be a common response it’s a response of idiots. What it is though is “ohh you’re in defensive gear, well now you can suck and be fine”. It allows you to be less skilled, doesn’t require it.

If you choose to bring all the safety nets you can, that’s fine, but trying to say that choosing this should not punish you in any way… well it’s silly.

It does punish you — at least if you care about speed or big numbers. It doesn’t punish you much and that’s fine.

To the point of the OP, for most dungeons there’s ‘one right answer’, and that’s kind of a letdown, at least philosophically.

Then the “let down” is of your own limitation.
There is significantly more than one way to complete each encounter, or each dungeon.

Even “optimal” is debatable. I’m sure those who set records have had to try a lot of different strategies, builds and team comps over the past 2-3 years.

so.. The philosophical “let down” is the limitations of your own mind.

Leo G.4501:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

“playing offensively without offensive gear will lower your damage by like 60% everything you do will be substantially less effective.”

-Doesn’t alter the play style.

“playing offensively in nomads and clerics gear is not playing offensively. because you are 60% lower than max effecincy”

-still, doesn’t change the play style.

“playing defensively in berserker can still have you at max effeciency, which is not taking enough damage to kill you.”

Lol kind of the point. It doesn’t alter the playstyle which is the issue that could be changed.

But yeah you guys are posting a lot (most of it repeating the same thing). I’ll try to make some responds when I get home. . .

please begin with:
“This is why I think stats should alter playstyle..”

And no “because other games do it that way” is not a good answer.

“playing offensively without offensive gear will lower your damage by like 60% everything you do will be substantially less effective.”

-Doesn’t alter the play style.

“playing offensively in nomads and clerics gear is not playing offensively. because you are 60% lower than max effecincy”

-still, doesn’t change the play style.

“playing defensively in berserker can still have you at max effeciency, which is not taking enough damage to kill you.”

-not if you’re dying all the time. & playing defensively at all may not be optimal.

“playing in knights gear is harder than zerker IF you play with a high skill level, because you will have to do everything longer. taking one extra hit does not negate the fact that you had to fight twice as long.
sometimes you dont even get one extra hit out of knights.”

- that bolded & capitalized the key part of that sentence..
Inversely:
Playing in knights gear is easier than zerker unless you play with a high skill level

“speaking of people who cant play well in any gear isnt really relevant.”

So people who are still learning to play are irrelevant?
Elitist pot and kettle black.

Sure some stat combos are weak/pointless.

Feel free to list which gear types you think need improving/removing.
Don’t forget for each to include a sentence as to why.

nope, playing offensively does not require offensive gear.
I can play offensively in clerics or even nomads gear.

Playing in “full zerker” is easy.
But then so is walking up to a boss and dying.
Playing it well is not easy. This is where the learning curve is much longer than you seem to realise.

also knights gear is not harder to play than zerker.
edit:
I’ve met a lot of people who can’t play well in any type of gear. Just to point that out.

Another currency.
When we already have one sat around doing nothing for many ( pristine relics).
Which probably won’t get added to the wallet.

I’ll have to pass.

TPMN.1483:

“stats in a game are supposed to represent how you build yourself.”
- wrong. This is not a RPG MMO more an action mmo.

I can play defensively all day by running around in big circles at 600-900 range with perma swiftness ! I am now the master of defense ?

Funny I do this quite often ( as guardian) with the ettin in the harpy fractal.
I keep his attention by being the only one attacking him and the occasional imob so he can’t rush to my party mates who are beating the daylights out of the fire shaman.
So i’m being aggressive toward the ettin, to defend my party from him.
I still do this tank playstyle in full zerker. However I start playing full aggressive to bring down the bunny and bomber. I will then switch back to aggressive when the shaman is dead to bring down the ettin ASAP.

Except that people ARE choosing to take more defensive stat gear, because it makes it easier to learn the encounters. It provides a safety net. AKA difficulty slider.

Yes, gw2 favors the skilled by rewarding them with the ability to complete content faster and yield more reward in the time they have to play.
Yes defensive stats result in killing things slower. This is how your rewards are reduced. You can complete less in the time you have available.

so:
greater skill = less need for defensive stats = more reward*
lesser skill = greater need for defensive stats = less reward*

*within your play time frame.

Playing defensively does NOT mean playing unskillfully. But it does not mean you require defensive gear. It also doesn’t mean you can ONLY play defensively. Playstyle can switch even within a single fight.
There is no problem here.

You still haven’t explained how you suggest to improve things rather than drive players away.

tl:dr
It honestly seems like you want a completely different game. One where there are roles such as “tank” “dps” and “healer” which are much more clearly defined. As opposed to each and every player taking equal responsibility for each role.

I understand, its a radical shift in the way you play. It has a learning curve to it that is long. It requires much more adaptation and progressive thinking. It’s not for everyone.

maddoctor.2738:

phys.7689:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

phys.7689:

spoj.9672:

You still havent explained how you got those numbers though. And like i said whatever numeric comparison you give is meaningless. Actual gameplay effectiveness is what matters. It doesnt matter if toughness gives you really poor returns compared to power. If toughness allows you to survive encounters with greater ease then it is effective at doing that.

ok ignore the numbers, thats fine, because its even worse when you look at how you describe for pve.

a highly skilled person with 100% toughness cannot survive better than a person with 100% power.

they can make more mistakes, but a highly skilled person does not make that many mistakes. toughness, vitality give no benefit for skillfull play. thats why the more skill full you get, the less useful the stats are.

now, i know you say this is always the case, but it is not. in other games, being a top of the line defender is about skillful play.

So.. greater skill = less need for defensive stats.
Inversely: lesser skill = greater need for defensive stats.

looks fine to me.

because you connect being defensive minded with being less skillfull.

that doesnt have to be the case.

In a game without trinity it is.

Defensive minded players are there to get attacked and hold mob attention on them, that’s why they exist. In a game with dynamic action combat, defensive stats just give you a bit of extra survivability for when you make a mistake and mess up. So, since the defensive stats offer an extra layer of protection for player mistakes, it requires SLIGHTLY less skill to play with those stats.

And if you go all out in defensive gear you don’t even have to dodge attacks, there’ve been numerous videos on this thread alone showing what a full defensive party can do, facerolling through the hardest content without even dodging. How is that skillful?

Because the pros stack and 1 and they are pro, so doing that makes me pro too!

/sarcasm

phys.7689:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

phys.7689:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

phys.7689:

NikeEU.7690:

phys.7689:

they can make more mistakes, but a highly skilled person does not make that many mistakes. toughness, vitality give no benefit for skillfull play. thats why the more skill full you get, the less useful the stats are.

And we see that as a good thing. The only possible objection is you want tanky stats to be equally good for experienced players for… the sake of getting to use gear with a different name. Who cares what the name of the gear is? Just use what is most effective based on your skill level.

I like being criticized for “defending the status quo.” Sure. Whatever. The implication being that if the system was to change the good players wouldn’t be adaptable and suddenly all the bad players who have their Soldiers set would become the best players in the game. Sadly for you guys, the good players would still be better than the bad players regardless. They would still finish content faster and more cleanly. There would still be elitism and there would still be a meta and there would still be build exclusion. None of the so-called problems of the “zerker meta” have anything to do with the gear, but are the simple result of community standards and regardless of what you do there will always be community standards.

you like to assume a lot, you like to be adversarial.

There is no implication, good players will be good players, that wont change, why would i want it to change? Changing stats wont change that.

This isnt about elitism, that has nothing to do with build variety, many other games have elitism, and they dont have berserker style play.

This is very simple:
the point of stat customization existing at all, should be to customize your game play and build, to work to create various playstyles. Thats the only reason you should put it in a game.

If the game is better off without stat customization, which is a position that may have merit, then TAKE OUT STAT CUSTOMIZATION.

the best argument for our current implementation of stat customization is that you can use it to set handicap.
you know whats better at setting handicaps?
a little meter you move over that sets your handicap.

So how about a difficulty slider that works like this:

0% damage reduction: 100% rewards.
100% damage reduction 0% rewards.

Oh, and everyone is basically in full zerker. Just with higher base stats instead of stats on gear.
How many are going to want to turn that slider down from 100% rewards?
How many are going to prefer this to being able to take different gear, and simply slow down the run in favor of making it easier?
note: this would come at the cost of dev time, reducing the content we get to play.

i would have no problem with that slider at all.
devs are already spending time trying to figure out how to balance stats, and reworking things because stats have a large rng.

stats have rng?
care to back that statement up?

i meant range not rng. as in the variation between stats requires them to spend extra time balancing, like they had to juggle a number of traits multiple times due to the stats attached to them.

and whenever they design a boss, they have to consider the large variation in dps between different stats.

ect.

so you want everyone forced onto one stat set?

I’ve already posted the problem with this before:
option 1 ( eg cele gear stats included in base stats):
You get so good at the game you have pointless defensive stats you don’t need, get bored and leave the game

option 2 ( eg berserker gear included in base stats):
It takes so long to learn every fight, you are forced to go watch video guides outside of game, or you quit and leave the game because you can’t get past the initial learning curve.

either way: people leave the game. GG company goes bust due to no clients. no more gw2. ( are you secretly a blizzard troll trying to pull people back to WoW?)

So. Given difficulty slider already exists in the form of gear.

what exactly are you proposing to “improve” the game?

phys.7689:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

phys.7689:

spoj.9672:

You still havent explained how you got those numbers though. And like i said whatever numeric comparison you give is meaningless. Actual gameplay effectiveness is what matters. It doesnt matter if toughness gives you really poor returns compared to power. If toughness allows you to survive encounters with greater ease then it is effective at doing that.

ok ignore the numbers, thats fine, because its even worse when you look at how you describe for pve.

a highly skilled person with 100% toughness cannot survive better than a person with 100% power.

they can make more mistakes, but a highly skilled person does not make that many mistakes. toughness, vitality give no benefit for skillfull play. thats why the more skill full you get, the less useful the stats are.

now, i know you say this is always the case, but it is not. in other games, being a top of the line defender is about skillful play.

So.. greater skill = less need for defensive stats.
Inversely: lesser skill = greater need for defensive stats.

looks fine to me.

because you connect being defensive minded with being less skillfull.

that doesnt have to be the case.

That doesn’t make any sense to me.

phys.7689:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

phys.7689:

NikeEU.7690:

phys.7689:

they can make more mistakes, but a highly skilled person does not make that many mistakes. toughness, vitality give no benefit for skillfull play. thats why the more skill full you get, the less useful the stats are.

And we see that as a good thing. The only possible objection is you want tanky stats to be equally good for experienced players for… the sake of getting to use gear with a different name. Who cares what the name of the gear is? Just use what is most effective based on your skill level.

I like being criticized for “defending the status quo.” Sure. Whatever. The implication being that if the system was to change the good players wouldn’t be adaptable and suddenly all the bad players who have their Soldiers set would become the best players in the game. Sadly for you guys, the good players would still be better than the bad players regardless. They would still finish content faster and more cleanly. There would still be elitism and there would still be a meta and there would still be build exclusion. None of the so-called problems of the “zerker meta” have anything to do with the gear, but are the simple result of community standards and regardless of what you do there will always be community standards.

you like to assume a lot, you like to be adversarial.

There is no implication, good players will be good players, that wont change, why would i want it to change? Changing stats wont change that.

This isnt about elitism, that has nothing to do with build variety, many other games have elitism, and they dont have berserker style play.

This is very simple:
the point of stat customization existing at all, should be to customize your game play and build, to work to create various playstyles. Thats the only reason you should put it in a game.

If the game is better off without stat customization, which is a position that may have merit, then TAKE OUT STAT CUSTOMIZATION.

the best argument for our current implementation of stat customization is that you can use it to set handicap.
you know whats better at setting handicaps?
a little meter you move over that sets your handicap.

So how about a difficulty slider that works like this:

0% damage reduction: 100% rewards.
100% damage reduction 0% rewards.

Oh, and everyone is basically in full zerker. Just with higher base stats instead of stats on gear.
How many are going to want to turn that slider down from 100% rewards?
How many are going to prefer this to being able to take different gear, and simply slow down the run in favor of making it easier?
note: this would come at the cost of dev time, reducing the content we get to play.

i would have no problem with that slider at all.
devs are already spending time trying to figure out how to balance stats, and reworking things because stats have a large rng.

stats have rng?
care to back that statement up?

edit: and btw: you already have that slider.
Knights gear = lower dps = longer kill times = less rewards in the same time.
gear is your slider. Its just not quite so obvious, or easy/cheap to change.
Open world being pretty screwed due to being reliant on everyone else in a zerg anyway ( reason for wanting more dungeons over this zerg bs).

phys.7689:

NikeEU.7690:

phys.7689:

they can make more mistakes, but a highly skilled person does not make that many mistakes. toughness, vitality give no benefit for skillfull play. thats why the more skill full you get, the less useful the stats are.

And we see that as a good thing. The only possible objection is you want tanky stats to be equally good for experienced players for… the sake of getting to use gear with a different name. Who cares what the name of the gear is? Just use what is most effective based on your skill level.

I like being criticized for “defending the status quo.” Sure. Whatever. The implication being that if the system was to change the good players wouldn’t be adaptable and suddenly all the bad players who have their Soldiers set would become the best players in the game. Sadly for you guys, the good players would still be better than the bad players regardless. They would still finish content faster and more cleanly. There would still be elitism and there would still be a meta and there would still be build exclusion. None of the so-called problems of the “zerker meta” have anything to do with the gear, but are the simple result of community standards and regardless of what you do there will always be community standards.

you like to assume a lot, you like to be adversarial.

There is no implication, good players will be good players, that wont change, why would i want it to change? Changing stats wont change that.

This isnt about elitism, that has nothing to do with build variety, many other games have elitism, and they dont have berserker style play.

This is very simple:
the point of stat customization existing at all, should be to customize your game play and build, to work to create various playstyles. Thats the only reason you should put it in a game.

If the game is better off without stat customization, which is a position that may have merit, then TAKE OUT STAT CUSTOMIZATION.

the best argument for our current implementation of stat customization is that you can use it to set handicap.
you know whats better at setting handicaps?
a little meter you move over that sets your handicap.

So how about a difficulty slider that works like this:

0% damage reduction: 100% rewards.
100% damage reduction 0% rewards.

Oh, and everyone is basically in full zerker. Just with higher base stats instead of stats on gear.
How many are going to want to turn that slider down from 100% rewards?
How many are going to prefer this to being able to take different gear, and simply slow down the run in favor of making it easier?
note: this would come at the cost of dev time, reducing the content we get to play.

phys.7689:

spoj.9672:

You still havent explained how you got those numbers though. And like i said whatever numeric comparison you give is meaningless. Actual gameplay effectiveness is what matters. It doesnt matter if toughness gives you really poor returns compared to power. If toughness allows you to survive encounters with greater ease then it is effective at doing that.

ok ignore the numbers, thats fine, because its even worse when you look at how you describe for pve.

a highly skilled person with 100% toughness cannot survive better than a person with 100% power.

they can make more mistakes, but a highly skilled person does not make that many mistakes. toughness, vitality give no benefit for skillfull play. thats why the more skill full you get, the less useful the stats are.

now, i know you say this is always the case, but it is not. in other games, being a top of the line defender is about skillful play.

So.. greater skill = less need for defensive stats.
Inversely: lesser skill = greater need for defensive stats.

looks fine to me.

phys.7689:

spoj.9672:

Yes stats should never have been implemented. But its too late now.

And the point of stats in this game is not to change the way you play. Its to change the effectiveness of various passive parts of the system. Its a build supplementor. Not a build changer.

as a build supplementor it is extremely poorly balanced to the point of being useless/deceptive.

givers: Become 40% tougher. heal for 15% more boons last 6% longer overall, lets say 50% more survivable. heck lets make it 60% you are about 20% (better at supporting.

zerker:
117% more base dmg 35% more chance to crit 50% more damage per crit
something like 200% more damage?

thats a really crappy supplement compared to berserker. which is why it sucks as a supplement, its illogical to select anything but berzerker.
and whats even worse? in game design, passive survival is less useful to begin with. so its actually an ever worse tradeoff.

so basically, stat customization is a lie at supplementing your build.
And thats why there is always this rage. anyone who didnt pick berserk realizes eventually, that their stat points are straight up inferior. not just from a gameplay perspective, but in raw numbers, just inferior.

I’m pretty sure the majority of players will agree giver’s is a terribad stat.

Now compare soldiers or sentinels to zerker.

maddoctor.2738:

phys.7689:

Jerus.4350:

Leo G.4501:

NoTrigger.8396:

actually gw2 has the most entitled community ive ever seen in the history of seeing gaming communitys.

I’d actually say GW2 has the most intolerant and close-minded community I’ve encountered. Entitlement tends to be on a case-by-case basis since it also depends on context. Like, seems those that fervently defend PvE meta and speed runs think they’re entitled to some sort of upper status where they should somehow have more weight to their opinion.

But as far as intolerant and close-minded, I see it reflected in-game and on the forums. It often results in lots of wasted discussion and effort.

Can be seen on both sides of most arguments unfortunately.

Said it before and I’ll say it again, I enjoy the current GW2 system because it puts your tools on easily changeable tools, with gear in PVE mainly being a difficulty slider, both allowing less skills/active/whatever players to get by by beefing up a bit, and players can glass up and doing so is rewarded with faster kill times. These two people can group together and they both have their individual difficulty, I think it’s a pretty great setup.

On top of that by keeping most of the game based around actively defending yourself it keeps a player engaged. I played MMOs way back, and the reason I quit my first MMO completely after YEARS of always coming back was because it got boring, playing was too much based around using the correct setup and not enough to actively do. So I’d be doing raids half afk, and the one reaction I’d have to make every couple mins I’d only ever miss because I was so bored I stopped paying attention. So I like this setup. Some attrition based mechanics could perhaps encourage more tanky setups, but the flip side to attrition based mechanics is that you can also simply stack the dps and burn through it. So I’m not an overly big fan of those.

Again I’ll say if tank gear is something they want to make popular, they could put out “hard modes” that are unforgiving in that once you’re downed you’re dead and there’s no coming back. Perfect runs are required. Doing that and you’d have a lot of people loading up their safety nets again, only the especially brave would continue to glass up and believe they can handle it without a mistake.

its not really a pure difficulty slider

the game is actually probably hardest when your gear is in the middle.
because truth is, high dps does make fights easier
high defense also makes it easier

being in the middle? you fight long enough to make more mistakes, and mistakes can kill you.

i still say its a crappy difficulty slider and if thats the purpose they should design a real one.

stats should change how you play/how effective you are at various playstyles
or they shouldnt exist.

No they shouldn’t change how you play. Stats in the game do NOT affect your playstyle at all, it’s the rest of the build that defines the playstyle and the role, skills, traits and weapon choices. Currently the only exception to this rule is the difference between condition build and power build, other than that you can do anything you want with any gear stats you want. That’s one of the best things about this game.

It allows players to change their builds on the fly to adapt to any situation, without having a huge part of the inventory filled up by different gear sets. Good players are already utilizing most of the available weapons. Take for example a Guardian, all weapons except for the Shield have a use in the game and make certain encounters faster / smoother.

Why lock the player on specific builds / weapons with specific stats? Why limit player choice and variety?

Not true. There are times for shield to be pulled out too.

You’d be surprised how often I have to run clerics guard in fractals.
Especially with eles who dont stop throwing fireballs at archdiviner when he reflects Q.Q

Valento.9852:

I find it funny how many meta-mentality players think zerker stacking is the ultimate playstyle for dungeons, and other equipments are just a ladder until you get “pro”. This is completely wrong, how come you trash all other gear in a game that has no treadmill? Cleric should have its place, it should be wrong to have a full zerker party. It simply trashes all itemization, which is a core fundamental part of RPGs.

clerics gear does have its place.

Why should it be wrong to have a full berserker party?

Cuddy.6247:

Jana.6831:

Cuddy.6247:

I urge you to notice that a player will perform best in gear they’re comfortable with.

I urge you to compare the results of playing with good players, regardless of their gear, versus bad players in zerker.

Not really true, we have someone in our guild who loves to heal people and he’s usually down 80% of the time. Last time we were doing a dungeon he asked whether we’d prefer him as a healer or dps guy, so we said “dps” and it worked a lot better than usual. We carry him around as a healer though anyway because we like him a lot.

It would probably work better if there was such a thing as a healer. Water ele != healer. Support, as a convention, has been completely destroyed in GW2. You don’t have to wear zerker gear to imply DPS, the skillbar is more important. Still, I’m sure many, like him, would have preferred to have larger support roles. I know one of my favorite builds in GW1 was a weapon spell ritualist – very easy to combine Splinter and GDW on 2-3 frontliners in a dungeon to kill every mob with a single attack chain.

We don’t need healers.
You have a skill #6 for that.
Beyond that, learn animations for enemy attacks. Learn when to time dodges or when you can simply walk out of the way – saving endurance for attacks that do require dodge. wanting healers is a learn to play issue. Remember what I said about having the right build is only 10% of the learning curve? THIS is the kind of thing I’m referring to.

Tigaseye.2047:

Ashen.2907:

Different people have fun in different ways. Urging people to not have fun in a game they are playing is probably not a good idea.

If someone’s idea of having fun is to exclude other people they deem less worthy, then they shouldn’t play an MMO.

Or, they should only play it in a totally private (i.e. invisible) way, with a group of pre-selected friends (i.e. they shouldn’t list, or join listed, groups).

Otherwise, they risk putting off the next generation of players and that is not OK for the future of gaming.

Of course, once again, the main problem lies with the design of the game.

In other games, you simply cant write what you do and don’t want, in a list for dungeons.

You have to take what you’re given.

Then, you may be able to kick, or (more likely) you may leave, but you can’t just deign to never associate with “noobs” in dungeons; unless you only ever make your own premade groups.

Ashen.2907:

Then why are you the one encouraging selfish behavior?

Because, sometimes, you have to fight fire with fire.

I recommend being a nice person to nice people, only.

Unpleasant people think they can win, in life, due to the fact that “nice” people have no choice but to be nice, all the time.

They are wrong.

TPMN.1483:

Knowing how to play a class properly is exactly like a tool in life – anyone can spam 1 !
(Well some people cant even do that properly – but thats besides the point).

We’re not talking about spamming 1, here.

Or in fact, we are, because that is pretty much the advice you are constantly given by “pros” in dungeons.

Stack in one place, constantly, equip a melee weap and (basically) do little more than spam 1.

…and no, it’s no a tool in life, it’s a tool in a game.

A game – as in, a completely pointless (other than to have pointless fun) leisure activity.

So the LFG tool is exclusively yours and should be used only by people who think like you?

And you are complaining about others being selfish. Maybe you should go evaluate why people are selfish towards you.

As for why you’re told to just spam 1, its probably because explaining how to do anything else would take so long ( I spent an hour last week in LA teaching a guildie how to execute a 6 skill staff ele opening rotation, just to get those skills semi-fluidly executed, without any enemies present. I still need to spend 3-4 hours with him at that pace, at least). Who the hell is going to teach some random pug for long, when they could straight up 4man a dungeon without you in 5-15 mins?

You’re told to spam one because if you can’t figure out how to do anything beyond that, you arent worth the effort to teach for the vast majority of people who could. You are being used as an extra dps bot. You’re being treated like an NPC. Like a rangers pet.

Cuddy.6247:

Harper.4173:

Cuddy.6247:

Harper.4173:

Just because the game is designed to be casual friendly doesn’t mean the veteran players have to be casual friendly. Being friendly and nice towards a group of players is a choice.

Some people choose to be friendly and help casuals. I usually just avoid them every chance I get.

Players that expect the game to give them all the info they need to play are perfectly fine – but they shouldn’t expect people who take their performance and execution seriously to give them the time of day.

If you can’t bother to watch a 10 minute guide on the dungeon run you’re about do to – I can’t bother to carry you through it.

Players need to realize that the path to self-improvement comes from within.

If you can’t bother to be kind, I can’t bother to treat you with respect or disregard.

The path to snack pack throwing begins with this kind of jargon.

See? I can deploy euphemisms as a “point” too.

And this is exactly why you and me should never play together in GW2.
I don’t play this game to have a sandbox environment of niceness and patting each other’s back. I play it to get stuff done.

You play this game for completely different reasons than I do and because we have different objectives and means we should most likely never associate.

Now I will never join your party and tell you what to do or how to play – so please – live and let live and never join mine.

I urge you to find better time management if 5 minutes is an appreciable amount of time for you.

I urge you to notice that a player will perform best in gear they’re comfortable with.

I urge you to compare the results of playing with good players, regardless of their gear, versus bad players in zerker.

It’s so easy to turn these euphemisms around.

5 minutes is 1.31g for a highly competent party.

Tigaseye.2047:

^ If you’re seeing more (1)s than the other two options, that should tell you something about human psychology.

It should tell you that you may be approaching things in the wrong way.

Once again, this is NOT a job, or even a tool in life (like a language).

This is a GAME.

As such, the learning experience is supposed to be the fun part, before the monotony of grinding sets in.

Stop ruining people’s fun and only tell them stuff they really need to know (as in the occasional vital tip, if they fail something a few times), or specifically ask you and you will get a lot more (2)s and (3)s.

Seriously, this isn’t rocket science, guys…

Gw2 is a game with a very long learning curve.

Having a good build, reading or watching a guide is only the beginning of that curve.

Learning to then execute what you’ve learnt takes some people dozens of tries.
Then factor is there is 7 dungeons with 3 explorable paths, and 1 with 4 paths. Each path has some different fights/mechanics/requirements. Getting a decent baseline build, then learning what skills/traits/weapons you need to bring for each still leaves you 90% of the learning curve. It just makes that 90% a bit less frustrating for everyone else who has you in their group.

Leo G.4501:

TPMN.1483:

3) it is not rude to point people to wikis/guides/videos/forum posts rather than try to painfully chat about something for 20 mins to help explain something. There is no reason a player should have to explain something for the 50th time if somewhere else has it explained. The person may find it rude they are not taking the time to explain it to them personally in great detail – but honestly a guide may be a much better place to start.
Example:
You don’t take a car apart to repair it without reading a manual first or at least a manual to rebuild it. You could end up with a very expensive mess otherwise and never able to put it back together again. In other words searching external help is a good thing to help you accomplish your task. It is not a failure of the game if there are not enough hints in game.

Well no, pointing to guides and wikis isn’t rude. However, I wouldn’t say a game is a failure if you have to do that, but it IS badly designed. Here’s a cool/funny video about game design and the player by a youtuber named Egoraptor:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FpigqfcvlM

There is a difference between learning secrets and easter eggs and fundamental gameplay needing to be taught. Practically no encounter, IMO, needs a 20min description to educate the player and can be solved with a bit of trial and error on the player’s part. Gameplay becomes more satisfying outside of a guide when it’s designed to be played as such and GW2 is one of those game.

So you’re comparing gw2 to a game with 2 basic actions: jump;shoot. This explains a lot tbh.

I suspect a lot of people would be happy if we got some more uses for the pristine relics ( many suggested armor/weapon boxes, skins, tonic). Personally I’d say skins should still be RNG ( as skin selectable boxes above 30). tonic can stay uber rare – its pure cosmetic anyway. As someone who still has ~3 alts ( 5 including the engi and necro I don’t use in pve) to gear, i wouldn’t mind being able to buy armor/weapon boxes with a substantial number of pristines.

Since fractals is asc gear gated, it’d be nice to be able to make tangible progression toward it with fractal currency.

The same can be said for guild commendations. The currency needs some fresh new uses.

Maybe HoT will have some nice surprises for us ( doubt it..).

Just updated to:
10 points. 21 wins, 17 losses. 55% win ratio.

matchmaking geared around giving players 50% win:loss ratio means skill is meaningless and I may as well afk through matches. Which is still a regular thing from teammates.

This isn’t fun. May just go to custom arenas and trade dailies with guildies.

you are aware that with HoT we will get a wobble chest with materials in all zones except 1-15 areas for all events right? I don’t think SW or DT are getting the materials – though I could be mis-remembering.

Except I only had 11 points on the leaderboard when I looked earlier. ( I don’t actually pvp that often either..)

edit: just checked. 14 points. 21 wins, 14 losses. 60% win ratio.

Clearly my last 5 or so matches are not balanced.

My team mates are losing 2 vs 1, while I 1v2 or 1v3.
Why is the matchmaking putting people against players they can’t beat when they have double the players in a given fight?

Walhalla.5473:

sorudo.9054:

i for one hope they are gonna make dungeons easier, last time i did a dungeon (SF) i got killed way to fast. (and unfairly)
i can’t port back on death unless the whole team is ether dead or out of battle (which is extremely annoying), the enemies are way more powerful then the open world and that’s including scaling and the worst part is that you need to know the dungeon like the palm of your hand or you’ll die instantly.

SF? I’m guessing you are talking about SE. Could you also talk about how you are getting killed unfairly? I don’t remember about a Mob that kills you instantly or a Boss Fight there.

And that you can’t port back until all are dead or the Fight is over is done intentionally. Back then you could port back and join the Fight again, which was called Rezz Rushing. Was patched out because it cheesed the Fights too much and made it impossible for the Group to lose the Boss Fight.

sounds like someone needs to stop trying to run full zerker.

good ol’ graveyard zerging!
I remember the days when that was needed. I’d forgotten we could do that mind you. Just shows how easy we had it learning this stuff

Jay.1085:

Your best bet for fractal skin is to not hope for it at the end of a set. As the above post said try to get into the 31s for a higher chance. Ironically you will get a lot of ascended armour more than skins. So if you only want one skin be prepared to be frustrated as your chance for that skin is .3% drop. look at all that data. There is a reason fractal weapons are rarer then legendaries. Don’t even think about the tonic XD I have all the achievements and do fractals 50s, 37s, and 29s daily for a year now and I’m still missing the speargun, longbow, spear, scepter, and the one I want the most the SWORD! good luck at fractals.

FYI the lower levels are notorious as being the hardest ones to complete, because majority of players there are unfamiliar with the sets so don’t be surprised by pugs dropping out or just being wanna be metas with no actual idea of how to carry and support the team

I dont get it.
Why 50/37/29?
Why not 50/40/30?

Still get 3 daily chests ( 2 of them theoretically have better loot tables.)
40 is almost certainly easier than 37 for instability.

Thaddeus.4891:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

as others have said: take 4 noobs into arah p1, and see how easy hard it is to complete.

Even people that are not noob have a hard time playing Arah. I prefer to duo it then to get pugs, it’s just a terrible experience in that dungeon.

Whole other can of wurms.
Yeah its easier & quicker with incomplete party than with scrubs who mess things up.
Even my guild has taken to 3-4man over taking pugs, and we aren’t even that good at arah ourselves yet. Similar deal with fractal 50.

Explaining that to people who aren’t very good though.. Generates so much abuse :/

phys.7689:

spoj.9672:

They passively increase the damage you deal. Just like defensive stats passively decrease the damage you take. Or are you going to pick on that and say because you cant attack passively they arent passive stats?

Offensive stats do nothing to individual skills. They simply increase your base damage. Which happens to be used whenever doing damage. Shocking I know. They do not increase the damage coefficients of skills. Those are constant.

Active defence is only superior for skilled players. For everyone else passive defence is a godsend. And with better content that will be emphasized further. This is an active combat game. One of the best things about it is the ability to completely avoid damage with active defence. If you dont like it thats tough. Accept that this is what anet wanted or go play another game.

no, even for unskilled players active defense is far superior.

you can give all of your major stats to toughness, so you take 40% less damage, against an enemy swinging once every 4 seconds, 5 attacks in 20 seconds
or you can give nothing to toughness and dodge, and you take 40% less damage by only taking 3 attacks. if you use vigor? well you can take 80% less damage.

active defense is always superior to passive defense, the advantage to passive defense is when you run out of active defense, or mess up.

And to say it once again, i have no problem with active defense at all, i think that active defense should be the main way in which you deal with enemy attacks. However, IF you want to have a stat system, it should represent a real choice, and real descions. Most stats do not represent actual useful descions. People who dont know this assume they will actually matter, and are shocked to find out they are relatively worthless.

So either, make stats actually be a descion, that effects how you actively play the game, or get rid of the false choices that lead to poor encounter design.
Or keep the status quo, and have people forever complaining about stats that dont matter, and HPbag bosses for average parties, and lack of challenge for elite parties.

as for the passive offense, no, its not passive, you have to choose an attack, and press the button to gain anything from a DPS stat, that is the opposite of passive. Those stats effect the damage of your skills, defense stats do not effect the defense provided by your skills.

Again assuming even a complete noob can dodge attacks perfectly first time.

For the braindead easy content, yes.
And much of the content feels braindead easy due to experience.
For the first timer, it is far from braindead easy. It is very difficult to dodge every attack perfectly first time. Or in several subsequent attempts.

Yes we do need more dungeons that are less forgiving. More dungeons equally challenging if not more so than arah.
Making all content that hard creates a huge barrier to joining the game. This is not a good thing.

as others have said: take 4 noobs into arah p1, and see how easy hard it is to complete.

Bubi.7942:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

If you truly believe the "live-and-let-live philosophy regarding two camps of thought ( complete fast, vs just complete) then why the hell are you even arguing? get on and enjoy the game. Just don’t get mad if I kick you from my group because our goals don’t align.

I really hope you won’t do that, cause on rare occasions I actually do dungeons, I do it solo/duo. So don’t kick me from my group please.

Jokes aside, it’s great that we are getting somewhere.

It seems the difference lies in 2 things now:

- IMO you don’t go splat aside from a very bosses/situations (like 2% of the encounters) in dungeons
- it’s not only the dungeon experience that made dungeons “easy”. It’s also:
1. Better and more powerful traits than at the start,
2. Ascended gear, and easier access to exotic than ever,
3. General open world experience is more engaging and challenging now than before

if one doesn’t know what they are doing, it is significantly more than 2% of encounters that can cause you to splat.
Even ac spider queen will wipe an inexperienced zerker party. So again this comes down to how much experience each party member has.

Things like scaling have made dungeons a lot easier. Sadly this is needed. Look at all the QQ over some of the LS2 bosses?
Frankly I wish people would learn to read their dang skills/traits! It would fix a decent chunk of problems people have.

There is indeed a slight increase in difficulty of content in open world, but its mostly reliant upon others still, so many don’t realise they need to step up their game.

I think the point we want anet to take from this is:
Keep the existing dungeons.
Add new ones which are harder and more rewarding.
At the very least add a few more ( at the same difficulty as arah) so we can keep things a little more fresh.
Again.. DEAD HORSE.

phys.7689:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

phys.7689:

Fenrir.3609:

phys.7689:

uhh, actually i think stats has more to do with your DPS than synergy play.
25 stacks of might is 750
fury is 20% crit rate

you get more than 750 from traits and armor/weapon/trinkets
you get more crit rate from taits armor/weapon/trinkets
and you get ferocity from that, which you cant get from synergy

so im pretty sure those stats are more important.

some of those damages are multiplicative, not additive as well, end result is that there is a huge difference in dps between someone with no offense stats, and someone with all offense stats.

and design has to adjust their HP based around that range, and the fight overall, as well as phases (if they have phases)

Which is why I stated “build choice, utilities and group synergy” and not just “group synergy”. There is no denying gear stats make an impact, but the removal of them certainly would not resolve the issue you seem to see, as far as I am concerned that is.

Removing stats from gear would not remove boss design issues, nor would it appease the majority of the people who come on the forums to cry about “zerkers!!!” because instead they would be crying about build disparity.

boss design issues, even with excellent boss design, you would still have, with the current dps spread, some people beating them in 20 seconds. Lets be honest, no amount of interesting boss design, aside from negating your dmg is going to shine in 20 seconds.

and just to make that fight last 20 seconds, the boss needs so much hp, other people will take forever.

Build diversity is changeable on the fly, with minimal investment, gear is not.

yup. to make bosses that are significantly long for meta built parties, they would be so long for no meta that they wouldnt bother. Look how many PHIW’s do arah p4 regularly?
That path doesn’t even have particularly challenging bosses, just a lot of them.

Thats the thing though, a lot of people like the short instances. It caters well for limited time, but we can do a string of them when we have lots of time. Casual gamers catered for.

To say there is no need for counterplay ( or strategy/tactics) because a fight takes 20 seconds is naive and ignorant however.
Noting that much of the current content is sub-80 and so is meant partially as a learning curve. I think the " we need more endgame/level 80 dungeons/higher fractals" is becoming the proverbial dead horse now though.

I don’t see any problem with being able to change builds on the fly with little cost.
Gear is expensive, and this is why people don’t want to be forced into having multiple sets. Inventory slots get expensive too. Still not seeing any problem here.

counterplay requires your opponent to be able to do something to you.

If a fight lasts 20 seconds, and an opponent attacks once every 4 seconds, you can negate everything he can throw at you with 3 dodges and 2 aegis, which you can generate in 20 seconds fairly easily, heck you can even eat an attack or 2 in that time if you have protect.

lets be honest, defensively such a fight is far from deep, or even requiring counterplay.

So 3 dodges and 2 aegis that have to be correctly timed isn’t counterplay?

Back to this saying: please think before posting.

Leo G.4501:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

If you want people to discuss things with you, drop the ego.
You are far from a great player. That much is clear from your posts.
Accept the criticism of your ideas, instead of ignoring it.
Make the effort to learn why things won’t work.

I’d say it works both ways. Drop the ego and it’s easier to get your point across to others. Even if you feel you deserve your ego, humbleness is a great social trait.

As for my own skill, I don’t pretend I’m a great player but I’m certainly not a noob nor am I someone unfamiliar with speed clears (not record runs, but PuG zerk dungeon runs aimed at speed).

And as far as accepting criticism, I can and do. But often, on these forums, criticism is scarce and often accompanied by insults and accusations.

Artemis Thuras.8795:

For example, aegis blocks x% damage scaling with toughness (full toughness major stat to achieve 100% damage reduction):
If I have to load up with toughness, I dont even need to use aegis. The toughness will reduce the damage to trivial. If I don’t need aegis, what use is it?

Well the premise of your criticism is a bit confused. Only ‘Block’ (to clarify, that is the blocking skills/utilities) scales with toughness. Benevolence (the substitute for Healing Power) scales Aegis.

I’ve considered the point about the use of blocking if you have toughness. That’s why I mentioned toughness’ passive damage reduction not being quite so high but then it also sort of goes with the weapons too. A toughness build character will have to survive more of the enemy’s attacks longer so active use of defensive weapons with blocking abilities would be enhanced.

The premise behind making Bv help aegis is aegis is a boon and usually mean to assist. You’d have enhanced performance through many other boon types as well not to mention you yourself likely will need the advantage of better boons if your build focuses on that and not personal damage (speaking in terms of my idea, btw, not current game mechanics).

If it doesn’t stop 100% of a hit, then I’d rather dodge, rendering it useless.
At best you make it a single use protection, again, rendering it obsolete.
Timing an aegis takes knowledge, reflexes.
Knowledge of the boss, what attacks require aegis, what the telegraph is for them. Then reflexes to throw it when its needed, and not get munched (don’t forget, only blocks ONE HIT) by some stray trash mob/add/summon/auto attack.

Don’t forget ping.

But the same would be in my change. It would be a skill/reflex gameplay feature of a support/boon/healing type character…but if you simply want to use clutch aegis, I don’t see a problem with such which is why I mentioned you wouldn’t need Bv(or Healing Power, if we must so say) as a major stat for it, just some to improve the chance it will block the 1st hit. You’d have a slight tangent to the build to facilitate that use of the boon.

Artemis Thuras.8795:

Next problem: What if the attack I use aegis to block has conditions or stun?
Will aegis only function as a damage reduction like protection, or will it reduce the stun/condi durations?

It will nullify the other effects except the damage (which will get reduced/blocked) for the boon’s duration (after taking an attack).

Artemis Thuras.8795:

This has been explained to you several times. You refuse to accept the criticism of your idea.

Why are you making accusations? No one has criticised my idea (barring the quoted posts) nor have I refused to accept people’s comments about my ideas.

Artemis Thuras.8795:

Perhaps you should stop dismissing others arguments, and attempt to learn something yourself, before you go around calling some of the best PvE-ers in gw2(who incidentally, have spent a lot of time learning and discussing how the game works) out to do the same.

I called Nike out on civil discussion, not learning how to play the game. You know, some people might think they’re hot kitten when it comes to video games but lack social graces to discuss things like adults. I’m not saying that’s what I’m accusing Nike of, just that if you’re basing my attitude off of the post of mine you quoted, the old saying “you reap what you sow” and “attitude begets attitude” and all that jazz fits here.

Ok..
That suggestion again without a huge confusing wall of text?

Bubi.7942:

@Thaddeus:
Hm…

I have noticed this in previous posts, and I may get the wrong impression but I can’t help but feel that speedrunners think that non-speedrunners want to nerf zerker cause they are jelous of their super fast times, and want to also do that?

I dunno about others, but I’m sure I don’t. If that’s what floats others boat, let them do it. I do not care if my team beats a boss under 5 mins, while a speedrunner team does it under 30 secs.

The gripe I have is that zerker stat is way forgiving, the damage boost you get from it is not on par with the risk you take up by wearing it. It doesn’t become a glass cannon, just a cannon.

And I blame easy dungeons and cheese player tactics for that.

Edit: Wow, hot topic, got 4 ninja responses.

By your own words:
The problem lies in the design of enemies & content.
This is something many of us are in agreement on.

Zerker only seems forgiving because many have spent 3 years mastering the current content and know every boss’ attack and can counterplay them perfectly. One false move and a zerker will go splat. At least in some content. Some content ( like AC) is meant to be completed by lesser( experienced) players who haven’t learnt every telegraph, attack, and active defence yet.

This is just natural progression: vets want tougher content. Noobs still need easier content to learn the ropes. Anet has to keep the easier content populated so noobs don’t think its a ghost town until you reach end-game skill level.

If you truly believe the "live-and-let-live philosophy regarding two camps of thought ( complete fast, vs just complete) then why the hell are you even arguing? get on and enjoy the game. Just don’t get mad if I kick you from my group because our goals don’t align.

phys.7689:

Fenrir.3609:

phys.7689:

uhh, actually i think stats has more to do with your DPS than synergy play.
25 stacks of might is 750
fury is 20% crit rate

you get more than 750 from traits and armor/weapon/trinkets
you get more crit rate from taits armor/weapon/trinkets
and you get ferocity from that, which you cant get from synergy

so im pretty sure those stats are more important.

some of those damages are multiplicative, not additive as well, end result is that there is a huge difference in dps between someone with no offense stats, and someone with all offense stats.

and design has to adjust their HP based around that range, and the fight overall, as well as phases (if they have phases)

Which is why I stated “build choice, utilities and group synergy” and not just “group synergy”. There is no denying gear stats make an impact, but the removal of them certainly would not resolve the issue you seem to see, as far as I am concerned that is.

Removing stats from gear would not remove boss design issues, nor would it appease the majority of the people who come on the forums to cry about “zerkers!!!” because instead they would be crying about build disparity.

boss design issues, even with excellent boss design, you would still have, with the current dps spread, some people beating them in 20 seconds. Lets be honest, no amount of interesting boss design, aside from negating your dmg is going to shine in 20 seconds.

and just to make that fight last 20 seconds, the boss needs so much hp, other people will take forever.

Build diversity is changeable on the fly, with minimal investment, gear is not.

yup. to make bosses that are significantly long for meta built parties, they would be so long for no meta that they wouldnt bother. Look how many PHIW’s do arah p4 regularly?
That path doesn’t even have particularly challenging bosses, just a lot of them.

Thats the thing though, a lot of people like the short instances. It caters well for limited time, but we can do a string of them when we have lots of time. Casual gamers catered for.

To say there is no need for counterplay ( or strategy/tactics) because a fight takes 20 seconds is naive and ignorant however.
Noting that much of the current content is sub-80 and so is meant partially as a learning curve. I think the " we need more endgame/level 80 dungeons/higher fractals" is becoming the proverbial dead horse now though.

I don’t see any problem with being able to change builds on the fly with little cost.
Gear is expensive, and this is why people don’t want to be forced into having multiple sets. Inventory slots get expensive too. Still not seeing any problem here.

Bubi.7942:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

@ bubi – plenty of people care about speed runs. Plenty of people care about running speedily ( if not record times). Completing things faster is not “artificial difficulty”.
Go get a team together and set a record. Attempt to set a record. Then you can talk as if you have knowledge on the topikittenil then, leave your ego outside the door. To compare setting records to key farming discredits anything you could possibly have to say on the subject. It’s like comparing a water pistol to a military sniper rifle.

I’m still not getting through it seems. I will try to keep this as simple and clear as possible.

Dungeons are not difficult.

Speedrunning is difficult.

Speedrunnig in any game, or in any game aspect is difficult.

Why? Cause you set your own standards which you race against (or others standards).

This doesn’t change the base content in any way.

Thus the argument: “But dungeons are challenging cause speedrunning/soloing is hard” is meaningless. It has nothing to do with the subject of the thread.

This was what I was replying to originally.

Example1:
Super Mario Bros is not a hard game. Speedrunning Super Mario Bros is hard. That doesn’t make Super Mario Bros a hard game.

Example2:
You are at a tree climbing contest. You decide that you want to start the contest with your feet in a block on concrete. Then you say: “Man, tree climbing is hard!”

No, it doesn’t work that way.

Edit:
Speedrunning a dungeon is exactly as the same difficulty as speedrunning anything. The difficulty comes from the fact that you are speedrunning, not the content you are doing. Speedrunning a dungeon, is the same as speedrunning a key farm, speedrunning Super Mario Bros or speedrunning to your corner store.

Speedrunning = Speedrunning

Again, there is no need for the abrasive ego.

To use your tree climbing analogy:
Climbing the tree faster than the other person may be hard.
Climbing the tree faster than you did yesterday is hard.
If the ONLY goal is climbing the tree, then yes it may well be easy.
But climbing the tree alone will not win you the tree climbing competition.
Saying the tree climbers can’t use a cherry picker to get to the top of the tree is a reasonable restriction to the competition.

Back to the topic: the existing dungeons took 3 years to reach the “ease” we have now. Try taking 4/5 complete noobs and teaching them to run meta. It won’t be easy for them. This is why there is a group asking for there to NOT be harder content. They are struggling with what they have now. I could swear this has been explained before though..

maha.7902:

Valento.9852:

Have all creatures in the world to take half damage from critical hits. Problem solved. You’re welcome.

so

you still use the same gear and builds you just do less damage

you realise that damage has been throttled down already and nothing has changed right?

not true.
Its harder to carry PHIW’s and so now they get kicked from meta parties more often.

Enko.6123:

Jay.1085:

My only wish for fractals is to finally get higher levels ANET! Because I could care less about the rng or gold reward lets be honest most people at 50s fractals have all the gold they need and their gear is BIS. What I want with this persistent RNG is the FRACTAL WEAPON BOX! That is the simplest solution to this problem that has been since that ridiculous fractured patch.
I will do my daily fractals 50s/37s but when I get multiple copies of the same skin (7 warhorns) it starts to get past frustration. The fact that leader board hype for fractals was thrown out the window, the terrible reward, the many bugs in fractals has broken lots of regular fractal runners. I know lots of people aren’t bothered by not having a fractal title after getting all the achievements but I am. Some of those achievements are actually hard to do. To be honest I am only missing 4 skins and tonic but at this point, I don’t even know why I even bother. atleast let me salvage these skins for some ectos like before. Its the reason I’m not so hyped for the expansion, because over hyping like in the past years has lead to a lot of dissappointment

Just wondering but why are you runnings 50/37 instead of just 50/40?

I was thinking the exact same thing..

edit:
reduced rng, or some meaningful value ( 4s,95c is hardly meaningful)to the junk we really don’t want from the rng roll would be good.

The problem with removing stats from gear complete is this:
Two possible outcomes:
Good players are crippled to lower dps because they have defensive stats they simply don’t need ( due to being able to use active defences, and their HP never takes a single hit). This drives players away as soon as they become good at it because its too faceroll.

Or it becomes a case of you have to active defend perfectly to even complete the encounter, making it very difficult to get into dungeons or other “endgame” content. This drives new players away very quickly.

Either possibility results in the same: driving players away at one end of the learning curve. Neither makes for a sustainable game.

@ bubi – plenty of people care about speed runs. Plenty of people care about running speedily ( if not record times). Completing things faster is not “artificial difficulty”.
Go get a team together and set a record. Attempt to set a record. Then you can talk as if you have knowledge on the topikittenil then, leave your ego outside the door. To compare setting records to key farming discredits anything you could possibly have to say on the subject. It’s like comparing a water pistol to a military sniper rifle.

What needs to happen is for people to realise how long the learning curve is, and that full zerk is still only used by the minority ( seriously.. fractal 50 lfg: “zerk meta, ping gear or kick” 90% of people who join have soldier/cele gear).

I have no problem with people running that gear. Just need to accept that meta ( or close to meta) and non meta don’t mix well strategically or tactically and go separate ways. Some do, many are abusive when they get kicked.

This is a problem caused by people thinking they are more skilled than they are. Usually because they get carried more than they realise. Some don’t realise they can utilise their class to do much more than they are doing.

- and yeah, we do need harder content to challenge people. Sadly anet is still hung up on “everyone should be able to complete content. The only difference is the time it takes” concept. Not to mention new harder content with greater reward would leave the older, easier( it took us nearly 3 years for dungeons to get “easy”, thats a hell of a long learning curve) content that people should learn first desolate. Something anet wants to avoid.

tl;dr

Drop the egos and be willing to learn and adapt. This applies to some of the vets as well – the ego can be very abrasive. Playing meta doesn’t have to be anti-fun. Learning to overcome something faster, or counterplay a boss more effectively, working out how to help your party-mate is what a multiplayer game is ( or should be) about.

phys.7689:

Artemis Thuras.8795:

If you want people to discuss things with you, drop the ego.
You are far from a great player. That much is clear from your posts.
Accept the criticism of your ideas, instead of ignoring it.
Make the effort to learn why things won’t work.

For example, aegis blocks x% damage scaling with toughness (full toughness major stat to achieve 100% damage reduction):
If I have to load up with toughness, I dont even need to use aegis. The toughness will reduce the damage to trivial. If I don’t need aegis, what use is it?
If it doesn’t stop 100% of a hit, then I’d rather dodge, rendering it useless.
At best you make it a single use protection, again, rendering it obsolete.
Timing an aegis takes knowledge, reflexes.
Knowledge of the boss, what attacks require aegis, what the telegraph is for them. Then reflexes to throw it when its needed, and not get munched (don’t forget, only blocks ONE HIT) by some stray trash mob/add/summon/auto attack.

This is counterplay. You actively use an ability to counteract an enemy ability.
Forcing me to take toughness ( for aegis to be worthwhile over dodging) means I can just pay the attack no mind, and go on bashing my 1 key.

reduced counterplay means reduced learning curve for a fight. It means a fight is easier to learn. It becomes more faceroll 1spam 2 win.

Fact is your suggestion is to make things easier.
Alternatively: we just load up with vigor traits or energy sigils, good players are forced to run slower, and it becomes even harder to learn to play without toughness gear, due to even greater reliance upon dodging, and less help from a guardian. More people get kicked from pugs for failing to dodge attacks. More QQ about getting kicked from group at final bosses. More QQ about not being accepted into meta parties. More QQ about being held back by those reliant on toughness. All this leading to more people leaving the game. If you want gw2 to burn, please do everyone a favor and play another game.

Next problem: What if the attack I use aegis to block has conditions or stun?
Will aegis only function as a damage reduction like protection, or will it reduce the stun/condi durations?

Sure not everyone wants PvE to be about counterplay. But thats how gw2 is. There are plenty of areas ( eg much of the open world) where counter play is very minimal. There are areas where counterplay is much more useful ( eg fractals/ some dungeons).
There are plenty who want MORE counterplay, not less. At least in end-game content.

This has been explained to you several times. You refuse to accept the criticism of your idea.

tl;dr

Perhaps you should stop dismissing others arguments, and attempt to learn something yourself, before you go around calling some of the best PvE-ers in gw2(who incidentally, have spent a lot of time learning and discussing how the game works) out to do the same.

the base aegis can be one block, how much toughness you have can reduce the next attack up to 100% Im sure there are flaws, but this is just rough ideas.

the truth is, its kind of accurate, that the attribute system favors DPS.
What you are kind of saying, is its ok that people get high defense without much investment, but would it be alright for people to get high damage without dps stat investment?

why do dps skills deserve stats that improve it, but defensive skills do not?

to be honest, they should probably either make more attributes effect skills/traits, or they should normalize attributes greatly, so there isnt as much difference between stat sets.
Otherwise there will almost always be too much variation among dps/defense to balance fights so they are actually challenging.

So make aegis work as it does now, but able to work like protection ( only up to 100% mitigation) for a second attack?

So 2-4-1 aegis..?
And this doesn’t sound OP?
My guard is having a wet dream over his clerics armour at that idea.
He gets protection on virtue of courage traited anyway.. Add this idea and it’s still 2-4-1 aegis in full zerk. This would save my bacon more often than I care to admit to.

Active defence has no investment you say?
Then Go play guard for a guild group. Not a pug or Rosta or pugs.
See how easy it is to keep a thief or ele alive when they aren’t secretly in defensive gear or traits. Try staying 100% melee in snowblind boss or archdiviner @ 50 on a zerker ( non selfish traits) guard.
The investment is the hundreds of hours to learn every fight in every dungeon/fractal. Knowing what you can do to help your team, and not just yourself.
And even then, many lesser teams require guard to go clerics gear to take the pressure off them.

Please think about an idea before posting. That way we can have meaningful discussion.

I can’t resist stating the obvious:
Have you tried completing personal story?
That should make it go away.

:)

Leo G.4501:

NikeEU.7690:

Leo G.4501:

And yet it tends to be the more controversial aspect of a build.

It’s not controversial at all, among people who take the time to understand the game and character building system. It’s a huge controversy among players who install the game for the first time, dream of playing a clerics tank, and then get their dreams crushed by the reality of the game and the system. How about everyone agree that people who are ignorant should buck up and understand the game instead of dumbing the game down to their level of ignorance?

There are more perspectives than you’re limiting yourself to accepting. Rather than make up 2 camps of thoughts (the “wrong ignorant” side and then “your side”) to dismiss all argument, why not actually engage in discussion? Perhaps you’ll learn something.

If you want people to discuss things with you, drop the ego.
You are far from a great player. That much is clear from your posts.
Accept the criticism of your ideas, instead of ignoring it.
Make the effort to learn why things won’t work.

For example, aegis blocks x% damage scaling with toughness (full toughness major stat to achieve 100% damage reduction):
If I have to load up with toughness, I dont even need to use aegis. The toughness will reduce the damage to trivial. If I don’t need aegis, what use is it?
If it doesn’t stop 100% of a hit, then I’d rather dodge, rendering it useless.
At best you make it a single use protection, again, rendering it obsolete.
Timing an aegis takes knowledge, reflexes.
Knowledge of the boss, what attacks require aegis, what the telegraph is for them. Then reflexes to throw it when its needed, and not get munched (don’t forget, only blocks ONE HIT) by some stray trash mob/add/summon/auto attack.

This is counterplay. You actively use an ability to counteract an enemy ability.
Forcing me to take toughness ( for aegis to be worthwhile over dodging) means I can just pay the attack no mind, and go on bashing my 1 key.

reduced counterplay means reduced learning curve for a fight. It means a fight is easier to learn. It becomes more faceroll 1spam 2 win.

Fact is your suggestion is to make things easier.
Alternatively: we just load up with vigor traits or energy sigils, good players are forced to run slower, and it becomes even harder to learn to play without toughness gear, due to even greater reliance upon dodging, and less help from a guardian. More people get kicked from pugs for failing to dodge attacks. More QQ about getting kicked from group at final bosses. More QQ about not being accepted into meta parties. More QQ about being held back by those reliant on toughness. All this leading to more people leaving the game. If you want gw2 to burn, please do everyone a favor and play another game.

Next problem: What if the attack I use aegis to block has conditions or stun?
Will aegis only function as a damage reduction like protection, or will it reduce the stun/condi durations?

Sure not everyone wants PvE to be about counterplay. But thats how gw2 is. There are plenty of areas ( eg much of the open world) where counter play is very minimal. There are areas where counterplay is much more useful ( eg fractals/ some dungeons).
There are plenty who want MORE counterplay, not less. At least in end-game content.

This has been explained to you several times. You refuse to accept the criticism of your idea.

tl;dr

Perhaps you should stop dismissing others arguments, and attempt to learn something yourself, before you go around calling some of the best PvE-ers in gw2(who incidentally, have spent a lot of time learning and discussing how the game works) out to do the same.

cthaeh.2168:

Windsagio.1340:

‘cept it’s not skill based, because the ‘high skill/high risk’ option can be used by all skill levels.

Ha! Try sending 5 new players into a dungeon in full zerk and see how well they do. It is skill based, it’s just that everyone has spent the past 3 years honing said skills.

With meta traits, not selfish bunker traits…

Introduce more fights on the difficulty scale of level 50 mai trin, and watch ( more than) half the player base scurry off to clerics/pvt gear.

That being said, Started asking pugs to ping gear for 50s a few weeks ago.
90% turn up with pvt/cele gear. Trooper/Traveler runes etc.

If anet were to look at the metrics for how many players have berserker/assassins gear equipped right now, I suspect the % would be a lot lower than some expect.

edit:
To be fair most eles in pugs have to run cele gear because most guardians I’ve met can’t protect them from a wet noodle.

I tend to have to whip out the clerics armor on my guard quite often for teams who can’t dodge too (so this is also down to teamwork as well as individual skill and counterplay in pve).

Leo G.4501:

NoTrigger.8396:

and why limit it? whats the reason? if im good enough to dodge everything, why go and force me to use defensive gear in the future to allow me to dodge everything?

Because if you have the capability to dodge everything by default

Capacity:
Sure.

Ability?
no.

Less than 1% of the players I know can dodge every 1hit ko.
Hell Less than 1% of them even know what most of the bosses have as 1hit KOs or what the telegraph for it is.
Come back when only the handicapped can’t dodge everything effortlessly.

edit: Without a guardian who can provide aegis in a split-second to save your unskilled behind from a 1hit KO.

Veydar.5017:

But we all know that the average guild group takes around 20min for a super casual lv 50 run no scope. So increasing rewards would make it more worthwhile than dungeons and totally ruin everything including cantha /s

groups that can do this, can do p1 & 2 of arah in 20 minutes and get 6.5g

So upping the lvl50 gold reward to 5g would still be below par for regular dungeons.

So this is what..
“pls make dungeons easier so non-zerker builds are more viable”?

Paraphrasing: “pls make dungeons easier so 1-2 skilled zerker players can carry me in my nomads gear and I can carry on pressing 1”.

Noting that “all I do is press 1 and win. dungeons sux.” is a (selfish) personal choice. You could learn to use your class, getting the most out of it ( and typically completing a run faster, equalling more gold/hour). But most people won’t, or don’t know how to.

I see most players of gw2 using their characters as comparable to 5 y/o kids learning to play piano ( one handed), on a grand piano suitable for a famous orchestra.
Or learning to drive in a top-of-the-line ferrari.

I just used up a stack of candy corn and here is the results:
12 minutes of exp booster.
53 minutes of armor booster.
22 minutes of crafting booster.
7 minutes of run speed booster.
30 minutes of karma booster.
13 minutes of MF booster.
1:30 hours of gathering booster.
1:16 of rejuvenation booster.
46 minutes of killstreak booster.

6:45 hours of WXP booster.

I have no desire to WvW today.

The mix of boosters doesn’t seem right to me.