Well there are many things in this game that are not well telegraphed, but the best backstab builds are actually very well balanced – at least for spvp. So this made many here raise an eyebrow.
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)
I’ve said what you have said before on this forum Incurafy, but was I met with a lot of resistance. 8v8 hotjoin teaches absolutely nothing to new players: It teaches nothing on why certain builds are better than others; how dodges work effectively; or most importantly, where you need to be as a player. Over time, they might develop some simple combos and personal peeling tactics, but that’s it. That’s all it has to offer. There is no need to understand what another person is doing or how many dodges they have used because you have 3 to 5 other guys backing you up on any given node.
The structure behind hotjoin is just another reason why this game is in such a disarray.
Locuz, your lack of any valuable information at all makes many people on here get turned off to your post. Instead of insulting others, perhaps provide some information about your problem and we might be able to help you. Otherwise, why are you posting here? Just to vent? If that is the case, then do what you have to do and move on.
What thief build are you having trouble dealing with? Did they have might involved with their spike? Any signets? What is the build you typically run? Is it spvp we are talking here (we all assume so, since this is the spvp forum) or is it wvw?
If you don’t want to provide this type of information, then I can only assume you’re just venting.
The problem zacch, is that rule is too specific. If a person runs full zerkers with food in wvw, you need a crit chance of about 73 to 75%. Thanks for the contribution though, and you would be right in a general sense for spvp -though i would push those values up to 50 to 65%.
Okay so this has been posted elsewhere on the internets, but I don’t know if this has been addressed here.
The typical nomenclature is to use Hidden Killer in perma stealth backstab builds, and to use Executioner’s on other builds. This post is here to answer the question: Why? Hopefully from answering this question, we can have a better understanding of the two different traits and establish a guideline on how to effectively judge whether we should take one over the other in any given backstab build. So let’s get to it!
This is going to involve some basic math, but I’ll try to walk us through it as best as possible. For those who don’t care about the math, the formula is as follows:
b = (0.3 +a) / (0.6 + 1.2(a))
Where b = chance to crit; and a = crit% dmg increase.
Any b-value above the calculated value will mean to choose Executioner’s. Anything below this b-value will mean to choose Hidden Killer.
The expected damage (i.e. the damage that will occur most often) of any build follows this basic rule:
E = d(1 – b) + D(b)
Where:
Expected Damage = E
Non-crit damage = d
crit damage = D
increased % to crit damage = a
and percentage chance to crit = b
Also please note:
D = d(1.5 + a)
Plugging this into our E equation, we get:
E = d(1 – b) + d(1.5 + a)(b)
Now lets compare hidden killer expected damage to Executioner’s expected damage. First, we make some simple assumptions that we are only backstabbing (i.e. attacking from stealth) and the target is always below 50% health, holding all other variables equal:
Hidden Killer expected damage:
E = d(1.5 + a)
This is true since b = 1, or in other words 100%.
Executioner’s expected damage:
E = 1.2(d(1 – b) + d(1.5 + a)(b))
Basically multiply the expected damage by the multiplier of Executioner’s.
Now we set them equal to each other and solve for our crit chance:
d(1.5 + a) = 1.2(d(1 – b) + d(1.5 + a)(b))
simplifying will result to:
b = (0.3 + a) / (0.6 + 1.2a)
This equations says that the percentage chance to crit, where the damage of hidden killers and executioner’s is equal to each other, is when you take your crit% damage increase and do some maths to it.
As an example:
Say you have 50% increase to your crit damage. Then the crit percentage chance that will make hidden killer and executioner’s equal to each other will be:
b = (0.3 +0.5) / (0.6 + 1.2(0.5))
b = 2/3 = 66%
So at around 66% chance to crit, you will be indifferent between taking Hidden Killer or Executioner’s. Anything above this number, and Executioner’s will outperform Hidden Killer. Anything below this number, and Hidden Killer will outperform Executioner’s. Also, if you can breach this crit chance, then you will do more damage than if you use hidden killer with lower crit chance, regardless. This pushes us to establish some crit chance above a certain level.
Please note that, since we are dealing with assumptions, this number shouldn’t be treated as a specific value, only a general one. But to see why this number is a valid number, we look at a standard backstab build in spvp:
This build has a 53% dmg increase to crit. This means that the crit chance we need, to validate bringing Executioner’s, is 67%. At best, with side strikes, we can get 60% (65% with the off-chance you will be above 90% health). With fury, we get 80% – well above our threshold. So this merits bringing Executioner’s in this build. Fundamentally this highlights why there is an importance to bringing fury (Trickery V) in any backstab build with Executioner’s. Lets look at a typical perma-stealth build:
This build has a 58% dmg increase to crit. This means we need a crit chance of 68%.
The best we can get in this build is 54% with 5 minor in the crit line. If we chose to use 10 in trickery for trickery V, then we can push this value up to 69 – 74%. This would validate an Executioner’s, but to do this we lose out on better control of our heartseekers through blackpowder (acrobatics VI). So if we choose to have better control, we have to use Hidden Killer because we don’t have anything that will bump our crit chance past the threshold. This validates taking Hidden Killer.
I hope this helps others have some better foothold on how to choose ether trait. Of course this only applies if you have 30 in the crit line and running a backstab build, but I still hope it helps others.
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)
Start playing in solo ques. At the very least, stop playing in 8v8 hotjoin games. I assume much of the early complaints (a lot came from the downstate mechanics, and lack map diversity too) about the game came from playing 8v8 hotjoin games and developing a knee-jerk reaction to the spvp system. The system of conquest, designed by its very nature, discourages zerging when the numbers are limited. In 8v8 (which should never exist in the first place with the maps of this size), it is possible because you can easily have about 2-3 people per point – this usually ends up in zerging though. In 5v5, it just isn’t possible to effectively zerg against a team who knows what they are doing. Is playing in solo-que going to solve all your zerging problems? No, because there are stupid people everywhere that don’t know how to deal with zergs, but it’s less of a problem.
With regards to WvW, it helps to know how to roam effectively. I do not mean this in a pejorative sense, but most players simply do not know how to roam. Many players simply think roaming is the act of just that – wandering around looking to pick fights with other small groups of players. They can do that, but there is a good chance that they’re going to get facerolled by a zerg if they’re not paying attention.
Knowing how to roam effectively is even more of a critical issue if someone wishes to do it solo. This means to know all the knooks and crannies in a map (I personally have a rotation I do on certain maps – kind of a list of failsafes to make sure I’m following). To know their class profession well enough to be able to slip past zergs if they pop up. Most importantly, they need to know how to gather information on where the enemy zerg is at nearly all times.
Most of the time, zergs hang out on one map because they are weak players that stick with the group – equivalent to a small town militia picking up some guns and being able to use their trigger fingers. Roamers don’t have that safety net, so they need to be able to find ways deal with that. That being said, you have four maps to work with. Zergs have one or two depending on how active the playerbase is.
There are other ways to be able to roam effectively, but that deserves a post creation and not a simple comment to a complaint.
To Allie,
Again, you are not listening. I get it though, you specifically getting blasted by many people right now and it sucks to be a punching bag.
By “most” I mean to include everyone – the 10% and the 90%. There is a general consensus, from top players and general players, that this patch has not issued any major changes to the meta. So I feel, if the general consensus of anet is that there are major changes, that you guys are egregiously not listening.
With regards to trait clarification – I’m glad you guys finally put this into the game. Before this, the game felt like it was still in beta – which is really a facepalm since the game is a year old.
To Allie,
Personally, it takes me 5 mins to get a general view on what the top players would like to see changed in the game. There are streams on Twitch. On stream in particular where top players play while John and Karl are actively involved in the chat, there are youtube videos where top players specifically discuss bullet points on what they would like to see changed. There are posts by many top players (at least the ones anet hasn’t banned from the forums). And, for the most part, they voice a general consensus about what should be changed when they make these types of discussion. Again, it literally takes me about 5 mins to get a general viewpoint on what the top players like to see changed – 5 mins.
Instead of anet listening to people who have a deep connection to the game they play, you guys seem to listen, instead, to the players who whine about how their main class is bad at pvp (or is too hard to play in pvp) and so they need to be buffed. In other words, exactly the opposite of what you said in your initial post. So we get a game that seems, at least to me, sponsored by Kraft where the top builds are the cheesiest in the game.
You say that there have been major changes, but if you guys were actually listening, the major consensus is that there was NO major changes to the meta outside of immob stacking. The same cheese builds are still significantly viable. The only major changes are cosmetic ones involving trait selection – thats it.
To the rest of the forum go-ers,
You are free to voice your own opinion, but when it comes to balance, I’d rather listen to an expert over some random joe-blow. To put it bluntly, with regards to a heart transplant, I’m going to listen to an expert on the subject and not a random cousin of mine.
1) Give Spirits more health (maybe).
2) Change the trait that allows them to walk with the ranger to a trait that allows the ranger to activate their spirit skill twice as fast.
How it could be played: Place spirit at home, bunker can than maneuver around the spirit and the ranger can activate its ability to assist (ether by voice com or by watching health bar of bunker at point if no voice com).
Done. Now no more kittening.
@Deimos,
What are you even talking about? I already told you, you can play it however you want – that’s what you’re doing in hotjoin.
I’ve repeated many times already, I don’t give a kitten about capping points in solo que. Solo que is not as “serious business” as people are making it out to be. I know others who feel the same way. I know others who really want to cap. I know others who want to shadow their teammates. Who cares what they do, as long as they are playing the game their way and learning in the process.
@ensoriki,
You can do the exact same thing in solo que.
If more people played solo que, wait times would be nearly non-existent.
@Deimos,
That’s the beauty behind it! I’m not! I’m trying to promote and environment that allows people to learn how to play the game their way. You cannot, I repeat CANNOT get that in Hotjoin.
No CnD sucks because of wind-up time. The only other option to quicken that is through quickness, which ether is an rng proc or a skill on a 60 second recharge time. This is offtopic though.
I already told you I don’t play “serious mode” in solo que, so I don’t see why you keep bringing that up. If you actually play solo que, you would realize that a person’s life is actually really important – it’s why we have roamers in the game. It’s not because of conquest mode.
3v3, 2v2 in hotjoin? Lol it’s a zerg-fest that only promotes simple combos and peeling tactics! Wake up! The game is far more than that!
Condi spam – necros need to be toned down. I agree, but you will see even more of this junk in zerg-fest hotjoin than solo que.
AoE spam? How in the world can you compare AoE usage as somehow “less” than in solo que? Secondly, you can actually LEARN how to beat AoE spam in solo que because there isn’t 6 people doing it.
Evasion spam – I assume you’re talking s/d thief. There are windows of opportunity to take advantage of against s/d thieves, and a player might actually have a chance to LEARN how beat it in an environment where there isn’t 3 to four people on every point (more likely an entire 8 man team on one).
Ultimately you are assuming that ALL new players are going to run meta builds, which they don’t. This might be news to you, but not a lot of people who play video games visit and post on forums – we are a minority.
The hell are you talking about going on a mic. We’re talking solo que here, at least read and try to listen to what I’m saying before writing a response.
The ability to learn and know how to counter things in pvp is the magic behind pvp that you can’t really fully experience in pve. Unfortunately most players are subjected to the spam of 8 players in hotjoin, and instantly get confused and say whatever i guess i’ll just zerg. Then the pressing of one key the entire match commences. There is so much more to this game than that, but figuring that out requires a learning environment. You can’t get that from trash hotjoin.
@Warbarbie,
Yes they will. Some new person might say to themselves, “You know what? I’m going to try and create a build that is super tanky and all I will do is sit on one point. My hope is that I can tank any damage coming my way and hold that point for my team because I realized that capture points are critical.” Boom. they learned something called a bunker build. That introduction of a bunker build will lead other new players to try and beat it – hell they might try to make a guardian roamer, who cares? They are learning how to play the game, instead of just spamming a bunch of random skills. If the guardian roamer doesn’t work, then they have to ask themselves why it doesn’t work. Well it doesn’t work because most bunker builds use boons like protection or blocks to sustain themselves. Guardians don’t have many unblockable skills or boon removal, so they might find something different. The important thing is to get the learning to snowball without anyone saying to them, “You have to run this build.”
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)
@noobftw,
Do you honestly think I play solo que because i think video gams are serious business? Hell no. I don’t cap worth crap in solo que. I look for the fights because they’re fun. “serious business” is team tpvp to me. Who says that you have to play meta? You won’t see many new players play meta – which is great because that means they are LEARNING HOW TO PLAY THE GAME. Do you even solo que bro?
For example, they might use dagger offhand on thief and realize that it’s crap because of the cast time on CnD. They will realize that any good player will ether dodge roll, blind, or aegis it. Then they learn the power of dodging, blinding, or aegis’ing (I realize that isn’t a word). No meta builds needed to tell them that.
Hotjoin is the very thing that is suffocating the spvp of this game.
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)
You go to solo que. Why is everyone afraid of solo que? The rating system puts you in matches with people who are of similar skill as you.
Sure most of the early days of solo que will be a bunch of messups, but it’s an environment where you can actually LEARN to play your class – instead of just learning simple combos and peeling tactics.
Most of all, you actually feel like you’re playing your class and not just another person in a match. As a thief, nothing is more satisfying than using Shadow Refuge as a way to sneak up on a guy on point, instead of using it as an oh crap button or to res people in the midst of a crapstorm on mid point.
If there were no hotjoin, more people will play solo = less time waiting between games.
Life support!? Are you kidding!? It’s trash! It’s a terrible representation of what pvp in this game is. Promoting zerg wars? Are you kidding? So many beginners are put off by spvp because of their introduction to the game via hotjoin. Most don’t even know what the hell is going on in a match because there are too many people doing too many things.
Today I talked to a guy who said that he regretted purchasing guild wars because the pvp is so awful. He was playing hotjoin for the first time. Yes hotjoin is awful.
I talked to another guy (new) in the mists today, who experienced solo que for the first time. Said it was great because he felt the fights were like a chess game.
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)
Hotjoin is a taint upon the pvp community and gives the pvp of guild wars a bad rap – especially for those who are just starting. It needs to be eliminated.
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)
The problem with petting zooway, as well as was the case with IWAY, is that it promotes passive play and is as successful, and sometimes even more so, as someone who chooses to play a more active play-style. Hard counters like, “Well just bring a warrior,” are a ridiculous way to answer the problem. No one wants to play rock paper scissors, and that will only serve to limit the game variety and team composition even further.
Petting zooway is terrible and needs to be extinct. Pressing your 1 button to auto win and not worrying about dodging because you have protection for days is not good game design.
Ideally, spirits need to be used, and designed in such a way, to promote tactful play in order to establish some type of positioning advantage. You don’t get that with what we have now. Try again A-net.
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)
Okay so up front: All condition damage and Regeneration applied by the pet does not visually show up on the HUD. Next, I’d like to discuss if the active of Signet of Hunt is broken.
I ran some tests to see if there were any problems. The “funny business” that made me lead to these tests was when I tried to modify signet of hunt with beastmaster might and got 2k crits per hit with blinding slash (we used to get 3 to 4k without any modifiers). I used a 20/0/0/0/0 build with signet recharge and spotter, and no other gear was used since I am testing the pet. The process was to record all critical hit damage done by the white raven’s blinding slash without and with the active signet. Using Spotter and signet time reduction, I hoped to speed this process along – keeping in mind the 5% dmg increase from vulnerability (I attacked a medium target with the pet to stay in combat mode for the whole test, then turned my attention to a heavy target for the actual testing process thereby removing opening strike from the test). I did one testing process without active signet, and one with active signet. Again I only recorded critical damage for each test, and, since the active on signet of hunt applies only to the first hit, I only recorded the critical hit dmg on the first hit. Since this was somewhat monotonous to do, I only did 17 trials instead of the usual 35 – I hope this is satisfactory.
I assume a discrete uniform probability mass function in order to calculate my values.
This is the results of my work:
W/O Active Signet
Expected Crit Damage: 1360.176 damage
Confidence interval of 2 standard deviations away from the expected: 1297.404 to 1422.948 damage range
This being said I assume that, with the signet being active, this damage range should bump up by +150%. In other words, we should see a damage range of (1297.404 + 1946.106 = 3243.51) to (1422.948 + 2134.422 = 3557.37) dmg.
With Active Signet
Expected Crit Damage: 1983.471 damage
Confidence interval of 2 standard deviations away from the expected: 1864.554 to 2102.388 damage
Thus we see a discrepancy with the expected increase. If we divide the active over the w/o active, we see about a 50% increase in damage (1864.554 / 1297.404 = 1.44 and 2102.388 / 1422.948 = 1.48) any distortion is most likely due to the limited number of trials. However we do not see a 150% increase (the number would be 2.5) – or am I just reading this tooltip wrong?
These are my data sets:
Data Set W/O Active Signet
1394 1364 1308 1331 1345 1381 1373 1399 1331 1381 1388 1308 1392 1364 1362 1308 1394
Data Set With Active Signet
1946 1909 2039 1935 1964 1958 1979 2072 1919 2082 1914 1931 2049 2076 1979 2031 1936
Am I reading something wrong, or am I crazy? Before the recent changes, you would commonly see 3 to 4k crits per hit with a raven using blinding slash + sig of hunt. Now I only see around 2k. If this is just simply true and is just the result of the pet dmg nerf, then forget ever using the active of Signet of Hunt – it’s not like most people used the active much anyway.
Side Note Edit: I noticed they are using a different icon in the status bar. Signet of Hunt had its own gold fist emblem, but now it’s replaced with something else.
(edited by Chicago Jack.5647)